Torchwood: More Than This

Gwen returns as the central character in what's ostensibly the end of the first “season” of these audio plays - although, in fact, the second season started just one month later, and the season arc doesn't feature in this anyway. At its simplest, this is a “day in the life” story, set after the end of the TV series, with Gwen fighting off various threats as she tries to re-establish Torchwood Cardiff.

There's a fair bit of variety in that, showcasing the various different things that Torchwood does, with a good mix of action and humour, but this isn't what makes it great. Firstly, it's a good portrayal of Gwen, mixing touches of domesticity with her determination to save the world and ten years of experience to back that up. Indeed, she comes across as a very strong and powerful character in this, perhaps in part due to the fact that it's largely told through the eyes of somebody meeting her for the first time.

And that's the second thing that makes this so good. The viewpoint character is somebody entirely unremarkable, but we learn more of him as the story unfolds, creating a slow build to an emotional climax. As a result, the action isn't really the focus, and a fair bit of it occurs off-screen (as it were). Instead, as the title indicates, this is a story that reflects on the implications of the Torchwood universe for the lives of mundane people on Earth, and of the importance of what Gwen is doing in the larger scheme of things.

There's also a guest appearance from Sgt Andy, in some ways paralleling that of the viewpoint character, always on the periphery yet knowing that there is “more than this” - yet reacting to it quite differently. The episode, while essentially standalone (it kind of follows on from Forgotten Lives, but the two stories are independent of one another) is a good introduction to what Torchwood is about, and some of what the TV show did at its best; this is one of the best entries in what's been a remarkably good first season for these audios.