Callan - Wet Job

Bringing back a popular show can be enormously tempting. It worked once, so why wouldn't it work well again? I wasn’t keen on the idea of a revival and reviews from others set my expectations low, then lower again, so I had put off watching this for some time.

Wet Job does start reasonably well and the set up with the Section manipulating Callan is good. How he came to retire is left rather murky, allowing us to plough on with the present. The idea of an old job coming back to haunt him seems the best way to drag Callan back into the espionage world. The new Hunter fits in well. He's just as upper class and slightly removed as the others, and I think Hugh Walters does a reasonably decent job in the part. If Wet Job was a way of testing the waters for another series, I would have been pleased to see Walters again.

Callan's current occupation, running a military memorabilia shop, fits well as Callan was always depicted as having a great deal of knowledge as well as passion for the subject. The Nazi items on display seem a tad out of his area but perhaps he’s just decided to go with what sells well, as opposed to making friends with his local NF branch.

The scenes between Lonely and Callan are undoubtedly the best in the production. They both effortlessly slide back into their old roles and the two are wonderful together. I love how proud Lonely is at finally going straight and I only wish we could have got a look at the photo of his beloved. Gawd knows how he got her. It seems losing Mr Callan from his life has benefitted Lonely in the long run, which makes it all the greater shame that he honestly believes their meeting again is pure coincidence. While they do recreate much of their old on-screen rapport, I think scripturally their relationship is more reflective of the literary Callan, where James Mitchell depicts them as better friends. Callan treats Lonely much nicer here than he normally did in the TV series and Lonely himself has developed the confidence to stand up to Mr Callan a little. It’s lovely seeing Russell Hunter and Woodward so comfortable together.

In fact, I think Woodward is fantastic throughout. Despite those massive, ageing, we’re-definitely-in-the-1980s glasses, his old ‘Callan’ expressions shine through and there are intonations in his voice that immediately bring the character back into the room. Considering how physically different Woodward looks compared to Callan's last outing seven years earlier, I think easily establishing the character this well is important for the audience. This is probably the main thing that makes Wet Job slightly bearable because, well…

There is so much bad stuff. So, so, very much and so, so, very bad.

The script is a mess. After a promising start, it all goes to pot. Meres’ replacement, Thorne, is pointless and seems to be there to plug a gap that doesn’t need to be filled. Apart from tailing Callan and giving him a lift to Oxfordshire, he is utterly useless. He blags his way into Lucy Smith’s conspiratorial flat and learns precisely bugger all. It was undoubtedly an enormous mistake to believe that Anthony Valentine's wonderfully cold Toby Meres could be so easily replaced.

George Sewell could have been a marvellous villain but partway through his character decides to chuck out the whole plot so far, abandon his plan to kill Callan, and murder a Czech dissident with the KGB instead.

The KGB bloke. You need a high-profile enemy of the people to disappear in a foreign country on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Apparently you send a short fellow with a ‘tache who can barely use a gun.

There is also an awful lot of padding to bring this up to length as a TV movie. It's 80 minutes long, running in a 90-minute slot when broadcast, which seems like something today's advert-drenched prime time can only dream of. It needs to shave a good 20 minutes off though. Instead, things really start to drag, and we have too many minor characters like the KGB man and Lucy's communist friends that fail to make an impression. I was stunned to learn from Robert Fairclough and Mike Kenwood's The Callan File (an impressive and enthusiastically recommended tomb) that the Wet Job we got had already had 20 minutes cut. What did they cut for us to still end up with this monstrosity?

Who knows what was going on at ATV because the picture quality is noticeably worse than that of the Thames series a decade earlier. Everything in the studio seems to have a dark hue and I found myself squinting to make out details that should definitely be there. Yet outside on location everything is far too bright and sunny. Apart from the contrast between the two being terrible on the eyes, the brightness doesn’t suit the traditional dark colour palette of Callan at all. Bring back the grey and brown.

I've held back on what I believe is the worst aspect of the production and I only wish he had because the composer's incidental music on Wet Job is enough to make you want to cut off your ears, put them through a shredder and boil them in acid. Callan never really needed incidental music and the damning silence in scenes often spoke louder than a hundred of these electronic noise machines ever could. It sounds cheap, poor, and none of it, not one single note, is appropriate for the tone of the programme. If this wasn't enough, he, that ruinous bastard Cyril Ornadel, never lets up. There is not a moment of silence that he won't fill. It's infuriating. I just wanted it to end.

Wet Job is a poor revival for Callan. Cut the music, tighten the script and make it on film instead of whatever videotape atrocity ATV are utilising and I think it could have been great. It has nothing to do with the passage of time - indeed, Woodward makes a considerably better older Callan than I would have expected - and everything to do with what's gone on offscreen. Wet Job is frustrating because it feels like such a waste and it's a shame that Callan's final television outing is so far off the series' high standards.

TV Times 15th July 1967

Callan

Edward Woodward graces the cover this week as TV Times promotes Callan, which started last week. The second episode is now missing though.

007 Goes Back To Fairfield

In 1967 Sean Connery worked for a month for free, directing and narrating a documentary on the Fairfield Shipyard in Glasgow. The Bowler and the Bunnet, referring to the different hats worn by workers and management, would turn out to be the only thing he ever directed. Connery had become interested in the experiment taking place there. He saw it as 'the first real move towards breaking down the barrier between workers and bosses'. This article actually tells us nothing at all about the experiment, probably hoping we will tune into the programme to find out. The article comments on Connery's 'sinister new moustache'. He had grown the droopy tache for Shalako (1968), a Western to be released the following year, but was ultimately persuaded to shave it off before filming started. It also still references Connery as James Bond, indicating that he had yet to step down from the role. He would do so later that year before being persuaded to pick up his Walther PPK again for Diamonds Are Forever (1971) and $1 million.

Country Boy from the city

A couple of weeks ago we saw a preview of some of the new children's programmes, one of which was Country Boy, so it's nice to get a bit more information on it. Dennis Golding is a cockney lad who gets introduced to the ways of the countryside. Dennis is keen to point out he had seen the country before, 'once or twice, but only from a train or a car on a day-trip to the Essex coast. Just a lot of boring old fields it used to look like'. He has now seen swans, heard a cuckoo and learned how to handle a small boat. It's wonderful to hear the lad gushing about how much it has opened up his mind and he is now keen to live in the country one day. Presently, he lives in a terraced house with his 13 brothers and sisters. He was spotted for Country Boy while performing in a play. Dennis doesn't fancy drama school - 'They look a toffee-nosed lot to me' - though likes the idea of being an actor, 'But if it doesn't work out I'll be an electrician like me dad'.

IMDB does list a Dennis Golding but we can't be certain it is the same one, as this one has some pre-1967 credits.

My Micro-Mini

Susan Maughan dispenses more fashion advice. For a while now, she has been encouraging readers to cut off bits of skirts and dresses. The warmer weather is here and everyone should be embracing the fashion for shorter hemlines. It seems she has not gone short enough so far though and here she has turned to buying an actual mini skirt. It is so short, she has termed it a 'micro-mini'. Interestingly, on the same page of which she has been advising more comfortable nightwear for the warmer nights, she also suggests wearing a mini skirt with sweaters.

Entero Vioform

As British holidaymakers are still struggling with foreign food, a fun cartoon encourages you to take precautions against yet another bout diarrhoea.

We've Had Enough of Experts

Double helping of Monkhouse

We are informed Bob Monkhouse 'has about 500 miles of film valued at £30,000 carefully stored in his London home'. That is approximately half a million pounds today. However, this is only the start. Bob Monkhouse would continue to grow his archive, moving on to videotape and amassing an enormous amount of television programming. He undoubtedly made a fantastic contribution to film and television archiving. Some of his items have become the only surviving copies and the Bob Monkhouse Collection is now part of the Kaleidoscope Archive. 

Nivea Cream shampoos

Nivea is offering the chance to win either a diamond tiara or £1000. Simply rate how important you feel each contribution is for beautiful hair and, 'Complete this sentence in not more than ten words: I USE NIVEA SHAMPOO BECAUSE'. Being around £16,660 today, I think I would happily take the money.

Omega Seamaster

This is an absolutely stunning portrait of an Omega Seamaster 300. They really sell the benefits of this diving watch. Yet, for the most part, it is unlikely most wearers will spend very much time beneath the surface. They are simply very beautiful watches. Personally, that is enough for me. The Seamaster collection began in 1948 and the Seamaster 300 was first launched in 1957. Since 1995 the Omega Seamaster has been the watch of choice for James Bond and the brand now has strong links with the franchise. This Seamaster 300 costs £53.10.0 - approximately £891 in today's money. A new Omega Seamaster 300 will currently set you back around £4400. If I could, I would.

Exploring Television

In 2016 I discovered that the marvellous thing about being young is that there was already a lot of television before I was born. Although I felt I knew about enough of it, enough to be content with, enough that I would ever want to watch, it turned out I could not have been more wrong. It seems absurd that the Internet is enabling me to learn about so many of these pre-Internet programmes. Here are a few programmes I discovered and loved in 2016.

Callan

Callan is a reluctant employee of the Section, a government department whose remit covers: "Eliminating people, framing, extortion, death... all the jobs that are too dirty for Her Majesty's other security services to touch."

 Callan blew me away from the first episode I saw, Let's Kill Everybody. It impressed me so much I immediately ordered a box set. Armchair Theatre's Magnum for Schneider and The Good Ones Are All Dead were both fantastic and I watched them multiple times before moving on. Knowing several episodes of Callan were missing, realising just how smaller this made my box set, has made me savour every single one of these episodes. Whether I've watched three in a week or one in a fortnight, they have all felt incredibly precious and deserving of my full attention.

I love Callan himself. I love how little we know about his past, I love that he cares about the people he has to hurt, I love how every person he kills seems to hurt him personally and above all, I love the contempt he has for his employers.

I love the Cold War espionage that so many of the plots centre around. Callan's world is much closer to that of Alec Leamas and George Smiley than that of James Bond. The series takes place almost entirely in London but in fact, it could be anywhere as there are no defining landmarks or locations regularly name-checked. Spies do not all languish on famous street corners or tube stations. They stake out grotty flats from other grotty flats, they drink endless cups of tea whilst waiting in cafes, they stand around in telephone boxes. Some of the people they spy on are pleasant and others are some of the vilest humans you could ever hope not to meet.

I have found Callan thrilling, despite a limited amount of any 'action'. Instead, I spend many episodes with fingers clenched, breath held, as the tension rises. My favourite episode so far has been Heir Apparent, which saw Callan and colleague Toby Meres attempting to get a fellow agent across the East-West German border. I want to say that, being partly set abroad with more action and a larger role for Meres, it made for a different sort of episode of Callan. Yet there are numerous episodes I could say this of for one reason or another. Diversity is certainly one of the show's strengths.

I have recently reached the end of Callan's black and white episodes and have always had a slight feeling of apprehension about the colour ones. Will this wonderfully grim, spies-in-the-shadows programme work so well in colour? I hope so.

Public Eye

Frank Marker eschews the description of 'private detective', preferring 'inquiry agent'. He takes on anything from missing persons to divorce cases. He has been based in London, Birmingham and Brighton, as well as having a spell inside.

Callan and Public Eye will be forever linked in my mind because I first saw them both around the same time and after only one episode I ordered box sets of both. For Public Eye, the episode in question was My Life's My Own. I had found it gripping in a different way to Callan. Whilst Callan was all about the suspense, Public Eye was more intriguing. The plot of My Life's My Own concerns a mysterious young girl who tries to commit suicide and we uncover details at the same rate Frank does.

When I first sat down with the box set I was to discover that the earlier episodes of Public Eye were very different, with Frank trekking his way around the glummest-looking parts of London and Birmingham in search of information. I loved these early episodes too though, as we know so little about Frank and I enjoyed trying to spot any sort of insight into his character. At present, I am in Windsor with Frank. He has recently moved from Brighton where he became 'Frank' far more than 'Marker'. The series in Brighton focussed far more on Frank himself and after the previous veil of mystery, it was superb to get to know him at last.

Frank Marker began as quite a distant man, though I would never say he appeared cold. Initially, he seemed to flourish as a lone wolf but as the series has moved on he seems to have achieved a couple of friendships too. It has become apparent that Frank is a lovely man, sometimes too nice for his own good. He cares about helping people, even if it means advising them not to use his services.

Like Callan, I had worried about Public Eye's move to colour but as the tone of Public Eye changed in the Brighton episodes, it blended forward perfectly well. It has also meant the programme can deliver the full glory of early 1970s' fashions, contrasted with Frank's almost unchanging appearance of a dark shirt, light tie, grey suit and raincoat.

Public Eye may not have the high stakes of Callan but for the father who has lost a daughter or the woman who suspects her husband is having an affair, these things are world-defining. Frank Marker understands this. I am looking forward to spending even more time with him.

No Hiding Place

Detective drama.

I watched an episode called A Bird to Watch the Marbles, not knowing at all what to expect and by the end I adored it. Initially, I was unsure because there was so much time spent focussed on the guest actors that we barely saw the regulars. However, the idea of this grew on me and I found it a brilliant way of being able to build characters, even though they were only going to appear in a single episode. Far less plodding detective work gave greater room for plot and action.

This seemed like a brilliant series and as soon as the episode had finished I was keen to investigate it. But of the 236 episodes made, only 21 are known to exist (as per LostShows.com). As far as I can tell, A Bird to Watch the Marbles is the only episode to have had any sort of commercial release. Gutting.

There is little else I can say, having only been able to see one episode so far. It has made me realise how lucky I have been so far. Both Callan and Public Eye have numerous missing episodes but they do at least have a decent number intact.

Much more to come...

The series I haven't seen much of yet.

Fireball XL5

I have managed to see a few episodes of Fireball XL5 over the past year and have been pleasantly surprised by just how much I've enjoyed this children's puppet show. Steve Zodiac is a traditional type of hero and part of the World Space Patrol. He's backed up by an old Professor, Matthew Mattic, Robert the Robot and the lovely Doctor Venus. Together they battle bad guys all over the string galaxy. It's a fun 25 minutes. There is suspense, excitement and, sometimes, a magnificent explosion or two. As Thunderbirds was the only other Gerry Anderson show I was familiar with, my enjoyment of Fireball XL5 has certainly opened me up to the idea of seeking out the other shows.

The Adventures of Robin Hood

Sword fights! So many awesome sword fights! Although I was familiar with the story of Robin Hood, I don't think I had seen a version of it before. I have only seen the first episode of this 1955 series with Richard Greene but it was such a blast, such a fine run-around, that I can barely wait to be able to see the rest. Sir Robin is a fine gent and we have been set up with a superb nasty villain in the Sheriff. The band of merry men have come together and the stage is set for more leaping about sets, rescuing the downtrodden and swinging multiple swords around near fire torches.

Space: 1999

Man has been depositing nuclear waste on the moon for some years and the problems resulting from this are eventually fully realised. The crew find themselves entirely alone.

Unsure what to expect from this sci-fi, I had prepared myself to experience something a bit low budget and naff. Instead, when I watched the first episode I was presented with a fantastic, gripping drama with a wonderful ending. The characters all seem to have plenty of room for development and I was impressed by the scope of the sets, based on a fairly simplistic design. Space: 1999 is another series added to my 'box sets to buy' list as it left me so curious about what might come.

Suspense, excitement, intrigue, fun. Here's to more of it in 2017.

Callan - The Good Ones Are All Dead

Remember when I looked at Callan's Armchair Theatre and said how nice it was to see a German on 1960s’ telly who didn’t turn out to be a Nazi? Well, it’s back to business as usual in The Good Ones Are All Dead. We’re told Strauss is a Nazi from the start and Callan’s task is to bring him in as the Israeli authorities are rather keen to have a few words. Quite possibly 'What would you like for your final meal?'

This is officially Series 1, Episode 1 of Callan. The events of A Magnum for Schneider are referenced but with it being broadcast five months previously they are thankfully not dwelt on. Hunter convinces Callan to work for the Section again, partly by blackmail but he also convinces Callan to take more of an interest by bringing up the fact that during the war Callan’s parents were killed by a V2 bomb. This Strauss fellow had a lot of responsibility for the launch of the V2 bombs after being involved with the concentration camps. It surprises me that this is what convinces Callan. It’s not like Strauss stood there and gunned down Callan’s parents in cold blood. The V2 bombs were launched from the other side of the Channel. Attributing blame to one guy for them seems quite a stretch. It’s hard to judge Callan’s perspective because for one we don’t know what he did in the war, if anything. His age is difficult to gauge. If we’re being generous then Callan sports a sensible short haircut. If we’re being harsh I’ll point out Edward Woodward’s receding hairline. Receding hairlines aren’t the be-all and end-all of course, as some of you may be glad to hear. Callan seems like he’s seen a lot, done a lot, knows a lot and obviously had enough. He’s been around a while but just how long is hard to say. I remain sceptical of this reasoning but I suppose it ties in with Callan becoming emotionally involved in things.

Callan takes his bookkeeping skills off to work for Strauss who is now called Stavros. His accent sounds more French than Greek to me. It doesn’t take much to work out that Stavros is shagging his secretary. Is she his secretary because they’re shagging? There are no references to a wife or children so it isn’t that bad but he is a good twenty years older than her. Callan isn’t certain that Stavros is actually Strauss so goes off to do some snooping.

He does a neat spy thing of spotting a hair laid across the handles of the doors to Stavros’s bedroom. In Dr No you see James Bond pull out a hair, lick his thumb and stick the hair across his wardrobe doors. When he comes back the hair has gone and he knows his room was searched. Stavros has used a long hair or possibly a cotton thread so it can lie across the handles. Callan picks it up and remembers to put it back when he leaves. Inside the room, he finds nothing except for a large safe hidden in the wardrobe.

Later on, Callan meets Lonely and describes the safe to him. Lonely turns out to be something of an expert on safes and knows exactly what sort it is. He’ll need a copy of the key. Callan also meets with a Jewish man, Berg, who was in a concentration camp run by Strauss and insists the man is definitely Strauss. "I must know why you're so sure," Callan says."I was his house slave for three months," Berg explains, telling Callan that he once broke a plate and Strauss broke three of his ribs. "When you fear a man, you watch him all the time." Callan is convinced.

Having copied Stavros's key using plasticine, Callan now has a key to the safe. When he gets into the safe he finds a trunk and rifles through it. An SS uniform, a Nazi party card, a gun and a bag containing gold nuggets are among the items. The SS jacket has a cyanide capsule sown underneath the lapel and when Callan checks the wardrobe he finds several other jackets that have one too. Callan is rumbled by the secretary, Jeanne, who confesses she has known Stavros/Strauss's past for a while and it was she who turned him in. When Callan calls into Hunter we learn that the gold nuggets are in fact gold fillings, a detail that sent a shiver down my spine. If you weren't aware, the Nazis extracted them from Jewish people in the concentration camps.

When Stavros/Strauss returns he finds Jeanne in the bedroom who tells him she thinks Callan is a thief as she caught him acting suspiciously. He sends Jeanne away and tells her to get on a plane to Cairo. Afterwards, Callan hears a noise and going into the corridor sees the bedroom door open. As he goes towards it Stavros appears behind him with a gun, wearing his SS jacket.

Callan informs Stavros/Strauss that he has been found out. When Stavros is told it is the Israelis who are on to him, his sheer terror is conveyed in his "Oh my god". He tries to bribe Callan - "You work for money?" - but no dice. Here follows a magnificent scene between the two of them. Callan tells him he must be handed over as it is what the Israelis want. Stavros insists "Strauss is dead!" For the past 23 years he has lived a good life and tried to be a good man. He has been racked with guilt and it was finding Jeanne that was his ultimate salvation. "You poor bastard - she turned you in!" Callan yells at Stavros, who then seems truly defeated. He tries to bite the cyanide capsule on his jacket but Callan stops him, crushing it on the floor.  I don't think I have ever felt slightly sorry for a Nazi before but Stavros seems truly repentant. He convinces me that he regrets what he did, wanting to become a better person. He appears to convince Callan too, or at least to elicit some pity, as Callan hands him one of the other jackets. As Stavros bites into the capsule, the camera stays on Callan, showing his racked expression as he turns his back on the deed.

Stavros's repeated insistence that his old self is long gone is what grabs me at the end of this episode. I also thought it was a brave move for the programme to portray an ex-Nazi so sympathetically. The war had only ended 22 years before so a proportion of the audience would have fought against the Nazis and some may well have been in concentration camps or had family that had been. This wasn't just an ordinary infantryman either; we're told he was an Obersturmbahnführer, the SS equivalent of a Lieutenant-Colonel - a fairly high rank. Despite the pity I feel for Nicholas 'Strauss is dead' Stavros, the one gap in his story is that he held on to remnants of his Nazi past. Stavros says it is a reminder of a time when he was looked up to and held in high regard, but surely if he regrets what he did to earn him that respect then he would throw it all away?

I haven't mentioned Toby Meres, Callan's colleague, though he does appear in this episode. In Armchair Theatre he was played by Peter Bowles but from now on it's Anthony Valentine. I was initially disappointed not to see Bowles again but I actually think Valentine is much better for what's required here. He intensely dislikes Callan and comes across somewhat callous.

This is an excellent series 1, episode 1 for the show, managing to tell us what we need to without repeating Armchair Theatre too much. "What is the Section for, Callan?" asks Colonel Hunter. "Eliminating people, framing, extortion, death... all the jobs that are too dirty for her Majesty's other security services to touch," Callan replies, sounding like he's quoting a handbook.

There is also some continuity as Hunter throws Callan's own file in front of him, which Hunter had moved into a different cover at the end of A Magnum for Schneider. Callan is annoyed as he reads it: "Red cover. Most urgent, marked for death." Hunter's expression is blank as he blackmails Callan into taking on the job: "You do this for me or I'll have you destroyed." I love seeing the contempt Callan has for Hunter. He uses the word 'mate' a lot, often in the tone of someone in a pub at ten on a Friday night, asking 'D'you fancy taking this outside, mate?' Callan doesn't take Hunter's threat well. He leaves it a while before returning to the subject. "I know you can have me killed. But... [he draws a gun] don't you push me too far, right... because I might just let myself be killed... only you won't be there to see it because mate I'll get you first. And I can do it. Believe me, I can do it. You ought to know." It is interesting that Callan knows and states how good he is ("very good") but he never comes across as arrogant.

Hunter says Callan's only good at killing people but in both Armchair Theatre and The Good Ones Are All Dead we see Callan kill only one person. I think Callan does show himself to be very good, if not excellent, at what he does but what he does is more than just murder. Perhaps those other things affect Callan just as much.

Armchair Theatre - A Magnum for Schneider

What I liked when I watched the episode of Callan in Network's ITV 60 box set was that it seemed so different from the similar adventure series I had seen from that period. I have only seen a handful of the early Danger Man episodes and though there are similarities, in that both Callan and John Drake are doing the messy jobs that no one else wants to do, Callan’s character intrigues me more because he’s a reluctant participant. John Drake’s world is, if not necessarily glamorous, then at least exotic. The Saint takes similar excursions to foreign climes, even if the cast rarely stepped outside the grounds of Elstree Studios. Callan lacks that escapism and in comparison, it’s a very dingy world. The Saint and The Avengers are both fun and bright even when they start off in black and white. The Prisoner is weird, psychological and taunting. The colourful and relentlessly upbeat nature of the Village is increasingly creepy once you discover what is actually going on. But nonetheless, I would hesitate to describe The Prisoner as ‘dark’ and yet that’s the first word that springs to mind for Callan. Classing it as an ‘adventure’ series is probably pushing it. Everything seems to happen in the shadows and the main character has a big problem with the morality of what he does. I’ve also never heard the word ‘bastard’ in any of the other series. And tension. Tension! So much tension. The music is used sparingly. Sometimes it racks things up but other times the complete utter silence is nerve-wracking. I get the feeling that if anyone in the studio had coughed they would have been instantly fired. Everything seems planned to give it as much realism as possible.

As I sat down to the first disc of my Callan – The Monochrome Years box set, I selected ‘Play All’ and was intrigued to see a caption for Armchair Theatre appear. Armchair Theatre were one-off plays but this one eventually spawned Callan it would appear. The title of the play is A Magnum for Schneider. A chocolate lolly? Champagne? Probably not.

We have a wonderful opening scene where we learn quite a lot quite quickly. We meet Colonel Hunter (Ronald Radd), a rather cold and dislikeable middle-aged man. We gather that Callan used to work for him, for ‘them’, but he felt things too much and it turns out this isn’t a particularly desirable characteristic when your job is killing people. It seems to have been a mutual agreement that he left the job but now they want him back. As he’s utterly bored stiff in his current job he decides to reluctantly take up the offer to kill one more man. I’m sure plenty of people know how he feels. Just because he can, Callan fires four bullets at a target and considers himself a touch off form as one misses.

Callan’s victim-to-be, Schneider, has the office across the hall. He’s played by Joseph Fürst, an actor whom I’ve only ever seen portraying bad guys. Nothing in the world can stop him in Doctor Who (in fact on Saturday 4^th February 1967 you could have watched him go to a watery grave in The Underwater Menace on BBC1 then later turn over to see him in this episode of Armchair Theatre!) and he plays a Professor working for Blofeld in Diamonds Are Forever. He does over-the-top quite well. Callan bumps into him in the hall, they start talking and find they have a shared interest in model soldiers. It’s a very natural conversation and they even exchange a joke about the war, which I really liked considering Germans on TV at this time always seem to turn out to be ex-Nazis. Schneider has some soldiers set up in his office (I love that he plays with his toy soldiers whilst at work!) and invites Callan in to see them. Callan is hesitant but eventually goes in. He’s already been told that he gets too emotionally involved in cases and here he is going to play soldiers with the bloke he’s meant to be bumping off! No wonder he’s been struggling if this is what he usually does.

Heading back to work, his boss (Ivor Dean) reprimands him for being a few minutes late. There are only a couple of scenes between Callan and his boss in this episode but they’re good. They’re well written, showing us Callan’s contempt for his job and his boss. He takes the piss and the way he speaks to his superior is inappropriate at best. At worst it’s downright rude. I think Callan is supposed to have been there about six months and frankly I’m astounded he has kept the job that long. As a man with no track record or references we’ve been told that ‘they’ helped get him the job. I wonder if they purposefully chose him such a horrid job.

We get a scene in a pub. It’s small and grotty and so are some of the customers. Callan has come to meet one in particular. Lonely is so nicknamed because no one dare goes near him due to some serious body odour issues that Callan can’t resist repeatedly remarking on. Callan wants a gun and not-so-subtly passes Lonely an envelope containing £100. Quite where a bookkeeper has managed to quickly get £100 from, the equivalent of well over £1000 in 2016, is never explained. He must have savings from his days as an assassin because when we see Callan’s bedsit it’s clear that if he does have any sort of money he certainly is not spending much of it.

Callan isn’t at all sure about his assignment. He sleuths his way into Schneider’s office and later his flat, eventually finding some documents that prove Schneider has been selling guns to Indonesia. My knowledge of foreign affairs in that region is pretty slim. At a push, I could probably find Indonesia on a map. But helpfully this year I did see a BBC documentary from 1964 that followed the British Army in Borneo, which borders Indonesia. The army was in the jungle on the border defending Borneo against Indonesia, who were attempting to invade. I got the impression that the Indonesians they were fighting were more guerrillas than an officially organised army. The British government would understandably then have been none too keen on having someone in their country who was selling guns for people to shoot at its army. After seeing the documents, Callan’s mood changes and he agrees Schneider must die. This is a shame of course because Schneider, apart from illegally buying and selling lethal weapons, is rather a nice guy.

Colonel Hunter has been having Toby Meres (Peter Bowles) follow Callan. After Callan records a to-be-discovered-later tape stating that Colonel Hunter is behind the murder, he opens the door to Peter Bowles who whacks him over the head. When Callan wakes to a phone call from Hunter, he is told that the tape and a note left on his desk have been destroyed. Hunter tells Callan he was foolish but I disagree somewhat. Leaving evidence behind to cover his back if he was caught was a good idea. Not expecting Hunter to have someone keep an eye on him was the foolish part.

Schneider has invited Callan to come round to play toy soldiers for the evening. Hunter has instructed Callan to kill Schneider just before 11 o’clock. But Callan doesn’t. They are having far too much fun re-enacting historical battles. At 11 the doorbell goes and Schneider goes to have a chat with some policemen. His wife goes to bed only to find Toby in there, who coshes her one. Callan comes to see what all the fuss is about and is a tad peeved to see Toby. Between him and the rozzers on the doorstep, Callan is feeling the pressure a bit as Toby urges him to hurry up and shoot Schneider. With the coppers shooed away Schneider returns, finds Toby and is onto Callan too. He takes Toby’s gun and is suspicious that Callan doesn’t have one.

But of course, he does – it’s down his sock. He retrieves the gun, waits until Schneider is about to shoot Toby, then at the last moment quickly brings it out and pulls the trigger. It’s all very sudden and a fantastic moment. Though it is slightly spoilt by Fürst's over the top, highly unrealistic death. Once shot, he manages to toss his gun in the air and dramatically launch himself at a lamp.

After berating Callan for taking his time, Toby asks, “Are you alright?” “Yes,” Callan replies, wearily. But we’re not entirely sure he is.

When Callan asks Toby if it was he who hit him over the head before Toby laughs, apologises and admits it was. Callan isn’t laughing though and whacks him one back. With Toby out cold, Callan wipes his own prints from the gun and leaves it in Toby’s hand.

From a phonebox, Callan calls Hunter. He’s worked out Hunter sent the policemen around, expecting Callan to be caught with a smoking gun. He tells Hunter that Toby is still at the flat. “Oh well it's not important. You could get him out I suppose.” But Callan won't be going to fetch Toby. Callan feels used. “I don’t think I want to work for you, Hunter. It may sound very naive and all that but I did like Schneider. I hate you.”