Man, it’s nice to watch something without having to wait for a stream to load. Okay, we’re in teh old-timeys and a couple (though maybe not a couple couple) named Harriet and Gerald are running around on staircases with weird boxes hanging around their necks. The boxes look like the bastard offspring of an old camera and wind-up telephone, and have dials on top. My money says this is old-timey Torchwood. (If you don’t recall, Torchwood was started by Queen Victoria in the year hrmrmmmffffhmhmm in the Doctor Who episode Tooth and Claw). They seem to be looking for any weirdness in a big hospital, and accidentally turn the corner and crash into a nurse, who is annoyed that the ghost sightings are getting worse. She says she’s seen three today. Good to know the local yokels have always hated Torchwood. A chyron helpfully shows up to tell us this is St Teilo’s Military Hospital and it’s 1918. The old-timey Torchies look pityingly on the injured soliders in their beds and exposit that they’ll all be sent back to the lines despite their injuries, because they’ve been ordered to “fight to the last man.” From what I know of European history, that’s pretty much what they did too. Dammit, Torchwood, can’t you pick a war that isn’t so … depressing? The lights start to flicker and there’s a rumbling noise. Torchwood Retro runs off after their dial readings, and the guy you should recognize from last episode’s previews sits up in bed. The rumbling has become a sort of ripping, tearing noise, and Torchwood Oldschool find the soldier from the bed and Tosh crouching against one wall. Tosh yells at the soldier, “Tell them what to do! You’re the only one who can stop this! If you don’t, it’s the end of everything!” Oh, it’s always the end of everything, Tosh. Calm down. The soldier, whose name is Tommy, jumps up and tells Mulder and Scully to head back up to the ward and “take me.” Jeez, forward much? Mulder and Scully head back into the ward and wake up their Tommy, telling him to come along. He asks who they are, and they introduce themselves as Torchwood. WHAT A TWIST!

credits.

We get a longish sequence of Tosh getting ready in the morning, and really I could not care less what she eats for breakfast or what her bathrobe looks like, but there must be some Tosh fans out there somewhere who are enjoying this. Anyway, her calendar has the date – the 20th – circled in red. She seems happy about something. Down in Jack’s office, he’s showing her a picture of the soldier, Thomas Reginald Brockless (“Tommy,” Ianto corrects him), who he says is twenty-four years old (“depends on how you work it out,” Ianto interrupts again). Jack tells Gwen Tommy was born in 1894, and he and Ianto leave, calling for Owen. Gwen’s face nearly slides off her head as she attempts to do some mental math. There’s some quickfire exposition as they get Tommy out – he’s been frozen in the vaults for about 90 years, longer than anyone but Jack can remember, and every year or so they have to drag him out and unfreeze him for a day or so to “make sure he still works,” as Owen says. Does that include testing for … full functionality? I guess we know why Tosh was getting all dressed up. Anyway, Jack says they’re going to need him some day. Oh come on, Jack, you’re such a packrat. Always keeping frozen soldiers around just in case they “might come in use someday.” Owen does some weird stuff to shirtless Tommy, and there’s a tense moment while he checks for a pulse and they all worry that this’ll be the time they can’t bring him back. Owen grabs some paddles and shocks the hell out of him, and we learn that Tosh doesn’t understand that “clear!” means “get the fuck out of the way whilst I play with this very dangerous electricity!” Tommy comes to, freaking out, and Toshiko calms him down, but not before he fucking clocks Owen in the head. Haaa. “Is it time again?” he asks Toshi, “Blimey.” He … doesn’t have much of an accent, does he? I dunno, words like ‘blimey’ just don’t sound right without a real, thick, down-and-dirty London-style accent. Tommy asks for a cup of tea, and Ianto breaks off making flirty eyes at him to go get food.

They chow down in a scene lasting all of five seconds in which Tommy compliments Tosh’s dress, makes fun of the pants she’s wearing underneath, and wishes miniskirts would come back in style. Aaaaaand scene! Later, Owen finishes up some medical tests, and Tosh apologizes that they stick him with needles and stuff every year. “Once a year for you, every day for me!” he jokes. Back in his office, Jack is explaining the situation to Gwen. He says a time rift opened in the hospital in 1918, and the past got weirdly interleaved with the future. Somehow, in the future Tommy stopped it, and now to prevent a time paradox they need to make sure he’s here in the future so he will … have been there at the time of the shift to stop the thing … he’s already stopped. In the past. All caught up now? Good! Jack gives her a little cookie tin or something with the case notes in it. Gwen goes to open it and hilariously can’t get the top off. She’s embarrassed. “Okay … it’s stuck.”
“No,” says Jack mockingly, “It’s locked.” Tommy and Tosh come by to say hello, and Gwen wants to know whether she can have a pretty frozen boy of her own. Jack says this one belongs to Tosh. They go off for their dinner-and-a-movie date, which is in … Norway? Oh, this is just some place in Cardiff commemorating some explorer from Norway who left from here to explore the Antarctic. And who apparently died by the time he got there. Point taken, show, but thanks for ruining it. They chat a little awkwardly, and Tommy rags on Tosh for never doing anything with her life. She tries to defend herself by saying Torchwood takes up all her time, but Tommy is frankly having a more interesting time in his one-day-a-year allowance than she is. Back in the office, Ianto and Gwen look at old pictures of Torchies past. Gwen comments that they’re all very young, and Ianto says that Torchies tend to die young. “Nothing changes,” he mumbles, and Gwen looks troubled. She heads off to St Teilo and tells Ianto to stop moping around. You’re not the only one who wishes they were off with the unfroze soldier, dearie. In a bar, Tosh and Tommy are playing pool. According to the blackboard, Tosh is playing “home” and Tommy’s “away.” Cute touch. He asks if she’s got a boyfriend yet and we get it show, Tosh’s life is sad and pathetic. Don’t make me start drinking this early in the night. She asks if he’s ever had a girl, and he says yes. Tosh: “What happened?” Um, let’s see, there was this war and Tommy got frozen and now it’s 90 years later and she’s totally dead. Moron. Awkwardest date everrrrr.

Gwen wanders down the hall of updated St Teilo’s, which seems to be abandoned or just not in use. The lighting and stuff is very creepy. She wanders down one of the long wards and a guy on crutches, right leg amputated below the knee, is watching her. Gwen calmly says hello, but he just stares. She keeps trying to talk to him, but he starts crutching forward determinedly. Gwen backs away slowly, trying to figure out if he can see her or is just wandering at random and happens to be following her, but eventually fear takes over and she panics, screaming. The ghost vanishes. Gwen looks a little embarrassed that she hasn’t got better self-control by now, and keeps walking around, looking for more ghosts. The lights start flickering again, and just as Gwen’s starting to get wound up there’s a loud bang. She whips around to see some construction workers watching her in amusement. Way to be a wuss, Gwen. Later, she’s come back with Jack and tells him the hospital is condemned. Jack says all the psychic trauma has charged the building up in some way. He crouches down and starts rambling about how awful the war was. I get distracted because John Barrowman is just so goddamn pretty. Gwen waits patiently until he snaps out of “back in my day” mode. That was a nice story, grandpa. Now let’s go get you a nice bowl of mush. And maybe a pretty tea-boy.

Back in the bar, Tommy is ordering drinks when the news comes up on the tv. Tommy watches some scenes from Iraq and gets all misty-eyed, saying WWI was supposed to be the “war to end all wars,” and in the end it was all for nothing. There’s a downer of a moment and then he smiles at her. She says what, and Tommy says he’d do anything for Tosh. “All you’d have to say is, ‘Tommy, you’re my brave, handsome hero, and I need you!’” Dawwwwww he is so cute. He says anything she needs at all, all she has to do is call, and he’ll come running – and suddenly he cringes. His head hurts. They’re tearing down the hospital. Jack and Gwen (in a different wing, I assume) are wandering around in the dark. Jack wanders off on his own with a huge flashlight. From behind him he hears someone singing, “Tick tock, wind up the clock. Large and small, I like em all …” It’s not, unfortunately, Bilis, but some old guy in a wheelchair being pushed by a nurse. The nurse tells him to shush but he persists, “Tick tock, wind up the clock and I start my day over again …” Jack watches them go past, apparently oblivious to him, and wonders why he’s never allowed to sing on the show. I hear you, man. Owen is watching the rift activity back at base, and calls Jack to let him know he’s seeing some weirdness. Jack replies that he is aware of the weirdness, and checks on Gwen. Gwen has decided the room she’s in isn’t nearly spooky enough, and she’s decided to switch on some flickery lights to get the proper sort of mood. She cranks the dial to “maximum creepiness,” and it’s like goddamn Kingdom Hospital in here. Right on cue, a guy slumped over in a chair appears ahead of her. A nurse comes out from behind Gwen and tells the soldier he can go now. He heads off and the nurse turns the corner, then scares the shit out of me by leaning back and staring at Gwen. The nurse screws up her courage and steps forward, calling hello. Gwen ignores her, thinking she’s interacting with something back in her time, until the little nurse steps right up to her and says, “I see you!” Gwen freaks the fuck out, and the nurse starts chasing her down the hall, screaming “You shouldn’t be here!” until the lights flicker again and she’s gone. Gwen is like, oh for three here on the ghost-interaction scoreboard. We hears screams suddenly, but it’s just Tosh running down a dock while Tommy chases her playfully. He picks her up on his shoulders like the big loveable doof that he is, then puts her back down when she starts squealing.

They stare at each other for a second, a little breathless, then Tommy darts in and gives her a quick kiss. Tosh looks vaguely pissed, and Tommy’s hurt. She says “thanks,” and now he’s really hurt. Tosh? Again, this is why you NEVER GET LAID. Because you suck. I officially don’t feel sorry for you and your sad-sack ways anymore. Tosh lays some bullshit on him about age differences and stuff, and for chrissakes Tosh, the guy gets to come out once a year, and arrrrrrgh I’m not even getting into this. Tommy echoes my sentiments a little more nicely by calling her a daft lass and asking what goes on in her head. She gives up and kisses him back. She asks what he wants to do now, and he says, “Well, we could go back to mine, but there’s only room for one and it’s bloody freezing.” He eventually talks her into letting him come over to her place, and rushes off, all excited to get laid (Don’t get too worked up, dude, I’m pretty sure it’s nothing special. There is however, a super-kinky tea-boy who might be more than happy to oblige…) and Tosh’s cell rings. Tommy jumps up and down at the end of the dock all, “Come on! Sex! And nakedness and I wanna go nowwwwwwww,” but Tosh just looks solemn.

Back in the conference room, Jack is telling them that the hospital being demolished is going to trigger the time shift. Some of the Torchies are still confused about the whole concept, so Jack prepares a helpful demo. “Linear time!” he says, displaying a piece of A-4. “Screwed-up time!” he crumples it into a ball and throws it at Owen. Jack breaks them up and sends Toshi and Owen off to the hospital to monitor rift activity. Also to talk about issues, as we see when Owen starts cautioning Tosh about getting too close to Tommy. “You’ve fallen for him, haven’t you?” he asks, surprisingly gently. She says she doesn’t have to pretend around Tommy, and she can be herself, which, buh? Anyway, Owen hems and haws a little and finally manages, “I just … don’t want you to get hurt. That’s all.” Owen’s figured out what we all have by now which is that Tommy’s totally going to die. This awkward moment is conveniently interrupted by Gwen, who sends Owen scurrying down to the radiology department.

tbc.