Life On Mars: Series 2
Contender Entertainment Group (2007)
Science Fiction, Crime
In Collection
#465
0*
Seen ItYes
054961832590
IMDB   8.8
470 mins UK/English
DVD  Region 1   NR (Not Rated)
John Simm Sam Tyler
Philip Glenister Gene Hunt
Liz White Annie Cartwright
Dean Andrews Ray Carling
Marshall Lancaster Chris Skelton
Noreen Kershaw Phyllis Dobbs
Tony Marshall Nelson
Director Bharat Nalluri
John McKay
Producer Mathew Graham
Jane Featherstone
Writer Mathew Graham
Tony Jordan
Cinematography Tim Palmer
Grant Cameron
Musician Edmund Butt


A detective chief inspector from 2006 is investigating a serial killer when he is knocked over by a speeding car. Waking up, he finds himself mysteriously transported back in time to 1973. Initially struggling to come to terms with his situation, he has to come to terms with the old-fashioned technology and attitude of the day, while figuring out how he came to be trapped in the past. The actor John Simm described the show as "a cross between Back to the Future and The Sweeney", and it makes effective use of the disorientation of the unwitting time traveller while taking a post-modern romp through 1970s fashions and technologies, with due tribute paid to the classic police dramas of the day to fashion a truly unique programme.
Episodes
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    2/13/2007  1.  Episode 1
Tyler has visions of someone disrupting his life support system in 2006, and encounters who he thinks is the same assailant in 1973, running a gambling syndicate and protection racket. Recognising the man as a killer he failed to stop in the future, Tyler is prepared to go to any lengths to make sure his life is not threatened and the man doesn't kill his original victim.
Director:  S. J. Clarkson  Writer:  Matthew Graham (VI) 
Guest starring:  Tony Marshall (III), Noreen Kershaw, Kevin McNally, Craig Cheetham, Steve Garti, Yasmin Bannerman, Marc Warren, Michael Atkinson (V), Jonathan Wright (III), Gemma Wardle, Julian Kay
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    2/20/2007  2.  Episode 2
On an assignment to return a career safe breaker from prison for further questioning, Tyler, Ray and Chris are attacked by robbers and the man who they were taken in for questioning is broken out. Is a local gangster to blame, or is there more going on than meets the eye... specifically, was the crime actually arranged by Gene's old mentor? Meanwhile, Sam tries to break in the first black detective in the department, a man who will later become Sam's mentor when he first joins the police force.
Director:  S. J. Clarkson  Writer:  Chris Chibnall 
Guest starring:  Noreen Kershaw, Kevin McNally, Steve Evets, Chris Bieske, Craig Bieske, Ray Emmet Brown, Bill Rodgers (II), Stephen Bent, Trevor Williams (IV), Michael Thyx
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    3/6/2007  3.  Episode 3
The team receive a bomb warning, claiming the IRA has planted a car bomb in Manchester. Being from 2006, Sam realises the bomb warning reported doesn't fit with his understanding of IRA methods. However, when Sam's modern know-how fails and nearly kills Ray, the rest of the department shun his line of investigation to focus on an Irish socialist group. At the same time, Sam's visions of the future suggest that he may have suffered brain damage, affecting his higher reasoning, from having been in a coma for so long.
Director:  Richard Clark (VI)  Writer:  Julie Rutterford 
Guest starring:  Tony Marshall (III), Noreen Kershaw, Brendan Mackey, Peter Wight, Beatrice Kelly, Harriet Rogers (II)
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    3/13/2007  4.  Episode 4
The body of a young woman is found in wasteland. The investigation takes the team to suburbia, where a local car dealer is throwing private parties, employing make-up girls from a local company to “help out” when the wife-swapping begins. Posing as married couple Tony and Cherie Blair, Sam and Annie infiltrate one of the parties, only to discover that it isn't as simple as they think.
Director:  Richard Clark (VI)  Writer:  Ashley Pharoah 
Guest starring:  Noreen Kershaw, Alexander O'Loughlin, Nicholas Palliser, Eva Pope, Clare McGlinn, Georgia Taylor, Katherine Kelly (III), Meryl Hampton, Andrew Readman, Richard Sinnott, Carissa Wistow, Andy Hockley
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    3/20/2007  5.  Episode 5
The team investigates the abduction of a young woman and her daughter, who are being held prisoner by somebody who wishes the team to release a prisoner arrested on a murder charge a year ago. At the same time, Sam faces a life or death situation in 2006 when he thinks he has accidentally been given an overdose. As the deadline draws closer, Sam collapses into a deeper coma, leaving his colleagues to tackle the mystery on their own (Albeit using some of his earlier suggestions).
Director:  Andrew Gunn  Writer:  Matthew Graham (VI) 
Guest starring:  Noreen Kershaw, Reece Dinsdale, Lesley Clare O'Neill, Olwen May, Jonty Stephens, Adam Beresford, James Wells (II), Hayley McGroarty, Alicia Hall (II), Jodie Hamblet, Georgia Foote
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    3/27/2007  6.  Episode 6
As heroin hits the streets of Manchester for the first time, CID and DCI Hunt want culprits for the smuggling, the dealing and ensuing violence, which becomes difficult when Annie is kidnapped by the smugglers. As Sam tries to get to the source of the influx of this deadly drug, he finds himself intractably drawn to a beautiful young woman who was witness to a heroin-related shooting... and who, he later realises, is the mother of his girlfriend in the future. At the same time, Sam's 'visions' reveal that his girlfriend has decided to stop visiting him in hospital, as she can't keep waiting for him to wake up.
Director:  Andrew Gunn  Writer:  Guy Jenkin 
Guest starring:  Paul Shar, Noreen Kershaw, Archie Panjabi, Alex Reid (III), Tim Plester, Paul Sharma, Ian Puleston-Davies, Lorraine Cheshire, Paul Oldham
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    4/3/2007  7.  Episode 7
A water-tight court case fails to put away a local gangster. Unable to cope with a guilty man walking free, DCI Hunt turns to alcohol but soon finds himself in a spot of bother. When it appears as though Hunt may have killed someone, it's up to Sam, torn between Gene and his replacement, a DCI who actually uses Sam's modern police techniques and vocabulary, to help him out.
Director:  S. J. Clarkson  Writer:  Mark Greig 
Guest starring:  Tony Marshall, Tony Marshall (III), Noreen Kershaw, Ralph Brown, Seamus O'Neill, Kieran O'Brien, Corrinne Wicks, Jason Watkins, Ian Hanmore, Johnny Leeze, Genevieve Walsh, Bernard Nagle
    Seen it: Yes   60 mins    4/10/2007  8.  Episode 8
Sam learns that an operation is to be conducted on him in 2006 to try and revive him from his coma. However, he believes that to return to the twenty-first century, he has to betray his colleagues in 1973 - but can he regard them as real or imagined?
Director:  S. J. Clarkson  Writer:  Matthew Graham (VI) 
Guest starring:  Tony Marshal (III), Noreen Kershaw, Ralph Brown, Jack Deam, Sean Gilder, Philip Lightfoot, Jacqui Boatswain, Mason Phillips, Judi Jones, Harriet Rogers (II)
Edition Details
Series Life on Mars
Release Date 11/24/2009
Screen Ratio Widescreen (1.78:1)
Audio Tracks Stereo [English]
Layers Single Side, Single Layer
No. of Disks/Tapes 4