Torchwood Series 2 - speculations?

[VALEN]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Would it be possible for people to put aside the poor acting, story lines, production and directing & for us to discuss the possitives on TW

 

[Pyan]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Was that intended as sarcasm, VALEN, or did it just come out that way?
Strikes me if you take those factors out, you're left with.....the credits and the music!

 

[VALEN]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Strikes me if you take those factors out, you're left with.....the credits and the music!

I think people could even find negatives in them even.

Was that intended as sarcasm, VALEN, or did it just come out that way?

Sarcasm - a little - but I would like peoples ideas on improving the series.

Enough was been said about its bad points - (which there are many)

 

[Pyan]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Enough was been said about its bad points - (which there are many)

Yes.. but the problem is that there are so many bad points, and so few good...
Perhaps we could ask for peoples' 'Top 5 ideas to salvage Torchwood'!

I'll start:

1) Security. It must be the worst-kept secret secret organization ever, and just not believable. Bring in an expert to tighten it up, either on-screen or on the writing staff. Sacked personnel would be escorted from the base, not let wander out and in again. Scanners on the door to stop people taking alien goodies home. Psychological testing on staff members. A less obvious mode of transport.

Anyone else?

 

[VALEN]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

2] Accountability - TW need to be made accountable for there actions. Who are they answerable to (where does there funding come from)

As said previously - after the incident at the end of series one - then the world now know of the existance of such alien / monster

There could be a whole new level to Jack charractor explored with this route:
- the politics involved with chain of command
- asking for funding - proving that they exist to do good & not create more problems.

 

[Lenny]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

One the issue of security - sacked personnel are mindwiped within 24 hours, if that counts. Though I agree with the scanners.

One the issue of accountability:

the world now know of the existance of such alien / monster

They've known for ages. I don't quite know the exact times, but here's a short list:

• Torchwood 2 open the Rift and let Abbadon out.
• Torchwood 1 opens the Rift and allows the world to be terrorised by Daleks and Cybermen.
• Dr. Who Christmas Special (David Tennant's first) - a dirty great space ship hovers over London and is eventually destroyed by TW1 in a giant light show.
• Dr. Who (Eccleston) - a spaceship screams out of the sky, crashing through Big Ben. It might have been a pig that was found, but it's still an alien spaceship.

If the world doesn't know about aliens by the time TW2 opens the rift, then they must be living under a giant rock.

 

[Dave]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

If the world doesn't know about aliens by the time TW2 opens the rift, then they must be living under a giant rock.

Well then they should address that in the plot iself. How does the general public cope with the news? How does the world change with the new staus quo? What is Torchwood's role now it is no longer the worlds worst kept secret?

The problem is that they can't do that. Torchwood runs concurrent with Doctor Who and is set in the present day. Doctor Who has never done that. We have never been told about how UNIT saved the world from Daleks, Yeti, Cybermen, Sea Devils, Silurians etc. etc. I can see now that many of Torchwood's problems do stem from it being a spin-off.

3.) Teamwork Torchwood have not worked as a team. They are not lead by Jack, but rather argue like a group of unruly children. I think it work better as a smaller team, even just a man and a woman. Maybe they should kill off everyone but Jack and Gwen. In many episodes in the first season there was little for the whole team to do anyway, and the stories generally revolved around one or two of them. If they want to keep the whole ensemble then they need to write stories that involve all of them.

 

[Pyan]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I think it work better as a smaller team, even just a man and a woman. Maybe they should kill off everyone but Jack and Gwen.

Thus turning it into a sort of British X-Files. And probably none the worse for that!

 

[HappyHippo]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I know someone slated me for mentioning this, but....

3) less nooky and more decent well plotted stories (without Owens' strangely inverted pectorals). I think the X-Files was brilliant becasue of the good old UST (Unresolved Sexual Tension); there was still plenty of pheromones kicking about, but there was space for good storytelling and acting becasue Mulder and Scully weren't snogging the face off every alien and odd job they investigated, or each other for that matter.

maybe only relevant sex? Rather than creating an alien that has to have sex - the writer was so smug about the orgasm-eater - create aliens with real alien-ness, which aren't handily humanoid and happy to sleep with the team.

sorry, it's been a long day, and I'm rambling...will anyone notice the difference?

 

[ianto's-girl]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Yeah its been explained in all dr whos that everyone knows about torchwood battle of canary wharf and the cybrmen so the public do know about torchwood and they r allways given special acssess to cases and things. otherwise urgh and by the way i lurve torchwood its fun and if something can make u forget about the horrors of the real world and give u some entertainment well then bring it on

 

[Ice fyre]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Ello ello ello

Wots all this then.

Torchwood, well I'm big Dr Who fan and was interested to see what they were going to do with this. Hmm, kind of adult unit type thing?

Well overall I liked it, some really creepy episodes the Fairy one was very Saphire and steel (yes I know it was written by their writer) and the phyco killer one was good as well.

But the end episode was a let down part one was good (time slips to the forties) but part two was Mince (appologies for non scots but that means bad bad bad!) Oh well looking forward to March for S3 of Dr Who

 

[VALEN]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

and by the way i lurve torchwood its fun and if something can make u forget about the horrors of the real world and give u some entertainment well then bring it on

Maybe we are looking into this with to much detail:

I mean, was the show created not to be serious, but just to be a little bit different, for adult viewing (sexual nature) & fun: nothing to in-depth. Just a fun easy viewing show that doesn't work the old grey matter:

 

[Coolhand]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Maybe we are looking into this with to much detail:

I mean, was the show created not to be serious, but just to be a little bit different, for adult viewing (sexual nature) & fun: nothing to in-depth. Just a fun easy viewing show that doesn't work the old grey matter:

Well, the pre-release interviews with RTD and the rest of the crew gave me the distinct impression that they were going for gritty psycological sci-fi drama. And the way they've (tried) to write it leaves me with the impression that this is what they actually tried to do...
If it ends up being a brainless, shallow sex romp, that kinda says to me they missed the mark.

 

[Wocket]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I don't know, I find it all kinda refreshing to have fallible characters who are motivated by their own drives, sexual and otherwise. And for once it's great to have a silly sci-fi that’s not full of over the top ideals…or that resets the plot to a baseline every episode.

 

[VALEN]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I don't know, I find it all kinda refreshing to have fallible characters who are motivated by their own drives, sexual and otherwise

I agree, the failings of the charactors bring a much needed reaility to the show. At the end of the day, they are only Human.

 

[Pyan]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I agree, the failings of the charactors bring a much needed reaility to the show. At the end of the day, they are only Human.

Not quite: Jack certainly isn't. Humanoid, I grant you, but whatever he started as, he's not human now.

 

[Coolhand]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I don't know, I find it all kinda refreshing to have fallible characters who are motivated by their own drives, sexual and otherwise. And for once it's great to have a silly sci-fi that’s not full of over the top ideals…or that resets the plot to a baseline every episode.

Well, like I said it's not supposed to be silly-it's supposed to be serious.

Whilst characters motivated by their own selfish desires to the detriment of any professionalism might be plausible as school teachers or office workers, they aren't remotely plausible in a black ops unit. Soldiers and Intelligence agents, whilst still human, cannot afford to be as constantly selfish or to screw up to the extent that the Torchwood staff do. In almost every episode, the Torchwood staff either grossly exacerbate the problem or are the CAUSE of the problem due to their blithering incompetence or selfishness.

For example, Jack the Leader never actually leads or does anything about the constant disobedience or career-killing mistakes of his staff. You can read my reviews of various episodes for examples of his Neolithic incompetence as a commander of men. Any other commander from any other Sci-Fi show would have fired them all by now. Hell, can you see Commander Adama from BSG putting up with Owen? Or Gwen? (I could go on about why Gwen is vile and useless for pages but I think my soul would crack.)

The rest of them act like a bunch of sulky, hormone driven teenagers with absolutely no common sense. People like that by definition, do not get to be field operatives in a covert black ops unit. It’s like having a diving instructor who can’t swim. They’d be dead in a week.

As for the plot reset…well, SF tv hasn’t done that for years now so it’s nothing new but…well, just keep watching. I don’t want to spoil it…they have the worst plot reset I’ve EVER SEEN.

 

[Pyan]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

Any other commander from any other Sci-Fi show would have fired them all by now.

Any other commander from any other Sci-Fi show would have had them all shot by now!

 

[Wocket]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

For example, Jack the Leader never actually leads or does anything about the constant disobedience or career-killing mistakes of his staff.

Yeah, but with Jack as the commander it's more like he's thrown somthing together from what materials/people he had to hand...and he's kinda doing it to kill time, to try and do somthing right for a change.

He did start out as a conman. Perhaps he's just trying to get the Dr's attention?

*shrug*

Like most people who are trying to do the right thing, without proper training in the feild, he really dosn't know how.

 

[PTeppic]

Re: Torchwood Series 2

I guess in a way they're not "really" Torchwood... they've just taken on the role of Torchwood now that the first 1, 2 or however many have folded, collapsed or been destroyed by their own experiments. And as said, they're just a bunch of vaguely useful geeks, nerds, crackpots and techies who've been drafted in to help Jack with his personal mission to save the Dr's Earth.