“The Night of the Big Blackmail” serves as the premiere episode of the fourth, final, and trouble plagued season of The Wild Wild West. Both Robert Conrad and Ross Martin were seriously injured filming episodes. Martin also suffered a heart attack early on which limited his appearances. But it was the rising anti-violence sentiment in the wake of the assassinations of RFK and MLK that ultimately spelled the show’s doom. Until then, though, there was a lot of fun to be had.Case in point--this episode. Our heroes take advantage of a fencing tournament hold at an ambiguously Eastern European country’s embassy in Washington to steal a case I which Baron Hintertroiser has hidden some item which he will reveal as an embarrassment to the United States. Jim manages to steal the case in an exciting, Mission Impossible-esque escapade. Inside is an anachronistic, but bless them they tried to make it convincing fake film which shows “Ulysses S. Grant” signing a treaty with an oriental leader of an ambiguous, yet obviously public enemy number one country. With the United States in international disgrace, the Baron’s country can expand its territory unchallenged.
Our heroes spend the bulk of the episode engaging in an elaborate plan to place an altered film into its place I the embassy’s basement before anyone realizes it is missing. As per this show’s requirements, the embassy was designed by an eccentric architect with booby traps and a highly elaborate safe, all of which are made short work of by our heroes. When the baron ultimately plays the replaced film for his audience of dignitaries, it is mostly Artie engaged in an impression of The Little Tramp forty years before Charlie Chaplin.
“The Night of the Big Blackmail” has an unusually large number of anachronisms, such as a phonograph recording used to distract some foreign henchmen on top of the film that is the key to the entire plot. All of them I can excuse because of the general appeal of the episode. A big highlight id Harvey Korman’s role as the Baron. The character has echoes of his turn as the villainous Headley Lamarr in Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles, a movie which was still five years away from filming. Definitely a good start to the weirdly fun, but sadly unlucky fourth season.
Rating: *** (out of 5)
