Children of Earth: Why I can't accept certain "creative decisions" (and more)

[lefaym]

This post contains spoilers for both Children of Earth and filming reports for the Doctor Who finale. The Doctor Who stuff isn't until near the end, and I'm including a spoiler space in there, so if you just want to read the CoE stuff, then you can (though you might want to be careful if you look at the comments).

Comments

[sahiya]

I think something like that would be nice, and I would certainly love for Jack to be Eleven's companion for awhile (I have not been allowing myself to get my hopes up there, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see). I think that Moffat does not have the disdain for his fans that RTD has shown . . . but I think that in the end, it'll depend on how much Moffat considers Torchwood to be Whovian "canon." If I were him, I might look at what's been done with it and go, "Wow, that's a mess," and ignore it as much as possible (this is more or less going to be my philosophy with my fanfiction, I think). But yeah, very small touches like that would be a nice way to maintain continuity and please the fans, while not making it into a huge thing.

On the other hand, it's possible that Moffat loved CoE. He has said in the past that he thinks of Who as a horror show (among other things - he acknowledges that it's sort of "all things to all men"), and if CoE falls into any genre, horror would definitely be it.

[lefaym]

I think that Moffat does not have the disdain for his fans that RTD has shown

See... I don't think RTD has utter disdain for his fans -- but I think he did fail us in this instance. As for Moffat, well -- I think he was quite dismissive of the Doctor/Rose relationship in "The Girl in the Fireplace" -- even though I am not a huge Doctor/Rose shipper myself, it seemed very OOC for the Doctor to be willing to calmly accept that he was stuck, without his beloved TARDIS, in 19th century France, while Rose (and Mickey) are stuck on a space station in the 51st. I don't know what this says about Moffat's relationship with his fanbase, but I do think it shows that he's willing to overlook ships that he doesn't like, even if it means OOC-ness. So, as you say, I think it comes down to what Moffat thinks of CoE, and more specifically, what he thinks of J/I -- if he dislikes J/I, he may well choose to have Jack break his promise to remember Ianto, and that would just be heartbreaking to the fans, all over again.

[sahiya]

GitF is a very interesting ep on many levels (though it is also the only Moffat ep I haven't watched many times over). I agree that the part of it that is most difficult to accept is the Doctor's lack of anxiety at not getting back to Rose, Mickey, and - as you say - the TARDIS. I think my own interpretation of that is that he knew he would get back there eventually - perhaps not soon, but someday, and he could do it so that very little time will have passed for them

[lefaym]

I dunno... it just doesn't fit in with the closeness between the Doctor and Rose, and also with the Doctor's utter reluctance to be stuck in one place.

And yeah, sure, just because we don't see Jack remembering Ianto doesn't mean that it doesn't happen. But I'd like to think that, well, it was sort of a promise to the fans as well, that Ianto won't be forgotten, that we will see that he has a legacy, even if only in subtle ways. But I know I'm probably being overly hopeful here, and it's unlikely that we will get anything.

[misswinterhill]

I'm absoultely terrified that we're just going to see the same old happy-go-lucky "Doctor Who Jack"

Me too. Mighty terrified. I like your idea of Jack making some little gesture that tells the TW fans how affected he was by CoE.

[lefaym]

Yeah... it's just, the only thing Ianto wanted from Jack in the end was a promise to be remembered. If they don't show some sign of honouring that memory, it's just going to be a second slap in the face to all of Ianto's fans. But I'm so afraid that it won't happen, simply because I want it so very much.

[fmanalyst]

It occurs to me that if Joss Whedon were in charge that Jack would be the Big Bad of the next Doctor Who season. Actually, that may be coloring my view of COE -- having been a Buffy fan when Angel and then Willow became villains and an Angel fan when Wesley went dark. I'll see if that holds true when I finally get to watch the whole COE.

[lefaym]

Hmm... that would be an interesting place to take Jack, because he certainly does have that darker side. I wonder if it would work for Doctor Who...

ETA: Though come to think of it, I think that would be a bad idea-- because then not only will Ianto have been fridged, Doctor Who Jack will become "teh EVIL GHEY" instead of an awesome omnisexual role model for children.

[fmanalyst]

Which Whedon did do when he turned Willow evil, some to think of it. If the story were to go that direction, it would depend on whether Jack were to receive a redemption arc. Say he becomes the big bad out of despair and so the goal of the arc is to recover his sanity and put him in position to develop the wisdom and peace of the Face of Boe. But it would take a season-long arc to do it right, and Doctor Who has been reluctant to do that recently, beyond dropped in references to Mr. Saxon or Bad Wolf.

[lefaym]

Yeah, that would be quite an intense story.

I kind of hope that we don't see Jack turn into the Face of Boe. I mean I actually don't mind the Jack=Face of Boe at all, but I think it'd be really cool to just keep it open. Also, I really hate the thought of poor Jack, who is so physical, being confined to a glass jar so early on.

[phaetonschariot]

I suspect part of why the Jack/Ianto relationship was so clunky in season three was because they were writing it as though they had to explain to the new viewers all the problems it would have. The old viewers already knew the problems, and if they gave the new viewers any credit for intelligence they could have shown it much more subtly and made room for something better, but it seems rare these days for any tv producers to credit their audiences with intelligence. (Then again I saw an awful lot of people completely miss all the pretty subtext in Day Three's conversation, so maybe they're right...)

[lefaym]

I think the point to be made here has already been made by xtricks -- these are bloody good writers, all of them, and throughout CoE, they demonstrate exactly how talented they all are (very). So I don't see why they couldn't have done a better job on the J/I story, when they did everything else so well (and they did prove that they could do the J/I really well in Day Four too).

[littlebelleblue]

See, again, you expressed beautifully what I was thinking. :)

I really hate it when characters get sacrificed at the altar of narrative casualty, just because.

And hopefully in the next few episodes of Doctor Who, we will get continuity, if nothing else. Surely they will do that

[lefaym]

I think with the unevenness of the relationship development, much of it (not all of it - yes, a lot more little things could have been added in [if that was their priority]) has to do (unfortunately) with the sheer amount of material and story lines they were trying to fit in, and less with actual "let's take such and such scene out, just because."

The thing is, there could have been a huge difference without even changing the script much. There could have been shoulder squeezes, a couple of smiles shared between the two of them... that sort of thing. Tiny things that wouldn't have taken up extra time, but would have contributed so much to the J/I story development.

[littlebelleblue]

Oh, definitely. That could have been so easy to do, and much appreciated, and I really wish they had. And it would have helped the pain a little bit.

[lefaym]

Yeah... and the thing is, they did finally do it in Day Four (and a bit in Day One, even though it seemed a bit awkward), so we know the writers were capable of delivering the goods -- so why didn't they do so consistently?