MI-5 3/12/05 (spoilers)

[woyton]

And now Danny!

What the ... ?

[cheesesteak]

Just watched it. Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!

Is Harry the only person left from the first season?

[Rob Helmerichs]

Well, at least they didn't end the season with one of their patented idiotic fake cliffhangers...

Is there any word on a fourth season yet?

[Richard R1]

Is there any word on a fourth season yet?

Yes, their website has the following statement:

"Spooks returns for a 4th series in late 2005"

Of course, that's UK time -- probably be January 2006 for us.

Check it out at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/spooks/http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/spooks/

[Fool Me Twice]

RIP, Danny.

I didn't buy the enemy woman's sudden change of heart. Since when do suicide bombers have last minute conversions? I suppose it's possible, but I think the writers should have found another solution.

[MikeSh]

And now Danny!

What the ... ?

New name; Extreme Makeover BBC style.

[Rob Helmerichs]

I didn't buy the enemy woman's sudden change of heart. Since when do suicide bombers have last minute conversions? I suppose it's possible, but I think the writers should have found another solution.
Well, she seemed to question the plan before it even started ("They're still in love")...her mistake was to pick on people who had human qualities, while she still had some herself. Being exposed to Adam brought those human qualities out in her, and made her realize that she's not as much of a monster as she thought.

[cheesesteak]

I've never heard of suicide bombers having bombs implanted in them (although I did see Man On Fire). Must be uncomfortable as hell. Hope that isn't the start of a new trend.

So Tom's gone, Zoe's gone, Danny's gone. I can't imagine Fiona would want to continue. She's gotten her clocked cleaned twice already. When did they hire her anyway?

I liked Danny's character more than any of them. The only person I really like now is Ruth. Maybe they can hire Ben Browder and Claudia Black, too just like Stargate: SG1.

[speedcouch]

It was pretty obvious Danny was the next original cast member to go as it just seemed to be leading up to that the last couple of weeks. But this way was quite surprising. Anybody know exactly WHY the producers are cleaning house by getting rid of Tom, Zoe and now Danny?

I also questioned why the female terrorist turned sympathetic towards Adam all of the sudden.

Cheryl

[Jon J]

Anybody know exactly WHY the producers are cleaning house by getting rid of Tom, Zoe and now Danny?I don't think it's the producer's cleaning house but rather the actors wanting to move on. If the actor's leaving had not been on amicable terms I think their departures would have been much less sympathetic. :(

[lew313]

I'd like to see the cute blond get some more air time. :)

[cheesesteak]

I would have preferred it if Tom Quinn had caught a bullet, not Danny. He had the far more dangerous missions.

Do British dramas usually have a dozen or less episodes in a season? I was surprised that Murder In Suburbia's season only lasted six episodes. Then I started watching Night Detective and it's season ended after six episodes, too. I didn't expect this MI-5 episode to be the season finale either. How do the actors make any money?

[Jon J]

BBC seasons are typically short. This MI-5 season was 10 episodes. Seasons 1 and 2 were 8 episodes each. Because of the shorter seasons, actors are able to expand their work and not get typecast because of a long run.

Exceptions, of course, would be Coronation Street, etc. which are akin to our mid-day soap operas and run for years and years and years. ;)

[Rob Helmerichs]

BBC seasons are typically short. This MI-5 season was 10 episodes. Seasons 1 and 2 were 8 episodes each. Because of the shorter seasons, actors are able to expand their work and not get typecast because of a long run.
Actually, 1 was six eps and 2 & 3 ten each...

[Jon J]

Actually, 1 was six eps and 2 & 3 ten each...
Then you and the MI-5 website disagree. Guess they miscounted, huh? ;)

http://www.aetv.com/mi5/episodeguide.html

[Rob Helmerichs]

Then you and the MI-5 website disagree. Guess they miscounted, huh? ;)

http://www.aetv.com/mi5/episodeguide.html
They're wrong. If you look at their listings, what they show as Episode 6 of Season 1 is the Season 1 season finale (with the bomb going off), and Episode 7 is the Season 2 premiere (where we find out that they cheated).

Here's the real episode guide:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/spooks/episodeguide.shtml

[Jon J]

They're wrong.Have you informed A&E they're wrong?

[Rob Helmerichs]

Have you informed A&E they're wrong?
Nope. I couldn't care less whether they know what the seasons are. The BBC made the show, and they're the ones whose opinion matters.

(But as one who has watched MI-5 on A&E since the beginning, I note that they have shown it in the real seasons, not in the mistaken ones on their web site. That is, the break between Season 1 and Season 2 was after the sixth episode.)

[rwhitlow]

I must say that I saw it coming, but still screamed in frustration when he shot Danny. The one character I don't like (Harry) seems to keep on.

Its hard to believe now, with all of the killing that's gone on the last couple of seasons, that Danny killed his first, recently.

But, no fear, its a plot to fool Al Queida. His death was faked and he will be underground to penetrate sleeper cells!

[Richard R1]

This MI-5 season was 10 episodes. Seasons 1 and 2 were 8 episodes each.

Actually, if you look at the hyperlink when your mouse is poised over each of the episode numbers on the A&E website, you will see that they have them described correctly, according to each season.

The problem is that their webmaster placed incorrect text labels for each of the hyperlinks, making it appear that the first two seasons were 8 episodes each.

In other words, correctly named hyperlinks, incorrectly named hot spots.

(Hmm, I better stop now, the more I try to clarify, the worse it sounds!)

[Steveknj]

All I can say is shocking!! I didn't see it coming. Imagine a show continuing here in the states after the THREE main characters were written off, IN ONE SEASON!

[5thcrewman]

I smell Semtex. Did you fart?

[Jon J]

No, but Harry did. ;)

[sieglinde]

Was the third season the final season of the show? Epguides seems to indicate that it is.

[Rob Helmerichs]

It was the most recent, but not the final. There will be a fourth. (As somebody mentioned earlier in this very thread!)

[Mr. Soze]

We just watched this, and I must say I was only mildly surprised.
Danny was having his doubts about his work after he offed that
scientist. I'm actually glad he was killed rather than just "buggering off"
in the vein of Tom, or even Zoe to a lesser degree. And of the original 3,
I liked Danny the least, even though that's not a criticism because he'd
still get an A-. Tom was excellent, which seems to be a minority opinion
around here, and Zoe (real life Mrs. Tom) was very good and cute too.

I don't understand why no-one seems to like Harry. He fights for his people
and has real ba!!s in dealing with No. 10 and the rest of the suits. Adam Carter
is a good Tom replacement, but if Mrs. C. caught the bullet instead of Danny,
I would have liked it better.

Scariest line was (paraphrase) "Your son will watch you burning alive on the Internet a few years from now". Evil!

[KRS]

Wow. I did not expect Danny to go. It was a tense situation, but I guess US TV has conditioned me to not expect main characters to get bumped off (at least not so frequently). If anything, I thought Danny's character was going to start taking on a more major role as the show developed. Almost like a break for the actor.

I am surprised to hear that the show will have a fourth season - after Danny got shot, I started to think that the show was coming to an end, not just the season.

I wonder if they will change the opening credits - I found it interesting how Tom Quinn and Zoe remained in well after departing. Or perhaps the credits we see here in the US are A&E specific?

[Rob Helmerichs]

I wonder if they will change the opening credits - I found it interesting how Tom Quinn and Zoe remained in well after departing. Or perhaps the credits we see here in the US are A&E specific?
They must be to some extent, because the show has a different title here (it's "Spooks" there)...I don't know if they just change the text, or if A&E has come up with an entirely different title sequence.

[Mike20878]

They must be to some extent, because the show has a different title here (it's "Spooks" there)...I don't know if they just change the text, or if A&E has come up with an entirely different title sequence.

It's the same - A&E just puts MI-5 at the end. If you look closely, you'll see the title sequence still spells out Spooks as the lines are drawn.

[etemple]

Danny was having his doubts about his work after he offed that
scientist. I'm actually glad he was killed rather than just "buggering off"
in the vein of Tom, or even Zoe to a lesser degree.


Danny was the newest of the agents--in season one, it's suggested that he's pretty new to the job and needs supervision from Tom, isn't ready to handle certain responsibilities, etc. That the psychological difficulties of the job might build up, especially after his support network of Tom and Zoe has erroded is certainly understandable

But to say that Tom "buggered off and Zoe to a lesser extent" is just not accurate. Tom finally had a crisis of conscience after realizing that the professor's family was not safe and might well get killed (this after watching one of his own agents get her face burned off, almost losing his girlfriend and her daughter to a terrorist bomb and then losing them for real and finally facing the wrath of another sleeper's family after she got killed) . . .

Zoe's choice was to go to South America and live under an assumed name or prison. :(

it's not like either one just flaked out and quit . . .

[cvillacci]

Has the new season started yet on A&E or are they just repeating episodes?

[hereafter]

They are just repeating episodes right now (although the episodes "just repeating" are still far superior to a lot of what's on during the summer and, arguably, the fall, too).

Hopefully, we'll be able to see season 4 not long after the UK sees it later this year. Hopefully, A&E will still pay for the episodes to air over here. The entire network has nose-dived in terms of quality of programming over the last 3 or 4 years and MI-5 is the one oasis on the network. I suspect the ratings may not be so great because people have stopped looking to A&E for high-quality shows and have gone elsewhere. I'm not sure if MI-5 is too infrequent to retain the audience for the network, but we'll see. Maybe we'll get some new Horatio Hornblower or something similar later this year (unless Fantastic 4 is a huge hit, in which case, Ioan Gruffud (sp?) won't be in a hurry to do more, probably) to help the network move back in the direction of quality. I don't know, sorry for the rant, but yes, they are showing reruns right now...

[Rob Helmerichs]

Has the new season started yet on A&E or are they just repeating episodes?
There is no new season.

I'm not sure it's been scheduled in England yet. Has it even been announced for a fourth season?

[KRS]

It was the most recent, but not the final. There will be a fourth. (As somebody mentioned earlier in this very thread!)

:)

[Rob Helmerichs]

:)
You know, I thought I'd heard that somewhere, but my brain is so addled with poison and humidity, I just couldn't be sure...

Maybe this should be my new perpetual smiley: :confused:

[KRS]

[Steven Wright] The other day I... uh, no, that wasn't me. [/Steven Wright]

[Richard R1]

Okay, it's now the first of April, and I have officially gotten worried about the new season (series 4) of MI-5, which aired in Britain during the Fall 2005 time period. I have been checking all my bookmarks for the show, and googling for information, and here is the best that I can come up with at this time.

A&E: In an effort to give us the best trailer trash / reality programming they can, MI-5 appears to have been dropped from their schedule. It is no longer listed in their official Show List, and the A&E forums for MI-5 contain no tidbits of juicy gossip that would hold out any hope of it's return.

Wikipedia: Strange place for information like this, but they have a wonderful page of information about the show, including some brief hope that A&E will be airing these series 4 episodes later in 2006. Check it out here. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spooks)

Here is a clip from that website:

"A&E has not yet officially announced whether it will show Series 4 to the U.S., unlike Series 3, it did not air immediately after it ended in the U.K. In what may be a sign that they are abandoning the show, reruns of all three prior Series can only be seen in random order on Mondays at 4am Eastern time. Also, one can no longer directly get to the MI-5 sub-site from the A&E main website. However, a December 1, 2005 article in the Akron Beacon-Journal (http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/living/13299839.htm) says that Series 4 will be shown on A&E, but not until the fall of 2006, which is when Series 5 will be airing in the U.K. A January, 2006 TV Guide article said it will air in the summer, this was also quoted in a January 9, 2006 article in the San Jose Mercury News."

Another option: If you just can't wait, you might try our favorite "alternate source" for TV programs. I haven't checked yet, but I suspect the entire series could be "acquired", and in a MAJOR benefit, each episode would probably be the entire 59 minute length, not the 43 minute episode that A&E so graciously provides for us. That's a loss close to 30% of the show. In fact, as I write this, I am ready to kiss off A&E and just go download it!

Later.

[khark]

:confused: [

Another option: If you just can't wait, you might try our favorite "alternate source" for TV programs. I haven't checked yet, but I suspect the entire series could be "acquired", and in a MAJOR benefit, each episode would probably be the entire 59 minute length, not the 43 minute episode that A&E so graciously provides for us. That's a loss close to 30% of the show. In fact, as I write this, I am ready to kiss off A&E and just go download it!

Later.[/QUOTE]

For the uneducated, where is this "alternate source"?

[TiVo Bum]

For the uneducated, where is this "alternate source"? You can get season 4 (all 10 episodes) from torrentbox.com - it's 6+ GB though and makes for a long download even with a good connection. My download's been going for 7+ hours and has an estimated 15+ hours to go.

[Richard R1]

For the uneducated, where is this "alternate source"?

Tivo Bum answered correctly. I was purposely trying to be vague, in order to not stir up too much concern about bittorrent backlash from sources that would like to sue torrent sites and shut them down.

And to Tivo Bum, forgive me if you know this, but in my experience the download speeds up dramatically towards the end. You know, it's the nature of bittorrent -- the more you have to share, the faster you get what you want.

[cheerdude]

You can get season 4 (all 10 episodes) from torrentbox.com - it's 6+ GB though and makes for a long download even with a good connection. My download's been going for 7+ hours and has an estimated 15+ hours to go.

Hey friend... waving as the bits go by. Guess what I'm doing! (x4) :D

[TiVo Bum]

Hey friend... waving as the bits go by. Guess what I'm doing! (x4) :D
LOL - I thought I saw you go by. ;)

May your downloads be fast! :)

[Mr. Soze]

I don't know how I missed this, but I just started pulling it from uknova. Thanks for the heads up.

[TivoZorro]

I believe I read in TV Guide that the fourth season of MI-5 will air in the summer.

[cwoody222]

Mine are comin in pretty fast. I got 1-3 already. Getting 4-6 now. I literally don't have enough HD space for all of them so I have to download, store them on my iPod, shuffle them around, transcode them for TiVo, send them there, and then delete the originals. Repeat.

But it'll be worth it.

However, I think ffmpeg is going to smoosh the widescreen format :(

[cwoody222]

From TV Guide's Ask Matt (http://www.tvguide.com/TV/Roush/AskMatt/default.htm?cmsRedir=true&rmDate=04032006&cmsGuid={FD525D44-6D75-4DB2-83E8-137622C980CD}&cmsSrch=true) on 4/3/06

"...A&E's MI-5 (which the network insists will air in the "third quarter," meaning this summer)..."

[TiVo Bum]

Mine are comin in pretty fast. I got 1-3 already. Getting 4-6 now. I literally don't have enough HD space for all of them so I have to download, store them on my iPod, shuffle them around, transcode them for TiVo, send them there, and then delete the originals. Repeat.

But it'll be worth it.

However, I think ffmpeg is going to smoosh the widescreen format :(Ended up taking about 16 hours total to get 'em all. Already watched the first 5 eps - very good stuff. Excellent picture quality and only a couple of very brief audio drops.

Luckily I have a DVD player that will play .avi files so I just copy 'em to DVD, pop 'em in the player and away I go.

Just for everybody's info - these are the full ~ 59 minute episodes. When/if A&E gets around to airing them they'll chop off almost 17 minutes from each one.

[5thcrewman]

I thought it was only up to MI:3 this summer.
With Capote vs. the Closet Case! :p :p

[Mr. Soze]

I just watched the first two, and they were very good. But I still miss Tom. And Zoe. Not Danny though.