Thoughts on Children of Earth, post re-watch
Thanks to lionessvalenti for reading this through for me.
Also, many of the thoughts here came out of discussions with everyone who attended the re-watch. I don't usually remember the specific details of who said what, but I wouldn't have been able to write this without those discussions. Having said that, however, the opinions I express here are my own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of everyone else who was there on the weekend.
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I said before the weekend began that my primary goal for the Children of Earth re-watch was to be able to associate the mini-series with good memories, instead of just the bad ones that came out of last year, and that was definitely achieved. I think everyone had a really great time, and in the future, when I think of CoE, it won't just remind me of that horrible week last year, when something I loved became something horrible in such a short space of time; there'll also be memories--more recent ones--of a really awesome weekend spent with fellow fans, and that's no small thing. Additionally, I did find that the re-watch itself changed my perspective on certain elements of CoE.
Most significantly, for me, I didn't get the sense this time around that Jack didn't care for Ianto -- I just got the sense that the Jack/Ianto relationship had been really badly written, for the most part (especially in Day 3). It definitely wasn't the love story we were promised in the promo material, but at the same time I didn't see an anti-love story either. They simply didn't develop at all. I felt like the attempts to develop them (the "are we a couple" stuff and the stuff about Ianto questioning Jack about his immortality) covered ground that was implicit throughout S2, in a really clunky way -- but in spite of that, there were a couple of nice moments. To my surprise I found the way JB and GDL played the "couple" stuff in Day 1 kind of cute this time around; while I found those bit unnecessary, and while the writing itself felt forced, I think JB and GDL did the best with what they were given. The "die like a dog" line was awful though -- I could actually see Ianto engaging in that sort of gallows humour, but not Jack, not after Tosh and Owen. It's really jarring and really terrible foreshadowing -- more like fore-anviling. As for the Day 3 stuff... I don't know HOW they could have played that well. At the beginning of the ep, they seemed to be fighting for no reason at all, and then Ianto asks all these questions that imply that it's only just occured to him that Jack is immortal and going to outlive him, which makes him look really stupid -- the writing there is just so bad that I couldn't actually watch that scene and maintain any suspension of disbelief. Also, not allowing Jack and Ianto one final moment of intimacy (which didn't need to be sex) just felt cruel, given that RTD was planning to kill Ianto. RTD is capable of so much better -- I think part of the reason that I hung onto the idea that Jack didn't care for Ianto over the last year is that I couldn't really bring myself to believe that RTD was capable of writing a character scene that badly (because usually his character writing is really excellent).
For me personally, I feel like I can read J/I in the way I read them in S2 again, and that makes me really happy. At the same time though, it's really disappointing that CoE didn't develop their relationship beyond that, when it could have been done so easily, and I honestly don't know that I have the urge to write them further -- I just don't know that there's anything more to say about them. A few months before CoE, I wrote Power Play, which pretty much sums up my fanon about what I think their relationship was like in S2. After watching CoE last year, I felt that this was jossed in spirit if not in fact, but now I feel like it works again. But... there's nowhere else to take it from there, not in canon-compliant fic, anyway. I may write the odd PWP in the future for J/I, but that's it. So... well, I'm glad that this re-watch gave J/I back to me in some ways, but it's still a mixed bag, I guess.
The "mixed bag" thing definitely applies to CoE as a whole too. Right throughout the re-watch, all of us were pointing out little details that we liked/loved or disliked/hated, and I know that for me, there actually were more "liked/loved" bits than "disliked/hated" bits. Most of the "liked/loved" bits for me were part of the political storyline. I do think Frobisher's tragic story was excellent the whole way through, and the politicians talking about what to do about the children was chilling and brilliant. The original characters in this story all sparkled. I particularly enjoyed the way that the representative of the US were portrayed, and found the way that representations of global politics in the Whoniverse have shifted really interesting. I do, however, think that there was major fail in the way that for the story to work, we have to assume that all other countries in the world were willing to give up 10% of their kids because Britain told them to, and in the assumption that all other countries even have the infrastructure to do that. This struck me as a very Imperialist approach, and made me highly uncomfortable. From a plot perspective, rather than a political one, I also found the political storyline annoying simply in that the plan to blow up the Hub and kill all the other people involved in 1965 MAKES NO SENSE. After all, as PM Green points out, the people in power now were only children in 1965 -- it's not like they need to save their own arses. It would have made much more sense of them to kidnap Jack and all the others involved in 1965, so they could get as much info out of them as possible -- and THEN kill them/encase them in super-quick-dry-magic-concrete.
Having said that, I know that one of the criticisms that has been levelled at CoE is that it was tacking Torchwood onto a story that didn't really fit into the Whoniverse, but I don't buy that completely, even though there were some world-building problems. Before we watched CoE on Saturday, we watched a number of TW eps, plus "The Christmas Invasion", the latter of which I requested because I felt it had some really powerful resonances with CoE, in spite of huge differences in tone ("The Christmas Invasion" is one of Davies' happiest Who episodes). Essentially, the premise of TCI is the same as that of CoE, EXCEPT that the humans (most of the time) do the right thing instead of the wrong thing. When Harriet Jones recognises the threat they are facing, the first thing she does is get Torchwood on side, instead of trying to blow them up, and that changes the whole story. And, I think I've mentioned before, that the final scene of TCI is pretty much where Harriet Jones and the Doctor between them sow the seeds for CoE -- Harriet, because she ensures that the message, "We are defended" doesn't go out into space, and the Doctor, because he ensures that Britain won't have a PM who is capable of standing up to a threat like the 456.
So -- I actually do think that the political storyline fits very well into the political Whoniverse (although there are still problems in terms of the way the Doctor and Sarah Jane are absent), and I don't think this aspect of CoE would be jarring at all if it hadn't been for the way that a LOT of the Torchwood stuff was written very badly, with the exception of character moments between Gwen and Rhys, which were really beautiful. Other than that though... there's the shoddy J/I writing, the stupid way they got rid of the SUV and then didn't bring it back in, there's the Day 3 stuff with Gwen teaching Jack-the-con-man how to steal stuff (I can handwave her teaching Ianto-the-juvenile-delinquent because for all we know, he got caught the first time he tried to steal anything), and the absolutely stupidity of their plan in Day 4. It really does feel like RTD was trying to get rid of all vestiges of the Torchwood dynamic from S1 and S2 as quickly and as carelessly as possible.
I do find it interesting to note the differences between the way Ianto is characterised in the Torchwood-based CoE scenes (where he's generally written very badly) and in his interactions with Rhiannon, which I think were beautifully done. I think that outside the context of Torchwood, RTD felt more able to make Ianto his own character, and so we have this jarring contrast between mostly-OOC Ianto in the TW scenes, and beautiful characterisation with Rhiannon in Day 1. While I know that many people were disappointed that sexual orientation became an issue at all in Torchwood (and I did feel that way myself initially), the scene with Rhiannon, and the bit with Johnny hugging him at the end felt really positive to me. I also loved the bit in Day 2, when Johnson's agents storm into the Davies' home, and look for Ianto in Johnny's bed -- Johnny's response is "Not in my bed, I'm a married man!" That is, Johnny wouldn't sleep with Ianto because he's in a monogamous relationship. He's not at all worried about the idea that Ianto is another man, however.
Given that these things are handled so well, it seems almost incomprehensible that AFTER this point, there is a whole heap of fail with regard to the issue of sexuality. Clem's "So queer I can smell it" thing was really off, and Andy's questioning about whether or not Ianto was gay in Day 5 was completely unnecessary and it felt like it was making Ianto's sexual orientation the dominant thing about his character. (Also, we'd never seen Andy interact with Ianto at ALL -- why would he even care?) I think that this is a BIG part of why Ianto's death sat very uneasily with many members of LGBTQ communities and their allies -- because it seemed like there was a big neon sign over Ianto's head that said "OMG LOOK HOW GAY IANTO IS, HE'S SO QUEER YOU CAN SMELL IT, NOW WATCH HIM DIE." Now, I know that there are also many people from LGBTQ communities who didn't read it this way, and I am NOT saying that this is the only valid way of reading it. However, I think that by including the "so queer you can smell it" bit, and Andy's question, RTD left CoE wide open to be read as a "dead queer" narrative, when that option could easily have been shut down if he HADN'T included those moments. Likewise, I feel that Ianto's death wouldn't have come across as so problematic if RTD hadn't privileged the Gwen/Rhys relationship over the Jack/Ianto relationship, which (unintentionally, I am very sure) plays into the culturally pervasive idea that heterosexual relationships are positive and can persevere through adversity, while same-sex relationships are less deep and are doomed to death and bereavement. Again, I will stress I don't think this is the ONLY way of reading it, but I think that RTD left CoE wide open to these readings when he didn't have to -- he could have told the same story, but changed a few relatively minor things, and Ianto's death and the J/I relationship in general would NOT be open to being read that way.
On the topic of Ianto's death itself -- look, I am not opposed to character death. I think that the story that was originally planned for Ianto in S2 would have worked really well, and from a storytelling perspective, I think S2 would have been a LOT stronger if Ianto had been the one to die and get ressurected, then die again (finally, this time) in the finale. I would have been really upset if this had happened, but I think it would have worked. I really do not think that his death worked in CoE. It was a cheap attempt to provoke emotion, and it wasn't actually necessary for the story. I know I've said this before, but -- if RTD had portrayed J/I as a STRONG relationship, he could have had that relationship be the fulcrum for what happens in Day 5 -- Jack can only kill Steven because Ianto is there with him (maybe because Ianto is terrified for his own niece and nephew), because Ianto is the one who reminded Jack that it was wrong to give those children away all those years ago, etc. This would have DESTROYED their relationship, and Jack could have still gone off into space, but there would still be so much potential for the future -- Ianto developing as a character independent from Jack, Ianto and Gwen rebuilding Torchwood, Jack dealing with the consequences, etc... it would have been great.
Anyway, so I pretty much hate the way that Ianto's death was contexualised, both plot-wise (also -- the plot hole regarding Dekker escaping shits me no end) and in terms of representaitons of sexual orientation. I also hate that it happened at all -- I don't think it should have happened. Having said that, however, I do think that the death scene itself, viewed in a vacuum, was extremely well done, right from Ianto calling Rhiannon, up to the last conversation between Jack and Ianto, where the word "don't" is a constant refrain. I don't think it's a problem that Jack didn't say "I love you" -- I wouldn't have expected that even if J/I HAD been developed really well, and if I had watched that death scene with no context, then yes, I would have believed that Jack loved Ianto. I also think the moment when Jack comes back to life afterwards is done really well -- the contrast between that and the way that Jack usually comes back to live (all dramatic-like) seems to imply that this time, Jack was trying really hard NOT to come back, but he was drawn back by Gwen's touch (which is also what happened in "End of Days", so nice bit of implicit continuity there).
I have similar mixed feeling about the J/I stuff earlier in Day 4 -- in terms of the actual content of their fight about Jack not telling Ianto about the children, it was badly done. It makes Ianto seem really silly, because surely he would have realised that Jack simply doesn't have TIME to tell Ianto everything about himself. But the TONE of the argument between them, the way that Ianto is resisting Jack and challenging him -- that was really the first time in CoE that I felt that I was seeing the same relationship I'd seen in S2. I don't think it developed their relationship (exactly the same thing happens in "Adrift"*, and its' done much more subtly there). But it felt like THEM. It's just that the words were wrong. Likewise, with the death scene, the scene itself felt like it was exactly what I would have expected from a J/I death scene -- but it's function in the story was wrong, and it didn't work at all. I do honestly think that, on a Doyalist level, Ianto was fridged -- the only purpose of his death was to make Jack sad, and that's really lazy writing, especially when, with a little bit of thought and relationship development, the same story could have been told WITHOUT Ianto dying. It transforms Ianto from a character into a plot device.
The other part of CoE where reducing characters to plot devices is really problematic is in the representations of the children themselves. I think all of us who were there agreed that the children in the story felt more like props than characters, and given that children are supposed to be central to the story, this is a pretty big flaw. I remember that misswinterhill also noted that it was unrealistic that the children themselves didn't fight back -- sure, some of them cried, but none of them really struggled. It's actually a really interesting contrast with Moffat's Who, where I very much feel that children ARE treated as well rounded and complex characters. And, of course, Moffat's Who is very much about rejecting the discourses of hopelessness that are so prevalent in CoE. (I'm not saying that Moffat is intentionally trying to stick the finger to RTD, much as I'd love to believe that the "beans are evil" line was a reference to CoE -- just that his approach is the opposite to RTD's in many ways. But, I do think that RTD and the Moff are BFFs, really, and that they respect each other's work.)
I know that a lot of people will object "But Moffat is writing Doctor Who as a kids' show, and Torchwood--especially CoE--is NOT a kids' show". However, I think that Moffat's Who shows that writing for kids is NOT about denying that there is darkness in the world, and it is NOT about minimising that darkness. For myself, I utterly reject that joy is something that belongs to childhood and that hopelessness and disillusionment is a marker of adulthood. Both adults and children are capable of experiencing ALL of this, and ALL of these experiences are significant. RTD, however, does seem to attribute more significance to hopelessness and despair than to joy --his work in the Whoniverse, and especially on CoE, seems to imply that there is more meaning in despair than in joy.
This is the point where CoE really falls apart. As I said earlier, while watching CoE the other day, there were more things about it that I liked than there were things that I disliked -- but when I look at it as a coherent whole, those things that I liked -- they don't really let me take anything good away from the show, no matter how well they were done. And I think the reason for this is that CoE fails to provide a catharsis (at least for me). Yes, it's upsetting. It makes me cry. But I don't feel that I'm gaining anything by being upset; I'm not learning anything; the fiction is not enriching my life. I think that to achieve catharsis, there needs to be a conjunction of tragedy and joy -- not necessarily the joy that one feels at happy events, but the joy of fiction taking you somewhere new through tragedy.
The obvious contrast here is with "Vincent and the Doctor", which I found hugely cathartic. This episode was really fucking dark, there's no denying that. After all, Vincent kills himself, or rather, he is killed by a horrible disease that is all about grief and despair. And yet, that does not negate the beauty of the world. I am reminded of the quote from Bill Nighy's character:
Pain is easy to portray, but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy and joy and magnificence of our world - no one had ever done it before. Perhaps no one ever will again.
Now, I don't think Vincent van Gogh was the only artist to ever achieve this, but I do think this is where CoE just does not work -- RTD takes the easy route in portraying pain, and he absolutely fails to give the beauty of the world any significance. There is beauty there, but it means nothing in the face of pain. In "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang", Jack tells John that he stays on Earth for "all the beauty you could never see", and by the end of CoE, in that final scene on the hill, all that beauty has been negated. It's not that it's absent, it's just not something that can have any meaning for Jack anymore. Unlike "Vincent and the Doctor", in CoE, the pile of bad things DOES take away from the pile of good things. And that, IMO, is why CoE does not provide catharsis. That's why it just leaves me (and so many other people) just feeling horrible. We go through all of this emotional turbulance... and then there's no pay-off. There's nothing to take away from the story except despair.
So... as for where this leaves me -- well, I'm glad I watched it again. Watching it knowing what was going to happen did help me appreciate it in ways that I didn't before. But, much as I liked/loved some elements of it, as a whole, I don't think I'll ever like this story. I don't think I'll watch it again just for myself (which is really sad, because one of the things I loved most about S1 and S2 was re-watching to find new details, new readings). I'd be willing to watch it again in a fandom context, however. But ultimately, it's not my Torchwood.
Having said that though... Torchwood is still my fandom. This weekend definitely proved that to me. There is nothing of value for me to take away from CoE as a story, BUT there is still plenty of value in Torchwood fandom as a community. I'm so grateful to everyone who joined me on the weekend to watch CoE again, and I really did have a wonderful time. I hope we can do it again (although let's watch something happier next time!).
*I do actually think that "Adrift" is a very faily episode -- plot-wise it doesn't make a lot of sense and it's terribly ablist. But I think the J/I intereactions are done really well -- and I'm not just talking about the hothouse scene.
Also, many of the thoughts here came out of discussions with everyone who attended the re-watch. I don't usually remember the specific details of who said what, but I wouldn't have been able to write this without those discussions. Having said that, however, the opinions I express here are my own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of everyone else who was there on the weekend.
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I said before the weekend began that my primary goal for the Children of Earth re-watch was to be able to associate the mini-series with good memories, instead of just the bad ones that came out of last year, and that was definitely achieved. I think everyone had a really great time, and in the future, when I think of CoE, it won't just remind me of that horrible week last year, when something I loved became something horrible in such a short space of time; there'll also be memories--more recent ones--of a really awesome weekend spent with fellow fans, and that's no small thing. Additionally, I did find that the re-watch itself changed my perspective on certain elements of CoE.
Most significantly, for me, I didn't get the sense this time around that Jack didn't care for Ianto -- I just got the sense that the Jack/Ianto relationship had been really badly written, for the most part (especially in Day 3). It definitely wasn't the love story we were promised in the promo material, but at the same time I didn't see an anti-love story either. They simply didn't develop at all. I felt like the attempts to develop them (the "are we a couple" stuff and the stuff about Ianto questioning Jack about his immortality) covered ground that was implicit throughout S2, in a really clunky way -- but in spite of that, there were a couple of nice moments. To my surprise I found the way JB and GDL played the "couple" stuff in Day 1 kind of cute this time around; while I found those bit unnecessary, and while the writing itself felt forced, I think JB and GDL did the best with what they were given. The "die like a dog" line was awful though -- I could actually see Ianto engaging in that sort of gallows humour, but not Jack, not after Tosh and Owen. It's really jarring and really terrible foreshadowing -- more like fore-anviling. As for the Day 3 stuff... I don't know HOW they could have played that well. At the beginning of the ep, they seemed to be fighting for no reason at all, and then Ianto asks all these questions that imply that it's only just occured to him that Jack is immortal and going to outlive him, which makes him look really stupid -- the writing there is just so bad that I couldn't actually watch that scene and maintain any suspension of disbelief. Also, not allowing Jack and Ianto one final moment of intimacy (which didn't need to be sex) just felt cruel, given that RTD was planning to kill Ianto. RTD is capable of so much better -- I think part of the reason that I hung onto the idea that Jack didn't care for Ianto over the last year is that I couldn't really bring myself to believe that RTD was capable of writing a character scene that badly (because usually his character writing is really excellent).
For me personally, I feel like I can read J/I in the way I read them in S2 again, and that makes me really happy. At the same time though, it's really disappointing that CoE didn't develop their relationship beyond that, when it could have been done so easily, and I honestly don't know that I have the urge to write them further -- I just don't know that there's anything more to say about them. A few months before CoE, I wrote Power Play, which pretty much sums up my fanon about what I think their relationship was like in S2. After watching CoE last year, I felt that this was jossed in spirit if not in fact, but now I feel like it works again. But... there's nowhere else to take it from there, not in canon-compliant fic, anyway. I may write the odd PWP in the future for J/I, but that's it. So... well, I'm glad that this re-watch gave J/I back to me in some ways, but it's still a mixed bag, I guess.
The "mixed bag" thing definitely applies to CoE as a whole too. Right throughout the re-watch, all of us were pointing out little details that we liked/loved or disliked/hated, and I know that for me, there actually were more "liked/loved" bits than "disliked/hated" bits. Most of the "liked/loved" bits for me were part of the political storyline. I do think Frobisher's tragic story was excellent the whole way through, and the politicians talking about what to do about the children was chilling and brilliant. The original characters in this story all sparkled. I particularly enjoyed the way that the representative of the US were portrayed, and found the way that representations of global politics in the Whoniverse have shifted really interesting. I do, however, think that there was major fail in the way that for the story to work, we have to assume that all other countries in the world were willing to give up 10% of their kids because Britain told them to, and in the assumption that all other countries even have the infrastructure to do that. This struck me as a very Imperialist approach, and made me highly uncomfortable. From a plot perspective, rather than a political one, I also found the political storyline annoying simply in that the plan to blow up the Hub and kill all the other people involved in 1965 MAKES NO SENSE. After all, as PM Green points out, the people in power now were only children in 1965 -- it's not like they need to save their own arses. It would have made much more sense of them to kidnap Jack and all the others involved in 1965, so they could get as much info out of them as possible -- and THEN kill them/encase them in super-quick-dry-magic-concrete.
Having said that, I know that one of the criticisms that has been levelled at CoE is that it was tacking Torchwood onto a story that didn't really fit into the Whoniverse, but I don't buy that completely, even though there were some world-building problems. Before we watched CoE on Saturday, we watched a number of TW eps, plus "The Christmas Invasion", the latter of which I requested because I felt it had some really powerful resonances with CoE, in spite of huge differences in tone ("The Christmas Invasion" is one of Davies' happiest Who episodes). Essentially, the premise of TCI is the same as that of CoE, EXCEPT that the humans (most of the time) do the right thing instead of the wrong thing. When Harriet Jones recognises the threat they are facing, the first thing she does is get Torchwood on side, instead of trying to blow them up, and that changes the whole story. And, I think I've mentioned before, that the final scene of TCI is pretty much where Harriet Jones and the Doctor between them sow the seeds for CoE -- Harriet, because she ensures that the message, "We are defended" doesn't go out into space, and the Doctor, because he ensures that Britain won't have a PM who is capable of standing up to a threat like the 456.
So -- I actually do think that the political storyline fits very well into the political Whoniverse (although there are still problems in terms of the way the Doctor and Sarah Jane are absent), and I don't think this aspect of CoE would be jarring at all if it hadn't been for the way that a LOT of the Torchwood stuff was written very badly, with the exception of character moments between Gwen and Rhys, which were really beautiful. Other than that though... there's the shoddy J/I writing, the stupid way they got rid of the SUV and then didn't bring it back in, there's the Day 3 stuff with Gwen teaching Jack-the-con-man how to steal stuff (I can handwave her teaching Ianto-the-juvenile-delinquent because for all we know, he got caught the first time he tried to steal anything), and the absolutely stupidity of their plan in Day 4. It really does feel like RTD was trying to get rid of all vestiges of the Torchwood dynamic from S1 and S2 as quickly and as carelessly as possible.
I do find it interesting to note the differences between the way Ianto is characterised in the Torchwood-based CoE scenes (where he's generally written very badly) and in his interactions with Rhiannon, which I think were beautifully done. I think that outside the context of Torchwood, RTD felt more able to make Ianto his own character, and so we have this jarring contrast between mostly-OOC Ianto in the TW scenes, and beautiful characterisation with Rhiannon in Day 1. While I know that many people were disappointed that sexual orientation became an issue at all in Torchwood (and I did feel that way myself initially), the scene with Rhiannon, and the bit with Johnny hugging him at the end felt really positive to me. I also loved the bit in Day 2, when Johnson's agents storm into the Davies' home, and look for Ianto in Johnny's bed -- Johnny's response is "Not in my bed, I'm a married man!" That is, Johnny wouldn't sleep with Ianto because he's in a monogamous relationship. He's not at all worried about the idea that Ianto is another man, however.
Given that these things are handled so well, it seems almost incomprehensible that AFTER this point, there is a whole heap of fail with regard to the issue of sexuality. Clem's "So queer I can smell it" thing was really off, and Andy's questioning about whether or not Ianto was gay in Day 5 was completely unnecessary and it felt like it was making Ianto's sexual orientation the dominant thing about his character. (Also, we'd never seen Andy interact with Ianto at ALL -- why would he even care?) I think that this is a BIG part of why Ianto's death sat very uneasily with many members of LGBTQ communities and their allies -- because it seemed like there was a big neon sign over Ianto's head that said "OMG LOOK HOW GAY IANTO IS, HE'S SO QUEER YOU CAN SMELL IT, NOW WATCH HIM DIE." Now, I know that there are also many people from LGBTQ communities who didn't read it this way, and I am NOT saying that this is the only valid way of reading it. However, I think that by including the "so queer you can smell it" bit, and Andy's question, RTD left CoE wide open to be read as a "dead queer" narrative, when that option could easily have been shut down if he HADN'T included those moments. Likewise, I feel that Ianto's death wouldn't have come across as so problematic if RTD hadn't privileged the Gwen/Rhys relationship over the Jack/Ianto relationship, which (unintentionally, I am very sure) plays into the culturally pervasive idea that heterosexual relationships are positive and can persevere through adversity, while same-sex relationships are less deep and are doomed to death and bereavement. Again, I will stress I don't think this is the ONLY way of reading it, but I think that RTD left CoE wide open to these readings when he didn't have to -- he could have told the same story, but changed a few relatively minor things, and Ianto's death and the J/I relationship in general would NOT be open to being read that way.
On the topic of Ianto's death itself -- look, I am not opposed to character death. I think that the story that was originally planned for Ianto in S2 would have worked really well, and from a storytelling perspective, I think S2 would have been a LOT stronger if Ianto had been the one to die and get ressurected, then die again (finally, this time) in the finale. I would have been really upset if this had happened, but I think it would have worked. I really do not think that his death worked in CoE. It was a cheap attempt to provoke emotion, and it wasn't actually necessary for the story. I know I've said this before, but -- if RTD had portrayed J/I as a STRONG relationship, he could have had that relationship be the fulcrum for what happens in Day 5 -- Jack can only kill Steven because Ianto is there with him (maybe because Ianto is terrified for his own niece and nephew), because Ianto is the one who reminded Jack that it was wrong to give those children away all those years ago, etc. This would have DESTROYED their relationship, and Jack could have still gone off into space, but there would still be so much potential for the future -- Ianto developing as a character independent from Jack, Ianto and Gwen rebuilding Torchwood, Jack dealing with the consequences, etc... it would have been great.
Anyway, so I pretty much hate the way that Ianto's death was contexualised, both plot-wise (also -- the plot hole regarding Dekker escaping shits me no end) and in terms of representaitons of sexual orientation. I also hate that it happened at all -- I don't think it should have happened. Having said that, however, I do think that the death scene itself, viewed in a vacuum, was extremely well done, right from Ianto calling Rhiannon, up to the last conversation between Jack and Ianto, where the word "don't" is a constant refrain. I don't think it's a problem that Jack didn't say "I love you" -- I wouldn't have expected that even if J/I HAD been developed really well, and if I had watched that death scene with no context, then yes, I would have believed that Jack loved Ianto. I also think the moment when Jack comes back to life afterwards is done really well -- the contrast between that and the way that Jack usually comes back to live (all dramatic-like) seems to imply that this time, Jack was trying really hard NOT to come back, but he was drawn back by Gwen's touch (which is also what happened in "End of Days", so nice bit of implicit continuity there).
I have similar mixed feeling about the J/I stuff earlier in Day 4 -- in terms of the actual content of their fight about Jack not telling Ianto about the children, it was badly done. It makes Ianto seem really silly, because surely he would have realised that Jack simply doesn't have TIME to tell Ianto everything about himself. But the TONE of the argument between them, the way that Ianto is resisting Jack and challenging him -- that was really the first time in CoE that I felt that I was seeing the same relationship I'd seen in S2. I don't think it developed their relationship (exactly the same thing happens in "Adrift"*, and its' done much more subtly there). But it felt like THEM. It's just that the words were wrong. Likewise, with the death scene, the scene itself felt like it was exactly what I would have expected from a J/I death scene -- but it's function in the story was wrong, and it didn't work at all. I do honestly think that, on a Doyalist level, Ianto was fridged -- the only purpose of his death was to make Jack sad, and that's really lazy writing, especially when, with a little bit of thought and relationship development, the same story could have been told WITHOUT Ianto dying. It transforms Ianto from a character into a plot device.
The other part of CoE where reducing characters to plot devices is really problematic is in the representations of the children themselves. I think all of us who were there agreed that the children in the story felt more like props than characters, and given that children are supposed to be central to the story, this is a pretty big flaw. I remember that misswinterhill also noted that it was unrealistic that the children themselves didn't fight back -- sure, some of them cried, but none of them really struggled. It's actually a really interesting contrast with Moffat's Who, where I very much feel that children ARE treated as well rounded and complex characters. And, of course, Moffat's Who is very much about rejecting the discourses of hopelessness that are so prevalent in CoE. (I'm not saying that Moffat is intentionally trying to stick the finger to RTD, much as I'd love to believe that the "beans are evil" line was a reference to CoE -- just that his approach is the opposite to RTD's in many ways. But, I do think that RTD and the Moff are BFFs, really, and that they respect each other's work.)
I know that a lot of people will object "But Moffat is writing Doctor Who as a kids' show, and Torchwood--especially CoE--is NOT a kids' show". However, I think that Moffat's Who shows that writing for kids is NOT about denying that there is darkness in the world, and it is NOT about minimising that darkness. For myself, I utterly reject that joy is something that belongs to childhood and that hopelessness and disillusionment is a marker of adulthood. Both adults and children are capable of experiencing ALL of this, and ALL of these experiences are significant. RTD, however, does seem to attribute more significance to hopelessness and despair than to joy --his work in the Whoniverse, and especially on CoE, seems to imply that there is more meaning in despair than in joy.
This is the point where CoE really falls apart. As I said earlier, while watching CoE the other day, there were more things about it that I liked than there were things that I disliked -- but when I look at it as a coherent whole, those things that I liked -- they don't really let me take anything good away from the show, no matter how well they were done. And I think the reason for this is that CoE fails to provide a catharsis (at least for me). Yes, it's upsetting. It makes me cry. But I don't feel that I'm gaining anything by being upset; I'm not learning anything; the fiction is not enriching my life. I think that to achieve catharsis, there needs to be a conjunction of tragedy and joy -- not necessarily the joy that one feels at happy events, but the joy of fiction taking you somewhere new through tragedy.
The obvious contrast here is with "Vincent and the Doctor", which I found hugely cathartic. This episode was really fucking dark, there's no denying that. After all, Vincent kills himself, or rather, he is killed by a horrible disease that is all about grief and despair. And yet, that does not negate the beauty of the world. I am reminded of the quote from Bill Nighy's character:
Pain is easy to portray, but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy and joy and magnificence of our world - no one had ever done it before. Perhaps no one ever will again.
Now, I don't think Vincent van Gogh was the only artist to ever achieve this, but I do think this is where CoE just does not work -- RTD takes the easy route in portraying pain, and he absolutely fails to give the beauty of the world any significance. There is beauty there, but it means nothing in the face of pain. In "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang", Jack tells John that he stays on Earth for "all the beauty you could never see", and by the end of CoE, in that final scene on the hill, all that beauty has been negated. It's not that it's absent, it's just not something that can have any meaning for Jack anymore. Unlike "Vincent and the Doctor", in CoE, the pile of bad things DOES take away from the pile of good things. And that, IMO, is why CoE does not provide catharsis. That's why it just leaves me (and so many other people) just feeling horrible. We go through all of this emotional turbulance... and then there's no pay-off. There's nothing to take away from the story except despair.
So... as for where this leaves me -- well, I'm glad I watched it again. Watching it knowing what was going to happen did help me appreciate it in ways that I didn't before. But, much as I liked/loved some elements of it, as a whole, I don't think I'll ever like this story. I don't think I'll watch it again just for myself (which is really sad, because one of the things I loved most about S1 and S2 was re-watching to find new details, new readings). I'd be willing to watch it again in a fandom context, however. But ultimately, it's not my Torchwood.
Having said that though... Torchwood is still my fandom. This weekend definitely proved that to me. There is nothing of value for me to take away from CoE as a story, BUT there is still plenty of value in Torchwood fandom as a community. I'm so grateful to everyone who joined me on the weekend to watch CoE again, and I really did have a wonderful time. I hope we can do it again (although let's watch something happier next time!).
*I do actually think that "Adrift" is a very faily episode -- plot-wise it doesn't make a lot of sense and it's terribly ablist. But I think the J/I intereactions are done really well -- and I'm not just talking about the hothouse scene.