Meta Month of March: Ep Discussion: Boom Town

[trobadora]

What do you mean, who the hell am I? Who the hell are you?

So it goes: Through Mickey's eyes we are re-introduced to Team TARDIS. And quite a few things have changed since last we saw them! The Doctor, Rose, and Jack are finishing each other's sentences, Jack is working on the TARDIS all on his own, and they're all relaxed with each other, the wariness from the end of last episode gone.

Into time and space!

It's the only time we get the Doctor/Rose/Jack team on a normal adventure - well, what passes for normal for them! We have their first (The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances) and their last (Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways), and we know there must have been quite a few in between, but this is the only one we get to see. Jack is flirting with the Doctor, and in one scene (How come I never get any of that?) Doctor/Jack is paralleled and contrasted to Rose/Mickey. The Doctor trusts Jack to work on the TARDIS all on his own while everyone else leaves, and even when things go wrong, the Doctor doesn't just take over; Jack and he keep working on it together. Quite a change.

Also, once again (as usual when Jack is involved) there is so much joy and glee and fun around. Until ...

At last you have consequences.

For some reason, this episode doesn't get much love, perhaps because of that shift in tone. But it's one of my favourites - there's something about it that's quintessential Who to me. We get a fun romp - Jack telling tall tales, silly chase sequences, geeking out over the tribophysical waveform macrokinetic extrapolator, Rose learning how to say "Raxacoricofallapatorius" ... and then - you think you are so clever! - then, it all comes to a screeching halt: They have the death penalty. And what was a silly romp turns serious as Team TARDIS has to face the consequences of what they do. For once, there's no running away. No moving on to the next adventure. For once, they have to look the consequences in the face. And there's no easy way out.

Of course because this is Doctor Who and not Torchwood, we do get the TARDIS-ex-machina at the end, so they don't actually have to make that choice in the end: She's an egg! - But in the mean time, we get a very serious examination of what the Doctor's adventures mean for those not travelling along. This is an episode of outside perspectives, Mickey and Blon showing us the parts we don't normally see: friends and enemies, those left behind, the consequences. Brilliant.

What do you think? Here are a few questions for your consideration, in no particular order:

• How much time has passed since The Doctor Dances? The Team TARDIS dynamics have changed a lot - they're very clearly a team now. But at the same time, Jack has apparently never asked about the broken chameleon circuit before.


• How serious is the flirting? At this point the Doctor is very obviously flirting back; does he mean it? Would it have gone anywhere if they'd travelled together longer, if Bad Wolf hadn't already been looming on the horizon?


• The Doctor gives Jack that weird look when Jack rattles off his plan, but how serious do you think the Doctor really is about being in charge?


• Blon's insights into the Doctor (I bet you're always the first to leave, Doctor.) are every bit as devastating as his insights into her (That's how you slaughter millions.). This shades into the next episodes a bit, but how much of that do you think Jack is aware of?


• And here's something else that's not strictly about this episode, but still: What we didn't know back then was that the Torchwood Three Hub is right under the Plass - and that while Team TARDIS are running all over the city, Jack Harkness is there a second time. What do you think older!Jack is doing that day? Watching his own past? Deliberately not looking? How did he stop Torchwood from interfering with Blon's plans before then? They must have noticed, after all.

Comments

[iolo1234.livejournal.com]

I love this episode so much. I love the Doctor flirting with Jack.
'You're such hard work!'
'But so worth it!'
I especially love the questions it asks about taking someone to their death. Annette Badland s brlliant in this. She is both kind to the pregnant woman and a killer ruthless enough to take out Cardiff to escape. The dinner with the Doctor is one of my favouirite scenes as she explains what she can do. Also love that she mentions bondage in Doctor Who for a first date. Jack appears very much part of the team with the Doctor and Rose. Mickey is sidelined a bit and rather whiney in this one.
The question of what Torchwood is up to is answered in many fics. I've written one myself called One Night in Cardiff. I also wrote one called Under the Doctor set after the episode whcih brings Jack and the Doctor together. It must have been agony for Jack to see them there and not be able to do anything about it and to see his then mortal self. I must say that I'm glad he went back to the coat rather than the jacket.
So all in all this is a much unloved episode that I love and have watched many many times.

[firefly124.livejournal.com]

I also love this ep to bits. Exactly for all the reasons you've put out there: the shift in tone, the huge strides Team TARDIS have clearly made together, and all that implied backstory that ficcers have been filling in ever since.

I vaguely recall reading somewhere that "officially" Jack put the Hub in lockdown to avoid disrupting the timeline, but it would've been nice to actually *see* that ep. They do enough flashbacky stuff, it could've been worked in, and it's a shame they didn't.

[magic-7-words.livejournal.com]

I don't know that I'd call it a TARDIS ex machina, looks more like a deus ex TARDIS to me, or considering the gender maybe a dea ex TARDIS...

...but Jack/Doctor!

They've clearly been through a lot together by now, although considering how much the Doctor and his friends go through on a daily basis, it might not have to be as long time-wise as we'd expect. There's a quote in Bad Wolf that never sat well with me, as it seems to contradict their close relationship here, but I'll leave that till the proper time.

Sadly, I do not get any sort of interested vibe from the Doctor here. I've seen too many similar flirty comments tossed about in fun by friends who are comfortable with each other but not at all romantically interested. I think Jack isn't entirely joking, but there's nothing in the Doctor's demeanor to suggest that he acknowledges this. That said, there's obviously a very high level of trust and respect and enjoyment of each other's company, so it certainly doesn't preclude something more than friendship, if you want to approach it from that angle.

I love the Doctor's reaction to Jack's plan. He feels the need to reassert his dominance here, which is totally legitimate because Jack and Rose are guests in his TARDIS, after all. I get the feeling that Jack pushing his boundaries and the Doctor reminding him who's boss is an ongoing dynamic by this point. Whereas in TEC/TDD the Doctor would have taken offense and probably shot down the plan (on a trumped-up reason if necessary), here he takes it in stride, calling Jack out on insubordination but then paying him the compliment of adopting his exact plan, and he does it with a smile. Love the way Jack backs down, too--Sorry, awaiting orders, sir! The whole exchange practically screams "We've had this conversation umpteen times already, and we both know perfectly well where it's going, but we're having it again just to needle each other."

I'm not sure Jack was ever that fazed by Blon's whole guilt trip. He might've been uncomfortable with the tense atmosphere, but my overall impression of his character is that Jack has more of a black-and-white mentality than the Doctor. Either you qualify as a bad guy, in which case Jack has no problem killing you, or else he likes you and will let you get away with just about anything. Because of this, I'm guessing that whatever Jack knows about the Doctor's darker side, it simply doesn't bother him much because the Doctor is one of the good guys.

[wendymr.livejournal.com]

I do love Boom Town too, and for so many reasons: the vibe between the three of them, Jack and the Doctor flirting, both Jack and the Doctor so protective of and worried about Rose when Blon takes her hostage - and the Doctor-Blon scenes. To me, this is some considerable time after ED/TDD - I'd say a couple of months at least. The Doctor clearly likes Jack - no suspicion and no remaining digs about his character; he listens with more than interest to Jack's stories; he trusts Jack to help with TARDIS maintenance and is happy to leave him alone working on the ship; and, although it's not explicit, it's pretty clear that Jack knows what the Doctor is and how special the TARDIS is. And the vibe between the three of them is adorable. They're all so happy and carefree here - until things start to go wrong, and the Doctor and Rose are separately confronted with things they might have reason to be ashamed of. Jack - oddly, for an RTD episode - gets off scot-free from any angst-causing scenarios, but then that's more than made up for from here on :(

"In-between" stories that take place between the previous two episodes and this one are my absolute favourite for S1 (OT3, though, not Jack/Doctor), though I did write one fic where Torchwood-Jack can't resist letting himself into the TARDIS (with a hidden agenda) but is found by Nine.

The only thing I don't like about the episode is that it leads directly into the beginning of the end of their time together: Nine's regeneration and Jack's abandonment.

[wojelah.livejournal.com]

Augh. LJ ate my comment. Trying again - and without reading other comments yet.

1) You really, really capture what I love about this ep, and what makes me think, every time, that I really need to watch it more often than I do: that light-switch change from fun and frothy to high-stakes, hard, and bone-deep.

2) Re: the passage of time - I leave this at the nebulous answer, "enough". :D Several adventures, I think. I don't think they've been together long enough for shippy relationships, but the bond is there and the trust is solid.

3) Flirting: My OT3 and slash-loving heart says oh, my, yes, it would happen if Bad Wolf wasn't on its way - and then says, "let's invent ALL THE WAYS IT HAPPENED between Boomtown and Bad Wolf." (Because that, I buy.) At this point, though, I don't think the Doctor's full-on in earnest when he flirts, but I do think he's in the neighborhood of "half-in-jest, oh-wait-maybe-some-earnest".

4) That weird look: You know, to me, that reads almost as much like flirting - or at least friends giving each other grief - as "Buy me a drink first." Jack knows he's yanking the Doctor's chain by rattling off a plan - but he also knows it's a good plan - and the Doctor knows that he's the straight man playing for a reaction. And that it's a good plan. :D Generally, I think at this point Jack's acknowledged that as a general rule, the Doctor's in charge. What I'm less sure about is what happens when Jack really, deeply disagrees, and how far he's willing to push it (as compared to, say, Rose and Gwyneth and the Gelth on Rose's second trip out). I do think it says LOADS, in the confrontation with Blon, that Jack looks immediately, unhesitatingly, and completely to the Doctor before he moves the extrapolator - I *love* that moment, and really, the way he handles that whole scene. He knows how the Doctor's going to play it, and he follows that scenario even though you can see him wishing for action. I don't think the Doctor's got Jack on a leash - the very idea would give battle-weary Nine HIVES, I think - but I think to Jack, there's a commanding officer vibe. I wonder if the two of them (Nine, particularly) don't have to struggle with that a little? The Doctor has the habits of a soldier and doesn't want them, and Jack spent his exile pretending not to be a soldier, which could make falling into a chain of command a sort of comfortable alternative.

5) Re: Blon. Interesting. I really *don't* have an answer to that. Certainly, I don't think Jack knows about the Time War beyond maybe the bare outline. But I think (as we talked about in Empty Child/TDD), there's something of an instant recognition of like to like - and maybe that's all the detail Jack needs? If he wouldn't want someone exploring his own details, he wouldn't push the Doctor for his?

6) Oooh. Maybe he gets sneaky with retcon - or cooks up some out-of-town emergency for the rest of the team, and watches on the CCTV while his team snoozes in the conference room/volunteers to stay and hold down the fort?