I saw this on TV in Jan. 1967 and the story has stuck with me ever since. Just the idea of paying college students to kill was a tantalizing idea at that time in film making, least alone for family TV viewing, It was one of the few episodes to be shot OUTSIDE of the Elstree Studios. They went down the road to Aldenham Park for the outdoor shots. The story took place in a remote country estate and the park fit the bill. This was very noticeable from the usual "indoor studio" look of the series. This change was quit remarkable for TV in that era. I remember it like it was yesterday. It isn't on Y/T. There is a fantastic clear perfect copy on SHOUT FACTORY for anyone who want to see it. It is good.
6 Reviews
Something different
Leofwine_draca21 July 2021
Warning: Spoilers
Interesting plot in this one, about a pseudo cult going around playing in macabre games which eventually lead to murder. Angela Douglas doesn't give the greatest performance in the world but it is fun to see John Steiner, later a standby in Italian horror and exploitation films, playing a manic goon.
Hmmmm - warning of spoilers below
kmoh-128 January 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Utter nonsense, as The Saint tries to move onto Avengers territory without any understanding of why the Avengers worked.
Unlikely students with odd jumpers and trousers are drawn into developing their homicidal skills for not very much reason. It's not clear why the villain didn't simply employ decent heavies of a more traditional variety (as he clearly did for the security guards on his island).
Several death game students have gone missing, presumably chosen by Vogler to work in his organisation. But then where are they? How much work do they have to do? Why aren't they busy guarding his island? How many murderous geniuses does he need?
And when Vogler has Simon and his ladyfriend in his clutches, why does he let them go and try to catch them again? Why not simply kill them on the spot? It wasn't to make the murders look accidental, as they were to be shot. If he wanted to test his new employees, why do the security guards come along with them? If he valued the sport (as in The Most Dangerous Game), then it came at a high price when Simon triumphs at the end.
An early (pre-May 1968) example of a paranoid style in which students are sinister, clever, psychopathic, but also naive and easily controllable by evil geniuses, Moore's film Crossplot being another example of the genre. It was always a silly genre, but this one is completely ludicrous, devoid even of an internal logic.
Unlikely students with odd jumpers and trousers are drawn into developing their homicidal skills for not very much reason. It's not clear why the villain didn't simply employ decent heavies of a more traditional variety (as he clearly did for the security guards on his island).
Several death game students have gone missing, presumably chosen by Vogler to work in his organisation. But then where are they? How much work do they have to do? Why aren't they busy guarding his island? How many murderous geniuses does he need?
And when Vogler has Simon and his ladyfriend in his clutches, why does he let them go and try to catch them again? Why not simply kill them on the spot? It wasn't to make the murders look accidental, as they were to be shot. If he wanted to test his new employees, why do the security guards come along with them? If he valued the sport (as in The Most Dangerous Game), then it came at a high price when Simon triumphs at the end.
An early (pre-May 1968) example of a paranoid style in which students are sinister, clever, psychopathic, but also naive and easily controllable by evil geniuses, Moore's film Crossplot being another example of the genre. It was always a silly genre, but this one is completely ludicrous, devoid even of an internal logic.
Death is no game
coltras3519 August 2021
Playing murder as a game can be fun. Until it becomes a dangerous case of the real thing. After the death of tutor, killed because he suspected there was something more behind the Death Game, the Saint's scent leads him to the Swiss alps.
Highly entertaining and eccentric episode with a terrific opening where our hero is almost killed by a mini-cannon, an arrow - the rest is just as fun. It's a quirky entry with an interesting idea that wouldn't be odd in The Avengers TV series and its far from dull, especially when you get Angela Douglas and Roger Moore, who have a good chemistry.
Highly entertaining and eccentric episode with a terrific opening where our hero is almost killed by a mini-cannon, an arrow - the rest is just as fun. It's a quirky entry with an interesting idea that wouldn't be odd in The Avengers TV series and its far from dull, especially when you get Angela Douglas and Roger Moore, who have a good chemistry.
Favorite Episode
meatdivine16 September 2021
I've rewatched this episode more times than I can count. It still offers something new and exciting every time and keeps you guessing as to what is going on with the plot behind the death game. The cast is wonderful from George Murcell to John Steiner and the episode as a whole definitely deserves 10/10 stars.
Prescient.
aramis-112-80488012 December 2023
A mastermind comes up with an idea for creating assassins with a "game" where they think up ways of killing people. Most of the participants join it for the "fun" of the thing, but the really serious ones are taken to the next level.
Decades before the Internet came up with viral games where impressionable young people wind up killing themselves "The Saint" was exploring that territory. As a character said on "Monty Python," a murderer is only an extroverted suicide.
I'd like to say the whole thing is unalterably goofy, and it's not a favorite episode of mine. But it is within the realm of possibility.
In the 1100s a series of figures in Syria known collectively as "The Old Man of the Mountain" recruited young people into a worldly paradise (okay, promising "recruits" were kidnapped) and the were made especially happy with hashish (where we derive the word "assassin"). When the Old Man was paid to kill somebody he'd remove a promising trainee from "paradise" and say he couldn't come back until he'd killed his target. Since it didn't matter whether they went to paradise living or dead, they'd often succeed because they didn't care if they were killed on the job.
In an increasingly virtual tiktok world, one can see how a new Old Man can create a viral online game to weed out those with a truly murderous mind. It's easier to do that these days than any time since the twelfth century.
Watch the way college kids shut down speakers they don't want to hear. And other things they say, and how violent their language. It's only a short step from talking violence to doing it. (When I was in college as a young lefty if we didn't want to hear a speaker we simply didn't go; we didn't issue death threats).
It's a silly episode for its time but to anyone close to young people (as a student, grad student and employee I was at a major college for 36 years), one can see a glimmer of how it's possible in a virtual world, where a "death game" can be an obsession.
Fortunately, the presentation is faintly ridiculous. But so was lots of stuff in science fiction that is now taken for granted.
Decades before the Internet came up with viral games where impressionable young people wind up killing themselves "The Saint" was exploring that territory. As a character said on "Monty Python," a murderer is only an extroverted suicide.
I'd like to say the whole thing is unalterably goofy, and it's not a favorite episode of mine. But it is within the realm of possibility.
In the 1100s a series of figures in Syria known collectively as "The Old Man of the Mountain" recruited young people into a worldly paradise (okay, promising "recruits" were kidnapped) and the were made especially happy with hashish (where we derive the word "assassin"). When the Old Man was paid to kill somebody he'd remove a promising trainee from "paradise" and say he couldn't come back until he'd killed his target. Since it didn't matter whether they went to paradise living or dead, they'd often succeed because they didn't care if they were killed on the job.
In an increasingly virtual tiktok world, one can see how a new Old Man can create a viral online game to weed out those with a truly murderous mind. It's easier to do that these days than any time since the twelfth century.
Watch the way college kids shut down speakers they don't want to hear. And other things they say, and how violent their language. It's only a short step from talking violence to doing it. (When I was in college as a young lefty if we didn't want to hear a speaker we simply didn't go; we didn't issue death threats).
It's a silly episode for its time but to anyone close to young people (as a student, grad student and employee I was at a major college for 36 years), one can see a glimmer of how it's possible in a virtual world, where a "death game" can be an obsession.
Fortunately, the presentation is faintly ridiculous. But so was lots of stuff in science fiction that is now taken for granted.
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