Previously on Torchwood Week: Russell T Davies, creator of Torchwood and head writer of the new series Children of Earth, talked about the way the storytelling changes as a result of the new five-episode, single-story format and the demands of hiring so many children.
As before, do beware: more so than yesterday’s interview, this interview does contain spoilers about the events in Children of Earth.
The relationship between Jack and Ianto is really brought to the fore in this story. Was that a conscious effort to get a gay relationship into primetime BBC1?
I didn’t think of it in those terms, really. Personally, it’s just because I’m interested in that story. I’m fascinated by how Ianto used to have a fiancee, so I just had stuff to say about it. So, it’s not me going, “I must put this on BBC1.” I wouldn’t blink about putting it on on BBC1, but nobody was stopping me put it on BBC1, either.
I think it’s much more about relationships. It’s more intimate, which then becomes more resonant, really. So it’s always important to me to write that, but so important I don’t ever think about it. I’m not sitting there thinking, I must do this.
However, I like to see someone coming out to his sister when he’s not even sure what he is, and even he doesn’t know what’s going to happen, or anything. I like that scene. I’ll always write that sort of thing.
There are elements of Bob and Rose in there, too.
Yes, same issues, I suppose. Both of them defy labels, which is always true.
The Torchwood SUV gets written out in episode 1, although we’ll refrain from talking about how that happens. Was that part of a decision to ground the Torchwood team in a reality where they can interact with the public in a more realistic way?
I’ve never had a problem with those interactions. It’s funnier, in a way. I love Doctor Rupesh finding Torchwood because, as he says, if anyone asks about Torchwood they just point towards the bay! I like that.
You’ve talked a little about how the series builds from episode to episode. Can you provide a little more detail about that?
We’ve shown you a little taster in the trailers of Gwen recording a tape so “you can see how the world ended”. The whole point of what happens in this story — and sorry to get on a soapbox — is that what we see happening to British civilisation is what we see happening every day on television in Africa. Soldiers, military law… I can’t go into details, but children being taken away, basically.
And that is what the world is reduced to in [episode 5], basically. Because we watch this stuff in the West, with Western eyes. And you watch this footage from Africa, from Bosnia, as if we’re more civilised than those people, as though we’re more intelligent than them and that could never happen here. All that shit that’s ever said about World War II, about Poland. And it’s just a lie, a complete lie. The wrong economy, the wrong vote, and we could be in that situation.
This is why it works over five episodes, actually. The climate builds and builds into a state of terror by the end. It’s motivated by science fiction, but it could happen here within six months. You look at swine flu and stuff: actually this story is set in motion by a flu virus, in 1965. That’s revealed in episode 4. I’ve given away too much now!
That’s where it’s heading. It’s that point of saying whether you watch the news, or Comic Relief, or whatever Channel 4 documentary about what’s happening in Africa, you feel so much better and smugger than them..
So if it was set in Africa, do you think there’d be a barrier to allow ourselves to be detached?
If it was set in Africa, I wouldn’t need a science fiction element to it. And if I set it in Africa, not many people would watch. We’d get about one and a half million, like they do with documentaries now.
The point of it is to say, everything you watch there — they’re not alien, they’re not in Africa. Wherever society breaks down. We actually look at Poland in 1943 like it’s different to us, like it’s less civilised. It’s nonsense. Absolute nonsense. It’s a heartbeat ago, a couple of decades. And we just sit here, all smug and secure.
It’s about how thin society is. Britain gets fenced off from the rest of the world, a scapegoat. That’s how rubbish we are. We’re not a world power at all. That’s what I love about it. The whole point about Peter Capaldi’s character is that’s he just a civil servant, he’s not the Prime Minister. He’s not even the civil servant in charge of anything. He’s like the man who runs the Carlsberg complaints department, with that dusty phone that never rings. And that’s what the whole of Britain is: we’re nothing. That’s where the aliens are heading, they’re heading for the middle men. We’re just the middle men. It doesn’t matter what happens on British soil: it won’t affect anything anywhere else.
So we’re the victims of that: but we’ve brought that upon ourselves.
As you indicate, there’s quite a political aspect to the series. Did you have a yearning to write a Whitehall political thriller?
No, otherwise I’d go away and write that. And I’d probably get it made, as well. It’s just that in order to have the size of this story, you have to go to Whitehall — and Westminster. You see both sides of government. You have to sell it believably on that sort of scale. And I do love things like State of Play, I think they’re brilliant. So there are little nods towards that, but still in a very Torchwood-style world. It’s just necessary to see the size of this story. If it had been ten hours long, you’d be seeing the Chinese government, you’d be seeing the White House.
It’s also a choice to take all of Torchwood’s power away. What does the government think of them? How do they get paid? What happens when they’re saving the world in Cardiff? For me, it’s much more interesting as a story between Wales and England. There’s no power in Wales and they have to go to London. They literally have to travel to Westminster, to get to the seat of power.
Are there parallels there with the attitude the rest of the world has to Britain?
Yes, that’s the attitude the rest of Britain has to Cardiff. Yes, absolutely. That ticks away throughout it all.
There’s an opening shot of London that’s very similar to the Torchwood style of shots of Cardiff.
I know. We spent a long time wondering whether to caption that as “London”. We did, because when you first see Cardiff, it says “CARDIFF”. And when you put a caption saying “LONDON” on images of London, we just burst out laughing every time we saw it. But at the same time you think, “That’s not fair — if we caption Cardiff, we should caption London.” We spent hours on that. But in the end, the fact that you burst out laughing is not good.
And we see scenes in Scotland as well.
Yes, the whole Scottish thing grows, especially in Episode 4. So it is deliberately bigger, it’s covering the whole country. Except Northern Ireland. Tough! If only there’s been an episode six…
You’ve stepped away from Doctor Who now. Will your involvement in Torchwood end in the same way?
No, I’ll keep involved, if it comes back. I know exactly what happens — well, it depends on what the demands are. They might say, “Do a six part once-a-week story”. It’s been through every format so far, and can roll with it, I think. I’d like to do a continuous story like this again, I have to say. So hopefully, if it comes back I’ll be there.
Would you like to see it return in this format?
Yeah, I would. Until the BBC tell me they’d like it as ten half-hours, at which point I’d say, “That’s the best format in the world!” But truly, I’d find whatever’s good in that format and make it work.
So is the inter-show continuity going to be trickier with separate production teams?
There isn’t much, really. There was originally a mention of Daleks, actually, in Episode 1 of Children of Earth, by Ianto’s sister, but it just sounded a bit odd. She was like, “Where were you when those Daleks were flying around?” and to see it at 9 o’clock on BBC1, we just felt it was a bit strange, so we cut that.
I actually think the most interesting relationship in the future will be between Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures, because Sarah Jane has got a smaller budget, so it inherits the monsters from Doctor Who, just because it can’t afford them.
So that’s something we’ll have to keep track of, asking Steven [Moffat] what monsters he has got, and what he would want us to use if we can.
Looking longer term, what’s happening to Sarah Jane?
That’s still going. I can’t say yet, but we’re getting very encouraging signs from the Children’s department, who love it. Money’s always a problem with The Sarah Jane Adventures, but actually we’re about four weeks into filming [Season 3] on a new schedule, a slightly different way of making it, to save money. And it’s working. That’s brilliant. I thought it’d fall apart, personally. I shouldn’t say that, should I? But it’s really working. We’ve found a way to make it look just as good for slightly less money, so that’s looking promising. It could just run and run. [A fourth series] is not definite, but it’s really promising. And for more than four series, actually, if we can. But we’ll see.
please tell me is there a 4th torchwood and is there chance you could bring lanto back like you did last time