Episode 3 tackles the issue of animal rights; a little half-heartedly, as it's more about trying to stop dangerous activists hurting innocent people in a campaign of terror attacks, and not so much a platform to raise issues. It all starts when vivisectionist Nigel Pattison (Robert Portal) complains to CID about activists sending him a festering rabbit1 in the post, and whose daughter suffers third-degree burns after a biker drops a bomb outside the police department following their complaint...
Consequently, the case escalates in priority for Gene (Philip Glenister) and Alex (Keeley Hawes), particularly when CID receive a message claiming that six more attacks are to come. It's not long before they have a decent lead; Robin Elliot (David Bradley), an icon for animal rights campaigners currently serving time in prison and on his fortieth day of a hunger strike. Is Robin somehow organizing these attacks from inside his cell?I'm pleased to see Ashes has found some form with its weekly stories, as writer Nicole Taylor's storyline managed to keep me watching without resorting to over-egging the pudding with visions and Alex's insane prattling. Although she still refuses to stop grabbing nearby people and ranting at them about going home, or talks to Gene like a basket case sometimes.
A sequence with Alex receiving electrical jolts from Morph on her television holding defibrillator paddles, was good fun -- but I especially liked a later scene where Gene pushes Alex to avoid her being shot, and the adrenaline rush appears to almost send her back to the present-day, where paramedics are apparently successful in restarting her heart. The way '82 is tethered to '08 this season is far more compelling.
There was also an excellent guest-star in gaunt David Bradley (best known for his caretaker role in the Harry Potter films); a really good villain with an interesting point of view, who also appears to sense Alex's metaphysical crisis. The two share a Hannibal/Clarice vibe at times, with Robin trying to gain psychological footholds by prying into Alex's daughter -- whom she's struggling to remember just recently. Indeed, characters this year seem to be boogieman for Alex to grapple with, even invading her dreams. Here, her daughter Molly (Grace Vance) is seen brushing her teeth too roughly, suddenly transforming into Robin with a bloody mouth of teeth. Dreams about teeth falling out are attributed to anxiety, but what if you dream about other people's teeth falling out? It can't be good..
Glenister also felt much-improved as Gene, who's often written as a broad caricature of his Life On Mars persona in Ashes. The script here gave us the Gene of 1973 -- the usual witty lines ("sorry, is this an incident room or the make-up counter at Kendals?") but also the old-school methodology like beating a suspect in a police toilet, or guzzling fish and chips in front of the hunger-striking Robin, before pushing his face into the grub when angered. Away from those highlights, Gene's also feeling the pressure from DS Mackintosh (Roger Allam), who continues to push his fellow Mason into corrupt areas he's rather not go down, and who eventually forces a transfer on his unruly DCI to the relative backwater of Plymouth. In the closing scene, Alex toasts Gene "the lion" at Luigi's as the case is closed, before "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" pointedly plays over the end-credits...Overall, Ashes To Ashes is three-for-three right now, which is wonderful to see. The writers appear to have found a way to make the '82-set plots feel relevant to Alex's modern-day ordeal. There's still the problem that everything we're watching is just a fantasy construct (so, why worry about anything?), but the series is doing a better job of making the '80s-world feel like a relevant and symbolic representation of Alex's contemporary trauma.
Plus, there are a few intriguing plot-strands that hint at the fact it may not quite as simple as Alex being a solo fantasist -- maybe she's just one of many distressed people stuck in an imagined '82 (already revealed to be a sort of bespoke limbo by Sam Tyler in Life On Mars' finale.) We're also benefiting from a better sense of serialized storytelling (this episode harkens back to episode 1 in an early scene, revealing that cop-killer Kevin Hales hung himself in prison), and Alex's "admirer" has managed to leave her another red rose2 on her desk at work...
4 May 2009
BBC1, 9pm
Writer: Nicole Taylor
Director: Ben Bolt
Cast: Philip Glenister (Gene), Keeley Hawes (Alex), Dean Andrews (Ray), Marshall Lancaster (Chris), Montserrat Lombard (Shaz), Roger Allam (DS Mackintosh), Adrian Dunbar (Martin Summers), David Bradley (Robin Elliot), Rory Kinnear (Jeremy), Graeme Rooney (Adrian), Joseph Long (Luigi), Geoff Francis (Viv), Robert Portal (Nigel Pattison), Grace Vance (Molly), Lauren Brooks (Charlotte Pattison) & Sarah Annis (Jeremy's Wife)
1. You perhaps couldn't escape white rabbits in a story about animal activists, but a bunny's relevance to Alice In Wonderland was too difficult to ignore.
2. Continuing the Alice In Wonderland theme; the only reference to roses in Lewis Carroll's oeuvre is a scene where Alice finds Tweedledum and Tweedledee painting white roses red in preparation for the Queen Of Heart's visit.
