"Torchwood, episode 2x03: To the Last Man" Starring: John Barrowman, Eve Myles, Burn Gorman, Naoko Mori, Gareth David-Lloyd We open on a couple who are running around some apparently abandoned mansion. She is consulting what looks like an ancient crank operated radiation detector. She announces that they’re “pretty close” and starts leading him down a hallway when they are intercepted by a nurse in early 20th century uniform. She startles, then calms and says she thought maybe they were ghosts. The female half of the couple asks if she’s seen any ghosts around lately because in case you couldn’t guess by this past scene and the fact that they are on a show about paranormal bullshit, these two are early 20th century ghost hunters. Nurse says actually, she’s seen three today alone and it’s getting worse. Chrissy: Maybe you should put in for a transfer? Diandra: How would you indicate that on your application? Reasons for leaving last job: toxic work environment due to ghouls roaming the halls every night. Chrissy: No, you have to put a positive spin on it. Like this: “I wanted to advance my career in a supportive environment that doesn’t have blood dripping from the walls after midnight, accompanied by the shrieking howls of the damned”. She directs them to the ward and we FINALLY get a chyron identifying this as St Teilo’s military hospital in 1918. She notes that half of the soldiers there see things anyway, you know, being soldiers. And as soon as they’re better, they’re supposed to be sent back to the front lines. Um...when in 1918 is this? Because depending on how long some of those recoveries take, the war might end before they can get there. The female ghost hunter notes that this is based on Field Marshall Haig’s order that every position be held “to the last man”. Oh, so it’s April. Never mind what I said then. The lights flicker and the gauge in her hands comes to life. They run off to find the source of the disturbance. They end up in the basement or something and there’s a flash and one of the walls seems to disappear, replaced by a room where the soldier they happened to be standing over while reading that order from Haig upstairs is sitting against the wall with Tosh half curled over him protectively. Tosh blinks at them and orders the soldier – who she calls Tommy - to tell them what they need to do. “You’re the only one who can stop this! If you don’t, it’s the end of everything!” Chrissy: Sheesh, those Torchwood people are always so DRAMATIC about everything. Diandra: Terminators. Giant devil. Invading aliens. Time itself coming unravelled. Chrissy: Okay, FINE. Maybe it’s not an exaggeration. Tommy leaps up and tells the couple to go find him in the ward upstairs (“in 1918”, like THEY’RE the time travelers who don’t know what year it is). He says they have to take him away so he can be “here now”. They accept this easily enough apparently as they immediately head upstairs and order a confused Tommy to come with them. They introduce themselves (finally) as Gerald and Harriet of Torchwood (because of course they are). Chrissy: How old did you say Torchwood is? Diandra: Queen Victoria founded it after she was attacked by a werewolf and maybe sort of turned into one. Somehow she decided it was all the Doctor’s fault. Chrissy: Ah, yes. The werewolf thing. You know, I thought you were just making shit up before, but having seen a couple episodes of “Doctor Who” now...that sounds about right. Bleeping credits. We come back to Tosh running around her very big (for one person) flat in a bathrobe, apparently getting ready to go to work. It would seem that she is skinny because she doesn’t sit down at any point during the day as she’s eating her breakfast and drinking her coffee WHILE flitting around and getting dressed. She smiles before going out the door – looking a bit fluttery - and we focus on the date, which is Friday the 20th. Jack’s office. Gwen is holding a picture of Tommy and asking Jack about him. Jack says his name is Thomas Reginald Brockless and he’s twenty-four. “Sort of,” Ianto pipes up from the corner. Gwen says he can’t “sort of” be twenty-four: is he or isn’t he? Oh, Gwen. It’s like you haven’t been working here for nearly two years. Ianto says that depends on how you do the math. She says okay, then when was he born? Jack says 1894 and walks out the door, Ianto trailing him, before her look of confusion totally settles. He asks if Owen is ready. Owen says yep, then notices that Tosh is wearing a dress. She just smiles at him chipperly. Down in the morgue, Jack pulls out one of the drawers while Tosh explains that even in Victorian times Torchwood was able to use cryogenics because, you know, alien technology. So, Jack concludes, he was frozen 90 years ago, meaning he’s been part of Torchwood longer than anybody and he’s either 24 or 114 depending on how you count. Chrissy: So how old does that make Jack? Diandra: Don’t know. He gets upset when people ask that. And suddenly Tommy is laid out on Owen’s autopsy table while Owen explains that they have to thaw him out about once a year just to make sure he’s still okay because, as Jack says, “one day we’re going to need him”. Owen injects him with something and then tries to shock him back to life. Except once he’s awake he does what any combat soldier would do and starts taking wild swings at Owen. Chrissy: Oh, you don’t need to be a combat soldier to want to do that every once in a while. Diandra: I thought we were being nicer to Owen this season. Chrissy: I said I would be nicer to GWEN. You can’t expect me to be nicer to Owen too. I can only do so much. Tosh finally gets his attention and he recognizes her and calms. She asks if he knows where he is. Tommy sits up, looks around, identifies it as Torchwood and asks if it’s that time again. She asks how he’s feeling. He says he could use a cup of tea, which is the standard British answer to freaking everything. Tosh looks to Ianto, who makes a face like “yeah, I’ll go get it. Because NOBODY else around here can steep dried leaves in boiling water, I guess. Ugh.” Conference room. Tommy is digging into a big plate of food when Ianto brings the tea. He compliments Tosh on her dress and notes that she has slacks on under it. “Is it that cold outside?” Ianto says no, that’s just the fashion this year. Tommy reminisces about the fashion in 1968: miniskirts. “I thought all my Christmases had come at once.” Chrissy: Then they went back to pants with too much material around the ankles. And then for a few years it was all loud colors and an alarming amount of something they called “hairspray” that made them look like they’d been electrocuted. Diandra: Thank god that’s over. Have they fixed the hole in the ozone layer yet? Gwen leans toward Jack and asks again why he’s here. Jack repeats that one day they will need him, although apparently even he isn’t clear on WHY. Back in the morgue, Owen tests Tommy’s reflexes and muscle strength and takes blood samples. Tommy is obviously familiar with this routine. Tosh sympathizes that they wake him up once a year just to stick needles in him and that hardly seems fair. Tommy notes that it’s once a year for HER. For him, it’s been every day for the past three months. She smiles and says “so, while we wait...” and he launches into all the answers to her questions before she even asks them. Name, birthdate, rank, parents names and death dates – one of which was in 1931 so that must have been a rough “day”. Tosh apologizes because obviously this only happened a couple months ago for him so it’s still a pretty fresh wound. Jack’s office. Jack is explaining to Gwen that St. Teilo’s hospital went through a “time shift” in 1918. He describes this fracture as two rigid columns of time rubbing up against one another until they both “erupt”. Okay, that’s not exactly how he described it, but that’s what I’m going with. Chrissy: Sounds more fun than the broken snow globe explanation from “Fringe”. One of the times was 1918, obviously, but they don’t know what future time it was colliding with exactly. Did Gerald and Harriet not give a description of the woman who was with Tommy or did it just say “a skinny Asian woman”? Jack says their warning will come when bits of 1918 start appearing in the hospital. The current occupants will probably assume it’s ghosts, just like the people in 1918 did. “When the time shift is complete, it’ll start a chain reaction. Unless we stop it, time shifts’ll start happening all over the country and then all over the world.” Gwen asks how Tommy fits into all of this. Jack says he’s going to help them stop it. Somehow. Maybe. Everybody’s kind of just flying by the seat of their pants here, really, so who knows? He pulls the “sealed orders” Torchwood left in 1918 from the vault and hands it to Gwen, who tries to open it and declares it stuck. Jack says it’s locked actually. With a temporal lock that is tied to the rift frequencies from the hospital so it will only open when the rift opens. Okay, cool gadget, but WHY? Why would not knowing what the hell you’re supposed to do until the moment you need to do it be an advantage? One misstep and the world, what, gets sucked totally into the rift? Seems like a major risk. Gwen says as much in fewer words. Jack assumes they’ll know why they need to be kept in the dark when they find out what it is they need to do. Tosh and Tommy interrupt this conversation to show off the suit Tosh found for Tommy to wear. Gwen says he looks like a “movie star” and the only name Tommy can come up with is “Charlie Chaplin?” because he can keep up with many of the changes from the past ninety years, but when it comes to pop culture he is adorably quaint. Apparently they’re going on a date. Gwen watches Tommy help Tosh with her coat and asks Jack if he has any more of “those pretty boys” stashed in the freezers downstairs. No, honey, you do NOT ask Jack a question like that! Chrissy: None he’d be willing to share. Diandra: And THAT right there is why! He tells her to back off because Tosh already claimed first dibs. Gwen asks where they’re going. Tosh says a drink and a movie and maybe pizza. So, he’s seen a movie or two and he still only knows Charlie Chaplin? They leave and Gwen’s smile drops. “He’s a frozen soldier from 1918,” she says. We are talking about the woman who dated a homicidal alien, right? Jack just grins and says “nobody’s perfect.” Chrissy: Yeah, well, what is he going to say about it? He’s an immortal from the future who will eventually turn into a GIANT DEMONIC FACE IN A TANK. Diandra: And he’s dating a guy whose ex was a half-metal psycho who tried to Frankenstein herself. Chrissy: Jesus, these people are messed up. Tosh and Tommy are in front of what looks like a church that is flying Norwegian flags for some reason. Tosh complains that Tommy is racing ahead of her like a misbehaved child. He says he only has one day so he wants to see as much as possible. Does he do this every year or is this the first time they’ve let him out? Tosh explains that the creepy mosaic statue next to the church is of Captain Scott, who sailed from this point to Antarctica. Tommy remembers this because it happened when he was 16. Almost a hundred years ago. This might explain the Norwegian flags because after a two year journey to the South Pole, Scott’s team discovered the Norwegians had beat them to it. And then he died. Tommy is pretty flippant about this. He turns back to more important issues, asking what Tosh has been up to for the past year. She says not much, mostly working. He laughs and says he knew she would say that because she always does. He reminds her that she told him last year she was going to start taking piano lessons. She says yeah...that didn’t happen. He bets she never bothered with the Spanish lessons either. Well, to be fair, Spanish is pretty useless unless she plans to spend some time on the other side of the Atlantic. She says no, but she bought a book. In Spanish or are you saying that’s the only fun thing you’ve done this past year? Chrissy: Besides the psycho alien, presumably. Diandra: Yeah, she angsted so much over that that I’m not sure that qualifies as “fun”. Also, the lunatic tried to kill her. Chrissy: Well. That’s still an improvement over Ianto’s ex. Diandra: This is true. She repeats that she just doesn’t have the time. He says she talks about her life as if she has no control over it. She says yeah, well, she’s basically on call all day, every day with this job. Um...Jack specifically told Gwen not to let that happen to her, so I can’t imagine he expects YOU to not have a life. Tommy points out as much: she chose to do this voluntarily. Back at headquarters, Ianto is showing Gwen a picture of Gerald and Harriet standing in front of the part of the hub that has “Torchwood” mosaiced into the wall like the old subway station it is. Ianto says Harriet died the year after that picture was taken. She was twenty-six. He doesn’t say what she died of, but considering the time frame I’m going to guess Spanish Flu or Tuberculosis (I throw in the latter because my great grandmother died of it at almost the same age in that time period). Gwen seems to get an idea and runs off to St. Teilo’s Hospital. At a bar somewhere, Tommy and Tosh are playing a game of pool (and no, that’s not a euphemism) and she’s handing his ass to him. Chrissy: Also not a euphemism. Diandra: Why would that...never mind. I don’t want to know. He’s jokingly grumbling that this is what happens when you give women equal rights. They prove they’re just as competent as men at things? Yeah, funny how that works out. He awkwardly transitions this to asking if she has a boyfriend yet. Tosh says he sounds like her mother and asks if he had a girlfriend back in 1918. Well, seeing as she would be dead by now, that hardly matters, does it? But he says yes, he “courted” a girl named Ellie for two years and then the war happened and it kind of fell apart. “Right pair we make,” he finishes and they kind of smile at each other awkwardly and he goes back to lining up his shot. Oh, just KISS HER ALREADY. Apparently the hospital is now abandoned because Gwen is wandering hallways that are deserted but for some peeling linoleum, remnants of medical equipment and nesting doves. Then she runs into a guy on crutches, his hospital pajamas tucked around the stump that used to be his right leg. The lights start flickering. She says hello and he starts hobbling briskly toward her like he’s just going to mow her down, seemingly not seeing her at all. She backs away until she runs into a wall and yelps, but I’m not sure what she thinks he’s going to do to her. Beat her with one of his crutches? He disappears just as suddenly as he appeared and she gapes at the empty corridors, wide eyed and panting. She starts running around checking all the rooms and in one of them the lights start flickering again. She tries the switch, but nothing happens. Then three construction workers suddenly appear behind her, startling her. One asks if she’s okay because she looks “as if you’ve seen a ghost”. I half expect him to disappear because haha, he’s a ghost too, but no. Apparently he’s real. He and his men just move with the speed and stealth of ninjas for some reason. Cut to sometime later, Jack is in that first main room with her and explaining for the audiences’ sake that they’re tearing the hospital down. Strange that it took so long for them to decide to do that. Gwen asks if that’s what triggered the time shift. Jack thinks it’s a possibility: all the “psychic trauma” and “rift energy” caused a surge in activity. He squats to press his hand to the floor and goes into a sort of semi-trance as he talks about how this place was full of soldiers in 1918 after four years of constant battle and one million British soldiers dead. “It was like walking into hell.” He shakes himself out of it and notices Gwen staring. He says yeah, he was there. I assume he just means the war and not this hospital, otherwise I don’t know what we would need Tommy for. Jack touches his com and asks if Owen has anything. Back at the hub, Owen says it’s been calm ever since that little spike of activity earlier. But this is Tosh’s area of expertise. He asks if he should call her. Jack says no, not yet. Back at the bar, Tommy orders them both some drinks and then gets distracted by a TV flashing news of the latest casualties in the Iraq “war” that was never an official war. He mutters to Tosh that it seems like there’s always a war going on somewhere. She points out what I just said: this doesn’t exactly qualify as a “war” really. He says yeah, well it certainly LOOKS like one. He recalls the first year they woke him and told him the “war to end all wars” was over and the allies had won. It was a whole three weeks in his time before it all started up again with ANOTHER world war. His lament stops there, but obviously there was basically unofficial wars going on every other week since. Chrissy: Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia. Diandra: That was last week. This week they’re at peace with Eurasia and at war with Eastasia. “Do you never wonder if we’re worth saving,” Tommy asks. “The human race?” Yes. Every other goddamn week. Tosh thinks we are: wars and all. Apparently the Doctor agrees with her, and this is what I like about this show and “Doctor Who”. It highlights that while humans are capable of a WHOLE LOT of horrible bullshit, we also have the capacity for a whole lot of things that are GOOD. For example, I am writing this paragraph on June 16, 2015. The news has been full of dire predictions for the extinction of the human race and/or the collapse of civilization as we know it within the next couple generations. But today, my Facebook feed is full of rainbows and celebration because the United States became the 21st country to declare same-sex marriage legal. Granted, this latter good news doesn’t come even CLOSE to balancing out the previous bad news (especially since the Supreme Court followed the ruling up with a ruling that basically gave corporations a green light to keep spewing unlimited amounts of crap into the atmosphere to hasten our extinction), but it shows that the United States is CAPABLE of progress despite all evidence to the contrary. We ARE capable of doing good. We just need to continue fighting to do so instead of letting the people who don’t give a shit continue to control what sort of future we can or cannot have. Maybe we can use Canada’s success in totally shutting down the tar sands as a blueprint. Apologies for the last paragraph. I promise I will go back to trying to be funny for the rest of this recap. Tommy smiles dopily at her. She says what? Do I have something on my face? He dreamily says “I was just thinking I’d do anything for you.” Chrissy: But I won’t do that. Diandra: What is “that”, anyway? Chrissy: Nobody knows. Well, they do, probably, but they won’t talk about it. She blushes. He says no really: “all you have to say is ‘Tommy, you’re my brave, handsome hero and I need you’” and he’ll do whatever it is without question. He winces suddenly and grabs his head. She asks what’s wrong. He says he “felt something”. Chrissy: Oh, honey, that’s normal. You see, when you like a girl... Diandra: Not that, pervert. On a possibly related note, the construction guys are dumping chunks of what used to be the hospital into a dumpster. Jack and Gwen are walking down one of the hallways when he hears something and breaks away from her, poking around a darkened hallway in another direction with a flashlight. A ghostly voice starts chanting a nursery rhyme and he turns to find the source of the sound is an old guy in a wheelchair being pushed down the hall by a nurse. They don’t notice Jack and he just quietly watches them go past and around the corner into a room. Owen suddenly contacts him through his earpiece to ask if he sees anything because he just got another spike in activity. Jack says yeah, they’ve got a few “ghosts” and asks if Gwen is okay. Gwen is in another dark hallway and apparently doesn’t have a flashlight. She says she’s fine and turns on a light that flickers creepily. Instead of something suddenly jumping at her between flashes – as would happen in literally ANY given horror movie – she rounds the corner to find a WWI soldier slumped in a chair. A nurse brushes past her and informs the soldier that “they” are ready for him. He disappears into one of the rooms and the nurse starts down a hallway, then suddenly backtracks and looks RIGHT at Gwen. Gwen holds still and just watches as the nurse creeps closer to her, calling “hello? Hello?” like maybe it’s a coincidence and she’s not actually talking to her. This illusion is shattered when the nurse gets within three feet of her and says “I see you. Why won’t you leave us alone?” Gwen starts backing away, babbling that she doesn’t mean her any harm. The nurse screams repeatedly that Gwen shouldn’t be here until she just suddenly disappears between pulses of the flickering light. Tommy is playfully chasing Tosh around on a pier, lifting her over his shoulder and making her drop her purse. Then after they stop and just stare at each other for a moment, panting, he FINALLY kisses her. She looks more startled than she should be considering she’s been flirting and welcoming all of his advances so far and just says “thanks”. He’s baffled by this response and she says she was just caught off guard and brushes past him to sit on a bench. He asks what the problem is here and she says “it’s silly, but I’m a bit older than you.” He reminds her that he was born in the 1890s and she says yeah, but “you know what I mean.” He’s like yeah, “I’m old enough to die for my country, but I’m too young to give you a kiss.” Also too young to drink in the states. Yeah, it’s not supposed to make sense. He thinks this makes her “daft”. She responds to this rather well – giving him a chaste little peck on the lips. He scoots closer and says that he may be young, but he’s “seen a fair bit” in his life. Tosh, apparently desperate to get off this conversation, asks what he wants to do now. Chrissy: See your fair bits? He says they could go back to his place, but there’s only room for one person and it’s kind of cold. Chrissy: Also, the landlord is kind of a pervert. He stares at her and she realizes he’s prompting her to offer going back to her flat. He’s pretty sure he’s not rushing things because they’ve known each other for four years. She reminds him that four years for her is four DAYS for him. Tosh? He’s a guy. The fact that he’s waited until the fourth date is actually pretty chivalrous. Chrissy: Also, guys are perfectly fine with relationships where they only see their wife/girlfriend one day a year. Just ask Will Turner. Diandra: That was one day every TEN years and thanks for reminding me about the most annoying plot point in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies. They kiss again and she caves. This is, of course, when she gets a call from Jack. She listens for a few seconds and her face falls. “We’re on our way,” she says. Hub conference room. Jack is announcing that the demolition of the hospital is, in fact, what triggered the time shift. Owen thinks they can stop the demolition. Jack says it’s too late. Gwen asks what’s going to happen now. Jack says well, two points in time cannot exist simultaneously and does the world’s laziest demonstration of how messed up things can get the more 1918 tries to “erupt into” the present. He holds up a piece of paper and declares it “linear time”, then crumples it in a ball, declares it “screwed up time” and throws it at Owen. Chrissy: So kind of like string theory in Quantum Leap? Awesome. Who wants to visit Woodstock? Jack tries to redeem the demonstration by telling them to imagine their lives as a straight line from time of birth to time of death and then try to draw that line on that crumpled piece of paper without smoothing it out again. Gwen concludes that that would be impossible. Jack says that’s why they have to stop it. Er...actually, I think the snowglobe thing from “Fringe” might have made more sense. The team all file out to the main part of the hub and Jack asks Ianto if anything is happening with the box yet. Ianto emerges from Jack’s office to answer that it’s still locked. Jack says they need to figure out how quickly the time shift is happening so they can get an idea of how long it’s going to take until shit gets real. He tells Tosh and Owen to go cover the hospital with rift monitors so they can get some readings and Gwen to go over the files again to see if they missed something. Tosh and Tommy share an awkward look as she grabs her coat and runs off. Hospital. As they’re attaching the last few monitors to the walls, Owen decides to strike up a conversation. “I’ve been meaning to say, uh... just...be careful.” Tosh plays dumb and asks what he means. He says she’s gotten really close to Tommy. She plays the “it’s only been four days” card again and he’s like ‘yeah, whatever, you’ve fallen in love with him, haven’t you?’ She says she doesn’t have to pretend when she’s with him – she can just be herself. Owen says she doesn’t have to justify herself because it’s not like he thought she had “some weird fetish for defrosted men”. He just doesn’t want her to get hurt in the likely inevitable event that she has to say goodbye. He speaks from experience, obviously. Chrissy: They need to form some sort of support group for people who have had failed relationships with people from different eras. Diandra: And people who turned out to be psycho killer aliens. Gwen interrupts to instruct Owen to go to the hospital’s East Wing where the old radiology section used to be because she thinks that area contains some sort of clue regarding the time shift. Chrissy: Does he have enough XP for that or should he level up first? Diandra: You’ve been playing too many video games. Once Owen is wherever he’s supposed to be, Gwen reads a part of the Torchwood field report that she says doesn’t seem to make sense. “Through a hole in the external wall, we hear the roar of great engines. Outside is a woman in strange armor ripping a Union Jack, perhaps some future heroine of the Empire,” she reads. Gwen says that doesn’t sound like anything that would come from their era, so does that mean that the time shift has only STARTED and won’t complete until sometime in the future? Owen pokes around the room as she talks and then notices a hole in the wall, which nicely frames a billboard in the distance. The advertisement – which he says is for car insurance - features some sort of warrior princess surrounded by flames, blasting through the Union Jack. He concludes that the roaring sound was probably the traffic on the road below. So yeah, to summarize: not the future. Just a billboard shamelessly exploiting men’s inability to ignore a busty woman in armor and leather. And sell them car insurance. Somehow. Back in the main wing, one of the monitors starts bleating frantically. Tosh barely touches it and the lights start flickering and alarms blare. Meanwhile, Jack is writing some report or something when the box on his desk pops open with a cheesy stream of magic light. He grabs the sealed envelope inside and pulls out a fat pile of papers with small, neat handwriting covering them. He speed reads the first couple pages before Ianto enters the room and asks if they’re instructions. Jack says they are: for Tommy. He gets to the third page and stops, looking up at Ianto. “And Toshiko.” Conference room. Jack says in twelve hours there’s going to be a moment when both timeline will exist simultaneously “before the time shift completes”. He says Tommy needs to be in the hospital then, ready to cross the barrier between times. He can close the fracture that caused the time shift from inside it. Tommy asks what happens when it closes. Owen says 1918 will go back to where it was. Tommy swallows and concludes that he will go back there too. Jack nods and says he’s the only one who can do it. “We brought you from 1918 to now, and when you go back to 1918 your life will be like a thread stitching time back together.” Wait, so... Torchwood somehow figured out that sending a guy into the future and back through the fracture at the exact right moment would seal off this time slip that spontaneously opened in this spot and created a time loop wherein Tommy’s future self needed to give instructions so his past self could be sent into the future to give the instructions. Am I getting that right? Chrissy: The circle is now complete, ObiWan. Diandra: My head hurts. Chrissy: That’s because you’re thinking too much. We’ve talked about you not doing that. Jack holds up something that looks like a sextant soldered to a steam punk compass and says it’s a rift manipulator, which basically functions like a key he can use to lock the door behind him when he goes through the crack. Tommy says that’s in then, he’d just be...gone? Jack doesn’t answer. Ianto comes in the room with a box in his arms and Jack tells Tommy to go with him. Then he pulls Tosh back to his office, where Tosh asks what’s going to happen to him. Jack says he’ll die three weeks after he’s sent back to 1918. Because he was suffering from shell-shock and for some reason he won’t be able to retain his present memories and will just revert back to his shell-shocked self and be executed by the British government for “cowardice”. Tosh can’t believe the British government would execute someone for being too traumatized to go back to the front lines of that ridiculous war. Jack says yeah, well, a lot of guys actually managed to recover enough to be sent back to the front lines, only to break down once they got there because war is FUCKING INSANE. But they had to keep sending in the redshirts unless they wanted to surrender, so Tommy was one of 300 people who were killed for not wanting to die. Tosh says she can’t send him back to that. Jack says she has to because it’s the only way to “save the future” and then he shows her one of the pages from the capsule that is clearly a drawing of. He says Torchwood in 1918 saw her with Tommy telling him what he needed to do. He says he has every confidence she’s strong enough to do this. He hands her the instructions. She steels herself and asks if Tommy knows what’s going to happen to him. No. She asks what she should say if he asks. At the same time, Ianto presents Tommy with the contents of the box: the clothes he was wearing when he first came through the time slip. Tommy thinks it’s crazy that he’s going to be saving the world in some pyjamas covered by an army coat. And then apparently Ianto takes him out to the main part of the hub where Gwen and Owen are waiting because Tommy asks her what they’re supposed to do until tomorrow when all of this is supposed to happen. Chrissy: Care for an orgy? Oh, wait...that was John. Everyone sort of stares at each other uncomfortably until Gwen finally asks what Tommy would like to do. He says the soldiers used to play cards, write letters to their future widows and possibly drink to kill time before their potential death marches into the field at the crack of dawn. Ianto jumps to go get some booze or something and Tommy adds that they’re not going with him though. This is a solo suicide mission. The awkwardness of this conversation is interrupted by Tosh returning, carrying the steam punk sextant compass. She says Tommy can come home with her tonight because it’s not like he’s a prisoner and HAS to stay at the hub. Yeah, he’s not a prisoner, but this sounds an awful lot like a conjugal visit. Chrissy: It was a conjugal visit before. Now it’s the last conjugal visit for a death row inmate who lost his last appeal. Diandra: Well, this is a cheerful episode. I’m glad we didn’t just skip it. Jack thinks this is fine as long as they’re back at 6:30 in the morning. Tosh’s flat. Tommy looks around at the minimalist, ultramodern, ultraclean main room and says she’s very “neat”. She says yeah, well, it’s only her living here. And she uses the term “living” loosely because basically she just sleeps here for a few hours before running back to work. The place is probably so clean because she’s never home. They have a conversation full of the clunkiest, sappiest dialogue I’ve ever had to recap. And because it might kill me to do it, I’ll just summarize. He reminds her that this is his last night before he leaves forever and where he’s going he won’t even be able to write. Chrissy: Yeah, well, apparently it’s too dark to see anyway. It’s just a big void with some THING moving in the blackness somewhere. She thinks her fear of him seeing her get old is just silly now and then he kisses her and we’re spared any further reminiscing about just how much time travel sucks. Jack’s office. Ianto finds Jack fussing with some papers...or something. Jack notes that by this time tomorrow Tommy will be back in 1918. Ianto notes that is the time he came from and asks if Jack would go back to his own time too if he could. Jack, deliberately not turning to look at him, asks “why? Would you miss me?” Ianto says yes and inches closer to him. Jack sighs that he left home a long time ago and doesn’t really know where he belongs anymore, although he thinks maybe it doesn’t even matter. Ianto sits on the corner of his desk and notes that Jack gets lonely, so maybe... Jack says going back to where he came from wouldn’t fix that. Considering what we’ve seen of his “past”, it’s kind of understandable that he wouldn’t have a whole lot of ties there. He says he’s seen things and known and loved people he never would have known if he hadn’t left his home to come here and he wouldn’t want to change a thing. Ianto, bless him, leans in and kisses him fiercely for, like, a full minute. We skip ahead to 2:00 in the morning (according to the clock on Tosh’s bedside table) and Tosh is laying awake, staring at Tommy, both of them apparently naked under the covers. Let’s just hope they used protection and Tosh won’t have to explain to her child that dad died nearly a hundred years before they were born because UGH. Tommy isn’t able to sleep either, apparently, and when Tosh checks the clock he sits up and asks what Jack told her earlier: “what happens to me?” So she tells him. Sort of. Actually, she just tells him that they send him back to the front line in France and he asks if they found his body. She nods and he kisses her and cuddles up to her. Morning. Wait...what happened with Jack and Ianto? Chrissy: Apparently nobody cares. Diandra: Argh...THIS is why fanfiction exists! The whole team goes with Tommy to the derelict hospital. He’s dressed in the pajamas and coat, just like he was at the beginning except he’s cradling the steampunk sextant compass. Jack says they can’t be here when “it” happens, in which case they better move quickly because everything starts wobbling and alarms start blaring before he can say anything else. They all troop down a hall and get cut off by a nurse. Possibly the same nurse as before. Tommy runs after her and stops when they get to the empty main room, baffled that she just disappeared. He starts walking down the long room and we hear Gerald’s voice from 1918 ordering Tommy to come with them. Apparently these aren’t ghostly voices slipping through time – Tommy is just recalling this. Tosh interrupts his train of thought and he runs out of the room in some sort of panic. Tosh runs after him. Jack orders Ianto and Gwen to stay and runs after them too even though he just said he can’t be there when the time jump happens. They end up in the room with the view of warrior sex kitten and Tommy babbles that he can’t do this because they’re just going to send him back and he can’t do that because he DOESN’T WANNA DIE. He begs Tosh to help him. She starts crying and says he has to go. “Why me,” he shrieks. Then he drops the sextant compass and accuses all of them of being no better than the career military fat cats sitting safely in their bunkers while sending scared kids to fight their little battles. Jack thinks the difference is Tommy’s FROM that time and the rest of them “belong here”. Well...maybe not you, but you don’t belong in 1918 either so whatever. Chrissy: I’m thinking he “belongs” in a few too many eras. How many of him did you say were in 1941? Diandra: About five too many. Good point. Never mind. Tommy is unraveling though and he rants about how he’s been pushed around by freaking EVERYONE his whole life and for what? It’s all pointless! He goes over to the wall and sits propped against it in the pose he was in at the beginning of the time slip. Except Tosh hesitates and Jack goes over to try unsuccessfully to pull him up. Tosh asks him to leave them alone and he gives up and brushes past her with a reminder that she has two minutes. She picks up the steampunk compass and kneels beside him. Then she delivers the following attempt at a rousing speech. “Listen, you’re a hero. Do you know that? Because you stop the time shift and save everyone. You save us all. We need you.” He says he doesn’t want to be a hero, though. He wants to stay with her in this weird future where moving pictures and information can be watched and interacted with inside boxes right in your house and sexy warrior women are used to sell insurance. A wind comes from the other side of the room and there’s some ripping and crunching noises and they are blinded by a bright light. And we’re caught up to the scene from the beginning of the episode. After he gives Torchwood 1918 the message to go find him upstairs, there’s another bright light and they disappear. Actually, the rift connection seems to close again, but it’s not exactly clear and there’s still muffled ripping noises coming from the other side of the room. Tosh kisses him goodbye and instructs him to get back in the bed like he never left before using the rift key. There’s a long moment where he steps toward the...rift? and looks back at her and she cries before he steps through. 1918. A nurse finds Tommy in the supply room and yells at him. We replay the scene of Gerald and Harriet doing the “come with me if you want to live” introduction. Present Tommy is shoved in the room by a nurse as Torchwood is shoving 1918 Tommy out the door and it’s a miracle nobody (not even his 1918 self) notices there are two Tommys in the room at the same time. Well, nobody except Gerald, who pauses in the door to nod at Present Tommy. Present. The team are coming back down the hallway for some damn reason when Tosh runs toward them, screaming for them to turn around and get the hell out. They go back to the hub, where the alarms are going off because the time shift hasn’t stopped yet. Tosh and Gwen type furiously at computer terminals. The lights start flickering. Tosh pulls up a map of the area that shows little dots lighting up in a spreading pattern with the hospital as ground zero. Gwen asks what the dots are supposed to represent. Jack says “chunks of the past erupting into the present”. Gwen asks what happened to the rift key. Tosh says Tommy obviously hasn’t used it yet. Ianto asks why the hell not. Tosh snaps that gee, maybe it’s because his shell-shock has kicked in again or, you know, maybe he’s still a little jet-lagged from the trip to NINETY YEARS AGO. Jack concludes that one of them will have to go back, decides it should be him and starts to run off. Owen stops him because he says he’ll just get himself “stuck” in 1918. Okay, first of all, I’m sure there’s a version of him back there already. More importantly: WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE? He’s the ONE PERSON you can strand at any given point in history and it won’t matter because he’ll just come back through the front door tomorrow with stories about how he spent the last ninety years including how he might technically be Queen Elizabeth II’s father. But whatever. Let’s do this the hard way. Owen thinks they can use the rift to their advantage and he runs back to his lab to grab some blood samples, spouting some nonsense about sending a “psychic projection” of Jack into Tommy’s mind. Chrissy: The smoke in the writers’ room is particularly dense this week. Diandra: Possibly dangerously so. I hope somebody took away their car keys. Jack holds out his arm eagerly and Owen goes to inject him when Tosh interrupts to remind them that SHE should be the one to do this since they already pointed out that Tommy trusts her. Flash to Tosh, with some sort of sensor band wrapped around her head, holding her arm out for the injection. Jack tells her she only has one shot at this, so...you know...don’t fuck it up. 1918. Everything is shaking like the hospital is on a shifting fault line. Everybody is screaming except Tommy, who is looking around with an innocent, scared expression bordering on clueless. Tosh appears at the foot of the bed and calls his name. “It’s me, Toshiko.” He frowns at her and says “who?” Chrissy: Here’s a question: if he was going to forget everything the minute he got back to 1918, why didn’t we just do THIS in the first place and forget this whole convoluted plan that obviously didn’t work? Diandra: Because that would have made sense. Chrissy: Oh right. Forgot what show I was watching for a minute there. Tommy holds out the rift key and asks if it’s hers. She says no and explains that he has to use it. He says he’s scared. That’s why he’s in this hospital, in fact: he’s a coward. She says no, he absolutely is not. “What am I fighting for,” he asks. Nobody knows, Tommy. Nobody fucking knows. She says he’s fighting for the future and her and “because you’re my brave, handsome hero.” He finally focuses on her instead of the people running around and twists a little knob on the side of the “key” so that a stream of light shoots out. She says “thank you” and he seems to suddenly realize who she is (maybe) as he says goodbye and she disappears in a flash of light. Tosh gasps awake on Owen’s autopsy table and confirms that he did it in case nobody noticed that everything has suddenly gone calm and quiet in the hub again. Later, Tosh folds the clothes Tommy was wearing on their date and puts them in a box. Jack stops her as she’s putting on her coat and heading out of the hub. She gives him a look that could probably melt glaciers and he just says “thank you”. She nods curtly and walks off. Owen catches up to her out by the Captain Scott statue. She says Tommy trusted her right up to the end. Owen thinks it’s because she was strong. Then he points to Cardiff in general and says “all of this is still here because of you.” Tosh knees this compliment in the balls by saying that actually it’s because of HIM and “let’s hope we’re worth it”. She walks off while a Moby song plays. Chrissy: Well, that was a nice little chat. We should do this again some time. Diandra: Maybe at the next meeting of People who Have Lost Loved Ones to the Rift, which is a support group Torchwood should obviously be starting at this point.