User Reviews

THRUSH aside, the men from U.N.C.L.E.'s other most frequently recurring adversaries were The Third Reich - embittered Nazis determined to avenge Hitler's death by taking over the world.

In this Milton S.Gelman-scripted episode, we get both Nazis and THRUSH working together. Scientist Von Etske ( Will Kuluva ) is sprung from a German prison when a mind-control device is passed onto him. Solo and Kuryakin give chase, but lose him. A photographer, Terry Cook ( Jusy Carne ) witnessed the break-out, but due to the device's radiation her pictures are ruined.

Von Etske is whisked off to an observatory in South America, where Marshal Gurnius ( George Macready ) runs a THRUSH-financed operation to construct a bigger version of the mind-control ray, intending to take over the mind of the American President as he makes a speech before a joint session of Congress. Gurnius next plans to use the device against THRUSH Central.

Luckily for U.N.C.L.E., Illya is a dead ringer for one of the Nazis and takes his place, while Solo and Terry try to break into the observatory via the back door...

Another solid episode, if one ignores the contrived plot device of Illya just happening to look like one of the bad guys. George Macready had appeared in the previous U.N.C.L.E. adventure about Nazis - Season 2's 'The Recollectors Affair', while British actress Judy Carne ( the 'sock it to me girl' of 'Rowan & Martin's 'Laugh-In' ) was also a familiar face, having been 'Salty Oliver' in another Season 2 episode ( 'The Ultimate Computer Affair' ). Will Kuluva, who plays 'Von Etske', was 'Mr.Allison' in the original U.N.C.L.E. pilot, and then 'Mr.Thaler' in the Season 3 two-parter 'The Concrete Overcoat Affair'.

The observatory was the same one in Season 1's 'The Double Affair', and the explosion that wrecks it came from the same episode.

Yet another super villain/super weapon story. This time a long distance mind controller device (that comes in a handy pocket version as well). The villains are vaguely ex-Nazis (although they wear bespoke insignia). The unimaginative plot relies on the old gimmick of coincidentally identical people: this time Illya looks exactly like the son of a dead quasi-Nazi, who had been surgically altered to look just like his father: a ridiculously improbable workaround to allow Illya to pose as an ex-Nazi despite two decades having passed since the war ended. The secondary characters are generally weaker then usual, especially the laughably blood-thirsty eponymous Gurnius. The only good parts are seeing the supercilious THRUSH agent being double-crossed (there being no honour among thieves) and the girl-of-the-week, Laugh-in's Judy Carne, in her typical 'mod' outfits.

When Nazi criminal Dr Von Etske (played by Will Kuluva) escapes from a maximum security prison, UNCLE agents Solo and Kuriyakin are convinced that he will re-join his fellow war criminals Marshal Zorgon Gurnius (played by George Macready) and Colonel Nexor (uncredited), which will mean trouble. Nexor is killed in an ambush with the men from UNCLE and, since Kuriyakin looks exactly him, he takes his place in order to infiltrate the network of war criminals. This takes Solo and Kuriyakin to South America where the three men plan to dominate the world using a wave gun that Von Etske has developed, which will enable them to control the minds of everyone on Earth. It transpires that THRUSH have provided the financial backing for the project. Solo and Kuriyakin reluctantly allow an ambitious, young newspaper photographer called Terry Cook (played by Judy Carne) to tag along since she is the only one who happens to know what one of the criminals looks like...

Another fast paced, action packed tongue in cheek adventure with the UNCLE men. Director Barry Shear, a series regular, neatly blends straight espionage drama and humour. The chemistry between Vaughn and McCallam is still there and the premise of Kuriyakin posing as a war criminal and having to pretend to be disposing of his old friend Solo after he is captured by the enemy allows for much suspense. There is the usual amount of globetrotting - we go from Europe to South America and back to New York and, to be fair, the settings don't look as unconvincing here as they sometimes did either. Fans of the series will recognise Will Kuluva who played UNCLE chief Mr Allison in place of Leo G Carroll's Alexander Waverley in the first big screen spin off from the show, To Trap A Spy (1966), and also the title character in The Spy In The Green Hat (also 1966). The supporting cast here is competent and Judy Carne is amusing as the ambitious young journalist who is so eager to get the big story, but at the end Solo points out that if she tried to print a story about falling in with secret agents and stumbling upon villains with a mind grabbing machine, who would believe her?

To see David McCallum times two is a real treat.Watching a very noticeably short-of-breath Macready as Gurnius hamming it up was worth the price of admission-not for his obvious dyspnea from emphysema,but that he seemed to be enjoying playing a baddie bent on world domination.He'd left Peyton Place in January 1967,hope this was one of his projects after deciding to leave a sinking ship at PP.Judy Carne was awful,seriously getting in the way,and not funny.Don't know how the guys tolerated her in this episode.The mind control ray seemed totally meh but it moved along.When the players were "frozen" it looked so weird,unbelievable.