Doctor Who *Spoilers Abound! We've lost Containment*

Extended trailer for the Torchwood 5 episode special. Looks interesting, creepy kids 'n' that.

consciousness wrote:

The end of Series 4 of Doctor Who had a pretty big spoiler for it, though, so watch that.

Freema Agyeman kind of screwed that one by leaving to do a really, really poor UK version of Law And Order for ITV. It's difficult to blame her for looking for a steady gig, since the Who team was messing her around a fair bit, but it threw Torchwood into a bit of a confused loop for a while, since their plans were pretty much wiped out. No sign of Micky-boy in the trailer, either.

A quick, somewhat late reminder: Last year's Christmas special, "The Next Doctor," premiers on BBCA tonight.

consciousness wrote:

A quick, somewhat late reminder: Last year's Christmas special, "The Next Doctor," premiers on BBCA tonight.

Thanks for the tip. I had forgotten all about this.

spider_j wrote:

Extended trailer for the Torchwood 5 episode special. Looks interesting, creepy kids 'n' that.

consciousness wrote:

The end of Series 4 of Doctor Who had a pretty big spoiler for it, though, so watch that.

Freema Agyeman kind of screwed that one by leaving to do a really, really poor UK version of Law And Order for ITV. It's difficult to blame her for looking for a steady gig, since the Who team was messing her around a fair bit, but it threw Torchwood into a bit of a confused loop for a while, since their plans were pretty much wiped out. No sign of Micky-boy in the trailer, either.

Not a huge fan of Torchwood thus far but that does look quite good.
I like the idea of the shorter 5-episode long single story arc too.

First episode of Torchwood's Children of Earth premiered tonight. I loved it. To tired to go into details right now, but I think that was a great start. I am so glad this is a mini series and that they'll show all five episodes this week. If I had had to wait one week for the next one, I'd go nuts.

Anyone else happen to catch it?

Yeah, I saw it. Too soon to say yet, but it was a very competent opener. It annoys me at how governments in these things are useless until the second when the plot needs them to be effective and move really quickly. I wonder how much actual information we're going to get on Tuesday and Wednesday or whether they're going to spend it all dodging bullets until we get a tiny bit more information right at the end. Ultimately I don't care about the black bag stuff, just the alien bits.

Also watched it...like you say - too early to form much of an opinion thus far but it's off to a pretty good start.

VDOWhoNeedsDD wrote:

THIRD SEASON OF TORCHWOOD?!

I goddamn hate living in America.

It'll air on BBC America the week before it releases on DVD and Blu-Ray. Not quite at the same time as in Britland, but it's really close.

There were few shows I liked less than the first season of Torchwood, but the second season was such a turnaround in terms of making the characters likable and having interesting stories that I'm eagerly awaiting the upcoming series.

Noob and filthy skimmer here. My wife and I have just finished the first three seasons of the new series via Netflix streaming. (i.e. the season ending with "Blink" and the three-episode arc with The Master)

Our goal: Get caught up with both Doctor Who and Torchwood, then start watching them as they premiere on BBC America.

Our problem: It's hard to decode the BBC America website and Wikipedia well enough to figure out how far we can catch up via Netflix, and when the new shows run. I'm also not sure if we should be alternating between Who and Torchwood; I know that occasional Buffy/Angel crossovers were enhanced by watching both shows concurrently, is that the case here? (And if so, what's the timing?)

Another question: Is there a compelling reason (i.e. commentary, extras) to watch Doctor Who of DVD instead of streaming? Is there any hope of legally owning the DVDs at bargain basement prices (i.e. via collections) instead of the hefty MSRP or even Amazon prices?

Thanks for any help.

beeporama wrote:

Noob and filthy skimmer here. My wife and I have just finished the first three seasons of the new series via Netflix streaming. (i.e. the season ending with "Blink" and the three-episode arc with The Master)

Our goal: Get caught up with both Doctor Who and Torchwood, then start watching them as they premiere on BBC America.

Our problem: It's hard to decode the BBC America website and Wikipedia well enough to figure out how far we can catch up via Netflix, and when the new shows run. I'm also not sure if we should be alternating between Who and Torchwood; I know that occasional Buffy/Angel crossovers were enhanced by watching both shows concurrently, is that the case here? (And if so, what's the timing?)

Another question: Is there a compelling reason (i.e. commentary, extras) to watch Doctor Who of DVD instead of streaming? Is there any hope of legally owning the DVDs at bargain basement prices (i.e. via collections) instead of the hefty MSRP or even Amazon prices?

Thanks for any help.

Welcome, welcome! *rubs hands together creepily*

There has been very little in the way of crossover between Who and Torchwood. Off the top of my head, there is nothing other than "who are those 2?" when Gwen and Ianto appear in the season 4 closer, though the same could be said for the character from the Sarah Jane Adventures who pop up in there.

Torchwood arguably owes a bit more to the events in Dr Who, but nothing that could end in a problem following it. It aired in the UK with the series staggered (Torchwood during the Who off-season) so you certainly shouldn't alternate episodes like with Buffy and Angel.

You know, when Sky showed the concurrent series of Buffy and Angel on a Thursday night over here, my wife and I used to crack a bottle of wine and gorge ourselves on cookies. It was a geek high point of the week.

Turning to new Torchwood, I really enjoyed the first episode last night. The acting was strong, it was surprisingly funny in places ("Have you turned bender?") and the 5 episode arc gives them time to really build things up. I always felt that Torchwood was either too rushed in one hour, or didn't have enough plot to fill the hour, with very little in between. This format could really work for it.

Torchwood can be funny, it's just sometimes they confuse comedy with parody. And parody with self-parody. And self-parody with being rubbish.

I can't wait to watch this. I've run out of Doctor Who episodes on my DVR so now is a great time for some more Torchwood =)

Howdy beeporama. The time lines operate a bit like this (hang in there, this may get a bit wibbly-wobbly):
The series aired in the following order with no overlap like there was with Buffy and Angel: DW1, DW2, TW1, DW3, TW2, DW4. Series 1 of Torchwood directly references events in the first Doctor Who series and the first Christmas special (found on disk 1 of Doctor Who series 2). Series two of Torchwood happens some time before Torchwood's appearance at the end of Doctor Who series 4. There is a pretty huge spoiler for the end of the second Torchwood series at the end of Doctor Who series 4, so if you can watch Torchwood first, I recommend it.

As for the character of Sarah Jane Smith, who makes her first modern appearance in the second season episode School Reunion and has her own (less watchable by adults) spin-off, you have to go back to the 70's for her first travels with the Doctor. (If you are curious, Netflix up Doctor Who: Genesis of the Daleks for one of the best of the old show featuring Sarah Jane, and of course the Daleks.)

Aside from the simple quality argument, the US DVDs contain cut-down versions of the Doctor Who Confidential companion shows for each episode. It's possible the non-cut down Confidentials are also available through ... non-traditional means. Sadly BBC DVDs are relatively expensive and generally stay relatively expensive. All the Doctor Who and Torchwood series that have aired are already out on DVD (and Bluray for Torchwood). Torchwood: Children of Earth will be out by the end of this month (a week after it airs). The two most recent Doctor Who specials are arriving out of order with The Next Doctor coming in September, and Planet of the Dead coming this month on the same day as the new Torchwood. Planet of the Dead is also the first Doctor Who available in HD. The Next Doctor premiered a couple of weeks ago in the US. Planet of the Dead airs the Saturday following the week of Torchwood on BBCA, if I remember correctly.

spider_j wrote:

Turning to new Torchwood, I really enjoyed the first episode last night. The acting was strong, it was surprisingly funny in places ("Have you turned bender?") and the 5 episode arc gives them time to really build things up. I always felt that Torchwood was either too rushed in one hour, or didn't have enough plot to fill the hour, with very little in between. This format could really work for it.

They're certainly doing a very good job at ratcheting up the tension so far, which I think has a lot to do with them being able to take their time and not cram everything into an hour.

I'm going to be rather disappointed if the '456' turn out to be men in a rubber suit though, 'slitheen style'. Hopefully the shorter series means they can splash out a bit more on some convincing aliens.

One other small thing - somebody REALLY needs to give Gwen some firearms training or something as she is terrible with the shooting

Yeah, they had some great tense pauses in episode 3.

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
So, I'm gathering in 1965 that they gave the 456 a bunch of kids from a home in exchange for not killing everyone or possibly some technology? Since 1965 was 44 years ago, Frobisher must have been a child at the time, so he must have been a participant rather than a player.
[/color]

Oh, I so want Peter Capaldi to break into full-on Malcolm Tucker sweary mode next time he talks to the alien. I'd settle for some some outtakes where he does that.

DudleySmith wrote:

Yeah, they had some great tense pauses in episode 3.

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
So, I'm gathering in 1965 that they gave the 456 a bunch of kids from a home in exchange for not killing everyone or possibly some technology? Since 1965 was 44 years ago, Frobisher must have been a child at the time, so he must have been a participant rather than a player.
[/color]

I wondered the same thing until a colleague (who's a major Doctor Who fiend) pointed my attention to this...

**Warning: this could be a major spoiler. Look at your own peril. **

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]Frobisher was the name of a shape shifting alien from the Doctor Who comics in the 80s. Who, bizarrely, prefered to spend his free time in the form of a penguin. It may just be an innocent nod to a past character, but it seems like a big coincidence to me. There's a wiki article about him for those interested, I just couldn't work out how to post the link without ruining the spoiler.[/color]

beeporama wrote:

Another question: Is there a compelling reason (i.e. commentary, extras) to watch Doctor Who of DVD instead of streaming? Is there any hope of legally owning the DVDs at bargain basement prices (i.e. via collections) instead of the hefty MSRP or even Amazon prices?

Thanks for any help.

I absolutely love the Doctor Who Confidential extras that are included in the DVD set. I have the first four seasons of Dr. Who and they were worth every penny. My wife and I managed to get friends to pitch 50/50 on our birthdays for the box sets. There's more commentary and special stuff I haven't seen yet, but since we have to wait here in the States for the episodes it gives me plenty of time to check out the extras.

holy crap, 4/5 episodes down and this is actually pretty damned good...

...now if they can just avoid the patented "Russel's campy deus ex machina super solution" for the last episode I'll be pretty happy

I've seen the first 3 episodes and been similarly impressed with this season of Torchwood.

The political wranglings and arguing are fairly interesting, and nice to see U.N.I.T.

Lard wrote:

I've seen the first 3 episodes and been similarly impressed with this season of Torchwood.

The political wranglings and arguing are fairly interesting, and nice to see U.N.I.T. :D

Yeah one thing I think is pretty good is that the whole thing is playing out more like a low-budget "24" or political drama with (at least so far) minimal direct alien contact. Which is a great way to do it if your creatures aren't up to snuff (the 456 in the box is more than a little puppety - luckily it's mostly hidden in the conveniently foggy atmosphere).

Torchwood spoilers wrote:

[color=white]Well, that was far more bleak and depressing than I thought it would be. I knew that an entirely happy ending was well outside the realms of possibility, but, damn, that was dark.

It looks like an end to Torchwood as well. I suppose with only 2 of them left, and 1 with a baby, a new series was unlikely anyway. Someone should have told Freema Agyeman; she was recently quoted as saying that she hoped to do more Torchwood in the future!

So, no more Torchwood and a prepubescent Doctor. Ain't looking good; I really hope that Moffat can pull it out of the bag.[/color]

Holy Frikkin' Crap. That was a bloody good ending. Bleak as f**k, but a bloody good ending.

Far as I'm concerned they've redeemed themselves from the whole "pulling earth back to its original position with a tow rope" thing in the last Dr Who.

If you've been put off by Torchwood in the past I *HIGHLY* recommend giving it another shot with series 3.

Five damned good hours of TV right there.

Bonus points for Gwen's heartrending little comment about the Doctor and how he was most likely reacting to what's happening (because she'd be spot on).

According to the BBC the move to BBC1 gave it a hefty ratings boost (up to 5.9 million on the first episode compared to between 2.5-4.2 million for series 2). So there's always a chance of more if the rating kept up across the whole week.

Torchwood spoilers wrote:

[color=white]As for Torchwood itself, there's at least two new potential members for a reformed team (the assistant girl and the hard as nails assassin lady ... not to mention Freema Agyeman once that horrible Law and Order thing gets cancelled for being crap :P[/color]

I can't see them going back to the longer format but personally I think this short miniseries event type stuff could be revisited quite effectively (and was MUCH, MUCH better than the solo episodes anyway).

In fact, if they did the same with Dr Who (which would make it much more like the good old days ) I can't say I would be disappointed.

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
Well, it certainly had the strength to carry through its convictions. I postulated to my wife about the bit of technobabble that would beat them, but I didn't make the leap to the specific sacrifice to Jack. It was a nice touch that they're just using the kids as poppers.

Wasn't a big fan of Frobisher offing his family though. Surely there was a long list of things he could have done instead of that, up to and including killing the horrible PM, and got some absolution for his manifest sins. Maybe he was just too much of a yes man for such outright disobedience.

But they certainly appear to have dismantled the show, haven't they? No hub, no Jack, no Ianto, just Gwen and possibly Rhys. They've got the hard-faced assassin lady (who still runs like a girl) and Lois too I suppose. But they wouldn't be the A-team exactly, they have no doctor, and no scientist, unless they pick up that creepy Decker bloke.

[/color]

DudleySmith wrote:
spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
Well, it certainly had the strength to carry through its convictions. I postulated to my wife about the bit of technobabble that would beat them, but I didn't make the leap to the specific sacrifice to Jack. It was a nice touch that they're just using the kids as poppers.

Wasn't a big fan of Frobisher offing his family though. Surely there was a long list of things he could have done instead of that, up to and including killing the horrible PM, and got some absolution for his manifest sins. Maybe he was just too much of a yes man for such outright disobedience.

But they certainly appear to have dismantled the show, haven't they? No hub, no Jack, no Ianto, just Gwen and possibly Rhys. They've got the hard-faced assassin lady (who still runs like a girl) and Lois too I suppose. But they wouldn't be the A-team exactly, they have no doctor, and no scientist, unless they pick up that creepy Decker bloke.

[/color]

well..

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
The one thing they always like to emphasise is that working for Torchwood is pretty much like going up against the Chtulhu Mythos...don't go starting any long books. Constantly changing team members does make a lot of sense (they even reference it here when the assassin lady comments that it's rare to see a Torchwood member die of natural causes).

Martha Jones could still fill the doctor position assuming she's not doing other TV stuff at the time. (I would LOVE to see Decker end up working for them too, that guy is awesomely creepy ). No reason they can't introduce new faces as well...and hey, they could always bring back Spike...I mean, Captain John.[/color]

DudleySmith wrote:
spoiler wrote:

[color=white]
So, I'm gathering in 1965 that they gave the 456 a bunch of kids from a home in exchange for not killing everyone or possibly some technology? Since 1965 was 44 years ago, Frobisher must have been a child at the time, so he must have been a participant rather than a player.
[/color]

spoiler wrote:

[color=white]It was a cure to a mutated strain of a flu that would have killed millions. As a pure numbers game, exchanging 12 children that no one would have missed for the cure would have been a simple decision. Even if it's morally reprehensible.

In a way this gives me a little more appreciation of the first series, since it's possible Jack wasn't supposed to be the same character we knew from Doctor Who, but instead be more like the bleak version we glimpsed from '65. My guess, is, though, that after an appearance on Doctor Who, Jack will be sufficiently recharged to reboot Torchwood. I mean I'd be surprised if he didn't show up again before Tennant's (and RTD's) farewell.[/color]

I wonder if a 5-night event like this would make sense in the U.S. as well compared to our traditional mini-series format. I'm not sure most people can plan to sit down and watch a two hour telefilm two nights in a row.

VDOWhoNeedsDD wrote:

agreed. the finale of torchwood season 1, where he fought the devil, was so painful to watch. they'd been teasing it to be this big thing the whole series, and then...argh!

No, no, no, that was the son of the devil. And quite possibly one of the strangest directions they could have gone with for the finale.

Thanks Kurrelgyre, but that was me trying to work out the story halfway through it. I wrote that on Thursday morning before the complete 1965 flashback on Thursday evening's episode.

As others have said, I preferred the Han Solo version of Harkness from the first rebooted series of Doctor Who to the brooding, gloomy Angel-a-like from Torchwood.

According to the SFX magazine website...

Torchwood's BBC1 debut has been a major hit, with every episode easily winning its respective time slot. It was by the far the biggest non-soap drama of the week, with the kind of figures (an average of 5.88 million viewers) that most dramas these days would love to achieve (Hotel Babylon, the usual inhabitant of the Friday 9pm BBC1 slot languishes around the 4.5 million mark). Amazingly, it was also very consistent in its performance. Usually, with these "consecutive nights" mini series audiences will drop off from a heavily promoted first episode, but the audience pretty much stayed with "Children Of Earth" throughout. The show has also been being watched by just shy of 100,000 each night on the BBC HD channel, and clogging up the iPlayer chart.

Here are those figures in full:

Day One - 5.9 million viewers
Day Two - 5.6 million viewers
Day Three - 5.9 million viewers
Day Four - 6.2 million viewers
Day Five - 5.8 million viewers

Of course, these are only overnight figures. The official figures, including people who've recorded/Sky Plussed/whatevered the show, will be published in a couple of weeks' time. Expect a big increase for Day Five – Friday night is going out night!

I would say another series like this one is pretty inevitable.

It's funny, thinking about Series 3 as a whole, it reminds me so much of the old Virgin books Doctor Who New Adventure books (the NAs) that it's not even funny.

Tone - spot on.

Gloomy ending - spot on.

Morally grey characters - spot on.

I wonder if RTD was going through a bit of nostalgia for them or something, since he actually wrote one near the end of the run.

First pics of Doctor #11 in costume

IMAGE(http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/46086000/jpg/_46086374_doctor_who226long.jpg)

I sure hope he can act because that outfit is hideous! Here is the whole story where the picture showed up.

Bill Nye, Doctor Who.