Brief Reaction: Torchwood - Miracle Day
I liked it. It had its issues and some parts were really really hard to watch, but I liked it. There was a bit of wonky plot here and there, but watching it all in one go, I didn't find it nearly as bad as the assorted comments on it I've seen made me think it would be.
Here's a few comments on the individual episodes, possibly out of order since my note-taking was a lot more random and cryptic than usual.
Episode 1
-PC ANDY IS GWEN AND RHYS'S SECRET KEEPER, WITH CODED MESSAGES AND THINGS OMG AWWWWWW! *FLAIL*
-Unexpected Jack, Hee!
-"I'm staying hurt."/"Oooooooh my god." XD
-"Owen Harper, FBI", AW.
-Who played the coroner guy? He looked really familiar.
-Flight Attendant Danny is adorable!
-"Be careful with his coat!" XD
-Free and easy access to bullshit. *snerk*
Episode 2
-"The world's screwed up, you wanna help or not?" :-D
-Medical panels open to anyone who wants to help develop a plan. Love that. Also love the amount of thought that went into the social and economic ramifications of no death.
-MACS ARE EVERYWHERE! \o/
-Challenge: make EDTA from stuff found on an airplane. Medical remote MacGyverism FTW! \o/
Episode 3
-Gwen always has the best boots. That is all.
Episode 4
-Esther, you idiot! Seriously, going to visit a family member while hiding out, and then using your new unknown phone to call in child services??? You have no concept of covert, do you?
-No one ever turns off their cellphones while breaking into places, do they? *facepalm*
-"Oh great, and he's cryptic." I knew there was a reason I liked Gwen.
-Always and everywhere, the families will rise.... I really doubt this has much if anything to do with aliens.
-Crusher. Ow ow ow ow ick. D-:
Episode 5
-Jack still rocks at dramatic standing.
-"Angels." Eeeeep.
-Ceramic walls. Yeah, that's not storage, Rex, it's a mass crematorium. D-: ...Would the resulting ash still be alive? Gaaaaah.... DDDDDD-X
-Using it for murder also not cool. D-:
Episode 6
-*draws hearts around Rhys*
-Kissing later, running away from men with guns now.
Episode 7
-Jack backstory. "He travels with a companion." Awwwww. Angelo is totally doomed.
-Angelo's got some attitude to him, I like it.
-Run! \o/
-And then it all goes horrible as superstition and fear take over. Doubt very much that's the first time this sort of thing has happened to Jack.
-Three-way partnership with the triangle handshake as the origin of the triangle logo. Awesome.
-Jack being all 'I don't wanna die' is quite a change from Series 1 of Torchwood.
-Hello Major Kira Nerise, AKA Nana Visitor! You do nasty plotty possibly-evil well.
-Angelo, dude, you stabbed him and then turned him over to an angry mob who killed him over and over again, charged people to do it, and didn't even offer him a percentage. That's kind of a deal-breaker.
-I had a definite moment of '...Angelo's behind this??? O.o'
-SO MUCH YAY FOR PC ANDY!!! \o/
Episode 8
-OMG, HI Q!!!! John deLancie. Wonder if he's going to turn out to be a bad guy?
-Ianto. Aw. The really sad thing is that to Jack everyone he has an actual relationship with, he's got to develop a defensive shell with, because they will all die on him. He didn't do that with Ianto, but he's doing it in retrospect now. Badly.
-*facepalm* Oh, fantastic, Jack's mortality is contagious. Now Jack just has to kiss everyone on the planet. I'm sure he won't mind. Oh, and if that's the case, there's a bartender he should phone right now, because after his and Jack's liaison he's probably the most mortal being ever.
Episode 9
-"Good luck. You won't see me again." Hard to build a working relationship with anyone in a new job that way.
-So proud of Rhys for picking up on the Antipodean thing. Go smart!Rhys! \o/
-For personal reasons, some very hard bits to watch all through this for me, but some of the hardest so far are in this episode, and next episode will be...yeah. But I knew this was coming so I'm dealing.
Episode 10
-It's doing the overwrite thing like the Chula ship in Empty Child, except not using visible nanogenes, and on a global scale. Ooooor, like the Vinvocci planet-healer thing from End of Time, without the Master messing with it and the head shaking. Wonder if it's a similar thing, a lost planet-healer that's leaking and generating a new kind of Rift?
-Very lucky Jack's blood was compatible, though I wonder if by the 51st century all blood might be universal donor/recipient.
-There's two of them now? Not sure how that worked, unless, since it inverted Jack when his blood was first used on the thing, maybe it inverted both of them? Rex's immortality has to be somewhat different though, because it's from this and not the Tardis power. Still, good that there's two of them now, as there's two ends of a brand new unexplained rift running through the planet that'll need guarding, so a new Torchwood at each end one run by Jack, one by Rex? Wonder who's going to win the Shanghai/Buenos Aires coin toss?
All in all, I found this series much less dark and somewhat more scrambled plot-wise than Children of Earth, but given the length of the series and the need to draw the plot out that long, it's not surprising. It felt a little like 24 in spots, the mole business and so forth. The whole Oswald business was... uncomfortable, but that was the intent, so in that it was successful.
In the end this didn't feel quite like Torchwood but something new, which it is, really. If there was more made with Jack, Gwen, Rex, Rhys, and Andy, I wouldn't be terribly opposed.