Series 5 — Episode 3
Escape In Time

Regional broadcasts

TV Times listing

International broadcasts

* Italian listings showed this as 10pm, as Italy observed Summer Time and Switzerland did not.

This episode was moved up the schedule in the United States, displacing The Bird Who Knew Too Much, which had originally been scheduled for February 10 1967. That episode would screen four weeks later, on March 10 1967.

Episode Rating

I like this episode, but there are points where I would like more. Maybe more sustained humour, and a less stereotypical Thyssen would do it.

Mrs. Peel’s Grand Hunt Ball invitation turns out to be a summons from Steed, and they set out to discover what’s become of the world’s most wanted criminals.
They’re on the trail of Josino and follow him as he acquires a stuffed toy and a shaving cut. Steed takes the same path and ends up going through time to 1790! Emma follows, much to the gang’s surprise and confusion, and finds herself in the Tudor era after the mastermind cottons onto her. A leap across time saves Emma from the stocks and exposes Thyssen’s fraud.
Exit the Avengers in a veteran taxi - Emma in the driver’s seat and Steed with a face full of soot.

The Cars

Who’s Killing Whom?

Click a name to see the face

The Fashions

Continuity and trivia

1. 
   1:38 — It’s those doors again! You might remember them from From Venus with Love and The Bird Who Knew Too Much, amongst others.
2. 2:45 — great set design for the “time tunnel”, I especially like the conveyor belt in the floor.
3. 2:57–3:39 — There’s a fragment of celluloid or something caught top left of the screen when Paxton wakes up in the Elizabethan room. It remains for the tracking shot, so it’s stuck to the camera lens.
4. 4:15 — Ball invitation is propped up against the bird sculpture.
5. 4:28 — Steed utters the old chestnut, “one of our best agents”. It’s surprising how oftne the best agents are the ones killed!
6. 4:32–5:27 — There’s a hair caught top right/centre of the lens in the mortuary scene.
7. 8:21 — The cameraman loses focus as Peter Bowles walks towards the camera & Tubby Vincent.
8. 8:27–8:37 — When Tubby Vincent escape Thyssen after being stabbed, Thyssen has his back to the death masks and is thrust sideways, yet ends up slumped against the door, several yards away.
9. 9:21 — The cameraman loses focus when Emma walks towards the camera holding the note about Josino.
10. 
    11:42 — Mackiedockie Court must be near Tom Savage’s studio (The Bird Who Knew Too Much), as they’re both near the same Stone Street. And they must both be near Purbright & Co. (Quick-Quick Slow Death and How to Succeed .... At Murder) which is on Mackiedockie Street.
11. 13:53–14:55 — In the motorcycle fight scene, it’s rather obvious that there’s a stunt double, as the chalk marks on Diana Rigg’s pants are nothing like those on the performer who leaps over (and into!) the motorcycle - Cyd Child, getting a minor injury.
    Cyd tells the tale that they redid the scene several times, but every time the director declared it wasn’t close enough. They re-shot the scene one more time and the motorbike hit her, after which she went up to the director and asked, “Was that close enough?”
    
    both legs & arms
    
    sleeve only
    
    right leg
    
    ©1961–9 CANAL+IMAGE UK Ltd All Rights Reserved
12. 19:10 — Anjali says that Steed was estimated to be 6′ 2″ tall, and weighs 170lbs; he confirms this is correct, although it is different to what Remak calculates in Killer.
13. 24:30 — Thysen introduces Steed to his ancestors.
    1570
    
    Matthew Thyssen
    Tudor inquisitor
    1600?
    
    Bruno Thyssen
    Elizabethan sportsman
    1680
    
    Edwin Thyssen
    Jacobean duellist
    1790
    
    Samuel Thyssen
    Georgian philanderer
    1870?
    
    Herbert Thyssen
    Victorian squire
    1967
    
    Waldo Thyssen
    Sixties criminal
    
    
14. 28:28 — Lens flare in the top right corner of the screen.
15. 28:43 — Lens flare in the top left corner of the screen.
16. 31:07 — There’s something stuck to the lens top right as Smith marches Mrs. Peel into Thyssen’s sitting room. It reappears at 33:20–34:25.
17. 34:25 — “I appreciate your appreciation.”
18. 36:36 — There’s a corrupt frame on the DVD.
19. 38:53 — the holes in the stocks are too large to actually restrain Mrs. Peel.
20. 39:05, 40:54, etc. - You can just see the flare guard in the very top left corner of the screen in the angled CUs of Thyssen. It reappears at 43:40–43:59 during the fight and 47:06 when they re-enter the Sixties room and find Vesta still cuffed to the pillar.
21. 43:42 — Rocky Taylor is standing in for Patrick Macnee during his dance with the pike.
22. 44:59 — Stunt doubles for Peter Bowles and Patrick Macnee (Rocky again) but Diana Rigg does all her own work in the fight scene.
23. 47:06 — Upon finding Vesta handcuffed to a pillar in the 1960s, Emma asks, “Didn’t we get the vote?”
24. 47:18 — Bird sculpture back near the door again.
25. Running time: 49′22″

Cast notes

1. The executioner is played by stunt regular Terry Plummer - he’s seen at his best (although, as always, uncredited) as Frederick in A Surfeit of H₂O, but turns up in The Superlative Seven (his only credit, despite being in thick Chinese makeup), Never, Never, Say Die and a host of other episodes.