Diary of a Torchwood Virgin: Series one down, two to go

I promised to speed my Torchwood watching up a notch or two, thus this Sunday post. The first series ended on a bit of a cliffhanger, one I should have seen coming but did not. I will say, though, that this is a confusing bunch of characters. The only one I think I understand is Tosh and she’s, frankly, least relevant to the show (something I hope changes in the second series). Everyone else though? They’re a bit all over the place.

“Out of Time”

“I was born in the future, lived in your past; my time is gone, too!” – Jack

Owen is one of the most confusing characters. He sleeps around, which isn’t anything new, but he doesn’t come across as the standard player archetype. Generally, I like the guy, but I just don’t understand him. Plus, you know, the whole kissing guys thing from the Pilot. It is hard for me to believe that he falls in love with Diane here, considering what we do know about him, but I’m apparently wrong in that opinion. What kind of broken is this boy?

It was nice, even for a moment, for Gwen to have someone to share her Torchwood life with. I’ve mentioned I don’t like the idea of keeping one’s family out of the “supernatural crime fighting” loop, but now, I think my biggest problem with Gwen and Rhys is that I don’t like Rhys. He’s too plain, and, frankly, he’s not worthy of her.

“Combat”

“You want to release a weevil in the middle of Cardif?” – Tosh
“Not exactly in the middle … a little to the side.” – Jack

Second verse, same as the first? Owen and Rhys are both being bigger wankers than they were before. Rhys, well, is being Rhys … but Owen is going through some deep emotional turmoil right now. I had disconnected the “love” connection he made with Diane in the last episode, but I guess I was wrong. Still, I’d love to know what makes this guy tick.

The idea of people other than Torchwood working in the same “market” as is an interesting concept. I had hopes when the episode started that there’d be some type of rival team working for evil purposes. When it devolved into Alien meets Fight Club, I was disappointed.

“Captain Jack Harkness”

“I went to war when I was a boy. I was with my best friend. We got caught crossing the border over enemy lines. They tortured him, not me, because he was weaker. They made me watch him die. And they let me go.“ – Jack

I never really expected time travel to be a relevant arc in the show, but two episodes of three proves me wrong. I’m still clueless as to what the Rift is, and at this point, I’m a bit worried that I might have missed a bit of exposition when I was looking in the other direction.

I really liked the dynamic between the two Jacks. Both are, in their own way, fairly tragic heroes. We may not fully understand why Torchwood Jack is the way he is, at least not yet. With the original Jack, it is a much more clear story. When we hear what the future holds for him, we know that he is the definition of a hero. The tragedy comes when he just discovers how to feel love, he will die with only a dance to remember.

(I did think, just for a second, that Jack was going back for his coat … boy did I call that one wrong.)

“End of Days”

“All of your staff has feelings, Jack. Even Owen.” – Gwen

Am I the only one that found it funny that all of the verses that Ianto was quoting were also references and characters in NBC’s Kings, the best show you never watched. (I prefer Brian Cox to the scary monster thing, but that’s just me.)

After having watched just the first part of the episode, I knew that Torchwood was doing something that could scare me out of my mind. On The West Wing Josh Lyman told us once that there were only seven smallpox vaccines existing in the country. If someone, metaphysical or otherwise, had the ability to release history’s worst diseases on the world, there would be a lot of dead people before things were brought under control.

Not sure I really understand the structure of the cliffhanger. Why “kill” Jack, bringing him back to life only for him to leave Torchwood on his own accord?

Finally, now that I’m done with the first series, I’m also done trying to figure out the sexual relationships on this show. The only cast member who hasn’t seemingly kissed a member of both sexes on this show thus far is Gwen. I guess I’ll just shut up and enjoy the ride.

You can check out previous entries in my Torchwood Virgin Diary here.

Clacked by Ivey West
on Jun 19, 2011 @ 13:26 EST5EDT