5.15 - The Joker

[anti-clockwise]

* sigh *, never mind.

Fans today are not the mass audience sold to in the 1960s, btw. For a start, the Americans chose not to buy the Gales (I'm not sure about Canada). They also chose not to buy lots of other British VT drama, which Canada did buy. US buyers often underestimate their audience, like the ones who claimed "Licence Revoked" would not be understood as Americans would get the word "revoked", and why "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" had to have its name changed for US audiences. If anyone's underestimating them, it's the American studios/channels/distributors.

Lots of US buyers also claimed The Prisoner would be hated in America unless the central character won every week. "Americans don't like a loser", it was claimed. As I said, cultural differences. That's why the American studios commented on the colour episodes' scripts and suggested changes. It wasn't done for giggles!

Franky weren't you the one that told me that Randall and Hopkirk Deceased originally had a different name here because they assumed the US audience would not know what deceased meant? or some such craziness?

Lol, wasn't it something lame like 'me and my partner, the ghost'.

Cult audiences are very perceptive but it's understandable that Joe Public needs help if a series is to be successful. If a series costs money it has to earn the finance by being successful.

An issue I have with both episodes is the design of the houses. Not in terms of look as they are both wonderful visually but in terms of layout. The DLBY house was designed for live TV and the limitations there in (the cameras circle the ... circumference of the set with only one camera on the upper floor. No more than two cameras per room as the other three are needed elsewhere to capture the ongoing action etc) but it makes no sense as a proper house, one bedroom, a nursery behind the dinning room but entered from upstairs. A very strange layout.

Then in the Joker a lot if it is upstairs but the upstairs is above a part of the house that has no downstairs.

I think The Joker is the one if the big successes of season 5A. It's one of my favourite comfort watches. Diana carries the action and silences well just as Honor did. Sidney Hayers does his best bit if directing for the show, really having fun with the camera angles. Sally Nesbitt as Ola is suitably bonkers and Emma's bemused reactions are funny until her bonkersness becomes deadly. Ronald Lacey is amusingly twisted. He really should have guested more. And Peter Jeffrey is very season 5 bad guy as apposed to Martin Goodman's more disturbing casual menace. And John Stone appears in the flesh after voicing two roles in season 4 (the fashion show in Two's a Crowd and dubbing Alan Carter in Man-Eater of Surrey Green)

10/10

Yes thanks both Darren and Timeless. I guess it's rather ironic but not the first time that Hollywood is out of tune with American audiences.

[Timeless A-Peel]

Yes thanks both Darren and Timeless. I guess it's rather ironic but not the first time that Hollywood is out of tune with American audiences.

They do tend to miss the mark on occasion. I know that it's their money on the line, so they want to play it safe, but sometimes they wind up cutting out major selling points along with the risk. It's a strange phenomenon, really, seeing what's a hit and what flops. There are things that look guaranteed to be a smash and end up tanking, and other things come out with no fanfare at all, and do great. There are so many factors to take into account, and yet we're still frequently surprised. Keeps things interesting.

[Lhbizness]

Some of what sells and what doesn't is down to marketing, but by and large the American populace often has better taste than Hollywood marketers give them credit for. Disney, for instance, thought that the way Johnny Depp played Jack Sparrow would turn off American audiences; and Marvel fought hard to keep Robert Downey Jr. out of the Iron Man suit.

But I'm a bit confused - American audiences DID take to Emma Peel, so someone was right about that one.

[Frankymole]

It's a bit of a generalisation though. Emma was changed between the monochrome and colour seasons, as was the subtlety of the episodes. A broader, more comic definition of "British eccentricity" and English society was brought in. Subtlety was lost in the lighting and direction, but also in elements of the writing.

[Lhbizness]

Which I don't particularly agree with, but all right.

[Rhonda]

I gave 5

[Avengerholic]

Such an odd episode The Joker. The revolving card door is something that stayed in my memory for decades after I'd seen it as a child in the 1960's, I remembered nothing else about the episode itself, just the door. Having watched it again for the first time in 30 years back in the 1990's (on VHS) it didn't evoke much of a positive feeling. Ola however remains my favourite villain of the entire Avengers run, Sally Nesbitt played her to pefection. Ronald Lacey and 'the scream' is the best scene of this episode, and many other episodes. Much like The House That Jack Built, The Joker becomes tiresome very quickly after the first 15 minutes. Another episode with Emma running round an empty house looking confused, Don't Look Behind You was far superior in acting and in creating atmosphere. I was always baffled as to why Emma (armed with a gun) suddenly looks utterly terrified and backs away in complete fear from a man only armed with a pair of scissors, she'd faced far worse, and confronted and over powered greater foes with steely confidence many times before. Totally out of character IMO. However the look she gives Steed in the final scene when he asks her if she'd like to stay is priceless and worth the price of the entry ticket alone. Not a good episode, not a bad one, you'd just kinda seen it all before.

[Dfrise]

Such an odd episode The Joker. The revolving card door is something that stayed in my memory for decades after I'd seen it as a child in the 1960's, I remembered nothing else about the episode itself, just the door. Having watched it again for the first time in 30 years back in the 1990's (on VHS) it didn't evoke much of a positive feeling. Ola however remains my favourite villain of the entire Avengers run, Sally Nesbitt played her to pefection. Ronald Lacey and 'the scream' is the best scene of this episode, and many other episodes. Much like The House That Jack Built, The Joker becomes tiresome very quickly after the first 15 minutes. Another episode with Emma running round an empty house looking confused, Don't Look Behind You was far superior in acting and in creating atmosphere. I was always baffled as to why Emma (armed with a gun) suddenly looks utterly terrified and backs away in complete fear from a man only armed with a pair of scissors, she'd faced far worse, and confronted and over powered greater foes with steely confidence many times before. Totally out of character IMO. However the look she gives Steed in the final scene when he asks her if she'd like to stay is priceless and worth the price of the entry ticket alone. Not a good episode, not a bad one, you'd just kinda seen it all before.

Yes, Ola was a great character.

I never tire of The House That Jack Built, or The Joker. I agree about the acting in the first version. Honor was superb in Don't Look Behind You. But Diana's turn was almost as good. She's presented in a different manner than Honor in the Don't Look Behind You. I was stunned by the emotions that played across Honor's face near the end of the story.

As for Emma retreating from the villain who was armed only with scissors, perhaps she was at her mental limit in this episode. She was alone in an isolated mansion. There was no way to leave it or communicate with anyone. Her enemy had been waging psychological war against her since her arrival. I like this unique display of the normally indomitable Emma being vulnerable.

Even though The Joker is a retread, I thoroughly enjoy it.

[Avengerholic]

She was alone in an isolated mansion. There was no way to leave it or communicate with anyone. Her enemy had been waging psychological war against her since her arrival.

My point exactly - The House that Jack Built, seen it all before

As for Emma retreating from the villain who was armed only with scissors, perhaps she was at her mental limit in this episode. I like this unique display of the normally indomitable Emma being vulnerable.

Mmmmm, that doesn't stand up IMO. She'd faced worse in the past (THTJB for example), its the sudden change from confident to completely terrified (in the blink of an eye) for absolutely no apparent reason that baffles me.

[Spaceship Dispatcher]

As for Emma retreating from the villain who was armed only with scissors, perhaps she was at her mental limit in this episode. I like this unique display of the normally indomitable Emma being vulnerable.

Mmmmm, that doesn't stand up IMO. She'd faced worse in the past (THTJB for example), its the sudden change from confident to completely terrified (in the blink of an eye) for absolutely no apparent reason that baffles me.

That's what makes it stronger for me. Even super confident people can be freaked out, in modern parlance, by something unexpected and apparently illogical or irrational to others. It's a real life human characteristic, and I like the episode because it explores it here. There's some visual or psychological trigger, maybe just a small thing, that gets under Emma's usual self assurance and temporarily shakes her up. Characters who never lose it don't work as well for me, even as fantasy creations.