It's what all the big kids are doing...
May. 23rd, 2008 09:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tencrushThere was a "write your own series of Torchwood" thread on the doctorwhoforum, so I decided I would.
Ep1 - That Old Chestnut
The diminished team, still glum over the loss of their two most two-dimensional members, are going through various boxes of artefacts Tosh never had the chance to analyse. They spread them out on the conference table and poke them a bit. Suddenly one of them springs to life, and who would have thunk it, Jack, Ianto and Gwen seem rather strangely affected to the point where they end up having a threeway in the meeting room. When they come to their senses they realise they’ve discovered what six of the other artefacts were for and also that they feel a whole lot better. Ianto has a smoke, Jack walks around for the rest of the episode in a state of undress and Gwen goes home, retcons Rhys and tells him all about the sexcapades. Oh, Torchwood, how we’ve missed you.
Ep2 - Dear Sir or Madam
Finally shaken out of his funk, Jack decides it’s time to start recruiting a techie for Torchwood through ads in the local paper that don’t mention Torchwood at all, nor do they sport their spiffy logo, no sir. Gwen whines for a project and Jack hands over the recruitment to her. She proceeds to blu-tak all the cv’s to a wall, mark the candidates’ assorted merits with little colour-coded stickers and do absolutely nothing apart from stare at the wall with her arms crossed defiantly over her chest for about a fortnight. Eventually Ianto gets fed up, throws a dart at the wall and their techie is hired. You know the type, geeky and lanky, think Brendan from Attachments who played that guy in that prozzie thing with Billie Piper. Actually, maybe it IS him. Is he free? His name’s George. Oh, and there’s a weevil in this episode, doing weevil-type stuff.
Ep3 - George of the Jungle
Ianto shows George around the Hub on his first day then hilariously lets him out of his sight. George ends up in Owen’s now overgrown hothouse talking to a brain-eating, hallucinogenic alien plant. By the time the team find him George is naked, sitting cross-legged on the floor with a big green sucker attached to his head, weeping softly and stroking the fern strategically placed on his lap. Gwen has to summon up all her l33t empathising skills to talk him out of sacrificing his brain to his new alien god. She eventually manages it through the medium of big puppy eyes. The team have a pizza and laugh and point at George a lot. Viewers paying attention will note that during this scene George develops what the half the fandom will later refer to as “that sexy evil glint in his eye”, and what the other half call “that special needs squint”.
Ep4 - You’re Brecon my Heart
The team, sans George, investigate a UFO sighting in, surprise, surprise, the Brecon Beacons. Chilling scenes of nighttime foresty torch-led investigations are interspersed with shots of George acting suspiciously in the Hub (Already? Yes! Already!). Eventually Ianto gets captured and beaten up, because that’s what the viewers want. Ianto’s disappearance causes Jack to emote at Gwen a bit, but not enough for us to actually discern if he has genuine feelings for the boy. The UFO turns out to be some joyriding alien hotshot and the Iantobashing turns out to be, shock horror, just some punk kids after Ianto’s pda and 80 gig ipod full of My Chemical Romance songs. Jack and Ianto are reunited and Jack manfully pats him on the back. Or was it the arse? The debate continues…
Ep5 - It’s My Party and I’ll Cry if I Want To
Despite his having been born in the 51st century under a calendar not yet introduced, Gwen, by squandering precious work time and computer processing power, has managed to work out that it’s Jack’s birthday next week. She decides to throw him a surprise party in the Hub. Hilarity ensues as Ianto and Gwen try to outdo each other on Jack’s present and disagree on the arrangements, with Gwen’s fists of rage and Ianto’s patented eyerolls battling for supremacy. They finally settle their differences and, together, buy him a puppy. An evil, flesh-eating cgi ALIEN PUPPY, as it turns out. Jack shoots the puppy, Ianto cries as per his contractual obligations and eventually order is restored to the Hub once again. George eats cake and does that evil squinty thing like that dog did in the Simpsons. It’s called foreshadowing.
Ep6 - Doctor in the Hub
While out Weevil hunting, Ianto gets shot in the hip by a stray bullet as the duo are caught up in one of Cardiff’s notorious turf wars. Jack skillfully removes the bullet with his teeth (oh the angle at which this scene is shot, it’s hilarious, I’m telling you) and Ianto takes it like a man. The incident only serves to remind Jack that he hasn’t yet recruited a doctor. He calls Martha but she mysteriously tells him to bugger off. Jack and Ianto eventually go out to the local hospital, holding hands and stalking the staff of the casualty department until they spot a suitable candidate. They ask her to join the team. She refuses. They take her out for a drink. She still refuses. They take her back to the Hub and show her their collection of alien wonderfulness. She’s not interested. Eventually, Jack takes Ianto aside and announces he has a plan. Ianto raises several eyebrows at once, and one moody nighttime shot of Cardiff later, she shows up for work the next morning. The internet implodes under the sheer weight of speculatory fanfic that ensues. Oh, Torchwood, you tease.
Ep7 - Maybe Baby
Oh, the irony. Gwen really is pregnant this time, despite her insistence on taking the pill, having an IUD fitted and using condoms. She and Rhys shout at each other a lot and eventually Nerys Hughes happens. Torchwood goes deep and emo as Gwen contemplates an abortion. Eventually, Jack sits her down and has a talk. Many, many big eyes and pained faces later, Gwen decides to keep her baby. (What was she implying in that scene, internets?) Meanwhile, George and Ianto go to investigate a suspicious character who has been cheating Cardiff’s bookies out of money with what they believe may well be knowledge of the future. Oh, blow me down, it’s Captain John. Innuendo ensues back at the Hub and John is forgiven what with him being not actually an alien, but a human and therefore more easily forgiveable and also Jack’s ex. Gwen looks wistful, Or maybe that’s gas, I don’t really know.
Ep8 - Dear John
After all that emotional turmoil, it’s time for the comedy episode. But dear sweet lord, what happened? We open on a shot of John and Ianto in bed together in what we can only surmise is Ianto’s mysterious flat. Ianto wakes up and does one of those shocked double takes that he does every now and again, while John smirks at him and says, yes, wait for it… “good morning, eye-candy.” Like we didn’t see that one coming. Ianto points his gun at him suggestively and it soon turns out John actually has no idea what happened either. Cue the comedy as we flash back to the events of the past 24 hours as seen and told by various major and minor characters. PC Andy puts in a particularly lolworthy performance. I won’t tell you what actually happened, but that burning sensation Ianto had? It turns out it was just a harmless alien probe. Fandom rejoices. John buggers off again.
Ep9 - Sick leave
The team’s new doctor (Gosh, we haven’t given her a name yet, let’s just call her Emily, shall we?) investigates a strange superbug that has caused half of Cardiff to call in sick. What do you know? It’s alien. The team are eventually led to the source of the outbreak at a dingy little bed-and-breakfast run by an unassuming elderly couple who turn out to be from Betelgeuse and not from Guildford as everyone had been led to believe. In a blatantly lazy rip-off of Stephen King’s The Stand or Outbreak or what have you, we are shown in numerous innocent-looking scenes of people casually talking to each other, kissing babies and buying newspapers and such, how quickly a communicable disease could conceivably spread. Thankfully, the cure is easily found and Ianto flies a crop duster over the city to administer the antidote (gosh he’s got hidden talents, that boy). Jack muses foreshadowingly that next time, we might not be so lucky. Ianto tells him to STFU and assume the position. Somewhere on a train to London, someone coughs menacingly. Dun, dun, DUNNN!!!!
Ep10 - Blue Christmas
It’s Christmas in the Hub and everyone is in high spirits as they make their arrangements to spend time with their families, or bugger each other senseless, depending on who you’re talking to. George, disturbingly, gives various members of the team various differing reasons as to why he and his family don’t get along and why he’ll be spending Christmas with his friends. Ianto eyes him suspiciously but is soon distracted by Jack and his baubles. Christmas happens without a hitch and we’re treated to a Fragments-style framework of various happy Christmas vignettes involving Gwen and Rhys, George and his mates, Emily and her family, and Jack and Ianto in the Hub, each of which feature someone telling a story about an alien encounter. Just when you thought it was all turning pretty jolly, the last story Ianto tells Jack and involves the violent death of his entire family. Downer. But pretty crying, so that makes it all OK, and GDL has filled his two episode teary quota for another series.
Ep11 – Liberty or Bust
Bit of a turkey, this one, it involves the revelation that Liberty Pizza is in fact a wholly owned subsidiary of UNIT itself and has been using their meat feast pizzas to spy on the goings on in the Hub for, frankly, inadequately explored reasons. It all gets a bit clinical and there’s far too much exposition by Emily about how the pepperoni actually acts as a transmitter as it works its way through the digestive system. It transpires that George is a vegetarian. Really, this one was a throwaway episode and only seemed to serve as a vehicle for Ianto to wear that UNIT cap a lot and Jack to make jokes about his rectum (his own, not Ianto's).
Ep12 – You Say Potato
Ep13 – I say DIE!!
George was evil. Who would have thought. His evil potato overlords, the Sontarans, finally call upon him to implement the evil alien plan they had all along, and in doing so try to up their status in the Whoniverse from “villains that nobody really liked” to “kind of menacing if you squint”. Explosions happen in the Hub. Jack’s coat gets singed. Guns are pointed in several directions and George turns himself and the SUV into a human cluster bomb and escapes into the streets of Cardiff for his rendezvous with his midgety alien pals. The team chase him in a spiffy little car and chaos ensues. A lorry full of live chickens is overturned. The team drive their car through a plate glass window. Jack and Ianto’s relationship hits shaky ground in the spiffy car as Jack blames the whole sorry mess on Ianto’s dart-throwing skills and Ianto blames it on Jack being a fuck-awful manager. They start insulting each other like girls while Gwen and Emily save the world from destruction with a HUGE MOTHERFUCKING GUN. By the time Gwen and Emily return, smugly, from having saved the day, Jack and Ianto are going at it like bunnies in the spiffy car. Jack cracks a filthy joke about the big gun. Ianto rolls his eyes. The balance of the universe is restored once again.
ETA: I forgot to put in gratuitous lesbianism. Let's just say Gwen and Emily snog in episode 9, yeah?
So... what does your ideal series of Torchwood look like?
Ep1 - That Old Chestnut
The diminished team, still glum over the loss of their two most two-dimensional members, are going through various boxes of artefacts Tosh never had the chance to analyse. They spread them out on the conference table and poke them a bit. Suddenly one of them springs to life, and who would have thunk it, Jack, Ianto and Gwen seem rather strangely affected to the point where they end up having a threeway in the meeting room. When they come to their senses they realise they’ve discovered what six of the other artefacts were for and also that they feel a whole lot better. Ianto has a smoke, Jack walks around for the rest of the episode in a state of undress and Gwen goes home, retcons Rhys and tells him all about the sexcapades. Oh, Torchwood, how we’ve missed you.
Ep2 - Dear Sir or Madam
Finally shaken out of his funk, Jack decides it’s time to start recruiting a techie for Torchwood through ads in the local paper that don’t mention Torchwood at all, nor do they sport their spiffy logo, no sir. Gwen whines for a project and Jack hands over the recruitment to her. She proceeds to blu-tak all the cv’s to a wall, mark the candidates’ assorted merits with little colour-coded stickers and do absolutely nothing apart from stare at the wall with her arms crossed defiantly over her chest for about a fortnight. Eventually Ianto gets fed up, throws a dart at the wall and their techie is hired. You know the type, geeky and lanky, think Brendan from Attachments who played that guy in that prozzie thing with Billie Piper. Actually, maybe it IS him. Is he free? His name’s George. Oh, and there’s a weevil in this episode, doing weevil-type stuff.
Ep3 - George of the Jungle
Ianto shows George around the Hub on his first day then hilariously lets him out of his sight. George ends up in Owen’s now overgrown hothouse talking to a brain-eating, hallucinogenic alien plant. By the time the team find him George is naked, sitting cross-legged on the floor with a big green sucker attached to his head, weeping softly and stroking the fern strategically placed on his lap. Gwen has to summon up all her l33t empathising skills to talk him out of sacrificing his brain to his new alien god. She eventually manages it through the medium of big puppy eyes. The team have a pizza and laugh and point at George a lot. Viewers paying attention will note that during this scene George develops what the half the fandom will later refer to as “that sexy evil glint in his eye”, and what the other half call “that special needs squint”.
Ep4 - You’re Brecon my Heart
The team, sans George, investigate a UFO sighting in, surprise, surprise, the Brecon Beacons. Chilling scenes of nighttime foresty torch-led investigations are interspersed with shots of George acting suspiciously in the Hub (Already? Yes! Already!). Eventually Ianto gets captured and beaten up, because that’s what the viewers want. Ianto’s disappearance causes Jack to emote at Gwen a bit, but not enough for us to actually discern if he has genuine feelings for the boy. The UFO turns out to be some joyriding alien hotshot and the Iantobashing turns out to be, shock horror, just some punk kids after Ianto’s pda and 80 gig ipod full of My Chemical Romance songs. Jack and Ianto are reunited and Jack manfully pats him on the back. Or was it the arse? The debate continues…
Ep5 - It’s My Party and I’ll Cry if I Want To
Despite his having been born in the 51st century under a calendar not yet introduced, Gwen, by squandering precious work time and computer processing power, has managed to work out that it’s Jack’s birthday next week. She decides to throw him a surprise party in the Hub. Hilarity ensues as Ianto and Gwen try to outdo each other on Jack’s present and disagree on the arrangements, with Gwen’s fists of rage and Ianto’s patented eyerolls battling for supremacy. They finally settle their differences and, together, buy him a puppy. An evil, flesh-eating cgi ALIEN PUPPY, as it turns out. Jack shoots the puppy, Ianto cries as per his contractual obligations and eventually order is restored to the Hub once again. George eats cake and does that evil squinty thing like that dog did in the Simpsons. It’s called foreshadowing.
Ep6 - Doctor in the Hub
While out Weevil hunting, Ianto gets shot in the hip by a stray bullet as the duo are caught up in one of Cardiff’s notorious turf wars. Jack skillfully removes the bullet with his teeth (oh the angle at which this scene is shot, it’s hilarious, I’m telling you) and Ianto takes it like a man. The incident only serves to remind Jack that he hasn’t yet recruited a doctor. He calls Martha but she mysteriously tells him to bugger off. Jack and Ianto eventually go out to the local hospital, holding hands and stalking the staff of the casualty department until they spot a suitable candidate. They ask her to join the team. She refuses. They take her out for a drink. She still refuses. They take her back to the Hub and show her their collection of alien wonderfulness. She’s not interested. Eventually, Jack takes Ianto aside and announces he has a plan. Ianto raises several eyebrows at once, and one moody nighttime shot of Cardiff later, she shows up for work the next morning. The internet implodes under the sheer weight of speculatory fanfic that ensues. Oh, Torchwood, you tease.
Ep7 - Maybe Baby
Oh, the irony. Gwen really is pregnant this time, despite her insistence on taking the pill, having an IUD fitted and using condoms. She and Rhys shout at each other a lot and eventually Nerys Hughes happens. Torchwood goes deep and emo as Gwen contemplates an abortion. Eventually, Jack sits her down and has a talk. Many, many big eyes and pained faces later, Gwen decides to keep her baby. (What was she implying in that scene, internets?) Meanwhile, George and Ianto go to investigate a suspicious character who has been cheating Cardiff’s bookies out of money with what they believe may well be knowledge of the future. Oh, blow me down, it’s Captain John. Innuendo ensues back at the Hub and John is forgiven what with him being not actually an alien, but a human and therefore more easily forgiveable and also Jack’s ex. Gwen looks wistful, Or maybe that’s gas, I don’t really know.
Ep8 - Dear John
After all that emotional turmoil, it’s time for the comedy episode. But dear sweet lord, what happened? We open on a shot of John and Ianto in bed together in what we can only surmise is Ianto’s mysterious flat. Ianto wakes up and does one of those shocked double takes that he does every now and again, while John smirks at him and says, yes, wait for it… “good morning, eye-candy.” Like we didn’t see that one coming. Ianto points his gun at him suggestively and it soon turns out John actually has no idea what happened either. Cue the comedy as we flash back to the events of the past 24 hours as seen and told by various major and minor characters. PC Andy puts in a particularly lolworthy performance. I won’t tell you what actually happened, but that burning sensation Ianto had? It turns out it was just a harmless alien probe. Fandom rejoices. John buggers off again.
Ep9 - Sick leave
The team’s new doctor (Gosh, we haven’t given her a name yet, let’s just call her Emily, shall we?) investigates a strange superbug that has caused half of Cardiff to call in sick. What do you know? It’s alien. The team are eventually led to the source of the outbreak at a dingy little bed-and-breakfast run by an unassuming elderly couple who turn out to be from Betelgeuse and not from Guildford as everyone had been led to believe. In a blatantly lazy rip-off of Stephen King’s The Stand or Outbreak or what have you, we are shown in numerous innocent-looking scenes of people casually talking to each other, kissing babies and buying newspapers and such, how quickly a communicable disease could conceivably spread. Thankfully, the cure is easily found and Ianto flies a crop duster over the city to administer the antidote (gosh he’s got hidden talents, that boy). Jack muses foreshadowingly that next time, we might not be so lucky. Ianto tells him to STFU and assume the position. Somewhere on a train to London, someone coughs menacingly. Dun, dun, DUNNN!!!!
Ep10 - Blue Christmas
It’s Christmas in the Hub and everyone is in high spirits as they make their arrangements to spend time with their families, or bugger each other senseless, depending on who you’re talking to. George, disturbingly, gives various members of the team various differing reasons as to why he and his family don’t get along and why he’ll be spending Christmas with his friends. Ianto eyes him suspiciously but is soon distracted by Jack and his baubles. Christmas happens without a hitch and we’re treated to a Fragments-style framework of various happy Christmas vignettes involving Gwen and Rhys, George and his mates, Emily and her family, and Jack and Ianto in the Hub, each of which feature someone telling a story about an alien encounter. Just when you thought it was all turning pretty jolly, the last story Ianto tells Jack and involves the violent death of his entire family. Downer. But pretty crying, so that makes it all OK, and GDL has filled his two episode teary quota for another series.
Ep11 – Liberty or Bust
Bit of a turkey, this one, it involves the revelation that Liberty Pizza is in fact a wholly owned subsidiary of UNIT itself and has been using their meat feast pizzas to spy on the goings on in the Hub for, frankly, inadequately explored reasons. It all gets a bit clinical and there’s far too much exposition by Emily about how the pepperoni actually acts as a transmitter as it works its way through the digestive system. It transpires that George is a vegetarian. Really, this one was a throwaway episode and only seemed to serve as a vehicle for Ianto to wear that UNIT cap a lot and Jack to make jokes about his rectum (his own, not Ianto's).
Ep12 – You Say Potato
Ep13 – I say DIE!!
George was evil. Who would have thought. His evil potato overlords, the Sontarans, finally call upon him to implement the evil alien plan they had all along, and in doing so try to up their status in the Whoniverse from “villains that nobody really liked” to “kind of menacing if you squint”. Explosions happen in the Hub. Jack’s coat gets singed. Guns are pointed in several directions and George turns himself and the SUV into a human cluster bomb and escapes into the streets of Cardiff for his rendezvous with his midgety alien pals. The team chase him in a spiffy little car and chaos ensues. A lorry full of live chickens is overturned. The team drive their car through a plate glass window. Jack and Ianto’s relationship hits shaky ground in the spiffy car as Jack blames the whole sorry mess on Ianto’s dart-throwing skills and Ianto blames it on Jack being a fuck-awful manager. They start insulting each other like girls while Gwen and Emily save the world from destruction with a HUGE MOTHERFUCKING GUN. By the time Gwen and Emily return, smugly, from having saved the day, Jack and Ianto are going at it like bunnies in the spiffy car. Jack cracks a filthy joke about the big gun. Ianto rolls his eyes. The balance of the universe is restored once again.
ETA: I forgot to put in gratuitous lesbianism. Let's just say Gwen and Emily snog in episode 9, yeah?
So... what does your ideal series of Torchwood look like?
