1.2 Fall to Earth Discussion (spoilers on release)

A friend of mine is actually from Izmir, and pretty much everything about Turkey there is wrong, starting with the accent.

Lot's of love from me. And it won the Tom's Tardis award!

You're right. I like The Conspiracy, but this was so much better. 

Going to be honest, Ianto was just kind of there for me in the show. He was pretty much background decoration and, like much of the cast in Series 1, seemed to flit from partner to partner. So I went into this looking at the box and seeing that it was just him and a non-regular and was kind of just expecting to let this run in the background while I did other things.

But it was good!

Made me care about him as a character. Explored some of his tiks and querks and actually brought up Cyberwoman, which I can't actually recall the show doing much (it's been a while, so forgive me if I got that wrong) and made Ianto feel like... well.... a person.

We also continue the Committee plot nicely.

Placement wise it's not too long after The Conspiracy, and Ianto talking of trust issues due to Cyberwoman, but not yet seeming to be with Jack, makes me want to put the pair of them mid Series 1.

Re-listened to this today. I really like Ianto's interactions with the lady from the call center. And I like the way it filled in some background for Ianto.

And Gareth David-Lloyd really did a very good job with the part. Hope there will be more from him. (I think, so far, we've had this and Broken, which was also very good.)

He also gets a meaty role in Outbreak.

Well, that was one of the best Big Finish audios I've ever heard. Funny, tragic, heart-stopping, uplifting. Just brilliant.

So, I'm going to be honest, Ianto still isn't my favorite character. However, he's much, much better on audio than he was in the show, in my opinion. Relistening to this, it's interesting to note how they've mirrored the Dark Shadows format a bit for these early Torchwood releases (apropos, considering The Torchwood Archive is The Crimson Pearl turned up to eleven). When I first heard that the Torchwood titles were going to be two& three-handers featuring only one of the regulars each, I would have waited a bit to see how the reviews turned out. And, in fact, I did. I think it wasn't until, oh, The Victorian Age that I actually sat down and listened to everything, since the reviews had been good and the second set of audios' descriptions had peeked my interest. I went into this one in particular with some trepidation. A fan-favorite character that I didn't particularly care for trapped on a crashing shuttle talking to an Indian customer support worker for an hour or so. Sounds bloody awful, when you put it like that. But I'll be damned if it wasn't good, and engaging, and actually made me care about Ianto a bit. As well as upping the potential threat of The Committee from "manipulating conspiracy nuts and framing Jack for murder" to "bringing down a shuttle and getting it to remote-crash into a building killing everyone inside to cover their tracks." Seriously upped the game there. Good stuff. Given the sheer quality that we've become accustomed to in the range, these early ones can be a bit choppy at times, but still, well worth another listen.