How do you feel about Torchwood Miracle Day

[MacLeod]

Well maybe great is too strong a word, perhaps better might be a fairer word to use. Sure the plot solution would still have been dire. But sometimes if a story sweeps you along with it you can overlook problems.

If the story is not engaging you start to pick apart all it's flaws.

Perhaps if TW was to return it might be an idea to go back to individual stories. Sure S1-2 of TW when it was that style had it's weak episodes what show doesn't bu there the odd few that were good. Though if they did that they would have to get some new characters who knows perhaps they could make all of them characters you care about.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Speaking of Miracle Day, BBC America will be airing the series starting September 14th.

 

[TJ Sinclair]

Speaking of Miracle Day, BBC America will be airing the series starting September 14th.

They should fire whoever made that programming decision. I suppose, aside from thinking it'd be good for ratings (among people who didn't/don't have Starz), it might be an attempt to garner some renewed interest in Torchwood.

But the people seeing this mess for the first time are just going to have their hopes dashed against the rocks of appalling disenchantment, and they'll end up thinking, "well, if that's the best they can do, then maybe it shouldn't come back."

 

[M.A.C.O.]

I wish TW had stopped after COE. The ending with Jack leaving Earth, Gwen, his daughter after the tragedy of sacrificing his grandson to save the entire planet had such a powerful poetry to it. A fantastic ending to a show that had a really shakey start. I recommend TW to all my Who fandom friends, but I tell them avoid MD like the fucking plague. With Torchwood being essentially in limbo now and RTD unsure if the show will ever come back. I like to think COE was RTD signing off on Torchwood as his DW run was also coming to an end at the time.

 

[Mitty]

Children of Earth was fantastic TV. Gripping.
Miracle Day was garbage. After a few good episodes it spirals into just... unwatchable... shit. It's just shit. It's one of the shittest things I have ever watched.

I prefer to think it never happened.

QFT. Absolutely abominable television. So very disappointing after how fantastic COE was.

 

[Anachronus]

And there in lies the problem. It could never match CoE. Of course it could have tried.

 

[MacLeod]

Of course it could have matched CoE, it could have eclipsed CoE, unfortunantly it failed on almost all levels.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

The problem, as I see it, is that RTD didn't understand why Children of Earth worked, so when he was asked to do something like CoE but bigger, he didn't know how to do it.

From the little that The Writer's Tale (second edition) covers the writing of Children of Earth, it's clear that CoE was a happy accident that worked in spite of RTD (who didn't have a clear vision of what he wanted to do and didn't understand how the story would work) and not because of him. Which is kind of ironic, in that I believe that CoE is the best thing RTD ever did in the Whoniverse and outclasses anything he did on the mothership.

So I think with Miracle Day he was trying to emulate CoE's success without understanding why it was successful.

Interesting idea. I wonder if maybe it goes even further and explains why Torchwood was such a mess, maybe no one had a handle on the show right from the get go.

For all it's flaws I thought TW had its moments and CoE really grabbed you but MD was the pits. I kept trying to convince myself it was at least worth watching forcing myself to complete it but alas...

 

[tomalak301]

Well, reading this thread, I wonder if I should continue watching. I don't have STARZ so I didn't see Miracle Day when it first aired, so I'm watching the first episode now and it's decent. It is a letdown from Children of Earth but honestly I'm not sure if anything RTD would do would be as powerful and emotionally draining as Children of Earth.

As for Torchwood, I really enjoyed the series. Yeah Children of Earth was the best season, but I can't help but think I enjoyed the first two seasons more since the tone of it wasn't so completely and utterly dark. Given this thread, I don't know if I will continue to watch Miracle Day (I already miss Ianto and the gang together) but at least I checked out the first episode.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

If you checked the first episode and thought it was decent you might as well keep watching until you think it isn't. You know what they say about opinions so I wouldn't let us dissuade you from going forward.

 

[Mr Light]

I remember being quite excited about the first episode... but then not much happened in the next eight...

 

[Sindatur]

Well, reading this thread, I wonder if I should continue watching. I don't have STARZ so I didn't see Miracle Day when it first aired, so I'm watching the first episode now and it's decent. It is a letdown from Children of Earth but honestly I'm not sure if anything RTD would do would be as powerful and emotionally draining as Children of Earth.

As for Torchwood, I really enjoyed the series. Yeah Children of Earth was the best season, but I can't help but think I enjoyed the first two seasons more since the tone of it wasn't so completely and utterly dark. Given this thread, I don't know if I will continue to watch Miracle Day (I already miss Ianto and the gang together) but at least I checked out the first episode.

Children of Earth indeed was very heavy, and too emotionally heavy and draining to be "fun", would be more "fun", if it had been stretched a little bit more. That's not to say it was excellent, it definitely was excellent.

Miracle Day is slower, so you might enjoy it, especially if you marathon it in only a few nights. Don't spend the entire Series waiting for aliens to show up, I think the slower pace, the lack of aliens and shown over a 2 1/2 month period were the biggest letdowns. Marathon-ed, with full knowledge not to expect aliens and it's more enjoyable, IMHO. There were other complaints, but, those were my biggest ones.

 

[tomalak301]

If I do watch the 4th season, it will be on BBC America's schedule. Also, based on the first episode, I don't expect Aliens.

 

[Professor Zoom]

If I do watch the 4th season, it will be on BBC America's schedule. Also, based on the first episode, I don't expect Aliens.

I'll say this: the first episode is good. Very good even. But, that's the high water mark.

Seriously, don't judge it on the first episode. It's a shit series. If you do decide to continue with it: you can't say you weren't warned.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

The internet review SFDebris is currently reviewing Miracle Day. Check that out if you're in to that sort of thing. I've been planning a Torchwood rewatch but I had such a bad exp with MD the first. That I don't think I'll watch it again.

 

[chelly]

I never really could get into Torchwood. The only characters I really liked was Jack (which is odd since I didn't really like him in DW ) all the rest annoyed me. That I couldn't understand half of what they were saying sometimes.

I did see a little bit of SJA and that was enjoyable to watch.

 

[Starkers]

CoE excepted SJA was a far better show than Torchwood.

 

[tomalak301]

CoE excepted SJA was a far better show than Torchwood.

I never saw SJA. I wish it was streaming on Netflix.

It's a shame they couldn't get John Barrowman back for the 50th anniversary. If they were only going to cover from nine to now, there was a time where Torchwood was a pretty big thing in the Doctor Who universe.

 

[Worf2DS9]

I remember I was disappointed in Miracle Day too, but I've thought about watching it again on Netflix to see if time has been a little kinder to it.

 

[tomalak301]

I remember I was disappointed in Miracle Day too, but I've thought about watching it again on Netflix to see if time has been a little kinder to it.

Miracle Day is not on netflix, unless you go with the disc option or something.

One thing I was wondering (And maybe this might help when I'm watching it) was if the further we get from when Children of Earth originally aired the more kinder Miracle Day might be. I mean it seems like we're comparing Apples to Oranges here. Children of Earth was so well done and so focused that comparing anything to it would seem a little unfair. Now if we compared Miracle Day to Season 1 or 2, I wonder how it stands up, and that could be exciting.