At Westminster, civil servant Frobisher (Peter Capaldi) is still fretting about the situation with the world's children and the imminent return of "the 456", only now the government have translated the alien's message and (in shades of Contact) realize they're instructions to create a chamber of poisonous gas. Assumedly, this will provide the E.Ts with a breathable environment when they arrive.
Following the destruction of the Torchwood Hub, resulting in an impressive fiery crater in Cardiff Bay (containing a charred pterodactyl?), Gwen (Eve Myles) and Ianto (Gareth David-Lloyd) both go on the run from Johnson (Liz May Brice) and her hit squad. This results in Gwen and her boyfriend Rhys (Kai Owen) smuggle themselves aboard a truck full of potatoes bound for London, intending to meet with someone in authority. However, they instead end up meeting Home Office clerk (and future Torchwood recruit?) Lois Habiba (Cush Jumbo), who tells them her superiors are behind the hit squad that targeted the Hub and warns Gwen that the government can't be trusted.Meanwhile, Johnson's team unearth pieces of Jack's (John Barrowman) body in the crater's rubble and take the remains back to a MoD facility, where they witness his body reconstitute itself. There's a nice, creepy shot of a body bag slowly inflating into human form, too. Apparently unable to kill Jack, Johnson decides to contain him inside a cell she orders to be filled with quick-drying cement. Elsewhere, the world's children stop to issue another synchronized announcement: "We Are Coming Tomorrow." These messages are becoming less worrying as time passes, aren't they? What next: "We Are Coming Tomorrow. Put The Kettle On. Tea. Two Sugars"?
"Day Two", written by John Fay, was an episode of slow development with a tincture of fun moments, but it didn't really add up to much or grip as tightly as the opener. I'm not a big fan of John Barrowman, but keeping Captain Jack sidelined for a whole episode was detrimental, as was restricting Clement (Paul Copley) to a few terrible scenes of him acting like a lunatic in a pub and on the street.
A lot of the resulting slack was taken up by Eve Myles, who certainly did her best to look tough leaping out of an ambulance firing twin handguns, helping to rescue their team leader, and suchlike -- but Torchwood has a tough time selling such moments and we're soon sitting atop potatoes or eating pies in a greasy spoon. It doesn't help that someone desperately needs to instruct the cast how to fire guns so they don't look like they're shooting water pistols with the kick of a mule.Overall, I was disappointed and mildly bored by "Day Two". I also found the climax more laughable than exciting -- with Ianto behind the wheel of a fork-lift truck, using it to crash into Jack's concrete cell and tip the retrieved block into a quarry to smash it apart. I'm still looking forward to the third episode tonight, but a lot rests on the shoulders of "Day Three", which seriously needs to take things up a notch. I think it's time we started getting answers to a few questions, before the motif of spooky children becomes dull and the mystery of the 456 goes from intriguing to tiresome.
7 July 2009
BBC1, 9pm
written by: John Fay directed by: Euros Lyn starring: John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness), Eve Myles (Gwen Cooper), Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto Jones), Lucy Cohu (Alice Carter), Peter Capaldi (John Frobisher), Kai Owen (Rhys Williams), Tom Price (PC Andy Davidson), Liz May Brice (Johnson), Nick Briggs (Rick Yates), Susan Brown (Bridget Spears), Lachele Carl (Trinity Wells), Paul Copley (Clement McDonald), Aimee Davies (Mica Davies), Nicholas Farrell (Brian Green), Deborah Finlay (Denise Riley), Ian Gelder (Mr. Dekker), Julia Joyce (Holly Frobisher), Cush Jumbo (Lois Habiba), Rhodri Lewis (Johnny Davies), Ben Lloyd-Holmes (The Operative), Rik Makarem (Dr. Rupesh Patanjali), Hilary MacLean (Anna Frobisher), Bear McCausland (Steven Carter), Colin McFarlane (General Pierce), Sophie Miller (Vanessa), Luke Perry (David Davies), Simon Poland (456 Voice), Rhiannon (Katy Wix) & Madeline Rakic-Platt (Lilly Frobisher)
