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seriously random meta (with extra toppings)
As I was driving home from work today, contemplating Torchwood: EPIC FAIL (yes, I'm still working on it, and yes, I know it's been ages, shh), I figured out Torchwood's main problem: it's not Star Trek. Now, I realize you could also say that its main problem is that it's not Mad Men or Homicide: Life on the Streets or Battlestar Galactica (Seasons 1 - 2.0, anyway) or any other number of shows, but I'm not talking about overall quality. In fact, I'm talking about the exact opposite, because I think that Star Trek: The Original Series, while awesome, probably fails just as often as Torchwood does. Writing!FAIL, ACTING!!FAIL, SFX!FAIL, gender!FAIL, general sense-making!FAIL -- TOS has got it all.
::fends off shower of styrofoam rocks hurled by Trekkies::
The difference, of course, is that TOS manages to overcome its limitations and be awesome, whereas Torchwood usually takes one step forward and two steps back, and then shoots itself in the foot. I think it all boils down to the production team's devotion to mission statements (as it were). Gene Roddenberry said TOS would explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where no man has gone before; in other words, "Look! Cool shit!" Rusty, meanwhile, promises that outside the government, beyond the police, Torchwood fights for (or against, there seems to be some waffling about this) the future on behalf of the human race, in the 21st Century when everything changes; basically, "Look! Cool shit and modern living!"
TOS delivers cool shit to discover, contemplate, or try to blow up pretty much every episode. Of course, sometimes it delivers it two hours late and puts pepperoni on your vegetarian pizza, but usually there's something that was, at some stage of development, recognizable as cool (or delicious), regardless of how the episode (or pizza) actually turned out. On the other hand, I feel like Torchwood cheats a lot, because way too often it seems the plot doesn't arise organically from the conflict of cool shit and modern living (aliens! in Cardiff!), but instead has been twisted by an outside influence designed to remind us that it's all dark and gritty. It's frustrating because the premise doesn't discount the darkness and grittiness; it's all just badly incorporated, like the delivery guy giving you a pizza and then hurling a pepperoni through your front window. There's too much focus on what ~kind~ of TV show it is (the "adult" Doctor Who) instead of on the stories it's actually telling. That's why they so often go awry, and that's why it's so annoying when they do, because Rusty et al. are prizing style over the substance promised in the opening spiel, and now the audience is covered in glass when they could have just given us a regular pepperoni pizza in the first place.
In conclusion: you will never guess what I had for dinner.
::fends off shower of styrofoam rocks hurled by Trekkies::
The difference, of course, is that TOS manages to overcome its limitations and be awesome, whereas Torchwood usually takes one step forward and two steps back, and then shoots itself in the foot. I think it all boils down to the production team's devotion to mission statements (as it were). Gene Roddenberry said TOS would explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where no man has gone before; in other words, "Look! Cool shit!" Rusty, meanwhile, promises that outside the government, beyond the police, Torchwood fights for (or against, there seems to be some waffling about this) the future on behalf of the human race, in the 21st Century when everything changes; basically, "Look! Cool shit and modern living!"
TOS delivers cool shit to discover, contemplate, or try to blow up pretty much every episode. Of course, sometimes it delivers it two hours late and puts pepperoni on your vegetarian pizza, but usually there's something that was, at some stage of development, recognizable as cool (or delicious), regardless of how the episode (or pizza) actually turned out. On the other hand, I feel like Torchwood cheats a lot, because way too often it seems the plot doesn't arise organically from the conflict of cool shit and modern living (aliens! in Cardiff!), but instead has been twisted by an outside influence designed to remind us that it's all dark and gritty. It's frustrating because the premise doesn't discount the darkness and grittiness; it's all just badly incorporated, like the delivery guy giving you a pizza and then hurling a pepperoni through your front window. There's too much focus on what ~kind~ of TV show it is (the "adult" Doctor Who) instead of on the stories it's actually telling. That's why they so often go awry, and that's why it's so annoying when they do, because Rusty et al. are prizing style over the substance promised in the opening spiel, and now the audience is covered in glass when they could have just given us a regular pepperoni pizza in the first place.
In conclusion: you will never guess what I had for dinner.
no subject
lol. But seriously, nice critique. I haven't watched much Star Trek (don't shoot me!), but I totally agree with you here.
no subject
Hey, maybe that's where Torchwood got confused!
And now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure there's an episode of Star Trek with a giant pizza. Or maybe it was supposed to be an alien. Sometimes it's hard to tell. :D
no subject
On a more serious note, I think you're on to something here - TOS, for all its issues, knew what it was trying to do, and made a good effort to do it. It was a sci-fi show, it was in space, and there were going to be LESSONS about the HUMAN CONDITION. On very rare occasions, this all happened.
Torchwood doesn't have that same focus. It says its about one thing, and then it becomes something else (mostly: life sucks and then you die), and even the things it ends up being about don't really play with the toys in the sandbox.
In conclusion: Pizza is good.