DAY ONE

[tencrush]

So I DO have a few thoughts on Children of Earth, Day One, and I DO have ten minutes to write them down, but probs not to comment. They're randomly here below the cut.

• I'm finding Ianto's extremely working class roots kind of hot. I feel like Jarvis Cocker. But yeah, Ianto's three-piece-suitedness suddenly aquires a whole new depth when you see where he's come from. Giving Ianto new levels of depth probably doesn't bode well, though.


• Ianto's dorky what-the-fuck-are-we, do-we-hug-when-you-die-? position in the Jack/Ianto relationship was really fucking cute.


• Having said this, I thought we'd established that Ianto was bisexual. Perhaps not out but certainly a guy who knows about himself that he's attracted to both sexes. I always quite loved this about Ianto, as I've said before, because I loved the fact that he was bisexual but not a televisual bisexual-who-sleeps-around stereotype. Now we find out that he seems to view himself as hetero, it's just that Jack's that awesome. I was spoiled for this episode, so I knew this was happening, but it still grated on me when it did. First of all because it annoys me that someone can't just be bisexual on the telly, like bi is such a bad thing to be. Secondly, obviously, because it feeds that tired slash trope of I'm-not-gay-I-just-love-your-cock that I really fucking hate. And last but not least, it is, once again, that Russell thing of using one character to tell me just how awesome another character is (oh, and the one doing the telling, that one'll probably die to prove it, yeah?) There just seems to me to be no narrative reason to make Ianto gay-only-for-Jack, other than to establish the awesome power of Jack's cock. I wish they'd just make Jack be more awesome instead of resorting to this. Gah.


• Gwen gets more awesome as time goes by. Her pregnant-is-that-good-yes-I-think-so face was for the win.


• Lois is SPUNKY and INQUISITIVE and KINDA CUTE and if we don't get to keep her I will be VERY VERY ANGRY. She's going to die, isn't she?


• Is the big bad, apart from the 456 which is alien, some sort of rogue team of evil civil servants? Is it significant that Ianto's sister calls him a civil servant? Is it an anti-UNIT? I know Russell likes this whole let's-keep-a-nice-broad-grey-area thing regarding who, exactly, in the government-Torchwood-UNIT-other axis are the good guys and who the bad guys, but I wish he'd make his mind up just a wee bit more. Especially when it comes to UNIT.


• That honeymoon thing just read to me as "LOLS, she ain't never coming back to the 'verse, we don't really like the girl." I've never really been fond of Agyeman, but I can imagine those who were were perhaps a bit miffed?


• I'm going to end my sentences with the phrase "and I've got tupperware" more often from now on.

Comments

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

I'm not well versed on cliched representations of bisexuals, other than the most obvious one, ie the bisexual who will sleep with anything, ie Jack. (I've been poking through Bisexual Characters In Film for some ideas.) But I wonder if Ianto's sexuality is not intended to be "really heterosexual", but undefined. This could be reflected in his uncertainty about what his and Jack's relationship exactly is.

"Only Jack" could mean "I am not attracted to men other than Jack" but it could alternatively, or additionally, mean "I'm in a monandrous relationship" - especially if he suspects his sister assumes he's promiscuous, or at least playing the field.

If RTD has a political intention here, it may be to subvert the insistence of both straights and gays on defining who is "really" bisexual - related to the "quaint little categories" thing, where sexual identity is a phase the culture's going through. Given his past record, though, I think it's more likely the whole thing serves a story purpose instead: Ianto is committed to Jack but isn't sure if the reverse is true, and the rest of the miniseries is going to answer that question. IMHO the most likely outcome is that they end up as a couple. "Bisexual Characters in Film" suggests this would be an unusual portrayal; the world, but not the screen, is full of bisexual people in committed monogamous relationships.

OTOH, it might just have been Jack's aftershave.

ETA: Well, of course TV Tropes has useful information! Should've headed there in the first instance.

[tencrush]

TV Tropes says in the article If it's you, it's okay, and I quote: "According to RTD, Torchwood's Ianto Jones isn't really gay. Jack is just special." I wish they'd provide me with a source for that one, because that's a cliché I really think Torchwood could do without.

[noneinnyet.livejournal.com]

I feel like Ianto only being gay for Jack's cock goes against what I remember Rusty saying in the Declassified in Greeks Bearing Gifts. If I remember correctly, he felt that the great thing about Torchwood was that their sexuality could be fluid and that he didn't need to be writing coming out stories because he did that 10 years ago, it's been done. Maybe that was just in my cloudy head where things make me happy and RTD doesn't latch onto an idea and go crazy.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Anyone can add those examples, and you'll sometimes see them dispute each other. That particular one may have been added in response to COE! Given that by now fandom has put a dictionary's worth of words into RTD's mouth, you're right to be cautious. I may be wrong, but I don't think RTD has ever defined Ianto's sexuality one way or another in an interview - largely because, if he had done so, fandom would've burnt to the ground. (An actual quote from RTD isn't necessary for Mt Fandoom to go off, but it certainly is sufficient. :)