A CBBC Show that premiered in 2007 about a team of three teenagers who lead a double, secret life as spies for MI9 — a branch of MI5 specialising in turning students into spies. With a headquarters hidden in a bunker below their school, the team foil the plans of S.K.U.L (a Nebulous Evil Organisation who plans to take over the world), and every other baddie that they happen to come across.
If this sounds at least a little familiar, it's because the show is created by the same people who brought you Spooks, and is essentially a Lighter and Softer version of that show, but no less dramatic.
The entire series can be watched on BBC iPlayer
(UK only).
This show contains examples of
- Accidental Athlete: At the end of one episode, set during sports day, a frustrated student grabs the nearest object and hurls it in frustration. Said object happens to be a discus... and the throw just happens to set a national record.
- Action Girl:
- Although Blane was the hired muscle in Series 1 and 2, both Daisy and Rose had Action Girl moments.
- Carrie Stewart filled this role from Series 3 to 7.
- Violet Webb in the Series 2 episode "the Others".
- Zoe in Series 6 and 7, along with her clone Keri in the latter.
- Affably Evil - Quite a few of the villains, most notably the Grand Master himself.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: A.L.L.E.N doesn’t take long to go off the deep end and try to turn the country into a police state.
- Almighty Janitor - Lenny Bicknall and his replacement Frank London. When Frank is removed from his post in "We Need to Talk About Kortex" thanks to the MI High division being shut down the school quickly falls into disrepair.
- Artificial Intelligence: Bodlien is a benevolent example in "The Ghost."
- Badass Bookworm: Rose. She solves most of the team’s problems and in one episode, her dad decides to transfer her to a better school.
- Badass Longcoat: Dehaverland in "It's a Kind of Magic" sports one.
- Baguette Beatdown: In "Don't Cook Now", the MI High team get in a fight in the kitchen of a restaurant. Oscar squares off against one of the bad guys who is wielding a pair of baguettes, picking up a baguette of his own to defend himself.
- Beauty, Brains, and Brawn:
- The first set of team is made up of Daisy, Rose and Blane respectively.
- The second retains Rose, with Oscar and Carrie filling the Beauty and Brawn roles respectively.
- The third batch was supposed to be Aneisha, Tom and Dan,but Zoe was added to the team by the end of their debut episode.
- Big "NO!": Davina lets loose an impressive one of these in "Day of the Jacket Potato" when Mrs King orders everyone to come to school in correct school uniform including blazers and ties.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Dr. Steinberg. Hamish Campbell. Also the Deputy Prime Minister Evelyn Baxter.
- Black-and-White Insanity: Kloe, Zoe's "sister" and failed clone suffers from a form of this, considering people either friends or enemies with no middle ground. She quickly turns against Zoe when informed she can't be an MI High agent like her.
- Bland-Name Product: Series 5 had a political party called the "Morris Dancing Loony Party". This was based on the 'Monster Raving Loony Party', a joke political party in Britain that used to try and get the votes of people who looked upon the real parties with disdain.
- Another episode has "Twitcher", a parody of social networking site Twitter.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Blonde-haired Dan, dark-haired Aneisha and Tom, and red-haired Keri and Zoe during season six and seven.
- Daisy (redhead) and her two school friends Zara (blonde) and Letitia (brunette) in Series 1 and 2.
- Brainy Baby: Grace Stein. Her intelligence is enough to overpower both of her parents.
- The Can Kicked Him: In "Dark Star'', Frank takes out one of Colt's henchmen with an exploding toilet.
- Captain Nemo Copy: In "The Octopus", pirates have been raiding numerous trade ships, stealing components to make a nuclear warhead. Their leader is the Octopus, and he has plans to blow up Antarctica and flood the world to protect the world's marine life from humans. And to drive the Nemo connection home, the Octopus' state-of-the-art submarine is named the Naughty Lass after Nemo's Nautilus.
- Child Hater: Lady Blahga in "The Wasp" on top of being a general jerk. Mary Taylor from "Big Sister" is a more misguided version.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: If you're not one of the members of the cast of season 3 (aside from the old boss and the old spies) raise your hand.
- Hand Wave: Now, if you're not in Season 3 and haven't raised your hand yet, raise it now.
- Cloning Gambit: The truth behind Zoe's and Keri's origins. They are two of 87 female clones of the Mastermind, created specially to function as his new body. Zoe is thought to be the only successful attempt. Season Seven reveals that there are two others, Keri and another girl named Libi.
- Conspiracy Theorist - Stewart spends a lot of time trying to cover supposed “truths”. Sometimes, he’s closer than he realises.
- Commie Land: Boldovia in one of the series 3 episodes.(I think. It's a bit more Fascist.)
- Cowboy Episode: In "Dark Star", an old enemy of Frank's breaks out of prison and comes gunning for him. Colt Winchester (really Colin from Winchester) and his men have adopted cowboy outfits and affectations and the whole thing plays out like High Noon.
- Disappeared Dad: Oscar's is missing, presumed dead. They are reunited in "The Lost Hero."
- Dreadful Musician: Realistically played with many of the schoolchildren performers in "Eyes on Their Stars."
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: The M.I. 9 fitness instructor Jed Black in "Fit to Wurst".
- Double Agent: The show was particularly bad with this. It started in a season 1 episode with a rogue colonel playing General Ripper and became most prominent with Oscar’s mum.
- Elaborate Underground Base: Turns out the one under St Hearts' used to belong to Sternum, a faction of Korps. One of their agents was a schoolteacher who was working on a super soldier program.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: The Grand Master cares deeply for Flopsy. When he is finally incarcerated, he is willing to give information to help clear Frank London's name if only the MI High agents will remove Flopsy from jail and care for him.
- Everyone Can See It:
- Blane and Daisy. Also, occasionally, Oscar and Avril later on in Series 5. Zoe and Dan in Season 6.
- Aneisha is able to spot Frank and Stella's mutual feelings for each other after witnessing one interaction between the two.
- Expy: Carrie was obviously supposed to be an Expy for Blane, but although Oscar had most of Daisy's roles missions-wise, his personality and backstory were completely opposite to hers.
- The Faceless: The Grand Master. There's some
Narm involving this in Vote SKUL, where Julian Bleach's nose and mouth can be seen quite clearly behind the Grand Master's scarf. - Formally-Named Pet: General Flopsy, who the Grand Master treats as his superior/dragon.
- Friend to All Children: Downplayed case with Oscar who doesn't interact with many children but gets on pretty well with the few he does. He empathizes with the pre-teen Della/Sally enough to induce a Heel–Face Turn and is the best of the team at caring for the infant Grace Stein.
- Genius Ditz: Mr Flatley isn't a competent teacher by all means (though his heart is in the right place) but he is also one of five people in the whole world able to crack Quillian Pendrix's puzzle and the only one of the group able to crack the lock on the safe from which mechanism the puzzle was derived.
- Genius Serum: Created by Walter M Dainbridge in the second world war. Roly (a student) accidentally consumes this in "The Beginning" and becomes a temporary genius, only for the effects to quickly wear off.
- Gone Horribly Right: In "Vote SKUL", the Grand Master stands for election as Prime Minister so he can get rid of the security forces and steal everything. But he finds that other, more independent criminals have taken advantage of the opportunity afforded to them.
- Government Agency of Fiction: M.I. 9. Other episodes mention M.I. 4, M.I. 38 and M.I. 25.
- Grand Theft Me: Korps' ultimate plan for Zoe and later Keri. With Zoe, the attempt is foiled by her friends. With Keri, they temporarily succeed and replace her consciousness with the Mastermind's.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Korps, which SKUL used to be a part of until the Grand Master betrayed the Mastermind. In "Trojan Korps" Frank shows the team a diagram that shows just how dwarfed SKUL is in size compared to Korps.
- Heel–Face Revolving Door: Jade Dixon-Halliday betrayed MI9 when Oscar was younger. Then it is revealed that she is a deep cover agent who has been leaking valuable information from Skul. Ultimately she turns out to really be working for Skul and is arrested by MI9 in "Tim Brown's Skul Days."
- Hidden in Plain Sight: The Crime Minister visits the school in "The Hive" but is unable to recognise the undisgusied Zoe as V.9.5. Hamish likewise fails to recognise Keri as K.3.R.1.
- Impossibly Delicious Food: The addictive wursts in "Fit to Wurst". Rose explains that it doesn't actually taste any better than regular food but contains artificial chemicals that make people crave them abnormally.
- Instrument of Murder - Frank creates a weapon that uses jazz as a projectile in “The Wasp”. It doesn’t work against the titular machine.
- Known Only by Their Nickname: Scoop and 50 Pence. Scoop's real name is Timothy Hinklebottom.
- Living MacGuffin: The weapon V.9.5. turns out to be a teenage girl.
- Loss of Inhibitions: The effect of the cupcakes in "Revenge is Sweet." The first stage of the compound is happiness, which doesn't seem too bad until people become so euphoric that they lose all sense of realism and are unable to take anything seriously. Not good if you're MI High Chief Agent Stella Knight or the Prime Minister. The second stage is rage, which is even worse.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: Alexis Von Hades reveals that the Mastermind is Zoe's. Not quite. He is her creator.
- Massive Numbered Siblings: Zoe turns out to have 86 "sisters" across the globe. They are all clones.
- Master of Disguise: Daisy, Oscar and Aneisha fall into this in their respective teams. In Aneisha's case this comes in handy when it comes to seeing through other people's disguises, as she correctly manages to identify the disguised Crime Minister and Mike Stern just from their photographs.
- May Contain Evil: Any product SKUL uses as the basis for one if its schemes. Examples include the mind regressing beauty treatment in "Forever Young", the logos that turn kids into human/clothing hybrids in "Evil by Design", and the addictive wursts in "Fit to Wurst" to name a few.
- "Mission: Impossible" Cable Drop: Zoe performs one in the fittingly-named episode "Mission: Incredible".
- Mr. Fanservice: Notably, Oscar was adored by the fanbase, which probably stemmed from his appearance (tall, lots of blond curly hair, bright blue eyes) and Dark and Troubled Past, which appeared to have affected him in a way that made him completely adorable. Later on, we see that the actor is in fact an extremely good dancer.
- My Greatest Failure: Hyperia Von Hades' death, which ruined Frank's relationship with Stella and caused Alexis to have a personal vendetta towards him.
- My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels - In "The Wasp", Mr Flatley attempts to welcome a new deaf student to the school by signing "Hello and welcome to St. Hope's". According to Oscar, he actually asked Avril to go and buy some sausages.
- Nerds Are Sexy: Interestingly enough, Rose has more male admirers than either Carrie or Daisy, with Stewart, the Worm and Scoop all having crushes on her.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed:
- Subverted with "Fifty Pence", who obviously named himself after 50 Cent but otherwise bears no resemblance to him (for starters, he's white).
- Scoop Doggy for Snoop Dogg.
- The Series 3 premiere revolved around street artist Kranky, an obvious send-up of Banksy, complete with "must never be seen in public" shtick.
- Non-Action Guy: Tom, who doesn't accompany Dan and Aneisha on missions and acts more as tech support. Becomes a plot point in "The Germinator" when he's forced to take on the others' roles due to them being taken out of commission.
- Nonuniform Uniform: Daisy. Scoop and Davina in later seasons, which becomes a plot point in "The Day of the Jacket Potato" when Mrs King enforces a strict dress code.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome:
- Two in "Red Button Rampage". First Blaine knocks unconscious two army men in an enclosed space, off screen, later while the climax is happening an army sergeant is dealing with a squad of reinforcements, we don't see the fight... but she comes back with a handful of dogtags!
- Zoe gets trapped behind a door in "The Hive" and separated from Aneisha and Dan with a group of mooks. After frantically trying to get back through to her, when the door slides back up, there is only one left standing, who Zoe quickly knocks out.
- Perky Goth: Avril.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Stella Knight in season six and seven and the Head of M.I.9.
-
Reclusive Artist: Kranky; much like his inspiration, he refuses to show his face in public and his real name is unknown. He's not very pleased when M.I.9.'s plan to stop a SKUL agent who's been impersonating him includes him showing up at St. Hope's in person to judge a (fake) art contest. - Replacement Goldfish: Tom teases that Keri could be this for the absent Zoe, who Dan had a crush on. Dan is not amused.
- Right-Hand Cat: Parodied by the Grand Master and his right-hand bunny General Flopsy.
- Road-Sign Reversal: Blaine does it in The Others.
- Sacrificed Basic Skill for Awesome Training:
- Zoe has trained all her life as a Skul agent. Consequently she is very highly skilled, more so than Dan and Aneisha, but extremely innocent and naïve about the ordinary aspects of everyday school life.
- Agent X who turns out to be a pre-teen capable of effortlessly beating Oscar but has never had any toys to play with.
- Sadist Teacher: Walter M Dainbridge, who made Mrs King "look like a pussycat."
- Searching the Stalls - One of Colt Winchester's henchmen does this while searching for Frank in the deserted school in "Dark Star". Figuring Frank must be in the last stall, he bursts in. Frank is actually hiding behind the bathroom door, and has rigged the toilet to blow up in the mook's face.
- Shoe Phone - Various gadgets disguised as school paraphernalia.
- Soapbox Sadie - Avril (Season 3-5)'s personality is essentially this. Her attempts at protesting various situations are always in vain. She is either not taken seriously or is seen as annoying and in the way. In "Doppelgangers", she criticizes the school's international dress day for stereotyping. In "The Visit", she cuffs herself to a classroom heater to protest the practices of the (fictional) country Boldovia, whose gymnastics team was visiting that episode. Even when she's summoned as a spy in the episode "The B Team" she lambasts MI9's method of doing so 'fascist'.
- Split-Personality Merge: Bodlien, an artificial intelligence containing the details of every book ever written, does this with Crime, an artificial intelligence made up of his collective knowledge of crime, split from him when he was attacked by a hacker.
- Spy Versus Spy - M.I.9 versus S.K.U.L. (originally) and K.O.R.P.S. (in the later seasons).
- Squee: Most of the female population of St. Hopes in "Eyes on Their Stars" when famous boy band Crush arrive on school grounds. Some of the girls are literally swooning as they walk down the hall.
- Stalker with a Crush: Avril. In one episode, the class is tasked with looking into their family trees. Avril looks into Oscar's instead, finding his real last name, and literally interrupts him mid-mission to try and show him her discovery. To no surprise, Oscar is anxious.
- Stern Teacher: Mrs King, whose first appearance has students running for cover, and Mr. McNab.
- Submarine Pirates - The Octopus from the episode "The Octopus". He uses his submarine Naughty Lass to hijack ships to steal the components he needs to make a nuclear warhead to melt the polar icecaps.
- Superpowers for a Day: After Carrie, Oscar and Rose are taken out of commission in "The B Team," Stark and Frank use the compound "Smart-Ease" to turn Avril, Scoop and Davina into agents for a day.
- Teen Superspy - The show hinges on this concept.
- This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: the spies always find themselves in a situation that requires the use of whatever gadgets they were given earlier in the episode.
- To The Bat Pole: Evey episode will use the same stock footage of the spies entering the lift in the broom closet.
- Token Rich Student: Daisy comes from a rich family and her parents sent her to St Hope's on some hippy parenting advice.
- Trap Door - The Grand Master has one in his office for disposing of annoying underlings.
- Truth Serums - "Spy Animals"
- Uncancelled: After all the show's plot threads were resolved, someone suggested a reboot.
- Vain Sorceress - Vanessa Zeitgeist from the episode "Forever Young" is the scientific version of this trope.
- [Verb] This!: From "The Wasp." It Makes Sense in Context.Rose: Eat jazz!
- Will They or Won't They? - Blane and Daisy, sadly both characters left the show before they got together (which was inevitable).
- Wham Line: In "The Last Stand": Korps is MI9.
- You Are Number 6: Zoe's name comes from the number-letter combination tattooed on her arm: V.9.5.Z.0.E.6. Kloe, Keri, Libi and presumably all of the Mastermind's clones have similar letter-numbers on their skin.
