"Torchwood, episode 1x04: Cyberwoman"

Starring: John Barrowman, Eve Myles, Burn Gorman, Naoko Mori, 
Gareth David-Lloyd, Kai Owen

And we’re going right into this episode from the last one 
because Chrissy and I are still somewhat buzzed and I have a 
feeling we’re going to want to be blind drunk by the end of 
this episode.
   Chrissy: Well, that’s encouraging.
   Diandra: It’ll get better, I promise. Eventually.

Ianto enters the hub to find everyone else playing some sort of 
variation on basketball that seems to require a lot of 
shrieking on the part of the female players. Ianto stands 
staring at them like he’s just realized he is the most mature 
member of the team. They brush past Ianto, barely glancing at 
him after they finish playing and Jack tosses the ball at him. 
He waits until they’re gone and then runs off to...order pizza? 
He adds a tub of coleslaw to the order because “my boss says 
I’m not eating enough vegetables.” Aww, isn’t that cute. And 
weird. Apparently he was just killing time until some doctor 
arrives at the hub. He runs up to great him with a smile and a 
“good to see you again.” The guy stares and he bows and greets 
him in Japanese, which the doctor seems to respond better to. 

He takes Doctor Darega down to some sort of underground lab 
with bolt locks on the door. “I did all I could,” he says, 
unlocking the heavy ass door. Inside is a young, pretty black 
woman attached to all sorts of medical equipment and mostly 
encased in what looks like a metal suit of armor. “One of them 
survived,” Doctor Darega splutters, wide eyed. Ianto kisses her 
and introduces her as Lisa. Lisa’s eyes open and close, but she 
doesn’t seem at all aware of her surroundings.
   Chrissy: Terminator 1.0?
   Diandra: Pretty much.
   Chrissy: I’ll get some more alcohol.
   Diandra: You are an angel.

After the blippy credits we come right back to the same scene. 
Doctor Darega is so excited he’s practically wetting his pants. 
   Chrissy: Didn’t Ianto say his name was Tanizaki? Who is 
    Doctor Darega?
   Diandra: Exactly.
   Chrissy: What?
   Diandra: No, What’s on second. I Don’t Know is on third.
   Chrissy: You named him the Japanese equivalent of Doctor 
    Who just so you could make that joke, didn’t you?
   Diandra: Nah. Why would you think that?
He says Lisa must be the last of her kind on the whole planet. 
He waves a pen light in her eyes and as he pries each eyelid 
open it makes a mechanical noise. He asks what happened. Ianto 
says she worked for Torchwood London and toward the end of that 
Canary Wharf clusterfuck the Cybermen needed soldiers fast and 
“started upgrading whole bodies instead of transplanting 
brains”. The danger with watching a show that is spun off of 
something you’ve never watched is that you will eventually run 
into this problem. I have no fucking clue what he’s talking 
about. Obviously Cybermen are some sort of breed of humanoid 
machines, but I have no idea how they work so that last 
sentence makes no sense to me. They run on human brains? Why? 
Anyway. Lisa was halfway through the operation when “the 
machinery shut down.” There’s a brief flashback of Ianto 
pulling her – conscious and screaming – around on an unfinished 
set somewhere while red lights blink and crackling fire sound 
effects utterly fail to make this shot not look like it was 
taken from a low budget student film.  

Doctor Darega says her hearing and breathing appear “completely 
cybernetic”, yet she still has a good share of human skin 
peaking through the metal frame. He pokes at her abdomen and 
Ianto looks uncomfortable. Doctor Darega guesses the “upgrade” 
was about 55% completed. Or maybe 60%. “Can you make her human 
again,” Ianto snaps impatiently. Doctor Darega is still 
distracted by all the machinery surrounding her. He concludes 
that Ianto took parts from a “cyber conversion unit” and turned 
them into a life support system, but he can’t figure out how he 
knew to do that. “I told him,” Lisa pipes up. Ianto starts 
fussing over her, asking if she needs more pain meds. “Is this 
him,” she asks, eyeing the doctor. Ianto says he promised he’d 
bring someone to help and they make goo goo eyes at each other. 
Doctor Darega introduces himself as an expert in cybernetics 
and says her friend here asked for his help. “My boyfriend,” 
Lisa corrects.  
   Chrissy: It’s always the quiet ones.
   Diandra: Imagine what he’s like in the bedroom...
   Chrissy: Way ahead of you there.

She answers a few standard questions for Doctor Darega. Her 
name is Lisa Hallet, she’s 26 and the last thing she remembers 
before she woke up here is agonizing pain. A tear falls down 
her cheek and Ianto looks tortured.

Doctor Darega takes her up to Owen’s autopsy bay and works on 
disconnecting her from the respirator. “What if she’s not ready 
to breathe on her own,” Ianto frets. The doctor warns him that 
he must prepare himself because it’s possible she won’t 
survive. “Sometimes, in order to save what we love we have to 
risk losing it.” Nice sentiment, but hardly an original 
concept. Lisa flatlines and Ianto freaks out.

In a bar somewhere, Jack is on the tail end of a story. “And 
she said ‘do you know how difficult it is to find a man in this 
city? He had a nice flat, all his own hair, so frankly, a 
couple of tusks I can live with.’” I’m sure the writers have 
fun sitting around dreaming up all the ridiculous bullshit they 
make Jack say in any given episode, but I’m undecided about 
whether or not they are high as kites when they’re doing it. 
They get a call. UFO sighting over Cardigan Bay. Owen is less 
than thrilled that he can’t just finish one beer in peace 
without some weird crap happening.

Ianto is clutching Lisa’s hand, growling half-formed threats at 
Doctor Darega when Lisa gasps and blinks up at him. “She’s 
breathing,” he yelps excitedly. She notes that she’s not 
“connected” anymore and thanks the doctor. Ianto kisses her and 
grins like a doofus. Then a computer starts beeping and he sees 
the rest of the team on the CCTV heading toward the hub. He 
hurries to get her back down to the...cave and remove all 
evidence of her being there. 

“All I’m saying is, once in a while I’d like to drive,” Tosh is 
saying. “And all I’m saying is no,” Owen replies. He bitches 
about how every time he shares cars with a woman she readjusts 
all the seats and mirrors and the next time he goes to drive 
the steering wheel is in his crotch. Bitch bitch whine whine.
   Chrissy: That’s ALL HE EVER DOES.
Jack is giving orders as they come through the cog door. Ianto 
arrives and pretends his heart is not pounding wildly and he’s 
not out of breath. They all go about their business and Jack – 
not finding anything suspicious in the way Ianto is looking all 
furtive – asks if he’ll make some coffee. Obviously he’s not 
yet familiar with what Ianto looks like when he’s all out of 
breath and over-exerted.
   Chrissy: Pity that.
   Diandra: Mmm...yes.

Doctor Darega has Lisa almost back in her metal frame bed when 
she stops and grabs him by the neck, lifting him a foot off the 
ground and tossing him onto the frame instead. Several metal 
parts clamp him in. “I can help you,” she says in a creepy 
mechanical voice. “The human race is weak. I can make you 
strong.” She punches a button and some robot arms emerge from 
the ceiling and dive for him. He screams bloody murder.

Upstairs, the lights start flickering and Tosh confusedly says 
there’s been a sudden internal power drain. Jack tells her to 
run a system diagnostic. Ianto gulps and rushes to say they’ve 
been having generator problems and he was checking on it 
earlier and a few cables came loose and whatever you do, don’t 
go into the basement. Except he doesn’t say that last part out 
loud, obviously. But there’s practically a speech bubble 
hovering over his head screaming it. He runs off to “check on 
it”. He turns off the machines Lisa was connected to and finds 
Doctor Darega on the floor, covered in blood, face misshapen by 
the pieces of metal Lisa appears to have tried to ram through 
his eye socket and temple. “His upgrade failed,” she says 
simply. No kidding. “Was it an accident?” Ianto yelps. Oh sure. 
She accidentally rammed a metal pipe through his skull. Ianto, 
honey...I know love is blind, but it’s not usually completely 
stupid. 
   Chrissy: Usually being the operative word there.
   Diandra: We’re not talking about me right now.
   Chrissy: Oh, sorry.

Lisa says she wanted to repay Doctor Darega. He shouts that she 
killed an innocent man and the team is going to be down here 
any minute and if they find out what he’s been doing... “I can 
deal with them,” she says flatly. “Don’t you go near them,” he 
squawks. Then he starts rationalizing that something has gone 
wrong in her head and she didn’t mean to kill Doctor Darega, 
it’s some sort of post traumatic somethingorother and I’ve 
worked so hard to keep you alive and you’ve FUCKED IT ALL UP 
NOW. She just blinks at him, like a puppy that doesn’t quite 
understand why her owner is upset just because she pooped on 
the floor a couple times. He cries a bit, then pulls himself 
together and drags Doctor Darega’s body from the room, assuring 
Lisa that everything is going to be okay. Because he has lost 
all sense of reason, obviously.

The team is squinting at some footage of the UFO that was 
spotted. Jack tells Tosh to send a “polite” message requesting 
they get the hell away from Earth because they’re “spooking the 
locals”. Gwen asks why they’re not chasing it down and 
investigating further. Jack says nah, “if you interrogate an 
Arkan, you’ll be in there for a month. And that’s just the 
first question. They are SO boring.” The lights flicker again. 
Jack uses his wrist strap to call down and ask Ianto what’s 
going on. Ianto is too busy dragging Doctor Darega down a 
flickering hallway and sobbing hysterically to answer. “Ianto, 
I need to hear those beautiful Welsh vowels,” Jack tries again. 
“I’m standing right here, Jack. Way to play favorites,” Gwen 
does not say. Lisa is back in her frame and electricity is 
sparking all over her. It still looks like a student film. Tosh 
pulls up some sort of screen that scans for body heat and comes 
up with two signals in the basement. Jack thinks they might be 
under attack and starts running, shouting something about 
“battle protocols”. They all arm themselves and Owen and Gwen 
volunteer to go down and locate Ianto. Jack tells them to keep 
their comms open and if there’s any doubt, shoot first and then 
maybe think about asking questions.

Ianto puts Doctor Darega in a broom closet or something and 
lingers long enough that we can get a few more good shots of 
his messed up face before covering him with some sort of 
tarp/blanket thing. 

Gwen and Owen arrive and wave flashlights around in the dark. 
Ah, yes. There’s the “X-Files” flashbacks. 
   Chrissy: At least here they have a reason to not turn on 
    the lights.
   Diandra: Oh, they had a reason on “X-Files”. It was just 
    a stupid non-story related reason.
Jack’s voice comes over the comms, demanding a progress report. 
Owen says there’s signs of activity in the 
argnwioakqohugvalsifhnak *static*. Tosh says whatever is 
creating the power surge is interfering with the comms. Then 
she shows Jack the internal security feeds for the last couple 
hours, which somebody has been tampering with, but she manages 
to unearth a recording of Doctor Darega arriving.

Gwen and Owen realize they’ve lost Jack and Tosh on the comms. 
Owen peers through a window into the lab and sees the metal 
“operating table” with sparks shooting off from the machinery 
surrounding it. Gwen unlocks the bolts and they kick the door 
in. “Oh no,” Owen mutters when he gets a good look at the 
table/frame. Gwen has no clue what it is. Owen just says it 
shouldn’t be here and turn it off, now! Gwen slaps the big red 
off button and the power comes back up. Jack tries to contact 
them again, but the comms are still down for some reason. 
“These things brought down Torchwood One,” Owen is saying. 
“They were all destroyed. Why is there one in our bloody 
basement?!” Gwen still doesn’t know what it is. He finally 
explains: it’s a conversion unit for transforming humans into 
terminators. The comms snap back online and Owen is able to 
relay the discovery to Jack, who glares into space and barks at 
them to come back upstairs.

Too late. Lisa appears and knocks Owen out. Gwen swings her gun 
around and yelps “we have a code zero incursion. We’re under 
attack!” Jack tells Tosh to activate total lockdown procedures 
and run if she doesn’t hear from him in fifteen minutes, whips 
out a gun and takes off for the basement. 

Gwen is trying to reassure Lisa that she doesn’t mean her any 
harm. Aside from the fact that she will shoot if Lisa comes any 
closer to her. Lisa knocks the gun from her hands with a flick 
of her wrist and grabs Gwen by the neck. Okay, well, it was 
worth a shot. Lisa flings Gwen onto the table and turns on the 
machine. Jack comes charging in yelling at Lisa to throw down 
her weapons (like she has or needs any) and put her hands up. 
She takes a couple steps toward him, completely unfazed and he 
splutters “you’re a woman!” No, really? Good of you to notice, 
Jack. Gwen starts screaming for help and Jack goes to shoot, 
but Ianto slams him into the wall and the shot goes wide. The 
robot arms come out of the ceiling and Gwen screams for 
somebody to get their ass in gear and GET HER OUT OF HERE. 
Ianto tries to hit the off switch and discovers Lisa has jammed 
the circuits. Jack screams for Tosh to cut off all the power, 
everywhere. Oh, so now the comms are working? Mr. Plot 
Contrivance certainly seems to get a workout on this show. 
   Chrissy: You know I’ve always wondered...you’re always 
    making references to Mr. Plot Contrivance and Ms. 
    Exposition Fairy. Are they related?
   Diandra: They were, but they’re going through a bitter 
    divorce. 
   Chrissy: Ah.
Tosh says doing that will force a lockdown and trap them all in 
the building. Jack yells at her to do just do it, goddamnit. 
Tosh throws a switch and everything turns off and all the main 
doors slam shut. 

Jack orders Ianto to stand guard by the door. Ianto, looking 
like he might cry at any minute, apologizes to Gwen. She has no 
idea what he’s sorry for though because she doesn’t seem to 
have figured out how Lisa got in yet. Jack frees her with his 
wrist strap and they make their way down the hall, Owen draped 
over Jack’s shoulder, still unconscious. 
   Chrissy: I think I like him better like this.
   Diandra: Draped over Jack? Sure, I’d be cool with that.
   Chrissy: You know what I meant. Stop trying to get me to 
    picture him naked.

Lisa jumps in front of them and, under the pretense of 
explaining to Gwen what this new creature is, Jack pauses to 
spew some exposition about terminators while Lisa inexplicably 
just stands there staring like she’s waiting for something. 
Cyberpeople are upgraded humans “with emotions removed created 
on a parallel world then supposedly destroyed on this one.” 
Luckily, Lisa isn’t interested in this expository crap and 
clanks off. Jack points his gun at the back of Ianto’s head and 
orders him to get them back to the hub. “Jack, what are you 
doing,” Gwen yelps. “Resisting the urge to shoot,” Jack growls. 
   Chrissy: Oh, come on. You know you can’t kill him. He’s 
    too pretty. 

Jack orders Tosh to get everything out of the weapons room the 
second they emerge onto the main floor, then has Ianto kneel on 
the floor with his hands on his head. Tosh is just as baffled 
as Gwen that Jack has a gun pointed at Ianto, but you would 
think she would trust him to know what he’s doing by now. Jack 
asks how Ianto knew the terminator was in the basement. Ianto 
admits he put her there. Jack, barely resisting the impulse to 
shoot again, asks what else Ianto is keeping from them. “Like 
you care,” Ianto sobs. “I clean up your shit, no questions 
asked, and that’s the way you like it. When did you last ask me 
anything about my life?” So basically he’s like those postal 
workers who put up with abuse day in and day out until one day 
they just snap. 
   Chrissy: More like a long suffering child/spouse 
    desperate for any attention they can get.
   Diandra: Except he wasn’t trying to get attention. He 
    seemed perfectly happy leading his secret double life 
    with his murderbot girlfriend.

Gwen asks why he didn’t tell them because they could have 
helped. Ianto says yeah, right. An organization that exists for 
the sole purpose of destroying alien threats to Earth. “She 
worked for Torchwood. She was caught up in battle...we owe it 
to her to find a cure.” Jack, finally softening a little and 
putting the gun down, says there is no cure and never will be. 
Then he gives him a little lecture about how this is the sort 
of stupid decisions that lead to the whole human race being 
wiped out by kill machines because they know how to “exploit 
human weakness”. I would call it stupidity, stubbornness and 
ignorance, but same thing. Ianto stands up and argues that the 
conversion was never completed so she isn’t a full terminator 
yet. Jack reminds him she just tried to kill Gwen. Ianto sobs 
that he’s not giving up on her, damnit! “I love her. Can you 
understand that, Jack? Haven’t you ever loved anyone?” Jack 
just growls something about Ianto figuring out which side of 
the coming battle he’s on before it kills him.

Tosh and a newly conscious Owen say they can’t get into the 
weapons room without power, which won’t come back on for six 
hours. Ianto offers to talk to Lisa because he can reason with 
her. Yeah, like you did earlier? I take back what I said just 
now, Ianto is like a battered spouse. ‘He’s not all bad! He 
won’t hurt me this time, he promised!’ Lisa makes the decision 
for them, showing up in the main part of the hub behind them 
right at that moment. Ianto runs closer and tries to talk to 
her. Lisa totally ignores him, looking around and announcing, 
in her robot voice, that this will make the perfect base for 
her to rebuild her army. Jack asks who she is. She says she’s 
Human 2.0. Jack asks why she looks like Human 1.0 then. She 
looks at the nearest reflective surface to figure out what the 
hell he’s talking about and announces that the upgrade is 
incomplete and she is “disgusting” and “wrong”. Ianto makes 
some futile attempts to get her to remember who she is. He says 
he brought her to Torchwood so she could be cured and they 
could be together. Her eyes light up. “Yes, together. 
Transplant my brain into your body.” Yeah, there wouldn’t be 
any gender confusion there. She says they would be one complete 
person then and isn’t that what love is supposed to be about? 
“No,” Ianto moans. Lisabot says they’re not compatible then, 
grabs him by the neck and throws him across the room.

Jack tries to shoot her but she disarms him with a bolt of 
orange lightning. At least that’s what it looks like. Jack 
yells something about Code 9 maneuvers and they all scatter, 
taking different routes up to a conference room upstairs. Jack 
says they need to forget everything Ianto just said because 
that thing is no longer human and it won’t stop until they kill 
it. He hands Tosh something he grabbed on the way up – an alien 
lock pick. He wants her to use it on the cog door and get the 
hell out. Owen says that’s nice, but the door still weighs a 
metric ton. Jack hands her a few more things conveniently left 
in that room and gives her instructions to tap into...something 
and override the system and bullshit bullshit. I don’t care 
anymore. 
   Chrissy: Alcohol will have that effect.
   Diandra: And thank god for that. 
Tosh runs off and Jack tells Owen and Gwen to find anything 
that can be used as a weapon while he distracts the terminator.

This distraction involves basically yelling ‘hey, over here!’ 
and making Lisabot chase him around the room and back down the 
stairs. She’s getting pissed now and she says she will “delete” 
them all. Starting with Jack. She grabs his shoulder and 
electrocutes him. Everyone stops what they’re doing for a 
minute when he hits the ground. Lisabot starts to walk away but 
Jack drags himself back up and taunts “is that all you’ve got?” 
prompting Owen to wonder aloud how he could have survived that. 
Gwen says nothing. Lisabot shocks him again. This time he stays 
down. Which illustrates what I think is a massive flaw in this 
immortality thing. What good is resurrecting every time you die 
when the battle or, hell, Armageddon is still raging for the 
time that you’re dead and you’re helpless to stop it? Doesn’t 
that actually make him the least useful person to have around 
when the shit starts really flying?
   Chrissy: You’re thinking too much. Haven’t we had a talk 
    about that before?
   Diandra: Sorry.

Tosh gets the cog door unlocked and manages to roll it enough 
to slip around it and shove it back a split second before 
Lisabot catches up to her. Meanwhile, Owen heads for his 
autopsy room and fumbles for any sort of equipment he can use 
as a weapon, Gwen trailing behind him. Lisabot sees Gwen waving 
her flashlight around and starts for the autopsy room. Gwen 
asks Owen if there’s another exit. He says no, then opens the 
door to one of those drawers for holding dead bodies and tells 
her to get in. Oh and she’ll have to lay on top of him so they 
can both fit. “I’m not saying it’s a brilliant idea, but it’s 
the only one we’ve got.” The drawer closes a second before 
Lisabot shows up. “What do we do,” Gwen whispers. Stop talking 
might be a good start. Owen kisses her. Because why not?
   Chrissy: I can think of about a dozen reasons.

Meanwhile, Jack revives and tries to wake up Ianto, who may or 
may not be breathing. Either way Jack kisses him until he gasps 
awake, looking startled.
   Chrissy: That didn’t look like CPR. Can he kiss people 
    back into life or something?
   Diandra: Hmm? Did you say something?
   Chrissy: Nope. Not a word. 

Lisabot starts opening drawers. Gwen and Owen don’t even have 
to wait for her to get to the one they’re in because Gwen’s 
cell phone starts ringing. It’s Rhys, who leaves a voicemail 
asking if she’ll record his favorite stupid ass reality show 
because he’s going to be home late. Gwen and Owen fall out of 
the drawer and Owen grabs what looks like a screwdriver and 
stabs Lisabot in the stomach. Lisabot makes a godawful 
mechanical shrieking noise and falls over. Gwen takes this 
moment of respite to ask what the hell that kiss was about. 
“Last kiss for the condemned man,” Owen says flippantly. 
“Little embarrassing given we haven’t been killed.”
   Chrissy: Pity that.
   Diandra: Hey, I like Gwen.
“It’s not like I fancy you or anything,” he dismisses. She 
reminds him that she was laying on top of him and she’s pretty 
sure he didn’t have a gun in his pocket. Oh, really, Owen? A 
psychopath is banging down the door and you manage to be turned 
on? Oh, who am I kidding. Men are like walking bags of 
uncontrollable hormones.

Ianto runs in and hovers over Lisabot. Owen and Gwen rush to 
tell him they had no choice, it was self defense. Like that was 
enough to kill her. Please. Sure enough, her eyes snap open and 
they all scramble up the stairs, Ianto only slightly hesitating 
now. They run back to the main room where Jack is lighting a 
blowtorch. Owen notes that he should be dead, but doesn’t 
really dwell on it for long because Lisabot is barreling down 
on them.

Somewhere, Tosh is doing something with some wires. I have no 
idea what, but I’m sure it’ll be important later.

Lisabot notes that the power will run out on that blowtorch 
eventually and she’s willing to wait him out. Ianto is still 
stubbornly begging him to “help” her or at least give her a 
chance to surrender. She can stay in the cells! Jack squirts 
some sort of liquid at Lisabot while Gwen and Owen manhandle 
Ianto onto the invisible elevator. The Exposition Fairy pokes 
Gwen, making her pause to ask what the hell is in the bottle 
Jack is squirting for the benefit of the audience. Jack says it 
helps the pterodactyl identify its food and jumps on the lift 
with them. The pterodactyl shrieks and swoops toward Lisabot. 
And we now have the most ridiculous scene on this show so far: 
a half-metal woman wrestling with a dinosaur.
   Chrissy: So far? You mean it gets more ridiculous than 
   this?!

The team emerges on street level, where Tosh runs up to them, 
all excited that whatever she did to make the elevator run 
actually worked. Ianto marches up to Jack and punches him in 
the face. “You’re worse than anything locked up down there,” he 
screams. “One day I’ll have a chance to save you and I’ll watch 
you suffer and die.” 
   Chrissy: Yeah, he doesn’t know either, huh?
   Diandra: Not a clue.
Jack screams back that it was the only way to stop her and 
charges at Ianto and Owen and Gwen have to shove them both 
back. Tosh interrupts this little brawl to say she tripped the 
lockdown timer so they should be able to get back inside any 
second. Ianto, predictably, starts running for the entrance 
immediately. 

And because there wasn’t enough bullshit going on already, a 
delivery girl arrives with the pizzas Ianto was ordering 
earlier. She stumbles into the tourist office and right down 
the open hallway toward the hub.

Ianto arrives at the tourist office and grabs a gun from under 
the counter and waves it at the team as they barrel through the 
door after him. Gwen pleads with him to not be stupid. Too 
late, Gwen. He says he’s going in to save her and if anyone 
tries to stop him, he’ll shoot. Jack knocks the gun from his 
hands and pins him against the wall in about two seconds flat, 
drawing another gun he drew from thin air or his ass or 
something. I have no idea. “Get off me,” Ianto snarls, marking 
what will likely be the last time those words come out of his 
mouth. At least where Jack is concerned. Jack says if he wants 
to go back in there, he has to finish the job and kill her if 
she’s still kicking. Blah blah he created this mess blah blee 
she’s gone and his loyalty should be to the team now. Ianto 
says he can’t. Jack threatens to kill them both. Ianto says he 
won’t and Jack can’t make him. Also, pbbbbbbtttt. Jack says he 
has ten minutes and they’re coming in after him and kicks Ianto 
through the door.

Ianto enters the hub to find general chaos and blood 
everywhere, dropped pizza boxes and computer screens flashing 
messages about another power drain. He runs down to the 
basement and finds Lisabot laying dead, covered in blood. He 
sobs and wails over her body, but there is no sound until 
suddenly a female voice calls his name. The pizza delivery girl 
comes around a corner, looking like hell, a jagged, bloody line 
across her forehead. “It’s me,” she says. “It’s Lisa.”
   Chrissy: Oh, for... *chugs schnapps*
   Diandra: Save some for me, will you? 
NewLisa says she had to find a way to stay alive after all 
Ianto did to save her so she transplanted her brain into this 
woman because that’s TOTALLY POSSIBLE WITH HUMANS. Look, you 
can justify all weird crap aliens are capable of all you want, 
but this is a 21st century human body. You can’t just plop 
someone else’s brain in it, flip the skull back on and poof, 
total personality change. What writer came up with this copout 
of a scene? Ugh. 
   Chrissy: *hands Diandra bottle*
   Diandra: Thank you. 

Frankenstein’s Monster says Ianto always said he didn’t love 
her for her looks, which was really damn easy for him to say 
because she was hot. She spews some memories as Ianto cries 
some more. Gareth David-Lloyd must have had a raging headache 
after shooting scenes from this episode. FrankenLisa finishes 
that she needs him to hold her and tell her it’s all right. 
Dumbass actually does it.
   Chrissy: Hey, don’t be picking on...picking...what was I 
   saying?
Then he backs up and raises the gun again, so maybe he does 
have some sense. Except he still can’t pull the trigger and 
only ends up sobbing some more. FrankenLisa says they can be 
upgraded together, which is when everybody else shows up and 
plugs her full of at least a dozen bullets. She falls back on 
the upgrading table and dies. Jack and Ianto stare at each 
other for a moment and Ianto just dejectedly collapses beside 
Lisabot’s body.

Next day? One week later? Whenever. It’s night. Ianto comes 
through the cog door into the hub. He looks up at Gwen and Jack 
standing at the window to the conference room and he and Jack 
nod at each other. What is wrong with Jack’s lip? It’s like he 
has a scar there suddenly even though up until now all his 
other injuries seem to have healed rapidly. 
   Chrissy: That only happens if he dies, right? Otherwise 
    his injuries heal like normal?
   Diandra: Sometimes? I have no idea what the rules are on 
    this immortality thing. And I don’t think the writers 
    do half the time either. This first season especially 
    is so inconsistent it gives me whiplash. 

“You would never have shot him,” Gwen muses as Ianto wanders 
around, cleaning up pizza boxes and crap. “Wouldn’t I,” Jack 
asks. And thus begins the era of Gwen possibly knowing Jack 
better than he knows himself. She asks if he would have shot 
her if she’d stood next to Ianto. Jack brushes it off as a 
hypothetical scenario unworthy of entertaining. Gwen wonders if 
Ianto will stay. Jack doesn’t seem to care at the moment. Gwen 
ponders the levels of deception Ianto went through just because 
he loved Lisa so much he couldn’t bear to live without her, 
even after she turned into a half-human kill machine. “So have 
you ever loved anyone that much,” she asks. Subtle, Gwen. Jack 
looks at her out of the corner of his eye and says nothing. She 
says when Lisabot electrocuted him she was afraid for a moment 
that he could die after all. He says honestly, he did too and 
for a second he felt “so alive”.