Alternative Storyline and High Expectations

For a long time of Spooks 9 I thought, Ruth and Harry would find Lucas out. That they had no real clue till the bitter end a bit diminished their almighty in my eyes.

Ruth I gave good chances at least to find an important lead which could be taken up by Dimitri or Beth.
But Dimitri was a bit colourless, because he mostly was pushed into the background.
Also Beth, except for Spooks 9.2, had no real chance to get into the light.
(I must admit, I had hoped for a little side romance or at least office flirt between Beth and Lucas, even when I only had a fake tryst in mind for Lucas to cover his tracks. Unfortunately that chance is gone now.)

You see, I had a much more complex setting in mind than Spooks 9 turned out to really use.
Richard Armitage would have been ideal to play the required layers of gaining trust, covering betrayal, friendship, father-son-relationship to Harry, etc., but all these elements remained fairly in the dark. John Bateman’s obsession with Maya covered most of those other emotions.


So I must admit that part of my disappointment is a result of me in my mind giving the main figures much more interesting character developments and chances to show off their spooks-talents. The lack of development and instead shattering of the section chief’s character without the bonus of the least bit of explanation or background information just left me empty.

This empty feeling is hardly getting me in any mood to feel enthusiastic about Spooks 10. But that would be necessary to wanting to see the next series. I will watch Spooks 10, if I can, but I get nowhere near the urgency to wanting to see series 7, 8 or 9.

I will continue, as I watched the whole of Spooks so far and because this is the only TV series I ever watched completely.
I normally hate series, as effects to get a decent storyline for every episode normally have a bad effect on the overall ark of the story. What I so far had admired, was, that Spooks got the storylines quite well, though I found Tom Quinn’s private life a bit crowded and over-stuffed.
Later on, they did not want to pack so much private development into it and the storyline of Adam Carter with his wife and child was very gripping for me. Even his connection with Ross was a believable development of both characters desperately seeking some stability in their life.