Articles - Everything Changes Episode Breakdown

By DJ Forrest

Producer – Richard Stokes, Chris Chibnall

Writer – Russell T Davies

Director – Brian Kelly

Script Editor – Brian Minchin

Composer Orchestral soundtrack – Ben Foster

Additional music from The Pipettes – We Are The Pipettes (2006), The Kooks – She Moves In Her Own Way (2006), Snow Patrol – Spitting Games (2003)

John Tucker lies dead from a stab wound to the back, it’s raining, and SOCO are on the scene, Police have cordoned off the area and officers are dotted about the scene keeping back crowds, standing within the cordon.

WPC Gwen Cooper arrives with a Starbucks coffee and enquires after the situation to her partner of 4 years, PC Andy Davidson As he begins to explain, SOCO are pulled off the scene, Police move the crowd back and a black SUV, with black out windows pulls up, and four people exit.

Medical Officer Dr Owen Harper strolls casually towards the body in the alley way beside the NCP car park, joining him are his two Asian colleagues Toshiko Sato, computer specialist, and Suzie Costello, second in command of the team, joining them is Captain Jack Harkness, head of Torchwood 3.  Dressed in a military coat, that belonged in the Second World War, Captain Jack Harkness looks too young to have seen such active service.

The rain doesn’t let up.  Jack surveys the scene while the team set up, he thinks out loud, not expecting an answer.  Gwen Cooper is curious as to who the team are, and heads off into the NCP building for a closer look, peering over the ledge high above the team. 

“There you go! I can taste it! Oestrogen. Definitely oestrogen. Take the pill, flush it away, it enters the water cycle. Feminises the fish. Goes all the way up into the sky then falls all the way back down onto me. Contraceptives in the rain. Love this planet. Still, at least I won't get pregnant. Never doing that again.”

Suzie Costello has with her the Resurrection Glove and prepares John Tucker, her gloved hand just under his head.  Suddenly the lights glow brighter and the rain stops.  John Tucker is brought back to life but the team only has 30 seconds to find out what killed him.  When Toshiko realises that John Tucker saw nothing, she runs out of questions to ask him.  Jack Harkness crouches beside the man, introduces himself and asks the burning question.  “Tell me, what was it like when you died?  What did you see?  John.  Tell me what you saw.”

“Nothing.  I saw nothing...Oh my God.  There’s nothing.”

As John slipped back into death, Jack got to his feet. Owen quibbled about Toshiko’s handling of the victim’s, while Jack pondered on what the right way was.  He threw up his question to Gwen Cooper who had been watching them.  “What do you think?”

In the Police Dept, Gwen hands around coffees while the head of CID begins to discuss the cases pinned to the board, most stabbed in the front but John Tucker was stabbed from behind.  One CID officer asks why this is the case and is told it’s because they are looking for a coward.

Gwen asks Yvonne on Traffic if she can look up someone for her, a Captain Jack Harkness. 

Later that day Gwen Cooper heads to The Cornwall pub with PC Andy Davidson in a bid to calm a pub brawl, but is thrown against the wall in a tussle and hits her head.  Despite obvious concussion she heads towards the exit of the hospital in time to see a familiar man in military coat haring up the stairs.  With her curiosity piqued she follows after him to a sealed off corridor.  She enquires about it to the hospital Porter.  Unable to give her an answer the hospital porter disappears and Gwen, steps through the taped door and into the silent corridor.  She calls out to anyone who might be there and as if on cue a weevil (Paul Kasey) steps out silently from another room and watches her guardedly.  Gwen keeps talking, keeps her eyes front, aware the person in the ‘mask’ could be armed and dangerous.  She’s so close now that it would only take one wrong move for it all to go pear-shaped.  The hospital porter enters, breaking the tense moment and tells her about the chemical spill and why it was sealed off at 9am. 

He sees the weevil and thinks it’s a student in fancy dress.  So impressed he goes for a closer look and points at the snarling mouth and the teeth.  In that split second the hospital porter is attacked by the weevil, in the commotion, the Torchwood team contain the weevil while the dashing airman ushers Gwen out of the corridor yelling “GO GO GO GO!”

Gwen runs till she’s running through the corridors of the hospital and out of the building.  Getting her breath she hears the rev of an engine and follows the sound, that inkling of a hunch and jumps out of the way as the SUV hurtles out of the car park sounding its horn.  Gwen jumps out of the way but gives chase, running to the police car, the ID on the vehicle memorised she calls it in as she drives Andy’s patrol car out of the hospital and after the Torchwood Range Rover. 

Yvonne who has researched the Captain tells Gwen that there is only one Captain Jack Harkness in existence, “...but on the night of January 21st 1941, Captain Jack Harkness failed to turn up for duty....Are you chasing ghosts, Gwen?”

The SUV decants the team at the Millennium Centre while it heads off to park.  Gwen pulls up her patrol car and heads out after the team, calling in vain to them.  The security guy (Mark Heal) distracts Gwen a moment on his insistence that she move the squad car, when she looks back, the team have vanished.  It’s impossible!

As rain pelts the windscreen of the squad car Andy climbs into the passenger seat, wet through.  “I walked, I bloody walked!”

Unconvinced that his partner Gwen Cooper saw anything out of the ordinary, and blaming the bump to her head distorting the truth, convinces her she needs to go home, unbeknown to either of them, they are being watched from CCTV cameras.

Later in the evening Gwen convinces her boyfriend Rhys  that she has to work, they’re a man down on the shift and there’s a football match on.  Despite his protestations, he relents and Gwen heads out to find out more about Torchwood and the mysterious team who can disappear in the blink of an eye. It’s a cool night as she lingers about the water tower expecting someone to appear, a touch of rain in the air.  Its dark and the roads are reasonably quiet, she hears the sound of a scooter and sees a pizza delivery boy on his rounds and goes in search of the Jubilee Pizza house.  A young lad with his arm in a plaster cast is behind the counter.  Gwen asks him if he’s ever served a Captain Jack Harkness, or Jack or Mr Harkness but all names draw a blank on the shop computer, but as Gwen turns to leave she strikes it lucky when she asks if he’s ever had orders from Torchwood.  “Aye we deal with them all the time, good customers.”  He tells her.

Armed with two large pizzas Gwen walks along the boardwalk towards the Tourist Booth door, just along the jetty.  It’s eerily quiet with only the water lapping against the boards as Gwen makes her way slowly, cautiously towards the door. 

She lingers in the Tourist Booth and looks about as a young man in a smart suit steps from the next room, a mug of coffee in his hand and greets her courteously.  He asks who had ordered the pizzas, on the mention of Captain Jack Harkness the door behind her slams shut.  Ianto smiles.  Gwen looks nervous.  “Don’t keep him waiting!”  Ianto gently encourages.  Gwen goes through the open door towards a lift, taking her down to the base.  The lift door opens and Gwen steps into a  world like no other, a life underground, fully operational.  A woman works on a metal artefact with an acetylene torch and visor.  Captain Jack Harkness walks along the metal gangplank from the boardroom, down towards his office passing Gwen at the door, casually glances over but remains impassive and walks to his desk, taking his seat and resumes paperwork as if it’s a normal day.  Susie Costello removes her visor and switches off the torch, and as Gwen climbs the stairs, both Owen and Toshiko begin to giggle and snigger unable to maintain the impression that they haven’t been aware of Gwen all this time.

Gwen becomes aware that all of her movements outside for the past three hours have been monitored by the team.  She also discovers that the porter at the hospital was murdered, and that his body was removed and his work schedule manipulated so that his work colleagues would be none the wiser.  Gwen begins to feel out of her depth.  A group of people who can fake a man’s death could quite easily bump her off and not feel a shred of remorse. 

Captain Jack Harkness introduces his team before leading Gwen downstairs to meet the murderer, an ugly looking alien creature with savage eyes and teeth and wears a boiler suit.  The Captain informs Gwen that the creature is a weevil, least that’s what he calls them, as they have no form of communication, they have no idea what kind of creature it really is.  Gwen sits at Jack’s instruction and looks into the eyes of the creature fascinated, perhaps a little scared, but doesn’t show it. 

A short time later after the team leave to their respective homes, Jack takes Gwen out out through the roof that takes her to the water tower, he explains why people can’t see them, tells her about the Rift, but all Gwen is concerned about is the bloody great big hole in the ground that anyone could fall in.  “That is so Welsh” Jack retorts.  “I show you something fantastic and you have to find fault with it.”

In a bar in town Jack watches Gwen knock back a good quart of her beer while he drinks a pint of water slowly.  They talk about the aliens and artefacts that Jack and his team have caught and found, about the work that they do. Jack tells Gwen about the alien stuff they scavenge and how none of it leaves the Hub, unaware that Susie has taken the Resurrection Glove home and is testing it on a fly, bringing it back to life, Toshiko is testing out the Data Scanner on The Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens and Owen has taken out a bottle of cologne with intentions of pulling tonight. 

In the bar where Owen picks up more than just one date for the night Snow Patrol blast out their single “Spitting Games” from the speakers.

Gwen offers her services as liaison in catching the killer, but wires crossed, Jack isn’t looking to find the killer, Torchwood are only interested in the glove, they need victims, recently traumatic victims to test the glove.  Gwen dislikes the way Jack talks about the bodies as if they’re not important, and given what Jack and his team have, feels it’s her duty to report it.  Jack smirks.  “If you remember...how’s your drink?”  Realising with horror that she’s been drugged with something that will not only make her sleep but also forget everything she’s seen, she runs home, and begins writing up everything she can about her night, unaware that Ianto Jones, is already preparing to delete all her hard work.  As the screen goes blank, Gwen’s eyes become heavy and she falls asleep, at the desk in front of the computer.

The next morning in work and Yvonne has news about Gwen’s missing captain but Gwen has no idea who she’s talking about.  Up in CID however there’s something about the knife she’s seen in the sketch on the board, forensics had come up with something pretty brutal to inflict the damage on the poor victims.  Although Gwen can’t remember anything else about that night in the pub, and the lead up to Torchwood, the knife bothers her, she sees images of it in her mind, and unable to sleep one night sits at the desk beside the computer and sketches the knife.  Discarding it as it just didn’t fit the image in her head leans back in her chair and stares at the books casually on the desk, her eyes settle on the Millennium Centre book and in biro the words REMEMBER ME. 

Standing outside the Millennium Centre, the water tower to her right she sees a silhouetted figure step from the shadows and reveal herself to Gwen.  It’s Suzie Costello and she’s got a confession to make. 

Suzie tells Gwen that sometimes something can trip the amnesia just once and it’s enough to remember.  Gwen could remember the knife that Suzie pulled from her shoulder bag but not why she could remember it.  She began to read Suzie the Riot Act when Suzie pulled out her gun after putting away the knife.  Aiming it at Gwen and cocking the hammer, Suzie went on about her job, how it got inside you, and how as Captain Jack Harkness came up through the hole in the ground “the perception filter doesn’t work on me.”  She shoots Jack in the forehead killing him stone dead.  He falls down between them on the ground, shocking Gwen but not Suzie, who steps towards Gwen. 

Suzie knew the game would be up if she stayed in Cardiff.  Killing Jack and now finishing Gwen would give her enough of a head start, but she wasn’t banking on Jack coming back to life. 

Knowing the game was up; Suzie placed the gun beneath her chin and pulled the trigger.  Shocked at the traumatic scenario that had opened up in front of her, Gwen stared at the body announcing “I remember.”

The Resurrection Glove was packed into the vaults and sealed never to be used again, and Toshiko and Owen returned the items they’d removed also.  Up on the roof of the Millennium Centre, just as the sun was coming up, Jack thanked Gwen for not telling the team that he could come back from the dead.  He also offered her a job.  “There’s a vacancy – do you want it?”

Gwen accepts,

©BBC Torchwood 2006