beccaelizabeth's dreamwidth journal

Three stories, three consecutive Mondays, and they wrap around the audio Disco, where Ianto goes to his dad's funeral.

Dinner for Yvonne didn't work for me, it's about a bunch of boring horrible people Yvonne calls friends and the 'comedy' of trying to do a normal dinner while Torchwood stuff happens.

By Royal Appointment is basically Yvonne being badass and evil, but I found I didn't want to hear that.

Nerves is worth the price of the box set right there. Written by Joseph Lidster. Ianto and Tommy having all the feelings and actually talking about them. Trigger warnings for ( Read more... ) but they sort of work through a lot by the end. Ianto's mixed feelings make so much sense, but then Disco adds an entire other layer to them. It's a lot.
I will listen to this one again, but I'll make sure my mood's okay before I start.


It's another set I'd rate the parts very differently. 2 for the dinner, 3 for the Royal, and a 5/5 for Nerves, I think.

I think I liked this one. The last lines about the stopwatch felt a bit pasted on and I'm not sure they fit, and quite a lot of the story is lets make fun of newbie Ianto hour, before he Saves The Day at the end, but it has a lot of good story. And some bits were hilarious, in an incredibly dark way. And its sad tragic when you stop to think about it. And each character was very definitely a character who made sense. I'm just a little hesitant about the final mix because it never quite gave me what I was expecting next.

I reckon I'll like it better when I listen again.

Quite a good one.

I keep thinking of bringing Ianto back, as you do.
Canon already did the heavy lifting on 'back from the dead' with House of the Dead,
so we just need 'back from the Rift'
and that's easy.
That can happen literally any time.
I mean, if we want and we're doing even audios, it could be the next minute for Ianto, and he walks out of the pub wondering where Jack went.

The problem isnt How to do the story, it's Why.
What story are we telling, what story needs telling.

If we bring him straight from 2009 we have a time travel story where we import a different historical perspective without all that one decision at a time stuff from in the middle, so he's dropped straight in to 2024 attitudes with a 2009 perspective. That's only 15 years, usually story does at least 20s. And it's tricky because the writers have to get both sets of attitudes right.

If we're telling the story with Ianto, a lot of his story is about who he dates. Black woman, white man, drop him in a different era and there's story from either. His own attitudes to being queer and bi and potentially out are... frozen by where the story left off, and not comfortable if we take some of the books as canon. Oh, and book canon made him physically a woman for a while, so he has a rare perspective on being trans.

He's got the usual Torchwood thing about non human sentients, ie usually they're trying to kill him so he may have some Issues and it is their actual job to lock them up and erase all evidence they exist, but Jack hasnt been disappearing them as often at Torchwood has the reputation for, so that's... nicer? So Ianto could be written as non human racist, but he seems nicer than that, and also his boyfriend has definitely dated non humans. Ambiguity and tension makes drama, so having mixed feelings about alien life is a drama plus.

What I kind of want to do, on tv even so we need a reason for Gareth to be older, is to have sent Ianto somewhere he had to take the long way home. Just make it so he's been Out There for all the years in between. Because the Rift connects all these places, all these planets, so he could be Anywhere. But it connects them to Cardiff, so there could be humans wherever Ianto lands. Could be a human population goinf way back. Plus we know like Trion and Traken there's a lot of looks humans out there, and would Ianto know one way or another? So he could meet a population that looked like him, on a Rift in soace and time, presumably needing protection just as much as Cardiff does.

Torchwood Golarion (Pathfinder xover) is just one of many delightful options.

So the story I want to tell is what happens when he brings all these people back to Cardiff.

Torchwood being the 'adult' show has really put them in a corner for how things work out. If it works out happy and hopeful and optimistic, that's a Sarah Jane adventure. If a bunch of people die but it gets sorted out in the end, Doctor Who. So what's left for Torchwood? Everything awful always.

And some people think that's more realistic. Blergh.

What I want to do is write about a large but understandable population arriving on Earth as refugees. Torchwood has an Asylum policy as of that BBC audio, and Ianto knows it. If he figures out how to get home there can be many and more reasons to take friends with him.

Or to have to risk blind jumping through the Rift, possibly accumulating friends as he goes.

It could be a bit like a reverse Atlantis if we wanted, where they know how to open a connection but the team of a hundred that arrives on a one way trip arrives to Earth rather than from it.

Mostly though I want a big set of characters that can defamiliarise refugee stories. Not an alien invasion, so its led by a friend coming home, someone we trust already. Not something the Doctor can sort out by taking them back to their home planets, because for a wild assortment of reasons that wont work out for them. And not easy to look at and stereotype, because Ianto considers them all people and mostly basically human, but a lot of them look to weird to categorise to the average viewer, and the rest have never been near the continents they look like they're from to us.

DW does a lot of 'basically human but painted' characters, so that's a good start, tell stories about fantasy racism with fantasy races, maybe mix in some tiefling and aasimar type visuals that let people stereotype at a glance and then be wrong about it. Put the wildest differences on the characters that look most familiar. Maybe have half of them sound American for no obvious reason, like Jack.

Tell the story half in flashback, so we know where they're coming from and that they made it safe to here, but we find out why. Get to know them in the here now being 'weird' before we start seeing their pasts, so then they make sense and the viewer is led to understand they were too quick to judge.

Just stop telling stories of alien invasions and start telling how we're going to get along with people not exactly like us.



That's two separate reasons to use Ianto coming back, the time travely one and the one where we'll trust him cause we know him. The issues dont entirely fit together. But they both generate story.

I have been stuck reading Jack/Ianto, mosly post CoE fixit fic, lately.
(stuck as in I did not decide to focus on this particular variety but I cannot steer my attention for toffee)

It's good because there's a Lot of over ten thousand words not an out of universe crossover finished fic to read
but
a lot of it had the same ideas.

And they're great ideas! Yes, obviously Ianto should travel to the 51st century and meet both younger and older Jack, acting like a sort of reverse three ghosts, that's an excellent idea. And starting at the most bookmarked fics, it is also an idea I have read repeatedly already. I can also see the appeal of making Ianto immortal, by any means necessary, and making him a Time Lord, possibly with a stopwatch for a fob watch, works grand too.

But I am at that point in reading fic where I'm all
yes, like this!
... but not this.

I can't figure out exactly what differences I want either.

I mean the fic where Jack raises Ianto's baby in the far future is an excellent one, but, do I want to read another one?

I know I *don't* like the ones where the two of them leave Earth together after CoE. God knows they need a holiday, but it just doesn't feel plausible to me, knowing how they choose duty over and over. And of course having seen them choose duty, and on one memorable occasion vote screw it, we want them to get their freedom and their happily ever afters... but I just feel strongly that they'd manage a holiday for... maybe whole numbers of weeks, if it were a busmans holiday like the Doctor always manages. And after that they'd need to know Cardiff was okay roughly like you'd need to know if you left the cooker on.

I love the ones where everything gets declassified and everything changes.
It's perpetually frustrating that, in order to stay relatable and one step around the corner for new and young viewers, DW is just not going to do that.
Everthing resets instead.



I get tired of the tragic endings. Yes, the story can lead us through satisfyingly cathartic dark places, but, anyone can set it up and then leave it in the bad bit. Stories should figure it out and fix it too.



I've seen recent pictures of GDL and quite a large part of what I want is for Ianto to also have the chance to keep up. Live as long and look as good. It feels important more people get a turn at that.



Happily ever after isnt a childish ending. Leaving it in the dark seems teenage. Like you get scared and hide in a dark corner, but the good bit is figuring how to get out.

And it isn't really immortality angst when you get upset about having to watch everyone die
if they die like, every year. Every couple of years, tops.
That's just regular horrible trauma.



... give Jack the highly specific trauma he deserves, after spending the rest of the century watching Ianto grow old with him!

Ianto is such a classic character though. He's got that whole well organised butler sinks into the background thing going on, and then suddenly everyone has to *see* him and notice there's been wells of desperate passion driving him all along. And then he goes back to quiet competence? As you do? And getting underestimated, over and over. And that time he had to shoot Owen because both of them were absolutely certain they were doing their duty, that is good stuff. And just in general, the way Ianto will make a straight line plan starting where he is and going where he needs to go, and just do it, and you think he is therefor Fine, but he is having all the feelings, loudly, actually, and just getting everything done Anyway.

That's a kind of guy who could age in such interesting ways. Because maybe he continues to find someone to Follow, and Serve, and Look After. And they continue to wonder what they did to earn that. Or maybe he sort of grows into himself, and becomes the kind of highly competent leader who also knows how to get his people whatever they need. He could keep on trying to keep his feelings on the inside, or he could have his feelings out loud where actual other people can see them on a more frequent basis. And if he does, either way, it could be about growing out of insecurity into confidence, or he could keep that flaw of thinking he has to hide his needs in order to get a sliver of what is needed. Plenty of good story!

I do kind of want to see him as a parent, but not so much in the ways kidfic mostly covers, where there is A Cute Accessory that lets us see how much they Care. More like... for those of us who are not Immortal and unaging, there comes a day where someone else has to look after us, because they are more capable than we are today. Or than we will be anymore.

I think Ianto would have some Adjustments to make, to be the recipient of care.

And then his kids grow up a bit and want to work, want to *serve*, and how is he going to adjust to that? Send them elsewhere or set them up in Torchwood? Keep them where he can keep an eye on them, but everyone will know that's what he's doing?

(Not to mention the teenage years where the kids go all Sarah Jane Adventures but Ianto is very aware that the stakes are always Torchwood and his reality has no plot armour.)

They wouldnt have to be his biological kids for a lot of this to apply, obvs. Just, there keep being people who are Younger. Now what?

So the interesting bits about getting older when your partner doesn't, those would include watching him keep doing the same things the same ways, and you can't anymore... but maybe your kids can. And that is going to feel a whole heap of ways.

And Ianto admires James Bond so being a field agent seems like the height of glamor, but what if you hit the height of skill, and yet the rest of you doesn't keep up?

Kind of like Owen and Andy are doing in the audios, where Owen just can't risk getting any more broken, so then Andy gets hurt, and nobody is happy about that.

But instead like, an older Ianto has Jack as a model, someone to look up to and admire, and that includes a tendency to be the one throwing himself into danger. Yvonne didnt flinch from throwing other people in harm's way, and I feel Not Being Yvonne is going to be a legit priority in Torchwood future. But at some point you just arent the best option for the mission. It's time to send someone else.

I want to see someone adjust to those sort of long term changes.

TV isn't the format for that, unless you set up parallel stories, or giant flashbacks.

Fic can have it covered though.




Anyways, food delivery arriving, these are just some thoughts.

Three more stories from before the fall of Torchwood one.

TW for retcon, memory loss, arguably mind control, and from a certain point of view, child murder and attempted suicide.

These three discs are about retirement. ( Read more... )


This was a good set of stories.


But I, personally, should stick to Doctor Who adventures I've heard already when I'm in the mood I was in yesterday, or possibly even rewatch Sarah Jane. These got me in the feels real hard. Mental illness, grief, and loss, are not an easy evening's listen.

Well written though.

Okaaaay... so...
I remember back in season 1 of Torchwood where I quite happily theorised that Torchwood were, in fact, still the bad guys. Much as we might like them, the whole... everything they ever did, was in fact the problem. They were pretty much evil.
This audio? Very much supporting that.
It's well written, engaging, spooky, dark enough, and basically if the things that happen here are true then Ianto, specifically, is an evil bastard.

Which is interesting, as characterisation goes.

And I'm interested why I feel like this crosses a line. We've seen them use retcon before.
But here ( Read more... )



I'm going to give this 4.5 stars.
Might feel differently on a different day, but, I'm glad I own this one for later relistening.

You know what's not helpful? Having developed a tendency to giggle whenever Ianto says 'Lisa'. *facepalm*


Lots of spoilers: ( Read more... )

So I was all blah blah, yada yada, blah blah, thought I would be bored...
and then I pretty much quoted all the last bit.

So I'd say the ending worked. Really quite a lot.



... unfortunately, now there is no more. This was why I was saving them up and rationing them. All done now.

*hugs Ianto*

So for themes from these three audios we have: ( Read more... )

Ianto Jones:
( Read more... )

Did I miss any obvious ones? Include ones I shouldn't?

It doesn't mean much without more GURPS rules math. ( Read more... )

I'd aim for a final points total more 'hero in training' than full on superhero. We have Jack for that. Figuring out his point total is going to be spectacular.

Ianto Jones: Honours English Literature and History; Skypoint Chapter 8 p69

( Read more... )

I was figuring out how many GURPS character points my degree will be worth, because I am trying to figure out the GURPS RPG system character sheets for Team Torchwood. As you do. And I started with Ianto because he's so vaguely defined. To get Owen I can just slap a Medic template on a genius, same with Tosh and tech. Gwen is an average police template. No problems. But Ianto? I have to get creative to figure what skills he has at all. So I decided to start with his degree.

GURPS has rules about how many hours study converts to how many character points.

200 hours with a teacher is 1 point in a skill.
400 hours independent study is 1 point in a skill.

So how many of each in a degree?

At City College there are 360 credits in a BA(Hons) degree.
10 credits works out at 100 hours. 30 hours taught and 70 independent.

From that I work out one degree is 11.7 skill points, rounded up or down depending on how much independent study you put in to the nearest .5 points.
Also, I have 4 CP in English with Cultural Studies already.
( Read more... )in GURPS terms not all degrees are equal, and I'd need to know where he was studying and what their taught/independent split was.

Hence the long list of universities below.
Narrowing it further needs either canon I'm forgetting or a bit of deciding.

( Read more... )

Next I shall go figure out how many skill points he acquired while working at Torchwood 1. He was there 2 years according to fragments. GURPS rules allow you to claim 8 hours a day and it takes 800 hours to get 1 skill point, because mostly you're doing the same things over and over again. GURPS book reckons this works out at 2 or 3 skill points a year. This doesn't take into account any particular training courses Torchwood might send him on.

After he got to Torchwood 3 he probably got the Jack Harkness special on gun use.
But even under the rules for intensive study, that's 100 hours for 1 point.
Do we think anyone at Torchwood has spent 100 hours with Jack teaching them to shoot? Or 50 even? How about 400 hours self taught? 200?
If not, they're probably using guns at default levels, as in, unskilled.
... this could explain a lot.

Of course the quickest way to get points is to do adventures, otherwise known as Torchwood episodes. But even then they'd only apply to skills actually practiced.

Does practicing with arcade games count? Count at a familiarity penalty?
This could be key for figuring Owen's skill levels...
But arcade game laser guns could be Beam Weapons, and it reckons those default to Guns at -4.
Guns default to DX-4. So you could default it off Beam Weapons soon as you improve that.
So serious hours invested would improve your default, but you'd still never be as good with an actual boom stick as you are with an arcade game. And that's without the extra -2 for specialties (pistol to rifle to SMG) and familiarity penalities.
... rules are really picky about weapon skills, cause you use them a lot.



ETA: for people linked in from the newsletter, try the Ianto tag for my later added bits. If you like random maths or GURPS or rpg rules or Ianto. Well, mostly GURPS and maths.

You know the episode stuff? Background for The Electro, a leaflet about it's history and multiple renamings, is up on the website. And... well... it could of course be a cock up, but it's much more interesting if it's a clue.

( Read more... )

I awake again. This time there was fire engine outside and then I bit my tongue. Sleep, it is so complicated.

I am having recurring plot bunny. It's for a Jack/Ianto fic I have had the basic idea for since the middle of season 1. I'm not a quick writer though, things tend to just stew til I'm ready. Only now I'm starting to get an idea of what happens to characters other than Jack and Ianto, and who they are, and why that's important. And I invented an alien that fits the theme of the story and provides amusing and thrilling opening sequence. (Think hermit crab meets urban junk.) (There's probably shopping trolley involved.) And then... well, then I started thinking about characters who married a guy called Jones and why, actually, they'd make perfect parents on account of not fitting at all except for in important places. And it was a crack!fic funny idea last time I thought of it, but today it fits the serious story. And makes the mislead both more obvious and more likely to work. And... this plot, it would actually work. Properly. With, technically, no OCs.

So far I only know how Tosh reacts... no, tell a lie, I've got some idea from Owen now, he's mouthy whenever I think of him. And then Gwen chimes in... though there'll be more from that quarter in a couple of weeks. And we've got a lot from Jack... oh, we've got extra a lot, because I decided ages back Ianto has a very younger brother he took care of. So that's the whole team then. And I know how they contribute to the actual plot-plot too. And... yeah, this one fits together.

Also, does the 'meet the parents' thing that a lot of writers did some time between seasons, only things go all Torchwood.

Also also, fits the bad sex challenge, but in a polt and character developing way.

I should probably just actually write the thing.
Except for that thing where everything keeps changing every week on account of new canon.
But it's new and useful canon, for my fic requires an established relationship with some prospects, and canon is being helpful in that direction lately.
Hmmm.

Also? Helpfully? Owen is not the main character. I've got kind of fed up of how he took over my brain for a while there. He's interesting, but he's not all that. Right? Right.
... Those bunnies will be back with reinforcements too. I can just tell.

Torchwood
Fic: Need
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto
Rating: sweet and innocent... sorta
Spoilers: refers to the end of Doctor Who season 3
Word Count: 1181
Summary: Sometimes you can't just ignore the dark.
Author's Notes: Little angsty snuggly thing that sprang from someone else's image - Jack, after the Valiant, was always rubbing his wrists.
Beta by pinkdormouse


( Read more... )