Linkage

[tencrush]

Courtesy of rivier, I found this interview with Russell T. Davies from April this year.

Quote:
"You’ve got to be merciless. People will say ‘You love your characters’. But nobody loves their characters that much. If you really write, and you love them, you are the God of them and you can kill them with the click of a finger. It’s joyous to do so."

Hey, lol, at least you don't have to have a valid reason to do so. Just the God thing.

I'm so glad he has, by now, managed to make me completely hate Ten, otherwise I might be really, really afraid

Comments

[dune-drd.livejournal.com]

At least he's keeping true to his opinions *eyeroll*

[neadods.livejournal.com]

But nobody loves their characters that much.

Except for one, apparently. I doubt Rose was ever or will ever be on the execution roster.

What's annoying me is the interview going around of how Torchwood is all about the team. Which is true, but then when the team is all killed off... and to think how disdainful I was of the rumor at the beginning of S2 that it would end with everybody but Jack and Gwen dead. It took another season, but he accomplished it after all.

[tencrush]

I wouldn't be so sure about that. Killing Rose would be the ultimate way for Rusty to prove, through Ten's resulting man!pain, how much Ten really loved her and never told her because of failing holographic technology. I mean, obviously, that would be a horribly familiar thing there, with the deathbed and the OMGNOES declarations of pain, but Russell has already proven again and again that he is incapable of originality.

[forgiveninasong.livejournal.com]

D:

I honestly cannot do anything but that face anymore when it comes to this fandom.

D:

PS. OWEN IN MY ICON D:

[rowanswhimsy.livejournal.com]

This and that Confidential stuff are enough RTD for me for this week, I tell you.

It's easy to use death to bring another character down. It's a lot harder to find other ways to do it, ways that are truer to what people experience every day in life.

[love-jackianto.livejournal.com]

'It's easy to use death to bring another character down. It's a lot harder to find other ways to do it, ways that are truer to what people experience every day in life.'
I completely agree.

[aresnz.livejournal.com]

It seems to be RTD wanted this (COE) to be such an impact on Torchwood and their fans...breaking everything apart. The question is, should there be a series 4; how will it all be brought back? It'll be like a puzzle, fitting all the pieces in place. If at all possible.

Lori

[tencrush]

I'd lol if this was all a ruse and Jack actually gets a reset button in his episode of Who. This miniseries has assured a massive audience for Jack's Who special, and if it actually went there, if nothing else, we'd have definitive proof that we'd been fucking ruthlessly played.

I bet it happens. That'd be really funny.

[used_songs]

I bet it happens. That'd be really funny.

Well, I used to doubt your predictions but no more.

[coffee-kris.livejournal.com]

Now this prediction I'm happy to pray will turn out to be true. :-)

[radiant-pip.livejournal.com]

I wish (oh how I wish), but I don't see how that could really happen. Would they really make such a big change on another show? Now, if somehow Jack became mortal again on DW, I could see that...and wouldn't that be all the more tragic to Jack/Ianto fans that they couldn't get to grow old together? (Especially if he's safely placed back at Torchwood 3 where he and Gwen can continue the good times...you know, once they bump off Rhys.)

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

I hope you are right, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

And if you are, you just gotta know that RTD will be spinning it as a "see the fans had no faith in brilliant me."

[radiant-pip.livejournal.com]

Hey, if we got Ianto back, he could spin it any way he wants it. (We can always snark about it. ;) )

[takenatwork.livejournal.com]

I'm sad that I'm half hoping the DW specials are a dog's dinner, just to kill the belief that RTD is a good writer. But that's childish and I shall rise above it.

[morebliss.livejournal.com]

Yeah? Fuck off Russell.

[as1mplegirl.livejournal.com]

Are there any decent spoilers for the last Tennant eps yet?

[(Anonymous)]

The cynic in me thinks THIS is RTD’s new gay agenda. If it was truly about killing a character for impact then Gwen checks off more boxes. She is the audience id character, the one who is supposed to make you feel a part of it all. Raise the issue of females as soldiers and ram home the point that even the moms can die in war. Gwen was supposed to be Jack’s idealized version of humanity so wouldn’t it make more sense for him to run if he blames himself for destroying that then for losing Ianto who Torchwood had long ago corrupted no matter how much Jack personally cared for him?

This wasn’t power over characters or demonstration of the dangers of the job. This was RTD throwing a tantrum. He’s no longer special just for having “the ghey” in his show. Even here in the “backwards” USA it has become the thing to do in Hollywood although there is still too few who do it really well.

More than anything Rusty needs to be special so he has to do something else. Fridging the gay boyfriend isn’t new but the reaction to this particular incident is. I think that is the real reason why he did it. He slanted publicity to max the eventual pain of this part of the fandom hoping to send it batshit. He wanted the interwebs to explode, to generate liveblog meta’s and protests and anger at cons. He wanted to be able to say that he was the man who not only made “the gay” acceptable in mainstream, he was the one who made it so wonderful that fans would demand to have it back if it were removed.

Sadly I would let him have his fun if it meant having GDL/Ianto back on my screen knowing that every ep. would have me in knots waiting for him to break me again. There is a part of me hoping that Gareth’s message that he would be delighted to work with these people again in the future is an indication that he has been told that there is still a place for him in the Whoniverse bc this was their plan all along. I love this actor/ character that much, and it has everything to do with GDL and nothing to do with RTD. Most of me knows I’m an idiot for even considering putting myself through all that again.

About the only consolation I have is how spectacularly I think it is all going to fail. Eve is already spinning her glee for S4 aka Super Cooper – Defender of Earth where Gwen fights aliens by day and changes nappies by night. If the Beeb thinks their shiny new audience drawn by the pull of this “Schindler’s List” of a horror story are going to stick around and watch they are sadly mistaken. Of the 3 mil new viewers they will be lucky to retain half and few of those will be rushing out to pick up the tie-ins bc mainstream audiences just don’t work that way.

The original audience? Let's be fair and say half are happy that their flawed little show finally growed up. That still leaves half fuming that everything they loved about this show was ripped away as callously and pointlessly as possible because RTD needed a forum for social commentary. The feelings of disgust and betrayal are running hot at the moment but it will cool. A small portion will go back though I think the majority is done caring about characters that are only going to die. That leaves brand spankin new Torchwood with an audience of 3-4 million – exactly what it had when it started and not likely to be large enough to keep such an expensive show going.

The disenfranchised section of the fandom has been one of the most rabid consumers of its merchandise. There is a reason that Ianto is still alive in the October book releases. “Hey fans,we took the normal, loving, non-stereotypical gay characters off your screen in our quest for shock and a broader audience but its still in our books where it is safely out of the spotlight and we still get to take your money. Really you should be grateful.” I think they have gone too far and the majority won’t buy. Not only do they go back to square one audience wise they lose money on the merchandise.

Sorry for the rant. I am deeply grateful for the chance but would understand completely if you chose to remove the post for its length.

Teresa

[tencrush]

No, thank you for posting it. I love getting anon comments at the moment because it reassures me that it's not just some rabid LJ contingent that feels like we've been played for suckers. There's a lot of disdain for hardcore fandom about, and a lot feeling that the fanbrats are just pissed that Russell killed their OTP. That's not the case (though they are out there, obvs), it's the manner in which it was marketed and sold to us, and the manner in which it was done. It stinks.

[love-jackianto.livejournal.com]

'That's not the case (though they are out there, obvs), it's the manner in which it was marketed and sold to us, and the manner in which it was done. It stinks.'
I couldn't have put it better myself.

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

I'll too will be interested to see how many of the new UK TW viewers will watch the next DW special.

There's been no heavy promotions of Tw3 here in the US (except on BBCA), so they are unlikely to pick up huge numbers of new viewers from that. And its generally part of a buy-up cable package, so many folks don't even have access to it. I'd be suprised if the numbers move up at all. Especially since a lot of us who are highly interested have already seen it on-line.

[qthewetsprocket.livejournal.com]

*thinks ten's a prick, but still cares about donna, wilf, the master, sarah jane...*

*trembles and weeps*

[tencrush]

I think Donna has a bit of that Ianto thing going on where I don't think RTD expected people to warm to her as much as they did, and she was intended as more of a light relief companion and one that Russell could take the piss out of a bit, and we weren't supposed to take her retreating-into-bimboness quite so seriously. And then it turned out we liked her and thought she got a rough deal, and that's pissed him off so he'll off her to teach us a lesson about his authorial might.

I fear for her life.

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

Good point. I never expected to care so much for Donna. When her memories got wiped I found it suprisngly hard to take, but 1)there was a point to it and 2)he didn't kill her 'because he's G-d.'

[michele659.livejournal.com]

He lies through his motherfucking teeth! He does have characters he loves so much that he would never kill. Like The Best Companion Ever,Rose.
He adored Rose,so even though her dying would have made sense from a storytelling point of view (going by Rusty's view of someone having to die in a big,epic battle for the earth)and yet she got to go to a parallel universe instead.
And in the big,epic battle for THE UNIVERSE in JE,Rose didn't die,when it also would have made sense for her to do so. There was talk of Martha going to Torchwood then,Jack can't die,SarahJane has her own show,and not enough people cared about the minor characters for it to have much of a dramatic impact.Instead,Donna had to be sacrificed for the Doctor to have the truly tragic(gag)ending he needed to have to be the lonely angel and go off alone(Sound familiar?).Well at least she didn't die physically-that's one small consolation.
On Torchwood,his obvious love is Gwen,so even though it would have had a major impact on Jack if she had died while pregnant at the same time he had to give up his grandson,we get Ianto dying instead.
He says "you're like God"-oh,I'm going to be sick! And "it's joyous to do so"-what an asshole! That's one of the reasons why,even though he comes up with great characters and ideas for a show both are always destroyed by the end.He doesn't care enough-not the way a really good author does. He doesn't care enough about the characters OR the story he chose to tell. That alone negates any comment he made about it being all about the "art".

[(Anonymous)]

But it's also good drama! And super duper brave! I mean, it's not like character deaths are the go-to plot device of every crappy tv show known to man.....Oh. Wouldn't it be swell if a script could be so nuanced and intelligent that, even if a character death occurs, it's a completely necessary and logical conclusion? As opposed to something that happens because you've run out of ideas? That the only reason you can wring any emotion from it at all is due to the fact that said character (actor) will be missed by his fans, rather than any beauty in the writing of their final scene? Because honestly, i've seen better writing in death scenes on Home and Away. If GDL weren't that good and John Barrowman hadn't chosen that particular moment to act believably for the first time all series, more people would have seen it for the mawkish crapfest it was.

And i'm not even pissed at Ianto's death! I knew it was going to happen. I just wish it wasn't such a shitty end.

Also, for anyone still slightly appreciative that the writers even bothered acknowledging the relationship between Jack/Ianto. It was only for the purpose of letting all those shiny new viewers know that they were together, so that they might care when they broke out the death scene.

[aviv-b.livejournal.com]

And to let them know that they won't have to worry about DA GAY in the next series.

[flohkatie.livejournal.com]

This.

And RTD telling us the show was sexy, well, a perv might think so.

[kel-reiley.livejournal.com]

i like this quote:
"he doesn’t understand fandom, he doesn’t belong to it, and says ‘You must never have anything to do with these people again.’ And I have to explain that it’s not the viewers, it’s just a very particular subset, usually men, who choose to type online."

...yeah

[tencrush]

Yeah, that one's quite funny in a ha ha sense.

[as1mplegirl.livejournal.com]

Where's that from?

[as1mplegirl.livejournal.com]

Found it. Never mind.

[as1mplegirl.livejournal.com]

What put you off ten? I gather from what I've read of this journal that your LJ name comes from the fact that you used to fancy him. Where did it all go wrong?