‘I do not like moral horror’: Spooks and the Ethical Challenge of the Secret Services in Twenty-first Century Britain

Abstract

Spooks (BBC, 2002–11) is a success story of British television that has been noted for the way in which it responded to political and social concerns of the United Kingdom during the time it was produced. In the course of ten seasons, the programme presented the heroism of MI5 officers who defend the realm against the many threats of the twenty-first century. However, its displays of heroic action are always entangled with negotiations of serious ethical questions: Spooks's heroes can perform their duty only because they constantly stretch and transgress the morality of ordinary life. As spy fiction, Spooks also scrutinised political ethics at a time when, during the ‘war on terror’, the practice of politicians was as openly criticised as the work of the intelligence services. This article investigates how Spooks functioned as a morality play for the first decade after 9/11, and how it epitomises the claim that television creates for its viewers a cultural space in which moral ideas can be shared and debated.