Torchwood at 10: Revisiting Season 1

This article originally appeared on Den of Geek UK. Note for American readers: BBC Three is a British channel that recently moved completely online, broadcasting its last TV signal on March 31, 2016. It was the original home of Torchwood. 

BBC Three was first connected with Doctor Who as a channel mentioned in The Dæmons (1971), and in 2005 when it became the broadcaster of Doctor Who Confidential, providing the new series with accompanying documentaries akin to the existing DVD range. These were initially full of clips from the show's history, then became more about the making of the contemporary series. On top of this, 2006 saw the broadcast of Doctor Who spin-off Torchwood.

This came about as part of BBC Wales' drive to produce more drama series, and Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies' desire to make a Buffy The Vampire Slayer-inspired series. When the Doctor Who production team were approached about making a spin-off (originally the BBC had suggested the adventures of the young Doctor on Gallifrey, which Davies was not in favor of), these factors combined nicely with plot strands from Doctor Who. A fictional organization called Torchwood was first mentioned in "Bad Wolf," and would go on to form a major part of season two. Furthermore, the character of Captain Jack Harkness was brought back from the dead but abandoned in the season one finale.

Controller of BBC 3 Stuart Murphy felt that a post-watershed science fiction series would be perfect for the channel, and announced its broadcast as a "major coup" for BBC Three. It was the biggest production the channel had undertaken, but Davies' involvement — and Doctor Who's unexpected success — made it less of a risk. Plus, Davies had already adapted Casanova for the channel in 2005, yielding generably favorable reviews, good viewing figures, and ensuring David Tennant would play the Tenth Doctor. It seemed a no brainer: Torchwood was to be the centerpiece of BBC 3's autumn schedule.

While the show was Russell T. Davies' idea, he would not be in charge of the writing, though he would remain on board as an executive producer and have input into the characters, look and feel of the show (down to insisting on reshoots for an eight-second hospital scene because it looked too futuristic). He would write the opening episode, come up with the characters, and have significant creative input throughout the series.

The first episode filmed, though, was Chris Chibnall's "Day One." Chibnall had created the Sunday night teatime drama Born & Bred after writing successfully for theater, and was given the showrunning job on Torchwood after developing a project with executive producer Julie Gardner, then working with her again on Life On Mars. The first thing Russell T. Davies said to him about the project was that, if Chibnall accepted the job, he should never go online again.

The first season, buoyed by the confidence the channel had in it, didn't fix on a specific tone or style for its duration, and was allowed to experiment. From first script to screen, the production took around ten months. Chibnall is on record as saying "I don’t think there were any of us who after that first season felt we'd cracked the show," and that it lacked the cohesion of later series. What it did have, though, was an unpredictability. The production team didn't know how far they could go in terms of horror, sex, and pathos, and so the episodes vary in style and quality. "Day One," as the first story, is tonally uncertain by its author's admission, but the unhinged quality means you get uniquely strange television that can go from the sublime to the ridiculous at lightspeed.

In hindsight, the first season is generally regarded as the third best run, after the second and third seasons, and the varied nature of the stories produced an understandably varied reaction from viewers. The critics were mixed in their response. Charlie Brooker (future creator of Black Mirror) compared it to Scooby Doo. The Guardian were reserved in their praise. IGN.com said "The building blocks are there." Doctor Who fansite Androzani.com said "It's awful, it's horrific. It seriously, seriously sucks."

And yet...

Did you know that the episode "Cyberwoman" (script by Chris Chibnall from an idea by Russell T. Davies) was not only a favorite of the production team, but was also ranked in the top five episode of season one by the readers of Torchwood magazine? It's Appreciation Index score is 84. This is higher than the score received by "Heaven Sent" from season nine of Doctor Who. A website called Den of Geek described it as "absolutely brilliant" in their review.

BBC 3 is a channel aimed at a specific audience: the young adult demographic. While you and I may be surrounded by people who regard Torchwood's first series as patchy, it clearly entertained people. At a convention in Glasgow in 2007, Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto) was asked to perform something called "The Ianto Rap." He was not asked to perform it ironically, but by a genuinely enthusiastic fan.

There is now a wall dedicated to the character of Ianto in Cardiff. Clearly the show instilled enough dedication in its fans to turn making a shrine into a group activity. So, while you may not like "Cyberwoman" — and I might not like "Cyberwoman" — a lot of people do like "Cyberwoman" and some of them have proven track records in television. This season was varied enough to entertain people on a lot of different levels, from the quieter character work of Cath Treganna to the utter bombast of unrestrained Chibnallhalla; to "They Keep Killing Suzie," somewhere in the middle of those approaches, and the unsettling fairy tale of "Small Worlds." It did enough to earn a second season, this time on BBC 2.

Torchwood's first season was a success for BBC 3. It achieved huge viewing figures for a satellite channel drama series (it's lowest viewing figures are not far off The Fades' highest, and that was for an episode broadcast on Christmas Eve), established itself for its later heights, and quickly found its own fanbase. Season two — which Chibnall had more control over — moved to BBC 2 and found itself on a surer footing, with the episode "Adrift" influencing Russell T. Davies' writing choices for Children Of Earth.

It's somehow appropriate that the foundation of Torchwood is the least sensible, knowingly silly, and most tonally uneven season of the lot. It's a key part of its appeal, something that was arguably lost for its fourth and final television series, and something that makes it distinctive even in its most divisive moments.

A version of this feature originally appeared in February 2016.