LIFE ON MARS: SEASON 1, EPISODE 8 {SEASON ONE FINALE} {U.K. VERSION} (TV)
Summary
One in this series about a policeman who suffers a car accident and apparently travels back in time from the year 2006 to the year 1973.
The police department is busy trying to bring in the Morton Brothers, the mysterious leaders of a new gang trying to gain a foothold in the city. Gene and the others corner a pair of their gangsters after a car chase, but another car ostensibly sent by the Mortons runs into them, killing them instantly. Sam finds a postcard in one of their pockets indicating a nearby hotel room and the police raid the room. They find a man inside and arrest him; Sam realizes that the man is his father, Vic Tyler, and he is distressed by this revelation. He recalls a memory from his childhood when his mother told him that his father would have to go away for a while, and that he never saw his father again.
Back at the station, Sam tells Annie that Vic is his father, and he believes that Vic could somehow hold the key to allow Sam to return to his own time. Sam insists that Vic is innocent, but Gene isn't so sure, stating that Vic is their only lead on the Mortons. Gene and Sam interrogate Vic, who claims to have no knowledge of the Mortons or their activities, claiming to simply be a door-to-door salesman. However, after some pressure they get Vic to reveal that he was in the hotel to play in a card game set up by known affiliates of the Mortons. Sam asks about Vic's son and Vic talks about his four year-old "Sammy." Sam continues to insist that Vic be released, but Gene orders a search of his house.
Gene and Sam visit the Tyler residence, where Sam meets his mother Ruth again. Sam searches around the house, already familiar with it due to his childhood. Ruth remarks that while Vic is often on the road for business, he always makes sure to visit and provide for his family. Sam gets especially sentimental when he comes across his father's jacket. Gene reveals that he found a bookie's receipt in the house, believing that it could provide a vital clue. He becomes irritated with Sam's continuing insistence that they should leave Vic alone. Gene and Sam find Jimmy Lips, a gambler, and get him to give them the name of a snooker club where the Mortons supposedly operate. The police raid the club and find that pornographic films are being screened in a back room. They arrest the men there and confiscate the films, deducing that the Mortons are running a pornography ring.
At the station, Sam calls a phone number they found at the snooker club. He is horrified when it turns out to be his home phone number, and he hears his child self pick up on the other end. He hangs up, telling Gene that it was a disconnected number. In private, Sam wonders why his father ran out on the family and feels that he must somehow prevent it from occurring again. He hears what sounds like a doctor's progress report on his health on a nearby radio sports broadcast; it indicates that his cranial activity is increasing and he may be recovering. He theorizes to Annie that his father might have run away in order to escape the Mortons. He says his father disappeared at a family wedding and that even thirty years later Sam never found a trace of him. He starts to believe that perhaps he was sent back to 1973 in order to prevent his father from leaving. However, Gene calls in Sam for some bad news: among one of the pornographic films they confiscated, they discovered a shot of Vic standing alongside the men producing the film, which seems to indicate that he is involved.
The police take Vic into custody again and question him about his appearance in the film. He claims that Jimmy Lips put him in touch with the Morton gangsters and that he was forced to help them produce the films when he couldn't pay off his gambling debt to them from their card games. He claims that they forced him to help them make the films and planned to get him to sell them around the city, using his salesman job as a cover. He says he never met the Mortons personally, and that they always acted through agents. Vic claims he only agreed to help them because they threatened his wife and child. He had hoped that his visit to the hotel would have ended the whole thing, but then he was arrested. Gene and Sam decide to work out a deal with Vic: in exchange for his freedom they will allow Vic to meet with the Mortons and thus allow the police to go after them directly.
Sam accompanies Vic as he awaits instructions from the Mortons. Vic says that all he wants is for his family to be safe and secure, and wanted money from the Mortons in order to provide for them. While waiting, Sam and Vic pass the time by kicking a football around. Eventually Vic is directed to head into the snooker club, and Sam and the other police wait around to rush in. They hear gunshots coming from inside and find Jimmy Lips and the club manager shot dead, and Vic hiding in the back office behind a desk. He says that a number of men came in from upstairs and shot up the place. Vic appears to be quite frightened and asks that he be left alone. Sam wants to comply, but Gene demands that he be kept as an eyewitness to a double homicide. Their argument is interrupted when they discover that Jimmy Lips is still barely alive. He says the word "key" over and over until finally he can hold out no longer and dies. Gene and Sam discover that Vic got away while they were distracted.
Annie accompanies Sam as he returns to the Tyler house, finding no one at home. He continues to try to convince her that Vic and Ruth are his parents, but she thinks that he's still experiencing mental symptoms from his accident and wants him to see a psychiatrist. Sam decides to wait in his house, convinced that Vic will return; he found a cigarette card autographed by footballer Bobby Charlton which was his prized possession as a child, and thinks that Vic would thus be compelled to retrieve it for his son. He waits all night until finally Vic returns and Sam confronts him. Vic claims he ran away for fear of being arrested by Gene. He thinks he's "bad news" for his family and they would be better off without him, but Sam tries to convince him otherwise. Vic appears to be convinced by Sam, and as he leaves Sam hears the sounds of medical equipment and doctors around him, indicating that he may be returning to consciousness. He braces himself but after a moment nothing happens, leaving Sam despairing. He closes his eyes and sees a vague vision of a woman in a red dress running through a forest. This experience leaves Sam in tears.
Sam tells Nelson that he fears that his father is going to leave the family again just as he recalls. Nelson advises him to get to "the root of the problem." Gene comes into the bar and argues with Sam about the events surrounding Vic. They figure out that Jimmy Lips was actually trying to say "quay" instead of "key," and use that hint to find another of the Mortons' pornography studios by the docks. While arresting the people within, Gene starts believing that Vic is more involved with the Mortons than he is letting on, although Sam simply wants to find him so that he doesn't run out on his family. Gene and Sam fight and Sam manages to knock down Gene long enough for him to run off. Sam knows that the family wedding where Vic disappeared is about to commence, and rushes over to the community centre where it's happening.
There, Sam looks in through a window and sees his parents dancing with each other. He experiences his vision of the forest and the woman in the red dress, but this time sees his father in the vision as well, murdering the woman. Vic leaves the party to head into a nearby forest and Sam sees Annie, working undercover at the party and wearing a red dress, head in after him. He realizes that his vision is coming to pass. Sam is confronted by his four year-old self asking where his father is; he tells him to back inside, and neither of them make eye contact with each other. Sam follows Annie and Vic into the forest and sees them confront each other. He is furious that she was planted in the party to spy on him and starts assaulting her. Sam steps in before Vic can continue the assault, and Annie takes the opportunity to kick Vic. As he stumbles back, a handgun falls out of his pocket. Vic claims he was planning on turning it on himself if the Mortons found him, again insisting that his family would be better off without him. Again Sam tries to convince Vic to stay with his family.
Suddenly Gene emerges from the foliage brandishing his own gun aimed squarely at Vic. He reveals that the evidence the police compiled suggests that not only is Vic a part of the Morton gang, he may actually be the Morton Brothers himself, posing as two people and running the gang. Sam refuses to believe this, thinking that Gene is trying to set Vic up. He aims Vic's gun at Gene, and the two of them have a tense standoff. Sam cannot bring himself to shoot Gene, but Vic runs away into the forest during the confrontation. Sam, Gene, and Annie run after him and search for Vic. Shortly thereafter, Sam and Vic encounter each other again in a clearing. He again tells Vic not to leave his family and insists that he can protect them. As he speaks to Vic, he once again hears sounds of doctors and medical equipment, and he once again believes that he is waking up. Vic asks for his gun back, and Sam slowly gives it to him as he hears voices around him saying he is waking up. Vic takes the gun and promptly points it at Sam. Sam reveals that he emptied the ammunition out of the gun beforehand, saddened that his father has turned out to be the "rotten" individual which Gene and Annie claimed he was. The voices recede as Sam reveals that the vision of the woman in the red dress being murdered was a memory from his childhood which he had suppressed for the rest of his life.
He places Vic under arrest for murder and producing pornography, but Vic points out that his family will suffer when they discover what he's done. Thus Vic cannot stay with his family. Sam is furious at this, screaming to the sky that "it's not fair." With a heavy heart, Sam allows Vic to go free. He reunites with Annie and the other police at the party, and tells Ruth that "involved in something" and had to flee in order to protect him. Sam finds himself advising Ruth to tell "Sammy" the very things he remembers her telling him as a child: that his father had to go out on the road again, but that he would see him again someday. Annie tells Sam that he can't "wake up" because he's already in reality. He implies to her that he may be attracted to her. The episode ends as Sam catches up with Gene, Ray, and Chris and the four of them decide to head out to the pub together.
Details
- NETWORK: BBC (United Kingdom)
- DATE: February 27, 2006 9:00 PM
- RUNNING TIME: 0:59:05
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: 108355
- GENRE: Drama, fantasy/science fiction; Drama, police/private detective
- SUBJECT HEADING: Drama, fantasy/science fiction; Drama, police/private detective
- SERIES RUN: BBC - TV series, 2006-2007
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Matthew Graham … Executive Producer, Created by, Writer
- Jane Featherstone … Executive Producer
- Claire Parker … Producer
- Marcus Wilson … Line Producer
- John Alexander … Director
- Tony Jordan … Created by
- Ashley Pharoah … Created by
- Edmund Butt … Music by
- John Simm … Cast, Sam Tyler
- Philip Glenister … Cast, Gene Hunt
- Liz White … Cast, Annie Cartwright
- Dean Andrews … Cast, Ray Carling
- Marshall Lancaster … Cast, Chris Skelton
- Noreen Kershaw … Cast, Phyllis Dobbs
- Tony Marshall … Cast, Nelson
- Lee Ingleby … Cast, Vic Tyler
- Joanne Froggatt … Cast, Ruth Tyler
- Matt Cross … Cast, Jimmy Lips
- Paul Kemp … Cast, Manager
- Alexander O'Loughlin … Cast, Young Sam