The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (TV Series) The Super-Colossal Affair (1966) User Reviews

A Stinker in more way than One

[gordonl56 · 5/10 · 28 January 2015]

MAN FROM UNCLE – The Super Colossal Affair – 1966

There is not much I can say about this stinker of an episode that the other reviewer has not pointed out. What were the people in charge thinking when they made this terrible excuse of an episode. I think several martinis too many at lunch or the like.

If it was not for Carol Wayne's ample upper-works, and the odd laugh supplied by Shelley Berman I would have given up watching 10 minutes into the thing. No wonder the series started taking a nose dive in the ratings. A return to first season form in year four was too late to save the series. Too, bad.

U.N.C.L.E. jumps the shark!

[ShadeGrenade · 1/10 · 2 July 2009]

Television historian and U.N.C.L.E. buff William J.Koenig describes this as 'the first sign that Season 3 was going to be hell for U.N.C.L.E. fans'. He is right.

Solo and Kuryakin are spying on a Mafia conference in Sicily. Uncle Giuliano ( J.Carrol Naish ), the head of the mob, says Las Vegas has gotten out of control. The U.N.C.L.E. duo are spotted, and are lucky to escape with their lives.

Back in the States, Frank Cariago ( Bernard Fein ) arrives in Hollywood to carry out a secret assignment. Hearing about a troubled movie based on the 'Sodom & Gomorrah' legend, he steps in and offers two million dollars to resume production. The one catch is that he wants his talentless girlfriend Ginger LaVeer ( Carol Wayne ) to star.

Solo and Kuryakin turn up at the studio, but are caught. However, Cariago thinks they were sent by Uncle Giuliano, and gives them jobs. The gangster is using the shoot as cover for an operation to wipe Las Vegas off the map with an atomic bomb...

Appallingly bad, the worst the show had gotten at that point. Gangsters plotting to nuke Vegas? Come on! In a 'hilarious' plot twist, it transpires that said bomb contains nothing more dangerous than ( are you ready for this? ) essence of skunk! Yes, a ten-pound stink bomb! The sight of Illya riding the bomb free-fall over the city outraged fans, and disgusted Sam Rolfe, the show's developer/first season producer, who told his wife not to expect too many more royalty cheques in the future. It beggars belief that writer Stanford Sherman thought that he could get away with such a crass idea.

The script has other problems too. When Solo and Illya are caught, Cariago has them suspended in mid-air and the latter lowered into quick-drying cement. Later ( when it has hardened ), Solo taps the block and Illya is still alive! How did he breathe in there? Carol Wayne is an eye-full as dippy 'Ginger' and Shelley Berman provides a few chuckles as hack director 'Sheldon Veblen', but that's about it.

Unfortunately, this was not the worst Season 3 had to offer. A bomb in both senses of the word.

The LAS VEGAS Affair

[profh-1 · 4/10 · 14 July 2022]

The Mob is concerned that they've lost control of the city they built. So head man J. Carrol Naish (the Irish actor who played every nationality conceivable except Irish in his time) sends his idiot nephew to make things right-- OR ELSE. Said idiot has a "dumb blonde" girlfriend who wants to get into the movies, and when they find a film based on "Sodam And Gomorrah" needs money, the gangster puts up the cash in return for her becoming the new leading lady. (Shades of "Bullets Over Broadway".) Solo & Ilya are briefly mistaken as having been sent by HIS uncle, rather than their U. N. C. L. E. And then in the last act, things go COMPLETELY insane, when it turns out, the climax of the film involves dropping an a-bomb on the city.

I wanna sarcastically "thank" whoever wrote the IMDB sypnopsis for blowing the end of this story. It's a good thing I watched the episode before reading it. Hey, I found it funny and clever! The mobster figured out a way to get revenge and lower property values without losing all that real estate! I'd say on that score, he's smarter than The Pentagon.

Other opinions to the contrary, I did NOT find this to be the "worst" episode so far. There were MULTIPLE 2nd-season episodes way more painful to sit thru than this one, and, frankly, "The Mother Muffin Affair" over on "GIRL" was way worse than any of those-- or this! If I'm laughing hard enough, I can put up with a lot. And I was laughing!

The blame, I suppose, can be laid on Stanford Sherman, a name I know well, from no less than 18 2nd & 3rd-season "BATMAN" episodes. That includes "Hizzoner The Penguin" and "The Penguin's Clean Sweep", 2 of the VERY WORST stories on that show, but, ironically, also "The Zodiac Crimes" and "Pop Goes The Joker", 2 of the very BEST Joker stories!! (Go figure.) Suffice to say, the 1966-67 TV season saw some of the STUPIDEST, most INSANE writing in the entire history of television. How on Earth did both "STAR TREK" and "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE" manage to debut that same season, with some of the very BEST writing ever seen on TV, to this day?

I really liked Carol Wayne. I bet she was pretty sharp off-camera to play such a convincing "dumb blonde" on-camera. And she managed to get out of that locked closet by herself, and find the heroes. So she must have had something going on. And, she was such a sweetie.

No matter how you look at it... this was STILL better than "DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER" (1971). Way better!