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Spooks – I Spy Apocalypse (2003)

This installment starts with the intelligence unit confined during a training exercise relating to a hypothetical terrorist attack, supervised by two Home Office agents. As things progress, it appears that there really has been an attack with a chemical weapon released. The anxiety increases as messages indicate a crisis unfolding beyond their walls, and gets worse as the boss appears to be infected, with the two officials trying to exit, compelling the character played by Matthew Macfadyen to decide between shooting them or letting them go and risking contaminating the sealed MI5 offices. As this is Spooks, the outcome is expected.

Threads (1984)

The production was inexpensive but one of the most frightening programmes I have ever watched due to its harsh realism and dismal official figures. Viewed it recently having watched the original; I often attended the bar in Sheffield featured in the show that highlighted the truth and the offhand factual official statements which was broadcast. Continuing to be utterly horrifying 35 years later.

Severance – The We We Are from 2022

The first season finale of Severance deserves a top spot as a tense chapter. I spent the entire episode literally perched nervously, exerting with Dylan to maintain his grip on the controls that kept the Innies on overtime, while yelling at the Innies to disclose their facts. The final climactic moment – “she survives!” – was like an eruption.

Industry – White Mischief (2024)

The fifth episode of Industry’s third season made my pulse quicken. I had to pause and get up and depart the area multiple times due to the immense extent of the reckless self-harm I observed. Rishi Ramdani is in major difficulty professionally and personally – buried in financial obligations from unscrupulous lenders due to his addictive betting, taking such risks with a gamble on the pound which could lose his company millions. So of course, he goes on a gambling spree, consumes excessive substances and alcohol and wins, loses, wins, is severely assaulted. Whenever you assume things cannot decline more, it does. Redemption seems possible as the installment closes but he misses the opening, with horrifying consequences in the concluding part of the season. Definitely needed a lie-down after that!

Peep Show – Holiday from 2007

Peep Show is not inherently a tense series. Yet the installment Holiday features such degrees of awkwardness that it will make you rise the whole episode, riddled with anxiety. The situation intensifies as Jeremy and Mark discover being compelled to falsify about the canine they accidentally run over and following tries to eliminate it. You then occupy the remainder of the episode questioning whether it truly can be worse than incineration, and it is possible!

The West Wing – The Two Cathedrals (2001)

No other viewing has been as gripping as when I first saw the season two finale to The West Wing. The installment begins with the consequences of the demise (in a car crash) of the president’s confidential aide and reaches a crescendo with a crisis in Haiti, and the fallout from the non-disclosure about the president’s MS condition, along with affirmation of his plan to pursue re-election. Superb programming. Unsurpassed.

Bodyguard – episode one (2018)

The beginning of the UK show Bodyguard, featuring the main character on a train alongside his juvenile boy, is personally a top tense installment. He notices a Muslim female entering the restroom and realizes something is amiss. The explosive disposal specialists are summoned, board the train, and endeavor to coax the woman to discard her bomb jacket. Tension escalates to a nearly intolerable level, until, indeed, the vest is disarmed.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer – The Body from 2001

Buffy arrives at her residence to find her mum has passed away from natural reasons, which is the rarest form of demise in this paranormal series. The show features no musical score, a gloomy atmosphere, and we witness the episode via the perspective of Buffy’s dismay upon uncovering her mother.

The 2007 The Sopranos finale Made in America

The ultimate sequence of the series finale of the show was pants-wettingly tense. And if you watched it when it originally aired, you – at the start – didn’t understand the cause. Tony’s foes, genuine and fictional, were all vanquished. Surely this has the feel of the season one ending? “Remember the little things.” Yet the atmosphere is strangely foreboding. Approaching Twin Peaks-esque horror. The family gathers in a diner. Meadow parks. Tony gloomily informs Carmela problems are brewing with yet another of his crew collaborating with the authorities. Meadow parks the vehicle. Strange people enter the restaurant. Look at Tony(?) Meadow is parking. Tony puts a record on the jukebox. Meadow parks. The bell sounds, an individual enters. It isn’t Meadow, she remains parking. Tony glances upward. Keep going. It stops. My heart sank around 20 minutes subsequently.

The Walking Dead – The Last Day on Earth (2016)

I stayed up to watch this episode at 2am. It was so intense following the introduction of villain Negan finding the group, cruelly taunting his victims then not knowing who he killed (concluded with a suspenseful moment). The point-of-view shot from the victim and the muffled sounds – oh no! {We then had to wait for season seven|We then needed to await season