years. The original line-up consisted of Tom Owen, Mary Maude and Gregory Phillips. Chris Chittell featured in series 2 and 3 and Adrian Wright played Mike Hobbs in series 4–7. Former Doctor Who companion Wendy Padbury joined the cast in series 5 as art student Sue Craig. Her youthful looks enabled her to portray a character several years her junior, although by the final series, with the actress in her mid-twenties and then married to actor Melvyn Hayes, careful camera angles were required to conceal an advancing pregnancy. Padbury was the only regular actor to appear in the eighth series, which was a single 13-part serial. She was teamed with co-star Martin Neil, who played Sue's boyfriend Dave. Initially Geoffrey Toone played the resident villain Karl von Gelb, a former high-ranking SS officer. To avoid prejudicing potential sales of the programme to West Germany, references to the character's Nazi past were dropped in series 3. From series 4, the character was replaced by a succession of similarly crazed criminal masterminds, such as Jerome Willis as Professor Nero and Commander Caine played by Kevin Stoney. The criminals were aided by various henchmen, perhaps most memorably by Ryan (Richard Shaw) and the beret-wearing Burke (Michael Ripper) in series 5 and 6. Episodes Home release and repeats The first five series were wiped by Southern but telerecordings of series 1 and a single episode from series 2 survive, the final three series exist in various formats. A Region 2 DVD of series 6 was released in April 2009. Repeats of the surviving episodes of Freewheelers were shown on the British satellite television channel Film 24 in 2010 and on Talking Pictures TV in 2017 and 2019. In December 2021, series 6 and 7 were made available on the Talking Pictures streaming service "TPTV Encore". Publications The children's magazine Look-in featured a weekly cartoon strip of Freewheelers. Two novelisations by Look-in editor Alan Fennell, featuring the characters from series 6, were published in paperback: The Sign of the Beaver (1971) and The Spy Game (1972). A book about the series, Calling White Knight – The Definitive book about Freewheelers by Mark Harris, was published in December 2019. References External links ITV children's television shows 1960s British children's television series 1970s British children's television series 1968 British television series debuts 1973 British television series endings Television shows produced by Southern Television English-language television shows Television