Categories of Life
The fourth series of
Torchwood brought the cast and crew to a whole New World: North America. As
part of the production deal with STARZ, much of Torchwood Miracle Day would
take place in the United States, China, South America as well as the United
Kingdom, creating an international scope and scale to the production.
This month we’re again
combining two of the episodes because of the limited number of LA locations
used by each. A lot was shot, just not in a lot of places.
This month we’ll revisit CATEGORIES OF LIFE which takes us to
the rather disquieting Angels Gate Park in San Pedro, a long arm of Los Angeles
that drops some 25 miles south to the waterfront as well as back to Venice Beach
and the Warner Brothers Studio.
ANGELS
GATE PARK, SAN PEDRO
CATEGORIES
OF LIFE gives us the
first introduction to the three levels of “survival” as assigned by the world’s
governments (with nasty input from the PhiCorp crowd). If you are unfortunate
enough to be assigned categories one or two, well, you might just end up in
Angels Gate Park, in the Los Angeles district of San Pedro — adjacent to the
Port of Los Angeles.
The Angels Gate Park area
played a government concentration and execution base in which those people
deemed Category One were quite literally burned out of existence. (This begged
the question whether tiny little semi-sentient ashes continue to flutter around
the LA basin, but that’s a question for a different time and website.)
Walking around Angels Gate
park, which is a former World War II -era military site, is a fairly creepy
affair…at least on an early Sunday morning when few other people are likely to
be around. That’s an appropriate response, I think, for a location that for all
intents and purposes played the role of an American Auschwitz. Walking around
the locale — with virtually no restrictions, unlike the majority of TORCHWOOD
shooting sites — you cannot help but recall those scenes in the barracks as the
Torchwood members went undercover to discover the secrets of the camp.
Angels Gate has a far less
nefarious role in real life, having been reborn in #@$! as the Angels Gate
Cultural Center, dedicated to artistic projects and cultural exchange. Visitors
are welcome to walk the grounds and check out some of the art classes and
installations to be found around the campus.
Just avoid the ovens in
the back…
VENICE BEACH
For the second episode in
a row we’re in Venice Beach, where Torchwood has set up shop on Westminster
Avenue. At least that’s where their apartment is supposed to be located, and
the location shots show us just how a group like Torchwood can disappear into a
community like Venice Beach.
THE
FORUM - WEST LOS ANGELES
And finally, another new
site as Oswald Danes begins his rehabilitation tour and is confronted by Jack
Harkness for the first time. The Forum, a giant concert and sports entertainment
facility not too far from LAX.
Jack first meets and
attempts to reason with Oswald Danes, who is entirely too caught up in his ego
to possibly hear Jack’s words. These scenes were shot in the mammoth hallways
in The Forum’s “behind the scenes” walkways and halls. While I could not get
access to those areas, these shots show what the exterior of the facility looks
like, and generally what visitors may expect to see if they seek it out. A
better way to see the Forum, of course, is to take in a concert.
The Forum and a schedule
of events and concerts can be accessed here: http://www.thelosangelesforum.com
WARNER
BROTHER STUDIOS
And, of course, it’s back
to the Warner Brothers Studio in the Valley for on-set shooting.
That’s it for this month.
Let us know if you have any questions or clarifications. Otherwise...
Next time we really get
into the story and take a trip around LA for the shooting sites of TORCHWOOD, MIRACLE DAY: THE MIDDLE MEN
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