22 replies on “Torchwood Discussion”

  1. Torchwood? What’s that, some kind of TV show? (;

    For the five days it was on, all I’ve wanted to do it just go up to people and go “Did you see that? DID YOU SEE THAT??!” but sadly all of my sufficiently-nerdy friends haven’t seen it yet!

    Plus I was actually speechless for like an hour after Day 4 ended. I was just sitting there going “Holy @#$^% did that just happen?”

    I’d pretty much have to have a huge spoiler tag to really mention anything.

    Anyone else catch this yet? What did YOU think?

    • Day 4 got to me because, well, it’s like the previous days were building up to this. There’s big bad aliens trying to do something utterly terrible, and the government is preventing Torchwood from dealing with them – and we just KNOW Torchwood are the EXPERTS and if ANYONE can fix it, Torchwood can, and they spend most of the first 4 days trying to get around the government, and finally Captain Jack, consummate HERO, marches up to the aliens, gives them the Big Hero Speech that’s going to just put the bastards in their place, and it FAILS CATASTROPHICALLY.

      Just in the WORST POSSIBLE WAY.

      I mean, up until day 4 I just wanted them to save the world etc. After day 4, I wanted REVENGE!

  2. Holy crap.. chararacter development, proper creepy aliens, a decent storyline, believable extras, no cringe-worthy dialogue… !?

    OK, who are you and what have you done with the real Torchwood? A show that has repeatedly given me the urge to slap the writers for being idiots.

    But this was good. Really good!

    • I really didn’t like what happened in Day 5. Then I thought about the who series a bit more and some of the characters are really paper thin. How many lines did Steven have throughout the whole series? Who is the special ops gal? does the PM do anything else than cover his ass at the expense of Frobisher?

      Then I thought about the whole premise of the situation. Why didn’t the aliens just start beaming up random kids directly? Why did they need us humans to round them up?

      To me this series had too much of RTD’s usual writing usual writing style and faults (the whole Earth is in danger *again*?)

      -vc

      • Actually, the premise doesn’t necessarily have a problem. Perhaps it was all a game? Perhaps they were under some sort of compulsion to give their victims a chance to fight back? Perhaps a species that is able to fight back in the allotted time is off limits? Perhaps it is a sort of “nyah, nyah, you can’t touch us” type of arrogance. Maybe a combination thereof?

        • Yes, there could be plenty of reasons for the aliens to do what they did. Did they ever say why in the episodes or have the characters address it or did I miss something?

          -vc

  3. What is the title of the episode in question?

    Perhaps one of us will start doing Torchwood reviews soon. Or maybe you guys could send your own. We could have rotating Torchwood commentary.

    If you’ll discuss it, we’ll at least post a discussion.

    What do you think?

    • The latest episodes are “Children of Earth.” Five episodes that occur over 5 days, which makes all of series three. It is supposed to show on BBC America & Space from July 20th-24th.

    • If they ever have more Torchwood, I’d be more than happy to write reviews.

      Or I can do one for Children of Earth.

      • I second this! (Jethro doing reviews, that is.)

        I watched it all today. We had plans for a friend to come over yesterday for a marathon, but she couldn’t make it, and then it fell through again today, so my wife and I just watched the whole thing. Definitely some of the best Torchwood yet.

        I still say that at the end, Jack just decided to do the same thing he was fighting against. Instead of 10% of the children to save the rest of the planet, he sacrificed just one child. He used few to save many. The deal (1 or six billion) was a lot better, but the concept was the same. That just didn’t sit too well with me, but I’m not sure what I’d have done in that situation differently.

        • Not only did Jack sacrifice a child, it was his own (well, grandchild.) More than any of the politicians were willing to do. Jack also did this to stop the alien’s plan, not give into it. I just wish Jack actually said something (anything) to Steven before pushing the final button.

          -vc

  4. Children of Earth annoyed me. If Russell T Davies can write like that, then why the hell have we had to put up with some of the rubbish he foisted on earlier Torchwood and Doctor Who? Though maybe he had to wait until he could channel the spirit of Nigel Kneale given the tone of the series.

    A series 4 could be tricky given the state of the characters. And I hope Jack knows where his towel is…

  5. I still found it mostly painful to watch. Less cringe-worthy than previous Torchwood, but still bad. Does anyone else find the relationship between Jack & Ianto utterly unconvincing? Does anyone else find Gwen & Tosh just plain uninteresting? It also seemed like a regular episode compressed into 5 hours. What happened in the first 4.5 episodes that could not have been put into the first 40 minutes? The ending lasted less than 10. A lot of hype for nothing.

    Maybe it’s just that the plot of government meddles -> good guys roll over and play dead, just pisses me off. Good guys should tell the government to piss off and get out of their way. Having the meddling government win just makes me angry, and is not a good or interesting story.

    Bring in some fresh writers, please…and stop trying to make Jack be just like the Doctor. His character was much more interesting when he first showed up on Dr. Who, but the guy in Torchwood sucks.

    • Did you actually watch this? I find it doubtful you did, since you’re referencing Tosh, and she died in the previous season. What’s next, are you going to complain that Owen didn’t get enough screen time either? And how did the good guys roll over? They had their base blown up for crying out loud and were on the run for about 60% of the series.

      Personally, I thought this was phenomenal. Jack had been somewhat lackluster in the last season, and by the end of this they appear to have brought back the older version of him (the one more likely to turn his back on people and serve his own needs). If there was a low point for me, it was the doctor at the beginning – other than that, it was solid.

      • We really need an edit button – I used the wrong brackets on my spoiler tags again! Sorry everyone!

      • Yeah I like to comment on things I’ve never seen.

        By “Tosh” I meant “that other character besides Ianto, Jack, and Gwen”, which, as you say, Tosh & Owen weren’t in this episode. They’re still boring though.

  6. He (RTD) seems to do emotion very well, because people get all worked up – I think once that dies down and they return they’ll see not that good a story with a lot of holes and lack of logic.
    But worst of all to me, its not very scifi when you get right down to it – remove a few bits and it could be a thriller.

    • This had the emotional feel of Second Coming, which I thought was good in concept, but slow, and could have been compressed to a forty minute show. Second Coming did help me understand what Eddie Izzard meant when he described ‘Room With A View With A Staircase And A Pond’.

    • I chose to think of it as they needed to target the specific location, and only going get a large area at a time, styled like using the transporter room in Star Trek, except needing it on both sides.

      IE: They can do 20 acre-sized sites, but not a few million meter-wide sites.

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