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Torchwood: Are we looking forward to it or not?

Started by LARF, 17 October, 2006, 02:25:57 PM

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Steve Green

It was very bad - the direction seems to be leaden, and the flashback to the conversion was comical.

It would have worked better, and had been creepier if the cyberwoman was a bit more Tetsuo along the lines of the upgraded doctor. As it stood, it just looked too panto.

The biggest problem I have with Torchwood is the characters are such an unlikeable bunch of amateurish fuck-ups.

In the pilot, one turns out to be a serial killer, one is a creepy borderline rapist using that alien rohypnol, and two otheres are responsible for deaths of innocent people.

- Steve

paulvonscott

The problem with the cyberwoman for me was that she looked like a very sexy woman at a star trek convention.  I'm sure if you had been patially cybernised (?) then she would looked a bit manky.

I'm picking for the sake of it, but she was very distracting.

Talking about the characters McWild, the biggest dissapointment for me is Captain Jack.  I have no real idea who he is, the charisma of the Who series needed to gain a bit of reality.  

Anyway, I'm assuming him to be some sort of bisexual Angel (as in buffy) character, living in his exotic pad, beset by personal problems despite being good looking (for the ladies and the gays) and surrounding himself with a bunch of misfit characters.  

If Doctor Who was crossbred with Buffy, then this is a British Angel.  Except as it is now rather obious, it's Darkplace for real.

Still, can't wait for next weeks PJ one.  High hopes...

IndigoPrime

:: If Doctor Who was crossbred with Buffy, then
:: this is a British Angel.

It's what happens when you crossbreed Angel with British sci-fi with a massive turd. After the promising pilot, despite some really very major character flaws, Torchwood's really gone to hell. I give it one more episode, and RTD had better not make TW "compulsory" viewing for understanding Doctor Who's third series.

paulvonscott

Well, i wouldn't bet on that.  He really revved up Torchwood throughout the entire second series, turning it into a big advert for his new series, which kids can't officially watch of course.

The whole concept for the series is wrong in my mind.  The BBC could have spent that money on a new independant SF series with nothing to do with Doctor Who.  You can't have an adult spin off fom a kids show, especially one that contains so many elements from Doctor Who and elements that are too adult for kids.

I dunno, with the new Sarah Jane series in the pipeline, it's hard not to be dissapointed in his total domination of the field.  Why have three series that are the same, Dr Who lite, Dr Who and Dr Who with sexuality (and no Dr).

Why am I even thinking about this stuff!  :)

Quirkafleeg

Well this weeks I watched it via the magic of beer goggles... and it was bloody brilliant*!





* for all the wrong reasons of course. Just hilariously bad.

Adrian Bamforth

Watching John Barrowman on Jonathan Ross I'm not exactly surprised to find he is gay himself - not a dig at anyone's sexuality, it just strengthens my suspicion that RTD literally casts whoever he fancies.

ADE

Leigh S

Well, finally watched Cyberwoman, and i dont think ive seen anything quite so cackhanded under the name of Who since the McCoy days.  

So much wrong with this, but some points -

They go down to confront the Cyberwoman with guns - then the next minute Jack is telling them to use whatever weapons they can find... erm, maybe those guns?  

But Ok, maybe i missed the scene where everyone left them on the side cabinet... but whats this!? They all get out of the base, and start producing guns left, right and centre to point at each other!   Utter cobblers!

Then theres the whole Darkplace parody thing going on - elements of the funeral from Ep 1, the broccoli woman and Skipper the eyechild - and thats just the most obvious ones

Theres some pretty incredible dialogue that sums up my two main gripes with new Who and this... Firstly, theres a scene where Ianto calls Jack a monster for wanting to kill the evil DEATH DEALING CYBORG! Like the dalek episode, where the Doctor is "just like a Dalek" for wanting to kill it, or the Christmas invasion where according to the Dcoctor, the humans are worse than the Sycorax (who only wanted to enslave the population and/or commit genocide).  Utter cobblers!  

Secondly, the plot is riddled with not so much plot holes as plot canyons - the six hour shutdown, the hilarious brain surgery, the fact the janitor smuggled in a whole cyber conversion kit...but you can see the production team are ready to address this issue:

From episode 1
Question:  Gwen: "this makes no sense"
Answer:    Capn Jack:"I show you something fantastic and all you do is criticise"

and now in this one:

Jack: "I will send in you, Ianto, the only guy I cant trust, to sort out this menace.  Even though a second ago I was trying to stop you.  and even though i cant be killed by it and could just keep having a go til it dies"
Other woman: "but that makes no sense"
Jack: " I don't want your opinion"

Ah right, so that explains it!

Utter utter cobblers!

Leigh S

For full Darkplace effect, the "declassified" show that followed was superb.  RTD telling us "this was a story begging to be told" with a straighter face than Dean Learner;  another guy saying how important it was to get the costume right - cut to appalling cheesefest Trek-Con cosplay thing; back to RTD telling us "their is NO DOUBT that this episode is brilliantly scripted"

If he had turned around and said "this is the story that Highway to Heaven were too scared to tell", I dont think I'd have batted an eyelid.

Seeing RTD preening over how good these episodes are is probably the worst bit.  The week you've spent giving interviews to the press or these vanity docs would have been better spent actually rereading some of these turkeys...

UTTER COBBLERS!

Bico

Now I know it's a load of old shite, I don't mind it as much as I did initially.  It's a bit of camp toss and it has Captain Jack in it - albeit not actually acting like the Captain Jack from the Doctor Who episodes.

Bico

Although, having said that, I admit it's a bit of a cop-out that an entire series of Doctor Who was used as an extended trailer for the show, building it up as a deeply sinister and menacing enterprise, and now it turns out it's just some chaps in one of Rentaghost's sets mouthing some sort of This Life fanfiction dialogue.
The format is also not a million miles away from a similar alien technology-stealing organisation (also led by an unkillable main character with a shady past) that appeared in the Dr Who audio books.  Good to see RTD stretching himself to think of something new.

paulvonscott

It's the PJ Hammond one tonight (I think), so interesting to see if it's a future shock to shit us up, or hamstrung with a lot of camp nonsense.


wrighty47

Can't really defend Cyberwoman! I've enjoyed most of the series so far (with some reservations) but the fourth episode really was mindless rubbish wannit!?

Like PVS, I am looking forward to Hammond's ep. Could be the best of the series, going on the previews and the writer's credentials.

Alan!

TordelBack

"..now it turns out it's just some chaps in one of Rentaghost's sets mouthing some sort of This Life fanfiction dialogue"

The Prof is on fire tonight! (Ugh, singed bear fur smell...).

Lobo Baggins

It's the PJ Hammond one tonight (I think), so interesting to see if it's a future shock to shit us up, or hamstrung with a lot of camp nonsense.

Coinkerdinkerly, it's on at the same time as a PJ Hammond scripted Midsummer Murders...

I dunno - you wait 25 years PJ Hammond to write something, then two come along at once.  I blame the goverment.
The wages of sin are death, but the hours are good and the perks are fantastic.

Lobo Baggins

now it turns out it's just some chaps in one of Rentaghost's sets mouthing some sort of This Life fanfiction dialogue.

Surely you mean to say 'it's Rentaghost meets This Life - ON ACID!'
The wages of sin are death, but the hours are good and the perks are fantastic.