Nuclear Strike (Spooks)
Encyclopedia
"Nuclear Strike" is the series seven
finale and 64th episode of the British
espionage
television series Spooks
. It was originally broadcast on BBC One
on 8 December 2008. The episode was written by Neil Cross
, and directed by Sam Miller
. In the episode, Tiresias, the Russia
n equivalent of Sugarhorse, awakens a sleeper agent to detonate a nuclear suitcase bomb
in central London
. The Section D team use Connie James
(Gemma Jones
), an FSB mole who helped set up Tiresias, to help them stop the bomb. However, the team find themselves targeted by an FSB kill squad, who are unaware of the bomb threat.
The idea behind the episode came from an earlier series three
episode about a series of Russian weapons caches throughout the United Kingdom set up during the Cold War
. Cross also felt it gratifying to kill off Connie, a character he created in the sixth series
. Filming took place during the summer of 2008, with much of it taking place in disused tunnels of the London Underground
. The series seven finale was seen by six million viewers and a quarter of the television audience, a large increase of 900,000 viewers and four share points from the previous week. Critics reacted to the episode with near universal acclaim, for being a "superb season closer," "exciting" and "thrilling."
, Kent
, Walter Crane (Kevin Fuller) receives the message "rain from heaven" in Russian
from a numbers station
. Upon hearing this, Crane unburies a cache. Section D, having heard "Tiresias wakes 3 pm tomorrow" the previous episode, work on what the message means. Lucas North
(Richard Armitage
) and Harry Pearce
(Peter Firth
) discover Tiresias is the Russia
n equivalent of Sugarhorse, but "bigger and better;" while Sugarhorse placed pro-western Russians to infiltrate its government
, Tiresias does the opposite; recruit spies to infiltrate the British Government
. Ros Myers
(Hermione Norris
) believes Connie James
(Gemma Jones
), a mole from the FSB, might know what Tiresias is planning. Ros and Lucas release Connie from custody by posing as masked Russian agents. Later, it is revealed that FSB officers have been assigned to assassinate her. FSB head Viktor Sarkisiian (Peter Sullivan) orders a kill squad to search every MI5 safehouse, provided by Connie, to kill her and the Section D team who are harbouring her.
At the safe house "Ottawa Bravo", Connie reveals she helped set up Tiresias over two decades ago and will give all sleeper agents and operations in exchange for safe passage to New Zealand
. After listening to the numbers station broadcast, she reveals Tiresias has awakened a sleeper agent to a specific task; detonating a nuclear suitcase bomb
in central London
by 3 pm. The only way to know where it would detonate is a locker at London Bridge station
, which contain all Tiresias members and codes. When they start their journey however, they encounter the kill squad. They and Lucas engage in a shootout, and after evading them, the team decide to split up and regroup in Catherine Wheel Alley, while Harry returns to Thames House
.
After returning, Harry warns Home Secretary
Nicholas Blake
(Robert Glenister
) of the threat and tells him that if he receives a call from MI5 at 2:45 pm, he should order the evacuation of Parliament. Lucas, Ros and Connie regroup and head towards a London Underground
station, but Lucas is wounded by a sniper; though not seriously wounded, the kill squad could follow Lucas' blood trail. To slow them down, Lucas sets up rudimentary traps and the three venture through empty tunnels towards the station. Later, the kill squad send in a runner to find the three; Lucas is able to trip and kill him. Back in Thames House, Harry believes the FSB are not aware of the bomb threat, and decides to meet with Sarkisiian face-to-face. In order to get there alive, Harry uses the emergency "handshake protocols" and reasons with Sarkisiian that he would turn himself into the FSB if he stops the kill squad. Meanwhile, Lucas attempts to draw off the squad by splitting up, but at the confrontation, his gun jams and is cornered. Before he can be killed, Sarkisiian calls the team off and orders them to help stop the bomb.
Ros and Connie find the locker with the bomber's name and location, Grosvenor Square
. An FSB sniper kills Crane, and at Connie's request, the bomb is sent to her, as she is the only person with the expertise to disarm it. Connie defuses the bomb, but by doing so a secondary countdown is initiated. She removes the nuclear material, but the bomb will still detonate. In her last words, Connie admits that she set up Lucas in Moscow
eight years ago, which resulted in his imprisonment. Lucas and Ros then run to safety as the bomb detonates, killing Connie. With disaster averted, Lucas calls Harry, but receives no answer. In the end, it is revealed Sarkisiian has him locked up in the boot of his car.
. Before he started writing Cross did not know Connie was the mole from the previous episode, so he included it to help with the storyline. The character was originally intended to be killed by the end of the last episode, but Cross kept her alive until the end of the finale. He wanted her killed off at this episode, as he was the one who created Connie in the sixth series, and felt it gratifying to kill off a character he created. In writing the plot, Cross was inspired by the Rupert Walters script for "Frequently Asked Questions" from the third series
, which revealed a series of weapons caches throughout the United Kingdom set up by the Russians during the Cold War
; Cross wanted to use that as a way to introduce the nuclear suitcase bomb. The bombs design from the episode was based from actual designs, but invented its failsafes.
The producers also intended to tease the audience that after the brutal killing of Ben Kaplan
(Alex Lanipekun
) from the previous episode, they would think that things could not get worse for the team, until the nuclear threat in the finale. The scene where the team breaks Connie out was intended to show the audience that the protagonists are willing to go to extreme measures to stop serious threats. Cross wanted to make it a very pure Spooks episode by setting up the entire plot in one scene, and then include a chase throughout London between FSB officers and the main characters. Cross enjoyed creating the FSB team featured in the episode, especially as he created them as a Russian version of the Spooks protagonists, but also make their base much more lit with windows. The bomb defusal scene was originally set at a graveyard, but the producers decided it would be best to set it underground. Though it took several rewrites, the script remained "fundamentally the same" throughout the writing process.
The part where Connie asks for safe passage to New Zealand was a "sly personal reference" to Cross, as the writer himself resides in the country. In one scene, Lucas can be seen breaking into a car and getting his hands on various items that would be useful to help set up traps against the FSB officers. Throughout the episode's development, the items kept changing. There were also staff discussions about what they could get away with in terms of the protagonists killing FSB officers. The most prominent discussions included Harry strangling one officer with his necktie
, and Lucas shooting another in the head in cold blood despite being unarmed and subdued.
felt that Fuller was one of the most influential actors he ever worked with. Elsewhere, Peter Sullivan, who plays Sarkisiian, never spoke Russian
before. Since most of his dialogue would be in Russian, Sullivan was trained how to speak it phonetically before he would play the part.
The episode was filmed sometime during Summer 2008. Miller wanted to style the filming as if the cameras are following the team like in a documentary. The first day was spent in the "Ottawa Bravo" safe house set, where Connie reveals the threat. Throughout the shoot, Gemma Jones had hip problems. Concerned, the producers set up a body double on hand. However, Jones insisted she could do everything herself, and in the end the double was not used. During the first shootout scene in the episode, Miller wanted to make the sequence as real as possible by having the camera film as if it was under attack. Richard Armitage recalled the shootout sequence; "There was a shoot-out in the final episode where I surprised myself about the amount of rounds I could pull off and how quickly. It's a weird thing. I'm not a violent person but when you put a gun in somebody's hands something strange happens. It's like a little animal comes out of you that wants to fire the gun again."
Filming did face some disruptions. The sequence where Lucas breaks into a car for some supplies was filmed at a street near Hyde Park
. On one end of the street was an event in the park, while on the other end a wedding
took place. Elsewhere, Fuller carried a mock-suitcase bomb to film in Grosvenor Square. However, because the American Embassy is situated next to the square, shortly after Fuller and the filming crew arrived, they found themselves surrounded by five armed American security officers who believed Fuller was about to commit an attack. Fortunately, location manager Patrick Stuart was able to "sweet-talk" the American officials, and they were allowed to film in the area.
Five days of filming were spent at the London Underground
tunnels. Filming took place on actual tube tunnels, albeit disused ones. As the crew were scouting the disused tunnels, they came across an abandoned tube train. When Sam Miller called Cross about the development, the writer included it as a last minute addition to the script, and the sequence was shot the next day. As a way to scare the audience, Cross included a homeless woman living in the train. The filming crew present disliked filming the Underground sequences because while filmed during the summer, it became hot locations to work in. The crew were prohibited from bringing food or drink into the tunnels, as it would attract rats
. Furthermore, break times had to be longer than usual because it would take a while for a crew member to leave the tunnels, have a break and then return. The FSB base was filmed in the London Docklands, near the ExCeL London.
play The Merchant of Venice
. The speech begins; "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, it droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven. Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; it blesseth him that gives and him that takes..." Later in the episode, Lucas tells Connie about Bridget Driscoll
, the first person in the United Kingdom to be run over and killed by a car, which, while big news back in her time, becomes forgotten over time and is now only "a single moment," much like Connie's contributions to her country during the Cold War
. When Jo asks Malcolm to evacuate his mother, he explains she is busy watching A Place in the Sun
, a television programme about Britons buying property abroad, followed by Countdown
, a game show on Channel 4
.
, during the 9 pm to 10 pm time slot
on Monday, 8 December 2008. However, it was held back to 10:40 pm in Northern Ireland
, and did not broadcast in Scotland
on the day all together. The finale attracted 6 million viewers on its original broadcast, earning a 25% audience share. Ratings were up by 900,000 viewers and four share points from the previous episode which aired against I'm a Celebrity, Get, Me Out of Here! on ITV1
. On the next week, the Spooks finale beat Taggart
on ITV1 in the same time slot. "Nuclear Strike" ended being the ninth most seen broadcast on BBC One, and the 24th most seen broadcast overall the week it aired.
The episode attracted near universal acclaim. The Spooks producers regard "Nuclear Strike" as one of their favourites in the series. Sam Wollaston of The Guardian
reacted positively to the episode, stating "it's nice to see MI5 locking horns with the Russians again. Maybe the Spooks people just got bored with Islamic terrorism, so they did what they had to do: they restarted the cold war. A bold move, but an admirable one." Gerard O'Donovan of The Daily Telegraph
placed the episode as a "critic's choice," calling it a "superb season closer," and "all terrifically exciting." O'Donovan also said of the episode's settings; "the streets and Underground tunnels of London have rarely been used to such climactic effect – with great performances from everyone involved." He also complimented it for setting up a "great cliffhanger ending that will leave fans absolutely gagging for the next series."
Andrew Billen of The Times
however, felt the finale was "not [a] very exciting episode," and "conducted with a minimum of acting." Mof Gimmers of TV Scoop praised the episode, saying "Neil Cross knows a thing or two about ratcheting up the tension, and in the finale of the seventh series of Spooks he used both of them. And then, from somewhere, he found a third thing. And a fourth," and "pressure piled on pressure relentlessly throughout this brilliant finale as each new success only led to the next, even bigger problem." Gimmers called the chase sequence in the episode "one of the most thrilling traditional chase sequences ever seen on British TV," the interplay between the characters "was handled expertly," and ended with "already I can't wait for the next series!"
Spooks (series 7)
The seventh series of the BBC espionage television series Spooks began broadcasting on 27 October 2008 on BBC One before ending on 8 December 2008 on the same channel, and consists of eight episodes, two less than previous series. It follows the actions of Section D, a counter-terrorism division...
finale and 64th episode of the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
espionage
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
television series Spooks
Spooks
Spooks is a British television drama series that originally aired on BBC One from 13 May 2002 – 23 October 2011, consisting of 10 series. The title is a popular colloquialism for spies, as the series follows the work of a group of MI5 officers based at the service's Thames House headquarters, in a...
. It was originally broadcast on BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
on 8 December 2008. The episode was written by Neil Cross
Neil Cross
Neil Cross is a Booker Prize nominated novelist, crime writer and television scriptwriter born and raised in the United Kingdom, and now living in Wellington, New Zealand.-Life:...
, and directed by Sam Miller
Sam Miller
Sam Miller is an English television director. He is best known for his work on the BBC television dramas Cardiac Arrest and This Life. -Filmography:-Actor - Filmography:...
. In the episode, Tiresias, the Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n equivalent of Sugarhorse, awakens a sleeper agent to detonate a nuclear suitcase bomb
Suitcase nuke
A suitcase nuke is a tactical nuclear weapon which uses, or is portable enough that it could use, a suitcase as its delivery method. Synonyms include suitcase bomb, backpack nuke, mini-nuke, pocket nuke and snuke....
in central London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. The Section D team use Connie James
Connie James
Connie James played by Gemma Jones is a fictional British MI5 spy in the BBC television series Spooks.-Introduction to the Team:According the BBC website, Connie joined MI5 as a secretary when she was 19 in 1963. She was first seen in episode 2 of Series 6, brought in as a regular female lead...
(Gemma Jones
Gemma Jones
Gemma Jones is an English character actress on both stage and screen.-Early life:Jones was born in London, England, the daughter of Irene and Griffith Jones, an actor. Her brother, Nicholas Jones, is also an actor...
), an FSB mole who helped set up Tiresias, to help them stop the bomb. However, the team find themselves targeted by an FSB kill squad, who are unaware of the bomb threat.
The idea behind the episode came from an earlier series three
Spooks (series 3)
The third series of the BBC espionage television series Spooks began broadcasting on 11 October 2004 on BBC One, before ending on 13 December 2004. It consists of ten episodes. The series continues to follow the actions of Section D, a counter-terrorism division of the British Security Services...
episode about a series of Russian weapons caches throughout the United Kingdom set up during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. Cross also felt it gratifying to kill off Connie, a character he created in the sixth series
Spooks (series 6)
The sixth series of the BBC espionage television series Spooks began broadcasting on 16 October 2007 before ending on 18 December 2007. The series, consisting of ten episodes, is the first where there is a story line throughout the episodes...
. Filming took place during the summer of 2008, with much of it taking place in disused tunnels of the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
. The series seven finale was seen by six million viewers and a quarter of the television audience, a large increase of 900,000 viewers and four share points from the previous week. Critics reacted to the episode with near universal acclaim, for being a "superb season closer," "exciting" and "thrilling."
Plot
In FavershamFaversham
Faversham is a market town and civil parish in the Swale borough of Kent, England. The parish of Faversham grew up around an ancient sea port on Faversham Creek and was the birthplace of the explosives industry in England.-History:...
, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, Walter Crane (Kevin Fuller) receives the message "rain from heaven" in Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
from a numbers station
Numbers station
A numbers station is a shortwave radio station of uncertain origin. In the 1950s, Time magazine reported that the numbers stations first appeared shortly after World War II and were using a format that had been used to send weather data during that war.Numbers stations generally broadcast...
. Upon hearing this, Crane unburies a cache. Section D, having heard "Tiresias wakes 3 pm tomorrow" the previous episode, work on what the message means. Lucas North
Lucas North
Lucas North, formerly known as John Bateman, is a fictional character from the BBC espionage television series Spooks , which follows the exploits of Section D, a counter-terrorism division of MI5. North is portrayed by British actor Richard Armitage...
(Richard Armitage
Richard Armitage (actor)
Richard Crispin Armitage is an English actor famous for his roles as John Thornton in North and South, Guy of Gisborne in Robin Hood, and Lucas North in Spooks...
) and Harry Pearce
Harry Pearce
Sir Henry James "Harry" Pearce KBE is the fictional head of the Counter-Terrorism department of MI5, featured in the British television series, Spooks...
(Peter Firth
Peter Firth
Peter Firth is an English actor. He is best known for his role as Sir Harry Pearce in the BBC show Spooks, of which he is the only actor to have starred in every episode of the show's 10 series lifespan...
) discover Tiresias is the Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n equivalent of Sugarhorse, but "bigger and better;" while Sugarhorse placed pro-western Russians to infiltrate its government
Government of Russia
The Government of the Russian Federation exercises executive power in the Russian Federation. The members of the government are the prime minister , the deputy prime ministers, and the federal ministers...
, Tiresias does the opposite; recruit spies to infiltrate the British Government
Government of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Government is the central government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Government is led by the Prime Minister, who selects all the remaining Ministers...
. Ros Myers
Ros Myers
Rosalind "Ros" Sarah Myers was a fictional character from the BBC espionage television series Spooks, which follows the exploits of Section D, a counter-terrorism division in MI5. She is portrayed by British actress Hermione Norris. The character was a former MI6 officer who works with MI5 in the...
(Hermione Norris
Hermione Norris
Hermione Norris is an English actress.Norris attended the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art in the 1980s before taking small roles in theatre and on television. In 1996, she was cast in her breakout role of Karen Marsden in the comedy drama television series Cold Feet...
) believes Connie James
Connie James
Connie James played by Gemma Jones is a fictional British MI5 spy in the BBC television series Spooks.-Introduction to the Team:According the BBC website, Connie joined MI5 as a secretary when she was 19 in 1963. She was first seen in episode 2 of Series 6, brought in as a regular female lead...
(Gemma Jones
Gemma Jones
Gemma Jones is an English character actress on both stage and screen.-Early life:Jones was born in London, England, the daughter of Irene and Griffith Jones, an actor. Her brother, Nicholas Jones, is also an actor...
), a mole from the FSB, might know what Tiresias is planning. Ros and Lucas release Connie from custody by posing as masked Russian agents. Later, it is revealed that FSB officers have been assigned to assassinate her. FSB head Viktor Sarkisiian (Peter Sullivan) orders a kill squad to search every MI5 safehouse, provided by Connie, to kill her and the Section D team who are harbouring her.
At the safe house "Ottawa Bravo", Connie reveals she helped set up Tiresias over two decades ago and will give all sleeper agents and operations in exchange for safe passage to New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
. After listening to the numbers station broadcast, she reveals Tiresias has awakened a sleeper agent to a specific task; detonating a nuclear suitcase bomb
Suitcase nuke
A suitcase nuke is a tactical nuclear weapon which uses, or is portable enough that it could use, a suitcase as its delivery method. Synonyms include suitcase bomb, backpack nuke, mini-nuke, pocket nuke and snuke....
in central London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
by 3 pm. The only way to know where it would detonate is a locker at London Bridge station
London Bridge station
London Bridge railway station is a central London railway terminus and London Underground complex in the London Borough of Southwark, occupying a large area on two levels immediately south-east of London Bridge and 1.6 miles east of Charing Cross. It is one of the oldest railway stations in the...
, which contain all Tiresias members and codes. When they start their journey however, they encounter the kill squad. They and Lucas engage in a shootout, and after evading them, the team decide to split up and regroup in Catherine Wheel Alley, while Harry returns to Thames House
Thames House
Thames House is an office development in Millbank, London, on the north bank of the River Thames adjacent to Lambeth Bridge, designed originally as commercial head offices...
.
After returning, Harry warns Home Secretary
Home Secretary
The Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
Nicholas Blake
Nicholas Blake (Spooks)
Nicholas Blake MP is a fictional character in the British TV series Spooks, portrayed by British actor Robert Glenister. Blake was Home Secretary in the British government. He was regularly in contact with Harry Pearce, regarding National Security....
(Robert Glenister
Robert Glenister
Robert Lewis Glenister is a British actor known for his roles as con man Ash "Three Socks" Morgan in the British TV series Hustle, and Nicholas Blake in the BBC spy drama Spooks.-Career:...
) of the threat and tells him that if he receives a call from MI5 at 2:45 pm, he should order the evacuation of Parliament. Lucas, Ros and Connie regroup and head towards a London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
station, but Lucas is wounded by a sniper; though not seriously wounded, the kill squad could follow Lucas' blood trail. To slow them down, Lucas sets up rudimentary traps and the three venture through empty tunnels towards the station. Later, the kill squad send in a runner to find the three; Lucas is able to trip and kill him. Back in Thames House, Harry believes the FSB are not aware of the bomb threat, and decides to meet with Sarkisiian face-to-face. In order to get there alive, Harry uses the emergency "handshake protocols" and reasons with Sarkisiian that he would turn himself into the FSB if he stops the kill squad. Meanwhile, Lucas attempts to draw off the squad by splitting up, but at the confrontation, his gun jams and is cornered. Before he can be killed, Sarkisiian calls the team off and orders them to help stop the bomb.
Ros and Connie find the locker with the bomber's name and location, Grosvenor Square
Grosvenor Square
Grosvenor Square is a large garden square in the exclusive Mayfair district of London, England. It is the centrepiece of the Mayfair property of the Duke of Westminster, and takes its name from their surname, "Grosvenor".-History:...
. An FSB sniper kills Crane, and at Connie's request, the bomb is sent to her, as she is the only person with the expertise to disarm it. Connie defuses the bomb, but by doing so a secondary countdown is initiated. She removes the nuclear material, but the bomb will still detonate. In her last words, Connie admits that she set up Lucas in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
eight years ago, which resulted in his imprisonment. Lucas and Ros then run to safety as the bomb detonates, killing Connie. With disaster averted, Lucas calls Harry, but receives no answer. In the end, it is revealed Sarkisiian has him locked up in the boot of his car.
Writing
The episode was written by Neil CrossNeil Cross
Neil Cross is a Booker Prize nominated novelist, crime writer and television scriptwriter born and raised in the United Kingdom, and now living in Wellington, New Zealand.-Life:...
. Before he started writing Cross did not know Connie was the mole from the previous episode, so he included it to help with the storyline. The character was originally intended to be killed by the end of the last episode, but Cross kept her alive until the end of the finale. He wanted her killed off at this episode, as he was the one who created Connie in the sixth series, and felt it gratifying to kill off a character he created. In writing the plot, Cross was inspired by the Rupert Walters script for "Frequently Asked Questions" from the third series
Spooks (series 3)
The third series of the BBC espionage television series Spooks began broadcasting on 11 October 2004 on BBC One, before ending on 13 December 2004. It consists of ten episodes. The series continues to follow the actions of Section D, a counter-terrorism division of the British Security Services...
, which revealed a series of weapons caches throughout the United Kingdom set up by the Russians during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
; Cross wanted to use that as a way to introduce the nuclear suitcase bomb. The bombs design from the episode was based from actual designs, but invented its failsafes.
The producers also intended to tease the audience that after the brutal killing of Ben Kaplan
Ben Kaplan
Ben Kaplan DSO, portrayed by Alex Lanipekun was a starring character in the British spy series, Spooks.- Appearances :Ben Kaplan first appeared in Series 6, Episode 5 as a freelance journalist who was in a relationship with Jo Portman. He tried to expose what was going on with MI5's and Section D's...
(Alex Lanipekun
Alex Lanipekun
Alex Lanipekun is a British Actor of Nigerian and Italian/English origin. He trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art but left early to join the cast of the BBC drama Spooks as journalist come spy Ben Kaplan. In 2007 he won the prestigious Carleton Hobbs Award, joining the BBC Radio Drama Rep...
) from the previous episode, they would think that things could not get worse for the team, until the nuclear threat in the finale. The scene where the team breaks Connie out was intended to show the audience that the protagonists are willing to go to extreme measures to stop serious threats. Cross wanted to make it a very pure Spooks episode by setting up the entire plot in one scene, and then include a chase throughout London between FSB officers and the main characters. Cross enjoyed creating the FSB team featured in the episode, especially as he created them as a Russian version of the Spooks protagonists, but also make their base much more lit with windows. The bomb defusal scene was originally set at a graveyard, but the producers decided it would be best to set it underground. Though it took several rewrites, the script remained "fundamentally the same" throughout the writing process.
The part where Connie asks for safe passage to New Zealand was a "sly personal reference" to Cross, as the writer himself resides in the country. In one scene, Lucas can be seen breaking into a car and getting his hands on various items that would be useful to help set up traps against the FSB officers. Throughout the episode's development, the items kept changing. There were also staff discussions about what they could get away with in terms of the protagonists killing FSB officers. The most prominent discussions included Harry strangling one officer with his necktie
Necktie
A necktie is a long piece of cloth worn for decorative purposes around the neck or shoulders, resting under the shirt collar and knotted at the throat. Variants include the ascot tie, bow tie, bolo tie, and the clip-on tie. The modern necktie, ascot, and bow tie are descended from the cravat. Neck...
, and Lucas shooting another in the head in cold blood despite being unarmed and subdued.
Casting
Kevin Fuller was cast as Walter Crane, the man with the bomb. The character did not say a word throughout the entirety of the episode, yet had such a strong presence, which the producers felt was unique for a guest star in the series. Fuller did "a lot of getting into the part," director Sam MillerSam Miller
Sam Miller is an English television director. He is best known for his work on the BBC television dramas Cardiac Arrest and This Life. -Filmography:-Actor - Filmography:...
felt that Fuller was one of the most influential actors he ever worked with. Elsewhere, Peter Sullivan, who plays Sarkisiian, never spoke Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
before. Since most of his dialogue would be in Russian, Sullivan was trained how to speak it phonetically before he would play the part.
Filming
Filming did face some disruptions. The sequence where Lucas breaks into a car for some supplies was filmed at a street near Hyde Park
Hyde Park, London
Hyde Park is one of the largest parks in central London, United Kingdom, and one of the Royal Parks of London, famous for its Speakers' Corner.The park is divided in two by the Serpentine...
. On one end of the street was an event in the park, while on the other end a wedding
Wedding
A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...
took place. Elsewhere, Fuller carried a mock-suitcase bomb to film in Grosvenor Square. However, because the American Embassy is situated next to the square, shortly after Fuller and the filming crew arrived, they found themselves surrounded by five armed American security officers who believed Fuller was about to commit an attack. Fortunately, location manager Patrick Stuart was able to "sweet-talk" the American officials, and they were allowed to film in the area.
Five days of filming were spent at the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
tunnels. Filming took place on actual tube tunnels, albeit disused ones. As the crew were scouting the disused tunnels, they came across an abandoned tube train. When Sam Miller called Cross about the development, the writer included it as a last minute addition to the script, and the sequence was shot the next day. As a way to scare the audience, Cross included a homeless woman living in the train. The filming crew present disliked filming the Underground sequences because while filmed during the summer, it became hot locations to work in. The crew were prohibited from bringing food or drink into the tunnels, as it would attract rats
RATS
RATS may refer to:* RATS , Regression Analysis of Time Series, a statistical package* Rough Auditing Tool for Security, a computer program...
. Furthermore, break times had to be longer than usual because it would take a while for a crew member to leave the tunnels, have a break and then return. The FSB base was filmed in the London Docklands, near the ExCeL London.
Cultural references
Though the series in general does not note many cultural references, Neil Cross decided to include some into this particular episode. The phrases "rain from heaven" and "it is twice blest" from the numbers station was taken from "The Quality of Mercy" speech from the William ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
play The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
. The speech begins; "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, it droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven. Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; it blesseth him that gives and him that takes..." Later in the episode, Lucas tells Connie about Bridget Driscoll
Bridget Driscoll
Bridget Driscoll was the first pedestrian victim of an automobile accident in the United Kingdom. As she and her teenage daughter May crossed the grounds of the Crystal Palace in London, she was struck by an automobile belonging to the Anglo-French Motor Carriage Company that was being used to...
, the first person in the United Kingdom to be run over and killed by a car, which, while big news back in her time, becomes forgotten over time and is now only "a single moment," much like Connie's contributions to her country during the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
. When Jo asks Malcolm to evacuate his mother, he explains she is busy watching A Place in the Sun
A Place in the Sun (TV series)
A Place in the Sun is a British FreeForm/Channel 4 lifestyle programme about buying property abroad. It most often focuses on places in southern Europe, but in recent years has also featured a number of places in other areas of the world...
, a television programme about Britons buying property abroad, followed by Countdown
Countdown (game show)
Countdown is a British game show involving word and number puzzles. It is produced by ITV Studios and broadcast on Channel 4. It is presented by Jeff Stelling, assisted by Rachel Riley, with regular lexicographer Susie Dent. It was the first programme to be aired on Channel 4, and over sixty-five...
, a game show on Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
.
Broadcast and reception
The episode was originally broadcast on BBC OneBBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
, during the 9 pm to 10 pm time slot
Time division multiple access
Time division multiple access is a channel access method for shared medium networks. It allows several users to share the same frequency channel by dividing the signal into different time slots. The users transmit in rapid succession, one after the other, each using its own time slot. This...
on Monday, 8 December 2008. However, it was held back to 10:40 pm in Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
, and did not broadcast in Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
on the day all together. The finale attracted 6 million viewers on its original broadcast, earning a 25% audience share. Ratings were up by 900,000 viewers and four share points from the previous episode which aired against I'm a Celebrity, Get, Me Out of Here! on ITV1
ITV1
ITV1 is a generic brand that is used by twelve franchises of the British ITV Network in the English regions, Wales, southern Scotland , the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. The ITV1 brand was introduced by Carlton and Granada in 2001, alongside the regional identities of their...
. On the next week, the Spooks finale beat Taggart
Taggart
Taggart is a Scottish detective television programme, created by Glenn Chandler, who has written many of the episodes, and made by STV Productions for the ITV network...
on ITV1 in the same time slot. "Nuclear Strike" ended being the ninth most seen broadcast on BBC One, and the 24th most seen broadcast overall the week it aired.
The episode attracted near universal acclaim. The Spooks producers regard "Nuclear Strike" as one of their favourites in the series. Sam Wollaston of The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
reacted positively to the episode, stating "it's nice to see MI5 locking horns with the Russians again. Maybe the Spooks people just got bored with Islamic terrorism, so they did what they had to do: they restarted the cold war. A bold move, but an admirable one." Gerard O'Donovan of The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
placed the episode as a "critic's choice," calling it a "superb season closer," and "all terrifically exciting." O'Donovan also said of the episode's settings; "the streets and Underground tunnels of London have rarely been used to such climactic effect – with great performances from everyone involved." He also complimented it for setting up a "great cliffhanger ending that will leave fans absolutely gagging for the next series."
Andrew Billen of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
however, felt the finale was "not [a] very exciting episode," and "conducted with a minimum of acting." Mof Gimmers of TV Scoop praised the episode, saying "Neil Cross knows a thing or two about ratcheting up the tension, and in the finale of the seventh series of Spooks he used both of them. And then, from somewhere, he found a third thing. And a fourth," and "pressure piled on pressure relentlessly throughout this brilliant finale as each new success only led to the next, even bigger problem." Gimmers called the chase sequence in the episode "one of the most thrilling traditional chase sequences ever seen on British TV," the interplay between the characters "was handled expertly," and ended with "already I can't wait for the next series!"
External links
- Series 7, Episode 8 at bbc.co.ukBbc.co.ukBBC Online is the brand name and home for the BBC's UK online service. It is a large network of websites including such high profile sites as BBC News and Sport, the on-demand video and radio services co-branded BBC iPlayer, the pre-school site Cbeebies, and learning services such as Bitesize...
- Episode 8 at TV.comTV.comTV.com is a website owned by CBS Interactive. The site covers television and focuses on English-language shows made or broadcast in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Japan...