London Spy

Plot

London Spy begins as the story of two young men: Danny (Ben Whishaw)—gregarious, hedonistic, and romantic—falls in love with Alex (Edward Holcroft)—asocial, enigmatic, and brilliant. Just as they discover how perfect they are for each other, Alex disappears. Danny then finds Alex's body. They lived very different lives: Danny is from a world of clubbing and youthful excess; Alex, it turns out, works for the Secret Intelligence Service. Danny decides to fight for the truth, utterly ill-equipped to take on the world of espionage.

Main

Recurring

Production

The series was commissioned by Janice Hadlow and Polly Hill, and produced by Guy Heeley for Working Title Television. The executive producers are Juliette Howell, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, and Polly Hill. Filming began in 2014 in London and Kent, on the Isle of Grain and at Dartford.

The story is based on the death of Gareth Williams, an actual MI6 agent who was found dead under similar, mysterious circumstances.

Release

The first episode premiered in the U.K. on BBC Two at 9pm on Monday 9 November 2015, and the serial concluded 7 December 2015. In the U.S., it premiered on BBC America starting 21 January 2016.

Critical reception

Reviewing Episode One for The Guardian, Lucy Mangan called it "an unutterably delicious, satisfying dish," with "Jim Broadbent, in fully teddy-bear-carrying-a-switchblade mode.." and Whishaw "the most powerful actor ever made out of thistledown and magic." The Daily Telegraph's Jasper Rees was unconvinced: "Whishaw's intense fixity of purpose could do nothing to defibrillate his DOA dialogue..." The same newspaper's Harry Mount gave a critical review of episode 3 which he regarded as "wearily unconvincing" with "long spells of ennui." In the Daily Mail, Christopher Stevens wrote: "Believe it or not, BBC execs reckon there is not enough gay drama on the Beeb [...] You might think that it's become impossible to switch the telly on without seeing two men locked in a naked clinch, or in drag, or snogging." The Huffington Post UK reported that Stevens' review had inspired a reader backlash, with online comments noting, "It's not a gay spy drama, it's a spy drama and some of the characters happen to be gay."

After Episode 4 had screened, several prominent critics agreed that, whatever they thought of its story, the series possessed a haunting quality. Gabriel Tate of the Daily Telegraph wrote: "London Spy, has been adored and abhorred. Its ambition has delighted and infuriated, its obfuscation has intrigued and frustrated. It is, if nothing else, a singular vision..." A.A. Gill of The Sunday Times wrote: "This is a strange, inexplicably compelling story. There are vast lacunas in the plot, filled with the unblinking performance of Ben Whishaw, made more memorable because most of it is done without words. Everyone else revolves around him, but he remains essentially a hole at the centre of the doughnut. It is a characterisation of great depth, in a plot that is nothing more than a series of enigmas, presented enigmatically."

Jack Searle in The Guardian called it an "intoxicating series" with "a beguiling emotional aesthetic." "It was inevitable that, when prosaic explanation finally had to intrude on all this elliptical artistry, the spell was partly broken. A thriller hasn't so boldly made the genre beautiful since The Shadow Line. London Spy has lived in the gap between plot and subtext – between what it's about, and what it's really about. It's really about self-knowledge, and how lovers try to know each other while lying about themselves."

Following the screening of the final episode, Gabriel Tate wrote in The Guardian that the series had "a somewhat daft and implausible ending, but there was still much to enjoy, mostly from the brilliant Ben Whishaw." Benji Wilson in the The Daily Telegraph called it "wonderful and infuriating in equal measure..Has there ever been a television series that's frustrated as much as London Spy (BBC 2)? Over five weeks this contemporary thriller has scaled giddy heights and then plumbed ludicrous depths, gone from being completely gripping to turgid as hell, thrown up single scenes of startling brilliance then followed them with some preposterous self-indulgence... London Spy's potentially great script was in desperate need of some doughty editing."

The Guardian's Mark Lawson named the series one of the best shows of 2015.