The great Victor Buono makes his second and unfortunately final appearance as Count Manzeppi in “The Night of the Feathered Fury.” While I have to honestly say the Count plays second fiddle to Dr. Miguelito Loveless when it comes to recurring villains, the cot has a humorous, yet menacing demeanor of which I would like to have seen more. Alas, ’twas not to be.The plot centers around the search for a toy chicken which was I the possession of Gerda, one of the Count’s associates, but wound up confiscated by the Secret Service when she was nearly captured. The significance of the toy is a mystery until the fourth act, but in the interim, there are double-crosses, fist fights, and other assorted machinations and Jim attempts to discover what is so important about the bird while the cout ad his ew cadre of eccentrics attempt to steal it from him.
The toy chicken is a shell that covers the famed Philosopher’s Stone, a stone which can turn bae metals into gold. The Count discovered the Philosopher’s Stone was real on some of his journeys . He decided to disguise it inside a toy for safe keeping, but has had a difficult time holding onto it as more people figured out what its true power.
Ggerda wounds up with the toy chicken, but accidentally turns herself into gold with it when exposed to a full moon. So the series that claims to be James Bond in the Old West features a direct homage to Goldfinger. The Count escapes in a hot air balloon with promises to return another day. Unfortunately, we know he will not.
“The Night of the Feathered Fury” features one of my favorite femme fatales of the series, Michele Carey. The smokey voiced beauty is quite alluring. She will return again in another avian themed episode I the fourth season called “The Night of the Winged Terror, Part I/II” a story I remember her being even more sultry in. We will see soon if my memory holds up.
I do not recall her facing such a tragic end in the latter episodes. 
“The Night of the Feathered Fury” is a highlight of the second season and series as a whole, largely due to Buono. He only played Count Manzeppi twice, so we have to take what we can get. There is a huge leap I logic getting Jim and Artie involved in the story--Gerda is to kill the two in revenge for thwarting the Count’s plan to assassinate Mexican President Benito Juarez. She fails and just happens to hae the toy chicken with her for o other reason than to drop it. Nevertheless, the episode is fun enough to overlook the absurd catalyst for it all. The Count is eccentric, after all.Rating: **** (out of 5)
