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Mr. Grey Reviews The Fifth-Season Premiere of SPOOKS (aka MI-5)!!
SPOILER ALERT !!
I am – Hercules!!
While we yanks just got the fourth-season premiere of “MI-5” on Friday, our Brit cousins are getting on Sunday the fifth-season premiere.
Here’s "Mr. Grey":
Spooks (or as the spies-like-US calls it: MI-5) returns to UK screens Sunday night for a new season with the second episode on Monday. Having seen the first three episodes, I thought I'd give you a quick review of the opening two-parter. Spoilers, obviously - including the last episode of Season 4. If you use this, please call me Mr Grey.
Does this show pick up where Season 4 (currently being shown in the US) finished?
In the S4 finale 'Diana', UK viewers saw Adam, Harry and co come under heavy fire from a psychotic ex-agent Angela Wells (Lindsay Duncan) who was after the Royal Family and Adam was obviously hit at least once... we were left with the site of him on his back , seriously wounded and blood flowing from his mouth and Harry looking to be the next victim.. We see the immediate results of that and we then rapidly move through several disorientating weeks as MI-5 rallies its troops.
Wait, is Adam dead, then?
Hey, this is Spooks. Nobody ever dies...oh, wait....ok, fair point. Promotional trailers have already shown that the events of last season’s finale didn’t kill him outright. But let's just say one regular face may not make it out of the first episode intact and their final scene is quite a gut-punch.
So the team still have to deal with last season’s psychotic agent?
Actually, last's season's finale is quickly wrapped up and disposed of in the first few minutes, though this opening two-parter spins off from her warped motivation. MI-5 are convinced that a wave of terrorist activity in the UK is a prelude to something bigger, hinted at by tons of graffiti claiming “Djakarta is coming…‘. At the same time, there's an uneasy feeling that certain people in the governmental ranks may be planning to use the bombings and threats to their own distinct advantage.
What can you tell us about the key plot points?
Well, in the first hour alone look for real threats made against air-craft, bombs exploding in the heart of London, a shadow cabinet that lives up to the description, an attack on the Prime Minister's son and some serious fist-fights. And not since V for Vendetta has the area near Westminster been such an explosive backdrop. The villains of the piece have lofty ambitions, but the scary thing is that their public-relations methods are as easy to pull of as they are effective. Couldn't happen in real life, though, surely? Hmmmm.
So, spy-boy, is it still cutting edge spy drama?
Well, on the good side, the cast are as strong as ever and each gets a moment to shine. The incoming Hermione Norris (from the UK's Cold Feet and Wire in the Blood) is a fellow agent and femme fatale who'd give Emma Frost a run for her money and is maybe only half as trustworthy. The risk seems real, the fatalities they experience are meaningful and the first episode cliff-hanger is a great moment. The second episode (which concludes the opening story) doesn't let-up on the tension. On the negative side there's definitely a step towards the higher-stakes 24 style, which is fine in its own right, but Spooks was always more down to earth and gritty. The conspiracy angles played out here go further and faster than one hopes they would in real life and while some of the story's gambits pay off fantastically well, there are others that will make you shrug. Would an agent who only got drafted into the team from her civilian job less than a year ago REALLY be charged with looking after the PM’s son? Using the character of the Prime Minister's son, but changing his age and name (Ewan becomes Rowan) also moves us a little out of the everyday world and into a fictional reality that is sometimes jarring for such a solid show. But whatever fantastical tweaks have been made... this is still Britain's top action show and the thinking man's 24.
Best lines?
“Would you have smiled at your wife’s killers?”
“………..yes. I would have smiled at her killers if that had been necessary.”
“Yes... I believe you would.”
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Really - it's not very good is it?
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"Spooks," however, is a derogatory term for African-Americans. That's why I always thought it was changed. And no, Barney Hood, it's actually one of the best shows on television, although the major cast change threw me off between s2 and s3. But really, the show is better than pretty much anything on network TV, and is only displaced by "Wire" and "Deadwood" for best show on TV imo.
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The E. Kelly show was "Snoops".
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I've been waiting a long time for season 4 -- especially after the balls-out season 3. Nice to know season 5 is on the way... someday.
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this was, hands-down, the baddest-ass show on tv. fuck alias. fuck 24. it was all about mi-5. and then came the episode where zoe got a boyfriend and the whole thing went in the terlet. who gives a shit about their personal lives? who wants to hear danny say 'zoe, i love you'? everything got very boring, very pedestrian and very...dare i say it...american!!
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Blimey. Just caught both episodes over here in the UK. Really good stuff but kind of agree with Mr Grey in terms of 24 comparisons.
One of the best things about Spooks has been that it's always been a touch closer to real life than Jack Bauer's escapades.
Tonight's shows just seemed that little bit more far-fetched than previous series. Here's hoping it's a one-off and the more reality based stuff is to come, although judging by the tease afterwards, i'm not so sure... -
as much happens in the first hour of this as happens in like half a season of 24! 24's only downside is that only so much can happen within 24 hours (but by God it's a hell of a lot when Jack Bauer's involved). Spooks is more realistic in that any kind of operation wouldn't be over and done with within 24 hours. Saying this, the season opener felt more like 24 than ever, with Adam being more Bauer-esque than is perhaps needed. It's like 'Okaaaaaaay, we get it, he's meant to be like an English Bauer!' The title 'Spooks' was most likely changed so that they didn't have people tuning in thinking it would be a show set in Compton or something...he he. Also, they really want people to get that we're dealing with MI-5 here because it's not like 24 where 'CTU' is mentioned like a million times in an episode. Good first episode anyway, despite a cheesy pull-back sort of effects shot when the car explodes.
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ok blah blah blah...ah. here we go.
Yep. I agree, the start of series 5 was cracking, but I really wish they'd keep the americanisation of quality british productions down to a minium; doctor who was quite enough thank you. After all, it is our licence fee paying for all of this and not BBC corporate. -
I've seen zero promotion for it.
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Saw the first one last night and have to agree entirely with those saying it's too over-the-top, even for an often silly programme. The team of conspirators and their plot seems vastly implausible (can't imagine Rupert Murdoch, the head of BP and the head of M16 getting together in a darkened basement together, somehow, but maybe that's just because I'm not paranoid enough). If the plot were to be even the slightest bit plausible the coup should have been revealed over a series, or at last five or six episodes, rather than exposed in the first 20 minutes.
It's a shame as the last two series have been awesome for British TV. Not up there in the same league as State of Play or Time Trumpet IMHO, but great prime-time fare.
One of the joys of the last series was how the BBC used it, and Dr Who, to get their revenge rather unsubtly on the Government over the Hutton report. Some of the scripting was just remarkably prescient, but others were almost funny in their heavy-handedness - like the one in which Ian McDiarmid plays a David Kelly type figure, or the exploration of torture techniques which coincided with revalations over Abu Ghraib.
Dr Who carried it on with all its nudge-winks about aliens starting wars for oil without real evidence. And we'll no doubt get even more in Robin Hood - he disapproves, apparently of the misjudged war in the Middle East that Britain is involved in (the, erm, crusades). -
It was perhaps more grounded in reality than the first double episode. It also turned out to be the wittiest drama featuring Islamic terrorists that I've seen. Hermione Norris had some great scenes, and Harry and Ruth's romance proved to be more faltering than Ted and Ralph. Line of the show: "You're going to gazump Al-Qaeida?"
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I take back some of my negativity after seeing the frenetic episode two, which was gripping, breathless stuff with a few Bourne-Identity-gritty fights thrown in. In some ways the overload of plots and willingness to hurry through material is a good thing - too often, on British TV in particular, there are long finger-tapping bits where most bright TV-savvy viewers have figured out what's going to happen next weeks before. Still not sure where on earth they will be able to take the series from here, though. -
Season four (keep that in mind, not the new season five) premiered last Friday on A&E. I would recommend getting your hands on the first three seasons of DVD. It's quite intricate.
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intricate he says. The show's lost whatever it is they had since they replaced Matthew Macfadyen with Ruper Penry-Jones. Which is a shame, because either actor could cockslap someone like clive owen into the next century on a bad day when it comes down to talent, and I think british drama is in dire need of a new wave of actors to replace or branaghs, harris' and Jacobis - all of whome seem to be intent to make an appearance in a harry potter movie of late.
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Rupert Penry Jones was interviewed for 007, but at 35 the producers felt he was too young, then they cast Daniel Craig who is the grand old age of 38 !!! The character of Adam is much better now after (SPOILERS FOR YANKS A SEASON BEHIND....DO NOT READ ON) the removal of his wife.
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Whoever said that pile of unfunny hubris and ego was better than Spooks needs his head examined.
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And the award for a phrase that in no way describes the pile of monkey spunk that is Spooks goes to....... This idiot! Next time you get confused Mr Grey, remember this. Spooks is a piece of shit.
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Or alternatively Spooks is the best thing on TV before BSG returns. But hey, opinions are like arseholes aren't they mate ?
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