Torchwood episodes 3, 4 and 5
Nov. 17th, 2006 10:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayThere will be spoilers under the cut, but I think it's fairly non-spoilerish to say that episode five (Small World) is really very excellent and nobody should give up on the show until they've seen as far as that one :-)
With Doctor Who, it was The Unquiet Dead that really grabbed me and made me certain that I adored the show to itty pieces. I'd enjoyed the first two episodes a lot, but TUD was the grabber episode. I've been waiting for that episode from Torchwood and Small Worlds was it :-) I've enjoyed the other episodes a lot, but this was the one that had me completely glued.
But first, the other two. I've forgotten the title of episode three, but it wasn't a half bad episode despite that. It added a bit of depth to Owen, who is still a little bit slimy but at least seems to have a conscience at last. I have to admit that I wasn't expecting the ending, despite Gwen's visions and the fact that there were some fairly big signposts during the episode. I'm putting it down to being under the influence of The Bug From Hell. I'd been expecting that they'd change the way everything turned out or at least that it was going to be Owen rather than Gwen that stabbed the guy (or had the knife in their hand while the guy stabbed himself on it, as it turned out). So for me, in some ways, it was a surprise ending although I can see why my father at that point was declaring that Torchwood isn't doing anything particularly original.
Cyberwoman was an episode that I enjoyed more on second viewing, mainly because the plot holes that I'd spotted on the first viewing were slightly smaller on second viewing when I was paying more attention to the dialogue. This doesn't, however, mean that there were no plot holes - you could still drive a bus through them and it was reasonably easy to predict what would happen in the episode when you were about five minutes in. That said, I enjoyed it (forgiving its faults) and it was interesting to learn a bit more about Ianto. Obviously I'm a very sad, herd following woman because I really do like Ianto. Bad Sel. The episode wasn't what I expected from the trailers, mainly because the reason for the Cyberwoman's existence and her ties to Torchwood weren't at all what I expected.
One thing I did like was her reaction of disgust to her partially upgraded body. That, for me, was when she clicked as Cyber-creature. The brain transplant moment also worked for me and wasn't quite what I expected. But mainly the episode was about Ianto, which is why I enjoyed it and am forgiving all other faults.
In fact, Ianto is my only minor niggle with Small Worlds - no mention of what happened the previous week and he's acting as though nothing happened. I'm hoping that we'll see some consequences of what happened and particularly his confrontation with Jack later in the series. OTOH, there was some nice subtext in the opening scenes between Jack and Ianto that started all kinds of speculation in my head, so I'm wondering where that relationship will be going now.
Apart from that tiny niggle, I thoroughly enjoyed Small Worlds. It had me glued and feeling slightly shivery afterwards. The petals in the mouths was a really good, creepy touch. I think what I liked in particular was the fact that it didn't end the way that I expected. This kind of thing, where a child is in danger and being taken by alien things, usually ends with our heroes defeating the aliens to save her or, at the least, making some kind of deal so that they won't take that child in particular (usually ignoring the other children that the creatures will be taking at a later date). I definitely wasn't expecting Jack to let them have her. His reaction to the Faeries and the information we're now getting about how long he's been on Earth (I'm assuming that he didn't die in that train because the Faeries knew that they couldn't kill him) also gives us an idea of why Jack is so much darker and wearier than he was when we left him in Doctor Who.
It was also interesting based on an In Our Time show that I listened to recently about the history of Faeries in stories. It's only recently that they've been seen as the happy, tinkly, lovely creatures that we picture. At various times they've been closer to demons in stories and the various myths about where they originate also tie in well. There was a time when Faeries were thought to be the souls of still-born children and murdered men. They were also at one time thought to steal babies and children away to join them. All of which ties in with the ideas in this episode.
We also had some lovely acting from John Barrowman (I did like the Estella subplot), a tighter plot and a slightly more ambiguous ending than we've had previously. Putting all of this together produced a very good episode and I'm a very happy person :-)
With Doctor Who, it was The Unquiet Dead that really grabbed me and made me certain that I adored the show to itty pieces. I'd enjoyed the first two episodes a lot, but TUD was the grabber episode. I've been waiting for that episode from Torchwood and Small Worlds was it :-) I've enjoyed the other episodes a lot, but this was the one that had me completely glued.
But first, the other two. I've forgotten the title of episode three, but it wasn't a half bad episode despite that. It added a bit of depth to Owen, who is still a little bit slimy but at least seems to have a conscience at last. I have to admit that I wasn't expecting the ending, despite Gwen's visions and the fact that there were some fairly big signposts during the episode. I'm putting it down to being under the influence of The Bug From Hell. I'd been expecting that they'd change the way everything turned out or at least that it was going to be Owen rather than Gwen that stabbed the guy (or had the knife in their hand while the guy stabbed himself on it, as it turned out). So for me, in some ways, it was a surprise ending although I can see why my father at that point was declaring that Torchwood isn't doing anything particularly original.
Cyberwoman was an episode that I enjoyed more on second viewing, mainly because the plot holes that I'd spotted on the first viewing were slightly smaller on second viewing when I was paying more attention to the dialogue. This doesn't, however, mean that there were no plot holes - you could still drive a bus through them and it was reasonably easy to predict what would happen in the episode when you were about five minutes in. That said, I enjoyed it (forgiving its faults) and it was interesting to learn a bit more about Ianto. Obviously I'm a very sad, herd following woman because I really do like Ianto. Bad Sel. The episode wasn't what I expected from the trailers, mainly because the reason for the Cyberwoman's existence and her ties to Torchwood weren't at all what I expected.
One thing I did like was her reaction of disgust to her partially upgraded body. That, for me, was when she clicked as Cyber-creature. The brain transplant moment also worked for me and wasn't quite what I expected. But mainly the episode was about Ianto, which is why I enjoyed it and am forgiving all other faults.
In fact, Ianto is my only minor niggle with Small Worlds - no mention of what happened the previous week and he's acting as though nothing happened. I'm hoping that we'll see some consequences of what happened and particularly his confrontation with Jack later in the series. OTOH, there was some nice subtext in the opening scenes between Jack and Ianto that started all kinds of speculation in my head, so I'm wondering where that relationship will be going now.
Apart from that tiny niggle, I thoroughly enjoyed Small Worlds. It had me glued and feeling slightly shivery afterwards. The petals in the mouths was a really good, creepy touch. I think what I liked in particular was the fact that it didn't end the way that I expected. This kind of thing, where a child is in danger and being taken by alien things, usually ends with our heroes defeating the aliens to save her or, at the least, making some kind of deal so that they won't take that child in particular (usually ignoring the other children that the creatures will be taking at a later date). I definitely wasn't expecting Jack to let them have her. His reaction to the Faeries and the information we're now getting about how long he's been on Earth (I'm assuming that he didn't die in that train because the Faeries knew that they couldn't kill him) also gives us an idea of why Jack is so much darker and wearier than he was when we left him in Doctor Who.
It was also interesting based on an In Our Time show that I listened to recently about the history of Faeries in stories. It's only recently that they've been seen as the happy, tinkly, lovely creatures that we picture. At various times they've been closer to demons in stories and the various myths about where they originate also tie in well. There was a time when Faeries were thought to be the souls of still-born children and murdered men. They were also at one time thought to steal babies and children away to join them. All of which ties in with the ideas in this episode.
We also had some lovely acting from John Barrowman (I did like the Estella subplot), a tighter plot and a slightly more ambiguous ending than we've had previously. Putting all of this together produced a very good episode and I'm a very happy person :-)
