Fight Clip Club: The Avengers

The TV show, not the Marvel franchise.

From 1961 to 1969, there was a British TV show centered on two secret agents, and it was as surreal as any of the weirder Brit spy mysteries of the era (I’m thinking The Prisoner in particular). Its centrally featured spies were named John Steed and Emma Peel during the most popular seasons of the show. They would be involved in a classic mystery-of-the-week, that would often seem supernatural or scifi in nature until the very end when the whole thing would be explained. 

Mr. Steed, played by the dashing Patrick Macnee, wore a bowler hat and toted an umbrella (with which he often swordfought bad guys), driving a Bentley the likes of which Bond himself would covet. His partner in solving crime, Mrs. Peel, was played by the exquisite and extraordinary Diana Rigg, whose outfits throughout the show made her into a fashion icon of the time (and even after). The two co-spies were never a romantic couple, but their flirty quips and arch banter made them such a fantastic combination that when Rigg left the show, it went downhill fast. There’s nothing like the chemistry of Mr. Steed and Mrs. Peel.

I used to watch this show religiously as a kid—they must have put reruns on in the ‘70s and ‘80s but I don’t remember what channel. I loved the weirdness of the plots each week, and loved the witty banter especially. Steed and Peel were both icons to me, but especially the catsuited Mrs. Peel in her little gogo boots, kicking all kinds of implausible karate ass. I knew I had to find one of these immortal fight scenes to talk about for Fight Clip Club, in that as much as I love them and still love the show, the fights don’t look very good by any professional standard. Not really. Why do I enjoy them even so? Maybe it’s just a nostalgic love for the show, or for Rigg herself… I don’t know. What do you think? 

One other thing about this selection, that makes it unusual for FCC—I don’t know which episode this fight is from, other than that it’s from Season 4, in its pre-color days still, which would have aired in 1966. I wanted to show you this because it’s got a lot of Mrs. Peel action in it (along with the swashbuckling Steed, of course). Meet me below the paywall and let’s get into it.