Tuesday, 24 December 2013

Gadgets & Gizmos They Keep Killing Suzie by Mickie Newton


Introduction

It’s deja-vu time peeps! Just as you thought it was safe to step back into the HUB, Suzie Costello has popped up again in issue 9’s episode of focus ‘They Keep Killing Suzie’ (damn right too you unpleasant lady!) But of course Suzie isn’t the only revisit, as we also have the return of the Resurrection Glove (Risen Mitten), which we shall skim over and then you can click on the provided hyper link to go back to issue’s 2’s article and we shall look more at the ‘Life Knife’ (where does Ianto come up with these names?). And finally we look at something a little off from the episode; the GPS used by Toshiko numerous times!

The Resurrection Gauntlet
(Segment from issue 2 article)

Also known as the ‘Risen Mitten’, so named by Ianto Jones.

The first thing we notice about the gauntlet is that it looks like a piece of a knight’s armour with its jointed fingers, held together with rivets and made for the right hand. The metal looks to be nothing more special than the aforementioned knight’s armour, but that’s where the similarities between them end.

The gauntlet was thought to have fallen through the rift around 1967 and into Cardiff Bay where it lay at the bottom until it was dredged almost 40 years later by Torchwood Three and at the time no one at Torchwood knew what it did.  So Captain Jack Harkness had his weapons expert and second in command, Suzie Costello (Indira Varma), do research and experiments with the gauntlet to try and find out what exactly it did…..

Issue 2 – Gadgets & Gizmos Article link

What Do We Have On Earth?
(Segment from issue 2 article)

When I try to think of something that returns someone from the dead, the nearest I can get is a defibrillator that is used by doctors and paramedics. Though in reality, and unlike in TV and movies, it is not used to re-start the heart when it ‘flat lines.’  When that happens CPR has to be used in order to get the heart going again, along with other things such as drugs and direct heart massage.

The reality is that a defibrillator is used when a heart fibrillates, meaning it’s out of its normal rhythm. The electrical jolt of the defibrillator knocks it back into rhythm.

The Life Knife

This ornately carved knife with winged blades along the edge was found along with the original Resurrection Glove. This knife was used by Suzie to initially kill her victims before she attempted to resurrect them with the glove.

In ‘They Keep Killing Suzie’ Jack and Gwen use the knife, in conjunction with the glove, to resurrect Suzie, stabbing it through her chest and into her heart, as the glove didn’t work on its own. This may be due to the fact that Suzie has been dead some time and the glove only works on the newly dead. It’s as if the knife enhances the power of the glove when they are used together.

What Do We Have On Earth?

Gosh let me think…is there ANYTHING like the Life Knife that brings people back to life when used with a scary glove…Errrmmmmmmm….No! No there isn’t!

But if we think about it in terms of killing people?! Yes…lots!

Global Positioning System or GPS

Almost always referred to as GPS, it is a very techy navigation system and that is also very sci-fi as it is space-based due to its use of satellites that move around earth. Now I could sit here reading through reams and reams of information and trying to break down and relay what I have managed to digest, but life is short and I know there’s so much going off in the world of Project Torchwood and our mega monthly issues that you really don’t have the time to sit here reading it all. You also may get VERY bored and leave me altogether and that’s just not good! So lets see if I can possibly manage to keep this to just a couple of paragraphs.

Ok we are able to pinpoint locations and times, regardless of weather, on or near the earth where there is an unobstructed line of sight between ourselves and that of four or more GPS satellites.  It is a system that is used to its full capacity by military, civil and commercial around the world and although owned and run by the United States, everyone has full use of it. It was created back in 1973 to replace other navigation systems that were very limited in their abilities. And integrated numerous predecessors; this did include a number of engineering design studies, that were classified, from the 1960s. It originally ran with 24 satellites and became fully operational in 1994. It didn’t become available for civilian use until President Ronald Reagan, after a Korean Boeing 747 strayed into USSR air space and was shot down killing 269 people in 1983, issued a directive that would make GPS available once it was sufficiently developed. The first satellite wasn’t launched until 1989 and the final and 24th GPS satellite to be launched was in 1994.

Today GPS can not only be found in military equipment and vehicles, but also planes, you can have GPS for your car and also hand-held units, we call these Sat Nav! We can also have them inTablets and mobile/cell phones. In fact pretty much anything you can fit with a ‘chip’ I would imagine.

We have seen Tosh use a hand-held unit in Torchwood, most notably ‘Countrycide’ and she used it to track the missing SUV. In ‘real life’ the hand-held units are used by hikers, mountain climbers and even canoeists & kayakers though by many they are considered an expensive & unnecessary piece of kit – however, they are often most valued by Mountain and other voluntary Rescue teams.  The police have also used GPS to locate mobile phones and on occasions missing laptops, if it is fitted and switched on.

Of course like with all gadgets and gizmos that come through the cog-door, the chances are they’ve been alien teched up (I think I have just created a new word!). In what form this may have taken is anyone’s guess! It could be as simple as increasing it’s range or what it will search for. As it’s hand-held, Toshiko may well have made it much more than just a GPS system. It may scan for life forms, or other alien tech. After all when you do see a scanner in Toshiko’s hand’s it’s usually the same gadget.

I am now hoping that all this babble about GPS makes some kind of sense. If not, forgive me, it’s Christmas!

What Do We Have On Earth?

Of course, as this is an earth-based piece of technology there is nothing other than this on earth. As I said before, it is very possible that it has been modified in some way by Toshiko using alien technology.

End Note:

And now I shall sign off. I wish all our readers a wonderful Christmas and hope you all have a fabulous New Year. See you all again in 2014!!

Mickie aka Tosh

Bibliography

Torchwood: The Encyclopedia by Gary Russell

The Torchwood Archives by Warren Martyn aka Gary Russell

Wikipedia

GPS



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