Category: Reviews

James Bond is back.

There’s no more fitting way to describe this film. It’s the highest praise I can give it. It certainly wipes the bad taste left by Die Another Day out of the mouth and shows that the “new” (since 1995) production team of Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli have finally gotten their act together and caught the Bond spirit. Every film in their reign (Goldeneye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day) has, to one degree or another, felt off-kilter.

This one is absolutely on the mark.

The worst thing I can say about this film is that the titles are absolutely naff and have no naked women cavorting around.

As pointed out in my earlier post, the novel Casino Royale is a flawed book, with the action out-of-balance, and the plot being very short. The movie does an admirable job of following the book but, to flesh it out to an admittedly, butt-numbing two and a half hours, they’ve embellished the original story in several ways and improved it in every way.

In the original novel, M receives a memo outlining Le Chiffre’s financial difficulties and his high stakes baccarat game at Casino Royale to win back the money has already been setup. Bond is assigned simply because he is the best card player in the service.

In the film, the first hour concentrates on Bond’s efforts to stop first one, then a second hired bomber from causing financial turmoil and, not coincidentally, a financial windfall for Le Chiffre – who only puts in token appearances in the early part of the film.

The casino sequences have been embellished with action between breaks in the gaming, which is now poker rather than baccarat, presumably because baccarat has never been a popular game in the US and poker is currently experiencing an unfathomable popularity as a spectator sport.

The movie then follows the spirit of the book quite closely. (Easily the closest adaptation since On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.) Vesper and Bond are kidnapped, Bond is tortured and hen the principal baddie is killed by an unknown assassin while Bond is still tied in his torture chair and the movie still has a good 30 or 40 minutes to go.

Apart from the title sequence, my main secondary complaint would be that the movie might follow the book a little too closely and the story slows into the final act of Bond and Vesper falling in love. Unlike the book’s final act which ends with a complete fizzle, the writers have thankfully ended this film with an exciting Bond finale.

Then when you’re sure it’s finally over and you think you’ll finally be able to go empty your bladder, they throw a final twist in that makes you clinch up and prepare for some more chair time.

This is not a movie at which to buy the 44oz soda at the concessions counter.

The movie is a little disjointed, feeling more like 4 (or more) different, yet related, short stories following one after the next. The final segment, like the book, rings a bit untrue, as the developing love between Bond and Vesper really manfests itself only after the mission is over. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service tells a better Bond love story because you can see the love develop over the film, and it makes Bond’s desire to marry more credible. While OHMSS’s love story is superior, Craig’s performance leaves Lazenby’s far, far behind.

Director Martin Campbell redeems himself after mangling Goldeneye and does a journeyman job. (Only complaint: during the final fight sequence, there are times when it is difficult to tell which stunt man is supposed to be Bond.)

As I’ve mentioned earlier, the score is not one of my favorites when listened to by itself, but in the context of the film does well and compliments the movie nicely. The theme song, which I dislike does have a nice melody and I found myself humming it after the film. It’s apparently the vocal performer that fails for me on this one.

Finally
A lot of ire was tossed at Daniel Craig prior to the release of this film, and I certainly had my doubts about him. His “look” is still not what I expect, and when he’s dressed up in his dinner jacket, he looks in desperate need of someone to comb his hair. With that and his features, he looks more like a bouncer than a secret agent.

That notwithstanding, he turns in a great performance. No complaints, not one. His Bond is smart, resourceful, arrogant and rather humorless.

Prior to the release of the film, the film is hyped as Bond’s first adventure and how he becomes the agent we all know. Frankly, that’s just hype. While it is true that this film depicts Bond’s promotion to 007, the script really just plays lip service to the concept. Bond is every bit the agent he’ll be in the end from the beginning of the film to the end. Character “growth” really isn’t there.

So there it is, a superior Bond film. Go see it. Bring a comfy cushion, have an empty bladder.

One other thing…
I almost loath giving these guys a link, but I’m going to. You may know that there was a vocal anti-Craig movement, based largely on his looks. One of the most visible manifestations of it is the Daniel Craig is Not Bond website. They’ve been urging a boycott of the film and the return of Pierce Brosnan. Having once been in the “I’m not sure he’s a good choice” category, I was curious to see if they’d changed their tune – or better yet, taken down their website completely and replaced it with the I’m-Eating-Crow website.

Nope, they’re still sponsoring a boycott of the film (their loss) and have even posted a few “honest and reliable” reviews (presumably from people who didn’t go along with the boycott). I’m going to link to them here because they are so wrong they’re funny. They’re kind of like the conspiracy nuts who think we never landed on the moon.

Don’t let someone else make up your mind for you, go see it for yourself.

Technorati Tags: 007, Blog, Movies, Review

In one hour I go to see the new Casino Royale Bond film. 15 minutes ago I finished re-reading the original book, which I haven’t taken off my shelf in 20+ years.

Fortunately, all those years ago, I didn’t choose Casino Royale as the first book to read, instead I choose Moonraker, which was at jarring disparity with the film of the same name. Nonetheless, I eventually read all of the Bond books, including Casino Royale. It was an unmemorable book, apart from the lingering mental image of the savagery of the torture that Bond is inflicted in the course of the story. They say the new movie has gone back to the story. (Has there been a Bond film actually remotely following the original book since On Her Majesty’s Secret Service?

In a few hours, I shall know.

Synopsis
Le Chiffre a French agent working for the Soviets has gotten himself into a bit of trouble. His investment in prostitution collapsed on him. Too bad he used Soviet moneys that were entrusted to him to make the investment. The auditors have got wind that something is up and the communists don’t send you to prison when you use non-standard accounting practices. He has to get back the money and he plans to win big playing baccarat at Casino Royale.

M sends 007, one of the service’s best agents to beat him at cards. The logic follows that the Soviet will do the rest. Le Chiffre will be discredited and terminated, crushing his branch of the organization.

When Bond arrives, they’re on to him already but they bungle the attempt to kill him. In what can only be considered the shorted spy assignment on record, Bond stomps Le Chiffre (with a little help from the CIA’s pocketbook) in just about 8 hands. Mission over, time for Bond to go bag Vesper, the assistant sent to help him on the assignment.

Foreplay consists of having dinner, but before the after dinner mint (so to speak) Vesper is kidnapped by Le Chiffre. Bond follows and is captured, tortured viciously (Seriously, I’ll never sit in a cane chair) and then Le Chiffre is killed by SMERSH, the Soviet assassination branch before he finishes we Bond.

Case solved again. Well, apart from weeks of being in the hospital nursing Bond’s battered and broken gonads.

Well, and then there’s the last third of the book where Bond takes Vesper who was unhurt in the ordeal, to the seaside to give his newly healed gonads a good workout. He falls in love with her and then she kills herself because she’s been a double agent for years and can’t stand it anymore.

Analysis
Ian Fleming was a spy, once, sort of. Ian Fleming was a playboy. Ian Fleming decided to get married, but before he did and settle down, he decided to write the definitive spy novel. Being an actual spy is probably quite boring, consequently, much of Casino Royale, being said definitive spy novel, is quite boring. It’s a three act play, where the exciting parts come in acts 1 and 2. Act 3 is a long, slow letdown. As with all Fleming books, he spends way too much time describing what they’re eating, what they’re smoking, drinking or how many buttons they have on their clothes.

However, there’s no doubt that there’s a glimmer of the future (and better) Bond books to come.

Technorati Tags: 007, Blog, Books, Review

My friend over at Stalking Moon Comics was moving his store this last weekend^* (and that, in itself is a story equally as “amusing” as my iPod’s Tale) and I was helping out as much as a could, recovering from the flu as I was and all. On my way over on Monday night, at 35th Ave and Greenway, I passed a place called “The Codfather” which I could just make out said “fish & chips”, along with a large banner saying “Now open.”

I’m always on the lookout for some place that could make good fish & chips, although I’m usually disappointed. Arizona is just nowhere near enough to an ocean to get good fish.

Now, I’m the first to admit, I grew up in the desert, and I don’t appreciate much in the way of seafood, but I love fish & chips. When we went to the UK, one of the things I liked best was the fact that British fish & chips really are the best. We ate in chippies from London to Ft. William and only once did I get sub-par fish.

So, later in the week I returned to the Codfather at dinner time with the family. The first thing I noticed was that they emphasized that they were “English fish & chips” and the second thing I noticed was that the place was completely devoid of customers. Considering how busy the nearby restaurants were, that wasn’t a good sign.

Inside it’s clean, and decorated with few English-themed pictures, plus a wall mural of Parliament and Big Ben. The most important (or, more often, the most unimportant) piece of decoration was a New Times Best Fish & Chips of Phoenix 2005 award. Since the New Times is not always known for having good taste, the award is meaningless, but it did tell me the store was open longer than I thought, since those awards are given out in September, meaning the store has been open more than a year.

Their menu contains the obvious fish & chips, which come in the traditional cod, plus haddock, halibut, mahi-mahi, salmon and catfish. Haddock was common in the UK, more so up north, but I’ve never seen it in a chippie in the US. Their menu also includes other traditional British items such as saveloy sausages, battered sausages, steak & kidney pie, shepard’s pie & bubble and squeak.

I was there for the fish.

So how was it? For once, the New Times got it right – this was the real deal – an English fish & chip shop smack dab in the middle of the desert. We all had cod and you get 1 piece with the combo (fish, chips & soda), but it was an enormous piece of fish, fully 10“ or more long and at least 2” wide.

The chips were of that authentic, soggy British variety and when the whole thing was soaked down with vinegar it was great.

Some research after the fact reveals that the Codfather is run by a British ex-pay who trained in the UK as a fish fryer. You can’t ask for more authentic than that.

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^*He actually moved weeks ago, but I wrote this back then and for some reason for got to post it. 🙁

Technorati Tags: Blog, Food, Restaurant, Review

The Mark of the Rani
by Pip and Jane Baker

Starring Colin Baker as the Doctor and Nicola Bryant as Peri

The Doctor and Peri are diverted to the early 19th century where not one, but two renegade Time Lords are out to do the Doctor mischief.

Summary

In a peaceful iron mining town in the 19th century, miners are being changed into violent luddites by a mysterious old woman running a bath house. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Peri arrive on scene after the TARDIS is dragged off course by a mysterious interference from another time machine. Unbeknownst to them, they are stalked by the Master, who has drawn them here to kill them.

The Master reveals the woman running the bath house to be the Rani, an exiled Time Lord scientist. She is uninterested in his feud with the Doctor and wants to proceed with her own business: Extracting the brain chemicals that allow humans to sleep. The process isn’t fatal, but has the side effect of making the victims violent and unable to rest.

The Master forces the Rani to help him destroy the Doctor.

The Doctor investigates the outbreak of violence and meets the famous inventor George Stephenson. Stephenson has called a meeting of some of the worlds greatest geniuses, and he Master wants to harness them to rule the Earth.

Analysis

Perhaps it is the fact that I just watched the appalling Ghost Light, but I enjoyed this episode a lot more than I recall doing when it first aired in 1985. I intensely disliked Pip and Jane Baker’s work back then, but this story really wasn’t that bad. Despite that, I’m not particularly looking forward to the release of Time and the Rani.

Some have said that the location footage is the star of this story, and while I wouldn’t go that far, it certainly adds a lot to the production value of the episodes. Colin Baker, at this point, had settled into the Doctor fairly well and struck a good balance between obnoxious and brilliant do-gooder.

Kate O’Mara plays the Rani just slightly over-the-top, but you might not notice it because of the completely over-the-top, pantomime Master as played by Anthony Ainley. Ainley’s portrayal of the Master is one of the most disappointing things in this story. Perhaps it was an intentional descent into madness for the character, but each successive appearance was more camp than the last. In this episode, he cannot even walk normally and is constantly sort of tip-toeing with his shoulders hunched over and wild eyes. At any moment I expect him to turn to the camera, put his fingers to his lips and say to the audience, “Be very quiet, I’m hunting the Doctor.” (Followed, perhaps by the sound of someone slapping their leg and shouting, “OH NO YOU’RE NOT!”)

The Master’s character really has no business in this story, and I’m sure he was added in as an afterthought. It’s a complete waste of his character and he is completely eclipsed by the Rani. No more is he a formidable adversary of the Doctor, but an insane caricature – a shadow of the Master past.

While the location scenes are nice and well put together, too often the studio scenes come across like a stage play, with lots of stilted dialog, particularly between the Master and the Rani. If I don’t know better, I would say it was two different directors.

There’s a tragic tale of the musician hired to score the story dying after only producing 20 minutes of music. His score was scrapped and a new one commissioned. The new one is not good, it drones and grates and sounds grotesquely, electronically anachronistic. Well, Doctor Who has never had great incidental music – and yet I keep buying the CDs.

Despite the fact that I enjoyed this one, I’m not letting Pip and Jane off the hook that easily, I do have a number of bones to pick with their script.

For example, who’s going to buy that the Master wants to “harness the genius” of early 19th century humans to take over the world. Surely the 19th century’s greatest brain is nothing but a drooling idiot by comparison to even the lowliest of Time Lords. What could they possibly come up with that wouldn’t be child’s play to the Master? (I’m sensing a theme there, because, as I recall, in Time and the Rani, the Rani is capturing earth geniuses for some equally idiotic plan.)

Why would the Master try to drop the Doctor’s TARDIS into the mine shaft to destroy it? Surely he, of all people, should know that something that simple could never harm the TARDIS?

The Rani, a brilliant Time Lord chemist, can’t synthesize a simple human brain substance? And she supposed to so brilliant and amoral, yet she wastes time to invent land mines which turn people into trees? (And don’t get me started about the scene where the tree reaches out to cop a feel from Peri… er… save her from becoming a tree, too.)

Still, despite all that, I enjoyed it. (Alright, I bristled a bit every time the Master was made look idiotic.) As I recall, I didn’t originally like the 45 minute episode format, but it plays well here. I’m more convinced than ever that the new Doctor Whos should adopt two-part episodes as the norm in the future.

Colin Baker is one of my favorite Doctors and yet, he didn’t get very good stories. It’s disconcerting to say that this is his best of those currently available on DVD.

Hand of Fear is waiting on my DVD shelf for viewing next.

Technorati Tags: Blog, Dr Who, Review

Little Storping-in-the-Swuff =» “The Invasion” Animated Episodes Review

The first “re-constructed” Doctor Who episode for DVD has been released in the UK. “Invasion” starring Patrick Troughton as the second Doctor battling the Cybermen in London with the first appearance of UNIT. They have combined the original audio track and new animation to re-create the missing episodes. While I have to wait a few months for release in the US, early indications are that the it’s good.

Simon at Little-Storping-In-The-Swuff writes:

(T)he episodes have been reanimated by Cosgrove Hall (who produced the BBCi Doctor Who: The Scream of Shalka serial).

The animation, in black and white, is impressive. It has a different “feel” to the live action episodes, and clearly the animation isn’t photorealistic and doesn’t resemble live action, but whilst it’s two dimensional the images have depth…

Technorati Tags: Blog, Doctor Who, Review

Ghost Light
by Marc Platt

1989, Starring Sylvester McCoy as The Doctor
and Sophie Alred as Ace

Synopsis
The Doctor and Ace arrive at a Victorian House and lots of nonsensical crap and dialog get spread around like someone had a sprinkler attachment on their asshole.

Analysis
Seriously, I can only assume that Marc Platt is a pseudonym because I find it hard to believe anyone would take credit for this story. After three viewings I still couldn’t make head nor tail of what they were trying to accomplish except to waste airtime. In just three episodes, even the most hardcore Doctor Who fan would have to be convinced that it was time to put a bullet in the series’ head and let us all out of our misery.

If you’re buying Doctor Who DVDs, give this one a miss and save yourself 20.625in² on your bookshelf that you could use for something useful, like dust bunnies.

Technorati Tags: Blog, Doctor Who, Review

Small Worlds
by Peter J. Hammond

The mystery of Capt. Jack deepens as the Torchwood team comes up against their most formidable opponent yet: fairies.

Summary

A quintessentially eccentric British old lady (QEBOL) stalks silently through the forest. She is hunting and finds a circle of glowing fairies, flittering around a stone circle. She takes a few photos and leaves. Her intrusion does not go unnoticed.

Meanwhile, Capt. Jack has a nightmare and awakes to find a rose petal. At the same time, the Torchwood monitoring systems notice freak weather patterns.

The next day, a pedophile attempts to abduct a young girl, but something invisible and unseen attacks him, attempting to choke him with rose petals. Jack and Gwen go to visit the QEBOL, who turns out to be a former lover of Jack’s “father” from the 1940’s. [Her name is Estelle, but I’m going to keep calling her QEBOL.] She’s a researcher into fairies, and she’s been giving a talk about her recent photographs. Jack asks to see all her photos and data and warns her that these fairies aren’t nice, sweet little creatures. QEBOL explains to Gwen that she and Jack have had disagreement on their nature before.

As the investigations progress, it is clear no one is safe from them and their pursuit of one young girl, their next “chosen one”.

Analysis

This story was by Peter J Hammond, creator of Sapphire & Steel and it shows: It plays fast and loose with the concept of linear time, features creatures “from outside of time” and doesn’t bother to explain the real nature of the antagonists. That might sound like a criticism, but it isn’t. There are very few TV writers who can pull that off and Hammond is certainly one of them. The episode is well written and constructed and isn’t nearly as “unexplained” as episodes of Sapphire & Steel. This may be the best episode of Torchwood yet.

In fact, most of the unexplained “mystery” in this episode does more to make the story of Capt. Jack more complicated rather than bog down the main narrative.

The QEBOL’s lover was, in fact, Jack himself. That’s not so much of a surprise as the Doctor first met Jack in 1940’s London. Although we know Jack was a renegade Time Agent, we never learned what Time Agents do. Perhaps I was reading something into it that wasn’t there, but it seemed in The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances that Jack hadn’t been there more than a few months. QEBOLs explanation in Small Worlds makes it sound like he’s been there much longer.

Later, Jack reveals (to the audience, if not specifically to Gwen) that he was commanding troupes in 1909. Again, what does a Time Agent do? Would Jack as an agent or a con man have spent enough time in 1909 to take command of troupes going into war?

Considering how world-weary Jack’s character seems in Torchwood, compared to Doctor Who, I almost think they’re going to reveal that he somehow after the Dalek battle in space and his resurrection by Rose and the time vortex that perhaps he was sent way back in time and has been living for ages as an immortal being.

Acting and production were again impeccable, the only reservation I had was that the CGI fairies in “scary” mode had a slightly rushed feel to them.

This episode relied on story, action and characters and required no superficial insertions of sex scenes, innuendo nor Capt. Jack’s “kiss of life.”

This story makes me wish they’d bring back Sapphire & Steel.

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Additional note: Maybe it’s just me, because my wife says she didn’t understand the episode.

Technorati Tags: Blog, Review, Torchwood

Cyberwoman
by Chris Chibnall

Summary

Ianto Jones, Torchwood’s faithful… um… what? butler? front man? garbage picker? Clean up man? Well, anyway, Ianto has a secret: He keeps his girlfriend, Lisa, locked up in the basement of Torchwood. The thing is, she’s been half converted into a Cyberman. Ianto secretly brings a cybernetics expert to the help her regain her humanity, but things go horribly wrong when the expert succeeds in weaning her from the life support mechanism – which just happens to be a cyber-conversion unit.

Lisa then shows her colors by trying to convert the cybernetics expert into a cyberman, but the upgrade “fails.” Ianto, obviously completely blinded by love, covers the crime up, while the rest of the Torchwood team begin to realize something is amiss. The rest of the episode is basically a battle to the death, while Ianto tries to save his girlfriend from destruction.

Analysis
I enjoyed this episode a lot. In fact, I’d go so far as to say it contained the single coolest scene I’ve ever seen on TV. How can you not love a cyberman battling a pterosaur? Too cool! (PS, Torchwood team – Pterodactyls are more primitive pterosaur types that have long tails, making Torchwood’s pet something more like a pteranodon.)

Overall the episode was a tense, exciting battle from end to end, although I had some issues with the pacing. Despite that, there’s a lot in this episode that doesn’t stand up to closer inspection.

The most obvious is the cyberwoman herself. Obviously, they’ve tried to make a sexy incarnation of Maria from Metropolis, and the costume they’ve devised is quite good, but… well, why has she still got breasts? Why are her feet cyber-heels instead of cyberman boots? We know from Doomsday that, during the Canary Wharf battle, human females were converted into standard cybermen. The cybermen weren’t experimenting with new models and so the notion that Lisa’s cyber-conversion would ever have had cyber-breasts is ridiculous. During the episode, Ianto explains that the cybermen were upgrading humans rather than “transplanting brains” because they needed troups, fast. That seems like a poor attempt to gloss over this particular plot hole. Clearly the cyber converters, all the way back to the beginning in the alternate universe “upgraded” people rather than did brain transplants on them.

The second is her brain conditioning, which, even on 2 viewings, I cannot determine if the idea is that she’s always been conditioned and she’s been playing on Ianto’s emotions to get free or if something “snaps” when the cyberneticist works on her.

And then there’s Ianto… I just don’t buy this character. Yes, Ianto has been played as mostly a shadow of a character so we’ve been kept in the dark about him, but this performance doesn’t ring true. He’s obviously been Torchwood since before the war, so he’s been a willing part of an organization which is, let’s face it, less than savory. Are we to believe that he learned nothing from the events at Canary Wharf? Love is blind, but not that blind. I could buy the setup all the way up to the point where she attempts to “upgrade” the cyberneticist. Even then Ianto is torn… I can even buy that, but with each progressive demonstration that she was lost, he didn’t get seem to get any clue at all. The only way he could have redeemed himself in my mind was if he’d finally pulled the trigger on the pizza delivery girl once she started on about upgrading.

And what has he got against Jack? I feel like Ianto is going to prove more of a liability than as asset as the show progresses.

Once again Jack’s immortality is put to the test, and each time they do that, I feel Jack’s actions are not in keeping with someone who is immortal. Something like that is bound to impact the way you think and behave more than it apparently has Jack. Jack’s comments about thinking he might die and feeling so alive echo a common theme is sci-fi: that to truly be alive, life must be ephemeral. Perhaps Jack is the monster Ianto says he is.

Speaking of Jack’s powers, what’s with his “kiss of life”? Does he just has a gay necrophiliac streak or does he have some supernormal power? In Day One he seemed to give some sort of “extra special” kiss to the girl, but that was accompanied by bright lights and fairy dust. Laying one on Ianto’s seemingly dead body appeared to be pointless, although it did seem to shake him out of his death/unconsciousness. It certainly wasn’t meant to be mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Perhaps this will prove to be Jack’s super-hero power.

One last note on the pacing. Television and movies exist in a bizarre time-dilated world where one minute on screen rarely equals one minute in real life. We’ve all been programmed since childhood to understand the shorthand of time on screen, and so to convincingly portray 1 to 1 passage of time, filmmakers usually have to resort to gimmicks to keep the audience “grounded” in real time. Throughout this entire episode, the director never conveyed to me that this was “real time”, and so the arrive of the pizza delivery girl 40+ minutes after the pizza was ordered was jarringly out-of-time. It felt more like a couple hours had passed, but perhaps pizza delivery is more leisurely in Wales. If I were Ianto, I would not accept those pizzas, nor would I give her a tip.

Technorati Tags: Blog, Review, Torchwood

Torchwood
Day One by Chris Chibnall

Here it is, almost a week after Day One aired and I’m just now putting out this review. Why the delay? Oh, I could go on about a busy week, family members being sick, some kid at my daughter’s school with hoof and mouth disease or any of a number of reasons, but the real reason was sex.

My immediate reaction to the episode was that it was a juvenile example of a writer trying to cram something he shouldn’t into a story just to prove he could do it. It’s rather like a teenager loosed from his parents’ supervision and he suddenly starts to do stupid things – just because he can get away with it. My delay was because, having felt like they’d done the exact same thing in the first episode, I wanted to make sure I was not combining the two episodes into one and responding to a compounded gut reaction rather than weighing the merit of what was being presented.

So without further introduction…

Synopsis
Gwen’s now on her first day at Torchwood and an alien arrives to shag the boys in Cardiff to death. No, I’m not making that up, nor am I referring to a crap plot from a low-budget porn film, nor the next Austin Powers movie. That’s really what this story is about. Oh, there’s some human drama about trying to save the poor infected girl rather than killing her, but basically, it’s just a poor excuse for the snogging and shagging. (Whoops, rant on there for a moment… let’s try that again.)

Gwen, newest member of Torchwood is going to start her first day tomorrow, so, to celebrate, she’s decided on an all-nighter with her boyfriend, but that gets interrupted by the arrival of a meteor-like spacecraft.

The Torchwood team take control of the situation and begin analyzing the rock/craft. Gwen tosses a tool, which, with only a light toss, manages to embed deeply into the apparently not-so durable craft from another world, releasing a gas-like alien. The alien floats into town and inhabits the body of a 19 year old girl. She proceeds into the nearest club, picks up a guy, hauls him (willingly) into the ladies room where she has sex with him. He enjoys himself up to the point of ejaculation, where he explodes into a little pile of dust.

Torchwood investigates and, luckily for them, the security guard at the club was watching the couple on the security monitors (while slipping one off his wrist) and saw the “murder.”

Gwen, feeling really guilty about releasing the alien, uses her police skills to track down the girl and take her into Torchwood’s custody.

First the alien explains that it has come to Earth to feed off the sexual energy of orgasms. Then the alien overcomes Gwen with pheromones which leads to some girl on girl kissing and a bit of breast-fondling, before the alien backs off because it really has to be a man to give it what it needs.

Study of the alien shows that the possessed girl will soon explode. Gwen, feeling ever more guilty by the minute, feels Torchwood must do something to help her, and this really brings up the only solid dramatic aspect of this story – the dichotomy between Gwen’s desire to help people, versus the Torchwood mentality of suppression and cover-up. It’s a theme I believe they’ll continue to explore – if the writers can just keep their minds out of their trousers.

The alien uses pheromones to overcome Owen, escape and take his clothes. In a gross plot blunder, she doesn’t screw him to death, but leaves him alive for no apparently good reason. (Or could it be Owen can’t get it up?).

She then kills off her ex-boyfriend and the men in the wanking rooms at the fertility clinic the host worked at.

Again, Torchwood arrives, Gwen is willing to sacrifice her life, Capt. Jack imparts a magical kiss and then uses alien technology to capture and kill the alien.

It’s all in a day’s work for Capt. Jack and the intrepid Torchwood team.

Analysis
No bones about it, my opinion is this was a poor excuse for a plot motivator.

That said, the episode was well-crafted. I’d go so far as to say impeccably well-crafted. The acting, pacing, dialog and cinematography all worked well and while it certainly wasn’t an intellectually challenging episode, they touched on a few aspects of the format of the show which I feel hold great promise for the future. I’m eagerly anticipating this week’s episode.

One thing that I am pleased about – you know darned good and well this is what they would have done to Doctor Who if they’d been given a completely free hand, so perhaps it’s best they get it out of their systems this way.

Technorati Tags: Blog, Review, Torchwood

I’m not one for giving spoiler warnings, but, in the interests of global harmony, this and all future Torchwood reviews and commentary are apt to have spoilers. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

The BBC aired the first two episodes of the new Russell T. Davies’ Sci-Fi series, Torchwood, Sunday. The overnight ratings are in and they are good, really good. Record-breaking good, in fact. The story follows Capt. Jack Harkness, late of Doctor Who, as he runs Torchwood 3, a ultra-top secret organization designed to collect alien technology and utilize it for mankind’s defense.

Mention of Torchwood made nauseatingly regular appearances in last season’s Doctor Who episodes, culminating in a battle between the Cybermen and the Daleks which destroyed Torchwood 1.

Despite the two episodes being run back-to-back, even sharing the same end credit space, I’ll treat them separately.

Episode 1
Everything Changes by Russell T. Davies

Everything Changes is a basic pilot episode, told from the viewpoint of Gwen, a Cardiff police constable who sees too much and can’t let the mystery go. Her investigations lead her deeper and deeper into the mystery that is Torchwood until she finally discovers Capt. Jack in their secret base at the Cardiff Millennium Center – the place which, not coincidentally, the Doctor, Rose and Jack parked the TARDIS two years ago on top of a temporal rift for recharging. Rather like SHADO from the classic 60’s series, UFO, the super-secret base is underground. Security is absolute and unwitting witnesses have their memory erased by amnesia drugs. In fact, the story reminded me a lot of the UFO episode “Exposed”, which told how the character of Paul Foster learned about SHADO and then doggedly investigated until they reached the point they had to kill him or let him join.

Like RTD’s first episode of Doctor Who, Rose, this story is also told from the perspective of the outsider being drawn in. It’s a tactic he likes to ground the story with the viewer and, while generally successful, the episode still suffers from pilotitis, that malady that afflicts most shows that need too much introduction, yet at the same time must have a conventional mystery to solve, too.

In this episode, the secondary mystery is so underplayed as to make the viewer not really care, it’s incidental, and that’s good. The second good thing is that, rather than try to cram the extra story in the pilot, the showed two episodes back to back, allowing Torchwood to have a proper introduction, without leaving the viewers cold for a week.

In general, I enjoyed both episodes, but I have my reservations. The signs are already showing that a series-wide hook will be running through the episodes. With luck, they won’t be as awful as “Bad Wolf” and “Torchwood” from Doctor Who. Jack, we learn, is now immortal (probably because Rose revived him in Parting of the Ways) and is waiting for a special kind of Doctor (Who, could that be, I wonder) to help him out. We also see that he’s got the Doctor’s severed hand in a jar. (Alright, they don’t specifically say it’s the Doctor’s hand, but Jack is awfully attached to it.)

Jack spends an inordinate amount of time on completely impractical rooftop locations, so that the camera helicopters can dramatically take in the scenery. The cameras spend a distracting amount of time pointlessly flying over Cardiff.

What about the celebrated “adult” aspects of Torchwood or perhaps the much-blogged “RTD Gay Agenda”?

“Adult” drama can mean several things. It could mean profanity, gore and violence or, of course, sex. Everything Changes was consistent with a PG-13 rated movie in the US. Profanity, some blood and violence, kissing and implied sex. Consistent, that is, apart from one thing. It was fairly tame, but certainly not for my 4-year old.

The “one thing” of course was that some of the kissing was man-on-man action, with implication that it would lead further, much further. Was it the “RTD Gay Agenda”, or an effective way to demonstrate just what an amoral slime Owen Harper is? Only more episodes will tell for sure.

Looks like they won’t be selling this series to the Sci-Fi channel, though.

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