Ashes to Ashes and Doctor Who recs
Apr. 21st, 2009 12:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Ashes to Ashes is back. (Icon justified by an 80s theme and the fact that if there ever is a B7 remake, Servalan must be played by Keely Hawes. I insist.) Now, I liked the first season way better than the second season of Life on Mars (even leaving my issues with the ending aside, though I have to say, now that I've heard how the Americans ended their LoM, the original ending starts to look better to me *g*), and actually, I have to confess to the heresy of liking AtA in general better than LoM. LoM is the greater and more original artistic achievement, I'll freely concede. But I like the greater ensembleness of AtA, which gives us far more development for Chris and Ray than they ever got on AtA and gives Shaz more to do than poor Annie had, plus as of now, I like Alex Drake better than Sam Tyler. Which might change by the time the second season is done for all I know, hence the qualification. I am admittedly slightly nervous about that. Because both LoM and AtA had strong narrative arcs through their respective first seasons... which were resolved in the s1 finales. So it might very well be that the second season of AtA will suffer from the same or similar problems the second season of LoM did. However, now that I've seen the season opener, my nervousness about this possibility is somewhat lessened. I liked it very much, it avoided doing what had annoyed me about LoM 2.1, and right now I'm feeling all fuzzy about the entire A2A gang. In a "no, I don't want to live through the 80s again" way, of course.
Re: LoM 2.1, that one had Sam switch good cop, bad cop roles with Gene in the sense that now we had Sam bullying witnesses etc. There was a motivation within the episode, but it never seemed all that credible to me. Also, way later towards the end of the season, we had the climax of the Frank Morgan plot with Sam being ready to write of Gene & Co. until being told the cancer, i.e. Gene, is benign, and then doing his dramatic suicide thing to return to the 70s; the rift between Sam and friends always felt artificial to me, and didn't make me more easily inclined to swallow the suicide late. Now, in AtA 2.1, Alex has also changed a bit since the end of the first season, but in ways that make sense; she's more comfortable with the 80s world, less flippant about it, and, now that she has found out the truth about her parents' death and worked through it, more focused on the 80s mystery of the day. But she's still no less resolved to return to her daughter (I always thought one of the best twists to make Alex distinct from Sam was to give her a child to return to, because as opposed to Sam's girlfriend, Molly won't end up telling comatose Alex not to worry, she's moved on - I hope!). And instead of coming late in the season, the seeds for new tension between her and Gene - tension not dependent on UST - are planted here, in a within character and within period way. Just where Gene draws the line has been an ongoing question early in LoM, and Alex knows, both from her own experiences and from the Sam report, that it can be a pretty vague line at times. (A mini illustration of Gene's ethics comes when they arrest our killer of the day, Gene chews him out for betraying his partner, killing a girl, and being bent, then asks his team who wants to have a new tv (from the arrested cop's stash). So when he agrees to SuperMac's order near the end, shuts her out and has his secret man-to-man talk with him, it makes sense that this sows seeds of distrust in Alex. BTW, in the large run I do expect Gene will come out of this looking good, with some qualifications, given audience sympathies, but it's plausible for Alex not to trust Gene blindly.
There is another possibility, too. If you take LoM and AtA really taking place in the same universe. Because then, and given scenes like the s1 finale's "I'm always there/ I go where I'm needed" statement from Gene, and now in 2.1. the "just ask" (why she's here) exchange between him and Alex (where she does ask, and he does reply, with said reply making sense on a within 80s level but could also apply on another one), the conclusion that Gene Hunt is some kind of psychopomp/guardian angel/use term of your choice/ who helps dying cops with their transition isn't that far fetched, with Sam and Alex both coming to terms with parent issues, and being able to help people in ways they might not have been able to in their lives before. Why Gene Hunt? Maybe because he has things to atone for himself. Back when Spooks did a Diana's death episode I groaned, but I didn't feel like groaning about the Diana imagery this time around. The mysterious person talking to Alex on the phone said "I held the grieving crowd back at her funeral", which means said person is a policeman. The more obvious suspect is Superintendant MacIntosh, but this show likes shocking doubles and revelations of same (what with Alex father/ the clown last season), so I wonder whether MacIntosh isn't just a counterpart to Gene but somehow related to him. The "are you going to be my partner or work against me?" question certainly applies to both Gene/Alex, Gene/MacIntosh, and Alex/Mysterious Kidnapper Who Might Be MacIntosh as well this episode.
On a less metaphysical level, I had strong Our Friends in the North flashbacks with this episode and its theme about Soho and police corruption in the early 80s, as well as the corruption of Northerners coming to London, so much so I was looking for Daniel Craig or Malcolm McDowell. We got presented with several shades of corruption here; Ray thinks it's okay to take money, but also proves he's become good as a cop if he tries, being the one to finding the murderer's face in the photograph; said murderer is in some ways Ray's counterpart; Gene thinks it's okay to hand out property from suspects but is disgusted by people getting killed to cover up for greed. And note that he finds the idea of the dead cop cheating on his wife far less upsetting than the later revelation she had an affair with his superior; the former is not great but forgivable by his standards, the later causes him to revile the woman on a spectacular level. (All of which I find reassuring on the question whether or not the show idealizes Gene Hunt; here we get scenes where he's compassionate with a fellow Mancunian, but also scenes where he as a double standard from hell.) For continuinity fans, we get our first reference to the former Mrs. Hunt, aka the Missus, since the AtA pilot (go, Alex, for asking, because I'm pretty curious myself; that the reference comes in this particular episode where we see Gene reacting so differently to cops cheating, and cops' wives cheating, might or might not be significant), and of course the fact that Sally the stripper who dies in Gene's arms is from Hyde, where Sam's 70s persona was supposed to be from.
On a shallow level: Shaz, Chris and Alex' new hairstyles are still very 80s and made me smile in a fond way. And Chris stripping at the end was just plain adorable. He and Shaz continue to be too cute for words.
Speaking of the 80s,rozk posted a description a real life police encounter back then, which everyone tempted to feel nostalgic for the Gene Hunt days of policing (as some newspapers apparantly are) should read.
Lastly, two fanfic recs from another fandom:
Doctor Who:
On the Horizon: what became of Brannigan and Valerie after Gridlock. Gridlock was one of my favourite s3 episodes (always fighting it out with Utopia and Paul Cornell's two-parter for favourite and often winning), and I adored the cat/human couple. This story also has a cameo of a certain season 4 character which made me smile very fondly.
Heartland: in which Jabe the tree from The End of the World (probably my favourite Nine era episode, full stop, and Jabe is certainly one of my favourite guest characters) meets classic Who's Jo Grant and Sgt. Benton. Written with much love for everyone concerned, this is a joy to read.
leia_naberrie and other people wanting a Dreamwidth account: if you sign up for Dreamwidth with an OpenID account before April 30, and you validate your email address, you will automatically get an invite.Ashes to Ashes is back. (Icon justified by an 80s theme and the fact that if there ever is a B7 remake, Servalan must be played by Keely Hawes. I insist.) Now, I liked the first season way better than the second season of Life on Mars (even leaving my issues with the ending aside, though I have to say, now that I've heard how the Americans ended their LoM, the original ending starts to look better to me *g*), and actually, I have to confess to the heresy of liking AtA in general better than LoM. LoM is the greater and more original artistic achievement, I'll freely concede. But I like the greater ensembleness of AtA, which gives us far more development for Chris and Ray than they ever got on AtA and gives Shaz more to do than poor Annie had, plus as of now, I like Alex Drake better than Sam Tyler. Which might change by the time the second season is done for all I know, hence the qualification. I am admittedly slightly nervous about that. Because both LoM and AtA had strong narrative arcs through their respective first seasons... which were resolved in the s1 finales. So it might very well be that the second season of AtA will suffer from the same or similar problems the second season of LoM did. However, now that I've seen the season opener, my nervousness about this possibility is somewhat lessened. I liked it very much, it avoided doing what had annoyed me about LoM 2.1, and right now I'm feeling all fuzzy about the entire A2A gang. In a "no, I don't want to live through the 80s again" way, of course.
Re: LoM 2.1, that one had Sam switch good cop, bad cop roles with Gene in the sense that now we had Sam bullying witnesses etc. There was a motivation within the episode, but it never seemed all that credible to me. Also, way later towards the end of the season, we had the climax of the Frank Morgan plot with Sam being ready to write of Gene & Co. until being told the cancer, i.e. Gene, is benign, and then doing his dramatic suicide thing to return to the 70s; the rift between Sam and friends always felt artificial to me, and didn't make me more easily inclined to swallow the suicide late. Now, in AtA 2.1, Alex has also changed a bit since the end of the first season, but in ways that make sense; she's more comfortable with the 80s world, less flippant about it, and, now that she has found out the truth about her parents' death and worked through it, more focused on the 80s mystery of the day. But she's still no less resolved to return to her daughter (I always thought one of the best twists to make Alex distinct from Sam was to give her a child to return to, because as opposed to Sam's girlfriend, Molly won't end up telling comatose Alex not to worry, she's moved on - I hope!). And instead of coming late in the season, the seeds for new tension between her and Gene - tension not dependent on UST - are planted here, in a within character and within period way. Just where Gene draws the line has been an ongoing question early in LoM, and Alex knows, both from her own experiences and from the Sam report, that it can be a pretty vague line at times. (A mini illustration of Gene's ethics comes when they arrest our killer of the day, Gene chews him out for betraying his partner, killing a girl, and being bent, then asks his team who wants to have a new tv (from the arrested cop's stash). So when he agrees to SuperMac's order near the end, shuts her out and has his secret man-to-man talk with him, it makes sense that this sows seeds of distrust in Alex. BTW, in the large run I do expect Gene will come out of this looking good, with some qualifications, given audience sympathies, but it's plausible for Alex not to trust Gene blindly.
There is another possibility, too. If you take LoM and AtA really taking place in the same universe. Because then, and given scenes like the s1 finale's "I'm always there/ I go where I'm needed" statement from Gene, and now in 2.1. the "just ask" (why she's here) exchange between him and Alex (where she does ask, and he does reply, with said reply making sense on a within 80s level but could also apply on another one), the conclusion that Gene Hunt is some kind of psychopomp/guardian angel/use term of your choice/ who helps dying cops with their transition isn't that far fetched, with Sam and Alex both coming to terms with parent issues, and being able to help people in ways they might not have been able to in their lives before. Why Gene Hunt? Maybe because he has things to atone for himself. Back when Spooks did a Diana's death episode I groaned, but I didn't feel like groaning about the Diana imagery this time around. The mysterious person talking to Alex on the phone said "I held the grieving crowd back at her funeral", which means said person is a policeman. The more obvious suspect is Superintendant MacIntosh, but this show likes shocking doubles and revelations of same (what with Alex father/ the clown last season), so I wonder whether MacIntosh isn't just a counterpart to Gene but somehow related to him. The "are you going to be my partner or work against me?" question certainly applies to both Gene/Alex, Gene/MacIntosh, and Alex/Mysterious Kidnapper Who Might Be MacIntosh as well this episode.
On a less metaphysical level, I had strong Our Friends in the North flashbacks with this episode and its theme about Soho and police corruption in the early 80s, as well as the corruption of Northerners coming to London, so much so I was looking for Daniel Craig or Malcolm McDowell. We got presented with several shades of corruption here; Ray thinks it's okay to take money, but also proves he's become good as a cop if he tries, being the one to finding the murderer's face in the photograph; said murderer is in some ways Ray's counterpart; Gene thinks it's okay to hand out property from suspects but is disgusted by people getting killed to cover up for greed. And note that he finds the idea of the dead cop cheating on his wife far less upsetting than the later revelation she had an affair with his superior; the former is not great but forgivable by his standards, the later causes him to revile the woman on a spectacular level. (All of which I find reassuring on the question whether or not the show idealizes Gene Hunt; here we get scenes where he's compassionate with a fellow Mancunian, but also scenes where he as a double standard from hell.) For continuinity fans, we get our first reference to the former Mrs. Hunt, aka the Missus, since the AtA pilot (go, Alex, for asking, because I'm pretty curious myself; that the reference comes in this particular episode where we see Gene reacting so differently to cops cheating, and cops' wives cheating, might or might not be significant), and of course the fact that Sally the stripper who dies in Gene's arms is from Hyde, where Sam's 70s persona was supposed to be from.
On a shallow level: Shaz, Chris and Alex' new hairstyles are still very 80s and made me smile in a fond way. And Chris stripping at the end was just plain adorable. He and Shaz continue to be too cute for words.
Speaking of the 80s,
rozk posted a description a real life police encounter back then, which everyone tempted to feel nostalgic for the Gene Hunt days of policing (as some newspapers apparantly are) should read. Lastly, two fanfic recs from another fandom:
Doctor Who:
On the Horizon: what became of Brannigan and Valerie after Gridlock. Gridlock was one of my favourite s3 episodes (always fighting it out with Utopia and Paul Cornell's two-parter for favourite and often winning), and I adored the cat/human couple. This story also has a cameo of a certain season 4 character which made me smile very fondly.
Heartland: in which Jabe the tree from The End of the World (probably my favourite Nine era episode, full stop, and Jabe is certainly one of my favourite guest characters) meets classic Who's Jo Grant and Sgt. Benton. Written with much love for everyone concerned, this is a joy to read.
