Spooks, season 4
Something else you do when sick during the holidays: you watch your presents. In my case, the fourth season of Spooks provided by kathyh. Which I liked very much, with some nitpicks as usual.
The high turnover rate on this show works surprisingly well for me. By now, Harry is the only character left from the season 1 set-up, and yet I don't have any "I want X back!" or "when Y was still on the show, it was better" feelings. I can't think of a comparable example where that was the case. I mean, obviously, some of my favourite shows like B5 or BTVS lost or changed characters, but not at this rapid speed. Mind you, it must give the actors a somewhat disquieting "here, really nobody is expendable" feeling...
Zaf was quickly introduced last season; this season, he's a full-fledged regular, but of all the newbies, he's the who still comes across as much of a cypher. It doesn't jar, because the way this show is written, you don't know all about everyone at once, but it's still noticable. The most we saw of him as a person was probably in the episode with the unjustly suspected Algerian not-terrorist - which btw was a great episode - and in the scene where he couldn't bring himself to shoot the guy despite Harry's order, with the last second reprieve, the raw emotion was really palpable, but otherwise, not so much.
(Difference in narrative styles: most other shows would have written the episode using the obvious angle of making Zaf confront being a non-white in a society where by now that automatically makes him a bit suspicious in the current paranoia, aka "it could have been me" that was locked up for two years based on a identity mistake. Can't decide whether in advantage or disadvantage Spooks ignored the possibility completely.)
On the other had, this year's two new characters, both female, worked really well. Having just said I don't miss anyone I must retract and admit that Juliet filled the Tessa-shaped hole in my heart, i.e. ever since they made Tessa evil and wrote her out at the end of s1, I've been missing Harry having to deal with a female equal/superior his own age and match in wits and ruthlessness. Even better, Juliet (so far?) is not evil. I thoroughly approve, and am glad of her presence. On the other end of the scale in age and experience, Jo is very likeable, with a believable mixture of pluck and inexperience, and the writers used her well, remembering, for example, that there is no reason why she should automatically show trust and faith in Harry when she hardly knows him, and letting her question group decisions like letting Angela go. Though given everything that happens after she joins the team, I wouldn't be surprised if she quits next season! Talk about baptism through fire.
The big death this season was Fiona Carter's, with a question mark about Adam's fate at the end. Fiona's death, or rather not the death but the way it came about is one of my few complaints. During the last minutes of that episode, I felt like a jojo:
- they're letting her kill herself? So a woman can't escape her trauma but through death? Gee, thanks, writers.
- Sorry, writers, I apologize! That was clever! Go, Fiona! I love it! Okay, risking all to kill the bastard herself is perfect! I'm even okay with her dying, because she brought down her enemy by her own hands!
- WHY THE HELL DID YOU HAVE THE GUY SURVIVE TO SHOOT HER SO ADAM CAN SHOOT HIM? Okay, forget I asked, I know why. So Adam can kill his wife's killer, and you have a dramatic shootout at the end, as opposed to Adam finding Faroukh dead and Fiona dying/dead. In other words, you sacrificed the perfect ending for your female character so your male character gets SOMETHING to do.
Seriously. If you kill off a character, and you have already the ending that means it's HER ending, something active for her own story, don't change it in a way that makes her just a victim providing angst fodder for your male character. I was displeased.
(I was also afraid that Fiona got killed off so Adam could get what Tom Quinn put us through the first two seasons, i.e. a very annoying love life, but thankfully, so far that did not happen.)
My other nitpick of the season was not so much a nitpick as an observation. After the very strong last but one episode, the last episode felt, well, not up to the rest of the season. Not that the idea of a former superb agent turning against MI5 wasn't good, but I'm sorry, combining that with a Diana plot just didn't work for me. For starters, it asked me to believe that most of the main characters reach a point at which they believe, even briefly, Diana got assassinated. For another, it made me listen to the phrase "the people's princess" without any irony. I can't believe someone who is supposedly a tough old broad like Angela would use it with a straight face. (Even if she was playing a long-term mind game, but presumably her original motivation was supposed to be genuine.) I kept having flashbacks to The Queen and Alistair Campbell mouthing this very phrase which he coined to Blair, adding, "you owe me, mate!", and wondering whether Spooks had to pay royalties, no pun intended...
Ah well. The parts that worked best about that episode were Angela being sadistic towards Jo and Angela playing with Adam. But the Diana stuff meant I couldn't even appreciate the ongoing Ruth/Harry subtext turning text without being distracted.
Speaking of Ruth and Harry, though: that was a nicely down subplot through the season, and I do love them both. Also, Ruth's solo outing at the start of the season was fab, though I have to point out Les Mis wasn't written by Andrew Llyod Webber. Never mind, she was still maintaining cover when she said that.
Favourite episodes: the last but one ep, the one with the Algerian, and, minus the shootout, Fiona's big episode.
The high turnover rate on this show works surprisingly well for me. By now, Harry is the only character left from the season 1 set-up, and yet I don't have any "I want X back!" or "when Y was still on the show, it was better" feelings. I can't think of a comparable example where that was the case. I mean, obviously, some of my favourite shows like B5 or BTVS lost or changed characters, but not at this rapid speed. Mind you, it must give the actors a somewhat disquieting "here, really nobody is expendable" feeling...
Zaf was quickly introduced last season; this season, he's a full-fledged regular, but of all the newbies, he's the who still comes across as much of a cypher. It doesn't jar, because the way this show is written, you don't know all about everyone at once, but it's still noticable. The most we saw of him as a person was probably in the episode with the unjustly suspected Algerian not-terrorist - which btw was a great episode - and in the scene where he couldn't bring himself to shoot the guy despite Harry's order, with the last second reprieve, the raw emotion was really palpable, but otherwise, not so much.
(Difference in narrative styles: most other shows would have written the episode using the obvious angle of making Zaf confront being a non-white in a society where by now that automatically makes him a bit suspicious in the current paranoia, aka "it could have been me" that was locked up for two years based on a identity mistake. Can't decide whether in advantage or disadvantage Spooks ignored the possibility completely.)
On the other had, this year's two new characters, both female, worked really well. Having just said I don't miss anyone I must retract and admit that Juliet filled the Tessa-shaped hole in my heart, i.e. ever since they made Tessa evil and wrote her out at the end of s1, I've been missing Harry having to deal with a female equal/superior his own age and match in wits and ruthlessness. Even better, Juliet (so far?) is not evil. I thoroughly approve, and am glad of her presence. On the other end of the scale in age and experience, Jo is very likeable, with a believable mixture of pluck and inexperience, and the writers used her well, remembering, for example, that there is no reason why she should automatically show trust and faith in Harry when she hardly knows him, and letting her question group decisions like letting Angela go. Though given everything that happens after she joins the team, I wouldn't be surprised if she quits next season! Talk about baptism through fire.
The big death this season was Fiona Carter's, with a question mark about Adam's fate at the end. Fiona's death, or rather not the death but the way it came about is one of my few complaints. During the last minutes of that episode, I felt like a jojo:
- they're letting her kill herself? So a woman can't escape her trauma but through death? Gee, thanks, writers.
- Sorry, writers, I apologize! That was clever! Go, Fiona! I love it! Okay, risking all to kill the bastard herself is perfect! I'm even okay with her dying, because she brought down her enemy by her own hands!
- WHY THE HELL DID YOU HAVE THE GUY SURVIVE TO SHOOT HER SO ADAM CAN SHOOT HIM? Okay, forget I asked, I know why. So Adam can kill his wife's killer, and you have a dramatic shootout at the end, as opposed to Adam finding Faroukh dead and Fiona dying/dead. In other words, you sacrificed the perfect ending for your female character so your male character gets SOMETHING to do.
Seriously. If you kill off a character, and you have already the ending that means it's HER ending, something active for her own story, don't change it in a way that makes her just a victim providing angst fodder for your male character. I was displeased.
(I was also afraid that Fiona got killed off so Adam could get what Tom Quinn put us through the first two seasons, i.e. a very annoying love life, but thankfully, so far that did not happen.)
My other nitpick of the season was not so much a nitpick as an observation. After the very strong last but one episode, the last episode felt, well, not up to the rest of the season. Not that the idea of a former superb agent turning against MI5 wasn't good, but I'm sorry, combining that with a Diana plot just didn't work for me. For starters, it asked me to believe that most of the main characters reach a point at which they believe, even briefly, Diana got assassinated. For another, it made me listen to the phrase "the people's princess" without any irony. I can't believe someone who is supposedly a tough old broad like Angela would use it with a straight face. (Even if she was playing a long-term mind game, but presumably her original motivation was supposed to be genuine.) I kept having flashbacks to The Queen and Alistair Campbell mouthing this very phrase which he coined to Blair, adding, "you owe me, mate!", and wondering whether Spooks had to pay royalties, no pun intended...
Ah well. The parts that worked best about that episode were Angela being sadistic towards Jo and Angela playing with Adam. But the Diana stuff meant I couldn't even appreciate the ongoing Ruth/Harry subtext turning text without being distracted.
Speaking of Ruth and Harry, though: that was a nicely down subplot through the season, and I do love them both. Also, Ruth's solo outing at the start of the season was fab, though I have to point out Les Mis wasn't written by Andrew Llyod Webber. Never mind, she was still maintaining cover when she said that.
Favourite episodes: the last but one ep, the one with the Algerian, and, minus the shootout, Fiona's big episode.