Episode 1
London, 2008. DI Alex Drake has risen rapidly through the Metropolitan Police and has an added string to her bow. A trained psychologist, she is writing a book on colleagues who have suffered trauma, and spent several months studying Sam Tyler, the DCI who found himself in 1973 when he was hit by a car and fell into a coma. Brilliant at her job but at the expense of a home life, she has no relationship save that with her 12-year-old daughter Molly.
As Alex drives Molly to school on her birthday, she is called to a hostage scenario where drug-addled Arthur Layton holds a gun to the head of a busker. When Alex tries to reason with Layton, he tells Alex that he knew her parents, both of whom were killed when Alex was only eight years old. Layton manages to get Alex away to an abandoned boat, where he shoots her in the head.
Alex opens her eyes – to find herself dressed in a red leather mini skirt and fur coat, with Ultravox ringing in her ears. She is surrounded by hedonistic City boys and prostitutes partying on a boat. It’s 1981. Alex is confused, to say the least.
Episode 2
It’s the week of the Royal Wedding and the streets are buzzing with excitement. Alex has mixed emotions of the day. She was eight years old at the time and remembers she was left alone at boarding school to watch the event on television. Her mother is also on her mind as she appears on the television, embroiled in a high-profile legal case with the Met. Being a fighter and an optimist, Alex is determined not to let her memories get her down, and enters into the spirit of things.
Gene, by contrast, is on edge. He wants to keep the streets quiet for Lady Di’s wedding – so when a protesting family threatens to disturb the peace, he races onto the scene.Episode 3
When a prostitute named Trixie makes a complaint of rape, Alex has a job persuading her intractable DCI that raping a prostitute is even possible. Only the resemblance of Trixie’s injuries to that of a recent murder victim, Delphine Parkes, is enough for Gene to want to investigate the matter further.
Injuries aside, the two victims couldn’t be further apart. Trixie is a street-wise tart, whereas Delphine was a devout church-goer who sang in the local choir. Gene believes that one is more of an innocent victim than the other; and Ray and Chris are inclined to agree. Alex feels she’s on a one-woman campaign to help Trixie and warn other working girls in the area.Episode 4
When a dead body is discovered at a warehouse, DCI Gene Hunt is quick to dismiss the death of Martin Kennedy as suicide. However, with signs of a struggle and a massive blow to the head, the CID team finds itself involved in a murder investigation.
Feisty DI Alex Drake soon uncovers an intriguing piece of evidence: a piece of paper with a code. Leaving Custody Sergeant Viv with the task of solving the puzzle, Gene and the rest of the team head out to do the “real work”.Episode 5
DCI Gene Hunt and the team are hot on the trail of pimp and drug dealer Simon Neary. They track him to a swanky London hotel, as they believe a major drugs deal is about to go down.
However, their Eighties surveillance technology lets them down and, when they raid the room, all they find is a bag of sex toys and Neary’s confused boyfriend, Marcus Johnstone.
Gene and DI Alex Drake quiz a mole for information on Neary’s latest dealings. It seems he has a major firearms deal in the pipeline and Alex believes that if she can stop the guns being sold, she will wake up and get back to daughter Molly in 2008.Episode 6
A witness statement taken by DCI Gene Hunt following an armed robbery sets alarm bells ringing for the straight-talking detective. He immediately links the modus operandi of the robbers to Chas Cale, a renowned criminal whom he tried to bring down in Manchester.
Chas is brought in for questioning but, as Gene pushes for a confession, Chas claims he could not have been involved; he has developed epilepsy and has had to give up his adrenaline-fuelled life of crime.
The realisation that Chas is not as young as he once was makes Gene think about himself and his career, and he wonders whether he is past his prime.Episode 7
Fund-raiser Gill Hollis has spent the last year travelling Great Britain in a bathtub of beans raising money for Children in Need. So, when he is shot in the arm and robbed of all the money he raised, DCI Gene Hunt and the team need to do all they can to bring the robbers to justice.
DI Alex Drake believes a reconstruction will help lead to an arrest, much to Gene’s disapproval.
Gill fails to remember anything about the incident, so Alex takes him back to the crime scene to try to jog his memory. As Gill’s behaviour becomes erratic near the area of the robbery, Alex realises he has OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) that not only gets in the way of any progress, but also gets right on Gene’s nerves.Episode 8
Alex is 24 hours from the event that changed her life – the murder of her parents in a car bomb. She believes that if she can save her parents, she will get home to her daughter in 2008. Her childhood memories of the day are vague, so, armed with that information, she makes her parents’ death into a ‘case’ – a crime that hasn’t happened.
Ray is horrified when Alex chooses him to help her with her crazy mission. She destroys the blue Ford she thinks was the car her parents died in and starts to believe she is in control of her destiny. Ray thinks she’s finally lost it.
Meanwhile, Gene is in hell; Lord Scarman is due to visit the station. Gene will stop at nothing to give a good impression, right down to releasing all the prisoners and locking up Chris so that he can give the station a good review.