Series Two Here We Come . . . .

With Series One now over, and official confirmation from the BBC of the second series fans have many questions. Rightly so too. Alex was unable to stop her parents dying, the true identity of "The Clown" was revealed and Gene (thankfully) averted losing his job from Lord Scarman. Speaking of Lord Scarman played by Geoffrey Palmer, fans of Doctor Who would have instantly recognised him as being Captain Hardaker from last years Christmas Special "Voyage Of The Damned". Life On Mars had connections to Doctor Who through its cast, now I guess its its Ashes turn.

The questions episode eight promted me to ask are:

1. Will we see The Clown in Series 2, now that his true identity has been revealed or will he be replaced with a new character? After all for a while there he was considered to be Ashes version of the channel girl from Life On Mars.

2. Will Alex and Gene, finally get together or will the tension just simply keep continuing to build between them?

3. Will we ever get to see the now ex-Mrs Hunt, or will she just be spoken about and not seen?

4. Have we seen the last of that Delorean and Danny Moore?

5. Will we ever see Sam Tyler again? His body was never found, this could be deliberate in the hope that John Simm will make a cameo at some stage.

6. Now that Layton is out of jail, thanks to Alex's Dad will he pursue Alex in Series 2?

I'm sure many of you out there have similar questions. Another one of mine is, when can we expect some more mechandise? We have the soundtrack already out, the Series 1 DVD Boxset coming soon and a tshirt from DJTees. Surely there is more to come? I'm hoping so, anyway. What are your thoughts, can you bear the wait until next year? Please feel free to comment.

'Til next time Martians / Burn Victims / Ash-heads, whatever you would like to call yourselves and be careful not to have any accidents. You never know where you may end up, 1973, 1981, 1995?



Cyberman

40 X 40 = Ashes To Ashes.tv

Greetings all, strange title for post but with good reason. This is the fortieth post on the site, and at the same time the site is approaching its 40,000th visitor. By the time you read this, it may very well have passed that. Well that's my trumpet blowing for the day, you want the the news though and here it is.

Over the past 7 weeks, we have all been treated to Ashes To Ashes series one. The show has unfortunately had its critics, some even piping up after or even before the first episode aired. Not really giving it chance, were they? The Deano agrees, and has written so over at his official site. Next to all the knockers (and I'm not talking about breasts here), the show has also had many positive reviews as well. A large amount of these coming from the famous Ian Wylie, over at the Manchester Evening News. Good on you Ian.

With that said this Thursday the 27th of March, Ashes sees the final episode of series one airing. What a ride its been and the show is finally starting to exhibit some increased tension, between our two main characters. I guess the writers probably did that deliberately, and at a guess will probably leave it to develop further in series two. While we are on the topic of series two, no official announcement has been made yet by the BBC in respect to a second series being picked up. Phil and Keeley have apparently confirmed a second series recently on the Jonathan Ross Show, but did not let on any more than that. I guess we will all find out soon enough though.

On the merchandise front, DJTees have released their second Gene Tshirt at the highly affordable price of £17.99. To sweeten the deal, they also offer free delivery worldwide. Will you be getting one? I know I will. In addition to this, I previously spoke about the fourth coming dvd set. The cover artwork has now been released for it, and in no real surprise at all mirrors the soundtrack artwork as expected. The artwork you can find below.


(Ashes To Ashes Series 1 DVD Artwork)

Well that is about it for this update, the episode breakdowns will return shortly. Sorry for the delay. 'Til next time Martians peace, and will Alex save her parents? I don't think so, changing the past effects the present and could very well hurt Alex in the process. Well just have to wait and see, not long now.....




Cyberman

Take Away A2A . . . .

Greetings all. Just a quick update, before I continue with the episode breakdowns. As you all would be aware, the Series 1 boxset has already been given a release date of May 5th 2008. The set is currently available for pre-order at Amazon (UK), Sendit.com, BBCShop and several other outlets online. If you pre-order the set, all outlets are offering a substantial discount which varies from site to site. So anyone ordering now is et to save themselves, big bucks!!!

Well before the boxset hits our shelves, the official soundtrack cd is set to be released on the 17th of March. This can also be pre-ordered from Amazon. The disc has a RRP of £8.98, and offers free delivery in the UK for all orders over £15.00. So why not do your friends a favour and pre-order 2 copies, that way the delivery is free. The disc contains the following tracks . . .

1. Introduction - Dialogue: Alex Drake
2. David Bowie - Ashes To Ashes
3. Visage - Fade To Grey
4. The Human League- Love Action
5. Duran Duran - Girls On Film
6. Dexys Midnight Runners - Geno
7. OMD - Souvenir
8. The Stranglers - No More Heroes
9. The Clash - I Fought The Law
10. Heaven 17 - (We Don't Need This) Fascist Groove Thing
11. Interlude - Dialogue: You're Nicked
12. Edmund Butt - Gene Genie (Gene Hunt's theme from `Ashes To Ashes')
13. The Passions - In Love With A German Film Star
14. Altered Images - Happy Birthday
15. Joe Jackson - It's Different For Girls
16. Flying Lizards - Money
17. The Beat - Doors Of Your Heart
18. The Ruts - Staring At The Rude Boys
19. The Teardrop Explodes - Reward
20. Tenpole Tudor - Swords Of A Thousand Men
21. Bryan Ferry - Let's Stick Together
22. Ultravox - Vienna
23. Edmund Butt - Title Music from `Ashes To Ashes'
24. Epilogue: Dialogue: Fandabydozy

The disc cover is an adapted version of one of the BBC desktops, currently available from the official site. I imagine this will more than likely serve as a preview for the yet to be released DVD Boxset cover, you can find the cover artwork below.


(Ashes To Ashes - Original Soundtrack Cover Artwork)

Other than these 2 items, many less than official pieces of merchandise have started to appear on ebay.co.uk. These counterfeit or non-endorsed items can found here. The items include tshirts, mouse pads, mugs, key rings, coasters and more. 'Til next time Martians, peace and I hope you are all enjoying Ashes To Ashes. I certainly am . . .




Cyberman

PS: I have a correction to make, in the last post I stated that the A2A font was the same font as used in the movie "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind". This is simply not the case with the logo. Although the 2 fonts are similar and share the "Blinds Effect" throughout the lettering, they are actually different. I just wanted to clear that up.

Series One - Episode One (PART TWO)

Okay I teased you quite a bit there, you're all waiting for an episode synopsis and here it is. The episode begins with with the familiar Sam Tyler self questioning, with a difference this time. "Am I mad in a coma or back in time?", is not being said by Sam but Molly, Alex Drake's daughter. Molly is reading Sam's "Confidential" reports, much to Alex's displeasure. Molly asks Alex will she write about Sam in her memoirs, and is told that Sam is worthy of a book all to himself.

The banter between the 2 is interrupted by Alex's police radio, which informs them that there is a siege taking place down at the docks. Alex arrives on the scene and tells Molly to stay in the car, so she remains safe. When Alex speaks to the officers in attendance, she is told that the gunman has asked for her by name. This perplexes Alex, she immediately goes over to the gunman and enters hostage-negotiation mode. The gunman appears to know Alex, though she has no idea of who he is.

The gunman lets go of the hostage, which further complicates matters as Molly is now out of the car and running to her mother. The obvious outcome of this would be for the gunman to grab Molly, and he does a predictable scene up until this point. The gunman then makes threats to kill Molly if Alex follows them, we hear a gunshot and of course Alex expects the worst. Running down the steps of the Quay to the shore, Alex is stopped by Molly. She has a sense of relief, which is short lived. The gunman appears to have given them the slip, from the surrounding confusion resulting from the gunfire.

Alex thinks her troubles are over and drops Molly off with her step-father, she then heads back to the car to go to the station. As soon as Alex puts her keys in the ignition, she is distracted by the sound of a gun being loaded in the back seat. A voice is then heard directing Alex to drive (a quite predictable but necessary plot development). They get to their destination and Alex is shot by the gunman (Layton), only to wake up in the same place in 1981. Alex's adventure now begins.

The plot of this first episode, I found to be very reminiscent of Life On Mars's very first episode in several ways but I suppose it needed to be to introduce Alex. Firstly in present day in both episodes, a crime is being committed which is connected directly to a crime happening in the past LOM (2006/1973) and A2A (2008/1981). The central character in both suffer near death experiences, which triggers an apparent time shift backwards to an earlier period of their lives. They (Sam & Alex) both encounter Gene Hunt, Chris Skelton and Ray Carling. Perhaps these are more the series' formula, rather than the actual plot. Either way both episodes had very similar story lines.

The episode not only introduces Alex, but also a new character as well which we had seen in promo pictures the character of course being WPC Sharon Granger. Sharon Granger is I suppose A2A's equivalent character to Annie Cartwright from LOM, but with a difference. Unlike Annie Cartwright, Sharon "Shaz" Granger seems to be a stronger character. This is more than likely due to the fact that Shaz is living in a time, where women were starting to become more equal in the work place. Though Gene's and Ray's archaic attitude to women, still manage to crush her spirit. Shaz also has a much more outgoing personality, and seems to be modelled (in hair at least) on one of the Human League's back up singers. It will be interesting to see how her character evolves over the series. Oh I forgot to mention, Shaz is Chris "the Div"'s girlfriend too.

Any way thats about it for this post, I'm sorry this site has started to fall behind now that Ashes is actually being screened. Over the next week I intend to play catch up, so by the screening of epidode 5 we will actually have full breakdowns of each episode. 'Til next time Martians / Burn Victims, peace. Also if anyone is curious about what font the titles are done in, its actaully the same font that was used for "Close Encounters of The Third Kind".




Cyberman

Series One - Episode One (PART ONE)

(Radio Times [2nd - 8th February 2008] - 4 Different A2A Covers)

Well Martians its here and it certainly did not disappoint, well myself in any case. The Radio Times seems to share my opinion by offering 4 different covers, for this weeks edition. For the majority of Life On Mars fans, the episode answered some pressing questions, and at the same time posed some more. We find out that Genes wife left him, and that Sam Tyler died (or so the team presume, seeing as his body was never recovered). These two answers prompt the questions, "Will we ever get to see Gene's now ex-wife on screen?" as well as "Will Sam Tyler ever make an appearance in Ashes To Ashes?".

If John Simm was to be asked this question now, he would more than likely answer no. The show seems to have been diliberately written this way, to make you ask these questions. Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah deserve congratulations here, for an extremely well written introduction to the series. Again the duo have started screwing with our heads, but did we really expect anything less. Of course we didn't, and neither did the show's fan base over at The Railway Arms (which by all means should be re-named Luigis', or least the A2A section).

For those of you expecting an episode synopsis here, I hate to disappoint you but you'll get that in the next post. Tonight Philip Glenister offers lucky UK fans, his own insights into Gene Hunt and Ashes To Ashes on "Friday Night With Jonathan Ross" at 10.35PM. Best set the PVR/DVR or primitive 80's VHS Recorder, or take the other option and be disappointed.

Ashes To Ashes Starts Today . . . . .

Greetings again Martians, today is the day when our hero Gene Hunt returns to the our screens after a year long abscence. This time in a different era, and with a different partner Alex Drake. Keeley Hawes (Alex Drake) was recently interviewed by GMTV in the UK, about her role in A2A and upcoming film appearances. Keeley mentions that Alex, unlike Sam in LOM is very aware that she is living in a dream. This should give her a major advantage, when dealing with Gene and 1981 in general.

She also discusses the disadvantages of being cast as Daniel Craigs sister, in one of her latest film outings "Flashbacks of a Fool". Poor Keeley, oh well I'm sure she'll survive. In addition to glimpses of A2A, we also get to see Keeley in a promo for the movie "The Bank Job". Keeley also talks about her husband appearing in Ashes To Ashes, with a mullet. As we count down the minutes until Ashes To Ashes starts, enjoy the interview.



(Keeley Hawes talks about Alex Drake)




Cyberman

Less Than A Week To Go, More Video, Confirmations, etc. . . . .

Greetings Martians, the excitement is building as we countdown the remaining days to episode one of Ashes To Ashes. Its taken a long time to get here, since the initial announcement of the show, but the wait is nearly over (well for citizens of the UK, anyway). Over the past 3 weeks, we have all been inundated with with video, pictures and articles.

Now something else to add to the list, downloadable mp3 interviews. "Whats new about that?", a lot of you are probably asking yourselves right now. Well it is and it isn't new, how can it be both? Quite simply, last year a number of audio interviews were posted. The difference though is that they were not mp3's, they were wma's (microsofts propriatry audio format). I'm making a point of this for one simple reason, these files can be locked to a certain country. In this case the UK. Whilst people in foreign countries can still download these protected files, they playback at a painfully slow speed making them virtually un-listenable (if that's a word). Mp3 format though does not support this region protection, thankfully allowing people from all over the world to listen to them. Links to these files are posted below.

Next up, what looks like the launch of an official Facebook page for the show. This may not be the case though, as there are many Facebook sites dedicated to A2A already but lets keep our fingers crossed. A fellow "youtuber" and member of "The Railway Arms", Herr Kamel seems to have scored a bit of a bonus with this new page. With a music video of his own creation being featured on the site, good on you Herr Kamel. If you become a "fan" of A2A through this site, you will automaticlly recieve updates in your own feed. A worth while feature for keeping on top of things.

Besides what I have mentioned above, more video has been circulating this past week though not in the form of a trailer. The Manchester Evening News (thanks to everyones good buddy Ian Wylie) as well as Philip Glenister's Official Site, have both posted identical clips featuring Alex, Gene and WPC Sharon Granger. In this rather short clip, we get to Alex investigating Genes new computer which is more than likely an 8086 or 286. By todays standards a mobile phone from 5 years ago would have a faster operating speed. This in time will more than likely prove to be one of Alex's pet hates, and rightly so. May be Chris (the resident computer genius or Div) will have to teach Alex some patience there.

Ian also fills us in on what happened to Sam Tyler and Genes wife after LOM, it appears the writers haven't overlooked anything. This will be great for fans, as many have pondered these questions since the end of LOM. Well that about wraps up this post for today, if you haven't done so already it may be time to program your PVRs, VCRs or DVD Recorders. After all no one wants to miss the premiere on Thursday February 7th at 9.00pm. 'Til next time Martians peace, and may A2A be everything and more than we all hoped for.

Audio 1, Audio 2, Audio 3, Audio 4, Audio 5, Audio 6.




Cyberman

Trailer 3 (PART 3)

As promised Martians, Burn Victims, etc, here is the third series 1 trailer. This trailer again includes previously seen footage, but also includes some great new scenes as well. We are recieving footage on a drip at present, which is only adding to the tension and anticipation already there. Its torture I know, but we will all be sated soon with the series 1 premiere.

You may have noticed a recent inclusion on the site, of the Ashes countdown clock on the menu bar. There simply to remind us how little time there is now, until we get Ashes To Ashes. Will Alex be a match for Gene? Its certainly looking that way. 'Til next time Martians peace, and enjoy Trailer 3.


(Ashes To Ashes - Series 1 Trailer 3)




Cyberman

Trailer 3 (PART 2)

Hello all, as promised the second part of this 3 post series. In the first part, I gave you a series of 10 stills from the third trailer. This post will be no different in that respect, here are another 10 stills for you all to enjoy. In the final post of this trilogy, as I mentioned previously I will post the trailer itself.

'Til next time Martians peace and remember, "this means nothing to me . . . " No I'm lying it means quite a lot to me, enjoy the pictures.















Cyberman

Tralier 3 (PART 1)

Hello all with the monumental thirst for content and information on Ashes To Ashes, now being quenched with promos. I've decided to give you all a special treat with the third trailer. This time in addition to the trailer itself, I'm giving you stills as well. The first of which you can find below.

If you are noting the 'part 1' in the title, this will be the first of three. The first and second will contain the pictures, the third with the video. I hope you enjoy them.













Cyberman

Official Site, Teaser & Other Stuff . . . . .

What an amazing month! Going back to December 21st last year I was in awe over the fact the site had nearly reached 10,000 visitors, well one month later its passed 15,000 and doesn't look to be slowing down anytime soon. I'm happy, but enough of my boasting you want the news. First up the trailers. To those of you who have been enjoying all of the recent trailers for A2A that I've posted, you would of noticed the fact that I had missed the very first one. To satisfy your hunger for material, I've decided to put up the initial Teaser-Trailer.

The trailer which is only 12 seconds long is still worth a look at, even though it contains footage appearing in one of the longer ones. It was our official introduction to the show, so its here for you now. You can find it located at the bottom of the post. The teaser itself, appears stretched out of perspective (ie: wide screen stretched to full screen) but it was the only version of it posted on youtube at the time. If this changes I will edit this post, and replace it with one that is in perspective. For the mean time though, this will have to do.

In site news, the official BBC Ashes To Ashes site has finally gone live. It's only one page at this stage, and part of BBC Drama though I am sure it will move to a larger site when the series begins just like Life On Mars did. It offers nothing in the way of desktops, avatars or icons. So it is a bit of a disappointment in that perspective, just simply series information at the moment. Possibly as a reaction to this, one of the contributors to the A2A Live Journal site has made some awesome avatars for your downloading pleasure. You can find the avatars located here.

In other site news, the guys over at the official Philip Glenister site have come back from their holidays now and have posted a large amount of new material. Phil also informs us of a new project hes just started for ITV, the supernatural drama "The Last Van Helsing". In this Phil plays a CIA agent, Rupert Galvin. Filming commenced on the 20th of January, for this 6 part ITV1 drama. So by the looks of it Phil is going to have a big year of scum busting, firstly with A2A and his "southern nancy boys" aided by Chris, Ray and Alex. Secondly as a Vampire-Hunter, the girls over at Philip Glenister Index will be going crazy over this one.

'Til next time Martians peace, and get your pre-orders in for the dvd.


(Ashes To Ashes Series 1 Teaser)




Cyberman

Second Trailer (Already)

Hello again, whilst writing my post yesterday I was amazed when all of a sudden a trailer for the series appeared on YouTube. Today, I'm over the moon. Not even 24 hours since having posted that first trailer, another one has appeared and I'm sure more will very soon. What I'm most amazed about is the shear volume of traffic it has generated for the site. At the time of writing this I've received more than 470 visits, since putting it up here. Wow. We'll see how this one goes.

This second trailer contains the guys with their machine guns on the Thames. It also gives us a quick glimpse of Alex getting shot, if you look closely (its quick) you'll actually be able to make out Alex's face on the bullet as it comes towards her. During November last year I wrote a post about Andrew Clover being cast as a Clown in the show, well that clown appears to be the clown from the original Bowie music video. Same costume so I guess we can only presume Andrews character is David Bowie. The scene is quite surreal and makes one wonder "will we be getting to meet Major Tom", the character in the song as well?

We also get our first taste for what music will be used in the series as well. The trailer features Vienna by Ultravox as the background music, and gives us a quick flash of Adam Ant as well. Anyway you want to see it, here it is enjoy . . . .

(Ashes To Ashes - Trailer 2)

Well I hope you all enjoyed that, as the other trailers are shown on tv I will keep you all up to date. By the time the show actually airs, their should be quite a collection happening here. 'Til next time Martians peace, and remember "My Mum said to get things done, you better not mess with Major Tom!".




Cyberman

2008 Is Here & Ashes Nearly Is . . . .

Greetings Martians, Burn Victims, etc . . . its been just under a month since I spoke to you last, about this up-coming series. There has been huge gaps and broken promises of posts, downloadables and other things from both this site and its parent site LifeOnMars.tv, over the last month. All I can say is sorry, these things will be sorted out soon. Apologies aside, I actually have something to say about Ashes To Ashes, its nearly here.

Yes finally after months of speculation over when the show was actually going to start, the BBC offers us a partial answer. Hooray! The BBC have finally listed the show as starting in Week 6 of there schedule. For those not in the know, what this means is the week commencing February 2. It does however not elaborate on this any further, as it is appearing as an "Unplaced Show".

Over the past few months only drips and drabs of information, besides the initial series announcement have manged to come our way. We have been tormented and teased by "I know something that you don't know journalism", which really doesn't tell you anything other than the person reporting it is a so and so. You know I didn't that Mr Wylie, love your work! I have actually been guilty of this myself. Why you ask? Quite simply the release of pictures, videos and information has been conditional on us not releasing certain sources or revealing specific information. In a way this has been good, as it has made the information we have shown you relatively spoiler free.

Other than this news, a couple of tidbits have come to light. For instance, the fact that Keeley's husband will be appearing the series. Hmmm, perhaps this was for trust reasons so he could keep tabs on the Mrs. Who knows. One thing is for certain, and that is that we will all find out soon enough. Getting back to the release date, Amazon has already posted the release date for the series 1 boxset. Yes you heard me correctly, we now know when we can buy it before we know when we can actually see it. Strange to say the least. The release date is tentatively marked for the 12th of May 2008, and the set has a price tag of £29.99 if you pre-order. The normal price will be £39.99, so a substantial saving there if you pre-order. I know I will.

With only just over a week to go until "Week 6", trailers for the series should start to appear relatively soon. As usual I will attempt to post trailers if they appear on youtube, but as we all know the BBC are quite diligent in there quest to remove unauthorised material from the web. So when these appear, they may not work on here for very long. I could have another bitch about this, but I've done it before so I'll give it a rest this time.

Over the past couple of months, since its beginning Dean Andrews Official blog has provided us with lots of juicy bits to tantalise our senses. Well the Deano comes through again, recently posting pictures of the Christmas Dinner and a couple of others including candid pics of Dean and the rest of the cast and the BAFTAS. You can find those pics here. As per usual Ms Hawes looks delicious, hey I'm male give me break.

I certainly didn't expect this, but while I have been writing this post a trailer has already appeared on youtube. Here it is, enjoy!


(Ashes To Ashes - Trailer 1)

Just before I go, you may also wish to check out this entertaining and highly fictitious interview with Ashley Pharoah, Matthew Graham and Gene Hunt. Yes Gene Hunt and not Philip Glenister, this was posted on the 7th of January at the MediaGuardian.co.uk website. Its well worth a read and will keep you entertained as well offering, well its fictitious what else can I say. The interview was conducted in the Luigi's restaurant that I have previously shown you pictures of. By the looks of it Luigi's, maybe the equivalent to The Railway Arms in LOM (ie: the local hang out).

'Til next time Martians (which will be sooner, rather than later this time), peace and may the next imaginary person you run into be Gene Hunt. Just like Keeley.



Cyberman