I haven't seen Ashes to Ashes yet, but so much of the pleasure of Life on Mars came from the sheer angstiness of Sam's situation. By the sounds of it Ashes to Ashes opts for a comedy route instead (which is fair enough, because a repetition of all that angst would have been rather tedious), so what I really want to know is, is it actually funny?
I think you're right that 1981 can't be nostalgic in the way 1973 was. One of the lovely things about LoM was discovering just how much of another country 1973 was, whereas the 1980s are basically us in bad clothes. That sense of total disconnect is missing, so I imagine it's quite hard to come up with stories that do more than laugh at 80s bad taste. But I'd be really happy to be proved wrong, because I want Gene Hunt's afterlife to be a worthwhile one.
Lucky you, getting to see baby Rupert Graves at school assemblies!
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I think you're right that 1981 can't be nostalgic in the way 1973 was. One of the lovely things about LoM was discovering just how much of another country 1973 was, whereas the 1980s are basically us in bad clothes. That sense of total disconnect is missing, so I imagine it's quite hard to come up with stories that do more than laugh at 80s bad taste. But I'd be really happy to be proved wrong, because I want Gene Hunt's afterlife to be a worthwhile one.
Lucky you, getting to see baby Rupert Graves at school assemblies!