The world has been rocked by a wave of political assinations. A mysterious organisation known as The Fanatics are responsible and Richard – masquerading as a killer called Richard Carson (David Burke) – infiltrates the group.

Matters are complicated when the real Carson escapes from prison. And then it’s discovered that the Fanatics will be targeting Tremayne next …

Today it’s Richard who steps up to the front. The episode gives William Gaunt a good opportunity to do some acting – to begin with there’s a fine two-hander between him and Donald Pickering (as Colonel Banks). Banks is the army officer responsible for detaining Carson in a military prison – he has little time for Carson and it seems even less for Richard.

Now posing as Carson, Richard is rescued by the Fanatics. It’s done in a very blood-thirsty way (the handful of military police officers travelling with him are either killed or badly injured). This is a slightly jarring moment, but it does reinforce the notion that the Fanatics do mean business.

Colonel Banks later gets to confront Craig and Sharron. He wonders if they have the deaths of the military policeman on their conscience. Craig angrily replies that “in our job justification and conscience are luxuries that we can’t afford”.  This feels a little more of a real-world monent than we often see in the series.

Gerald Harper (Croft) and Julian Glover (Anderson) are amongst the top actors enriching today’s episode. Croft is the boss of the Fanatics whilst Anderson (sporting a natty moustache) is his number two.  Harper is icily effective as the implacable Croft. Glover doesn’t get a great deal to do, alas.

Richard suffers a bloodless long-distance spot of torture, designed to establish if he really is Carson. Odd that Croft wasn’t in the room with him, surely the scene would have a little more punch if Gaunt and Harper had been able to make eye contact. But no matter, things are redeemed by a later scene where Richard and Croft face off. It’s wonderfully tense, with both actors impressing.

Given that It’s a Terry Nation script you might have expected a bit more of a science fiction feel (or indeed a character called Tarrant). Instead we get a fairly straightforward script which doesn’t really utilise the Champions’ powers.

And after the action-packed pre credits sequence, the episode does becalm into a rather talky run-around. But it’s by no means all bad, mainly thanks to Gaunt and Harper, and things do pick up towards the end.

It’s amusing and eye-opening to see how both Richard and Craig squabble to take the attractive female assassin into custody at the conclusion of the episode. Craig is the lucky one, with Richard muttering that his friend will be well capable of handling her (a line simply dripping with innuendo).

Slightly patchy, but I’ll still give The Fanatics four out of five.