No nonsense: Phil Glenister as Gene Hunt in Ashes to Ashes. Photograph: BBC
It's been a long and miserable winter, but fear not: Gene Hunt is (nearly) back.
At the end of last week, the BBC launched a new teaser trailer for Ashes to Ashes, the follow-up to Life on Mars, which starts in February. Rumours that Hunt, the undisputed star of the show, was to become a "new man" in the new series look to be thankfully well wide of the mark. Instead, the BBC promises he'll be as politically incorrect as ever as he transfers to the London Met. The sinister seam that ran through Life on Mars looks to be explored further. The police are no longer cheeky 70s coppers bending the rules: Ashes to Ashes is set in 1981, the year of the Brixton riots.
After the divisive ending to Life on Mars (spoiler alert!), there are a number of unanswered questions to be addressed. Not least how the new visitor from the future, trained psychologist DI Alex Drake (Keeley Dawes) comes to be in 1981, interacting with Gene Hunt, having read Sam Tyler's reports in 2006. (Confused? I am.) But the north/south element, and the fact that the character replacing Sam is female, should add to the tension (and provide plenty more Huntisms).
Bloggers have already picked up on at least one anachronism: Hunt's Audi Quattro wasn't available as a right-hand drive in the UK in 1981. But in typical style, actor Phil Glenister dismissed this with the words, "Who cares? It's a cool car."
News that a pilot of an American version of the show has already been shot for ABC has been met with a mixed response: will the wit of Gene Hunt transfer to 1972 Los Angeles? But, thanks to the writers' strike, it's yet another question that will have to remain unanswered for now.
