# Danger 5
**Danger 5** is an Australian action comedy television series created by Dario Russo and David Ashby, set in a bizarre, 1960s-inspired version of World War II in which a team of five international spies is on a mission to kill [Adolf Hitler](https://www.edgepedia.org/adolf-hitler). It was commissioned by the multicultural broadcaster SBS, premiered on SBS One in February 2012, and ran for two series, in 2012 and 2015.[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) • [2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) • [3](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Premise | Five Allied spies, Danger 5, unravel one of Hitler's diabolical schemes per episode across exotic locations worldwide[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) |
| The team | Jackson from the USA, Tucker from Australia, Ilsa from Russia, Claire from Britain, and Pierre from Europe[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) |
| Format | Series 1: six 25-minute episodes, completed 2011; series 2: seven episodes airing January 2015[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) • [2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) |
| Creators | Dario Russo (director, writer, composer) and David Ashby (writer, actor); produced by Kate Croser and Russo for Dinosaur[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) • [4](https://www.classification.gov.au/titles/danger-5-series-2) |
| Origin | SBS approached Russo and Ashby after their third-year university film *Italian Spiderman* (2007) drew nine million unique YouTube views[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) |
| Production style | No computer-generated effects; deliberately dodgy post-production dubbing, obvious miniatures, and recycled sets in emulation of 1960s television[5](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains) • [3](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show) |
| Reception | 8.3/10 on IMDb from about 5,400 users; Australian Directors Guild awards for direction in 2012 and 2013[6](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1807165/) • [1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) |
## Premise and characters
The series centers on what are said to be the Allies' most skilled special operatives: Jackson, an American; Tucker, an Australian; Ilsa, a Russian; Claire, a Briton; and Pierre, a European. In each episode the team unravels another of Hitler's diabolical schemes, traveling across a myriad of exotic locations spanning the globe.[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) The missions include discovering [Josef Mengele](https://www.edgepedia.org/josef-mengele)'s Antarctic death circus, busting [Erwin Rommel](https://www.edgepedia.org/erwin-rommel)'s golden murder casino, and posing as exotic dancers to take out Hitler at his own birthday party.[7](https://cms.adelaidefilmfestival.org/assets/archive-content/aff-2011-program.pdf)
The villains' plans are deliberately ahistorical and drawn from comic-book logic: in the first episode, Hitler abducts the world's national monuments with a squad of zeppelins, and later episodes involve resurrected dinosaurs and a trigger-happy [Triceratops](https://www.edgepedia.org/triceratops).[8](https://thetvdb.com/series/danger-5/allseasons/official) About half of the major characters have massive animal heads, and nobody seems to speak the same language.[9](https://paragraphfilmreviews.com/2015/03/02/danger-5/)
The cast pairs the actors with familiar spy-fiction archetypes: David Ashby plays the macho lone wolf Jackson, Sean James Murphy the straight man Tucker, Natasa Ristic the chain-smoking Russian femme fatale Ilsa, Amanda Simons the prude Claire, and [Aldo Mignone](https://www.edgepedia.org/aldo-mignone) the debonair European barman Pierre. Carmine Russo plays Hitler and Tilman Vogler plays Colonel Chestbridge.[10](https://www.justwatch.com/us/tv-show/danger-5) • [11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html) Ashby explained that the team deliberately used character types audiences had seen a thousand times, then twisted them into something different.[11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html)
## Production
SBS commissioned the series in 2010 after the viral success of *[Italian Spiderman](https://www.edgepedia.org/italian-spiderman)*, a low-budget parody short Russo and Ashby made while at university, which generated nine million unique views on YouTube. The program was produced by Dinosaur Worldwide, a company formed by Russo, Ashby, and Croser, with investment primarily from SBS and additional funding from the South Australian Film Corporation, the Adelaide Film Festival, and Screen Australia.[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) SBS executive Michael Ebeid noted that Russo was just 21 when he first pitched his ideas to the network, which gave the team creative license to develop them; a trailer placed on YouTube drew almost 200,000 views in its first week.[12](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/2011/12/13/michael-ebeid-address-2011-spaa-conference/)
**Retro technique.** The show avoids all use of computer-generated effects. Russo and Ashby worked within the same technological constraints as the 1960s film-makers they emulated, relying on special lens filters, hokey props, dubious foley (custom sound effects created in post-production), and studio-recorded dubs; no location dialogue or sound was recorded at all.[5](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains) Every line was re-recorded in post-production, partly as a homage to 1960s Italian film-makers who routinely re-recorded actors speaking different languages in the same scene. The practice also freed casting: Natasa Ristic spoke all her lines in Russian on set, while Carmine Russo spoke English as Hitler and a voiceover actor matched the German lines.[13](https://www.adelaidereview.com.au/arts/performing-arts/2020/04/28/danger-5-audio/) • [11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html)
The aesthetic draws on 1960s and 1970s European exploitation films, 1960s genre television such as *The Prisoner*, *Thunderbirds*, and *The Avengers*, and men's adventure magazines of the same period, whose outrageous covers inspired the pulp-style episode titles such as "Kill-Men Of The Rising Sun" and "Hitler's Golden Murder Palace".[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) • [11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html) The same bar set reappears in every episode in different contexts, and one amphitheatre doubles as Hitler's birthday hall, Mengele's death arena, and Goering's Bahamas villa; the creators argued that reusing the same spaces treated the audience as intelligent rather than spoon-fed.[11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html)
Russo has said the show emulates well-known television and film-making techniques without making references so overt as to be instantly recognizable, so that it feels less like spoof or parody and more like a TV show from childhood that somehow passed you by.[5](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains) Unlike *[Garth Marenghi's Darkplace](https://www.edgepedia.org/garth-marenghis-darkplace)*, which the creators cite as an encouragement, they steered clear of a fake-film-maker frame story; the Danger 5 world is its own thing.[11](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html)
## Series 1 (2012)
Series 1 consists of six 25-minute episodes: "I Danced For Hitler", "Lizard Soldiers Of The Third Reich", "Kill-Men Of The Rising Sun", "Hitler's Golden Murder Palace", "Fresh Meat For Hitler's Sex Kitchen", and "Final Victory".[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/) • [9](https://paragraphfilmreviews.com/2015/03/02/danger-5/) It aired as part of SBS's Monday evening comedy lineup, drew strong ratings, and developed a cult fanbase on the internet.[14](https://www.safilm.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/SAFC-2011-2012-Annual-Report-FINAL.pdf) A five-part webisode prequel, *The Diamond Girls*, was produced alongside the six broadcast episodes and released online in late 2011; it was one broadcast episode divided into five parts of four to six minutes each.[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf)
The series won the Australian Directors Guild award for Best Direction in an Original Online Project in 2012 and Best Direction in a TV Comedy in 2013.[1](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/)
## Series 2 (2015)
After SBS deemed the first season a success, a second series of seven episodes was commissioned, created between September 2013 and January 2014 and airing from January 2015 on SBS 2.[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf) • [15](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/2014/11/14/diversity-matters-sbs-unveils-2015-line/) The season transposes the team to a 1980s excess-soaked universe of neon, ninjas, discos, dinosaurs, pizza, and prom queens as they reunite to stop Hitler's ultimate quest for world domination.[15](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/2014/11/14/diversity-matters-sbs-unveils-2015-line/) To reverse-engineer the look, Russo and Ashby studied *Miami Vice*, *The Breakfast Club*, and *Robocop*, analyzing shooting style, lighting setups, and sound design, including the pronounced backlighting of female characters typical of 1980s television.[5](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains) The episode titles include "Merry Christmas Colonel", "Johnny Hitler", "Revenge of the Lizardmen", "Un Sacco di Natale", "Super Dead", "Back to the Fuhrer", and "Welcome to Hitlerland".[4](https://www.classification.gov.au/titles/danger-5-series-2) The DVD was classified MA 15+ on 18 September 2014 for strong comedic violence, with a total duration of 176 minutes.[4](https://www.classification.gov.au/titles/danger-5-series-2) SBS delayed the season's air date after actions by Islamic State in September 2014, concerned that a show about international crime fighters and a hell-raising nemesis called Adolf Hitler might appear to echo grotesque terrorist violence; Russo said the season was written long before those events and takes its references from genre film-making, not the news.[5](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains)
For season 2 the online strategy changed: social media platforms received a much stronger focus and no webisode series was commissioned, because the season 1 webisodes had felt almost identical to the broadcast program and social media offered more immediate feedback and clearer audience measurement.[2](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf)
## Audio revival and afterlife
In 2018 Amazon's audiobook offshoot Audible approached the creators, and the eight-part audio series *Danger 5: Stereo Adventures*, narrated by Shaun Micallef, was released in 2020 with the original cast returning. Freed from visual production costs, the writers devised set pieces such as Dracula's beach and a city-squashing giant pussy cat that would have been impossible to film, and the live room recording allowed improvisation that the tightly budgeted television shoots had not.[13](https://www.adelaidereview.com.au/arts/performing-arts/2020/04/28/danger-5-audio/) • [16](https://tollbit.forbes.com/sites/joshweiss/2020/05/05/danger-5-david-ashby-dario-russo-audible-stereo-adventures-interview/)
The series has sustained a cult afterlife through Netflix, home video, and reaction GIFs such as the "Sensible Chuckle" magazine and Ilsa shooting an enemy through a phone; Ashby has said their GIFs have a bigger audience than the TV shows themselves.[13](https://www.adelaidereview.com.au/arts/performing-arts/2020/04/28/danger-5-audio/) • [3](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show) The Guardian's 2026 retrospective credited the show with using its absurdity to make sharp critiques of spy-genre mainstays, especially male entitlement, through Jackson's endless pursuit of Ilsa.[3](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show) The show has been sold to international streaming services, and is available via Foxtel and Binge in Australia, Tubi in the US, and Netflix in the UK.[17](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/wp-content/uploads/sites/sbs.com.au.aboutus/files/21_final_sbs_submission_-_australian_content_on_broadcast_radio_and_streaming_services_inquiry_-_january_2018.pdf) • [3](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show)
## References
1. [Danger 5 series 1, Screen Australia Screen Guide](https://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/screen-guide/danger-5-series-1-29858/)
2. [Matt Loads (2022). Engaging Audiences Through Multi-Platform Television: Danger-5 and the Diamond Girls. Online Journal of Communication and Media Technologies 12(4), e202231](https://www.ojcmt.net/download/engaging-audiences-through-multi-platform-television-danger-5-and-the-diamond-girls-12450.pdf)
3. [In praise of Danger 5: a delightfully stupid comedy where spies try to kill Hitler every episode. The Guardian (2026)](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/aug/19/danger-5-five-streaming-where-to-watch-sbs-tv-show)
4. [DANGER 5 - SERIES 2, Australian Classification](https://www.classification.gov.au/titles/danger-5-series-2)
5. [Monica Tan (2014). Danger 5 director Dario Russo on mocking Hitler. The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/dec/30/danger-5-director-dario-russo-on-the-tricky-task-of-mocking-world-villains)
6. [Danger 5 (TV Series 2011-2015), IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1807165/)
7. [Adelaide Film Festival 2011 program: Danger 5](https://cms.adelaidefilmfestival.org/assets/archive-content/aff-2011-program.pdf)
8. [Danger 5 - Aired Order, TheTVDB](https://thetvdb.com/series/danger-5/allseasons/official)
9. [Danger 5, Paragraph Film Reviews (2015)](https://paragraphfilmreviews.com/2015/03/02/danger-5/)
10. [Danger 5 - watch tv show streaming online, JustWatch](https://www.justwatch.com/us/tv-show/danger-5)
11. [Mission Accomplished! A DANGER(ous) 5 Chat with Creators Dario Russo & David Ashby, Screen Anarchy (2012)](https://screenanarchy.com/2012/03/mission-accomplished-a-dangerous-5-chat-with-creators-dario-russo-david-ashby.html)
12. [Michael Ebeid - Address to the 2011 SPAA Conference, SBS](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/2011/12/13/michael-ebeid-address-2011-spaa-conference/)
13. [Walter Marsh (2020). Cult hit Danger 5 returns as 'Pythonesque' audio drama. The Adelaide Review](https://www.adelaidereview.com.au/arts/performing-arts/2020/04/28/danger-5-audio/)
14. [South Australian Film Corporation Annual Report 2011-2012](https://www.safilm.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/SAFC-2011-2012-Annual-Report-FINAL.pdf)
15. [Diversity matters - SBS unveils 2015 line-up, SBS](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/2014/11/14/diversity-matters-sbs-unveils-2015-line/)
16. [Q&A: 'Danger 5' Creators on the Audible-Produced Sequel 'Stereo Adventures', Forbes (2020)](https://tollbit.forbes.com/sites/joshweiss/2020/05/05/danger-5-david-ashby-dario-russo-audible-stereo-adventures-interview/)
17. [SBS submission to the Australian Content on Broadcast Radio and Streaming Services Inquiry (2018)](https://www.sbs.com.au/aboutus/wp-content/uploads/sites/sbs.com.au.aboutus/files/21_final_sbs_submission_-_australian_content_on_broadcast_radio_and_streaming_services_inquiry_-_january_2018.pdf)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Scripted television and comedy series › Sitcom and comedy series › Comedy series outside the US and UK › Premiered 1964 to 2021*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license