Episode 6 begins with Alex at home, asleep on the sofa. Haunting whistling is heard as she dreams of a soccer ball being kicked down the hall of the station. She picks up the ball and stares at it.
The next morning, she walks into the station… and looks confused. Police in riot gear are everywhere, and Viv is seen telling someone on the phone that all leave is canceled. When the person on the other end of the phone asks why, Viv tells him to “turn on your bloody television”.
Alex walks into the office, where the TV is reporting news of the riot and takeover of nearby Fenchurch Prison. It seems that ten prisoners jumped a guard patrol and the rest of the guards reacted with the “speed of a spastic tortoise” (Ray’s words). Alex asks if the wing held juveniles. Gene says that it does not, that it holds the worst prisoners: “You name it, they’ve raped it, robbed it, killed it.”
Gene says that their priority is a prisoner who escaped during the melee. Viv comes in and says he needs to have a word with Gene. But before they can talk, others join in the conversation and Viv gets lost in the shuffle. After Chris describes the escaped convict, Gene says that the gang can handle that by themselves, and that he’s going for a “quick refresher course” at the prison, which is only a couple minutes away. Alex, smiling, calls him “Braveheart in Paco Robanne”.
At the prison, all is chaos. The police are pelted with roof tiles, masonry, hammers and Molotov cocktails. Viv again tells Gene that he needs to talk to him, but Gene says there’s no time to chat… “it’s playtime”. We then see the scene inside the prison, and the advancing police officers are pelted with even more debris. Gene scans the prisoners and takes a long hard look at one in particular. The police advance with Hunt leading the charge. It’s like the biggest barroom brawl you’ve ever seen.
Continue reading “Ashes to Ashes: Season 3, Episode 6”
Rusty Torres, a Puerto Rican-born baseball player, was one of the few baseball players in history to deal with not one, not two, but three baseball-related riots in his career.
