Responses to Comments on a Website

[book_junkie007]

TV Line has an article on the top 20 biggest disappointments on TV in 2011. Not surprisingly, Torchwood: Miracle Day is one of them. Their reason:

The Endless Miracle Day
Too many new faces, too little Captain Jack/Gwen twosome time and a way-too-big plot resulted in a welcome, yes, yet grim and slogging Torchwood mission.

TV's 20 Biggest

Comments

[firesnap]

I never understand the debate over why the books aren't canon. RTD read over them and stamped them with approval, made authors change stuff he didn't like, and let them be published. But, I always just shrug at that. Some people consider it canon, some don't.

On that note, you're the first person I've ever discussed Torchwood with that doesn't consider the radio plays canon. They had the original actors, tied into the series they were aired before, were approved by RTD and written by people who handled the episodes for the shows. They were either episodes that they couldn't afford to do or make up for a not-full season.

I liked parts of Miracle Day. I still hold to that. There wasn't enough of Jack and Gwen -- especially Jack. He was almost secondary to all the action. I really loved Vera. She was a good character addition to the collection of great characters that came out of Torchwood. But yeah, my fiance commented that he felt like watching the show was 50% of him waiting for Jack and Gwen to get back on the screen.

I will say, the scenes we did get with them were great. I think my favorite part of the whole series was when they went undercover together. That looked happy to be in each other's company and happy to be working together again.

However, Miracle Day was too long and meandered a bit with some preachy moments. It could've easily been six episodes. The whole thing with Esther's family, the Souless and the Dead is Dead stuff didn't need to be in. All of those plot points either were dropped entirely or went nowhere. It's like they had a ton of great ideas and no one was jumping in and saying "this is waaaaaaay too much to cover in one series."

As a mini-series, the reason CoE worked was because it was tight. It was focused on a handful of characters and, while there were other issues they could've examined in that plot, they focused on just a few. MD should've done that. CoE was relentless and had as many emotional gut punch scenes and horrific revelations as MD in half the amount of episodes.

Part of me wonders if that's the problem too. It isn't that MD was BAD, it's that it was mediocre and after following CoE that's even worse.

I wrote a novel. I am sorry.

[book_junkie007]

My issue is that with the books and the radio plays, there's no defined time period for them other than vague, it's during series one, or between two or three, or whatever. It's more of a sliding scale of relation to canon, which makes it more difficult to judge when exactly it took place. I realise that fanfic is written under the same mentality, though, which makes me an oddity (what else is new). I've never heard the radio plays either, so I probably shouldn't be making definitive choices about whether they're canon.

I need to know exactly when something occurs in relation to other events, or else it drives me nuts. I've even gone so far as to write out a timeline for the events of 2.06 to 3.08 of Being Human for a fic I'm writing, just so I don't mess things up. (Fun fact: George and Sam were only together for a month or a little over a month before he proposed to her.)

I agree with the rest of your comment, and don't apologize for writing a long comment. They're your opinions and they deserve to be heard. :)

[firesnap]

Well, I know someone went through and on Wikipedia lists between which episodes all of the books take place, if that helps. It's still mostly "Pre-Cyberwoman" or "Pre-Reset" rather than anything terribly specific.

Yeah, if you ever feel interested in the radio plays there's a time line actually available for the first four. Lost Souls taking place a few weeks after Exit Wounds, followed by the others and ending with, I think, The Deadline taking place just a few weeks before Children of Earth. However, I always have issues with how long after Exit Wounds that Children of Earth occurs anyway. It keeps going back and forth between anywhere from six months to a year.

I haven't heard what the timeline is for the "Lost Files" ones other than they occur between Exit Wounds and CoE. Except House of the Dead. There's a very, very specific time that one happens. I have serious issues with that audio play though. I don't recommend it. If you listen ANY of them, go with Lost Souls. It has Martha in it, Gwen being awesome in general, Ianto and Gwen being cutesy and bantery with each other, and the team dealing with Tosh and Owen's deaths.

Thanks for the rest. :) I really did enjoy watching Miracle Day overall, I hope that's clear. I love Jack and Gwen too much to feel otherwise about it. Radio or TV, I'll take them where I can get them.

[book_junkie007]

Awesome, thanks for the recommendation. :)

Don't worry, it's clear you enjoyed watching Miracle Day overall. I adore Jack and Gwen as well, and will take them wherever I can, which will mean expanding my horizons on canon.