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Ashes to Ashes 3.04
Which, contrary to trailer-raised expectations, wasn't actually a Chris-centric episode, but that's okay.
Allow me to feel a bit smug, because I think the scene with Jim Keats and Louise Gardner made my theory that Keats & Gene are the same kind of being, call them psychopomps or (fallen)angels whose original job is to help the dying transition, pretty explicit. Gene Hunt has been explicitly connected to these type of these type of scenes, holding the dying (last season notable occurances were the girl from Hyde in 2.1. after she got shot, Supermac after he committed suicide, and Martin Summers when he died), but, and correct me if I'm wrong, nobody else has. Not Ray, Chris or Shaz, and not Alex. Jim Keats is the first one to do the holding-the-dying thing, other than Gene.
Now, if you go with the opinion that Keats is really, really evil, he may have sucked the dying Louise's soul, but if he's ambigious and/or good and simply of another opinion than Gene, he helped her transition. Guess we'll find out later in the season. His most wrong action in this episode, imo, was giving Chris an alibi at the end. Because seriously, the instances where either show (LoM and AtA, that is) really declares that beating up suspects and Gene's model of policing, complete with kicking suspects nearly or actually to death, is not a good thing are far and few in number. I can think of only two direct examples for each, the last but one episodes of their respective first season. (LoM, the episode when Ray and Chris let a suspect die because they were following Gene's role model, and AtA, the episode when Gene encouraged Chris to take revenge for Shaz' stabbing by beating the guy in question to near-death while Alex was administring life support to Shaz.) Otherwise, we're more or less encouraged to see this as one of Gene's tough guy quirks. Now I had hopes raised in this episode this might be another instance of those very few episodes where we see that Gene is, in fact, in some ways a catastrophic role model for his crew, and that following his example is NOT the thing to do, but no, because Keats when from correctly stating Chris did what Gene taught him and that this was wrong to declaring Chris is just such a prince it should be handwaved. Now, on a Watsonian level, we're clearly meant to see this as a sinister ploy by Jim Keats to ingratiate himself with Our Heroes, but what disturbs me is that on a Doylist level we're supposed to rejoice that Chris won't suffer any consequences. (He didn't suffer any for his screw up last season, either, unless you count Shaz breaking off their relationship.)
Which isn't to say I didn't like the episode per se, though every single Gene scene enhances my problem that the story I'm seeing is not the one I assume the show is trying to tell, because my Gene dislike increases by the minute, and what I see in every episode is that they really would be all better off away from the Gene cult. And I don't think that's the reaction I'm supposed to have. But I have it. The coffee spilling on Keats, swinging a golf club at the crippled Wilson - I'm with Jim the sinister here, it's juvenile. And thuggish. Bah.
Meanwhile, I feel reassured that something else is deliberate, not sloppy writing, to wit, Alex' failure to mention Molly after Gene slapped her back into the past. It's not the show has forgotten Molly (her name is written on the wall, just as the Gene/Sam graffiti which should please LoM fans is), but I think Alex has, which is a process that started in s2 where she noticed, and it freaked her out (she couldn't see Molly's face in her memories clearly any more, then not at all) and by now the process is nearly completed. Add the coffin image, and I think it's likely Alex will find out at the climax of the season that she has completed the transition from coma to actual death. "This is all there is for me" (Alex to Louise about policing) is the kind of statement that sets that up.
Who played Terry Stafford? He reminded me a little bit of Patrick Stewart in looks. Anyway, the twist with Louise having lost her way and having switched sides, only not to Daniel but to Terry, was one I saw coming. What I found very interesting is that Louise is paralleled with both Alex and Shaz in this episode. Alex evidently sees a similarity between her situation in the 80s and Louise's undercover; Chris and Ray keep comparing Shaz (who wants that promotion Gene promised) to Louise. Hints that either Alex or Shaz will break with the superior who was supposed to guide them and let them down (Wilson for Louise) and instead switch sides to go the enemy? Hmmmm.
Allow me to feel a bit smug, because I think the scene with Jim Keats and Louise Gardner made my theory that Keats & Gene are the same kind of being, call them psychopomps or (fallen)angels whose original job is to help the dying transition, pretty explicit. Gene Hunt has been explicitly connected to these type of these type of scenes, holding the dying (last season notable occurances were the girl from Hyde in 2.1. after she got shot, Supermac after he committed suicide, and Martin Summers when he died), but, and correct me if I'm wrong, nobody else has. Not Ray, Chris or Shaz, and not Alex. Jim Keats is the first one to do the holding-the-dying thing, other than Gene.
Now, if you go with the opinion that Keats is really, really evil, he may have sucked the dying Louise's soul, but if he's ambigious and/or good and simply of another opinion than Gene, he helped her transition. Guess we'll find out later in the season. His most wrong action in this episode, imo, was giving Chris an alibi at the end. Because seriously, the instances where either show (LoM and AtA, that is) really declares that beating up suspects and Gene's model of policing, complete with kicking suspects nearly or actually to death, is not a good thing are far and few in number. I can think of only two direct examples for each, the last but one episodes of their respective first season. (LoM, the episode when Ray and Chris let a suspect die because they were following Gene's role model, and AtA, the episode when Gene encouraged Chris to take revenge for Shaz' stabbing by beating the guy in question to near-death while Alex was administring life support to Shaz.) Otherwise, we're more or less encouraged to see this as one of Gene's tough guy quirks. Now I had hopes raised in this episode this might be another instance of those very few episodes where we see that Gene is, in fact, in some ways a catastrophic role model for his crew, and that following his example is NOT the thing to do, but no, because Keats when from correctly stating Chris did what Gene taught him and that this was wrong to declaring Chris is just such a prince it should be handwaved. Now, on a Watsonian level, we're clearly meant to see this as a sinister ploy by Jim Keats to ingratiate himself with Our Heroes, but what disturbs me is that on a Doylist level we're supposed to rejoice that Chris won't suffer any consequences. (He didn't suffer any for his screw up last season, either, unless you count Shaz breaking off their relationship.)
Which isn't to say I didn't like the episode per se, though every single Gene scene enhances my problem that the story I'm seeing is not the one I assume the show is trying to tell, because my Gene dislike increases by the minute, and what I see in every episode is that they really would be all better off away from the Gene cult. And I don't think that's the reaction I'm supposed to have. But I have it. The coffee spilling on Keats, swinging a golf club at the crippled Wilson - I'm with Jim the sinister here, it's juvenile. And thuggish. Bah.
Meanwhile, I feel reassured that something else is deliberate, not sloppy writing, to wit, Alex' failure to mention Molly after Gene slapped her back into the past. It's not the show has forgotten Molly (her name is written on the wall, just as the Gene/Sam graffiti which should please LoM fans is), but I think Alex has, which is a process that started in s2 where she noticed, and it freaked her out (she couldn't see Molly's face in her memories clearly any more, then not at all) and by now the process is nearly completed. Add the coffin image, and I think it's likely Alex will find out at the climax of the season that she has completed the transition from coma to actual death. "This is all there is for me" (Alex to Louise about policing) is the kind of statement that sets that up.
Who played Terry Stafford? He reminded me a little bit of Patrick Stewart in looks. Anyway, the twist with Louise having lost her way and having switched sides, only not to Daniel but to Terry, was one I saw coming. What I found very interesting is that Louise is paralleled with both Alex and Shaz in this episode. Alex evidently sees a similarity between her situation in the 80s and Louise's undercover; Chris and Ray keep comparing Shaz (who wants that promotion Gene promised) to Louise. Hints that either Alex or Shaz will break with the superior who was supposed to guide them and let them down (Wilson for Louise) and instead switch sides to go the enemy? Hmmmm.