Torchwood SDCC 2011 Panel from treena on Vimeo.

Torchwood Q&A at Wales Comic Con 2011. 1/2 from Eldarwannabe on Vimeo.

Torchwood Q&A at Wales Comic Con 2011. 2/2 from Eldarwannabe on Vimeo.

“One day, nobody dies. All across the world, nobody dies. And then the next day, and the next, and the next, people keep aging — they get hurt and sick — but they never die. The result: a population boom, overnight.

With all the extra people, resources are finite. It’s said that in four month’s time, the human race will cease to be viable. But this can’t be a natural event — someone’s got to be behind it. It’s a race against time as C.I.A. agent Rex Matheson investigates a global conspiracy. The answers lie within an old, secret British institute. As Rex keeps asking “What is Torchwood?”, he’s drawn into a world of adventure, and a threat to change what it means to be human, forever.”

Landing a job to pen a script for a TV show is usually a major feather in any writer’s cap, especially if the said show is related to one they grew up loving. But it doesn’t always go smoothly and behind the scenes of the TV production world there are all sorts of pitfalls most of us will never be aware of; all is laid bare, however, in Torch, Wood & Peasants by ‘Webley Wildfoot’. From the description:

“When a major network successfully re-launched a hit family SF show, they were anxious to find a post-watershed spin-off as soon as possible to cater for the fans who had grown up with their original series, but now wanted a more adult version of the same thrills. The bulk of this book contains an original commissioned script intended for broadcast that never saw the light of day. The rest of the book tells the story of how that script was commissioned, edited, re-edited and re-commissioned only to eventually disappear without trace; an insider viewpoint on how the television industry works as seen from a writer’s perspective. ‘Torch, Wood and Peasants’ contains the script and behind-the-scenes story of an entirely fictitious television program and bears no relation to any real show of a vaguely similar name… honest guvnor.

But imagine, if you will, a well known writer in both TV Drama and Comic Books was in the above position, his name bandied all over the online community as a key writer on a prospective new hit show. The commissioning process turns out to be a nightmare of confusion that results in a finished script that never gets used. Over the years, people constantly ask the writer about the experience and what the script was about, until eventually the writer decides to self-publish the script along with a potted behind-the-scenes history of the formation of a TV show, the commissioning process and ultimately what went wrong. It’s not a bitter book by any means; the writer approaches the experience with good humour, but just in case, names and locations are disguised throughout both script and back story to protect the innocent and avoid any tricky copyright issues.

This ‘could’ be the story of ‘Torch, Wood & Peasants’, Webley Wildfoot ‘could’ be a pseudonym for Si Spencer. Who knows?”

Torch, Wood & Peasants is available from print on demand service Lulu right now and we have two signed copies to give away to lucky readers – just tell us what service’s uniform coat Captain Jack Harkness normally wears to be in with a shout.

written by Paul Grist, Simon Furman, Ian Edginton, Brian Williamson. Art by Paul Grist, D’Israeli, SL Gallant, Brian Williamson.

Titan Books

Torchwood: Rift War collects together the 10 part Rift War storyline that ran in the Torchwood magazine and throws in “Jetsam”, an 11 page story written and illustrated by Brian Williamson that’s a good little story, (actually it’s probably more enjoyable than the multipart Rift War) with nicely drawn photo-realistic art. But why just stick it at the end of a 10 part story? I have no idea.

Anyway; in Rift War the Torchwood team find that the space-time rift they’re sat on top of in downtown Cardiff has opened to release mysterious alien types and it’s up to the team to try to cope with the dangerous Harrowkind, dinosaurs, armies out of time and giant babies whilst figuring out who’s on who’s side, work out just what the Rift War is and how they can possibly stop it.

I picked it up out of curiosity more than anything else. We like Torchwood in our house and enjoy the adventures of Captain Jack and the team. And I was intrigued to see how some really good comic people would handle the comic adaptation. After all, I’ve had nothing but praise for Paul Grist (Kane in particular is a spectacular triumph) or the Edginton/D’Israeli team (see these reviews for Scarlet Traces and Leviathan and Stickleback.)

So it’s real disappointment that the best I can really say about Torchwood Rift War is that it’s perhaps about as good as an episodic collection of comics written by three different writers trying to stick to a convoluted and flimsy story idea can be. It’s incredibly patchy and bitty, each individual story within the bigger storyline is no more than competent stuff. And when they’re read as one story they manage to become much less than their individual parts. Because then the different writing styles, combined with the ridiculous amount of exposition, just failed to gel in any way and what we’re left with is a bit of a mess. With such talented writers involved I really hoped for more, but perhaps working within the confines of the Torchwood world just put too many constraints upon the writing process?

(Paul Grist’s take on Captain Jack and the Torchwood gang: from Torchwood: Rift War.)

The artwork is a damn sight better than the writing. And with artists as talented as Grist and D’Israeli that’s no surpise. But the lesser known artists; SL Gallant and Brian Williamson acquit themselves just as well. However, just as the story suffers from the episodic nature of the book, so does the artistic flow of the book. There are just too many artistic shifts throughout the thing and it just adds to the fragmented nature of the whole thing.

(D’Israeli’s great visuals – perfect for a little multi-dimensional Torchwood exploration. From Torchwood: Rift War.)

So no, I didn’t like it all that much. I get the impression that the various creators involved would be much better suited just being allowed to tell their own, self-contained 2 or 3 parters and the result would have been far better than this collaborative effort that just didn’t work for me.

I’ll stick to the TV series for my Torchwood and I’ll be glad to go back to seeing talented folks like Grist, Edginton and D’Israeli doing what they do best – their own material in their own great comics.

Richard Bruton.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSB5re-ZWrc

Strip!: Doctor Who comics now, this evening at 5pm on Resonance FM, podcast on Panel Borders after transmission

Alex Fitch talks to the creators of a couple of recent innovative Doctor Who comics about bringing a new angle to the popular franchise. Leah Moore and John Reppion wrote the recent one off comic “The Whispering Gallery” which sees the Doctor and Martha exploring a terrifying museum on an alien planet. Also, Alex talks to Richard Morris, creator of the popular and unauthorised web comic, “The Ten Doctors” – an epic serialised graphic novel which celebrates almost every aspect you can think of from 46 years of the Timelord’s adventures (see here).

(Doctor Who, the Whispering Gallery by Leah Moore and JOhn Reppion, art by Ben Templesmith, published IDW, DW (c) BBC)

I’m ready for my close-up: Fly me to the moon (Patrick Moore & Gerry Anderson), tonight at 10.30pm on Resonance FM

On the 40th anniversary of the moon landings, Alex Fitch talks to two television pioneers who were inspired by the events of July 16th 1969. Sir Patrick Moore covered the events of the Apollo 11 mission live on TV and discusses the events of that day with Alex as well as the highlights of his six decades presenting The Sky at Night. Alex also talks to Gerry Anderson about how the space race and technological innovations of the 1960s inspired such shows as Fireball XL5 and Thunderbirds. N.B. The interview with Sir Patrick is available to download now from SciFi London.

Reality Check: Torchwood in print, on SciFi London on the 19th of July

In a panel discussion recorded live at a meeting of the British Fantasy Society, late 1980s Doctor Who script editor Andrew Cartmel talks to a quartet of Torchwood novelists – Mark Morris, Sarah Pinborough, Guy Adams and Joe Lidster – about bringing the show to the printed page and expanding the adventures of Jack, Ianto and Gwen to the length of a hardback novel.

Previous podcasts:

Reality Check: Female action heroes, online at SciFi London

To coincide with the release of updates of the Terminator franchise and Blood: The last Vampire, Alex Fitch talks to actress Linda Hamilton about her career, working with Arnold Schwarzenegger and becoming a feminist icon. Alex also talks to anime expert Helen McCarthy about the various incarnations of Blood: The Last Vampire, the Japanese version of Buffy which has moved from TV animation to manga, video games and now live action cinema.

Panel Borders: Small press Sci-Fi and Fantasy

Continuing Sci-Fi comics month on the show, we have a couple of interviews recorded at comic book conventions with small press creators who are working in the SF and Fantasy genres. In an interview recorded at this year’s Bristol Comics Expo, Dickon Harris talks to comic book creator and musician Dave Lander who contributes to the anthology comic Decadence which in the last couple of instalments has been heavily SF themed, Dave also produced a CD soundtrack to go with recent issues and there are extracts in the podcast.
Also, Alex Fitch talks to Rob Jackson about his fantasy comics Random Journeys and Bog Wizards which combine unreliable narrators, humour and magical landscapes, in an interview recorded at a pub in the East End after the UK Web & Mini Comix Thing.

Coming soon:

Strip!: Doctor Who comics then…

Alex Fitch talks to two of the creators of Marvel UK’s seminal Who comic strip printed in Doctor Who Weekly. Pat Mills co-wrote the first 43 instalments of the weekly Doctor Who strip with fellow 2000AD cohort John Wagner, bring to the page such outlandish tales as The Iron Legion and The Star Beast about a Robot Roman army and a psychotic cute alien who befriends children. Dave Gibbons drew 56 of the first 60 instalments of the Marvel comic, making him the most iconic artist to be associated with Tom Baker’s Doctor in comic strip format and drew the first episode of Peter Davison’s run, as his swan song. Alex talks to Pat and Dave about their work on the comic and also about Pat’s forays into Who on the radio, writing scripts for Colin Baker and Paul McGann.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHR8a2Gs5qM

(Ianto, Jack and Gwen strike a pose in a publicity shot for Torchwood: Children of the Earth, (c) BBC)

Meanwhile, sticking with a Torchwood theme, John Barrowman told the BBC site that he felt that the new Torchwood: Children of Earth  being only a five-part season instead of the usual thirteen was “like a punishment.” The man behind Captain Jack explained that the first season of Torchwood was the most successful audience puller on the digital channel BBC3, then moved successfully to terrestrial channel BBC2 where again it did very well prompting the promotion to BBC1, but with a shorter run. Other shows have made similar moves across the BBC network without having their seasons cut, causing Barrowman to say he felt like they were being punished in some way, before commenting “I’m going to get a little political and I’ll probably get into trouble for it” although he also said that the five-part show (which is covering one long story arc this time round) was “incredible”. Russell T Davies said that they had done two thirteen episode series and changing formats was something to try out and that he thought audiences would buy into it.

Personally I can see why the actors might have preferred to have a longer season as they had before but on the other hand they’re getting much more exposure doing one giant epic this way, so I think they’re doing pretty well from it.Torchwood starts on July 6th on BBC1 at 9pm and to warm you up there’s more from Radio 4 with Torchwood drama Asylum on the airwaves again, from 2.15 pm this afternoon.