Channel Surfing: Judy Greer Finds Mad Love, David Strathairn Circles Alphas, Gossip Girl, True Blood Twist, and More

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing.

Judy Greer (Miss/Guided) is heading to CBS. The actress--whose voice appeared this season on FX's animated comedy Archer--has signed on to star in CBS ensemble comedy Mad Love, which has been picked up for thirteen episodes and will launch in midseason. Greer replaces Lizzy Caplan, who had only signed on to appear as a guest star in the pilot, and will star opposite Sarah Chalke (who herself replaced Minka Kelly), Jason Biggs, and Tyler Labine (who replaced Dan Fogler). Project, from writer/executive producer Matt Tarses, revolves around a group of Manhattan friends looking for love. (Variety, Deadline)

Deadline's Nellie Andreeva is reporting that David Strathairn (Matadors) is in talks to topline Syfy's action-adventure pilot Alphas, which revolves around a team of people with extraordinary abilities. Strathairn would play the "the overseer/team leader/prescribing doctor and all around mother hen to the team: an eccentric, absent-minded professor at times, who is also a cunning and manipulative power-player willing to bend the rules in pursuit of his objectives." Ryan Cartwright (Mad Men), meanwhile, would play a team member with Asperger's Syndrome who is able to receive wireless transmissions. (Deadline)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Katie Cassidy (Melrose Place) has signed on to a multiple-episode story arc on the CW's Gossip Girl next season, where she will play "a student at Columbia and a love interest for fellow undergrad Nate (Chace Crawford)" who will cause trouble for the well-heeled set of the CW drama series. Her first appearance is slated to air during the fourth season premiere this fall. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

POTENTIAL SPOILER E! Online's Kristin Dos Santos has an interview with Mariana Kleveno--who plays vampire Lorena on HBO's True Blood--about the disturbing final-act twist in last night's taut installment. "[That scene] was actually the most shocking thing that I've ever read in a television script," Kleveno told E! "My jaw dropped on the floor when I read it and thought, 'Oh my god, I actually have to do that?!" Kleveno also goes on to say that filming the pivotal scene was "kind of uncomfortable." [Editor: when I interviewed Stephen Moyer a few weeks back, we discussed the scene and he referred to it as "f---ing gnarly."] (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Remember those rumors circulating last week that the Beeb was considering resurrecting Philip Glenister's Gene Hunt character from Ashes to Ashes and Life on Mars? Looks like--thankfully--there is absolutely no truth to them whatsoever. Ashes co-creator Matthew Graham has denied the report, originally published by The Daily Mirror, stating in no uncertain terms that Gene's story was done. [Editor: Whew! As much as I love Gene and Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes, it had the perfect ending.] (Den of Geek)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that A.J. Cook will be returning to CBS' Criminal Minds this fall... at least for a "brief stint to tie up JJ's storyline." Additionally, Paget Brewster will also be returning for another season, having successfully concluded a contract renegotiation that will see her return in the fall for "a significant number of episodes," according to an unnamed Criminal Minds insider. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Lolita Davidovich and Kathleen Quinlan have joined the cast of of HBO telepic Cinema Verite, which revolves around the making of the landmark reality series An American Family. (Also cast: William Belli and Nick Eversman.) Elsewhere, Steve Hytner (Hung) has been cast in CMT's comedy pilot The Hard Life, where he will star opposite Matthew Lillard and Gillian Vigman, appearing in flashbacks to the 1970s. (Deadline)

SPOILER! TV Guide Magazine's Will Keck has some dirt on the Season Seven opener of FOX's House, which finds Gregory House (Hugh Laurie) taking Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein) away for an "idyllic day." "Anywhere other than Princeton-Plainsboro Hospital is an easier place for them to be together in a relationship," House executive producer Katie Jacobs tells Keck. "That's where we start — 'What if we only have each other?' As their day goes on, Cuddy will learn that the locales they visit hold a secret significance... It would be impossible for Cuddy to spend every day as if her child and her professional life don't exist; a little easier for House, since he is somewhat of a child himself. But what's cool about Season 7 is that House is going to try to stay off drugs and have a meaningful relationship. We don't rush through this. It's taken six years to get there, so this is not a story that's going to be done in three episodes." (TV Guide Magazine)

Marvel Entertainment has created a television division and named scribe Jeph Loeb (Heroes) to head up the new sector. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Loeb will "oversee the translation of Marvel’s popular characters and stories to the television medium, in both live-action and animation formats" as well as "the development and distribution of live-action, animated and direct-to-DVD series." (Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision)

Peter Horton (Grey's Anatomy) will direct and executive produce FOX's upcoming con man drama Lonestar, signing a deal with 20th Century Fox Television and FOX that will also secured him a premium script commitment. He'll also direct a pilot for the studio and network next season. Horton will direct the first episode of Lonestar after the pilot episode, which was directed by Marc Webb. (Variety)

Former Dexter showrunner Clyde Phillips has signed a two-year overall deal with Lionsgate Television, under which he will develop programming for the studio. Anything that is ordered to pilot (or series) would be shot on the East Coast, where Phillips lives with his family. (Deadline)

Emily VanCamp (Brothers & Sisters) has been cast in CBS' upcoming Hallmark Hall of Fame telepic Let Them Shine, where she will play a novice teacher who makes a difference in the lives of several homeless students. Project is written by Camille Thomasson and directed by Jeff Bleckner. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: Dexter Lures Miller, Jordana Spiro Out at Love Bites, Greenblatt Exits Showtime, Gene Hunt, and More

Welcome to your Friday morning television briefing.

Showtime's Dexter is on a casting role. Variety's Stuart Levine is reporting that Jonny Lee Miller (Eli Stone) is the latest to board the serial killer drama, signing on to appear in a multiple-episode story arc on Season Five of Dexter. Miller will play "a mysterious man who ends up tangled in a storyline with Julia Stiles, who is beginning her first season on the skein." (Variety)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Jordana Spiro has exited NBC's midseason romantic anthology series Love Bites. Spiro's participation in the series was always in second position to her role on TBS comedy My Boys, which returns for its fourth season next month. "Although the odds appear slim that TBS will renew the show for a fifth season (season 4 premieres July 25), it was a risk NBC apparently wasn’t willing to take," writes Ausiello. "It’s unclear if her role will be recast." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Elsewhere, E! Online's Jenna Mullins has an interview with Spiro about Season Four of My Boys. "PJ has to deal with moving on to the next level with her relationship. She and Bobby start living together," said Spiro. "When you start getting a little too comfortable with your significant other, the new video game becomes more exciting than the new piece of lingerie." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

In surprising news, Robert Greenblatt has stepped down from his role as Showtime Networks president after a seven-year run and will be succeeded by former Imagine TV partner David Nevins. "Though the executive shuffle came down just this week, sources portrayed Greenblatt's decision as a long time in the making," writes The Hollywood Reporter's James Hibberd. "It's unclear if the network's corporate communications chief, Richard Licata, who's worked with Greenblatt for 16 years, will opt to continue at the network in the wake of the entertainment president's departure." (Variety, Hollywood Reporter)

Could the Beeb be resurrecting Philip Glenister's Gene Hunt once more? According to The Daily Mirror, the BBC is contemplating whether to develop a new series that would be set in the present day and revolve around Glenister's fiery Gene Hunt character from Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes. No word on whether the rumors are in fact true or just that: rumors. [Editor: personally, I thought given the perfection of the ending of Ashes to Ashes, that Gene's storyline was nicely tied up. But...] (via Digital Spy)

Vulture's Emma Barker has a speed round with Party Down and Parks and Recreation star Adam Scott in which he discusses everything from prosthetic penises (cough, Tell Me You love Me, cough) to Matthew McConaughey-esque catch phrases, all in his inimitable style. (Vulture)

Digital Spy's Catriona Wightman is reporting that Doctor Who head writer/executive producer Steven Moffat has asked Russell T Davies to pen an upcoming episode of Doctor Who. But will it happen? "He's pretty adamant that he's not going to," said Moffat. "He did an awful lot of Doctor Who for an awful lot of years, and I think he's finding it in a way hard, because he's done a Doctor Who story in effect for Sarah Jane Adventures. So I think he probably wants to get away from it for a bit. I can understand that, because he did a hell of a lot. But I'd love to get him back, it would be just joyous to get him back because I miss him." (Digital Spy)

No surprise: Andy Richter will be making the move with Conan O'Brien to TBS this fall. "I'm doing the TBS Conan show because I went back to work for Conan on The Tonight Show," Richter told Variety's Michael Schneider. "But that story ended unnaturally... I didn't want them to end that story of me and Conan getting back together. I had come back to work with a friend." (Variety)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello talks to Weeds star Mary-Louise Parker about the departure of Elizabeth Perkins from the cast of the Showtime dark comedy series when it returns for its sixth season on August 16th. "It's really sad -- really said," Parker told Ausiello. "I just can’t think of a single negative thing to say about Elizabeth Perkins. I’m sure there are many because she’s a human being, but I worked with her for [five] years and she was a wonderful person in the morning and she was a wonderful person when you worked an 18-hour day." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Rob Lowe (Parks and Recreation) has teamed up with reality shingle 44 Blue to produce a new unscripted series that is set in Washington, D.C. and which will focus on "real-life aspiring politicos as they look to move up the ranks of power in the nation's capital." (Variety)

TLC has ordered eight episodes of an untitled reality competition series spinning off of its successful Cake Boss franchise in which ten aspiring cake makers will compete for an apprenticeship at Carlo's Bakery. Production on the series, from High Noon Entertainment, is slated to begin in September. (via press release)

VH1 has ordered a pilot for Office Bonus, in which "office workers battle for a $50,000 bonus" as they are locked in their workplace for 72 hours and must convince their co-workers to give them the cash bonus. Project, from 3 Ball, is executive produced by JD Roth, Todd Nelson, and Adam Greener. (Hollywood Reporter)

A&E has given an pilot order to unscripted series The Incurables, which will focus on British self-help guru Paul McKenna as he attempts to help people with severe psychological or physical problems. Project, from Ryan Seacrest Productions and McKenna Media, will be executive produced by Ryan Seacrest, McKenna, and Sam Mettler. (Variety)

TV Land is developing an untitled docusoap that will revolve around George Hamilton, his adult son Ashley, and his ten-year-old son George, as they move in together in Los Angeles. (Hollywood Reporter)

Turner Broadcasting has promoted two publicity executives, bumping Jeff Matteson to SVP/strategic communications officer and Misty Skedgell to SVP of corporate communications. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Dreams End: Heaven's High on the Series Finale of Ashes to Ashes

"A word in your shell-like, pal."

With those final words, BBC One's extraordinary drama series Ashes to Ashes faded into the ether, offering a stunning series finale that was equal parts mythology and mystery, grounded in an emotional context for each of the characters that had me shamelessly weeping on the sofa by the end.

For those of us who have been following the struggles of many of these characters since they first appeared on the scene in Ashes's predecessor, Life on Mars, anticipation was running high that the end to the series would not only provide some vital answers to come of the central mysteries of these two series--such as the identity of Gene Hunt and the nature of this world--but also provide a sense of closure that befitted the legacy of Life on Mars and offered a catharsis of sorts to the viewers.

It managed to accomplish just that and so much more, offering a series finale that I loved every second of and never wanted to end.

Throughout its remarkable third season run, Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah's Ashes to Ashes delivered a jaw-dropping parable about good and evil, light and darkness, all enacted against a 1980s backdrop that swirled with menace, the color red, and so many shattered dreams. At its very center lay the man himself, Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister), an anachronistic copper with a penchant for violence, misogyny, and a good boozer.

In the talented hands of Graham, Pharoah, and Glenister, Gene Hunt became one of the most memorable characters in any fictional medium, a maverick that you couldn't help but fall in love with, from his trademark snakeskin boots and love for flashy rides to his gruff exterior and intrinsic need to exert order over his little kingdom, Fenchurch East.

In a single hour, writer Matthew Graham managed to tie up five seasons worth of storylines and give us the important answers about just what has been going on in this impossible world, a place that has been at the forefront of both Ashes and Life on Mars and which holds the key to unlocking the series' mysterious truth.

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two or Season Three of Ashes to Ashes.

I'm still trying to process many of my thoughts and reactions to the series finale of Ashes to Ashes, a beautiful and transcendent episode that revealed the truth about Gene Hunt and the world in which these characters inhabit, the identity of Officer 6620, and the status of Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes) in the so-called "real" world. And indeed, we were given answers to all of these questions and more, a stunning hour of television that challenged us to see what has been staring us in the face all season.

In covering the third season of Ashes to Ashes, I've been making my own conjectures about the series: I believed that Officer 6620 was a dead Gene Hunt, that each of the characters were dead and given an opportunity to process the traumas that occurred to them in order to let go, and that Jim Keats (the superb Daniel Mays) was the evil incarnate. (Several of details about the final episode appeared in my write-up of episode 307.)

I wasn't disappointed at all to learn that many of my theories were in line with what Graham and Pharoah were planning since the start of the season. The clues have been masterfully planted, from the recurring image of the screwdriver surrounding Shaz (Montserrat Lombard, showing off some dazzling acting chops here) and the presence of the stars in the sky.

Alex uncovers Gene's identity by heading to the house from her vision and the photograph she recovered from Gene's desk drawer: a farmhouse in Lancashire with that creepy weathervane, a crone pointing West. (Which I still maintain is one of many Oz references that are woven through the series.) Under the watchful eye of a scarecrow (whose jacket has the Officer 6620 epaulet pin), Alex uncovers a grave even as Gene orders her at gunpoint to stop digging. But she doesn't, even as Gene remains frozen and motionless, uncovering a skeleton and an old warrant card. A warrant card for Officer 6620: Gene Hunt himself.

While many of us came to this conclusion some time ago, it was a staggering scene nonetheless as Gene was forced to contend with proof of his own gruesome death, murdered at a young age in the nearby farmhouse, still decorated for a royal coronation long past.

This world that each of them--Alex, Shaz, Ray (Dean Andrews), and Chris (Marshall Lancaster)--inhabits is a purgatory of sorts, a place where dead (or nearly dead) coppers can access or are sent in order to decide their ultimate fates. Can they achieve the resolution and catharsis that was denied to them in life or will they linger forever, never quite reaching the afterlife?

Fenchurch East Police Station isn't a "real" police station, it's a fantasy concocted by the long dead Gene Hunt, a slice of purgatory carved out as a mythical fiefdom, a fact that Jim Keats is only all too willing to reveal to them, ripping off the ceiling of CID to reveal the stars in the sky, the celestial kingdom looming overhead. Will they choose heaven or hell? Will they move on or cling to old patterns?

Gene Hunt is meant to be helping them on their way, guiding them to an eventual salvation at the end of the road, a communion with the heavens that is embodied in the Railway Arms, the Manchester pub from Life on Mars, the last boozer after the final case, the ultimate reward of a life lived. But Gene is a lonely soul, himself a dead young copper living in this place for far too long. It's clear that he loves his team. Too much in fact as he can't let go of them either, keeping each of them close to him for far too long.

Both Sam and Alex weren't dead when they arrived in this place. Each of them was clinging to life in their own way, desperate to return home, and therefore their minds rebelled against the world, seeing it for what it truly was, a place where their subconscious dragged up images, traumas, and puzzles for them to process. They weren't ready to follow Gene to the pub at the end of the road. Not yet, anyway.

Because they were clinging to life, they were still able to access their memories of their lives but even those faded over time. Alex began unable to remember Molly precisely and Gene himself had all but forgotten his true nature. But Alex and Sam, due to hovering between life and death, were still able to connect to their previous lives, still able to remember their identities and what had happened to them. (Keats even tells Alex this, saying that she and Sam are different than the others: "You both challenge this world that Gene's carefully built for himself. You're dangerous to him.")

Let's not forget that Sam chose to return to this world. Unlike Alex, he recovered from his coma and returned to life but chose to reembark on a path that brought him back here, to a place where good coppers chased bad guys and turned up for a boozer at the end of the day, where childhood memories mixed with filmic and television representations of fictional cops.

Gene Hunt didn't see himself as a skinny kid in a uniform. He saw himself as Gary Cooper in High Noon, a strong, gruff lawman who is unlike him in every way. Building a world around him that was based on this representation, Gene surrounded himself with the good cops who died and were unable to move on, building a team that gave him strength even as he forgot why he was there or who he really was. That's the problem with pretending: after a while, fantasy can become reality.

But it all has to end sometime. When Sam died at the end of Life on Mars, he returned to this world and lived there for years with Annie. But he wanted to move on and he asked Gene to help him, which he did. And which is why he disappeared without a trace. He was finally ready to let go and Gene allowed him to finally head to the afterlife. Likewise, the same held true for Alex, Shaz, Ray, and Chris.

Alex died from Layton's gunshot after clinging to life for the first two seasons of Ashes, dying at 9:06 am in a hospital in London, listening to the news that a body had been found in a shallow grave in Lancashire. Shaz died after attempting to stop a car thief--who had been jimmying open a door with a screwdriver--after he stabbed her in the gut with the tool. (It's worth noting that the courageous Shaz herself died in 1995, as evidenced by the fact that the first piece of modern music--Oasis' "Wonderwall," released that same year--played over her death scene. It also explains her modern thinking: she came from a different time period than Chris and Ray.) Ray, depressed over beating a young man to death--covered up by his DCI--and unable to deal with his grief, hanged himself in his flat. (Ray, heartless though he seemed throughout LOM and Ashes, actually felt too much, both grief and shame at disappointing his father.) Chris, a uniform officer, follows his superior's orders and is shot to death. (He knows better but is unable to stand up for himself, whereas he finally stands up to Gene in episode 307, finally earning his brains.)

I don't want to think of this world as a strict purgatory in the traditional sense of the word. This isn't some limbo for lost souls, but rather a magical place in line with the kingdoms of Oz and Narnia, a place that's perhaps more real than reality, granting the users the ability to deal with their mortal traumas, the formative moments that shaped them as individuals and set up their characters.

For Sam, that was 1973, the year his father murdered a woman in red (Annie) and took off into the wind. (It also explains, with no uncertainty, that copper Annie was also dead in the real world, which fits with the resolution here.) For Alex, that was 1981, when her parents were killed in front of her as a child. Both formative moments in their psychology, which is why their subconscious latched onto these particular time periods. In attempting to understand the very moments that shaped them, they are given the opportunity to reevaluate themselves, to come to know themselves inside and out, and to finally process their pain and release it.

I thought it was interesting that Shaz, in the seventh episode, threw out a line about it being 1953 in Ray and Chris' heads, and wondered if that was the year that Gene Hunt died. It was, as we learned this week, as he was a young copper murdered on the day of Queen Elizabeth's coronation, his body buried in a shallow grave in Lancashire. Since that time, he's been helping cops achieve heavenly release, pushing them on their way in his capacity as a hard-talking angel of sorts.

His polar opposite, Jim Keats, serves an inimical purpose, ferrying souls to Hell in an elevator that goes down to the basement level, making false promises and attempting to lure Ray, Chris, and Shaz to his division. Alex figures out early in the episode that Keats isn't Discipline and Complaints but something else altogether, even if she can't quite put her finger on what it is. But Keats isn't taking no for an answer. He pushes the trio to become self-aware once more, forcing them to come to terms with the nature of their deaths, giving each of them marked video cassettes that contain footage of the way they each died (as I theorized last week), each trapped in an act of violence that marked them forever.

Would they go with the guv? Or choose the seductive lures of Keats? They'd come face to face with proof of their deaths but the choice was in their hands. Would it be up or down? And would Alex stand at Gene's side or help Keats destroy this world after learning that Gene had the power to send her home whenever he wanted?

While Keats offers pleasures of the flesh, Gene offers the team something else: to achieve the things they never could in life: Shaz gets her promotion to DC, Ray receives the praise he always needed, Chris becomes his own man. Keats might offer what they want, but Gene offers what they need.

Keats is all too willing to take whatever souls he can get his hands on, taking them through the fire exit to an elevator bank where they await the path down to the fiery pit below, which is where poor Louise Gardner and Viv end up. It's even more depressing, given Chris' ominous dream of Viv among the fire.

Elsewhere, however, there's an alternative. The Railway Arms, Gene's favorite pub in Manchester, which has now magically been "shifted" across the landscape to London. Chris picked up on barman Nelson's voice in last week's episode as "Life on Mars" played in the background. It's here that our group, after stopping the diamond thieves and saying goodbye to the series' trademark Quattro, find themselves. It's the end point to the world, where a soft white light filters outwards, bringing with it the sounds of happy voices and David Bowie singing "Life on Mars." This is the end of the line, the point at which they can leave this world and travel on to the afterlife. Nelson himself stands at the door, St. Peter at the gates of heaven, ready to admit them to Paradise.

It's been Gene's job to eventually guide them here, to take them to the pub after the case is closed, the bad guys caught, evil vanquished. (Or as he puts it, "sorting out the troubled souls of Her Majesty's constabulary.") But there's one last showdown between Gene and Keats as he once again attempts to get Alex to cross over to his side. But Gene is stronger here than in their last encounter at Fenchurch East (where Keats is able to reveal the stars in the sky and display Gene's true form) and he knocks Keats for a loop.

Chris and Shaz finally reunite, Ray shakes Gene's hand, and then all of them enter The Railway Arms, their deserved final destination. Only Alex remains, Alex who wants to stay with Gene in this world, to continue to challenge and provoke him, to force him to be better. But she can't stay and neither can Gene leave. Both have the paths they must walk and they can't walk them together.

Kudos go to Daniel Mays for making Jim Keats such a spectacular character and for delivering a nuanced and brave performance this week as Keats' true colors began to emerge over the course of the hour, a terrifying shape of evil that, while broken and battered at the end, still was able to cackle malevolently and promise Gene that he would be seeing him again.

Likewise, I also want to praise Lombard, Marshall, and Andrews for stunning performances over the course of the series and especially with this final installment. Shaz's horror, Ray's stoicism, Chris' attempt to prevent Shaz from pain, all cut me like a knife. (Lombard in particular deserves praise for her shocking breakdown after seeing herself die in 1995, which made the hair on my arms stand straight up.)

The final scene between Alex and Gene finally gave them their moment under the stars, a true kiss that signified the end of their relationship and their time together. I've loved Hawes and Glenister together and after their near-consummation in Episode 307, I thought that this was a brilliant way to end their interactions, a soft kiss, laden with passion and love, as Gene finally sent Alex on her way to the afterlife. (Hawes' performance absolutely breaks my heart here.) It's with some regret that Alex finally steps into the light, leaving Gene alone once again. But not for long.

As he peruses a crimson Mercedes Benz 190D catalogue, Gene gets a new visitor: a traveler from 2010 who turns up at Fenchurch East looking for his office and his iPhone. A new companion for Gene, someone who can help him gather together his troops and send them on their way. The magic circle has opened once more for a new figure. (I do wish, however, that this new copper had been a "name" actor, offering us a cameo appearance at the very end, a way of continuing the story in our imaginations.) "A word in your shell-like, pal," he says in pitch-perfect Gene Hunt. And the cycle begins anew as Gene repeats the very words he said to Sam Tyler at the start of Life on Mars.

At the end, Gene is always there, the immortal guardian of this kingdom, an Oz for dead coppers, always watching and waiting. Just like George Dixon of Dixon of Dock Green from the footage at the very end of the episode. It might be the end but these characters endure forever, caught on the television screen, watching over us just as we watch over them. The police light remains on, a beacon in the darkness to all in need of salvation.

I'm going to miss Ashes to Ashes terribly, as well as the remarkable characters whose lives--and deaths--we've followed these past few years. Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah have created a remarkable piece of television that transcends the medium, delivering a powerful parable of life and death in two series that bookend the human experience: the turbulent joyfulness of life (Life on Mars) and the release of death (Ashes to Ashes). I'd like to thank them and the many writers, directors, and actors from the bottom of my heart for five extraordinary seasons of a genre-busting series that is unlike anything else on television.

All that's left to say is to fire up the Quattro and see you at The Railway Arms. Be seeing you, guv.

What did you think of the series finale of Ashes to Ashes? Were you satisfied by the resolution to Alex's story? The identities of Gene Hunt and Jim Keats? And the truth about Chris, Ray, and Shaz? How much will you miss Ashes to Ashes? Head to the comments section to discuss.

Slouching Towards Bethlehem: Things Fall Apart on Ashes to Ashes

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

Just what is Yeats' rough beast that slouches towards Bethlehem to be born, within the context of Ashes to Ashes?

Is it the mysterious DCI Gene Hunt, whose presence within the world of Ashes and Life on Mars seems to be one of the few constants? Or is it his nemesis, Discipline and Complaints Officer Jim Keats, Gene's dark reflection and a man of enigma himself?

Once again, Alex Drake finds herself caught between wanting to trust Gene and her own suspicions about what happened to Sam Tyler. Despite the fact that she wants to make a major leap of faith and believe Gene when he spins her a yarn about faking Sam's death, there's something that she can't quite let go of, something that's not quite right, and something that Gene isn't telling her.

What that might be remains to be seen, but it could bring about the end of this world if Alex manages to uncover the truth about Gene Hunt, Sam Tyler, and the world they are all currently inhabiting, a series of secrets that involve Officer 6620, the car crash, a weathervane, and the identity of Gene Hunt himself.

Yes, everything is beginning to unravel as, for each of the characters, things fall apart...

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two or Season Three of Ashes to Ashes.

Functioning as the penultimate episode of Ashes to Ashes and the joint storyline of Ashes and its predecessor Life on Mars, I though that this week's installment was a work of staggering genius, managing to balance both a compelling mystery of the week--surrounding a potential ANC plot to assassinate South African president Pieter Botha in London--and the funeral of Viv with the sort of slow-burn reveals and mind-bending twists that this series excels at.

Viv's funeral brought things home for the gang at Fenchurch East (save maybe Chris, who found himself laughing at a rather inappropriate bit), offering up a Gene Hunt who, for a change, seemed utterly defeated, having to admit that he'd lost another officer to death. (Or is it Death?) The fact that the curtains wouldn't close around Viv's coffin, leading Gene to yank them shut, to grant Viv a final piece of dignity denied him by the brutal way that he died, was a biting reminder about the transience of life... right before we got a shot of a flame and those ubiquitous stars, which this week seemed all the more vital and important.

While Alex was forced to turn over the film canister she swiped from Gene's office to Keats, a number of inexplicable things occurred this week, as Keats received a set of VHS tapes (which he labeled with Ray, Shaz, and Chris' names), Shaz and Ray heard a disembodied voice from a supply closet at Fenchurch East, and Chris Skelton finally got his own well-earned Life on Mars moment this week... and managed to solve a crucial part of the puzzle in the process.

All this and the sexual tension between Alex and Gene nearly came to a head, before their near kiss was brutally interrupted by the arrival of Jim Keats, who brought Alex the developed film that she had given him. Just what did the film reveal? A series of photos, all happy ones, of the Manchester gang, including Sam Tyler and Annie... and a photograph of a house in Lancashire, one with a memorable weathervane that we've seen before.

There's been a bit of conjecture about that weathervane. I've long maintained, since the first or second episode of this season, that it depicted a crone with a walking stick facing west, a symbolic manifestation of Oz's Wicked Witch of the West, and another in a long line of Oz imagery that has peppered both this and LOM. Given the appearance (as seen in the promo for the series finale) of a scarecrow (!!!), the fact seems certain that we've been meant to see these things as symbolic allusions to the Oz story, pointing towards the fact that this world is a magical realm along the lines of Oz or Narnia, an impossible place that shouldn't exist.

Like either of those fantastical worlds, characters find themselves traveling there unwittingly and want desperately to return home, only to discover that, once returned, the place they were truly alive was in that other realm.

Home is, as they say, where the heart is.

Like travelers Sam Tyler and Alex Drake, we've seen others who were out of place in this world, like Railway Arms barman Nelson and Italian restaurateur Luigi, who this week informed the gang that he had come into money and would be going home. A foreigner (whether real or fake) has run both drinking holes in both series; several characters have looked for ways home but it's rarely ever as simple as clicking your ruby slippers together three times (though Ashes has shown a fixation with all things red from the start).

Alex's mission has been returning home. For the others, it hasn't been quite so clear cut. To use the Oz metaphor I invoked a few weeks back: Shaz needed courage; Ray a heart; and Chris needed brains. All three have attained their missions now, Chris by disobeying the gov and doing what was right, releasing prisoner Joshua and sending him out into the wind and then facing Gene one last time. In doing so, Chris got the moment that had been denied him: the acceptance on the part of Gene Hunt, that pat on the shoulder and respect that signified his inclusion into the circle of trust.

And just as the others did, his moment of epiphany came with darkness and the familiar strands of Bowie's "Life on Mars," though Chris realized two things that the others didn't: that the song was being played somewhere like a pub and the voice he heard in the foreground was none other than Nelson, the barman at the Railway Arms in Manchester. (In the end, it all seems to come back round to Manchester, doesn't it?)

It's an important realization and another clue towards where the series is going in its final week. Both Alex and the others are looking backwards, towards the past, in order to figure out the truth about their present day, much like both series did in their own way. Does it all come down to a song played in a Manchester pub, a place where perhaps the truth came out between Sam and Gene?

I'm also curious about the fact that Joshua literally disappeared after he provoked Chris to realize that Alex might be from the future. An intentional tip of the hat to the religious and mystical? Is it vital that Chris accept just where Alex--and maybe himself as well--actually came from? What to make of the old-school police whistle as well that was freaking Chris out so much this week? Another clue about the Officer 6620?

Meanwhile, Ray and Shaz heard a voice echoing out of a Fenchurch East station supply room, a moment that terrified both of them so much that they instinctively grabbed onto one another for support. Given the fact that Shaz loathes Ray, it was a major turning point in their relationship, a realization that they're either both going mad or are experiencing the same mortal terror as their world begins to disintegrate.

Later, joined by Chris, the troika are given another vision of the stars, looming over them, around them, a suffocating, dizzying swirl of light and darkness, that obliterated everything else out in its wake. A vision of the afterlife? The truth that this world is fleeting and false? Or that they're on the road to heavenly release? Could it be that each of them is closer to death than anyone realizes?

Just what is on the tapes that the malevolent Keats is preparing for each of them to see? Proof of their deaths? Of their pasts? Is he trying to goad them into catharsis or death itself as he attempts to tear this world down around their ears?

What did Shaz mean when she said to Ray and Chris, "it's like 1953 in your heads"? A throwaway line or something deeper? Could it be that that was the year Gene Hunt died? Hmmm...

Alex and Gene, meanwhile, come closer than they ever have to a full-blown sexual encounter with one another. While the night is ruined by the explosion at the South African embassy, the two retire to Alex's place where they dance that delicate dance and very nearly kiss for the first time. But whatever trust is there, whatever fragile faith, is destroyed by Keats' appearance with those photographs, which he claims depicts the grave of Sam Tyler, one in the shadow of that house with the weathervane.

I don't believe that is the case. Gene, though he tells Alex that he helped Sam fake his death, didn't tell her the whole story. And while there might be a grave in those fields, it's not Sam Tyler's grave, but that of Officer 6620. Just who is he? Another traveler, like Alex and Sam? Or, as I've suspected for a while now, the body of the "real" Gene Hunt, dead and buried all these years? Will finding that corpse and unearthing it cause this world to end, to disintegrate into nothing more than stars in their firmament?

There's also the matter of the bullet. Keats makes a point of referring to the bullet that nearly killed Alex and she infers that he means the accidental shot that Gene took at her in Season Two. But what if he was referring instead to that original bullet, the one that Layton fired at her skull in the very first episode? The point of impact that would have likely shattered her mind had Gene Hunt not stepped in to save her psyche?

As Gene said, the Final Chapter is at hand now. (Or as he actually said, "This is the final chapter, Bolly.") We've only got one episode of Ashes to Ashes remaining as the interconnected mysteries of Gene Hunt, Sam Tyler, Jim Keats, and the true nature of this world come crashing to a conclusion on Friday evening. Regardless of the outcome and the numerous reveals that the episode will likely contain, I'm going to miss Ashes to Ashes more than I can say, from the memorable characters to the mind-bending mysteries that the series has kicked up over the course of its intoxicating run.

The end is almost here... Will it end with Gene pouring Alex a big glass of Chianti or the destruction of their entire world, ashes to ashes, dust to dust? Find out Friday.

What do you think is going on here? Is the gang already long dead? Clinging to life? Will Alex get home or is that not even a vital component to the series anymore? Just who are Gene Hunt and Jim Keats? What happened to Sam Tyler? Head to the comments section to discuss.

On the series finale of Ashes to Ashes, DCI Gene Hunt and his team investigate a diamond heist following the murder of three London gang members. But DI Alex Drake is distracted and, with encouragement from DCI Jim Keats, she decides to pursue her own investigation to the bitter end, seeking to discover whether Gene Hunt murdered Sam Tyler; Gene races after Alex, leaving Ray Carling, Chris Skelton and Shaz Granger to plan an ambitious sting operation. As Gene desperately tries to reach Alex before she discovers the truth, Chris, Shaz and Ray's world completely falls apart. It's time for Alex and the rest of the team to find out the truth about Gene Hunt...

A Pebble on the Beach: Revisting Last Year's Review for Season Two of BBC America's Ashes to Ashes

BBC America was originally meant to air Season Two of genre-busting drama series Ashes to Ashes last May, following their run of the first season of the Life on Mars sequel series starring Keely Hawes, Philip Glenister, Dean Andrews, Marshall Lancaster, and Montserrat Lombard.

Unfortunately, things didn't quite turn out that way. A year later, BBC America is finally bringing Season Two of Ashes to Ashes to American shores, with the first episode slated to air tonight at 10 pm ET/PT. (It's also the perfect jumping-on point for viewers who may not have seen the first season.)

Thanks to a region-free DVD player and a friend in the UK, I've been writing up episodes of Ashes's phenomenally mind-bending third season on a weekly basis over the last few weeks (the series is set to end its three-season run next week in the UK), but I wanted to resurrect my review of the first two episodes of Season Two of Ashes to Ashes, which I wrote last May and which I heaped much praise upon, calling it "darkly seductive."

You can read the full review here (beware: it contains spoilers for the first two episodes), or you can read my wrap-up thoughts on the first two episodes of Ashes to Ashes's brilliant second season below:

"...the first two episodes of Ashes to Ashes' second season kick the Quattro into top gear, presenting a series of tantalizing new possibilities for Alex Drake, new enemies for Drake and Hunt, and an intriguing overarching plot that increases the tension and danger for our New Wave heroes. I just can't wait to see what happens next."

Having seen the entirety of Season Two (and most of Season Three now), I can honestly this is one series that's well worth your time as it only gets better and better with each subsequent episode. You'll soon fall in love with Alex, Gene, Ray, Chris, and Shaz... and marvel at the slick production, mind-altering plot twists, and metaphysical implications that the series kicks up. So set your DVRs and break open the Bolly...

Season Two of Ashes to Ashes begins tonight at 10 pm ET/PT on BBC America.

Floating Among the Stars: Metal Boxes on Ashes to Ashes

"My name is Sam Tyler. I had an accident and I woke up in 1973. Am I mad, in a coma, or back in time? Whatever's happened, it's like I've landed on a different planet. Now, maybe if I can work out the reason, I can get home."

Those were the words spoken by John Simm's Sam Tyler at the start of every episode of Life on Mars, summing up the series' central conceit: the investigation of what had happened to Sam Tyler. His anachronistic presence in 1973 might have been the result of madness, coma, or time-travel... or something altogether different.

While Life on Mars wrapped up after two seasons, the mystery surrounding Sam Tyler--and Philip Glenister's DCI Gent Hunt--has continued to swirl tantalizingly around Mars' sequel, Ashes to Ashes, which delivered another knock out installment as it continues to head towards its own conclusion as DI Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes) looks for a way to return to her own world while looking to solve the mystery of Sam Tyler himself. Did he die that day when his car crashed into the ravine? Was Gene Hunt responsible in some way? And just what is Hunt hiding?

All of these questions seemed to forcibly collide this week as Alex came face to face with a man claiming to be none other than Sam Tyler himself. But it wasn't Sam, not really, though escaped prisoner Paul Thordy (Steven Robertson) did speak Sam's intoxicating words from the opening of Life on Mars. But if he's not Sam Tyler, then who is Thordy? And how did he know about Sam's predicament?

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two of Ashes to Ashes.

This week's episode, written by James Payne and directed by Jamie Payne, saw the tension among the members of Fenchurch East CID continue to fracture the group, assisted ably by the machinations of the seemingly malevolent Jim Keats (Daniel Mays), who continues to be one of the most terrifying characters on Ashes to Ashes, while maintaining an inexplicable aura of boyishness at the same time.

A riot underway at Fenchurch East prison turns into a hostage situation when Viv James (Geff Francis) is himself taken prisoner by Jason Sachs (Stanley Townsend) but not everything is as it appears to be here: Viv was in on the riot, itself a smokescreen to deflect attention away from what's really going on: a breakout. Finding himself between a rock and a hard place, Viv brings a gun into the prison in exchange for Sachs assisting in the breakout of his incarcerated relative. And if that wasn't bad enough, Gene sends Chris and Ray in undercover as journalists in an effort to get Viv out.

Just what did Viv want to tell Gene before the assault on the prison? Was he going to confess that he had done something wrong? Was he looking to backpedal and alert the team that not everything was what it seemed? We'll never know as poor Viv dies at the hands of Jason Sachs during the ultimate incursion to free Ray and Chris. He never gets to come clean to Gene, nor is he given a chance to redeem himself. (Though Ray, even after saying that Viv was dead to him, did attempt to intervene on his behalf to save him earlier, proving that some bonds can't so easily be broken.)

And then there was the manner of his death. Not just is he shot and left to die in a dank corridor of the prison but the first person to reach him isn't Alex or Gene, or even Ray: it's Jim Keats. And Viv doesn't so much as go quietly into that good night but is dragged there, kicking and screaming, by Keats.

Keats removes one of his black gloves and holds Viv's head in place as his body breathes its final, wracked breaths, staring into the eyes of Jim Keats. It's not particularly pleasant to watch and it seems as though Viv's soul is being sucked out of his body by Keats.

Which is interesting because we've seen this scene play out before. A few episodes ago, someone else died in Keats' arms and it didn't seem altogether pleasant either, reflecting some sort of weird connection between the victim and Keats that bound them together in their final moments. That person was Louise Gardiner (Zoe Telford), an undercover copper who was killed when she was struck by a lorry. She died staring into Keats' eyes too.

But that's not all that Viv and Louise had in common: both had betrayed the Metropolitan Police Force. Viv had sold out his team for his family, choosing personal responsibility over professional duty, though it was clear that he hadn't made the decision lightly (in fact, it seemed to be eating away at him). Louise had gotten her mission so confused that she became the villain she was trying to bring to justice. Both of them died and Keats was there when they did.

Could it be that he was sending their souls someplace? Not out into the floating stars of heaven but somewhere else? Somewhere, not above, but below? And if that's the case, just who is Jim Keats? Is he the Devil? Or Death himself? (After all, the title of Ashes to Ashes refers not only to David Bowie's 1981 song but to the Anglican burial service--"ashes to ashes, dust to dust"--itself derived from Genesis 3:19. If that's the case, the titles of both series together comprise an equation of Life and Death, really.)

If each of the characters are in fact dead--or nearly dead--could it be that this world and the alliances they forge and the actions they take there decide just where they go in the next world? Those who side with Gene get their glimpse at the celestial kingdom, the stars in the sky. "Good coppers stick together," Hunt said this week and that could be a clue to the ultimate identities of Gene Hunt and Jim Keats, one on the side of the angels, the other on the side of evil, each ferrying souls to their final destinations. The cops who have chosen to stick together, to remain with Gene, have been promised their reward: to float among the stars after being given the one thing that they've been searching for all along. Those who haven't, who have betrayed their fellow coppers, don't get that.

They also don't get their Life on Mars moment, either. All of which makes me extremely concerned about the fate of Chris Skelton (Marshall Lancaster), given that he betrayed the team in the second season and seems to be slipping further and further away from Gene as the third season goes on. Can he be saved? Is he doomed to fall at the hands of Jim Keats? And if Keats is able to pull away Gene's followers, would this entire world cease to exist? It's certainly food for thought.

And then there's Paul Thordy, the escaped prisoner who claims to be Sam Tyler himself. Thordy was Sam Tyler's last collar before his car crashed into a ravine and he disappeared like smoke. But Thordy knows things, things that only Sam Tyler could know: that he came from the future and pondered his presence in this world. How are these two men connected?

Likewise, Alex manages to trick Thordy into helping them save Viv and the others in the prison. He tells her that the answers are in a tin box... and leaves her the personal possessions he had brought with him into Fenchurch, which includes none other than a tin box, with a map of the prison and an illumination into Jason Sach's plan: to have Chris and Ray electrocuted by the good guys as they storm the prison.

But that's not the only box that contains answers. Alex has a vision of Shaz, Ray, and Chris seated around a table, unwrapping a box that contains... Well, we're not sure yet. And she's visited once more by the Officer 6620 ghost, who seems to be pointing her towards solving the mystery of Sam Tyler, a mystery whose answer lays just inside Gene's office.

In his desk is another tin box, one that contains a roll of film (likely the missing images from Sam's accident) and a small black and white photograph... of Officer 6620 with his face intact. Just who is he? Is he, as I've wondered for a few weeks now, Gene Hunt himself in an earlier time? And if so, why would Gene keep a photograph of himself hidden away in a box in his desk drawer? Thordy claimed, speaking as Sam Tyler, that the longer they stay in this world, the more they forget. (Alex herself once claimed that she couldn't remember what color eyes Molly had and said that she was forgetting what her daughter looked like.) Is Gene trying to remember where he came from? Was he the first cop to cross over into this world? Is he attempting to keep this world together? And will the future discovery of this body, near the house with that recurring weathervane, end everything?

What did you think of this week's episode? Do you agree that Officer 6620 is a young Gene Hunt? How did Sam Tyler die? Why is Gene being so secretive? Who is Jim Keats> And what do you think the ultimate resolution of the series will be? Head to the comments section to discuss.

On the next episode of Ashes to Ashes, the team raids an illegal drinking den used by members of the ANC, where Ray discovers a dead body; Gene soon extracts a confession from the group's leader, though he appears to be lying, as the team's investigation uncovers evidence of both illegal immigration and terrorism; DCI Keats presses Alex into continuing her investigation into Sam Tyler's fate.

Dead Man's Jacket: The Pipes Are Calling on Ashes to Ashes

I received quite a few emails and Twitter replies asking me where my weekly write-ups of BBC One's Ashes to Ashes had gone. After a one-week break, I'm happy to say that they're back and I'll be covering the last two installments of Ashes--the series' fourth and fifth episodes--in this write-up.

The fourth episode continued the pattern established earlier this season, with each of Ashes to Ashes's supporting cast getting a character-centric episode. With both Shaz and Ray getting their individual episodes (representing courage and heart, respectively), Chris Skelton finally got his installment with Episode Four, as he fell for a female undercover police officer who wasn't quite exactly what she appeared to be.

While the team attempted to protect Officer Louise Gardner (Zoe Telford) from the villainous Stafford gang, the true war that was being waged was the invisible one between DCI Gene Hunt and Discipline and Complaints Officer Jim Keats as the latter continued to systematically attempt to lure Gene's foot soldiers over to his cause... and Alex continued her own private investigation into the disappearance of Sam Tyler three years earlier.

And then there's the matter of Officer 6620, the disfigured young copper who continues to haunt Alex this season. Just what is he warning Alex about? Who is he? And how does all of this connect to Gene Hunt, Sam Tyler, and Alex Drake?

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two of Ashes to Ashes.

What struck me the most about the fourth episode--Chris Skelton's episode--was the fact that he didn't get a "Life on Mars" moment like Shaz and Ray both did in their own individual episodes, a significant moment that seems to coincide with each of the characters achieving what they want most--for Shaz a sense that she's making a difference and can really be a cop, for Ray, the guv's approval--as Gene's influence over them is keenly felt.

But that moment doesn't quite come for Chris Skelton here. If we're using the Oz characters as a reference guide, Shaz gets her courage and Ray his heart, but Chris--acting here as the Scarecrow--never gets his brains. He remains uncompleted at the end of the episode and only barely escapes with his job intact after he falls for Louise's lies and nearly kills Daniel Stafford (Bryan Dick) in the cells, believing him to have raped and slashed Louise.

But Louise was playing Chris; as an undercover officer she's become so used to lying that it's become second nature to her. She's no longer sure who she is anymore nor where her loyalties lie. It almost seems as though Alex is able to get through to her as they spend an evening together at Alex's place but Alex is knocked unconscious by an unseen assailant and Louise disappears into the night. (Interestingly, having been chloroformed, Alex envisions herself buried alive in a coffin as dirt is piled on top of her before Gene almost presses his mouth to hers in an effort to perform CPR.)

Chris' entire police career dangles by a thread but Gene doesn't give in to Jim Keats' demands. Keats offers Gene a lifeline: he can save Chris' career if Gene agrees to have Chris transferred over to his team. Gene refuses... but Keats still steps in and saves Chris. It's an important about-face. Previously, Gene has been able to exert his influence over his team and, when faced with a monumental decision, his subordinates end up choosing Gene and Fenchurch.

But that's not exactly how things play out with Chris. He's already seduced by Keats before we get to this point; earlier in the episode, he makes an error in referring to Keats--and not Gene--as the guv, a fact that gets right under Gene's skin... and Chris proves several times in this episode that he's more than willing to work with Keats and perform tasks for him when he should be following his DCI's orders.

So Chris doesn't get a "Life on Mars" moment, a spotlight thrown on him in the darkness that connects him inexorably with Gene Hunt. The familiar refrain of Bowie's song never flits around him at Luigi's. It's a significant moment, I think, for Gene Hunt, proving a weak link in the chain of command, a chink in his armor that Keats can exploit for his own ends.

Gene, of course, isn't exactly helping his own cause. In Episode Five, he breaks into Alex's desk and steals Sam Tyler's leather jacket and the case files relating to his disappearance... and he burns them. ("It's a dead man's jacket," Gene tells Alex as Sam's trademark leather coat goes up in flames.) While Gene might seem to want to bury this case, it's not going away any time soon. Alex knows that Sam Tyler's disappearance--and alleged death--is significant and is connecting to both Gene Hunt and her presence in this world. Just what is Gene hiding?

That question becomes all the more obvious when Gene's former colleagues in Manchester, DCI Litton and DI Bevan, end up in London as part of an investigation that brings them onto Fenchurch East's beat in pursuit of comedian Frank Hardwick. Both Litton and Bevan knew Sam Tyler... and the corrupt Bevan is all too aware of the mystery surrounding Sam's death. While he doesn't go so far as to point the finger of blame at Gene, he strongly implies that something wasn't quite right about Sam's car accident in the canal and that Gene Hunt gets others to do his dirty work for him. And he was the one who took the crime scene photos that Alex has been poring over these past few episodes. Was Gene all the more willing to shoot Bevan in order to protect that secret?

And then there's the stars. Both Alex and Shaz have had moments where they saw the night sky filled with stars, a sudden hallucination that disappeared as quickly as it arrived. This week, it's Ray Carling who sees the stars. Both Shaz and Ray share this peculiar moment after their "Life on Mars" moment, which might point a clue to its true meaning. In following Gene Hunt and pledging their allegiance to him, are they now seeing the true nature of the world?

Ray briefly admits to Shaz that he saw the stars but her questions to illicit more information from him about this visual clue result in Ray clamming up. Neither of them want to appear as daft as Alex, who is always going on about dead coppers, Pierrot clowns, and the like. But these individuals--and I'd include Sam Tyler in this grouping--seem connected to the metaphysical mysteries of this world, glimpsing such entities as Officer 6620, the Test Card Girl, the Clown, and now the stars in the sky. The others seem immune to their influences, closed off from perceiving the world in this fashion.

So what is this world? It's the central question that's been at the heart of both Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes since the very beginning. Is it an Oz that only coppers can access, a place that uses notions about policing--idealized and demonized ones founded on such television series as The Bill--as a sort of refuge for lost souls? A purgatory between heaven and hell? Are they ready to achieve their final rests now that they've achieved what they needed to hear?

And if that's the case, are each of them already dead? Could it be that Sam Tyler and Alex Drake are able to see through the veneer of this world because they were both--at least initially--clinging to the last remnants of their consciousness back on Earth? In comas, kept alive by machines, both of them exist on bridges between the worlds, able to access memories from their lives but also able to see behind the curtain of this strange universe.

Are both shows inherently about Death?

While Ray Carling is meant to be popping and locking with Chris (a hysterical interlude, BTW), he instead opts to sing that old Irish chestnut, "Danny Boy." The lyrics couldn't be more apt in that case:

"And if you come, when all the flowers are dying/And I am dead, as dead I well may be/You'll come and find the place where I am lying/And kneel and say an "Ave" there for me."

Which made me wonder: is the police report in the opening sequence this season--the one that indicated that the body of a police officer had been found (near the house with the weathervane)--indicating exactly what Alex has to do? Should she be looking for that spot and unearthing the body of Officer 6620? And if she does, just whose corpse would she discover? Could it be that she would find the remains of Gene Hunt himself, a young copper, killed all those years before?

And if that's the case, could it be that all of them--Shaz, Ray, Chris, and the rest--are all in fact, already dead? Is this universe a Valhalla for English coppers, a place of puzzles and mysteries and crimes to be solved?

Is this whole world constructed by a long-dead police officer whose body lay undiscovered all of these years, his own central mystery unsolved by everyone? As the song says, "I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me..."

So does Alex go over to Keats' side at the end? Do they have that little chat? I'm not sure yet that they do (though in Episode Four, she did tell him that she was being haunted and seemed ready to sit down with him). But I think that the battle between Hunt and Keats for Alex is only just getting underway...

What did you think of the last two episodes? Did those of you in the know (regarding the awful US version of Life on Mars) chuckle at the astronaut comment (which reminded me of my recent interview with co-creator Matthew Graham)? How great was it to see Litton and Sam (at least in an opening montage) again? Just what is going on and, with only three episodes remaining until the end, how will the writers wrap up all of the compelling storylines and mythology they've established? When all is done and dusted, what do you think the ultimate resolution of the series will be? Discuss.

On the next episode of Ashes to Ashes, Viv's life hangs in the balance after an attempt to stop a prison riot goes badly wrong; when Alex's negotiations with the prisoners fail, Gene sends Chris and Ray in to the prison posing as members of a press contingent.

Channel Surfing: AMC Sets Mad Men Return Date, Scott Porter Returns to FNL, Laurence Fishburne Staying Put at CSI, Lost, and More

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing.

Mark your calendars, Mad Men fans: Season Four of the period drama is set to launch on Sunday, July 25th at 10 pm ET/PT while new drama Rubicon will launch with two back-to-back episodes on Sunday, August 1st at 8 pm before it moves into its regular 9 pm timeslot the following week. "Sunday nights are where you find the best of premium television so it should be no surprise that AMC -- the home of premium television on basic cable -- is stacking our original dramas there as well," said Charlie Collier, president of AMC, in a statement. "We welcome back Mad Men and look forward to introducing Rubicon all on Sunday nights this summer." Rubicon stars James Badge Dale (The Pacific), Dallas Roberts (Walk the Line), Jessica Collins (The Nine), Christopher Evan Welch (Vicky Cristina Barcelona), Lauren Hodges (Law & Order) with Arliss Howard (The Sandlot) and Miranda Richardson (Sleepy Hollow). (via press release)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Scott Porter will be reprising his role as Jason Street in Season Five of NBC/DirecTV's Friday Night Lights. Porter, who will appear in the seventh episode of the season, was last seen during Season Three of the drama series. He'll be joined by fellow former stars Taylor Kitsch and Jesse Plemons and possibly other ex-Friday Night Lights cast members for what is likely the series' last season. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Hollywood Reporter's James Hibberd is reporting that Laurence Fishburne has renewed his deal and will remain as the lead of CBS' CSI: Crime Scene Investigation through the 2010-11 season. "In the upcoming Season 10 finale, Fishburne will face off against two serial killers in a battle of wits that will conclude in a life-and-death cliffhanger," writes Hibberd. "One villain is played by Matt Ross (Big Love) in a guest-starring role. The other is Bill Irwin, who reprises his role as Nate Haskell, the Dick and Jane Killer. Also in talks to guest star in the finale, veteran actor Marty Ingels." (Hollywood Reporter)

SPOILER! TV Guide Magazine talks to Lost and Supernatural star Mark Pellegrino, whose enigmatic character on Lost, Jacob, is set to get some major reveals in the May 11th episode ("Across the Sea"). "Jacob has a lot of darkness and corners we haven’t explored yet, so the differences between him and Lucifer are not as much as you would think,” Pellegrino told Keck. "With these archetypal characters, the boundary between good and evil becomes blurry. Jacob’s on a mission. It’s your judgment as to whether he’s good or bad." (TV Guide Magazine)

BBC America has announced the launch of Season Three of comedy Gavin and Stacey, set for Friday, May 14th at 9 pm ET/PT, the much-delayed premiere of Season Two of Ashes to Ashes on Tuesday, May 1st at 10 pm ET/PT, and the third season premiere of comedy Not Going Out on Friday, May 14th at 9:40 pm ET/PT. (via press release)

Brannon Braga (24) has come aboard the Steven Spielberg and Peter Chernin-executive produced FOX drama Terra Nova as showrunner/executive producer, according to Deadline's Nellie Andreeva, who reports that the project--revolving around a family from 100 years in the future who return to a pre-historic Earth overrun with dinosaurs--has been given an unofficial pickup, with 13 episodes ordered. (Deadline.com)

Meanwhile, Michael Ausiello is reporting that Friday Night Lights star Kyle Chandler has been made a "very lucrative offer" to star in Terra Nova. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Gil McKinney (ER) has been cast in a recurring role on Friday Night Lights, where he is set to appear in at least six episodes as a married graduate teaching assistant in the college history department who falls into a relationship with Aimee Teegarden's Julie. In other casting news, Aisha Tyler and Scott Foley (The Unit) have been cast in CBS comedy pilot Open Books; Foley--who is a regular on ABC drama pilot True Blue--will guest star. (Deadline.com)

TVGuide.com's Natalie Abrams has an interview with V star Logan Huffman about why his character, Tyler Evans, is about to change and why he's the real hero of the series. "There is something special going on with him," said Huffman of Tyler. "To be honest, people don't realize it because it's right in front of their face, but Tyler is a hero. Have you read The Hero with a Thousand Faces? He's the only character that fits every criteria. Almost every famous character does not know who his father is. Luke Skywalker! Those characters have huge hearts, but not much of a brain, and through pain they gain a real soul." (TVGuide.com)

David Hasselhoff is returning to CBS' daytime soap The Young and The Restless after an almost three decades-long absence beginning in June. (The Wrap's TVMoJoe)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Donnie Wahlberg (Boomtown) has been cast in a two-episode story arc on TNT's upcoming drama series Rizzoli & Isles, opposite Angie Harmon and Sasha Alexander. He'll play Sgt. Joey Grant, Rizzoli's childhood friend who now serves as her boss. Series premieres in July. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

FOX has given a pilot presentation order to animated comedy Heel about "a man and his sociopathic dog who is jealous of his owner's family," from writer/executive producer Chris Cluess, Reveille, and Machinima. (Variety)

Elsewhere, FOX renewed Cops for a 23rd season. (Hollywood Reporter)

The premiere of Matt Smith-led Doctor Who on BBC America scored an average of 1.2 million total viewers, a record-setting telecast for the digital cabler, as well as a record for adults 25-54 (0.9). (Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed)

TNT has shot a pilot for reality adventure project The Great Escape from executive producers Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, according to Deadline's Nellie Andreeva. "The show, which has a MacGyver-flavor to it, puts ordinary people in extraordinary movie-like situations challenging them to escape using only their everyday skills, team work and what they can find around them," writes Andreeva. Project shouldn't be confused with Michael Bay and Magical Elves' own adventure project, One Way Out, which is being shopped to networks. (Deadline.com)

Starz has begun to reorganize its management under recently installed president/CEO Chris Albrecht, with EVP of development Bill Hamm now out at the network and several others expected to receive pink slips. Former HBO executive Carmi Zlotnik is expected to join the pay cabler. (Variety)

Elsewhere, The Wrap's Josef Adalian takes a look at why Albrecht is shaking up the management structure at Starz and offers some rationale as to why Hamm may have been axed. (The Wrap's TVMoJoe)

Warner Bros. Television has signed a two-year overall deal with Fringe executive producer Jeff Pinkner, under which he will remain on board the FOX sci-fi drama as co-showrunner and will develop new projects for the studio. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Stars in Their Eyes: The Darkness Closes In on Ashes to Ashes

Looks like Ray finally got his heart.

In the shared stories of Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes, DI Ray Carling (Dean Andrews) has been a stalwart member of Gene Hunt's team but never the focus of any particular storyline. That decision has granted Ray the illusion of being what he appears on the surface: a misogynistic lackey who is all too willing to follow Gene's instructions and make trouble for Sam Tyler or Alex Drake.

But this week's fantastic episode of BBC One's Ashes to Ashes, written by Julie Rutterford and directed by Alrick Riley, shaded in Ray's backstory, rendering a tragic air to his character that was both emotionally wrenching and wholly unexpected.

Thoughout the five seasons that comprise Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes, Ray hasn't been the type of character who openly discusses his feelings or his past, yet this week's installment featured a major moment of catharsis for Ray as well as a scene that offered a surprising act of tenderness towards Alex.

Ray's backstory played out against a series of arson cases on the days leading up to the 1983 General Election. Just as last week's case of the week offered a rubric by which to better understand Montserrat Lombard's Shaz, this week's episode did the same for Ray Carling, granting the audience a prism through which to look at Ray's actions over the last few seasons.

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two of Ashes to Ashes.

Ray's dogged quest for the approval of Gene Hunt has been at the heart of his character since he was first introduced on Life on Mars, and it's why Sam and Alex both served as such a thorn in his side, freely receiving the praise from the guv that he believed was rightfully his as he toiled away in semi-obscurity, only really receiving Gene's attention when he did something wrong.

Of course, this week's episode found Ray going to some great lengths to earn the praise of Gene Hunt, entering a burning building to place his own life at risk to rescue someone inside... and then leading him too to become trapped. Fortunately, he's rescued by fireman Andy Smith (Joe Absolom), a shell-shocked Falklands vet who quickly becomes the prime suspect in the serial arson investigation, as the fires seem to have one common link, a military-grade explosive trigger of which only a former soldier would have been aware.

While the case focuses on the team's efforts to prove Andy's guilt, the case uncovers a series of uncomfortable truths about Ray's life and the shame he's carried around for years. Finally catching Andy as he attempts to set himself and his adulterous wife ablaze, Ray manages to talk Andy down and hand over his lighter.

Yes, you read that correctly: Ray.

In previous circumstances, the one doing the talking would likely have been Alex Drake herself, but her earlier talk with Ray awakens something within him and he manages to get Andy to connect with him by finally unleashing the guilt and shame that he has kept pent up inside of him for years, talking about how he was so terrified of following in his father and grandfather's footsteps and entering the army, so scared of getting shot and killed, that he threw away his interview by drinking himself into a stupor the night before the interview and missed it.

Ray talks about his father's gutting disappointment in him, and his own shame, a feeling that he's been carrying around for so many years and which explains his own desperate need to gain Gene's approval, to replace that which he never got from his own father. He's successful and gaining Andy's trust, getting him to hand over the Union Jack cigarette lighter (nice payoff with the pink lighter) and end the standoff.

And just when we thought Ray couldn't get any more in touch with his feelings, he plants a sweet kiss on Alex's cheek, the first really emotional connection between the two Detective Inspectors.

It's a tender moment that follows up his emotional outpouring in front of Andy and the team. Andrews manages to pull off Ray's vulnerability without eliminating his masculine machismo, summing up the way that most sons spend their entire lives searching in vain for approval from their fathers, literal or figurative. It's a moment of precise clarity for Ray Carling and his actions these past few seasons, beautifully played by Andrews with grace and humility.

Ray finally gets the three little words he's been aching for these many years from Gene Hunt himself, who pats Ray on the back and then says, "Well done, Ray." It's the approval he's been so desperate for and he's pulled back once more into Gene's orbit, his claws firmly sunk in Ray. Just as Gene offered Shaz precisely what she needed--a shot at the future, at belonging, and fulfilling her dreams--he does the same for Ray... just as, rather hauntingly, the darkness closes in around Ray and the familiar refrain of Bowie's "Life on Mars" plays. Hmmm, another sign that Jim Keats has failed to lure someone away from Gene's side, perhaps? A testament of their solidarity?

(Looks like we'll get a chance to see if Chris chooses to follow the same path on the next episode, if it follows the same pattern.)

Then there's the matter of 6-6-20, the numbers that seem to be following Alex as closely as the specter of the murdered young copper. At the end of last week's episode, we caught a close-up glimpse of the copper's epaulet, which contained the numbers 6-6-20... and, this week, Andy kept repeating his identification number over and over again, a sign to Alex.

The 6-6-20, of course, refers to the officer's badge number and is a means of Alex tracking him down in the old personnel files. Just who is he, though, and why does he keep appearing to Alex? Why was he murdered and his body dumped into a shallow grave that lay undiscovered for many years? And how is he connected to Gene Hunt?

Is he, as I believe, another Visitor from the other world? (Perhaps the first?) Here's what we known: He, like Sam and Alex, is a cop. He's appears to be connected to Gene Hunt in some fashion, just as Sam and Alex were. Through some means, he ended up dead, and half his face blown off and disfigured. Jim Keats indicated that Gene has some skeletons in his closet and seemed to indicate that people near Gene ended up dead. So did Gene kill Officer 6-6-20? Or is someone else eliminating the Visitors?

And why does the officer's corpse end up dumped near that house with that most peculiar weathervane? (The one that I discussed last week, which seems to contain a symbolic reference towards the Wicked Witch of the West.) Is a clue to his death? Or to the killer?

This week's episode seemed to offer a hell of a lot of fire imagery, particularly swirling around Jim Keats himself. There was a gorgeous shot of Jim enveloped by the smoke from the polling station fire that seemed to set him up as some sort of malevolently evil figure. And there were two nice Oz shoutouts this week with the appearance of the bicycle (Miss Gulch's perhaps) and the stacked case files that Keats assembled in his little office, little shoeboxes that looked a hell of a lot like the Yellow Brick Road.

Coincidence? Or subtle shout-outs to that great story of the imaginary lands that we all contain inside of us? Lands that, once accessed, are just as real as our own universes, comprised of our fears and dreams, allegories of hope and death, of magic and darkness.

Lastly, there's the recurring pattern of the night sky, which seems to be winding its way through this season. Last week, Alex followed Shaz from the office and, exiting a narrow alley, was suddenly cast up in an all-consuming vision of the stars in the sky. This week, Shaz shared with Alex that she too witnessed the same phenomena: looking outside for a split-second, she suddenly saw the stars, a creepy shared hallucination. But what does it mean? It's not the first time that Alex's imagery has ended up inside Shaz's mind. Back in Season One, as she lay dying, Shaz witnessed the Pierrot Clown, seeing it as a personification of Death itself.

So why do these two continue to share the same vision of darkness? How is it connected to the mystery of Officer 6-6-20? Taking a cue from Shaz (who had scribbled the stars), Alex draws some random patterns of stars on a piece of paper and then is able to connect them into a pattern representing 6-6-20 just as the disfigured copper appears before her.

I'm still trying to connect the dots myself but I cannot wait to see just what new clues turn up in Friday's episode...

What did you think of this week's installment? Did you think that Dean Andrews did a smashing job? Curious about the link between the stars, the darkness, the dead copper, Keats, and Gene? Got any theories about just what is going on? Head to the comments section to discuss.

On the next episode of Ashes to Ashes, Gene is determined to bring a drug-dealer to book, and his actions compromise the life of Louise Gardner (Zoe Telford), a detective who has been working deep undercover.

The Girl with the Mousy Hair: The Lovely Shaz on Ashes to Ashes

"It's a god-awful small affair/To the girl with the mousy hair."

David Bowie's seminal song "Life on Mars" may have provided the musical hook to 1970s set metaphysical cop drama Life on Mars but its presence had until this point been limited to that series and not crossing over into sequel spinoff Ashes to Ashes. Until now, that is.

The song--along with Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl"--offered two of many memorable moments in the latest fantastic installment of Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah's Ashes to Ashes, a mind-bending installment that offered some additional clues to the identity of Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister) and his war with Jim Keats (Daniel Mays) as well as the circumstances surrounding the death of Life on Mars' Sam Tyler (John Simm) and the presence of Alex (Keeley Hawes) in this strange world.

While retaining its aura of dread, this week's episode of Ashes to Ashes focused not only on a case involving a serial killer stalking the female clients of a dating agency but also on the team's most junior member, Sharon "Shaz" Granger (Montserrat Lombard), who has reached a crossroads with her career. Will she stay with Fenchurch East or will she leave the police force all together?

That was the question but while Shaz's employment may have seemed like a subplot, it became a driving force in the ongoing battle between Gene and Jim, with both of them manifesting a vested interest in Shaz's decision. But why? Hmmm...

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two of Ashes to Ashes.

I have to give Graham and Pharoah credit for meticulously recreating Billy Joel's 1983 music video for "Uptown Girl," right down to Alex wearing the hat in the car, Gene fixing his hair and tucking in his shirt, and the pin-up girl poster in the garage. Both hysterical and period-appropriate, Alex's "Uptown Girl" dream sequence continued to position Gene and Alex as star-crossed lovers from different worlds, here manifesting itself as the uptown/downtown dichotomy of Joel's song. (I'll also admit that I watched the opening about three times as I just loved seeing the guys sucked into Billy Joel's romance fantasy and found all of it to be absolutely hilarious.)

Of course, Gene Hunt seems to run Fenchurch East much like a garage: all pin-up girls, testosterone, and boys only. Alex and Shaz's presence there offers an injection of estrogen, along with a more modern approach to policing that's in line with Alex's experiences in the gender-neutral police force of the present day.

But the women aren't the spanner in the works. That role goes to Daniel Mays' Discipline and Complaints officer Jim Keats, who this week continued to search out Gene Hunt's weak spots, looking to turn the team over to his side. In addition to creating an uncomfortable environment in the hellish little office he's using, Keats literally turns up the heat on the Fenchurch East gang, a little electric fire roaring away at full blast in the corner.

Interestingly, Keats has already learned the team members' trigger points: he looks to manipulate each of them by appealing to their vulnerabilities. Ray's loyalty to Gene is tested, as is Chris' sense of ambition and Shaz's fears that she's not up to the task at hand. But why is Keats so determined to sway them to his side? Is it to tear down the kingdom that Gene has constructed within the station? Or is something more going on here?

With Ray and Chris seemingly unwilling--yet, anyway--to bend to Keats' will, he turns his attention to the team member that's currently the most vulnerable: Shaz. Doubting her role on the team and her place within the police force, Shaz is convinced that she needs to leave behind her dreams of being a copper and leave the force altogether, a position that Keats seems to support. In fact, he seems hellbent on making Shaz leave. The choice has to be hers but the outcome must be the one that Keats wants, another domino falling that he's knocked over.

As for Keats, he's more than just a shifty D&C man with a grudge against Gene. His abhorrence of Gene does a hell of a lot deeper than just a personal dislike; there's something between them, something dark and mysterious that has brought him to this moment. I'm also intrigued by the notion that he knows exactly what Alex is going through and might even be from her world. The fact that he didn't twinge at all when she mentioned Jeffrey Dahmer, agreeing with her assessment, was an auspicious one as Dahmer's killing spree didn't reach its zenith until the late 1980s and early 1990s. Was his agreement with Alex just a cover for his lack of knowledge? Or was he agreeing with her because he knew of Dahmer from the future? Hmmm...

This week's case focused on a serial killer whose victims all belonged to a dating agency called Crescent Moon--run by Elaine Downing (Beth Goddard, who just happens to be Philip Glenister's real-life wife). The women were all buried in shallow graves and branded by their killer with a crescent moon, a solid link between the women and the killer. While Alex and the others sought to catch the killer by infiltrating the dating agency (with Alex inventing speed dating), it was Shaz who was reluctantly forced into providing their last-ditch effort at catching the man responsible for the crimes when their efforts fail.

But Shaz had already announced her resignation from the police force. Already uneasy, Shaz was nearly the victim of mob violence and proved unable to stop the attackers by displaying her badge. When one of them drew a screwdriver and threatened her, she ran and later broke down, unable to stand up to the gang and get them to drop their weapons with just a sheer force of will. But Gene is awfully persuasive and he convinces Shaz that she has to do one last thing for him: go undercover and lure out the suspected killer.

Which she does. Despite her uneasiness, Shaz does manage to get the killer to confess, though only after he lured her to the deserted shoreline, where he attempts to brand her and strangle her on the ground. Paying off both the gang sequence and the ongoing construction at the station, Shaz stabs him brutally with a screwdriver concealed in her coat and manages to get to safety, before collapsing into Gene's arms.

Later, the gang celebrates Shaz at Luigi's, with Gene even calling her "Granger" and Ray making a speech about women on the police force. Gene, meanwhile, says that, if she keeps up the good work, Shaz could be a member of CID by Christmas. It's a strange and evocative moment as Shaz is swept up in darkness and Bowie's "Life on Mars" plays as Alex seems to look on from a distance.

Just what does it mean? Is it meant to be a portent of doom? Or just a sign that Gene Hunt has exerted his influence over Shaz and reclaimed her from Keats? After all, the lyric of that section of "Life on Mars" would seem to match Shaz precisely: "the girl with the mousy hair." Curious, that, given the song's importance to the first series and to Sam Tyler.

Alex, meanwhile, continued her own investigation into Sam's death, going so far as to order his personal effects from Manchester and secreting them in her desk drawer, where Gene discovers them. While he doesn't directly confront Alex about her ongoing investigation, he warns her that they all have to stick together as a team. His words aren't just a discussion of solidarity; again, there seems to be some notion that they do need to offer a unified front against Keats' entreaties.

But Alex isn't one to give up, especially when her curiosity has been piqued. She wants to get to the bottom of what really happened to Sam Tyler and Gene appears to be stonewalling her, but why? And if it wasn't Chris who took the photograph of Sam's car in the canal, who did? She's not quite willing to question Ray directly about the photograph or Sam Tyler, knowing that he'll likely tell Gene just what she's up to. But there is someone else whom Alex should be speaking to, someone who hasn't yet been seen in Ashes to Ashes: Annie.

After all, Annie would have some answers to Alex's questions and, given Sam's untimely end, would likely be all too willing to speak to her about Sam, Gene, and everything that happened in Manchester. While I have no idea if Liz White is set to appear on Ashes, I'd love to see her turn up here and offer Alex a few clues about what really went down in 1980. She's the only major character that hasn't been mentioned since Life on Mars and I do hope that there's some way Graham and Pharoah deal with just what happened between Annie and Sam after the final credits rolled on Life on Mars.

Meanwhile, there was Alex's shocking vision at the very end of the episode, one that had my brain twisting in knots. In addition to the shot of the blue puffy clouds in the sky (at odds with the stars in the nighttime sky she envisions while following Shaz earlier in the episode), there's a shot of the young copper in a green field, and then a quick flash of a weathervane.

That weathervane is hugely significant. I went back and rewatched the vision unfold and the weathervane would seem to depict an old crone standing atop the directional arms of the vane. A crone, huh? And then there's the fact that the vane is pointing west. So crone plus west...

Wait, that couldn't be a reference to the Wicked Witch of the West, now could it?

Both Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes have featured imagery dealing with Oz but this seems so pointed that it's impossible to ignore. After all, if we use The Wizard of Oz as a (very) loose analogue for Ashes, the characters do match up: Alex is Dorothy, lost in a strange world; Shaz is the loyal Toto; Chris the often unintelligent Scarecrow, missing his brain; Ray, the heartless Tin Man; and Shaz the cowardly lion. (Hell, Shaz even makes a "lion" reference in this week's episode.)

While I'm not suggesting it's as black and white as that, the Oz parallel offers some interesting food for thought. Oz, like this world, was originally thought to be a dream (remember, Dorothy wakes up believing she dreamed the whole thing) but she discovers later that Oz isn't a dream but a real place that she can access, just like Sam and Alex were able to access this world. And if we take the Oz analogy even further, would that make Keats the villain of the piece? The Wicked Witch of the West? Or is he the all-powerful Oz, himself a refugee from the "real world" who holds a possible key to escape? Curious.

Looks like we'll have to wait for some more holes to be filled in on this yellow brick road before we can form a complete theory about what's actually going on here. But regardless of the outcome, I'm hooked and can't wait for the next installment. Graham and Pharoah are doing brilliant work here as they wrap up five seasons of storylines and in the next six episodes bid farewell to the rich universe created by Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes.

What will happen next is anyone's guess. But I'm curious to see what you thought of this week's episode. Do you agree with the above theories? Disagree? What was your take on the weathervane imagery? What's really going on? Discuss.

On the next episode of Ashes to Ashes, the team investigates a series of arson attacks in the run-up to the general election, with a Falklands veteran, now working as a fireman, identified as the prime suspect; Alex continues to be tormented by visions of the mutilated police officer as she investigates Sam's death.

Sweet Dreams Are Made of This: Diving Into the Ashes to Ashes Third Season Premiere

"Sometimes in life, you can't help which way you fall."

There was a moment in the third season premiere of BBC One's trippy genre-busting drama series Ashes to Ashes that had me jump for joy: the gorgeous shot of a sheet being sucked backwards off of Gene Hunt's cherry red Audi Quattro before he and Alex took off into the streets of London to the tune of Eurythmics' 1983 hit "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)."

It was a period-appropriate sequence that gleefully summed up everything I love best about this winning and mind-bending series, now entering its final season in the UK. In the hands of co-creator Matthew Graham, we're given a season opener to Ashes to Ashes that is at once dazzlingly operatic and provocatively bleak as the final endgame to a mystery that began all the way back in the first episode of Life on Mars finally comes to a head this season.

That mystery, of course, being: Who is Gene Hunt?

It's a tantalizing one that's at the heart of Ashes' third and final season. (For more on this mystery, you can read my one-on-one interview with co-creator Matthew Graham here.) Thanks to a friend in the United Kingdom, I was able to watch Ashes' fantastic season premiere over the weekend and I'm already jonesing for another fix as this dark new season promises to be the series' best yet.

Warning: spoilers abound for US viewers who haven't seen Season Two of Ashes to Ashes.

The third season begins roughly three months after the events of the second season's cliffhanger-laden finale--in which Philip Glenister's Gene Hunt accidentally shot Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes)--as Alex finally emerges from her coma in 1983. The opening sequence is the television equivalent of pulling the rug out from underneath the audience as it initially appears as though Alex has paid promise to her mission and found a way back to the present day and daughter Molly.

But not so. Despite the scenes shared with a police psychiatrist--clearly intended to echo the final scenes of Life on Mars with John Simm's Sam Tyler--and her trip to a Virgin megastore (where she glimpses DVDs and posters containing Gene and the Fenchurch East team), Alex reemerges from her coma... but back in the world she's come to know as her home, a world shared with Gene Hunt, Ray Carling (Dean Andrews), Chris Skelton (Marshall Lancaster), and Shaz Granger (Montserrat Lombard).

But while the dream sequence seems like a classic Ashes mind-game, there are some potential clues lurking within Alex's subconscious, most notably the first appearance of Daniel Mays' Jim Keats and the ghostly presence of a dead policeman with half his face missing. It's the juxtaposition of the two which have a striking effect. Does Alex know Keats from her world? Who is the dead copper? Does any of this have to do with Sam Tyler's unsolved disappearance? And are these three things somehow related? Hmmm...

Waking up once more in this dystopia (thanks to a well-timed slap to the face from Gene), Alex discovers that Gene has been on the run in Spain since her shooting and is under investigation by the Discipline and Complaints Division, who has sent their best man--that would be DCI Jim Keats, natch--down to Fenchurch East to keep an eye on Gene and the others. Jim seems to maintain an easy camaraderie with Alex; he claims to want to help her and seems almost aware of her predicament here, saying that he "knows what [she's] going through." He's also keen to get the other officers on his side, offering them champagne and free drinks as an incentive to think of him as just another cop and not a "rubber heeler."

Shaz and Chris have split up, Ray has been promoted to Detective Inspector, and nearly everything is out of whack. While Alex might need a bit of R&R after her coma, she's not going to get it. Dragged back to the station, she attempts to clear Gene's name while jumping into an ongoing investigation into the kidnapping of Dorothy, a young girl being held for ransom.

But while the team manages to successfully recover the girl (hidden at her father's old Dot Matrix warehouse by her step-mother and her criminal ex), there's an ominous scene behind closed doors between Jim Keats and Gene Hunt that's all the more revealing as Jim promises to tear down Fenchurch East around Gene's ears and destroy everything that's he built, offering a reveal that he knows what Gene has done in the past and says that he hates him. One can't shake the feeling that what Gene did might just be connected both to Sam and Alex appearing in this world, Sam's disappearance, and more. It's aided, quite effectively, by Alex finding Sam's redacted file in Gene's cabinet, which had been moved to the storage room during his time on the lam.

"You fooled everyone into believing in you," says Jim. "I have the unpopular job of showing the world what you really are." But what's really quite intriguing is that Jim claims to know just what Gene did "three years ago." Which would be exactly about the time that Sam Tyler disappeared and could explain just why Sam's file is so heavily blacked out... and the reappearance of the half-faceless young copper Alex saw in her coma. Is it Sam Tyler? Did Gene kill him? Was it in an accident or something far worse?

And what does Jim mean when he says that Gene "can't leave here" and that it "defines him"? Just who and what is Gene Hunt? And, consequently, who and what is Jim Keats? What is this place? If it's not Oz, what is it? What does Alex suspect that she would hide Sam's file in her desk? (Love that he offered her a cup of alcohol, nicely echoing the moment in the very first episode of Ashes when Gene poured her a very full glass of wine.)

All questions that will likely be answered over the course of the next seven episodes of Ashes to Ashes' final season, which will finally provide illumination on just what the Manc Lion really is. If this first installment is any indication, we're likely in for one hell of a bumpy ride to the finish line. Just be sure to buckle your seatbelt in the Quattro.

On the next episode of Ashes to Ashes, a severed hand is sent to Fenchurch station; Alex joins a dating agency in order to investigate the murder of several female clients; Alex tries to discover the truth about Sam Tyler's death, but Gene is obstructive.

End of the (Thin Blue) Line: Televisionary Talks to "Ashes to Ashes" Co-Creator Matthew Graham About the Final Series

Who is Gene Hunt?

It's been a question that fans of Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah's Life on Mars and its sequel series, Ashes to Ashes--which stars Keely Hawes and Philip Glenister as Gene Hunt himself--have been asking themselves for years now.

The answer to that and many more of Ashes to Ashes' mind-bendng mysteries will be revealed when the trippy 1980s-set drama wraps up its run later this spring in the United Kingdom, with the third and final series set to launch on Friday evening on BBC One.

I had the opportunity to interview co-creator Matthew Graham about the upcoming third season in a one-on-one interview in which we discussed the strange journey from Life on Mars to Ashes to Ashes, the identity of Gene Hunt, where and when we find ourselves when Series Three gets underway, the new character joining the ranks of the Metropolitan Police Force, what viewers should expect from the final series of Ashes, and much more.

Televisionary: Series 3 marks the end of Ashes to Ashes and the end of a story arc that began more or less with the start of Life on Mars. What is it like coming to the end of the road and completing the story that you set out to tell?

Matthew Graham: It’s very, very satisfying. As you know more than anyone, Jace, you don’t normally get to end a show; a show is just ended for you by higher powers. You usually only find out after you’ve completed a season and then you’re just told you’re not coming back. That’s how it works in the UK. In the US, it’s a little more brutal because you can be cancelled in the middle. To be able to write the end and know that you can actually draw an underscore on your show with a conclusion and a climax is terrifically satisfying. I wondered whether I would feel sad or melancholic coming to the end but I haven’t yet. I just felt a sense of real satisfaction at being able to bring it to an end.

Televisionary: Life on Mars ending up being two series long because John Simm didn’t want to commit to a third season. When you set out to tell the story of Ashes to Ashes, was there a specific timeframe or length you had in mind ideally? Did you have three series in mind?

Graham: Absolutely. We actually gave—Ashley Pharoah and I—an interview for Series One where we said we have a three-year plan for the show. And then afterwards, we thought, wow, that’s big talk from two guys launching a show. [Laughs.] But whether we actually get three is another matter. But that was always the plan and always the hope: that the first series would be the most frivolous and frothy and fun—fun with a “big F”—and that gradually we would start to darken the world and bring Life on Mars into it, so that the feel of that show, the darkness, starts to permeate Ashes as Ashes runs on.

That was the plan but we had no idea if we would get three series out of the BBC. But after Series One, it did very well so we knew that in, UK television terms, usually if you get a second series, you’re in pretty good shape for a third. That just seems to be how audiences go. If they come back for [Series Two], they will come back a third time. We felt more confident about it. In fact, we had quite the opposite problem with the BBC in that they were trying initially to keep it running longer for obvious reasons. It’s rare to get a proper break-out show and, when you do, you don’t want to kill it.

We managed to persuade them that it was better to tell a story, develop it, and end it. We didn’t want to get tied up in too many cul-de-sacs as Lost was in danger of doing, though it sounds like they’re pulling themselves out of that with great aplomb, from what I hear. We didn’t want to get into a state where we kept having to create more and more convoluted and unusual mysteries and then think, well, how the hell do we tie those up? Three is good: three and out.

Televisionary: It’s interesting that that you mentioned Lost. Executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse were able to convince ABC to give them a timeframe to end the show, because they were treading water for so long and wanted to tell the story that they wanted to tell. In looking at Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes as a single narrative unit, is it the ending that you and Ashley wanted to tell?

Graham: It’s the ending that we wanted to tell as we began the journey with Ashes. But we didn’t have this ending in mind when we wrote Mars. What we had was a theory or a strong idea of what the world represented and what it was and who Gene Hunt was but we never really got to explore that because when we realized that we were truncating Mars and finishing it after two [series], we realized that we had to spend all our time focusing on the Sam Tyler journey. So we just concentrated on that. When we came to Ashes, we had an overall plan but it’s evolved. It has evolved; it just does along the way because you come up with better ideas and people come on board and they have ideas and you think, well that that would be great. Let’s incorporate that.

So although the world, the big mystery that we’ve created, i.e., that there’s a world that Sam Tyler and now Alex Drake find themselves in, has always been the same for us, and we will explain it. It’s bits and pieces to do with Gene and his relationship to Alex and a few other things have come on along the way and sort of stuck like little idea barnacles onto the ship and we’ve used those as well. It has changed and it has evoked.

Televisionary: Obviously, the mystery of who Gene Hunt is has been at the heart of both shows, especially in Ashes. In looking at how you were going to wrap up this series, did you have a clear, concise idea of who or what Gene was? Or has that evolved as well?

Graham: We were pretty consistent about who Gene was, up until we began storyline Series Three. An idea came up in the room that didn’t destroy what we had, but was so cool and so fascinating and flipped so much on its head but at the same time seemed to make perfect sense—it didn’t fly in the face of anything that had come before, as far as we could see with that character—that we just couldn’t resist doing it. We thought, well that’s something that I don’t think people will see coming and yet hopefully won’t feel like it’s a cheap, tacked on novelty reveal. That was a brand-new idea that I can’t, obviously, explain what that is yet, but it was a brand-new idea that came out of left field and we got very excited about.

Televisionary: Obviously, you can’t tell us who Gene Hunt is. But can you tell us who he isn’t?

Graham: [Laughs.] Um, that’s difficult too in a way, isn’t it? It seems more and more to the audience Gene represents something and that he isn’t just a big, rough, tough Northern copper. I’ve heard various Internet speculation about Gene and some people are quite closer to the truth than others. What I can tell you is that it’s a big reveal and it’s something I think that’s very fascinating for him. It works on one level as just something very exciting and, on another level, it works as something very human. It’s not going to be Gene Hunt’s an alien. It’s not going to be that. But it is something that is quite big and revelatory and at the same time play as something very human, underpinning his character, I hope. I hope we’ve managed to crack both sides of that.

Televisionary: So we’re not going to see them on an actual mission to Mars then?

Graham: What, a gene hunt? No, we’re not. [Laughs.] I never like to give anything away but I feel quite comfortable saying that to anybody who asks. No, they will not be waking up on a spaceship.

Televisionary: Thank god for that.

Graham: [Laughs.]

Televisionary: Where do we find Alex Drake and Company in Series Three? How far into the future is this next series set?

Graham: Not far, just a few months. Really, just to take us into Spring of 1983 so that she’s been unconscious in hospital for an unspecified number of weeks. And in that time, Gene has been on the run and he’s come back as he needs her conscious to clear his name and tell everyone that he shot her accidentally. So that’s pretty much where we pick it up.

It’s quite interesting, actually, because that’s the natural place to start the series. And originally I’d come up with the idea that he’d come back in, there would be a police investigation, he would run rings around them in the first episode and then they’d all leave him alone. But when I began to think about it, I thought that it was incredibly unrealistic, even for our show, that a senior officer could shoot someone, having threatened to kill them, shoot them, almost kill them, go on the run, and then within a week, the internal affairs [officers] say, ‘okay, we’ll leave you alone; you’re too clever for us.’ And we felt that was going to undermine the credibility of the world. So we created a character, played by an actor named Daniel Mays, who you may have seen in the film Atonement and he’s just had a role in Spielberg’s Tintin movie. He’s fantastic, just a brilliant actor. He got him in to play this guy from Discipline and Complaints and internal affairs.

Televisionary: And that’s Jim Keats?

Graham: Yes, Jim Keats. As soon as we created this character, we thought, he’s so fantastic that we have to keep him on board for the whole series and we have to give him an arc and a journey. That character is a portal for a whole another aspect of the story, which raises the stakes by the end of the series to as high as they can possibly be. Out of a practical consideration, we’ve got this amazing new thread for the show. And he is extraordinary! He gives you something that John Simm gave you in Life on Mars, a kind of a… hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck performance.

Televisionary: What questions should the audience be asking themselves as they’re watching the third series?

Graham: It sort of depends. Half our audience just seem to ask the question, will Gene and Alex get married and have babies and live in a house in a meadow. That seems to be on the minds of some of our fans. Now with this show, as with Mars, I don’t think people care so much whether Alex gets home. I think what they’re really interested in is finding out what the hell has really been going on and who Gene is. I think that’s sort of the overarching and salient question in everyone’s head is who is Gene and what is this place and is it real or is it just a figment of her imagination?

I think the show just now serves that purpose. The crime stories have become almost insignificant, really. [Laughs.] But they are quite clever because we tried to structure the crime stories now so that they play into the mystery rather than just stand alone. But the whole thing almost runs as a mini-series, almost. It feels like a continuous story told over eight weeks.

Televisionary: On that point, how heavily serialized is the third series?

Graham: It’s more heavily serialized than any of the others, and I include Mars in that, because the Mars mystery was fairly straightforward: is he mad? Is he in a coma? Is he back in time? And everything went to serve those things, whereas with Ashes—and especially with Series Three—we start seeding in a lot of unusual imagery and new things you’ve not seen before, darker imagery that suggests that these things that you’re seeing are going to tie into the overall picture and explain things. These are the hooks that I hope will keep people coming back week on week. We feel like, from Episode One, that we’re in the endgame.

Televisionary: In speaking of that endgame, there was a major cliffhanger ending to the second series. Should viewers expect to have a narrative resolution at the end of the final series?

Graham: I don’t think we’ve tied up every single tiny loose end. Some people will be annoyed by that because I know that some people want every single loose end to be tied up. But the answer to that criticism would be that I think that there should always be a bit of ambiguity and a bit of mystery in the cosmos. We didn’t want to do a Doc Brown and get the blackboard out and with some of these things you’d have to start inventing a theory and have a character actually explaining it with a pen and paper. What I am concerned about is that you get to the end of Series 3 and you can explain the mystery to somebody who hasn’t seen Series 3 but knew the characters. You’d be able to say, ‘This is what happened to Alex Drake. This is where she went. This is who Gene Hunt is. And this is how it ended.’ You should be able to explain the big dome of the show.

Televisionary: Life is somewhat unknowable. We don’t get that Doc Brown blackboard for our own lives and I don’t mind there being some mystery for those of us watching to piece together.

Graham: Absolutely! There will be little things [left unexplained]. But the big things are explained, absolutely.

Televisionary: What’s next for you now that Ashes is winding down?

Graham: Ahh! Well, a number of things. We’re developing a couple of new shows for the BBC. Very excited about those but it’s very early days. One is an adaptation from a series of books and the other is a new show, which I can’t talk much about at the moment but I could say that it’s European-set and it’s in the ‘60s. And that’s a very exciting show for us.

We’re developing a movie, which is set in the 40s in Baltimore. I would describe it as a little bit like if Tim Burton had directed Seven. [Laughs.] Which is about as I close as I can get to a broad, reveal-nothing description of it.

Series Three of Ashes to Ashes launches Friday evening at 9 pm on BBC One.

Channel Surfing: Cuthbert Gets "Happy Endings," Betty White to Host "SNL," Madsen Clocks in for "24," Acker Finds "Human Target," and More

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing.

Elisha Cuthbert (24) has been cast as the female lead in ABC comedy pilot Happy Endings, where she will play Alex, a woman whose relationship ends at the alter and she and her would-have-been husband have to figure out how they and their friends can keep their relationship intact. Project, from writer David Caspe, directors Anthony and Joe Russo, and Sony Pictures Television, also stars Adam Pally, Casey Wilson, Eliza Coupe, and Damon Wayans, Jr. (Hollywood Reporter)

Facebook has spoken and Lorne Michaels has listened: 88-year-old Betty White (The Proposal) will be hosting NBC's Saturday Night Live on May 8th. "It took on a groundswell," Michaels told USA Today's Gary Levin. "It isn't something we would have said no to, [but the campaign] validated that... It was the outpouring of affection from fans, and we feel the same way." White's episode will also feature former SNL-ers Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Molly Shannon, Ana Gasteyer, Maya Rudolph, and Rachel Dratch. (USA Today)

TV Guide Magazine's Will Keck is reporting that Michael Madsen (Kill Bill) will be turning up later this season on FOX's 24, where he will play "an ex-military guy from Jack Bauer’s past." (TV Guide Magazine)

Amy Acker (Dollhouse) is slated to guest star in the season finale of FOX's Human Target, according to series star Mark Valley. "Baptiste [Lennie James] comes back, and Amy Acker shows up and plays this one character who's very pivotal in Chance's past," Valley told reporters on a recent press call, "she was the catalyst for him becoming Christopher Chance." (via Digital Spy)

Richard Kind (A Serious Man) and Ian Hart (Dirt) have been cast in David Milch and Michael Mann's HBO horseracing drama pilot Luck, opposite Dustin Hoffman, Nick Nolte, Dennis Farina, and John Ortiz. Kind will play a jockey's agent, while Hart will play "a loudmouth who comes into some cash and bankrolls a series of Pick Six bets." (Variety)

Mamie Gumer (The Good Wife) has been cast as one of the leads in Shonda Rhimes' ABC medical drama pilot Off the Map, where she will play Mina Minard, a doctor who takes a position in a remote South American medical clinic. Gumer, the daughter of Meryl Streep, will star opposite Caroline Dhavernas, Enrique Murciano, Jason George, Martin Henderson, and Valerie Cruz. (TVGuide.com)

Bravo has ramped up its development on both the unscripted and scripted fronts. The cabler announced at yesterday's upfront that it had ordered Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Miami Social Club, Million Dollar Decorators, and Pregnant in Heelsto series, renewed The Fashion Show, Million Dollar Listing, Real Housewives of Atlanta, and Tabatha's Salon Takeover, and was developing several unscripted series, including Around the World in 80 Plates, Commander in Chef, Hitmakers, Fashion Masters, and an untitled docusoap following So You Think You Can Dance choreographer Mia Michaels. On the scripted front, Bravo is developing two dramas, including a Darren Star-executive produced musical-drama adaptation of Josh Kilmer-Purcell's book "I'm Not Myself These Days," about a New York City power broker who moonlights as a drag queen at night, and an untitled dramedy from writers Damian Harris and Gary Marks about a high-end hotel that offers male escorts to its guests. (Variety)

Pilot casting update: Traylor Howard (Monk) will star opposite Dana Gould in Gould's untitled ABC comedy pilot; Lyndsy Fonseca (How I Met Your Mother) will star opposite Maggie Q in the CW's remake of Nikita; Maria Thayer (State of Play), Lauren Weedman (Hung), and Mahaley Hessam (Easy A) have joined the cast of Larry Charles' NBC comedy pilot Our Show; James Frain (The Tudors) has scored one of the leads in NBC vigilante drama pilot The Cape; Stephen Rea (Father and Son) has been cast in CBS drama pilot Chaos; David Gallagher (7th Heaven) has joined CW's supernatural drama pilot Betwixt; Sonja Sohn (The Wire) has been cast in ABC drama pilot Body of Evidence opposite Dana Delany; Raoul Trujillo (True Blood) has been added to the cast of ABC drama pilot Edgar Floats; Will Sasso (MADtv) and Stephanie Lemelin (Cavemen) have joined the cast of CBS' comedy pilot Shit My Dad Says. Finally, FOX is recasting two roles on Greg Garcia's comedy pilot Keep Hope Alive, with The Riches' Shannon Marie Woodward landing one of the available spots. (Hollywood Reporter)

BBC America will segue to becoming a dual-feed network on Monday, April 26th. Move means that primetime and late night scheduled will be changed as the cabler will air programming at the same time in both Eastern and Pacific time zones. The British-themed network also announced that it will bring back Peep Show and That Mitchell and Webb Look in April, which also marks the launch of Season Five of Doctor Who. (via press release)

ABC has ordered a pilot from executive producer Mark Burnett for unusual game show Trust Me, I'm a Game Show Host, in which two hosts will compete with the contestants on a variety of topics in front of a live audience. One of the hosts will be telling the truth, the other lying, and the contestants will have to figure out which is which. (Hollywood Reporter)

SPOILER! Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello talks to The Good Wife executive producer Robert King about whether Alicia (Julianna Margulies) and Will (Josh Charles) will ever hook up. "[They have] one of the most complicated relationships… because it really is a friendship that doesn’t want to lose its friendship by going to the next step," King told Ausiello. "There’s an episode [coming up in April] that’s all about not knowing what a jury is thinking and it’s a metaphor for how Alicia and Will can’t get into each other’s heads. During this trial, they have to make moves, guessing where the jury is headed. Sometimes we see that they’re just completely wrong." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Gene Hunt returns! BBC has a first look at Season Three of 1983-set sci-fi/period/trippy drama Ashes to Ashes, featuring Philip Glenister's Gene Hunt and Keeley Hawes' Alex Drake, which returns to BBC One for its final season of eight episodes this spring. Dean Andrews, Marshall Lancaster, and Montserrat Lombard all return, and the team gets a new member in Daniel Mays' Jim Keats, a discipline and complaints officer who adds "an unsettling twist to the team dynamic." Look for the final season of Ashes to resolve its mysteries as well as those lingering from its predecessor, Life on Mars. (BBC)

E! Online's Kristin Dos Santos has a first look at the four original cast members from FOX's Melrose Place--Heather Locklear, Thomas Calabro, Josie Bissett, and Daphne Zuniga--reuniting on the CW revival series. "We've had visits by original castmembers throughout the year, and we all thought, 'Let's get them together in one show,'" executive producer Darren Swimmer told E! Online. "One of the highlights of the season for me was walking on the set to see all four original castmembers together on the courtyard staircase. There was a true sense of reunion in the room, and I think you can see in their performances how tickled they are to be acting together again." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

The CW is developing two reality competition series, including Stone & Co's One Mass Dance, which features choreographers who assemble a huge dance team from three cities and then perform a "mass dance" in front of surprised viewers, and 25/7's Shed to Wed, in which couples compete to lose weight before their weddings. (Hollywood Reporter's The Live Feed)

Planet Green is preparing to launch a 24-hour daily schedule, including a three-hour primetime block of programming called Verge on March 29th, which will feature such series as Future Food, Living with Ed, Conviction Kitchen, Operation Wild, Blood, Sweat and Takeaways, and off-net acquisition 30 Days. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: ABC to Air "V" in Pod Form, CW Kills "Beautiful Life," Marc Cherry Talks "Desperate" Reveal, and More

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing.

ABC has confirmed that it has now altered its launch plan for sci-fi drama series V, which is set to premiere November 3rd. The network has decided to air just the first four installments of the Warner Bros. Television-produced series and then place V on hiatus until after the Winter Olympics. The news comes as a surprise as the series, which is written and executive produced by The 4400's Scott Peters, has enjoyed extremely positive buzz from critics and from Comic-Con audiences who screened the pilot episode earlier this summer. However, both Warner Bros. Television and ABC were quick to point out that the episodic order for V hadn't been shortened; series is still set to air 13 installments. (Los Angeles Times/Show Tracker)

The first official cancellation of the fall season is here: The Beautiful Life, we hardly knew ye. The CW has confirmed that it has axed The Beautiful Life after just two episodes, which plunged to just 1 million viewers in its second outing. Series, which was executive produced by Ashton Kutcher, had been filming its seventh episode when the crew received word to shut down on Friday. The series has been pulled from the schedule and its timeslot will be filled by repeats of Melrose Place beginning this Wednesday. (Hollywood Reporter)

SPOILER! Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello talks to Desperate Housewives creator Marc Cherry about the resolution to last May's wedding cliffhanger, which was revealed in the opening minutes of the series' sixth season premiere, which aired last night on ABC. Cherry says his decision about which woman Mike would marry "plays better for this season's mystery" and gives the jilted woman a hell of a storyline as well. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

A&E has canceled drama series The Cleaner after two seasons. The series, which starred Benjamin Bratt as a professional interventionist, wrapped its second season earlier this month. (Hollywood Reporter)

The Chicago Tribune's Maureen Ryan talks with new Lie to Me showrunner Shawn Ryan about what's coming up on the second season of the procedural drama series, which kicks off tonight on FOX. (Chicago Tribune's The Watcher)

Crista Flanagan (Mad Men) has been cast in a recurring role on ABC's new comedy series Hank, where she will play Dawn, the wife of David Koechner's Grady. She replaces Melissa McCarthy (Samantha Who?), who dropped out of the series in order to take a role in romantic comedy feature film Life as We Know It. (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

The CW has ordered eight episodes of an untitled reality series that will follow the life of New York socialite Tinsley Mortimer, whom some may recall appeared on-screen on the CW's Gossip Girl. Project, from executive producer Andrew Glassman, will follow "Mortimer, currently embroiled in a high-profile divorce, as she hits the New York scene." (Variety)

Production has begun on the third and final season of Life on Mars sequel series Ashes to Ashes, which will air on BBC One in early 2010. "Everyone has their own theory about who Gene Hunt is, and why Alex Drake and Sam Tyler ended up in his world," said executive producer Jane Featherstone. "Alex's journey is nearing its end and Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah have planned a fabulous finale. We're now at the point where we can finally reveal some of the answers and we can't wait to hear what the fans think about it all." (BBC)

As if he weren't animated enough already. Gordon Ramsay is the basis for a new stop-motion animated series entitled Gordon Ramsay, At Your Service from Canadian production company Cuppa Coffee, which will be pitched next week at Mipcom in Cannes. Project, which is currently seeking a writer, will focus on the hot-tempered celebrity chef and television personality. (Broadcast)

TBS has canceled comedy series The Bill Engvall Show after three seasons. (C21)

Charlie Cox (Stardust), Donald Sutherland (Dirty Sexy Money), and Gillian Anderson (Bleak House) have been cast opposite William Hurt and Ethan Hawke in TeleMunchen's big-budget Moby Dick telepic. Cox will play Ishmael; Sutherland will play Father Mapple; Anderson will play Elizabeth, the wife of Captain Ahab (Hurt). (Variety)

Annie Potts, Kim Zimmer, Drew Seeley will star in Hallmark Channel telepic Freshman Father, about a Harvard student who finds himself in a shotgun wedding and must juggle school and parenthood. Project, slated to air in 2010, is written by Bill Wells and directed by Michael Scott. (via press release)

BermanBrauun has hired former Fox Television Studios executive Jerry Longarzo as the head of business affairs. (Variety)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: Natalie Zea Tackles "Lawman," Armande Assante Targets "Chuck," CW Orders More Scripts for "Melrose" and "Diaries," and More

Welcome to your Thursday morning television briefing.

Former Dirty Sexy Money star Natalie Zea, who most recently recurred on HBO's Hung, has signed on a series regular on FX's drama Lawman, starring Timothy Olyphant. Zea, who appeared in Lawman's pilot, will reprise her role as the ex-wife of Olyphant's US Marshall Givens in the series. Project hails from Sony Pictures Television and FX Productions. (Hollywood Reporter)

Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello is reporting that Emmy winner Armand Assante has been cast as a guest star on NBC's Chuck, where he will play "a Castro-esque dictator who Casey has unsuccessfully tried to assassinate multiple times." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

The CW has given a full season order to veteran drama series One Tree Hill, which is currently in its seventh season. Initially, the netlet had only ordered 13 installments for this season but the order bumps the episode total to a full 22. Elsewhere, the CW ordered nine additional scripts for drama series Vampire Diaries and six more scripts for ratings-starved soap Melrose Place. (TVGuide.com, Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

NBC has given a script order to an untitled multi-camera comedy pilot starring former Saturday Night Live cast member Jim Breuer about a man who decides to stay at home to look after his three daughters and take care of his elderly parents at the same time. Project, from Sony Pictures Television and Varsity Pictures, will be written and executive produced by Wil Calhoun (Friends); Breuer, Brian Robbins, Judi Brown-Marmel and Sharla Sumpter. (Variety)

Stephen Root (True Blood) has been cast in a multiple-episode story arc on Day Eight of FOX's 24, where he will play Ben Prady, "an officer of the Department of Corrections looking into a parolee gone missing." (Hollywood Reporter)

E! Online's Watch with Kristin has the first official photograph of Charisma Carpenter on syndicated fantasy drama series Legend of the Seeker. Carpenter appears in the November 7th second season premiere, where she will play "Triana, one of the feisty Mord-Sith warrior women who regularly make Richard Cypher's life miserable—when they're not trying to sex him up, that is." (E! Online's Watch with Kristin)

Empire creator Tom Wheeler has set up two high-concept dramas at NBC and FOX, which have received script commitments with penalties attached. The NBC project, entitled The Cape, is about a former cop who, after being framed for a crime, becomes The Cape, a marked vigilante out to clear his name and reunite with his son in a city beset with corruption. Project, from Universal Media Studios and BermanBraun, will be executive produced by Wheeler, Lloyd Braun, and Gail Berman. FOX project, The Mysteries of Oak Island, is about a mother and daughter who inherit a 200-year-old lighthouse on a privately owned island off the coast of Nova Scotia where there are legends of buried treasure. That project, hails from Warner Bros. Television, and is described by Wheeler as "mixing Romancing the Stone and What Lies Beneath with a little bit of The Goonies thrown in. It's a family adventure but also about the adventure of being a family." (Hollywood Reporter)

Daniel Mays (The Street) has joined the cast of BBC One's time travel drama series Ashes to Ashes for its third and final season. Mays will play Jim Keats, a Discipline and Complaints Officer with the Metropolitan Police on the series, which returns to BBC One in 2010. "Series three of Ashes To Ashes will have the same combination of thrilling crime drama, outrageous '80s outfits and cutting one liners," said executive producer Piers Wenger. "We’ll be sad to see Gene and the gang go but the journey that will take us to that finale will be one of the most exciting, compelling and edge-of-your seat rides on TV!" (Digital Spy)

Allison Silverman (Colbert Report) has signed a blind script deal with Broadway Video to write a pilot. Word comes shortly after Silverman announced her intention to step down from Colbert Report. (Variety)

The Hollywood Reporter's Nellie Andreeva is reporting that Simon Cowell is talks to bring his British reality competition series The X Factor to FOX in a deal that would also extend his role on American Idol for two additional years, through the 2011-12 season. (Hollywood Reporter

UK fans will get to watch Glee after all. Digital channel E4, home to Skins and The Inbetweeners, has closed a deal with 20th Century Fox Television for the UK rights to Glee. No air date was announced. (Broadcast)

Looks like MTV will be airing the late DJ AM's intervention series Gone Too Far after all. According to the Hollywood Reporter's James Hibberd, a source close to the cabler has indicated that the network will be airing the series and has been in touch with Adam Goldstein's family to consult about the timing of the broadcast. MTV for its part has declined to comment. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

Channel Surfing: "Ashes to Ashes" Renewed for Third (and Final) Season, Gilles Marini to "Brothers and Sisters," Bates to Chase "Alice," and More

Welcome to your Monday morning television briefing.

Ashes to Ashes has been recommissioned for a third and final series by BBC One. Series, which airs in the US on BBC America, will return next year with its final season, which will offer "intriguing twists and turns to keep viewers guessing about the final outcome," said co-creator/writer Ashley Pharoah, and will complete the journey of Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes) as well as reveal just who Gene Hunt (Phillip Glenister) really is. (BBC News)

Catch this interview with Glenister speaking to BBC Breakfast this morning about the third and final season of Ashes to Ashes:



Dancing with the Stars' Gilles Marini will be sticking around on ABC. The Dancing runner-up has signed on to a multiple-episode story arc on Brothers and Sisters, where he will play a potential love interest for Rachel Griffith's Sarah Walker. (Variety)

Kathy Bates (The Day the Earth Stood Still) will co-star in Sci Fi's upcoming mini-series Alice, Nick Willing's reimagining of Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking-Glass," which will provide the basis for a dark journey into a strange realm, much like Willing did with Sci Fi's Tin Man. Joining Bates will be Crash's Caterina Scorsone, Colm Meaney (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), Tim Curry (The Colour of Magic), Alessandro Juliani (Battlestar Galactica), Philip Winchester (Crusoe), Matt Frewer (Watchmen), and Primeval's Andrew Lee Potts. (Chicago Tribune's The Watcher)

Matt Letscher (Eli Stone), William Fichtner (Prison Break), and Scott Caan (Ocean's Eleven) have been cast in multiple-episode story arcs on Season Six of HBO's Entourage. Letscher will play arrogant studio executive Dan Coakley who is assigned to Johnny Drama's TV series, Fichtner will play Phil Yagoda, "a slick TV producer who had a hit teen series in the 1990s and is trying to remake it with Drama," and Caan will play Scotty Lavin, a "cocky and highly competitive manager who acts tough and trash talks to cover up how insecure he is and sees E (Kevin Connolly) as a threat." (Hollywood Reporter)

Wondering why Dominic Monaghan popped up in those new ABC promos and if it's in any way related to a possible return to Lost? Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello has the scoop: "The real reason Monaghan is featured in that cheeky spot is because he's actually joining the cast of another hour-long ABC drama series as a full-time series regular. And the net's brass want it to be a surprise." So what series could it be? Grey's Anatomy? Flash Forward? Hmmm... (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Producers of drama series In Treatment will meet with HBO executives this week to discuss the possibility of a third season, though HBO Programming Group president Michael Lombardo stressed that no decision has been made about renewal. Meanwhile the pay cabler will begin shooting new series Treme in New Orleans this fall, production begins on the pilot for Martin Scorsese-produced period drama Boardwalk Empire this week, and HBO is developing a series based on Steve Bogira's non-fiction book "Courtroom 302" with executive producers Tom Fontana and James Yoshimura. This summer the channel will feature the launch of Hung and the return of True Blood and Entourage. “We had unwittingly maneuvered ourselves into a little bit of a box,” said Lombardo about HBO's post-Sex and the City years. “Our programming started to skew a little ponderous. We are as excited about a show like Treme as we are about Hung, and they're very different shows.”(Broadcasting and Cable)

ABC will be launching reality competition series Shark Tank (the US version of British format Dragons Den) on Sunday, August 9th at 9 pm ET/PT, in order to use the return of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire as a lead-in. Series will then run on Sundays through August 23rd, after which it will move to its regular timeslot of Tuesdays at 8 pm on August 25th. (Futon Critic)

Days of Our Lives' Rachel Melvin will guest star (with the option to recur) on Season Four of NBC's Heroes, where she will play Annie, another college roommate of Claire Bennett (Hayden Panettiere), along with Californication's Madeline Zima. (Hollywood Reporter)

Nick at Nite has acquired rights to all 151 episodes of FOX's Malcolm in the Middle from 20th Century Fox Television, which it will air Sundays through Thursdays at 8 pm ET/PT beginning July 5th. (Variety)

The CW has opted not to launch its unscripted series Blonde Charity Mafia on July 7th as planned but will instead hold off on the series launch until later next season. (Futon Critic)

Picture This Television has signed a production deal with 14-year-old chef Greg Grossman to develop an unscripted series based around the life of the professional teenage chef. (Hollywood Reporter)

Stay tuned.

A Pebble on the Beach: An Advance Review of Season Two of "Ashes to Ashes"

Those of you hooked on Life on Mars sequel series Ashes to Ashes (well, those of us in the States, anyway) are going to have to wait a little while longer to check in with DI Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes).

BBC America was meant to launch the second season of the Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah-created series this past weekend but opted to push the start of Season Two of Ashes to Ashes until later this year. Which left many of the series' US-based fans in the lurch. Rather like Alex Drake herself.

Luckily for me, I have friends in the UK with access to BBC One, so this weekend I sat down with feverish anticipation to watch the first two episodes of Ashes to Ashes' darkly seductive second season. So what are the fictional constructs up to this time around? Let's discuss. (Beware: there are spoilers below for the first two episodes.)

Set six months after the events of Ashes to Ashes' freshman season, Season Two finds Alex Drake adapting to life in her new reality. It's 1982 and Maggie Thatcher's England is about to be plunged into a conflict with Argentina over the Falklands. As Alex contends with the bullish behavior of her supervisor DCI Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister) and discovers a seething nest of corruption within the Metropolitan Police, she also makes a shocking discovery that makes her question the very nature of her predicament.

While it's been fairly certain that Alex didn't in fact travel back in time to the year 1981 at the start of the series, Alex has been operating under the assumption that this world is wholly of her creation, a series of puzzles that her subconscious has created for her to solve in order to stay alive after being shot at point blank range in the present day. While her body, clinging to life, is discovered in 2008, Alex learns that she's not alone in this world: there's another "time traveler" with her in 1982, one who is not sure whether he can trust Alex to become his partner or whether they're slated to be enemies.

This figure, whom I'll refer to as The Stranger, has an agenda of his own and it's a sinister one, to boot. In the first episode of Season Two, he drugs and kidnaps Alex and holds her against his will while he interrogates her about what she is doing in this world. It's an eerie and terrifying scene that presages some new terrors ahead for Alex. The mystery surrounding the Pierrot Clown might be solved (and the Clown is missing from Season Two) but The Stranger presents some major complications for Alex.

For one, The Stranger seems to be three or four steps ahead of her and is patently aware of her presence in this dystopia. He seeks her out, kidnaps her, and looks to get some answers but isn't at all pleased with her answers. And he's not only got information about Alex (as well as access to her flat and a penchant for leaving red roses and creepy notes), but also about the future: he knows that Princess Diana is going to die at Pont de l'Alma tunnel in Paris. In fact, he claims that he was on the scene of the Princess' death... and his words seem to indicate that he could be a police officer as well.

While some could argue that The Stranger is just another fictional construct that Alex's dying brain has built for her, a speed bump on the road back to consciousness in the present day, there's a major clue in the season's opening scene that would seem to indicate otherwise. Season Two opens with two nurses watching a television news report about Alex Drake's disappearance while a comatose man lays in a hospital ward bed. One nurse claims that they shouldn't be talking about these things in front of him as he can likely hear what they are saying. Hmmm... Which would explain just how The Stranger knew about Alex's presence in the world and when the police discovered her wounded body in the present day as well. He's the comatose man in said hospital bed and he is receiving information about the present day, just like Sam Tyler did in Life on Mars, by processing it through his unconscious body.

Which, if it's true, is a rather fantastic, original, and unexpected twist. It would mean that Alex Drake isn't the only "time traveler" in this world and that it's not a figment of her imagination, but another reality that the fatally wounded can access: a purgatory between life and death in which the traumatic and critical events from their own lives are jumbled up into a specific time period. And it could mean, as Alex suspects in the second episode, that Gene Hunt could even be a real person himself and not just a construct that she and Sam have encountered.

Likewise, as Alex seeks to solve the mystery of The Stranger and find a way home, she finds herself enmeshed in battling corruption within the Metropolitan Police, a Herculean feat since it has taken hold of Superintendant "Supermac" Mackintosh (Roger Allam) and several other officers... and which involves a Masonic Lodge. How widespread this corruption goes is unclear but it seeks to involve Gene Hunt, who receives an invitation to join the secret society from the sinister Supermac himself. Whether it's this fraternal order that was behind the murder of a police officer in Soho (investigated by Drake and Hunt in the first episode) remains to be seen but from the way that the suspect, another officer, whisperers to Alex that "we are everywhere, like pebbles on the beach," one can't shake the feeling that the conspiracy is growing.

It's likely going to be a while before US viewers get the opportunity to catch the second season of Ashes to Ashes, which is already shaping up to be a real treat, but I can say that it is going to be worth the wait. Season Two forces Keeley Hawes' Alex Drake into a much more proactive position as she seeks to unmask the conspirators within the Met and tangles head-first with Gene Hunt himself. Likewise, the subplot involving The Stranger gives the sophomore season a strong throughline and a slick aura of menace.

All in all, the first two episodes of Ashes to Ashes' second season kick the Quattro into top gear, presenting a series of tantalizing new possibilities for Alex Drake, new enemies for Drake and Hunt, and an intriguing overarching plot that increases the tension and danger for our New Wave heroes. I just can't wait to see what happens next.

Ashes to Ashes will return to BBC America later this year.

Tears of a Clown: Alex Unmasks a Killer on the Season Finale of "Ashes to Ashes"

I'm hoping many of you tuned in to the phenomenal and shocking season finale ("Alex's Big Day") of Life on Mars sequel series Ashes to Ashes this weekend. I saw the entire first season last fall (the spoils of a trip last year to London, where the first season was released a while back on DVD).

I discussed the questions raised by this season finale last October in a post about Ashes' first season finale, but rather than just direct you to that post itself, I thought I'd make things easier and reproduce some of my thoughts here for the sake of convenience.

So crank up some David Bowie and Roxy Music on your iPod as we dive into some burning questions left over from Ashes to Ashes' brilliant first season. (WARNING: there are major spoilers for the end of Season One after the jump.)

My very first question, after watching the full first season of Ashes to Ashes, naturally concerns the first season's ending... in which we learn that Young Alex had met Gene Hunt before, seconds after witnessing the death of her parents and that it had been Gene's hand (and not Evan's) that she had gripped in the hallucinatory memory flashes Alex kept experiencing.

The fact that she knew Gene in the past is significant: if Gene was actually in Alex's past, then he must be a real person and is not, as Alex keeps maintaining, a fictional construct. So is he real? And, if so, is he still alive in 2008? Alex has believed that 1981 is a series of puzzles devised by her subconscious to keep her mind struggling to survive rather than succumb to the darkness and cold of death. Has she then always carried a memory of Gene Hunt around in her subconscious, unaware of his significance in her life? Is this world a puzzle for her psyche as it resists shutting down or has she really traveled back into time?

I had figured out both the Clown's identity and the motive behind Alex's parents death a few episodes before the season finale. Watching as her father put "Ashes to Ashes" on the cassette player, Alex is stunned to see him remove his glasses and transform into the Clown seconds before the car explodes. So my question is this: did Alex again *always* subconsciously know that her father had planned to kill her and her mother in a pathetic murder-suicide as payback for her mother's affair with Evan? I'd suggest that she did and that her memory filled in the blanks in her subconscious that she had successfully managed to repress for so many years.

But if the Clown is her father and an Angel of Death, why did Shaz (Montserrat Lombard) see him rather than another personification of death when she was nearly fatally stabbed in the series' seventh episode ("Charity Begins at Home")? And is the Clown still significant now that Alex knows who he actually is? Is his power over her now nonexistent now that she's peeled away the mask from his face and seen the skull beneath the skin?

I had always thought it was interesting that the song that was playing when Alex woke up in 1981 wasn't Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" but rather Ultravox's "Vienna," which is why I was so glad to see that the writers saved that song for the moment of her parents' death, a soundtrack to their demise that makes it far more iconic and significant to Alex and alludes to why she sees her father as the Pierrot Clown rather than in some other incarnation.

Lastly, as I mentioned earlier, Gene Hunt is an actual physical person in Alex's life as a child, so is he the reason that she was pulled backwards to 1981 and why Sam Tyler was pulled back to 1973? In both cases, Alex and Sam arrived in the past just prior to a critical incident in their lives that lead to their psychological development as adults. And yet in both cases Gene Hunt was on the scene, despite Mars taking place in Manchester and Ashes in London.

So, why is Gene significant in both their stories? And is Gene more than just a common link but a means for them to latch onto that particular point in time? And is it important that in 1981, Gene is struggling to maintain relevant in a world that is changing around him? If Sam thought that 1973 was his Oz, is 1981 Alex's Narnia, a journey to understand the critical incidents that defined them later as adults? For Sam, it's a need to follow the word of the law, to enforce the concept of justice. For Alex, it's the need to find logic and meaning in the criminals she chases, to understand the flaws in their psychology... even as all along she's been trying to discover what deficiency in her father's makeup lead to him seeking to obliterate his entire family.

And how does this connect to Arthur Layton, the man who created the car bomb that killed Tim and Caroline and who Alex arrested in the first episode of the season? The man who, I might add, shot Alex in the present day... after calling an unseen person. Just who does Layton call as he leads Alex away? ("I've got a piece of your past standing right here in front of me. Tim and Caroline Price's daughter. And I'm going to tell her the truth about why her parents died... Well, that's your choice.") His words seem to perhaps indicate it's Evan, but what if it's someone else altogether different? Some other force at work perhaps? A sign of something else yet to come?

What did you think of the season finale of Ashes to Ashes? What is this world that Alex has found herself in? Why wasn't she able to prevent her parents' death from occurring? And what will it take for her to wake up in the present day? Discuss.

Season Two of Ashes to Ashes, originally intended to launch this Saturday, will instead air later this year on BBC America.

Message from the Action Man: BBC America Pulls "Ashes to Ashes" Season Two, Slots "Primeval" Season Three Instead

Those of you anxious to see Season Two of the Life on Mars sequel series Ashes to Ashes had better hold on to your hats... and sit tight.

BBC America, which was slated to launch Season Two of Ashes to Ashes on Saturday, May 2nd, has indicated that it will be delaying the launch date for the second season, instead opting to launch Season Three of sci-fi series Primeval in the Saturdays at 9 pm timeslot.

The news comes as a bit of a surprise and was discovered only when BBC America sent out a press release for the launch of Primeval announcing that the series, which stars Douglas Henshall, Jason Flemyng, Lucy Brown, Hannah Spearritt, Andrew Lee Potts, Ben Miller, Laila Rouass, Juliet Aubrey, and Ben Mansfield, would be launching on Saturday, May 16th at 9 pm ET/PT.

What it failed to share was that Primeval would be taking over Ashes to Ashes' current timeslot.

Listings services, including TiVo's on-screen guide, Yahoo! TV, and Zap2it, had Ashes to Ashes' sophomore season launching next week and, at press time, still had May 2nd listed as the start date.

A BBC America publicist has confirmed to me via email that Primeval will be taking over Ashes to Ashes' timeslot.

No reason was given for the abrupt and unexpected change in scheduling and, as of yet, no current revised launch date for Season Two of Ashes to Ashes has been made available, other than that it will "air later this year."

Meanwhile, the BBC One trailer for Ashes to Ashes Season Two, which launched earlier this week in the UK, can be seen below.



Fingers crossed that we get Season Two of this sensational series sooner rather than later.

Ashes to Ashes will wrap its first season this Saturday at 9 pm ET/PT on BBC America.

"I Am Not Going to Die in a Trattoria": The Manc Lion and Alex Square Off with Death on "Ashes to Ashes"

Last week, I told fans (via Twitter) of both Life on Mars and the series' sequel Ashes to Ashes to be sure to tune in to Saturday's installment of Ashes to Ashes on BBC America.

The most recent episode ("Charity Begins at Home") offered several intriguing twists in the ongoing story of DI Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes), a forensic profiler from 2008 who was propelled backwards to the year 1981 after being shot at point blank range. As Alex tries to figure out how to get home, she's increasingly faced with the prospect that she might be seconds away from dying in the present day and that her entire life in 1981 might be a series of puzzles that her psyche, at its shuts down, is presenting to her.

This week's episode of Ashes to Ashes featured the gang at Fenchurch East Police Station attempting to solve a robbery involving prominent fundraiser Gil Hollis (Matthew Macfadyen of Spooks, who is also Hawes' real-life husband), a mustachioed OCD sufferer who spent eight months in a bathtub to raise money for children in Africa. After he's found shot in London and his money stolen, Gene and Alex investigate what really happened to Gil and their discoveries lead to a dramatic break in their own professional and personal relationships when Gene twice crosses a line, choosing instinct over logic, savage brutality over cool professionalism.

I watched Ashes to Ashes' first season last summer (thanks to a box set I picked up in London on holiday), but I've been rewatching them the last few weeks, thanks to BBC America, and I didn't want to let this haunting and memorable episode go by without making a few comments.

First of all, I have to say that I was absolutely shocked by the death of Shaz, short-lived (heh) though it was. The Pierrot clown promises Alex that he'll come for one of the members of CID that day and Alex makes it her mission to stop him, to exert control over her life. Which is a rather Herculean feat when the Pierrot Clown seemingly represents Death itself. Accompanied by that creepy dripping noise (and some water-based imagery), Alex bares witness to the possible deaths of Gene, Ray, Chris, Viv, and Shaz. But it's Shaz herself who dies, accidentally impaled on the Swiss army knife owned by by fraudulent Gil Hollis himself who, after engaging the gang in a firefight at the Italian restaurant, takes off and reveals that he shot himself and hid the money in the scaffolding of a billboard that plays rather prominently into the plot.

That Shaz should die, after murmuring that she's more than a typist (echoing Alex's own words to her that women like her are "the future" of the police force) and then seeing the Pierrot clown himself, was utterly heartbreaking. I'm glad that Shaz didn't stay dead as Alex is able to revive her, as Shaz brings a light and glow to the oppressive environment at CID. Both have now glimpsed the clown's evil smile and icy breath and Shaz's brush with death will likely link these two in more ways than one. I was completely shocked that Shaz saw the clown (how creepy was that?) and that Gene would once again break the law outright by letting Chris attack a cuffed Gil Hollis, as Viv tried to stop him and Alex was paralyzed with grief.

And yet Alex does win this round against the clown. She does prevent him from taking another life and does exert control over this reality. Which all begs the question once again: has Alex actually traveled back in time? Is this reality as we know it? Or a fantasy land that enables her to revisit a critical time in her life, regain memories that were lost to her, and achieve a knowledge of her parents in ways her younger self couldn't? Or, to use an image that resonates with young Alex, is this her Narnia, a symbolic battlefield where good and evil collide and the fate of Alex's existence hangs in the balance?

On the season finale of Ashes to Ashes ("Alex's Big Day"), Alex is just 24 hours away from the day when her parents were killed by a car bomb. With help from Ray, Alex races to try and save them and alter history, hoping it will send her back to 2008.