The Avengers Forever: The GLG Reports

	The GLG Reports Page 42 of 67

The Forget-Me-Knot
By Grant L. Goggans

"I'd rather she didn't have any happy memories." We bid farewell to Mrs. Peel in what is among the worst of all her stories. "The Forget-Me-Knot" is a slow-paced drudge with a very boring score by Johnson, which would presage a few later hiccups in the music this season. Tellingly, the best scenes, outside Emma's tear-jerking exit, are the ones introducing Tara and Mother. The original storyline, which apparently featured Mother but not Tara, is dull at best, almost as though cast and crew alike were going through the paces. Tara's scenes, filmed later, after Linda Thorson had already established her character, are imaginative and Thorson is having a blast, although there's still an element of desperate humor in them. Tara's use of a brick in her handbag (which produces a vaudevillian "BOING!" sound) isn't funny at all, and the appearance of her instructor camouflaged as a tree is more Get Smart than Avengers. If only Mrs. Peel was given more to do than sit around locked in "The Glass House" with Mortimer, this might have gone over better, but sadly these tedious scenes dominate the second half of the story. Emma's departure should deserve an A+ for being one of the most moving departures from a continuing series any TV character has ever received (some of the others in this exclusive league are Col. Blake in M*A*S*H, Mike and Gloria in All in the Family and DCI Bilborough in Cracker). Unfortunately, that diamond sits at the end of a very, very bad episode.