Torchwood: Sleeper

(Originally written 16/9/13) 

In a lot of ways, this episode feels like it belongs back in Series One. We have a rip-off of a classic movie (Terminator II), the Convenient Weevil Powers are used to indicate that something is not right, and the final scene involves a chat between Gwen and Jack.

Meanwhile, Gwen’s sole purpose is to be the caring one - painfully so at some points. Everyone else feels for Beth on some level (except apparently Jack), but Gwen is the only one who truly understands her.

But this episode also sets up what to expect in Series Two when it comes to Ianto and Jack’s new rules of dialogue – the former delivering humorous one-liners 90% of the time, and the latter delivering at least one awful one-liner per episode. This episode’s contender is *shoots sleeper* “Factor that into your plans.”

Speaking of awful lines, the Torchwood team has a mind probe! And while this did eventually dig deep enough to reveal Beth’s true identity, part of me wonders why they didn’t at least start off with the lie detector from Adam...

Speaking of technology, when they mentioned the phone networks being down the first thing I thought of was radio. This is not because I’ve seen the episode before, but because one of the magazines we publish at work is a radio mag, so I know they’re important in an emergency.

Two questions about Beth as a sleeper agent:

• Why did she kill her husband? I don’t recall him having anything to do with their plans, and she was trying to get away from him anyway.
• With each sleeper agent surrounded by a force-field 1mm thick, this has me wondering about how, er, bodily fluids are exchanged.

 I’ve never really had much to say about this episode, but I will say that in Beth’s final scene, I really began to appreciate the acting of Nikki Amuka-Bird, and I finally felt what Beth must have been feeling. Pity I couldn’t feel it for the rest of the episode though.

Since this post is so short, I’ll go into the preview for To The Last Man. And this reminds us that Gwen needs to be told that Tommy is woken up once every 12 months, which means Jack couldn’t have been gone 18 months after Utopia, which means I need a new theory.