How many rewatches?
Jan. 20th, 2008 09:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI forgot to take paper and now have Torchwood notes written all up my arm. After my bath. This was not my best planning.
Watching the same ep 7 times in a week might seem excessive, and yet I'm pretty sure I've managed that already... Okay, onwards to the fiddly TW 2-01 discussion:
Ianto in the office - the banner says Customer Liaison Team. I have amusing thoughts about 'liaison'.
Jack's office - rearranged and enlarged by taking a wall out. Jack's desk used to be next to the safe and the hatch to his sleep place. Now it has been moved over in front of the big window they were always using to draw on last year. So it still has a view of the rest of the Hub, just with a bunch of stuff drawn on the glass between. Also it means that whoever was using that desk - and why move it if you didn't use it? - wouldn't be over Jack's personal space. Not sitting next to his bedroom the whole time. Plus the redecorating would be like claiming.
Team Torchwood power dynamics:
Owen drives the SUV, ignores Gwen's suggestions about driving and her 'don't you dare' about giving up on driving and climbing out the window, and snaps orders once they're in the confrontation with the fish. But he's pretty much taken out of that by the medical emergency, so the other three would have to become the bosses of themselves. This might explain why they just stood around like lemons while exposition fish talked, there was a transfer of command necessary and it weren't being done. Gwen's gun was shaking worst of any of them.
Power - Owen vs Gwen? Owen isn't taking Gwen's orders, and Gwen takes Owen's with minor complaint.
So then Jack turns up. And Owen stops pushing.
Pulling, yeah, when he has a plan - again, in his specialty, a medical plan - and he grabs Jack as the nearest pair of hands.
But Owen isn't the one asking where Jack went, he's mostly concerned with if his Doctor fixed him.
So Owen in his own domain is king - he's the medic, he knows what he's doing with that. I wrote it that way between seasons, with him becoming increasingly unhappy at being asked to do other jobs, so I have smug and a view on canon that has a bit of my stuff coloring the edges.
But Owen and Gwen is not a simple boss-subordinate relation in either direction.
Gwen says she lead the team while Jack was away. Yet the sequence we just saw gave no such evidence for that.
I've seen it divided up into field command, Owen in charge of the action stuff and Gwen of the admin. Which kinda sorta fits... but...
It could just be that Owen won't push when it's Jack.
I think any power issues the two of them had ended up with that cry and hug moment in 1-13. Trying to wind up Owen enough to have another go at Jack would take a heck of a lot of work, now he's seen how that works out. He said he was tired of people doubting him, but how much does he doubt himself now, with the apocalypse so nearly on his hands?
Yet he's still obnoxious and reckless to the point of being a danger to himself and others. Speeding in that tank? And there was someone out on the roads, that old lady, so he can't claim it's so deserted it's safe. And then there's the small matter of climbing out the bloody window. Cool, yes, but not actually sane. And trying to be both driver and gunner is *daft*. If he wanted the tyre shot out then why didn't he tell one of the others to do it?
Owen has improved, in that he didn't actually shoot his boss, but he isn't exactly 100% yet.
And if he's going to pull stunts like that, why do they let him drive? I know he had a nasty little rant about women drivers, but there's always Ianto. Of course there's the symbolic level of driving=control and he isn't going to hand that to Ianto - I'll believe him defering to the teaboy when I see it. He'd have to grow up a hell of a lot to do that. yesno?
Captain John Hart, who ended up injected in the heart. "There's a bit of all of you inside of me"
Not just a technobabble solution there: character design?
drink problem and killing Jack = Owen
can't let go / obsessed = Ianto... maybe. He's a lot saner in this ep than he was in 1-04. But we're talking all their darkest sides, right? To make a proper nemesis for the group?
Gwen's suggestion that she flirt for information is using his tools right back at him.
And Tosh has the tech toys and maybe some arrogance about everyone else's toys being primitive.
He most clearly dark-mirrors Jack, but there's bits of the others in there... maybe.
Actually he's such a grab bag of all your darkests that he could have bits of *everyone* in there. I mean was there a deadly sin he didn't cover in the course of the episode? Even sloth could explain using the team to get his stuff.
Owen's reaction to John's story - whenever John mentioned the woman, we got reaction shots from Owen. When he thought the woman died we got sympathy, when he learned John killed him there was anger. So that side of the story was linked to Owen in particular. I mean we didn't see what Gwen thought of it, and we only saw Tosh when John was coming out with "I hate technological geniuses" or whatever.
Ianto clearly got the lines about Jack dating someone else - will he go back to the Doctor, (came back for you! *happy*), partners in what way, why are we helping him linked to that whole dating conversation. So reading his glee in the bomb/stopwatch scene as jealousy works, because he's had that emotional bit. BUT John had also shot/smashed/poisoned the lot of them, his team, his friends, so I think a bit of glee can have nothing to do with who Jack isn't shagging.
I like how his voice started off all :-D and switched to concern as soon as Gwen got handcuffed into the problem. I also like that it's Ianto saying cut his hand off. Practical boy. Except for the thing where getting his DNA all over the place could be a problem given the targetting system on the bomb. And Tosh said it would set it off. Don't know how she decided that, but it did cut down on the mutilation.
Tosh is happier, more confident, more smiling, and with a new and improved box of tricks. Got to love that. Aside from that I can't think of much to say about her.
You know the other thing about John and that 'bit of all of you' is that's what saved him. If he has all their dark bits does he have potential for all the good bits too? A guy who can drop his ex off a roof... actually phrased like that it makes perfect sense; a guy who can drop Jack off the roof is a serious problem, and given that it looked like he regretted it / was sad of it before Jack even hit the ground I think even he would think so. Rehab. Big mess. And on an acting level, looooove all his reactions to that bit.
... it is also one of those moments where having knowledge from interviews/events can rather alter one's perceptions. This event report means every time I watch I end up thinking of what James Marsters has just seen rather more than what his character is thinking. "John's vulnerability"... heh, yeah, I'm sure that's the word for it...
Okay, I have run out of steam for another page.
... it's not obsession, it's close reading...
... *looks shifty and changes subject*...
My nice new recorder is all kinds of fun. Unfortunately either it blips the sound and freezes the picture at random or there's something wrong with my TV. The shop is sending someone round on Monday to see if they find out; the 'at random' part is practically guaranteed to mean it won't misbehave for them. *sigh*
But aside from that I have a huge and shiny picture to watch. Am pleased.
Watching the same ep 7 times in a week might seem excessive, and yet I'm pretty sure I've managed that already... Okay, onwards to the fiddly TW 2-01 discussion:
Ianto in the office - the banner says Customer Liaison Team. I have amusing thoughts about 'liaison'.
Jack's office - rearranged and enlarged by taking a wall out. Jack's desk used to be next to the safe and the hatch to his sleep place. Now it has been moved over in front of the big window they were always using to draw on last year. So it still has a view of the rest of the Hub, just with a bunch of stuff drawn on the glass between. Also it means that whoever was using that desk - and why move it if you didn't use it? - wouldn't be over Jack's personal space. Not sitting next to his bedroom the whole time. Plus the redecorating would be like claiming.
Team Torchwood power dynamics:
Owen drives the SUV, ignores Gwen's suggestions about driving and her 'don't you dare' about giving up on driving and climbing out the window, and snaps orders once they're in the confrontation with the fish. But he's pretty much taken out of that by the medical emergency, so the other three would have to become the bosses of themselves. This might explain why they just stood around like lemons while exposition fish talked, there was a transfer of command necessary and it weren't being done. Gwen's gun was shaking worst of any of them.
Power - Owen vs Gwen? Owen isn't taking Gwen's orders, and Gwen takes Owen's with minor complaint.
So then Jack turns up. And Owen stops pushing.
Pulling, yeah, when he has a plan - again, in his specialty, a medical plan - and he grabs Jack as the nearest pair of hands.
But Owen isn't the one asking where Jack went, he's mostly concerned with if his Doctor fixed him.
So Owen in his own domain is king - he's the medic, he knows what he's doing with that. I wrote it that way between seasons, with him becoming increasingly unhappy at being asked to do other jobs, so I have smug and a view on canon that has a bit of my stuff coloring the edges.
But Owen and Gwen is not a simple boss-subordinate relation in either direction.
Gwen says she lead the team while Jack was away. Yet the sequence we just saw gave no such evidence for that.
I've seen it divided up into field command, Owen in charge of the action stuff and Gwen of the admin. Which kinda sorta fits... but...
It could just be that Owen won't push when it's Jack.
I think any power issues the two of them had ended up with that cry and hug moment in 1-13. Trying to wind up Owen enough to have another go at Jack would take a heck of a lot of work, now he's seen how that works out. He said he was tired of people doubting him, but how much does he doubt himself now, with the apocalypse so nearly on his hands?
Yet he's still obnoxious and reckless to the point of being a danger to himself and others. Speeding in that tank? And there was someone out on the roads, that old lady, so he can't claim it's so deserted it's safe. And then there's the small matter of climbing out the bloody window. Cool, yes, but not actually sane. And trying to be both driver and gunner is *daft*. If he wanted the tyre shot out then why didn't he tell one of the others to do it?
Owen has improved, in that he didn't actually shoot his boss, but he isn't exactly 100% yet.
And if he's going to pull stunts like that, why do they let him drive? I know he had a nasty little rant about women drivers, but there's always Ianto. Of course there's the symbolic level of driving=control and he isn't going to hand that to Ianto - I'll believe him defering to the teaboy when I see it. He'd have to grow up a hell of a lot to do that. yesno?
Captain John Hart, who ended up injected in the heart. "There's a bit of all of you inside of me"
Not just a technobabble solution there: character design?
drink problem and killing Jack = Owen
can't let go / obsessed = Ianto... maybe. He's a lot saner in this ep than he was in 1-04. But we're talking all their darkest sides, right? To make a proper nemesis for the group?
Gwen's suggestion that she flirt for information is using his tools right back at him.
And Tosh has the tech toys and maybe some arrogance about everyone else's toys being primitive.
He most clearly dark-mirrors Jack, but there's bits of the others in there... maybe.
Actually he's such a grab bag of all your darkests that he could have bits of *everyone* in there. I mean was there a deadly sin he didn't cover in the course of the episode? Even sloth could explain using the team to get his stuff.
Owen's reaction to John's story - whenever John mentioned the woman, we got reaction shots from Owen. When he thought the woman died we got sympathy, when he learned John killed him there was anger. So that side of the story was linked to Owen in particular. I mean we didn't see what Gwen thought of it, and we only saw Tosh when John was coming out with "I hate technological geniuses" or whatever.
Ianto clearly got the lines about Jack dating someone else - will he go back to the Doctor, (came back for you! *happy*), partners in what way, why are we helping him linked to that whole dating conversation. So reading his glee in the bomb/stopwatch scene as jealousy works, because he's had that emotional bit. BUT John had also shot/smashed/poisoned the lot of them, his team, his friends, so I think a bit of glee can have nothing to do with who Jack isn't shagging.
I like how his voice started off all :-D and switched to concern as soon as Gwen got handcuffed into the problem. I also like that it's Ianto saying cut his hand off. Practical boy. Except for the thing where getting his DNA all over the place could be a problem given the targetting system on the bomb. And Tosh said it would set it off. Don't know how she decided that, but it did cut down on the mutilation.
Tosh is happier, more confident, more smiling, and with a new and improved box of tricks. Got to love that. Aside from that I can't think of much to say about her.
You know the other thing about John and that 'bit of all of you' is that's what saved him. If he has all their dark bits does he have potential for all the good bits too? A guy who can drop his ex off a roof... actually phrased like that it makes perfect sense; a guy who can drop Jack off the roof is a serious problem, and given that it looked like he regretted it / was sad of it before Jack even hit the ground I think even he would think so. Rehab. Big mess. And on an acting level, looooove all his reactions to that bit.
... it is also one of those moments where having knowledge from interviews/events can rather alter one's perceptions. This event report means every time I watch I end up thinking of what James Marsters has just seen rather more than what his character is thinking. "John's vulnerability"... heh, yeah, I'm sure that's the word for it...
Okay, I have run out of steam for another page.
... it's not obsession, it's close reading...
... *looks shifty and changes subject*...
My nice new recorder is all kinds of fun. Unfortunately either it blips the sound and freezes the picture at random or there's something wrong with my TV. The shop is sending someone round on Monday to see if they find out; the 'at random' part is practically guaranteed to mean it won't misbehave for them. *sigh*
But aside from that I have a huge and shiny picture to watch. Am pleased.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-20 11:43 pm (UTC)No one apparently thought of cutting off Gwen's hand. Drastic, to be sure, but between that and dying in the explosion?
no subject
Date: 2008-01-21 08:48 am (UTC)Reminds me of comics, Green Arrow I and his first death. He had the choice of Superman cutting his arm off or blowing himself up and he decided on boom. Very stupid. And then he got unboomed by his friends.