fajrdrako | Torchwood: Combat... (Reply)

I watched Torchwood 1x11: Combat on Christmas Day. Loved the story, but wanted more Captain Jack. Another Owen story, soon after the last one! Okay, an interesting episode, especially if you liked Fight Club (as I did), but... why not give us more about Jack? I keep thinking how ecstatic I'd be if Jack got a sex scene or two like Owen got in "Out of Time", and if he had the focus of the storyline like Owen got in "Combat", I'd be thrilled.

And then I think: why doesn't he? I feel cheated.

That being said, I loved the story, the use of the Weevils .... aww, let me itemize this again. Things I loved about "Combat" (leaving out the obvious: Captain Jack in his greatcoat) - and a few things I didn't like:

The Fight Club plot was fun. I liked the ineteraction between Owen and the real estate agent. I liked the set deisngs - the huge empty warehouse, the real estate agent's cold, angular flat; the dark tackiness of the place the fights were held. And why did I immediately imagine Wolverine in the cage?

Loved the exploration of the question, "Suppose other people knew about the Weevils?" I liked the way no had worked out (or really cared) exactly what they were, but simply exploited them without conscience. All the more moving, of course, when the Weevil at Torchwood was weeping for her friends. And all the more moving that Jack sees them as something he can empathize and wants to protect - even while he wants to protect humans from them. So sad, that he had to shoot the Weevil to save Owen - but so like him.

The overall sympathy for the Weevils, from Jack's point of view, and the narrative viewpoint.

A Torchwood story that actually had aliens in it! Yay!

Loved the story-segment about Gwen and Rhys. Gwen is just so mixed up - why should Rhys forgive her, after the way she's treated him? (Including drugging him, now!) The answer to that question, of course, is "because he loves her", but how far can she abuse his love without killing it? We shall see.

So: now Owen has dumped Gwen with contempt. He's even more screwed up than she is. I love this.

Loved it that Owen, at the end, is making a stab at speaking Weevil.

Loved it that the Weevil we were following was female. Janet.

Are we to believe that Owen is somewhat suicidal? Or just angry and reckless?

Tosh, come back, I miss you. Loved the moment when she was lurking around the gate with Jack, and exploring the warehouse. She needs more scenes like that. She needs more scenes, period.

We saw so little of Ianto. I was watching it with maaseru, who had never seen Torchwood before. "Does he ever get any lines?" she asked me. I told her about his beautiful voice and the brief-but-good lines he sometimes gets, and his beautiful Welsh vowels, but oh, I wish we'd get more! I think my Ianto-love is growing by the moment, but sadly, it's a case of absence making the heart grow fonder.

Loved the scene between Jack and Owen in the hospital, with grapes. Nice memories of the grapes in hospital scens in The Professionals.

If I really tell the truth, I'm beginning to resent Owen's inclusion in the show because it seems to be at the expense of screen-time for Jack, Tosh and Ianto. I hoped for a moment there that the Weevil had killed him. I'm half-hoping that in the near future he will die, preferably in some redemptive fashion - to save the rest of the Torchwood team, maybe, like Jack going off with the bomb in The Empty Child. I also am annoyed that we haven't got this story yet - how he came to Torchwood, why he isn't practising medicine. We've been given hints. I've certainly guessed at his backstory and don't really expect to be surprised. But... he's the only one for whom we haven't been told. Jack is of course a series of complicated mysteries, but we still know more about him than we do Owen. And one last Owen-complaint: we've seen his flat and his bed and his general living quarters several times. Not Ianto's, and only the feeblest glimpse of Jack's - more of a tease than a revelation.