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Life on Mars
Life on Mars can be stunningly good.
There are two totally different ways of interpreting the series and I'm not sure that they're compatible, but I'm hoping it will continue to work as well as it is.
My main theory is that Sam is indeed hallucinating, but that the hallucination is not meaningless. Gene is the part of himself that he denies. Sam is logic and adherence to the letter of the law. Gene is hunch and 'end justifies the means'. Somewhere in the middle may be where the balance actually lies.
Yet, Gene is a complex character himself and quite capable of manipulating Sam. Gene setting Sam up to do the investigation of his team when a man dies in custody was ruthless and clever, but also demonstrated that Gene will not cross over a certain line even when defending his people.
In fact, I've come to realise that Gene is the more interesting character.
I love the relationship between the two men. I could never write it as slash - it just doesn't read that way to me (though I've no doubt whatsoever that it's been written by now) There's a mutual respect and reserved liking that shines past all the disagreements, fistfights and differences of opinion.
If the past is real, then the reason Sam is there is to help Gene.
It seems not impossible that Sam's mind has gone back in time. Maybe he's in someone else's body. No, that won't work, he still looks the same in the mirror.
Perhaps Gene is also in a coma in his own time. Actually, I like that theory. They form a link over time. They both need one another. They both have the capability to help the other reach the parts that had atrophied. Sam helps Gene recover his respect for the law and for truth. Gene helps Sam realise when the letter of the law is not always the best solution.
All of the other characters, even Annie, don't have the intensity of Gene or Sam. It doesn't bother me if they are real or not. But I don't think I could accept Gene being nothing more than a dream, unless he is the other half of Sam's mind. (the first episode shows very clearly that Sam is conflicted about procedure and instinct)
There are two totally different ways of interpreting the series and I'm not sure that they're compatible, but I'm hoping it will continue to work as well as it is.
My main theory is that Sam is indeed hallucinating, but that the hallucination is not meaningless. Gene is the part of himself that he denies. Sam is logic and adherence to the letter of the law. Gene is hunch and 'end justifies the means'. Somewhere in the middle may be where the balance actually lies.
Yet, Gene is a complex character himself and quite capable of manipulating Sam. Gene setting Sam up to do the investigation of his team when a man dies in custody was ruthless and clever, but also demonstrated that Gene will not cross over a certain line even when defending his people.
In fact, I've come to realise that Gene is the more interesting character.
I love the relationship between the two men. I could never write it as slash - it just doesn't read that way to me (though I've no doubt whatsoever that it's been written by now) There's a mutual respect and reserved liking that shines past all the disagreements, fistfights and differences of opinion.
If the past is real, then the reason Sam is there is to help Gene.
It seems not impossible that Sam's mind has gone back in time. Maybe he's in someone else's body. No, that won't work, he still looks the same in the mirror.
Perhaps Gene is also in a coma in his own time. Actually, I like that theory. They form a link over time. They both need one another. They both have the capability to help the other reach the parts that had atrophied. Sam helps Gene recover his respect for the law and for truth. Gene helps Sam realise when the letter of the law is not always the best solution.
All of the other characters, even Annie, don't have the intensity of Gene or Sam. It doesn't bother me if they are real or not. But I don't think I could accept Gene being nothing more than a dream, unless he is the other half of Sam's mind. (the first episode shows very clearly that Sam is conflicted about procedure and instinct)
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1. Not SF - this is plainly happening in Sam's head;
2. Not original or even the best of its kind (see 'The Black and Blue Lamp')
3. Not in the least realistic in that I can neither believe in Sam's whiter-than-white current day cops or Gene's totally unreconstructed squad. I was there in 1973 and remember it well.
4. Full of small errors both in plotting and research. (See lots and lots of message boards mainly packed out with people muttering that that make of car was not made until 1974 etc.)
5. Extremely shallow in its characterisation. Both Sam and Gene are total stereotypes - good cop, bad cop indeed.
6. Lacking in humour (it's one joke about Sam's need for his computers and mobile phone has now worn extremely thin) and suspense. (Personally, I couldn't care less whether Sam was stuck in 1973 forever, so long as he stayed there and didn't bother me.)
Why am I watching. Because my housemate loves it. She's allowed if I can keep up with 'Invasion' (not brilliant, but at least I keep wanting to know what happens next.)
I must admit to being totally baffled as to why 'Life on Mars' is such a success. I've come to the conclusion it must be pure nostalgia for 70s cop shows. But the first series of 'The Sweeney' and of 'Starsky and Hutch' were so much better. And so much more realistic.
6.
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I never watched 70s cop shows, so it certainly isn't nostalgia in my case.
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Possibly this is one of the reasons you like it: you aren't comparing it to the 'real thing'.
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However, I think that the SF elements are poor. My take has always been that it is actually happening and that the writers know nothing about science or SF and are just using the going back in time business as a device and nothing more. As a device I think it works really well; as science, it's b*****ks. To me, it's even more far-fetched to believe that it's all happening in Sam's head - far too detailed :-).
I think the device points out the differences between the 70s attitudes and the modern attitudes well. Sure, it's exaggerated, but this is TV, not real life.
Gene is basically a copy of Regan in The Sweeney, but I don't have a problem with that. It's hard to invent totally new characters and especially for prime-time TV and what better series to copy from? I don't buy the "bad cop" theory. No-one would describe Gene as a "bad cop"; he just has a different set of values, albeit ones where the ends justify the means. I don't buy your Gene in a coma theory - there's nothing to support it although there would be a pleasing symmetry.
I cannot believe that people pick up on the "small errors in ...research" - to complain that a car wasn't made until the following year...I'm speechless. Get a life people!
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And the change of clothes is a major problem for that theory. He didn't arrive in his own clothes, but in a period outfit.
I like the shared hallucination theory as it allows Gene to supply the 70s details of the dream that Sam wouldn't know about.
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What I want to know is: what is it actually about? What is it saying, if anything? Most TV shows have some sort of reason for the existance, be it about fighting for freedom ('Firefly', 'Blake's Seven')or teaching you weird and wonderful science factoids (CSI, in all its forms) or even that women can fight while keeping every hair in place (Charlie's Angels).
'The Black and Blue Lamp' was about the different perspectives through which TV viewed the police in the 1950s and the 1990s. In it, the thug who killed George Dixon and his police escort have a car crash (yes, a car crash) and end up in the middle of an imaginary 1990s TV show called 'The Filth'.
Now, if 'Life on Mars' is about the same thing I must dispute its premise, because I don't notice any of today's TV shows showing the police as any less or more corrupt, racist, sexist and violent than they were in the 70s. In fact, though nowadays they have to be a bit more covert about it, I seriously doubt that they are actually any more or less corrupt, racist, sexist and violent than they were in the 70s.
If it's not about that, what is it about? What's it got to say?
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Sam's world is very 'correct' but it's also very souless and he wishes he had the energy to resent that.
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[Deranged laughter] Oh yes. It's being written. And I'm rapidly coming to the view that the makers of this series are sophisticated enough to know all about slash; they're not writing it as canon, but they're slipping in enough signs to keep the slashers happy while not frightening anyone else's horses.
I don't think we can judge the overall premise until Monday night, when we see where they're going with it. I'm praying they don't blow it. My hunch - though I suppose this may depend on how confident they were of getting a second season - is that the coma plot won't be resolved. The plot arc for this season is about What Happened with Sam's Dad in 1973. And for that reason, I'm tempted to see Gene as a father surrogate. Not for who Sam's father actually was, but something a bit closer to what he'd have liked him to be - someone who is there, taking a strong line but simultaneously allowing him to try things out for himself, and always coming through for him in the end.
And I'm with you on Gene being the more interesting character. Sam's is too much defined by his predicament (though John Simm's a good enough actor to overcome that), whereas Gene just is; he's a man having to cope with the complexities of his own time and place without the metaphor of their being alien to him. Now I'm trying to work out how to persuade my fellow-Martians that we mustn't split our votes when it comes to Best Actor in a BBC Drama in December, because it has to be Philip Glenister. He's blown me away.
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I definitely agree that Sam has helped Gene find his moral core again.
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Its the style that pulls people in - Kudos who also produced Spooks and Hustle seem to know how to put the elements that attract Genre fans into non genre shows - Spooks seems to be fairly widely watched by sf fans and hustle is rapidly gaining popularity.
I have suspicions that the company is run by a bunch of fans ...
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But we did agree that what is actually going on is only of secondary interest because the plots within the episodes themselves are so interesting. But then I like cop shows.
I definitely agree that Gene is the most intersting character in it. He looked quite black and white (and a bit of a Burnside clone) in the first episode, but he's got more interesting since then. I'm liking seeing the friendship developing by him and Sam. I know there's slash out there between them, it scares me.
I'm quite interested by the relationship between Annie and Sam as well. I think if he didn't have a girlfriend he obviously loved and she didn't have a boyfriend then it could be a different relationship between them altogether.
And hey, I actually have an appropriate default icon!
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Obviously, there are going to be anachronisms. If you've ever looked for props for am-dram, you'll know you just have to find the closest match and hope the inaccuracies aren't too glaring. We also know Manchester quite well, so that's interesting too.
The thing we've most commented on is the smoky fug that fills the station. We very well remember that. 8-( It's something we can really live without! We're not missing the piercing tone that followed the test card either! {G}
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