In the opening scene we see an agent asking his partner, Melville, if everything is okay; he confirms that the coast is clear
despite the fact that the target of their investigation has just gone past. This results in the death of the first agent
is Melville a traitor or is there another reason for him to lie? Melville is part of an investigation into the activities of Lord Edgefield, he has been accused of blackmail but witnesses are suddenly retracting their testimonies. While Steed concentrates on Melville, Tara follows a suspicious milk float back to the dairy and learns that somebody is adding a clear flavourless liquid to the milk
this make those who drink it unable to tell the truth.
This is a fine episode with an interesting premise; so many stories have involved truth serums it makes an interesting change to have one which features an untruth serum. There are some inconsistencies with it though; after taking the serum Melville clearly believes the lies he tells are the truth, he even passes an 'infallible' lie detector test, yet when Tara is under its influence she is clearly struggling to tell the truth but is unable to. We also see that they are adding the serum to the whole batch of milk rather than just certain bottles but there is no reported outbreak of lying amongst the public who presumable also get milk from the dairy this doesn't spoil the story though as 'The Avengers' was never meant to be overanalysed. We don't learn about the serum too early on so there is initially a belief that Melville probably is a traitor. As well as an interesting story there are some great action scenes including two fights in the dairy, a surprisingly real looking scene where Tara takes a tumble while chasing the milk float down the road and a rare moment where Steed loses cool and thumps Melville. We also have some laughs; many provided by Mother's mobile office in a London bus where regular travellers are turned away.
This is a fine episode with an interesting premise; so many stories have involved truth serums it makes an interesting change to have one which features an untruth serum. There are some inconsistencies with it though; after taking the serum Melville clearly believes the lies he tells are the truth, he even passes an 'infallible' lie detector test, yet when Tara is under its influence she is clearly struggling to tell the truth but is unable to. We also see that they are adding the serum to the whole batch of milk rather than just certain bottles but there is no reported outbreak of lying amongst the public who presumable also get milk from the dairy this doesn't spoil the story though as 'The Avengers' was never meant to be overanalysed. We don't learn about the serum too early on so there is initially a belief that Melville probably is a traitor. As well as an interesting story there are some great action scenes including two fights in the dairy, a surprisingly real looking scene where Tara takes a tumble while chasing the milk float down the road and a rare moment where Steed loses cool and thumps Melville. We also have some laughs; many provided by Mother's mobile office in a London bus where regular travellers are turned away.