A striking, Prisoner-esque opening with a group of the eponymous undertakers shooting Madden (Patrick Holt returning from Intercrime) before solemnly doffing their top hats.
Then we have a series of scenes where Steed tries to see Professor Renter, who he's been tasked with accompanying to America, but is put off by Mrs Renter (Lally 'You're Only Young Twice' Bowers). She, it transpires, is a central figure in the 'undertaking' scheme, which is basically about pretending that dead people are still alive, in order to avoid inheritance taxes. The apparent assassination of Madden is a quite confusing first impression to give us, because it suggests the scheme works in the opposite way.
The best bit for me was Cathy being taken on by Mrs Renter as assistant, and being warned to watch out in case a Mrs Catherine Gale should call. Also some amusing allusions to Dracula when one of the characters hides in a coffin. But on the whole this story didn't really satisfy me: the fight among the empty coffins feels a bit contrived, and the gun battle at the end goes on for too long. And Steed gets a terrible closing gag which I think is meant to make him sound raffish, but comes across as making him seem like a pervert. I was surprised to see that Malcolm Hulke was the scriptwriter, perhaps this was one of his off days.
I notice that the incidental music is getting more varied as we go along: back in series 2 it was all just bits of the theme tune, then there seemed to be a new, but quite limited selection of other cues; by this point though there's far more variety. The gun battle for example features the main riff from the signature tune being played on what sounds like some kind of tuneable drum (sorry, I'm not very good with musical terms).
Ronald Russell (Lord Holdhurst in the Granada Naval Treaty) as one of the dead-people-impersonating actors employed by the Undertakers.
Howard Goorney returns from Girl on the Trapeze.
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