Jasmine Sahu is well suited with this new American drama exclusive to Dave.
Lois Cameron explains why this series is much more than your average cosy period drama.
The last episode of this series sees Sherlock and Moriarty attempt to solve the final problem with devastating consequences.
With major cast changes afoot, Jacob Martin ponders whether Being Human can live up to its own scarily high standard.
“Sometimes you have to give a man a chance, Ruth, to show you who he really is.”
The final sample of an experimental bio weapon – thought to be destroyed in the 1960s and so without any antidote – is being hunted by a renegade Azaktan terrorist, and the team at M15 have to stop him. In the name of peace and reconciliation, reluctant Harry agrees to have an FSB agent on the grid to help with the search, but is he to be trusted? (No, he isn’t.)
After last week’s ambitiously structured episode, things are back to a more traditional Spooks approach this week. Bar the completely obvious reveal of Lucas under the balaclava leading into the titles, this episode worked brilliantly. It was intense, clever and full of plot twists that encouraged the viewer to engage their brain from time to time. All the classic Spooks elements are here: the running; Tariq watching said running on CCTV cameras; the bomb in the centre of London; the wonderful turn from the Home Secretary; and Ruth being right about pretty much everything. Since Harry usually shares that role with her, it was interesting that the whole episode hinged on Harry making the wrong call from a security point of view (even if it may have been the decent thing to do.) I hope this was the last week of getting no real clues to Lucas’s past, as I don’t think I can cope with it much longer, although Maya’s done pretty well to resist his beautiful blue eyes for even this long.
And, three episodes in, I’m calling it – Simon Russell Beale, clad in his majestic pyjamas, is the best politician Spooks has ever had. I can’t see anything happening this series to make me think otherwise. One of my absolute favourite Spooks traditions is continued with great aplomb in this episode: the British actors putting on very dodgy, supposedly Eastern European accents. There are three classic examples here: that bloke from Waterloo Road (Nick Sidi) as a Russian ambassador who fails to get on Harry’s good side; the quite sexy one from ITV Sunday evening classic Where the Heart Is (Julian Lewis Jones) as the deceitful FSB agent; and, most brilliantly of all, Sherlock’s sarcastic forensic scientist (Jonathan Aris), whose character is so vaguely Eastern European that they made up a country for him. It’s all complete nonsense, of course, but it gives me a bit of a thrill and is an essential part of the Cold War-tinged, highly ridiculous world of Spooks.
Things were pretty frosty on the Harry and Ruth front this week, as they both pretend to be completely normal with each other, and fail miserably. The situation isn’t helped by Harry ignoring Ruth’s advice, and then feeling all inadequate when she’s proved right. His veiled plea to her at the end of the episode to give him a chance melted even my cold, cynical heart, though, so hopefully it’ll have a similar effect on Ruth.
Overall, despite the lack of real development on the Lucas front, this was a wonderfully tense episode of Spooks, filled with enough twists, turns and dodgy accents to keep this fan happy.
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