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Claudia, it was a telly series which finished last night. A modern day policeman is in an accident and 'wakes up' in 1973. He isn't sure if he's mad, gone back in time or something else I've forgotten. He is still a policeman though.
ST, I saw the last half hour but couldn't decide what actually happened.
My hubby said that Sam had not survived the operation, something about a time slip that took him back to the railway line. That he was already dead when he jumped off the building so it just took him back to where he'd been etc.
Sorry, it just went over my head.
I'm sorry Carol but your hubby is wrong over his theory because as Sam did wake from his coma, it's clear that he had dreamt it all. The ending gave me a 'cheated' feeling as it wasn't plausible at all. Sam jumped off the top of a building and he would be dead, meaning there was no way that he could jump back to where he left off in 1973 in dreaming. The script writers scored an own goal in this patchy ending and probably did it to allow the spin off series 'Ashes to Ashes' to happen with Gene Hunt & team in the 1980's but no Sam Tyler. I won't be watching it for sure.
I thought a better ending would be for Sam in the present day after waking from his coma to discover from records that Gene Hunt & his team were killed in trying to avert a train robbery in 1973. It would've left Sam to believe that he was in 1973 after all and that it was REAL.
I've never watched the series, but that sounds like the ending of the movie Vanilla Sky (a fantasy movie) which was based on a spanish movie, Open Your Eyes (I think).
The jumping off the building thing is an allusion to a scene in either the first or second episode of the first series where Annie tells him that if he doesn't believe that 1973 is real he can always jump off the building they're standing on together.
life on mars - how could you not enjoy it? please suspend belief all who enter here - surely thats the way to do it?
sam tyler has been dipping out of life and death for the two series and when, in the last episode, the operation to save him is successful, he finds that he prefers death with gene etc. in 'real' life he can't 'feel' eg the cut on his hand, so he commits suicide and back to the 70's.
now is that so difficult to understand?!
I also think that it s meant to ask the question does it really matter what is real and what is not. As long as we feel something is real then we can live happier, more contented lives instead. So reality is giving up the struggle against the fight to conform into what is expected of us and by us. It is almost a spiritual ending. Sam jumping off the building was a leap of faith.
So it does not matter if he was from the future or from the past because ether way both lives were all a delusion. He took the choice to switch channels at the end; the decision to accept one reality over the other and abandon the other delusion and accept the new life as real.
Yes was a bit "Open Your Eyes" ending. But when I watched that I thought it was stolen from George Bailey's jump from the bridge into a different reality in It's a Wonderful Life.
I liked the touches like M.A.R.S being an acronym for the operation name and the hospital room number was the phone number he had in the past. Yes it probably would have been neater if it had ended with him jumping off the tower, but they have to open the door to the sequel so fair do on that.
Somebody said that he had accepted death and that was the end. Where the test card girl turns off the TV is supposed to be turning off his life support. But I personally think she was turning off the fourth wall because he had bricked over it with his commitment to the 1973 reality.
I think it was right that he went back and saved his friends, but it was still a sad ending as well. When he jumped off the building, I took it as a positive thing he was doing, and the risk paid off because that act did take him back to the moment under the railway bridge.
I thought the test card girl turning off the TV that we were watching them through meant that Sam had decided that he didn't want to come back to the present.
I didn't see all the first series on its first run but watched it on BBC3 when it re-aired just prior to series two starting. I loved it and I felt the ending was perfect. All through he was worried they would leave him in 1973 so it was no suprise when he jumped off the roof and ended up back there.
I can understand him not being in any more as other than the episode that was told in flashback poor John Simm was in every scene. Hard filiming schedule that one.
I thought Life on Mars was a particularly clever piece of writing as the viewer has to make so many choices and decisions for themselves. It was also very entertaining. Interesting reading how others see the ending above. The way i felt it wrapped was that Sam , well his cover name was Sam, was a highly intelligent man which always brings the human mind to an edge place in itself. He had also suffered serious trauma as a child of 12 having seen his parents killed in a coach crash. Such trauma combined with high intelligence would and could cause someone to have periods of withdrawel when under pressure especially and move their mind into a comfortable place, EG lying in a hospital bed in a coma being cared for. Add to this that it was mentioned by Inspector Gorman that he (Sam) had also fairly recently been in a car crash and had been suffering periods of amnesia. In reality this is feasible that a car accident with some form of head injury in addition to childhood trauma could have caused a 1973 Police officer (sam) to have been nothing more than always in 1973. Yet under periods of stress and he had plenty of them, retreat into a blank fantasy world of being in a coma in the future. As the script was written through the eyes of Sam then Sam's vision of the future would be however Sam saw it to be. The fact that it represented 2007 as we know it to be could be simple coincidence or a little twist from the writer to make the viewer choose. The extreme stress or battle like situation where the police team were under gun fire on the train was not unlike battle conditions that many a soldier has experienced very strange behaviour and visions . Sam was retreating from this by running into the tunnel.Again that is common trauma escape ,EG,run into, tunnel, trench, hole whatever. Some poor souls were shot for this in WW1 and called cowards when as we know now they were ill.Their minds saw and felt some extraordinary events and things. So recapping if we take it as highly plausible that the character Sam was suffering from, childhood crash and parental loss trauma coupled with high intelligence and a recent car crash then where his mind was jumping about, seeing visions on the TV, hearing voices on the radio, phone etc, etc etc, imagining a coma situation was a way of coping and would possible.
When he cut himself in the meeting and felt "nothing" he realised that scenario was in fact not reality and he had retreated somewhere.The whole scene of Sam waking up after the Coma, speaking to his Mum, in the meeting etc lasted only a few minutes, during that time the under gun fire Sam in the tunnel would probably have been curled up in a ball trying to cope with the violence all around him and soothing himself by his fantasy future. To get out of that and back to reality (1973) the only way his mind could do it was jump off the building and prove to himself he would not die. By doing this it was enough to snap him back into reality. The effort to do this rather than stay in retreat was triggered by love for Annie.
Why would Gene not be "pensioned off" as Gorman had intimated. Easy enough as Sam would not stand testimony to back up the tapes and records he had given him and also Gorman would have to back down as he had set up fellow officers to be shot at or killed.
Why or how did Sam know about future Police methods? How about because he was a highly intelligent police prodigy remember and may well have been the man who eventually introduced many of the modern police methods.
Scenes like in the previous series where he met his Mum in 1973 as a grown up Sam and told her to bet Red Rum to win the Grand National was just his mind trauma like a deja vea situation almost. Similar to when he Sam saw his girlfriend from 2007 in her mother on a cine film being projected on the wall.Mind jumping projecting an imaginary scenario into the present to cope with trauma and stress. Possible.
There willalways be AHHHHH but what about.... whatever scene it may be. Surely that is all deliberate to keep the viewer thinking, deciding, choosing. there has always been alot of clues , in the last series Sam almost jumped off a building if my memory serves me right.
Very good, clever, well crafted. A script with real effort for a change. Nice touch at the end scene when the wee lass from the test card ran out to play with the other kids and stared at the screen for two seconds, then ran away to play, finish on the theme, choose,decide,think.
Not that I have thought about this series much
;-)
Now as a writer under constant stress and trauma I am going back to retreat into my fantasy world place and watch Saturday's Grand National in advance. Whats that the voice is saying on my radio..... they have fifty yards to run in the 2007 Grand National and it's Homer Wells fighting it out with Clan Royal and Joes Edge both challenging with point Barrow finishing fast..... Dont say I didn't tell you...
Interesting to read all the explanations. I enjoyed the finale, but wasn't 100% sure what to make of it. I like Aegean's version of events (though wasn't the bloke you refer to as Gorman actually called Morgan? - I think you've created an anagram! - or I have). On balance, I was pleased to go back to the 70s, as those were the characters we were now engaging with.
I love those kind of mind game ideas - in fact, I was going a bit doolally by the end of the Easter break (which for me ran on into Tuesday), as I watched both Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (loved it) and Life on Mars and read The Lovely Bones...so my sense of reality was all over the place by the end of all that!
i was totally hooked on both series,and enjoyed the second series even more than the first.
i think its left up to the viewer to make up their own mind.
i loved the ending of this series, but my hubby, who enjoyed every episode, hated it, felt cheated, he said. not sure i want to watch the spin off from it though, as no sam tyler!
Not sure how Gene will cope in the 1980's, could be fun.
Did you see the piece in the papers and on the BBC, that someone is claiming the prog, and characters are responsible for homophobic bullying and name calling in the playground.
Do these people live in the real word! It was a tv drama.
No, it is not acceptable now, and if it's happening it should be explained why it's wrong.
I was a teenager at that time, and that sort of attitude by some grown men was 'the norm', and many gays/lesbians still kept quiet about their sexuality.
Next they'll be demanding a warning before the start of this type of programme.
Carol, I work for a union, where everyone pretends to be very PC (but chauvinism reigns), so I had to embark on a hasty explanation of why I was calling one colleague (a good friend and a big fan of the show) a 'n***y a***d f***y boy' (Gene Hunt's last bit of abuse to Sam Tyler) the day after the final episode.
Did anybody note that his name was Sam, same as Sam in Quantum Leap. Also Tyler as in Rose Tyler from Dr.Who ( I know that this has been explained by the writer's that his daughter chose it) but above that...
Tyler Durden was the alter ego created by the narrator in Fight Club. He is invisible to everyone except for the man who created him to deal with his neurosis. He is also in a hospital dreaming this alternate world.
I think that answers your earlier thread Tony,regarding does TV influence.
Seems probable the Life on Mars writer was influenced by the productions you mention.Possibly subconsciously, bit if a coincidence though as names have to originate from somewere.
Aegean
Yes you are right. I have also laid a few ghosts to rest concerning similar ideas through this. I now consider the fact that your idea may be similar on a subconscious level to another as cultural osmosis now. As long as you change it or evolve it, then an idea becomes new, even if it is an old one.
Actual new ideas or concepts are rare Tony.
I was thinking after reading your post that although Life on Mars was ,for me anyway, one of the much better peces of work as already said, I have an increasing feeling that aspects were influenced by the movie Beautiful Mind also.
Comments
ST, I saw the last half hour but couldn't decide what actually happened.
My hubby said that Sam had not survived the operation, something about a time slip that took him back to the railway line. That he was already dead when he jumped off the building so it just took him back to where he'd been etc.
Sorry, it just went over my head.
I thought a better ending would be for Sam in the present day after waking from his coma to discover from records that Gene Hunt & his team were killed in trying to avert a train robbery in 1973. It would've left Sam to believe that he was in 1973 after all and that it was REAL.
I thought the ending was perfect.
sam tyler has been dipping out of life and death for the two series and when, in the last episode, the operation to save him is successful, he finds that he prefers death with gene etc. in 'real' life he can't 'feel' eg the cut on his hand, so he commits suicide and back to the 70's.
now is that so difficult to understand?!
So it does not matter if he was from the future or from the past because ether way both lives were all a delusion. He took the choice to switch channels at the end; the decision to accept one reality over the other and abandon the other delusion and accept the new life as real.
Yes was a bit "Open Your Eyes" ending. But when I watched that I thought it was stolen from George Bailey's jump from the bridge into a different reality in It's a Wonderful Life.
I liked the touches like M.A.R.S being an acronym for the operation name and the hospital room number was the phone number he had in the past. Yes it probably would have been neater if it had ended with him jumping off the tower, but they have to open the door to the sequel so fair do on that.
Somebody said that he had accepted death and that was the end. Where the test card girl turns off the TV is supposed to be turning off his life support. But I personally think she was turning off the fourth wall because he had bricked over it with his commitment to the 1973 reality.
So I liked it anyhow LOL.
I thought the test card girl turning off the TV that we were watching them through meant that Sam had decided that he didn't want to come back to the present.
I can understand him not being in any more as other than the episode that was told in flashback poor John Simm was in every scene. Hard filiming schedule that one.
When he cut himself in the meeting and felt "nothing" he realised that scenario was in fact not reality and he had retreated somewhere.The whole scene of Sam waking up after the Coma, speaking to his Mum, in the meeting etc lasted only a few minutes, during that time the under gun fire Sam in the tunnel would probably have been curled up in a ball trying to cope with the violence all around him and soothing himself by his fantasy future. To get out of that and back to reality (1973) the only way his mind could do it was jump off the building and prove to himself he would not die. By doing this it was enough to snap him back into reality. The effort to do this rather than stay in retreat was triggered by love for Annie.
Why would Gene not be "pensioned off" as Gorman had intimated. Easy enough as Sam would not stand testimony to back up the tapes and records he had given him and also Gorman would have to back down as he had set up fellow officers to be shot at or killed.
Why or how did Sam know about future Police methods? How about because he was a highly intelligent police prodigy remember and may well have been the man who eventually introduced many of the modern police methods.
Scenes like in the previous series where he met his Mum in 1973 as a grown up Sam and told her to bet Red Rum to win the Grand National was just his mind trauma like a deja vea situation almost. Similar to when he Sam saw his girlfriend from 2007 in her mother on a cine film being projected on the wall.Mind jumping projecting an imaginary scenario into the present to cope with trauma and stress. Possible.
There willalways be AHHHHH but what about.... whatever scene it may be. Surely that is all deliberate to keep the viewer thinking, deciding, choosing. there has always been alot of clues , in the last series Sam almost jumped off a building if my memory serves me right.
Very good, clever, well crafted. A script with real effort for a change. Nice touch at the end scene when the wee lass from the test card ran out to play with the other kids and stared at the screen for two seconds, then ran away to play, finish on the theme, choose,decide,think.
Not that I have thought about this series much
;-)
Now as a writer under constant stress and trauma I am going back to retreat into my fantasy world place and watch Saturday's Grand National in advance. Whats that the voice is saying on my radio..... they have fifty yards to run in the 2007 Grand National and it's Homer Wells fighting it out with Clan Royal and Joes Edge both challenging with point Barrow finishing fast..... Dont say I didn't tell you...
Cue X-Files type music.
Aegean
---------
I love those kind of mind game ideas - in fact, I was going a bit doolally by the end of the Easter break (which for me ran on into Tuesday), as I watched both Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (loved it) and Life on Mars and read The Lovely Bones...so my sense of reality was all over the place by the end of all that!
puts it in a nutshell, really.
i was totally hooked on both series,and enjoyed the second series even more than the first.
i think its left up to the viewer to make up their own mind.
i loved the ending of this series, but my hubby, who enjoyed every episode, hated it, felt cheated, he said. not sure i want to watch the spin off from it though, as no sam tyler!
Did you see the piece in the papers and on the BBC, that someone is claiming the prog, and characters are responsible for homophobic bullying and name calling in the playground.
Do these people live in the real word! It was a tv drama.
No, it is not acceptable now, and if it's happening it should be explained why it's wrong.
I was a teenager at that time, and that sort of attitude by some grown men was 'the norm', and many gays/lesbians still kept quiet about their sexuality.
Next they'll be demanding a warning before the start of this type of programme.
Tyler Durden was the alter ego created by the narrator in Fight Club. He is invisible to everyone except for the man who created him to deal with his neurosis. He is also in a hospital dreaming this alternate world.
Just a thought.
I think that answers your earlier thread Tony,regarding does TV influence.
Seems probable the Life on Mars writer was influenced by the productions you mention.Possibly subconsciously, bit if a coincidence though as names have to originate from somewere.
It was a thoroughly good series though wasn't it.
Aegean
------
Yes you are right. I have also laid a few ghosts to rest concerning similar ideas through this. I now consider the fact that your idea may be similar on a subconscious level to another as cultural osmosis now. As long as you change it or evolve it, then an idea becomes new, even if it is an old one.
I was thinking after reading your post that although Life on Mars was ,for me anyway, one of the much better peces of work as already said, I have an increasing feeling that aspects were influenced by the movie Beautiful Mind also.