Does anyone else remember this show? It was a British sci-fi show which ran from 1979-82. Sapphire and Steel (Joanna Lumley and David McCallum) were two 'operatives' who had to maintain the order and integrity of Time.

Time is described in the series as being like a corridor that surrounds everything and intersects it, but where there are weak spots, Time can break into the present and take things away (usually humans). There are also malign beings who 'patrol' this corridor looking for weak spots where they can break in and wreak havoc. Different things can create these weak spots, antiques, chanting an old nursery rhyme, old photographs etc.

Sapphire and Steel themselves are clearly not quite human, and have 'abilities' which help them carry out their duties. Steel has telekinetic abilites, while Sapphire can 'rewind' time selectively.

The series is actually quite spooky, and is more like a series of ghost stories with a sci-fi edge to them. They could often be genuinely scary, and one episode made it onto one of those 'Top 100 Scary Moments' shows. I'm not sure if the show was ever screened in the U.S, but it's well worth getting on video if it wasn't.

So, anyone else remember it?

Oh yes! Not only do I remember it, but I have the DVD sets of the entire run. Although I refuse to watch the last adventure because I hate the way it ended.

I still remember how freaked out I was by the very first S&S story. Mainly because at the time I was living in an old house with old furniture...let's just say I wasn't singing nursery rhymes for a long while afterwards!

Yay! Someone else knows the series! There is something very freaky about the first one.... 'Ring a ring a roses....' ;)

There's a set of audiobook adventures too, but I don't know much about those.

I've ordered the one with the old photographs (adventure 4), is it as scary as the first one?

Is that the series that ended with them in a room floating in space?

"Is that the series that ended with them in a room floating in space?"

That's the one! There had been plans for more episodes after that one - but Joanna Lumley and David McCallum were big stars at the time and couldn't make the time commitment to the show. They do escape from the room, I think, some of the audiobooks that have been made recently are set after the last televised episode. I don't know *how* they escaped though.

I don't think it's the creepiest, but don't be surprized if you find yourself a little camera shy afterwards!

To me, the 2nd adventure, the one in the railway station is the absolute creepiest one.

Thanks ceindreadh! The railway station one stuck in my head for ages after watching it. I kept singing the song the soldier was whistling; 'pack up your troubles in your old kit bag......'. It was quite unnerving.

I'm looking like crazy to buy this series, but so far can only find the new audiobooks. I remember this show seriously freaking me out as a child. There was one scene thats still with me, where a newly assigned agent is found dead, with his face burned. Scary stuff. I didn't sleep properly for days.

You can get the videos and dvds over Amazon Marketplace and eBay, Booklad. I just got and watched the one with the photographs (Adventure 4), which although it's much shorter than Adventures 1&2, had some very horrible moments: 'As I was walking up the stair, I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today, I wish, I wish he'd stay away. *Shivers* Creepy stuff.

Yes there are, with David Warner and Susannah Harker in the title roles.

The audio plays are from Big Finish, and the five to date (two double CD stories and three single CDs) are very good -- David Warner makes an excellent Steel.

The series itself is available on DVD in the UK and US, though you might have to hunt a little for it. I'm sure Deep Discount DVD could turn it up, as could Amazon, and certainly Mike's Comics can as they've procured and sold copies to several people of my acquaintance. They can also get you the Big Finish releases.

Despite the lack of VFX budget and the fact it was shot on videotape it's well worth seeing.

For me, it's hard to choose between the second or the fourth story as my overall favourite. The railway station adventure is chilling, but also so moving in many ways. The fourth is horrifying - killing people in photographs - and taps into that folk myth that says that if a photograph is taken of you, then it also captures part of your soul with it. Steel's advice to the woman at the end - to destroy any photographs with her in them and never have another taken - also adds to the dark fairy tale feel of the series.

The least effective is no. 3, which starts out as an intriguing look at a survey team from Earth's future conducting research into present-day (1980) London, and ends up being a cloddish critique of animal abuse.

Anyway, Sapphire And Steel is one of my all-time favourite series.

An intentionally obscure series, nothing more about the series and its characters was revealed other than a metaphorical explanation that time was like a "corridor" with occasional weak links in its fabric. Malevolent entities would try to use these weak links to "break in" and disrupt the smooth flow of time. And it was Sapphire and Steel's job to stop them. Other than that, Sapphire And Steel didn't give an inch to its audience as far as exposition was concerned. This pair of transdimensional troubleshooters took human, corporeal form to operate on Earth and their enemies were utterly abstract. S & S didn't fight foes, they fought concepts - anger, loss, resentment...

The series felt utterly opaque, mysterious, otherworldly with the occasional presence of other "agents" like Silver and Lead and the mentions of others - I love Sapphire's rather snippy reaction to Lead telling Steel that "Jet sends her love" - offering tantalising hints of a whole fascinating back story just waiting to be explored, of different "elements" taking on different forces in different environments. "Transuranics may not be used where is life..."

Filmed on a low budget, Sapphire And Steel was almost entirely studio-bound, which lent the series a distinctly surreal, theatrical air. The episodes built on a kind of folklore, with stories revolving around old nursery rhymes, a railway station haunted by the restless spirits of the dead and a shape-shifting presence who travelled through different dimensions through old photographs, and set pieces that delivered genuine supernatural, gothic horror. What was remarkable about the series was that it went out on British television at 6.30 p.m.!

David McCallum was excellent as the cold, remote, enigmatic Steel while Joanna Lumley was never more radiant than as the flirtatious, diplomatic yet utterly alien Sapphire.

There are moments in the fourth that I found very chilling. The absolute worst, though, is where he sets fire to the photograph with the girl trapped in it. The bit at the end that you mention, too, does leave you with a nasty cold feeling in your stomach. They never really leave you with any comfort in closure.

I love in Sapphire and Steel how the stories have that same 'empty' feel to them that a lot of Avengers episodes have. It lends everything such an eerie air.

It was made in the early 1980's? For some reason I thought it was from the early 1970's. It used to air on the CBS late movie, unless I am thinking of that other brit SF show about the people from Tibet.

I've started watching this via Netflix, thanks to a recommenation from a friendni the UK. I've watched the first three, and so far I found the first the creepiest - the sing-song of nursery rhymes and how the little girl seemed to feel compelled to say them-- ack!

I've watched a few, and most of all I've come away impressed by Joanna Lumley. I've heard all about her history as a glamour girl, and all about her infamous role as Patsy Stone, but I never knew she was a good actress until I saw this show. Her work in the second adventure was superlative, especially when she had to go back and forth between accents during the seance, and then the devastation on her face as the memories of those poor dead soldiers entered her mind. She's never had the credit she deserved as an actress.

The second adventure was superb and the ending broke my heart, but I have a certain fondness for the first one, even though the story felt very padded (I could've done without the sidekick who showed up to sing Paul Robeson songs every few episodes). The teenage boy in that story was very effective as the confused youth trapped between trusting these strangers and trying to get his parents back. That moment at the end where his parents and little sister are reading, he's left out, and he hears Sapphire telling him goodbye...haunting.

PJ Hammond, who created this show, wrote a very good Torchwood episode called Small Worlds, all about fairies. He's writing another episode for the second series.

Did I see what I thought I saw in the second series called "The Railway Station"?!

Did Sapphire and Steel REALLY sacrifice the old man to the Darkness to free the 20 or so ghosts it held prisoner? OK, Sapphire scanned him and determined he only had 5 years to live, but holey moley! They sent him up on the foot bridge and I heard this blood-curdling scream (off camera). I guess the Darkness took him to torture for the last 5 years of his life. Jeese. Scarred for life, I am.

[hides head under blanket - whimper]

Yup. And that's when I decided I could get into this series from 70s, which generally means cheesy fluff. ;)

Wow, nice to see a thread dedicated to this near-30 yr old show on the forum !

S&S seems to be having a revival of late online. The DVD series has just been re-released in the UK, & the Big Finish audio company are producing new audio dramas, but very different actors - David Warner & Susannah Harker as S&S. And indeed the creator/writer P J Hammond was in talks last year with the ITV network for a remake. Thankfully the talks fell through as Hammond said the network wanted the show to spell everything out, which is surely missing the entire point of the series.



Not quite sure what you mean by 'glamour girl'. She was never a topless model lol. Found fame as Purdey in The New Avengers & has pretty much never been off UK TV screens ever since. Her best TV roles have been more recent - in an Alan Bennett style of monologues 'Up In Town' & the much acclaimed series 'Sensitive Skin'. Regarded as a national treasure here in England alongside the likes of Judi Dench & David Attenborough. She even does the voice for AOL UK 'You've got e-mail' :) Makes me sad to think Americans only know her from AbFab !

Got room under there? I just saw season/series via Netflix. I kept thinking there had to be another episode where they rescued him. It was bad enough him talking about what his life might be like in his 70s and knowing from Sapphire that it wouldn't happen...

David McCallum was pretty stunning too. When Sapphire turns back time in the second or third episode and he kisses her hand, the moment was sexier than some full on French kisses I've seen, partially because Steel seems so cold.

I definitely agree with you, Fabrisse! That was quite a moment.

I'm part-way through Assignment Five. I was a bit surprised at how well Steel manages to mingle with the houseguests, but then there was the delightful exchange where he had to give his pseudonym to a guest, and he asked Sapphire "Quick, what's my name?" and she rolled her eyes.

I'm getting a little worried as I approach Assignment Six, because I know how it ends, and I don't want it to end.

Well, if you can take Susannah Harker and David Warner as Sapphire and Steel (their voices, anyway), there are 3 seasons worth of audio stories from Big Finish Productions...

I've just treated myself to the box set as this was one of my favourite shows when I was a kid (although I seem to remember it scared me as well!).

Having just watched Episode 1 of Assignment 1, all I can is a big 'Yowza' to the smokin' chemistry between McCallum & Lumley.

Totally missed the fact that this had been (re)released on DVD last year, must get round to buying it.

I finally broke down and bought the box set, so I've now seen series 3-6. Wow. It's low budget, but the acting and writing just keep me enthralled.

I must admit, I don't much care for Silver. Although, I do like it that he basically treats S&S as a couple.

Assignment 5 was interesting, and I love Sapphire's evening gown.

I particularly liked Assignment 3 with its sinister adult baby and the animals protesting.

It's interesting, David McCallum is not a tall man, but his air of authority is so strong that it never once seems odd that everyone, but everyone, defers to Steel.