This article analyses three serialised adaptations of John le Carré novels produced by the BBC: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1979), Smiley's People (1982) and A Perfect Spy (1987). It aims firstly to position them in the context of developments and trends during the period of the serials' production. It explores how, on the one hand, they were produced as variants on the classic serial model which aimed for a more contemporary focus and aesthetic in response to concurrent developments in British television drama, and on the other, how they have a complex and ambivalent relationship with the genre of television spy fiction. Secondly, this article builds upon this positioning of the serials to explore how the themes of le Carré’s novels are interpreted specifically for the television medium. Central to this is the issue of temporal displacement, as television's process of ‘working through’, often considered as characteristic of the medium's immediacy and ‘liveness’, is in this case delayed over many years by a cycle of continual adaptation. Here a particular narrative – the defection of Kim Philby in 1963 – resonates across three decades and is worked through in a variety of approaches, initially in the novels and subsequently reworked on television. It then examines how this manifests in the television adaptations in a contemporary heritage aesthetic which is complex and highly troubled.