"Mrs. Peel, We're Needed"

The first time I saw a commercial for the TV series THE AVENGERS, way back there in the mid-Sixties, I thought for a second it was about the Marvel comic book. I quickly realized that couldn't be the case. But I watched the series anyway, loved the theme music and the opening with Steed and Mrs. Peel and the Bentley, and I was hooked enough that I never missed an episode.

Today I was in Sam's Club and looked at the boxed set of 16 DVDs that comprise the entire run of the Mrs. Peel episodes. The best of the series, in my opinion, although I know some people like the earlier episodes with Honor Blackman as Kathy Gale. None of the actresses who came after Diana Rigg even came close to what she brought to the series, at least not for me. I can't say I was really tempted to buy the DVDs. The set is nearly 90 bucks, and I don't have time to watch all the DVDs of various stuff that I already own. But for a second there I thought wouldn't it be nice to sit down and be transported back to those times for a little while.

By the way, while it was a great TV show, THE AVENGERS may hold the distinction of having the worst series of tie-in paperback novels. The ones published by Berkley and written by Norman Daniels (usually a fairly good writer), Keith Laumer (likewise), and John Garforth (whoever he was) are just terrible, even worse than the I SPY novels by John Tiger (who I think may have been Walter Wager).

Other than that, I wrote 15 pages on the current book and did some research reading for the next one.