{ Spooks, 8x06. }

[delga]

None of the below makes much sense out of context. And for a little while I go off on one about Ros, but you should expect that by now. (If that's the only part you have anything to say about, please keep it to yourself. I am feeling way cantankerous about things.) But, yes: live edit insta-reactions that basically amount to: I enjoyed it; I am enjoying this series; Ros should run a lot; sometimes the writing is shit.

+ Ros & Sarah, double-team! I may have just died.

+ Baysley/Beysley/Baisley WHATEVER is total lol. I am already in love with this episode.

+ this week was the first time I actually watched the new opening credits? How did that even happen?

+ more and more often I don't understand the niggly parts of the plot. Nothing the Home Sec said made ANY sense to me until his closing summary statement.

+ Harry/HomeSec! Oh yeah, I went there.

+ I'm so over people's issues with Lucas still sleeping with Sarah. HI HONEY TRAP. It's ill-advised but it's been done before, and I've never liked it as a plot motivator, but HEY. Why is the Ros/Maynard one thing and Lucas/Sarah another? Or Adam/Ana? Or WHATEVER.

+ Did Ruth and Ros have a conversation? My goodness.

+ Any episode which features Ros running and shooting is A-double-plus for me.

+ "Next week the UK will be a Third World country." I'm actually offended by this bullshit.

+ Someone give Ruth something to do, already, godamn.

+ FSB and Mossad! Russia and Israel. OF COURSE.

+ Tariq apparently types with only two fingers. Not even asking.

+ I would probably be very pleased if some time this year they put Ros and Lucas in a situation like the S7 finale - where they're using wit and wonder to be superspies! I dislike the way in which these people don't really work together any more. This sounds like a massive complaint, but it's a minor one, because I have decided that I have actually enjoyed a lot of this season. Mostly I would just like to see these people being awesome in tangent.

+ Ros giving instructions! Do that more! AND THEN ROS LIES BECAUSE SHE IS A LYING LIAR WHO LIES.

+ Harry Pearce talking about displacement? Real life lol.

+ the guy Harry and Ros go to see is the SHITTEST liar.

+ Who are the DeWitts? (Is that the Evil Bank?) And also: "Our new Boy Wonder"!!!!

+ "He gets the date of his daughter's birthday wrong." Ruth is the Spooks detail!girl.

+ "Cometh the hour, cometh the geek." WHO THE FUCK IS WRITING THIS.

+ "You love all this, don't you?" Oh, Ros. It's like she was talking to Malcolm. Tariq speaks beautifully.

+ Lucas is going undercover as a Russian. OF COURSE.

+ Isoptopes! Different processor! Output and input modes! "Just twist it round and pin it, it might work." HAHAHA TARIQ. Amazing diction on that boy.

+ The matches in the door was one of the coolest things I have EVER seen on this show.

+ "No, they're not going to let you do a deal." SHE SOUNDS SO ANNOYED. <3

+ I suspect a lot of people will be satisfied by the action this week. Who doesn't love watching these guys run, shoot and drive backwards?

+ "I don't judge." Say it after me: WHATEVER.

+ Nightingale. So that would be this year's Tiresias? Bit late.

+ "I think... she hasn't accepted Jo's death."

+ "If I'm honest, I think it's affected my judgement." Ros going rogue is lovely. You never quite know when she's going to go off the rocker. But unlike our Heroes (Tom, Adam, Lucas) the threat of her crazy always seems less selfish. Or maybe that's just me? I don't know. Her mental fuck-ups seem to play in the team's favour - as opposed to Adam's which nearly always put people in peril. (Tom's resulted in Harry getting shot, so make of that what you will.) The idea is that the job gets to you, but it's just been played out so completely differently with Ros. Like. You can't make her a traitor again, not directly. But you can't play her too softly, either. So you have this character who is incredibly self-aware and incredibly compartmentalised, and therefore kind of ruthless in her efficiency. She's like Emily Prentiss, if Emily Prentiss wasn't polarised between sympathy and empathy. There's a lot of selflessness there but it's not motivated by a higher calling; it's not for a greater good that she actually believes in. Maybe it's penance? I don't know. I just know that she's not the same sort of agent as the others we've seen. And I talk about her a lot because yes, I have always enjoyed this character. But I think there's more there than woman-who-kicks-ass. What are her motivations? Where does she keep them? Why is she the way that she is? So.

+ "A consolation?" "No, it's just cigarettes."

+ Confronting Ros with her lies is an interesting way to soften her. "I lie a lot." Because deceit has always been her foundation - traitor, undercover, corpse. And like I said last time, you have to confront Ros with herself because ultimately she's her own undoing.

+ The location of the account numbers was excellent. THIS IS SO GREAT. Less great is the possibility of the HomeSec breaking his bromance with Harry. I'm heartbroken.

+ !!!! "Why did you kill your boss?"

+ "Ideologues who are in fact terrified we're going to lose the Cold War." What is this? Is this for real? This makes no sense. And is Sarah in a Yalta situation?

+ I love that Harry just wants Tariq to FIX things. Like when he demanded the internet be shut down. THIS IS EXACTLY HOW PEOPLE WHO DON'T GET TECH THINK.

+ Of COURSE Sarah is the signatory on the account. Why would you make her interesting and then REALLY BORING? You wouldn't. Again I have to ask what the hell her motivations could be but at this point it probably doesn't even matter.

+ "You shoot him first!" She's so devious! Sarah is only interesting when she's being duplicitous. "You have no idea how big they are! They are taking over!" ...aaand lame again.

+ "Politics is victory chased by defeat, so make sure you develop a taste for two things: blood, and strong liquor." Lots of pontificating this week, more than usual. GUYS, JUST KISS ALREADY.

+ NO, NOT THE HOME SEC! WE NEED HIM!

+ Transparency and honesty? Shut. the. fuck. up.

+ "Harry, do you want to get a drink?" lol, Tariq; timing! And enter the Pakistan plot. Which will lead to an India plot. And I'm already over this story.

+ Next week: Harry preaches about the English Civil War and the show gets taken over by British Asians. Still no Archie Panjabi, though.

Mostly I am just easily confused AND easily amused.

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UGH I AM SO CRANKY ABOUT LIFE THINGS.