My One Big Eyeball, week of 19/02/07

Yeah, it's back.

Battlestar Galactica 3x15 - A Day In The Life
Episode Grade: B

Man, the first half of this season was so incredible that it's pretty understandable that people are going to have violent reactions when they start putting out episodes that are just OK ("The Woman King" was straight up awful though, I agree). OK, Baltar's trial is the big endgame for the season, which means we're treading water until that happens. I want to see more of Caprica's adventures on Galactica as much as the next guy, don't get me wrong, but apparently we've got three more episodes of filler to sit through first, and if you don't just accept that fact and deal with them on their own merits, you're going to go crazy.

So, turns out Baltar and Caprica are not as special as they like to think, because Adama's got an ex in his head that talks to him too, but only on his wedding anniversary, and that's a little stupid, really. On the other hand, Adama/Roslin flirting goes into even more overdrive than that time when they got stoned on New Caprica, which is awesome in any language. And while they'rre doing that, they also decide that Apollo's going to be the offical Cutter Through Lawyer Bullshit for Baltar's trial, because as we know, Lee's always had a big interest in law which totally didn't come out of nowhere.

Meanwhile, Tyrol and Cally spend some quality time together in one of those nice out of nowhere life threatening situations that this show always does so well, when they're doing some routine maintenance and suddenly the ship's automatic systems go crazy and trap them in a room because there's a tiny pinprick of a hull breach in there. And there's no time or way to get them out except firing them out of the ship and catching them in Athena's Raptor, and man, you know, I love people floating out in space and being caught in spaceships, like that bit with Squall and Rinoa in Final Fantasy VIII, and the Farscape season one finale. There's something intensely beautiful about that image. That plus the whole deal that Jacob pointed out with the elegant symmetry with the Collaborators airlocking make this part a really fantastic moment in an otherwise fairly average episode.

And Hotdog has an STD!


Desperate Housewives 3x15 - The Little Things You Do Together
Episode Grade: A-

It's totally the season finale, except that there's still seven or so episode to go. Huh? Oh, right, because Marcia Cross is taking time off, so they had to rush things, except it doesn't actually feel rushed, it just feels awesome. I really think they've done a fantastic job this season; I was extremely weary about it at the start, when Orson seemed to be a George rehash that couldn't possibly go anywhere good, and slowly but surely, they've completely turned that on it's head, and Orson is actually totally a good guy and absolutely perfect for Bree, and I love them for totally punking me like that. I mean, there's still the tiny matter of DELIBERATELY DRIVING A CAR INTO MIKE, and maybe they should deal with that a little, but knowing them, they probably won't, but still. Orson's crazy mother was a truly great villain, which is always good.

Meanwhile, in storylines that will have to carry the rest of the season in Bree's absence and I can't imagine how that will possibly go well, the Scavos finally open their pizzeria, which gives a perfect opportunity for the whole neighbourhood to get together, and yet there's nex to no interactions between all the housewives, which is a real shame, because everybody knows those are great. Ian rushes a proposal to Susan before Mike starts remember thaty he loves her, and while he is nearly as perfect for Susan as Orson for Bree, they're pretty boring, truth be told. And Zach also proposes to Gabby, which gets a resounding "no way in hell", naturally, and that's not particularly interesting either. I'm really not optimistic about the rest of the season. But 90% of this episode is the culmination of the Orson story, which is great, so this one's the best since "Bang".


Heroes 1x16 - Unexpected
Episode Grade: A

Heroes is still completely freaking cool to a ridiculous, and no one can take that away from me. NO ONE! Since I last said anything about it, man, everything happened. Peter saved the cheerleader, saved the world, and also CHRIS ECCLESTONE fantastic!ally joined the cast as an invisible dude named Claude who beats Peter about the head whenever deserved, which is often. And far too much else to go into.

So, this week, Hiro teamed up with some kind of Sin City-esque misanthropist bounty hunter or something, who taught him the important lesson that other people will only let you down and it's better to work alone, man. So Hiro told Ando to go back to Japan and got on a bus (driven by Stan Lee! Man, you know, I can't wait for the next season of Who Wants To Be A Superhero?) to somewhere by himself, so I'm sure there'll be a joyous reunion in store for those two crazy kids a week or two down the line.

Also, Matt, AKA Thought Police teamed up with the other Heroes with obvious superhero names; Ted Sprague, AKA Radioactive Man, and a new one, Hana Gittelman, AKA Wireless, who can connect to the internet WITH HER BRAIN. And they are all mad at Mr. Bennet for kidnapping them and making them forget what the hell happened, so they go to his house to confront him. At the same time, Claire's mad at him too for making Mrs. Bennet forget so much that her brain is melting, and she is maybe going to team up with them.

And last week, Sylar teamed up with Mohinder to track down other Heroes and eat their brains, only Mohinder doesn't know about the second part, so he's somewhat surprised when the woman with super-hearing they catch up with turns up dead the next day. Mohinder decides that this makes their mission more important, because they have to warn these people about Sylar! But, come on, Sylar can't eat too many brains before Mohinder starts getting suspicious of the fact that every Hero they track down dies soon after. It's gonna be pretty funny while it lasts though.

Finally, Peter continues to team up with Claude in an effort to learn to control his powers and not explode New York, and then also saves Claude from being captured by Mr. Bennet and his Primatech Paper crew. Bennet gives Isaac a gun in case Peter turns up at his place and tells him to shoot the Peter, save the world, but when Peter actually does show up, he gets all invisible and telekinetic on Isaac's ass and Isaac shoots Simone by mistake. Oops!


Lost 3x09 - Stranger In A Strange Land
Episode grade: F

So, you may recall that before Lost took a giant hiatus, I was getting majorly tired of it, and stated that they had two episodes to convince me to keep watching. Well, the first of those was "Not In Portland", which was pretty much "I Do" Part 2, and sucked about as much, but it had a cool Clockwork Orange ripoff and... Man, I'm sure there was something else I liked about it, but hell if I can remember now. But then, in "Flashes Before Your Eyes", the bastards went ahead and pulled their actual best episode ever, for real, totally out of nowhere. It was kind of a wacky hybrid of The Butterfly Effect and Eternal Sunshine and all those kind of films, and I totally love that shit, plus there was a bunch of the kind of cool stuff that you used to be able to expect from this show, dude in red shoes having a house falling on him, crazy dream world (or not) version of Charlie telling people to "stay off the drugs", just awesome.

And thanks to that, I didn't give up, and I actually bothered to watch this utter crapfest. And, I mean, I hated it to like a "Random Shoes" level even before I learned that the promo monkeys advertised it as "answering three of Lost's biggest mysteries". So, what were those three mysteries? Well, #1: How did Jack get his tattoos? Yeah, that's sure been weighing heavy on my mind in those sleepless nights. #2: Uh... No, I've got nothing. But like, even if we ignore the ridiculous empty promise, and ask the simple question of what happened in this episode that served any useful purpose? I've got nothing. OH, WAIT! Karl kind of reminded me of River Tam, and that plus his association with Alex, that's a new character I can actually feel something for, which I guess had to happen eventually with how many of them Alcatraz has been spewing out. Juliet who? Sherriff wha?

Nonetheless, I'll watch again next week, because I think I've ascertained that I still like the show as much as Season 2 when they keep away from the Others' camp, which has just been an absolutely fruitless endeavour from start to finish (get Alex and the cameras the hell away from them ASAP, yo), and it seems like they're going to alternate between the two on a weekly basis for the moment. So next week might actually be somewhat tolerable.


Scrubs 6x10 - My Theraputic Month
Episode Grade: B

And, joining Lost in the "totally sucking this year" camp, Scrubs. Only, Lost had two pretty good seasons with clear signs that it was on the brink of collapsing under its own weight any time soon, wheras Scrubs had five near-perfect seasons with absolutely no signs that anything was going to change, then all of a sudden season six came along and everyone but the Janitor seemed to totally forget how to be funny OR poignant, both which they'd always been great at before. But after nine episodes, including a freakin' musical, this season is finally starting to look like Scrubs again. It's not dizzyingly hilarious, but at least I actually laughed a few times, and this one actually seemed like it would be worth watching again. Here's hoping the upwardly mobileness continues for the rest of the season.

Yeah, I can't write so much about Scrubs when it's just funny with no particular story going on, as this one was.


Veronica Mars 3x14 - Mars, Bars
Episode Grade: B+

And finally. I hadn't yet got into this show back in the old One Big Eyeballs, so let's have a little background. Veronica Mars is a college student (as of the start of this season) and also a private investigator. Once upon a time, she floated like a butterfly without a care in the world, but then someone roofied and raped her (only not really! (but then, surprise! actually it was really)) and her best friend was murdered and it turned out life kind of sucked. The first season was pretty damn perfect, especially towards the end when the big mysteries of "Who killed Lilly Kane?" and "Who raped Veronica?" were solved (well, the second on until they decided to totally rewrite history at the end of the second season, anyway), but getting the right mix of clues and red herrings to a big mystery over the course of twenty two episodes is a pretty tricky business, and doing it effectively proved beyond them second time around. And while all that was going on, not enough people were actually watching the show for it to avoid cancellation, except somehow it did anyway, but it's totally living on borrowed time and everybody knows it. So, in an attempt to make it more accessible, and also maybe to lose the problems season two had, this season doesn't have one big mystery that will play out over the course of the entire season, but three smaller mysteries, of which we're now nearing the end of the second.

And furthering the extreme likelihood of it's cancellation this season, a lot of fans are hating it and giving up, especially after this episode, because they are of the insane shipper variety who hate anything that doesn't involve lots of hot steamy sex between Logan and Veronica (nauseatingly referred to as LoVe, which is the ultimate in irritating name-smushing), and they keep NOT HAVING SEX this year, dagnabbit. And Veronica is probablyly going to get together with this new guy, Piz who seems pretty shifty to me and they have NO CHEMISTRY and WHY DO YOU HATE YOUR FANS WHEN THEY SHOW YOU NOTHING BUT LOVE, ROB THOMAS??? Also, maybe some people have valid reasons. But, come on, how anyone can think they have no chemistry after seeing this video here is completely beyond me.

So, Dean O' Dell was murdered back at the start of the current season arc, and all evidence seems to point to either Professor Landry or his wife, so I'm betting it wasn't actually either of them. But really, I haven't been particular engaged with this mystery like I was with the Lily Kane murder, or the bus crash, or the rapes or any of them, but that doesn't matter because the Mysteries of the Week have been uniformly excellent while that one's been going, so I still love this season, and I could definitely deal with the entirely standalone episodes that may well happen if season four somehow miraculously comes into being.

The MotW this week is actually the second part of a two week mystery, and it turns out the guy killed himself, which seemed pretty obvious to me as soon as they revealed his debillitating illness, so I think this is probably my least favourite episode of season 3.2. While Veronica and Keith are taking way longer than they ought to to figure that one out, Logan sheds his emo coocoon at last and goes on a Valentine's Day scavenger hunt with Mac and Parker and Bronson, and oh, the wacky, wacky hijinks. It definitely has nothing on last week's Logan subplot as far as awesome cuteness goes, I'm afraid.

And then Lamb dies the most anticlimactic main character death I have ever seen. This development has some people wailing and moaning and making up insane conspiracy stories about how Rob Thomas sold his soul at some point after season one and he just did this to futher destroy the hopes and dreams of the fans, but those of us possessing of some sanity, once our brains finally manage to process what in the hell just happened, love it.

Mob Cat

Torchwood Episode 1x11 - "Combat"

Episode Grade: B-


This week, tacked in towards the end of the usual opening spiel, we get a tiny montage of Owen and Diane moments from last week, which consists of Owen saying "How are you doing this to me?" and Diane saying "Love... You're always at its mercy." It's about two seconds of footage, but still, continuity! Hurrah!

A Weevil runs down an alley, with Jack giving chase, and finds itself trapped in a dead end. Jack tells it "I hate to break this to you, but you're not my first", and he's in an unusually good mood, which probably means someone's going to run off to another dimension with his baby by the end of the episode. That's my gratuitous Whedon reference out of the way for today, let's get on with this. Jack tells the Weevil he has "anti-Weevil spray and hand clamps", and so it has no hope of getting away. In response, the Weevil jumps him and gives him a pretty nasty scratch across the chest, and Jack moans that "This always happens when I give them the day off", which is an obvious 'comic juxtaposition' segue if ever I have heard one.

And, yep, here's Gwen, at a restaurant with Rhys, and looking throughly bored out of her mind. Rhys starts off on a happy nostalgic story about a weekend in France, but breaks it off pretty quickly when he realises Gwen is paying no attention and demands to know why she's looking like she'd rather be somewhere else. Yeah, that's a no-brainer. Gwen gives him a "stop making a scene in public" look, which he quite justifiably ignores. He starts asking if it's something he's done wrong, but gets distracted when he sees Jack and the Weevil running across the road outside and is all "What the hell is that?" Gwen turns around and, man, how her face lights up when she sees Jack. Gwen, Rhys, one or the other of you needs to get a clue and end this charade of a relationship already. Jack tells Rhys it's nice to meet him and starts to drag Gwen away without even introducing himself, which Rhys doesn't take too well. Gwen tells him "This is Jack, my boss", ignoring his request for her to sit down until he yells "SIT THE FUCK DOWN!" There's an awkward pause, and Gwen quietly tells him to never speak to her like that again. Jack's all "Let's go, Gwen" and runs off without even the slightest doubt that she'll follow. That's pretty arrogant, but, well, he's not wrong. Rhys points out that she promised him this one night off, eyes pleading with her not to do this, but Gwen turns and goes after Jack without even so much as an apology. Rhys calls "If you go now, Gwen!" after her, but he can't even muster up an empty threat to tack on the end of that.

Jack apologises for interrupting, Gwen breezily dismisses it with a "Rhys'll get over it, he always does." Jack stops and gives her a serious look and reminds her that she promised she'd keep hold of her life outside of Torchwood, and see, how's about that for continuity. Jack still doesn't give Gwen time to actually let that sink in before they go running off after the Weevil again, and really, if he wants her to keep her promise, maybe Jack should stop pulling her out of any opportunity she has to so. They catch up with the Weevil in a carpark, only before they can grab it, a white van with some kinda blue logo pulls up and these guys in all black and balaclavas get out and shove the Weevil in the back of the van. Jack asks "Who the hell were they?", as if Gwen's going to know, because we need a more dramatic moment to lead us into the credits.

This one written by Noel Clarke, better known in these circles as Mickey the Idiot. His first foray into writing for the franchise could certainly use some improvement, but then, as I recall, the story was much the same with his acting.

Hub. Jack wants the crew to track down the white van guys, naturally, only he makes this request with far more words than are actually necessary. Naturally. Ianto, noting that it may not be connected, reports that Weevil attacks have been on the increase lately. Jack also reports that the Weevils are starting to develop an immunity to the spray. Tosh is all surprised, "They're mutating?", which Ianto suggests 'correcting' to "Evolving". OK, right, those are both the same thing, and that is pretty much how nature works, so I don't know what is so surprising. But hey, mutating, evolving, intelligent designing, whatever you want to call it, it's thematically significant, I don't doubt. Jack starts to give Tosh an order to do some technobabble, but she is way ahead of him on that one. Jack is also trying to get hold of Owen, but he's not answering his phone right now.

And neither is Rhys; Gwen babbles about how she has so many excuses but they are all lame, but this job is so hard, boo hoo. Rhys' hand hovers over the phone, like, oooh, he's about to pick up, but he's actually just waiting for Gwen to finish so he can press the "delete" button. I sure have never seen anything like that before.

Owen is busy going on a self-destructive emo rampage because he can't handle rejection, which is awfully trite and predictable of him. His phone is ringing, he just ignores it, barmaid attempts to be friendly and discover the root of his sorrows, he responds with monosyllabic grunts. You know, the usual. But tonight, Owen will be playing the role of reluctant anti-hero, and so the barmaid's goon of a boyfriend has to interrupt their scintillating conversation to demand that she stop chatting up punters so Owen can tell him he's being a childish dickhead and a fight can break out and la dee da. Owen gets the better of the big dumb ox in spite of his weasel-like stature, of course, because the guy is a big dumb ox. And, oh, what's the Meaning Of Life this week, Owen? "It's about using your opponents agression to your own ends." Righto. Owen's phone goes again, he doesn't answer it, again.

And in the Hub, paying no heed whatsoever to "show, don't tell", Gwen tells Tosh that Owen is still not answering his phone. Tosh suggests that maybe he's going on a self-destructive emo rampage because he can't handle rejection, only Gwen did not know anything went on between Owen and Diane and now there is jealousy so I guess Owen and Gwen weren't so done after all, maybe? I mean, I know I complained about their affair when it was exceedingly prominent, but I wasn't actually pulling for "have all future developments in this relationship happen entirely offscreen". Find the middle ground, guys. But hey, this is all just preparation for the ultimate offscreen relationship WTFness that we'll get into in the next couple of episodes, I suppose. So, Tosh thought Gwen knew Owen and Diane had a thing, Gwen did know, she just didn't know they had a thing thing, and, if anything, I am playing down the overuse of the word 'thing' in this coversation.

Down in the cells, there's a Weevil making total Wookiee moans, and Jack tells Ianto that Owen has been studying this one, and has reached the conclusion that it is weeping, because Weevils have minor telepathic abilities and somewhere, another Weevil is in pain. Jack whispers "What can you feel? What do you know?" at it, in a half-hearted attempt to make this scene poignant or something. Hell if I know.

Tosh has done her usual techno magic and tracked down the van, only the CCTV footage breaks up into static before they can see anything much happening, which everyone agrees is quite likely deliberate sabotage on the part of the white van ninjas. And Jack makes a crack about how he "knows it's a character flaw", but them not wanting to be seen makes him all the more eager to figure out what they're doing. Which is a good job, because it would be a pretty stupid show if he was all "Oh, these guys don't want to be discovered, maybe we should leave them alone."

So, Jack merrily trundles the Hyena alongside some docks, which I'm pretty sure is the same place where he kept killing Suzie, not that I can find any particular significance in that. CCTV eye view watches Jack and Tosh get out and look around for the white van, which is nowhere to be found.

Jack and Tosh have a look around a warehouse to see if the van ninjas left behind any clues since they left in such a hurry and Jack is, as usual, unable to not talk for more than five minutes, so he starts off on some nostalgic angst about how back in the good ol' days, they used to use these warehouses to store the bodies of dead soldiers. It's nice to reminisce! He broodily tells Tosh that "sometimes, you can know too much history", and if that is the case, it's nice of him to share this bad knowledge with her so she can know too much history too. They hear a crash and quickly draw their guns, (which you'd think would have been a pretty good idea as soon as they went in there) but there still doesn't seem to be anyone or anything in this place. Oh, except that dude lying on the floor. Jack and Tosh approach cautiously, and Jack asks the guy if he knows anything about the van ninjas, but the guy is unable to answer on account of he's had his throat ripped out. Jack identifies this as likely the mark of a Weevil attack, duh, and then the dude's phone goes off, and his ring tone is the fucking Crazy Frog, so any remorse you were feeling for his death can stop right there. Tosh asks "Is that his?" in surprise, Jack glares at her and snarks "You don't think I'd choose that ring tone?" Heh. Jack digs out the phone, Tosh tells him not to answer, which Jack ignores, because, seriously, that's the quickest way to shut the damn thing up. Distorted voice on the other end tells him to stay away from the van ninjas, Jack totally ignores this, claiming "selective deafness when talking to cowards or murderers". So, right, assuming she hasn't murdered anyone, is he calling Tosh a coward? Harsh, dude. The guy on the phone tells him again to stay away from things he doesn't understand, Jack tells him he understands perfectly, thanks, and also, he's going to hunt the guy down and make him pay for all the kidnapping and murder and shit. The guy hangs up, and Jack immediately calls Ianto and tells him to trace all calls to and from the phone in the last 24 hours.

Elsewhere, Owen's self-destructive emo rampage is interrupted by a call from Jack, he answers his phone with "This is Owen's voicemail, don't leave a message", but Jack knows it's obviously not his voicemail, and if he actually wanted to ignore it, he would have not answered, so he's just being a stroppy bitch. Jack tells him to get his arse back to the Hub, they've got Weevil-nappers to hunt.

Gwen looks through the dead guy's wallet and identifies him as one Dan Hodges, born 21/1/79, salesman for "Web Publishing Software", which is the most generic name ever, and from the looks of the photo in his wallet, the guy was married with a kid. Owen points out the wedding ring on the corpses finger and tells her "No shit, Sherlock". Again; stroppy bitch. He gets on with identifying cause of death; it was a Weevil. DUH. But also, there are other bruises that look more likely to have been inflicted by humans beforehand, isn't that odd. Ianto comes into to report no luck with the phone tracking, the van ninjas planned ahead for that and blocked and erased everything. So pretty much, the van ninjas totally anticipated Jack's investigation and just left the body to try to scare him away. Jack suggests that they're using the Weevils to get away with the perfect murder: no fingerprints or recognisable DNA evidence to connect anyone to the murder. Now see, Veronica, that sounds a whole lot simpler than faking a suicide, and I bet you'd still have got an A. Owen points out the fact that this is not going to make it easy for them to track down the ninjas, Gwen notes that someone ought to tell the Hodges' family that he's dead, everyone glances around at each other and then they all look pointedly at Gwen. Heh.

So, Gwen returns from this task to the Hyena, and Owen is there too, which doesn't appear to have any basis in logic as far as I can see. Gwen complains that telling people about dead loved ones was the worst part of being a police officer, and yet it's the part that she can't get away from. Owen totally blanks her, Gwen sarcastically thanks him for his kind words of support, Owen asks what the hell she wants him to say, and Gwen, in one of her usual remarkable displays of intelligence, decides that this is a good time to have a heart to heart with Owen about Diane. Not that there would ever be a good time for that, I guess. Owen tells her "I didn't want her to go, she went." with a quite deafeningly unspoken "Now leave it the hell alone" tacked on the end. Gwen looks at him seriously and asks "Why are we still doing this?" They stare at each other for a while and then Owen shrugs "Fine, let's not. I was getting bored of your fuck tricks anyway" and gets out of the van, Gwen cries "You can be such a wanker sometimes, do you know that, Owen?" as she drives off, and he shouts "I do, as a matter of fact!" after her. Ha! OK, the self awareness is making me hate him less. And also, right, Owen was there because Gwen wanted a quickie just before or after telling a woman her husband is dead. Classy; but also, I retract my complaint about Owen's presence in the van, because it did make sense after all, and I retract previous complaints about developments in their relationship happening off screen, because it turns out there weren't any developments in any direction until now. Good scene for raising my opinions! Well done!

Owen returns to the Hub, Jack bitches at him for taking so damn long and tells him that, in his absence, Tosh has had a great idea. Owen bitches "It had to happen soon or later," Gwen immediately snaps out "Ignore him, Tosh!" and she and Owen get into another playground argument. Tosh sensibly ignores them both, and explains that the van of ninjas went straight to the warehouse after kidnapping the Weevil, so they must have known it would be empty, which Gwen concludes must mean the ninjas either own the place or had previous contact with the estate agent. I'm not entirely sure I follow the logic there, but OK. Jack tells Owen he's "going into property", Owen's all "Why me?", Tosh points out that the van ninjas would recognise her and JAck from the warehouse, and Gwen from the car park, and Ianto is just the butler. OK, she doesn't actually mention that one. Anyway, point is, they're only sending Owen in as a last resort, which has just got to make him feel special.

And suddenly the show has turned into Hustle, and Owen's doing his best impression of Danny Blue, which is no great strecth for him. His fake business is the import and export of jellied eels, which is just awesome, frankly. The estate agent guy is called Mark Lynch, and he has similar Cockney Geezer credentials to Owen, so it turns out Owen would probably have been the right choice for this job even if he wasn't the only possibility. They blather some about Owen's cover story and then while Mark's not looking, Owen gets out a device that looks like it was probably made by the same aliens as that ol' multi-purpose Optimus Prime's belt buckle, and holds it against the back of Mark's laptop. In the Hub, Tosh exposits that this will allow her Apple MacGuffin to track all activity on Mark's laptop, which is mightily convenient. There's a lame attempt to build up tension as to whether Mark will catch Owen hacking is laptop, but Tosh radios to tell him he's clear just in the nick of time. Mark brings Owen some possible locations for the transfer of his jellied eel business, Owen complains that they all look like shitholes and asks about the warehouse on the docks, claiming he saw their sign outside it. Mark tells him they've pretty much already signed a deal on that one, which Tosh reports is a total lie. Mark suggests they meet up later once he's looked for some more possibilities, and they do a little macho posturing about the "gorgeous birds" Mark has answering his phones, and Mark makes the profound observation that "It's all bollocks, really". That's just too easy.

As soon as Owen leaves, Mark goes straight to his laptop and googles him, and in the Hub, Tosh tracks him and marvels at her own brilliance in setting up Owen's fake website. It's pretty obnoxious. Mark calls the number of the "sales director" listed on the site, which goes to Tosh's phone. She answers "Harper sale, Jenny Knox speaking", Mark claims a wrong number and hangs up. Ianto's found another probable Weevil attack victim at the hospital, Jack orders Tosh to keep monitoring Mark's movements, and Ianto to come with him to the hospital. Gwen offers to join them, but Jack tells her to go home, and adds that that's an order too when she starts to protest, reminding her again of her promise.

And so Gwen goes home, and Rhys is understandably snippy with her and tells her he's going out to a friend's Stag Night. Gwen hasn't heard anything about this guy getting married, Rhys claims the guy "thought he was missing out on an excuse for a piss-up, so he's have a 'singles stag do'", which is quite obviously total bollocks. Gwen asks when he'll be back, Rhys tells her doesn't know, Gwen sadly moans that she's home tonight, he snottily tells her he isn't. I find I can't really feel sorry for her over this, no matter how much of a sad face she pulls.

Weevil Victim #2 lies in his hospital bed and telss Jack "I've already made my statement to the police", which is a pretty damn clear indication of a guilty conscience if ever I have heard one. Jack tells him he knows what did this to him, and describes a Weevil, WV2 claims that he was mugged, "they had knives". Ianto asks how come the paramedics described his wounds as "bite marks", WV2 mumbles about them getting mixed up because they're overworked or some nonsense. He knows he's lying, Jack knows he's lying, I know he's lying, which makes this all rather tedious. Jack makes an appeal to the dude's conscience by telling him the Weevil will claim more victims if he keeps holding back, WV2 honestly actually says "I can't. They'll kill me." Dude, come on. Jack asks who will kill him, WV2 tells him "everyone" and that amazing enlightenment is apparently a good enough place to end the scene. I'd object, but stretching this scene out further certainly wouldn't improve matters, so whatever.

Torchwood Cells, Ianto tells Tosh what just happened in the previous scene just in case you dozed off for a second there, and Jack decides they only have option left; they're taking one of their pet Weevils (which Jack has named 'Janet', rather adorably) out for a walk.

So, Jack's put tracking devices on Janet and is planning to release her into the wild so the van ninjas can capture her, Tosh objects that Janet could kill a whole bunch of people before the ninjas get to her, but hey, acting irresponsibly with reckless disregard for human life is the Torchwood way! Plus, the plan is to follow close behind Janet in the Hyena, so they probably should be able to stop her from killing people. Except that monkey rather gets a wrench thrown in it when Janet starts ducking into alleyways that are far to narrow for the Hyena to fit into. She's a wily one.

Meanwhile, Owen and Mark are out drinking, as previously planned, and they just so happen to have chosen the same bar that Owen was drowning his sorrows in earlier, and the boyfriend goon shows up with a few of his mates to have another go at Owen, which is a fight Mark is all too willing to get into alongside Owen, despite Goon Boyfriend clarifying quite explicitly that his beef is with Owen only. And, presumably, this isn't a random coincidence, and Owen deliberately chose this bar in the hope that this would happen in a cunning attempt to appeal to the homoerotic testosterone-fuelled bullshit side of Mark's character. And since that is the onlyside Mark's character has, it works out pretty well for him.

Jack and Tosh are running after Janet when the ninjas show up to take her off their hands. Jack quickly pulls Tosh back to hide from them. Behind a chain-link fence, which is made of, like, 90% air. And anyway, the van ninjas have already seen Jack chasing after Weevils, and they know Tosh is working with him, so why even bother hiding? Tosh demands to know exactly where they stand on certain moral issues; "We would never deliberately put a human being through that! But Weevils are fair game, is that right?" She sure didn't get the whole "aliens are the enemy" part of the manifesto, did she? Total toaster lover, right there. Jack is all "I did what I had to" and runs back to the waiting Hyena, Tosh stands around looking conflicted.

Mark takes Owen back to his "gaffe", and takes his shirt off for no discernable reason other than the fact that some people only appreciate the incredible gayness when it's subtextual, which this show really hasn't done a great deal of, previously, but MAN, are they making up for that here. Also, so we can see the big scratches on his back, obviously from Weevil fights. Owen starts beating the crap out of Mark's punching bag, in a continued appeal to his only side. Mark asks him what his outlet is for his anger, Owen pretends not to know what he's talking about, Mark is, like, "Dude, you don't even live here and you already have people assaulting you as soon as you set foot in a bar." You know, I think maybe that right there is pretty obviously his outlet. Blah blah nihilistic macho posturing-cakes for far, far too long, plus a pretty out of place "something coming in the darkness" reference because, oh shit, we've only got a couple of episodes left and we've only mentioned that once so far which just isn't good enough for a running creepy message.

Oh, but this scene is awesome though; Gwen pours a couple of drinks, one for herself, one for Rhys, who has presumably just returned from the "singles stag do". Gwen sits awkwardly on the sofa, Rhys joins her, and they both take sips from their drinks to steel themselves for the conversation that they are about to have, which has been a long time coming, and it seems like it's fairly obvious what is going to happen here. Rhys starts first, but Gwen talks over him; "I need to tell you something." And, sounding almost bored, she confesses that she's been sleeping with someone from work, "he's a bit of a tosser actually, and it's all going to stop, but, uh..." Rhys tells her to shut up, and protests that she wouldn't do that. Gwen tells him "But I have", and Rhys is thrown and asks why she's telling him this, and Gwen stands up and starts pacing as she explains that she's ashamed of herself and she wants, no, needs him to forgive her. Oh, and also, she slipped Retcon in his drink, so he'd better hurry up and forgive her before it takes effect. Rhys calls her a selfish bitch as he collapses back onto the sofa, and Gwen grabs his head and starts slapping him around, demanding and pleading with him to forgive her as he drifts into unconsciousness. So yeah, quite aside from the awesome left hook out of nowhere of that reveal, because, man, I did not see that coming at all, there's some pretty great elegant symmetry going down here, because this sounds remarkably similar to the beginnings of Suzie's descent into madness, Retconning someone so you can get all your sins out without having to deal with the consequences. Now that's evolution for you.

Continuing the stunning level of attention put into ensuring that this storyline can in no way be considered original, Owen has gone snooping around Mark's gaffe under the cunning pretext of looking for a bathroom. Mark's helpfully signposted the door Owen needs to look behind by putting a big honking padlock on it, but it still takes him three tries before he gets the right one. And behind door number three, after a little pointless attempted suspense-building, Owen finds a battered Weevil chained up and snarling. Mark enters and Owen attempts to excuse himself with the quite reasonable "I couldn't resist a padlock", but Mark's not interested in his excuses, he just wants to know what Owen thinks of the Weevil. Owen gives a pretty convincingly shocked "What is it?", Mark tells him he doesn't have a clue, but presents a few theories; "scientific experiment gone wrong? Nuclear victim?" and, with a derisive snort, "one of the lads even reckons it's an alien". I see no particular reason why he finds that any less plausible than anything else, which makes this "haha, the truth is staring him in the face and he thinks it is stupid" thing just annoying. Mark's personal belief is that it's what humanity will have evolved to in a thousand years time, "when all we have left is our rage". Yeah, that's certainly a lot less retarded than "it's an alien". Owen muses that that's not exactly a comforting thought, and Mark suddenly orders him to punch it. Owen asks why, Mark tells him "that's what it's there for" and when Owen continues to hesitate, he starts beating the poor thing up himself. After a few seconds, Owen's had enough and yells at him to stop, saying "it's not exactly putting up a fight". Mark claims that "everybody needs a punching bag", and I'm sure if they'd met him, it'd have his face on it, and then asks Owen who he is, pointing out that "it'd be pretty stupid not to assume you're not connected to those two in the black SUV". I'd give him credit for not being a total moron there, except he fucked it up with a ridiculous double negative. He makes fun of the whole 'jellied eels' idea, Owen stops feigning ignorance and snits "I wasn't that bad," and Mark gives a delivery that makes "Pretty much you were" a lot more hilarious than it seems like it should be on paper. Mark goes on to complain about them fucking up his plans, although how they've done that at this point is totally unclear to me.

Owen asks about Dead Dan Hodges, Mark claims he's "not responsible for other people's life choices", and asks why they took the body themselves instead of going to the cops, giving Owen an unmissable opportunity to put on his "fuck tha police" hat once more and get back with the macho bullshit bonding once more. Mark asks again who he is, Owen shows him his gun (yes, absolutely like that, I'd say), which Mark disdainfully informs him is decidedly the wrong answer. So Owen pulls it out and throws it away with a shrug. Mark starts manhandling him and says these exact words; "Good boy. We're finally getting somewhere. Now you're just you. Stripping things back to the core." And, seriously, they're not going to start making out at any point in this episode? Are you sure this is Torchwood? Owen asks again why he killed Dan Hodges, Mark assures him that he didn't and not just in the sense of "technically, the Weevil did it". Owen asks Mark to tell him what did happen, then, and Mark's like, "Dude! Show, don't tell, remember? This episode is already bad enough!"

Hub. Gwen's brought pizza, but nobody is around to share it with her. Wow, that was a short scene.

Meanwhile, the members of the crew who aren't having an existential crisis, or are at least putting it on the back burner this week, have tracked down the tracer they put on Janet, only it's not so much attached to her anymore, but rather, a small piece of cloth that I guess was torn off her clothes. And hey, the fact that Weevils wear clothes? Kind of weird, thinking about it. Jack's pretty upset, because this means they have nothing; "no clue where they are, or what they're doing." He's sure displaying a lot of faith in Owen's abilities, there. Not that I blame him.

In Mark's car, Owen and Mark watch a bunch of guys (because self-destructive emo angst of this caliber is a purely masculine pursuit oh yes sir I can't believe they made Starbuck into a girl WTF IS THIS SHIT) slowly trickle into to an inconspicuous building, which is precisely as exciting as it sounds. That might be overcompensating on the 'show, don't tell' thing, guys. It's boring enough for Owen to say "screw this" and just head in after them.

Hub. Gwen eats, like, a single mouthful of pizza and then sits and cries alone, in the dark. SO FUCKIN' EMO. And then she gets a text, except not, because it's actually Dead Dan Hodges' phone going off (unlike his main ring tone, his text message tone is just a generic 'ping', so her confusion there isn't a reason to direct further ire her way). What is a reason for further ire, however, is the fact that Gwen takes frickin' ages to actually pick up the damn thing. The message just says "CF10 6BY", which is evidently the postcode of the secret meeting place Owen went to, and for a group that were supposed to be wowing us with their mad ninja organisational skillz earlier, it's pretty sloppy of them to send the message to a guy they know is dead and has been picked up by Torchwood. Gwen's happy for something to take her mind off her angst and springs into action, checking out the postcode and finding a place there owned by "Lynch-Frost", which is Mark's estate agent company, as well as a shout out to the creators of Twin Peaks, apparently. And then there's a funny little bit where Gwen starts to radio the news to Jack, then suddenly stops, along with the OMG Tension music, when she realises she's not actually wearing one of their Bluetooth headset things, and has to spend a moment rooting around the desk for it. Nice.

In the Hyena, Jack receives Gwen's call and bitches at her again for not being home when she's supposed to be. Gwen ignores this and tells him her discoveries, he says they'll pick her up on the way. Ianto realises out loud that "people get an alert by text message, and they head to a property", and Tosh further clarifies that it's "a property Mark Lynch knows is empty". Thanks, guys, I really had no idea what the hell was going on here until you explained that!

So, inside the secret meeting place, Muse's "Assassin" is blaring out and guys are beating the crap out of each other, which Mark explains is a "warm up". Owen asks who "these blokes" are, Mark tells him that, like Owen and Mark, they are "Ordinary blokes trying to find meaning in a world that doesn't have any." By beating the crap out of each other, and later Weevils, and keeping all of this secret from the outside world. Now, I've never actually seen (or read) Fight Club, but as I understand, if you take out the Weevils, this is basically the exact same story in every respect, no? Mark babbles some more about how terribly nihilistic he is, but lets skip ahead to the part where there's a guy in a cage with an unchained Weevil, with a timer counting up how long he lasts. Which, in this case, is about ten seconds before he calls the guards standing by outside to cattleprod the Weevil away and let him out. Mark, speaking quickly, yet still coherently enough to fit this exposition into approximately a tenth of a second, explains to Owen that it costs £1000 to enter the cage, and whoever lasts longest wins all the money for the night. Owen asks, once again, what happened to Dan Hodges, and, of course, what happened was he stood in the middle of the cage and just let the Weevil maul him before anyone could stop it. "And still you all come back," Owen sneers as he starts to walk away, disgusted. Mark calls "What else is there?" after him, Owen yells that more people will die, and it has to stop.

Mark chases him and asks him "How long are you going to keep hiding?" Seriously, has anything ever been more homoerotic than this? He pulls out his own weapon, now (again, it's totally like that), and orders Owen to get in the cage. Owen calmly tells him that he won't do it if Mark's going to point a gun at him, and coolly walks towards him, and Mark relents and puts his gun back in his trousers. Owen whispers back the "good boy" and strides purposefully towards the cage, taking off his jacket and asking what's the longest anyone has lasted in there. Mark tells him "That would be Dan Hodges", which is not actually answering the question, and then pulls Owen back to tell him to look into the Weevil's eyes, "It's like looking into the darkest recesses of your own soul" and OH MY GOD, would you just shut up with all the emo crap already. Seriously, even I have my limits.

So, Owen's locked in the cage with a Weevil, and they stare each other down, and then he glances quickly to Mark, who nods, and then he closes his eyes and starts, like, meditating or something. But then Jack bursts in and fires a shot into the air, which totally breaks Owen's concentration and he ends up on the floor with the Weevil ripping his throat out. And Gwen uselessly can't get the door open, even though it's just a basic bolt latch, so Jack has to shoot the Weevil in the arm to stop it killing Owen, and all the nihilists mill around chaotically. Jack wheels on Mark and yells that what happened to Owen is his fault, but Mark, looking shellshocked, blankly says "He did it to himself. He had no fear." Jack yells to the crowd that it's over now, and they'd better leave the Weevils alone, and while he's not paying attention, Mark locks himself in the cage. Jack asks him what the hell he's doing, Mark repeats "It's over now" to him, and Jack just shrugs and lets the Weevil kill him. Showing how far she's come, for better or worse, Gwen doesn't even bat an eyelid at this.

Later, Owen's patched up in hospital. Jack tosses him some grapes, Owen tells him "You shouldn't have. No, really, you shouldn't. I hate grapes." Jack tells him the doctors say he'll be allowed to leave soon, Owen blows that off to get to the real meat of the scene; "I didn't want saving." Jack disbelievingly asks if he wants an apology, Owen continues: "For a few seconds in that cage, I felt totally at peace. And then you blunder in. Do you always know best, Jack? Is that what you believe?" Jack squares his jaw and tells Owen he expects him back at work tomorrow, as usual, not actually dealing with the problem in any useful way.

Over on the TWoP thread, ceindreadh made an excellent observation about this scene, and I don't think I could say it any better, so I'll just quote; "Jack - in Owen's opinion - doesn't have enough faith in him to let him finish his undercover mission without bursting in. Owen had the Weevil situation under control until Jack distracted him (something I didn't pick up on until the second viewing, originally I was going with 'suicidal Owen didn't want to be rescued', then I realized it was 'in control Owen who didn't need to be rescued'.)"

Back at work, Owen goes down to the cells to confront the Weevils, and they snarl and growl at him, and after pausing for a moment, Owen puts a hand to his chest and snarls right back at them, and they shrink back into the corners of their cells, moaning. Owen smiles, content with the knowledge that he is the alpha male here.

Next time: "Out Of Time", but in reverse. Still awesome.

Emo Outfit

Torchwood Episode 1x10 - "Out Of Time"

Episode Grade: A+


Everything comes down to moments. The most basic of machines, the lever, is all about moments, life is all about moments (and it sure as fuck isn't all about random shoes), this episode is all about moments. It's an odd one, because most of the plot elements you'd expect just plain aren't there. There's no particular antagonist, there's no particular goal that anyone's trying to reach, there's just a series of moments. It's one of the more beautiful things I've ever seen.

The moment the episode starts, there's a flash of white light. An old-fashioned biplane (specifically, a 1946 de Havilland Dragon Rapide, apparently. Don't you love the internet? I love the internet.) flies across the sky. She's called the Sky Gypsy. It's a fairly appropriate name, I think. Jack, Gwen and Owen stand ready her as she lands. I don't know why Tosh isn't there, but I'm sure there's a perfectly adequate explanation, and we don't need to go into it, hmm? The pilot gets out and apologises for the unplanned landing, "we just hit some remarkable turbulence". Jack introduces himself, she does likewise; "Diane Holmes, pilot." Diane's passengers get out behind her, one of whom is an older gentleman I do not recognise, though something about him is saying "a younger Cavill" to me. I think it must be the hat, because he doesn't really look much like Dean Stockwell. The other is Olivia Hallinan, about whom I have gushed at great length already, so let's take that as read. Olivia asks how long they'll be delayed, as her uncle's expecting her. Jack asks when they left, Diane tells him "about half an hour ago", Jack clarifies, in his usual unnecessarily intense way, that he wants a date and a year; December 16th, 1953. And that's the plot setup. Moments to follow. In a moment. (Sorry.)

And credits. This episode written by Catherine Tregenna, who also wrote "Captain Jack Harkness", which is a definite mirror to this one. She's got a clear flair for emo, and you know how I love that.

The passenger of the Sky Gypsy follow Gwen and Owen into the Hub, Jack takes the rear and tells them they have nothing to be scared of, which is always a disconcerting thing to hear. He also tells them "the least you know about us, the better" which has got to be even more worrying, and also, 'the least you know'? Is that some crazy American sentence construction, or is Jack just weird? Both crews introduce themselves, Owen as "Dr. Owen Harper" which is, if you recall, when he is at his least obnoxious. Olivia is called 'Emma Louise Cowell' here, the other guy's name is John Ellis. There's Christmas lights up the stairs, and that might be a nice little touch, but it's possible that they're part of the normal Hub decoration and they've always been there and I've just never noticed before. While Owen leads them into the conference room, Gwen remarks to Jack "At least it wasn't a spaceship full of aliens." Oh, Gwen. Haven't you got past that stage by now?

Conference Room. John incredulously asks how they could possibly have travelled fifty years in half an hour, Jack explains that they fell through a "transcendental portal". Emma's all "who in the what now?", Jack dumbs it down for her; "a door in time and space." And come on, would it have killed you to have him say "magic door"? That would have been so rad. John's still sceptical, so Jack hands over to Tosh (for no reason other than that she's barely in this episode), who gives them more proof than could conceivably be fabricated, so unless John thinks the moon landing was a... oh, wait. Diane asks the obvious next question; "How do we get back?", Jack doesn't waste any words at all in answering; "You don't." Diane asks what'll happen to them, then [future], John says "Never mind about us, what happened to everyone else? Our families? [past]" Emma just stands with tears in her eyes, looking stunned. [present does not fit this nearly as well as the other two, but whatever. present]

Gwen walks around the Hub with Emma, and reads from her files; "Your father died in 1959, he was 48." Emma sombrely notes that he always said he'd die young. Gwen adds that Emma's mother lived to 81, and puts an arm around her, saying "I know this is hard, but is there anyone else?" Emma shakes her head as they move offscreen and we pan over to John, who's telling Tosh details of his son, Alan, while Jack looks on. Tosh can't find anything, "the archives in the 50s weren't that well documented", Jack promises John they'll keep looking and tells him to get some sleep for now. Pan over to Owen, who's talking to Diane. Owen asks if she had a boyfriend, Diane takes a drag from a cigarette and tells him "Not really. I never stayed in one place long enough."

Gwen takes Diane and Emma into the house or whatever it may be in which they'll be staying, Gwen apologises for it being so basic. Diane shrugs it off; "not when you've slept in barracks", and they all wander in and start unpacking. Oh man, everyone looks so sad! This episode is so melancholy! It's going to make me cry, I just know it.

John gets a room of his own, of course, which Jack takes him to. John comments wistfully about some business he was supposed to attend to "tomorrow", Jack asks him more about it, in a pretty clear attempt to get his mind away from things. John gets out a radio and tries to tune it, Jack gives him a hand and manages to get it straight to Classic FM or something so we don't get any 'OMG what is this noise' to dance music scene or whatever going down here. John also gives Jack a camera containing photographs of his family and tells him not to worry; "I'll look after the ladies".

Back in the girls' room, Emma hears some giggling from next door or downstairs or somewhere and asks who else is here. "Couple of young girls," Gwen answers. I really don't know what the deal is with not getting the Sky Gypsy crew a place to themselves is, but let's just go with it. Gwen compliments Emma's dress and does the same as Jack, asking about unimportant details to take their minds off it all; "What were you in Dublin for?" "Auntie Nora's ill," Emma explains, "And Uncle Finn can't manage the children by himself. It'll be good practice for when I have children of my own, mum says." The 'taking her mind off it' tactic is not exactly going swimmingly here, though; "She'll know I'm missing by now." [aha! present!] And Olivia is, of course, doing some great holding back tears, which means I'm doing the same. And we're only five minutes in. So emo. Gwen, as kindly as possible, remind Emma that 50 years have passed, so, I mean, Nora will certainly know she's missing by now. Emma clutches a teddy bear to her chest and wonders what everyone will have thought happened to her. Gwen tells her that official reports said the plane went down in the sea, and Emma can hold back the tears no longer. I'm still going strong for now, but I doubt I'll make it to the end.

Back at the Hub, the next day, Jack hands out passports and tells the refugees they've set up bank accounts for each of them, but for now they'll be giving them a daily allowance so they can get used to the new economic situation and suchlike. They've each been assigned fake names, and their reactions, like many little things throughout the episode, completely inform the way each of their stories ultimately turn out, but not such a way that you feel like you're being beaten over the head with it at all; Diane is pretty nonplussed, Emma enjoys the novelty of it, John is angry that Jack would think he wouldn't want (or rather, need) to keep his own name; "For God's sake, man, it's all we have left! It's my son's name. It's the name above my shop." John throws his fake passport down and storms out, Jack and Diane watch and look apologetic. And melancholy. Always melancholy.

Now it's time for some culture shock which will try to pretend it's funny for a little while just because they don't want the melancholy to be completely overpowering, even though it inevitably will be. For no reason other than him having nothing else to do in the episode, Ianto's the one taking the refugees to a supermarket. Ianto suggests £25 for food, £20 for luxuries. Emma's shocked; "My dad only made £10 a week!" and everyone looks around at the shiny new world in wonder and/or fear. They're actually stopped in their tracks by the automatic door, and Diane asks "How did it do that?" so Ianto starts to explain the mechanics behind it, but Diane cuts him short and goes running into the shop, because she's seen bananas. Ianto, with fabulous exasperation, sighs "Of course, bananas are far more interesting." Hee hee! See, that's the Ianto I used to enjoy before "Cyberwoman" happened. And jolly Christmas music starts up and everyone runs around marvelling at all that the new world has to offer; Diane marvels at widescreen TVs and DVDs, Emma runs around grabbing all the junk food she can find while Ianto keeps a running total of her funds and points out that she'll destroy her teeth, John is aghast at the half naked women adorning the magazine covers ("There's children around!" "She's a children's TV presenter."), and, my favourite, Diane holds up a packet of cigarettes and asks Ianto what the "Smoking Kills" label is all about. She has such an awesomely baffled expression there. This scene is hardly original, for sure, but it is kind of necessary in this story, because we'd all be like "MAN, these people are jaded" if they didn't have it, and Ianto provides some nice commentary throughout to keep it from being irritating.

Done with shopping now, Ianto drops John off at the Millenium Stadium, looking concerned, but powerless. John tells the girls to stick together, "I'll be back in time for supper", and, as soon as Ianto's driven out of sight, he turns around and walks away from the stadium. He makes his way to a house, which is all boarded up now, and asks a passerby if he happens to know a man named Alan Ellis who used to live there. The passerby does not, and John stands and looks melancholy some more.

In the kitchen of their house, Emma's pouring the contents of some teabags into a teapot, and Diane's lounging against the countertop. Diane says she's going to go check on the plane later and asks if Emma wants to come along, Emma tells her she's planning to watch a DVD. Diane wonders out loud what work she'll be able to get in aviation, Emma remarks that she'll have to find a husband. Enter the two girls that are also staying there, and man can I not make sense of that, because it's such a weird excuse for the awkward scene that will follow, and it's not like it would be difficult to find an excuse for that awkwardness. I don't know. The girls introduce themselves as Alicia and Jade (It's really nice the way everyone keeps saying their names as quickly as possible, and I assume they are doing this as a personal service to make my job easier) and start making themselves some tea, in the background, Diane's mouth actually hangs open as she notes that they just chuck the teabags straight in there and she gives a great 'Check this shit OUT.' nod to Emma. It's the little moments that make the episode, you know. Diane excuses herself and heads upstairs, Alicia tells Emma her shoes are "lush", Emma intuits from tone of voice that this is a compliment, and thanks her accordingly.

Hangar, somewhere. Owen takes Diane to see the Sky Gypsy, he face lights up as she says "Hello, old girl. Did you miss me?" Owen tells he's been reading up on her and is impressed by some of the wonderful feats of piloting she achieved back in the day and asks how she got into it. "Ferried planes during the war. Of course, when it was over, we were supposed to go back to being dutiful wives and daughters. But I got a taste for it. No pig-headed man was going to tell me what to do." Owen, being the pig-headedest of pig-headed men, tries to feign annoyance, or something, but he remains far too impressed for it to fly. Diane babbles some obsolete techno about the plane and asks Owen hungrily (and I seriously mean that. We're talking like the wolf. Bad Wolf, no doubt.) "Can I take her out?" Owen has bad news; her lisence isn't valid anymore. Diane takes the news with a dashing "Bugger." Dude, she's even more Ace Rimmer than Jack used to be. Owen jokingly suggests this makes him "another pig headed man telling [her] what to do", Diane flirts that he'd better make it up to her by teaching her all about the new world.

If there's one thing that hasn't changed in fifty years, it's manly bonding about sports over a pint. John's telling Jack about the F.A. cup final of whichever year Bolton lost 4-3, and how amazing it was to have it broadcast live in his own living room. "I charged the lads a shilling each to come and watch it." Jack laughs, "Ever the business man, eh?" and then there's a slight awkward pause. John starts lighting his pipe and notes Jack's American accent, and asks how he ended up here. He's moved away from his own history, but he's still working in the past tense, of course. Jack tries to fob him off with "it's a long story" and "kind of complicated" and all the usual clichés, but John's like "I've just been thrown fifty years into the future, you cannot phase me any further." Jack admits that he also fell through time, but gives no further details. That is, of course, still more than he's told any of the team he's been working with for the past so many months. Well, he did tell Gwen about his immortality back when she joined the team. I guess if you've just met Jack, and you want to know anything about him, it's now or never. John and Jack raise their glasses in a toast to falling through time, I guess, and the barman tells John he's not allowed to smoke here. John blows out his match resignedly.

OK, awkward time. Emma, Alicia and Jade are hanging up christmas decorations, Emma asks the others what their plans are for Christmas Eve, "We could go carol singing!" The girls can't hold in their laughter, though they do at least try to be nice about it. Jade (or maybe Alicia, they're not wildly distinguishable) tells Emma "Sorry, love, I'll be getting hammered." Emma's confused of course, and asks where their families are. Jade tells her they don't have families, they grew up in care and Emma attempts to make a connection by saying "I don't have anyone either" and now she's going to start crying again, isn't she? Alicia is entirely perplexed by the crazy secluded posh chick; "They didn't leave you a house or anything?" and it pretty much dawns on Emma right there that she's got nothing, and she says so. Alicia sympathetically asks if she was close with her parents. She was. Alicia and Jade share a look and then Jade, with much ceremony, offers Emma a can of cider, and, damn, either everyone who has ever appeared on Sugar Rush is freakishly tall, or these girls are really short. Or Emma's lush shoes are crazy high heels, maybe. Anyway, Emma gives the cider a try, and seems to actually enjoy it, I think, and all three start to laugh. Emma is well up for embracing her new life.

Back at the pub, John's saying morosely that it must have been an awful Christmas for his family, thinking he'd drowned, and then tells Jack desperately to track down his son, "He's all I've got left". Jack watches him leave, looking worried.

Elsewhere, Owen's taking Diane out for dinner. Owen takes his seat, Diane stays standing, because she's waiting for him to pull out her chair. Owen laughs at the fact that she expects "equality and chivalry", but humours her anyway, with a vaguely sarcastic "Your chair, ma'am." He also lights her cigarette for her, and the first thing she wants to know is "What other strides have women made?" Owen being the one track mind that he is, the first thing he comes out with is "You don't have to have sex to have kids any more." Diane does not believe him, "I wasn't born yesterday", which gives Owen a pretty obvious segue to "For a bird who's going on 90, you look pretty hot." Who ever said romance was dead?

Back at the house, Emma's clearly had a few more drinks, and I guess they've watched whatever musical it was that she bought on DVD, because she asks the others what they're favourite song was. Alicia offers "It's hard to say..." and Emma gets up and starts singing her favourite and dancing, and there is much merriment to be had. At least until John walks in and starts yelling at her for causing a scene. Alicia and Jade really do not know what to make of this, and just sit and suddenly find the wall exceedingly interesting.

At the restaurant, Owen gives Diane her coat and asks where she wants to go next. Diane leaves it up to him, and he suggests that she could come back to his place, and read up about herself on the net. Diane doesn't say anything and Owen starts worrying that he's being to forward (because that's always been such a concern for him before) and babbles about how he's not chatting her up and blah blah, and eventually Diane interrupts to ask "Got any scotch?"

At the house, Emma's called Gwen in to attempt to break up tension, which she is her usual fantastic job of. John accusingly tells Gwen that Emma was drinking, Emma claims she only had half a glass, which I doubt is true since she was drinking from a CAN. John tells her they're not supposed to draw attention to themselves, not realising that she'd clearly be drawing at least as much attention by not doing it. John promises Gwen there's no need to worry further, "I won't let her out of my sight again", and tells Emma to sit down and eat her dinner. Emma insolently declares that she doesn't like liver, because whatever time period you pull them from, teenagers are still teenagers. John tells her to be grateful for what she's given, and she sneers at him and says "Only my dad gets to talk to me like that. And I'm never going to see him again. Or my mum. Or my best friend. Or my dog!" And suddenly her voice is going up a few hundred decibels, like YOWZA, and she shrieks "And I miss them! AND I HATE THIS FILTHY, STINKING PLACE!" and storms upstairs. And we have door slamming. John rolls his eyes and sighs "I never had this sort of trouble with my son."

Owen's Swingin' Bachelor Pad. Owen hurriedly sweeps magazines and shit under the couch as Diane comes out of the bathroom and asks, if he doesn't have a girlfriens, what is with all the beauty products? Owen tells her they're his, "real men can moisturise too, you know", Diane gives him a "Whatever, Joan" look, but goes with it. Owen notes the fact that she's lighting another cigarette and tells her she smokes too much, she gives another quick look to the "Smoking Kills" label and shrugs "So I gather", then non-sequiturs "Amelia Earhart." What? "She disappeared in 1932." Oh, I see. Apparently you're off by three years there, I'm afraid. I mean, I don't care about minor historical inaccuracies when there are much greater inaccuracies like 'there is a big secret and also not secret alien hunting organisation directly underneath the millenium building in Cardiff' to deal with, but I guess some people do. Diane sighs some more about the "whole new world", Owen tries to convince her she'll get used to it and fit in just fine, Diane looks away, clearly not believing it. It's pretty clear that she didn't fit in just fine in 1953 either. I don't think she's wired to fit in fine anywhere she goes. She's a drifter. Diane turns and looks into Owen's eyes and tells him "I'm glad you haven't got a girlfriend". "Me too," Owen breathes. Heh. I cannot remotely comprehend the fact that he appears to be completely irresistable to women even without his magic date rape spray, but for the moment, let's just accept it and move on.

Over to Gwen watching Emma asleep on the couch (Emma is at Gwen's place because I guess she refused to stay in the same house an John? Sure.) and looking concerned. And here's a point they've just reminded me of with the juxtaposition of "Owen has no girlfriend" and Gwen; is their affair over now? I mean, clearly, Owen would not have referred to Gwen as his girlfriend in any case, but we haven't heard anything about their fling since "Greeks Bearing Gifts" and you'd think Gwen would have something to say about Owen and Diane later in this episode. But then, considering how much emphasis they put on it, it doesn't seem plausible that they'd end it completely off screen. Anyway! Gwen flicks off the light and leaves.

Owen and Diane, post-coitus now, so I guess I can be thankful they skipped that part, even if I still have to deal with Owen's naked chest here. Owen appraises her performance; "I take it that wasn't your first time", Diane tells him she had a lover, who was married, which suited her, since she didn't have to bother with all the cooking and cleaning malarkey. Owen chuckles that he always thought the 50s were sexually repressed, Diane chides him; "You didn't invent it, you know." Owen asks if they can go again, Diane shrugs that she doesn't not see why not. "We could have an affair," Owen mutters, mostly to himself, "we could be fuck buddies." I love how he is totally confused by how this is going, because Diane is way away from all preconceptions he has about her. Diane asks him what a fuck buddy is; 2a friend you have casual sex with." Diane smirks at the foolishness of the modern age; "There's nothing casual about what we just did." Like, word. "Both parties should give it 100% concetration." And Owen is certainly doing that right now, so I guess I jumped the gun rather on being thankful that they skipped that part, but it's OK, because of this: "When you take off together, it's the next best thing to flying." I love that so much. That is a pretty fine example of the ol' 'turning clichés around' thing if ever I have seen one. Like, you say something is "better than sex", that is dumb and predictable and trite and all that, but that is taking it to the next level, to the point where you're reverential about something that it's not that it's "better than sex", but rather that "sex is almost as good". I don't know, I just find that really awesome. Don't mind me. Regular service will resume in just a moment.

Oh, and it's this one. Haha! So, a little backstory, in case you don't know this part; in the classic "viewing figures just went up" scene in Doctor Who, Captain Jack's buttocks were originally planned to be on full display, but since that show is For The Kiddies, they got cropped out. And when this show was announced as being the sexy, no holds barred spinoff featuring Jack, everyone was all anticipatory about Jack's buttocks and related aritcles finally getting their due display and the TWoP Torchwood thread was subtitled "Captain Jack's Arse Unleashed" and all that. And instead, what we get is a show where not only is Jack's arse thoroughly leashed at all times, but also, in any given scene, Jack is wearing at least five more layers than everyone else in the room combined. And, making the following far more hilarious than it would otherwise be, to add insult to injury, what they get instead is Rhys's arse unleashed. All in aid of a little moment of comedy wherein Emma wakes up to the sight of Rhys's own De Havilland Dragon Rapide. But, as it so often is, the real point here is that Gwen is an idiot, because apparently she didn't think it necessary to tell her boyfriend about the teenage girl who was sleeping on their couch. And also, she explains it to Rhys with the claim that Emma is a relative of hers, who was staying with a friend in Cardiff but came to Gwen after they had a big row. "And she doesn't really want to go back home, so I thought maybe she could stay with us." There's part of the truth in her wacky story, but it's completely the wrong part. Rhys gives Gwen a serious "Why the hell do I put up with you?" stare, but, seemingly intuitevly knowing she is entirely innocent in all this, gives in to letting Emma stay for Christmas. Gwen cheerily introduces Rhys to Emma and explains away Emma's out of time shock about their cohabitation to Rhys with "Emma's parents are very religious." After Rhys leaves, Gwen gets ridiculously into Emma's personal space and stage whispers how she couldn't tell Rhys Emma's parents are dead, because she keeps many, many secrets from him and she just kinds of trails off into bizarre twitching motions at the side of Emma's head. Emma is understandably perturbed. Stay off the Retcon, Gwen.

At the Hub, Gwen's ranting to Jack about how she couldn't leave Emma with John and Diane, "they're complete strangers", and you know, I really hadn't picked up on that before, and I just assumed they were at least casual acquaintances, but that really didn't make a whole lot of sense. Now I know. Huh. Owen slyly covers Diane's unknown (to the others) location last night with "I think she was at a B&B" and quickly changes the subject before they can unravel that tangled web of lies. Not that he needed to, because Tosh interrupts to tell Jack she's tracked down John's son Alan.

Oh, shit. Yeah, this is the scene that will break me. A nurse leads John in to meet Alan, who is now considerably older than John. Nurse tells John "I'm not sure how much use he'll be to you" and explains John's cover story to Alan; he's a nephew on Alan's father's side, trying to track down his family. Alan looks at her blankly and asks "Is Sally coming?" And, oh, John's face is so crushed. And the mournful piano and strings that have been pretty much ubiquitous in this episode are going into overdrive now, and really, I cannot blame them. Nurse tells John that Sally is Alan's wife, who passed away a while ago, and, on John's questioning, briefly explains Alzheimer's, and also tells John that Alan never had any children, so there was no one to look after him. And, while John's face is pretty much just a solid mask of pain, just for a moment, there's an almost imperceptible flicker of less pain when she tells him Alan had a wife, and there is a definite shift to more pain at the news that he never had children. Mark Lewis Jones is really hitting this scene way out of the park (he's playing cricket, not baseball, OK?) John sheds a tear, and so do I, and really, who wouldn't?

I guess Jack got the photographs from John's camera developed for him, because John's showing them to Alan now. Alan complains that they took his clothes, Nurse explains that they're probably in the wash and leaves to look so John can have a moment alone with Alan.

And I guess they decided this bit was a little too heavy to put it all in one chunk, so we get a brief interval of lightness with Owen and Diane at the hangar again, or maybe a different one. Owen's tracked down a plane of the same model as the first one Diane ever flew, and she is full of nostalgic glee and greets her old friend enthusistically. Owen promises to get her back behind the throttle as soon as possible, and she sincerely thanks him with a kiss which is a lot less intimate than she is being with the plane. I'm not joking at all; this girl loves her planes more than most people will ever love anything or anyone in their lives.

And crashing back down to Earth, John's telling Alan about the same cup final as he told Jack earlier and as he gets more and more into the telling of it, Alan looks him in the eyes, which is the first time we've seen him do that, and he starts to smile, and says "Blackpool won!" And, just for a moment, the joy is overwhelming. John tells Alan who he really is, but Alan's already drifted away again, and John is full-on crying now. Nurse comes back and asks if everything's alright, John tells her that Alan just remembered who won the F.A. Cup final when he was a boy, Nurse nods and explains that he sometimes remembers little snippets from his childhood. Moments, suspended out of time. Just moments, nothing more. All he has left is a few orphaned moments that don't fit together, and if you can't fit the pieces together into the whole, they don't really have any meaning any more, and what could be sadder than that?

Back at the Hub, Jack's telling Tosh that he knows John's world is falling apart, but he doesn't know what he can do about it; "there's no puzzle to solve, no enemy to fight." Just a lost soul, out of time. Jack throws his hands up in frustration.

At the hangar, Owen's trying to get Diane a flying lesson, I guess, but they're fully booked for a while, and the guy won't let Diane up on her own without a lisence, and won't take Owen's bribes to bump one of today's customers down the line so Diane can take their place. Diane tells him to just forget it and take the earliest date they have. Owen apologises and says he should have phoned ahead, as if that would have made a difference. Unless he thinks he should have booked before the Sky Gypsy even appeared through the Riftmouth, just in case he had a need for a flying lesson? Yeah, there is such a thing as being too hard on yourself, you know. Diane holds back tears and chides herself for being so silly, "it's just I was really looking forward to..." It's heartbreak, and nothing but, this episode. And see also; "looking forward". Yeah.

Meanwhile, Gwen and Rhys have taken Emma out to a club and then left her to her own devices, which is not exactly the first thing I would do, though she copes pretty fine. She's a little uncomfortable looking, for sure, but she knuckles down and gets on with the business of fitting in with the dancing as best she can. A guy comes up to dance with her in pretty short order, because while she may be supremely awkward looking, she's still totally smokin' hot. Emma gives him a smile and gets into it a little more. Gwen's a little worried about Emma, but Rhys assures her she'll be fine. Gwen gives him a big sloppy kiss and he's all "what was that for?" because clearly Gwen does not do that often these days. "For putting up with me," Gwen answers, and Rhys quite rightly tells her he deserves a lot more than that for it.

A little later, Gwen finds Emma and her guy making out on the seats and pulls him off of her and Rhys drags him away and tells him to go back to his friends. Gwen's giving off total parental vibe here, so Emma's immediately on the defensive; "I wasn't going to let him do anything!" Gwen tells her she might not have had a choice, and, I don't know, clearly Emma is a fish out of water here (which is why you shouldn't have taken her to the club in the first place, GWEN), but this is kind of an overreaction. And, yeah, Rhys has got my back.

Gwen's taken Emma home now, and is explaining the birds and the bees, or how the bees are a lot more promiscuous than they used to be, or something. And she has some women's magazine with an article entitled "10 STEAM IT UP SEX MOVES TO DRIVE HIM WILD". Emma declares it disgusting. I'm sure Kim would agree. I am just saying that so I can segue into this; I love seeing (good) actors playing different roles, seeing the differences and similarities in the ways they play them; the only reason I can stand to watch Stargate SG-1 at all is Browder and Black's migration to it after Farscape went down, one of the reasons I love this season of Battlestar Galactica especially is seeing actors playing different characters on the same show; I love the subtle nuances Grace Park puts in to differentiate Boomer from Athena and either of them from any other less developed Eights that show up. That's what acting is, I know, but I just wanted to say it is very cool. Hooray for good actors! So, where were we? Ah, Gwen wants Emma to know that people are more sexually aware these days, attitudes have changed, so on and so forth. In the spirit of sexual awareness, Emma asks Gwen how many men she's slept with, Gwen does a bit of a spit take with her coffee and says "a few", and she's doing that bizarre twitching again. She is seriously weirding me out in this episode. Emma asks, with scholarly interest, if Gwen was in love with all of them. Gwen says no and tells Emma that if you feel like doing it, sex is totally cool, like, so I'm not a slut, yeah? She's being highly unnecessarily defensive, is what I'm saying. So, naturally, Emma asks if, in the event she is with a guy and they're getting on OK and he wants to have sex, she should dive right in? Gwen tells her that's not what she's saying at all, even though it totally was five seconds ago, and Emma asks what she is saying then. Gwen gives a clear look of "I don't have a fucking clue what I'm saying", and eventually settles on "Sex... is nothing to be ashamed of. And as for you, well, your first time should be with someone special!" Emma asks if Gwen wishes she'd waited for Rhys for her first time, "he's your special someone, isn't he?" Ha! Gwen vaguely says "Yes, yes, I suppose...", and Emma continues "Sex with him is better than with all the others, right?" Ah, what a wonderful giant redwood of doubt is growing here. In conclusion, Emma decides, she'll wait for Mr. Right; "I'm not the kind of girl who sleeps around." There's no malice intended there, and I don't think she even realises how that comes across to Gwen, but Gwen is pretty shaken by this whole awkward conversation. I mean, literally shaken, like, her arm is actually shaking quite heavily. She's showing some serious signs of withdrawal symptoms, I'm telling you. What is that all about?

Owen's Swingin' Bachelor Pad. Diane's figuring out how to work the World Wide Tubes on Owen's laptop and complains it appears that flying these days consists of sitting on your arse pressing buttons, and where is the thrill in that? But, you know, sex is headed the same way, so flying is still better. Owen attempts to take her mind off things by giving her a present, which is a shiny new red dress. Not bad, Dr. Harper. Not bad.

Back at Gwen's, Emma's gone out to get herself a job with some fashion designer or something, I guess, and thanks to the whole cyclical nature of fashion and retro chic and all that, her clothes are pretty down with the times, and so they offered her a job. Presumably there was slightly more to the application than "Do you dress like a blind hobo? Y/N", but anyway, Gwen's happy for her and gives her a hug, and starts musing that they're going to need to find her a flat somewhere in town. Except, not so much with the 'in town' bit, as Emma continues that the job is in their new branch in London. Emma's way excited because she's always dreamt of working in the big city, and babbles excitedly for a while while Gwen looks upset and mumbles things like "London's a big city..." and "There's no rush..." Oh, but they grow up so fast, don't they?

In the fake souvenir shop that hides the Hub, John tells Jack he's going to find himself a job and get his driver's lisence and so on and thanks Jack for all his help. Once Jack's gone back down to the Hub, John gets a pretty empty look on his face and grabs a bunch of keys from behind the counter. Ianto walks out just after he's grabbed them and John covers pretty well by claiming he was looking for a bus timetable to aid him in his job search. Ianto hands him one with a smile and wishes him luck. John gives a weak smile in return. This is not a man with hope for the future.

Owen drives Diane, now wearing her new dress, out to a secluded carpark and tells her to bear with him while he goes to get something out of the boot. Diane waits, beaming with excitement. This is a woman with nothing but hope for the future.

Gwen's place. Rhys is waiting on the sofa for Gwen to return, looking exceedingly pissed off. Ooh boy, but this has been a long time coming. Gwen barely notices that he is refusing to even look at her, because she is, now and forever, completely oblivious to his existence when she doesn't need him. "Your mum rang," Rhys tells her, "Funny thing, she has no idea who Emma is!" Gwen's all "No way! Mum's losing her marbles!" for half a second before it occurs to her that that will never work, ever. She's an idiot, you know. Like, could she not have just said "She's a girl from work and she is going through a rough patch right now, and I know this is a lot to ask, but she possibly stay with us for a few days while she gets back on her feet." What was the need for the ridiculous, easily falsifiable whenever her mother felt like a chat, "Oh, she's my cousin" claim. Gwen, you fool. Rhys yells at her some more and demands to know who the hell "Pollyanna" really is. Gwen just stares at him with quavering lip, and he figures out it's to do with her damn work. Gwen gives the following explanation; "She was lost." That's is the full extent of her explanation. I'm sure that's a real comfort. She sincerely tells Rhys she's sorry, he gets right to the heart of the matter; "What worries me is how easy it seems to be for you to lie to me." Emma tries to step in and claim it's her fault and she'll leave by tomorrow, and Gwen yells "She's 18 years old, I couldn't turn my back on her!" as Rhys storms out. So I guess she didn't listen to a word he just said. How unusual.

A little later, Gwen's attempting to explain herself to Emma; "It's like there's two separate worlds; Torchwood and real life." And Emma truns and gives her a piercing look and says "That's why you've got to let me go." Ooh, well played. This is a girl with real hope. For the present, or at least the very near future.

Car Par O' Love. Owen's poured a couple of glasses of champagne and offers one to Diane, saying "I, uh... couldn't help noticing you standing out here in that beautiful dress." Diane runs with it; "This beautiful dress is a gift from my lover." "Then he is a fool to let you go out in it alone." Aw, I like that. See, this is why I don't hate this storyline like I ought to; I can actually buy Diane seeing something in Owen, the way he is around her. And then they get some good ol' swing, or bebop or something (any music invented before The Beatles? I have no idea what I'm talking about.) going, and dance. It's fairly remniscent of this scene, only in a dingy Cardiff carpark instead of on a spaceship hovering above London during the Blitz. I'll let you decide for yourself which of those is a more romantic situation. Mind you, for a dingy Cardiff car park, this one is holding its own pretty well, moon shining bright in the sky, like a big pizza pie and all that jazz, or bossa nova, or whatever. Owen gives Diane his coat, because I guess it's probably cold out, it being December, and also Wales. Diane says "Let's go home", and so they do, and again with the sexings. And then Owen's phone goes off, except now we've moved across to the Hub, and both the music and the phone are still going, so I guess it's actually Jack's phone. Oh, right, Ianto's discovered that John nicked his car keys, and is now not responding to calls.

They've got a tracer on Ianto's car, naturally, so it's pretty easy for Jack to track him down; "He's gone home." Back to the past; he has no home in the present. But the past isn't there any more, so really he has no home to go to. Jack follows his tracker and finds John trying to suffocate himself inside the car. Jack, in his usual dramatic way (though it's well deserved in this case), declares that John can't just throw it away like that, "Not without trying!" John tells him he doesn't understand, "I'm not as strong as you." Jack tries to tell him he does and explains that he was "born in the future, lived in your past", and John demands to know why he's "speaking in bloody riddles" and trying to keep him there when he has nothing left. Jack tries to persuade him that he can still do this, still find a job, start a family, but John already did that, "years ago. When I was meant to." John Ellis died when the Sky Gypsy was lost at sea in 1953. He doesn't have the strength to become someone new.

Owen and Diane are still making love, and there is not much left to the imagination here. I am watching Owen thrusting, repeatedly, and yet I am still giving this episode an A+, because they are making love and that is not something I thought we would see Owen do.

Garage of No Return. Jack tells John he's not going to leave him there. John tells him they'll wait then, "and the sun will rise. We'll have breakfast. Take a walk." Jack happily agrees, thinking he's getting through to him, but John carries on; "And I'll suffer it all and smile and wag my tail. And then, as soon as your back is turned, I'll make sure I do it properly." Jack tells him he won't get reunited; "It just goes black." John asks how he knows, Jack explains that he died once. And Suzie said the same thing, and I am perfectly happy to pretend that "Random Shoes" didn't happen, as we seem to be doing here. John asks again "Who are you?" and Jack tells him he's "a man. Like you, out of his time. Alone and scared." John asks how he copes; Jack shrugs that he has no choice. John points out that Jack may not have a choice, but he does. "Let me go with some dignity." Jack whispers "Are you scared?" and Barrowman is often pretty hammy with the heavy stuff, but he plays this whole scene perfectly.

Post-coitus, once more, Diane tells Owen he's being awfully quiet. And he pauses, trying to find the words, and says "I don't think I can do this any more." And I'm like, "Oh Owen, you dick." But then he goes on that he's been with many women and "done the fuck buddies thing", and this is not that. "All I see is you. All I can think about is what you're wearing, what you're thinking, what you're... What your face looks like when you come." And now I'm like "Oh, Owen. You dick", you know? "It's been, what, a week? And yet, I feel like, when I'm not with you... erm..." Honest to God, I thought he was going to start reciting "...Baby One More Time" right there. But no; "When I'm not with you, I lose focus. How have you done this to me? I'm scared. I'm fucking scared." Diane is rather moved by it all, and tells him "I love you too", and they kiss.

Let's pause for a second; "It's been, what, a week?" See, in actual, real world time, it's been 42 minutes and 45 seconds to the end of that scene. And that's counting the introductory spiel and opening credits, so we can knock a little time off that and make it 40 minutes. A week, in 40 minutes. Time has to rush by pretty quickly in TV shows, and if you don't handle it carefully, it'll seem ridiculous (except with, like, 24, which has its own entirely separate set of 'ridiculous'), but right here, considering they've got basically three different stories going at once here, it's quite extroardinary that they've managed to get them all across in such a short space of time without any one of them come across as rushed. That takes some pretty careful choosing of exactly which moments to show us, and where to leave us to fill in the blanks.

Jack sits in the car with John and holds his hadn as he slowly runs out of air and drifts out of consciousness. And lets go. Diane tells a sleeping Owen that "the thing about love is you're always at its mercy." Jack takes John's lifeless hand, again, and cries. Gwen (who, in a possible nod to the second season of Sugar Rush, is wearing a beret.) takes Emma into the airport, tells her not to talk to strangers, call her as soon as she arrives, always wear clean underwear, and so on. And lets go. Owen wakes to find a note on the pillow next to him, and reads it, though we don't get a cheesy Diane voiceover reading it out to us. They actually keep this one private, and I like that. Owen does not let go.

At the airport, Gwen has a moment of hesitance, and tells Emma she doesn't have to go. But, and this is the closest we come to cliché, I think, "If I don't, I'll always wonder what it's like." Gwen pulls her in for a tight hug, and finally hands her the ticket and really lets go. I hope we see her again some time, but I'll understand if we don't.

At the hangar, Diane's getting back into the Sky Gypsy when Owen's car pulls up and he gets out, telling her he can't let her do this, it's madness. Diane tells him if she listened to people who told her that, she'd never have achieved the things she did, back in the day. Owen tells her she belongs here, with him, but they both know that's not true. Diane tells him the weather conditions are the same as the day they took that fateful flight, "the Rift's going to open again, I can feel it!" Owen thinks she's trying to get home, which he tells her is impossible, but that's not it at all, she wants to go into the unknown. Into the future. Owen, in desparation, says he'll come with her, but that's not going to happen either. In the end, he's reduced to just begging her not to go, and, in case the role reversal wasn't already abundantly clear, she takes her flight scarf and drapes it around his neck before taking off and leaving him with these words; "Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for brekfast." OK, so, not really. What she actually says is "What memories I'm taking with me," and that is pretty good too.

And then we get a montage of all the moments that led us here, in each of the three stories, and Diane says "When you take off together, it's the next best thing to flying" again, because, man, that is a great line. And the moment we leave with is, of course, the same as the one we came in with; the Sky Gypsy flying into the future.

Next time: Weevils!

Oh, Modern Ass

Yep, I'm finally done. "Out Of Time" recap should be done by the end of the week too, because I've been working on that one intermittently whenever the suckitude got too bad, so it's pretty near finished already. And then there's only three to go! Ooh, isn't it exciting.

Torchwood Episode 1x09 - "Random Shoes"

Episode Grade: F


Yeah, sometimes there are bad episodes. Farscape had The Meagerly Awaited Return Of Fuckin' Maldis in "Picture If You Will", Battlestar Galactica had Apollo's Two Never-Seen-Before-Or-After-This-Episode Girlfriends Plus A Bunch Of Adolescent Bullshit in "Black Market", Buffy had the entire seventh season, and endless other examples. It happens. They can't all be winners. But here's the thing, they usually, no, always have the occasional redeeming feature. Maybe a funny line or two here and there, or some really great acting in spite of the script, something to salvage whatever mess is going on. I've never before seen an episode that fails on every conceivable level. (Because I never watched Charmed.) It's truly a sight to behold.

So, there's this guy called Eugene, right? Eugene. Isn't that an awful name? I mean, when I picture a 'Eugene', I go straight to the geek stereotype. Now, maybe that's just because the only Eugenes I have ever encountered are "Careful With That Axe, Eugene" (who has no identifying features beyond a need to be careful with that axe), the guy from Big Brother, and the one in this episode (both of whom have the exact same annoying nasal voice appropriate to said stereotype), but really, how many great Eugenes have there been throughout history? None. None at all. (Can you imagine if kids had to study "Great Eugenes Throughout History" in school? You could call it, like, 'Eugenics' or something. Wouldn't that be awful?)

...I think this episode is so bad, it's made me retroactively have hated the name 'Eugene' for my entire life, honestly.

Anyway, this guy is called Eugene, and has this annoying nasal voice, with a total London accent, despite having supposedly lived in Wales his entire life with his family, all of whom have completely Welsh accents, and no explanation for that is ever offered in this episode, either. Whatever.

He's lying in the road, because he's just been hit by a car and died. And in any sane and decent world, this would make him shut up. But in the hell we inhabit for the next 50 odd minutes, he instead gets to talk and talk and NEVER STOP TALKING. And what he'd like to begin by saying is this; "The speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second. [ONLY IN A VACUUM, FUCKWIT. MUUUUUUUUUUUH.] Pain travels through the body at 350 feet per second. Even a sneeze can reach a hundred miles per hour." THANKS, USBOURNE JUNIOR ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE. "And as for life? Well, that just bloody whizzes by." Zoom down on Eugene, lying in the road. He gets unsteadily to his feet and wanders past some police cars (with a RANDOM shot of his SHOES, like WOAH MAN) and shouts "Gwen! Jack! Tosh! The guys on the road just let me through, so..." See, what we have here is a Torchwood fanboy, IN AN EPISODE OF TORCHWOOD! And through his eyes, we can look in on our intrepid crew from an outsiders perspective, which will shed exciting new light on everything. Isn't that clever? If you're thinking this sounds awfully familiar, I think it's obvious you're going crazy, and should seek help. (But, in all seriousness, that episode, for all that I hated its execution, the 'outsider perspective' idea was sound there, where there's a forty year history to delve into. On a show with a rich history of EIGHT EPISODES, it's fucking stupid. If, indeed, that's what they were trying for here. I can't actually tell what they were trying for here, because see above re: failure on every conceivable level.)

The Torchwood crew ignore Eugene totally, because they cannot hear him, because he is dead, and they are here to inspect his rapidly cooling corpse. Hi, Eugene's rapidly cooling corpse! I hate you and all that you stand for! Eugene's ghost is all "Uh, that looks a lot like me", which is I suppose is probably supposed to be funny. Tosh remarks that he "couldn't even cross the road without messing it up", which sounds like it really ought to have been an Owen line to me, and Gwen suggests that "maybe he really did have something important". Because, apparently, Eugene's been following them around for a while, and, you know, maybe they could have shown this in at least one of the preceeding episodes, and then we'd be all "oh, that nerd that always follows them around is dead, bummer" instead of "who the hell is this guy?" Tosh thinks it was probably just an accident, Jack notes that Eugene has red paint under his fingernails, so the car that hit him must be red, Eugene finally pays attention to what's going on and repeatedly asks no one in particular "Am I dead?"

Credits. This episode written by one Jacquetta May, who was presumably hired to make Chibnall's efforts look good in comparison. Initial intelligence gave the title of this one as "Invisible Eugene", and I can't really decide which of the two options is a more appropriately lame title.

Back to where we returned, and Eugene's phone starts ringing. Tosh answers it, then immediately realises that she is not the one with people skills, and hands it over to Gwen, who says "Hi, Mrs. Jones. Somethings happened, we need to talk to you." And after that all too brief respite, we go back to Eugene with the annoying nasal voiceover news. "I'm dead but I'm not dead. Am I a ghost? Or a ZOMBIE? OH GOD." Because it's a well known fact that zombies are invisible and intagible and all that malarkey. Shut UP. The Torchwood crew pack up and leave, and Eugene hops into the Hyena with them. He notices his lack of reflection and freaks out a little more, and per Jack's request, Gwen takes a look at his phone for weird messages or anything; "Just some pictures of random shoes." That one, I can cope with, but each and every future mention of 'random shoes' in this episode makes me want to beat myself to death with my own svered leg or something. EVOL (Eugene Voice Over, Like.) remarks that whatever the hell is going on, "I'm somewhere I've always wanted to be", and Eugene stares lustfully at Gwen. The Hyena departs.

EVOL: "Let's back up a bit. I mean, every story's got a beginning." You know what else stories should have? An intersting and coherent plot, maybe a central character who isn't an unimaginably stupid dullard, and above all, SOME KIND OF POINT. Whatever, this 'story', such as it is, begins with a young Eugene in requisite horrible grey school uniform, at "the final of the inter-school maths competition, 1992." Young Eugene looks exceedingly miserable, as schoolchildren are wont to do in any situation that requires them to wear such horribly itchy sweaters. So, Young Eugene and his team failed to win his school the magnificent honour of the "SOUTH WALES INTERSCHOOL MATHS CHALLENGE" and his father, who TOOK THE DAY OFF WORK TO SEE HIM because THAT'S HOW IMPORTANT THE SOUTH WALES INTERSCHOOL MATHS CHALLENGE IS, was horribly disappointed in him because they lost by a totally unrespectable 42 to 34 and it was ALL HIS FAULT and WHAT A FAIlURE HE IS, I'M SURE HE WAS SCARRED FOR LIFE BY THIS EVENT AND FOOD WOULD NEVER TASTE GOOD AGAIN. And everybody blamed Eugene, which is demonstrated by one of the other kids on the team muttering "useless" under his breath as he walks past Eugene. HOW HARSH. Evol continues that "it must have been what happened afterwards that started this whole thing off" and if that is the case, why did you bother telling us that part? NOBODY CARES THAT YOU GOT A MATHS QUESTION WRONG WHEN YOU WERE 12. GOD. I am seriously abusing the capslock key here, I know, but honestly, can you blame me?

Eugene's maths teacher, Professor Squashedface (seriously, his face occupies, like, 10% of the front of his head. It's so weird.) comes in and asks him if he'd like to "take a proper look" at his "collection". Yeah. Oh, and also, he sounds like Mr. Bean. Eugene says no, Professor Squashedface says "I play golf!", and even Eugene is like "That's just fucking FANTASTIC." Professor Squashedface continues his thrilling tale; he was playing golf one day, and this thing, which he thought was a golf ball, fell out of the sky, so he picked it up and put it in his pocket. What the hell? Way to ruin someone else's game there, Professor DICKface. But anyway, he took a closer look at it later, and it turned out it wasn't a golf ball, it is, in fact, a paperweight, or a large marble, or possibly a glass eye. Squashedface reverentially marvels at the fact that it just fell out of the sky and then tells Eugene he can have it, so I guess it can't have been all that amazing after all. Eugene's dad barges into the room at this point and angrily asks where the hell Eugene has been. Squashedface gives him a pointed "Good evening", and Dad settles down a little and tells Eugene to "come on". Squashed face asks Eugene on his way out if he has everything, Eugene stares at the Magic Eye and says he has.

At Eugene's house, while he continues to stare at the Eye, his parents are yelling at each other about something or other which is pretty unintelligible since they're both yelling at once. EVOL explains: "Dad was mad at me for losing the final." Because what we are expected to believe here, you see, is that Eugene honestly believes that his parents separated because Eugene did not win the South Wales Interschool Maths Challenge. That's a pretty huge stretch even for Eugene at whatever young age he is in these flashbacks (I guessed at twelve, but as usual, I am no good at these things), and we're supposed to believe that he's gone through his entire life without ever questioning this belief. The flashbacks have been dated at 1992, and various time stamps in Doctor Who episodes mean the present day stuff in this one is occuring in 2007 at the earliest, so even if I've overestimated his flashback age a little, he's got to be at least 25 at the time of his death. So, yeah, he's 25, and he still thinks his dad left because he wasn't good enough at maths. That is what we are dealing with here. OK.

EVOL continues that at least he still had the Eye, and if it fell out of the sky, "it probably... no. NO. Almost certainly... belonged to an alien." David Bowie's "Starman", which is far too good a song to deserve any association with this horrible episode, starts up as Young Eugene watches through a window where his father is leaving. EVOL babbles endlessly on and on about whatever shit is coming into his head, and I just can't be bothered. Believe me when I say it isn't important. It's probably something to do with aliens. Eventually he shuts up and there's some welcome relief as they just let David Bowie soundtrack the Magic Eye whizzing around through space for a while.

And we're back to the present day, and EVOL tells us "My dad never came back". I GUESS YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER AT MATHS THEN, EH, FUCKTARD? And as Eugene became older, he became a geek, AS IF HE WASN'T ALREADY. And then he discovered Torchwood and became obsessed with Gwen, but alas, he was just too bumbling and awkward and she never noticed him. Oh, isn't that sad.

Gwen breaks the news to Mrs. Jones, Eugene's mother, who gives some clear Denial and Depression in the usual five stages, and one positive thing I will say about this mess is that Mrs. Jones gives some pretty good distraught. While Eugene watches Owen and Ianto sift through all his not-actually-alien junk upstairs, Gwen sits down for a talk with Eugene's younger brother, Terry, who is playing the part of me in this episode by a) not giving a damn about Eugene, and b) thinking Eugene is a moron (though in his case it's because Eugene let himself get run over, rather than the multitude of other available reasons). Gwen asks after Terry & Eugene's dad, Terry disinterestedly informs her that he "works for a big corporation in America". Owen calls her upstairs to look at Eugene's junk for some reason, despite the fact that he thinks it has no worth whatsoever. Gwen notices something that might possibly be an empty stand for the Eye, and somehow figures out that there is something missing from Eugene's collection. She asks Mrs. Jones about it, but she's too busy on Anger; "Why didn't they stop? They killed my boy and just... drove on!"

Cut to the Torchwood crew leaving Eugene's house, and Mrs. Jones breaks up yet more at the sight of the box of Eugene's stuff that Gwen is taking with her. Gwen gives her a vaguely sympathetic "I am sorry, Mrs. Jones," and carries right on going. That's real great, Gwen. "Sorry your son died and all, I'll just be taking everything you have left to remember him by." Eugene follows and apologises to his mum too, not that she can hear him. "But we've got the best team ever working on this!" he adds, enthusiastically. Wait, but isn't Face still busy contributing a vastly insignificant positive side to the one thing on TV even worse than this episode? Well, not by the time I actually get round to posting this, no doubt. And, anyway, he means Torchwood. Haha. Yeah, "Torchwood are the best team in the world" is possibly even more stupid than "My dad left because I failed at maths." Oh, wait, "Torchwood, and me." Modest, Eugene. Modest. "See, I think there's been some mistake," Eugene continues. Yeah, it's called this episode. Too easy? Eh.

And that's one less scene to get through! Hub. Eugene goggles at how amazing the set is, and, you know, it's pretty cool, I guess. Yeah, hand in a jar, I know. Shut up, Eugene. Shut up forever. Gwen wants to know what the hell Eugene was doing standing in the road, Owen takes the right approach and doesn't care. The rest of the crew have taken an even better approach and stayed the hell away from anything and everything relating to this episode. Owen and Gwen have some of their patented annoying banter, which is at least slightly preferable to Eugene's prattling. Not that that's actually stopped. Right, Owen DOUBLE DARES Gwen to do the autopsy on Eugene because otherwise SHE FANCIES HIM! GWEN AND EUGENE SITTING IN A TREE! I swear, this is honestly what is actually happening on my screen. Eugene faints at the sight of his own body being cut open, which has the double bonus of mutilating his corpse AND shutting him up! Awesome! Ianto enters and gives some pretty compelling evidence that Eugene's death was just your basic car accident; the guy driving the car admits to hitting him and drove off because, quote, "I thought he'd be OK." So, this falls entirely outside Torchwood's sphere of interest, case closed, episode done, right? Please? And, oh dear, Owen is saying the same thing. That's twice in this scene I've agreed with him. This episode is messing with the natural order of things!

And now we have Antony And The Johnsons' "Hope There's Someone" playing. I can't imagine any reason anyone would think that would be appropriate to this scene. Mostly because I just can't imagine any scene of anything that that would be an appropriate soundtrack for. Basically, I just don't get Antony And The Johnsons. But right now they're awesome, because the song is occupying time that would probably be otherwised occupied by Eugene talking. You sure deserved that Mercury prize after all, I guess! Also, Eugene watches Mrs. Jones crying. I'm really moved, I'm sure.

At the hub, everyone else wants to get on with, you know, their jobs, but for no actual reason, Gwen Bloody Cooper has a feeling that something more is going on with Eugene, and so we must endure the rest of the episode. THANKS, GWEN. I HATE YOU. Owen is an obnoxious cunt to her about it, as usual, but frankly, I think it's deserved. Jack tells them to break it up, Gwen says "Just forget about it. I have." Oh, how I wish I could believe you.

Lame plot contrivance #4815162342; Eugene had a DVD rented when he died, and for some reason Owen has put it up on the Hub TVs. He tells Gwen he was going to take it back, but she can do it if she likes. Gwen acts real shifty and steals some evidence or something and, in an exceedingly obvious "I AM LYING" voice, tells Owen "I'm going to go for some lunch." Even though he just handed her a perfectly good excuse for whatever it is she's just about to get up to; Is "OK, I'll return the video now" really that hard to say, Gwen?

The heinous crime Gwen is really commiting that she so expertly covered up with her 'lunch' lie is... Going to a café? So she wasn't lying? Oh, but she asks the waiter if he knows when the video store across the road will be open. So, right, Owen told Gwen to return the video, she took the video and said "OK, I'm just going to... get... some lunch." and then went to return the video, but the video store was closed, so she went to get lunch. Right. Am I watching Family Guy all of a sudden? Really, what the hell is going on? The waiter does not know when it will be open; "He's a law unto himself", so Gwen orders ham, egg and chips which Eugene notes is EXACTLY WHAT HE ALWAYS ORDERS. It's FATE! Gwen looks again at Eugene's phone and the fucking random shoes. Eugene can't remember whose shoes they are, and realises he can't really remember anything much about his death and then tells Gwen to phone Gary. And "phone Gary becomes a ghostly echo" and Gwen does so, apparently without registering that anyone is telling her to. She gets voicemail and leaves Gary a message saying "Hi, my name is Gwen Cooper. I have some very bad news for you." Yeah, you hear that, you're going to think it's a prank.

Gwen enters the video store, which apparently has opened in the time it took her to eat her lunch, and gives the guy behind the counter the DVD and tells him it's on behalf of Eugene, who is dead. He hits on her in a most sleazy manner and tells her he remembers Eugene, "sweet guy", but he cannot give a discount on the late return fine just because the guy is dead. He also says that Eugene "had loser written through him like Brighton in a stick of rock" and maybe he commited suicide because he couldn't take his failure. But honestly, when it's a failure in something as big as the South Wales Interschool Maths Challenge, who could blame him?

EVOL is highly shaken by Random Offensive Video Store Clerk's words and gives lame excuses for his failure of a life; "I was waiting for the alien to come collect his eye and change my life!" "The dog ate my worth as a human being!" Gwen's off to visit Eugene's workplace, and apparently Eugene wasn't unsympathetic enough already, because it turns out that, before running into oncoming traffic, he was a telemarketer. Gwen takes a look around and spots a pair of the Random Shoes from Eugene's phone and somehow ascertains that their owner must be Gary. She introduces herself and asks if he saw Eugene the day he died, Gary distractedly says no as someone gives him the card they've been handing round for all Eugene's coworkers to sign. He yells at someone for writing "Good luck on your new job" on it, Gwen gets accosted by a Linda or Lynda, leaving Gary to wander off again, and who the hell knows why anything that is happening is happening at this point. Linda is going out with her boss, Craig, who, according to her, kept Eugene on out of the goodness of his heart, because Eugene was as bad at his job as he was at everything else in his life. Gwen asks L(i/y)nda if she wants to meet for a chat at lunchtime, despite the fact that lunchtime very clearly passed by two scenes ago, and then gets Gary's cubicle number from her. Gary's not in his cubicle, so Gwen just steals a leaflet saying "Black Holes and the Uncertainty Principle" from his desk (one of which she also found in Eugene's room), and fobs Owen off when he calls up asking where the hell she is.

OK, so L(i/y)nda is having a liquid lunch, apparently. Exposition ho! So, right, one day Eugene came in looking depressed and L(i/Y)nda was also depressed because she wanted to go to Australia but she couldn't afford it and Eugene told her she MUST go to Australia and he promised to get her the money for it. Which he would do, of course, by selling hisy MAgic Eye on Ebay. And he brought it into work to show L(i/y)nda and some other assorted coworkers for some reason, and they were all, like, "That's a fuckin' paperweight, dude", but Eugene still believed the truth was out there. But, to everyone surprise, Eugene (whose Ebay username is 'ejones'. Yeah, as if he wouldn't need to tack some numbers on the end of that.) got a bid of £2.50 in Birmingham, and then the bids just rocketed up to £3,000, and then one day it suddenly jumped to £15,000 and then, a few seconds later, £15,005.50. L(i/y)nda does not who who any of the bids came from, and Gwen bids her adieu, because she has a phonecall from Mrs. Jones, who has something Gwen needs to see.

Which turns out to be Absent Dad's home video of the frigging South Wales Interschool Maths Challenge. Mrs. Jones tells Gwen the riveting story of how Eugene acquired the Magic Eye, which would be boring even if we hadn't already seen it in excruciating detail at the start of the episode. Terry shoots his mouth of about Eugene some more, God bless him. Mrs. Jones admonishes him a little, and Gwen moves on to wondering if Absent Dad knows about Eugene's death. Mrs. Jones robotically recites her line about how he "works for a big corporation in America", Terry tells her to stop spouting that shit, he works in a garage just up the road! And now Eugene remembers why he sold the eye, I guess because it turns out his whole life was a lie? Or perhaps he shot a man in Reno 'cause they cancelled Firefly. (Yeah, I just wanted to fit as many outside references into an irrelevant sentence as I could manage. With this episode, I have to make my own fun.)

And Gwen goes to see Eugene's dad, but as she's about to get out of her car, Eugene calls out "Don't, Gwen, I don't want anything to with him!" And Gwen stops and says "It's OK," still without apparently being consciously aware of Eugene's presence. As this episode goes, it's a vaguely intriguing mystery first time around, but since it never gets even a half-hearted attempt an explanation, it can fuck off, too.

At the Hub, Jack gets on Gwen's case for having her phone turned off and being generally unreachable in case of emergencies. Gwen's like, "Eugene needed me!" and Jack's all "What the hell, the guy is dead." Jack exits, saying "I've got work to do" with an unspoken, pointed "And so do you." Gwen sits and bites her nails for a while, Eugene rants that she can't just give up now. Just as Jack's getting to the door, Gwen calls out to him and explains that Eugene had "an alien eye", which he sold on ebay. Jack uses his mystical psychic voodo to immediately determine that it is "a Dogon Sixth eye" and, I mean, clearly I don't know as much as Jack about alien life in the Whoniverse, but it strikes me as a mite implausible that he can correctly identify exactly what the thing is from the words "an alien eye". Just a tad. Gwen asks what one of those is, Jack explains that it "lets you see what's behind you. Kind of puts things in perspective." Uh huh. Eugene gushingly tells Gwen she's brilliant, "and I'm brilliant too." No, and HELL NO. Gwen gets out the "Black Holes and the Uncertainty Principle" leaflet and smiles, so I guess that is the next stop on this thrilling investigation.

Eugene rambles irritatingly in Gwen's passenger seat for a while, and hell with that.

OK, so I guess this black holes thing is a museum exhibit or something like that. Fair enough. Gwen looks around the place for a while and spots Gary, who makes a break for it when she comes over to say 'hi'. Gwen gives the worst attempt at chasing in the history of forever, but it's ok, because Gary changes his mind and comes to talk to her anyway, saying "I'm not proud of what I did."

Then they get instantly transported to a different room for the rest of the conversation for no apparent reason. So, Gary was the one (or one of the ones; he slips up and says 'we' at one point, then stupidly makes a point of correcting himself to 'I', just in case Gwen hadn't already picked up on that.) bidding on the Eye, which he did in an attempt to cheer Eugene up, but then actual genuine bidders started appearing, and he became the fucker who artificially inflates the cost of his friend's ebay auctions. In flashbacks, Eugene tells Gary that he was starting to lose faith in the existence of aliens, but the high bidding has changed all that, and now he thinks the alien has come back to claim what is rightfully his, "He couldn't contact me any other way!" Gary looks a little sick for feeding Eugene's delusions and sceptically asks "So he chose Ebay?" Eugene's response; "Cyberspace! I mean, even an online auction has a certain elegant symmetry." OK, first of all, anyone who uses 'cyberspace' in this day and age when there are so many better words to choose from is an idiot. Secondly, "an online auction has a certain elegant symmetry"? What the fuck are you talking about? Back to present day, Gary tells Gwen that when the bid suddenly jumped to £15,000 he started to think maybe Eugene was right; "I wouldn't spend that kind of money unless it was my own personal private body part or something." Gwen suspiciously says "I thought it was £15,005.50?" Because no one would ever round that amount down to the nearest thousand. Gary's like, "Whatever", as any sane person would be to that question. Eugene remembers that he got an email from the winning bidder telling him to come to a restaurant to deliver the Eye. Gwen asks if maybe the exchange was supposed to take place somewhere on the A48, that presumably being where Eugene was run over. Gary shrugs "Or not. Eugene was very secretive. Could have been in Splot." "Splot," Gwen repeats. Come on already, it's not that funny. Gwen takes another look at the Random Shoes, and notices that one of the pairs look suspiciously like Gary's shoes and asks him a) why would Eugene take a picture of his shoes, and b) whose are the others? Gary tells her "They're just random shoes, I should think." GRAAAAAGH CRUSH KILL DESTROY. It occurs to Gary that he is maybe looking a little suspicious right about, so he gives Gwen puppy dog eyes and says "I miss him.", which she eats right up, of course. That one totally works in court when you're accused of murder, too. Trust me.

Gwen's in a hotel room now for some reason. She can't possibly go home until she's figured out this mystery? I don't know. Eugene hangs around babbling, of course, and after getting vague memories of a place that had something to do with happiness, he comes to the realisation that he doesn't actually want Gwen to figure it all out, because then it would end, and following her around as she figures things out is far more exciting than anything else in his useless life ever was. I'm sure this monologue would be terribly moving if I cared the slightest bit about his character, but I do not. Which is really the problem here; I got no emotional connection. Plot holes and all that be damned; you either feel a thing or you don't. And I'm sorry, "Random Shoes", but I don't. Focusing an episode on a minor character or one who's never even been seen before is always going to be a risk, because presumably if you're watching the show, you've got that connection with at least some of the main characters, but a minor character is going to be something of a wild card on that front. It can be a risk that pays off (though I'm sure many people would violently disagree with my choice of example, which is kind of my point), or it can go horribly wrong. And it really doesn't help that the only one of the major characters they've chosen to feature is Gwen, who is undoubtedly my second least favourite of the main characters at this particular moment. If it had been Tosh doing the investigature, maybe I'd have actually somewhat liked this episode, in spite of Eugene's prattling. So, what's going on? Right, Eugene loves Gwen, and is being a total stalker really. Gwen maybe hears Eugene saying "I love you", and gets up and looks out the window, which brings her to the point where she'd be almost kissing Eugene, were he actually tangible. And then she goes to sleep. Fill in your own joke about this episode sending me to sleep, I'm too tired. Goodnight!

Next day, Gwen's alarm goes off, and she actually does look like she's just woken up, which is a fairly rare thing on TV. Eugene's been lying there watching her sleep, in his stalkerish way, and for some reason he says "I thought we were on holiday."

Gwen goes out for a drive and happens upon a "Happy Cook" in a motorway service station. I can't imagine what real life chain of roadside restaurants that could be a thinly disguised version of, can you? Anyway, the Happy Cook logo, which is basically a red Pac Man in a chef's hat, matches a logo she found at some point earlier in the episode, I don't remember or care when. Point is, it links the place to Eugene, so Gwen stops by. While Eugene tries desperately to remember what happened the last time he came here, Gwen notices a waitress is wearing another pair of the Random Shoes and remarks "I've been looking for a pair of shoes like that for ages." Ho ho. Eugene finally realises that when he came to meet the alien, what he found instead where his "mates"; Gary and the skeevy prick from the video store.

So, flashback time again. Eugene, whispering for some reason, tells his 'friends' that it's good to see them, but he's meeting the alien, and he doesn't want a crowd. Record Store Prick (let's call him Lenny) is like, "it's us", which Eugene interprets as "we're your friends, we want to be part of this" until Lenny clarifies that "we're the alien". Eugene is hella confused, Lenny explains exactly what Gary explained to Gwen earlier, which is really not interesting enough to be worth hearing a second time. It wasn't really worth hearing the first time, truth be told. Only we get the end of it now; Gary and Lenny weren't responsible for the £15,000 bid, but Lenny couldn't resist raising the bid a tiny bit more, and apparently the extra £5.50 was too much for the genuine bidder. Eugene is pretty angry, naturally, and asks Lenny if he has the £15,005.50 on him. Lenny shrugs that he has £34, and Gary tries to persuade Eugene that that's a very reasonable offer which is pretty goddamn stupid. Eugene gets out his phone and says he's calling a cab, Lenny tries to grab the phone from him, and then the waitress arrives with their meals and Eugene takes pictures of her, Gary and Lenny's shoes for no apparent reason. That is the solution to the big mystery of the Random Shoes; Eugene did it for NO FUCKING REASON. I think maybe he is supposed to be doing it accidentally while trying to call a cab, or his phone just goes off in the struggle with Lenny, but if either of those are the case, it is an incredibly poorly acted scene, because Eugene is quite clearly taking the pictures deliberately. So, yeah. What the hell is that? Eugene asks why the hell Lenny even wants the Eye, if it's such a joke to him, and then, displaying far more intelligence than he has at any other point, realises that Lenny is planning to resell it online, since he knows there's an alien out there willing to "pay anything" for it. Actually, he's clearly only willing to pay £15,000, Eugene, but pretty reasonable otherwise. Well, OK, so also; the guy is not an alien, as Lenny explains; "Mr. c. Blackstaff is a collector of alien artifacts and Nazi memorobilia. And also Beanie Babies." I assume that last is supposed to be funny; it's not. "If he's willing to pay £15,000..." Lenny continues, darkly, and the unspoken end of his sentence appears to be "...then I am willing to assault my so-called "friend" in order to have the Eye for myself and win that money."

Back in present day land, the waitress with the Random Shoes is telling Gwen this story, but thankfully we don't actually have to hear a description of what we just saw, because when we join her, she's telling Gwen how Lenny jumped Eugene; "now they're inconveniencing customers!" In flashback land, EVOL announces that he didn't know what the hell the Eye actually was any more, but he sure as hell wasn't letting it go for £34 and a banana milkshake. And so he swallowed it. And he gets all blurry, momentarily, And Lenny starts trying to give him the Heimlich manouver while Gary forcefeeds him the milkshake. Because that's what friends are for. But Eugene breaks free, and runs out the door. And the waitress just gets to this end of her story, when who should walk in the doory but Lenny and Gary! "That is so weird!" the waitress comments. You say 'weird', I say 'stupidly contrived'... Gwen is all of a sudden hiding in the corner somehow, and, after Eugene gives Lenny's real name as 'Josh' and starts yelling at him and Gary, who ignore him, of course, Josh starts telling the waitress that there are people, specifically a woman, who might be investigating what happened last week, and it might be in her best interest to stay quiet. I'm pretty sure you can't just loudly threaten a waitress in a crowded restaurant like that without one of the customers maybe intervening or calling the police or at least looking up from their meals. But anyway, Gary tells Josh to shut up, because he's spotted Gwen. Josh tries to make a break for it, but Gary trips him up because he is feeling guilt about it all and he misses Eugene.

Gary finishes the story; He and Josh tried to chase Eugene, but they were too slow to catch him, and he got to the other side of the road and they lost him behind all the cars. OK. Gwen accepts this and leaves them, and, while Eugene looks out the window and gives an annoying speech about "all those lives whizzing by in a frenzy of burgers and chips, bank holidays, burst tires" blah blah fucking blah. DEEP, MAN. Gwen calls up Eugene's dad and tells him she has some bad news. And Eugene remembers that he ran across to another road and EVOL, with an incredibly grating smug tone of "I am making a Deep And Significant Point About Life", says "smell of banana milkshake, a slight nausea because I wasn't that fit. All the stuff! That tells you! YOU'RE ALIVE!" And then he got hit by a car. Isn't that ironic. Hell, I don't even know any more.

And now, much like it's predecessor, the logical endpoint of the episode is followed by a whole bunch more endings that become increasingly absurd and awful as they go on. EVOL continues his self-satisfied Important Lesson About Life; he should be angry about Gary and Josh screwing him over like that, but instead he is thankful because when he swallowed the Eye, he got the chance to Learn An Important Lesson About Life. We're at Eugene's funeral now, and about ten people have turned up; Gwen, Gary, Josh, L(i/y)nda and I guess a bunch of his relatives. Eugene tells Gary he's going to miss him, and tells Gwen he wishes he could thank her and forgives his dad for not being "Superman or even an alien," and instead being just an ordinary bloke, and that particular Important Lesson About Life has already been done so very much better, so again I say SHUT UP. Mrs. Jones stands up to speak, but all she can do is cry, and then Eugene's dad gets up to say his piece; "Eugene was... He was a good boy. But somehow, things went wrong. I wasn't there. I wish I could have been there to see him, before..." And then, honest to God, he starts singing "Danny Boy". SERIOUSLY. HE BREAKS INTO "DANNY BOY". HALFWAY THROUGH A SENTENCE. THIS REALLY HAPPENS. And yet, it still can't beat the worst eulogy ever.

In the cemetary outside, Eugene's fretting to Gwen that he thinks he's going to have to go soon, and babbles some more irrelevant mathematical/scientific trivia, as all geeks are wont to do. Some bearded guy has apparently dug into Eugene's corpse to find the Eye for Gwen, and gives it to her. Wait, but why the hell didn't Gwen find it when she was doing the autopsy earlier? Oh, whatever. Only five minutes to go!

EVOL wonders why he's still here, if it was the Eye that's doing it. Gwen wonders the same, so apparently she does sense his presence? Maybe? I don't care. Gwen's hanging out across the street from Eugene's house, the Symmetric Hyena pulls up and Gwen gives the Eye to Jack, who is duly impressed. Gwen asks Jack to give her five minutes so she can go talk to Eugene's family, and also stand in the road ready to hit by a car herself. EVOL recites yet more trivia, and then spots the car about to hit Gwen and does a slo-mo dash towards her yelling "GWEEEEEEEEEEN!" and throws her to the ground, to safety. Three minutes! Just three minutes to go! All the funeral goers and the Torchwood crew gasp and stare at the suddenly visible Eugene. And he thanks Gwen for everything, and she thanks him for saving her life, and he kisses her and says goodbye and floats up to heaven with nary a word to his grieving family. No seriously, I am not making this up, or hallucinating or anything. And Gwen looks up to the sky and begs him not to go, but apparently his parents don't care that much.

And there's just time for another self-important EVOL speech before we can leave this horror behind us and never speak of it again. Here we go; "The average life is full of near misses and absolute hits. Of great love and small disasters. It's made up of banana milkshakes and loft insulation and random shoes. It's dead ordinary and truly, truly, amazing. What you've got to realise is it's all here, now, so breathe deep and swallow it whole. Because, take it from me, life just whizzes by, and then, all of a sudden, it's..." Well, you've succesfully made me vow to never, ever use the word 'random' in anything other than its strict mathematical definition. Good work.

Next week: Just to make the dip in quality even more pronounced, the two best episodes of the season go either side of this one. Also, I'll make my own self-important declarations about what life is really about, because I'm a giant hypocrite. You gotta do what you gotta do.