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.

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.

TV on DVD: "Life on Mars: Series 2"

Time to go down the yellow brick road again.

Yes, Stateside Life on Mars fans, that day has finally arrived as Acorn Media today releases the complete second season of the original UK drama series Life on Mars on DVD.

Forget about the lackluster (and mercifully short-lived) American version and travel back to the 1970s with the original UK Life on Mars, which has only deepened and grown more mysterious and provocative after its abrupt conclusion in 2007.

Not up to speed on the franchise? Created by Matthew Graham, Tony Jordan, and Ashley Pharoah, Life on Mars is an alternately trippy and gritty crime drama series that follows the adventures of Detective Inspector Sam Tyler (John Simm), a grimly determined investigator in present-day Manchester who is seemingly thrown backwards in time. While in pursuit of the serial killer that abducted his girlfriend, Sam is struck by a car and finds himself mysteriously in 1973 Manchester, where he comes face to face with a personal mystery from his childhood and the best fictional copper on television, the swaggering misanthrope Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister). Can Sam get home and save his girlfriend? Has he traveled back in time? Or is he losing his mind completely?

Season Two deepens the mystery and the drama even as Sam moves closer both to understanding the nature of the place he's in (is he deep within his subconscious? is he in a coma in a hospital someplace) and to a full-blown romance with female copper Annie (Liz White), who might just be one of the most perfectly realized love interests ever to grace the small screen. He's also forced to make a number of life-altering choices throughout the second season. Can be betray his boss, Gene Hunt? Can he leave his police colleagues in jeopardy if an escape route back to his normal life materializes? What price do these decisions have on his very being?

The second season brilliant answers these questions and more, offering a metaphysical mystery that unfolds over eight gripping installments that juxtapose Sam's struggle to regain his life with a vintage procedural police series that's both a parody of such 1970s cop television fixtures as The Sweeney and a gripping tour de force in its own right. (Hell, Glenister's Gene Hunt has proven so popular and so iconic that he's a major element of the sequel series Ashes to Ashes.)

The four-disc release of Life on Mars: Series 2 includes a slew of bonus material including a 45-minute documentary entitled "The Return of Life on Mars," behind-the-scenes footage of select episodes, a tour of the series' set, and a 28-minute featurette entitled "The End of Life on Mars." (Which, if I'm being honest, makes me teary-eyed every time I watch it.)

Ultimately, Life on Mars is one series that is virtually impossible to pigeonhole into a genre and that's a very good thing at the end of the day. Is it sci-fi? A police procedural? Who cares, it’s bloody good television that proves impossible to look away from.

Life on Mars: Series 2 is available today on DVD for the suggested retail price of $59.99. Or pick it up in the Televisionary store for just $39.49 today.

Channel Surfing: "Life on Mars" Co-Creator Likes US Version; Jamie Bamber "Too Scared" to Play the Doctor, Potential SAG Strike, and More

Welcome to your Tuesday morning television briefing. While everyone is buzzing about the possible SAG strike, I hope you all tuned in to last night's episode of Chuck, the final piece of the three-part Jill storyline.

Life on Mars co-creator Ashley Pharoah has praised the US version of the series, calling it "marvelous." In New York to receive an International Emmy for best drama for the original UK version of Life on Mars, Pharoah was pleased that the producers had changed the mythology of the series for the US audience and that the studio had moved the action from LA (where it was based for David E. Kelley's original pilot) to gritty New York City. "They're changing the mythology, which I think is all right," said Pharoah. "It has to be different. Otherwise everyone just goes on YouTube and sees how it ends." (Hollywood Reporter)

Just how would a SAG strike affect a television industry still recovering from the crippling 100-day WGA strike? For one, only scripted primetime series would be affected (soaps and variety shows are covered by AFTRA) but it would completely derail the current season in the midst of the current economic crisis. Network executives are said to be currently looking at contingency plans but as of right now there is no plan to shorten or cancel series' two-week holiday hiatus in order to shoot additional episodes.

Most scripted series will have about 60-70 percent of their episodes shot before the break, with some having about five episodes in various stages of post. 24, According to Jim, and Rules of Engagement have already completed their full orders for the season. Meanwhile, freshman series 90210, Gary Unmarried, Better Off Ted, The Unusuals, and Harper's Island are covered by AFTRA rather than SAG and most scripted cable series are also covered by AFTRA. (Hollywood Reporter)

Ashton Kutcher's Katalyst is developing two scripted series for netlet the CW with CBS Paramount Network Television. Ensemble drama The Beautiful Life, will follow the lives of young models who live together in Manhattan and comes from former model-turned writer Adam Gaiudrone and executive producers Carol Barbee (Jericho), Karey Burke, and Jason Goldberg; offering up a look at the dark side of modeling, series could be a good companion for Top Model. Drama Chloe Gamble, based on novel "The One" by Ed Decter, will follow a Texas girl who moves to Hollywood with her mother and twin brother with dreams of stardom dancing in her head. Decter and John Strauss will write and executive produce the project, which is told from a vantage point in the future, where life didn't end up so well for Chloe. (Variety)

CW is said to be close to renewing America's Next Top Model for a thirteenth cycle to air next fall. (Hollywood Reporter)

FOX will give Spike Feresten an 11 pm slot for a six-week run of daily one-hour episodes beginning January 17th, intended to be a tryout to see whether Talkshow With Spike Feresten could fill the Saturday night void left open by MadTV's cancellation. (Broadcasting & Cable)

Michael Trucco (Battlestar Galactica) will guest star on CBS' The Big Bang Theory next month, where he'll play Leonard's motorcycle-driving partner on a project and "one of the youngest MacArthur Genius Grant winners ever." (Entertainment Weekly's Ausiello Files)

Speaking of Battlestar Galactica, Jamie Bamber has said that he would be too scared to replace David Tennant as the Eleventh Doctor on Doctor Who. "Those would be very big shoes to fill - if I'm going to be honest it would be very daunting to take on an icon like Doctor Who," said Bamber. "It's right at the core of British television and to take that on is a big challenge. I think it's a very enviable one for whoever gets it, but I'm not actively seeking it. I think I'm too scared to actually want it." (Digital Spy)

CBS is developing single-camera comedy Things a Man Should Never Do Past 30. Project, from executive producer/director Barry Sonnenfeld, the Tannenbaum Co., and Sony Pictures TV, is based on a book by Esquire contributing editor David Katz containing a list of 500 items that men shouldn't attempt after they hit 30, such as "google ex-girlfriends" or "high five in a business situation." Katz and A.J. Jacobs will write the script with supervision from Al Higgins (Malcolm in the Middle) and Sonnenfeld will direct the pilot. (Hollywood Reporter)

BBC have confirmed that Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures will return for a third season in 2009, with Russell T. Davies remaining on the series as executive producer. Elisabeth Sladen, Tom Knight, Daniel Anthony, and Anjli Mohindra are slated to return. (Digital Spy)

What a surprise: Reveille will produce the previously reported Tony Robbins unscripted project at NBC. (TV Week)

Stay tuned.

Over the Rainbow: The "Life on Mars" Series Finale

Oh. My. God.

I don't even know where to begin after watching last night's final installment of Brit import Life on Mars, one of the most gripping, thrilling, and jaw-dropping series finales (or series, full stop) around.

While I knew that the writers--Matthew Graham, along with Tony Jordan and Ashley Pharoah--wanted to tie things up in the strange, strange life of Detective Inspector Sam Tyler, I had no idea the lengths Sam would go to in order to return to 2006, who he would betray, and what mechanism by which he'd catapult himself out of his future coma-state.

If the above sentence made any sense to you, you're obviously a Life on Mars fan. If not, you've missed out on a series, which over the course of sixteen episodes, redefined genre television, blending science fiction, cop drama, romance, metaphysical drama into one groovy package and populating it with a cast of characters that proved themselves misogynistic, racist, pigheaded... and yet having a sort of primal dignity that was impossible to look away from. Simply put: this series rocked like vintage Bowie.

It was no surprise that Sam did manage to get home but what a long, strange road it was to that darkened tunnel. Would Sam betray Gene and "A" Division to the ruthless machinations of Frank Morgan, a man hellbent on making an example of Gene Hunt and bringing order to the chaos of the Manchester constabulary? Would he make it back to 2006? Would he be able to say goodbye to Annie?

All of these questions were answered in a fashion with last night's episode, a heart-pounding installment that made the audience question everything we've been told about Sam Tyler since the start and which bookended the series with its first episode in dizzying, brilliant fashion. We learn from Frank Morgan that Sam is in fact an undercover officer from Hyde, sent to
infiltrate Gene's team as part of Operation: MARS (Metropolitan Accountability and Reconciliation Strategy); his real name is Sam Williams. Or is it?

Just as Sam begins to question his true identity and is willing to sell out Gene and his colleagues, he undergoes an operation in the future to remove a tumor that is keeping him in his coma. Is Gene the manifestation of this cancer in his dream state? Sam believes so and gives over evidence to Frank Morgan that would lead to Gene's pensioning and dismissal from the force; Morgan promises him that he can come home to Hyde, a promise made all the more real by what Morgan reveals: that Sam had been in a car accident on the way to Manchester, that he had been in a fugue state before when he was in a bus crash at age 12, and that everything that was happening here was very much real.

Faced with the choice to save the team from their demises at the hands of a psychotic cop-killer (presaged by a telephone call last episode) or the chance to return home, Sam chooses the latter and wakes up in 2006... to discover that Frank Morgan is his surgeon. While Morgan was able to remove the pressure from his brain, the tumor was inoperable but is benign. (Which begs the question then if the tumor was what caused him to time-travel or if it was all a dream.) The hospital room where Sam laying all this time? Hyde Ward, Room 2612, the same combination (Hyde 2612) as the phone number Sam was trying to call earlier in the episode (and from which several of his ominous calls derived).

A brief aside: I'll let you count out the many, many references to The Wizard of Oz that have filled this series, including last night's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," but I will say this: it's no coincidence that Frank Morgan, the surgeon/copper played by Meadowlands' Ralph Brown, is also the name of the actor who played the titular character in The Wizard of Oz...

Returning to work, Sam discovers that he cannot relate to his coworkers nor can he feel anything, such as when he cuts his finger during a meeting (recalling bartender Nelson's words that to feel pain is to know you're alive) and promptly--and to the tune of David Bowie's "Life on Mars"--throws himself off of the building, an echo of the series' first episode in which Sam nearly jumped off a roof in order to free himself from 1973.

Does Sam die? That's a matter of conjecture. But he does suddenly return to 1973 to the precise moment in time when he faced that earlier choice. This time, he chooses to save his dying friends, felling the villain with a few precise gunshots. And later, he finally gets to confess his love for Annie (yay!), telling her that he's staying "forever" and asks her to tell him what to do ("stay here"), before embracing her in a climactic kiss that we've all been waiting sixteen episodes to see and which echoes their conversation from the series' first episode.

Gene, Chris, and Ray have all survived the debacle at the train (engineered by Frank Morgan to lead to their deaths to further discredit the department), and the fivesome climb into the back of the Cortina before driving off into the afterlife, down that yellow brick road, as it were. But not before Sam switches the radio from the sounds of the EMTs trying to save him ("It's no good, he's slipping away from us")... to Bowie's "Life on Mars," a deliberate choice on his part to choose this "dream" over reality, over death, over the end.

Was the psychic pain of his "suicide" enough to propel him back to 1973... or is this Sam's dream state, his own personal Oz, experienced in the moments as his brain shuts down in the back of an ambulance in 2006? The answer is deliberately, deliciously vague and left to the audience to decipher. (Though I did get goosebumps when the little girl in red--the Girl from the Test Card--appeared and turned off the "television," signaling the end of the series.)

As for this jaded writer, I choose to believe that Sam did die in 2006 after coming out of his coma... and lived in 1973, in a state of suspended animation. I want to believe that he did finally find love with the adorable Annie and that in order to survive, both Sam and Gene--two sides of the same coin--need each other, to push each other into changing themselves and the world around them. What better place to bring about real change then, then the front lines of policing in the 1970s? What better ending for a crusading copper than to drive off into the twilight to fight crime?

Of course, some of the truth of Sam's condition must come in the form of Life on Mars' sequel, entitled Ashes to Ashes (again, deriving its title from a Bowie song), which picks up the story of Gene, Chris, and Ray in the 1980s as they come into contact with Alex Drake (MI5/Spooks' Keeley Hawes), a female detective who has traveled back to 1981 after reading Sam's case files. A look at the promo for the series, due later this year on BBC1, can be found below.

But don't expect to find Sam Tyler in Ashes to Ashes; his story has already been told and actor John Simm sadly won't be appearing in the sequel. But from the looks of that gorgeous promo and the fact that I am already experiencing withdrawal pains from Life on Mars, Ashes to Ashes can't arrive on these shores quickly enough.

Hyde and Seek: Sam Encounters A Tantalizing Clue on "Life on Mars"

If there's one word to sum up this week's episode of Life on Mars, it's just... wow.

The latest installment of the second (and final) season of Brit import Life on Mars has once again managed to bowl me over with its low-key dread and spine-tingling mystery; all this and a plot about the Gene Genie himself, DCI Gene Hunt, arrested on suspicion of murder. Can Sam clear Gene's name? Does he want to? And just what is acting DCI Frank Morgan hiding?

I'll admit that the murder investigation had me baffled. While I knew that Gene was somehow innocent, the evidence clearly pointed to him. He had thrown a brick through the victim's window only hours before his death (after threatening Terry Haslam in a courthouse surrounded by witnesses), drunkenly dropped his gun at or near the victim's house, and went back to get it. Next thing Gene knows it's the next morning, Haslam is dead and his corpse staring at him from across the room, and his gun is missing... only to be found under the sofa, with only Gene's prints on it, and signs that it had been recently fired.

You'll admit that it didn't look too good for ol' Gene, though Sam reluctantly agrees to help clear his name. What follows is a gripping--and often hilarious, thanks to inept surveillance from Ray and Chris--story of Gene being on the other side of the law for a change. Of course, Sam manages to find Gene innocent, thanks to a irate hairstylist who saw a man pour a drunken Gene into the back of a van the night of the murder and a heating vent that altered the time of death significantly.

End of story, no? Hardly, thanks to the ominous arrival of Frank Morgan (Meadowlands' Ralph Brown), Gene's temporary replacement at CID, who comes to Manchester PD from... Hyde. Longtime viewers on Life on Mars will remember that Sam Tyler's cover story--including his miraculous transfer paperwork--came from the English town of Hyde as well. So just what is the connection between these two and why does Morgan seem so hell-bent on Gene going down for a crime he didn't commit? Curious, as is the creepy and overly familiar way he keeps saying Sam's first name, rather than Tyler.

But I was not prepared for the episode's very ending, in which Morgan casually turns to Sam and says that it was too bad that Gene managed to wriggle out of the murder charge but that it's not Sam's fault. A puzzled Sam can only stare at Morgan as the lift doors open. And then came the words that made everything else fade into the background: "Hang in there, Sam. As soon as we can, we'll sort this out... and bring you home."

Say what? My jaw hit the floor. Even though I suspected Morgan of some sort of profound connection to Sam, I had no idea that he would actually speak--out loud--directly to Sam about his condition, his appearance in the past, or about his getting back to the future.

Which puts everything else we've seen so far this season into question. Was Morgan the voice on the telephone that Sam heard a few episodes back when he called that number in Hyde? Is Morgan responsible for getting Sam his cover story and paperwork? And just what is Sam's mission in the past and how did he get there? And what relationship does it have to the car accident and his apparent coma in 2006?

More tantalizingly: was that dream phone call Sam received this week--in which he could hear gunshots and Annie's voice begging for help--a harbinger of things to come as we move into the eighth and final installment of this groundbreaking and brilliant series?

In a series that has proven so adept at pulling the rug out beneath your feet, this week's episode was another turn of the screw, a thrill ride that few series, British or American, manage to achieve. While I'll miss Life on Mars when it wraps up next week, I am deeply pleased that it is ending on a high and leaving the party when it's still going strong, rather than overstaying its welcome.

Next week on the series finale of Life on Mars, the team investigates the murder of a miner, with all fingers pointing towards a notorious cop killer. While Gene and Morgan both race to arrest the killer, Morgan makes Sam a tantalizing proposition in order to bring him home...

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Power of 10 (CBS); Deal or No Deal (NBC); Crowned: The Mother of All Pageants (CW); Wife Swap (ABC); American Idol (FOX; 8-10 pm)

9 pm: Comanche Moon (CBS; 9-11 pm); Law & Order: Criminal Intent (NBC); Gossip Girl (CW); Supernanny (ABC)

10 pm: Law & Order (NBC); Cashmere Mafia (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

9 pm: Gossip Girl.

After my lovely fiancee, the future Mrs. Televisionary, presented her case about why she loves Gossip Girl, I am relenting and catching this soap from the very beginning. On tonight's installment ("Pilot"), Serena returns to Manhattan under some mysterious circumstances and her former BFF Blair is less than pleased to see her.

10 pm: Project Runway on Bravo.

On tonight's episode ("On Garde!"), the designers have to put aside their preconceptions when they are tasked with creating a design based around a model's hairstyle, while Sweet P and Rami reach their breaking points during an argument.

Sam Tackles Heroin, Hate Crimes, and... Big Bird on "Life on Mars"

Just a few quick words this morning about last night's superlative episode of Brit drama Life on Mars, whose second season has been just as captivating as its groundbreaking first.

On last night's episode, Sam Tyler found himself once again saving his future by messing about with the past. This time, it's a dangling plotline involving his girlfriend, fellow police detective Maya, who was last seen in the series' pilot and who it was believed had been abducted by serial killer Colin Raimes. How Maya managed to escape from Colin's clutches in the future has yet to be revealed but Sam's early involvement in a 1973 serial killing case (with which Colin was connected as a young boy) may have altered the future.

In fact, Sam's entire reason for being in 1973 subtly points to a mission to change the future for the better and protect the people around him. We've already seen how this impacts his beloved Auntie Heather, mentor Glenn Fletcher, and perhaps Maya as well. But just what exactly was the man on the telephone speaking about a few episodes back when he said that Sam doesn't want his CID counterparts to know the "real reason" why he's there? Curiouser and curiouser.

In this episode, Sam's involvement in a case involving the murder of a Ugandan-Asian man, the heroin trade and Manchester, and hate crimes produces another one of those fortuitous moments as he manages to convince Layla, a woman caught up in the web of racial warfare, hatred, and lies, to go ahead with her pregnancy... only to discover that Layla is actually Leslie Roy, the mother of his future lover, Maya. It's a nifty twist that makes me wish that NBC's similarly-themed Journeyman had taken some more notes from Life on Mars' playbook.

While that was tantalizing enough, this week's episode also brought us two of the scariest, most foreboding, and just plain weird characters I've seen on television since the Greenes first appeared in Season Two of Big Love: Toolbox Terry (Ian Puleston-Davis) and Big Bird (Lorraine Cheshire), the latter of which gives Selma Greene a run for her money in the mannishly freaky female sidekick department. The scene in which Big Bird held a bag of irritated ferrets above Rocket's privates was freaky enough, but her evil, evil ways only become clear at the end, what with the hot iron bound onto Sam's chest, Annie all bound and gagged, and the unexpected shooting of Ravi Ghandi. Creepy.

And how fantastic was it that Chris was the one to save Sam, Gene, Annie, and Ray? I did not expect it at all when the gunshot rang out that felled Big Bird and the camera cut to reveal our Chris, dopey grin and all, holding the smoking gun.

And that brief kiss between Sam and Annie that only lasted a brief second but was tense with tenderness and longing? Priceless.

It was also great to see some depth to Philip Glenister's Gene Hunt, whom we learn has a junkie brother whom he hasn't seen in ten years. It's a small confession but one that's tinged with complexity and revelation, given Gene's seemingly irrational willingness to let Toolbox kill Ravi. After all, when Sam says that addiction is often a substitution for something that's missing from life, Hunt claims not to understand that... as he swigs from a hip flask. Just what was missing from the life of the swaggering Hunt remains to be seen but I have a feeling we're only just scratching the surface of Gene's hidden demons...

Next on Life on Mars, a drunken Gene Hunt turns up at Sam's flat in the middle of the night to make a shocking confession.

Things Get Trippy for Sam Tyler on "Life on Mars"

Was it just me or were you on the edge of your seat during last night's installment of BBC import, Life on Mars? This series, which stars John Simm as time-traveling detective Sam Tyler just gets more and more taut as the second season continues.

I can't help but wonder what sort of clue was contained in this week's episode, in which the team tracks down a kidnapped woman and her daughter, being held captive in an effort to secure the release of a teenager who confessed to murdering a 14-year-old girl a year earlier. While the CID review their case files, they are forced to wonder if they locked up the wrong man a year earlier; meanwhile, a deeply ill Sam--pulled in from sick leave--passes out at the station.

His condition--due, we're told, from his entrance into a deeper coma in the future, due to the wrong balance of medication--is alternately creepy, scary, and just plain weird. Sam is clearly seeing hallucinations (but as Annie says, when is he NOT seeing visions) and running a high fever. Sam clearly believes the voice on the phone that tells him that he's been given the wrong drugs, but Phyllis later learns that Sam was drugged with LSD after a pub raid. So which is it?

And, even if Sam were just drugged, how exactly was he able to view events at several different remote locations--Annie and Phyllis in the station bullpen, Chris searching Lamb's house, Annie questioning the murder victim's family--through the television set? Out of body experience? Astral projection? Expanded consciousness? Hmmm...

Instead, we're left to ponder just what was going on to Sam exactly and where he was in this week's episode: what appeared to be an office at the station, cold and dark, with that television set showing him events of the elsewhere. Was it a construct of his consciousness? A holding station for his psyche? Limbo?

Meanwhile, Annie's strengths as a detective are coming to the fore as she twigs to the connection between the victim's father and Lamb's family, locating the missing girls, and talking the perp down. This all comes on the heels of last week's episode, in which Annie and Sam went undercover as a married couple to infiltrate a wife-swapping party. Is it obvious how utterly smitten I am with Annie?

It's clear that Sam is influencing not only to future but also changing the way Manchester CID conduct investigations, introducing them last week to the concept of surveillance (which Gene termed "not very manly") and getting Chris to realize that sometimes they can't go blundering into the unknown but need to play smarter than the bad guys they're hoping to trap.

So while I'm still slightly confused over just what this episode showed us in terms of Sam's actual condition, I can't wait for next week for another piece of the puzzle...

Next week on Life on Mars, the team investigate the murder of a Ugandan-Asian man and the inroads of the heroin trade in Manchester, while Sam battles the bigoted reaction of Gene and receives a shocking message from the future.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Power of 10 (CBS); Deal or No Deal (NBC); Crowned: The Mother of All Pageants (CW); Wife Swap (ABC)

9 pm: Criminal Minds (CBS); Law & Order (NBC; 9-11 pm); Gossip Girl (CW); Supernanny (ABC)

10 pm: CSI: New York (CBS); Supernanny (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

9 pm: Gossip Girl.

Wow, a first-run episode of something tonight. On tonight's installment ("School Lies"), the kids break into the school swimming pool to have a party, with disastrous and near-fatal results.

10 pm: Project Runway on Bravo.

Finally, the sartorial showdown returns with a new episode ("Eye Candy") in which the remaining designers must source materials from a chocolate shop in Times Square in order to create a design.

Sam Finds Himself Caught Between the Facts and His Gut on "Life on Mars"

While the ongoing dispute between the WGA and the AMPTP might have derailed our favorite series for now, there is one bright spot on the television landscape and that's BBC America's brilliant time-travel/cop drama Life on Mars.

While this week's episode, the second season's third, doesn't answer any more questions about the mysterious phone call Sam made last week (and its implications about his "assignment" in 1973), it did forward the story of Sam's possibly recovery from his coma in 2006 and give us an episode based around the constant pull between facts and instinct.

The basic thrust of the episode revolved around a car bomb outside a school that the IRA was allegedly behind. Sam knew that it couldn't have been the IRA--they weren't planting explosives on British mainland soil until the 1990s--but his hunches were discounted by the rest of the team as he couldn't prove any of the facts. He also managed to get colleague Ray Carling nearly blown to smithereens, as he wrongly suspected that there was in fact no bomb planted outside the school... and pushed Ray to investigate. The resulting explosion--viewed from Sam's POV as well as a gorgeous aerial shot--was impressive, especially for a television series, and had my jaw on the floor.

Much of Sam's skills as a detective come from his scrupulous analysis of the facts at hand but also his gut instincts (such as the fact that Pat O'Brien wasn't behind the bombings). Shaken by Ray's accident (and its odd resulting shock and hearing loss), Sam begins to doubt himself and nearly gets killed trying to defuse a second bomb. It's a gripping scene that's soon echoed in another appearance from the little girl inside the television set (a welcome return of a creepy trope) who reminds Sam to trust his instincts... even as he fails her little test.

Who exactly is this little girl (besides for the broadcast sign-off mascot)? Is she a part of Sam's subconscious? Did she help Sam restore some vital brain functions in the future? I do find it interesting that technology plays a large role in keeping Sam connected to the future, whether it be televisions, telephones, or radios.

And how much are we loving that Annie has become a major part of the team? I know I was pleased as punch when she showed up at the building site to help Sam and show her support for him, even after everything that had gone down with Ray.

As for Ray, I do think the bombing incident has made him much more sympathetic of a character to me. I know that he's supposed to be a chauvinistic hard-ass but it was fantastic to see him forced into several vulnerable situations in this episode. Did he hear Sam tell him not to shoot that fleeing suspect? We'll never know the truth there...

What did you think of this week's installment? Discuss.

Next week on Life on Mars, the discovery of a young woman's corpse in a wasteland sends the team into an investigation of wife-swapping in the suburbs, while the beauty rep's murder stirs up childhood memories for Sam.

Talk Back: "Life on Mars" Season Two

So hopefully you all tuned in and watched last night's two-hour installment of Life on Mars (well, two back-to-back one-hour episodes anyway), so here's your chance to talk back about the second season opener.

If you haven't yet seen the episodes in question, beware as there are spoilers lurking here.

(If you missed my advance review of the two episodes, click here to read.)

What was with that near-kiss between Annie and Sam? So tantalizingly close! I am happy, however, to see Annie join the CID as a plainclothes detective (a difference between the UK and potential US version, which already has Annie as a full detective when the pilot begins) as hopefully this will mean she finally gets a little bit of the respect she deserves.

One word: stinger.

I was completely stunned by that shocker of a telephone call in which Sam connected with the mysterious caller from Hyde, who promptly told him that he should not be contacting him as it's not part of "the plan." Hmmm, does this mean that Sam was intentionally sent back in time for a specific reason? And if so, who would be the people behind this and what is the connection to (A) the Colin Raimes serial killings investigation and/or (B) the car accident that left Sam for dead?

Theories, anyone?

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Kid Nation (CBS); Deal or No Deal (NBC; 8-10 pm); America's Next Top Model (CW); Pushing Daisies (ABC); Back to You/'Til Death (FOX)

9 pm: Criminal Minds (CBS); Crowned: The Mother of All Pageants (CW); Private Practice (ABC); Kitchen Nightmares (FOX)

10 pm: CSI: New York (CBS); Dateline (NBC); Dirty Sexy Money (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

8 pm: Pushing Daisies.

On tonight's episode ("Corpiscle"), Ned tries to heal the rift between him and Chuck while Emerson tries to get him to focus on their latest case involving a frozen insurance adjustor and scent expert Oscar Vibenius returns to discover what makes Chuck and Digby so utterly different. Uh-oh.

8 pm: America's Next Top Model.

On tonight's season finale ("The Girl Who Becomes America's Next Top Model"), the final three girls face off on a commercial and national print ad for corporate sponsor Cover Girl, get some advice from Jaslene, and then the final two compete in a runway show in the Forbidden City.

10 pm: Dirty Sexy Money.

No, sadly, it's not a new episode of Televisionary fave DSM but here's a chance for you all to catch the pilot episode once more, in which Nick inherits an sadistic and wealthy family to look after following his father's untimely death, and must deal with their every whine and complaint.

10 pm: Project Runway on Bravo.

Season Four of Bravo's Project Runway continues. On tonight's episode, the designers are challenged to do something involving seamless fashion transformations. Heh, seamless.

Is There Still "Life on Mars"? Bloody Hell, Yeah.

Just in the nick of time (what with the holidays upon us and the strike in no signs of wrapping up any time soon), BBC America is finally bringing the second season of Life on Mars to this side of the pond.

For those of you who don't know, I'm absolutely obsessed with Life on Mars, which stars John Simm (State of Play, Doctor Who) as Sam Tyler, a police detective who--following a car accident in 2006 during the pursuit of a serial killer who may have taken his girlfriend prisoner--wakes up in 1973 Manchester to the sounds of David Bowie, bell-bottom pants, rampant sexism on the force, and a general lack of policing savvy.

The first season of this groundbreaking series focused on Sam's attempts to get home and to determine whether he had (A) gone mad, (B) fallen into a coma, or (C) truly traveled back in time to the year 1973 and joined up with the Manchester police force under the steely and often pigheaded gaze of DCI Gene Hunt (Phillip Glenister).

At the end of the first season (and shame on you if you haven't seen it!), it was revealed that Sam does appear to be in a coma in 2006... but that doesn't mean that he hasn't also somehow traveled back in time or gone hopelessly insane. Or that the origins of his present situation aren't far more malevolent than he imagines. Sam's connection to the future has grown tantalizingly close, with messages received via radio, telephone, and television that suggest that he is in a coma attempting to regain consciousness. But, by the close of Season Two's second episode, there are a few new questions posed that will make you question the very nature of Sam's condition.

Thanks to the good folks at BBC America, I previewed the first two episodes of the second--and sadly, final--season of Life on Mars, which air tonight in a two-hour block. These combined episodes are astonishing in their complexity, wit, and imagination. Yes, it's no wonder that David E. Kelley would attempt to remake the series for US audiences, but really the thing is perfect just the way it is. In fact, it points to the heights that fellow time-traveler drama Journeyman could have ascended to in different hands.

In Season Two, Sam finds himself increasingly drawn into cases that have repercussions for himself in the future. In the sophomore season's first episode, Sam comes face to face with villain Tony Crane (guest star Marc Warren of, yes, State of Play and Doctor Who), whom he managed to apprehend after decades of murder and fraud in the future. Sam is faced with an intriguing dilemma: can he catch a killer before he kills? And will he go outside of the rules of the law in order to catch Crane? Complicating things further is Sam's utter conviction that Crane is right now sitting beside Sam's comatose body in 2006 and torturing him to death. Will he be able to take down Crane in 1973 before Crane kills him in the future? It's a bravura start to what promises to be an amazing season of such morally grey situations.

That energy is continued in the second episode, which also airs tonight. In this episode, Sam and the CID find themselves caught in the midst of a gang war but when the finger of suspicion points towards one of their own, no one on the team is sure of whom to trust. Meanwhile, Sam comes face to face with his future mentor Glenn Fletcher, whom Sam learns from a newspaper message has just died in the future. As the team deals with having their first black member, Sam must convince Glenn to take a stand and become a role model for future officers. Once again, the series has subtly swung the episode's plot around to directly involve Sam and the results are at once surprising, shocking, and satisfying.

I am not sure what to make of a certain plot twist in Episode Two involving the ramifications of Sam being in the past. This stunner of a reveal is so unexpectedly understated and yet so mind-blowing that it had me up half the night trying to puzzle it out. It also deftly sets up the next six episodes and makes the audience questions some assumptions about Sam's predicament that we've been presented with so far.

But the question many of you are asking, I am sure, is what is going on with Sam's sole confidante and possible love interest Annie (Liz White)? When Series Two begins, the young WPC--typically the butt of sexist remarks from Gene and the lads in CID--finds herself thrust into the spotlight. All I will say is this: say good-bye to that little bowler cap and skirted uniform. As for, er, romantic relations between Annie and Sam? Look for a little development in the second episode that had me almost falling out of my seat, in the best possible way.

Ultimately, while Life on Mars' freshman season lured me in with its spectacle and creativity, Season Two has deepened the aura of dread and hopelessness that surround Sam Tyler and expanded upon its dense mysteries in meaningful and seductive ways. This is first rate television making of the highest standard: beautifully written, acted, and directed, set to an addictive soundtrack of Bowie, Mott the Hoople, Elton John, Uriah Heep, Santana, and Cream, and featuring some of the most memorable characters you're ever likely to meet.

So, come on, why not rev up your Cortina GXL and take a peek at the addictively sublime Life on Mars? You'll thank me in the morning, whatever decade that might be in.

Life on Mars airs Tuesday evenings at 8 pm ET/PT on BBC America.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: NCIS (CBS); Deal or No Deal (NBC); America's Next Top Model (CW); Shrek the Halls/Winnie the Pooh and Christmas Too (ABC); Bones (FOX)

9 pm: Cane (CBS); Biggest Loser (NBC); Victoria's Secret Fashion Show (CW); According to Jim/According to Jim (ABC); House (FOX)

10 pm: Cane (CBS); Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (NBC); Boston Legal (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

8-10 pm: Life on Mars on BBC America.

Season Two of UK import Life on Mars finally begins tonight with two back-to-back episodes. On the first, Sam Tyler--still stuck in 1973--encounters the younger incarnation of a villain (guest star Marc Warren) of a villain he arrested in 2006, who may have a connection to his current condition. On the second, Sam comes face to face with his future mentor, DC Glenn Fletcher, the team's first black member, as they investigate a string of robberies that point to a turf war between rival gangs.

Return Mission to "Mars" Finally Set

Remember Life on Mars, that absolutely brilliant BBC series starring John Simm as a detective in pursuit of a serial killer who wakes up in 1973?

For a while it seemed as though David E. Kelley's Americanized version of the series (stuck firmly in pilot status for the last year or so) would make it to air before the second season of the brilliant British series would ever air on digital cabler BBC America.

You can exhale now. BBC America has finally announced the launch date for Season Two of Life on Mars (coincidentally the last season of the skein), which will kick off on Tuesday, December 11th... only fifteen months after the conclusion of Season One in September 2006.

I'm not quite sure what's responsible for the delay in transmission as the second season of Life on Mars wrapped in the UK in April, but I'm glad for something to look forward to in these dark days.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Ghost Whisperer (CBS); Deal or No Deal (NBC); Friday Night SmackDown (CW; 8-10 pm); Men in Trees (ABC); Next Great American Band (FOX)

9 pm: Moonlight (CBS); Friday Night Lights (NBC); Women's Murder Club (ABC); Don't Forget the Lyrics (FOX)

10 pm: NUMB3RS (CBS); Las Vegas (NBC); 20/20 (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

8-11 pm: BBC America.

If you happen to be staying in after a long work week, why not do it in true Anglophile style with back-to-back episodes of The Office, Coupling, Catherine Tate Show, and Mighty Boosh?

"Wonder If He'll Ever Know He's In The Best Selling Show": Is There "Life on Mars"?

Time travel is a funny thing. Especially when the traveler in question has gone backwards in time, rather than forward. Can you change the future by altering the past? Can you save yourself?

Such questions have been plaguing Detective Sam Tyler (John Simms) for the last eight episodes of the superbly twisted British import Life on Mars. For those of you who have heretofore avoided the trippy time-travel/cop drama and weren't lucky enough to get a DVD box set from BBC America (it's already in a prized spot on my living room bookshelves), here's a quick primer on the story so far. In 2006, Sam is on the hunt for a twisted serial killer abducting young women. After his own girlfriend, a police colleague, is abducted, Sam is hit by a car in a near-fatal accident. When he wakes up, he finds himself in 1973, still assigned to the Manchester police force, on the hunt for a serial killer abducting young women... But is Sam mad? Or in a coma? Or has he traveled back in time?

It appears the answer to the above is resounding yes to all three. Poor Sam has become inextricably tangled up in his own past and in tonight's simply amazing season finale, Sam is assigned to a case that involves his own father. Will he find out what happened that caused his dad to leave him and his mum at a friend's wedding reception 30 years ago? Can he prevent history from repeating itself? And can he use this crucial moment in his past to cause his future self to wake up from his coma?

If those questions are confusing you, you've obviously not gotten hooked by this television gem. For those of you that have become obsessed with this series, I will say that tonight's episode, the eighth in the series, answers several questions while purposely leaving others tantalizingly unresolved. Just what happened in the woods and what did a four-year-old Sam see in those frustratingly brief flashbacks? What memory has Sam repressed for all of these years? Who is the woman in the red dress? (Viewers will be happy to learn that all of those questions WILL be answered and the resolution to the last plot point was very unexpected, at least to this Mars fan.)

However, I'm still dying to know about the little girl in the television (is she a figment of Sam's imagination or something far worse?), how and why Sam traveled back in time to this particular junction, and if Sam's actions in tonight's episode have changed anything in the future or if, rather, they've ensured that the future as Sam knows it has come to pass. I was a bit worried that the writers would wrap everything up at the end of the season but, don't worry, the Beeb has commissioned another batch of original episodes which means that Sam Tyler isn't leaving 1973 anytime soon. (Not if I have anything to say about it, anyway.)

The best line of the entire episode: "That's a very mixed metaphor." (One guess who utters that one.) The Gene Genie (Philip Glenister) has some astoundingly fantastic moments in this episode (complete with funky black leather driving gloves, no less) and I'm happy to report that the drool-worthy Cortina GXL is still in one piece at the end of the season. Speaking of the "end" as it were, the final 30 seconds to the season are a beautifully understated affair containing only one word, repeated five times. (And, no, I won't tell you what that word is.) It's a fitting end to what has become quite simply one of my favorite series, a mind-bending mix of police procedural, existential sci-fi, and period drama.

So, if you're wondering if there is life on Mars, the answer is a resounding yes... and I for one have been more than happy to be invited along for the ride so far.

"Life on Mars" airs its season finale tonight at 10 pm ET/PT on BBC America.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Two and a Half Men/How I Met Your Mother (CBS); Dateline (NBC); 7th Heaven (WB); The Path to 9/11 (ABC; 8-10 pm); Prison Break (FOX); Desire (MyNet)

9 pm: Two and a Half Men/The New Adventures of Old Christine (CBS); 7th Heaven (WB); Medium (NBC); Vanished (FOX); Fashion House (MyNet)

10 pm: CSI: Miami (CBS); Medium (NBC); Primetime (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

10 pm: Life on Mars on BBC America.

See above. It's the season finale of this brilliant (and British) mind-bending mystery series that stars State of Play's John Simm as Detective Sam Tyler, a modern-day copper who wakes up in 1973. On tonight's episode, Sam begins to investigate crimes that implicate his own father.

10 pm: Weeds on Showtime.

Season Two of Showtime's suburban-set pot dramedy is in full swing. On tonight's episode ("Mrs. Botwin's Neigborhood"), Nancy finds herself dealing with Silas and Megan's pregnancy as well as the Amenian mob, Celia prepares for the city council election debate, and Peter gives Nancy the perfect wedding present.

More "Life on Mars"

Just a brief post today as I am still celebrating the virtual death of cable company Adelphia, who have made my life here in Los Angeles a hellish oblivion over the last four years. So buh-bye Adelphia, and hullo Time Warner...

Which brings me to a point about the joy of digital cable, specifically the pride and joy of my digital cable lineup: BBC America. If you are not watching Life on Mars, then you are officially dead to me at this point. (Well, you're getting there anyway.)

While I usually try to avoid discussing a series so soon again after it's just started to air, last night's deliciously brilliant episode of British import Life on Mars has compelled me to mention it yet again and to pose a delicate yet vexing question: if you're not watching this show, why the bloody hell not?

Last night's episode was another turn of the figurative screw, as poor, stranded Sam Tyler (John Simm) seemingly inches his way to madness... or self-realization, depending on whether you're a glass half-full or half-empty kind of person. First, that little girl from the television test pattern screen (you know the creepy one with the clown doll) emerged from the television to taunt Sam into submission and force him to remain in 1973 rather than return to the present day. But was it all a dream? Or is something more sinister at work here? Later, when he's visiting a wounded colleague at the hospital, Tyler experiences another aural and visual "hallucination," one that seems to clearly indicate that he's trapped in a comatose state in the present day. Or is he? One of the joys of this trippy series is that it keeps you guessing from one moment to the next about just what is happening to Sam Tyler.

Why 1973? Why now? Why not, as Tyler screams, 1988 and color television? Do any of us choose the times we live in? But that's an existential question for another day. In the meantime, you've been warned: avoid Life on Mars at your own peril. Like the series' hotheaded Gene (Philip Glenister), I really can't be held responsible for what I do in a moment of rage...

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Big Brother: All-Stars (CBS); Fear Factor (NBC); Gilmore Girls (WB); According to Jim/According to Jim (ABC); House (FOX); Veronica Mars (UPN)

9 pm: Rock Star: Supernova (CBS); Last Comic Standing (NBC); Gilmore Girls (WB); According to Jim/According to Jim (ABC); House (FOX); Veronica Mars (UPN)

10 pm: 48 Hours Mystery (CBS); Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (NBC); Boston Legal (ABC)

What I'll Be Watching

7 pm: Love Soup on BBC America. (10 pm ET)

In the premiere episode ("There Must Be Some Way Out of Here"), we are introduced to our series leads, two strangers who will eventually fall in love. Alice (Black Books' Tamsin Greig) is the manager of a department store perfume counter looking for Mr. Right. Gil (Lois & Clark's Michael Landes) is an American comedy writer who has moved to the English countryside to find true love. One thing stands in their way of making a perfect match with one another: they seem to be leading parallel lives.

9 pm: Eureka on Sci-Fi.

The whimsical new sci-fi drama that's more Northern Exposure than Stargate. On tonight's episode ("Before I Forget"), Carter accidentally shoots Henry but can't remember what happened. However, a visiting scientist may hold the key to Carter's blackouts. It's written by Kung Fu Monkey's John Rogers, so tune in and catch this quirky sci-fi lite series.

From Across the Pond: "Life on Mars"

No, this isn't another declaration of my love for Veronica Mars. (Though there's nothing wrong with spreading the love of Mars.) Rather, I'm referring to the Stateside premiere of the trippy crime drama Life on Mars, which launched its first season last night on BBC America.

While it's nominally a mystery series, Life on Mars is far from being your standard crime procedural. Instead, it's a deft blend of police procedural, pitch black humor, and crime drama, with a sci-fi twist. In 2006, Detective Chief Inspector Sam Tyler (State of Play's John Simm) is on the hunt for a man he believes is a serial killer targeting young women, keeping them alive for 24 hours, and then strangling them. Tyler thinks he's caught his man when he brings in ginger-haired Colin Raimes (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire's Sam Hazeldine), a troubled schizophrenic, but when his social worker has an airtight alibi for him, Tyler's back at square one. However, Tyler's police colleague and girlfriend Maya (The Constant Gardener's Archie Panjabi) has a hunch of her own but when she goes to investigate, she too is abducted by the killer. Tyler is distraught and drives aimlessly, listening to David Bowie's 1973 classic "Life on Mars." When he is nearly in a crash, he pulls his car under the freeway and is himself struck by a passing automobile. Tyler drifts into unconsciousness...

But when he awakens, he's not in 2006 and everything around him has changed. Instead, Sam Tyler finds himself transported back in time to Manchester in the year 1973. But here's the strange part: he's still Sam Tyler, but he's now dressed in the height of 1973 vintage style: wide collar, awesome black leather jacket. He's still a copper, but his ID card shows that somehow he's been demoted from DCI to Detective Inspector. His car, formerly a Jeep, is now a typical 70s jalopy and contains transfer papers to the very precinct where Tyler worked in the present day. All rather odd, no?

Needless to say, Tyler is baffled. And more than a little freaked out about what's happening to him and to Maya. Strange aural and visual hallucinations seem to indicate that Tyler is in a coma in the present day as physicians attempt to revive him. But the level of detail in this 1973 world is too uncanny for Tyler to accept that it's all in his mind. Something else is at work here, something powerful and profound.

When Tyler is assigned to solve the crime of a missing local woman, he discovers another link to the present day. This killer is abducting women, keeping them alive for 24 hours, and then strangling them. If Tyler's going to save Maya, he has to stop this killer in 1973. The only problem is that crime-solving methods have grown a hell of a lot more sophisticated by 2006 and these police offers, led by DCI Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister), have no idea what they're up against. Fortunately, they have one thing that their predecessors didn't have: the time-traveling cop Sam Tyler. If Tyler is able to catch the serial killer now, will he be able to save Maya in the present day?

While Sam feels completely alone in this alien world (he was only four years old in 1973, after all), there is someone here who does reach out to him: adorable WPC Annie Cartwright (Liz White), a former psychology student turned officer who doesn't quite believe Sam's story about time travel. But Sam is determined to get back to the present day, no matter what the cost. That is, if all of this isn't just one big coma dream, after all...

Creators Chris Chibnall, Matthew Graham, and Ashley Pharoah have crafted an entire universe of possiblity for poor, tortured Detective Tyler and have given us a new twist on the familiar trope of time travel. Additionally, Life on Mars' sets and costumes are flawless and easily transport the viewer to a gritty 70s Manchester. I can only imagine how much fun it must have been to design this entire world and that dedication and level of perfection shines through on the screen.

Simm is a fantastic lead for this brilliant series, which sucks the viewer in from its opening minutes and never lets go. Life on Mars is a psychedelic roller coaster ride through the heart of 70s-era England, in the days before Maggie Thatcher, when The Who, Uriah Heep, and Bowie blared from record players and police officers represented The Law, but didn't mind bending it either. Simms turns in a fantastic and ultimately sympathetic performance of a detective solving the mystery of his own madness/time travel/fantasy. Glenister is riveting to watch as the gruff Gene Hunt, stuck in his ways, cracking jokes at Annie's expense, but somehow managing to keep these rowdy officers in line. White is the perfect blend of innocence and wisdom as attentive WPC Annie Cartwright. (Something tells me that if Tyler is stuck in 1973 for a while, romance will undoubtedly blossom between these two.) But what's the deal exactly with Annie's ex-boyfriend, psychologist Neil (Christopher Harper)? There's another connection to Tyler's "future" that hopefully will be fully investigated.

Ultimately, Life on Mars is unlike anything else currently on television: a gripping, trippy, and surreal mind-bender of a mystery. So while David E. Kelley is developing an adaptation of this series for American television, stick to the brilliant original UK version instead. After all, this is one Life that speaks for itself.

"Life on Mars" airs Monday evenings at 10 pm ET/PT on BBC America. Repeats air Sunday evenings at 9 pm ET/PT.

What's On Tonight

8 pm: Big Brother: All-Stars (CBS); Fear Factor (NBC); Gilmore Girls (WB); According to Jim/George Lopez (ABC); House (FOX); Veronica Mars (UPN)

9 pm: Rock Star: Supernova (CBS); Last Comic Standing (NBC); Gilmore Girls (WB); The One: Making a Music Star (9-11 pm; ABC); House (FOX); Veronica Mars (UPN)

10 pm: 48 Hours Mystery (CBS); Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (NBC)

What I'll Be Watching

9 pm: Eureka on Sci-Fi.

The whimsical new sci-fi drama that's more Northern Exposure than Stargate. On tonight's episode ("Many Happy Returns"), Carter attends a funeral while a dark figure begins to materalize in the town of Eureka. Connection? I'd say so.