Excellent review of TW: CoE

[honorh]

CoE as a horror story

Spoilers, of course, and some very good thinking.

Comments

[lady_moriel]

What's interesting for me is that this review was what made me decide I don't want to watch CoE. And I think part of the problem people are having with the miniseries--part of the problem I'd have with it, although the fact that it's so depressing with a massive downer ending is the main one--isn't so much that it's a bait-and-switch but that this is what Torchwood was always supposed to be...and it wasn't. S1 in particular always seemed to me like it had these pretensions of being dark and edgy and gritty, but mainly it was just gratuitous sex and language that let them feel like they were being edgy. S2 somewhat less so, but there was still that, still downer endings that seemed to be used for the sake of downer endings and nothing else, all because they were trying so hard to be edgy. And they weren't--they were pretty much posers, because it was still campy and silly

[honorh]

I think the label "evil" is going too far. Yeah, they make a lot of mistakes, and their methods can be harsh, but they've also done a lot that's worthwhile. And lost people doing it. "Evil" is what I saw in CoE, when a bunch of civil servants were sitting around talking about which children they should sacrifice to essentially a bunch of alien drug dealers.

I will agree Jack shouldn't be leading the group. He's not a natural leader; witness how easily he slid into a follower role with the Doctor. If Gwen were to take over the reins, I think the group could grow into what Jack hoped it would become. If he returns, he needs to take a backseat role.

[lady_moriel]

Well, yeah, "evil" probably goes too far since their intentions are essentially good, but it does seem that there's a ruthlessness and almost...inhumanity, I suppose, that characterizes so many of their methods, which is maybe to be expected when they're dealing with inhuman threats but is also rather odd seeing as it's humanity they're supposed to protect. And when you start becoming like what you're fighting--well, yeah. Stuff like being able to hold Tosh indefinitely and basically making her disappear, the team basically using the resurrection glove on murder victims for experiments rather than trying to solve their murders or anything, the early-1900s Torchwood operatives coldly experimenting on Jack to see whether he'd keep coming back to life...I dunno. It just seems like Torchwood, as seen in TW if not in DW, demands a certain coldness and lack of compassion for humans or aliens, which again is weird since it's humans they're trying to protect.