Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant passages that can help answer the question.
Query: When did the first series of Spooks begin?
The first series of the British spy drama television series "Spooks" (known as MI-5 in the United States) began broadcasting on 13 May 2002 on BBC One, before ending on 17 June 2002. It consists of six episodes. "Spooks" follows the actions of Section D, a counter-terrorism division of the British Security Services (MI5). Among the storylines, main character Tom Quinn faces dilemmas living a double life with his girlfriend, who at first does not know he is really a spy, and Tessa Phillips is running phantom agents for monetary gain. Matthew Macfadyen, Keeley Hawes, David Oyelowo, Peter Firth, Jenny Agutter, Lisa Faulkner, Esther Hall, Heather Cave, Hugh Simon and Greame Mearns are listed as the main cast.
All series of Spooks (most episodes edited) are available on iTunes, with series 7, 8, 9 and 10 becoming available to download one week after original broadcast. Series 1–8 have been released on DVD by Contender Home Entertainment with its successor Entertainment One then taking over; series 9 was released by Universal Playback.
The second series was first released on a DVD box set in the United Kingdom (Region 2) on 20 September 2004. It was later released in the United States (Region 1) on 11 January 2005, and in Australia (Region 4) on 21 March 2005. The box set consists of all 10 episodes of the second series over five discs in widescreen format. The box set includes an array of special features. Five of the episodes contain audio commentary tracks, and all (with the exception of the second) include their own behind-the-scenes featurettes. In addition there are numerous other featurettes including many cast and crew members of the series, discussing various main characters and their cast members, resolving the cliffhanger from series one, and addressing the controversy the second episode attracted. An edited 50-minute showing of the first series finale that aired in the United States is also included. There were also deleted scenes, image galleries, trailers, series credits ("Spooks" is a programme that does not include credits in its episodes), and scripts of the episodes, the latter of which are found on DVD-ROM. In the United Kingdom, the box set was released with a "15" British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) certificate (meaning it is unsuitable for viewing by those under the age of 15 years).
The series has been released on DVD in the United Kingdom (Region 2) on 12 October 2009. It was also released in the United States (Region 1) on 26 January 2010, and in Australia (Region 4) on 30 March 2009. The set consists of four discs and contain all eight episodes, as well as a few special features, including a Behind the Scenes documentary, which contain cast and crew interviews covering the characters and storylines of the series, ""Spooks in Russia"", a featurette behind the scenes of filming in Russia, ""Action Sequence"", which covers filming a chase sequence in episode six, and audio commentaries for episodes five and eight. The box set also contains the original trailer for the series, while the Region 1 release also contains trailers for other British television programmes, including "Doctor Who", "Torchwood" and "Primeval".
Mof Gimmers of "TV Scoop" named "Spooks" series seven as the best television show of 2008 out of 50 programmes. Gimmers felt the seventh series performed better than the previous, as it "lost its way slightly" with the concentration of Islamic extremists. The seventh series however, was praised for bringing back the more traditional enemy, the Russians. With the introduction of Lucas North, Gimmers stated "the possibilities for double-blinding the audience were legion and every single one was exploited to the max." Gimmers also cited the more "pacy" plots due to a shorter series as another factor of the series's success, and also said "the only problem with having a series as good as this in the bag is how they will match it next year?" David Blackwell of "Enterline Media" said that the series' storylines "have a grain of truth reflecting today's climate" and also "more deeply rooted in gritty realism and preying on the real dangers that terrorists and other countries pose to the UK." Blackwell also posed the storylines also "keeps the characters human and show what they go through" and reacted positevely towards Lucas' introduction, stating "I like Lucas North better than Adam Carter or Tom Quinn. His dark and conflicted persona adds to the story and makes him a more interesting character than Adam or Tom ever were." Blackwell summed up the series as "as great as the first six seasons. The show maintains a high standard of quality."
Filming finished in August 2008 in Moscow, Russia; it was the first time in series history where filming took place outside the United Kingdom; producer Katie Swinden stated that "Spooks" is usually "London-orientated," including when it comes to filming scenes set in other countries, and it usually does not take place outside the confines of the M25, an orbital motorway which encircles the UK's capital. However, the producers were able to afford to shoot in another country. A small crew were used to save costs. Armitage and Norris were the only two of the main actors who participated in the shoot. However, the main problem with filming in Moscow was of the 30 plus degree heat, and the actors had to wear winter coats because the episodes were set during the colder months.
"Scooby-Doo" was originally broadcast on CBS from 1969 to 1975, when it moved to ABC. ABC aired the show until canceling it in 1986, and presented a spin-off featuring the characters as children, "A Pup Named Scooby-Doo", from 1988 until 1991. New "Scooby-Doo" series aired as part of Kids' WB on The WB Network and its successor, The CW Network, from 2002 until 2008. "Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated" aired on Cartoon Network from 2010 to 2013, and "Be Cool, Scooby-Doo!" aired on Cartoon Network from 2015 to 2018. Repeats of the various "Scooby-Doo" series are broadcast frequently on Cartoon Network's sister channel Boomerang in the United States as well as other countries.
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! is an American animated mystery comedy television series produced by Hanna-Barbera. Produced for CBS, the series premiered as part of the network's Saturday morning schedule on September 13, 1969, and aired for two seasons until October 31, 1970. In 1978, a selection of episodes from the later series "Scooby's All-Stars" and "The Scooby-Doo Show" were aired on ABC under the "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!" name and, as such, is sometimes marketed as its third season.
"Scooby-Doo" creators Joe Ruby and Ken Spears served as the story supervisors on the series. Ruby, Spears, and Bill Lutz wrote all of the scripts for the seventeen first-season episodes, while Lutz, Larz Bourne, and Tom Dagenais wrote the eight second-season episodes with Ruby and Spears as story editors. The plot varied little from episode to episode. The main concept was as follows:The second season featured bubblegum "chase scene" songs produced by La La Productions (which had originally been contracted to create the music for "Josie and the Pussycats", the first of many animated series made from the same mold as "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!"). These songs were written by Danny Janssen and Austin Roberts, and were performed by Roberts, who also made a new recording of the "Scooby Doo, Where Are You!" theme song for the second season. The series' theme song has been covered by several subsequent artists, including Matthew Sweet for the 1995 TV special and album ""; Third Eye Blind for the 1998 film "Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island"; Billy Ray Cyrus for "Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost" (1999); Jennifer Love Hewitt for "Scooby-Doo and the Alien Invaders" (2000); the B-52's (Cindy, Kate and Fred) for "Scooby-Doo and the Cyber Chase" (2001); MxPx for the live-action "Scooby-Doo" film (2002); and Krystal Harris for "Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire" (2003).
Jordan quickly produced some initial script drafts, which Featherstone took to the BBC; Gareth Neame, Head of Drama Commissioning, rapidly approved a six-part series. Featherstone assembled a production team that had considerable overlap with the "Spooks" crew, including Simon Crawford Collins as producer and Matthew Graham as co-writer. In creating the first episodes, Jordan drew inspiration from the long tradition of confidence tricks and heists in Hollywood and television, including "The A-Team", "The Sting" and "The Grifters" (and in a similar vein, the films and TV series of "Mission Impossible"). Featherstone remarked that ""Ocean's Eleven" was on around the time Bharat and I first spoke, and I think it helped to inspire us, but really we took our inspiration from a whole catalogue of movies and books... we wanted to make something that had the energy, verve, style and pure entertainment value of those sorts of films" At the same time, the writers attempted to draw on the success of recent blockbusters such as "Ocean's Eleven" and ""; speaking in an interview in December 2003, Crawford explained that "[such shows] worked because of the interaction within the group – the plotlines were almost irrelevant".
The series aired for six episodes broadcast on BBC One on Thursdays at 9.30pm between 28 September and 2 November 1989, ending nine days before Remembrance Day. The titles of the first five episodes, "Captain Cook", "Corporal Punishment", "Major Star", "Private Plane" and "General Hospital" are puns based on the pairing of a military rank and another word related to the episode's content. The final episode, "Goodbyeee", was the title of a period song.
Writers Ben Elton and Richard Curtis wrote the scripts for "Blackadder" episodes separately using word processors and then swapped the disks containing the scripts for each other to add or remove jokes and dialogue. Curtis recalls that they stuck to a policy whereby if one removed a line for not being funny, then it was never put back.
Following its debut on 6 September 2002, 56 episodes of "Still Game" were aired, including Christmas and Hogmanay specials. The first three series were broadcast only on BBC One Scotland, though five episodes selected from the first two series were later broadcast throughout the UK on BBC Two from January – February 2004. From the fourth series, "Still Game" was broadcast across the UK on BBC Two. With the seventh series in 2016, the programme began to be broadcast on BBC One on a nationwide basis. An eighth series has been filmed, which started airing on 8 March 2018 on BBC One.
Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated (also known as Mystery Incorporated or Scooby-Doo! Mystery, Inc.) is an American animated mystery comedy-drama series; the series serves as the eleventh incarnation of the "Scooby-Doo" media franchise created by Hanna-Barbera, as well as the first that was not originally run on Saturday mornings. The series is produced by Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network UK and premiered in the United States on Cartoon Network on April 5, 2010, with the next twelve episodes continuing, and the first episode re-airing, on July 12, 2010. The series concluded on April 5, 2013, after two seasons and fifty-two episodes.
For the show's first three series, the broadcast of "Still Game" was limited to BBC One Scotland. The show was then moved to BBC Two for the fourth series and shown throughout the UK. On 28 December 2005, the first Christmas special was shown on BBC One, the first national broadcast of the show on the channel. A fifth series of the show started filming in February 2006 and was shown the following June on BBC Two. As of 2006, series three had not been shown nationally, and only five episodes from the first two series were shown on national BBC Two from 17 January to 14 February 2004. The second series was shown nationally from 10 July 2008. This meant it was listed as a new series in TV listings, even though it is not for Scottish viewers.
Prior to the 1974–1975 series, the first generation of "Captain Pugwash" episodes were filmed in black and white and were first shown on British TV between 1957 and 1966. These early episodes numbered a total of 87 episodes, with the producers using the production codes CP001 to CP087; the later 30 episodes, from the second generation of the series, were produced in colour between 16 September 1974 and 11 July 1975. "Captain Pugwash" was also sold to various overseas TV stations, including Australia's ABC Television. There the show was screened during weekday afternoons in the 1970s and '80s.
"E.S.P." is the sixth episode aired of the first series of "UFO" - a 1970 British television science fiction series about an alien invasion of Earth. Alan Fennell wrote the screenplay and it was directed by Ken Turner. The episode was filmed between 23 October to 4 November, 1969 and aired on the ATV Midlands network on 21 October, 1970. Though shown as the sixth episode, it was actually the fifteenth to have been filmed.
The series debuted on July 12, 2002, on USA Network. It continued for eight seasons, with the final season concluding on December 4, 2009. The series held the record for the most-watched scripted drama episode in cable television history from 2009 through 2012 (broken by "The Walking Dead") with "Mr. Monk and the End – Part II", its series finale, with 9.4 million viewers, 3.2 million of them in the 18–49 demographic.
The series launched on 25 May 2001 on Channel 4. There were a total of four highlight shows airing Monday through Thursday, with Friday being a live eviction episode presented by Davina McCall. Two episodes of the series aired on Friday. During the first episode, viewers were shown the highlights from the previous day and McCall revealed the housemate who had been evicted from the House. Two hours following this, the second episode of the night aired which saw the evicted housemate exit the House and participate in an interview with McCall. One of the highlight episodes per week featured a team of psychologists discussing the events of the previous week from their viewpoint. The series lasted for 64 days, concluding on 27 July 2001. There were a total of 55 episodes this series. This was the first season to feature the spin-off series "Big Brother's Little Brother" (2001–10), presented by Dermot O'Leary; Natalie Casey co-presented the series with O'Leary during the first week. "Big Brother Reveals More" (2001) aired solely during this series, and saw the major plot points of the past week being recapped.
The first live-action film based on Spider-Man was the unauthorized short "Spider-Man" by Donald F. Glut in 1969. This was followed by "Spider-Man", an American made-for-television film that premiered on the CBS network in 1977. It starred Nicholas Hammond and was intended as a backdoor pilot for what became a weekly episodic TV series.
The series premiered on April 17, 2011, on HBO. David Benioff and D. B. Weiss both serve as executive producers along with Carolyn Strauss, Frank Doelger, Bernadette Caulfield and George R. R. Martin. Filming for the series has taken place in a number of locations, including Croatia, Northern Ireland, Iceland and Spain. Episodes are broadcast on Sunday at 9:00 pm Eastern Time, and the episodes are between 50 and 81 minutes in length. The first seven seasons are available on DVD and Blu-ray.
The Thick of It is a British comedy television series that satirises the inner workings of modern British government. It was first broadcast for two short series on BBC Four in 2005, initially with a small cast focusing on a government minister, his advisers and their party's spin-doctor. The cast was significantly expanded for two hour-long specials to coincide with Christmas and Gordon Brown's appointment as prime minister in 2007, which saw new characters forming the opposition party added to the cast. These characters continued when the show switched channels to BBC Two for its third series in 2009. A fourth series about a coalition government was broadcast in 2012, with the last episode transmitted on 27 October 2012. In a 2012 interview, series creator Armando Iannucci said the fourth series of the programme would probably be its last.
Kudos Film and Television developed "Spooks" after releasing Channel 4 medical drama "Psychos" in 1999, though the company initially faced friction from television networks which saw no potential in a post-Cold War spy show. The producers later successfully pitched the series to the BBC after the networks' commissioning teams were replaced. Four episodes were being written when the September 11 attacks took place, and the some scenes were rewritten to take the event into account to show the audience "Spooks's" goal of fighting terrorism. Throughout production, the producers were advised by former intelligence officers from the Security Service, KGB and Central Intelligence Agency. Filming took place from November 2001 to March 2002.
The first series was seen by an average of 7.49 million, and received generally favourable reviews from critics, with some comparing the series to American espionage-based series such as "24". The second episode attracted controversy after a scene which depicted the brutal death of main character Helen Flynn (Lisa Faulkner) attracted more than 250 complaints. As a result of the series, MI5's website saw a surge in a number of applications to the organisation by viewers. "Spooks" was awarded a British Academy Television Awards (BAFTA) for Best Drama Series, and was nominated for two other BAFTAs and three Royal Television Society Awards. The first series was released on DVD on 16 June 2003 in Region 2, 18 August 2003 in Region 4, and 13 January 2004 in Region 1.
Ten main cast members are listed in the first series. Matthew Macfadyen plays primary protagonist and senior case officer Tom Quinn. Creator David Wolstencroft found Tom to be the most fun, yet hardest character to write for due to him being the main character. When portraying the character, Macfadyen did what he was told to do; he did not want to create a backstory for the character as he did not find merit in doing so. Keeley Hawes plays junior case officer Zoe Reynolds. Hawes was attracted to the parallels between acting and spying. The actress described Zoe as "a feisty little number. She can be quite cold and you don't really know her," and the series sees "flashes of how she can be". David Oyelowo plays fellow junior case officer Danny Hunter. Oyelowo first became aware of the show when his agent brought him the script, and was quickly intrigued by the project, and wanted a part to play in it. He downplayed his enthusiasm to get the part. Macfadyen, Hawes and Oyelowo were initially wary of playing the lead characters even though the actors were in their mid-twenties, but eventually felt that they earned the right to be in the series.
Following the success of "Torchwood" (the BBC Three "Doctor Who" spin-off series) the controller of BBC Three, Julian Bellamy, announced in December 2006 a "Spooks" spin-off entitled "Spooks: Code 9" (working titles: "Rogue Spooks" and "Spooks: Liberty"). The show started filming in Bradford in 2008 and the first and second episodes were broadcast on 10 August 2008. It was not well received by critics, who said "the script is poor and the acting little better" ("The Sunday Times") and the production "utterly uninspired and stale" ("Digital Spy"), "daft and unconvincing" ("The Telegraph"), "an utterly cynical venture" that "given its patronising awfulness ... actually damages the Spooks brand" ("The Guardian").Video games based on the show were created by Preloaded for promotional purposes. In 2005, the video game "The Grid" (a promotion for "Spooks" series 3) was nominated for a Webby Award under the category of Best Game.
The episode was written by Christian Spurrier, his first writing credit for the series. He joined the "Spooks" writing staff in January 2008. Producer Katie Swinden wanted to base an episode on the economy, which at the time was facing a recession following the financial crisis of the British bank Northern Rock just months before. After trying a few different stories, the producers settled on a story about a bank collapse that is so severe it could result in an economic collapse. Spurrier did research on banking climate in the City of London in March 2008, and realised the economy was going down, but also wanted to exaggerate the numbers for the episode. Ros was chosen to lead because the character had a background in business. In some of the original drafts of the episode, John Castle would return as Jocelyn Myers, Ros' father, but later on the producers realised they did not need him. The producers also wanted to include some jeopardy in the climax, namely adding a gun to a head or a bomb, which created the scenes where Darlek threatened to kill Ros. Spurrier felt he had a "lot of juggling" in writing three separate storylines; the main plot, the Sugarhorse subplot and Jo; but did a lot of learning how to write a "Spooks" script as he wrote it.