Amazon pushed this to me this weekend, by way of Brit Bix I think, and I inhaled the three short seasons (series). Shocked I had not heard of it before, as a little googling reveals it is highly regarded in the UK, has been run several times on PBS, and seems to clearly be a bit of an inspiration to one of my favorite shows of all time (and which I just rewatched for the 5th time earlier this summer) Spooks (MI5).
I wonder if Adam, or anyone else who may be familiar with the show, know how it played originally in the late 1970s? These were the Carter years in the US, and the transition from the Labor government of James Callaghan to the ultra Tory government of Margaret Thatacher in the UK. The show reads as partly a love letter to Thatcherism, but it does seem several cuts above propaganda because it’s Thatcherite hero in MI6, Burnside (who by my reading of twilight Cold War history was proven to be pretty much dead wrong), while being lionized in characterization is also shown to be flawed and mistaken in some of his judgements and schemes. But I can’t tell if he was seen at the time as a flawed and often misguided hero, whose antagonists were better than he gave them credit for being, and often right where he was wrong, or was the show catching an early Thatcher wave that saw itself as preaching the Gospel? Sent from Gmail Mobile -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKGtkY%2BHaijo1wy6TvN8YtZyo10EuZXhcw-9n2OU2i867S75cQ%40mail.gmail.com.
