Too little too late...or maybe not

So the last two episodes of Torchwood were way above the level of quality that had been established this season. I found that I had quite a bit of feelings about them in common with the i09 recapper.

"Adrift", with Gwen investigating the disappearances of random people around Cardiff, was pretty engaging and made me kind of wish that her police buddy Andy was around more often. Maybe by next season, what with the massive overhaul that's been talked about, he will be. I also liked Ianto secretly helping Gwen out. It felt kind of like the Welsh/empathic portion of the Torchwood team banding together. The episode had about as many flaws in logic as any other, but effects of Gwen's distrust of Jack made it intriguing enough to get past that. I do have to say though, that as much as the Gwen walking in on Jack and Ianto scene was straight out of the fanfiction, it was very surprisingly not at all hot.


"Fragments" was really good. Why was this episode not part of season 1? All four of them were more interesting in their flashbacks then they ever are in the normal course of the show. Particularly Owen. Turns out Owen is the sad, broken man that I tend to love on every other show I watch, but the show just didn't bother to mention that until this episode. And Jack and his history with Torchwood was really interesting. I don't know why they didn't make that the spinoff series. It could have started off as a period thing and the story would have followed Jack through his Torchwood career. Or it could have been done like Angel, where within each episode with moder-day Jack and his current team, there would be flashbacks to other incidents during his Torchwood career. Also, Tosh was way more interesting when she was frightened and desperate than she is now that she's just lonely and kind of pathetic. And the Ianto flashback seemed to hint what I've hoped for all along: that Ianto is actually way cooler and James Bond-ier than we ever get to see on the show. Which begs the question, why don't we ever get to see that cooler, James Bond-ier Ianto on the show?

Anyway, it really does look like the finale could go either way. The end bit of "Fragments" with the threat from Captain John Hart made it seem like he's only evil because he's crazy jealous and in love with Jack. Just generally kind of weird. I am kind of curious about Jack's brother though. And I'm interested to see if the end of the show sets up for the beginning of whatever totally different thing they've apparently turned it into for next year. Damn this show. It's just like Lost, disappointing for weeks and weeks and weeks and just when I'm ready to give it up, throwing in interesting ideas to drag me back in.