Reviews

If 'Greeks Bearing Gifts' was ludicrous but entertaining, then 'They Keep Killing Suzie' is even more so. The episode opens with some obligatory gore, as Jack et al are called to a crime scene where two corpses are sprawled on a bed with "Torchwood" written in blood on the wall. As Swanson tells Jack, "Somebody's trying to get your attention", to which he grimly replies, "They've got it." Cue the title sequence and the vague promise of a gripping thriller of an episode. The episode continues in this vein for a time after the opening titles, with Swanson angrily telling the team, "Torchwood walks all over this city like they own it. Now these people are paying the price" before coldly walking out. The plot thickens as Owen finds traces of retcon in traces the killer's blood, then the resurrection gauntlet comes out of the vault and suddenly the episode becomes an absurdity. Again.

The team's decision to use the gauntlet to resurrect Suzie Costello, who memorably committed suicide at the end of the series' opening episode 'Everything Changes' initially seems like an interesting use of the series' continuity and a chance for Torchwood to lay some of its ghosts to rest. Much is examined here, from Gwen's guilt about Suzie's death (and the revelation that Suzie had previously had sex with Owen), to Jack's stupidity in giving a woman with a dying father access to the gauntlet, and it briefly looks like the episode is going to go down the route of redemption, as Suzie saves Gwen and asks, "Maybe I came back for a reason?" And then she turns into a scheming mastermind and the end episode becomes bonkers.

It's difficult to emphasise just how great an air of stunned disbelief I had when I watched 'They Keep Killing Suzie' for the first time. The revelation that everything that happens in the episode is all part of an elaborate plan that she put in place in case she died so that the team would resurrect her represents a plan of such Machiavellian complexity that it is hard to believe that she managed to hide her villainy for so long before her fatal confrontation with Jack, especially when this episode sees her gloatingly dispatch her father, and cackling maniacally as Jack fires shot after shot into her twitching body with a complete lack of success. Presumably, she never invited them to her undersea base and didn't bring the henchmen to work. No wonder Owen glibly remarks, "You've got to admit, that's not bad. I'm picking her for my team", which is of course the sort of flippant remark that anyone would make if his or her lover was rapidly approaching the verge of death.

Because briefly, in the middle of the episode, 'They Keep Killing Suzie' decides it wants to be a comedy. Realising that Suzie is alive because the gauntlet is letting her drain Gwen's life energy, and locked in the hub by Suzie's machinations, Jack and the team are able to make a phone call. Rather than, say phoning Gwen to warn her what Suzie is doing, they phone Swanson, a woman who intensely dislikes them, and is forced to explain, "We're locked in our base and we can't get out", a statement that Jack is forced to repeat whilst her sniggering colleagues listen in. Swanson is actually well acted by Yasmin Bannerman and works well as a character; it's interesting to see what a career officer with some knowledge of Torchwood makes of them albeit without knowing what they really do, although it does raise the question of why Gwen had never heard of them in 'Everything Changes' and why nobody seemed to be able to tell anything about them, even something vague like "they're a special ops unit". It's almost as though the script editor still isn't paying attention, which incidentally brings me to several points of contention about the episode which I'd quite like answering:

Why does Ianto, who until last episode was still miserably reflecting on the traumatic death of his girlfriend and threatening to kill Jack for his involvement in it, now not only appear to have gotten over Lisa, but go off with Jack for a shag? Why are a statistically unlikely number of team members bisexual? Will the series culminate in a massive orgy between the five of them? Why does Gwen develop a gunshot wound when the gauntlet transfers her life energy to Suzie? It's almost as though writers Paul Tomalin and Dan McCulloch is dressing magic up in technobabble. And why doesn't Gwen seem overly concerned when she learns that Torchwood will sequester her corpse and belongings when she dies, just mildly indignant?

In the midst of all this silliness, we do get a couple of scenes worthy of note; when Gwen's belief in heaven is shaken by Suzie's brutal statement that there is nothing after death, Eve Myles makes Gwen look suitably distressed. This later gives rise to an interesting tidbit as Suzie tells Jack before she dies for (presumably) the last time that "There's something moving in the dark, and it's coming for Jack Harkness, it's coming for you!" With all the various hints about Jack's undead nature, this is presumably all leading somewhere: as the season lurches erratically towards a finale, it will be terribly interesting to see if everything gets tied up neatly. Whatever the outcome however, 'They Keep Killing Suzie' feels to me like a typical Torchwood episode; utterly ridiculous, but somehow obstinately entertaining.