Ruined forever

[Dannyalcatraz]

Heh...Hannibal is one of the best cooking shows on TV.

 

[delericho]

Ehh, I have a lot less faith in things than you. There are numerous real world examples and not that far in the past, of governments and militaries doing just that. Particularly when you add in class issues as well.

The thing is, though, that we're not talking about some general thing that's happened somewhere at some time in the past. We're talking specifically about the UK in 2009, and in that country at that time, it simply would not have happened like that.

 

[Lwaxy]

I generally hate reboots.

While I think the cast for the new Star Trek is fine, I don't like what they have done with it at all. Watched the first movie to see how it is going and, asides from them blowing up Vulcan for no reason at all but to piss off old fans (so it seems to me anyway), thought it was basically a run off the mill action space opera which has little to do with the real Star Trek. Not even to talk of the gaping plot holes and the awful light reflections.

It would have made a somewhat decent stand alone alternate universe movie. But I doubt I will ever watch another part of that series, or even consider it real Star Trek. Ah yeah, same with Enterprise, too.

Watching Roddenberry rotate in his urn...

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Now, I put the question to you as well: The Government just employed soldiers and police to steal your children. What could anyone possibly offer you that would allow you to permit that government, or anyone involved in government, to continue to exist?
Because just a few weeks later, it seems like everything is back to being hunky dory in the Torchwood universe awfully quickly.

Yeah, if they tried to get back to "business as usual" that wouldn't make sense. But the grim reality is that if your government came after you there isn't much you could do about it. After something like that though I'd expect a change in the form of government to something non-democratic.

The thing is, though, that we're not talking about some general thing that's happened somewhere at some time in the past. We're talking specifically about the UK in 2009, and in that country at that time, it simply would not have happened like that.

How can you be sure of that when aliens are added to the equation? That's when the situation becomes speculative at best.

 

[delericho]

How can you be sure of that when aliens are added to the equation? That's when the situation becomes speculative at best.

The premise of "Torchwood" was that it was supposed to be 'adult' sci-fi. That means taking it seriously: 'real' people dealing with a 'real' (albeit speculative) scenario in a realistic way. But the events depicted were so far from anything even remotely realistic as to blow that out of the water.

 

[Elf Witch]

The thing is, though, that we're not talking about some general thing that's happened somewhere at some time in the past. We're talking specifically about the UK in 2009, and in that country at that time, it simply would not have happened like that.

No it is not the UK in 2009 it is a UK which has numerous incidents with alien species and know what they are capable of. So taking that into consideration especially after the attack of the daleks which wiped out UNIT and took down the big flying carrier that UNIT had the attacks of the Sontarans I can well see a populace being afraid to not give into the demands.

 

[delericho]

No it is not the UK in 2009 it is a UK which has numerous incidents with alien species and know what they are capable of.

Absurd as it may be, it's a conceit of the Doctor Who universe that humanity encounters these aliens, have the world-shaking revelation that we're not alone in the universe... and then promptly forget and get back to life as usual.

Even if that were not the case, humanity also has a 100% success rate against all those alien invaders.

And on top of all that, you're not talking about some nebulous sacrifice here - this is the loss of the children of a significant chunk of the populace. Our government famously failed to take free school milk away from children.

Seriously, "Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol" is more realistic.

 

[delericho]

Incidentally, if you want to see a realistic view of how the UK could collapse into a dystopia as a result of alien influence, see the Doctor Who episode "Turn Left". It's not that it couldn't happen here; it's that it couldn't happen here as depicted in "Torchwood: Children of Earth".

Interestingly, RTD wrote both "Turn Left" and the bulk of "Children of Earth". Funny how he often gets it right and sometimes gets it so very wrong.

 

[Hussar]

They made the point in the movie I thought. The aliens say something to the effect that millions of children die every year and there is hardly a push to overthrow those governments. There is no huge hue and cry over that.

So now there would be? Torchwood could destroy one spaceship but we never even see the spaceship from these aliens. It's been shown numerous times that earth cannot defend itself against the truly advanced tech races. It's always the Doctor that saves them.

It's not far fetched to me that an alien race could be that far advanced that resistance would be short lived.

 

[delericho]

They made the point in the movie I thought. The aliens say something to the effect that millions of children die every year and there is hardly a push to overthrow those governments. There is no huge hue and cry over that.

Yes, but there's a big difference between that and the government taking away people's children en masse.

It's been shown numerous times that earth cannot defend itself against the truly advanced tech races. It's always the Doctor that saves them.

It's not far fetched to me that an alien race could be that far advanced that resistance would be short lived.

The problem with the argument that "resistance is futile" is that the show itself gives lie to it - the aliens are defeated.