Miracle Day - are we facing another CoE slap in the face?

[blucougar]

Spoilers behind the cut

For anyone who has seen the "preview to episode 10" that is available when you purchase Torchwood: Miracle Day through a season pass, you'll know that John Barrowman says that there will be a death in the final episode and that we will be shocked.

Frankly, I don't care if they kill off Rex, Esther, Oswald... and I think I'll cope if they kill off Rhys. I know I'll be shocked if Jack is killed off, although it's been said that Jack will be in the anniversary series of Doctor Who, so it's hopeful that he will be returned to his immortal state, and continue on his happy way to becoming a giant head in a jar.

I live in hope, slim though it might be, that the shock death will be Gwen. I say that unapologetically. RTD and Julie Gardner insisted right from the beginning of Torchwood that no character (barring Jack) was safe, and that Torchwood operatives died young. They've killed off Tosh, Owen and Ianto. To leave Gwen untouched would be hypocritical at the very least.

I really do hope the character dies, because if that happens then we can be sure that if Torchwood is resurrected for a new season, then it will be a completely fresh show with a complete set of new characters.

Yes, I know I am a bitch, but I hate Gwen. I thought maybe she had taken a turn for the better at the start of this season, but sadly she just degenerated into her usual, sanctimonious and irritating self.

Unfortunately, I worry that RTD has another slap in the face of CoE proportions planned for those of us who have been brave enough to stick with the show.

There is one episode left. Jack was shot at the end of episode 8 and appears to be slowly bleeding to death. We have been promised a death that will shock us. All I can say is that if that death is Jack's, then Torchwood is officially dead in the water, and there will never be another series. I may never even watch another episode of Doctor Who, unless Moffatt is prepared to go against RTD and bring Jack back.

I am sorry, but Eve Myles cannot carry a show like Torchwood on her own. Without Captain Jack, there is no Torchwood. End of story.

Comments

[remuslives23]

I don't think it'll be too much of a shock if Jack bites it as many TW fans have been predicting his demise since Ep 1. It would be a stunner if Gwen was to die, simply because RTD has said how untouchable she is (and RTD has already commented in an interview that he has already got a plot for S5 which focuses on Gwen, implying Jack is either a bit player or not there at all). My money is on Jack, unfortunately, although I wouldn't put it past RTD to make Jack toss poor Anwen into the giant vagina as a sacrifice.

[idamus]

The thing is, Jack can die in ep 10 and still be in Doctor Who, timey wimey stuff, we do afterall (I think) have the time between Jack leaving and returning unaccounted for (I haven't watched MD)
I still think the only safe one in this show is RTD....... I mean Gwen

[wolf-were.livejournal.com]

More and more, I'm glad I didn't watch MD.

[badly_knitted]

RTD and co have already ripped Jack to shreds so much, short of killing him off there's really nothing else they can do to him. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if he was killed and I'm in two minds about how I'd feel. On the one hand, Jack's suffered so much it would put him out of his misery and he could go join Ianto in the afterlife. On the other, I want Jack to be around to appear on Doctor Who. Of course, in my head neither CoE nor Miracle Day exists in the same universe as Doctor Who, to me it's all AU and in the Doctor Who universe's version of Torchwood none of this happened, because if it had, the Doctor would have showed to fix it.

I can't help feeling that RTD would have killed Jack off long ago if he hadn't been immortal, so that Torchwood could be completely The Gwen Show, so Miracle Day may well have been created just in order for him to have an excuse to do just that. Make everyone else immortal, make Jack mortal, then kill him to fix the world. It's cynical of me, I know, but it wouldn't surprise me.

If Gwen dies, I will be very surprised. Sadly, I think it's highly unlikely (although I suspect a lot of people would be relieved, myself included). RTD practically worships Gwen, he thinks she's perfect, so I can't see him killing the wonderful character he created (shame sarcasm doesn't come across well in writing). I'd be surprised if Rhys bit the dust, because Gwen never loses anything important to her, but then I'm not convinced Rhys really means that much to her anyway...

Having said all this, I haven't watched Miracle Day at all, nor do I ever plan to. I suspect the reviews are more entertaining than the actual show and I don't have to waste 10 hours of my life to know what's happening. 5 minutes a week tells me all I need to know.

[theorclair]

Of course, in my head neither CoE nor Miracle Day exists in the same universe as Doctor Who, to me it's all AU and in the Doctor Who universe's version of Torchwood none of this happened, because if it had, the Doctor would have showed to fix it.

Me too. If I had to list twenty things that bothered me about CoE, the first five would all be variations on "Where's the Doctor and why hasn't Martha/Sarah Jane/The Brig/insert other person he's close to here called him yet?" Because the Doctor cares so much about Earth that he's repeatedly dropped everything to come save it.

[badly_knitted]

Exactly! It makes no logical sense, so they can't be in the same universe. Martha being on her honeymoon wouldn't have kept her from at least contacting the Doctor, and she would have have found a way to get in touch with Torchwood. Sarah Jane would have got Mr Smith and K-9 working on the problem...

Someone else said somewhere that global threats really don't work for Torchwood because of the Doctor and UNIT being the people who would automatically respond to anything on such a grand scale, and it's true. Torchwood worked while it was dealing with the flotsam and jetsam that fell through the Rift - they had a clear purpose, protecting the people of Cardiff and the surrounding areas from things and creatures that could harm them - but when you make the threat global and claim that only Torchwood can help and even they are incompetent, it all falls apart.

[theorclair]

I've been working on a fic for more than two years (writer's block some) where Martha explicitly states who knows how to reach the Doctor and that he'd come for anything serious. Watch "The Stolen Earth" again and you'll see how they should have reacted - they know this is way over their heads and ask for help.

People always seem to assume I hate CoE because I'm a butthurt shipper (I am a shipper, but not a butthurt one...) and somehow it never occurs to them I don't like it because it doesn't make sense in the Who universe.

[badly_knitted]

I think a lot of Who-Verse fans are in the same position. We have perfectly valid reasons for not liking CoE - not only doesn't it make sense within the Who-Verse, it doesn't make sense in any respect a lot of the time - but we just get accused of not liking it solely because they killed Ianto.

I'll admit I think killing Ianto was unnecessary to the plot (such as it was), but by the end of Day One I was pulling apart all the plot holes and rolling my eyes about how little sense it was making, and it just went downhill from there. There were a few brief moments when it seemed like Torchwood, but most of it was a nonsensical mess. There were so many things that bugged me, I couldn't suspend my disbelief for more that a few minutes at a time before the plot fell down another gaping hole.

[idamus]

Disaster it might have been, but I didn't want the Doctor to come to the rescue, I can see that in his own series, I liked how these ordinary people (and one immortal from the future) tried to make a difference, I also very, very rarely read fanfic where the Doctor fixes things, Torchwood is not Doctor Who

[badly_knitted]

No, Torchwood isn't Doctor Who, but it is supposed to exist in the same universe. By making the plot global, it begs the question of why no one even tried to contact the Doctor, who has shown up to rescue earth from far lesser threats. If the threat had been more localised, say only Britain in danger, then yes, the Doctor might have thought Torchwood could handle it and stayed away, but he doesn't have a high enough opinion of the apes who inhabit the planet to leave such a devastating threat to be dealt with by earth itself.

Then there's the fact that UNIT apparently made no attempt to tackle the threat. Isn't that what they exist to do? Protect earth from alien threats? Even if the Doctor didn't show up, UNIT should have been fighting back, but instead...

And I'm not saying that I myself wanted to see the Doctor come riding in to save the day, just that there's not even any real explanation of why he didn't or couldn't even though fans were bound to ask "Why?"

I've long thought that the whole idea would have worked better if the global threat had been season 2's Sleepers. They could have crippled earth's communications so an S.O.S. couldn't be sent to the Doctor and the destruction of the Hub would have actually made sense. Maybe something in Beth's body activated and blew the Hub sky high. Anything would have made more sense than planting a bomb in Jack and hoping he'd get back to his secret base before exploding.

I also would have enjoyed it more if the ordinary people and the immortal hadn't been made to look so downright incompetent most of the time. It beggars belief that Torchwood didn't have any backup Hub in case their base was compromised, no off-site stash of weapons and equipment for emergencies, no pre-established false identities they could use, etc. etc. It looked like amateur hour.

[theorclair]

Exactly. If they are in the same universe there's no logic to the story line. It wasn't a matter of wanting the Doctor to show up as much as there was no reason he couldn't.

And mind you, it's established in "Journey's End" that Tosh is a master at planning for unexpected things, which makes the whole plot from day one onward make no sense. If she prepared something for a Dalek invasion she'd surely have come up with something for explosives in the Hub.

[badly_knitted]

That's been my problem with CoE from the start - the moment you start thinking about the 'plot', the whole thing just collapses. It's like getting hold of a loose thread, pulling it and watching everything unravel.

The Hub would surely have had some sort of detector beyond the alien ultrasound scanner thing that would have registered the bomb in Jack! Tosh built enough safeguards and alarms into the Hub systems!

CoE was one of the reasons I chose not to watch MD - I'd been burnt once, I didn't wanto to watch something as dark, depressing, bleak, pointless and nonsensical again. From everything I've heard, it was a good decision on my part. I wasted 5 hours on CoE, I'm glad I haven't wasted twice that on something I can't even recognise as the Torchwood I used to enjoy so much.

[aviv_b_artwork]

What everyone else has said. If anyone dies, it'll be Jack and perhaps one of the Laurel and Hardy CIA agents. I had bet on Rex, but now there's a rumor about him becoming immortal! TW is dead. Whether Jack survives or not, this series has been, by all accounts (even some of its big supports like After Elton and the Guardian) a craptastic piece of shite. RIP TW.

[ice_elf]

I won't be that surprised if Jack does die. He's been sidelined this series and I think RTD seriously wants to make Gwen his main character. (Although you could argue she always has been.) Killing Jack off would allow her to be the star. I'm fairly sure Gwen won't die, though. She's more immortal than Jack. And I can't say I'd be all that bothered about Rex or Esther. I like Esther but I can't say losing her would cause me too much angst.

I can't see the show working without Jack, and I can't see it lasting very long either. I certainly wouldn't be watching a show with Gwen as the main character and I can see a lot of people doing the same - I know Gwen has some fans but I know of more who dislike or tolerate her. It would keep the casual viewers, of course, but more of the hardcore fans would desert the show, I suspect.

I honestly believe Gwen could have been an awesome character if she had been better written. She does have her awesome moments too but they're so often ruined by bad writing and her flaws not being written as flaws. I could say the same about Miracle Day though - the premise has been interesting but the writing hasn't been great and the pacing has been terrible. I've enjoyed it to some degree but it hasn't been brilliant and it hasn't been Torchwood.

[raggedblossom]

Am normally a bit of a lurker but just have to respond. I've really tried to be open minded about Gwen and even thought in the very early eps of MD that she had improved. How foolish I was! She has sunk to even lower levels. Whether it is the fault of the writing or the acting, Gwen simply does not measure up to the boasts of RTD. And speaking of the man, I am certain that he would love to be rid of Jack to make way for his beloved Gwen however I think that even he (if not the BBC as well) would realise that this would be a huge mistake. And I think JB would have a lot to say about this! There may be no Torchwood after this MD debacle but without Jack TW is certainly dead and buried no matter how many 'great and talented' they introduce to future series.

As far as Ep 10 goes, for what it's worth I think Jack may well be killed (possibly by Gwen)as an offering to The Blessing ........ but I believe he will revive with his immortality restored. Of course, in reality I am totally clueless about what is going to happen....... and I am sick with worry about it!

[rhia_starsong]

I completely agree. I didn't tune in to the show in the first place to watch Gwen bloody Cooper, and she's a big part of why I no longer watch it. RTD needs to get his head out of his ass and realise that people watch the show for Jack. He's the main character, and since it's a spin-off from his character's time on Dr Who, that's why most of us watch Torchwood. I agree that Gwen can't carry the show (though I might be happier if they just moved him back to Who...).

[idamus]

However much I don't like it, fans does not write or dictate a show, that where fanfiction comes in, RTD can do with the show as he sees fit, we can just choose not to watch

[rhia_starsong]

Oh, that's definitely true, but I think that RTD does a disservice to fans who want to be loyal to the show; I read an interview where he flat-out said that "If fans want to watch pretty young men, they should watch Supernatural." That kind of thing doesn't really endear me as a fan, and I think the attitude sort of comes out in the show. But you're right; we can only choose to not watch if we don't like it and send a message that way.

[milady_dragon]

I've thought from the very beginning that MD was the perfect way of getting rid of Jack: turn him mortal and then kill him before whatever happened reverses itself. We've all known that RTD didn't want Jack in Torchwood at all, and was practically forced to have him in it in order to make his show about the female copper who chases aliens. So yes, I think Jack is well and truly dead.

There was a rumor saying that Gwen would have to make a terrible decision, and I think that decision is to kill Jack for the reversal of the miracle. I've been thinking since Jane Espenson made the comment that burning someone to ash would really kill them, that this is how Jack was going to go...and that Gwen would push the button. And now we have the gigantic alien vagina showing up, I've changed my mind, and that Jack is sacrificed to it.

However...

I also think that there will be a bit of ambiguity about how he dies. Starz has said they may do another series if a good idea comes up involving Jack...not Gwen, Jack. So yeah, I think he dies but they leave an out.

[thraceadams]

Well I'm one of the ones that is convinced that RTD is going to kill Jack off - and hmm...now I wouldn't be surprised if he sacrificed Gwen's baby. I stopped watching after epi 5 - I'm just waiting to see the reaction after Epi 10 - we'll see if I decide to watch the rest after that. I've heard the ratings are terrible.

this used to be such a fun fandom.

[badly_knitted]

I'd say the fandom is still fun, it's just that the show itself has had its sense of fun surgically removed.

[rhia_starsong]

this used to be such a fun fandom.

Yeah, it did; the show's premise and plots were fun, despite the darker tone. I miss that show.

[geminia]

I have no doubt Jack's going to die - at least temporarily - more and more I've come to the conclusion that's the only way to revert him to his immortal state - and they did show a shot of him gasping like he does when he revives in the previews for Ep 10.

I really can't see RTD being stupid enough to permanently kill of the show's main character. He may have a blind spot where Gwen's concerned, but he's said in the past there's no Torchwood without Jack, so I think he knows where the cash cow is.

Even those of us who don't actually hate Gwen (well, outside Immortal Sins, anyway) and simply tolerate her for the sake of watching the show aren't going to stick around for a show minus its central character.

As much as I love Tosh, she, Owen and Ianto were pretty much living on borrowed time from the beginning (since Ianto was originally supposed to die in CW, then the whole Zombie!Owen thing *shudder*, I'm really surprised all 5 of them were still there for EW).

Eve was the only one ever given actual co-star status with John, so I think the others were considered cannon fodder right from the start.

*sarcasm* After all, since Jack's immortal he can't possibly suffer unless it's by having people around him suffer instead. */sarcasm*

Given that co-star status and RTD's aforementioned blind spot, as much as I'd love to see the show go on with just Jack, Rex, Esther and Rhys, I don't count my chances very high (I may not hate her, but I also think she and Ianto were far more expendable than Tosh and Owen, so just going back to EW, she's been given more than enough passes already).

[evalentine99]

TW is dead long live TW.
Gwen is an okay character for me but not a main focus. Before episode seven Jack has less screen time than Eshter, (don't get me started on her)
At that time for me it was clear they had reduced Jack to a gay sterio type who had been sidelined in his own show.
Rex will not sacrifice himself for anything the man is to selfish and caught up in his own hubris.
Eshter too stupid
Gwen to selfish.
That only leaves Jack.
If Jack goes that's me gone as a viewer.
No Captain Jack no TW.

[shelbynm]

I was wondering what people would be hoping for. I can honestly say I hope they do kill Jack. I have never wished death on any of my favorite charaters - until now. It would put a great end to the series - and I think the series should end here. TW:MD is a good show, but it is not the TW I fell in love with years ago. Plus, even if Jack is dead he can still show up on DW. There is so much time we don't know what Jack was doing - especially over the last 2 years. So DW could just use an earlier version and it still work into the story. - Okay that just made my brain hurt. Jacks timeline is so confusing.

[stlscape]

At first I expected Jack to die-die-dead-dead-dead in MD. (Kinda hoped for it, actually, to put the poor guy out of his misery...and ours.) Now I don't think he will. Remember, he's got the Rectangle o' Reversability from the floor Angelo stole from the exploded Hub within the last 18 months or so.

Now, I'm expecting Jack's death to be a fake-out. He *will* really die (but not die-die-dead-dead-dead), and Gwen will be the one who pulls the trigger and kills him. (O! The anguish! O! The emotional pain! O! Let's ignore the fact that two (three?) eps ago you were happily sending him to his dead-dead-dead death and expecting him to tell you happy fairytales while you waited to turn him over to the "bad guys".)

So Jack will die, but will call on the Powers of His Rectangle o' Reversability (since he's mortal now (and I *still* want to know why healing slower = mortal), the RoR makes him immortal), so he'll gasp back to life. Maybe we'll even see him gasping back to life days later, after Abbadon sucked most of his life-force out of him and died in an abandoned space station warehouse, all alone, except for piles of Dalek dust and dead bodies. And the camera pulls back in a crane shot, and there's poor Jack, sitting all alone again, abandoned again by his teammates. And we end the show with Gwen on a commercial flight to the UK, from China closed it's borders Shanghai, in tears, because the mean Chinesies and Family peopleses won't let her sit in their warehouse for days, while ignoring her family's needs and letting everyone else do the clean-up work, and because now that the "team" is dead there's no way to make herself feel more special and more important, and because Jack won't be around any more to keep implying that everything she does is right and proper and logical,(we'll ignore that little "rip the skin from your skull comment" shall we? Gwen certainly is.) and to keep her supplied with Retcon for everyone else that Gwen's in a snit with.

who dies

[ohinyan.livejournal.com]

On a purely practical note, JB has been turning down work opportunities because he is contracted to Torchwood for the next series, if it happens. If Jack ends up absolutely stone dead for ever, surely they wouldn't hold him to that contract. Or am I being totally naive thinking they'd release him before the finale air date?

So if Jack does die (which I think he will, and have done since episode 1), he must resurrect when the Miracle is turned off.

I also think Danes will die doing something useful. There has been such a plot contrivance to get him there, he must do something important. Why they didn't just retcon him, to stop him exposing their secrets, I don't know. They even had it handy.

What I would like to see is Gwen sacrificing herself instead of Jack, as an act of contrition for betraying him.

I definitely don't want Jack to end up as a head in a jar!

Gwen and Jack's relationship should have been wrecked by what Gwen did in episode 7, but, unfortunately, I believe that the quick hug is RTD's take on what it took for them to get over it.