Tom Hooper worked 10-hour days on "EastEnders", and learned to direct with speed. He was influenced in his early career by the cinematic style of American TV series such as "ER", "NYPD Blue" and "" and tried to work that style into his "EastEnders" episodes; one scene featuring Grant Mitchell (Ross Kemp) involved a crane shot, which Hooper believes made him infamous among the "EastEnders" production crew. In 1999, Hooper directed two episodes of Granada Television's comedy-drama television series "Cold Feet", which marked his move to bigger-budget productions. There was initially concern at Granada that Hooper might be an unsuitable director for
Ross Kemp in Afghanistan of the second series, 5 SCOTS and Kemp are ambushed by the Taliban within 30 minutes of his first patrol, targeted by small arms fire and RPG rockets, as well as mortars. Kemp is extricated to safety by crawling 50 metres along a ditch. In a later contact, after coming under fire, Kemp unwittingly ran into an area Kemp described as "probably" featuring the pressure plate devices used to detonate IEDs and mines, necessitating 30 steps back to the cleared area. During the filming for the second series, 100 metres from the crew a 22-year-old Royal Marine was fatally wounded