Reviews

The show loved to parody other shows (such as the Batman parody in "The Winged Adventure" and the title of "The Girl From AUNTIE") and movies, and this is a fine parody of Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None" and the two movies based on it (at the time). In the original, after 3 of 10 guests were killed, they concluded that the killer was one of the 7 remaining. In this episode, the 7 were informed of this at the very beginning. One might note that a key element was a faked death (which The Avengers took a bit further). Finally, in both it comes down to a man and woman left. In the book the woman killed the man and eventually committed suicide, but in the play and both movies they survived.

Alfred Hitchcock often included some comic relief in his thrillers, and occasionally an outright comedy. This may have been the best of his comedies, featuring Bob Newhard as a husband who decided to get rid of his wife -- perfectly legally. Her predictability makes it easier -- he knows exactly how she'll react to a variety of incidents leading to an attempt to poison him with their usual bedtime drink of hot chocolate.

Knowing that she will use rat poison (to get rid of a pair of rats he had bought at a pet store in a nearby town -- including "the big fat one", of course), he pours it into another container. This proves handy when the police come by, making it much easier to get her for attempted murder. He explains all this to a showgirl who had played a minor and probably unintentional part in the plot ("I'm Gerald's wife." "Oh . . . who's Gerald?"), played Joyce Jameson, late of the Vincent Price/Peter Lorre/Basil Rathbone/Boris Karloff classic The Comedy of Terrors.

And then he gets ambushed on the way out by the one person who could put the kibosh on his plans, and who liked his picture in the paper so much she says she had it framed. "Funny word, framed."

In this episode (the first of the second season), Victor Buono (perhaps most famous as BATMAN villain King Tut) plays a villain who's everything Aleister Crowley wanted to be: a magician with genuine ability who glories in being evil. He also heads a gang of assassins of varied talents (including Richard Pryor as a ventriloquist, although he has about one line and I think someone else voiced the dummy, who did most of their speaking) aptly known as the Eccentric. Their target is President Juarez, who got mentioned a lot in the series. Manzeppi was also one of the few villains who got away, and even came back in a later episode. Unfortunately, he didn't come back again, unlike Dr. Miguelito Loveless (who admittedly was a greater villain, perhaps the best I've seen on TV).

Boris Karloff plays an expatriate maharajah with a palace on a Pawnee reservation who wants James West to teach his rambunctions sons (two of whom, naturally, have the names Chandra and Gupta after a famous early Indian emperor) the fine art of killing. West gives them an interesting lesson, highlighted by tossing a box of matches at them with the (false) suggestion that it's a secret weapon. When one observes that it really was just a box of matches, West says "By George. You're right." I still use that phrasing occasionally under similar circumstances.

Naturally, there's a lot more going on. The maharajah, with the Sikh name of Mr. Singh, also seems to want West to couple (and perhaps even mate) with his daughter, whom West keeps calling Rapunzel (eventually, meeting Artemus Gordon, she bemusedly identifies herself by that name). The boys are just out to get West. One fun sequence comes in the obligatory capture, when they note out how much more comfortable he'll be without his hidden knife and his ring with a very sharp edge ("Why, you might have hurt yourself"). Later they play invite to play polo -- as the goal, naturally.

It also turns out that there's still another layer, which is Singh's real concern (and that of his ally, who obviously will not be identified here). I'll let you find out by watching the episode.

This is a superb episode, starting with Rob watching TV in his room -- a supremely schlocky science fiction horror movie about an alien (played by Danny Thomas, though we never see one scene from the movie) from the planet Twilo who uses strange devices hidden in walnut shells to convert humans into Twiloites (who have eyes in the back as well as fronts of their heads, but no thumbs).

Laura is naturally upset listening to all the eerie music and by Rob's summary of the plot -- wondering (in an imitation Boris Karloff voice) how he could type without thumbs. (He wouldn't be able to press the space bar.)

The next morning things turn weird. Laura brings out an egg carton -- packed with walnuts. She hands Richie his school lunch -- a bag of walnuts. Then Rob tells Sally and Buddy about the movie, and Sally insists she was at the UN when it all happened. Later the alien (Kolak) turns up, and Rob naturally tries to assume he's really the actor -- receiving the response, "What is a Danny Thomas?" (Very British-sounding accent.) Rob finds a walnut with the alien device, and while trying to flick his lighter seems to be missing a thumb.

He finally arrives to a famous scene of Laura sliding out of the closet on a large pile of walnuts. You'll have to view the episode to see what happens after that.

Alfred Hitchcock liked a touch of humor in his stories, and sometimes a lot more than that. This is one example, a mystery writer who thinks he should have no trouble figuring out who murdered him given his last day to live over again. In the end he still needs help figuring it out, but also by then no longer really cares. Indeed, he now wonders how he ended up in Heaven -- only to learn that mystery writers always go there. God apparently has interesting tastes.