When Macfadyen announced his return for those episodes, they had to be rewritten. Brenton went through a "nightmare" rewriting the first episode as he "dug this enormous hole, and [he] had no idea how to get out of it." It became a long process of growing the story where Tom turns the tables against Joyce. To make a suitable send off to the character, Brenton did not want Tom to be disillusioned; instead he wanted him to "sort of [become] a human being," as there have been real life instances where spies are attracted to the idea that "the world's a stage to them all the time," but later on they start to unravel. Tom's exit allowed the writers to pull the focus on the other characters, namely Danny and Zoe, to give the show more of an ensemble feel. Overall, the producers made the third series more character driven. Raymond Khoury felt that because the length of a Spooks episode is one and half times longer than the average American television episode, the writers could use the extra time to flesh out the characters. Khoury also noted another difference between Spooks and American television is that most American seasons usually consists of 22 episodes, much of those episodes are more plot driven, while Spooks series three only had 10 and hence all of them contain some character development. The main character developments include Zoe's relationship with Will, which Danny did not like because he was in love with her. The writers initially wanted to expand on the potential Danny and Sam Buxton relationship which began in the second series, but the idea was dropped in favour of his affection towards Zoe, as the producers believed that was delivering more. Harry was given more depth by introducing his estranged daughter in "Who Guards the Guards?". Through the daughter's introduction, Harry would appear more human as opposed to the boss who "barks orders" to his officers. When Hawes announced she wanted to leave, Richards decided to write a "big episode" to give Zoe a decent send off. Richards did not want to kill off the character, as he deemed it predictable. Oyelowo eventually decided to leave the series as well between filming episodes four and five; by then the finale was not yet written. The actor wanted Danny to be killed off, reasoning that since Tom and Zoe left as disgraced