Sep. 22nd, 2007 11:09 pm
BBC, you have failed me again
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muckefuckCaught my first couple episodes of Torchwood--or, as I'm told the Doctor Who crowd calls it, Crotchwood--tonight and it lived up to its rude moniker and down to my lowest expectations. It's the same damn problem I know I've bitched about before: A team that doesn't act like one purportedly doing a job that the writers don't understand. If said authors were recruited from Doctor Who, then I can readily understand the issues. The Doctor is a maverick; after all, if he knew how to work within the system, he'd've remained on Gallifrey instead of jaunting about space-time in an unreliable machine. Every solution is off-the-cuff. He doesn't have time to learn the niceties of whatever planet he's on, even if it's one he's visited thousands of times like his beloved Earth.
But the premise behind Torchwood is nothing like that. It's supposed to be a secret agency set up by Queen Victoria to monitor alien activity. The members (with the possible exception of Captain Harkness) are all native Terrans. You'd think one of them would've learned how to do special ops intelligently--hell, that's where you'd expect to do all of their recruiting from. If everyone who worked there pulled as much crap as the current crop of cowboys, you'd expect the plug to have been pulled ages ago.
What kind of crap do I mean? A character recovers an alien artifact and what's the first thing she does? She pushes the button! The team captures an alien and it has no more trouble getting out of their super-secret lair than I would escaping a Tastee-Freeze. A character has a daring plan to save the day and doesn't tell anyone else about it. All in all, they remind me of a group of PCs being run by really noobish players. ("But you never actually cast it!") Except even in a forgiving game like Castle Falkenstein or Chill, characters who acted like this would all be dead.
I could deal with shoddy procedure if I at least liked the personalities, but I'm finding every one of them annoying--including the POV newbie who's supposed to provide the moral compass. Her stabs at enforcing basic decency are too inconsistent to be convincing. She goes out of her way to humanise an innocent prisoner possessed by an alien host, but does she even think to inform her loved ones that they've got her in custody? (Which brings us back to: Torchwood has done this thousands of times by now; why don't they have a procedure in place?) She complains about their illegal access to police files but doesn't point out their complete disregard of habeas corpus?
And don't get me started on the crap use of technology. They've got a thousand ultra-high-tech ways of immobilising threats without harming them and they chase down their quarry with guns? Captain Harkness has a super precious piece of tissue he wants to preserve and he keeps it in a glass jar that shatters on being thrown five feet to the floor? Hello, you don't even need 21st century tech to prevent that kind of accident! Men in Black was supposed to be nothing more than a laugh-out-loud comedy, but its staff was ten times more competent at this shit than anyone associated with Torchwood.
And on and on. With enough effort, I guess I could rationalise away the foibles in the same way I did with Buffy. But why? With that show, the premise was fresh and engaging and I totally fell for the Scooby Gang. Moreover, they were teenagers, so it makes bloody sense for them to be incompetent at times. The only thing that Torchwood has going for it that similar shows don't is the brilliant Welsh accents, but it's going to take a lot more than that to hold my attention.
In a nutshell: Kiss my arse, Russell T. Davies.
But the premise behind Torchwood is nothing like that. It's supposed to be a secret agency set up by Queen Victoria to monitor alien activity. The members (with the possible exception of Captain Harkness) are all native Terrans. You'd think one of them would've learned how to do special ops intelligently--hell, that's where you'd expect to do all of their recruiting from. If everyone who worked there pulled as much crap as the current crop of cowboys, you'd expect the plug to have been pulled ages ago.
What kind of crap do I mean? A character recovers an alien artifact and what's the first thing she does? She pushes the button! The team captures an alien and it has no more trouble getting out of their super-secret lair than I would escaping a Tastee-Freeze. A character has a daring plan to save the day and doesn't tell anyone else about it. All in all, they remind me of a group of PCs being run by really noobish players. ("But you never actually cast it!") Except even in a forgiving game like Castle Falkenstein or Chill, characters who acted like this would all be dead.
I could deal with shoddy procedure if I at least liked the personalities, but I'm finding every one of them annoying--including the POV newbie who's supposed to provide the moral compass. Her stabs at enforcing basic decency are too inconsistent to be convincing. She goes out of her way to humanise an innocent prisoner possessed by an alien host, but does she even think to inform her loved ones that they've got her in custody? (Which brings us back to: Torchwood has done this thousands of times by now; why don't they have a procedure in place?) She complains about their illegal access to police files but doesn't point out their complete disregard of habeas corpus?
And don't get me started on the crap use of technology. They've got a thousand ultra-high-tech ways of immobilising threats without harming them and they chase down their quarry with guns? Captain Harkness has a super precious piece of tissue he wants to preserve and he keeps it in a glass jar that shatters on being thrown five feet to the floor? Hello, you don't even need 21st century tech to prevent that kind of accident! Men in Black was supposed to be nothing more than a laugh-out-loud comedy, but its staff was ten times more competent at this shit than anyone associated with Torchwood.
And on and on. With enough effort, I guess I could rationalise away the foibles in the same way I did with Buffy. But why? With that show, the premise was fresh and engaging and I totally fell for the Scooby Gang. Moreover, they were teenagers, so it makes bloody sense for them to be incompetent at times. The only thing that Torchwood has going for it that similar shows don't is the brilliant Welsh accents, but it's going to take a lot more than that to hold my attention.
In a nutshell: Kiss my arse, Russell T. Davies.
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And yet, I cannot stop watching for the pretty that is John Barrowman.
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I agree that Barrowman is much too pretty, but I think he's got oodles of charisma. When he's not trying to be Grim Action Hero I go all gooey.
It is also amusing seeing who pairs up with whom over the course of the season. I'm happy to spoil you for it if you like.
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Maybe he's got family in Wales. Do not try to make sense of Torchwood. It's got plot and character holes you could fit large buildings in.
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Is there anything about Owen that *isn't* irritating?
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(I don't watch it for the plots, believe me.)
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...not that I'm doubting the show's a steaming pile, mind, and I'm sure it would strike my gamer/suspension-of-disbelief funnybone just as hard as yours.
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There are many justifications you could make for their incompetence: the main Torchwood in London got destroyed in a Doctor Who episode. One could always argue that the Cardiff branch was a backwater posting full of rebels and morons which suddenly found itself in charge of the whole megillah when the main branch went blooey (two other Torchwoods are mentioned in the first episode: one's a batty old guy in Scotland and the other disappeared years ago). This would, of course, make a great comic premise for the show. Sadly, it's billed as a drama.
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