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Post by Max The Autist on Oct 22, 2021 0:10:34 GMT
Gotta say a pretty solid story through and through. I feel like it will be a little controversial because the entire thing is basically faffing about until everything gets wrapped up how it could have in 20 minutes, but it's a fun journey and a fun ending, and if we don't get a follow-up to this story, I'm killing James Goss. Probably an 8 or 9 / 10. Also, Tuigirl, Norton is actually pretty subdued and also spends a lot of time off-screen in this story, I'd say. Gideon also has a rather small role all things considered. It's mostly about Andy and Lizbeth having a TERRIBLE time of it XD Fun, dark, never AS dark as Parasite I'd say, but definitely cray cray
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Post by tuigirl on Oct 22, 2021 7:17:10 GMT
Gotta say a pretty solid story through and through. I feel like it will be a little controversial because the entire thing is basically faffing about until everything gets wrapped up how it could have in 20 minutes, but it's a fun journey and a fun ending, and if we don't get a follow-up to this story, I'm killing James Goss. Probably an 8 or 9 / 10. Also, Tuigirl, Norton is actually pretty subdued and also spends a lot of time off-screen in this story, I'd say. Gideon also has a rather small role all things considered. It's mostly about Andy and Lizbeth having a TERRIBLE time of it XD Fun, dark, never AS dark as Parasite I'd say, but definitely cray cray Thank you very much for this assessment. Well, since I thought that Parasite was not too bad, I am seriously considering getting this! Andy is just such a great character!
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Post by tuigirl on Oct 23, 2021 21:16:20 GMT
I did a long Torchwood afternoon today. First joining the Great Sontaran War for some not so subtle social commentary. And now, coming along for a beach trip to Ashenden. This is a VERY good release. It is a great alien invasion story.
However, let me get my MAIN criticism out of the way first. This is kind of nagging at me. I am wondering, why do these alien parasites always need to be so blatantly sexualized? If it is not alien female parts jumping at you, like with the Facehuggers, it is giant eels penetrating victims left right and centre. I am a real life parasitologist by training, and honestly, please please please come up with a bit more imaginative way of doing alien parasites in fiction? Maybe? This is tiresome. I know it is Torchwood, and juvenile sexual humor seems to be a thing, but getting presented the same tired ideas about sexual alien parasites again... SIGH. I am over it. And I am a parasitologist, someone who has a collection of pickled worms on my desk and loves the dear little beauties. Especially tapeworm larvae. They are so adorable. Thank you.
So. Now that that is out of the way. This is a great release. It is a clever story, the performances are impeccable. There is a great atmosphere, there is lots of character drama, lots of betrayal and secret plans gone wrong. Norton is actually bearable. He still is his usual a**hole self, but his secret plan is really quite clever. The tension builts up perfectly, and we get a sad and sobering ending, which might be heartbreaking, even for selfish egotistical Norton.
Did I enjoy listening to this? Well, here comes my mental sensibility in play. I have a hard time dealing with darker stories. And that has prevented me from delving deeper into Torchwood. This is a very dark release. It can drag you down if you are in the wrong mood. I agree, it is not as dark as Parasite, and there are several great more lighthearted bits.
But I would lie if I told you I did enjoy listening to this.
I can appreciate that it is clever, and well written and perfectly performed. But poor poor poor Andy. He gets put through the wringer. Mental and physical torture for 3 hours straight. This is basically torture porn with Andy as the victim. It is perfectly performed, and I felt every bit of pain and anguish inflicted on him myself. I think after this, I really need to download Stranded and listen to a happy and un-tormented Andy, just to remind me of his happier times. Oh, and yes, we also get some social commentary here. It is however, slightly more subtle here than it was in the Great Sontaran War. This is, and I agree with Max the Autist, mainly an Andy story. Andy is the main focus, Andy does the heavy lifting. Yes, it is Norton scheming in the background, but Andy gets to do most the dirty work, plus most of the heroics, plus the despair, plus the torture. And the scenes of him freaking out and running around screaming on a beach. If you are a fan of Andy, this is a great story featuring him (if you can bear him being mentally and physically assaulted for the whole runtime, that is).
So here it is. My honest opinion. But maybe I was a bit harsh....
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Post by Max The Autist on Oct 23, 2021 22:51:33 GMT
However, let me get my MAIN criticism out of the way first. This is kind of nagging at me. I am wondering, why do these alien parasites always need to be so blatantly sexualized? If it is not alien female parts jumping at you, like with the Facehuggers, it is giant eels penetrating victims left right and centre. I am a real life parasitologist by training, and honestly, please please please come up with a bit more imaginative way of doing alien parasites in fiction? Maybe? This is tiresome. I know it is Torchwood, and juvenile sexual humor seems to be a thing, but getting presented the same tired ideas about sexual alien parasites again... SIGH. I am over it. And I am a parasitologist, someone who has a collection of pickled worms on my desk and loves the dear little beauties. Especially tapeworm larvae. They are so adorable. Thank you. Am I the only person who literally never thought of facehuggers as genitalia like? Or who has literally never thought of alien parasite descriptions as being sexual? Am I the odd one out here? I literally have never viewed it as sexual?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 23, 2021 22:54:36 GMT
However, let me get my MAIN criticism out of the way first. This is kind of nagging at me. I am wondering, why do these alien parasites always need to be so blatantly sexualized? If it is not alien female parts jumping at you, like with the Facehuggers, it is giant eels penetrating victims left right and centre. I am a real life parasitologist by training, and honestly, please please please come up with a bit more imaginative way of doing alien parasites in fiction? Maybe? This is tiresome. I know it is Torchwood, and juvenile sexual humor seems to be a thing, but getting presented the same tired ideas about sexual alien parasites again... SIGH. I am over it. And I am a parasitologist, someone who has a collection of pickled worms on my desk and loves the dear little beauties. Especially tapeworm larvae. They are so adorable. Thank you. Am I the only person who literally never thought of facehuggers as genitalia like? Or who has literally never thought of alien parasite descriptions as being sexual? Am I the odd one out here? I literally have never viewed it as sexual? As a David Cronenberg fan, I'm conditioned to see it as sexual every time.
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Post by Max The Autist on Oct 23, 2021 22:54:42 GMT
This is basically torture porn with Andy as the victim. Strong disagree, but I will say that Andy does get wrecked by this story. I wouldn't go so far as to say torture porn, but Andy does get screwed over a lot, admittedly.
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Post by tuigirl on Oct 23, 2021 23:05:55 GMT
This is basically torture porn with Andy as the victim. Strong disagree, but I will say that Andy does get wrecked by this story. I wouldn't go so far as to say torture porn, but Andy does get screwed over a lot, admittedly. Well, as I said, I am a person of the highly sensitive spectrum and these things affect me physically. So I admit I will react more strongly to this than the average person.
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Post by tuigirl on Oct 23, 2021 23:09:21 GMT
However, let me get my MAIN criticism out of the way first. This is kind of nagging at me. I am wondering, why do these alien parasites always need to be so blatantly sexualized? If it is not alien female parts jumping at you, like with the Facehuggers, it is giant eels penetrating victims left right and centre. I am a real life parasitologist by training, and honestly, please please please come up with a bit more imaginative way of doing alien parasites in fiction? Maybe? This is tiresome. I know it is Torchwood, and juvenile sexual humor seems to be a thing, but getting presented the same tired ideas about sexual alien parasites again... SIGH. I am over it. And I am a parasitologist, someone who has a collection of pickled worms on my desk and loves the dear little beauties. Especially tapeworm larvae. They are so adorable. Thank you. Am I the only person who literally never thought of facehuggers as genitalia like? Or who has literally never thought of alien parasite descriptions as being sexual? Am I the odd one out here? I literally have never viewed it as sexual? Well, with the facehuggers I admit I did not realize at first. But then I listened to the audio commentary by writers/ director and actors of the Alien movies, and as soon as the word "giant jumping vaginas" was put out, it was literally impossible to un-see it from then on.
And those eels in this story.... it was made so blatantly obvious in the most Torchwood fashion imaginable....
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Post by nottenst on Feb 16, 2022 16:27:10 GMT
Gotta say a pretty solid story through and through. I feel like it will be a little controversial because the entire thing is basically faffing about until everything gets wrapped up how it could have in 20 minutes, but it's a fun journey and a fun ending, and if we don't get a follow-up to this story, I'm killing James Goss. Probably an 8 or 9 / 10. Also, Tuigirl, Norton is actually pretty subdued and also spends a lot of time off-screen in this story, I'd say. Gideon also has a rather small role all things considered. It's mostly about Andy and Lizbeth having a TERRIBLE time of it XD Fun, dark, never AS dark as Parasite I'd say, but definitely cray cray Just finished listening to it. Andy was really put through the ringer here. I guess they could have told the story just using parts of episode 1 and 6 in a much shorter time, but we wouldn't have understood just what was happening, how it happened and how bad the situation was. We needed to see the journey. Norton was quite the actor here, making it seem that he didn't have a plan all this time even though a good portion of it was revealed at the end of episode 3. His apparent despair was nagging on me as I knew he did have something going on. Oh, and I also wasn't thinking of the aliens in that way either.
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Post by elkawho on Feb 20, 2022 15:11:23 GMT
However, let me get my MAIN criticism out of the way first. This is kind of nagging at me. I am wondering, why do these alien parasites always need to be so blatantly sexualized? If it is not alien female parts jumping at you, like with the Facehuggers, it is giant eels penetrating victims left right and centre. I am a real life parasitologist by training, and honestly, please please please come up with a bit more imaginative way of doing alien parasites in fiction? Maybe? This is tiresome. I know it is Torchwood, and juvenile sexual humor seems to be a thing, but getting presented the same tired ideas about sexual alien parasites again... SIGH. I am over it. And I am a parasitologist, someone who has a collection of pickled worms on my desk and loves the dear little beauties. Especially tapeworm larvae. They are so adorable. Thank you. Am I the only person who literally never thought of facehuggers as genitalia like? Or who has literally never thought of alien parasite descriptions as being sexual? Am I the odd one out here? I literally have never viewed it as sexual? Nope. I never thought about it in that way. Ever. Maybe I'm just naive.
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Post by sidestep on Dec 3, 2022 13:58:09 GMT
Pimlico - I continue to like this mini episode format. I love Lizbeth & Andy’s adventure & banter in this first part. Minimal Norton. O Little Town of Ashenden - I was confused by this part, which continued on to the next part, The National Health. Good thing Norton made an appearance & explained what was happening. I usually prefer show, not tell, stories, but in this case, I very much appreciated the tell. It put the story back on track for me, at least, & cleared up the confusion. Once again, the mini episode format was useful because it enabled me to take a break from the story when I was struggling to understand what was happening. I personally have difficulties recognizing some voices, faces & handwriting, so if there were any clues during the conversation in Andy’s hospital stay, I totally missed them all. Lol. (But this partial voice blindness is occasionally useful in audio stories where an actor is disguising his or her voice or is playing multiple roles. It works on me. 😊) Rivers of Blood - Lizbeth reappears and the mystery of Ashenden is unraveled some more. 👍🏻 I like the math problems part. Miss Satterthwaite was a good supporting character. And the plot thickens in this episode. I’m liking the behind the scenes interviews as well. They talk about the short format. Very interesting. Now is the Time for all Good Men - The action picks up. I like Lizbeth’s quote, very timely, ”No one dares speak up, no one dares challenge, and that is how worlds fall.” I like the writing in this boxset as well. Norton & Andy’s adventure has one second guessing what is the actual agenda. The Hour of the Hallow Man - Interesting how various characters deal with the situation. I can’t tell if they’re serious or pretending while biding their time. I love Andy’s speech here. Listeners who like Andy would really like him in this boxset, I think. Wow. Wasn’t expecting that ending. Love it. Brilliant writing. This last part ranks up there with my favorite episodes, because of the speeches & the ending. Another solid, enjoyable, entertaining boxset. Onwards to The Unbegotten.
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