How did you rate Season 10?

[Silktie]

Hmm, at the moment it's not knocking season 4 off its perch as my all-time favourite, but certainly in my top four favourite seasons.

I think it had the potential to be truly magnificent, if they had had more time to develop the storyline. Those extra two episodes we got in previous seasons would have made the world of difference, methinks.

[Scarlet]

Silktie I agree with you. Shame they could not have stretched the budget to at least 8 episodes. Although I still miss the days of 10 episodes! I would say, having re-watched ep 6 twice now, it still disappoints me on many levels. Not the acting or directing I might add. I would say 8/10 for eps 1-5 and 4/10 for ep 6. I personally would have preferred another ending, but that aside, as I've said before, I just thought the resolution of the plot was poor and let everything else down. I kept expecting another revelation but it never came. Maybe I was expecting too much but this disappointed me almost as much as Ruth's death. However, I did like the scene by the memorial. Probably the only bit I did like.

[nimax1]

Only one more comment about Series 10: Peter Firth was amazing throughout. However one gets acting awards in the UK someone should try to get him one. And the last 10-15 minutes of the episode 6 were absolutely incredible. He never said anything from the time he walked down the lane to the house until he picked up the phone - He did everything with his eyes, his body, his movements. You don't see too many moments like that in TV --- or the movies for that matter. Just a master.

[Tranquility]

Having just re-watched series 1 and 2 it's clear to see just how downhill Spooks had gone, specifically series 7, 8 and 9 which I didn't particularly enjoy (series 7 because of Adam's death. ) the only things that kept me watching were the performances of Peter and Nicola. Not so much because of the R/H storyline, but I got slightly uncomfortable with the new cast, specifically after Malcolm left and they kept the familiarity I needed in the show.

However, series 10 in my eyes was definitely up there with the earlier series. A few scenes had me pacing the room as I couldn't sit down with the suspence, something I hadn't felt for a long long time and I loved it. The ending was a disappointment to me though. I had already accepted that one of them was destined to die but the romantic side of my brain still wishes for a bit more closure, perhaps another kiss (with both members of the party alive) or an admission of love.

I'll have to bite the bullet and accept it though because it just wouldn't have been Spooks if that had happened. They've always had a knack for killing off my favourite characters, why stop just because it's the last episode?

[harrbd]

Thought the acting in this series from PF, NW, SRB, AK, JH and GS was brilliant especially the first two. I liked the plane dilemma. However the rest of the storyline has become a complete mystery to me when I look back ! I get that the Russians wanted to stop the Treaty but why all the other stuff? I'll watch again and then ask you for your thoughts on the bits I didn't understand !

[SweetTea]

Now that the shock of the ending is wearing off - or maybe just sinking in - it's a little easier to look back on the series as a whole. I did rewatch it all before the final ep on Sunday and I'd love to try and sneak it all in again, but not sure if I'll have time before BBC pulls the eps from iPlayer.

In general I enjoyed the overall storyline - the 'old school' nature of it - despite the plotholes one could have flown a medivac chopper through. I do agree it was better than S9, but I think S4 is still my favorite.

GS really grew on me as Calum - I thought him doofus in the first ep and yet at the end he was probably my favorite of the 3 officers. LP wasn't bad but her character wasn't very consistent. MB looked better this season (the hair helped) but he wasn't given much to work with either. Very much enjoyed PF and NW's performances, and JH, AK, and TWJ did well as the Gavriks. SRB as Towers was great as well.

Proof that I would never be cut out to be a spook: I finally noticed that during the opening titles, the little (what I call) firefly lights are spelling out the word Spooks. My only defense is that I'm in the States so I've always thought of the show as MI-5, even though I knew it was called Spooks in the UK. This is the only series I've watched live, and thus have started to think of it as Spooks rather than MI-5.

I'm glad that I was able to watch this series live, as I knew that waiting for the DVD would be torture and that I'd never be able to avoid spoilers to not know how everything turned out.

[molecatcher]

For me this was my favourite series of all. The parallels running through with Harry still condoning the burning of assets 30 years after he had left Elena on a park bench was a clever touch and showed just how ruthless a man he could be, but his past coming back to haunt him also showed a vulnerable side and I loved that conflict. The writing for Simon Russell Beale was sharp and witty and he was the perfect actor in that role. I'm now a committed fan! I've already posted my appreciation of the ending, tinged with sadness of course and can see why Peter Firth picked those last five minutes to be his favourite out of all 10 series. He had me crying where Ruth's last moments hadn't but that's certainly no criticism of Nicola Walker. The pain, jealousy and utter frustration at Harry's entanglement with the Gavriks was played to perfection. There were some beautifully directed shots, my favourite being the stunning look down the Thames and across London with those high buildings towering over Harry and Ruth on that beach as they said goodbye. Whoever found that on a recce deserves a bonus! I just have to work out how I get a copy on to my computer as a screensaver!! Finally, for me Harry back on the grid was the perfect and definitive end. More an end of an era than end of Harry so long live the man!

[dalia]

Personally, my favorite is S4 - best group on the grid, fantastic stories. Then I would put S1 - S3 and S7, great as well. Then would be S5 (very good, but I didn´t like Ros at first very much, started to like her only at the end of S6), S6 (I know many people didn´t like it, but I liked Adam and how his problems were portrayed, and 6.8 was a great Harry episode, I just didn´t like very much the Yalta story) and S8 (I loved Ruth´s return first of all). My least favorite are S9 and S10. In both, I enjoyed the actors performances very much and I liked the weekly stories. But I didn´t like the Lucas-Maya story in S9, it really was quite unbelievable for me. In S10 except of the terrible ending (how much better and more fitting would be the ending mentioned by Sam Vincent in the DVD extras!!!), I didn´t like very much the whole Gavrik story (even if the actors were very good). I liked the new characters of Erin and Colum, they had very good potential, but not enough opportunities. I liked Dimitri in S10 very much. But it´s one of my least favorite seasons.

[nothingisasitseems]

(29-11-2011 12:38 PM)dalia Wrote:  In S10 except of the terrible ending (how much better and more fitting would be the ending mentioned by Sam Vincent in the DVD extras!!!)

You're memory plays tricks on you so it's hard to judge the early Seasons. I'm currently re-watching from the start so I'll judge when I get to the end.

Season 1 though now seems a bit dated and Ellie annoyed me intensely.

S4 and S7 seem to stand out in my mind, though. S5 was great up to the departure of Ruth then Adam's personal problems got in the way!

Haven't got S10 yet. What is the ending mentioned by Sam Vincent?

[beatrice4ruth]

I am happy that I am not the only one who was intensely annoyed by Ellie.

It is a different ending. You will learn about the alternate ending in the s10 DVD extras.

Thanks to ForeverSecret, there is a link to it

http://shallowbayer.livejournal.com/23629.html

and to the interviews of PF, NW, the writers and the producers. NW is very touching in it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXkDu8Awi...e=youtu.be