I'm not sure about that. I feel like I saw a lot of Jack and his darkest days prior to CoE. I'm not sure I felt I saw him stripped naked - more than the loss of Tosh & Owen and the betrayal of his brother. That was some really dark stuff. How much more did we need to see? Will RTD and friends try to top CoE next? I mean damn.

My central question: Did we need RTD to try to attempt to go darker after "Exit Wounds?"

What's next? Watching Jack choke all of his living kids and grandkids by hand and then seeing him get pulled limb from limb. When he reassembles, can we then see him drawn and quartered? Then can we see a flashback that he was involved in some genocidal act?

My central question: Did we need RTD to try to attempt to go darker after "Exit Wounds?"

I think so, because in this case, it was showing the ordinariness of evil. The fact that the 456 were using the children as drugs. That the real villain of the piece was an ordinary man, the Prime Minister.

And that in showing us that kind of evil, how it's the good people, the ones with conscience, who ultimately pay the most.

I feel like I saw a lot of Jack and his darkest days prior to CoE

What did he do that was as harrowing as sacrificing a child (his own blood to boot) over its mother's screams?

your previous post was regarding his emotions: which seems pretty in the pits in "Exit Wounds."

That was what my response was regarding. I cannot comment on actions since I’m not sure I attribute "dark" to actions in and of themselves. Dark is a sense of hopelessness. That is more of an emotional response than actions.

I'd say that the story was about selfishness versus sacrifice. And how we'll justify or turn a blind eye to all sorts of things as necessary evils until they affect us personally. They could have called the 456 the NIMBY. The PM was the most extreme example, but there's a lot of "That's a shame, but it's not my problem" running through the whole thing.

So if Jack saves millions by killing some crazy, miserable old man nobody cares about -- or some other child, with no connection to the characters -- I think that undercuts the story significantly. It's not a sacrifice if it doesn't cost anything.

So if Jack saves millions by killing some crazy, miserable old man nobody cares about -- or some other child, with no connection to the characters -- I think that undercuts the story significantly. It's not a sacrifice if it doesn't cost anything.

::hugs Strega's spicy brains::

And yes Le Nubian, I agree that Jack's actions earlier were those of a complete bastard when he sacrificed those 12 children and justified it as "a good deal". But I think one of the points was that he was trying to change and then confronted with unimaginable circumstances. And again I think part of the point was the change in emotional impact of the two choices. He betrayed 12 children to their death to save millions of people the first time, but they were strangers, and he did not seem to really care. But still they needed a cure and would not have received one if they did not trade the children back in 1965. And still emotionally I don't think we are left with any doubt that 1965 Jack is being a complete bastard. This second time he destroys one child to save tens of millions. And emotionally we see the dilemma. I think one of the points of this is to make us emotionally complicit in the same thing we condemned earlier.

your previous post was regarding his emotions: which seems pretty in the pits in "Exit Wounds."

I was talking about his emotions in respect to himself and his actions, though, not independent of them.

From that panel report above:

3.42pm: "As you're such a big musicals person, will there ever be a musical episode of Torchwood?" someone from the floor asks.

"I can answer on behalf on Russell. No" Says Barrowman.

"The thing is, when Buffy did that episode ..." says Russell T "You just can't beat that."

Strega,

but I cared about that miserable old man, a lot more than Jack's grandson. I was really upset for him and what was done to him in 1965 and his loss of sanity going forward. He was sacrificed, he could have just done so with more meaning.

Perhaps my negative reaction to the storyline in CoE comes from the feeling that CoE was lecturing the viewers about evil and its banality. This is not a unique message, nor anything I am personally a stranger to. This is Hurricane Katrina and any number of other things we could name across the world. There are ways to fight its everyday appearance and not just feel helpless when confronted. Too many victims in CoE and not enough fighters.