Life on Mars (Series 2)

Star Review

The second series of BBC’s sleeper hit sees the screws tighten around detective Sam Tyler (John Simm) as he adapts to live in the 1970s, but still without any clue as to how he got there. The setup of Life on Mars evokes evokes the best of genre TV – hit by a car, a 21st century cop wakes up in 1973. Has Tyker’s body been knocked back in time, or has his brain simply been knocked out of kilter? This would be hokum if it wasn’t for the cracking cast – which includes Philip Glenister as hard-nosed DCI Gene Hunt - and the show’s uncanny knack for nailing the look and feel of the era better than any costume drama. As Tyler uses modern policing methods to crack 70s crimes and solve the mystery of his predicament, he finds himself running up against 70s attitudes that are equally mysterious.
Will our hero end up in a 21st century hospital bed or be forced to end his days surrounded by leather jackets and bad hair? The second and final series promises to reveal all!

on 12th March 2007

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Film Description

All seven episodes of the second series of the acclaimed BBC police drama starring John Simm and Philip Glenister. Detective Sam Tyler (Simm) is a professional 21st-century cop, keeping the streets of Manchester clean. But when he is run over in a near-fatal hit and run accident, he wakes up to find himself seemingly transported back in time to 1973. Trying to adjust to the archaic and sometimes brutal methods of Seventies police work, Sam frequently clashes with his abrasive, hard-drinking DCI, Gene Hunt (Glenister), but finds a sympathetic friend in WPC Annie Cartwright (Liz Smith). But is Sam just imagining all this? Is he in a coma? Or is he really back in time?

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• 4 discs.

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John Simm

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