DRAMA

The spin-off show is a seemingly inevitable symptom of modern TV production: when ideas are running on empty, just grab a programme, give it a shake and see what kind of sub-version can be made out of it. So, here we are in 2013 and London has been evacuated after a nuclear bomb is set off with power being transferred to the north of England. For some reason, this means that people in their twenties and thirties are now in charge of MI5 and they are tracking down a bunch of rogues who coincidentally appear to be in their twenties and thirties.

Unfortunately, the Beeb have more or less done this already in a slightly less pompous fashion with MI High, which has about as much credibility as this tedious affair. Quite why the security services would suddenly be run by folk in their gap year is wholly unexplained and frankly irritating. Coming up next: Spooks Code 2 and a Half in which newborns run the treasury, toddlers front Al Qaeda and a Tweenie has been voted in as Mayor of London. Actually, that last bit . . .