this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2025
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This one will probably be a bit contentious, but hear me out first.
That '60s/'70s TV show The Avengers. The time with John Steed and Emma Peel, specifically. (I haven't watched enough of the pre-Peel episodes to form an opinion, and the post-Peel episodes were horrible in this regard with Tara King spending most of each episode unconscious or imprisoned.)
Now you have to filter for the times if you want to appreciate the status of women in The Avengers. Yes, Emma Peel was a sex magnet (she was specifically named to mimic the sound of "Man Appeal") and eye candy. But unlike most such shows of the era she wasn't only that. She was, in fact, John Steed's—ostensibly before her introduction the main character of the series—full-on equal.
Did she spend a lot of episodes imprisoned, unconscious, or otherwise ineffective until saved by John Steed? Sure! Dozens of times. But the reverse is also true! About the same number of times Emma saved John from certain doom. And indeed one of the more famous episodes ("The House That Jack Built") had Emma trapped in a death house, and John desperately trying to find her to rescue her, only to have her rescue herself and step out while John was breaking into the same house. She solved the puzzles, worked out the mechanisms, and broke free of the house meant to drive her mad and then kill her before the male lead could get there and rescue here (or, rather, simultaneously with).
She was a martial arts badass (by the standards of the time: you have to keep your '60s/'70s filters firmly in place) and a top-notch fencer. She was of superior intellect. She was an artist. She was, basically, good at everything she chose to do (and the key word there is "chose": she had actual agency). While stylin' all the way.
In the modern milieu she'd be an anachronistic throwback to a more sexist age (because make no mistake, the age in which she came out was incredibly sexist), but put her in that old milieu and she stands out as incredibly progressive for the time.
(I ... ah ... may have a little bit of a crush on Dianna Rigg, so take this with some grains of salt. 😅)