Torchwood Season 2

Yes, okay, my loyalty to Torchwood is mostly because I'm a Doctor Who nerd. SUE ME!

But I also watch the show because its POTENTIAL is so huge. You've got a diverse, quirky cast -- most of whom are amazing actors -- under the guidance of one of the most wonderfully-conceived action heroes in history. Their mandate is open-ended and they have a dedicated pool of creative writers. Their fan base is such that they can hardly do wrong, allowing the show to experiment without fear of losing popularity.

So why did the first season mostly suck? And why did the second season suck even WORSE?

You don't have to be Tosh to figure out the reasons. There are three of them.

First, the budget is simply too low, so when they attempt to pull off Doctor Who-style scenes of mayhem they end up looking like a CGI version of...well, the '80s Doctor Who. I'm thinking mainly of the "space whale" and the "exploding Cardiff" scene, which left me wondering if I'd developed an astigmatism or if it really DID look like crap.

Second, John Barrowman can only play one role well, that of the sexy, flippant, mostly-likeable hero. When forced to branch out -- particularly in the presence of more capable actors like Eve Myles, Burn Gorman, and Naoko Mori -- he's a space whale out of water. When he was forced to cry in the first series he looked like he was taking a dump. I'm pleased to report that he's a better crier in the second series, where instead he looks like a small child about to blubber. I expect this is how Barrowman really cries.

All this would be fine, however, if it weren't for the third and most heinous problem with the series: the producers seem unaware of Barrowman's limitations -- and the obvious strengths of the Torchwood premise -- and therefore constantly shoehorn emotionally over-the-top moments into plots that don't NEED them.

This is (mostly) fine in the new Doctor Who, where the characters and mythology provide plenty of fodder for emotional blowouts. But in Torchwood, putting a requisite ten-minute weepy scene into every episode is like adding emotional depth to a Flash Gordon serial: unnecessary, distracting, and obvious.

So season two's Mostly Random Arc involving Jack's lost brother ("GRAY!!! GRAY!!!") is ridiculous, and just gives the characters yet another opportunity to say "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry."

Try contrasting "Something Borrowed," the only really good episode in the series, with one of the crappy ones like "Meat." In "Something Borrowed," the Torchwood team runs around battling a sexy alien in a ridiculous setting, cracking witty jokes and being self-referential and basically having a good time. Captain Jack gets to strut around and be tough, Gwen gets to be funny, and even Rhys is a welcome (and essential) part of the episode, instead of just saying "Darn it, Gwen, YER NEVER HOOOME!"

But in "Meat" you have an overly-ambitious, budget-free bunch of crap effects, and a pointless subplot about Rhys perhaps being evil (though we know he's not), and a heavy-handed message about...cruelty to animals, or something. You even have the conscious-stricken younger brother shouting "I DIDN'T AGREE TO THIS!" and Rhys complaining that Gwen is (yes) never home, and Jack's first opportunity this season to say (snicker) "I'm sorry..." and then (yes) "...I'm SO SORRY."

"Something Borrowed" knows that Torchwood can just be FUN. "Meat" wants to be relevant and complicated and heart-rending. One passes, one fails. WAKE UP, PRODUCTION TEAM!

Add to this yet another limping climax full of random obstacles (for which each member has a relevant skill) and the main character saying "I forgive you" to the evil mastermind (where have we heard that before, a year ago, in the climax to a show which is an anagram of "Torchwood"?) and you have, essentially, a load of whatever Barrowman was trying to crap out in the first series.

It's not ALL bad. I loved the "Owen's dead" subplot, and the cast reductions in the final episode were brilliantly performed (and tear-jerking, not least because those actors represented 66% of the team's acting talent). And whenever the show DECIDED to be funny, I laughed. And I thought "Maybe they've figured it out...maybe they understand that they should titillate me, and scare me, and make me laugh?"

Then, seconds later, Gwen would start mooning about how Torchwood had hardened her, and Owen was covering up his soft interior by being a brash jerk, and somehow Ianto still had security clearance after sneaking his cyberwoman girlfriend into the Hub. Oh, give me a break.

Gay Mafia in Anoraks

It's hard not to look at the new series of "Doctor Who" -- and its accompanying series "Torchwood," AKA "Campier Doctor Who with Sex and a Backwards Guitar Sound" -- without noticing how most of the high-ranking people involved are gay (or at least "sound INCREDIBLY gay but have wives"). What's more, they're gay RABID FANS. I don't think anybody has done a study to find out how skewed the demographic is, but it has long been acknowledged that something VERY gay is going on there, in all departments.

I figured this was just due to Russell T. Davies bringing his long-term acquaintances along, some of whom are exceptionally "out" in the same way that he is. But long-time fan Tat Wood devotes a section to this phenomenon in his terrific (and very funny) series "About Time."

The section is called "What's All This Stuff About Anoraks?" and is on page 167 of volume 6 (accompanying the writeup for a story starring Kate O'Mara, appropriately). The section is a mini-essay about British Doctor Who fandom in the '80s. After explaining the stereotype of the British Doctor Who fan (geeky, cynical boys who wear anoraks) versus the American counterpart (obsessive and slavish young men who wear Doctor Who scarves), he leads into the relevant stuff with the sentence "...but the real statistic anomaly was how gay it all was."

Perhaps spending so much time in an environment where people already knew the most embarrassing thing about you made it easier to make the second-most awkward admission of your life. Perhaps some people found that a hero who never quite belonged, and had other priorities than getting the girl and looking cool, helped them through difficult school years. Or perhaps it was the fact that the Nathan-Turner years were the most overtly homosexual mainstream TV ever transmitted at that point... a significant percentage of fandom in the UK -- and a very high proportion of the high-profile fans and future spin-off creators -- were gay or bi.

Wood doesn't try to explain it much beyond this, but I'm sure he has a point.

Incidentally, it never seemed to me that classic "Doctor Who" was particulary gay, but then I stopped watching shortly into JNT's producership...going back now and seeing those stories for the first time I can only say...wow. Total camp and a bit mortifying.

Torchwood Thoughts

A few thoughts, now that I've just finished watching the final episode of Torchwood:

• Everything from "Countrycide" to "Out of Time" was very, very good.
• The other episodes ranged from flawed ("Small Worlds") to embarassingly bad ("Cyberwoman").
• The final two episodes of the season were bungled. So bungled, in fact, that I can't even figure out where the screw-up began. What's with the horrible shadow-killing monster that we first hear about during the last twenty minutes of the program? Considering the effort they've put into programming us for future episodes ("BAD WOLF! TORCHWOOD! MR. SAXON!") couldn't they have given us SOME foreshadowing?
  
• Eve Myles is an exceptionally good actress. I mean really, she's fantastic. The sad thing is, watching her go bonkers over the death of her hubby, I knew that the writer would cop out in the end. WHICH HE DID, THAT JERK! I can't take a second year of "Ack, Gwen, y'bloody well nevah home!"
  
• John Barrowman is an exceptionally bad actor. This does not bode well for the series, as he's the main character. But he simply CANNOT convey sincerity. Every time he cries, I laugh. Every time he says "I'm sorry" I have the urge to bite styrofoam.
• Why does it still feel like a children's program?
  

I will buy this series when it comes out on DVD, simply because the middle portion was so successful. And I'll even look forward to watching Borrowman flap his trenchcoat around in season two. But c'mon people, get it together, will you?

What's the Story with Torchwood?

I had high hopes for the "Torchwood" TV series. A spin-off featuring Captain Jack Harkness, a character who shone so brightly during the first season of the revived Doctor Who? A crime/mystery drama with ramped-up sex and violence? Lots of actors and actresses with those exotic Welsh accents?

Sadly Torchwood arrives with a millstone already around its neck; not only is it suffering from conflicting aims of being both SIMILAR to Doctor Who (to keep the fans) but still very DIFFERENT from Doctor Who (to appease those of us looking for something a bit grittier)...it's also suffering from the continued presence of Russell T. Davies. The man's brilliant, but let's just say that somebody needs to put a leash on him. And on David Tenant too, incidentally.

Anyway, I watched the first two episodes of "Torchwood" and was bitterly disappointed. John Barrowman just isn't a strong enough actor to carry Captain Jack beyond brave/hunky/funny sidekick. The "Torchwood" base of operations looks too much like a Scooby Doo hideout (c'mon guys, a GIANT FAKE-LOOKING GEAR for a doorway?). The sex-and-violence seems awkwardly inserted, as though we were watching a children's script re-written so that everybody has at least one bisexual encounter an episode...just 'cause! It DOES look like a children's program, and tends to be even more childish that anything in the first season of the new Who.

But tonight I decided to give the third episode a try. And while it's still sloppy and amateur, and while I still cringe hearing Captain Jack wax philosophical, I have to say it's beginning to draw me in. Maybe this is the blessing/curse of a Russell T. Davies project: you need to watch at least three episodes before you realize you're actually starting to CARE. I thought Eccleston was a goof until "Dalek."

What's more, this episode has the first Torchwood scene that's managed to genuinely surprise and shock me, and which shows that Eve Myles can really act when she's given a proper scene to act IN. Oh, the blood.

So if anybody out there turned off after the second episode (and I know at least one person who turned off halfway through the FIRST), I encourage you to at least stick it out for a few more. Maybe they'll end up sucking horribly, but I see glimmers of potential genius in the background...