Torchwood S2 01 Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Review
Chris Chibnall has been reading my mind.
I said a year ago that I wanted Jack to be gone long enough for the team to learn how to function properly without him. He did that. I said I wanted Ianto to more mature. Check. I said I wanted Tosh to be more assertive. Check. I said that I wanted the parallel between Owen and Jack to be made more explicit. Check. I wanted Jack's past to be genuinely dangerous. Check. I wanted the attraction Jack has for Gwen to be acknowledged but to be less than the attraction Jack has for Ianto. Check and mate.
All this came wrapped up in a laugh-a-minute script, tied up with a novel stringing together of science fiction and Western conceits, and with James Marsters as the bow stuck on top. I couldn't ask for a better present!
In Jack's absence, the Team has learned how to function as a team. Jack is palpably nervous about their good will in his first scenes with them. He needs time to make nice with them and get back in their good books. So of course who shows up before he can get the time? His Ex From Hell, in the form of Marsters' "Captain John Hart."
Captain John is appropriately mad, bad, and dangerous to know; and makes it appropriately clear that Captain Jack used to be worse. Jack's time has always given the impression of great instability, and something about the way they talk about their five years together makes me think that this might have been a very rare period of stability in the lives of two hard, desperate men. The strongest attraction in this episode is between the two Time Agents, while at the same time Jack clearly loathes the ground John walks on. But, while John is clearly a villain, how much of Jack's animosity is really directed not at John but at the man Jack used to be? Jack may have made his peace with the Doctor, but he is clearly nowhere near ready to make his peace with his own past.
In a scene with Tosh, Chibnall makes it clear that this season is picking up the hinted-at parallels between Jack and Owen from last season. Like Jack in his own past, Owen was off the rails in the first season. In the episode, Owen makes it clear he's gotten tired of the game of one-night stands and is looking for someone more stable. This is exactly the impression I got from Jack in The Empty Child, that he had become tired of the con games (otherwise he would not have dropped it so fast) and was looking for something else but didn't know who, what, where, or how to find it. Interestingly, it's not the impression I got from Captain John -- at least not yet.
Gwen is shown as a competent leader, Ianto gets more lines and a chance to save everybody, and both Tosh and Owen show off their genius. Jack has a scene with Gwen which makes it clear that he's still attracted to her -- but not as much as he is to Ianto, whom he tells "I came back for you" and in the episode's sweetest scene, very nervously asks out on a date.
All told, a wonderful start. I can't wait to see what the rest of the series brings.
Part 2: Relationships
Part 3: Themes
I said a year ago that I wanted Jack to be gone long enough for the team to learn how to function properly without him. He did that. I said I wanted Ianto to more mature. Check. I said I wanted Tosh to be more assertive. Check. I said that I wanted the parallel between Owen and Jack to be made more explicit. Check. I wanted Jack's past to be genuinely dangerous. Check. I wanted the attraction Jack has for Gwen to be acknowledged but to be less than the attraction Jack has for Ianto. Check and mate.
All this came wrapped up in a laugh-a-minute script, tied up with a novel stringing together of science fiction and Western conceits, and with James Marsters as the bow stuck on top. I couldn't ask for a better present!
In Jack's absence, the Team has learned how to function as a team. Jack is palpably nervous about their good will in his first scenes with them. He needs time to make nice with them and get back in their good books. So of course who shows up before he can get the time? His Ex From Hell, in the form of Marsters' "Captain John Hart."
Captain John is appropriately mad, bad, and dangerous to know; and makes it appropriately clear that Captain Jack used to be worse. Jack's time has always given the impression of great instability, and something about the way they talk about their five years together makes me think that this might have been a very rare period of stability in the lives of two hard, desperate men. The strongest attraction in this episode is between the two Time Agents, while at the same time Jack clearly loathes the ground John walks on. But, while John is clearly a villain, how much of Jack's animosity is really directed not at John but at the man Jack used to be? Jack may have made his peace with the Doctor, but he is clearly nowhere near ready to make his peace with his own past.
In a scene with Tosh, Chibnall makes it clear that this season is picking up the hinted-at parallels between Jack and Owen from last season. Like Jack in his own past, Owen was off the rails in the first season. In the episode, Owen makes it clear he's gotten tired of the game of one-night stands and is looking for someone more stable. This is exactly the impression I got from Jack in The Empty Child, that he had become tired of the con games (otherwise he would not have dropped it so fast) and was looking for something else but didn't know who, what, where, or how to find it. Interestingly, it's not the impression I got from Captain John -- at least not yet.
Gwen is shown as a competent leader, Ianto gets more lines and a chance to save everybody, and both Tosh and Owen show off their genius. Jack has a scene with Gwen which makes it clear that he's still attracted to her -- but not as much as he is to Ianto, whom he tells "I came back for you" and in the episode's sweetest scene, very nervously asks out on a date.
All told, a wonderful start. I can't wait to see what the rest of the series brings.
Part 2: Relationships
Part 3: Themes