Just been watching a couple of the  early black and white episodes from my collection, and I realised how much I missed that "talking to the camera" sequence at the beginning of every show.  I once read that at that time, no other tv show did it, so Roger was the first one!  

Do you think they should have continued with them, when the color shows were made? I do.

I do too - it adds to the continuity I think. Never mind - I still like them.

I missed not seeing him talk into the camera, but at the same time I loved how after the introduction of "Simon Templar" in every colour episode, he'd look up at the halo. It was fun watching this moment, because he always did it differently. Sometimes, when mad, he wouldn't look up at all. A few times, he'd be knocked out unconscious by the episode's baddie. And every now and then he'd look up delayed, after the halo is up already, or prematurely, before it's up.

Both, black and white, shows had their uniqueness in this respect. But I think that if they had done both at once - i.e. looking up at the halo and talking to the camera, it could have been too much.

I think that the way they did this in black and white show, and the way they did the beginning in the colour episodes, brought light hearted atmosphere to the show. But at the same time, especially the black and white shows, many episodes were not always light-hearted. This goes to show that the  ballance of humour and seriousness was done very well, and I wish more series of today had that, instead of going either into one direction or the other, with nothing in between.

Roger once said in an interview that several times when he was doing the "talking to camera" sequence, his very young daughter Deborah  was holding his hand. How cute! I would love to see a pic of that.