Torchwood: Miracle Day

Not bad. I was a little upset with the whole "2 months later" beginning as well. The cliffhanger from last week is what had me excited to watch this episode. It was disappointing but it made a little sense later on. A lot sure happened in this episode. It kinda feels like I watched 2 or 3 eps at once.

Still enjoying it, but I'm ready for this storyline to end. I wish there were more episodes this season but with a different plot. I like this cast.

I dont usually mind when they jump ahead, but where they did it just made me think they realized they only had two ep left to work with. Now if they had just taken out all the padding in the previous eps...

And about padding... I am still going to withhold final judgment until next week, but it seems to me there was a lot of stuff that I ended up thinking- why was this necessary to the story again?

Especially the new elements. As I mentioned about 1-2 eps ago... Rex was a jerk and not too bright. Esther had some potential, but she kept screwing up too, and both didn't show much signs of growth or learning. They were less team members that you wanted to stick around and more just more opposition and conflict sources for Gwen and Jack. So in this ep, we jump two months later, and presto, NOW they seem to be where they should have been at a long time ago, but we never got to. Might be too little too late.

Next- Gwen's dad. You make it a point that he's a victim, then steal him from the center, not much else goes on after that, then the man comes and steals him back. I found myself thinking... what was the point of having him at all? Just a little bit of something extra to do when Gwen went to check out the center? Definitely not needed to add to the threat when they took the rest of her family hostage. Not needed to bring about her new life as a drug thief... she never got into any trouble for that. She was already sold on the idea of heading to the two cities, so it wasn't like dad heading to the bbq was needed to provide her motivation. This ep made me think the dad being Cat 1 all this time was unnecessary. Hardly did anything needed to advance anything important story or character wise.

And now, Oswald. You spend all these eps building him from scum to media craze #1, then with just one incident, he's now all the way back to square 1. What was the point then? We haven't been shown what the needed effect was for the baddies plan. Apparently it was important enough for them to eliminate his media opposition by turning her into a car cube... but they didn't seen concerned at all that Oswald blew it, and even gave his PR person a promotion for it. No sense of any plans that now need to be rushed or changed now because of his meltdown either.

So I hope there is more to it than that, or all the Oswald stuff becomes unnecessary fluff too. There is the fact that the writers got Oswald to TW, and contrived to have him present going into the two cities. I say contrived because in all his spiel about 'this is why you have to take me. Rhys will kill me. I know all your plans.' Well, point 1- if Rhys is a problem (and i can't see him going against Gwen's wishes anyway if she tells him to keep Oswald alive) then you make him think he's going with you like he wants, then you deal with him on the way. 2- How do you deal with him 'knowing their plans' that they just came up with in that short session? Say it with me: RETCON. You can use it just fine on the watcher across the street, but it never occurs to them they have the means to make Oswald forget everything he just learned? Hey Oswald, sorry about that. Here's your beer. Problem solved.

The build to seeing what was inside the facility wasn't epic either. Good thing they didn't end on that. Jack's blood being drawn to it is intriguing though.

Will have to see in just 50 minutes they can bring some surprises and show how some of these things fit into the baddies masterplan to justify their part in the story. I hope we get a decent wrap-up with some sense of closure, in case this ends up being the end to the Torchwood series.

I kind of hope this will be it for Torchwood as far as TV goes. This series hasn't given me a lot of hope for a future series. Maybe if they'd done this plot in less time and then done another with Jack setting up a new branch of Torchwood somewhere. Or even if they worked that into this plot instead of just an emergency organization.

jaredofmo wrote:

I kind of hope this will be it for Torchwood as far as TV goes. This series hasn't given me a lot of hope for a future series. Maybe if they'd done this plot in less time and then done another with Jack setting up a new branch of Torchwood somewhere. Or even if they worked that into this plot instead of just an emergency organization.

Not a bad approach at all... splitting up the 10 eps into two separate arcs. Would have probably worked a lot better and kept each story tighter.

Same problem with classic Who I guess. Not many of the longer serials pulled off a solid storyline without being drawn out and suffering from padding.

I had wondered in what direction they were heading as far as the institute went. Since most of Miracle Day was not involved with the UK, they never addressed the UK still hunting them because of their 456 involvement (which we still don't know the aftermath of CoE, which I am hoping they cover in the prequel books). Not trying to deal with/fix their being hunted in this series meant there wouldn't be an option for a new team to be formed in the UK. The US was a possibility, but who knows with all the CIA corruption and being declared enemies too. Maybe afterwards when the story is resolved, but having the institute in the US probably writes Gwen and Rhys out of the series, unless they decide to stay in the states to raise their family versus still being hunted in England.

IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, WHY ARE YOU WATCHING?!?!?!?

But well said, Cruel Angel. I honestly don't know why I'm so surprised they did the "two months later" thing, since I've been ragging on the show for terrible writing and seemingly pointless developments all along. Then there were two episodes I actually kinda liked (even though Angelo's character came out of nowhere and the stabby revival party was kinda problematic, I did enjoy the flashback adventure). I feel like Torchwood punk'd me.

Has anyone else thought that maybe the Blessing is the (a) Piece of Boe?

I'm watching because I want to see how the story ends. I've seen 9/10, so why not finish?

Still, if they said, "This is the final series of Torchwood," I wouldn't complain. As CA pointed out above: HOW can Torchwood continue as an institute? Aside from what they did here with Torchwood coming back together for a global emergency, I don't know how it could be done.

I liked it. . .

It. All. Ends. TONIGHT!

Rocco wrote:

It. All. Ends. TONIGHT!

I hope they can bring a couple of surprises and have all of this have some worth, but I'm pretty much set up to be disappointed.

I'm kinda half and half. I hope this isn't the total end of TW on tv, but if they can't pick up a better show runner and writing staff if it lands on another network, maybe it is a good thing for it to end before it gets even worse.

Here we go. Series 4 finale...

Please place any episode spoilers in the Spoilers tab.

Well, I need to think about this..I'm not entirely positive how I feel about it yet. 'Children of Earth' is still, to me, the best of television. Ever. Miracle Day doesn't come close.

That was... disappointing.

Started off going downhill and just kept rolling and rolling. The last 3 minutes just made me roll my eyes. This season had a lot of potential at the start but the ending just didn't live up to it.

If this show's going to continue then I'd rather see them go back to monster-of-the-week type episodes. The 5 episode format for Children of Earth paid off in dividends but investing 10 weeks into a single plot only to get this? Blah.

Yay for the Silurian and Racnoss references, though.

See, this ending felt kinda satisfying to me, even though I acknowledge that it didn't make sense even given what's been said before on the show. They've said repeatedly that there's nothing special about Jack's blood -- which makes sense, since his immortality came about via active manipulation of the power of the time vortex rather than biological tampering. (That being the case, the Miracle shouldn't have had any effect on him unless it involved similar temporal manipulation, which apparently wasn't the case.) So, then it comes down to the wire... and we get an ending that a) isn't fully explained or even understood by the characters and b) relies upon the idea that Jack's blood actually did have immortal/restorative properties, even when it was already stated that that wasn't (and legitimately shouldn't) be the case. Not that any Torchwood finale has made more sense, but the gaps here should be obvious to everyone.

That said, the events were suitably dramatic, the characters seemed mostly competent, the dialogue wasn't horrible and had quite a few great lines (could've done without Danes screaming about coming to get little girls in heck at the end though), and I kinda liked that Rex survived and how (even though it doesn't make sense).

As a whole, though, I still think this is a pretty bad show. While the performances throughout were generally pretty good, I ultimately care more about things making sense and being well written. Torchwood failed (and has always failed) on those fronts. (But I'd probably still sit through a Series 5 despite my better judgment. )

rdks wrote:

Yay for the Silurian and Racnoss references, though.

That and Gwen punching Jilly were the only highlights of this for me. The rest left a bad taste in my mouth. Weakest episode this year, no question about it.

Well, Wes, when it comes to making sense, I won't even go there. RTD gave us the Series 4 nuWho finale. That is all the proof I need to know that his finales will never actually 'make sense' completely. I didn't expect this to make sense, so I wasn't surprised when it didn't.

Great. They cheesily left it open for another series.

*Sigh*

I am going to miss The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Wes Crayon wrote:

They've said repeatedly that there's nothing special about Jack's blood -- which makes sense, since his immortality came about via active manipulation of the power of the time vortex rather than biological tampering. (That being the case, the Miracle shouldn't have had any effect on him unless it involved similar temporal manipulation, which apparently wasn't the case.)

First thing I've ever agreed with you about.




In my opinion of the series, Yes it had some slow episodes, but i loved it. Maybe thats because i sit their to Enjoy and Watch it into of judge it on everything it does. I like that theirs definitely a chance for more Torchwood. Even if RTD just rights a fill in season and then continues with "Plan B". Although the end was corny (: i called the Rex getting shot, Charlotte getting shot, Rex still having Harkness Blood and coming back. It's also interesting that Jack now has someone to be by his side (Even though i doubt Rex will) for all Eternity (or at least until jack dies as the face of boe). Give the Series an A. I didn't enjoy COE as much as a lot of you guys here on the forum but i did like it. I think the 5 episode season pissed me off and made it so that i couldn't really enjoy it. I've also never been a big fan of Single stories (Even with Doctor Who) so i would probably put this down as my favorite season.


Let me just add Torchwood is always great when it comes to the Dramatic kill offs.

Toshiko and Owen Death- Shocking.
Ianto Death- Even more Shocking
Veras Death- Meh kinda.
Esther- I thought it would be Rex just saying.

So, just finished watching this. Maybe when I watch the entire thing from start to finish again,I will like it more as far as the story. Maybe. But I loved the characters. I was very sad to see Reese with Gwen's dad as he died, and Andy was great and loved him sitting with the unknown Cat 1 as she died.
It had its moments, but the drama of COE was just not here. Too many shots of Jack's tushie, needed more of Gwen or Esters to be fair, lol.
And the ending with Rex, I can see RTD with his deep laugh, laughing like mad as he came up with that twist, and then the end. Even though it was totally predictable.

Rocco wrote:

Please place any episode spoilers in the Spoilers tab.

LOL,I didn't even open this thread until after I watched the episode. I would expect to see spoilers in this thread about the discussion of the episode.

The finale to me pretty much met my expectations. And that wasn't a good thing.

They had a lot of stuff that needed explaining, then resolving the whole Miracle Day thing. I kept looking at the clock and counting down how much time was left, and they didn't even get to where the gap was until about 20 min left. That's all the time they had to actually get that stuff done.

Sure enough, we got hit with a rapid fire plot point explanation. And if you could actually keep up with it all, there were a few things they still left out.

Again, no aftermath afterward. But then they didn't have the time anyway.

Seeding for a new series I could see, but I would have preferred much more closure. It took so long to get series 4 and you have no idea if you are going to get a guaranteed series 5. I think they should have given us more of a sense of what Jack and Gwen were going to do afterwards so if this is the last we see of them, we had a bit of an end to their stories.


Overall, Miracle Day was a fail for me. The first two eps started out great, dropped to a mediocre level for the next few, then went over the cliff after that.

Way too much padding and threads that served no important purpose to the main story. Oswald Danes and all the time they spent on him could have been taken out completely. Same with the Gwen's dad bits. Same with all the past with Angelo that took up so much of Immortal Sins. They did enough of a recap in the next ep that they could just have gone with that with no problems.

Then the new characters. Rex was always a jerk. Esther was nice, but she kept messing up and didn't learn anything. With all that, I'm not behind these characters- liking them, wanting them to be on the team and continue with the series. For almost the entire run, their only purpose was to actually oppose and provide plot obstacles for Gwen and Jack. After the jump forward, now they are where they should have been a long time ago- working with the team, and Rex finally having a clue that he can't trust the CIA people. All that came too late. Only people whose fates I cared about were Jack and Gwen.

This was definitely not the writing staff to go with for this series. I think they put too much unneeded stuff in, and got caught having no time to have a non rushed, well played out ending and resolution. I wonder what good RTD remaining as show runner was- did he not see the problems with the story and characters, or were his hands tied somehow behind the scenes and Starz execs were getting in the way?

I'll buy it eventually for completeness sake, but it definitely is not going to get many replays versus the first 3 series.

Maybe they didn't want it to be another 5 episode series -.-

Rocco wrote:

Maybe they didn't want it to be another 5 episode series -.-

I'm pretty sure Starz insisted on the length. Running a 5 ep series only gets you practically a months worth of a show and that's it. Not a lot of output, and most people over here expect a 'season' of a series to be way more than just 5 episodes.

Plus, many of the longer classic Who serials were very well done without a lot of padding. It can be done.

Cruel Angel wrote:

Rocco wrote:

Maybe they didn't want it to be another 5 episode series -.-

I'm pretty sure Starz insisted on the length. Running a 5 ep series only gets you practically a months worth of a show and that's it. Not a lot of output, and most people over here expect a 'season' of a series to be way more than just 5 episodes.

Plus, many of the longer classic Who serials were very well done without a lot of padding. It can be done.

Thats what i said. They didn't want one like COE.


Stop comparing Torchwood to Who. Now. Different shows.

This appeared at the end of the Aussie Showing of Torchwood (: