SYNOPSIS
Gwen’s at home in her apartment with Rhys, her partner. On the TV news she sees that strange phenomena are occurring all over the globe, including UFO sightings in Bombay, soldiers from far flung history are appearing in other cities there’s a Roman soldier under arrest in Cardiff jail there are more Weevils than ever on the loose and Cardiff Hospital has an outbreak of the Black Death due to an infected person from the 1400’s being admitted.....is this Judgment Day? The religious groups certainly think so.
The Hub is the center of all the abnormal activity - the temporal cracks emanates from Torchwood HQ, where the rift was opened and tempers are flaring because it’s all Owens’s fault. During this heated exchange - Jack fires Owen.
But there are other problems as well. The team is experiencing individual visions. Sato sees her mother, Gwen sees Bilis, Ianto sees his late girlfriend Lisa (pre Cyber process) Owen sees Diane, the pilot.
Gwen & Jack track Bilis to a clock shop called "A Stitch in Time". Bilis explains that he can step across eras, and advises that the rift should be reopened, and then everything would be sucked back to its original place. Bilis also shows Gwen the future - where her partner has dies of a stab wound. In an attempt to forestall this, she goes home, stuns him and has him placed in a cell at The Hub where during a power outage; he is visited and stabbed to death...by Bilis.
Owen returns, determined to over-rule Jack and open the rift he is backed up by the rest of the team. Jack makes a last ditch effort to keep the rift from opening and Owen shoots him in the head.
Jack regains consciousness (he can’t die - remember) when the rift has been opened and chaos is the order of the day. Bilis appears chanting "Out of the darkness he is come… the great devourer". From the rift, a huge Godzilla sized monster called Abbadon (please excuse my spelling if it’s wrong) has appeared - as per Bilis’s plan. Abbadon feeds on life itself, so as the monster stomps through central
"If he feeds on life, let’s see how he does with me. I’m an all you can eat buffet". Gwen drives him to open ground, where Abbadon sees him and feeds....and feeds....and feeds until Jack dies and Abbadon collapses and disappears. Jack though really IS dead and stays so for several days before being revived by Gwen, who kisses him on the forehead after maintaining a vigil over his body for days. Up above The Hub, everything has returned to normal. The way it was before the rift was opened the first time. The rift will, however be more volatile from now on.
When the question is asked if Jack had a vision, he says there wasn’t one in his case. When asked what vision would have convinced him he thinks for a moment and says..."the right kind of Doctor".
MAJOR SPOILER ALERT.
The hand in the jar, first seen in the second episode becomes active and the TARDIS sound is heard off screen. Jack smiles. Gwen appears - "Something’s taken him. Jack’s gone" cut to credits.
SO, WHAT DID WE LEARN?
When Owen is fired, he knows that someone will wipe his memory clean within the next 24 hours. We still have no idea who or what Bilis is. Is he alien? (He sure looks alien). The relationships between the Team seem more confused than ever...Owen has slept with Gwen, Sato and Suzie. Ianto (if we are to believe what Owen says in anger) has slept with Jack.
SPOILER ALERT AGAIN
Oh...and I was right about the hand, wasn’t I? Apparently Jack teams up with the Doctor in one of the first episodes of the season that begins transmission during Easter.
THE VERDICT
I’ll admit that although I enjoyed the episode and its left me hungry for more - there were some things that fell flat. We’re still in the dark about Bilis, we still know precious little about Jack. I would’ve thought that at least one major character would’ve been killed in this episode (my personal vote went for Owen because he’s a jerk.) but instead they copped out and although they killed Rhys once and Jack twice NOBODY stayed dead. I also couldn’t help but notice that there was a 150 foot high monster stomping
I’ll be tuning in for the second season though.....
SYNOPSIS
The episode begins with flashback to Owens’s troubles over the past 2 episodes.
The
In the present, Gwen is investigating their disappearance with Ianto & Own providing backup at The Hub.
Naturally, Sato is having more than her fair share of problems blending in to an Armed Forces ball in 1941 - seeing that she is Japanese, but things are getting a little strange for Jack as well...as they meet an officer who introduces himself as Captain Jack Harkness of the 133rd Squadron. Jack (our Jack) introduces himself as Capt James Harper, explaining quietly to Sato that "Jack is not my name, it’s his. I took his". Jack admits he’s been in this time before, and took Harkness’s name as he dies the following day (21 January) on a training sortie
Back at The Hub, they know there’s been a temporal shift and Owen wants to open the rift to allow them to come back. However, he only has half the equation needed to achieve this. The other half is on Sato’s laptop back in ‘41. Ianto is violently opposed to the idea of the rift being opened, especially when Owen starts looking for a missing piece of the machine that can open it, which Jack has hidden in a safe.
To make things worse, the Ritz Manager in 1941 and the Ritz Caretaker showing Gwen around is an odd looking elderly gentleman named Bilis Manger...who hasn’t aged a day in the 65 year time span. He appears to be the key.
Following several failed attempts to get the second half of the equation to The Hub by Sato, which are sabotaged by Bilis, Owen opens the rift and is shot in the shoulder by Ianto while doing so. Jack & Sato walk in to the light, leaving a tearful "real" Capt Harkness on the dance floor, having shared a tender moment with "our" Jack.
The episode closes with Sato & Jack drinking to Captain Jack Harkness.
SO, WHAT DID WE LEARN?
We know that Jack has already been in 1941 - that’s where The Doctor first met him and he became a traveler in the TARDIS. The bisexual aspect of his character, broadly hinted at in "Dr Who" is now more implicit, in his relationship with the "real" Capt Harkness. We’re also told that he was a conman before taking Harkness’s name.
There was reference made to an incident (we presume) earlier in Jack’s military career. He has been to war before and was caught along with his best friend on the enemy line. They tortured his friend to death and made Jack watch him die. When asked who the enemy was, Jack replies "the worst creatures possible". So we don’t really know whether they were even human.
THE VERDICT
A poignant episode in which we think we learn more about Jack than we actually do. The whole temporal shift element is well handled and the Torchwood Team is as disparate bunch as ever. The gay scenes between the two Jacks were tastefully handled and would cause offense to nobody (always a potential hazard). A good lead in, overall to the season closer which immediately followed....because you KNOW there are going to be repercussions to opening the rift - right ?
Prior to transmission, the BBC broadcast a warning that the episode contains explicit language scenes....surprisingly, in retrospect, they gave no such warning about violence.
SYNOPSIS
We’re right in to the action in this episode with Jack on a Weevil hunt - alone. Everybody else has the night off. The pace is very reminiscent of a Buffy opening. Jack accidentally runs into Gwen, enjoying a meal at a restaurant with her boyfriend. She joins Jack in his pursuit - adding fuel to her boyfriend’s jealousy and anger at the commitment she’s showing her mysterious new job.
As they close in on the Weevil in a multi storey parking lot, a white van appears; masked men dressed in black appear and abduct the creature right from under their noses.
Owen won’t answer his cell phone, getting involved in a bar fight, Gwen’s relationship with her boyfriend is becoming ever more stormy and the captive Weevil we’ve seen at The Hub since Episode 1 appears to be weeping. Jack theorizes that it possesses some kind of telepathic empathy and senses that it’s fellow Weevil is in pain.
When they eventually catch up to Owen, he’s sent undercover to investigate a realtor by the name of Mark Lynch, while the rest of the team set the captive Weevil from The Hub loose in the middle of Cardiff to see if they can trace those responsible for capturing the earlier one.
Lynch himself is an evil looking character - truly the Yuppie from hell. After joining him for a drink and getting involved in the second bar fight of this episode - and a truly violent one at that - we saw Owen beating the stuffing out of his opponent, he goes back to Lynch’s home...where he has a Weevil chained in a spare room. He keeps it there to take out his aggression....to beat to a pulp whenever he feels the urge. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for it, seeing its battered face.
It turns out that what Lynch is doing is using his position as a realtor to acquire large properties like disused warehouses to host...a kind of Fight Club, where the rich and bored can go head to head with each other, and a Weevil. Owen is severely injured when he goes into the cage with the Weevil, but is saved when the Team appears to close the place down.
Realizing there’s nothing left for him - Lynch enters the cage to face the beast....Jack allows it to tear him apart.
Next week - the rift opens, and they’re back in 1941.
SO, WHAT DID WE LEARN?
Interestingly - Lynch echoes almost word for word to Owen what Suzie said to Jack before dying in Episode 8: "Something coming...out there in the darkness. Something coming". Owen is practically suicidal following Diane’s departure in the previous episode. Gwen is regretting her affair with him, and confesses all to Rhys, her boyfriend. But not before administering an amnesia drug.
THE VERDICT
They got it right this week. Torchwood is back on track after a peculiar couple of almost tediously slow episodes that seemed to go nowhere and contribute nothing... There was a satisfying mix between the action and domestic blitz as seen between Gwen & Rhys. The "something" that’s "coming" in "the dark" seems to be building up as a threat to be resolved within the next two episodes, to be shown as a double bill on New Year’s Day. Frankly - I can’t think of a better way to kick ’07 off. Can you?
SYNOPSIS
Owen, Gwen & Jack meet a plane landing in airfield. Nothing unusual in that - except the plane took off 30 minutes ago......in 1953!
The story is then how the Torchwood Team helps the three temporally displaced occupants of the plane adapt to life in 2007. Some of it is humorous, (shopping - their first sight of CDs, glamour magazines, etc) other parts are tragic.
The male occupant, John is the only one able to locate a surviving member of his family. His son is in an old people’s home, suffering Alzheimer’s.
Owen - true to form - wastes no time in seducing the female pilot, Diane. However, in a strange departure for his love them and leave them lifestyle - he falls deeply in love with her.
The remaining one Emma stays with Gwen & her boyfriend under the cover of being a relative of Gwen’s. But there’s domestic conflict. Rhys (the boyfriend) gets suspicious that all isn’t what it seems. He’s getting sick & tired of the secrecy shrouding Gwen’s job.
John decides he can’t face life in our time and succumbs to suicide. Jack tenderly stays with him as his car fills with carbon monoxide.
Diane decides to fly off somewhere else, leaving Owen in tears.
Emma leaves for
Uh...and that’s it.
SO, WHAT DID WE LEARN?
In his chat with John, we learn that Jack has also fallen through a hole in time, much as these three did. He also explains that he was born in the future, has lived in the past and has died once.
THE VERDICT
Regular readers might remember what I wrote as a verdict for the last episode: "It’s a slow episode - completely without tension or threat, though well played by the actors. Maybe it’s a chance to catch our breaths as the series winds up to a close over the next four episodes. If not, then it’s a misguided oddity that sticks out like a sore thumb".
The same is true here. To quote Jack “There’s no puzzle to solve, no enemy to fight, just three people who’ve become our responsibility” in short - another well played episode but ultimately pointless. It’s an ensemble piece for the characters of Jack, Owen & Gwen with Toshiko and Ianto barely visible even as peripheral characters. There’s no explanation why the plane ended up in 2007 other than they fell through a door in time & space" and there’s no attempt at an explanation as to how Jack, Owen & Gwen were waiting for them at the airfield. What began reminiscent of a classic Twilight Zone episode "The Last Flight" became a meandering oddity with no punch and very little in the form of a storyline. In fact, for the second consecutive week the plot has been more about the guests than the cast.
Never mind - business looks set to pick up next week, when we see some Weevils. I think it’s high time we brought back some kind of alien threat.
SYNOPSIS
Eugene Jones finds himself lying in the middle of the road.
He’s dead. He also appears to be acquainted somehow with the Torchwood team.
In a flashback to his schooldays, we see that he froze in an inter-school competition, costing his school the victory, to the shame and anguish of his father, who left the family home shortly afterwards. One of his teachers gives him something - apparently an alien eye (which looks like a prosthetic glass eye) that he found on a golf course. This is how he met team Torchwood. He began taking an interest in alien artifacts.
Now, dead and invisible he stows away on board the Torchwood SUV and follows them to The Hub, where he sees, among other things, Jack’s beloved hand in a jar which we last saw in ep 2. (In a "Starburst" interview with actor John Barrowman he confirms that this IS The Doctor’s severed hand from "The Christmas Invasion, though there’s no indication how, or if, this plays into the storyline.)
As the story progresses, it becomes increasingly obvious that
There are a handful of people at his funeral, but later as Torchwood are continuing their investigation, he saves Gwen from suffering the same fate he did by somehow pushing her out of the way of a moving car...then for a few seconds he becomes visible and everybody sees him, but properly. He then goes in to the light and disappears.
THE VERDICT
Originally entitled "Invisible Eugene" you could be forgiven for thinking you’d tuned in to "Ghost Whisperer" instead of "Torchwood". However - I feel strongly that the original title was by far the better, more evocative and descriptive one. It’s obvious that
Style-wise, I guess the closest we’ve seen to anything like this on Doctor Who is last season’s "Love & Monsters" episode which was told entirely from the point of view of the supporting incidental character.
That episode showed us someone whose life The Doctor touches and it’s pretty much the same here, with the way
It’s a slow episode - completely without tension or threat, though well played by the actors. Maybe it’s a chance to catch our breaths as the series winds up to a close over the next four episodes. If not, then it’s a misguided oddity that sticks out like a sore thumb.
They Keep Killing Suzie: Review and Overview by Robin Pierce
Prior to transmission, the BBC broadcast a warning that the episode contains violent scenes....and boy, they aren’t kidding.
SYNOPSIS
Remember Suzie Costello? She’s the Torchwood operative who went bad in the pilot episode, killing innocent people to field-test the resurrection glove that would bring the dead back to life for a couple of minutes. She died at the end of that episode having first shot Capt Jack Harkness - but at that point neither she, nor we, knew that the good Captain couldn’t be killed. This is shown in flashback at the episode’s beginning, just prior to Torchwood’s arrival at the scene of the latest in a gory series of messy murders. What distinguishes this from a normal murder is that the word "Torchwood" is written in the victims’ blood at the scene. Again, kudos to the makeup artists for a rendition of murder aftermath that wouldn’t look out of place on the cover of Fangoria magazine.
There is evidence to suggest that the killer is someone who’s been dosed up with an amnesia inducing drug that is only obtainable through Torchwood, and the only way to interrogate the victims is to use the glove, nicknamed by Ianto as "the risen mitten". The glove fell through the rift over 40 years ago, landing in Cardiff bay. Its origins are unknown, but to date the only person to use it with any success was past Torchwood member Suzie Costello. Fortunately, it appears that Gwen also has a talent for using the glove. The murder victim mentions the names "Max" "Pilgrim" and "Suzie".
Pilgrim is a religious support group, of which Suzie Costello was a member. "Max" was acquainted with Suzie. So, the investigation leads them to use the glove on Suzie’s body, in cold storage at Torchwood, and that’s when things get interesting. Suzie far outlasts the customary 2 mins, and is still alive, in a wheelchair with a gaping exit wound in the back of her head, three months later. Max is a person she "used" in order to talk about her days at Torchwood. She would then administer the amnesia drug, one per week...every week...for 2 years. Now. He’s a fully functioning psychotic. It has to be said that despite her resurrection, Suzie is a very grouchy, sulky, self pitying corpse. Understandably part of this is due to the fact that she’s forbidden to see her father, dying of cancer in a local hospital.
Max is picked up at a nightclub - and the word "Torchwood" is a trigger for him to go into a destructive, homicidal rage. It is also discovered that Suzie is getting stronger and that she’s actually using the glove to suck the life out of Gwen, thus literally replacing her own replacement. Unwittingly Gwen, in a humanitarian gesture, takes Suzie (against orders) to see her father. Torchwood is under lockdown at this point which prevents them from stopping Gwen & Suzie, and embarrassingly have to ask the police for help in finding the codeword that’ll cancel the program.
Own calculates that Gwen has only 40 mins to live, and is deteriorating rapidly. The back of her head has started to bleed in the same area as Suzie’s exit wound. At the hospital, Suzie walks out of her wheelchair and calmly kills her own father, while Gwen is too weak to intervene.
As the pair of them get away, with Gwen near the point of death - the rest of the team show up, and Jack shoots Suzie multiple times in a sadistic scene, especially for t.v.. This doesn’t kill her, but destroying the glove back at the Hub does. The connection between Suzie and Gwen is broken.
Back at the base, Suzie’s body is back in cold storage. Ianto mentions that it might not be over....gloves come in pairs.
SO, WHAT DID WE LEARN ?
There was a lot of information that may or may not be important. We learned that Suzie had also slept with Owen (we already know that both Gwen & Toshiko have). We learned that Jack is quite open about having had boyfriends in the past, as he tells Gwen about an encounter. If you work for Torchwood, then when you die, ALL your possessions are taking into lock-up storage by them. That’s EVERYTHING. Actually, when you die...you are ALSO put in cold storage by them. Forever. Maybe most importantly, we find that Suzie knows something that may figure in a future episode. She warns about "Something moving in the dark...coming for you, Jack"
THE VERDICT
Wow. Considering how down I was on last week’s episode for centering in more on the soap operatic relationship angle rather than a threat or a dramatic story arc, this episode is refreshingly back on course, and consolidates the best aspects of the series so far, with the hint of a story arc beginning to unfold. It also begins to build and expand on it’s own established continuity with the appearance of Suzie, and the reappearance of the glove. It’s a little disappointing that Jack’s answer to every threat is still to kill it, but given the fact that he had to choose between Gwen and Suzie - I think it’s understandable this time. Not much to do for Owen, Ianto or Toshiko this time around, but they’ve had the last few episodes more or less to expand their characters. Curiously, apart from a few hints, we’ve yet to learn anything substantive about Capt Jack Harkness.
PLOT
In the teaser, we're back in
As the episode begins, Torchwood arrives at an excavation to investigate the discovery of a skeleton and some kind of artifact. Watching them from a distance....is Mary. She hasn't aged.
The body has been in the ground for about 196 years, and back at the lab in the Hub, Toshiko Sato is tense - Owen & Gwen are openly flirting in a carry-on of the events of last week’s episode. Sato is obviously feeling isolated. In a bar, she is approached by Mary who easily befriends her and gives her a pendant capable of giving the wearer the ability to read the thoughts of others. It "levels the pitch between man & God".
Sato finds the use of this pendant to be addictive, even to the point of hiding its existence from the rest of the team. She listens in to the thoughts between Gwen & Owen, becoming aware of their affair. In their next meeting, Mary finds very little resistance in luring Sato into a Lesbian relationship.
During a stroll on
She is now fully seduced by the pendant, and (no pun intended) by Mary also. When Jack hears about her heroic act from an outside source, she brushes him off, but learns she cannot read his thoughts.
Mary reveals her true alien nature to Sato and explains that she's a political refugee. In her real form, she's a floating translucent being, and it turns out that the pendant is actually a communicator, as Mary explains "speaking orally is archaic...and kind of gross to look at". The alien artifact is a transportation device. Mary wants Sato to take her in to the hub to retrieve the device, and Sato agrees.
Capt. Jack is there waiting, and the full story is told. The alien assumed Mary's form seconds before the soldier shot her. She killed the soldier by tearing out his heart and she's basically been killing ever since. Capt Jack allows her to have the transporter - and she leaves. Jack reveals he had preset it to take her directly to the center of the sun. Sato destroys the pendant.
Next week, the return of the glove that brings the dead to life for a few minutes and of Susie, whom we haven't seen since she was killed off in the pilot episode.
THE VERDICT
Very poor, unsatisfactory "filler" episode, indifferently written, in my view. The series is taking a worrying tangent off the rails. This was an episode without any real purpose, other than to titillate the audience with a few lesbian sequences. Rather than have the main story arcs come from a threat from outside, they seem to center on the Torchwood team's sexual exploits.
I'm beginning to think also that the revelations about the relationships between the team members are being made a little too quickly with no time to allow previous relationships to "settle". Last week, Gwen & Owen began an affair, this week Toshiko has a lesbian affair....all before we've really begun to get to know the characters. It also seems that the Torchwood team is a very secretive and untrustworthy bunch of people. Consider this. So far in the season, we've had Susie murder members of the public to test her alien technology, we've had Ianto hide his half Cyber girlfriend in the Hub's storage facility, and we’ve got two members having an affair and Sato keeps this pendant a secret and allow an outsider in to the base. This is our defense against alien threats? Consider Capt Jack Harkness' appalling record of late, his response to threat seems to be an over-riding instinct to kill...everything.
Okay, so that's the bad - what's the good?
Despite my misgivings about all these relationships - the sexual chemistry between Owen & Gwen is well portrayed, the CGI on Mary's alien form is awesome looking (think "Abyss" for a visual reference) and, best of all...U.N.I.T. is mentioned a couple of times, putting paid to the notion that they no longer exist within the continuity of the "Whoniverse" (Sorry, that was awful.)
Until next week.....
Small Worlds: Review by Thomas Spychalski.
Every once in awhile, television stories and drama makes the best and boldest leap I know, and it starts to play out like a wonderfully written fictional short story. The pace moves just right, the air of suspense are tangible and the ideas presented in the tale drag you in just enough to suspend disbelief.
This episode is an example of that regardless of what shows name is atop the marquee.
This episode, along with Everything Changes, is another top notch story that shows that ‘adult themes’ do not mean getting an erection in a cupboard. It means taking simple things and thinking about the twists and turns you can add into the story, and then using the medium of the cameras and SFX to enhance and flesh out the basic plot.
Captain Jack got a little bit more polished as a character in this one, and while still being a little dark and cold (Which is a nice touch if done properly.), we also get a little back story to let us get to know him better and some believable emotion from him, and he was not even on a roof!
I am yet again also inclined to say that if we could tone the violence down just a smudge, and leave the adult sexual world behind, this is everything Doctor Who has not been so far, bar a few episodes made of the right stuff, but it dare not to.
The other great thing here is that it was not dealing with a violent alien race, bent on survival or conquest, but something that’s a part of our world, always was too, we just can’t see it or understand it. It is the outside, the true outside, and it really shocks us and makes us sit up and take notice when it comes around to visit us.
The little rip off I spotted and groaned at, when Gwen is picking the flower petal out of the child molesters corpse, a mimic of a similar scene in the movie Silence of the Lambs, was quickly forgotten, although I’m starting to think that someone in the Torchwood team is a great fan of that movie, as in everything changes the Weevil and Gwen do a little “Hello Clarice” gag down in the Torchwood cells, copying the scene where the two main characters of the movie meet for the first time.
I really almost thought that my Torchwood fan days were numbered after the Cyberwoman tale, at least until we got to see some of Captain Jack’s secrets, and I am happy to report that I was wrong.
Also, we get another little Doctor Who reference, as Jack mentions the Mara, an entity that appeared in two Peter Davison episodes, which is a nice touch also, as we are shown that not all Who references will be about the new series episodes, and that’s a great way of lining the two, and also a good way to do a reference without alienating casual viewers, another thing I wish we would see more of in Who.
I hope there are some more like these in the future, they make the series its own special entity, and everyone knows you hate those pesky enemies you cannot see.Small Worlds:Review and overview by Robin Pierce
Synopsis:
An elderly lady is in a forest at night, obviously looking for something. As she stands on the edge of a clearing, small, luminous flying creatures are seen, seemingly fairies. She photographs them.
As she turns away, they morph into something far more sinister looking.
Captain Jack is experiencing nightmare flashbacks while catching a nap in the
In the next scenes, a child is waiting for her stepfather to pick her up from school, and is being watched by a pedophile, who tries to lure her in to his car. She is saved by an unseen force. Most of these scenes are from the force's point of view, with a green tint and soft focus, very much like the opening scenes of "The Evil Dead". We hear a distorted childlike voice say "Come away, human child".
Capt Jack & Gwen attend a talk given by the old lady from the pre-title sequence. She's giving a presentation of slides showing the "fairies", whom she says are "friendly, loving creatures”, but according to Jack, she is "Wrong. She always gets it wrong".
Meanwhile, the pedophile has left his car and is staggering around a market, coughing, and vomiting red flower petals. He begs a police officer to help him and manages to get himself arrested.
The old lady is called Estelle, and Capt Jack & Gwen visit her at home. Surprisingly, she has very old pictures of Jack on her mantle. The photos are old, but Jack looks exactly like he does now. When Gwen asks about this, he dismisses her with an explanation that it was his father in the photo. He & Estelle knew each other during the war.
The pedophile is killed in his jail cell, choked on red petals. Jack has seen this before. He explains that they are not an alien race, they can be seen peripherally, they live forever and protect their own. They have a "chosen one" - a human child whom they look after, and can control the elements and the weather.
Estelle comes under attack and is drowned in heavy rain on an otherwise clear night. The weather anomaly is picked up by Torchwood. Jack cries as he sees her body and admits to Gwen that it was indeed him in the photos. "We made each other a vow that we'd be with each other until we died". He also explains his first encounter with the "fairies" was in
Gwen's home has been trashed - there are red petals among the wreckage.
Torchwood track another incidence of freak weather to a primary school, where the fairies are protecting the chosen one, Jasmine Pierce (no relation) who was the girl saved from the pedophile. A couple of bullies are picking on her. Incredibly high winds rear up, leaving Jasmine untouched. Later, they launch a spectacular attack on a family barbeque, killing Jasmine's cruel stepfather. Here they reveal themselves and manifest as green, tall, thin, spindly, sprite-like creatures with gossamer wings. Jasmine follows them as they lure her away to an area close to the house which used to be an old forest.
Gwen & Jack follow Jasmine...and in a stunning development, Jack allows Jasmine to go with them in order to save the many. The Torchwood team is disgusted with him, Jasmine's mother in hysterical with grief, having lost both her partner and her daughter within the space of a few minutes. But, as Jack pleads "what else could I do?”
The episode ends on a somber note as Gwen sees an image of a fairy with Jasmine's face on a photo.
Verdict
This is an interesting change of pace for the series. The previous threats have all been alien, now we deal with naturally occurring phenomena. Interestingly we have Jack doing the "wrong" thing for what he sees as the "right" reasons, pretty much like Ianto did in the previous episode. We learn some more about Jack, in that he hasn't aged a day since at least 1919 - the earliest sighting we had of him previously was in 1941. He still has something strapped to his wrist, some kind of scanner that has never been explained.
This is the hardest hitting episode yet. It is also the closest thing we've seen to a crossover episode with Doctor Who, and, from what I gather - this is as close as we're likely to get.
The theme is the question "what lengths would you go to, to save the one you love" and it's Ianto's turn to take centre stage. Up to this point, Ianto has been pretty much a man of mystery.
The dark horse, the guy who stays at the base while the others get to do the more glamorous alien chasing. He keeps the home fires burning, he mans the reception and as he says, basically he picks up the others’s**t. (There WAS a strong language warning before broadcast).
Following the standard intro, the Torchwood team is enjoying a strange game of basketball which involves the pterodactyl we saw in the first episode. As Ianto enters the scene, he is obviously troubled but nobody seems to notice his apparent edginess. As usual, the team leaves to go for a social drink in the local bar, leaving Ianto behind.
Yes, he does have some secrets, and Dark ones at that.He greets a visitor to the Torchwood complex, a Japanese doctor called Tanizaki. Ianto leads Tanizaki down in to the catacombs, where the full darkness of his secret is revealed. There is a girl down there, who has been half cyber converted. Also there are the remnants of a Cyber conversion unit. The girl was Ianto's girlfriend Lisa, and she worked for Torchwood London which was destroyed in the battle of
Cut to the Torchwood Team who are alerted to an UFO sighting over
Meanwhile Tanizaki is now alone with Lisa, who is awake and lucid. Though things are about to turn ugly with a capital "U". Remember one of Darth Vader’s first scenes, where it became apparent how much of a galactic badass he was by holding the rebel soldier up by the throat to his feet are hanging a yard off the ground. Well, that's what she does to Tanizaki before casually tossing him on to the conversion table which is now activated. Her voice is now fully "Cyber" as she intones "I can help you - I can make you strong".
As the team return to investigate the UFO sighting, there is a power loss as the conversion chamber works. Ianto actually covers this up. When he sees (in extremely gory close-up) the half converted face of Tanizaki (steel implant showing under torn skin, handlebar headset protruding from one side of his head) he asks what happened, the flat reply is "His upgrade failed".
Ianto persists in the cover up by hiding the body - as Lisa recharges.
Team finds out that the UFO poses no real threat, but notice the second power loss. A scan shows more than 1 life sign at Ianto's location so they assume they're under attack. CCTV footage shows them the beginnings of Ianto's betrayal of the team. Meanwhile - Gwen and Owen discover the Cyber Conversion Chamber. Owen recognizes it...but it's not supposed to be there.
Lisa walks in to frame and disarms Gwen with ease, uttering the chilling phrase "you will be like me". She throws Gwen into the conversion chamber. Jack arrives and struggles with Ianto, while Tashiko cuts the power just as the conversion process is about to begin.
Ianto is now a prisoner and confesses to everything at gunpoint. When asked why he never told the team about Lisa, he states "Torchwood exists to destroy alien threats" which is in line with what Queen Victoria said, as well as their attack on the retreating fleet in the Christmas special.
Well, the power is down and they're all trapped in the underground base with a super strong, determined Cyberwoman with more tenacity than a Terminator. "The army will be rebuilt from here" she says, casually surveying the Torchwood base. Ianto tries to reason with her, but she wants to transplant her brain in to his body. Sort of the ultimate marriage, I guess. When he refuses, she mutters "Then we are NOT compatible" and all hell breaks loose.
She repeatedly attacks Jack, mercilessly electrocuting him twice (but of course we know it's already been established he can't die) but while he's stunned and goes after Tashiko next.
Gwen & Owen are in hiding in what appears to be a morgue-type storage locker. Now here's a strange and unexpected scene. Owen & Gwen share a passionate kiss while hiding. The cell phone gives them away and the chase is on again.
In a final stand, Jack throws what he calls barbeque sauce over Lisa. This is a compound that helps the pterodactyl to find and home in on its food. It swoops. Believe me, the CGI rendition of the 'dactyl here is worthy of ILM and Jurassic park - no kidding. As it feeds on the struggling Cyberwoman, the rest of the team make their way above ground. Ianto is understandably distressed and emotional, telling Jack "One day, I'll have the chance to save you - and I’ll watch you suffer".
The power comes back on as a pizza delivery girl arrives, finding the place deserted....apart from Lisa, who's still alive.
Realizing that the power might save Lisa, Jack orders Ianto back in to the base execute Lisa in an act of inhumane redemption, uncharacteristic of the character as we've come to know him, which again hints at the possible darkness of future episodes. We really don't know whether he'll pull the trigger of the gun he holds to Ianto's head in these scenes. He insists Ianto prove his loyalty to the team in this way...or Ianto can take a bullet to the head.
Ianto agrees (as if he has any choice) and goes to face the final horror. Lisa has transplanted her brain (though how she did this unassisted remains kind of a mystery, unless the conversion chamber is now fully functional and automatic) into the head of the hapless pizza delivery girl.
Ianto can't shoot her, he's caught in an emotional turmoil...but the team does.
Unfortunately the ending is not as strong as the rest of the episode and after an act of treachery on this scale - almost costing the team their lives and unleashing the horror of the Cyber race...Ianto is allowed to return to his duties.
Overall, a great episode, very claustrophobic, dark and disturbing with the bulk of it taking place within the amazing Torchwood complex, but it almost seemed that they ran out of time to give us a properly satisfying ending.
Can they trust Ianto again....ever?
Have you ever sat through an episode of a series and thought to your self that you know exactly where this is going...and you continue to sit there just out of curiosity to see (or confirm) that you're right ? Yes - we all have, at one time or another.
Isn't it just a little disconcerting when you realize that they've double bluffed you outwitted you and pulled an absolutely blinding episode out of something you were a little blasé about ? Yep - I was well and truly taken for a ride on Sunday night with this episode.
"Torchwood - Outside the government, beyond the police, tracking down alien life on Earth and preparing the human race for the future because the 21st century is when everything changes...and you've gotta be ready" says Capt Jack Harkness' voiceover at the episode's beginning.
Torchwood is on foot, in chase mode at the episode's beginning, following an alien signal through the streets of
Incidentally, something I haven't touched on before but I will now - the Torchwood title sequence is a masterpiece of minimalism and lasts around five seconds. No photos...a pulsating logo as the show's stars are listed on the left of the screen.
Wonderful things, phone books....the little boy is found by Owen by looking in the directory just as the computer search is about to begin. He's a wartime evacuee, who stayed in
This is where things pick up. As they return form a fruitless search for the suspect Owen fumbles with the gadget as they enter a tunnel. He sees a young girl, dressed in early sixties fashion, she is terrified of a leering young man who approaches her. Owen is totally helpless...as he sees the girl beaten and taken away at knifepoint. Full marks here to Burn Gorman (Owen) his performance in this scene are entirely based on his facial expressions. He doesn't...or understandably can't...say a word. He appears as intimidated as the girl, though also outraged, and angry at himself for his inability to help. This inner rage carries over to all his subsequent scenes.
A computer search shows that there was a girl raped and murdered at that location, the culprit being an Ed Morgan - who was never brought to justice. They also theorize that the alien device amplifies strong emotional echoes - the little boy WAS lost and traumatized at reaching the station, having left his family for the last time ( they dies during the war) and the rape/murder speaks for itself.
Meanwhile, Owen is tormented by his memories of what he saw, while Gwen now at home, revisits key moments of her relationship with her boyfriend/partner/husband. She seems to be having a conflict of interest between her ordinary somewhat slobbish husband and her day-to-day-life and the dashing, heroic Capt Jack and her alien chasing day-job.
Owen tracks down Ed Morgan, now a retired old man. Paranoid, twitchy, claustrophobic, and very quick to anger. He also manages to capture the young man with the hoodie - who admits to having stolen the alien gizmo. He has seen a vision of his own death with the gadget.
Here comes the first attention grabbing twist. While holding the device, Gwen has another vision...this time...the most disturbing of all. It is dark, she has blood on her hands and she says "Owen...he's dead...I couldn't stop it". What? Does she kill Owen?
Capt Jack assures her this is only one possible future.
It appears that the hoodie kid has ALSO seen what Owen saw, and has been blackmailing Ed Morgan. Morgan has had enough, has a knife (his weapon of choice) and is on his way to kill the kid for once and for all when Torchwood shows up.
Here's the second twist - They reason with Morgan, who gives the knife to Gwen without a struggle, then in an emotional moment - accidentally walks straight in to the knife in Gwen's hand...there's nothing she can do to stop him, as she turns pleading to Owen that "he's dead....I couldn't stop it".
Back at Torchwood, the gizmo is placed in storage.
In all honesty, I never saw that coming and was a pretty ingenious twist. This is exactly the kind of high caliber writing that will keep me tuned in every week.
...and so it starts, the long wait is over....TORCHWOOD is here, and is well worth the wait.
So, what's it all about? For those of you still watching the second "new" season of Doctor Who, you'll be aware that TORCHWOOD has already been mentioned in a couple of episodes, most notably the Christmas Invasion, where they were contacted by the Prime Minister close to the episode's end and the "Tooth and Claw" episode where the TORCHWOOD institute was created by Queen Victoria. There will be other references, but I'll keep this spoiler free.
Now, TORCHWOOD comes in to they’re own. The opening episode promises a series that is a gritty at times, funny at times combination of "Men in Black" and "The X-Files". From the outset, the message comes loud and clear, that although this is a spin-off from Doctor Who....we're playing a whole different ball game and this is post watershed viewing with bloodshed, profanity and adult themes.
PC Gwen Cooper is investigating the latest in a series of murders, when a "special ops" unit turns up, causing the area to be evacuated. We instantly recognize the leader of this unit to be Capt Jack Harkness, still wearing the same familiar military uniform. From an overlooking multi storey car park, Gwen sees the incredible sight of a mysterious steel glove being used to temporarily resuscitate the murder victim for 2 minutes for interrogation.
Thus begins her investigation of TORCHWOOD.
Her second run in with them is at a local hospital, where the upper floors have been sealed. Following a hunch, she has her first encounter with an alien, and meets up with Capt Jack, whom she follows to
Joining Capt Jack are Toshiko Sato, Owen Harper, Suzie Costello, and Ianto Jones. TORCHWOOD is based
Underneath
There are other references to Dr Who, but apparently there will be no crossovers. Mention is made of the Christmas Invasion and of Cybermen but in the spirit of not spoiling, again - I'll go no further.
Naturally, as the title suggests, everything does indeed change and Gwen joins the TORCHWOOD team by the episode's end thus setting the scene for the upcoming episodes.
Day One:
It's Gwen's first day on the job, and a meteor crashes to Earth just outside
A gaseous alien is accidentally released and chaos ensues as the alien seeks a host body. This is when things get just a little different in an interesting way. No invasion, no takeover, no "take me to your leader"...this entity now in the host body of a young woman feeds off orgasmic energy during sex, reducing her partner to a small pile of dust. Apparently, human orgasmic energy is the best hit there is.
A touchy subject to be sure - one that is skillfully handled here with the right amount of humor (without plumbing the depths) and pathos as we see the effect the invader has on the host. It becomes clear that Gwen's part in the series is to provide the basic humanity - the empathy.
Capt Jack's origins are still a mystery; we still don't know how he got from the Dalek battle to 21st Century Earth. He claims to have come from a lot of places...but we find that he has a severed hand in a jar that seems to mean a lot to him (....I'm not sure if this will turn out to be the one the Doctor lost in the Christmas Invasion shortly before regenerating a new one...or it could just be wishful thinking on my part.)
Roll on episode 3. I'll see you then.
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