So we are four weeks in on the Doctor Who spin-off, and my telebox almost exploded with joy when it sensed that there might be a Robot vs Dinosaur Fite! in the episode Cyberwoman. Let us move swiftly on from Captain Jack’s masterplan of siccing an ancient creature on a electrical weapon toting killing machine, and instead consider how close this episode got to the cinematic platonic ideal.
Robots vs Dinosaur: FITE! is about as close to the perfect ideal of adventure cinema you can get. The fact it has been so rarely attempted shows the paucity of ideas in Hollywood today. And it took BBC Wales to get the closest to it in years. Close. But not quite there. Because as any six year old will tell you (after reading Wikipedia): a Pterodactyl is not actually a dinosaur as that term exclusively refers to terrestrial reptiles with an upright stance (as commonly seen in Dinosaur Comics).
So okay, Robot vs Pterosaur Fite: right? Sorry, the Cyberwoman in question is not strictly a robot, clearly still having human parts such as a face and belly button (nice to see that the prudish Cybermen thought it fit to prioritise a cyberbra over body armour). Therefore as a human augmented by machinery, she was just a Cyborg, albeit one resembling a cross between Cleopatra Jones and the Bride Of Pinbot.
Fun load of nonsense anyway, and load of nonsense it surely was. But has anyone else noticed the subtext of Torchwood? Who are the real badmen here? The so called good guys going around accidentally killing people when they play with their alien tech, or the aliens – in their suit and ties? Let us examine the plots to discover:
1: Bad guy is Suzie – Torchwood Number 2 – using alium glove.
2: Bad guy is sex alieng – accidentally released by Torchwood newbie, then captured and re-released to go on sex / killing spree.
3: Not much death here, but still the story only exists because of unauthorized use of alien tech – oh and wideboy Torchie decides to be JUDGE / JURY / AND EXECUTIONER because he is above the UN or something.
4: This weeks menace is deadly cyborg girlfriend of Ianto wot he has hidden in the basement. Death toll one cybernetics expert, the pterodactyl and any credibility that Ianto can continue in the series in any serious way.
Rather than the first line of defence, they seem to be causing all the trouble. PC Fringeface should really sort them out.