Miracle Day: End of the Road

"You've got the only corpse on planet Earth."

Writers: Ryan Scott & Jane Espenson

Format: TV

Broadcast: 26th August 2016

Series: Torchwood 4.08

Featuring: Captain Jack, Gwen, Rex, Esther 

Synopsis 

Captain Jack faces a showdown with a man he thought long dead, but will the outcome be beneficial? Rex takes extreme action but is it too late to prevent the collapse of society?

Verdict 

Miracle Day: End of the Road was yet another excellent episode of Torchwood and sees us really get into the business end of this fantastic fourth and final series. It's a great shame that given the success this series had they haven't produced a fifth series in the five years since but even so, what we had was wonderful and I'm not quite finished yet. With only two episodes to go, we're still no nearer to discovering the truth about the Miracle but we're getting close. Jack's theory about a morphic field has been proven true and as we follow on from Immortal Sins, Jack is reunited with a long lost lover in the form of Angelo. After what he saw in 1920s New York with Jack, he fully believed in immortality but was set aside by the Three Families who seem to be the key behind the Miracle. We've seen one spearhead of a family in the form of the mysterious man offering Jilly a promotion and shooting Shawnie who he somehow knew was part of the CIA. The revelation that Charlotte was another part of these Three Families was wholly unexpected but absolutely brilliant. The very person Esther thinks she can trust and has on the case to finding members of the Three Families is actually one of them. She's infiltrating from within and I love it. The return of Friedkin was short lived as he proved just how inadequate he was. Rex had cleverly taken the Torchwood contact lenses and had Friedkin's confession broadcast and ready for transmission. Once Shapiro arrived, he took full control and in a comedic moment it appeared that Torchwood had joined the CIA. Given their recent crisis, it didn't seem like a bad move at all. His relationship with Gwen was humorous and I loved how she stood up to him. Her reiteration of not being English was truly wonderful but nonetheless she was sent back home. After a two episode absence we saw Oswald Danes back and he was just as creepy as ever. Brian Pullman plays the role so incredibly well. His dancing in front of Jilly was rather humorous but I liked how she knew she wouldn't have to deal with him much longer. The introduction of a category 0 was being passed through legislation and this meant that people who deserved to die because of their crimes would also be placed in the ovens alongside category 1 victims. That meant Oswald's death sentence would be properly carried out. The death of Angelo was a bit of a surprise considering nobody was dying but as my opening quote suggests, he was the first person to die since the Miracle. Jack knew why from an early stage but Esther soon worked things out for herself and also showed her strong allegiance with the CIA by going against Jack's instructions and revealing the truth about the floor under Angelo's bed. The null field was intriguing and I liked how Jack knew all about it. He knew it meant trouble and it was not good news at all. The Three Families had found the Blessing by the sounds and Jack needed to get away. Rex and Esther went some way to achieving that but in the chaos of escape, Jack was shot. He was no longer immortal so Captain Jack was dying. Esther didn't know what to do or where to go and Gwen was on a plane back home so she couldn't help. Things weren't looking good. Is Jack going to die? Well I guess I'll find out tomorrow. Overall, another brilliant episode!

Rating: 9/10