A few Torchwood observations...

[fajrdrako]

I watched "Cyberwoman", "Greeks Bearing Gifts" and "They Keep Killing Suzie" tonight with walkingowl and Donna.

A few observations:

(1) Gayle pointed out that the item I have been so casually referring to as "Ianto's stopwatch" was tossed to him by Jack at the beginning of the glove scene, which explains why Ianto says, "I still have the stopwatch" - meaning, "I still have your stopwatch." So it is... it was Jack's stopwatch, and a very Jack-like thing for him to own. Somehow this just adds to the sexiness of it, and I would like to think Ianto has kept the stopwatch ever since. Though they could, I suppose, pass it back and forth.

(2) I noticed that Mary quotes Coleridge and that reminded me that Sarah Jane's alien friend, apparently from the same planet or race, was a poet. So it seems that it's an alien culture that values poetry. I wonder whether we'll see them again.

(3) Though Suzie seems to have a love/hate attitude towards Gwen, it's interesting that she seems to take it for granted that Jack loves Gwen. Yet she never asks Gwen if she's sleeping with Jack, which (to my mind) implies that she knows Gwen wasn't, and that she never had sex with Jack herself. I see the love triangle of Jack/Gwen/Suzie as being the psychologically significant one, not Owen/Gwen/Suzie.

(4) At first I saw it as a contradiction, but I love it more each time I see the episodes: that in "Cyberwoman", Lisa talks to Owen about their shared camping experiences, while in "Countricide" Ianto says he never liked camping. I like all the possible implications of this. After all, a dog peed on their tent.

(5) Interesting that Jack let Toshiko destroy the pendant. We discussed that a little after the episode, and I think it bolsters my theory that Torchwood's mandate (as described in the charter) is nothing like Jack's personal agenda, and he is using Torchwood for his own purposes.

(6) I have noticed the many references to something moving/lurking/coming in the dark, which originally didn't make much of an impression at all. I wrote it off as general spooky atmosphere.

(7) The more I watch, the more the characters seem well-drawn, with carefully set-up motivations and subtle revelations of purpose and character. Interactions that seemed mysterious first time through seem both clear and significant now. The plots don't become more clear - I think some of them really could have used better editing - but the characterization does.

(8) I continue to find the Jack/Gwen relationship extremely interesting. Gwen doesn't annoy me at all this time through, perhaps because I know what to expect from her.

(9) Apparently the line "Guess you aren't from around these parts" is from Oklahoma!

(10) I love the way in "Cyberwoman" Jack is so clearly a soldier fighting a war, while his team is made up of civilians dealing with an emergency. Different attitudes. I really love Jack in his episode: his anger and love towards Ianto (including the kiss), his determination, his protectiveness... his use of the pterodactyl as a weapon. His willingness to die (several times) to save the others. His unwillingness to say whether he's ever loved anyone that much, but willingness to talk to Gwen about his feelings on life and death.

Comments

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Okay, still no brain power but I'm awake so giving this a go.
(1)Though they could, I suppose, pass it back and forth.

I did catch that Jack tossed the stopwatch to Ianto, but with Jack's "So" I assumed it was just a piece of equipment that they kept around from the previous experiments with the glove. I can't really imagine Jack leaving his personal-personal items lying about the hub. Seeing the idea that it belonged to Jack explored appeals to me, greatly, though. It certainly makes things interesting now just with the immediate scene at the end, but Ianto's exchange with Owen earlier.


(2) I wonder whether we'll see them again

All I've got is : So do I.

(3) I see the love triangle of Jack/Gwen/Suzie as being the psychologically significant one, not Owen/Gwen/Suzie.

I definitely see the important interaction here being about Jack, Gwen, and Suzie, but more about Suzie/Jack and Suzie/Gwen than Jack/Gwen. I don't know if it's because I don't read them right (and I admit I have a hard time comprehending the motivations going on beneath the surface there), but their interaction seemed almost incidental to me. To me the important things going on were Jack-Suzie; his killing her, immortality, her need for him to love her and let her replace Gwen again, and Gwen-Suzie for similar reasons. Jack/Gwen didn't seem to do much in the episode that struck me as important, and I'd love to hear what your thoughts are.

(4)while in "Countricide" Ianto says he never liked camping.

I never considered it a contradiction, but I'd never contemplated the potential explanations for it, either. I'm glad I have now, because there are a lot of them and they're fun.

(5) Interesting that Jack let Toshiko destroy the pendant

I definitely have a different take on this one. I definitely think Jack is using Torchwood to serve his own purposes, whatever those may be, but I also really think that Torchwood essentially belongs to Jack. He really seems to do what he wants to do - and I don't think that's because he's sneaky, but rather there's no one else that can (or will) tell him otherwise. I personally suspect he LIKES it, and likes what he's doing, but that he's the one doing it. Not just at Torchwood Three, but in general. I'm not sure I'm articulating what I mean well, but essentially: Yes, he's using Torchwood to do what he wants, but I don't particularly think there's any con involved.

(6) I have noticed the many references to something moving/lurking/coming in the dark, which originally didn't make much of an impression at all. I wrote it off as general spooky atmosphere.

I really, really, don't know what this means but I suspect it's something. The dark may be the void, it may not but I can't help being curious and really wanting to know.

(7) The more I watch, the more the characters seem well-drawn, with carefully set-up motivations and subtle revelations of purpose and character.

Yes, absolutely. The more I watch and pay attention the more I understand what's going on - or at least I think I do. Like you, it's not hte plot that makes more sense, it's the characters I grasp better. I still have only the vaguest idea what I think of Ianto, but Gwen I'm getting and I think I've got Tosh, Owen, and Jack (In reverse order).

(8) I continue to find the Jack/Gwen relationship extremely interesting. Gwen doesn't annoy me at all this time through, perhaps because I know what to expect from her.

Gwen is definitely becoming less annoying to me. Jack's relationship with and to Gwen is something that I still don't intuitively understand, but it does interest me and sometimes I get a flicker of emotional understanding that's helpful.

(9) Apparently the line "Guess you aren't from around these parts" is from Oklahoma!

Oh, like Jack liking musicals is a surprise *G*. Okay, it is a bit, because I hadn't thought about it, but now that I have it fits well. Really well.

And I've covered 10 in my earlier comment.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I can't really imagine Jack leaving his personal-personal items lying about the hub.

Please discard this particular bit, as Jack apparently had the watch on him - though it somehow doesn't really discount my impression of it being a piece of equipment they used to time with the glove and Jack just didn't care - I STILL like the idea that it was Jack's and could easily buy it, if I spin the relationship between Jack and Ianto right. Which, knowing almost nothing about it, could very well be the truth.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

What I like best about the watch is that it works as a metaphor on numerous levels at once. Time is an essential symbol of Jack as Time Agent, time traveller, TARDIS companion, man from both the past and the future. The stopwatch echoes the technology of the 1940s, dear to Jack's heart and part of his outward image. So Ianto using the stopwatch as a reference to the sex between them is inspired - all the more so if the stopwatch belonged to Jack.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I can't really imagine Jack leaving his personal-personal items lying about the hub.

But he does, all the time. He doesn't own much besides his clothes - but arguably his most valued posession is the hand, which sits around the office. I think the stopwatch was in his pocket. Alongside - I add with a certain tongue-in-cheek glee, because I can't prove it - his TARDIS key.

Seeing the idea that it belonged to Jack explored appeals to me, greatly, though.

Me too. For one thing, time and timepieces are iconic in this show - symbols of Jack's unmentioned time travel - we see them over and over, in the background, long before Bilis' shop. And it's so cool to think that Ianto uses Jack's own stopwatch to seduce him.

I don't know if it's because I don't read them [Jack/Gwen] right ... but their interaction seemed almost incidental to me.

Really? I see a lot of UST there, in both directions. Obviously Jack hasn't had sex with Gwen and doesn't intend to, but there is a strong mutual personal connection - physical attraction going both ways and something else, I think, something of significance to Jack but unknown to Gwen or the others. I have various theories as to what it might be, and they aren't mutually exclusive. I see this in Jack's relative trust of Gwen, the glances they sometimes exchange, the gun-room scene, the way he sometimes keeps her around privately to talk (or vent).

In "They Keep Killing Suzie", the Jack/Gwen element comes out in several ways - the way he handles Gwen with the 'acrobat' story when she's angry, the way he feels protective of her, but mostly in Suzie's insistance that Jack won't kill her if there's a spark of Gwen inside her - clearly Suzie thinks Gwen is personally important to Jack. I think she's right. (But not in the way she thinks she is.)

I really, really, don't know what this means but I suspect it's something. The dark may be the void

I think it's just absence of life - that the dichotomy set up in the show is not life/death but life/absence of life, if that differentiation makes sense. And I think the creature/force/thing lurking in the darkness is Abaddon, looking for his chance to escape.

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

I think of the hand as more a pet than a posession. Sort of goldfish-y.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well, it lives in a glass case filled with liquid, and the lights and filtration system looks very aquarium-like, so I can see the 'goldfish' analogy. I don't expect it needs to be fed like a goldfish does, though.