No, I haven’t completely lost my marbles—that’s one of the hilarious lines from Life on Mars, which Darin and I just finished watching. For those of you who haven’t heard the hype, it’s the story of Sam Tyler, a DCI in 2006, who gets hit by a car and wakes up in 1973. Did he really go back to 1973, or is he in a coma? And if he is in a coma, how on earth did he imagine 1973 in such vivid detail?
The show is absolutely wonderful, and John Simm (who’s in practically every frame, because the entire series has to do with his POV) is fabulous as Sam Tyler. The big breakout star from this is evidently Philip Glenister, who plays DCI Gene Hunt (or, Gene ‘unt, as everyone calls him), and he’s completely hysterical as the foul-mouthed, old-school policeman who does not understand any of Tyler’s wacky innovations to police work, such as “surveillance” or “profiling.”*
The first episode of Series 1 and the last episode of Series 2 are completely brilliant. (That ending! It’s the feel-good ending of the year!**) The episodes in between range from the good to the really, really good, with some utterly hilarious lines, and not just the anachronistic one from the title of this entry. The depiction of 1973 does make it seem like they’re on a completely different planet. (Although, as Darin put it, if you could actually get someone from 1973, they’d probably watch this show and point out tons of anachronisms. Doesn’t matter. Close enough.)
If you want to see it, either demand Region 1 DVDs of it or, er, find other ways of getting it. I didn’t watch it on BBC America, but since each episode was 55-60 minutes long and filled with swearing, they must have chopped the hell out of it.
David E Kelley is remaking this series for the US. So…one guess: it’ll be set in Boston, 1973. I’m also going to wager one of the first story notes from the network is, “Change the ending,” because there is no way an American network would approve that. (Cable: maybe.) I haven’t the slightest clue how they would drag this show out for 22 or 24 episodes a season. It is primarily a police procedural in time travel garb, and police procedurals have become extremely tired and stale of late. (Cf. Life, a show I love and miss—Damian Lewis: fabulous; police procedural part: oy.)
* When we started watching the show, Darin said, “You know who the guy playing Gene Hunt reminds me of? Colm Meaney.” And when I went to the IMDb page for the American version, lo and behold: Gene Hunt will be played by…Colm Meaney.
** If you don’t know what the ending is, don’t seek it out. I unfortunately got spoiled by Alan Sepinwall, so I knew what was coming, but Darin was like, WHOA.