Review for The Protectors - The Complete Series

'The Protectors' is, in my humble opinion, one of the most FAB series produced in the history of television. Of course, I may be slightly biased. Anything that carries the 'Gerry Anderson' brand means that it is a series produced by some of the finest creative television and film-makers in the industry, and with a stellar cast, and stories written by Terry Nation and Brian Clemens (amongst others), this classic high-glamour, truly international adventure series makes for highly compelling viewing.


On the up side, anything featuring self-confessed anglophile Robert Vaughn (who, post Man from Uncle, could pick and choose the offers as he was a truly international star) and which had budget for filming all over Europe was bound to be a winner. But on the down-side, unlike many other ITC series of its era, it was made to fill a half-hour slot (rather than an hour) and as a consequence, never quite got the opportunity to fulfil its promise. (The exception being the two-parter, WAM, which gave a good indication as to how well the series could sustain an hours interest).


Also on the downside, it was filmed on 16mm as a budget saving exercise, as so much was being spent on the talent and the location filming. This proved to be a real shame as, with the higher production value, it was not captured in its full glory like previous Anderson ITC productions (like UFO and Space 1999) but rather in this lesser format which is noticeable on these rather lacklustre prints.


So - what's it all about? Each of the world's major cities has its best detective agency, and each of these detective agencies has its best agent. These super-agents are The Protectors. Robert Vaughn is Harry Rule, the suave American who leads the operations of three private sleuths whose job is to protect the innocent. Nyree Dawn Porter is the elegant, Rome-based Contessa di Contini, and Tony Anholt is Paul Buchet, a French agent operating out of a Paris apartment.


Their adventures take them from Venice to London, from Paris to Hungary, to Switzerland and Bavaria. Packed with high octane special effects, and snappy, often humourous dialogue, despite running for 52 episodes, the series feels as fresh on episode 52 as it did at the outset.


The deleted Carlton series sets (a separate one for each of the series) have been pretty much deleted and this was beginning to get scarce, with the inevitable hike in Ebay prices, so this new release will be a bonus for those who were unable to get that set. It also boasts some excellent extras, including more than 1500 stills, and a bunch of PDF's (accessed via the DVD-Rom drive in your computer) which include some quaint looking hand typed press releases, three covers of 'TV Action' comic from 1973, and an ITC publicity brochure. However, these may not in themselves be worth the price of a double-dip. Like many, I had been hoping to see an improvement on the slightly washed out, low contrast Carlton transfers and was disappointed to discover that these were the self-same prints. Oh well.


Worthy of note is the superb score. It's groovy, 'blaxploitation' feel sounds as cool today as it did then, even if the Tony Christie sang outro gets a bit wearing after a while.


The check discs that I had did something weird with the audio every time I put a new disc in; a faltering note as if the music was stuck before the disc played in earnest. I wouldn't have mentioned it except it was a feature of each and every disc and may therefore be a fault. Hopefully that minor irritant will be ironed out before the actual pressing of commercial discs. (If anyone reading this has the set then please feel free to post a comment!).


Running at some 1300 minutes, this really is a mega-set and it's a real treat to watch.

Here's the full episode listing.

Disc One
2000 ft. to Die, Brother Hood, See No Evil, Disappearing Trick, Ceremony for the Dead , It Was All Over in Leipzig, The Quick Brown Fox, King Con, Thinkback

Disc Two
A Kind of Wild Justice, Balance of Terror, Triple Cross, The Numbers Game, For the Rest of Your Natural…, The Bodyguards, A Matter of Life and Death, The Big Hit

Disc Three
One and One Makes One, Talkdown, Vocal, …With a Little Help from My Friends, Chase, Your Witness, It Could Be Practically Anywhere on the Island

Disc Four
The First Circle, A Case for the Right, Quin, Bagman, Fighting Fund, The Last Frontier, Baubles, Bangles and Beads, Petard

Disc Five
Goodbye George, WAM - Part One, WAM - Part Two, Implicado, Dragon Chase, Decoy, Border Line, Zeke's Blues

Disc Six
Lena, The Bridge, Sugar and Spice, Burning Bush, The Tiger and the Goat, Route 27, Trial, Shadbolt

Disc Seven
A Pocketful of Posies, Wheels, The Insider, Blockbuster