Simon Fernandes

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 12 – Stake Out

“How many stake outs you been on, Bodie?”

The one where…

The stakes escalate dramatically when Bodie and Doyle’s stakeout of a bowling alley reveals a plan to nuke Central London.

After the rather overambitious attempt at spectacle in the previous episode, this one goes completely the opposite way by having an entire episode mostly set in one location. And you know what? It’s much, much better. Unfolding over the course of about four hours, as Bodie and Doyle stake out a bowling alley after a CI5 agent is killed with a scorecard in his pocket, the episode is both tense and, surprisingly, funny.

Alien: Earth Season 1, Episode 5 – In Space, No One…

“They want their monsters. Here they come.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Quite a change in format for Alien: Earth this week, as the show takes a break from its ongoing plotlines (and last week’s cliffhanger ending) for a flashback ep to the events on the USCSS Maginot before its crash on Earth. Well, having so meticulously recreated the original sets from the first Alien, it would be a shame for Noah Hawley not to get as much use out of them as possible, and they’re showcased this week in what is, essentially, a beefed up remake of that film. Hence the episode title.

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 11 – Look After Annie

“You never married then?”
“You didn’t have to ask that, Annie. You know that as far as I’m concerned, you were always…”

The one where…

Bodie and Doyle are assigned to watch over a controversial evangelist/politician, only to discover that she’s an old flame of Cowley’s…

After two episodes focusing mostly on Bodie and Doyle, respectively, it’s now time for one that’s all about Cowley. As Bodie remarks at one point, besides being the standard firm-but-fair boss from all shows like this, we (and they) know very little about him. Look After Annie redresses that balance, delving into the dry, dour Scotsman’s past and giving Gordon Jackson a chance to be the standout cast member for once.

Alien: Earth Season 1, Episode 4 – Observation

“I think they picked me. They’re talking to me. I want to hear them.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It was a much more character-driven, intrigue filled episode of Alien: Earth this week, with barely a terrifying beastie in sight most of the time. That’s definitely a good thing, as (besides advancing the plot) a breather in the action allows us to get to know these characters, and the world they inhabit, rather better.

Alien: Earth Season 1, Episode 3 – Metamorphosis

“Trillions of dollars of research and development just landed in our laps!”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Looks like my initial impression of what Alien: Earth was going to be was wrong. I’d assumed, based on the first two episodes, that what we were going to get was one of those stories that takes place over a short timeline, entirely set around the “search and rescue” operation of the crashed spaceship and the apartment block it had crashed into. Instead, it became clear this week that the story is wider and more ambitious than that, moving to new settings and later days.

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 10 – Klansmen

“I’ve seen and fought prejudice of one kind or another all my life, and I intend to keep on fighting it.”

The one where…

Doyle infiltrates a white supremacist group bringing the Ku Klux Klan’s brutal methods to Britain. But all is not what it seems…

Uh oh – it’s the racism one. Or the ‘racist’ one, depending on your point of view. In 1977, with race riots and the National Front very much on the rise, this was a very sensitive topic for an action-oriented thriller series to take on. Too sensitive, as it turned out, for ITV to feel comfortable showing the episode, which remained unbroadcast in the UK until satellite TV reruns of the show in the late 80s.

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 9 – Close Quarters

“The Myer Helmut group. Anarchists, fanatics, they’ve bombed, killed and maimed at least a hundred people in the last two years. Now they’re here, in Britain – and I want them.”

The one where…

Bodie, on medical leave with a broken hand and a girlfriend, stumbles over the leader of a German terrorist gang while out rowing.

It’s back to the countryside this week for a tense siege thriller (you’ll read that phrase a lot) which puts the focus squarely on hardman Bodie. It is, in fact, almost a Bodie solo episode; there are occasional cuts to Doyle and Cowley searching for him, but for the most part, Lewis Collins carries this one by himself.

Alien: Earth Season 1, Episode 1 – Neverland / Episode 2 – Mr October

“You used to be food, you know. Humanity. Your lives were short. Then your brains grew. You built tools and used them to conquer nature. Built impossible machines. Went to space. You stopped being food. Or, I should say, you told yourself you weren’t food anymore.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It was inevitable, really. Once Disney got its hands on the Alien franchise, it was only a matter of time before we got a TV show from it. That’s how Disney work with successful film franchises – they milk them to death by overproducing content, both film and TV until nobody wants to watch them anymore. They’ve done it with Star Wars, they’ve done it with Marvel – is this the first step to doing it with Alien?

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 8 – Everest Was Also Conquered

“Would you push a girl out of a window for two million?”

The one where…

The deathbed confession of a corrupt lawyer prompts the reopening of a murder case from 1953 – but 24 years later, all the witnesses are being killed.

Murder. Corrupt police. Corporate subversion of government. Flashbacks to 1953. On the face of it, Everest Was Also Conquered has all the makings of a very good Professionals episode. But in fact, it’s a surprisingly simple plot, far more linear than the usual twists and turns that lead the CI5 boys to a solution.

The Professionals: Series 1, Episode 7 – The Female Factor

“A hooker is a woman too!”

The one where…

Doyle’s emotional involvement in the death of a former informant leads CI5 to a prostitute-based blackmail ring, and ultimately, to the KGB.

What with this show basically half-wanting to be The Sweeney, it was only a matter of time before the boys of CI5 would find themselves immersed in the seedy world of prostitution. This being The Professionals, though, we’re not talking about the kind of chainsmoking, tired looking tarts whose witness testimony Jack Regan’s superiors found it so hard to swallow. Oh no, these are high class call girls with perfect skin, who only blackmail the richest of clients and never smoke. Well, they do cocaine, but isn’t that classier than Rothmans?