Not perfect at all, though, is the purely cop part of the show. Michael Imperioli's Det. Ray Carling is annoying - that's the fault of the character and the writing, not the fine actor - and though I've warmed up a little to Harvey Keitel's Lieutenant Gene Hunt (he finally displayed a bit of a heart last night), he still has a way to go.
It almost feels if the series is a collaboration between a very cool and a tone-deaf writer, with the cool one writing the time travel parts, and the tone-dead writer the cop parts.
There were very good time travel touches last night - the best being when Sam sees his younger self at the end. A time traveler running into his or her younger self is one of the sweet, infinitely paradoxical moments of any time travel story ... does the older traveler instantly get a memory of that encounter? What happens when that look is exchanged between their eyes? "I'm changing, rearranging..." as The Marmalade sing.
I've played with that a lot in my Loose Ends and Plot to Save Socrates stories ... When you're writing a novel or a story, it's easy to explore and lay out some of those possibilities. But what was Sam, the older Sam, thinking we he saw his younger self, and his younger self saw Sam, last night?
I'm looking to find out...
See also Life on Mars Debuts in America ... Life on Mars 2nd Episode in America: Coma, Time Travel, Mars Rover ... Life on Mars #4: All in the Family ... Life on Mars #5 Meets the Wire ... Life on Mars #6 Meets Itself on Television ... Life on Mars #7: Is Annie Real, Or, Is Life on Mars a False Memory
The Plot to Save Socrates
"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News
"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book
more about The Plot to Save Socrates...
Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!
And, hey, like a short, savvy, funny book about time travel? Try Frank Borzellieri's The Physics of Dark Shadows...
2 comments:
I got chills during the closing scene with the different cuts. Especially when they showed the 1973 World Champion Knicks banner:) Also I like the characters, Det. Rey seems to be the antognist to Det. Tyler. And Lt. Hunt is a throw-back Harvey Keitel character. And of course, who doesn't like Annie!
not but a minute or so into the show I saw a possible continuity problem. Among some young people in the park, was a bottle of bubble soap. That bottle had a UPC symbol on it. That is cutting it close. The first retail use of UPC barcodes was not till the middle of 1974, and it was not yet widespread. I doubt it had made it onto toy products in 1973.
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