The many dimensions of Life On Mars

[meteordust]

The thing about Life On Mars is that it works on so many levels.

There's old meets new as Sam tries to bring modern investigative techniques to 1970s policing. There's culture clash as Sam and Gene go head to head over their methods and their ethics and run around being alpha at each other. There's classic police drama - you have the undercover episode, the siege episode, the internal investigation episode - all staples of the genre for a reason. There's Sam's personal journey, which I don't want to give away too much about, but which is deeply moving. And like all time travel stories, there are lots of moments of foreknowledge woven in - some that are fun, and some that are haunting.

The one thing I don't get is all the intense fascination with whether Sam is in a coma or back in time. Because to me, it's clearly both. 1973 is real, and so are Sam's visions of the coma. (I've only seen Series One, so I know my theory has most likely been totally Jossed. No spoilers please...)

This is a show that stands up to a great deal of rewatching. John Simm acts his socks off, and the rest of the cast does an excellent job of keeping up with him. No remake could possibly do it justice, because everything about it is just so perfectly put together. You don't get magic like this very often.

Comments

[calla-s.livejournal.com]

Hell yes about Life on Mars (that it's excellent, that it contains so many different nifty elements - and I feel much the same as you about "why's it got to be time travel OR coma?" (haven't seen the second season either)).

I've got a bunch of coherent thoughts about LoM stashed somewhere but it might take a while to find them. I actually wanted to say THANK YOU so much for the vids! (I don't seem to have your email address). Getting them totally made my evening, and that was before I started watching - I guess everyone's known all along that Heroes would be a spectacular show for vidders but it's still awesome to see the results.

[pelrun.livejournal.com]

I think it's far easier for us as viewers than it is for Sam. That's partly because of his personality - there's his need for rigorous procedure and concrete explanations backed by proof, and to be presented with so much directly contradictory evidence is hard on him. He certainly couldn't accept an "it's both" explanation because it's essentially handwaving.

But probably more important is that many of the decisions he's forced to make in 1975 appear to have a different "right" choice depending on which explanation is the correct one (or which he chooses to believe is correct.) It's explored more in S2 when yet another possibility arises...