Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Lord Woodlouse wrote:
PREDATOR490 wrote:Watched it and found it excellently done for the most part.

As for the Doctor, supposedly Martha was on her honeymoon to justify her absence but that quickly became bullshit after things started to escalate. UNIT would logically have hauled Martha's ass back and got her to phone the Doctor non-stop. Although my liking of the Doctor has rapidly diminished now considering he hasnt given UNIT the ability to contact him and his performance over the new series.

What, only his washout companions get that privilage ?
What about Sarah Jane and K-9 ?

Part Five's camera bullshit about the Doctor was exactly that. The irony is the Doctor either simply dosent care to help, cant or wont help and it makes Harriot Jones right in her viewpoint.

Although, I wont be suprised if the next Doctor Who special attempts to justify why the Doctor never turned up and what Martha was doing at the time. Could this be why the special is rumoured to have all the companions in it again, that way Martha wasnt actually around during these events to contact him etc. ?
lt makes far more sense, l think, to simply say that the 456 somehow blocked communications. lt's just something that would have needlessly detracted from the plot.
It also makes far more sense for jack to just transmit this freqency (which, hey, could be picked up by radio reception equipment) from Joddrel Bank.

That's not what happened. Lanterns were not correctly hung: plot holes were formed. Having to observe a degree of continuity to tell a convincing story is the price for the immersion of a persistant setting.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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PREDATOR490 wrote:Watched it and found it excellently done for the most part.

As for the Doctor, supposedly Martha was on her honeymoon to justify her absence but that quickly became bullshit after things started to escalate. UNIT would logically have hauled Martha's ass back and got her to phone the Doctor non-stop. Although my liking of the Doctor has rapidly diminished now considering he hasnt given UNIT the ability to contact him and his performance over the new series.
He did. The Doctor left a device called a Space Time telegraph with UNIT and the Brigadier in the 1970s before leaving. The Fourth Doctor was called back to Earth with it in his sixth story. I picked on Martha Jones because she's the one mentioned on-screen.

As an aside, I understand the perils of trying to write this kind of thing without calling in bigshots like the Doctor or K9 that'd detract from the story - especially with something as silly as K9 - which is somewhat their own fault for establishing Torchwood as such a pathetic organisation. But it would be quite easy for them to show a scene with them trying just this, and the 456 jamming it. They had five hours, that takes five seconds. It's not like they forgot that the Doctor is out there - they just hung a woefully inadequate lantern on his abscence.
What about Sarah Jane and K-9?
This has the problem of 'why didn't they fix the problem.' - Sarah Jane has not one but two computers better than any on Earth by orders of magnitude, why she wouldn't be able to trace these guys' signal is... an interesting question.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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NecronLord wrote:For all we know, it's blood control, and the kids will break it when they get hungry. That's not my solution, shit for brains. It's a last resort that is still better than giving the drug addicts what they want. They're druggies. If they find a reliable supply, they will be back. That is what druggies do. They want more drugs. That is why it's called addiction.
For all we know all manner of explanations are possible. We simply have no good reason to believe they're the case. Playing chicken with a species threatening to exterminate our entire race strikes me as idiotic.

We have no reason to believe your last resort is not the inevitable conclusion. Given that, there's no difference between the your solution and the last resort.
Frankly, shooting all the kids (which is obviously a last resort if the 456 have some means of taking the kids - a bullet through the brain is considerably better than immortal torture) will demonstrate that they will never get what they want from Earth. And when the next set of children are born, the 456 will have no reason to think we'll hand them over.
You're conveniently ignoring their threat to exterminate our entire species (which given our experience of their biological warfare methods, seems achievable).
It wasn't originally a Whoverse story, and that rather shows with the sheer unpreparedness for aliens. There are dozens of other things they could have done - what, we're supposed to believe that Martha Jones being on honeymoon prevents them calling the Doctor? AHAHAHAH. Where was she, in some luddite Himalayan monastery? Wait, no, they could still get to her there on day one, even if they had to get a high altitude plane and parachute messengers. Never mind that she's not the only one with means of contacting him.
The same could be said of any story where the Earth is threatened. Ring the Doctor and save the Earth is frankly an unsatisfactory solution for me, and l'm happy for them to come up with any reason to ignore it. lt's not worth dwelling on.
But no, there are very few things worse than giving them what they want. Mass infanticide is not one of them.
l happen to disagree. Because l like being alive just that much. l'm crazy that way.
Which is better than eventually, 100% of the species being rendered immortal, immobile, and subject to eternal sensory deprivation. Which is what happens to those they take. They are addicts. They will want more. That is what addicts do.

Certainly there's every possibility that they'd be stopped by an external force - or that the entire Earth would be cyberconverted by the time they came back, whereupon they'd be crushed by the cybermen we've been made into, or something equally amusing, but from the 'moral dilemma' of 'do we give them the kids' - yeah, they've a neat trick in making the children talk, but they can't afford to kill their supply, they have shown very limited technology (by known galactic standards) in not being able to get the kids themselves, and want to cause literally infinite suffering. There is every possibility they're bluffing, or don't even have the means to wipe out the Earth.
*shrug* Who knows? lt's entirely possible what we've given them is enough. lf they can prolong life that much they probably don't reproduce that much. Our first "gift" was pretty obviously a sample, the second would logically be enough to jack onto every 456 who wants one.

But again, who knows? One thing l do know is that we're probably going to have limited success comparing human drug addicts to an alien species that happens to enjoy being plugged into our children.
No there isn't. They didn't even try and claim that this would be their last batch. No one even asked (for whatever the 456's word is worth).
They have every reason to wipe out our species in this instance (they don't have anything but a sample). But we can always say if you come back, we'll destroy any children they ask for.
Bollocks. Over forty five years they went from 12 to over a hundred million. And you think they won't want more, despite their lack of even saying they don't want more?
l seriously doubt 12 was designed to satiate their entire species.

l simply don't know if they'll want more. l merely think it's entirely possible that they won't.
No it wasn't. They can make children talk. They also made Clem talk. For all we know, they can make anyone talk, or for all we know, it was being done with one device sitting on their bridge with a big threatening button, and all a feedback should achieve is making a warning light activate. It's a DeM, it's no more established than any other DeM. What's more, there was never said to be any means of backward flow. The writers put that in, just because they wanted Jack to kill his grandson, because it's dramatic. It doesn't flow from the plot, it is a deus-ex-machina. And like any deus-ex-machina, they just put it in during the last ten minutes.

And they did it to literally incarnate one of these trite 'torture one child to save millions of people' 'quandries.' Yes, dramatic. It took me completely and jarringly out of SoD though.
Meh. l happen to agree with your previous incarnation, that the existence of a DeM was relatively unimportant to the rest of the plot.
They were also shown to be pretty well adapt at making funky noises come out of children[/u], but that's how they killed the fucking thing, too. Why couldn't the 456 answer with a kill pulse for that?

Because it's a DeM, it works precisely how the writer wants, to be convinient for the plot. A bio-weapon, a bomb, or something similar is no more unrealistic than anything else. Actually, take back bio-weapon. Putting a bomb in a child the way they blew up Torchwood would at least be foreshadowed, rather than a complete DeM. Oh, and creepier to boot.
Given their demonstrations it seems logical that bio-weapons are their preferred methods of killing. They've demonstrated they can cure biological agents. They've not demonstrated any way of blocking the resonance thingywotzits that make them blow up.
There's no disputing taste. I found it absurd and unrealistic that he would casually take that from the guy he's been killing for, after promises to the contrary that his family would be unharmed. Never mind that it was pointless sadism from the PM. What, was that Prime Minister also the Master? Why did he do that? What possible reason could he want to kill Frobisher's, who's been loyal to a fault, family?
lt was an attempt to satiate the people. The PM simply thought Frobisher was enough of a doormat that he'd take it. Because he's an utter bastard.
Superiors? The PM isn't above the law. His activities were outright treasonous.
So they'd arrest him, not execute him.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Lord Woodlouse wrote:You're conveniently ignoring their threat to exterminate our entire species (which given our experience of their biological warfare methods, seems achievable).

l happen to disagree. Because l like being alive just that much. l'm crazy that way.
Personally, I don't. Not enough to want every child on earth to be tortured (human race vs 10% hell-torture is a more difficult ethical question, but it will inevitably turn into 100% hell-torture given the pattern of their behaviour) even assuming they won't bother to harvest adults like you at some point; there's no chemicals in a human child of twelve that aren't in an adult, as far as I know.

Question: when would you stop cooperating with the 456? What if they wanted to harvest everyone but you? Everyone but your family? What if you or your offspring were freak mutants the 456 want to torture forever, and will kill the world if are not delivered intact and alive? Would you try and escape and let the Earth die, or would you go for the infinite torture, or would you go willingly for the good of the human race? (Any pretense of moral behaviour breaks here, in the real world of non-RAR internet, I'd be far too scared if I knew what was involved, and probably would try and run or kill myself, so rather, would it be morally right for the government to try and capture you and yours for the 456?)

*shrug* Who knows? lt's entirely possible what we've given them is enough. lf they can prolong life that much they probably don't reproduce that much. Our first "gift" was pretty obviously a sample, the second would logically be enough to jack onto every 456 who wants one.

But again, who knows? One thing l do know is that we're probably going to have limited success comparing human drug addicts to an alien species that happens to enjoy being plugged into our children.
Why? They fucking call it 'The Hit' they've obviously studied our culture enough to find that a satisfactory analogy. They're addicts; their 10% number could be anything - most likely, a number they picked as something they thought humans would go along with; why else pick a nice, round, number prevalant in human culture?
They have every reason to wipe out our species in this instance (they don't have anything but a sample). But we can always say if you come back, we'll destroy any children they ask for.
In which case you'll have to prove it at some point. If you're going to draw a line against further capitulation, then you'd best draw it right away - because eventually, you will have to bite the bullet and say no - and see if they're willing and able to destroy humanity. All you're doing by delaying that confrontation is buying a few decades for six billion people, in exchange for torture until the days of the Toclafane (potentially) for a hundred million people. Let's say the 456 last a billion years:

Six hundred billion man-years of life, vs one hundred quadrillion man-years of sensory deprivation torture.

And yes, we have seen that at least one species can survive fundemantally socially static for billions of years - the Time Lords.
l seriously doubt 12 was designed to satiate their entire species.
Any number of explanations. Twelve was the number the science team that found humans were 'goooood'. Ten percent is the number of customers they have available, from their hundred trillion member species.
l simply don't know if they'll want more. l merely think it's entirely possible that they won't.
I emphatically disagree.
Meh. l happen to agree with your previous incarnation, that the existence of a DeM was relatively unimportant to the rest of the plot.
Yes, it was. But the issue I have is the fact that they continue to talk about capitulation when the aliens admit it's for drugs, and deliberately compare themselves to human addicts.

The actual DeM used, however, was a trite effort to show, what? Jack hasn't learnt? That the original decision to kill one to save millions was justified, and that it's morally right to give the 456 what they want? What the hell was the point of it? As far as I can tell, the point was to pile cheap hurt on Jack like some cheap fanfic that's going to lead to comfort sex with the Doctor.

My previous incarnation was expecting the likes of UNIT to at least try and fight in some way. Not be utterly spineless to the end.

My previous incarnation thought the moral dilemma was interesting - he also expected the humans to say no, as opposed to knock-head despite having no reason to trust that what they're doing is of any actual benefit.
Given their demonstrations it seems logical that bio-weapons are their preferred methods of killing. They've demonstrated they can cure biological agents. They've not demonstrated any way of blocking the resonance thingywotzits that make them blow up.
Spectacular reasoning there. They've demonstated they can walk people through an innoculation for a flu strain, thus they can cure any unknown pathogen that captain 'I come from an era with technology that makes the 456 look positively pathetic' - nanogenes anyone - can come up with. And again - my example doesn't matter. I don't honestly comprehend what, from a story perspective, makes this ending in any way superior to 'they discover a way to beam on board the 456 ship and Jack blows it up.' - For me, the writer's reason to kill his grandson was purely to brutalise the character some more. That is why it felt forced.
lt was an attempt to satiate the people. The PM simply thought Frobisher was enough of a doormat that he'd take it. Because he's an utter bastard.
And telling him in advance, before he goes on camera, is still pointless gloating that means he'll fuck it up somehow.
So they'd arrest him, not execute him.
Why? Torchwood has previously mindwiped and excecuted people on numerous occasions. A reporter even knowing about Torchwood was grounds for sectioning as a lunatic, in Dr Who's 'Tardisodes' - Torchwood acted outside the law until, err, this.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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In fact, this is getting a little long, key points.
  • I dislike the DeM because to me it was pointless Jack beating that served no story function I can discern other than ending the plot and torturing Jack (and his daughter). It shows no character growth, nor does it show, well, what? What does it accomplish, other than to tear at the heartstrings and rend Jack's some more after he lost his lover? I would rather have had Rose Tyler God of Thunder - that also served no story function but to end the plot and usher in a new dynamic, but at least it didn't smack of 'let's torment the main character simply for the sake of the emotional drama.'
  • I disagree with the idea of giving them any children - there's no reason to think they wouldn't be back for more, and more, and more, and every reason to think they would. They didn't even ask the 456 about future takings, no one seemed to have their eye on that. To me, it's pretty clear that they would, unless stopped, be back over and over for more.
  • Torchwood has wide ranging powers over the government. They, and the audience, want a 'dark', 'gritty' theme - yeah, the title organisation carrying out summary excecutions would be good for that. Torchwood was very much implied to have the power for excectuions in Doctor Who, Army of Ghosts for one. It's not strictly necessary, it's merely how I would have liked it to end - set up Cardiff as the happy go lucky ones, and T1 in London as 'The Man.'
Now, my allergy testing grid of 456 hypotheticals:
  1. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: When asked if they'll be back, the 456 say 'if and when we have the need' Do you defy them then?
  2. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 say they're going to keep harvesting annually until there's nothing left. Do you defy them then?
  3. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 say they'll take everyone but your nation. Do you defy them then?
  4. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 say they'll take everyone but your blood relatives and their partners/spouses. Do you defy them then?
  5. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 say they'll take everyone but you. Do you defy them then?
  6. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 announce that they will kill everyone if You do not hand your children over within one day. Do you defy them then?
  7. You're the POTUS, or otherwise calling the shots: The 456 say they want you and you alone for the torture, but will kill the Earth if you don't go, alive and unspoilt. Do you defy them then?
So, which of these is too extreme? Personally, while I'd probably send someone else in the last two, I'm not brave enough to go myself, and would probably say 'fuck the world' on that score.

Of course, the mere existance of this discussion is proof that the serial worked if the aim was to provoke discussion.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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To me they're all false dilemmas until we'd be forced to make them. 10% of the human children on Earth is something l could accept if that's where it ends. Even if that means a 1 in 10 chance for every child l happen to be close to. But then l'm willing to accept a lot of loss for the sake of our continued survival.

l draw the line at the point where the price is unacceptable and not before, for the simple reason we have zero room to negotiate. l wholeheartedly agree that the show should have touched on the possibility of future visits. lf they come back then that proves your slippery slope scenario to be exceedingly likely, at this point l think the loss is too great to bear and we draw an all or nothing line in the sand.

lt's vile, but based on pure numbers, l'm with Jack on this.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Lord Woodlouse wrote:To me they're all false dilemmas until we'd be forced to make them.
So's the 10%.
10% of the human children on Earth is something l could accept if that's where it ends.
Yes. If you can be sure of that, it's much more of a quandry.

Even then, it's still infinite torture, which is pretty bloody grave. If it were sacrificing them to stargate's Wraith, it'd be substantially easier to balance - but the amount of actual human suffering from this is almost infinite... that gives the matter a weight, in my recknoning, beyond what it'd have if they just got up against a wall and shot.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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I wanted Frobisher to kill the PM instead of his defenceless family (and that elderly assistant who stood up to him was complicit in the murder/suicide!) but he couldn't reliably kill the PM, what with the intense security heightened by the 456 emergency. However instead Frobisher weazled his way out and showed what a spineless prick he always was by murdering his family to spite everyone, when he could've at least blown the HMS government's skulduggery wide open and made a attempt to protect his family. If he tried to do the right thing in front of the world press, the evacuation process would be shown in a bad light if the camera's see police/agents/soldiers storming the house of a high ranking dignitary to get at his two girls. Instead of skulking himself and his family away to kill them.

It was a hopeless situation, but why be a quitter, and a sore one at that?

However I'm with Woodlouse in regards to the futility of striking back at the 456 creatures. To start with where was their ship? Why shoot nukes and lazers blindly out into seemingly empty space? And they could very easily kill us all and we could only hit their sole emissary in a fishtank: they could transmat quadrillions more virul spores into our atmosphere and water, killing most of us in the billions within minutes, even if their technology is overall nowhere near as flashy as the Dalek's or even the Judoon's. Jack sacrificing his grandson to save millions of other children is dramatically effective but we just see the 456 emissary getting killed by the feedback noise, with no indication of other 456 creatures dying up space. Fuck it, why didn't the UNIT troopers present just prise the fishtank's doors open and tossed a grenade inside?
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Big Orange wrote: However I'm with Woodlouse in regards to the futility of striking back at the 456 creatures. To start with where was their ship? Why shoot nukes and lazers blindly out into seemingly empty space?
Is that strawman fun to knock over? I am not saying that. I put the same questions for you as for Woodlouse: How many of us do they need to condemn to eternal torture before you would say no?
And they could very easily kill us all and we could only hit their sole emissary in a fishtank: they could transmat quadrillions more virul spores into our atmosphere and water, killing most of us in the billions within minutes,
Twaddle. We don't know what they could do - for all we know, they're limited to hucking asteroids. Their transmat is obviously severely limited - or they'd just scoop up the kids and be done.
even if their technology is overall nowhere near as flashy as the Dalek's or even the Judoon's. Jack sacrificing his grandson to save millions of other children is dramatically effective but we just see the 456 emissary getting killed by the feedback noise, with no indication of other 456 creatures dying up space. Fuck it, why didn't the UNIT troopers present just prise the fishtank's doors open and tossed a grenade inside?
Because they didn't have gasmasks. :lol:
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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NecronLord wrote:Is that strawman fun to knock over? I am not saying that. I put the same questions for you as for Woodlouse: How many of us do they need to condemn to eternal torture before you would say no?
There was nothing palatable to shoot back at, all of Earth's strategic sensors showed nada. However, if I wanted to push my luck I would've killed the 456 representative as soon as it kept pressing for more children than we could realistically give, then scan for the skies to await for something to shoot at when it arrives in reprisal. But that sounds like a big gamble that that is not stacked our way.
Twaddle. We don't know what they could do - for all we know, they're limited to hucking asteroids. Their transmat is obviously severely limited - or they'd just scoop up the kids and be done.
Their transmat was slow, bright, and noisy, but good enough to send in objects that could kill us all. Just transmat viral/nerve gas canisters and fusion bombs into every major population centre, then bye bye world. I get the impression the 456 were going to transmat away the children, but they could only do it properly if they're crowded together in wide open and designated areas, which is why they consulted the British government.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Big Orange wrote:Their transmat was slow, bright, and noisy, but good enough to send in objects that could kill us all. Just transmat viral/nerve gas canisters and fusion bombs into every major population centre, then bye bye world.
And has only been shown to work to a pre-designated location. For all we the audience know, there was a radio homing device in there. Otherwise, what, they don't have a space suit it could have worn instead?
I get the impression the 456 were going to transmat away the children, but they could only do it properly if they're crowded together in wide open and designated areas, which is why they consulted the British government.
Yes. That's the rub, really. Their transmat sucks compared to the ones humans have - see Project Indigo.

I see no reason to assume it's capable of anything beyond going up and down to mass deisgnated sites. Until proven otherwise, I'm assuming they planned to wipe out earth either with a plague released from their ambassador, or by hucking asteroids at the planet.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Project lndigo is just scavenged Sontaran tech, and all l've seen from it is an unreliable backback that sends a single person in the vague direction it thinks they want to be. For all we know they want everyone rounded up because it's much more energy efficient for them that way. Or possibly their vessel was so far away it needed to limit the method of transmat (one explanation or us having no luck finding them).

That's the real issue. We know the 456 are more powerful than us, we simply have no way of telling quite how more powerful they are. Any assumption that they're bluffing over anything is a gamble, a gamble with the entire human race.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Lord Woodlouse wrote:Project lndigo is just scavenged Sontaran tech, and all l've seen from it is an unreliable backback that sends a single person in the vague direction it thinks they want to be
Err. what? It picked out one house across the Atlantic. That's three thousand four hundred miles. One. House. What the hell kind of accuracy do you want?
For all we know they want everyone rounded up because it's much more energy efficient for them that way. Or possibly their vessel was so far away it needed to limit the method of transmat (one explanation or us having no luck finding them).

That's the real issue. We know the 456 are more powerful than us, we simply have no way of telling quite how more powerful they are. Any assumption that they're bluffing over anything is a gamble, a gamble with the entire human race.
Would you like to answer the above questions now? At what point would you defy them? What if they outright said "We'll be back for the rest next year?"
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Lord Woodlouse »

lf they explicitly say they're coming back in a year for the rest, l wouldn't give them anything. No idea where l'd draw the line (it asks me to put value to life and quality of life versus human right to survival, l can't say l've ever tried to do that), but possibly 50% of all our children as a one-off would be my limit (but l wouldn't tell them that, naturally).

All things being equal l accept 10% of all our children, even if it does include a chance (a chance l still feel is impossible to quantify) that they'll be back. lf they come back in forty years l don't give them anything, and l feel like a dupe for taking the chance with the first gift.

As mentioned, however, l would try to gain assurances they'll not return.

How about you? You said 10% as a one off was tolerable. Where do you draw the line? l admit l don't have a particularly scientific method here, l'm genuinely curious to see if you do.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Stark »

Once they find out what they're for, it's plainly obvious they'll never stop coming. It buys time - years perhaps - but due to plot forty years was less useful than a five-minute conversation with Jack.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Rye »

NecronLord wrote: Except as of episode five, they're there for 'The Hit' - the one behaviour we can realistically project on them is that their demand will rise over time and they will be back again - and next time, they will want more.
We might have a means of dealing with them by then, which we definitely won't if we're all dead.
In short, they're going to kill our species anyway, and will never stop coming back.
Not necessarily. They apparently take decades between harvests, I'd be surprised if that meant the species' survival was ever in serious doubt. Also, it wouldn't be in their best interest to let us go extinct.
It's just a choice of whether we want to die quickly, or whether we want a long drawn out period of being farmed by aliens with those we surrender being tortured for eternity. Fuck that noise. I'd rather round up every child and shoot them to show the bastards our resolve.
The Keyzer Soze approach. Good if the situation's desperate, bad if species survival is not in the balance. In fact, it would make more sense to kill you to make sure nobody else has that idea.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Thanas »

*Sigh* Sadly, RTD has once again fallen prey to the finish fever.

The first four parts were very good TV. Logicwise, not contacting the doctor makes no sense, but storywise it had to be that way. Who knows, maybe he currently is Spoiler
once more in Rose's universe and thus unavailable?
All parts were good drama, excellently acted and well shot. You really notice that Euros Lyn is a great director. Of the performances, Peter Capaldi and Susan Brown take the cake for their portrayal of John Frobisher (he also starred in NuWho) and Bridget Spears respectively. Ben Foster's music was likewise good, both terrifying and majestic. This is certainly the best Torchwood I have ever seen and it proves RTD is a good writer if he is not overworked and has a strong second writer.

I also liked that they killed of Ianto. I didn't expect that at all. Well done. I also liked all the little touches with Ianto's death scene.


That said, as usual with RTD the finale makes little sense. It also sadly rehashes every single one of his pet peeves:
- deus ex machina
- the hero makes a terrible sacrifice
- in the end the hero is cut off from his flock and is gone
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Drooling Iguana »

I just finished watching the miniseries and overall I thought it was amazingly good, among the best filmed science fiction I've ever seen. The only real problem was the constant nagging feeling that it would have been even better if the Torchwood crew wasn't in it. Sure, Jack managed to come in at the last minute to provide the solution* but any character could conceivably have done that and for the rest of the miniseries everything the Torchwood crew did was pretty much superfluous to the main events. John Barrowman was also, as usual, the weak link in the show acting-wise, especially in day four.

It also would have prevented a few of the continuity issues but frankly I don't have much of a problem with ignoring a few of the sillier bits of Whoniverse backstory in order to tell a story as good as this one.

*and while this solution was a bit of a deus ex machina, it's really the only sort of ending that would have worked for this kind of story. The whole point of the miniseries was to show how mankind dealt with a hopeless scenario and the scenario wouldn't have been hopeless if the solution had been telegraphed all the way through.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by NecronLord »

Lord Woodlouse wrote:How about you? You said 10% as a one off was tolerable. Where do you draw the line? l admit l don't have a particularly scientific method here, l'm genuinely curious to see if you do.
Where did I say that? I said I could see governments capitulating. Not that it was right to do so.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by NecronLord »

Rye wrote: We might have a means of dealing with them by then, which we definitely won't if we're all dead.
The possibility that we will one day become more powerful than the aliens is pinned on 'we're in the whoniverse and there are authorities around these guys have to be wary of' - in reality, that would never happen. Even a tiny vanishing sliver of 456 competance would easily have them prevent us ever building anything to harm them. They're at the top of a gravity well, we're at the bottom.

If you're going to say 'we'll develop tech and get them' - you may as well say 'Nag Jack to get an FTL transmitter and call the Shadow Proclamation in' Both are answers that are pinned entirely on knowledge of the setting they're in.

Of course, that's not what the government does, it immediately kills some of the most useful people (yes, even Torchwood) on the planet in order to bury its guilt. If they'd not blown up Torchwood 3, the 456 would probably have been killed much faster. What with Torchwood three being an immense radio/FTL transmitter (Stolen Earth) among other things, and their needing to kill the aliens (oh, and Jack's grandson) with a radio signal (the 456 are named for the frequency their stuff is transmitted on, remember).


However, without invoking 'we're in the whoniverse,' in which case there are millions of better answers (foremost of which is 'I don't kill the agency charged with defeating aliens, and they kill 'em'), the only answers are 'knock head before the aliens and surrender to the torture' or 'say no.'
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Lord Woodlouse »

NecronLord wrote: Where did I say that? I said I could see governments capitulating. Not that it was right to do so.
Sorry, it sounded like you agreed with it as acceptable. You have been a touch vague on just what you would find tolerable.

As for the rest, well, you seem to be operating on a number of assumptions. You assume they'll be back (there's nothing guaranteed about it) and you assume these creatures have motivations that are no different to human druggies based purely on their use of human slang.

I mention the possibility that this 10% is enough to satisfy their populace, and that's instantly unreasonable because they might have a hundred trillion member population.

There's a multitude of assumptions about the 456 you've made in this thread, generally worst case assumptions, which you're treating as fact for the purposes of dealing with them. To me being willing to allow the entire human race go extinct over so little information staggers belief.

*shrug* Not that any of it is worth debating anyway. It seems you're unwilling to accept any amount of children being handed over, even as a guaranteed one off (by all means correct me, but if you do please state in as comprehensive a way possible exactly what you would and would not accept, so I don't have to keep guessing). I am. I'm willing to make that trade. Hell, I'd even think about it if they made return journeys every few decades, so long as our species had room to grow (another set of assumptions, that the 456 will prevent our growth. It might be sensible to do so if the 456 have a long game in mind, but there's absolutely nothing to base that assumption on besides the fact that they've been here before). You, however, don't. There's no middle ground here. We evidently have two separate ethical foundations for our conclusions. There's little point in the debate continuing.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

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Lord Woodlouse wrote:Sorry, it sounded like you agreed with it as acceptable. You have been a touch vague on just what you would find tolerable.

As for the rest, well, you seem to be operating on a number of assumptions. You assume they'll be back (there's nothing guaranteed about it) and you assume these creatures have motivations that are no different to human druggies based purely on their use of human slang.

I mention the possibility that this 10% is enough to satisfy their populace, and that's instantly unreasonable because they might have a hundred trillion member population.
Ten percent is a pretty arbrtrary number, though; it seems much more likely that it is the maximum they expect humans to accept, because the number ten is so prominent in human culture. In short, combined with their assumption that what we've done once, we'll willingly do again, I see no reason to think that this isn't the maximum they expect to get away with in one hit, rather than their actual total demand.

They also see fit to apply our drugs terminology (the hit!) to themseves - which seems like comparing them to druggies is something they're quite happy with. And druggies' demands increase over time, just like theirs have to date.

There is an established, increasing trend. There is not even a promise that they'll not be back for more. We have an upward trend, and no evidence that it will cease... What does that suggest to you?

By saying 'this might be everything they want' you're making up terms in our reckoning that would not notherwise exist except for your wishful thinking.
There's a multitude of assumptions about the 456 you've made in this thread, generally worst case assumptions, which you're treating as fact for the purposes of dealing with them. To me being willing to allow the entire human race go extinct over so little information staggers belief.

*shrug* Not that any of it is worth debating anyway. It seems you're unwilling to accept any amount of children being handed over, even as a guaranteed one off (by all means correct me, but if you do please state in as comprehensive a way possible exactly what you would and would not accept, so I don't have to keep guessing).
I don't know. It's a much harder decision to say it's unacceptable for one person to suffer essentially unending torture, than it is for millions upon millions. Over time, in that schema, the vast majority of human existance would be as children in 456 sensory deprivation. Human suffering created by the decision would grossly outweigh human benefit (continued existance)

Regardless, I would certainly not hand over anyone in the situation they were in in the show. Far from sufficient information was given there.
I am. I'm willing to make that trade. Hell, I'd even think about it if they made return journeys every few decades, so long as our species had room to grow (another set of assumptions, that the 456 will prevent our growth. It might be sensible to do so if the 456 have a long game in mind, but there's absolutely nothing to base that assumption on besides the fact that they've been here before)
People are saying 'go out to the stars and kill them.' What living being of any complexity does not have as a priority the defence of its own life? They have every reason to limit human ability to strike at them, and the means to do so - or if they don't have that ability, they're bluffing about killing us anyway.
. You, however, don't. There's no middle ground here. We evidently have two separate ethical foundations for our conclusions. There's little point in the debate continuing.
Not entirely - however, the egregious nature of the suffering that the deal would create is my reason for being so extremely reactionary.

Ironically, I'm normally against this level of 'fight them on the beaches' stuff - I'd quite happily hand over people (preferably serious criminals) in many, many, circumstances. But the prospect of essentially eternal torture is so extreme it requires extreme justification, which the 456 just didn't provide. We've no reason to trust them over such a capitulation.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Dahak »

I really liked it, felt much better quality than previous Torchwood. It was a nice touch to see more of the background and family of the Scooby Gang.
Frobisher was a highlight, as was his assistant. I didn't agree with his decision at the end, but from the context it was believable. But why the PM just had to be a sadistic prick about it...
Though I would have liked a ending much more in which Captain Jack not killing his grandson. It just felt rather pointless at the end; just to show that Jack Really Makes Hard Decisions (TM)...
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Drooling Iguana »

Actually, I think it was meant to be karmic payback for what he did in 1965.
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Re: Torchwood: Children of Earth

Post by Stark »

Dahak wrote:Though I would have liked a ending much more in which Captain Jack not killing his grandson. It just felt rather pointless at the end; just to show that Jack Really Makes Hard Decisions (TM)...

I thought it was poor drama. Frobisher was 'sold' very well; the stupid LOL WE CAN WIN IN TWO SECONDS thing was not sold well and was anticlimactic.
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