MI-5: Volume 1 & 2

Defending their country, deceiving their friends, no one is immune from the eyes and ears of MI-5. Enter the thrilling world of MI-5 - known to insiders simply as 'five' - the clandestine security service, and meet the people who make up the elite team. They tackle organized crime, terrorist activities, embassy sieges, weapons proliferation and anarchists, not to mention the conflicts and power struggles back in the office.

This exclusive set includes all 16 episodes from the first 2 seasons of this exciting spy drama. Also known as Spooks to some viewers.

Series 1
Spooks is a topical and edgy drama about passion, jeopardy and the intrigue of people who have to lie for a living – and who have to deceive their loved ones about what they do.

Like Tom, who is struggling to keep his worklife hidden from new girlfriend Ellie and her daughter Maisie – something which is proving even more difficult as he begins to realise he’s falling in love with Ellie.

Meanwhile,high-flying junior members of the team zoe and danny try and make a name for themselves in the complex and cynical environment that surrounds the security service.

Series 2
The stakes are raised in Series 2, as the threat to national security increases and the need to thwart the activities of terrorists operating within the UK becomes more urgent. Tom and the team find themselves at the heart of the action and must deal with the psychological fall-out of leading such dangerous double-lives.

Series 2 gets off to an explosive start, picking up from the exact moment when Series 1 ended. Tom’s girlfriend, Ellie, and her young daughter are trapped inside a securely sealed house in which a bomb is about to explode. There is no way out.

Other storylines include a visit by the US president, a war criminal on the run, a computer security breach at MI5, a poisonous gas explosion in the centre of London and a potential mutiny in the British Army. The Section B team, which includes Harry, Tom, Zoe and Danny certainly have their work cut out.

A newcomer to the team is Sam Buxton, who is keen to make a good impression and joins Zoe undercover on a surveillance operation to discover who is behind a nationwide bombing campaign. Other new characters include intelligence analyst Ruth Evershed, and Carlo, who takes a fancy to Zoe. .

Series 1
Episode 1 - A car bomb explodes in Liverpool and Zoe is sent undercover to investigate. Tom's life gets complicated when he falls in love with a woman he met while working undercover.

Episode 2 - The team uncovers connections between racist ring-leaders, politicians and mass killings of immigrants. The gang has sophisticated equipment to protect itself from electronic infiltration. Tom is forced undercover, and recent recruit Helen pretends to be his wife...

Episode 3 - Zoe finds herself in the Turkish embassy just as it is taken siege by Kurdish rebels. Meanwhile, Tessa proves herself to have some dark secrets in her past.

Episode 4 - Ellie starts to doubt whether she can cope with dating a spy. Tom's mentor is working undercover, but his methods start to appear dangerously unconventional. Meanwhile Zoe discovers Tessa is up to something.

Episode 5 - An ex-MP is released from prison, proposing to publish his memoirs. Plenty of people are interested, and when a double agent is murdered, the plot thickens.

Episode 6 - Tom is confronted by an Irish terrorist who seems to be trying to help MI5, but nothing is as simple as it seems. Ellie and Maisie move into Tom's house, just as he's tricked into bringing a bomb home in a laptop...

Series 2
Bosnian - A car bomb kills the wife and daughters of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, then a British army base is attacked. When the Irish terrorist group denies responsibility for the second blast and Bosnian war criminal, Miroslav Gradic, is spotted flying into the UK, the team realises this could be the start of a revenge campaign. Zoe is tasked to befriend a possible weak link at the Serbian Embassy – a cipher clerk – whom they suspect of sending coded messages to the war criminal. Two more hits take place on military targets in the UK, leading the Prime Minister to convene Cobra. Whilst debriefing the mole in the MOD, who’s been providing information to the Serbs, they discover that it is in fact Cobra, which has been Gradic’s target all along. The most powerful people in Britain will all be in the same building at the same time, and Gradic knows where they are...

Mosque - An M15 agent is identified and tortured inside a Birmingham mosque, where the MulIah is suspected of extremist activities. Before his health deteriorates, the agent tells Tom that boys are being trained to be suicide bombers. The team urgently needs to put someone else inside the mosque, but there is no one suitable. Enter Algerian spy lbhn Khaldun, who is in the UK and desperate for a British passport. After being rejected by Special Branch, M15 is keen to recruit his services - but can he be trusted? With no time to waste, lbhn is tasked to infiltrate the mosque and uncover the 'nest of angels'. lbhn doesn't show for several arranged meetings, then turns up to inform Tom that a suicide bombing is planned for the following day. The problem is that he will not know the location until the last moment. Helpless, Tom wants to pull lbhn out, but it is too late - lbhn is determined to see it through and save the boy from a pointless death.

Hacker - Someone is hacking into M15's central computer. Files are disappearing and agents are being lost in the field. The number one candidate is a secondary school teacher, Gordon Blaney (Chris Fairbank - Auf Wiedersehen, Pet), who is face-matched near an offending computer. M15's files link him to a violent socialist group, the SFM, and terrifying assaults and protests. The SFM is thought to have disbanded some time ago; has it regrouped? Posing as a supply teacher, Zoe is placed in the school in order to get near Blaney. Danny, meanwhile, tries to infiltrate the SFM. Zoe enjoys normal life in the community, getting to know the children etc, but she has doubts about Blaney's politics and whether he is the hacker. Meanwhile, the central computer is being hacked into more and more, and it's not clear whether two agents in Pakistan are alive or dead. Just as the team think they are near to breaking Blaney, it becomes clear they have been looking at the wrong man. Could it be someone who has been under their noses, but who really doesn't fit the mould? Also guest-starring William Gaminara (Silent Witness) and John Salthouse (The Bill).

Bank - When $2 billion is stolen from the last British family-owned bank in London, M15 is tasked by the Government to track down both the thief and the money. Harry is convinced there is something they are not being told and puts Danny in the bank, undercover. It becomes obvious that the bank has secrets, and that the Government is protecting it. When the CIA starts asking questions about aid money stolen from Russia, and the bank's 'thief' turns up dead - murdered in the Russian style - the team starts to make links. Danny learns from a fellow 'trader' that the bank is involved in money laundering and a Swiss bank is also mentioned. Zoe is shocked to discover that her relationship has to come under the microscope when her lover is implicated. Honey trap follows honey trap, as it becomes a race to retrieve the rest of the stolen aid money. The question is: what will the British Government do with the money if they get to it first? Guest stars include Sophie Okonedo (Hotel Rwanda), Robert Hardy (All Creatures Great And Small) and Rade Sherbedgia (24, The Quiet American).

Germ Warfare - The team is busy at work when an alarm goes off. It's an EERIE (Extreme Emergency Response Initiative Exercise), a practice run for a national emergency - in this case, germ warfare in Central London. All information received will be sent by an EERIE assessment team, which at this moment is somewhere else in the building. But as the exercise continues, information dries up, power and phone lines go down, victims try to break into Thames House - and suddenly Harry gets sick. With their boss in isolation, the team tries to stay calm and pass the test, but doubts start to set in about whether or not this is for real. And as they watch victims suffering and dying through their last remaining link with the outside world, can they protect the nation's security by proxy alone?

President - When the President of the United States makes an unscheduled trip to the UK, it's a huge and complex operation. MI5 must work with the CIA and the President's security team to ensure his safety throughout. At times it becomes a battle for power but as each new threat comes in, it has to be dealt with. Tom and Christine are thrown together and there is very obviously more to their relationship than just work - but there's the small matter of a President who is about to land in the UK. This surprise visit, combined with a routine psychological assessment of Tom and his team, means that everyone has a lot to deal with. As if this wasn't enough, intelligence comes in to say that the President may not be being entirely honest about his visit, although this could be the work of someone trying to drive a wedge between the UK and USA. There are plenty of threats flying around, but it's a tough call working out which ones should be believed.

Briefcase - The French Intelligence Service wants to work in partnership with M15 to catch an arms' expert, whom they suspect of trying to sell Eurofighter technology to the highest bidder. Harry, however, has 'higher' information that the arms' expert has actually developed the technology beyond that of the Eurofighter, and the British government wants M15 to acquire it for themselves. An operation of European unity turns into one of lies and mistrust. There is also the question of how they access the technology. Tom tracks down a thief who managed to break into Harry's house and steal highly classified files and equipment. Who better to use in this operation - a 14-year-old child, plucked from the streets: a clean skin, a completely deniable operation. All they need to do now is train him in the skills of the spy, and then trust him to complete the task they set him...

Unions - At an Army barracks, a platoon immaculately performs a practise exercise on their grounds, led by the highly regarded Major Curtis. One of the uniformed men moving in perfect synchronicity is Tom, working undercover. Britain has been through a winter of discontent with the country brought to almost a standstill by industrial action, and MI5 has been closely monitoring the situation. The fire fighters, nurses, teachers, air traffic controllers, council workers and rail unions have all clashed with the New Labour Government and the unions are dominating the political agenda. With the stability of the country already under threat, MI5 receives word of a potentially far more serious situation: the British Army is planning strike action – despite the possibility of impending war. MI5 knows that Major Curtis is at the heart of this latest move and Tom is in on the inside to uncover exactly what is being planned. His mission is to earn Curtis’ trust and carefully feed him false information to defeat his plans. But what if Tom actually agrees with what Curtis is fighting for?

Drugs - A much-respected journalist and author is assassinated in his office. When M15 learns that he was investigating crimes against human rights in Colombia, the killing ties in with information received that a leading Colombian sicario (paramilitary) may be setting up in London. Rafa Morientes has a reputation for savagery and specialises in the murder of human rights activists and trade unionists. He has come to the UK in order to establish himself as the head of a terrorist network called the Seventh Division. MI5 discovers a connection between Rafa and the Director of Finance at Petrex, the UK's biggest oil corporation. Could Rafa be using Petrex to attempt a coup d'état within a British company? If he is successful, it would pass control into the hands of men who will use it as a clearing house for drugs and terrorism, and harness its enormous power to control politicians across Europe and the globe... Morientes has to be stopped.

Christine - Tom receives a tip-off from Christine Dale, who has accidentally got hold of information that a known American assassin has been sent to Britain by the Iraqis. Apparently the CIA is determined not to let MI5 know, but if there's a risk of a major British figure being assassinated she feels Tom ought to know - but he mustn't tell anyone else. Tom secretly talks Zoe and Danny into helping him. Zoe is suspicious and she does not like keeping secrets from Harry. They begin to suspect that Tom has gone bad. Nevertheless, they follow a trail of evidence to a deserted farm in Suffolk, where they are ambushed, chained up and drugged. When they wake up, Tom has gone, so they rush back to the office and tell Harry everything. Meanwhile, Tom has been tricked into putting his fingerprints on a gun. When he recovers consciousness, he rushes to the nearest house to phone the office, with a warning about a planned assassination and his fingerprints on the gun. It is too late. The assassination has already happened, and the team is convinced Tom is to blame. Desperate to prove his innocence, he persuades Harry, Tom and Zoe to meet with him. But the set-up is too good; there is no way he can convince any of them. Tom is cornered and, as Harry threatens to call in back-up, Tom takes the only way out. He shoots Harry and runs. When he reaches the beach he just keeps going, swimming out to sea and an uncertain future.

Tom Quinn	---	Matthew MacFadyen
Zoe Reynolds	---	Keeley Hawes
Tessa Phillips	---	Jenny Agutter
Harry Pearce	---	Peter Firth
Danny Hunter	---	David Oyelowo
Christine Dale	---	Megan Dodds
Malcolm Wynn-Davies	---	Hugh Simon
Colin Wells	---	Rory Macgregor
Sam	---	Shauna MacDonald
Vicki	---	Natasha Little
Ruth Evershed	---	Nicola Walker
Carlo Franceschini	---	Enzo Cilenti

Created by David Wolstencroft
Written by David Wolstencroft, Howard Brenton, Matthew Graham, Simon Mirren, Ben Richards, Steve Bailie Directed by Rob Bailey Produced by Simon Crawford Collins
Produced by Jane Featherstone
Executive Produced by Stephen Garrett, Gareth Neame

“A smart, slick and highly effective vehicle for thrills and spills, delivering them at a cracking rate and in spectacular style.” -Daily Mail

“I’m not surprised that applications for jobs at MI5 soared during the first series of Spooks. The counter-espionage business hasn’t looked so glamorous since the heyday of James Bond … It’s a glossy, flashy, pacy action thriller in the tradition of The Avengers.” -Daily Star

“…pacy dialogue and confident plot twists…” -Independent

“The BBC’s surprise hit of last year returns … with all the glamorous, high-speed style that it had in the first series … Spooks is fast, it is entertaining and it has some good plots … Don’t miss.” -London Evening Standard

“Good old-fashioned entertainment … this moves at a terrific pace, and has some splendid spy stuff.” -Financial Times

“Spooks has returned in a ten-part series, and for many – me included – joy will be unconfined.” -Daily Mail

“Absorbing spy drama … the second series contains just as many stories that have been ripped from the headlines.” -Independent

“Forget David Shayler and Stakeknife, Spooks must be the best advertisement MI5 has ever had … it’s enjoyable and compelling escapism.” -Observer

“It’s not all glamour and gadgets … personal dramas help to avoid Spooks getting too close to the nightly news and turning into a new form of post-9/11 Reality TV. “ -Observer

“Matthew Macfadyen as Tom does a brilliant line in sublimating personal feelings to professional duty. In Harry Pearce, Peter Firth has created one of the most compelling spymasters of all time. The baddies are extremely convincing. And I’m well and truly hooked.” -Daily Mail

“More explosive than ever.” -Sunday Mirror

“The format is a dream one for scriptwriters because the characters can be put in almost any situation under the guise of investigative work and there is plenty of scope for action, drama, suspense and even comedy.” -Daily Star

“An example of that always-welcome phenomenon: the thriller that thrills.” -Daily Telegraph

BAFTA® Awards
2003 – Best Drama Series