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major_clangerIf nothing else, The Children of Earth seems to be polarising fan opinion, and I can see why. On the one hand, it delivered some incredibly powerful television; on the other, it was an impressive veneer over a plot with some painfully stereotyped elements and a resolution right out of the 'reverse the polarity of the neutron flow' stable, albeit with rather nastier collateral damage than normal.
The 456's motivation was an interesting concept - were we meant to infer that the creature's outbursts were in effect withdrawal symptoms, and that the 1965 children were somehow running out? (And why the need to go from a dozen to tens of millions?) A nice touch too that we never got a particularly good look at the creature, although whether this was to keep a sense of mystery or just down to limitations of FX remains to be seen.
TCoE also did a good job of laying out Captain Jack's situation: he is denied even the option of the way out that Frobisher took. Jack is doomed to spend eternity living with the knowledge that he has been responsible to a greater or lesser degree for the death of almost everyone he has cared about, and increasingly is turning to the Doctor as a role model - the eternal wanderer.
There are conflicting rumours on whether there will be more Torchwood. On the face of it it seems that Torchwood as an organisation is gone. But I doubt it will be that simple; we have seen that UNIT, Torchwood and MI5 have all been spying on one another, and there are too many layers of conspiracy to definitely say that we have seen the end of any one of them. (It was almost an incidental detail that most of MI5 got wiped out in this story.)
One criticism I have is that it just feels very hard to see TCoE as being in the same dramatic universe as New Who, and in particular the near-slapstick of The Aliens of London or the over-the-top excess of The Sound of Drums. (As another aside, the Who/Torchwood UK of the 2005-2010 is running through an awful lot of Prime Ministers.) And the events of The Stolen Earth / Journey's End all seem to have been forgotten, including - if I recall correctly - that Gwen met the Doctor, if only by video link. In fact, this might almost have been better as a stand-alone drama along the lines of (the in some ways very similar) Invasion: Earth.
A Hugo contender for next year, though? I think it likely (and would I ever have imagined I'd have said that about Torchwood?), certainly more so than Doctor Who unless one of the remaining specials really works out.
The 456's motivation was an interesting concept - were we meant to infer that the creature's outbursts were in effect withdrawal symptoms, and that the 1965 children were somehow running out? (And why the need to go from a dozen to tens of millions?) A nice touch too that we never got a particularly good look at the creature, although whether this was to keep a sense of mystery or just down to limitations of FX remains to be seen.
TCoE also did a good job of laying out Captain Jack's situation: he is denied even the option of the way out that Frobisher took. Jack is doomed to spend eternity living with the knowledge that he has been responsible to a greater or lesser degree for the death of almost everyone he has cared about, and increasingly is turning to the Doctor as a role model - the eternal wanderer.
There are conflicting rumours on whether there will be more Torchwood. On the face of it it seems that Torchwood as an organisation is gone. But I doubt it will be that simple; we have seen that UNIT, Torchwood and MI5 have all been spying on one another, and there are too many layers of conspiracy to definitely say that we have seen the end of any one of them. (It was almost an incidental detail that most of MI5 got wiped out in this story.)
One criticism I have is that it just feels very hard to see TCoE as being in the same dramatic universe as New Who, and in particular the near-slapstick of The Aliens of London or the over-the-top excess of The Sound of Drums. (As another aside, the Who/Torchwood UK of the 2005-2010 is running through an awful lot of Prime Ministers.) And the events of The Stolen Earth / Journey's End all seem to have been forgotten, including - if I recall correctly - that Gwen met the Doctor, if only by video link. In fact, this might almost have been better as a stand-alone drama along the lines of (the in some ways very similar) Invasion: Earth.
A Hugo contender for next year, though? I think it likely (and would I ever have imagined I'd have said that about Torchwood?), certainly more so than Doctor Who unless one of the remaining specials really works out.
