Paul Temple and the Geneva Mystery

On the contrary it revolves around Julia Carrington - the film star who looks fifteen years younger than she is. Steve hates her.

This is the late 1960s where characters are allowed to say "bitch" and no longer go in for such antics.

Except this one which happens twice. The first time Paul and Steve aren't in the car - instead it is two car thieves who end up in a ditch but the killer wasn't to know that. So much so that he went all the way out to Switzerland to have another go.

Dear Dolly, on what appeared to be her deathbed, uttered the moving, significant and eventually tedious words "I'm too young to die".

By Timothy! yes. Geneva and St Moritz (which varies in pronunciation from week to week - anything between "San Mer-itz" to "Sunt Morits") and London form a "Triangle" style triangle between which the various parties are forever travelling.

The key to the whole mystery seems to be finding out who used the name "Richard Randolf". But, hold hard!, why does he, she or it want a suitcase to be left with instructions that it be collected by "Leslie"?

Having had their car stolen and then forced into a ditch by a maniac with a machine gun, a replacement car seems a godsend. Until it blows up in traffic with enough force to shatter nearby windows but without damaging the cars all around it in the gridlock.

First they are lured to a hotel in Bray-on-Thames and from there to a houseboat called "Peter's Folly". But who is Peter and why is there a mysterious phone call from an apparent well wisher telling Paul not to "pick up the book"?

Again with the doubling up - not only is the Calendar Club possibly mixed up in this affair but also the Carlos Club. And Vince Langham seems to frequent both of them...

We briefly meet a foreign doctor and he gives Mrs Temple some pills but I don't think it would be fair to claim he was mixed up in the Milbourne Affair.

At the heart of this whole affair lies a sordid tale of blackmail, blackmail and more attempted blackmail.

With the amount of travelling that goes on in this tale they could've smuggled half of Switzerland over but they don't seem to have bothered.

Oh lordy yes. Barely two minutes passes without mention of "Too Young To Die" by Richard Randolf.

Not a whiff of it. Even the car bomber chooses the dreadfully dull name "Stone" when he calls to deliver his gift of death.

No less than three of the five cliffhangers are someone saying they're "too young to die". It gets rather wearing after the first couple. You begin to wish they'd prove themselves wrong.

He asks some pretty personal questions but never prefaces them with his former catchphrase. I guess people in the swinging sixties weren't in need to advance warning to hide their budgies and cover their wives.

Simon Lack is on the scene playing playboy film director Vince Langham. His wife sounds like she'd give good phone sex.

Steve is having a seriously off few days. She is saved from certain bomb death not by her powers of hunch but by Charlie jogging over and telling her to get the heck out of the car. The closest she gets to any sort of inspiration is a mild dislike of Maurice Lonsdale, international financier. She even requires a telephone call from a mystery well wisher to make her suspicious of the message asking Temple to go out to a houseboat and meet an apparent baddie.

Maurice Lonsdale, international financier, gets a migraine and takes too many tablets. But can our heroes believe what they deciphered from his hotel room blotter? Luckily, he survives the overdose and furthermore doesn't seem in the least bit bothered by it.

Danny Clayton - Miss Carrington's confidential secretary - is the owner of a variable American accent. It's better than most in the Templeverse but in 2006 - where we have real Americans to play with - it doesn't pass muster. This clip is his first and least convincing appearance.

Another double whammy (of a sort) as the villain gets him, her or itself run over by a police car.

A very commendable 12.5 marks. Extra credit when you remember that this serial only had six episodes while all the others under consideration had eight. With another hour to play with who knows what Mr Durbridge would've come up with? A foreign, drug smuggling doctor known as "Stethoscope" Von Erich no doubt.