As part of the BBC season about white Britain, there was a "re-evaluation" of Enoch Powell's famous "rivers of blood" speech last Friday. The history of the late sixties and early seventies alone made an interesting programme, its claim to "re-evaluate" the speech still more so. The speech remains one of the most mis-quoted in recent history, because like all great quotes, the man never actually said it - and this seemed to be the key point. Enoch Powell never said it. In a subsequent telly outing, he defined his terms very clearly, explaining that he did not see people as different because of their colour, but because of their culture.
The programme seemed to seek to make him directly responsible for a failed policy of multiculturalism, precisely because he had opposed and, worse, sought to open a debate about it. Apparently neither the media coverage, nor the internal politics of his party, nor the fears of the native working class at the start of an economically wobbly period were in any way to blame. Well done them, eh?
The mob loved him, and the mob in this case were Alabama via Huddersfield, but Enoch Powell had not taught them this. I suggest anybody who thinks the British Empire did not deliberately make the British people very racist indeed, by calculated campaigns of indoctrination to justify itself, consciously "stepped up" on the arrival of emigrants from the West Indies after the war, is a lazy and partial historian. Enoch Powell's language was indubitably racistand ugly, and its emotive nature actually damaged his case, because it allowed the debate to be stifled and obscured by the opposition, who seized on it to make him seem inhumane and dangerous. One should beware people who issue warnings about other people's faults; we see the faults in others we most abhor in ourselves.
Enoch Powell looked dangerous. He had the bright piercing blue eyes of an out-and-out maniac. You would not wish to be trapped in a lift with Enoch Powell and that piercing gaze. He looked like he might laser you in two with it if you disagreed with him. But his real misfortune was that he was intelligent and educated. He thought that politicians could talk about issues like grown up people, and that things could be discussed, and who knows, even retracted if they seemed to have been taken the wrong way, or to have suggested something mistaken or not-thought-through. Enoch Powell believed in freedom of speech, and that is, indeed, very dangerous - for politicians.
For the rest of us, it is important. Debates need to be had. Those who advocate violence to resolve conflict are a problem, but those who think that violence can be avoided when food and space and other good stuff are limited and population is not are idiots. History shows that sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting "No! No! I can't hear you!" solves nothing. Politicians have got so mealy-mouthed and wishy washy that nobody addresses how inbred children make up a disproportionate number of those born with disabilities, and teachers are blamed for the kidnap of 13 year old girls by their parents for forced marriage.
The next offering was "The Poles Are Coming!" a hilarious programme which told us all what we already know, the highlight of which for me was the Peterborovian natives explaining over their cans of Stella outside the Unemployment Office that they were desperate for work, but not so desperate they would do any. The work on offer was arduous, cold and grim - vegetable harvesting, and it was a long day. That said, it paid £7 an hour. I know this is not a great deal of money, but seven hours of it would pay more than a week's income support, and that would mean that in the other days of the week, you could easily earn more money than you get on the dole. You would have to earn your rent as well, but that would still mean you would end up with £100 a week in your pocket. Dammit, I bought a house on £7.50 an hour.
This fits in with My Mighty Question: if we have migrants finding jobs, why are we paying able bodied homegrown couch potatoes to sit around on the dole? I want to know.
I'm also quite interested in how come all these foreign workers - who are surely paying tax - are such a strain on resources. Where is all that income tax going? Or have the government lost that as well? Oh look, there's the problem! Not the migrants, but the crapsticks administration who don't know they are there because they don't keep records at passport control or at the Tax Office. William the Conqueror would never have run the country like this.
Back with Enoch Powell and voluntary repatriation, I felt that the Czech sleeping under a bush, and the Poles who spoke of people who "couldn't come back" might not have found that as racist a policy as all that.
Friday, 14 March 2008
Sunday, 2 March 2008
Eurovisual
I have a sneaking regard for the Eurovision Song Contest. It is rather like one's parents' stories about the war; having found them tedious and annoying for the first thirty years, sometime in your fourth decade you change your mind and decide they are interesting, and social history, and not so much justification for homicide as they once seemed.
However, unlike your parents' stories about the war, Eurovision has actually changed. And with every passing year it becomes more camp, more bizarre, and more incomprehensible.
It has long been hard to understand by what criterion Israel is part of Europe. Indeed, my understanding of Israel was that it was created by people who needed to escape Europe, so even its desire to be involved is pretty baffling. Geographically (which is often how countries are defined) Israel appears to be in Northern Africa or the Middle East. Really not Europe. Yet there they are, upon occasion even there they are winning. Strange.
Less strange but more annoying, is the addition of every tiny country which used to be in Russia and now wants to be in the EU. Again, this is all very bizarre - they made a great deal of fuss about not being in Russia, but five minutes out and they want to join another pan-European community. It makes little if any sense. If they think Brussels is going to allow them their own sense of individual nationalism, they clearly haven't yet been through the designated food definition laws which have got the English Press so aeriated so often in the last 35 years. If they think Brussels is going to dole out the profits of capitalism so as to help them to catch up to the West, they must think that Western Europe has no sense of self-preservation or self-promotion, which is not a conclusion history would necessarily lead to.
However, this would not matter if they weren't busily voting tactically in the Eurovision Song Contest that it has become practically a foregone conclusion that a) an Eastern European former Communist State will win and b) nobody West of the Iron Curtain will get a look-in.
This fills my soul with dark inchoate rage.
Let us for a moment discuss the music. The music was - throughout one's childhood - nearly uniformly awful, but the songs that won were sometimes quite perky little pop songs. The point was that there was always one song that was okay - and this all-right-tune, regardless of the petty politics of Malta and Spain and Certain Other Countries always voting for each other, won. It was the law.
Now, however, there is far too much politics. And it isn't right. Primarily because it strips us of even a remote chance of winning - worse, of a remote chance of making a decent showing on the score board. This flies in the face of all Eurovision tradition; Nul Point throughout is the province of the Scandinavians. But the real problem is not the dodgy tactical voting - although I would like to point out that these people are using the tools of democracy to make a laughing stock of us - no, the real problem is that there are around a million of these itty bitty teeny weeny totty dotty Used-To-Be-In-Russia countries. If you have about ten countries in a contest, then you have a statistical hope of winning every ten years or so. Once you are up to 49 countries - well, you do the sums. I think England should start watching again in about 2046.
When I rule the world, I will fix this in a simple manner, or by making the votes of countries proportionate to their population. Since we have always been - with Germany - the industrial heart of Europe, with the resultantly dense population, and now we have started another wave of immigration, I figure England's will be the only vote worth having. We will once again rule the musical waves and Hurrah for Us. Alternatively, we should start breaking down our countries into smaller components, allowing us to rig the voting. The UK has four parts for a kick off, without getting into the whole question of the Isles of Wight, Scilly and Man, and the Channel Islands. France has Brittany, Spain has Catalonia, and Germany could claim to be about five countries right off the bat.
The Eurovision Contest, however, has another plan. This year there will be not one but TWO semi-finals. This will bring a certain result, which is - all Western Europe will be out before the final. Western Europe will then not watch the final in droves. Eastern Europe - which uses the Contest primarily as a platform for national advertising for tourism etc - will have lost their target audience and be Annoyed. And next year, I suppose the Contest Planners hope, one or two of the Westerners will be allowed back in. I don't know that this will work, but I do assume it's their plan. And if it doesn't work - well, who cares? Let's have our own competition; something we do best; something only we Brits can do - live costume drama anybody?
However, unlike your parents' stories about the war, Eurovision has actually changed. And with every passing year it becomes more camp, more bizarre, and more incomprehensible.
It has long been hard to understand by what criterion Israel is part of Europe. Indeed, my understanding of Israel was that it was created by people who needed to escape Europe, so even its desire to be involved is pretty baffling. Geographically (which is often how countries are defined) Israel appears to be in Northern Africa or the Middle East. Really not Europe. Yet there they are, upon occasion even there they are winning. Strange.
Less strange but more annoying, is the addition of every tiny country which used to be in Russia and now wants to be in the EU. Again, this is all very bizarre - they made a great deal of fuss about not being in Russia, but five minutes out and they want to join another pan-European community. It makes little if any sense. If they think Brussels is going to allow them their own sense of individual nationalism, they clearly haven't yet been through the designated food definition laws which have got the English Press so aeriated so often in the last 35 years. If they think Brussels is going to dole out the profits of capitalism so as to help them to catch up to the West, they must think that Western Europe has no sense of self-preservation or self-promotion, which is not a conclusion history would necessarily lead to.
However, this would not matter if they weren't busily voting tactically in the Eurovision Song Contest that it has become practically a foregone conclusion that a) an Eastern European former Communist State will win and b) nobody West of the Iron Curtain will get a look-in.
This fills my soul with dark inchoate rage.
Let us for a moment discuss the music. The music was - throughout one's childhood - nearly uniformly awful, but the songs that won were sometimes quite perky little pop songs. The point was that there was always one song that was okay - and this all-right-tune, regardless of the petty politics of Malta and Spain and Certain Other Countries always voting for each other, won. It was the law.
Now, however, there is far too much politics. And it isn't right. Primarily because it strips us of even a remote chance of winning - worse, of a remote chance of making a decent showing on the score board. This flies in the face of all Eurovision tradition; Nul Point throughout is the province of the Scandinavians. But the real problem is not the dodgy tactical voting - although I would like to point out that these people are using the tools of democracy to make a laughing stock of us - no, the real problem is that there are around a million of these itty bitty teeny weeny totty dotty Used-To-Be-In-Russia countries. If you have about ten countries in a contest, then you have a statistical hope of winning every ten years or so. Once you are up to 49 countries - well, you do the sums. I think England should start watching again in about 2046.
When I rule the world, I will fix this in a simple manner, or by making the votes of countries proportionate to their population. Since we have always been - with Germany - the industrial heart of Europe, with the resultantly dense population, and now we have started another wave of immigration, I figure England's will be the only vote worth having. We will once again rule the musical waves and Hurrah for Us. Alternatively, we should start breaking down our countries into smaller components, allowing us to rig the voting. The UK has four parts for a kick off, without getting into the whole question of the Isles of Wight, Scilly and Man, and the Channel Islands. France has Brittany, Spain has Catalonia, and Germany could claim to be about five countries right off the bat.
The Eurovision Contest, however, has another plan. This year there will be not one but TWO semi-finals. This will bring a certain result, which is - all Western Europe will be out before the final. Western Europe will then not watch the final in droves. Eastern Europe - which uses the Contest primarily as a platform for national advertising for tourism etc - will have lost their target audience and be Annoyed. And next year, I suppose the Contest Planners hope, one or two of the Westerners will be allowed back in. I don't know that this will work, but I do assume it's their plan. And if it doesn't work - well, who cares? Let's have our own competition; something we do best; something only we Brits can do - live costume drama anybody?
Friday, 29 February 2008
Torchered to Death
It was a big day for Torchwood. Billed by the BBC as "their darkest hour", they were facing up to the fact that Owen was dead. After 5 minutes of screentime and an hour in their world, they had had enough of that facing up to facts malarkey, and Capn Jack went to a church full of snoozing weevils, who kept a Special Glove (twin to Buffy's glove of Mynhegon) which brings people back to life in a biscuit tin under a small avalanche of broken dolls. I was pleased by this detail, and I have started to warm to Torchwood.
Soon Owen was up and running, full of the darkness of death, and acting as a portal for Death Itself. It was very important to the gang to stop Death from claiming thirteen victims. Otherwise Death would walk the earth and his hunger would know no bounds. Many people might point out that Death does walk the earth, and that the idea that he would gain control seems - well, are the Dead going to be more dead after Death comes back? Will there be more of them? It didn't seem to make any sense. Still, it was clearly an important piece of information, since Death bothered to mutter it to himself in a strange Death-language that took the alien technology (everything in Torchwood is done with alien technology, probably including the special effects, meaning there's no need to worry about them taking over the world just yet) several seconds longer than usual to translate. This was just long enough for Tosh to say it wasn't working - she is named after what she talks, and should have whacked the Alien Tech with a human fist before making any such ridiculous claims.
Then Death followed them to a hospital - apparently a work-related decision; maybe Death was feeling too peaky to kill the healthy, though the gang thought it was due to Death's wish to conceal his plan. Shouldn't have possessed Owen and talked to himself in front of the CCTV then. Things carried on making less and less sense until Owen played two-man ring o' roses with Death which despatched it back to the Other Place. Don't ask, I've no idea what it was all about, and neither has anybody else - certainly nobody on the creative side.
Owen being dead is actually a hoot. He can't sleep, shag or drink, and this makes him very sad. However, it does mean it's now safe for him to date the Femme Fatale of the Group - Tosh. They can't have sex, but then none of the women in this show are permitted to do so - only boys, and preferably together.
Anyway, I said it was a big day for Torchwood and so it was - the day we found out whether Capn Jack's omni-sexuality embraced necrophilia. And it turned out it didn't. There are still some places - like Canadians having sex with dead people, or women having sex with anybody at all, that are too dark for even the post-Watershed BBC to go. Thank goodness.
Soon Owen was up and running, full of the darkness of death, and acting as a portal for Death Itself. It was very important to the gang to stop Death from claiming thirteen victims. Otherwise Death would walk the earth and his hunger would know no bounds. Many people might point out that Death does walk the earth, and that the idea that he would gain control seems - well, are the Dead going to be more dead after Death comes back? Will there be more of them? It didn't seem to make any sense. Still, it was clearly an important piece of information, since Death bothered to mutter it to himself in a strange Death-language that took the alien technology (everything in Torchwood is done with alien technology, probably including the special effects, meaning there's no need to worry about them taking over the world just yet) several seconds longer than usual to translate. This was just long enough for Tosh to say it wasn't working - she is named after what she talks, and should have whacked the Alien Tech with a human fist before making any such ridiculous claims.
Then Death followed them to a hospital - apparently a work-related decision; maybe Death was feeling too peaky to kill the healthy, though the gang thought it was due to Death's wish to conceal his plan. Shouldn't have possessed Owen and talked to himself in front of the CCTV then. Things carried on making less and less sense until Owen played two-man ring o' roses with Death which despatched it back to the Other Place. Don't ask, I've no idea what it was all about, and neither has anybody else - certainly nobody on the creative side.
Owen being dead is actually a hoot. He can't sleep, shag or drink, and this makes him very sad. However, it does mean it's now safe for him to date the Femme Fatale of the Group - Tosh. They can't have sex, but then none of the women in this show are permitted to do so - only boys, and preferably together.
Anyway, I said it was a big day for Torchwood and so it was - the day we found out whether Capn Jack's omni-sexuality embraced necrophilia. And it turned out it didn't. There are still some places - like Canadians having sex with dead people, or women having sex with anybody at all, that are too dark for even the post-Watershed BBC to go. Thank goodness.
Thursday, 21 February 2008
I know it's only me ...
But hell, couldn't Torchwood just try to be something other than a feeble imitation of Buffy?
Bad enough that the episodes are weak re-tellings without the wit and character of the original, but surely they could have changed the titles? "End of Days" and "Sleeper" are both straight steals, and "Something Borrowed" echoes "Something Blue". It's just - depressing, to make so little effort, and insulting to your audience, to assume they won't notice.
Owen is about as dead as I am. Possibly less.
As I say, I'm growing increasingly convinced it's only me...
Bad enough that the episodes are weak re-tellings without the wit and character of the original, but surely they could have changed the titles? "End of Days" and "Sleeper" are both straight steals, and "Something Borrowed" echoes "Something Blue". It's just - depressing, to make so little effort, and insulting to your audience, to assume they won't notice.
Owen is about as dead as I am. Possibly less.
As I say, I'm growing increasingly convinced it's only me...
Thursday, 7 February 2008
Intergalactic Austin Powers
Scary episode this week: horrible people chopping up an innocent off-world creature for meat while it was still - quite inexplicably - alive. Gwen's man finding out that she meets her half of the rent by hunting aliens. And Capn Jack Not Getting Any. My he looked hacked off. He emoted teariness, wood-faced fury and ethical dilemma by turns, but we viewers knew that what was really pissing him off was that he had been FORCED to go a whole fifty minutes without a snog.
At one point he had Gwen in a tight-shot up against a tall order, but still she did not dive forward with a small gasp and smother him in a suffocating 90 second screen kiss. I don't know why; he was telling her she couldn't run up to her husband until after he had endangered and/or incriminated himself with the alien-butchers, which was just as alluring as his talk last week on how he was glad he'd left his home planet because he'd seen such amazing stuff, and that earnt him a Random Snog from one of the team. There was neither lead-up to this snog, nor was there any sequel to it; it seems that this is just what happens to any character left alone with Capn Jack. He doesn't care what he snogs or sticks his dick into; far from being an alien, he seems - well, pathologically & superhormonally male. He pretended to cry out of pity for the alien whale, but for my money, when Burn Gorman was struggling with an Acme Comedy Syringe full of Alien Whale Killer (his own invention; three buckets full of which he had cunningly knocked up in two seconds flat from the contents of an Ikea shelving unit full of bottles of coloured liquid, none larger than the average bottle of cough mixture) in a "mercy killing", it was not the continued anguish of being butchered piecemeal that he was rescuing the house-sized mammal from; no indeed, it was the likeliness of a romantic interlude with "Capn Jack".
That man has no more right to that rank than I have. He's so blatantly somebody who's made up an army label for himself so he can impress people who don't know any better. He hasn't even got the knowledge to pretend to a decent rank. Captain indeed. At least Dr Who used to be helped out by a Brigadier - fallen on hard times now. But now, Capn Jack uses his rank to get dates and it's all a very obvious ploy. "I'm a Captain, baby, does it make you horny, baby?" I kept expecting to hear him crooning at the chained leviathan. Or Rhys, whom he was also very tetchy about not getting to snog.
Oh well, there is always next week, when I think it will be Burn Gorman's turn for Capn Jack's attentions. His character should be well up for it. He uses extra terrestrial rohypnol to get relationships; his sexual politics are just exactly the same as Capn Jack's.
Does it make you horny, baby?
At one point he had Gwen in a tight-shot up against a tall order, but still she did not dive forward with a small gasp and smother him in a suffocating 90 second screen kiss. I don't know why; he was telling her she couldn't run up to her husband until after he had endangered and/or incriminated himself with the alien-butchers, which was just as alluring as his talk last week on how he was glad he'd left his home planet because he'd seen such amazing stuff, and that earnt him a Random Snog from one of the team. There was neither lead-up to this snog, nor was there any sequel to it; it seems that this is just what happens to any character left alone with Capn Jack. He doesn't care what he snogs or sticks his dick into; far from being an alien, he seems - well, pathologically & superhormonally male. He pretended to cry out of pity for the alien whale, but for my money, when Burn Gorman was struggling with an Acme Comedy Syringe full of Alien Whale Killer (his own invention; three buckets full of which he had cunningly knocked up in two seconds flat from the contents of an Ikea shelving unit full of bottles of coloured liquid, none larger than the average bottle of cough mixture) in a "mercy killing", it was not the continued anguish of being butchered piecemeal that he was rescuing the house-sized mammal from; no indeed, it was the likeliness of a romantic interlude with "Capn Jack".
That man has no more right to that rank than I have. He's so blatantly somebody who's made up an army label for himself so he can impress people who don't know any better. He hasn't even got the knowledge to pretend to a decent rank. Captain indeed. At least Dr Who used to be helped out by a Brigadier - fallen on hard times now. But now, Capn Jack uses his rank to get dates and it's all a very obvious ploy. "I'm a Captain, baby, does it make you horny, baby?" I kept expecting to hear him crooning at the chained leviathan. Or Rhys, whom he was also very tetchy about not getting to snog.
Oh well, there is always next week, when I think it will be Burn Gorman's turn for Capn Jack's attentions. His character should be well up for it. He uses extra terrestrial rohypnol to get relationships; his sexual politics are just exactly the same as Capn Jack's.
Does it make you horny, baby?
Monday, 4 February 2008
Oh, the Shame ...
Once again I am gripped by febrile guilty interest in something I know I shouldn't be watching. This one is called "Vanity Lair" and it is on T4 Sunday at lunchtime (when people of my age should be serving up crispy roasts to ungrateful oiky children of their own genetic stamp.)
There are ten self-selected "beautiful people" who sit around wanting to shag each other in a mild sort of way, but are prevented by their own all-absorbing narcissism, a series of "tests" of their attractiveness, and the fact that each week they have two new auditionees, of whom one will stay, duly choosing who to evict to make room for them. So either they shag everyone or no one.
The show claims it will test "what is most attractive", and advertises a hope that qualities other than the skindeep will emerge victorious. What currently looks like it will emerge victorious is having a penis. Already the group has chosen to take in a man, and he has chosen to evict a woman, leaving the group 6:4 male. The boys and the girls like men - boys because they're the elite, like themselves, girls because they dislike other girls for being shallow and vain, like themselves. Within a very few weeks, that will be a very boy heavy house.
When I first stumbled across it, I thought it was a remake of that film where nobody can leave the dinner party; they are rather creepy. My impression was not altered by the fact that when their faces were tested for symmetry the boy whose face was least symmetrical left the dinner table for the toilet and retched. It was the most extraordinary display of distress. Not for the first time, I wondered if Channel 4 has Gone Too Far. Obviously the person concerned is vapid beyond the wildest wet-dreams of Heat magazine, but the fact that he was genuinely upset fascinated me. He has no sense of self beyond his floppy hair. He doesn't even realise it. I genuinely wondered if he should be on show, because surely believing you are only as good as your hair-do indicates that the balance of your mind is disturbed.
Or maybe it's just me. Maybe I am eccentric because I don't think my value as a human is dependent on the floppiness of my hair. Maybe I shall be watching next week.
There are ten self-selected "beautiful people" who sit around wanting to shag each other in a mild sort of way, but are prevented by their own all-absorbing narcissism, a series of "tests" of their attractiveness, and the fact that each week they have two new auditionees, of whom one will stay, duly choosing who to evict to make room for them. So either they shag everyone or no one.
The show claims it will test "what is most attractive", and advertises a hope that qualities other than the skindeep will emerge victorious. What currently looks like it will emerge victorious is having a penis. Already the group has chosen to take in a man, and he has chosen to evict a woman, leaving the group 6:4 male. The boys and the girls like men - boys because they're the elite, like themselves, girls because they dislike other girls for being shallow and vain, like themselves. Within a very few weeks, that will be a very boy heavy house.
When I first stumbled across it, I thought it was a remake of that film where nobody can leave the dinner party; they are rather creepy. My impression was not altered by the fact that when their faces were tested for symmetry the boy whose face was least symmetrical left the dinner table for the toilet and retched. It was the most extraordinary display of distress. Not for the first time, I wondered if Channel 4 has Gone Too Far. Obviously the person concerned is vapid beyond the wildest wet-dreams of Heat magazine, but the fact that he was genuinely upset fascinated me. He has no sense of self beyond his floppy hair. He doesn't even realise it. I genuinely wondered if he should be on show, because surely believing you are only as good as your hair-do indicates that the balance of your mind is disturbed.
Or maybe it's just me. Maybe I am eccentric because I don't think my value as a human is dependent on the floppiness of my hair. Maybe I shall be watching next week.
Sunday, 20 January 2008
Buffy's Still Better
The BBC is making valiant efforts with Torchwood, and one wishes them well. But still, it is important that I let them have some hints about why it is still not as good as Buffy.
1. Characters and Casting
They all look very similar. Owing probably to restricted budget, but possibly restricted acting range, you never get moments when you are oggling a character's face as it emotes Something Important. For some reason, nothing in Torchwood ever seems very important, although often it does look overplayed. It would matter less if they didn't all look the same - a bunch of people in poor light with similar colouring and height. It is NO GOOD having people who look similar on the telly, because it confuses the viewer. I refer Torchwood - and other programmes - to Buffy. Three leads of either sex, all distinctive. The female leads have DIFFERENT COLOUR HAIR and sometimes even different heights. The male leads have DIFFERENT AGES AND COSTUMES AS WELL AS DIFFERENT COLOURED HAIR. And different accents.
I never understand quite why anybody casts similar looking types in the same programme, but the BBC have done it all my life. I suppose it hardly helps that good looking people tend to have regular features, and therefore a tendency to resemble each other. But I still don't believe they're trying. Having carefully cast identical actors, they continue to dress them like two sets of triplets - except for Capn Jack, who has A Coat. He is currently being challenged in Coat Supremacy by Spike from Buffy, who sports The Coat in the Buffyverse. Spike has A New Coat in Torchwood; it is a rather dashing Redcoat in the Hussar style. When it comes down to the Coat Wars, my money is on Spike. He is daringly wearing colour, apart from anything else. Oh yes, and he has that conviction that the rest of the cast lack. Wait and see.
2. Want of Drama
Why is it nothing matters on British TV? Is it to do with our lack of international clout? American TV is full of High Stakes and all that guff. When Torchwood tells me that Cardiff is about to be exploded by nuclear-warhead-wielding aliens, I just don't believe them. What on earth would aliens be up to in Cardiff? Hoping to blend in better because alien accents sound like Welsh ones? Pull the other one. Either they'd be in the middle of nowhere, or the White House. Not the Millennium Stadium. And why blow it up? It's all a bit ho hum.
3. No Relationships
Do they know each other? Really? Crumbs.
1. Characters and Casting
They all look very similar. Owing probably to restricted budget, but possibly restricted acting range, you never get moments when you are oggling a character's face as it emotes Something Important. For some reason, nothing in Torchwood ever seems very important, although often it does look overplayed. It would matter less if they didn't all look the same - a bunch of people in poor light with similar colouring and height. It is NO GOOD having people who look similar on the telly, because it confuses the viewer. I refer Torchwood - and other programmes - to Buffy. Three leads of either sex, all distinctive. The female leads have DIFFERENT COLOUR HAIR and sometimes even different heights. The male leads have DIFFERENT AGES AND COSTUMES AS WELL AS DIFFERENT COLOURED HAIR. And different accents.
I never understand quite why anybody casts similar looking types in the same programme, but the BBC have done it all my life. I suppose it hardly helps that good looking people tend to have regular features, and therefore a tendency to resemble each other. But I still don't believe they're trying. Having carefully cast identical actors, they continue to dress them like two sets of triplets - except for Capn Jack, who has A Coat. He is currently being challenged in Coat Supremacy by Spike from Buffy, who sports The Coat in the Buffyverse. Spike has A New Coat in Torchwood; it is a rather dashing Redcoat in the Hussar style. When it comes down to the Coat Wars, my money is on Spike. He is daringly wearing colour, apart from anything else. Oh yes, and he has that conviction that the rest of the cast lack. Wait and see.
2. Want of Drama
Why is it nothing matters on British TV? Is it to do with our lack of international clout? American TV is full of High Stakes and all that guff. When Torchwood tells me that Cardiff is about to be exploded by nuclear-warhead-wielding aliens, I just don't believe them. What on earth would aliens be up to in Cardiff? Hoping to blend in better because alien accents sound like Welsh ones? Pull the other one. Either they'd be in the middle of nowhere, or the White House. Not the Millennium Stadium. And why blow it up? It's all a bit ho hum.
3. No Relationships
Do they know each other? Really? Crumbs.
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