Doctor Who Club of Australia

[dave]

Toshiko should smile more often. She has a gorgeous smile.

I'm not sure why, but I didn't find this particularly moving. Maybe it was just too similar to Owen's thread in the Out of Time episode from last season, maybe Naoko Mori just wasn't that convincing in portraying any kind of sadness. I don't know, but it didn't really draw me in.

Nice to see some charcter development for Owen. So he's not just a callous jerk after all.

Favourite line had to be: "Someone saving the world in their pyjamas. That's daft." - or something to that effect from Tommy. Nice reference to the Christmas Invasion.

[Panecea]

I'd have to disagree with you Dave. I see it as a step for Toshiko, she seems to always feel awkward when it comes to relationships of a personal nature. However, there was less discomfort this time. If she were completely comfortable with this one I think it would be out of place.

I do not think the similarities between this episode and Out of Time are completely unintentional; you can see that Owen cares for Tosh but up until now they've really had no common ground on which to develop a relationship. I believe this is that ground.

This episode was dynamic in that it really demonstrated a versatility of production. We just had two relatively fast paced episodes and have transitioned rather smoothly into slower one that is still entertaining or at least mildly interesting. It will be intriguing to see how the next episode plays out.

I believe this is crunch time at this point. The first three episodes seemed to be based on the better points of last season. I hope they can pull something unexpected out of the hat.

[meglos]

Panecea said everything I wanted to say and said it much better than I ever could, so I will leave it at that

[Greg]

I had some trouble tuning the old space/time visualiser to this one, but I've seen it now.

Can I say that Helen Raynor should only write one-parters? This story didn't suffer from the enormous disappointment of part 2 that we had with Evolution of the Daleks!

The character of Tommy was well-established even before he was brought out of the deep freeze; the Torchwood regulars, other than Gwen, gave a very strong impression that Tommy's day each year was something they looked forward to. It even brought Owen's good side to the surface!

The story unfolded slower than usual, which helped heighten the mystery of exactly what was going to happen. That tension was a nice change from the diet of action with a small amount of investigation we normally get with Torchwood.

It was also great to get a glimpse of Torchwood as it was, almost 100 years ago. I wouldn't mind seeing Gerald and Harriet again - maybe once a year they should have a story from Torchwood's past that doesn't feature the regulars, but past Torchwood members?

All that said... This story wasn't all that much to write home about. Credit to the cast and to the director for taking a pretty run-of-the-mill story and injecting it with a spark that made it work so much better than it would have on paper.

[Theta Sigma]

First of all I should have known the title would refer to something General Haig said during World War I who did not get an impressionable view of from history lessons at school.
Written by Helen Raynor and like her previous Torchwood episode Ghost Machine in the previous season it has the "bringing the past into the present" theme and the episode definitely works thanks to Naoko Mori's performance as Tosh.
This episode is certainly better than the last Tosh episode Greeks Bearing Gifts.
Quite a surprise when Gerald and Harriet told Tommy that they were from Torchwood.
Very eerie moment when that nurse from 1918 sees Gwen.
Brilliant episode.

[montypython]

I thought this was quite a good episode. I liked how it developed Tosh's character a bit more, and it had a good balance of mystery, emotion and drama. I don't really have anything bad to say about it.

Nice reference to The Christmas Invasion.

This would have to go into my favourite lines of all time: "Being here, I've seen things I never dreamt I'd see ... loved people I never would have known if I'd just stayed right where I was - and I wouldn't change that for the world."

[montypython]

I was reading in John Barrowman's autobiography Anything Goes that the cast and crew occasionally pull pranks on each other to keep them going through long/tough shoots. One such prank involved the Jack/Ianto pash in this episode: