Torchwood: EPIC FAIL - Doctor Who Road Trip!
So, once upon a time, I decided to help out the cross-section of my friends who 1) watched Doctor Who and 2) had actual standards like "not sucking" for what TV shows they watched by recapping Torchwood Series One. (For those who haven't been paying attention, or who repressed all memories of s1 after watching "Cyberwoman", Torchwood chronicles the exploits of Captain Jack Harkness -- lady's man, man's man, man about town -- and his team, whose job of "tracking down alien life on Earth" and "arming the human race against the future" while monitoring the Rift in time and space that runs through Cardiff somehow translates to "making poor life choices" and "unleashing alien terror upon the unsuspecting populace" with upsetting regularity.)
I was going to stop there, for lo, I beheld Series Two and thought it awesome. Which it is, to be sure, but upon closer examination, I determined that this was not because Torchwood stopped failing, but because it started winning enough to counteract the FAIL that still lurked beneath the surface as stealthily as Torchwood themselves -- in other words, not very. And so, dear readers, Torchwood: EPIC FAIL will return... in THUNDERBALL! at some point, hopefully before the new series comes out! And since that's apparently not until THE SUMMER WTF I suspect that probability is in my favor!
Of course, part of Torchwood's... charm is that fairly critical backstory likes to happen in other shows, whereupon it is vaguely alluded to but not actually explained on Torchwood itself. (I have thus been forced to speculate that Torchwood may actually be allergic to backstory, and its appearance will cause the entire show to go into shock which explains the s2 finale.)
This being the case, I feel obligated to recap the Doctor Who Series Three finale for completeness' sake, since it has Torchwood backstory up the wazoo. (Not literally.)
(I hope.)
So, please enjoy this brief interruption to your irregularly scheduled programming!
Previously on Doctor Who:
Torchwood Series One concluded with our intrepid hero, Captain Jack Harkness, mysteriously MIA after hearing the sound of a TARDIS materialize over the invisible lift. Naturally, his team assumes that persons or aliens unknown have penetrated the defenses of the Hub and kidnapped him while they were out getting coffee.
As it turns out, Jack disappeared by cunningly taking the stairs and running across the Roald Dahl Plass in full view of Torchwood's security cameras, producing what is probably the most hilarious 30 seconds of CCTV footage ever.
However, the Doctor (who has stopped by Cardiff to refuel the TARDIS while jaunting across time and space with the ever-awesome Martha Jones) is less than pleased to see Jack and tries to run away. This merely forces Jack to FLY LIKE A MORON and cling to the outside of the TARDIS as it zips through the Time Vortex.
Unfortunately, Jack's presence causes the TARDIS to go bajillions of years into the future (not an unreasonable response to s1) and it deposits everyone at the End of the Universe. Sadly, there is no restaurant. Martha and the Doctor emerge from the TARDIS to find Jack lying dead, killed by either unprotected Time Vortex traveling or by his heart exploding after running up 105 stairs and all the way across the Plass.
After attempting CPR, Martha sadly informs the Doctor that Jack is definitely dead, which is his cue to return to life in pursuit of possible make-outery, much to the surprise of Martha and the twelve children in Great Britain who did not manage to sneak watching Torchwood or have access to internet spoilers. Jack and Martha quickly become besties and bitch about the Doctor:
MARTHA: Is that what happens, though? Seriously? Do you just get bored with us one day and disappear?
JACK: Not if you’re blonde.
MARTHA: Oh, she was blonde? Oh, what a surprise.
THE DOCTOR: You two! We’re at the end of the universe. All right? We’re at the edge of knowledge itself and you’re busy… blogging!
In approximately 5 minutes or so total screen time, we get more explanation for Jack's peculiarities than we did in 13 episodes of Torchwood, such as:
Possessing a hand-inna-jar
MARTHA: Oh my God. You’ve got a hand. A hand in a jar. A hand in a jar in your bag.
THE DOCTOR: That’s- that’s my hand!
JACK: I said I had a Doctor detector.
And the Doctor adds "body parts in the possession of known sketchballs" to the list of things he never thought he would have to worry about.
Ending up in the 21st century
JACK: So there I was, stranded in the year 200,100, ankle-deep in Dalek dust, and he goes off without me. But I had this. I used to be a Time Agent. It’s called a Vortex Manipulator. He’s not the only one who can time travel.
THE DOCTOR: Oh, excuse me. That is not time travel. It’s like I’ve got a sports car and you’ve got a space hopper.
MARTHA: Boys and their toys.
JACK: All right, so I bounced. I thought "21st century, best place to find the Doctor!" except that I got it a little wrong. I arrived in 1869 and this thing burnt out so it was useless.
THE DOCTOR: Told you.
JACK: I had to live through the entire 20th century waiting for a version of you that would coincide with me.
MARTHA: That makes you more that 100 years old.
JACK: And looking good, doncha think? So I went to the time rift, based myself around the thing ‘cause I knew you’d come back to refuel.
Here we learn two important things about Jack: 1) he can't do math; 2) the image of him bouncing through time and space is KIND OF HILARIOUS.
Being immortal and all
JACK: Last thing I remember back when I was mortal… I was facing three Daleks. Death by extermination. And then I came back to life. What happened?
THE DOCTOR: Rose.
JACK: I thought you sent her back home.
THE DOCTOR: She came back. Opened the heart of the TARDIS and absorbed the time vortex.
JACK: What does that mean, exactly?
THE DOCTOR: No one’s ever mean to have that power. If a Time Lord did that, he’d become a god, a vengeful god. But she was human. Everything she did was so human. She brought you back to life but she couldn’t control it. She brought you back forever. That’s something, I suppose. The final act of the Time War was life.
Well, either the immortal time goddess couldn't control bringing back Jack but was perfectly capable of wiping an entire Dalek fleet out of existence, or maybe she decided that the Doctor needed a friend who would pretty much always be there SO HE COULD STOP ANGSTING ABOUT BEING ALONE ALREADY. I'm just sayin'.
Getting ditched by the Doctor
THE DOCTOR: When did you first realize?
JACK: Earth 1892. Got in a fight in Ellis Island. A man shot me through the heart. Then I woke up. Thought it was kinda strange. But then it never stopped. Fell off a cliff, trampled by horses, World War I, World War II, poison, strangulation, a stray javelin… In the end, I got the message, I’m the man who can never die. And all that time you knew.
THE DOCTOR: That’s why I left you behind. It’s not easy even just…just looking at you Jack, ‘cause you’re wrong.
JACK: Thanks.
THE DOCTOR: You are, I can’t help it. I’m a Time Lord. It’s instinct. It’s in my guts. You’re a fixed point in time a space. You’re a fact. That’s never meant to happen. Even the TARDIS reacted against you-tried to shake you off. Flew all the way to the end of the universe just to get rid of you.
JACK: So what you’re saying is that you’re prejudiced?
More important things: 1) Jack went for 23 years without aging and didn't notice anything out of the ordinary; 2) He doesn't get along with INS; 3) He had REALLY bad luck at a track meet.
Also, the Doctor? Kind of an asshole.
However, plot insists intruding on the awesomeness that is the Team TARDIS show, and part 1 of the finale ends with the return of the Master and subsequent theft of the TARDIS (and the hand-inna-jar). Fortunately, Jack's Vortex Manipulator comes to the rescue, and Team TARDIS returns to the not-too-distant future in the most amusing way possible.
In the present(ish) day, the Master has been elected PM by broadcasting the bass line of the Doctor Who theme song and telling everyone to VOTE SAXON, which works out surprisingly well. He kidnaps most of Martha's family and puts Team TARDIS on the Most Wanted list.
Jack tries to contact his team, but it turns out the Master has sent them on a wild goose chase in the Himalayas, probably by telling them that Jack had been kidnapped by the Abominable Snowman. They aren't mentioned again, presumably because they got lost in Tibet while being pursued by enraged Yetis after accidentally destroying Shangri-La.
Jack finally 'fesses up to the Doctor that he's been working for Torchwood, and the Doctor is initially Not Pleased.
DOCTOR: Everything Torchwood did and you’re part of it?
JACK: The old regime was destroyed at Canary Wharf. I rebuilt it, I changed it. And when I did that, I did it for you, in your honour.
I don't really know how much of an honor that actually ends up being, but fortunately for Jack the Doctor didn't watch s1 and is eventually mollified.
Team TARDIS attempts to thwart the Master's sinister plans, but part 2 ends with Jack and the Doctor captured by the Master, leaving Martha to escape with Jack's Vortex Manipulator to save the world on her own.
One year later, Baltar has been elected president, and things on New Caprica have gone to crap. Wait, sorry, no. One year later, the Master has thoroughly conquered Earth and is about to move on to the rest of the Universe. Jack has apparently spent the entire year chained up and not allowed to bathe.
He and the Doctor (who is forced to wear old-age makeup and live in a tent -- no, I don't get it either) pass the time by organizing extremely FAILy coup d'etats with the help of Martha's family, but this only results in the Doctor being transformed into Dobby the House Elf. This is what happens when you let the Master have the hand-inna-jar.
Martha, meanwhile, has been hanging out with a ragtag band of rebels (most notably Scruffy Guy) in her quest to save the world, but finally gets captured. Oh noes!
However, it turns out that she has out-Mastered the Master, and she laughs in his face when he falls right into her trap. As the entire world claps their hands three times and says "I do believe in fairies the Doctor, I do, I do!" (?!) the Doctor taps into the Psychic Network (?!?!), becomes Discoball Jesus (?!?!?!), and defeats the Master (more or less).
+
=
Jack gets to blow up the deus ex machina, which trips a giant RESET switch. Everything snaps back one year and returns to normal, the entirety of the last episode being totally erased for everybody except the main characters and, bizarrely, Coldplay. (What else is "Viva la Vida" supposed to be about?)
With that all sorted out, the Doctor and Martha give Jack a ride back to Cardiff. The Doctor has apparently gotten over being a huge jerk Jack being all ucky immortally, and asks if he wants to travel with him again. However...
JACK: I had plenty of time to think that past year, the Year That Never Was. And I kept thinking about that team of mine. Like you said, Doctor, responsibility.
I am somewhat concerned it took him an entire year to figure out that Torchwood should under no circumstances be allowed to go unsupervised, but hey, he got there in the end.
The Doctor helpfully deactivates Jack's Vortex Manipulator so it can't do anything useful on his own show, and Jack returns the favor by revealing that eventually, he will turn into the giant mysterious head-inna-jar who died ten episodes previously (?!?!?!?!):
JACK: But I keep wondering… what about aging? ‘Cause I can't die but I keep getting older. The odd little grey hair, you know? What happens if I live for a million years?
DOCTOR: I really don't know.
JACK: Okay, vanity. Sorry. Yeah, can't help it. Used to be a poster boy when I was a kid back on the Boeshane Pennisula. Tiny little place. I was the first one ever to be signed up for the Time Agency. They were so proud of me. They Face of Boe they called me.
=
...?
No, seriously.
And then he saunters off to the Hub to see if Torchwood is back from Nepal yet.
THE END
Macro via Roflbot, macro quote from MST3K, and screencaps from time-and-space.co.uk, except for Miss Cleo. The four hundred pounds of pure high-grade Russell T Daviesian crack was made possible by funding from the BBC and Viewers Like You.
The Torchwood: EPIC FAIL Project Table o' Contents!
I was going to stop there, for lo, I beheld Series Two and thought it awesome. Which it is, to be sure, but upon closer examination, I determined that this was not because Torchwood stopped failing, but because it started winning enough to counteract the FAIL that still lurked beneath the surface as stealthily as Torchwood themselves -- in other words, not very. And so, dear readers, Torchwood: EPIC FAIL will return... in THUNDERBALL! at some point, hopefully before the new series comes out! And since that's apparently not until THE SUMMER WTF I suspect that probability is in my favor!
Of course, part of Torchwood's... charm is that fairly critical backstory likes to happen in other shows, whereupon it is vaguely alluded to but not actually explained on Torchwood itself. (I have thus been forced to speculate that Torchwood may actually be allergic to backstory, and its appearance will cause the entire show to go into shock which explains the s2 finale.)
This being the case, I feel obligated to recap the Doctor Who Series Three finale for completeness' sake, since it has Torchwood backstory up the wazoo. (Not literally.)
(I hope.)
So, please enjoy this brief interruption to your irregularly scheduled programming!
Previously on Doctor Who:
Torchwood Series One concluded with our intrepid hero, Captain Jack Harkness, mysteriously MIA after hearing the sound of a TARDIS materialize over the invisible lift. Naturally, his team assumes that persons or aliens unknown have penetrated the defenses of the Hub and kidnapped him while they were out getting coffee.
As it turns out, Jack disappeared by cunningly taking the stairs and running across the Roald Dahl Plass in full view of Torchwood's security cameras, producing what is probably the most hilarious 30 seconds of CCTV footage ever.
However, the Doctor (who has stopped by Cardiff to refuel the TARDIS while jaunting across time and space with the ever-awesome Martha Jones) is less than pleased to see Jack and tries to run away. This merely forces Jack to FLY LIKE A MORON and cling to the outside of the TARDIS as it zips through the Time Vortex.
Click to viewUnfortunately, Jack's presence causes the TARDIS to go bajillions of years into the future (not an unreasonable response to s1) and it deposits everyone at the End of the Universe. Sadly, there is no restaurant. Martha and the Doctor emerge from the TARDIS to find Jack lying dead, killed by either unprotected Time Vortex traveling or by his heart exploding after running up 105 stairs and all the way across the Plass.
After attempting CPR, Martha sadly informs the Doctor that Jack is definitely dead, which is his cue to return to life in pursuit of possible make-outery, much to the surprise of Martha and the twelve children in Great Britain who did not manage to sneak watching Torchwood or have access to internet spoilers. Jack and Martha quickly become besties and bitch about the Doctor:
MARTHA: Is that what happens, though? Seriously? Do you just get bored with us one day and disappear?
JACK: Not if you’re blonde.
MARTHA: Oh, she was blonde? Oh, what a surprise.
THE DOCTOR: You two! We’re at the end of the universe. All right? We’re at the edge of knowledge itself and you’re busy… blogging!
In approximately 5 minutes or so total screen time, we get more explanation for Jack's peculiarities than we did in 13 episodes of Torchwood, such as:
Possessing a hand-inna-jar
MARTHA: Oh my God. You’ve got a hand. A hand in a jar. A hand in a jar in your bag.
THE DOCTOR: That’s- that’s my hand!
JACK: I said I had a Doctor detector.
And the Doctor adds "body parts in the possession of known sketchballs" to the list of things he never thought he would have to worry about.
Ending up in the 21st century
JACK: So there I was, stranded in the year 200,100, ankle-deep in Dalek dust, and he goes off without me. But I had this. I used to be a Time Agent. It’s called a Vortex Manipulator. He’s not the only one who can time travel.
THE DOCTOR: Oh, excuse me. That is not time travel. It’s like I’ve got a sports car and you’ve got a space hopper.
MARTHA: Boys and their toys.
JACK: All right, so I bounced. I thought "21st century, best place to find the Doctor!" except that I got it a little wrong. I arrived in 1869 and this thing burnt out so it was useless.
THE DOCTOR: Told you.
JACK: I had to live through the entire 20th century waiting for a version of you that would coincide with me.
MARTHA: That makes you more that 100 years old.
JACK: And looking good, doncha think? So I went to the time rift, based myself around the thing ‘cause I knew you’d come back to refuel.
Here we learn two important things about Jack: 1) he can't do math; 2) the image of him bouncing through time and space is KIND OF HILARIOUS.
Being immortal and all
JACK: Last thing I remember back when I was mortal… I was facing three Daleks. Death by extermination. And then I came back to life. What happened?
THE DOCTOR: Rose.
JACK: I thought you sent her back home.
THE DOCTOR: She came back. Opened the heart of the TARDIS and absorbed the time vortex.
JACK: What does that mean, exactly?
THE DOCTOR: No one’s ever mean to have that power. If a Time Lord did that, he’d become a god, a vengeful god. But she was human. Everything she did was so human. She brought you back to life but she couldn’t control it. She brought you back forever. That’s something, I suppose. The final act of the Time War was life.
Well, either the immortal time goddess couldn't control bringing back Jack but was perfectly capable of wiping an entire Dalek fleet out of existence, or maybe she decided that the Doctor needed a friend who would pretty much always be there SO HE COULD STOP ANGSTING ABOUT BEING ALONE ALREADY. I'm just sayin'.
Getting ditched by the Doctor
THE DOCTOR: When did you first realize?
JACK: Earth 1892. Got in a fight in Ellis Island. A man shot me through the heart. Then I woke up. Thought it was kinda strange. But then it never stopped. Fell off a cliff, trampled by horses, World War I, World War II, poison, strangulation, a stray javelin… In the end, I got the message, I’m the man who can never die. And all that time you knew.
THE DOCTOR: That’s why I left you behind. It’s not easy even just…just looking at you Jack, ‘cause you’re wrong.
JACK: Thanks.
THE DOCTOR: You are, I can’t help it. I’m a Time Lord. It’s instinct. It’s in my guts. You’re a fixed point in time a space. You’re a fact. That’s never meant to happen. Even the TARDIS reacted against you-tried to shake you off. Flew all the way to the end of the universe just to get rid of you.
JACK: So what you’re saying is that you’re prejudiced?
More important things: 1) Jack went for 23 years without aging and didn't notice anything out of the ordinary; 2) He doesn't get along with INS; 3) He had REALLY bad luck at a track meet.
Also, the Doctor? Kind of an asshole.
However, plot insists intruding on the awesomeness that is the Team TARDIS show, and part 1 of the finale ends with the return of the Master and subsequent theft of the TARDIS (and the hand-inna-jar). Fortunately, Jack's Vortex Manipulator comes to the rescue, and Team TARDIS returns to the not-too-distant future in the most amusing way possible.
In the present(ish) day, the Master has been elected PM by broadcasting the bass line of the Doctor Who theme song and telling everyone to VOTE SAXON, which works out surprisingly well. He kidnaps most of Martha's family and puts Team TARDIS on the Most Wanted list.
Jack tries to contact his team, but it turns out the Master has sent them on a wild goose chase in the Himalayas, probably by telling them that Jack had been kidnapped by the Abominable Snowman. They aren't mentioned again, presumably because they got lost in Tibet while being pursued by enraged Yetis after accidentally destroying Shangri-La.
Jack finally 'fesses up to the Doctor that he's been working for Torchwood, and the Doctor is initially Not Pleased.
DOCTOR: Everything Torchwood did and you’re part of it?
JACK: The old regime was destroyed at Canary Wharf. I rebuilt it, I changed it. And when I did that, I did it for you, in your honour.
I don't really know how much of an honor that actually ends up being, but fortunately for Jack the Doctor didn't watch s1 and is eventually mollified.
Team TARDIS attempts to thwart the Master's sinister plans, but part 2 ends with Jack and the Doctor captured by the Master, leaving Martha to escape with Jack's Vortex Manipulator to save the world on her own.
One year later, Baltar has been elected president, and things on New Caprica have gone to crap. Wait, sorry, no. One year later, the Master has thoroughly conquered Earth and is about to move on to the rest of the Universe. Jack has apparently spent the entire year chained up and not allowed to bathe.
He and the Doctor (who is forced to wear old-age makeup and live in a tent -- no, I don't get it either) pass the time by organizing extremely FAILy coup d'etats with the help of Martha's family, but this only results in the Doctor being transformed into Dobby the House Elf. This is what happens when you let the Master have the hand-inna-jar.
Martha, meanwhile, has been hanging out with a ragtag band of rebels (most notably Scruffy Guy) in her quest to save the world, but finally gets captured. Oh noes!
However, it turns out that she has out-Mastered the Master, and she laughs in his face when he falls right into her trap. As the entire world claps their hands three times and says "I do believe in fairies the Doctor, I do, I do!" (?!) the Doctor taps into the Psychic Network (?!?!), becomes Discoball Jesus (?!?!?!), and defeats the Master (more or less).
+
=
Jack gets to blow up the deus ex machina, which trips a giant RESET switch. Everything snaps back one year and returns to normal, the entirety of the last episode being totally erased for everybody except the main characters and, bizarrely, Coldplay. (What else is "Viva la Vida" supposed to be about?)
With that all sorted out, the Doctor and Martha give Jack a ride back to Cardiff. The Doctor has apparently gotten over being a huge jerk Jack being all ucky immortally, and asks if he wants to travel with him again. However...
JACK: I had plenty of time to think that past year, the Year That Never Was. And I kept thinking about that team of mine. Like you said, Doctor, responsibility.
I am somewhat concerned it took him an entire year to figure out that Torchwood should under no circumstances be allowed to go unsupervised, but hey, he got there in the end.
The Doctor helpfully deactivates Jack's Vortex Manipulator so it can't do anything useful on his own show, and Jack returns the favor by revealing that eventually, he will turn into the giant mysterious head-inna-jar who died ten episodes previously (?!?!?!?!):
JACK: But I keep wondering… what about aging? ‘Cause I can't die but I keep getting older. The odd little grey hair, you know? What happens if I live for a million years?
DOCTOR: I really don't know.
JACK: Okay, vanity. Sorry. Yeah, can't help it. Used to be a poster boy when I was a kid back on the Boeshane Pennisula. Tiny little place. I was the first one ever to be signed up for the Time Agency. They were so proud of me. They Face of Boe they called me.
=
...?
No, seriously.
And then he saunters off to the Hub to see if Torchwood is back from Nepal yet.
THE END
Macro via Roflbot, macro quote from MST3K, and screencaps from time-and-space.co.uk, except for Miss Cleo. The four hundred pounds of pure high-grade Russell T Daviesian crack was made possible by funding from the BBC and Viewers Like You.
The Torchwood: EPIC FAIL Project Table o' Contents!