About a Boy
It’s all about Jack. This whole episode is a setup to explore Jack’s past, Boeshane Penisula and explain about Gray (the same Gray Captain John mentioned). Almost a shame they have to include the other people really. But at least we get whacky Torchwood in which people have been reimagined courtesy of Adam… well, in which Tosh and Owen have been reimagined… well, in which Tosh and Owen have had their personalities swapped. Yeah, thanks Adam. At least Owen had the balls to actually ask Tosh out. I did like “assertive Tosh”, but “geek Owen” deserved a good slapping (even more so after he reverted back to normal).
I do have to inquire as to how Adam managed to infiltrate Torchwood: if he came from the Void, he still had to touch them to get into their minds, but he wasn’t Adam then, so… clearly Tregenna just wanted to get to Jack’s past and didn’t stop to think about important things like ‘coherency’. Adam himself was suspicious from early on, as soon as you have “this chap the audience has never seen” you are looking at Adam shiftily. Fortunately, the writer and director manage to flatten this impression into mere “probably, not definitely, evil” as the episode goes on until the Ianto moment. From then on, it was all downhill, but props to Tregenna for using the obvious camera footage. (Touches like that might suggest Tregenna should give Who a go.)
It all gets very religious at the end, with Jack (the episode is about him, after all) becoming the team’s saviour. He takes their deepest confession and hands out the Eucharist… I mean, retcon, and forgives them their sins. (But it does raise a point that if Gwen didn’t remember Rhys, and professes love for Jack, why didn’t she make a move on Jack?) However, one wonders what Rhys will spill when he gets his normal Gwen back. (Although he can only explain “there was this guy Adam” that probably won’t cause too much trouble.)
In many ways, this episode is an excuse for Jack’s backstory to come out (the Time Agent stuff might have to wait until Captain John returns, oh what fun the production team will have then). Clearly the production team are going all-out for the character stories, although I would like to see a decent plot-based episode. So far, series two has been superior (for most episodes) to series one. I wouldn’t mind if series one disappeared, but we aren’t done yet, and the series may yet completely fall over…
JE