catalyst2 | Torchwood: Day One

Second episode of a series is always the test for me. The first episode can always make excuses about "the need for exposition" etc (which I thought Everything Changes did fairly well, btw) but the second episode has got to deliver something more - and Day One certainly did that

this felt strange somehow. Some of the things that worked well last week were curiously absent and there some .... umm ... inconsistencies in the plot.

1. It is a gaseous alien (in its natural state) and you put it into a cell WITH HOLES IN THE WALL? Hello, Deathwish!

2. No-one wears any kind of protective equipment when investigating a meteor that crashed to Earth just minutes (Hours?) ago. What are you all, FIREPROOF?

3. Why did the alien go all the way (sorry, unintentional pun!) to Central Cardiff? Why not "posses" Gwen or Toshiko there and then at the crash site? I mean, how many dozens of guys were all around them?

4. Did Eve Myles just forget to act this week? Because she was just awful for most of this - flat, mis-timed, just baaaaaaaaaad!

5. If the alien gets off on orgasmic energy, why not just possess the guys - why is it always the women who become the Evil Bitch Monster of Death?

6. Jack, you were just trying to argue that Gwen is a fully-fledged and competent part of your team but did you then really have to lead her to the crash site by the hand like she was a little girl?

That all said, I liked most of the ideas for this episode. Gwen's first day and she tries just a little too hard to fit in. She tries to get into the repartee of the team and doesn't quite get it. That was good.

She screws up on the first day because she tries something that the other team members try and it goes wrong with bad (read murderous) consequences. That was good.

Gwen gets the team on track because she humanizes the victim. The team are all so tied up on the technology and the data that they forget the human touch. Gwen does at least carry out that part of her role well, given that that's what Jack brought her in for. I like the theme of the team failing at what they do because they are distanced from ordinary human concerns because of their excessive specializations. Interestingly, I wonder if Ianto is jealous of Gwen (or will they become allies on this score?) because this seems to be the role that Ianto may have played prior to Gwen's arrival.

The "rat splat" was completely unnecessary but fun - because exploding rodents? ALWAYS FUNNY (unless you are the rodent - but given that it may just have died due to an excessive accumulation of orgasmic energy, perhaps that's not so bad a way to go)!

The sex scenes were suitably menacing - the alien's frantic need always over-ran any kind of titillation factor - and so it should. It's just travelled across galaxies and it's going to slow down for foreplay?

The Sperm Donor clinic scenes were good (and just as an aside, how come Owen knew so much about that place?) - and the various piles o'dust were all strategically placed in convenient view.

Actually, I just realised that if this alien's housework had been just a little bit tidier, it could have gotten away with this whole spree!

Overall, I enjoyed this but it did misfire a little for me. People watching the episode with me - 5/6 commented on Gwen's bad acting, 4/6 said the music was much better than last week's (can't say I noticed it either way, either week) and 6/6 said the sex scenes were not gratuitous (given the nature of the alien) but were very disappointed that we didn't see as much of Owen's "sex scene" as we did of Gwen's kisses (all 6 were female, btw ;-)!).