The mystery of the forces behind the Miracle continues to deepen while the members of Torchwood begin to feel the negative affects on a very personal level. I’m not even sure you can accurately say that the good guys are any closer to figuring out what’s going on … heck, you can’t even say that they’re any closer to even figuring out who the bad guys are. Miracle Day isn’t trying to be the same kind of story that Children of Earth was, and it is catching a little flack from its fandom because of it. To me, it’s still Torchwood, and I’m enjoying the ride.
I can’t tell you how excited I was to see the introduction of characters played by C. Thomas Howell and Mare Winningham; only to be disappointed when they were both killed off later in the episode. I’m a big fan of Winningham, and liked the creation of a Tea Party-esque Republican politician without leaning on the cliché of making her stupid; because we really haven’t had enough of that in our fiction lately. Plus, Howell’s assassin was pretty bad ass, and was the first real sight of someone who seemed like he knew what was going on (because, did anyone really see Wayne Knight as anything but a lackey). Too bad Rex shot him … in the throat.
This episode also pulled back the curtain a little on Torchwood’s newest members. Esther’s decision to report her sister’s treatment of her kids to Child Protective Services was heartbreaking. She’s in this position where she can’t do anything to help her family specifically, other than the work she’s doing to save the planet as a whole. It might seem like that might be enough, but, emotions shown in the van with Rex showed that it wasn’t enough.
I’m not sure what the diversion to meeting Rex’s dad really will do anything to redeem him. Sure, understanding him should lead to liking him more, but only when the backstory shows him in a positive light. Producers have promised that we’d eventually learn what makes him tick, but I’m not sure Rex will be redeemable by that point.
As I have mentioned before in the Torchwood Virgin Diaries, I was a latecomer to “Team Rhys,” but I’m fully on board now. I’m not sure, though, that I like how his part of the story is going. We see Gwen worry about her family, and Esther criticized for doing the same thing, and it just comes across as false. And, if the previews are any indication, I’m going to be less of a happy camper in the next episode.
I mentioned last episode how I liked Gwen’s “introduction” to America, with the different names for things and such. The commenters, however, didn’t seem to agree. But I look at it this way; as Rex said in this episode, “Torchwood sees this as a game.” Gwen and Jack are always making light of the situation that they are in … it is one of the things I really like about them. When Gwen was enjoying Venice Beach, it brought to mind the story that Eve Myles told us about sitting in a bus station when she first got back to the States (she’d toured here with the Royal Shakespeare Company previously) just watching the world go by. You might not think that’s what a “real operative” would do, but it is definitely the way that Torchwood rolls.
Finally, the little monologue about the mysterious triangle people, “They are everywhere, they are always, they are no one” … yeah, very creepy.
Clacked by Ivey West 
on Jul 30, 2011 @ 13:49 EST5EDT
So why didn’t Rex take a whole bunch of pain killers when they were standing in a warehouse filled with Phicorp goods?
This episode was better than the last, but Torchwood still isn’t pacing right, imo. I own all three previous seasons, and unless the last six episodes step it up a bit, I won’t own the fourth (and possibly last).