The energy thing they were all worried about... and it's just music of some sort? And no-one's bothered that Owen's carting it around Cardiff at night?
Owen telling this complete stranger all about Torchwood, and no indication that he's going to have to retcon her?
And Jack. Jack being a complete bastard to Owen, behaving as if he's a nuisance and all he's good for is making coffee, and Owen's state is his bloody fault? Does he acknowledge what he's done? Does he even apologise when Owen tells him how much he hates it? Nope.
But wasn't it all... well, very touchy-feely, Jack aside? What's happened, some of the writers overdosed on insulin?
I could live with the touchy-feely after last season when everybody seemed like they'd be happy if all the other characters got washed into the bay. And I really liked the old coot - I know he had to die for the Buffy ripoff, I mean "touching moment" - but he was fun. I wish he could have stayed on as a character in the background, snarking at them now and then.
But then I start actually thinking about the episode, and it all goes downhill. Owen is just suddenly happier about being a zombie because he saw the pretty lights? So's the bloody bride? Why does Jack keep citing rules and regs like he has no control when he is the leader of Torchwood and creates/maintains the rules and regs? Why *did* they let Owen cart a random alien object all around? Why was Jack being such a heartless bastard (and how much egg would be on Jack's face if Owen hit the bottom of the sea and just started walking?)
WHY THE HELL DID THEY LEAVE OWEN LIKE THAT? What plot point does it serve to have an immortal and a zombie on the show? Oh, and if we're supposed to be remembering all the good times with Owen, why did those flashbacks include the fact that the little shit is a date rapist?
And are they going to be ripping off Adderly as well as Buffy with that glove?
They had to leave Owen like that because retconning to make him properly alive again would be really stupid and raise the question of why kill him at all in the first place. And it's just kind of rolling with the Buffy/Angel similarities that now TW can be making actual undead jokes regarding a castmember too.
I'm actually comfortable with the ending, since the whole point seemed to be that Owen was fixating on the eating and screwing he can no longer do, and forgetting to take into consideration whether those things were absolutely the only things that had made his life worth living before. And he got reminded that compensations may occur.
Very much agreed on Jack being a special git considering he did this to Owen -- at least there were a few hints of nods to that, like Owen telling Jack not to bring him back again or IIRC a scene where Owen was having an issue and Jack looked a bit guilty. OTOH, given that last week's trailer made it sound like Owen was getting completely turfed from TW on the basis of his zombiedom and this week was more about restricting his duties a bit till they could verify he was the harmless kind of undead, I'm at least glad of that much.
They had to leave Owen like that because retconning to make him properly alive again would be really stupid
Except that they've more or less established that he's going to fall to bits no matter what they do. So he's either got to die properly or come back to life, unless they want to reduce him to a head on a plate or something.
Yeah, with the nonhealing thing they've pretty much boxed themselves into a corner with Owen, since they're going to wind up with a result like the ending of Death Becomes Her unless they either find a way to "repair" Owen or else un-undead him. (Mind you, I can also see them as largely forgetting the whole issue except when it gets "funny" or "dramatic," mainly just evading the problem by turning Owen into the tea boy and no longer having him doing field missions to avoid situations where further injury would be probable.) I can't see the TW production staff as suddenly developing sufficient interest in continuity to really work through the potential consequences here (especially considering they're already leaving little plot holes), I can't quite see them as really killing Owen off in the next season or two, I perhaps can see them as taking the Angel similarity so far as to be planning for the eventual series finale to destroy most or all of the main cast (and thereby solving the Owen problem -- with potential for him to have grown gradually more and more ragged around the edges as time went on). What I think is likely to happen is for them to find a way to genuinely bring Owen back to life -- hopefully after long enough to make the whole character arc less pointless than if it had been resolved within the course of three episodes. (And perhaps even after some actual character-building, though probably also more "comic relief" or contrived situations where having a dead man on staff becomes useful.)
WTF indeed. The only plausible excuse for the date rape drug would be that Owen didn't really know what it did and ran away from the couple before molesting anyone. But, that's unlikely. In the commentary for S1.01, RTD thinks the spray is just peachy.
Plot? What plot? Owen is dead and he is sad and OMG! Energy! We have a problem that only a dead guy can solve! Who should we send? *pause. think.* Hey! Let's send Owen!
That whole scene between Owen and Mr. Dying Man was one big WTF? This things going to blow up and presumably take half of Wales with it...so Owen says he's gonna...what? Throw himself on it? And even if not, what exactly was the plan -- he was supposed to...lob it over the fence? WTF?
On another LJ I mentioned that someone needs to tell Team Cardiff that when you bring a character back or cross her over, you need to write a script where she's not just randomly plugged into the next story that happens to come up. And now I add: When you do a big character arc ep, there should still be a plot. At least a little. The sad thing for me is that I liked the Owen stuff, but the woeful underuse of Martha and lack of plot undermined it very muchly.
Owen says he's gonna...what? Throw himself on it? And even if not, what exactly was the plan -- he was supposed to...lob it over the fence? WTF?
He has no plan (or container) to contain it, he has no plan to neutralize it, and then he's allowed to walk all over Cardiff with it, showing it to random passers-by. Someone was smoking the leftovers from the Zagreus scripting session.
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winterfish
no subject
Date: 2008-02-28 03:18 am (UTC)spoilers below
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The energy thing they were all worried about... and it's just music of some sort? And no-one's bothered that Owen's carting it around Cardiff at night?
Owen telling this complete stranger all about Torchwood, and no indication that he's going to have to retcon her?
And Jack. Jack being a complete bastard to Owen, behaving as if he's a nuisance and all he's good for is making coffee, and Owen's state is his bloody fault? Does he acknowledge what he's done? Does he even apologise when Owen tells him how much he hates it? Nope.
But wasn't it all... well, very touchy-feely, Jack aside? What's happened, some of the writers overdosed on insulin?
no subject
Date: 2008-02-28 03:38 am (UTC)But then I start actually thinking about the episode, and it all goes downhill. Owen is just suddenly happier about being a zombie because he saw the pretty lights? So's the bloody bride? Why does Jack keep citing rules and regs like he has no control when he is the leader of Torchwood and creates/maintains the rules and regs? Why *did* they let Owen cart a random alien object all around? Why was Jack being such a heartless bastard (and how much egg would be on Jack's face if Owen hit the bottom of the sea and just started walking?)
WHY THE HELL DID THEY LEAVE OWEN LIKE THAT? What plot point does it serve to have an immortal and a zombie on the show? Oh, and if we're supposed to be remembering all the good times with Owen, why did those flashbacks include the fact that the little shit is a date rapist?
And are they going to be ripping off Adderly as well as Buffy with that glove?
no subject
Date: 2008-02-29 04:26 pm (UTC)I'm actually comfortable with the ending, since the whole point seemed to be that Owen was fixating on the eating and screwing he can no longer do, and forgetting to take into consideration whether those things were absolutely the only things that had made his life worth living before. And he got reminded that compensations may occur.
Very much agreed on Jack being a special git considering he did this to Owen -- at least there were a few hints of nods to that, like Owen telling Jack not to bring him back again or IIRC a scene where Owen was having an issue and Jack looked a bit guilty. OTOH, given that last week's trailer made it sound like Owen was getting completely turfed from TW on the basis of his zombiedom and this week was more about restricting his duties a bit till they could verify he was the harmless kind of undead, I'm at least glad of that much.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-29 09:31 pm (UTC)Except that they've more or less established that he's going to fall to bits no matter what they do. So he's either got to die properly or come back to life, unless they want to reduce him to a head on a plate or something.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-29 10:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-28 05:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-28 05:41 pm (UTC)That whole scene between Owen and Mr. Dying Man was one big WTF? This things going to blow up and presumably take half of Wales with it...so Owen says he's gonna...what? Throw himself on it? And even if not, what exactly was the plan -- he was supposed to...lob it over the fence? WTF?
On another LJ I mentioned that someone needs to tell Team Cardiff that when you bring a character back or cross her over, you need to write a script where she's not just randomly plugged into the next story that happens to come up. And now I add: When you do a big character arc ep, there should still be a plot. At least a little. The sad thing for me is that I liked the Owen stuff, but the woeful underuse of Martha and lack of plot undermined it very muchly.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-28 06:21 pm (UTC)He has no plan (or container) to contain it, he has no plan to neutralize it, and then he's allowed to walk all over Cardiff with it, showing it to random passers-by. Someone was smoking the leftovers from the Zagreus scripting session.