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custodianI'm still not dead, and the cycle of Major Schedule Disruption appears to be winding down, and what bits of IEIT #22 I have on the page seem to be working mostly as advertised on the tin. These are all good things. I'm hoping that I'll be back on track by the end of the week, and by that I mean no more 11 hour days, trips out of town, working weekends, etc.
Yeah, hope springs eternal.
First of all, I'm really pleased this exists, and I did actually like it. I will listen to it again without needing to be bribed. I may actually make other people listen to it with me. I like that the Torchwood franchise holds enough interest for the people who pay for it with taxes and media fees that it was part of BBC Radio 4's Big Bang Day. Seriously. It warms the blackened remains of my icy, fanboy heart. It was a nice little tidbit amid the sprinkle of stuff that happens between series. Hooray, Torchwood. I enjoyed my 45 minutes with you this morning.
There. That's the cheerleading out of the way. On to the critique.
Lost Souls is not on the whole, a bad story. It's written to commemorate a specific event, and is thus by it's nature a little hokey, but when you've got a giant experiment that gets some doomsayers' attention, of course someone's going to think about writing it into fiction. Heck, there was a podcast last year with John Barrowman visiting CERN, and I thought, "dude, how cool would that be for Torchwood to visit CERN and the LHC?" Of course, then they announced a radio play. So. Consider me easily led and fully on-board conceptually. Hence, the issues I had with Lost Souls mainly came down to the way the format was utilized.
I'm not sure who the production team thought the target audience was. Radio 4 listeners? Afternoon Play faithful? Kids? Hmm. I will say, though, that Lost Souls is a brilliant example of something being aimed in the wrong direction or maybe offered too broadly to do its job well. I mean, honestly. Introducing yourselves at a club and telling them you catch aliens whilst on a weevil hunt? Hello, Torchwood Lite. Aren't you secret? Precious.
Anyway, the script is heavy enough on exposition to rob the rest of the piece of space for things like depth and characterization. Considering that it was produced for a whole day of coverage about the LHC and CERN and the experiment, they could have done without a good chunk of it. This is especially true where the script's treatment of Gwen and Ianto is concerned. If I'm aware of CERN and the LHC, it's not unreasonable for Gwen and Ianto to be at least as well-informed. I could make all sorts of jokes about them bothliving working under a rock, but this is a giant experiment that's got people going "ZOMG END OF THE WORLD!" and UNIT is involved. Torchwood (especially Ianto) should practically know the physicists' shoe sizes before they get on that airplane. At the very least, I expect them to know what atoms are made of.
Which brings me to the science.
Lost Souls is another one of those great Whoniverse Science moments along the lines of "42" where even I go "Bwuh?!" A particle-hungry, mind-reading being from another dimension is a great idea, but the application makes my skull hurt. This really, really isn't the way it works. REALLY. Also, isn't it a little ironic to write a humanity v. science radio play for broadcast as part of Big Bang Day?
It wasn't all bad. There were some moments -- the Ambassador, his Wife, and his Personal Assistant in particular -- that were spot on and brilliant. Gwen doing clever Gwen things is always welcome, and Martha being concerned about the team after Toshiko and Owen's deaths had a lot of promise. Unfortunately, a lot of those moments were buried between heavy exposition and rushed characterization. I don't doubt for an instant Ianto might crack when confronted by something that can get into his head presents itself as a manifestation of his fallen loved ones, but Lost Souls doesn't sell me on that moment because it's too busy telling me what bloody CERN is.
Ahem.
At the end of the day, Lost Souls is a bit of canon-dubious fun that celebrates a marvel of modern science, is read by the cast, and starts to address the aftermath of S2. As 45 minutes of life I will never get back, it brought me joy, and a handful of witty catchphrases that will serve me well until the next bit of Torchwood media comes along. "My bike's got a bell!" isn't quite the next "poptastic danceability," but "coffee and Jack" and "Is Ianto moaning?" could go a long way toward tiding me over. Plus, I look forward to the inevitable porn follow-ups to the whole Personal Assistant business.
Rating: Two-and-a-half Mysteriously Exposited Weevils of Five.
Yeah, hope springs eternal.
First of all, I'm really pleased this exists, and I did actually like it. I will listen to it again without needing to be bribed. I may actually make other people listen to it with me. I like that the Torchwood franchise holds enough interest for the people who pay for it with taxes and media fees that it was part of BBC Radio 4's Big Bang Day. Seriously. It warms the blackened remains of my icy, fanboy heart. It was a nice little tidbit amid the sprinkle of stuff that happens between series. Hooray, Torchwood. I enjoyed my 45 minutes with you this morning.
There. That's the cheerleading out of the way. On to the critique.
Lost Souls is not on the whole, a bad story. It's written to commemorate a specific event, and is thus by it's nature a little hokey, but when you've got a giant experiment that gets some doomsayers' attention, of course someone's going to think about writing it into fiction. Heck, there was a podcast last year with John Barrowman visiting CERN, and I thought, "dude, how cool would that be for Torchwood to visit CERN and the LHC?" Of course, then they announced a radio play. So. Consider me easily led and fully on-board conceptually. Hence, the issues I had with Lost Souls mainly came down to the way the format was utilized.
I'm not sure who the production team thought the target audience was. Radio 4 listeners? Afternoon Play faithful? Kids? Hmm. I will say, though, that Lost Souls is a brilliant example of something being aimed in the wrong direction or maybe offered too broadly to do its job well. I mean, honestly. Introducing yourselves at a club and telling them you catch aliens whilst on a weevil hunt? Hello, Torchwood Lite. Aren't you secret? Precious.
Anyway, the script is heavy enough on exposition to rob the rest of the piece of space for things like depth and characterization. Considering that it was produced for a whole day of coverage about the LHC and CERN and the experiment, they could have done without a good chunk of it. This is especially true where the script's treatment of Gwen and Ianto is concerned. If I'm aware of CERN and the LHC, it's not unreasonable for Gwen and Ianto to be at least as well-informed. I could make all sorts of jokes about them both
Which brings me to the science.
Lost Souls is another one of those great Whoniverse Science moments along the lines of "42" where even I go "Bwuh?!" A particle-hungry, mind-reading being from another dimension is a great idea, but the application makes my skull hurt. This really, really isn't the way it works. REALLY. Also, isn't it a little ironic to write a humanity v. science radio play for broadcast as part of Big Bang Day?
It wasn't all bad. There were some moments -- the Ambassador, his Wife, and his Personal Assistant in particular -- that were spot on and brilliant. Gwen doing clever Gwen things is always welcome, and Martha being concerned about the team after Toshiko and Owen's deaths had a lot of promise. Unfortunately, a lot of those moments were buried between heavy exposition and rushed characterization. I don't doubt for an instant Ianto might crack when confronted by something that can get into his head presents itself as a manifestation of his fallen loved ones, but Lost Souls doesn't sell me on that moment because it's too busy telling me what bloody CERN is.
Ahem.
At the end of the day, Lost Souls is a bit of canon-dubious fun that celebrates a marvel of modern science, is read by the cast, and starts to address the aftermath of S2. As 45 minutes of life I will never get back, it brought me joy, and a handful of witty catchphrases that will serve me well until the next bit of Torchwood media comes along. "My bike's got a bell!" isn't quite the next "poptastic danceability," but "coffee and Jack" and "Is Ianto moaning?" could go a long way toward tiding me over. Plus, I look forward to the inevitable porn follow-ups to the whole Personal Assistant business.
Rating: Two-and-a-half Mysteriously Exposited Weevils of Five.