Torchwood

[Philip Ayres]

Series 1 DVD out Monday ! Cheapest I've found is £39 from ASDA.

Missed loads of these the first time due to Jonathan arriving !

[Gav]

In a shocking display of incredible awesomeness, my Missus bought the single discs as they were released. Imagine my rapture!

[Andy Turnbull]

Torchwood was a maddening series that had some cracking episodes but let down when it tried to be "edgy" and "adult" and ended up coming off as a bit childish.

John Barrowman was excellent throughout the series though.

Andy

[Gav]

J.B is a legend, in every sense of the word. I do agree about the 'adult' parts, they always make me laugh. It's like they're trying so hard to show how mature the show is, when they've got this half girl/half cyberman hybrid romping around in the basement.

[The Doctor]

I find any residual interest in this has been killed by the long gap between series. Season 1 finished 11 months ago!

JB is awesome though!

-Ralph

[Grand Moff Muffin]

However annoying all the characters in it are (Jack excepted), I feel it only prudent to follow the one media outlet which warns me which streets not to walk down in my home city.

Martin

[legios]

Torchwood struck me as a show desperately uncertain of its identity. It was sold to the audience as "moody and adult", which too often seemed to boil down to "everybody scowls a lot, and we have a strongly adolescent streak". The first season pretty much served up something like six different takes on the general concept - none of which felt entirely like the same series. Some of the cast were decent - John Barrowman was always watchable despite the very inconsistent way his character was written - and some were less so (or so poorly served by the material it is impossible to tell whether they would have been any good).

A few episodes I quite enjoyed The opener that managed to take in some quite grim material and the more whimisical moments of "oh yeah, we have a pterodactyl. He's kind of a pet" seemed like the setup for a completely different show to any of the following episodes. But in general I found "Torchwood" struck out with me more often than it connected. And watching the last three episodes I found that I got steadily more bored and less interested with every passing minute.

I'm honestly not sure at this moment that I have any interest in watching any of Season 2 when it finally emerges.

Karl

[The Doctor]

I know what you mean. I finally broke free of Who-completist urges when I only watched episode 1 of Sarah Jane Adventures. Haven't been motivated to watch/download any more of that.

-Ralph

[Shockprowl]

I enjoyed Tourchwood, but I agree with what many of you are saying about it not quite sorting itself out in regards to what it wants ot be. I think that'll be something that improves with time. And yes J.B. is cool!

[Deleted]

I havn't exactly watched an episode of Torchwood but I did once mention the series to a workmate who is a massive fan of Doctor Who and he initially didn't believe me when I said that the name 'Torchwood' is an anagram of 'Doctor Who'.

[kayevcee]

Ohhh yeah.

-Nick

[Gav]

I think series two should be a lot more solid, now that they've established the characters and have a general direction to steer the show in. They've settled into their groove a little.

Although we still need more 1940's romance episodes.

[Nigel]

I am reliably informed (from Mam, who was watching a John Barrowman interview) that Torchwood returns to our screens in January.

I don't know when Who is back on but I would speculate that the schedules are intended to create a smoother transition as Freema switched between series.

[Philip Ayres]

Been known for a while. And not just freema by all accounts.

[Gav]

Straight from the mouth of Barrowman yesterday: We just finished up last wednesday, It'll be back in January, bitches!

[Hero]

New series starting soon.

===KEN

[Gav]

Yaldy! I cannot wait for more Torchwood action.

[Philip Ayres]

Wednesday 15th @ 9pm BBC2

[Grand Moff Muffin]

From what I read in the Radio Times, they've taken a lot of criticism on board from the last series. The characters will now (apparently) be more likeable, and Cap'n Jack more like he was in season one of Doctor Who. And it will no longer be so adult-oriented that they can't broadcast an edited version for the kids at 7pm the following week.

Martin

[Hero]

So no 'agenda' basically?

[The Doctor]

Usually, I would question a break of over 12 months between series (especially when a show is new) but in this case if there has been some significant re-tooling (which the change of channel and pre-watershed editions being produced) then I can see the point of a long gap. We shall see.

-Ralph

[legios]

hero said:

So no 'agenda' basically?

I'm not sure the first season of "Torchwood" could have been described as having an agenda. It hadn't sufficiently gotten its act together to really know what it was trying to say, which would have made if difficult to have an agenda really.

Haven't decided yet if I will watch Season 2. It's on BBC 2 so the chance of me getting decent audio on it is a bit dicey at the moment, and the picture quality is at best going to be adequate. I shall see how I feel on Wednesday I guess.

Karl

[Gav]

I'll watch it for Jay-Bee, as well as occasional plot-enjoyment.

[Philip Ayres]

TODAY

[Gav]

Okay, so Jay-Bee kissed everyone.

Thoughts?

[Andy Turnbull]

It was a solid opener which was far less juvenile than it's BBC3 incarnation. The story was nothing spectacular but made up for it with a lot of good performances. JB of course was top notch.

I absolutely detested the "Bloody Torchwood" joke before the title sequence - lazy writing of the highest order.

More shadowy hints of Jack's past and the way they touched on his appearances in Who were vague enough to keep the two series distinct.

I'm hopeful this series will be more palatable as a whole than the first, but something tells me we might not get anything on a par with They Keep Killing Susie.

Andy

[legios]

Thoughts about Torchwood... Hmm, ok then.

Firstly, pick a tone and stick to it. Their attempts to seque back and forth between different tones didn't really work for me at all. It felt like they had to come to a stop every time they changed gears. They haven't quite mastered the art of switching tones on the fly it seems.

I also did think it veered a bit into the adolescent again in places. But nowhere near as badly as last season though so that is an improvement.

I'd agree that the story itself was fairly thin - and pretty predictable really. I doubt there were many of us who didn't see a lot of the main beats coming. Fortunately the cast did a decent job with it - even James Marsters who I wasn't really expecting a great deal from to be honest.

The joke at the end of the pre-credits sequence made me groan audibly. A shame really, because they would have got a better effect if they had cut it off at
"Excuse me, did you see a Blowfish in a Sports Car?"

I didn't think it was too bad as a season opener - not stellar but better than most of the previous batch of episodes, but then the opener for the first season wasn't too bad. I'll reserve judgement for the moment - I'm not expecting them to serve up something on a level with "They Keep Killing Suzie", but if they can maintain the level they've found for this episode they will be ahead of where they were last time around.

Karl

[Gav]

Man i was hoping the fish dude turned out to be INJEKTOR....

Well we can dream...

[Grand Moff Muffin]

I was greatly relieved. The thing about season one I most wanted them to fix was the likeability of the characters. They managed to go easy on the in-fighting, and even Owen wasn't particularly annoying. I just hope they stick to that. And James Marsters was a plus. He played the reaction to Jack coming back to life quite well. I trust they will never make the mistake of putting a chip in Captain John that makes him unable to hit anything and he becomes one of the good guys...

On the whole, it was a lot better than the Doctor Who Christmas special. "Bloody Torchwood" made me cringe, but not as much as the Queen waving or all those slow falls to death. The stopping at the pelican crossing bit redeemed it somewhat.

Martin

[Nigel]

admin said:

I absolutely detested the "Bloody Torchwood" joke before the title sequence - lazy writing of the highest order.

I couldn't disagree more. Putting aside the fact that it made me laugh, it says volumes in just two words. Torchwood, previously a secret(ive) organisation is now common knowledge; not only is the organisation known about but there also appears to be animosity towards it. I may be reading too much into it here, or maybe it is too early in the season to judge, but perhaps a part of that animosity, since the existence of aliens is now also common knowledge, is that Torchwood (in today's media-saturated society) provides an easy target on which to level blame for the alien invasions; an underlying theme that fits in with the scared, deserted London of Who's Voyage of the Damned.


Overall, a strong start to the season, I thought; they seem to have taken some of the criticisms on board. I enjoyed Marsters' performance, but he was really just playing a version of Spike, wasn't he?

Please don't talk too much about the "coming soon" segment; I switched off for spoiler purposes.