A quick review of tonight’s “Torchwood: Miracle Day” – including thoughts on why I’m likely taking this season out of the review rotation going forward – coming up just as soon as I hear rumors of Phil Collins…
Yeah, I think I’m out at this point. If I have time in the coming weeks, I’ll try to stay current on the season and maybe even come back after the finale, but “The Categories of Life” was so sloppy, silly and just plain stupid that any continuation at this point is about brand loyalty.
The character of Maloney, the camp administrator, encapsulated everything that’s gone wrong with this show – and most of the weak points in Russell T. Davies’ writing, to boot. It’s not enough for Davies to make his point; he has to demonize his opponent to do it. The idea of a middle manager being given absolute power and becoming absolutely corrupted as a result could be incredibly compelling. This was not that, though. This was an already corrupt, incompetent, racist, sexist good ol’ boy – and one who cares an awful lot about insurance coverage at a time when, in the timespan we’ve been given, even the healthcare machine would be too overwhelmed to worry about that – and then one who somehow sucks one of the camp’s soldiers into helping him find a way to commit murder post-Miracle. That’s not drama; that’s camp. Blech.
I continue to think there are some good basic ideas here, I like what Bill Pullman and Lauren Ambrose are doing as guest stars, but overall, “Miracle Day” has been a pretty big misfire after “Children of Earth” got so much right.
What did everybody else think?