Life on Mars & Ashes to Ashes

Life on Mars is a British television series broadcast on BBC One between 9 January 2006 and 10 April 2007. It tells the story of a Manchester police officer from 2006 (played by John Simm) who mysteriously finds himself working as a police officer in 1970s Manchester. Life on Mars, and its sequel, Ashes to Ashes, are notable for combining the mystery, supernatural, science fiction, time travel, period, and police procedural drama genres. The senior Police Officer in both series is DCI Gene Hunt, in Life on Mars he drives a Mk III Cortina 2.0 GXL, in Ashes to Ashes it is an Audi Quattro.

Ashes to Ashes is the sequel to Life on Mars. The series began airing on BBC One in February 2008. A second series began broadcasting in April 2009. A third and final series was broadcast from 2 April to 21 May 2010.

The series tells the story of Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes), a police officer in service with the London Metropolitan Police, who is shot in 2008 by a man called Arthur Layton and inexplicably regains consciousness in 1981

The final episode reveals that the Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes world is a form of limbo or purgatory, for "restless dead" police officers. These restless dead include Drake, Sam Tyler and the main characters Gene, Ray, Chris, and Shaz (Montserrat Lombard), all of whom died in violent circumstances.