I’ve resisted weighing in on the Life on Mars finale for a while, as I wanted time to digest it fully.

Its certainly sparked a lot of debate, with people either loving or hating it. For myself, I like its vague nature. Yes, I know that Matthew Grahame’s given an interview where he explains his take on it, but like all things, people can take what they want from the shows themselves. For myself, I like leaving it open to interpretation. Did he Time Travel? Is he dead? Was he mental? I don’t know. I’d like to think there’s an element of time travel involved, although there’s enough evidence to the contrary, I think some episodes lose their power if he’s just in a coma, or a nutter. I do like the theory that Sam never woke up in 2006, and those sequences were just a deeper aspect of his coma.

I especially like the idea of leaving things vague with Ashes to Ashes coming up. If you accept Life on Mars has a definitive answer, then Ashes to Ashes becomes a harder sell. Why should we care about her attempts to change the future for the better, if we know she’s just in a coma? (Assuming that’s the tact they’ll take again, of course).

Gridlock was another cracking episode of New Who. I loved the twist halfway through, and while the Face of Boe’s message wasn’t a surprise for anyone who’s read the 2005 annual, David Tennant nicely opened things up in Dr Who Confidential with his “Boe’s right, but the Doctor’s not wrong” statement. I just hope this season can keep this quality up throughout, as we’re off to a flying start again.

And finally, I’ve been gorging myself on Prison Break. I’d been meaning to watch it for months now, and I finally got round to using some time off to start working through the season 1 DVDs. Little did I know I’d get sucked in 24-style and blitz the lot over4 days. Yes, there’s some inherent daftness in the escape plan, and Michael is frequently the luckiest man alive, but the storylines remain gripping nonetheless, and there’s some really good acting. Of course, there’s not been much discussion about the morality of Michael helping various convicted and guilty convicts escape, and I’m sure that’s going to cause him some serious grief in season 2. Its great TV though. Now I just need to get my hands on season 2…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 17th, 2007 at 7:54 and is filed under Doctor Who, Television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.