Torchwood: Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang: Relationships Revisited...

[fajrdrako]

I watched Torchwood 2x01 "Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang" again this morning while doing my exercises. Of course, while one's hands are full of weights, it's difficult to take notes for future reference - but I dearly wanted to.

It set a few mental gears in motion, though - mainly with my favourite subject of considering Captain Jack and his relationships.

1. Captain Jack and Ianto

I seems obvious to me that if Jack wanted to simply seduce Ianto he could do it in seconds. Ianto is defensive, angry, frightened: loves Jack desperately but is afraid that Jack will simply walk off and leave him again, without warning or explanation. There's not much Jack can say to that, and he's not about to make excuses or explanations. What Ianto needs is to believe that Jack cares about him, but he's not about to believe reassurances at this point. He may not know about Jack's con man past, but he knows him well enough to mistrust his words.

But what Jack wants most of all is to disconnect himself with his own shady past - to stop being a con man. Even though he is one still, in many ways. But he wants to be an honest con man, fully aware of the paradox he is wrapping around himself. I think Jack will learn that he is the product of his own past and he can't escape it - but he can accept it and build on it by facing it. Which may mean sharing it with the Team. We shall see.

But meanwhile, Ianto and their relationship is something Jack wants as a staple of his present, and he wants to win Ianto back without breaking him. He needs his trust, whether he deserves it or not.

So he has set up to rebuild Ianto's pride and to show him respect. Even to play the courting game by the terms of Ianto's cultural background - ask him on a date. Did Ianto first ask Lisa on a date, way back when?

Jack is nothing if not adaptible. Flexible, we might say.

2. Captain Jack and Captain John

Jack is still trying to remake himself in the image of the Doctor, but I think, more than last year, he has found a way to keep his own personality while doing it. As if finding the Doctor again gave him back a supressed side of himself - which is, of course, as it should be. He still wants to successfully follow the path of his mentor, but he wants to be a flirty, gun-totin' version of the Doctor.

The parallels between his relationship with Captain John and the Doctor's relationship with the Master are pretty clear. The Master and Captain John are both from the heroes' past, both sociopathic and brain-damaged, with strong love/hate emotional bonds, lots of personal history - expressed by both obsession and possessiveness on the part of the Master and Captain John. And both Jack and the Doctor want to 'fix' their lover-opponents. Both fail.

Further, Jack wants to excise his past (which he feels shames him) and yet it keeps coming back to bite him. Obviously (happily) we haven't seen the last of Captain John, and the Grey thing implies more revelations about Jack's past, too.

At the end, Captain John wanted to stay with Captain Jack, perhaps seeing there a hope of redemption, or forgiveness.

3. Captain Jack and his Team

I have been fascinated by the roles Jack takes on, and how he handles them. There's quite a bit of talk in series 1 about Jack as Torchwood's leader and the boss - but he's really a terrible leader. He fails to give the team necessary information, he lets them get away with murder - his own murder, no less! - and shoot each other, he gives orders that they ignore over and over, and he only fires the one person who dares to question his identity. Which, of course, is false anyway, which is the reason it's an issue in the first place. He gives them the evening off and then drags them away from dinner because he can't handle things. And he has sex with the office boy. As he tells Tosh, he's really no good at playing the boss.

It's as if his only experience of working in a hierarchical situation was the military ranks - which he deals with easily and pretty much unconsciously. But he doesn't want to run Torchwood as a military institution. (I would suspect that he was horrified by Yvonne.)

From the end of "The Empty Child" Jack defers to the Doctor on all points. He'll state his case, he'll even argue, but always, always accepts the Doctor's judgement. Remember the lovely bit of dialogue from "Boom Town" that illustrates this delightfully:

JACK
Okay, plan of attack, we assume a basic fifty seven/fifty six strategy, covering all available exits on the ground floor. Doctor, you go face-to-face, that'll designate Exit One, I'll cover Exit Two, Rose, you're Exit Three, Mickey Smith, you take Exit Four. Have you got that?

[While Jack is rattling all this off, the Doctor is eyeing him with mild surprise at his impertinence, Rose's face is contorted with the effort of understanding what on earth he's going on about, and Mickey just looks plain confused]

DOCTOR [sternly]
Excuse me. Who's in charge?

JACK
Sorry. Awaiting orders, sir.

DOCTOR [voice deepening with authority]
Right. Here's the plan.

[Pause. The Doctor beams at them]

DOCTOR
Like he said. Nice plan. Anything else?¹

Jack seems happiest with a loose structure, though he's perfectly ready to make heavy decisions - even unpopular ones, like the fate of Jasmine.

So: in series 1, there was this gap between Jack-as-boss and the team as employess. Jack was the Alien Expert, while they operated on a need to know basis. No doubt Jack has to struggle on a continuous basis with what he can tell them about the future - which is his past - without precipitating disasters.

So he comes back in series 2, and seems reasonably prepared to rewrite the past, including his past in Torchwood. Power struggle? Not a bit of it. If Gwen has learned a new talent for organization and leadership, he's happy to let her run with it. Blowfish calls him the Teacher, and that fits his role - he offers guidance, experience, and knowledge, but he's not getting into power-roles.

Consequences? He seems to be offering Ianto a relationship on a much more equal basis - not so much boss and office boy, but two teammates who care for each other. I'm not sure I want to see Ianto drop the 'sir' because I loved it (and I like to think Jack did too), but it was becoming a barrier between them rather than a bond.

Jack offers Gwen - what, friendship? Some confidences. Watching again, his statement to Gwen that "I came back for you" seemed much less personal to me - she might have wanted him to come back for her alone, but he came for all of them, and I think this would be true even if he were sleeping with her. Is that what he wanted, with the smile and the hand-holding? I think so.

This looser arrangement reflects a kind of organization that Jack seems much more comfortable with than the usual working environments - no surprise, there: it seems rather like what he knew on the TARDIS.

~ ~ ~

¹ From Doctor Who transcripts

Comments

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

This is actually really, really freaking incredible and does a good job of accurately expressing a lot of things rattling around my brain about Jack and his relationships and things going on and that we're seeing.

Thank you.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the kind words. I was just reading posts on torch_wood and thinking "Did these people see the same episode I did?" since their comments seemed so off-base to me. I'm really glad to hear that someone interprets things the way I do!

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I think there are more people who think like you do than is obvious at first glance. A lot of the 'saner' (or more logical, less emotional) members of fandom seem to be keeping their mouths shut and hiding in the corner. *really candid*

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

You are so good at summing things like this up.

I've seen a remarkable lack of crazy in my flist, but I get the impression I'm very lucky with that. Thanks y'all. :-)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

That could be. Sometimes it seems that the most frequent posters in public forums are kids - meaning no offense to kids - but they're the ones with time to post, and the most likelihood of speaking before they think things through. Or of just not having enough life experience to figure out the psychology. Or to see things in terms of wishful thinking rather than what's on the screen.

(If wishful thinking worked, "The Last of the Time Lords" would have been very different for me, and Jack and the Doctor would still be snogging!)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

You are so good at summing things like this up

*blush* What a nice thing to say. *Hugs* I love doing this. I really do.

I'm lucky with my flist, too.

[devohoneybee.livejournal.com]

I love this analysis, because it contextualizes the personal nicely in the structure of the relationships. (And I always adored that Jack/Nine exchange *s*).

I think people get stuck when they try to give essentialist views of characters (who the person *really* is deep inside) -- missing how powerful relational context is. Is Jack more comfortable in the dominant or submissive role? The answer is "yes", depending on who else is around. For me the telling bit about this episode is the juxtaposition of Jack's clear pleasure in the fight/symbolic fuck scene with John in the bar -- he's having FUN in that fight -- and his next words, "I don't want you in my territory." He might personally enjoy tangling with John in any number of ways, but John's presence threatens to be a seduction/induction into past roles that Jack wants to leave behind. He can separate the personal connection from his understanding that having John around created an inevitable dynamic, one that in this case he just doesn't want.

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

Heh, I may have to change my assessment of the crazy level - I see a fangirl on torch_wood who theorizes that John Barrowman read the lines wrong! o_o

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Such lack of faith is staggering.

And that's... not how television works. If someone reads the lines wrong, they do a retake.

Unless it's Shark Attack Megalodon and no one notices or cares, but that's a movie, and a whole different kettle of, uh, sharkdom.

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

It's pretty impressive that when someone doesn't like the way a scene went, they think it's more likely to be a QUALITY CONTROL PROBLEM than that the scene was supposed to go that way. It's not like we're watching a high-school play!

CROSSOVER: Megalodon Shark/Blowfish!!! XD XD XD

[marvola.livejournal.com]

I'm impressed with your leadership explanations. And for me, it's a plausible way of having a competent team this season without changing the characterisation too much!

Agree about the 'Sir' as well - although I do hope we hear some kind of kinky innuendo from either Jack or Ianto about it! I do hold out a lot of hope for them this season but I guess I'm guilty as well of ignoring that this could be a slow burning relationship and expecting instant gratification.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

it contextualizes the personal nicely in the structure of the relationships

Yes! That's exactly what I was trying to do! But I couldn't have phrased it so cleverly.

I always adored that Jack/Nine exchange *s*

Me too. Which is not to say that I did't adore all the Jack/Nine exchanges. But that one illustrated to much about their personalities and their worldviews and - best of all - their enjoyment in each other. They worked together so well.

I think people get stuck when they try to give essentialist views of characters (who the person *really* is deep inside) -- missing how powerful relational context is.

Missing too that people are more fluid than it implies. If I were pressed to it I'd say that Jack was the archetypal 'con man', but that is as much misleading as true. Jack is also deeply honest and sincere. He has reasons for secrecy, privacy, and for not wanting to destroy our universe by messing up timelines. He is at least as much 'hero' as 'con man', but he redefines heroism with every event that happens.

Moreover, the Jack we met in "The Empty Child" is not exactly the same man we see in "Boom Town", because he has undergone a transformational experience - that of meeting the Doctor. He has another transformational experience at the end of "The Parting of the Ways", with death, rebirth, and the eventual discovery of his immortality. (Huh. Other heroes have to deal with the implications of their mortality. Jack's been there, done that, but dealing with the implications of immortality is a real bugger.) We know he had a transformational event when he left the Time Agency, his memories ripped away and a grudge to deal with. How many transformational events happened before that? The death of his young friend in war, tortured by monstrous beings? The more we look, the we see.

And so it continues. Jack is still Jack, and still reinventing himself. Of course his core personality doesn't change, but it's always a process of discovery and redesign as events force themselves upon him.

For me the telling bit about this episode is the juxtaposition of Jack's clear pleasure in the fight/symbolic fuck scene with John in the bar -- he's having FUN in that fight -- and his next words, "I don't want you in my territory."

Yes, exactly - I loved that. It sums up all Jack's mixed feelings, in a way, not just about Captain John - but about himself, and his past, and his assessment of himself. Not to mentin the way he feels protective of his Team and his planet and our time. Jack is still a hedonist, but he doesn't let that rule his choices or his judgement.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Megalodon Shark/Blowfish

I thought I'd seen the scariest slash anyone could want to write. I thought I'd seen the worst excesses fandom had to offer. But no... you've come up with something yet worse.

Congratulations. It's so appalling it seems inevitable.

The speech patterns alone would shatter the fabric of space and time into little whimpering shards.

[lonelybrit]

Erm, yeah, right, I pretty much agree with everything you say - great piece of meta! Problem is that when you do completely agree there's not a lot more to say. The one thing I'll slightly nit-pick on, and it is pretty much purely for the sake of it, is: And both Jack and the Doctor want to 'fix' their lover-opponents. Both fail.

Yes and no. The Doctor actively felt responsible for the Master, almost pity, and offered him the opportunity to come with him and change his was, he made active gestures.

Jack never really does that, all his actions are passive. Even before John has explained about the bombs, Jack is telling him he wants him off his territory. He doesn't boot John out on sight because he's giving him that chance to prove he's changed - but unlike the Doctor there's no active persuasion going on. From the start Jack makes it clear that once the job is done, one way or another John is expected to leave. When John's double-cross was revealed, we also never saw Jack going out of his way to preserve John's life - unlike the Doctor who made it clear there was to be no killing. My impression is that if John survives whatever and doesn't do anything too unforgivable, Jack will let him go because he does feel guilt over his past. But he's not going to go out of his way to sort John out, it's up to John to want to change.

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

I may not write anything, but I certainly know how to strike terror into the hearts of many that I might START! XD XD XD

[clipsie.livejournal.com]

*gives applause* I agree with that for the most part.

Also, people need to stop picking and choosing characters. I know it is something entirely normal, and we all do it to people we meet on the street, but I've seen some way out there comments just because someone didn't like a character, and that is their entire basis. Maybe I'm just more accepting of random bits than those people. But, it seems to be a problem, especially directed towards Gwen.

Still, wonderful and not really biased analysis. :)

[kiltfriction.livejournal.com]

One disagreement - Jack/John doesn't echo The Doctor/The Master. On the surface there's some similarities but the fundamental relationship is very different.

The Doctor/The Master
- The Doctor wants the The Master to stay with him.
- The Doctor wants to hold on to his past through The Master.
- The Doctor is all about redemption, he'll fight to bring The Master round, he'll spend his life as a guardian for the man to do that.
- The Doctor will always forgive him, The Master knows it.

Jack/John
- Jack doesn't want anything to do with his past.
- Jack doesn't want John around.
- Jack helped because there was a chance John had redeemed himself already but has no intention of spending any time helping him to redeem himself.

All of which is clearly displayed in the fact that:
- The Doctor asks The Master to stay
- John asks to stay, Jack tells him to leave.

There's little similarity between the two, which actually just makes it all the more interesting I'd say :D

[fatchickengirl.livejournal.com]

Gwen is the 'fag-hag' role however she may deney it he patenly came back for Ianto and whats to come.

He added the rest of the team and then again with her she was all google eyes 'how do i tell him about the wedding?' and he is delighten for her she is keeping her promise being human and connected. But she still pines for him which to a point my suit jack.

But in the end he wants Inato on a more perminant basis....

We will see!

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well - yes! I really love Gwen, and couldn't agree more that some fans let their dislike of her colour their perception of what is happening. I make no secret of my lack of sympathy for Owen, but I like to think I can still enjoy his role in the story.

In fact, I sometimes try too hard not to favour Gwen, because I don't want to annoy (or be dismissed by) the fans who dislike her. Which is a sort of backhanded way of handling it. I let my Gwen-love run free on torchwoodgwen and try to contain it here.

I also find the Jack/Gwen relationship fascinating for many reasons. It's sexy-hot, for one thing. For another: I've no idea where it's going, in terms of resolution of storylines. No idea how things will develop or not develop between them. I love that, in a world where most television relationships are transparently predictable.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Just threatening to do it... Just whispering that you might...

[Runs to cower in terror]

P.S. Do it! Do it!

[love-jackianto.livejournal.com]

Wonderful post :D One of the many things I have always liked about Jack is that he defies quaint little categories and I think you captured that really well.

I really liked the Master/Captain John parallel and the Tardis/Torchwood parallel.

[clipsie.livejournal.com]

I'm in agreeance completely. Such biased people.

On the Owen point, for some reason, I actually have started liking him better from KKBB. He wasn't as angry looking I feel, but we'll see how he goes.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well, I can't blame Gwen for wanting Jack. Heck, I'd want him myself, in her place! I am also convinced that Owen and Tosh also want him (but don't think they have a chance and aren't making a thing about it). And we all know Ianto wants him to the point of heartbreak.

Also: no doubt he wants Ianto. On a fairly serious level. How permanent it can be when one man is immortal and the other is not, I'm not sure; nor do I think Jack has a 'permanent' setting in his everchanging life.

Yes, we shall see.

But I do rather hope that something happens between Jack and Gwen. I love him with Ianto, but I like complications, and I don't want static relationships.

I do believe, though, that Jack came back for all of them, not just for Ianto, and not just in a sexual/romantic sense.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I agree with all those points, which is what makes the two relationship-patterns so interesting. John wanted to stay with Jack, and Jack refused him; the Master died to escape the Doctor. (If only temporarily.) All delightful variations on a theme, but it wouldn't be a theme if there weren't basic similarities.

Compare and contrast with another pattern: Jack loves the Doctor, the Doctor tried to avoid him (at the beginning of "Utopia"); then things change, the Doctor asked Jack to stay with him, but Jack leaves (at the end of "The Last of the Time Lords").

It's like a dance, with patterns changing all the time.

[confluents.livejournal.com]

*Thank* you.

There's been so much negativity about this scene and that scene, and no one seems to be taking in the episode as a whole.

The impression that I got from the episode was that Jack was expecting to come home to find, you know, home, only to find that everything and everyone is just a little bit different (maybe even a little bit better). They've even redecorated the freaking hub (if I remember the scene correctly). ^.^

This was beautifully put! I've seen some really biased reviews of the episode, but this one is respectful while still being insightful. Bravo!