How Many Episodes Of "Ashes to Ashes" Have You Seen?

When DI Alex Drake is shot and lands in 1981, she comes face-to-face with DCI Gene Hunt, the relic of old-fashioned policing she read about in Sam Tyler's reports. Alex thinks she is in a coma and needs Hunt's help to go after Layton, the man who shot her in 2008. She is confident she knows the rules of the game, but with no contact from the outside world Alex has to contend with a terrifying possibility.

When a prostitute complains of rape, Alex has a tough time convincing Gene to take the case seriously. She is the lone voice in CID, and only the link to a recent murder victim makes Gene take the investigation further. The pursuit of the attacker takes them undercover to a fancy dress boat party, but has Alex's determination got the better of her, and is her effort to prove a point masking her judgement?

Simon Neary is a gangster Gene has wanted to nail for years. When the team discovers that his latest deal is to obtain guns, the case takes on another imperative for Alex. Is stopping the guns a way to stop herself getting shot in 2008? Gene is shocked by how far Alex is prepared to go, including trying to persuade Neary's young boyfriend to turn informant. Would she put a civilian at risk?

Thousands of pounds collected for charity have been stolen, and the only lead is Gil Hollis, the man who raised it. Alex is sure that Gil knows more than he realises and that she can coax it out of him. But when Gene is humiliated on a TV appeal, he resorts to his 'fists first, questions later' method. Can Alex prevent Gene going off the rails just at the point when she needs to stay in control, and if she can't, will someone die?

After a pep talk from new broom superintendent Mackintosh who is anxious to stamp out police corruption, Hunt and his team are called to a Soho strip club where P.C. Irvine is found dead and, to quote Hunt, "looking like Hilda Ogden" in a photograph with stripper and wannabe actress Sally. Soon after Sally is shot dead. Irvine's widow Ruth is initially evasive, chiefly because she has been having an affair with Mackintosh, but she does give the team a diary, exonerating him from extortion but putting his young colleague Kevin Hales in the frame as the officer on the make, out to silence his worthier partner. The case resolved, Chris tries to atone to Shazz for his sexist comments by performing a full strip in public.

Alex hears that young Hales has died in prison, endorsing her conspiracy theory, and when Mackintosh wants the case closed even Hunt starts to agree with her. After a man who runs an animal research lab and his little girl are injured by a bomber Alex visits dogged anti-vivisectionist Robin Elliot, serving a jail term for a similar attack seven years before. He seems unnervingly aware of Alex's position but offers no help when the police are told to expect more attacks. After he has starved himself to death Alex learns from his effects who is continuing his campaign. The resultant shoot-out brings her closer to recalling her life in the 2000s but a celebration of her being saved coupled with the fact that Shazz and Chris are getting engaged is soured by the news that Mackintosh wants Hunt transferred to Plymouth.

Having heard television puppet Orville claim that she 'has made it to hospital' Alex attends at a burglary of her future in-laws and 14-year-old spouse-to-be, who obviously fail to recognize her. The thief's fingerprints are those of a crook who faked his death years earlier but has had a sex change, re-emerging as home beautician Gaynor who uses her work to locate victims like the Drakes. Alex is visited by ex-cop Summers, who is also from the 2000s, and who offers her a path home by subscribing to the dodgy Operation Rose, but she is wary, knowing that it implies the corruption Hunt is anxious to kill, following adverse press reports of police behaviour in the wake of the death of Mackintosh and his equally dishonest buddy.

Alex and DCI Hunt lead a raid on a construction site where a drug deal is being finalized. They also discover a partially buried body in a bed of freshly poured cement. For Hunt, making the drug bust and finding the the body is just a bit too convenient. He suspects the building site foreman of being up to something but can't quite put his finger on it. He soon realizes however that someone on the team is leaking information and he sets an elaborate trap to learn who it is. Alex meanwhile knows she's about to come out of surgery in her waking life and Summers, the rogue copper from her own time, warns her that her time is running short. She is shocked however when she meets the young PC Summers who approaches Hunt with a story about crooked cops and requesting his assistance.

Alex wakes up to find herself back in 1983 where Gene Hunt is on the run after shooting her, three months previously. His unit is being run by none other than Ray! Meanwhile the rest of the unit in involved with the abduction of Dorothy, a young girl, on her way to school. To make matters worse a ransom is demanded by the kidnappers, and it's up to the team to find the culprits - fast.

It's Election Night and an arsonist is setting fire to polling stations. Ray believes they have a military background given the devices used but is reluctant to believe the culprit, identified by an eye-witness, is fireman and ex-Falklands War hero Andy Smith who saved Ray's life. Andy is taken into custody,during which another fire is started, leading Alex to believe that a triangle involving Andy,his wife and his brother is the key to the crimes.Jim tries to persuade Ray to leave Hunt's team and join him.

Two loutish policemen, Litton and Bevan, whom Hunt knew in Manchester, turn up on his patch in pursuit of ageing comic Frank Hardwick,who has allegedly robbed the Police Widows Fund. However, when someone takes a pot shot at Frank ,Hunt and his team suspect that the visitors are lying. In fact he has evidence of their corruption and is fleeing for his life. With Frank safe at Luigi's Hunt takes great pleasure in playing the couple off against each other at a police gala.

The penultimate episode where the investigation of Gene Hunt is almost at an end, with Alex being pulled in two directions. Jim still wants to know whether Gene had anything to do with Sam Tyler's death, and Alex is best placed to find out everything they need to know so he's leaning hard on her to get the information. Gene and his team are called to an ANC illegal drinking den where things are not as they first appear to be. Initially it's a simple case of a public disorder but things soon take a turn for the worse.