When Torchwood arrives on the scene of a brutal murder, WPC Gwen Cooper’s burning curiosity is challenged. Their attitude, their approach and their technology is at odds with everything she believes in. But investigating the investigators leads her into a dark, paranoid world she never imagined existed.
Originally Titled Flotsam and Jetsam
Length 50’39”
First transmitted
9pm, 22nd October 2006, BBC Three and BBC HD
9pm, 25th October 2006, BBC Two
Both in double-bill with Day One, with no end credits, the words Coming Up replacing Next Time, and no saga sell on the latter episode – combined credits appeared at the end of the second episode (the BBC HD version had individual end credits). In between the episodes on BBC Three a Torchwood logo flashed on the screen, followed by two voiceovers with a generic BBC Three trail in between. On BBC Two, just the logo appeared.
Guest Cast
Kai Owen (Rhys Williams); Indira Virma (Suzie Costello); Guy Lewis (Young Cop); Tom Price (PC Andy); Jason May (SOCO); Rhys Swinburn (Body); Olwen Medl (Yvonne); Gwyn Vaughan-Jones (DI Jacobs); Dion Davis (Officer); Jâms Thomas (Hospital Porter); Paul Kasey (Weevil); Mark Heal (Security Guard); Gary Shepheard (Pizza Lad); Gwilym Havard Davies (Man); Cathryn Davies (Woman [Linda])
Writer Russell T Davies
Director Brian Kelly
Setting
Cardiff, over three days. Not between 27th April and 20th August (it’s pitch black by the time Gwen arrives at Torchwood the first time, where a clock reads 8:35).
Episode probably starts on either a Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday (the officers are making plans for “on Friday”, not “tomorrow night”) however when Gwen meets Torchwood, Toshiko explains that the porter has a fake alibi for the next 48hrs, so his body will only be missing three days when it’s found “on Tuesday”, making the second night of this story a Friday.
This is set some time after the events of ‘Doomsday’ (2006) as Jack refers to “the battle of Canary Wharf” – that story was set sometime in 2007, after ‘The Christmas Invasion’ (2005), which was set Christmas 2006, making this episode most likely to occur in September 2007.
Did You Spot?
The opening scene was recorded a moments walk away from the final scene of ‘Rose’ (2005), with familiar architecture around. Gwen’s view of the scene appears to form the basis of the first viral advert to be released (below), although she watches for too long for it to be a precise match (the second of the virals also seems to be based on this scene, although from an unseen observer). One of the victims is called “Rani”, although also a perfectly normal name it happens to be the name of a villain from 80s Doctor Who. It’s 2:01am both times we see Gwen in bed. The Torchwood van has a “CF06” license plate, so was licensed in Cardiff between March and September 2006. Jubilee Pizza also operates in Utah, according to a cut scene from ‘Dalek’ (2005), itself a reference to the Big Finish Production ‘Jubilee’. Stuck to Jack’s lamp we see a pair of anaglyph 3D glasses – similar to those used by the Doctor in ‘Army of Ghosts’ and ‘Doomsday’ (2006) – the following week’s issue of the Radio Times confirmed in an interview with Edward Thomas that the Doctor had passed on his knowledge of the application of these for seeing “void stuff”. The space-time rift created in 1869 (‘The Unquiet Dead’, 2005) and seen again in 2006 (‘Boom Town’, 2005) plays a major part in the series.
Twisted Reality
Gwen is drinking from a cup that looks suspiciously like that used by Starbucks, but with a different colour lid and a subtly different logo. PC Andy references the show ‘CSI: Crime Scene Investigations’, the long running series that began in 2000 and has since spun off a number of other shows. The real life location for Jubilee Pizza is a takeaway of a different kind – selling kebabs.
Love is in the Air
…but Estrogen certainly isn’t. It would never survive the evaporation process well enough to make the rainwater in Cardiff into a contraceptive, no matter how much it rains in the fair city – Jack has nothing to worry about. Gwen has a live-in boyfriend who she lies to about the details of her work. Jack thinks that Ianto looks good in a suit. Jack believes that to be forgotten by Gwen would be “kind of tragic”. Owen uses a love potion to get the attentions of a girl and her boyfriend (it’s unclear if he enjoys the second kiss and hails a taxi to take them both home, or if it’s just to avoid being hit by starting an argument between them and dashing off).
If it’s Alien, it’s Ours
Costello’s glove, possibly the hand in the jar, the Weevils, the “invisible lift” (caused by a machine with a faulty chameleon circuit landing on it – the TARDIS in ‘Boom Town’ (2005)), Toshiko’s magical scanner, Owen’s love potion and possibly the amnesia pill are all based on alien tech.
Torchwood Shop: Now Open for Business
This “secret” organisation’s car is clearly branded for all to see and the Weevil is wearing Torchwood branded pyjamas.
Cymru am Byth
All the police officers wear the bilingual uniforms with Heddlu alongside the English translation Police. The Torchwood reception contains brochures for Snowdonia. Jack believes Gwen’s negative nature is very Welsh.
To Live and Die in Cardiff
The body at the start, John Tucker, 19, is resurrected, but ultimately dies. Prior to the episode, Costello has bumped off Sarah Pallister, 72, and Rani Ghosh, 45 (all of whom have experienced similar resurrections). Gwen witnesses a hospital porter being killed by a Weevil. Captain Jack dies of a bullet wound to the head, and Suzie Costello then kills herself by gunshot wound through the jaw.
Sounds Brilliant
When Owen uses his love potion, we hear a segment of Spitting Games, from Snow Patrol’s first album “Final Straw”. When Gwen breaks up a bar-room brawl, the first song from The Pipettes’ first album (both entitled “We are the Pipettes”) is playing on the jukebox. Jubilee Pizza has “She Moves in Her Own Way” playing – the fifth single from “Inside In/Inside Out”, the first album from The Kooks.
It should also be noted that the opening theme is based heavily on a track used in ‘Army of Ghosts’ (2006) in which the Doctor sets up equipment on the playground to capture one of the ‘ghosts’.
Quotables
“Contraceptives in the rain. Love this planet!” – Jack
“Trust me. You’re dead.” – Sato
“CSI Cardiff, I’d like to see that. They’d be measuring the velocity of a kebab.” – PC Andy
“What was that?” – Gwen
“Pterodactyl.” – Sato
“I’m getting tired of following you.” – Gwen
“No, you’re not – and you never will.” – Jack
“No idea. We know how to use it, not how it happens. But, if I were to guess, I would say that there was once a dimensionally transcendental chameleon circuit placed right on this spot, which welded it’s perception properties to a spatial-temporal rift. But, that sounds kind of ridiculous. Invisible lift has got more of a ring to it, don’t you think.” – Jack
“That is so Welsh.” – Jack
“What is?” – Gwen
“I show you something fantastic – you find fault.” – Jack
“I did some research. And, there’s only one Captain Jack Harkness on record, and he disappeared in 1941.” – Gwen
“Well, that couldn’t be me. (pause) Could it.” – Jack
“The 21st century is when it all changes, and you gotta be ready.” – Jack
“’Cause it gets inside you. You do this job for long enough and you end up thinking how come we get all the Weevils and bollocks and shit. Is that what alien life is – filth. But maybe there’s better stuff out there, brilliant stuff, beautiful stuff… just they don’t come here. This planet is so dirty that’s all we get, the shit.” – Suzie
“Torchwood’s got a vacancy, job going spare. Do you want it?” – Jack
“But, what do you need me for?” – Gwen
“Because maybe you were right. We could do more to help. What do ya think, wanna join up?” – Jack
“Yeah. I do, yes.” – Gwen
Weren’t You In…?
Weevil actor Paul Kasey has appeared in most episodes of Doctor Who 2005/6, including as one of the Forest of Cheem (‘The End of the World’), Trin-E (‘Bad Wolf’) and various Cybermen (‘Rise of the Cybermen’ etc). Jâms Thomas appeared in Belonging (2000) and Belonging II (2001) with Eve Myles.
Unanswered Questions
Is there a connection between Gwen and Gwyneth (‘The Unquiet Dead’, 2005) – both live in Cardiff and look remarkably similar? Did Jack really become pregnant once? Why does Gwen lie to Rhys about being at a murder scene? Surely this is standard in her line of work (even if the specifics were a little supernatural this time round) If Jack lives at Torchwood, how have they become “good customers” without him even realising pizzas are being ordered under the company name? Where did Torchwood get a pet Pterodactyl from? Why does the underground portion of the fountain look significantly older than the above-ground portion? And surely the builders of the fountain would have noticed Torchwood when they were constructing it, since the tiling in the base clearly dates back to before the fountain? Where exactly did the Weevils come from (Jack’s explanation that they’re from another world notwithstanding) and why are they leaving the sewers more regularly? What’s so strange about the man in Torchwood 2, Glasgow? Where is the missing Torchwood 4? (Possibly a joke reference to Babylon 4, from the TV series ‘Babylon 5’)? Has Toshiko scanned anything more interesting than A Tale of Two Cities? Is Jack lying when he tells Gwen that Torchwood exists so no one government has access to alien tech – that isn’t the impression Yvonne Hartman gives in ‘Army of Ghosts’ (2006)? Why does Jack talk so loudly in a public place about a supposedly covert group? And why does he refer to a worldwide battle between Cybermen and Daleks as “the battle of Canary Wharf”? Is Gwen running some sort of a Macintosh skin on her PC – it seems like an odd combination of the two (it’s always possible that, as it’s set in the near future, this is an extrapolation of Apple’s recent acceptance of Intel technology)? Why on Earth is Jack standing on top of that large building? What technology do the Police have that managed to extrapolate that blade illustration so precisely, and also make it look like an artist’s impression? How did Suzie get away with disappearing off whenever there’s a murder? Where are the Plas Roald Dahl security guards during the final standoff? How does Costello know about the “police liaison” conversation, which took place when she wasn’t there? Why is Captain Jack immortal following the events of ‘The Parting of the Ways’ (2005)? And how did he first discover this? Why do Torchwood store Suzie’s body rather than faking a suicide as with others in this episode? How does the Pterodactyl get away with circling around Cardiff in broad daylight, and how do Jack and Gwen get on top of Plas Roald Dahl?
Fuck Ups
Adverts for the Doctor Who Exhibition at the Red Dragon (behind Plas Roald Dahl) are visible. When Gwen’s partner arrives at Plas Roald Dahl, it’s raining and yet he seems barely damp. When Gwen introduces herself at Jubilee Pizza, she covers up her badge with her hand, and yet the pizza boy still believes she’s with the police (perhaps he’s just very trusting). Gwen seems to spend an hour watching the Weevil, judging by the clocks. Much is made of the fact that the TARDIS landed on a specific paving stone in ‘Boom Town’ (2005), but in fact the TARDIS landed on the wooden planks several feet in front. Howells (usually redressed as Henrik’s in ‘Rose’, 2005, etc) makes a brief appearance as Gwen runs away from Jack. Some areas of the UK seemed to suffer from sound synch problems and/or stereo-downmix faults in brief portions of the episode.
High-Definition
Torchwood was filmed in High-Definition, and broadcast on BBC-HD (in 720p for the first week and 1080i for the rest), a test service available to a small number of UK subscribers.
Torchwood: Declassified Episode 0 (10’36”)
This episode was accidentally released onto the official site on its launch date, 12th October, in Flash Video format. It was quickly removed, but reappeared on the 19th in Real Media and WMP formats.
Interviews with Russell T Davies, Julie Gardner and John Barrowman about the concept of the show, the mystery of Jack’s resurrection, who Torchwood are and the “massive” set (which Ed Thomas discusses). Gardner also talks about the adult tone of the show, Barrowman about his love of playing Jack and Burn Gorman, Naoko Mori, Gareth David-Lloyd and Eve Myles (but suspiciously not Indira Varma, who at this point was being touted as a regular character) about the development of their respective characters.
Many clips of the first episode (and ‘The Empty Child’, ‘The Parting of the Ways’) including behind the scenes footage and recordings of the first readthrough session, the first tone meeting and Barrowman visiting the set while under construction, all of which had appeared in longer format in ‘Doctor Who: Confidential’ earlier in 2006.
Torchwood: Declassified Episode 1 (8’00”)
Broadcast BBC Three, Monday 23rd October, 2:40am in double-bill with episode two.
Mori, Barrowman, Myles and Davies explain the plot of the episode. Gardner, Myles, Davies, Mori and Barrowman talks about Jack’s character. Brian Kelly muses on Jack’s development, and Gardner on immortality. Gardner explains why it would have been preferable to film the episode later in the run, Richard Stokes talks about the quality of the script, and we again see footage of the first readthrough session. Davies describes the show as “gritty” and Gardner, Gorman, Davies, Barrowman, Kelly and Stokes talk about the Weevils.
Site Review by Rob Tizzard
So, at last, surely over a year since it was first announced, we have Torchwood. There’s been little or no publicity, or readily available info for spoiler hunters like myself, other than the few little bits gradually announced, such as the main cast. It started to become all Microsoft, “it’ll be on in the Spring, in the Summer, when we’re frigging ready, alright!” And then, boom, the last couple of weeks have seen trailers everywhere, even in cinemas, and subliminal flashes of the T logo, isn’t that frowned upon? Then finally, we are told it will debut with a double bill, at the same time as what will be the final episode ever of Prime Suspect. Yes there are those of us who like both this and Doctor Who. However, in the recent tradition of BBC Three, I note the episodes are repeated 3 or 4 times, including on the same evening, hooray!
Anyway, on with the first episode, which I intended to tape and watch the next day as for me this was 1am, my better half sound asleep beside me, my own eyelids flickering. ‘Everything Changes’, a more fitting title in many ways than the one originally announced. My, the credits are brief aren’t they, I should stress that as a long term Doctor Who fan, this show won’t be a whole new world to me, it’ll be a new side of a larger pan-dimensional cube. From the first shot my mind will be cataloguing new information with what I’ve already digested in countless other books, shows and plays that make up this eternal story. Pointless questions like, “Do they know about the house in Allen Road?” And obvious one’s like, “How did Jack get back to the present day AND instil himself as the leader of a section of Torchwood?” But I digress.
The beginning, right, it’s raining. Well hats off here, rain does not show up well on film, it involves a lot of extra work to make it look this good. And it’s mostly filmed at night, they are not making things easy for themselves so they really want to put on a show. I’m liking the aerial shots which add a certain mood to the following scenes, but the shots of Captain Jack standing on high buildings, why? Did he really do that, I’m getting vertigo just looking at it. I’m liking Gwen, she seems normal. Then the team arrive and take over, just the four of them. Captain Jack is spouting nonsense while the others do the work. It should be noted here that this character took time to grow on me when he first appeared last year in the new Doctor Who. The accent, the shiny skin, the arrogance, it’s not likable to me. Of the others, Toshiko is the one that gets my praise, I love the actress and she was brilliant in ‘Aliens of London’. But there’s a smack of arrogance about the others as well for now which is putting me off warming to them.
I’m with Gwen all the way, and that’s what RTD does really well in this and ‘Rose’. Torchwood is a story about a fantastical group using and meeting aliens, it could so easily be laughable, hackneyed. Best way is to discover it is through the eyes of a likable normal person who most people can relate to. She’s adventurous and wastes no time in finding the secret headquarters, fantastic, resulting in a dramatic presentation of the Torchwood hub where it all happens. There’s a hand in a jar, is it the Doctors? Of course it is. This scene is played showing the team working seriously at their stations until Toshiko starts to laugh at the absurdity of it all, good play, though a little jarring. It’s almost like they haven’t worked out how to present this world, but I doubt it.
Now, sure this is secret organisation and they need to keep it secret, but the amnesia dose and hacking of Gwen’s computer, this made me angry as well as Gwen. And yeah, the pheromone spray is also not very clever, until the very clever end to this episode which states the danger of these “toys”. Gwen, even with her memory wiped is back at the Torchwood location wondering why it’s important and bumps into Susie. I was totally with Gwen by this point, not a clue what was going on in Susie’s mind and didn’t click till very late she was a killer and this episode actually had a plot other than the discovery or Torchwood.
To sum up, some things will need time to grow but a very strong start, very well played in the use of Gwen and the introduction of characters, better pacing than Doctor Who with the extra time to play with, an absolute rug pull ending, well for anyway, stating that anything can happen in the coming weeks and very probably will and I’m well hooked.
Reader Reviews
Torchwood is here! At last! But, was it worth the hype and the wait?
What appears to start out as a fairly standard crime scene drama from the current television roster takes a sudden turn when a dead man gasps back to life. From that point, everything changes for the audience – and Gwen Cooper. The pacing and the music certainly keep the story moving along, and the one word to describe this episode: majestic. From the opening night shots over Cardiff, we are treated to some wonderful aerial shots of the city. More than just placing the location these help set the mood for the piece.
The characters, other than Gwen, don’t get enough screen time to make much from them. Even Suzie is reduced to a cipher in the end, committing the evil deeds, but only for the betterment of mankind. That was a bit hackneyed, but plays out well enough for a pilot episode. The focus stays on Gwen throughout. This is her journey, and everyone else are just the people she meets. Now that’s been set up though, the other members of the ensemble cast will need some background.
The other major character in this episode is Captain Jack, but even he seems to breeze through the episode, just pointing out what people should have been seeing all along. The story could easily have been told without him, but John Barrowman just adds a certain something to the part that makes him just this side of likeable. But, we’re not sure we trust him yet. This is a man who has obviously seen a lot since he was left in 200,100 AD. Eve Myles shines as another fine actress seemingly found out of thin air by BBC Wales. Her part in Doctor Who wasn’t big enough to let her skills show through, but here she takes to the starring role with apparent ease. I was concerned before the broadcast if she had it in her, but it looks like she’ll do just fine for this series.
The slight references to Doctor Who are kept to a minimum, even Jack’s sideways comments about the Doctor and the TARDIS are kept brief and as throw-aways so as to not leave anyone in the audience out. And, for those that get his references are left feeling like they are in on an inside joke that only the audience and Jack get. As long as this doesn’t get overplayed in the coming weeks, it could work.
All in all, a very good start to a new series. Pilot episodes never hold up to much scrutiny as they have so much to convey in their short span, but this episode still works on many levels. The Torchwood 3 HQ looks interesting, and I hope it’s staff come out more to the audience as the weeks go on.
Oh wait, I get it, Torchwood is an anagram of….
Tobias Rogers
