1. Call for the Dead
Foreign Office civil servant Samuel Fennan is found dead after a routine security interview with George Smiley. The death is treated as suicide, but a telephone call placed after Fennan's supposed time of death persuades Smiley that someone has constructed the scene. Working with Inspector Mendel…
2. A Murder of Quality
Stella Rode, the wife of a master at Carne School, is murdered in her isolated house. An old wartime colleague asks George Smiley to investigate because the police are struggling to penetrate a closed institution governed by status, gossip and long memory. Smiley finds that Stella's…
3. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
Alec Leamas, the exhausted head of British intelligence operations in Berlin, is ordered to appear disgraced and defect to East Germany. Control's plan is to feed the enemy a story that will destroy a senior East German intelligence officer. Leamas enters the operation believing he understands…
4. The Looking Glass War
After a British courier is killed near the East German border, a neglected intelligence department persuades itself that Soviet missiles are being installed across the frontier. The department recruits Polish émigré Fred Leiser, a former wartime agent who has spent years outside operational service. Leiser is…
5. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
George Smiley is recalled from forced retirement when evidence suggests that a senior officer inside the Circus has been working for Moscow. The suspects are four powerful men protected by the reputation of the former chief, Control. Smiley reconstructs failed operations, damaged careers and private betrayals…
6. The Honourable Schoolboy
After the mole's exposure, George Smiley becomes temporary chief of the Circus and tries to rebuild its credibility by finding a financial trail connected to Soviet intelligence. Journalist and occasional agent Jerry Westerby is sent to Hong Kong to follow the money through banks, shipping interests…
7. Smiley’s People
An elderly Soviet émigré is murdered in London after trying to contact the Circus. George Smiley recognises details that connect the death to Karla, the Soviet spymaster who defeated him and ran the mole inside British intelligence. Following a trail through Hamburg, Paris and divided Berlin,…
8. The Secret Pilgrim
At the end of the Cold War, retired intelligence officer Ned invites George Smiley to address a new generation of recruits. Smiley's reflections prompt Ned to reconsider the agents, informants and operations that defined his own career. The episodes move through Britain, Germany, Israel and Cambodia,…
9. A Legacy of Spies
Peter Guillam is summoned from retirement when a lawsuit reopens the British operation behind Alec Leamas's death. Files once treated as protected state secrets are now being examined by lawyers and younger officers who do not accept the Cold War assumptions of their predecessors. Guillam is…