Quartile rating: 4.5/10 · 1 rating
British Ministry agent John Steed, under direction from "Mother", investigates a diabolical plot by arch-villain Sir August de Wynter to rule the world with his weather control machine. Steed investigates the beautiful Doctor Mrs. Emma Peel, the only suspect, but simultaneously falls for her and joins forces with her to combat Sir August.
The 1998 Avengers film adaptation is widely regarded as a catastrophic misfire. The plot is incoherent and poorly constructed, failing to coherently translate the beloved TV series' charm into a feature-length narrative. The weather-control villain scheme is a cliché handled without wit. Ralph Fiennes and Uma Thurman are miscast and given almost nothing to work with, delivering stilted performances that lack the chemistry essential to the source material. Sean Connery as the villain is campy to the point of embarrassment. Visually the film is flat and unremarkable for its era. While the source TV series was highly distinctive, this adaptation strips away what made it novel, replacing it with generic late-90s action filmmaking — so Novelty is low. The climax and resolution are particularly weak, resolving hastily with little payoff. One of the more notorious box-office and critical disasters of the decade.