Churchill's Secret Agents: The New Recruits

I'm fond of espionage novels and films, especially World War II era. The concept here is brilliant: a group of modern women and men volunteer to undertake the same training program as British Special Operations Executive agents who were being prepared for intelligence-gathering, sabotage, support of local Resistance fighters, and covert communications in territories occupied by the Nazi enemy. This is reality television of a very high order. The participants, both volunteers and their instructors, are utterly convincing. The volunteers are exceptionally brave.

When I started watching this show I didn't know what to expect. I honestly thought it was going to be a typical documentary about World War II.

But I was wrong, it was actually much different from what I expected - and it was suprisingly enjoyable to watch. It's a mixture between a documentary and a reality show. Consisting of 14 civilian recruits coming from all sorts of backgrounds reenacting what it was like to become an SOE (Special Operations Executive) agent during World War II.

Normally I don't watch a great deal of reality, because I simply don't enjoy it. But this show was surprisingly well edited with enough content to keep me interested in it. I liked the instructors, as well as the participants, I think what also made it interesting was the fact that they had some unique backgrounds and varied personalities.

One of the downsides to the show is the fact that it's only 5 episodes long - even though it's well thought out, I don't think the format would be able to last more than 1 season. If you're interested in World War II history, I recommend this show. The process is quite fascinating.

I hope there will be another season. This is very interesting and I learned a lot about what might have occurred. A lot of the plot seems to be based on factual history. A twist on the typical reality series. Well done!

I wasn't quite sure I wanted to watch this, but once I got started, I'm happy I did. The historical links are solid and well-presented. Whether SOE was really as effective as the series hints at or not is a matter of conjecture, but there is absolutely no denying that the SOE training and missions had a significant effect not just on WWII, but on the development of the CIA para-military units, post-war SAS and the US Army Special Forces. It was very interesting to see a very varied group from today put through the SOE syllabus and training program, to include peer assessment and self-selection (drops) that are still an integral part of SOF selection today. I was only surprised by one of the non-selections and none of the selections.

As a SOE living historian and a British Army veteran I found this series to be interesting and very informative. Frome the rat bomb to the unarmed combat it was following the SOE training manual. It is shame they couldn't have used the actual SOE Finishing School for the Finishing School and the Final Scheme but since that is now the National Motor Museum I suppose it would have caused too much disruption. I feel that it was left incomplete without the Parachute School