THE INNOCENT: Diana Millay as Ernestine Pepper, a notary public who goes to Rome in search of the same man Solo and Ilya are - a racketeer she once dated (blindly) and who, as a result(?), acted as a witness to a will that's now being contested. And unless she can get his signature on another document, a poor widow and her kids will go hungry. She's a good person, but there are times when you wonder if she IS an agent for someone, as she seems to know way too much about (or seems too invested in) the villain and his lost kingdom. Millay had many guest appearances on television in the 60s and later became a regular on Dark Shadows.
REVIEW: I'm never going to complain about Waverly being absent (or "in Nairobi", whatever) because I find the character a boring drip, but it IS weird, right? After a bungled mission where the boys see a uranium peddler murdered and his killer kidnapped, they just go back to UNCLE and are told to find something to busy themselves. These agents are really quite autonomous and can just hang out in their boss's big office and do whatever they like. Now I understand why Mission: Impossible decided to make its boss a voice on a tape. We don't want our superspies to ask permission at every step, just to get on with it. And so Solo and Ilya are off to Rome to try and ferret out just what's happening here. Rome's UNCLE office is just like New York's (not the same sets, surely!), with a dry cleaners' front and a sexy receptionist. Among its agents are a couple of Star Trek people, which juiced this up for me: Arlene Martel (T'Pring) is Gemma Lusso, the hot Italian agent who obviously has a past with Solo, is a fount of local information, and loves playing coy. Her cover as Ilya's wife doesn't prevent her from planting kisses on her old flame instead. And then there's the receptionist, Tanya Lemani, who I immediately recognized when she was belly dancing later in the villain's club (a cover that doesn't amount to anything, just a bit of alluring exoticism) - that HAD to be the dancer from "Wolf in the Fold", and of course, it was. I'd know those moves anywhere.
There's a LOT going on from then on, with plenty of suspects, and yet, Paul Stevens HAS to be the big bad because he's in the opening credits - so that's a spoiler! To be fair, all the other people Gemma describes are in on his scheme, they just don't all have lines. Anyway, Stevens plays the king in exile of a fictional Middle Eastern country, Fasik el Pasad, keen to retake his throne in a complicated plan that involves sabotaged weapons from across military history (were Revenge rifles, etc. real!?) to demoralize the rebels (which slots into Solo's cover as a rather foppish arms dealer), and more strangely, the recruitment of a personal army using not much more than his charisma and maybe the promise of titles and lands in his country. His second banana, for example, is "Bobo Barrett", a thug now Prince, and the racketeer who everyone is tracking seems to have happily joined his kidnapper's forces and is studying hard to become a valued member of Pasad's army. The uranium was just a red herring so Pasad could recruit people who didn't seem to mind if bad faith actors caused a nuclear holocaust, that's the kind of people he wants to surround himself with. But he's not smart about it. For example, he asks Solo's cover identity to prove his loyalty by slicing Ernestine's throat open (no other means will do), but Solo isn't playing some cutthroat killer - he's an arms dealing middle man who is being bribed with money and land. Either you're paying for allies or they're your cultists who will do anything you ask, but not both. But then the title does seem to impugn the efficacy of this regime, doesn't it?
Where the episode fails - and this is increasingly on my mind - is the integration of the Innocent into the proceedings. Ernestine comes out of nowhere, seems like an insider, turns out to be a mundane American girl who is ready to go abroad and confront international criminals for a woman she hardly knows (it's the right thing to do), just to get a signature on a document. Her attraction to Solo, who's playing a disreputable role anyway, is likewise unjustified. When kidnapped in case she's an agent, she has a passionate opinion on the internal politics of the Middle East. I never believe in her character (or that she climbed over that courtyard wall, honestly). They do let her do a little stunt - jumping out of a high window - which was a surprise, given that the stunts are the episode's OTHER failure. Well, not the stunts themselves, but the director's inability to hide obvious stuntmen from us. The most egregious is when Ilya has a fight on Solo's balcony and it's clearly not him. Later, the otherwise cool Solo vs. horseman fight also shoots the stuntmen straight in the face. It's too bad. The horse stuff is still neat, and Ilya running in with the gasmask cavalry too, but the production is clumsy.
HEARD ON CHANNEL D: "He never really breaks the law. He just diligently destroys businessmen and businesses. Like a shark tearing a drowning man to shreds." (Gemma)
"You see, the safety catch is on. It limits the range of the weapon considerably." (Solo)
"You had another visitor drop in. He's dropped out." (Ilya)
BONDED: Ernestine Pepper shared a surname with the most polarizing James Bond character, though Sheriff Pepper won't appear in that franchise until 1973's Live and Let Die. Arlene Martel (Gemma) guest-starred on The Monkees' spy spoof episode, "The Spy Who Came in From the Cool".
REWATCHABILITY - Medium: Undercooked. There's too much going on that requires explanations, and the motivations are dodgy. Still a lot of cool moments to love - the dynamic between Solo and Gemma Lusso, the fights (no matter who's actually doing them), and Solo passing every test thrown at him.
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