when i grow up

it's not a new doctor -- it's the same man. new doctor who showrunner steven moffat has said this a lot recently, and it's true. in his latest incarnation, the doctor is the same man. only different.

the BBC's time lord hero has a new face (matt smith, above at left), along with a lot of other new things. and at long last -- well over a year since smith was cast to replace outgoing doctor david tennant -- the ever-growing u.s. who fandom will see him in action in "the eleventh hour," airing saturday night on bbc america at 6 and 9.

do i even need to say it? all right, i will: SPOILERS AHEAD! STOP READING NOW IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS.

the episode kicks off at high, loopy speed, with the seriously damaged TARDIS flying out of control over nighttime london while the newly regenerated doctor dangles, hollering, from the open doorway. he crash-lands in the garden of a house where a girl named amelia pond, who lives there with her aunt, is praying to SANTA (ahaha!). she needs someone to fix the crack in her wall, from whence mysterious whispers emanate. "thank you, santa," she says upon seeing the battered police box that has just crushed the garden shed.



it's a great start (restart?), and in general i like matt smith as the 11th doctor. as much as i loved tennant (and christopher eccleston before him), and almost everything former showrunner russell t. davies did with doctor who (including bringing it back to the screen in the first place), i have been looking forward to a change. after all, change -- brought on by the character's periodic regeneration, allowing another actor to take over -- has been at the heart(s) of this show practically since it began in 1963.

tennant became the most popular doctor ever in the UK, but matt smith is going to be the biggest doctor ever in the states. not because he's better than tennant or even necessarily more appealing to americans; it's just about timing. BBCA has relatively recently been ramping up its profile and didn't even air the show first over here for much of the new who run (which premiered here on scifi). doctor who is still a cult jam here, but the buzz is building. the major u.s. dailies have made a fair amount of fuss over this latest series, as have the entertainment rags and blogs.

smith, 27, is the youngest actor to play the doctor (a couple of years younger than peter davison, who was 29 when he became the fifth doctor back in 1981). and his secret weapon is karen gillan, a 22-year-old scottish redhead who is super-cute and very likable as the doctor's new best friend, amy pond. this week they did some promo appearances in new york and l.a., and boy are they adorably goofy and geeky together.

this apparent turn toward the youth market might be worrisome, were the very fine writer and award-winning fan fave moffat not at the helm. as it is, all that talk about smith playing old in a young body wasn't complete hype. smith makes a strong mark here, and i think it will become more distinctive. still, eleven's catchphrase -- "geronimo!" -- is not a patch on nine's "fantastic!" or even ten's "allons-y!" but at least he still says "whaaaat?!" and now he gets to pingpong about time and space in a redone TARDIS that is, as moffat says, "even bigger on the inside." hallelujah for that!



(image lifted from the eclectic banana blog; thanks.)

moffat is straightforward about his take on the show. "doctor who is a fairy tale," says he -- more grimms than disney, of course. his previous who stories often feature fantastical goings-on and creepy hybrids of myth and science fiction -- the gas-mask people in "the empty child"/"the doctor dances," the fabled weeping angels of "blink." however, like fairy tales, moffat's stories resonate not because of the supernatural but due to the all-too-human: lies, guilt, secrets, love. both moffat and RTD are emotional writers, but where RTD's who popped on every level -- visually, sonically, dramatically -- moffat's is so far more nuanced and intimate, although just as likely to get loud and silly.

sure, the doctor has 20 minutes to save the world in "the eleventh hour" -- without TARDIS or sonic screwdriver. but that's just backdrop. this is really about setting up the relationship between the doctor and seven-year-old amelia, a complex and psychologically fraught connection that's a far cry from "nice to meet you, rose tyler. run for your life!"



still wearing ten's battered suit and trainers, eleven hauls himself out of the TARDIS wreckage, but his extraordinary entrance barely fazes amelia. that crack in the wall, however, has her worried. "must be a hell of a crack," muses the doctor over a restorative meal of fish fingers and custard (the culmination of some overlong spit-take slapshtick involving the doctor searching for the right food to help him through the last phases of regeneration).

he got that right. on the other side of the crack, an ominous authoritarian voice announces, "prisoner zero has escaped." amelia's heard those words before but doesn't know what they mean. the doctor doesn't either, but he's going to find out ... right after he deals with the regenerating TARDIS. he tells amelia he'll be back in five minutes, and then she can come with him. amelia packs a suitcase and parks herself in the garden to wait.

and wait ... .

"geronimo!" be damned; the real catchphrase this season may be "timey-wimey" (a moffat-ism that basically means time travel causes weirdness). that is, the doctor doesn't come back in five minutes: he comes back 12 years later. well, it seems like five minutes to him, but ... like i said. timey-wimey. get used to it.



anyway, little amelia is now stunning redhead amy (karen gillan), the girl who waited a fucking long time. and her wait is not quite over. if this all seems kinda familiar, you've probably seen the tennant episode "the girl in the fireplace." penned by moffat, it had the doctor popping in and out of the life of madame de pompadour in a similar time-stretched fashion.

i got that feeling a lot: moffat, another lifelong who fan and more of a traditionalist than RTD, has made something so different, yet so very familiar. moffat establishes through-lines that will doubtless run all season, one of which is related to that crack in amy's wall, something called the pandorica, and the admonition that "silence will fall." there's also a laptop boldly emblazoned with the product name "MΨTH" (which recalls the atmos thing from last season but might just be a throwaway gag). amy doesn't have a family (nor, thank god, an unrequited or even requited love for the doctor), but she does have tenuous ties to ordinary life that may prove hard to shake. yet all this treading of familiar territory is preferable to new ideas that don't really work, such as the fast-forward "doctorvision" bit meant to show us, i guess, how the doctor's perceptions work.



eleven's tweedy jacket and bow tie somewhat recall the second doctor's get-up, but he's not as deceptively clownish as patrick troughton played two. smith does have a distinctly eccentric edge to his acting, and if he doesn't radiate manic joy at playing the doctor from every pore (as did tennant), his doctor still at times comes across as benignly unhinged and perennially distracted, a la the great tom baker, the fourth, longest-running, and still best doctor ever.

happily, amy is a bit unhinged herself. who wouldn't be, after that childhood experience? the doctor clearly left a big impression, as she grew up making dolls, stories, and comics about him -- likenesses so well rendered that when he finally does return, everyone in her tiny town is like, "hey, it's YOU! the raggedy doctor! YOU'RE REAL OMG!" which is a pretty funny running gag.

it's rather horrifying, however, to have all the adults around you trying to convince you your "imaginary friend" isn't real, when you know he is. the experience has made amy more independent-minded but has also damaged her. "12 years and four psychiatrists," amy fumes at the doctor -- yikes.

the doctor seems a bit hurt by her attitude. "i grew up," she snaps. "we'll soon fix that," he cheerfully replies. the doctor is peter pan, and now amy doesn't have to grow up.



it is like a fairy tale, or a dream. we never see amy in regular clothes; she wears either her nightclothes or her ridiculous "kissogram" costume, a policewoman outfit with the shortest skirt evar -- just like how sometimes in dreams you're wearing totally inappropriate clothes for whatever's happening. even the new opening sequence befits a fairy tale, as the time vortex swirls like a menacing black rose, shot through with lightning bolts and fire.

likewise, we see flashes of the more dangerous being behind the doctor's devil-may-care demeanor -- the emergence, perhaps, of the great and terrible time lord described by river song in moffat's "silence in the library." the doctor is the same man -- a point beautifully reflected in a sequence where 11 suits up in his new outfit while warning off the extraterrestrial threat du jour, as a montage of his previous incarnations plays over the alien's info screen. but by the end, when moffat puts a clever twist on the doctor's oft-repeated command of "run," it's clear that 11 can indeed be her doctor.

blown away

guess what, people? i have seen "the end of time part two," and it is good. and that's about all i'm gonna say about it here. you can watch it tonight on bbc america and decide for yourself. i have a million thoughts about the final appearance of david tennant's doctor, however. although it was not as soul-rippingly sad as "journey's end," it was still a satisfying yarn and an emotional roller-coaster indeed.

i laughed, i cried, i went "what the FUCK??!" so, despite lack of making me quiver on the floor in pain, i say well done, RTD. (and that's taking into account the inevitable OTT moments and did-you-HAVE-to? bits that are an essential part of the russell t. davies canon.) i alternately moaned and clutched the throw pillow and bounced up and down cheering, and that is an acceptable mind-fuck, so yay.

and i must say, the regeneration was pyrotechnic indeed. yummy! in his first scene as the doctor, matt smith appeared a lot more confident than he did when running through it in the "EoTpt2"-related episode of doctor who confidential. (which was titled "alons-y!" hee.) and now we get our first trailer dialed to 11. check it; this is also the first time hipspinter has posted a video clip. (or see it on youtube.) it's a brand-new world indeed.



one last thing: do not stay tuned for demons following "EoT." it sucks. i found it ridiculous when i watched the pilot almost a year ago, but thought i'd stick with it. only one episode later, i realized it was rubbish. a waste of philip glenister and your precious time.

you look so fine

this holiday season has been full of perpetually reincarnated fictional british heroes: on christmas day we got to see our favorite time lord, as well as shakespeare's angst-plagued danish prince hamlet, as portrayed by doctor who star david tennant in the film version of gregory doran's stratford-to-west-end production of the namesake play. and yesterday i caught the latest incarnation of the world's greatest detective, sherlock holmes, starring robert downey jr. as holmes and jude law as his faithful companion doctor john watson.

this guy ritchie-directed extravaganza is handsome but hardly cerebral (directly the opposite of how i imagine holmes to be), although there are a lot of great lines in a script also plagued by horribly cliched ones. ("solve this case -- whatever it takes!" ugh.) it is mainly a bunch of fight scenes and big ol' set-pieces strung together by an amped-up mystery and a few half-hearted attempts to show us holmes's deductive reasoning in action (which are mercifully soon abandoned for more traditional demonstrations of same). at least three people leap out of windows in this movie. one of them is on fire. that's pretty much all you need to know.

the many references to watson as "the doctor" here led to silly associations in my head. at one point i even poked JD and asked her how come the doctor couldn't just use his sonic screwdriver to get them out of the situation. RDJ was pretty good as holmes (despite, apparently, some objections to an amurican playing the part; isn't that why it's called acting?). but in some ways this movie was, for me, all about watson.

i'm not especially enamored of RDJ or JL as hunks of manflesh, but probably the best thing about sherlock holmes is how wonderfully, spiffily tweedy watson is with his walking stick and amazing clothes that seem to never get dirty, even in grubby ol' victorian england. his grey flannel/magenta pinstripe suit (seen above) is the best of several natty ensembles that kept my eyes riveted, as he does indeed wear them well. man-in-a-suit alert!

the second best thing about sherlock holmes is the original music, by prolific veteran hans zimmer. much of it is this zesty yet off-kilter fiddle-y, banjo-y, piano-y stuff that provides a much-needed organic element in the mix of relentless fisticuffs, fiery explosions, elaborate chases, and wildly evil ambitions.

i recently started reading sir arthur conan doyle's original holmes books, which i somehow never got around to as a kid. having inherited my techie sister's cast-off ipod touch, i downloaded a bunch of free holmes for my kindle app and started from the beginning, after reading a couple of short stories from later in the run. i've only just started the hound of the baskervilles (the third of the four early novels), but i've read enough to know that the movie's writers pretty much frankensteined different parts of doyle's tales and changed details at will. (one example: in the movie, holmes has never before met watson's fiancee, mary. but the whole second novel, the sign of the four, revolves around a case mary brings to holmes, which is how watson meets her in the first place.)

as a result, we have a very au courant emphasis on the bromantic aspect of holmes and watson's relationship, with watson sniping about how messy holmes is and how he keeps borrowing watson's clothes without asking, fussing over how holmes always forgets his revolver, and protesting how holmes uses the dog to try out his latest sleeping potions. ("he doesn't mind," holmes insists, as the plump bulldog snores in the corner.) holmes is still the savvy deductive-reasoning dude and master of disguise, but his ass-kicker quotient is pumped way up. (and his drug-use quotient is shrunken to just barely mentioned.) he also acts very much like an adolescent boy over watson's impending nuptials, using cheap tricks and rudeness to try to split them up. which may all be in the original mix, idk.



anyway. the main story involves a chap named lord blackwood (the amazing mark strong, who has been and will be in many things, but who i especially loved in our friends in the north). he's an apparent master of the dark magical arts who begins terrorizing london with his scary evil ways and has a BIG PLAN TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD. also hanging around is irene adler (rachel mcadams, who is just ok), a criminal american woman who has a History with holmes both here and in the written stories. a more mysterious figure from the holmes canon lurks in the background.

the problem right now with BIG PLANS TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD is that every fuckin' genre movie has them. i know warner bros. can't make tons of cash if they don't inject some epic-ness and over-the-top action into a tale involving a guy who mostly uses his mind to defeat bad guys, but they could have still had lots of fight scenes and stunts and set-pieces with a story that had a little less at stake than some mofo who wants to bend the entire world to his will mwahaha. in other words, bored now.

ah, but i mostly enjoyed the flick, although sometimes i laughed at it and not with it. it is way too long at two and a quarter hours, and the uneven pacing doesn't help. the thing takes off at full speed, which yanks you right in, but then it drags and revs up again in cycles that just make you wish they'd get it over with already. and, while i do love me some kicky-fighty, sherlock holmes has so many extended choreographed battles that, by the time we got to the big climactic numbers, i felt like i'd seen it all before.

oh, well. it is worth seeing for the escapism of it all. the man on fire, btw, is not the only cool pyrotechnic thing. so if you, like me, are a firebug who's crazy about balletic fistfights and well-dressed men, by all means go see it. but do get yourself some popcorn on the way in.

blue christmas

in honor of the beginning of "the end of time," here is a blast from christmas 2007 past. my original doctor who christmas song, penned for my DW buddy richie. although, while 'tis the season for a doctor who special, we are not going to get daleks. i don't think. but we will get wilf (see above)! so yay.

Santa, Bring Me a Dalek

Santa, I've been good this year
Now bring on the excess
But I don't want no costly gear --
No earrings, no Lexus
No MP3, no GPS,
No diamond watch, no Wii
This Christmas I will be a mess
Without supremacy

Santa, bring me a Dalek
I swear it is the best
Santa, bring me a Dalek
The Doctor's nemesis

It's fun, it's keen, it's neat, it's mean
Oh, what a sight to see
The scourge of planet Skaro
As cute as it can be
A mutant form of human life
It's programmed to survive
Mostly made of metal
And yet still quite alive

Santa, bring me a Dalek
The sci-fi king of death
Santa, bring me a Dalek
Or I will hold my breath

[dramatic pause]

I've been good, I've been sweet
I got high marks in school
I do just what my parents say
And follow all the rules

So give me what my heart desires
This super-duper beast
It never stops, it never quits
It's tops, to say the least
There's just no better way to prove
I've got the upper hand
Come Yuletide night I'll be the one
Who's lord of all the land

Santa, bring me a Dalek
It's round and cool and tough
Santa, bring me a Dalek
It's got balls, and that's enough

Santa, bring me a Dalek
Right now, it's not too late
Santa, bring me a Dalek
I will ex-ter-mi-nate!

happy christmas to all!

run

HELLO, FRIENDS. GUESS WHAT'S GOT ME BACK IN THE MOOD TO POST? THAT'S RIGHT: THE LATEST DOCTOR WHO SPECIAL, "THE WATERS OF MARS," AIRING TONIGHT ON BBC AMERICA. FOLLOWING IS AN IN-DEPTH DISCUSSION OF SAID EPISODE, COMPLETE WITH SPOILERS. SO DON'T READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANNA KNOW WHAT HAPPENS.

"it's the end. but the moment has been prepared for."

the final words of the fourth doctor do apply to "the waters of mars," the latest new doctor who special ... and the proverbial beginning of the end for incarnation number ten, played by the smashingly manic and wonderfully emotional david tennant. a mix of classic sci-fi thriller and dark morality play, the episode has already aired in the UK, and bbc america will screen it for stateside whovians tonight at 9 pm.

four's last words work as commentary on tennant's departure just as well as they served tom baker (still the longest-serving doctor and, until tennant, the most popular) in his day ... for surely no moment in british tv history was ever quite so prepared for as the tenth doctor's last story, "the end of time." (like i would know, ahaha.) "the waters of mars" brought a deluge of "the-end-of-time"-is-near coverage: magazine features and covers, radio and tv interviews, news stories, and special tie-in episodes of programs like the panel show never mind the buzzcocks. the UK has so many who-related broadcasts that the doctor who news page made up a handy chart for fans to keep track of it all. pubs in the UK will throw special parties to celebrate the final two-parter, airing on christmas day and new year's day over there, and dec. 26 and jan. 2 here. even time out magazine got into the act with a special edition featuring 10 different doctor who covers, one for each incarnation.



so, yeah. the moment has been prepared for. however, something in "the waters of mars" is a more direct throwback to the demise of doctor number four, which happened in the serial titled "logopolis," way back in 1981. but let's not get ahead of ourselves here.

in "the waters of mars" (working title: "red christmas"), the TARDIS materializes on the red planet, looking ever so fetching alone against the brick-colored landscape. out leaps the doctor, wearing the spacesuit he got in "the impossible planet" over his burgundy-pinstriped blue suit. (which we will never see again, sob! it's my favorite.) he's still traveling without a companion, which is just a bad idea. and he knows that, so it's actually a crazy bad idea.



he finds a base station and some scientists, led by the tough adelaide brooke (lindsay duncan), and quickly figures out he's in the middle of a soon-to-be-tragic historic event from the year 2059 -- background on which we see through the curious, somewhat clunky device of flash-asides to what look like 2009-era web pages with info about the scientist-pioneers. (a big problem of having no companion: no one to expositate to.) it's the flip side of the doctor's triumphant shout of "everybody lives!" from "the doctor dances." that is, this time, everybody dies.

the doctor knows the story and its characters well: in 2059, the inhabitants of earth's mars colony bowie base one (lol!) all died in a massive explosion. and he really should go. because this is one of those pesky "fixed points in time" that he's not allowed to change, due to the laws of time.

shades of "the fires of pompeii," no? but this time the doctor doesn't have the amazing donna noble around, not to persuade him to just save someone, but to stop him from going too far, as companions tend to do. and guess what happens? he goes too far. first, however, we get a lot of the usual clever banter and running about, along with some goofy robot shenanigans and a more external horror story involving contaminated water that begins to turn the bowie crew into super-creepy-looking zombies, one by one.



eeeyieeee! scary, huh?

the doctor can't resist this mystery. continuing to protest that he really should go, he stays right where he is and investigates the problem, even making a vague passing mention of the ice warriors (a reference to the classic series, be still my beating hearts). and as his time spent in this non-changeable event grows longer, he finds it harder to quietly accept the inevitable. fighting back is the doctor's raison d'etre. but today it will be his undoing.



lindsay duncan as adelaide is wonderful to behold, all tough and businesslike but with hints of love and compassion. adelaide embraces risk without a second thought, and the doctor admires that. but he's so impressed with her, and so upset about what's supposed to happen to her, that he breaks one of the rules -- the one about no spoilers for people's futures. he means to comfort her, but adelaide can't be expected to see things the way he does. as much as the doctor goes on about how his perceptions of time and the universe are painfully unique, he often fails to remember that in practice. instead of helping her, his relevation puts her through an even worse ordeal.

once the doctor breaks one time lord rule, the rest start to seem pretty damn stupid, especially because they're keeping him from getting what he wants, which is to save these people. damn the consequences -- he's the only time lord left! so the rules of time are his to command! he can do anything he wants. and no one can stop him. mwahahahahaaaaa!!!

i don't think i've ever wished harder for donna to pop in and smack him on the head.



but, nope. no one's there to stop our budding doc vader. as the perhaps-not-last of the time lords finally went off the rails completely, claiming his legacy with a power-mad arrogance (which is probably just the sort of thing that caused time lords to make up their dumb rules in the first place), i couldn't help wondering just when he really started losing it. i mean, things like this don't happen overnight, right?

arguably he's been kinda unhinged since the time war, but i prefer to imagine he snapped after returning donna to her human self, saving her life but going against her wishes, and dooming her to be ordinary forever ... not to mention lost to him forever as well. maybe the doctor's mind began to turn during that scene in "journey's end," where, his awful duty dispatched, he's standing in the pouring rain, heading back to the TARDIS all alone, having lost his beffie, someone he probably actually could have traveled with for the rest of her life. i like this idea because donna's granddad, wilfred mott, is there when it happens, looking at the doctor in that kindly knowing way of his and telling him he will think of the doctor on donna's behalf. and we know from the trailer at the end of "the waters of mars" that ten will seek out wilf again.



he will definitely need a friend. because when the dire resolution of his mars misadventure unfolds, it is dark indeed, akin to torchwood: children of earth dark. what adelaide does to stop him is so shocking and yet so clever -- exactly the sort of thinking he might applaud under different circumstances. in her own way, she does serve the companion's purpose of putting a lid on his excesses and keeping him grounded, although it's too late this time and she pays a terrible price to shake him out of his mania.



when it's all over, the doctor's actions leave history, the mars colonists, and us viewers totally messed up. and the doctor doesn't look so good himself. he knows he did wrong, but he doesn't want to face the music.

not just the music, mind you, but the song. ood song, that is. as the full weight of what he's done sinks in, the doctor leans against the TARDIS ... and hears the beautifully mournful psychic song of the tentacle-faced race known as the ood. then he sees him -- ood sigma, standing expectantly in the snow.

the doctor looks remorseful ... and afraid. "i've gone too far," he whispers. "is this it? my death? is it time?" he asks with distress.

why does the doctor think ood sigma is a harbinger of his death? well, he's seen this sort of thing before. in "logopolis," he kept encountering this white figure, hanging around at a distance from the action. the figure, called the watcher, was a signal to four that his time was up. (and was also apparently some future incarnation of himself ... wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey!) he didn't make a fuss about it then; in fact, seeing the watcher was a sort of comfort. so far, ood sigma doesn't seem to be a future incarnation of the doctor, but, hey, anything could happen.



but the doctor sure isn't comforted by sigma's appearance. in the last special, "planet of the dead," tennant's performance felt, by no means terrible, but definitely off his game, as though he just didn't have the energy to give it his all. here, he is fantastic -- not just in the broad physical shtick he does so well, but especially in the subtler moments. he does some of his best acting inside that damn spacesuit, for one thing. and also in this scene, where a dozen different emotions pass across the doctor's face as he slips into the TARDIS, still looking shaken to his core. the cloister bell -- that eternal harbinger of bad bad stuff for time lords -- chimes. and then the doctor turns defiant. "no," he says. and, slamming a lever on the console, he dematerializes the hell out of there. straight to, no doubt, the end of time. will he stop with the "i am the great and powerful time lord" jazz now? is he running away from his death because he wants to fix things or because that's what he does?

we'll know the answer in less than a week. i can't wait, but i'm also scared. the doctor's dark side has always been there, and it can be magnificent to behold in the right circumstances, but i don't want him to keep being frighteningly megalomaniacal till he dies. i hope he snaps back to some semblance of his usual self while dealing with all the delicious spoilery stuff yet to come. because you know that, when we see him again after regeneration, he will be very different ... and not just because he'll be wearing matt smith's face.

anyway. it seems i was right that RTD will be torturing the doctor to death for three episodes. SIGH. i never thought i'd say it, but all of this pain and drama and torment kind of makes me ready for a new doctor. (hmm. perhaps that is the plan.) i'm starting to miss the days when he just bopped out of the TARDIS with his companion and rushed off to embrace some new adventure. i mean, i am loving the angst and can't wait to see just how dark things are gonna get, but i really want the tenth doctor to have the proper wonderful sendoff he deserves. almost every single incarnation has died a heroic death, and if ten doesn't get one, i'm going to be well pissed off.



furthermore, if RTD doesn't give ten a heroic death and rip me into little pieces and throw me to the floor and make me cry just thinking about the ending -- as with donna and "journey's end," which to this day i have to shut off before it plays out or risk blubbering like a baby -- well, then he will have FAILED. so, russell. it is on. and you'd better bring it!

a love supreme

so, my friend brendan mullen died last week, which was a really awful shock to many, many people. me included.

if you don't know who he is, just google him and you'll see. that's him above, in a recent photo i nicked from his facebook profile, taken by the amazing gary leonard of brendan holding a much earlier portrait of himself, also taken by gary. (i hope it's ok to post this photo here; if not, please let me know and i'll take it down.) but as many (including the man himself) have already noted, brendan was a pioneer in the l.a. punk scene, nicknamed the mad scot (and possibly less flattering terms as well). so i, of course, met him through the local music world, when i was music editor at the l.a. reader. but i didn't even arrive in town until eight years after his legendary club, the masque, had closed. i first knew brendan as the booker for club lingerie; he'd leave me detailed voicemail messages with the listings for the week, which is how we did things in the dark time before e-mail.

anyway, brendan was one of the many original punks i got to know through going to shows and being a music critic -- people i loved meeting and talking to, but around whom i also felt kind of intimidated, as i was younger and had not "been there," as it were. but brendan was easy to be around, and he was fun to engage in conversation: so passionate, smart, funny, and wry. over the years i came to really adore him and was always happy to see him and his longtime companion, kateri butler, at a show or anticipate them being at a party -- especially at a party, as i am horribly uncomfortable in groups and they were guaranteed friendlies. but brendan's world was big, and as i struggle to write this, i feel like my own sense of loss is small and remote compared to what his real loved ones, and the communities he was part of, have lost.

still ... i knew brendan for a long time, and i felt comfortable with him. he was easy to talk to: as much as he could TALK, he was a good listener too. but we weren't really close pals, just simpatico people whose paths crossed a lot, especially after i took up with 00soul, who knows everyone from back in the day.

and one of my best memories ever revolves around brendan; indeed, it was set in motion by him. it happened last year -- almost exactly a year ago, in fact -- when i took my UK trip and very spur-of-the-moment met up with brendan in wales, where he was taking a break to visit his friend michael while caring for his sick (now deceased) brother. brendan had seen my facebook status about being in cardiff, and messaged me to come to hay-on-wye for a day. i wrote about that adventure at the time (see link), but it really stayed with me as a rare pleasure -- being welcomed like an old friend in a totally foreign place, spending a whole afternoon and evening just sharing stories and a meal and very fine conversation. i'd been traveling alone for most of a week by then, and, although i loved the independence of that, it was a good change to have friends to talk to.

the experience added a dimension to my friendship with brendan that hadn't existed before and made me feel like there was more to come. which maybe could have been so, but now that possibility is gone. i saw brendan a few more times, under circumstances both tragic and celebratory ... including at the bigfoot lodge in august, when 00soul and phast phreddie DJ'd to a packed house. i teased brendan then that the next time he needs a ride to london from the wilds of wales, he should just come right out and ask me, hahaha.

anyway. someone said that brendan was no saint, and that may well be true. but he was always kind to me, and i really liked him, and i'm very sad that he's gone. my heart kind of breaks when i think of kateri, and i wish i could do something more than write these words. but i have to celebrate that brendan was ever here at all ... because of my own little vignettes of remembrance, sure, but also because, for a lot of people, the world would have been very different without him.

so goodbye, brendan. you were a special person. and i'm really gonna miss you.

midnite dog

we interrupt this lack of service to make an announcement of epic proportions. epic RAWK proportions, that is ... the imperial dogs website is live at last!

long before i ever knew him or was even an adult, my main man don waller was involved in some sort of voodoo experiment with amplifiers, musical instruments, leather, chains, fur pants, and shock value. the imperial dogs had the misfortune of being ahead of their time, but they did do the original version of "this ain't the summer of love," more famously recorded by blue oyster cult. and they also impressed iggy pop.

anyway. but the point of the new website is, now there's a DVD of the group's live shenanigans, captured on B&W videotape in long beach on october 30, 1974 ... almost 35 years ago. and let me tell you, people -- i mean, i know i'm biased, but you've gotta see this thing. it is just, like, totally fierce and completely balls-out. the between-song banter alone is simply killin'. for a taste, visit the site to check out a couple of clips, or click the links above. it's an hour long, with a lush booklet full of history and lots of color pix (like the fetching one above of 23-year-old d-dub on stage), not to mention un-PC imagery, angry rants, dancing fools, and partial nudity. so don't turn it up too loud if you're at work.

back to black

this is rhys. he doesn't get to have a spiffy torchwood-logo'd action-y wallpaper image like the core torchwood team -- more's the pity, since he's totally worthy of one. rhys is the glue that holds gwen together ... and, while jack has been messing up badly at playing defender-of-earth, gwen's been doing a lot of the heavy lifting, with rhys there to carry her bag and come up with brilliant theories every step of the way.

this review is shorter and not as originally written, b/c my macbook's hard drive crashed yesterday, taking with it my work on "day five." thankfully, i have an awesome brother-in-law who sorted me out on trouble-shooting and buying advice (new HD on the way). and also a spare laptop, my trusty old ibook g4. so now come the KAPS:

SO TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH "DAY FIVE" AIRED LAST NIGHT ON BBC AMERICA, BUT I'LL STILL SAY SPOILERS AHEAD! BEWAAAAAAAAAAAARE.

we got some answers at last in this episode, which is rich in deep, dark irony. but one burning mystery remains: what will become of the TW SUV?

anyway. rhys didn't have much to do here, except sit on a park bench with a laptop, waiting for gwen's signal to transmit evidence to the world's media. and help gwen try to hide the kids rhiannon and johnny had taken in. btw, the aliens want the kids for the "hit." they're mainlining earth children. and it seems to be a growth market (or a serious addiction). it's kind of horrifying and kind of darkly funny -- very russell davies.

and so today the children must be collected -- all of them, say the 456. the afternoon quickly degenerates into scary scenes of the-monster-is-us: soldiers descending on the kids, citizens fighting back, everyone screaming, and gwen running running running ...



... but jack saves the day by reversing the polarity on the 456 -- which requires a child, steven, who will of course have to die. jack saves the world but kills his grandson, alienating his daughter for, probably, ever. his fellow middleman, frobisher, also pays in blood, after finally drawing the line when the PM taps him to be the government's symbolic dupe and publicly send his daughters for "inoculation." instead, froby goes home and shoots his family and himself, mere moments before jack fixes everything.

bridget takes the torchwood contact lenses and records the whole child-snatching operation, ruining the PM's career and leaving denise effectively in charge. boo-yah!



so where's RTD gonna go after all this horror and trauma? after burning down the whole bloody thing? ianto dead, and more of a mystery than ever? (it seems like a waste that ianto could have blossomed as a character and now won't get the chance; but i guess that's life.) torchwood disintegrated? jack mercilessly frying his own grandson, tears streaming down his cheeks while his daughter screams her son's name from outside?

well, where else but six months later, as rhys and a very pregnant gwen meet jack at night on a hilltop. she gives him his time agent wrist gizmo, and he says the whole planet is like a graveyard to him. she cries and says it wasn't your fault, but jack says ianto, steven, owen, tosh ... everybody was his fault. he began to like it, and look what he became. the monster was us ... but it was also jack.

well, like i said. he wasn't all that fantastic a person (charming or not) even before he became immortal. but i guess he tried. so maybe he'll live long enough to learn how to do better. but for now he's too tormented to stick around. so, time to go off to the intergalactic monastery and become the face of boe, or something. yep, he's running away -- again. gwen weeps ... for jack, for her lost purpose, for everything they've all lost. and rhys -- who is still there, like always -- says let's go home. gwen takes his comforting arm.

"yeah."

TW: CoE comes out on video this tuesday.

ask

WELL, THEN. HERE WE ARE AT "DAY FOUR" OF TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH. IT AIRS TONIGHT (THURSDAY) ON BBC AMERICA, AND THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS. SO STOP READING NOW IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS. AND THIS TIME ... SOMETHING REALLY REALLY BIG HAPPENS. AND I'M GONNA TALK ABOUT IT NEXT PARAGRAPH, SO YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

what becomes a casualty of captain jack harkness's hubris most? is it his fretful moue, his sadly unrequited love, or his own unerring grasp of the inevitable? maybe it's his way with a coffeemaker or his flair for finding just the right tie. ianto jones had all those things ... not to mention his share of secrets. yet it's not his secrets that get him killed in this episode, but his implacable faith in his boss/lover, who is fatally incapable of keeping his damn ego on a leash.

so yesterday we found out how jack's tied to the 1965 thing, and today the whole world finds out about that previous 456 visit. and torchwood: children of earth begins its inexorable slide off the rails. but at least now we understand better why jack was so blase about handing that little girl to the evil fairy creatures in "small worlds" -- he'd already done that sort of thing before.



in 1965, the 456 said a new strain of flu would kill multi-millions, then offered an antivirus in exchange for the "gift" of a dozen kids. jack may have been the decision-maker with the evil fairies -- giving them the girl so they wouldn't destroy the whole planet -- but he was just a middleman in 1965, like frobisher now. as jack's contact on that night explains, he got the job b/c he's the guy who doesn't care. in fact, he even says it's a pretty good deal.

gwen can't believe jack didn't see it was a protection racket. (well, darling, your fearless leader is many things, including not too bloody bright.) at once disappointed and self-righteous, ianto asks jack how come he never told him about this. "i tell you everything," ianto says. (hmm, really?) jack gets defensive and asks what he should have done, and ianto says that the jack he knew would have fought back.

yeah, well, be careful what you wish for, grasshopper.



meanwhile, after frobisher asks what the 456 will do with the children, the alien shows them ... via a terrified cameraman sent into the tank. amid the toxic muck and alien limbs, we see one of the children from 1965. wearing a sort of ventilator over its nose and mouth, he's kinda ... plugged into the multiheaded creature. still a child, in the same clothes even, and seemingly ... aware. everyone -- torchwood, frobisher, the PM and visitors -- recoils in horror.

hey, we don't hurt the kids, say the 456 (who look disturbingly like a cross between something out of doctor seuss and the aliens from alien), and they live a long time! frobisher loses it, and the creature flips out and plays a recording of froby asking to keep 1965 on the downlow. the cameraman gets out. and so does great britain's big secret. then the 456 give them one day to deliver the kids ... or else they'll annihilate the world.



the PM and his cabinet discuss what to do. exceptional weasel rick yates, played by voice of the daleks nicholas briggs, actually says they could maybe play on current fears about overpopulation and spin this as a good thing. nice! but the banality of evil is in full effect in these briefings (secretly recorded by lois's camera eyes), where they refer to children as "units." nothing like a little dehumanization to sanitize a dirty process.

all options exhausted, the PM tells his more squeamish underlings to save the hand-wringing for later: they've got 10 percent of their own children to sacrifice. well, not their children, of course -- the kids and grandkids of everyone at the table will be spared. but how do they pick the victims ... uh, units? denise riley (deborah finlay) has the genius idea to use the school leadleague (EDIT: misheard that and misunderstood it too!) tables to identify the bottom 10 percent. hey, they'll just be a burden on society anyway. it's practically a win-win!

time for gwen to make stuff happen again. she sends rhys and a laptop full of video to an undisclosed location, ready to transmit everything to the media. she also shows the info to johnson and turns her to their side. via lois, she confronts the PM and makes him let jack and ianto into thames house. gwen can't save clem, though: the alien has had a vestigial connection to him all along, and kills him by remote. poor clem.



jack cowboys into thames house with ianto. he's going to confront the 456 and show ianto how he'll fight back. and then he kills ianto. he doesn't actually murder the lad, but when jack rashly threatens the 456 with war if they try to take earth's children, the alien responds by locking down thames house and releasing a deadly virus, killing all the panicked cockroaches of government trapped inside (except for dekker, who somehow makes it into a decon suit without breathing the air).

why didn't jack just do something more useful, like examine clem to find out how the 456 control the children? that's what the doctor would have done.

so maybe there's supposed to be something tragically romantic about ianto marching bright-eyed to his death by his lover's side. but mostly it's infuriatingly pointless. also, i knew it was coming, and not 'cause i was spoiled, b/c i wasn't. it was just ... obvious. so many references to TW agents dying young = someone's gonna get it. and RTD is the joss whedon of brit tv: if a couple is happy, one of them must die (or get trapped in an alternate universe or fly back to their own time or whatever).



after his starry-eyed convo with his sister about jack, i knew for sure we were going to lose our lovely ianto, he of the dry wit, sharp outfits, strong coffee, insane detail-mongering, and wickedly clever schemes. i mean, it's no doubt impossible for anyone to resist those 51st-century pheromones and that flashy immortality, but, although one of the things i've loved about torchwood is its delight in unapologetic boy love, it's clear that ianto did struggle with his feelings for jack. he seemed to have strictly liked girls up to that point and even had a fiancee when we first met him ... a fiancee who was turning into a cyberman and nearly destroyed everyone, but poor ianto still loved her.

so maybe ianto also had a fatal need to be needed. in any case, jack's willing playmate crumples to the floor while the captain cries that it's all his fault. ianto weeps and says, "i love you." jack moans, "don't." then he begs ianto to stay with him. (mixed messages to the mofugging end!) "don't forget me," pleads ianto. jack says he never could -- not even in 1,000 years' time. he promises! ianto dies, and jack begs, "don't leave me, please."



this is the part of loving humans that the doctor can't deal with: watching them die. but jack always plunges right in -- we know he had at least two serious relationships in the 20th century, and probably more -- the pain be damned. it is hard not to think that, on some level, the allegation that he doesn't care is true. people are shiny good fun, and adoration is fantastic, but ultimately they're just so much tissue paper to jack.

anyway. the 456 win. jack sobs and kisses ianto one last time. then he slumps dead beside his dead lover, his hand on ianto's shoulder.

the cabinet watch it all in horror. denise says they have to surrender. 35 million children, says the PM. or 6.7 billion people, counters denise. (the needs of the many, yada yada ... .) the PM tells red-eyed frobisher to put the plan into action.

in a makeshift morgue, gwen walks forward, alone, to ID the bodies. she uncovers jack and looks at him, the tiniest smile playing around her lips. then she steels herself and pulls back ianto's shroud. jack wakes up and remembers. gwen cries and tenderly straightens ianto's tie. (sob!) jack hugs her as she whispers words of sorrow and defeat.

"there's nothing we can do."

stuck in the middle with you

GOOD EVENING AND WELCOME TO MY REVIEW OF TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH "DAY THREE." BBC AMERICA WILL BE SHOWING IT TOMORROW NIGHT (WEDNESDAY) AT 9ET/PT. SPOILERS FOLLOW, SO DON'T READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANNA KNOW WHAT HAPPENS.

yesterday, torchwood regrouped as the world prepared for the 456's arrival. today, tension mounts around the globe and inside the british government, as the secret of 1965 threatens to blow up big. meanwhile, jack and co. get back to work with a renewed sense of camaraderie. but this is torchwood, so you know that's not gonna last.

gwen, jack, ianto, and rhys set up the hub2, as rhys christens their new HQ in an abandoned warehouse. it's dank and has no electricity, and jack has to wear tracksuit bottoms and no coat. he still manages to be all inspirational leader-y ... then accidentally reveals he knew gwen was pregnant before rhys did. the man-fur flies, and rhys flounces out.

but this is no time to pout. torchwood's assets are down to a couple of guns, a now-dead laptop, some contact lenses, and not much else. the software's still on the server ... if only they had some computer equipment. and power. and proper trousers.



ever-resourceful gwen suggests a crime spree: cue slightly slapstick montage of the quartet staging fights and posing as waiters to score credit cards, laptops, even a car. (fancy wheels are essential.) ianto brings back other necessities: coffee, new clothes, and ... perhaps most implausibly of all ... for jack, a new coat, just like the old one. jack is back!

and he really ought to call alice, whose nervous attempts to contact him finally attract johnson's peeps. they soon work out who she is. her mom was a torchwood agent too, who died of old age. ("rare for torchwood," observes johnson. word.) that means alice gets to be all kickass when johnson's minions come around. she tells steven to do like they used to in granny's games. granny torchwood, that is. they flee ... and alice BELTS one dude with a cutting board, then takes his gun. go, alice! but johnson, though impressed, has them surrounded. then steven freezes, pointing to the sky.

it's the same around the world, kids all frozen and pointing. steven. frobisher's daughters. and all the children at rhiannon and johnny's impromptu day-care center, set up because parents gotta work, the schools are closed, and johnny needs the extra cash.

also pointing, of course, is clem -- who's just been sprung from the camden clink by gwen (with a little help from pc andy), who continues to be the get-it-done star of this show.



she not only retrieves the tearfully grateful clem, who's been having increasingly intense 1965 flashbacks, but also talks lois into wearing the contact lenses ... the special torchwood contacts with camera lenses, lipreading software so monitors can "hear" what's happening, and texting capability for communicating with the wearer.

lois is impressed, but scared to help torchwood again. it's treason! she can't do this -- it puts her right on the front line. anyway, frobisher doesn't take her into the 456 room. only bridget. gwen says please help us, lois habiba. you're our only remaining hope. lois can't. sorry. but she takes the lenses.

earlier, at the hub2, ianto wants to know if jack will ever stop not-dying. jack's pretty sure the can't-die thing is forever. so someday jack will see ianto die, "of old age," and just keep going? yeah, says jack. well, says ianto impishly, better make the most of it! they try to get some alone time, but rhys won't leave. rats. instead, they review clem's case: 1965, scotland orphanage, yada yada. jack's remembering something. and after he sees 40-year-old pictures of his fellow assassinees, he totally knows them. he just never knew their names. who were they, asks ianto. but jack just grabs his coat and runs out. typical.

all the children in the world (and clem) are pointing at thames house, as a ball of fire stabs down from the clouds, straight through the roof. ianto and rhys watch from atop the hub2.



frobisher dashes into the 456 room; dekker's already there. they watch the fire flow into the glass enclosure, boiling up inside. and now something, dimly visible, is in there.

"we are here," say the kids, and go back to playing. clem tells gwen they're back. she takes him to torchwood.

at thames house, frobisher makes bug-eyed but resolute first contact. the 456 speaks in an almost hypnotic low baritone ... and also makes weird, animal-like howls and roars. it thrashes wildly at regular intervals, causing a giant, vaguely vulture-like head to hit the glass and yellowish brown goop to be flung against the windows. super-gross.

scared though he is, frobisher has to get this 1965 stuff sorted out for boss and country. it's his duty, you know. he asks the alien to keep the previous encounter with britain off the record ... and the 456 says ok. phew! then frobisher and dekker bail, looking at each other like, that was freeeeeaky!

but frobisher scarcely has time to re-rack his nerves before the PM calls to say, guess what? you get to stay our point man on this.



that's how the PM placates UNIT colonel oduya (charles abomeli) and american general pierce (colin mcfarlane), who are very unhappy about an alien ambassador being on british soil ... and suspicious that the landing was clearly planned, without their input. the PM says well, the 456 came to us, what could we do? and he craftily suggests letting the civil service handle dealings with the 456. this sitch calls for a middleman. and who better than frobisher, since he's already spoken to the 456? plus, mwahaha, he's expendable.

pierce demands the PM guarantee he won't enter the negotiation room. yeah, not a problem. ok, deal.

meanwhile, jack steals mrs. frobisher's mobile, then calls froby and threatens to expose everything if he doesn't let jack talk to the 456. but frobisher has alice and steven, nyah! so jack needs to keep it zipped. jack threatens frobisher's family, but frobisher knows it's a bluff. and he's gotta go, because he has a date with a goop-spewing alien.

at thames house for the first official negotiation, everyone's in place -- including lois, who bluffs her way in by implying there's something "private" between her and frobisher. bridget seems to have heard this sort of thing before. "don't go thinking you're the first," she sniffs. lois is wearing the contacts. torchwood's in!

gwen, ianto, rhys, and clem watch via laptop as frobisher requests that the 456 stop using their children for communication (it agrees). then he takes a question from the audience (aka general pierce): why did it come to britain? the 456, keeping its part of the bargain, basically says oh, no reason. gwen and ianto realize the government got the 456 to lie ... but now the thing says they want a gift -- your children. ten percent will do nicely, thanks. clem freaks and says they want to take them, like they did before, like "the man" did. the man's coming back too -- in fact, he's here! and according to clem's flashback, he's ... jack. say what?



jack stands there, accused and guilty. we flash back to 1965, and now jack's there too, in his coat, telling the children to walk into the light.

loyal gwen says no, jack fights aliens. right, jack? no, says jack, "i gave them the kids." ianto looks stricken. in 1965, jack gave them 12 children. what for? "as a gift."

baby's on fire

LOOKEE HERE, IT'S A REVIEW OF TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH, DAY TWO, AIRING TOMORROW NIGHT (TUESDAY) ON BBC AMERICA. YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS -- SPOILERS AHEAD!!

yesterday's review/recap of day one was rather out-of-hand, lengthwise. this one's shorter, hurray!

ok, so. torchwood's down but not out ... not while the heart is still beating. better yet, said heart, aka gwen cooper, is blasting away two-fisted. look out, haters!

when gwen comes to after the explosion, choking on the smoke and temporarily deafened, the hub's just a fiery crater. two EMTs arrive -- but they're really assassins! the people who blew up her workplace and hurt, maybe killed, her friends? gwen so kicks their asses, taking their guns and the ambulance, then questioning one lackey, who screams (b/c she shoots him in the leg) that he works for the government and was only following orders.

pc andy (tom price, yay!) overhears johnson tell her minions that gwen and ianto are terrorists. he protests, but later directs her crew to gwen's place, still insisting she's not dangerous. gwen, having rushed home to collect rhys and get the hell out of there, pops up and blasts the black ops' SUV ... but only the tires. some terrorist, smirks pc andy.



dekker tells frobisher that the 456's message is instructions for building something. which they're doing, on the top floor of thames house, aka the HQ of british secret service MI5. frobisher says how come the 456 can communicate with such detail but still uses the children? dekker says it's to scare the humans, duh.

frobisher chats with the PM, asking whether any other country has been contacted besides britain. seems not. still worried about repercussions if the world learns their secret, froby wonders how long they can keep the previous visit quiet. then he actually thanks the PM for trusting him with all this responsibility. what a tool. the PM loftily informs frobisher that all he's done is put him on the front line -- the first to fall. indeed.

alice isn't really in this episode, except for repeated scenes trying to call jack. but he can't come to the phone right now, b/c he's having the worst. day. EVAR.

johnson's minions find an arm, shoulder, and part of a head at the hub site. they whisk it all off in a body bag, watched from afar by a grim-faced, still bloody and dusty ianto.



jack's body parts go to a government facility, where the bag's put in a cell with camera surveillance. pretty soon it starts to fill out, so johnson has the bloody skeleton chained to the cell wall. apparently they found the back of his head; otherwise, wouldn't we see part of jack's face instead of just a gory skull?

most of this ep is about running and rescue (and regeneration ... not just of jack but of TW itself), but we get some of the nicest character moments here too, amid all the chaos. especially lovely is how rhys learns of gwen's pregnancy, a surprisingly light scene that wonderfully demonstrates how tuned-in these two lovers are. (nice work, writer john fay.) they're bumping along in the back of a lorry loaded with potatoes -- their stealth transport to london.



gwen says she feels sick, even though she never gets travel sick, and then flumfers a bit, asking rhys, you know how some announcements go better in your head? and he's like, whattaya mean, announcements? and she just kinda smiles and looks away for a sec, and he totally gets it without her even saying. in spite of the dire situation and uncertain future, they're sooo delighted. sweet.

it's back to business when they meet up with lois, who's proving to be as tenacious and one-step-ahead savvy as any torchwood operative. she overhears when johnson calls froby to report jack's revival, then bugs him about the torchwood thing, risking bridget's wrath. lois intercepts gwen's call to frobisher's office and meets the fugitives at a cafe. while handing them cash for a meal, the floor plan to jack's prison, and the salt, brown sauce, and sugar, she fills them in on the blank-page assassinations. she doesn't even lose her cool when gwen huffs where's frobisher (torchwood's usual government liaison)? she just says he's the one who ok'd the bombing.



all the while, lois works out her own moral confusion -- if TW are the bad guys, why doesn't their file say so? and if TW are the good guys, why's the government trying to kill them, and who is lois working for, exactly?

rhiannon's husband, johnny (rhodri lewis), steps up too. soldiers ransack their house in the middle of the night, searching for ianto, who later sneaks a message to his sis inside the morning paper. it says meet him at the place where their dad broke ianto's leg, and bring a laptop. rhiannon's upset that he's put them in the middle of all this, but johnny insists they're the only family ianto's got. so he's not a total homophobic oaf, after all. he may change his mind about helping when he finds out ianto took his car, though.

in london, we see the scary traffic circle not once but TWICE. eyiieeee!

fleshed-out now, all white and nekkid, jack yanks on his chains and yells a challenge. johnson appears through a portal high above him, snarks, then pours gallons and gallons of concrete into the cell. now, that's containment!

lois, gwen, and rhys hatch a crazy scheme to rescue jack: gwen and rhys will pose as undertakers picking up rupesh's body. the ruse holds, even after the escorting soldier flirts hard with gwen, and rhys loses it. the grunt narrows his eyes and accuses them: "you're a COUPLE, aren't you?" ahaha.

but of course they can't rescue jack b/c he's drowned in concrete. plus, johnson and crew tip to the plan and bring on the firepower. (gwen's only got two hands, after all.) they're nicked -- but then there's a huge CRASH! it's ianto. and he's driving a forklift truck ... which he uses to extract jack's entire cell. gwen and rhys hop on, and they're away. it's totally ridiculous -- and totally awesome!



ianto drops the block of jack into (what else?) a quarry, and it breaks apart. jack awakens as the trio drive to the bottom to retrieve him. he stands in the rubble, still naked, with an indecipherable look on his face. then he says, "told you i'd be back!" irrepressible. gwen, averting her eyes, hands him a jacket and says get in, we've got work to do.

back at thames house, frobisher, dekker, and bridget -- an odd mirror image of ianto, gwen, and rhys -- check out the finished construction job. it's a big room, dominated by a glass chamber being filled with a prescribed combination of gases -- poison to humans. dekker says perhaps the room is an ambassadorial suite. or a throne room. or maybe a slaughterhouse.

they muse how the 456 will arrive inside this sealed glass chamber. no clue, but whoever they are, they're coming for britain. bridget wants to know why. dekker says indeed: why, mr. frobisher? the bureaucrat just walks away, leaving dekker to approach the now fog-filled chamber. he breathes on the outside of the glass and adds some fog of his own.

tick tick boom

the 21st century is when everything changes, and torchwood is ready.



and torchwood fans are ready too -- ready for series 3 of this hit doctor who spin-off to begin, after well more than a year's gone by since the heartbreaking end of series 2. the new season consists of only five episodes, already shown july 6-10 in the UK and debuting tomorrow night on BBC america. torchwood: children of earth will usher in the new BBCA HD channel and be aired from 9 to 10:15 pm ET/PT -- thus, without the usual slash-and-burn edits required to make most british series fit US tv length standards.

i'll post daily review/recaps of each episode, so here's the first one. but first, the obligatory spoiler warning. YES, THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 1 OF TORCHWOOD: CHILDREN OF EARTH. DON'T READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANNA KNOW. 'K? THX.

this installment plunges in with a creepy flashback, followed by a string of spooky incidents and surprising reveals that jet-propel us to the mind-blowing cliffhanger. creator/writer/exec producer russell t. davies sketches in backstory along the way, which is great for anyone new to torchwood. but longtime fans might be disappointed that we only get a passing nod to dearly departed team members tosh and owen, who died horribly last season. they sacrificed themselves in the line of duty -- something that happens a lot with the titular secret alien-fighting organization. which didn't make the pair's departure any easier for me to take, but clearly, surviving leader captain jack harkness (john barrowman) and his team, gwen cooper (eve myles) and ianto jones (gareth david-lloyd) -- all pictured above -- have moved on.

a brief prologue in 1965 scotland shows adorable children getting off a bus in the middle of the night ... and getting swallowed up by a blinding light. then it's just another morning in present-day cardiff, where the underground torchwood base is hidden by the bay. gwen's at an ATM, wearing a cool leather jacket with yet another awesome bag slung over her shoulder. a mom bustles about her kitchen, reassuring her kids that that bully won't bother them again. a dad with a briefcase dashes past his daughters at breakfast, promising to text his wife later. another mom warns her son not to let the cats in. and gwen's hubby, rhys williams (kai owen), drives his delivery truck through a neighborhood.

all around these adults, children are all just stopped dead in their tracks. it's a reliably creepy sci-fi trope that builds up unease as it recurs and expands throughout the episode ... turns out it's happening everywhere in the world. at first the frustrated adults think it's some kind of a put-on. but ALL those kids in the crosswalk, frozen in place? not. normal.



not normal is par for the course on torchwood, usually bullet-pointed as the darker, sexier, more morally complex offspring of british sci-fi institution doctor who (which was revived in 2005 by UK tv guru davies). yet, while entertaining and at times thought-provoking, the show has been pretty uneven, not always as challenging or emotionally affecting as who has been. TW is an echo, with captain jack himself serving as RTD's own version of the doctor, a time lord with multiple lifespans and seemingly endless knowledge of the universe, who has a knack for showing up to avert a crisis or at least lessen the damage.

thanks to a cosmic accident of sorts, jack, originally an ex-time agent and con man from the 51st century (uhm ... probably), can't die. he's lived for ages and really isn't quite human anymore, so he's kind of like a time lord, except he has sex. the doctor inspired jack to do better, and eventually he decided to remake torchwood, previously a lethally reactionary government organization, in the doctor's honor. jack's crew has faced some bad, ugly, menacing stuff, but usually they're only defending some people or cardiff or the UK ... not the entire world (with exceptions). children of earth ups the ante with a sweeping tale that pits torchwood against not only a relentless global alien menace but also the horrors of bureaucracy and plausible deniability (shudder).

director euros lyn balances the epic and the intimate in RTD's rumination on secrets, lies, and conspiracies. gorgeous panoramas of such settings as cardiff and london and pell-mell action sequences complement the tight two-shots, close-ups on small gestures, and subtle, slowly revealed connections among the characters. there are so many parallels here b/w individual and collective lying, and the lengths to which the characters will go to maintain their lies. just like we all tell lies to ourselves and others, whether big or small, whether just to coworkers and loved ones or the whole world. here the fabrications, designed to conceal everything from innocuous facts to horrifying truths, may be an integral part of who certain characters are ... which is never the whole picture, of course. maybe we don't see some of these supporting players at their best, but the lies the main characters tell begin to alter some fundamental perceptions about themselves. even jack, who we know is a bloody born liar.

but this ain't a philosophy lecture; it's torchwood, with all the rapid-fire sniping, snarky quips, unabashed boy love, and full-tilt running you'd expect. still, episode 1 is a romp compared to the the devastation awaiting us down the line -- much of which revolves around how sometimes what we lie about can be incredibly destructive, in ways we never intended and could not have foreseen.

what kind of stuff could jack be hiding from his peeps? where do i start? OK, he has a daughter. (only one?)



that's her, above. her name's alice (lucy cohu, totally awesome), and we saw her before, telling her young son, steven, not to let the cats in. jack lies that he wants to take the kid out, but alice says no way. she knows what he's up to -- she's his daughter, after all, even though she keeps away from him b/c he doesn't age and she does, and that's freaky. steven doesn't even know that "uncle jack" is really grandpa.

turns out ianto has family too -- his sister, rhiannon (the charming katy wix), who we also saw before, talking to her kids about the bully. and no, ianto cannot take them out today. besides, they need to talk. by which she means, is he gay or what? a friend spotted him and jack having dinner. ianto first, you guessed it, lies, saying that's his boss. but rhiannon guilt-trips him about not being around since their dad died, so he confesses. moony-eyed ianto says it's not men, it's just him. only him. and he's definitely not lying now. sigh. then his beefy bro-in-law comes in, looking like a giant hobbit, and brays, "i hear you're taking it up the ass!" great. BTW, says bro-in-law, your car's been nicked. triple-deadlocked or not, the torchwood SUV is gone baby gone.



earlier, at a hospital, jack and ianto banter about whether they're a "couple" while conning dr. rupesh patanjali (rik makarem) into letting them see a dead man ... from whom they extract an alien entity. rupesh catches them -- he's heard about torchwood (like half of cardiff, despite its alleged secret status) and seems interested in joining. but i say let rhys join instead, since he's the one who figures the weird kid thing is timed to a british schedule -- right before school, and then at break, for example.



yes, well. the government is way ahead of rhys. earlier, in london, briefcase dad -- aka home office bureaucrat john frobisher (peter capaldi, above) -- fakes a pleasant chat with a colonel from global alien-defense task force UNIT when a young woman arrives with the tea. the colonel is actually filling frobisher in on the weird kid thing, but mustn't discusss such formidable things around the new assistant.



her name's lois habiba (cush jumbo), and she answers to someone far more formidable than UNIT: frobisher's right-hand woman, bridget spears (susan brown):



rupesh is hanging around outside the hub, so gwen goes to chat with him while jack and ianto argue more about the couple thing. both agree they hate that word ... and both are totally, yes, lying. gwen gets in some exposition for those who've never seen TW before. rupesh earnestly blathers about how some people can't deal with knowing aliens exist now ... like the christian lady, his first case, who killed herself b/c this revelation made her feel insignificant. "it's like science has won," he quotes her as saying. haha, RTD, you naughty atheist, you!

but this is no time for reflection, b/c the kids are going off again. they stop. and then they start screaming!



that noise ceases, and then they chant, "we we we we we we we we are we are we are we are coming. we are coming. we are coming. we are coming. we are coming." OMG, says gwen, while ianto videos it all. cut to a mental hospital, where an older man is doing the same thing. the staff is mystified. they also video.

when it stops, the kids are normal again. but the man falls to his knees and cries, "they've found me!"

frobisher's office is inundated with calls ... including one from jack. but lois doesn't know him or torchwood ("how do you spell it?" hee!). however, resourceful and curious lois (as plucky and nosy as another lois, superman's main squeeze ms. lane) does some research on the down-low. meanwhile, mr. dekker (ian gelder) comes to tell frobisher that, as dekker warned, the 456 are back -- referring, it seems, to whatever's going on with the children. frobisher looks scared.

cut to frobisher's car going around a big-ass traffic circle. now, THAT'S scary!

frobisher is going to tell the prime minister (nicholas farrell, all supercilious) the 456 are back. dekker scoffs that elected officials come and go, but the 456 were there before him and will be there long after ... as will they, the civil service. "the cockroaches of government," dekker declares. later, the PM, who knows about the 456, tells frobisher to erase the historical record ... but the PM doesn't know anything about it, capish? time to issue a blank page -- a nice little euphemism for deleting said historical event. and anyone associated with it.

which includes, we learn after lois snoops some more, three people to off ... plus captain jack! whoa. so maybe jack, despite his protests to the contrary, has seen this sort of thing before.

gwen visits the man in the asylum, timothy white (paul copley):



she learns he had a scottish accent when he first entered care, as a child. she talks to him about "we are coming." he looks scared but denies aliens exist. then he sniffs her and says she's smelling, i mean telling, the truth, so he talks. (psychic sense of smell? ahaha!) he was one of the kids on that bus in 1965. a light took his friends, but he ran. occasionally, tim stutters something over his shoulder, as though talking to someone who isn't there. he says there were people too, but he can't remember. and, he says, they're coming back.

before gwen leaves, tim tells her his original name: clement mcdonald. he adds, almost casually, that she's pregnant. congratulations! whoa.

jack goes to the hospital to sweet-talk a kid out of rupesh. but the doc is no eager-beaver potential new recruit after all. he's a lying bastard, in fact, who shoots jack and lets in some black-clad commando types with guns, along with their boss, the hardass johnson (liz may brice).



she orders her minions to bring in timothy white and shoots jack when he revives, then tells rupesh they think jack's immortality is connected to the torchwood hub (wrong!), which makes it a target (uh-oh!). then they rummage about in jack's abdomen. gross.

at the asylum, clem smells trouble. he splits mere moments before the fake cops come to take him away. at the hub, ianto has the deets on clem gwen wanted, but she's not listening -- she's staring at a high-tech scanner image confirming she's preggers.

jack pelts in: he woke up with rupesh dead beside him (shot by johnson). then he sees the scan. gwen's stunned, but happy. so is jack: "ianto, we're having a baby!" he rests his hand on the scanner, and an alarm goes off. there's a bomb inside him OMG! jack shoves his team toward the exit, over their horrified protests.

above ground, the "we are coming" starts again, and everyone freaks out. at the hub, jack drags ianto away from his post. "there'll be nothing left of you," ianto cries plaintively. "i can survive anything," jack blusters. really? the red emergency lights flash, the music swells, and OMG nooooo! jack kisses his boy, maybe for the last time, before ianto takes the water tower lift to outta there. "i'll come back," jack says. "i always do." it's not all that convincing. jack has died a lot of ways, but never by gut bomb. he watches the countdown's final seconds and closes his eyes. outside, gwen runs along the dock.

BOOOOOOOOOM!!!! she falls, as flames blaze around her.

and the children say, "we are coming ... back."