The character received critical and public acclaim for his role in Life on Mars, being dubbed a "national hero", an unlikely sex symbol and a "top cop".

[2] The character is ultimately revealed to be an integral part of the strange world that both Sam Tyler and Alex Drake inhabit.

Throughout the programme Hunt is respected by the characters under his command, mainly Chris Skelton (Marshall Lancaster) and Ray Carling (Dean Andrews).

During the two series, Hunt often uses unnecessary force while making arrests and conducting interviews, along with practising "noble-cause corruption" demonstrated by his fabrication and falsifying of evidence in order to secure convictions but never for personal gain.

[4] The first series, set in 1981, reveals Hunt to have divorced and replaced his Ford Cortina, as seen in Life on Mars, with an imported Audi Quattro.

Hunt first meets Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes), the protagonist, during a police drugs raid at a party.

Initially, he mistakenly believes that she is a prostitute and is unaware that like Sam Tyler, she has travelled back in time from the future.

In order to do this, she believes that preventing the death of her parents, Tim (Andrew Clover) and Caroline Price (Amelia Bullmore), will enable her to return.

While watching the death of her parents in the finale of the first series, she discovers that the person she remembers taking her hand as a child was Gene Hunt and not Evan White (Stephen Campbell Moore) as she previously thought.

The second series, set in 1982, introduces a new storyline of both Hunt and Alex Drake working together in order to expose corruption within Fenchurch East CID.

As well as the corruption storyline, Drake is stalked by Martin Summers (Gwilym Lee and Adrian Dunbar) who also claims to be from the future.

After several discoveries and unofficial investigations led by Hunt and Drake, it is revealed that the newly introduced character, Charlie Mackintosh (Roger Allam) is heavily involved in the corruption.

Summers, also involved in Operation Rose, plants a tape stolen from Drake on Hunt's desk on which she had questioned his existence and motives.

Eventually it is revealed that Chris Skelton had been paid large sums of money to undermine the investigation into Operation Rose, and had done so in order to pay for his wedding to Shaz Granger (Montserrat Lombard).

It is revealed that Rose is the codename for an upcoming robbery of a van carrying gold bullion masterminded by corrupt officers.

After a heated argument with Drake, Hunt suspends her and confiscates her warrant card, threatening to kill her if he finds her involved in the following day's events.

During the first episode, it is revealed that following Hunt's accidental shooting of Alex Drake, he was accused of attempted murder and fled to the Costa Brava and Isle of Wight for three months.

However, the vision that Drake has of the police officer with injuries to the side of his face is connected to Tyler's presumed death, and a roll of undeveloped film apparently reveals where the policeman is supposedly buried.

During the last episode, Hunt is revealed to be part of a supernatural world, a form of limbo, populated by dead police officers.

Shaz Granger was stabbed sometime around 1996 while trying to stop a car being broken into, Chris Skelton was shot dead during a firearms incident in 1975 and Ray Carling had hanged himself in 1972 because he felt he had let his family down after having failed basic training to join the army.

According to a news broadcast Drake sees after waking from her gunshot wound operation in 2008, Hunt's undiscovered grave was recently found by a group of travellers.

Hunt characterises his younger self as "skinny," headstrong and full of male bravado; he confesses that he'd completely forgotten about his past.

Afterward, Hunt takes Ray, Chris, Shaz and Alex "to the pub", The Railway Arms, a favoured hangout in Life on Mars, where they are greeted outside by Nelson.

Glenister has also drawn similarities between Hunt and football managers José Mourinho and Brian Clough on account of his "arrogance" and way of thinking.

Such as, Hunt has been described as "not being scared of throwing a few punches to get a result", whereas both Tyler and Alex Drake are present day detectives who value forensic evidence and thorough investigative techniques rather than corruption and violence.

Hunt become that rare thing, in these creatively timid and threadbare days for British drama: [However] in 200 miles, eight years and one sequel – Gene has gone from being a complex antihero to a cartoon hero.

"[22] Subsequently, Kudos Productions, which owns the copyright to the Gene Hunt character, wrote to both parties requiring them to cease using the image.

"[7]According to India Knight of The Sunday Times, the character has attained the status of an unlikely British sex symbol: "the combination of power and, shall we say, lack of political correctness can be a potent one - which is why everyone in Britain fell in love with Gene Hunt, the hulking great throwback in the BBC series Life on Mars and that men wanted to be Hunt; women wanted to be with him.

Actor Colm Meaney was cast as Hunt, the precinct Captain of a Los Angeles Police Department squad.

[31] The setting of the series was moved to New York City, and Hunt was changed to a police lieutenant,[15] the typical rank of a NYPD detective squad's commander.