Torchwood are the charming villains
Jan. 20th, 2008 11:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethRemember when we first met Torchwood and they nearly destroyed the world?
... and yes, that sentence could apply equally well to DW or season 1 TW.
They've got all the shiny toys, they're pretty, they're powerful, they're above the law, they can cover up murder and wipe out memories and live, they think, without consequences... until it catches up with them after all.
Compare with TW 2-01 and the arc of a certain guest character.
He's worse than Jack - worse than Torchwood. Right? But... is he worse to make them look better, or is he the worse they could become?
And that right there is why I'm worried when the writers start calling them the crew of the Enterprise. Because they might be very pretty and now with new and improved teamwork, *but*...
Of course the other thing about that 'make them a team' upgrade is that it changes the template of the show. In one of the screenwriting books I've got it uses the Enterprise crew as an example of an attractive fantasy - this is a group of people we'd like to join, we'd like it if our lives were like that. But the first season version of teamwork was all about the negative fantasy - we can watch these people and be all happy our lives are better than that. Book also says most shows use a combination - on Buffy we have the attractive teamwork-with-power and the negative demons trying to kill them. On Torchwood season 1 we had the attractive power and the negative anti-teamwork and demons. On TW season 2 we seem to have power+teamwork. Flips the balance.
What Torchwood do - is that really the best, most moral, most useful, approach to the problem they've been set? Earth is part of a big wide universe - so lets shoot them down and nick their stuff? Well that Torchwood went boom, so obviously no. TW3 doesn't shoot down random tourists... but what else do they do? Nick stuff - yup. And okay, somebody else had nicked it first, but they were all kinds of gleeful about it. And the stuff that Gwen at the start of the series and Andy at the end brings up - civil liberties, data protection, do the prisoners have the same rights as a modern day human... that stuff is where Torchwood are the bad guys.
Plus in season one was there ever a time they saved the world when it wasn't them put it in danger in the first place? The thing with 1-05 would have worked out exactly the same without them.
The thing is this power stuff, it's attractive despite+because it's dark. It's the reason there's Batman, for a start. He can do all sorts of things the police can't so he can get things done. But regularly the comics go to a world run Batman's way, showing how truly nasty it would be to live in. Yet still Batman remains popular, because it's always tempting to just stop the bad guys because you know you're right. After all, he's the hero, right? Got to be right.
So it's worrying the more attractive the story makes the people wielding that kind of power. While their whole lives are one big downward spiral we can see a moral in the story, but if they pull themselves together and still act the same way? What then?
So here we have someone exaggerated in both directions - he's immediately got the vigilante thing going on, preserves just a small chance he's a Batman type 'good' guy, but then keeps getting darker. Do we like him? "Strangely attractive". Same reasons I always fancy the psychos like Baal and the Master - power plus confidence is attractive. We wants it. We wants the people who have it.
We hopefully wakes up and walks away, at least in a real situation.
Because if he's real... he's that bastard in the bar who drinks too much and thinks he's god's gift, only more so and with guns. Nobody wants to share space with that... except for if he's on their side. Get a gang.
Or a team. With a team name.
You know when Jack said "Death by Torchwood", it puts responsibility on this unfeeling abstract. Torchwood did it. Did Jack, Owen, Tosh do it? Hell yes, especially Jack. But he didn't say "death by Jack shooting her a whole lot and ordering her life support technology blown up" he said "Torchwood". Which admittedly fits in the box better, but... how do you hold "Torchwood" responsible?
Thus far, pretty much, you don't. They've got the get out of jail free card.
As this new guy seems to. I mean, why isn't he locked up? Why not take his vortex manipulator and leave him in a cell like a Weevil? He's done more damage!
Jack just sends him off his territory.
If John is supposed to be the Master to Jack's Doctor... you know the Doctor's solution to the Master thing? Take responsibility.
I can think of two reasons to not arrest John. He's either too dangerous or too embarrassing. Quite possibly both. But is he dangerous to the team? Well he didn't actually kill them - and 'why' is a question that really needs an answer some time, just asking it might lampshade but doesn't satisfy. Maybe he has associates that would come after him. Or enemies - that's pretty damn plausible given that this latest one nearly took out Cardiff. So maybe he's too dangerous to anyone standing next to him.
Or maybe Jack just doesn't want anyone to hear what he has to say. Snake tongued he may be, but there's just a possibility he's telling the truth, and the last time Jack's team didn't trust him was a pretty big problem all round.
... what kind of secrets is Jack keeping, and what's the price?
You know last season when he let a prisoner go to save the hand? What was the body count on that? Half a dozen? More? And his team didn't know enough to say if the hand was really that important. Plus it didn't actually work, the hand got smashed anyway. Stupid call. He needs people who can understand enough to point out when he's being too personal.
And keeping secrets distances him from his team, and drives them all kinds of cranky trying to figure him out. Not good.
Last and likely to come back in fun ways, getting rid of him meant getting rid of whatever information he had that was so important, whatever "Grey" meant. Someone else's turn to keep secrets, and it don't feel nice from the other side. (Like 1-04; secrets and lies and big reactions).
So that got longer and more rambly than I thought.
If Torchwood are meant to be the good guys they're going about it the wrong way. Maybe the new guy highlights that, a hint of things to come if they don't mend their ways. Marley's ghost.
But maybe he's meant to reset the standard. Torchwood aren't that bad so they aren't bad.
... I'd have a problem with that.
... and yes, that sentence could apply equally well to DW or season 1 TW.
They've got all the shiny toys, they're pretty, they're powerful, they're above the law, they can cover up murder and wipe out memories and live, they think, without consequences... until it catches up with them after all.
Compare with TW 2-01 and the arc of a certain guest character.
He's worse than Jack - worse than Torchwood. Right? But... is he worse to make them look better, or is he the worse they could become?
And that right there is why I'm worried when the writers start calling them the crew of the Enterprise. Because they might be very pretty and now with new and improved teamwork, *but*...
Of course the other thing about that 'make them a team' upgrade is that it changes the template of the show. In one of the screenwriting books I've got it uses the Enterprise crew as an example of an attractive fantasy - this is a group of people we'd like to join, we'd like it if our lives were like that. But the first season version of teamwork was all about the negative fantasy - we can watch these people and be all happy our lives are better than that. Book also says most shows use a combination - on Buffy we have the attractive teamwork-with-power and the negative demons trying to kill them. On Torchwood season 1 we had the attractive power and the negative anti-teamwork and demons. On TW season 2 we seem to have power+teamwork. Flips the balance.
What Torchwood do - is that really the best, most moral, most useful, approach to the problem they've been set? Earth is part of a big wide universe - so lets shoot them down and nick their stuff? Well that Torchwood went boom, so obviously no. TW3 doesn't shoot down random tourists... but what else do they do? Nick stuff - yup. And okay, somebody else had nicked it first, but they were all kinds of gleeful about it. And the stuff that Gwen at the start of the series and Andy at the end brings up - civil liberties, data protection, do the prisoners have the same rights as a modern day human... that stuff is where Torchwood are the bad guys.
Plus in season one was there ever a time they saved the world when it wasn't them put it in danger in the first place? The thing with 1-05 would have worked out exactly the same without them.
The thing is this power stuff, it's attractive despite+because it's dark. It's the reason there's Batman, for a start. He can do all sorts of things the police can't so he can get things done. But regularly the comics go to a world run Batman's way, showing how truly nasty it would be to live in. Yet still Batman remains popular, because it's always tempting to just stop the bad guys because you know you're right. After all, he's the hero, right? Got to be right.
So it's worrying the more attractive the story makes the people wielding that kind of power. While their whole lives are one big downward spiral we can see a moral in the story, but if they pull themselves together and still act the same way? What then?
So here we have someone exaggerated in both directions - he's immediately got the vigilante thing going on, preserves just a small chance he's a Batman type 'good' guy, but then keeps getting darker. Do we like him? "Strangely attractive". Same reasons I always fancy the psychos like Baal and the Master - power plus confidence is attractive. We wants it. We wants the people who have it.
We hopefully wakes up and walks away, at least in a real situation.
Because if he's real... he's that bastard in the bar who drinks too much and thinks he's god's gift, only more so and with guns. Nobody wants to share space with that... except for if he's on their side. Get a gang.
Or a team. With a team name.
You know when Jack said "Death by Torchwood", it puts responsibility on this unfeeling abstract. Torchwood did it. Did Jack, Owen, Tosh do it? Hell yes, especially Jack. But he didn't say "death by Jack shooting her a whole lot and ordering her life support technology blown up" he said "Torchwood". Which admittedly fits in the box better, but... how do you hold "Torchwood" responsible?
Thus far, pretty much, you don't. They've got the get out of jail free card.
As this new guy seems to. I mean, why isn't he locked up? Why not take his vortex manipulator and leave him in a cell like a Weevil? He's done more damage!
Jack just sends him off his territory.
If John is supposed to be the Master to Jack's Doctor... you know the Doctor's solution to the Master thing? Take responsibility.
I can think of two reasons to not arrest John. He's either too dangerous or too embarrassing. Quite possibly both. But is he dangerous to the team? Well he didn't actually kill them - and 'why' is a question that really needs an answer some time, just asking it might lampshade but doesn't satisfy. Maybe he has associates that would come after him. Or enemies - that's pretty damn plausible given that this latest one nearly took out Cardiff. So maybe he's too dangerous to anyone standing next to him.
Or maybe Jack just doesn't want anyone to hear what he has to say. Snake tongued he may be, but there's just a possibility he's telling the truth, and the last time Jack's team didn't trust him was a pretty big problem all round.
... what kind of secrets is Jack keeping, and what's the price?
You know last season when he let a prisoner go to save the hand? What was the body count on that? Half a dozen? More? And his team didn't know enough to say if the hand was really that important. Plus it didn't actually work, the hand got smashed anyway. Stupid call. He needs people who can understand enough to point out when he's being too personal.
And keeping secrets distances him from his team, and drives them all kinds of cranky trying to figure him out. Not good.
Last and likely to come back in fun ways, getting rid of him meant getting rid of whatever information he had that was so important, whatever "Grey" meant. Someone else's turn to keep secrets, and it don't feel nice from the other side. (Like 1-04; secrets and lies and big reactions).
So that got longer and more rambly than I thought.
If Torchwood are meant to be the good guys they're going about it the wrong way. Maybe the new guy highlights that, a hint of things to come if they don't mend their ways. Marley's ghost.
But maybe he's meant to reset the standard. Torchwood aren't that bad so they aren't bad.
... I'd have a problem with that.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 12:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 04:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 01:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 04:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 03:33 pm (UTC)I think Capt. John is a way to trigger Jack into confronting his past instead of trying to just move away from it. I don't think they planned for the charming villain thing because I don't think there is enough awareness of what the problem is - everyone likes Spike too much to actually notice the problem he causes. (Well, except for a few Spike haters, but the Torchwood writers clearly aren't amongst their number.)
What has been odd is that in my own meta on this I found that by pointing out that Capt. John is evil, I have been backed into a corner by several people who seem to want me to prove that Torchwood is good because if I am claiming John is evil then somehow I must be claiming Torchwood is perfect, so if they can show I am wrong by showing Torchwood isn't perfect then somehow John becomes less evil. Which is... a bit twisty.
A lot of it comes down to nobody wanting their squee harshed. I don't want my Torchwood squee harshed because I love the show and they don't want their Capt. John squee harshed because they love the character - I think this is why the fandom sparks are starting to fly on this one.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-22 03:22 pm (UTC)... they grade evil on a curve?...
I can squee about evil characters quite happily. Which explains much of my favourite characters.