Torchwood: Children of Earth
Jul. 14th, 2009 08:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrasteI'm a few days behind everyone else, since my graphics card committed seppuku last week and had to be replaced. (Neverwinter Nights 2: so awesome your hardware will melt.) I'm glad I waited and watched it all back-to-back, though, because I don't think I could have stood the cliffhangers. As it was I watched it in inferior quality on the 'Tube because I couldn't wait for the files to finish *ahem*ing.
Short, non-spoilery version: amazingly good, up there with the best ever episodes of its parent series. Unless you find the subject matter too upsetting (for which I would not blame you - I found it very hard to sit through at times, and it didn't push any of my personal buttons) you should definitely watch it. That applies to fans of all TV science fiction, not just Doctor Who specifically.
Thing I am already tired of hearing, less than two hours after I finished watching: "Jack is a monster! The Doctor would never sacrifice a child!"
Hating Jack for what he did is entirely understandable; heaven knows nobody is obliged to like the character or accept what he did. But the Doctor committed genocide several times over before the new series even opened. Exactly how many adorable Gallifreyan moppets do you think he killed when he torched his planet?
It's true that within the frame of the series, the Doctor would never do anything like this, but that's because the narrative is never going to put him in this position. And it shouldn't, because that's not what his story is about. The end of The Parting of the Ways is the right end for that story, just as the end of The Gift from Buffy the Vampire Slayer is right in its context. Those are stories about heroes thinking outside the box and finding alternative solutions when everything looks hopeless. Yet we all know that's not always possible. Stories about heroes who do the hard, horrible thing when it counts can be just as valuable and moving. This is a story that Doctor Who could never tell, which is part of what makes it great.
I came out of Children of Earth with a whole new level of love and respect for Jack Harkness: faced with a situation that has no good solutions, he does the best he can under the circumstances. (Given time, Torchwood could probably have found a better plan than killing a child, but they were a trifle busy being shot at and blown up.) So in between demonstrating the depths of his moral ambiguity, Children of Earth showcased my favourite things about Jack Harkness.
Jack has a heart like the ocean. Sometimes it's freezing cold, it's easy to get in over your head and people have been known to drown there. It's impossible to tame it or contain it or keep it for yourself. But you don't need to possess it - it's deep and beautiful and it has room for multitudes.
In five billion years when he's evolved into a big giant head, I have no doubt that the entity currently known as Jack Harkness will still remember and love Ianto Jones. The same way he'll remember and love the Doctor, and Rose Tyler, and Martha Jones, and Gwen Cooper, and Owen Harper, and Toshiko Sato, and John Hart, and his brother, and Estelle, and the woman in the faded wedding photograph, and Alice, and Steven, and the man whose name he took, and Hame, and millions of other people. Jack loves extraordinarily easily and - in an entirely non-exclusive sense - faithfully, which is why he's so wary of letting anyone get close to him.
It causes him a huge amount of pain - I'm not a Jack/Ianto 'shipper, but my heart broke when he begged Ianto not to leave him. He's also remarkably lucky to have so much love in his long life.
I may have further thoughts when I get beyond OMGTHEPAIN, but I will just say that Gwen was awesome - how did we get from Day One to here? Also, they must keep Lois, because she is made of pure win.
Short, non-spoilery version: amazingly good, up there with the best ever episodes of its parent series. Unless you find the subject matter too upsetting (for which I would not blame you - I found it very hard to sit through at times, and it didn't push any of my personal buttons) you should definitely watch it. That applies to fans of all TV science fiction, not just Doctor Who specifically.
Thing I am already tired of hearing, less than two hours after I finished watching: "Jack is a monster! The Doctor would never sacrifice a child!"
Hating Jack for what he did is entirely understandable; heaven knows nobody is obliged to like the character or accept what he did. But the Doctor committed genocide several times over before the new series even opened. Exactly how many adorable Gallifreyan moppets do you think he killed when he torched his planet?
It's true that within the frame of the series, the Doctor would never do anything like this, but that's because the narrative is never going to put him in this position. And it shouldn't, because that's not what his story is about. The end of The Parting of the Ways is the right end for that story, just as the end of The Gift from Buffy the Vampire Slayer is right in its context. Those are stories about heroes thinking outside the box and finding alternative solutions when everything looks hopeless. Yet we all know that's not always possible. Stories about heroes who do the hard, horrible thing when it counts can be just as valuable and moving. This is a story that Doctor Who could never tell, which is part of what makes it great.
I came out of Children of Earth with a whole new level of love and respect for Jack Harkness: faced with a situation that has no good solutions, he does the best he can under the circumstances. (Given time, Torchwood could probably have found a better plan than killing a child, but they were a trifle busy being shot at and blown up.) So in between demonstrating the depths of his moral ambiguity, Children of Earth showcased my favourite things about Jack Harkness.
Jack has a heart like the ocean. Sometimes it's freezing cold, it's easy to get in over your head and people have been known to drown there. It's impossible to tame it or contain it or keep it for yourself. But you don't need to possess it - it's deep and beautiful and it has room for multitudes.
In five billion years when he's evolved into a big giant head, I have no doubt that the entity currently known as Jack Harkness will still remember and love Ianto Jones. The same way he'll remember and love the Doctor, and Rose Tyler, and Martha Jones, and Gwen Cooper, and Owen Harper, and Toshiko Sato, and John Hart, and his brother, and Estelle, and the woman in the faded wedding photograph, and Alice, and Steven, and the man whose name he took, and Hame, and millions of other people. Jack loves extraordinarily easily and - in an entirely non-exclusive sense - faithfully, which is why he's so wary of letting anyone get close to him.
It causes him a huge amount of pain - I'm not a Jack/Ianto 'shipper, but my heart broke when he begged Ianto not to leave him. He's also remarkably lucky to have so much love in his long life.
I may have further thoughts when I get beyond OMGTHEPAIN, but I will just say that Gwen was awesome - how did we get from Day One to here? Also, they must keep Lois, because she is made of pure win.