What are we supposed to make of that ending? Did Sam kill himself? or is the 1973 world real?
If the 1973 world is real, how come he had such accurate knowledge of future technology, movie references, Red Rum winning, and such like? And what was the significance of Test Card girl.
But the alternative is to consider that he really was in a coma all that time, it was all a dream, which would be lame. Besides, isn’t Gene Hunt supposed to be returning for a sequel (without Sam). How can he do that if he’s just a dream?
The writer created a blog after the episode aired. While I quite liked the idea of leaving it slightly open to interpretation, I was looking for a clear resolution to the series. We were promised one!
The short version is that he did really return to 2006, it wasn’t part of his delusion. He just couldn’t relate to anything, yearned to return to his made up world. He committed suicide. I’m not entirely sure what happened at the end but I think the jist of it was that in the last few seconds of his real life he ‘lived’ out the entirely of his made up one. I’m a little surprised the BBC allowed it to end like that.
The ending left me a little cold. It felt rushed, I don’t think it was really a worthy ending to what has been a great series. It didn’t help that we were promised a clear resolution and all I could do at the end was look across the room and say ‘huh?’. He fought for the entire time to get back and then regretted it almost instantly. Okay, I understand the notion that ‘you never realise what you have until it’s gone’ but none of it was real. It didn’t appear that he even tried to reintegrate himself into 2006. He gave up his life to fantasy and in the end didn’t put up much of a fight. How did he even survive the first day with Gene Hunt with an attitude like that?
Okay, maybe I’ll like it more as time goes by. It was still a great series and the best thing on TV at the time. Now all we have is Doctor Who.
As for the new series. AFAIK it’s about a female detective from 2008 falling into a coma and being ‘sent back’ to 1980’s London. It includes Gene Hunt but Sam plays no part. Not sure about the rest of the gang… If you remember, when Sam returned to 2006, he made a taped record of his experiences while in the coma. She must have got her hands on them, that explains how she knows about Gene despite it all being imaginary.
I wasn’t really expecting there to be a tidy resolution, as I’m still not convinced that the writers knew how they would tie things up when they started the story. From a “making of” documentary that I saw, their main motivation for creating this show was to do an homage to The Sweeney. The time travel premise was just a set-up for that.
The official explanation from Matthew Graham, above, is all very An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, or Jacob’s Ladder, isn’t it? But if you prefer a more science fictiony sort of explanation, I suppose you could pretend that by going into a coma or dying, Sam actually travelled to a parallel universe, or through time. That would make Gene & Co. a bit more real. One fan theory I saw which I liked was that 1973 was real and Sam imagined 2006/7, as Frank Morgan told him in the graveyard. How does Sam know about mobile phones and RoboCop, then? Because he imagines everything about the future, including us, the audience. The test card girl at the end switches us off at the moment Sam accepts that this future was only in his mind. It seems that that theory is more elaborate than what the writers intended, but that does make me wonder what the graveyard scene was all about.
Conclusion aside, I thought the last two episodes were excellent, the Frank Morgan angle reintroduced some mystery to the show after a few too many crime-of-the-week episodes, and John Simm’s depiction of Sam finally cracking up was wonderful.
I looked at the schedule and was surprised to see an hour long episode - I had assumed a longer final episode in order to tie it all up. It did therefore feel a little rushed to me and as a result it appeared that Sam made little effort to connect with the now; and I did later think ‘what, so 1973 is great and now’s shit?’, however… that was just me lashing out at losing a loved one.
I think the constraint of time aside, we only knew the 1973 characters; how could we be happy to see the back of them and be introduced to the ‘real world’? It terms of story resolution he had to end up by choice in 1973.
I think it’s great that he did it for love, not for Spangles, Roxy Music and white dogshit. While I have a little professional discomfort at someone choosing suicide and a lifetime in a second over reality, the Tom Waits scene with Annie was so achingly perfect that it was the only choice he could make.
It also reminded me of the Star Trek episode where Picard lives a lifetime in minutes, where he has kids and grandkids and learns an instrument etc yet while still on the Enterprise. I found that pretty moving too.
I thought it was as good an ending as it could be and I’m quite sceptical of an 80’s version, only because I would want it to fall on it’s arse.
And in answer to the OP - yes, I think he killed himself - choosing his imaginary world over reality.
How does that make it lame?
Whilst there was great casting throughout, ‘Danny the Drug Dealer’ as ‘Morgan’ was inspired.
MiM
In the above post I meant to say ‘WOULDN’T want it to fall on it’s arse’ - alittle different