Alex Drake

Alex Drake
Ashes to Ashes character
Keeley Hawes as Alex Drake in Ashes to Ashes
First appearance	Ashes to Ashes: Episode 1, series 1
Last appearance	Ashes to Ashes: Episode 8, series 3
Portrayed by	Keeley Hawes (adult) Lucy Cole (child)
Information
Occupation	Police Officer Metropolitan Police (2008 & 1981-3)
Title	Detective Inspector (DI)
Nationality	British

DI Alexandra "Alex" Drake is a fictional character in BBC One's science fiction/police procedural drama, Ashes to Ashes. The character is portrayed by Keeley Hawes and as a child by Lucy Cole.

The character of Alex Drake is the main protagonist of Ashes to Ashes, the sequel to the 2006 series Life on Mars, which followed the story of Sam Tyler (John Simm) who wakes in 1973 after being hit by a car in 2005. Ashes to Ashes follows the similar storyline of Alex Drake who after being shot in 2008 awakes in 1981. The character has been described as "ballsy, confident and bright", along with being "perceptive in deduction" and "understanding the workings of the criminal mind".

During the first episode of Ashes to Ashes, it is revealed that Alex Drake is the unnamed police psychologist mentioned in the finale of Life on Mars, who interviewed and recorded case notes of Sam Tyler's time in 1973 and studied his subsequent suicide, as witnessed in the finale of Life on Mars.

During the opening scenes of the first episode, Drake, while driving her daughter Molly (Grace Vance) to school is unexpectedly called to a hostage situation near the embankment of the River Thames. Upon arriving, she is informed that the hostage taker, Arthur Layton (Sean Harris) is demanding to speak to her, despite Drake having no knowledge of him. Drake eventually negotiates the release of the civilian hostage in favour of herself. This prompts Drake's frightened daughter, Molly to rush past the cordon into the middle of the situation. Arthur Layton takes hold of Molly and rushes down the steps to the river's edge, followed by Drake shortly after to find her daughter unharmed with Layton missing. Upon returning to her car she fails to notice Layton in the back, who forces her at gunpoint to a disused barge and tells her that he knew her parents who died in 1981, Tim (Andrew Clover) and Caroline Price (Amelia Bullmore). Shortly after, Layton shoots Drake in the head.