A Touch of Brimstone
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A Touch of Brimstone is an 1966 episode of the television series The Avengers. It is widely known for Diana Rigg's "Queen of Sin" costume. It is the twenty-first episode of the fourth season, and was the most watched episode of the Avengers on its original showing.
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[edit] Tag line
"Steed joins the Hellfire Club, Emma becomes the 'Queen of Sin'."
[edit] Synopsis
In this episode, agents John Steed and Emma Peel infiltrate an organization based upon orgiastic rituals. The story is episodic, beginning with a series of pranks on fictional important international figures (an exploding cigar and a collapsing floor under a potentate's box seat in an auditorium) and then continues to Steed's finding a pair of fake scissors made of rubber. But real scissors are used by an unnamed, faceless official opening the "International Friendship Club" on an electrified ribbon, killing him. The young prankster did not expect to be involved in murder and is distraught. He knows Steed and introduces him to the Hellfire Club.
The episode is best known for the scene in which Peel (played by Diana Rigg) dons a revealing "Queen of Sin" costume, complete with spiked dog collar, whalebone corset, and boots. It is the Hellfire club members who dress her this way; she appears for less than ten minutes of show time in this manner, always demure, though ending with fighting a man with a whip. As a result of this and other elements, the episode was not broadcast when The Avengers aired on American network television; it did air, unaltered, on British television.[1]
[edit] Guest stars
Guest stars in the episode included Peter Wyngarde (who appeared in the eleventh episode of the fifth season, "Epic"), and Carol Cleveland of the Monty Python series.
[edit] Later influence
This episode was the inspiration for the Hellfire Club in Marvel Comics "X-Men", and the appearance and name of one of its members was based on that of Peter Wyngarde.
