jadesfire: Bright yellow flower (Default)
[personal profile] jadesfire
I've put my Day Four reaction, such as it is, up at [livejournal.com profile] torchwood_meta here.

One day to go, folks!



I am sorry for everyone who was heavily invested in Ianto as a character, and as someone who is incredibly invested in Jack, I know I've got it kind of easy on that front. It's not like they can kill him off, after all. But I have no intention of wading out into what I imagine is general fandom trauma, because quite frankly, it was bad enough when Donna was mind-wiped. I don't think I can handle the general insanity that will have ensued from this one.

What I will add is that... I'm trying to put words round this, considering I don't intend on f-locking it and am not trying to bait anyone who loves Ianto is going to miss him. But I liked that while the repercussions were huge, the death itself was quiet and personal. Him and Jack, no great heroics, just Jack's miscalculation which has consequences. One thing that has been great about this season of Torchwood is the little moments. Not that death is a little thing, but the moment was quiet, un-melodramatic, understated, which kind of suits Ianto. And I did like him making demands of Jack, the way he has done in epic foreshadowing through the series. "I love you" isn't really Jack's style, is it? I'm not happy Ianto's dead, but in narrative terms, the style and structure worked for me. And the fact that I was in tears for a character that I felt I barely knew tells you something about the strength of this writing.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 09:30 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] aeron-lanart.livejournal.com
I think it was the fact that it was such a normal human kind of death is one of the things that's got it upsetting me so much. You're very right when you say the the understated way suited Ianto, even if part of me (and probably part of him) wanted Ianto to go out with a blaze of glory. Still, at least he was with Jack and not on his own.

I feel like I've lost a good friend, to the extent where I couldn't sleep properly (like about 2 and a half hours) which is not much good for me when I've got work later, until 8:30pm, then a mad dash home to catch the last part.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 09:35 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
What is so striking about Torchwood this season is that, for all of the alien theatrics, what a lot of it comes down to is people making the wrong choice. It's a 'Turn Left' world, where people miscalculate and everything goes to hell. The humanity of it is staggering, really. In a weird kind of way it reminds me of Owen's death/destruction/whatever, where he's railing and yelling "not like this". One of the tragedies that TW brings home is that these deaths happen. They're small and tragic and so very human. Most people don't get the blaze of glory moment, just small stillness and passing. It's moving in a way that (say) Jack blowing up wasn't, and none of Jack's deaths can be.

Er. I'll stop there, but there's so much more meta where that came from.

I am sorry for people who've lost a friend like that - I know how invested we get in these things, and hope everyone's okay after tonight!

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 10:34 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] hab318princess.livejournal.com
haven't read the meta yet (I think) but totally agree, the writing and acting was incredible and yes, it suited him

I love Ianto and will miss him terribly, but whilst it hurts, it's not the end of the world (though it is the end of Torchwood as we love it)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 10:37 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
Heh, the meta is kind of an expansion on what I've said here, so you're not missing much ;) Although there are often interesting discussions in comments, if you're up for that.

I think it's the end of Torchwood as we *know* it. I'm hoping we can still love it, whatever happens next. Part of me wants to venture out to see what's being said, but the sheer vitriol and raw shock from some of the posts I've seen is really off-putting :S

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 10:48 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] hab318princess.livejournal.com
yeah, I struggle with the whole, I'll never watch it again, will not bother tonight... if RTD is any good then Torchwood is more than Ianto Jones (and believe me I love Ianto to bits)

The chucking it all out reaction is one I see in my hubby who's depressed, coupled with paranoia (just a bit) and not a rational response. I'm grieving Ianto more than I do Michael Jackson (which is scary on some level I will not investigate) but I'm a grown up, I will grieve him and then we see what they do, if we get a S4, I'll be watching it. One horrible scene does not negate 3 years or so of emotional investment in my favourite show.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 11:14 am (UTC)
From: [personal profile] aeshna_uk
Like you, I'm staying the hell out of the general fannish mire - I don't share the love, had no investment, and so can't identify with all the desperate (and very real, in many cases) grief. And just hearing about some of what is going on is rather worrying (I commented to a friend last night that James Moran might live to regret making his blog publicly accessible). It'll blow over, some folks will move on, others will come in (because, after all, the British audience has just doubled and there will be folks coming in for whom whoever is left at 10pm is their team!Torchwood), but in the meantime, duck-and-cover seems to be the way to go.

You're right - the death did suit Ianto in that it was quiet and understated and oddly simple. Jack had his bluff called, others paid the price. That's just how things are, and I'd far rather have this than miraculous escapes every time. Jack being blown to bits in a massive explosion was big and exciting and not really all that worrying because we know he can come back; Ianto quietly, quickly and permanently dying of an invisible virus is much more low-key yet far more tragic because there is no get-out clause.

Superb series overall, and repaying the Beeb's promoting it to BBC1 in spades. Fabulous stuff. :D

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 11:23 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
Real grief for fictional characters always makes me twitchy. I mean, I know that other people feel it, it's just not something I can get my head around personally so I'm better off well out of it. I hadn't thought of the 'their team!Torchwood' angle (a bit like 'you were my Doctor') but yes, that makes a lot of sense.

Heh, yes, that may have been a tactical error on James Moran's part. I dread to think what's going down over there, but am not even going to spectate, for fear of having to break out my 'WRONG ON THE INTERNET' icon again.

It's interesting for those of us who are invested in Jack primarily, because this series has been a goldmine for character notes. Not factual background, which is interesting but I can live with or without, but the harsh reality of what it means to be immortal. The loneliness of it, the flip-side of his almost cartoonish reality, if that makes sense. This has felt very much like Jack's show, for all that he hasn't dominated the screentime. I'm currently awaiting the emo fanvids to Queen's 'Who wants to live forever?' (which I'm sure exist already but I'm so not going to look for) because this series will be a goldmine for clips ;)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 11:42 am (UTC)
From: [personal profile] aeshna_uk
Yeah, I've certainly felt the gut-kick of losing a favourite character before now (I was about 11 when Blake's 7 ended, and if I survived that...), but a fictional character can never really die because they were never really alive in the first place. And isn't one of the joys of fanfic being able to pretend it never happened? :)

The "my team" thing is something I can certainly see happening. And that's a positive thing for the fandom. I've said before that TW is a show that grabs me for the concept as much as anything, this great Victorian scientific Institute that nobody knows is there (she types, in the bowels of a huge Victorian scientific Institute that hardly anybody knows is hiding beneath/behind the tourist-trap museum overhead!) that has all this history to it. When the show was first announced, I was all up for writing pre-Jack, all-OC TW adventures; then we found out that Jack was immortal and I got to have my cake and eat it! :D So my mindset was always that teams are transient things and I quite like seeing the turnover on screen.

Yeah, for those of us who are focused mainly on Jack, it's great! History! Family! Jack's darker side let out to play! I'm always a bit more positive than most on the immortality thing - he loses some but gains others as he goes along - but he's being put through the wringer right now, poor sod!

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-14 12:11 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lyorn.livejournal.com
Real grief for fictional characters always makes me twitchy

I think there is no "unreal" emotion (there is faked emtion, of course, but that's something entirely different). Emotions created in a game or through stories are the same things as emotion created by life's events, only (usually) more easily put into boxes and looked at from the outside, because the context in which they happen is not one's own and one can distance one's self from it.

I'm currently awaiting the emo fanvids to Queen's 'Who wants to live forever?'

My first fandom was Highlander. I get deja-vus.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 12:54 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] donutsweeper.livejournal.com
I agree wholeheartedly. I have issues with the plot (which I'll get into in the meta post) but the execution of the scene was very well done. Especially the growth of the two characters in this series (thinking back on the fact Jack does mention Alice and Stephen and, specifically, the way he does it) but, it IS Torchwood. As everyone knows, dying of old age isn't a terribly likely outcome of that line of work.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 02:49 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
This has been coming the whole way through, really. I'm just glad I can hide out here until the fandom-dust settles. It's not pretty out there...

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:05 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] donutsweeper.livejournal.com
It really, really isn't. Big boom is BIG. I used to have a 'mount fandom explodes' macro that would have been perfect for this

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:43 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
*giggle* You should totally dig that one out. Most of my flist seems okay, and the ones who aren't are upset but going to be okay. It's the DIAF RTD crowd that are scaring me...

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:49 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] donutsweeper.livejournal.com
ah, tracked it down. I think it fits the situation nicely.

Image (http://s605.photobucket.com/albums/tt140/donutsweeper/?action=view&current=fandomexplodes.jpg)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 04:15 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
*falls off chair*

PERFECT

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:06 pm (UTC)
naye: A cartoon of a woman with red hair and glasses in front of a progressive pride flag. (torchwood)
From: [personal profile] naye
See, I'm not even invested enough in Torchwood to write fic, and I'm still bawling my eyes out - and I'm torn between being incredibly impressed with how fantastic the writing's been on this, and pissed because now it's all about Ianto. Well. No, wait. That came out wrong.

But - I loved the story, and thought it was incredibly cool, and it had so much emotional depth without resorting to main-character killing. Which is something Torchwood's done frequently enough that they literally only have one more character left they can kill, now.

So I'm disappointed that they couldn't leave it at nail-biting, edge-of-the-seat tension and psychological drama and evil aliens and everything, but had to make it so extremely personal - had to go for such a visceral reaction as grief, which is now overshadowing all of my other reactions. (Reactions that were much more interesting and inspiring...)

Does that make any sense?

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:42 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
I makes absolute sense. I mean, despite what I've said - which I've actually qualified in the post I just made - I'm finding it hard to remember what else was in the episode *apart* from Ianto's death and that awful awful terrifying conversatoin around the cabinet table. If I concentrate, I can remember it, but the first impression is always of that grief.

I'm waiting to see what happens tonight before making any judgment calls but I know character-killing is one of RTD's favourite things to do in Torchwood, and as a writer, I understand why. You watch enough TV, you get the distinct impression that the lead characters are indestructable (and yes, I'm ignoring Jack for now - he doesn't count for the purposes of this conversation :P). Jack Bauer. Buffy and the Scooby Gang. Sheppard. They just don't die, despite it all. There is some precedent in British drama for doing this (Spooks/MI5 is a good example and a heavy influence on Children of Earth, I'd say), for whipping the rug out from under the viewers by never letting you know if the lead character is going to make it to the end of an episode. I think one of the RTD wanted us to know right from the beginning is that Torchwood is dangerous. It's not malevolent, but it isn't safe and it isn't nice. Everybody dies, and young.

While I might not choose to go that way myself, I do have huge amounts of respect for it, and the way it's played out here. It's gutsy writing, directed and performed wonderfully. When I can step back from it and understand it that way, it's less overwhelming, and I remain just as impressed.

*passes tissues* We're going to need them tonight, I think...

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:49 pm (UTC)
naye: nami from one piece in monochrome, full of sadness (kanashii)
From: [personal profile] naye
My problem is that I am emotional about my watching! And so when I think of the first season of Torchwood, all I can think of is that they were all being assholes, and it annoys me.

When I think of the second season, I remember Owen and Tosh, and all of those fantastic episodes that I loved when they happened? They just don't matter that much anymore, because I'm know I can never watch them again without either disassociating enough from the characters that their deaths won't hurt (but dulling emotions is a horribly boring way of watching stuff), or by clinging to someone and whimpering. XD

And we knew Torchwood was dangerous and life is short and all that. Knew it well enough that the greater challenge would've been to actually deal with Ianto's revelations regarding Jack and their relationship; and Ianto's relationship with his family; and... I don't know. It's not like anyone thinks characters are safe in Torchwood, so couldn't we have gotten a break from the character killing for more than three eps?

It's more - I'm afraid the writers did this just because they could; for shock value rather than for plot reasons.

And then I think I'm possibly only saying all of the above because it made me CRY, DAMMIT, and I don't like crying about things that can't be fixed. It makes me stupidly sad. *clings* (And I don't know when I'll get to see Day Five! I've got someone coming over tomorrow, so I might have to wait until Sunday night... you won't have forgotten all about this by then, will you?)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 03:58 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jadesfire2808.livejournal.com
*holds you tight* It's okay. I think everyone's a)still kind of shocked and b)unable to deal with it because WE DON'T KNOW what's going to happen.

Because of the way I write, I'm more or less incapable of watching things without detachment. It's not that I don't care/get emotionally involved, it's that I can't turn off the part of my brain that's analysing, watching from behind my eyes, and I think I forget that most people don't watch that way.

My instinct is that it's 50/50 plot/because they could. If I was a betting woman, I'd put 50p on Gwen at least temporarily leaving Torchwood to have her baby. There's also the fact that this series is pulling in new viewers who don't know about Tosh and Owen, so they don't *know* that Torchwood is a dangerous place to work, and they need to see it, I think. And...in a weird kind of way, having lost Tosh and Owen, it would be easy for us to think that the rest of the guys are safe, and we kind of need reminding that they're not.

Which doesn't take away from or make the emotional response any better or easier. It does also give a great big cloud hanging over the last episode, that I really, really hope they don't screw up a la 'Last of the Time Lords'. I'm watching nervously.

And of course we won't have forgotten! I'm going to be talking about this for months, I'm sure. And if I'm not talking here and you want to, email me ;D

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 04:06 pm (UTC)
naye: A cartoon of a woman with red hair and glasses in front of a progressive pride flag. (hug - teyla)
From: [personal profile] naye
Thank you~! *hugs*

Talking to you has cheered me up some, just... well, just because talking to you cheers me up! ♥

And - good point about the new viewers and such. Mm.

Want to know something funny, though? When I employ my powers of denial, I employ them at super strength! So when you mentioned being upset with "Last of the Time Lords", I was all confused, because I only remember my favorite parts! Ahaha. Really, truly. I just googled the title to see if I could figure out what had bugged you about it, and promptly went "...oh".

(I have also so convinced myself that Donna. Will. Be. Fine. that I think of Journey's End and squee!)

So much for consistency. ^^;;;

I'm not holding on to any hope now, though, because I don't want to have my hope crushed, on top of having my heart broken. Ianto's dead, and my way of dealing is spamming my poor friends with demands for hugs! *clings*

But, yeah, the bottom line is that I really do watch most things with my heart, and only switch on my brain as a self-defense mechanism, which makes watching less fun. These Torchwood eps were so good I was all heart about it, so I was an easy target for the angst.
Edited Date: 2009-07-10 04:07 pm (UTC)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 04:31 pm (UTC)
ext_1981: (BH-Mitchell hug George)
From: [identity profile] friendshipper.livejournal.com
So I'm disappointed that they couldn't leave it at nail-biting, edge-of-the-seat tension and psychological drama and evil aliens and everything, but had to make it so extremely personal - had to go for such a visceral reaction as grief, which is now overshadowing all of my other reactions.

*squish* That was exactly the problem that I had with Tosh and Owen's death -- well, even above and beyond the shock of "My favorite characters, they killeded them dead!" The "Owen's death" arc had been such fantastic television -- well written and well acted and incredibly, incredibly moving ... and now, it's always and forever overshadowed by the finale for me. I want to go back and wallow in those wrenching, uplifting episodes, but I can't let go in order to enjoy them completely, because of knowing how things end for them.

I'm lucky, I guess, that I wasn't really invested in Ianto as a character, and I'd already done a lot of emotional-pulling-back from the show, so this was more startling than painful to me. But it definitely means that I'm not going to be able to emotionally invest in characters in this show, and for me, that's a huge part of enjoying something really deeply. It's why I've never read GRR Martin's books, because I've seen just enough spoilers to know that you can't get attached to characters without having your heart stomped on.

I really do appreciate the fact that Torchwood doesn't pull punches when it comes to letting their characters survive these life-threatening situations, as so many sci-fi shows do. And I love the uncertainty of not knowing if a character will survive or not (well, I love it best when it's coupled with the glorious "and then they lived!" moment). But it's a really fine line to walk, because if a writer or a show just keeps killing characters, eventually I'll disassociate totally, which has already happened for me with Joss Whedon's shows, and this has pretty much done it for me with Torchwood. I'll definitely be watching the last episode, but if there's a season 4, I'm not really interested in coming back for more. ('course, that's what I said about season 3, and look what happened...)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-07-10 04:59 pm (UTC)
naye: A cartoon of a woman with red hair and glasses in front of a progressive pride flag. (hug - dw hugs)
From: [personal profile] naye
*squishes*

I wasn't... oh, who am I fooling. The writing pulled me right back into the Torchwood love zone, and the fact that the writers are using my love of their characters to goad a huge emotional response out of me is not fair.

And, yeah, I totally agree on the fact that Torchwood does fantastic plots and it's cool that it doesn't pull any punches and I appreciate it and laud it in a very theoretical kind of way.

In reality? Seeing one character after another die makes me unable to enjoy the show the way I want to - just like you said, about Owen and that arc and everything else. Disassociation. This is why I have an easier time fanning on non-fantastic shows that are guaranteed to never break my heart (except by starting to suck). ;_;

It's like - now there's not enough left of Torchwood for me to love! There's no team, there's just a pair of survivors with sadness and guilt that will haunt them for the rest of one of their lives, at least. And maybe they can build a team on that, and maybe they can go on and have full, happy lives, but - they'll never be the team I loved so much for these four brief episodes.

In short - don't they deserve a break?