Rodney Marshall

Lew Grade's pioneering ITC company created a production line of quirky new drama series for British Independent Television in the 1960s, fulfilling a vision of providing entertaining, colour film series for a global market. In the first of a proposed series of critical guides, Avengers expert Rodney Marshall and television historian Matthew Lee explore ITC's Man in a Suitcase. Their book offers new, inventive readings of all thirty episodes. Man in a Suitcase is a product of its mid-1960s context, exploring themes such as Cold War espionage and Swinging Sixties playgirls, yet most of the stories also have a timeless feel to them: political corruption, blackmail, murder, missing persons or money, art theft. Despite the private detective/bounty hunter formula, there are welcome elements of playfulness, quirkiness, surrealism and a healthy abundance of social and political critique. Man in a Suitcase cannot be simplistically labelled as 'light entertainment' given the dark subject matter and its treatment. It blurs the boundaries between television drama genres." A product of its time and a timeless product: Man in a Suitcase will always be a conundrum." (Matthew Lee)

Updated 2025, including actor lists and an essay exploring the importance of locations in Travelling Man. Drawing inspiration from the private detective and Western genres, as well as the cult 1960s series The Fugitive, Roger Marshall's mid-1980s drama Travelling Man was both critically acclaimed and commercially popular, drawing audiences of up to 13.2 million viewers. Ex-Drugs Squad detective and prisoner Alan Lomax is a fascinatingly flawed protagonist, but it is the setting of the canals and inland waterways of Britain which provide the unique charm of Travelling Man, offering the perfect backdrop for Lomax's nomadic quests. The canals also dictate the show's leisured pace. Writer and podcaster Rodney Marshall offers a critical guide to all thirteen episodes, exploring the scripts, direction, characterisation, acting and music.

Political satire, comic strip action adventure, science fiction, space opera, Orwellian dystopia, costume drama, Western... Drawing on a range of genres, Terry Nation's Blake's 7 resists categorisation or labelling; a ground-breaking piece of television drama. Presenting itself as easy-viewing, early evening entertainment for a (largely) teenage audience - which, on one level, it was - it tackles state-surveillance, propaganda, corruption, genocide, revolution, and terrorism. Avengers expert Rodney Marshall turns his attention to Blake's 7, offering unauthorised, entertaining, thought-provoking critical guides to all fifty-two episodes in Series 1-4. Horizon (the official Blake's 7 fan club) moderator Alex Pinfold has added a Foreword to this third edition, while television historian Matthew Lee has penned an essay on Terry Nation and Blake's 7. Combining dark humour, surrealism, shiny surfaces and dramatic depth, Blake's 7 blurs the boundary between hero/villain.