Is there Life in Gene?

Ashes to Ashes started last week, and I couldn't decide whether to look forward to it or not.

Gene Hunt was clearly a great invention, and it was inevitable and highly desirable that he would be brought back. The risk was that without John Simm the intensity would vanish from the experience, and instead we would be left with lightweight clowning and nostalgia.

I have to say that I enjoyed it much more than I expected to. Bringing a woman in for the eighties was absolutely spot on, giving an opportunity to highlight gender politics, but she did seem a bit shrill and frenetic against the relaxed joshing of the established gang in that first episode. Maybe that was the point though.

I joined the Met Police as a manager of civilian staff in the eighties, and I would say that casual sexism was still a very big issue, right up to when I left in the early nineties. In terms of authenticity though, what were they doing giving a DI short skirts and off the shoulder numbers showing her bra strap without her causing a riot? Of course we were all wearing sexy clothes outside of work, but in the eighties women were still fighting to be taken seriously in senior roles and were having to dress and behave like men. Even as a newcomer, she would have found her job impossible with those clothes. A2A is set in 1981, but in 1986 when I joined, suits were the order of the day for any woman hoping to be taken seriously, and I was given a ticking off during my first few weeks for wearing a (very smart) trouser suit; 'Women in trousers are not acceptable in a serious work environment as they are too revealing', so I think they missed a trick there.

It has already been interesting in highlighting how far we haven't moved, particularly in being unwilling to give a woman the benefit of the doubt. In the chat forums I have popped into it has been instructive to see how many woman have been grumbling about Keeley Hawes who plays the new female DI. I don't buy the argument that we are so far post-feminist that sisterly support is outdated. When women are being criticised by other women in terms that they wouldn't dream of using for men, I get really depressed.

Apart from that though, I think that there are some very interesting points to be made, so I hope they don't spend too long faffing about in an empty nostalgia fest, or gazing adoringly at Gene Hunt.

Having said all that, who can remain po-faced about gender politics for too long when Gene Hunt appears round the corner in his Audi Quattro? Certainly not me - I was hanging on every one of the Guvner's nuggets of wisdom within minutes this week despite all my misgivings. And there is the problem in a nutshell.

Ah well, I will just have to try harder next week.