User Reviews

Although IMDb lists "Fair Exchange" as the fifth episode of "The Secret Agent", it comes third on the DVDs from A&E Video. This could be a mistake by IMDb but I strongly suspect it's because A&E made the mistake. This is because I've watched other series by them and they showed complete indifference about presenting the shows in the proper order!

Lelia Goldoni plays Lisa, a British agent who had been captured and tortured by an East German agent, Pohlman. Now it's odd that they'd cast Goldoni, as she clearly has an American accent. Regardless, she comes to Drake asking for help--as SOMEONE is chasing her. Soon you find that she is being chased--by British Intelligence who want to stop her. This is because Goldoni is bent on killing Pohlman and they want to stop her because this will no doubt heat up the Cold War. But, through the course of the show, you realize that things aren't as they seem--there is SOMETHING else going on here.

This is a good episode of "Secret Agent". There's plenty of action, plot twists and intrigue. As usual, Drake manages to outsmart everyone and avoid killing.

Personal relationships---and personal vendettas---underscore "Fair Exchange" as M9 agent John Drake helps a tormented colleague with a deadly axe to grind. Pursued through London by a mysterious man, former M9 agent Lisa Lanzing (Lelia Goldoni) shows up at Drake's door also wary of him; she displays signs of paranoia and indeed had been institutionalized until recently, but her trauma is legitimate: She had been captured behind the Iron Curtain and tortured by a notorious security chief---and now she wants to return to East Germany to kill him.

John le Carré again figures into "Danger Man" as the sturdy script by Wilfred Greatorex (who had co-written the previous episode "The Professionals," also set behind the Iron Curtain) and Marc Brandel sends Drake through Berlin's infamous Checkpoint Charlie to follow Lanzing behind the Iron Curtain. Posing as her estranged husband, Drake tips her intentions to East German spymaster Otto Berg (Andre Van Gyseghem), but of course he and his son Wilhelm (George Mikell) sense an advantage in Lanzing's plot, although when Drake realizes what they've engineered, he must find a way to turn it to his own advantage---while saving Lanzing in the process.

Charles Crichton directs with a keen sense of suspense, underplaying the potential for outsized heroics during the action sequences, which include the climactic closing scenes that recall le Carré's 1963 novel "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold" (and soon to be echoed in director Martin Ritt's 1965 movie adaptation), although the extended pursuit of Lanzing in the opening does become overwrought.

Goldoni doesn't mitigate that with an uneven, creaky performance---she is outclassed by Patrick McGoohan in their scenes together as their characters attempt to convey an abiding friendship. McGoohan's Drake has a prickly relationship with his London handler, Gorton (Raymond Adamson), himself a shade irritable as tensions within the organization heighten over the disposition of erstwhile operative Lanzing. Subtly deflecting cliché, "Fair Exchange" takes familiar hallmarks of the Cold War and gives them a fresh twist while giving viewers a glimpse of the man behind John Drake, if only briefly.

REVIEWER'S NOTE: What makes a review "helpful"? Every reader of course decides that for themselves. For me, a review is helpful if it explains why the reviewer liked or disliked the work or why they thought it was good or not good. Whether I agree with the reviewer's conclusion is irrelevant. "Helpful" reviews tell me how and why the reviewer came to their conclusion, not what that conclusion may be. Differences of opinion are inevitable. I don't need "confirmation bias" for my own conclusions. Do you?