via The Uniblog

Digital Spy is reporting that Barrowman told Radio 1 listeners in the UK that he's in talks to join the cast of ABC's once-popular soap opera, apparently saying,

I'm off to Los Angeles on Sunday again. I probably shouldn't say this but I've got a meeting with the execs of Desperate Housewives. Can you believe it - I'm going to be a Desperate Housewife!

It's unknown currently what kind of role Barrowman could be meeting about, but should he end up a series regular, that may make his availability for Torchwood much smaller. Would Davies and the BBC make a Torchwood without its core character, or would they delay a fourth season until Barrowman was free? Should we start making up stories about Barrowman's unprofessionalism and forwarding them to ABC bosses, just in case.

Barrowman to meet 'Housewives' bosses [Digital Spy]

Talking to British TV Guide magazine Radio Times, Barrowman revealed hurt feelings about the decision to move networks from BBC Two to BBC One and limit the season to five episodes:

[P]ersonally, I felt like we were being punished. Other shows move from BBC Three and Two to One and they don't get cut. So why are we? It felt like every time we moved we had to prove ourselves.

Torchwood producer Russell T Davies explained the choice as less a punishment and more of a creative challenge:

Part of us thought, 'we could do another 13 episodes, we've learnt how to do that, and the second series was better than the first'. But why not change it?

Someone should introduce Davies and Barrowman; it sounds like they'd have a lot to talk about.

Torchwood cut 'like punishment' [BBC News]

Fans are buzzing about reports that "Master" actor John Simm is on set for the final Tennant story, and he's sporting bleach-blond hair. Simm's character, of course, was last seen dying in season three's "Last Of The Time Lords," before being burned in a funeral pyre... and having his ring rescued by a mysterious female hand. And now Simm is back — but has the Master returned from the dead as a surfer dude? The mind boggles. Maybe his hair is blond because he's merged with his wife, Lucy Saxon?

Here are some new set pics, courtesy of Alun_Vega (via Planet Gallifrey.) They show guards in black, a Jaguar, the wind from a spaceship landing on the front lawn, and a suspected Simm sighting. (It looks like Simm to me. What do you think?)

Meanwhile, producer/writer Davies and outgoing star Tennant gave an uproarious interview to the Times of London. (Apparently John Barrowman's penis is never not hanging out. And Davies only said his next TV show was about gay men because if he said his next show was about chipmunks, he'd be elected president of the chipmunk society and have chipmunks turning up at his door asking for work.)

The reporter asked Davies if there was anything he'd wanted to do on Doctor Who that he hadn't gotten to. And he'd replied, apparently seriously:

I would have loved to have done a Star Trek crossover. The very first year, we talked about it. Then Star Trek finally went off air. Landing the Tardis on board the Enterprise would have been magnificent. Can you imagine what their script department would have wanted, and what I would have wanted? It would have been the biggest battle.

(Presumably this would have been Star Trek: Enterprise, which went off the air in 2005.) Davies also says George Lucas has knocked on the door of every writer in England, including himself, to work on the live-action Star Wars series, but "I'm not going to do a series that's second rate compared to Doctor Who." He did say some unnamed British writers were working on the show, and they're at Skywalker Ranch right now, playing with the lightsabers in the prop room. Davies added that he'd been asked to do a new Lost In Space series, and had felt tempted for a moment:

Obviously, I said no. I'm sorry, I've done the best. But Lost in Space did make me think for a moment. If they got that right: a family, a robot, a villain, trapped on a spaceship . . .

And Tennant said he's been offered a new science fiction thing, that he's not allowed to discuss yet.

Meanwhile, Davies and Tennant said there won't be a dry eye anywhere when his finale airs. And they talked about this Saturday's episode, "Planet Of The Dead":

Russell T Davies: People are going to be Doctor Who-deprived this year, so it's got everything in it: CGI monsters, prosthetic monsters, army, police, an alien planet . . . It's our last chance to have a bit of a laugh. Now the Doctor's facing the end of his life, it's going to get dark.

David Tennant: Some of it was filmed in Dubai, and there were sandstorms . . . We were despairing. I'd look into the distance and go (Acting), "What is this strange alien world?" Well, I couldn't actually open my eyes to look at it. The Exfoliation of Doom would be a good subtitle. My hair was full of sand. And blonde. I looked like Tina Turner.

Wait, so is blondness a sign of transforming into Tina Turner? Could that be the Master's secret?

Oh, and the Times also links to this "ultimate mix" of the show's various theme tunes, which is totally addictive:

Pinball image by Stewtopia. Crocheted David Tennant by Bishma. Vote Saxon posters by OpheliaC.

The fan cameo is being offered as a prize on Tonight's The Night, a wish-fulfillment show hosted by Torchwood's John Barrowman, according to Digital Spy:

Viewers over 18 are invited to submit an application featuring a photograph of them in their home-made alien costume, along with information about their alien, such as where it is from and its characteristics. A group of 50 applicants will then be selected to meet a panel including John Barrowman and Doctor Who casting director Andy Pyror.

The site says that the winner will get to perform a "specially-written scene" on the set of Doctor Who, but stops short of saying whether they'll actually be seen in a real Who episode or not. We're guessing not... but almost hope that we're wrong.

Flick image from Tonythesuperperson.

Fans offered alien role in 'Doctor Who' [Digital Spy]

Appearing in issue #14 of the bimonthly (no salacious pun intended) Torchwood Magazine, the comic "The Tale Of The Selkie" is co-written by Barrowman and his sister Carole. Jack visits a remote Scottish island where people are disappearing one by one. And to his horror, he realizes he may know who - or what - is responsible.

The publisher sent us a mini-interview between Carole and John, and it's quite touching, especially the part where John talks about watching Doctor Who on the Chicago PBS station late at night as a kid:

CB: Ready to chat about our Torchwood Magazine comic?
JB: Wait. Shouldn't we have some sound effects if we're making this read like a scene from ‘24'?

CB: Do you even know how to write sound effects? You're the worst speller.
JB: I blame the doctor for that because when I was a kid I'd stay up late on Sunday nights when the classic DOCTOR WHO was on WTTW in Chicago so I'd never study for my Monday morning spelling tests. Add the sound effects later.

CB: Do you remember when we first got the idea to collaborate on a Captain Jack story?
JB: The summer when we were working together on Anything Goes. We were on location for Torchwood in a warehouse in Cardiff. I was filming the "Meat" episode.

CB: Wasn't that the same shoot where the pigeon pooped on Jack's shoulder? Now that was hilarious.
JB: That was good luck . . . the shoot was taking forever. Lots of green screen shots. I think I started making up ways that Jack could end the scene and we could all get home. Now that I think about it, we came up with some funny stuff . . . I still think we should do something someday with the idea of Jack and the–

CB: Shush!! . . . Can we tease shamelessly like that?
JB [laughing] I think we just did. Anyway, I remember the endings we made up got more ridiculous the longer we all sat in that cold damp warehouse . . . you and I kept playing on the way home in the car.

CB: I'd forgotten about that . . . do you remember what we called the game?
JB: "What Would Jack Do?" . . . but the actual comic didn't really take shape until Comic Con last summer in San Diego when we met Tommy Lee Edwards and Trevor Goring.

CB: It was the ‘Face of Boe' poster that did it.
JB: The poster they created of Jack superimposed on the ‘Face of Boe' still amazes me when I look at it. I framed it as soon as I got back to London. It's on the wall in my office and I think it's the best illustrated characterization of Jack that I've come across . . . until our comic is released that is.

And John says the comic foregrounds Captain Jack's guilt and compassion, plus his wicked skills with a harpoon.

Torchwood Magazine #19 comes out in the UK and Ireland on Feb. 19.

Barrowman's story - co-written by his sister, Carole - will appear in the next issue of Titan Magazine's Torchwood tie-in, illustrated by Tommy Lee Edwards (who most recently collaborated with Wanted's Mark Millar on Marvel Comics' 1985) and Trevor Goring. According to Carole Barrowman, this may not be the only Torchwood tale from the actor:

When John and I were working on [John's autobiography] Anything Goes, we spent a lot of time together on the Torchwood set. In between our storytelling and moments of inspired silliness (maybe one or two), we decided we’d like to work on a project together that involved Captain Jack. The role of myth in a culture’s zeitgeist has always intrigued John and I (it probably intrigues all sci-fi fans) so I when I got back to the US, I sent John a short story I’d written, ‘The Tale of the Selkie.’ Almost immediately he called and said, ‘This should be our first Captain Jack tale.’

The story, "Captain Jack And The Selkie," takes the Torchwood leader to a remote Scottish island where inhabitants are slowly disappearing one by one...

Torchwood #14 will be released in February.

John Barrowman to write Torchwood comic [Newsarama.com]

According to the show's star, John Barrowman, the show will be... more subtle in its third season so as not to offend American sensibilities:

We're not swearing or doing anything close to the bone because it's been a huge success in the US and the networks won't accept it with all that stuff in it... I'll still be getting naked and it will still be saucy - but it's done with taste. We'll doing everything so it doesn't have to be heavily edited for the US.

Has BBC America really been censoring the show that much, or is mention of "the networks" a sign that the Torchwood mini-season might be lined up as a summer special on one of the US broadcast networks?

John Barrowman: I dropped my pantos in Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber's pool [The People]

Barrowman shared his meat and two veg with the world via webcam during an apparance on BBC Radio 1's Switch show - but, to be fair, he was pushed into it by host Nick Grimshaw, who tempted fate (and Barrowman) by saying,

You're famous, we're told, for getting your willy out in interviews. Is this going to happen today?

Barrowman responded,

Alright. I'll get it out for you then, no problem.

And that's when the trouble started.

The trouble, of course, was pretty minor for the beleaguered broadcaster - Only one listener complained about the pre-9pm (Britain's broadcast watershed, after which nudity and swearing are fair game) nudity, compared with the slightly more controversial Russell Brand debacle from October. Nonetheless, both the BBC and Barrowman have issued apologies; Barrowman saying that the "light-hearted" banter went too far, and an official BBC spokesman commenting that "the programme overstepped the mark."

Of course, that's not stopped them making the show available on their iPlayer app.

BBC sorry over Barrowman 'exposure' [Digital Spy]

Sure, the Doctor (version II, anyway) eventually got to tell Rose Tyler he loved her, and they shared a nice smooch in Doctor Who's season 4 finale. But if you watched the Confidential, you know that actors David Tennant and Billie Piper provided much sweatier minutes of mackage than the two-second bit that was deemed appropriate for the kiddies. (I suggest watching it in slow motion for maximum shortness of breath.)

If you're not yet excited to see Eliza Dushku stretch her thespian legs in Joss Whedon's Dollhouse — or turned on by Dexter's Desmond Harrington — you certainly will be after this little firebomb of a clip. Wrong Turn may be from a dumb horror movie that pits college students against cannibalistic mountain men, but it's certainly got one scorching moment in it, and here's the proof.

Julianne Moore is something like the duchess of psychological sci-fi horror, with impressive stints in movies like Children of Men and Blindness (we won't talk about Evolution). In this deleted scene from The Forgotten, she and Dominic West can barely keep their hands off each other — and so they don't.

The Iron Man trailer seemed to promise us an onscreen meeting of the lips between Robert Downey, Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow, but it never quite happened. They did, however, film it, and this montage of set pictures gives us a glimpse of what could have been ... in Tony Stark's mouth.

All right, this last one isn't a kiss, but finding a cut kiss for this show would have been impossible: No kiss is too naughty for Torchwood. BBC Two did, however, draw the line at a Jack/Ianto crotch grab — so I guess it's a good thing we have the internet to show us the things that television won't dare to. John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd are in top (and bottom) form in this thrilling deleted scene.

Common featuring Pharrell - "Universal Mind Control"
If you can't dance to this then your heart is made of stone. This could very well be my new favorite singing robot. The track is from the album this Invincible Summer.

Locksley - "All Over Again"
Don't smoosh our new rockstars, giant beast. "All Over Again" is from the album Don't Make Me Wait, and the title track is yet another good track from Locksley.

Arsenal - "Estupendo"
Great dance-animation which made me think of Tron.

John Barrowman - "What About Us"

The man rhymes "don't wanna blame ya" with "we're In Danga." Barrowman's album Music Music Music is out November 24th. Swoon, Torchwood fans, swoon over these ridiculously saccharine lyrics that actually fit quite well with baby-face Barrowman's shtick.

Talking about the fact that Torchwood's nighttime slot in the UK has cut down on potential merchandising for the show, Barrowman said,

We can’t make Torchwood toys. We can’t market to children because it’s an adult show. Maybe we could do Torchwood sex toys. I will suggest it.

I would love to see the conversation if he ever did suggest it, if only to time how quickly the idea of the publicly-funded BBC licensing a line of sex toys based on a spin-off from their top-rated family-friendly show gets shot down in flames. I give it ten minutes, tops.

Barrowman wants 'Torchwood' sex toys [Digital Spy]

Talking about Eccleston - soon to make a reappearance in the third season of Heroes, and probably remarkably unconcerned about Barrowman's opinion - he said:

Chris was always grumpy. You don't always have to be intense. There comes a point when intensity makes you miserable - I think that was the case with Chris... Chris might have been a great Doc but he was darker and had a chip on his shoulder, he was not as much fun on set as David. I will give him the credit that he was the first Doctor to bring back the series and made a damn good job of it. But I just wouldn't go to the pub with him.

David's been to my house, we went to the Madonna concert with our partners - we socialise together. He's a lot more fun.

Barrowman criticises "grumpy" Eccleston [Digital Spy]

If we'd gotten to see this look at the secret origins of Torchwood much, much earlier, the whole show might have been better. Either the other episodes of season one would have actually been better, thanks to this episode clarifying the show and its characters. Or at the very least, they would have seemed better because we'd already care about the characters and the backstory.

Before anybody else jumps in and points it out, I know "Fragments" is a total retread of the Firefly episode where Serenity breaks down and Mal gets shot and then we see flashbacks of how the crew came together. But "Out Of Gas" was one of the best Firefly eps, and it seems to have inspired a similarly great Torchwood installment.

It's just sad that this is the penultimate Torchwood episode, instead of the second or third. Yes, I know the show isn't cancelled. But if all the rumors and half-announcements are to be believed, the show is getting such a drastic makeover in its third season that it might as well be a different show. This is the first time I actually really wanted to get to know these characters and this universe better.

Each of the four main characters — apart from the already overexposed Gwen — gets a lengthy flashback showing how he/she ended up joining Torchwood. And none of the flashbacks were quite what I expected. I had a pretty clear idea of how they were going to go, and this episode actually managed to subvert my expectations. Mostly by showing me a different side of the characters. We got to see Tosh being a resourceful spy, Owen actually showing human emotions, and Jack not having all the answers for a change. Ianto was still pretty much Ianto, but that's a good thing.

Because all of these characters managed to surprise me and show me different facets, I found myself caring about them much more. I still don't really care about Gwen, but I do care about Rhys. So she gets some emotional attachment by proxy.

The other reason this episode excited me so much is because it helped me understand what Torchwood is about. Why the organization originally existed, and why it exists now. I didn't realize until just now how frustrating the show's muddle backstory actually is.

Here's what we already knew: Queen Victoria founded Torchwood in the Doctor Who episode "Tooth And Claw," because Rose and the Doctor giggled too much during a werewolf attack. Torchwood's original charter includes keeping an eye out for the Doctor. When we next see Torchwood, it's the early 21st century and it has a huge London headquarters, and it's an imperialist organization that's tampering with forces it can't comprehend.

So how do we get from that set-up to Jack's cozy little gang in Cardiff? The newest episode finally shows us how. We get to see the sadistic Victorian ladies of the original Torchwood recruiting the devil-may-care Jack, and then around 1999 one of the members of Torchwood Cardiff becomes distraught at the way things are going and shoots himself and his colleagues. So Jack severs all ties with Torchwood's main London branch and sets about remolding the organization into a genuine force for good. All of this is backstory that you could have gleaned from the occasional aside during previous episodes, but it made a huge difference to see it actually laid out.

So that makes two great Torchwood episodes in a row. I'd say the season has been about half-and-half great and mediocre, which makes the season finale, airing April 4, the tie-breaker. Sadly, I don't hold up much hope, because it's about Spike coming back and going on a killing spree because he wants Captain Jack to pay attention to him. And it features the return of Captain Jack's long-lost kid brother. But this episode pleasantly surprised me, so maybe the next one will too.

According to the rumors, David Tennant is definitely leaving Doctor Who next year, to be replaced by Robert Carlyle (from Transpotting and The Full Monty.) (This part of the rumor has already been debunked, by Carlyle himself.)

Meanwhile, sources claim Torchwood will look very different in its third season. It'll lose three of its main characters: Captain Jack (John Barrowman), Owen (Burn Gorman) and Tosh (Naoko Mori.) Of those three, Captain Jack may guest star in a few episodes. Meanwhile, Martha (Freema Agyeman), who recently guest-starred on Torchwood, will join the spin-off's cast full-time. And the show will be more family-friendly and air in the same time-slot as Doctor Who. It may also have fewer episodes and serve as a sort of "filler" show for when Who is off the air.[SyFyPortal]

• Leonard Nimoy's Old Spock has a couple of scenes with Chris Pine's Young Kirk in the new Star Trek movie, Pine says. [TrekWeb]
• Episode five of the new Lost season is Desmond-centric, but boat person Jeremy Davies appears in flashbacks as an Oxford physics professor. [ApproachingLost]
• The Doctor Who rumors are true: not only will Rose and Martha come back at season's end to rescue the Doctor, but so will Captain Jack and Sarah-Jane Smith. The Doctor gets badly injured in an explosion and needs Captain Jack to be his "muscles and guns man," hints actor John Barrowman. [BadWolfOne]
• Meanwhile, fans are increasingly convinced that Davros, creator of the Daleks, will be in the final episodes. [Torchwood.TV]
• And here are some new pics from Jumper, featuring hot flamethrower action. [IESB]

We'll be judging the new Torchwood episodes based on important criteria such as raunchiness and drama.

The naughtiness: James "Spike" Marsters turns up, doing the same Fonzie trick he pulled off in Buffy. Actually, Spike is pretty great in his Adam Ant jacket, with his paralyzing lip gloss and his zany sexual innuendo. He copies Captain Jack's thing of lusting after everything that moves, including a poodle at one point. Oh, and there's a coked-up fish-man who steals a sports car.

How gay was it? Spike gets pretty raunchy with Captain Jack. The former boyfriends do a whole kissy-fighty dance when they first meet up, and then they argue in front of the Torchwood team about which one was "the wife" in their relationship. Answer: Spike was the wife. But he was "a good wife." Oh, and Jack finally asks Ianto the office boy out, and Ianto acts all gruff about it before saying yes. Of course.

Who gets laid? Nobody. In fact, boring old Toby complains for about twenty minutes about his lack of a sex life, while Tosh makes goo-goo eyes at him.

The pointless drama: Where to start? The gang is pouty that Jack was off traveling with David Tennant. In the middle of a conversation, Gwen grabs Jack and pushes him against the wall and shouts, "You left us!" and it feels like she's following a stage direction. Jack acts all put out that Gwen got engaged to her longtime boyfriend, and she hints that she only accepted Rhys' proposal because Jack was out of the picture. Spike is all possessive about Jack (as in the clip above) and wants the two of them to go off and run their old hustle again. I could go on and on.

Was there a plot? Umm. Not sure. There were some bombs, but they weren't really bombs,they were a diamond. But they weren't really a diamond, they were a bomb. And then they weren't. Sorry, not much help there.

Will the kid-friendly edited version make sense to anybody? It'll make as much sense as the regular version.

Marsters' character, Captain John, is a dark foil to John Barrowman's Captain Jack. "He is what Jack used to be," Marsters explains. "Though I have a feeling that Jack was even meaner and nastier, if that's possible. I think it's my job to make that old life seem as seductive as I can, so it's a question of which path Jack will choose. He's just come back [from traveling on Doctor Who], and his team are mad at him. So is he going to be a responsible leader, or is he going to screw it up?"

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• Episode One: Captain Jack returns, as the Torchwood team reunites to fight a rogue Time Agent. The mysterious Captain John Hart is determined to wreak havoc, and needs to find something hidden on Earth. But with Gwen's life in danger, and cluster bombs scattered across the city, whose side is Jack on?
• 
  
• Episode Two: When a burglary turns into a slaughter, Torchwood suspects alien involvement. Who is Beth, and can she be as innocent as she seems? But when the investigation escalates into a city-wide assault, Jack realizes that the whole planet is in danger.
• 
  
• Episode Three: Toshiko falls for a handsome soldier, trapped out of his time, who unwittingly holds the key to saving the world. When an old hospital is haunted by ghosts from 1918, a crisis foreseen by Torchwood 90 years ago is about to reach its climax. Time zones are colliding and with life and death decisions to be made, will Torchwood be able to stop an explosive end for Cardiff?
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• Episode Four: Rhys discovers the truth about Torchwood and becomes part of the team as they investigate a mysterious alien meat supply. With Rhys in increasing danger Gwen is under pressure like never before. Will Rhys go too far? Will Jack ask too much of him? And can Torchwood save the alien from being used as cheap meat?
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• Episode Five: An alien with the power to change people's memories infiltrates Torchwood - can the team save themselves before it's too late? With Captain Jack caught up in memories of his lost family, and Gwen struggling to remember Rhys, it takes Jack's love of Ianto to reveal the truth. But there's always a price to pay.
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