Writer: Chris Chibnall
Director: Jonathan Fox BassettCast: John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness), Eve Myles (Gwen Cooper), Burn Gorman (Owen Harper), Naoko Mori (Toshiko Sato), Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto Jones), Kai Owen (Rhys Williams), James Marsters (Captain John Hart), Paul Kasey (Weevil/Blowfish), Nariko Aida (Toshiko's Mother), Amy Manson (Alice Guppy), Heather Crany (Emily Holroyd), Skye Bennett (Little Girl), Julian Lewis Jones (Alex), Simon Shackleton (Bob), Gareth Jones (Security Guard), Clare Clifford (Milton), Andrea Lowe (Katie), Richard Lloyd King (Doctor), Catherine Morris (Nurse) & Selva Rasalingham (Psychiatrist)
After a booby-trapped building explodes, trapping Jack, Owen, Tosh and Ianto in the rubble, it's explained how each member came to join Torchwood...The pentultimate episode from writer-producer Chris Chibnall is a welcome breath of fresh air for Torchwood; shedding light on the main characters' murky pasts, in four entertaining vignettes that explain their backstories and help pull together various elements of the show...
Events begin with Jack (John Barrowman) leading Owen (Burn Gorman), Tosh (Naoko Mori) and Ianto (Gareth David-Lloyd) into an abandoned building, looking for two unidentified life-forms. However, it soon becomes clear that they've been tricked, with the readings actually belonging to multiple bombs -- which explode, trapping each team member beneath the rubble. Fortunately, Gwen (Eve Myles) was not amongst them, and quickly arrives at the scene with husband Rhys (Kai Owen), assisting each of her colleagues as their lives flash before their eyes...
Jack is discovered with a bottle thrust in his stomach, living in Victorian times. His immortality has been noticed by early-Torchwood operatives, Alice Guppy (Amy Manson) and Emily Holroyd (Heather Crany), who are particularly intrigued by Jack's overheard references to "The Doctor" (who they consider a danger.) After tying Jack to a chair and trying various methods to kill him, nothing seems to work, and they'rr forced to agree that he isn't a threat.
Instead, Jack is offered a job with Torchwood, which he declines -- until a visit with a young Tarot card reader (Skye Bennett), the same girl seen in Dead Man Walking, has her confirm he won't find The Doctor for another 200 years. Jack decides to join Torchwood, becoming the staple of the investigative team through the ensuing years.
In 1999, in the middle of millennial celebrations, Jack returns to the Hub to find the current Torchwood team murdered in cold blood by a mentally-unstable colleague called Alex (Julian Lewis Jones). Alex reveals that he's been made aware of "the storm" that's coming in the 21st-century, signalling when "everything changes", and decided it was an act of compassion to kill his colleagues to spare them. He commits suicide himself, leaving Jack as the sole survivor to tell the tale. As a side-note: can we take it that Jack recruited treacheous Suzie sometime after this purge?
Tosh's flashback reveals she used to be a workaholic (what's new?) member of a top-secret government facility. We find her staying late one night to steal the blueprints for a "sonic modulator", which she recreates at home after hours of work. Having eventually reconstructed the hand-held device, Tosh takes it to some criminals to exchange for the safe return of her kidnapped mother (Noriko Aida).
Unfortunately, Tosh has impressed the kidnappers so much that they require her continued cooperation. However, Tosh is arrested by UNIT for stealing the sonic modulator plans and thrown into a tiny cell. Help is at hand when Jack arrives to offer her a job at Torchwood -- revealing that the modulator's blueprints contained small errors which she managed to correct instinctively. Tosh has to agree to Jack's proposal.
Ianto's flashback paints him as a faintly-irritating thorn in Jack's side -- an ex-employee of Torchwood One at London's Canary Wharf (before it was destroyed in the events of Doctor Who's Doomsday). Ianto helps Jack placate a Weevil and spends the next few days trying to endear himself to Jack while asking for a job at Cardiff's Torchwood. Jack is adamant there are no jobs available, but Ianto eventually wins him over when he invites Jack along to a huge warehouse to snare themselves a pterodactyl that came through the Rift.
Owen's flashback has him happily engaged to girlfriend Katie (Andrea Lowe) while working as a regular doctor. Tragedy strikes when Katie begins to exhibit signs of memory problems, and specialists find a tumour after conducting an MRI scan. Katie has to undergo dangerous surgery, with an anxious Owen waiting outside during the procedure. However, Owen soon realizes the surgical team have all been rendered unconscious -- and a strange, tentacled creature can be seen attached to Katie's exposed brain. In shock, Owen finds himself face-to-face with Jack in the operating theatre -- who explains Katie has an alien parasite, which has to be removed. Shocked and angered, Owen's violent reaction forces Jack to chloroform him...
When Owen awakens, he's alarmed to discover an elaborate cover-up has been implemented. CCTV footage has been manipulated to erase Jack from events, and nobody remembers things the same way as Owen. Concerned for his mental health, Owen is given 3 months compassionate leave to grieve for his fiance. Later, at Katie's grave, Owen is amazed to see Jack across the graveyard -- there to explain the reasons for his actions. Cleary seeing potential in Owen, Jack offers him a job...
Back at the half-demolished building, Rhys and Gwen have managed to free their colleagues (nobody called the fire brigade?), and the battered team reconvene outside to find their SUV is missing. Then, Jack's holograpic transmitter relays a message -- from Captain John (James Marsters), who reveals he planted the bombs to kill Jack's team, before showing the holographic image of Jack's long-lost brother Gray (now an adult), and vows to tear Jack's world apart...
Fragments will surely rank as a fan-favourite, and not only because of its surface-level injokes and fun, time-jumping format. It's about time we learned how this disparate group came to be, as we spent season 1 playing catch-up through the eyes of Gwen, and prior episodes of season 2 were just content to bubble along with the relationships established. Chris Chibnall's not much of science-fiction writer, but he has a good sense of pacing, and each vignette proves to be revealing, interesting and enjoyable on some level.
Seeing how Jack was recruited into Torchwod was good fun, particularly as the early-Torchwood ladies who captured him were quite sinister. I think we forget that Torchwood were actually written as rather villanous when they were introduced on Doctor Who, and only became the sex-obsessed force for enlightened good when Jack took over. Mind you, it makes me wonder what Jack got up to under the leadership of Torchwood in the 2 centuries years before his takeover. It was a relief to see "The Doctor" referred to properly (the allusory nature was really becoming irritating), and also strange to see that the mysterious Tarot Girl (used as a weak plot-device in Dead Man Walking) might have some greater significance to play in the show. Or is she basically just a weak plot-device for the ages?
I enjoyed Tosh's story more than I thought I would -- primarily because the vignette made her look super-intelligent and impressive by fixing that sonic modulator, and not just a glasses-wearing social butterfly with a tragic love life, as she's usually written. In fact, one overriding thought stuck with me after watching this episode: I wish today's Torchwood characters were more like they were before they joined!
Even Ianto had a swagger about him that was more amusing than his contemporary "cynical doormat estate agent with a gun" personality. Unfortunately, if you had to point the finger at the weakest vignette -- it would definitely be Ianto's. The story didn't really add much to his character, and only highlighted how dedicated and loyal he is. And we knew that already. It would have been better to see his relationship with girlfriend Lisa before she became a Cyberwoman (if only to justify David-Lloyd's teary performance in season 1's Cyberwoman), but a "romantic vignette" was reserved for Owen. Still, at least we finally got to see how, and why, Torchwood have a pet pterodactyl!
Owen's story carried a decent emotional punch, as Burn Gorman is very good at looking anxious, nervous and generally upset, and you find yourself getting drawn into his performances. It looks like Owen's jack-the-lad nature seems to have been a recent construct -- possibly a defence mechanism against getting too close to someone and losing them again? The surprise of fiance Katie having a squid-like alien lodged in her brain was also brilliantly handled, as was the fallout of there being a cover-up only Owen knows the truth behind. But I did wonder why Jack didn't just retcon Owen's memory, too -- but I think it's safe to assume Jack had already decided to recruit him.
So yes, Fragments was definitely a very entertaining episode and certainly a series highlight. I sometimes think Torchwood has pacing problems with stories (with episodes either running out of steam after 25 minutes, or rushing to an unconvinging end in the last 10), but the narrative trick of multiple flashbacks worked brilliantly to combat that here. It held my interested throughout, made the characters take on fresh dimensions, and the series itself looked more cohesive as a result.
We even got a clearer reminder of some terrible tragedy befalling humanity in the this new century -- which is always alluded to in Jack's opening narration every week, but always seemed vague until now. It's still ominous and unspecified, but at least Fragments makes it clear the writers have some explanation for Jack's prophetic claim now. But I'm sure this apocryphal "storm" event will only reveal itself when Torchwood reaches its natural conclusion as a series finale, so don't hold your breath for answers.
I'm not happy with how Captain John has been handled through this season, really. He seems to be written simply as Jack's jilted lover out for revenge, which just sounds like a silly for such murderous acts -- although Marsters works well as Barrowman's "evil twin", in a clear Torchwood equivalent of The Doctor and The Master (The Marster?). Likewise, the mystery of Gray hasn't been as instrumental in the development of season 2 as I'd expected after its episode 1 mention, but I'm hoping next week's season finale manages to take what little we know of the Jack/John/Gray situation and bow out in style.
21 March 2008
BBC Three, 10.35pm
