The ultimate test of cerebral fitness

[redscharlach]

Obligatory post-series Ashes to Ashes post, coming up. Spoilers ahead, please proceed with caution.

• Firstly, a slightly sarcastic thank you to the BBC for telling everyone earlier today that there's going to be a third series. In other words: no, this is not the last episode ever, so don't get your hopes up too high, viewers - there are plenty of plates left to spin.
  
  
• The abovementioned downsizing of my expectations was probably a good idea, since the story took a bit of time to kick in, with too much of Alex saying meta-sentences that other people don't understand (yawn), and Gene's blonde bit on the side, looking like a refugee from EastEnders and so obviously EVIL that she could have turned up with "OH HAI GENE IM EVIL!" written across her chest in frosted blue eyeliner and it would have been more subtle.
  
  
• Despite the slightly lacklustre start, however, I soon found plenty of opportunities to make strange noises in the direction of the television:
  
  • GASP @ Alex confessing her secret to Gene!
    
  • GROAN @ Gene not believing her! (Of course he wouldn't, since he doesn't have the right cultural references for time-travel plots. If only Alex could have phrased it in terms of that Star Trek episode where they have to reenact the gunfight at the OK Corral - I bet he remembers that one.)
    
  • YAY @ Chris discovering his inner integrity!
    
  • LOL @ Shaz representing in her oh-so-eighties wedding dress!
    
  • BLEURGH @ Ray sinking his teeth into some poor bastard's saveloy of love... except not really (phew).
    
  • HUH?? @ Martin Summers turning out to have good motives after all, possibly-maybe-kinda will-we-ever-know does-it-matter?
  
  
• And then at the very end, I think I did all of those expressions at the same time. In fact, I now realize that the BBC news story bluffed me into thinking that Alex couldn't possibly go back to the present day... and then she did! Hmm, maybe the Beeb are cleverer than I give them credit for?
  
  
• Anyway, what on earth is series 3 going to be like? Is Alex going to spend the whole first episode banging her head off doorframes, headbutting walls, etc., just to land herself in a coma again? If she does wake up back in 1982, isn't a Gene-on-the-run plotline going to run itself into the ground pretty quickly? Will Gene's brain start wrapping itself slowly around the idea that Alex might be telling the truth? Will Annie from Life On Mars finally turn up and explain the whole darn plot to everyone? (Go on, writers, you might as well throw in the kitchen sink at this stage.)
  
  
• All in all: a much more solid series than the first round of Ashes, but can they pull any more lightning out of this bottle? Or will the elastic on Bolly's knickers have to give at some point? It's going to be a rather long wait to find out, isn't it. But I shall no doubt be there...

In other news, I am completely in love with Flight of the Conchords. That is all.