That was an interesting hour. We get another example of Napoleon being hypno-trained into a cover personality, another delicious villain, and Ilya training with a stick and a pointy thing on a rope. On the other hand, the Innocent's story is a bit half-baked, and the whole thing is just a tad prolonged. Ultimately, it's still a fun hour of television, so let's be happy.
In 'The Green Opal Affair', a visiting agent is discovered destroying a record tape while in a tortured mental state, whose words while collapsing point Napoleon towards an eccentric millionaire suspected of being part of THRUSH. However, and this is where we get a turnaround, the dying words are a trap! Napoleon has been selected for subtle brain surgery, so that he will become a double agent when he reaches the high command of UNCLE, along with many other professionals in other areas. Yes, almost the whole episode is a trap! Ha! The Innocent this week is a housewife, who has also been taken in order to later push her husband into a senior position for THRUSH's later benefit. She works pretty well, but not perfectly, as someone who is unhappy with her husband not being ambitious.
We don't have Mr Waverley this time, which is a shame, but we do have Carroll O'Connor as the hilariously villainous mastermind behind the brain alteration scheme, the wheelchair bound Brach, who has a numerologist and that great villain staple that is the shark bay. What better way than to be nobbled by your own sharks after your numerologist gets annoyed and shoves your wheelchair in? Huzzah!
All in all, this is a much better example of brain alteration and villainy than 'The Brain-Killer Affair', which really faltered thanks to the odd tonal shifts, and was bumped in the airing order to be far away from this one as they're thematically similar. 'The Green Opal Affair' isn't perfect, but it's pretty good, and it's great to see Ilya's bizarre exercise routines. He's definitely an usual and kooky Russian, but time will tell as to whether we prefer one man from UNCLE or two. Jerry Goldsmith's scores are continuing to be excellent when its his turn to compose, and we had sharks!
You can't beat sharks in secret agent stories. Go, sharks, go!
O.
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