30 Days of Shipping - Day 17
Late again, sorry. I don't think anyone's setting their diary by this though, so I figure it's probably OK.
Question List
Day 17: A pairing you never thought would work, but did.
Jack/Ianto (TORCHWOOD)
The first time I watched Torchwood, it was when it was on TV. I only watched it casually, and if I remember correctly, I didn't watch any further than Random Shoes. Even so, I shipped Jack and Gwen from the first moment, though nowhere near as avidly as I do now. But Ianto...well Ianto I barely noticed. In Cyberwoman, I literally wondered where on earth he'd come from, seeing as I couldn't remember him from any of the previous episodes. And after Cyberwoman, I pretty much forgot about him again. So I remember being highly confused by the stopwatch scene at the end of They Keep Killing Suzie. What was going on? Why was the receptionist guy whose name I wasn't sure of suddenly propositioning Jack? It seemed completely out of the blue to me.
Fast forward to the middle of 2010, and I decided to watch Torchwood again, mostly because of James Marsters. And this time, I paid attention. And started to really love Ianto. And to notice the little moments between him and Jack. Now, Jack/Gwen is still very much my OTP, but this time around I wasn't at all surprised by the stopwatch scene...in fact, I kind of liked it. And I kind of liked every scene the two had together.
It's not a particularly popular view, but I don't think Jack/Ianto and Jack/Gwen are mutually exclusive. I think he loves/loved them both in different ways and although if I had to choose one, it would be Jack/Gwen every time, I do think Jack and Ianto had a lot of lovely qualities when they were together.
I also think the fandom has increased my love of them, particularly through fanfic. There's so little seen on screen, so there's so much that's open to interpretation, and one writer who is now on my f-list writes them in such a beautiful, amazing way (and with such regularity, hooray!) that it's made me adore them even more. She's pretty much created my ideal relationship through them, so it's definitely increased my shipping of them, even if it's not canon.
So there we are. And sorry karaokegal , I know you'll disapprove! ;)
Oh, and I hope all my f-list had a good Valentine's Day! In honour of it, and in honour of this post, have a candy heart, made for me by the lovely aviv_b !
