Churchill's Secret Agents: The New Recruits
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Churchill's Secret Agents: The New Recruits | |
---|---|
Genre | Reality |
Narrated by | Douglas Henshall |
Country of origin | United States United Kingdom |
Original language | English |
No. of seasons | 1 |
No. of episodes | 5 |
Production | |
Executive producers | Dan Gold Cate Hall |
Camera setup | Multi-camera set-up |
Running time | 45-48 minutes |
Production company | Wall to Wall Media |
Release | |
Original network | Netflix BBC |
Original release | April 9, 2018 present | –
Churchill's Secret Agents: The New Recruits (originally released in the UK as Secret Agent Selection: WW2[1]) is an American/British reality competition television program released by Netflix on June 29, 2018.
Premise[]
In 1940, during the height of World War II conflict in Europe, British Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton founded the Special Operations Executive. The SOE was a secret organization responsible for espionage and reconnaissance during wartime efforts. The organization would take everyday citizens from all backgrounds and walks of life and put them through rigorous training to extract the traits necessary for a secret agent.
Now, a group of 14 modern day recruits will be put through the same rigorous testing as those agents in 1940 to determine if they would have had what it took to be an agent of SOE.
Filming occurred in Scotland on the Alvie and Dalraddy Estates in the Cairngorms area, and Forglen House and estate in Aberdeenshire.[2]
Cast[]
The Trainers:
- Lieutenant Colonel Adrian Weale, commanding officer
- Nicky Moffat, instructor
- Mike Rennie, military psychologist
- Rod Bailey, SOE historian
The Recruits:
- Samy Ali, ex-armed forces, eliminated during training
- Rohini Bajaj, doctor, eliminated during training
- Roger Barris, retired investment banker, voluntarily resigned during training
- Charlotte Beauclerk, interpreter, eliminated during evaluation
- Will Beresford-Davies, paralegal, successfully completed the course
- Ceebe Cae (credited as Maria Sebe Camara), eliminated during evaluation
- Debbey Clitheroe, drama teacher, grandma, successfully completed the course
- Rob Copsey, ex-paratrooper, successfully completed the course
- Dan Dewhirst, corporate developer, eliminated during training
- Lizzie Jeffreys, research scientist, successfully completed the course
- Alastair Stanley, maths graduate, successfully completed the course
- Paul Stone, entertainer, eliminated during evaluation
- Magda Thomas, interpreter, successfully completed the course
- Vicki Wright, former police officer, eliminated during evaluation
Selection[]
In the first episode of the series, the original 13 recruits were put through an initial four-day selection process, to determine which candidates would proceed to training.
Poker Chips[]
Recruits | Observational | Mechanical | Morse | Obstacle | Verbal | Blocks | Matrices | Psychology | Groupstacle | Pond Test |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Ali | ? | |||||||||
Bajaj | ? | |||||||||
Barris | ? | |||||||||
Beauclerk | ? | |||||||||
Beresford-Davies | ||||||||||
Clitheroe | ||||||||||
Copsey | ||||||||||
Dewhirst | ||||||||||
Jeffreys | ||||||||||
Stanley | ||||||||||
Stone | ||||||||||
Thomas | ||||||||||
Wright |
- The Recruit had an Outstanding performance in this portion of the test.
- The Recruit had a Good performance in this portion of the test.
- The Recruit had an Above Average performance in this portion of the test.
- The Recruit had a Below Average performance in this portion of the test.
- It is not revealed what this chip means
- The Recruit Failed this portion of the test.
- The trainers did not put a chip on the board.
Episodes[]
No. overall |
No. in season |
Title | Original air date | |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 1 | "Selection" | April 9, 2018 | (UK) / June 29, 2018 (US)|
The series opens by charting the beginnings of SOE. The students face the Student Assessment Board - an intense 4-day course to discover who has the raw talent to progress to the full training. DAY 1
DAY 2
DAY 3
DAY 4
After deliberation, the training officers decided which three recruits would not move forward to training. The eliminated recruits were Charlotte Beauclerk, Paul Stone, and Vicki Wright. The remaining Recruits were loaded into a truck and taken to their first day of training. Note: Some or all of the recruits also took part in a Verbal Skills test, a Kohs block design test, Raven's Progressive Matrices, a Psychological evaluation, and a "Groupstacle" test. However, these tests were aired only briefly or not at all during the episode. | ||||
2 | 2 | "Training" | April 16, 2018 | (UK) / June 29, 2018 (US)|
The students training begins as they learn how to use guns, explosives and silent killing techniques. We learn how these skills all came together and helped SOE pull off one of the most audacious assassinations of WWII. | ||||
3 | 3 | "Survival" | April 23, 2018 | (UK) / June 29, 2018 (US)|
The students go to the remote Scottish Highlands where they learn the survival skills required for life in the field. They are schooled in some of the same techniques which prepared a group of agents to halt Hitler's atomic ambitions. | ||||
4 | 4 | "Finishing School" | April 30, 2018 | (UK) / June 29, 2018 (US)|
The students attend the SOE "finishing school" where they will learn the skills needed to operate undercover inside enemy territory such as lock-picking and sending coded messages. They then face a mock interrogation. | ||||
5 | 5 | "The Final Scheme" | May 8, 2018 | (UK) / June 29, 2018 (US)|
As the immersive history series draws to a close, eight of the original students have fallen by the wayside. The six remaining recruits undertake a 24 hour practice realistic mission that will test all the skills they have learned. |
References[]
- ^ Hall, Charlie (25 July 2018). "Churchill's Secret Agents is the best reality TV show on Netflix right now". Polygon. Retrieved 25 February 2019.
- ^ SWINDON, Peter (29 April 2018). "Nazi-hunting secret agents trained to kill in Scottish Highlands for new TV show". The Herald. Retrieved 22 June 2020.
External links[]
- English-language Netflix original programming
- 2010s American reality television series
- 2018 American television series debuts
- English-language television shows
- Historical reality television series
- 2010s British reality television series
- 2018 British television series debuts