MI-5: Volume 2

BAFTA? Awards
2003 - Best Drama Series

?So good it makes you want to be a spy.? -Guardian
?Smart and fast ... this show should not be kept a secret.?- Guardian
?The problem confronted by any drama involved with special intelligence, undercover or police units is the difficulty of taking a well-worn genre and making it feel fresh and original. Spooks succeeds brilliantly ... the production standards are mesmerising, and it kicks over a routine audience expectation to shocking effect.You have been warned.? -The Times
?This is exciting, clever, gung ho television ? fast-paced and well-acted, full of split screens, technical wizardry and deft touches.?- The Times
?Very, very cool.?- Sydney Morning Herald, Australia
?Spooks pushes itself right to the forefront of edgy, suspenseful television"- Cult Times, California, USA
?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

The hit drama that takes us into the thrilling world of MI5, the clandestine security service, is back. There's organised crime, terrorist activities, embassy sieges, weapons proliferation, subversives, anarchists and drug traffickers, not to mention the conflicts and power struggles the elite team has to deal with back in the office. A topical and edgy drama about passion, jeopardy and the intrigue of people who have to lie for a living - and who can never tell the truth to their loved ones about what they do. The second series gets off to an explosive start, picking up at the exact moment the first one finished. Top agent Tom's girlfriend Ellie and her young daughter are trapped inside a securely sealed house in which a bomb is about to explode, and there's no way out.

Episode 1- 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...

Episode 2- 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.

Episode 3- 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, Crocodile Shoes), 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? Guest stars in this episode also include William Gaminara (Casualty,Attachments) and John Salthouse (The Bill).

Episode 4- 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, however, 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 start 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. Honeytrap follows honeytrap, 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 (Clocking Off, Dirty Pretty Things, Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls), Robert Hardy (All Creatures Great And Small,Winston Churchill:The Wilderness Years, Bramwell) and Rade Sherbedgia (Space Cowboys, Snatch, Mission: Impossible II).

Episode 5- 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?

Episode 6- 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.

Episode 7- 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...

Episode 8- 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?

Episode 9- 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??tat 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.

Episode 10- Tom received a tip-off from Christine Dale. She'd accidentally got hold of information that a known American assassin had been sent to Britain by the Iraqis. Apparently the CIA were determined not to let MI5 know, but she felt if there was a risk of the assassination of a major British figure then Tom ought to know. But he mustn't tell anyone else. He secretly talked Zoe and Danny into helping him. Zoe was immediately uncomfortable with keeping secrets from Harry. Zoe and Danny began to suspect that Tom had gone bad.Tom managed to win a last bit of trust out of Zoe and Danny and they followed a trail of evidence to a deserted farm in Suffolk.There they were ambushed and chained up. Danny and Zoe were drugged, and when they woke Tom was gone.The rushed back to the office and told Harry everything. Meanwhile, Tom was tricked into putting his fingerprints on a gun. By the time Tom had come to and rushed to the nearest house to phone the office, warning them there was a planned assassination and his fingerprints would be on the gun, it was too late. The assassination had already taken place, and the team were convinced Tom was to blame. He was desperate to prove he'd been set-up and persuaded Harry,Tom and Zoe to come and meet him. The set-up had been too good. There was no way he could persuade any of the team of his innocence.Tom was cornered and as Harry threatened to call in back-up,Tom took the only way out. He shot Harry and ran.When he reached the beach he just kept going, and swam out to sea and an uncertain future.

Terrorism, espionage and organized crime is ready for seconds. The elite team of special MI-5 agents continues a covert war on the streets of London in 10 tightly wound episodes battling religious fanaticism, racism, governmental cover-ups, drug kingpins, computer hackers and other miscreants. In Volume 2, the stakes are raised as terrorist activities threaten national security. Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) 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. Need a little excitement? Hit the streets with MI-5 and get ready for the thrill-a-minute ride of your life! Co-stars Peter Firth (Amistad) and Jenny Agutter (Inspector Lynley Mysteries). Each episode includes an extra 15 minutes of spine-tingling drama never before broadcast in the US! Also known as Spooks to some viewers.

Tom Quinn . . . . . . . .Matthew Macfadyen (Enigma, The Project,The Way We Live Now, Perfect Strangers, Warriors) Zoe Reynolds . . . . . .Keeley Hawes (Tipping The Velvet,Wives and Daughters, Our Mutual Friend,The Beggar Bride) Danny Hunter . . . . .David Oyelowo Harry Pearce . . . . . .Peter Firth (Pearl Harbor, Holding On, The Hunt for Red October) Sam . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Shauna MacDonald (Late Night Shopping) Colin . . . . . . . . . . . . .Rory MacGregor Malcolm . . . . . . . . . .Hugh Simon Vicki . . . . . . . . . . . . .Natasha Little (Vanity Fair, This Life) Ruth Evershed . . . . .Nicola Walker (Touching Evil) Christine Dale . . . . .Megan Dodds (Love in a Cold Climate) Tessa Phillips . . . . . . .Jenny Agutter (The Buccaneers, An American Werewolf In London,The Eagle Has Landed) Carlo Franceschini . .Enzo Cilenti Created by David Wolstencroft (Psychos ? Royal Television Society Award 1999 for Network Newcomer Behind The Screen) Written by David Wolstencroft Howard Brenton Matthew Graham Simon Mirren Ben Richards Steve Bailie Producer Simon Crawford Collins (Oktober) Director Rob Bailey Executive Producers Jane Featherstone (Touching Evil, Sex 'n' Death, Glasgow Kiss, Kudos Head of Drama) Gareth Neame