Ashes to Ashes – What’s up with the guns?

I think Alex Drake might be dead. Either that or she’s in a coma. Ashes to Ashes isn’t dropping a ton of clues, but that pasty faced clown Pierrot showed up again, and this time he pulled a sheet back to reveal Alex’s corpse with a bullet hole in the head. Pierrot reminds me of the crow in Damien: Omen II; whenever he appears, something bad happens. Alex also keeps hearing her daughter’s voice creepily saying “mommy” over and over. Is she trying to awaken Alex from a comatose state? I just dunno.

The plot last night had the gang of coppers trying to bring down a notorious crime boss named Simon Neary. Drugs, prostitution, murder and guns are some of Neary’s favorite past-times. He’s also gay, or a “pufter” if you prefer the eloquent term used by Gene and Ray. The gruesome killing of a police informant leads Alex and the rest to suspect Neary. In order to trap Neary, Alex gets chummy with his naive boyfriend, Marcus. Once Marcus learns Neary is a lying bastard, he agrees to help squash an impending gun deal.

This was easily the funniest of the episodes thus far. Gene unloads another clip of zingers (more on that later), but Ray Carling steals some serious thunder as well. Watching macho man Raymondo go undercover in a gay club is a riot. He takes to it quite naturally and Gene and Chris won’t let him forget it. The writers do an excellent job balancing the humor and drama, although Alex’s storyline often gets pushed to the back. They have so much fun with the character banter, you tend to forget Alex is lost in 1981 and we have no idea why.

About those guns. Alex throws a couple hissy fits about getting guns off the streets. She seems to surmise that ridding society of weapons will save her, and possibly her parents. Is this supposed to represent a general statement about the spread of violence or does it relate more specifically to Alex’s unusual predicament? Again, it’s not clear at this point. At first, I thought she was trying to find the exact handgun that shot her and remove it from circulation. Following this line of logic, if the gun is confiscated in 1981, then it can’t be used to shoot (kill?) her in 2008. However, this seems awfully far-fetched.

Time for the best of Gene Hunt:

• “Just follow him you dickhead.” Gene’s response to Chris’s pathetic attempt at being clever on the walkie.
• “It goes up your ass.” Gene explaining to Chris the appropriate location for a butt plug.
• “Get a waft of that. That’s man stink. Tell me that doesn’t moisten your gusset.” Gene really knows how to woo the ladies.
• “Might have fancied a punt.” Gene’s declaration at the prospect of Alex being a hooker.

Only three episodes remain. They got a lot of  ‘splainin’ to do. Since there is a second season, I’m not expecting the riddle to be solved. If you need to catch up on any of the episodes tune in to BBC America today at 3pm for the first five installments of the series. Maybe repeated viewings will stir up a new theory or two.

Clacked by Scott Tunstall
on Apr 05, 2009 @ 10:00 EST5EDT