Playback / Ashes to Ashes
Ashes to Ashes · 2008
Gene Hunt
A red Audi Quattro, a leather jacket and a low angle — a hero introduction assembled from three codes.
Watch for
- The car as characterisation — the Quattro arrives before he does and speaks for him.
- The low angles that place him above the camera, coding authority.
- The revving engine and music cue doing the announcing that no dialogue does.
A worked reading · COCA
CContention
The series introduces Gene Hunt through vehicle, costume and camera angle, establishing a whole personality before he speaks.
OObservation
Hunt arrives at speed in a red Audi Quattro, shot from low angles as he emerges in a leather jacket, the engine and music cue carrying the moment rather than dialogue.
CConnotation
Letting an audacious car and a rogue's costume introduce him codes him as authority that does not follow procedure, and the low angle grants that swagger visual legitimacy.
AAudience
We are positioned to enjoy him rather than judge him, which is what allows the series to keep a difficult character sympathetic.
Your turn
- How did the visuals and sound during the Quattro entrance establish his personality?
- What can you predict about his role in the series from this introduction alone?
- What do the costume and props tell you that dialogue does not?
For teachers
Rob's existing Notion analysis of this scene is the basis for the questions above, which are drawn from that page. A strong non-film example for the character-introduction shelf — useful for showing that television uses the same conventions.
