Talk about a fear of public speaking. As Dr. Tobias (Donald Bishop) addresses a conference room of distinguished persons to inform them that he and his fellow scientists Dr. Lazaar (Ross Elliott) and Dr. Prescott (James A. Watson, Jr.) have discontinued their work on the "XYZ Project," headed by Major "Dex" Dexter (John Rubinstein), which was to develop a secret weapon apparently too horrific to complete, he has a literal meltdown as he speaks, dissolving into a pool of transistors and liquid plastic on the conference table.
Turns out that the real Dr. Tobias had been replaced by an android, one of "The Deadly Toys" that plagues Diana Prince, her alter ego Wonder Woman, the Inter-Agency Defense Council, and, potentially, the entire world in this fairly involving adventure set at Christmastime in an oddly snow-free Washington, D. C. Anne Collins, making her debut as a series writer, scripted Carey Wilber's story that puts the spotlight squarely on Lynda Carter.
First, with Steve Trevor now her boss, Diana is doing the fieldwork on her own. And as she does so, she not only discovers that Dr. Prescott has also been replaced by an android, with the real Prescott, like Tobias, presumably kidnapped, she also discovers that all three scientists share a quirky wargaming hobby involving miniature toy soldiers. This brings her to the Jungle King toy shop run by Orlich Hoffman (Frank Gorshin), an infirm old man with a vaguely sinister, vaguely Central European accent that signals danger for Diana, confirmed when she is later attacked by a model airplane from Hoffman's shop as the not-so-kindly old man knew that Diana was onto him.
But Hoffman, a quietly demented Geppetto with a genius for robotics, has an even bigger surprise in store for Diana: a full-scale replica of Wonder Woman. And when--don't tell me you didn't see this one coming--Steve's old buddy Dex, in league with Hoffman to spirit all three XYZ scientists to a foreign power willing to pay them the big money, tells Diana to meet him as he has a lead on the two kidnapped scientists, she is lured into a trap with her bogus alter ego.
That meeting with the counterfeit crimefighter is oddly staged, with Carter caught between playing along while still surprised to see another Wonder Woman and falling under some kind of spell or drug, which happens when Diana is taken back to Hoffman's shop and made to divulge the location of Lazaar. Inevitably, Diana transforms into the real Wonder Woman and--fanservice alert!--does battle with the imitation superheroine, titillating the fantasies of any manner of fetishists, albeit in a disappointingly brief and, er, anticlimactic encounter.
As the villain, Rubinstein is too strident and suspiciously young-looking to be convincing, but Gorshin, best-known for playing the cackling, kinetic Riddler on the 1960s "Batman" television series, delivers a memorable, effective, nuanced performance. However, it is Carter who continues to assert herself as the undisputed star of "The Deadly Toys" as her acting continues to improve--nearly doubling your enjoyment, you might say.