Forked Thread: Torchwood - Children of Earth (Spoilers)

[Plane Sailing]

Forked from: Torchwood - Children of Earth (Spoilers)

This thread will definitely contain spoilers, I suggest we (assuming there is a "we") try keeping them only to episodes already aired and denote spoilers of yet to be coming episodes.

What did you think? Like or no like?

So far, I liked it.
They make it more obvious now that people don't just forgot the various alien attacks on Earth. That's nice, and very different from most other Sci-Fi (*cough*Stargate*cough*) shows where the secrets are kept secret, no matter how ridicilous.
Of course, I would prefer if the impact of the news of alien life would be a little more notable, but on the other hand, we don't really see much of Average Joes life. Hey, and who knows, maybe that's how it would work in reality, too...

The story itself sounds promising enough, and the whole "children messenger" concept is creepy. I loved how the children would just go on as if nothing happened - that really exemplifies the creepiness of the situation.

I've forked this thread so that we can start discussing it again in earnest - something we can't do in the old thread at the moment)

 

[Plane Sailing]

So, at the time of writing I've seen episodes 1-4, and 5 is left to come.

It was a great build up, and I love the alien in the box, although I can't help myself thinking (again) "what is torchwood good at anyway?"

Jack Harkness's plan was what, to shout at the alien and call its bluff? And he had no fallback plan for when the alien showed that it wasn't bluffing?

Too many of Russell Davis' Dr Who season enders suffered from following a dramatic build up (even including massive catastrophe) with salvation by a deux ex machina of one kind or another. I'm hoping that is not going to be the case tonight, but at this point my hope is only glowing dimly...

Cheers

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Well, the ride so far has been great, butI fear a Russel Davies deus ex machina, too. (Well, I feared it from the start.)

I agree the weakness is that there seems to be nothing behind Jacks "plan" - He has the Prime Minister and his staff in his hand, perhaps, but what can he do about the aliens? Apparantly, nothing at all. So he have to find a last-day/hour/minute solution, and that is often a little disappointing. I think a hope might be that they do find a way to locate the Alien spacecraft and can use Torchwoods defense weapon system (the one Harriet Jones activated in one of the Specials) and strike at it.

That could be done fine if they really have shown us all the pieces. The guy that escaped the aliens could have been it - but he is dead. The child inside the tank might be another possible source. Maybe the children themselves are it (maybe causing a "feedback" -instead of them making the childrens talk, we let the children talk and take them over.)

 

[Plane Sailing]

Well, I'm pretty unimpressed with the ending (and in fact all the final episode). Once again pretty much anyone who comes into contact with Torchwood dies, and disaster is mysteriously averted at the last minute - and then suddenly everyone is back to normal. Heck, considering the furore we've had in the UK over politicians claiming too much on their expenses...

Frankly, Torchwood were more useful when they had the torchwood defence beam system. Probably would have been better if they'd given the advanced torchwood software to people who could have made decent use of it.

Jack runs away as unlikeable and unreliable in the end as in the beginning.

Overall, I felt it was good while the plot was initially set out, but weakened as more was revealed and again Russell fails (IMO) to deliver a thought-through ending;

Presumably they don't intend to make any more

 

[BrooklynKnight]

Yea. I sorta agree with PS. It started out really good and compelling and you really start feeling for everyone. I downright cried a few times right along with everyone else. But in the end Russell, IMO falls flat on his face and just screws things up.

Why did Ianto have to die? What was the god damned point? Then Jack kills his own grandson?! Seriously? It would have been far more satisfiing and would have made all too much sense for the old man to have been the one to start the feedback. Or bloody hell if you're gonna use a dues ex machina at least let some of the characters survive! At the very least they could have allowed his grandson to survive and explained it as some risidual connection to Jack.

The more I think of it the more the ending kinda pisses me off. I thought the whole reason Jack stayed in the 21'st century and with Torchwood was because the 21'st Century was the "turning point" for humanity.

According to io9 the Torchwood ratings have been fairly high and explosive compared to its runs on BBC 3 and 2 so maybe we will get another season, but how the hell they're gonna patch things up I don't know.

Oh, lastly, The Queen of England started Torchwood for the express purpose to defend the Earth (and more specifically Great Britain and the United Kingdom) from Alien threats and incursions (even the Doctor if need be) and instead of using Torchwood for their intended purpose they try to kill them off?

BAH!

 

[WhatGravitas]

Overall, I felt it was good while the plot was initially set out, but weakened as more was revealed and again Russell fails (IMO) to deliver a thought-through ending;

Actually, for me that was the first really, really good Torchwood "episode". The plot fitted nicely, tension was good and worked well - but then I take you're not a fan of Torchwood's tone, which is decidedly grim, dark and bleak.

Yeah, not light-hearted pulpy sci-fi like Dr. Who, more like grim-dark-bleak Sci-Fi. But under that premise, it's working rather well, in my opinion. But the sacrifice at the end made the Deus Ex Machina waaay less "magical-make-everything-good" fairy than RTD's Who finales.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Plane Sailing]

True, although how much more satisfying it might have been if the grandson had been given the choice and chose to die to save others, rather than being murdered by Jack for the purpose?

In the first series of Torchwood, I was bothered not by the bleak tone of the show, but by the overall ineffectiveness of torchwood, who seemed to do a pretty rubbish job of saving anyone! In truth, it should have been a larger organisation; the heroes would be the senior members of the team, but with lots of grunts and scientists to help them do the work (and to show how the monster de jour kills people as necessary). Dramatically I'm sure that could have worked just fine, as the main UK government agency for defending against extraterrestrial theats I would have thought it was obligatory!

(I think my favourite Torchwood story was probably the one with the guy who dies and is invisibly following Gwen around (Random Shoes) - that had real pathos to it).

 

[WhatGravitas]

True, although how much more satisfying it might have been if the grandson had been given the choice and chose to die to save others, rather than being murdered by Jack for the purpose?

Okay, that would have made the story better - and Jack still would had something to grief about - and the mother would still hate Jack (because, frankly, a child doesn't fully understand what such a sacrifice would mean).

In the first series of Torchwood, I was bothered not by the bleak tone of the show, but by the overall ineffectiveness of torchwood...

Ah, yes - I also agree with that. It was a bit of a let down after seeing Torchwood 1 in Canary Wharf. I mean they had beams, huge teams - and just a entire skyscraper just because they needed one! Torchwood 3... feels rather low-budget compared to that.

Additionally, while I still stand by my opinion that CoE was very good - I have to say that I *hate* the final scene, because it is so out-of-character!

Gwen suddenly becomes all teary and sobby - after she became a confident and capable team member. If anything, her reaction to Jack leaving should be being furious, that he just runs away - becoming all sobby is like going back to the first episodes of Torchwood S1!

And Jack running away - I could've believed that in S1 as well, but after meeting the Doctor (twice even), he was a changed man, a lot more responsible and optimistic. And now he just runs!?

Totally throws away all character development these two made in all three series (and in Jack's case even the bit he made in the Doctor Who finales!).

Cheers, LT.

 

[delericho]

Overall, I felt it was good while the plot was initially set out, but weakened as more was revealed and again Russell fails (IMO) to deliver a thought-through ending;

As far as I can tell, it was all a vast and complex set-up to get to what amounts to a Paladin thread:

"An army of demons are intent on invading the Prime Material Plane, and the only way to stop them is for a Paladin to sacrifice an unwilling child, thus closing the portal. What should the Paladin do?"

Unfortunately, where it really fails (for me) is that they've had 44 years since the last time the enemy demanded a tribute, and they must have known there was a really good chance they'd be back. That being the case, they should have been able to break out the weapons and the strategy they had prepared for exactly this eventuality.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Also, the US military 'coup' was a bit weird. I can't buy the prime minister 'allowing the US military to take control so that he can pass the blame to them', I can't buy the whole government cabinet just handing over sovereign control to another state.

Plus, what was happening in other countries across the world? If this was a global phenomenon, did every country acquiesce in the same way? It was an Independence Day problem in that respect - everything is set up as a huge, global problem, but then the rest of the globe is ignored. It would have worked just as well if it had been a UK specific issue from the point of view of the dramatization we saw.

Cheers