Book Bloopers
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THE COMPLETE AVENGERS
Dave Rogers

It would seem the "world's greatest authority on The Avengers" might not be fully living up to his claim, although it could be argued either way; for those seeking to understand some of the behind-the-scenes machinations that led to Dave's subsequent The Ultimate Avengers (not released in the States), you may find Chris Perry's contributions to that book most enlightening.

EPISODE SYNOPSES
The fact that Rogers' episode synopses are not based on the episodes themselves is not an error, but the way the information is presented in the book is misleading. His note on using plot sheets and scripts is buried in the introduction, and if this is missed, the reader may easily assume his synopses represent the way the episodes appeared on screen—and when other authors based their text on his work, a legacy of misinformation was spawned.

PHOTO CAPTIONS
Quite often the photo captions appear to have little to do with reality.

Page 124. The caption for the photo at left indicates that it is the "Teaser to The Fear Merchants." Hardly the teaser, it is a scene from the middle of the episode.

Page 126. The caption for the photo at left reads, "Brodny sees the joke but Emma is not so amused by the dubious activities of The See-Through Man." Not to get too picky, but it's just the opposite: Brodny utterly fails to see the joke, whilst Emma is quite amused—the reader will notice that she is grinning, and he is grimacing.

Page 138. "Watched by Damita, Emma overpowers Kirby, whose attempts to film her life—and death—have reached Epic proportions." Kirby was not doing the filming—it was, of course, Z.Z. von Schnerk.

Page 150. "In You Have Just Been Murdered, Steed bursts in on Unwin, the blackmailing millionaire." That should read, the blackmailed millionaire. Needle was the one doing the blackmailing.

Page 153. Caption for the photo at right states, "Steed helps Mrs. Peel to clean off the custard pies used in a fight sequence in Murdersville." Now, that would have been something to see! In reality, they were right in the midst of a fight, and the custard remained untouched.

Page 168. The caption for the image from "You'll Catch Your Death" reads, "A cautious Steed dons a face mask to open a deadly envelope in You'll Catch Your Breath." Eh? It's Death, not Breath. Also, it's a gas mask, not a face mask.

Page 171. "Whoever Shot Poor George Oblique Stroke XR40? That's the question facing Steed and Tara when called in to put the byte on computer thieves." Thievery was definitely not the name of the game, as the episode's title clearly illustrates. And that's a terrible pun, Dave!

TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS
These may be found in abundance, although it is not always clear whether any given error was in the original manuscript or was introduced by the typographer. Here are just a few:

Page 94. "The Gravediggers" character is not Thirwell but Thirlwell.

Page 102. "The Hour That Never Was" is listed as being written by John Lucarotti and directed by James Hill. Actuality it was written by Roger Marshall and directed by Gerry O'Hara.

Page 136. "...they decide to join forcesss to discover the murderer." Sticky "S" key, eh?

Page 140. The writer for "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Station" is given as Bryan Sherriff (a pseudonym for Brian Clemens). The name as it appears on screen is Brian Sheriff.

Page 141. Nanny Smith is listed as being played by Louise Ramsay. Her name is actually Louie Ramsay.

There are numerous little errors in the episode titles throughout the book. While they may seem trivial, when you're regarded as the world's leading source of information in print, one should think that the titles ought to be correct. Note that most of the errors appear in the "Chronology" listing (pp 204-208). Other errors appear in the synopsis titles and photo captions.

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Page last modified 11 April 2005.