Torchwood - A Day in the Death, 2.08

Torchwood is so good. "A Day in the Death" is my favorite so far.

"What do you think, doctor, does it really get any better?" - Maggie

Owen meets a suicidal woman on a rooftop at night, and gives her only his profession: doctor. She refers to him as such, inviting comparisons to the Doctor (One has no heartbeat. The other has two). Intentional or not (knowing RTD it is), I thought it was extremely interesting.

On said comparisons:

• As Owen moves to administer CPR, he realizes he has no breath to give. His "immortality" in death as a detriment, versus a Time Lord's near-immortality, which can similarly hurt the people he is closest to.
• "I'm sorry," Owen tells Toshiko. She responds: "I love you." The Doctor is always apologizing; Ten in particular always repeats: "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."
• Owen saves Maggie from committing suicide. The Doctor also heals.
• The alien object sings to him as he stands on the rooftop; the Ood sings to the Doctor before he dies. Appreciation of the beauty of life for one last moment.
• Not a Doctor comparison, but the "My name is Owen Harper, and this is my life," voiceover vs. Rose Tyler's "This is the story of how I died" narration in Doomsday is worth mentioning.
• Watching television, Owen thinks about life in death. I love the scene so much, as he cleans out his refrigerator and medicine cabinet, because he no longer needs those things. ...Also not a Doctor comparison.

Sidenote: I really want Martha and Mickey to join the next season! How perfect would that be? They are in need of a doctor and a computer genius.

Doctor Who - The Five Doctors

"I'm definitely not the man I was. And thank goodness." - the Fifth Doctor

The concept of regeneration has kept the Doctor Who legacy alive. New actors in the role of the Doctor breathe life into the series so it never becomes tired (in theory; I haven't watched enough Old Who to definitively say). Despite changing his face, stature (Troughton's "little fellow" to Tennant's 6-ish-foot frame), wardrobe (question mark motifs come and go; celery was a one-off), hair (regrettably not a ginger, yet), and even personality, the Doctor is still the Doctor: he is quirky and alien, brave and righteous, a little bit cocky, and always the smartest person in the room.

Having only watched RTD's New Who, "The Five Doctors" 1983 serial was a new experience, and it was tons of fun to watch.

I knew Sarah Jane from "School Reunion" and Tennant's swan song episodes; I knew Peter Davison's Doctor (Five) from "Time Crash" and the first twenty or so minutes of "The Caves of Androzani" serial that I never finished; I knew Doctors One (Hartnell replaced by Richard Hurndall in this special), Two, Three, and Four from the few snippets I'd seen in RTD-Season-One's Doctor Who Confidential episodes (also super fun, and all on YouTube!). It was interesting to identify idiosyncrasies and compare performances among the Doctors. I was disappointed Tom Baker (Four) was hardly in it -- explained by being "trapped in the time vortex" for all but a few minutes in the beginning -- because I'm a fan of the wacky, strange Doctor (I think, as opposed to a romantic like Eight?). And I like the scarf.

But the other four Doctors were absolutely wonderful. I particularly liked Two and Three. And I think Five is better looking than Ten; that's not blasphemous, is it? I didn't really enjoy the companions, though, and it may have been because the writing didn't give them much to do other than follow their Doctors around and fall down a lot. Sarah Jane was cute, and I kind of liked Turlough. I found Tegan annoying, but Wikipedia tells me she didn't want to be there in the first place, so I understand that.

Thoughts:

• I laughed the hardest at the "perfect killing machine" Three and Sarah encountered. I'll probably rewatch that part when I'm having a bad day.
• When Sarah Jane and Tegan introduced themselves, they said: "Tegan." "Sarah." Coincidence! One of my favorite bands.
• I don't like John Simm's Master, and I don't like Anthony Ainley's Master, either. Maybe I just don't like the character, and it doesn't have anything to do with the portrayal.
• Having both Cybermen and Daleks in one serial was unusual, wasn't it? RTD kind of made it feel like it happened all the time, but I don't think it actually did.
• I wonder what happened with the Doctor-as-President after this.

"You mean you're deliberately choosing to go on the run from your own people, in a raggedy old TARDIS?" - Tegan

"Why not? After all, that's how it all started." - the Fifth Doctor

Misfits - Episode 3, 1.03

Brief thoughts about the show Misfits:

• I can honestly say I don't think there is a more gorgeously shot TV show. And to make a show about a ragtag bunch of losers, community service, and crime beautiful is an achievement. Everything from the makeshift living area on the community service center's rooftop (some boxes and mismatched chairs) to the empty locker room is shot as if it is a statement, a work of art on its own. Shows like Breaking Bad, which are shot in naturally beautiful locations, utilize languorous sunsets over sculpted mountains, etc, while Misfits focuses on trash in alleyways when it's overcast out.
• Its small budget (compared, at least, to over-saturated American TV shows) hardly shows. Because they produce six episodes a year compared to an excessive 24, the quality and care that goes into each episode goes up, I think. Comparable to cable TV shows in that they both have smaller budgets, more freedom i.e. less censorship, fewer episodes to produce per year, and as a result, quality is higher.
• Like Skins, impeccable music supervision.
• Substantial editing work. Great cuts, and I do like the color correction.
• Have I mentioned how wonderfully the episodes are directed? I want to frame each shot and put them on my wall. The placement of props and actors is so aesthetically pleasing.
• Excellent teenage actors, though not as strong as the Skins cast, in my opinion. Robert Sheehan doesn't convey a very believable irreverent jackass --> concerned teammate. No one can really match up to Nick Hoult, as far as I'm concerned.

Torchwood - End of Days, 1.13

Torchwood was branded a more "adult" answer to Doctor Who, but until its first series finale, "End of Days," it was little more than a highly uneven show showcasing a motley, unrelatable crew of grade-A screw-ups (a sex-monster and some cursing do not a mature show make).

However, "End of Days" (and "Captain Jack Harkness," the episode that preceded it), presented what I think is the series' first truly mature storyline: the true definition of a starcrossed romance (not gay for the sake of being gay, rather, heartbreaking love story because it's an impossible romance!) juxtaposed with a believable mutiny, climaxing when Owen shoots Jack. The challenging of the team's dynamic (Jack the leader, everyone else subordinate; not to mention the Owen/Ianto struggle the episode prior) was the right way to take the show. Why should Torchwood trust Jack when they don't even know who he is?

I was impressed with the design of the Abbadon, which looked a lot like the creature from "The Satan Pit," but thought it should have been bigger. For the destroyer of the world, it was kind of small. I thought the same of the episode's final showdown with Jack enduring the Abbadon's shadow -- impressed by the obvious solution, but disappointed by the "smallness" of it. No big guns. Just Jack and his surplus of life, which surprisingly, totally made sense.

My final criticism concerns Jack's resurrection. Why would Gwen be able to bring him back to life? What makes her so special? While watching, I thought it would be Ianto, because Jack had brought him back to life with a kiss before. (There is always residual space-time vortex energy! Ianto has got to have some stored somewhere!) Or if not Ianto, I would have been satisfied with a dream sequence in which nearly-dead-Jack sees Rose or "the right kind of doctor" and remembers he's got a ton of life in him. Something.

I'll be more than happy with season two if most of it is up to par with the second half of this season.

Doctor Who - Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, 4.09/4.10

I love Doctor Who. Luckily I've already written about it, so I don't have to praise and gush about the show in an introduction here; that's already done. I haven't talked about Tennant as the Doctor, but I don't have much to say about him other than I think he's brilliant and perfect. Simple.

I was excited for the Moffat-penned "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead," his first two-parter since series 1's "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances" (my favorite episodes so far), for numerous reasons: 1) I wanted to see how he would write my favorite companion, Donna, 2) I love libraries and forests and the fairytale-like happenings that often populate them, 3) I absolutely adore the never-corny emotional poignancy of his stories, 4) I think his villains are consistently fantastic, and 5) the caliber of his episodes is (arguably) higher than anyone else's.

"Silence in the Library" didn't quite live up to all my expectations, but I wasn't disappointed, either. Awesome monsters: check (reminded me of Crichton's Prey nanobots). Quippy Doctor/Donna lines: check. Intriguing world/universe/setting: check. Sufficiently creepy plot: check. Etc.

Wonderfully nightmarish details (that I always love to see in Who) include:

• Donna stuck in a world that progresses like a dream -- I loved this bit.
• The Vashta Nerada disintegrating meat on bones in less than a second
• Miss Evangelista appearing to Donna dressed in black/the quick flashback-like sequence that accompanied Donna remembering her
• Donna/Doctor in the Library events appearing on the little girl's television screen
• Dr. Moon/the "Doctor Moon" above the Library
• Miss Evangelista's warped face
• Donna's husband stuttering her name

I'm not sure of the mechanics behind River Song saving everybody in the end, but I'm not complaining. What a wonderful scene with her and the Doctor.

"Everybody knows that everybody dies. But not every day. Not today... Some days, nobody dies at all." - River Song

Like "The Doctor Dances" -- everyone lived! Moffat likes this theme: the Doctor faced with so much inevitable death that he often can't bear, sometimes there are small victories in which everybody lives. And at the end of each chapter, the Doctor is "all right," which very well may be Time Lord-speak for "not all right at all." Small victories are a reason to live; there are "always things to live for" ("The Doctor's Daughter"). Part of the reason I love this show is because beneath the quips and general wackiness of individual episodes, there is a lot of melancholy in the life of a near-immortal time traveler (who must part ways with everyone he loves because everyone dies), and the show never forgets that.

(Tennant wears this well when his voice cracks when he briefly mentions Rose to Martha, or when he is visibly anguished at the supposed death of a woman he knows he will love in the future.* Eccleston did a similarly spectacular job as the Doctor's even more heavily burdened ninth regeneration, the only survivor of the Time War.)

So, which Doctor did River know? I assume it's his final regeneration, because I also assume he would only tell her his name if he were about to die. Or, future-Doctor (Thirteen?) knew the only way Ten would trust River, which was integral to solving the Library, would be to tell her his name to pass on to his past self. Right now I'm leaning toward the former, because Time Lord names are pretty serious business.

Wow, these episodes were good.

* Future love, you say? Yeah. I went there.

Party Down - "Not On Your Wife" Opening Night, 2.06

Party Down is back in fine form with a near flawless episode, "'Not On Your Wife' Opening Night"!

I won't even try to record all the misunderstandings/scandalous after-party happenings that added up to the fabulous climactic backstage scene (and the smaller one in the post-credits tag), but it all worked perfectly, and was hilarious to boot. Paralleling the community theatre's farce at the beginning was brilliant.

All in all: triumph!

• As usual for Party Down, I could quote for ages, but I'll try not to.
• "So you were all magnificent, which means statistically, magnificent means average, so you were all average." - Roman
• "It was like all these little misunderstandings adding up to this tragic ending." - Kyle
• "Magnicifent!" - Roman
• Mullally's character is finally fitting in. Great scene with Ron and pepper spray.

Skins - Freddie, 4.05

To be honest, I usually watch this series of Skins in a small browser window while I play solitaire next to it.

It's still shot beautifully, gorgeous cinematography, utilizing light better than most shows on TV, and it still has a cast of really gorgeous and talented young actors. The individual episodes are written well; none as stand-out as the earlier seasons' stunners like "Cassie" (s1), "Sketch," or "Everyone," but they are still plainly good stories.

My main complaint is the same as it was last series: the second generation characters are not as strong, and neither are their relationships with each other, as the first generation's. In the second series, if Jal had a heart-to-heart with Sid, it was completely natural because you knew these people were all best friends. However, this series, I found it weird when Katie admitted her medical problem to Thomas (frankly, I think it's weird when anyone interacts seriously with Thomas -- when did they become even remotely close?) and when the girls showed up at Cook's birthday party in series 3. There is no evidence that they know each other at all. I expected them to create and grow relationships throughout series 3 so that in series 4 the writers could play with that, but it didn't happen. Plus, we were left with an irritating finale that only focused on the least interesting group of the bunch -- Freddie, Cook, JJ, and Effy.

Scratch that -- not the least interesting. That award would go to one of the twins or Thomas. Or Naomi.

I have quite a few complaints about this generation I suppose...

"Freddie" does nothing to assuage my annoyances. It is a moving, but very average, love story, what with Freddie trying to save Effy from depression, interspersed with beautiful scenes of field-frolicking and the like (not to mention, lines like "I fucking love you so fucking much"). I appreciate this episode for what it tries to be, but unfortunately, I don't care enough about Freddie and Effy to be moved.

Thoughts:

• Freddie runs into Cook dressed as the Devil, appropriate for a whimsical carnival scene where Katie is an angel and saves Effy.
• I am convinced I would love this episode a thousand times more if I wasn't so annoyed with Effy. Because the scenes with Freddie and his granddad are brilliant. Freddie is such a good person, and it's heartbreaking that his efforts are in vain in the end.