Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (TV story)

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang was the first episode in the second series of Torchwood. It introduced Captain John Hart and the Blowfish species. It saw the team question Jack's past again.

Synopsis
Captain John Hart, an old friend of Captain Jack Harkness, appears through the rift and causes problems for the Torchwood team.

Plot
It is midnight on a lonely Cardiff street. As an old woman approaches a crossing with traffic lights, a red Chrysler Crossfire sports car races through Cardiff, driven by a Blowfish. The traffic lights go red. He stops and impatiently urges the old lady to cross the street. The Torchwood SUV stops and asks the lady if she saw the Blowfish; she points them in the right direction. After they've gone, she mutters, "Bloody Torchwood!" The team catch up with the Blowfish after a short chase. Owen shoots the tires, forcing the Blowfish to leave the car. He flees into a house, where he shoots a resident and holds another hostage. The team hold him at gunpoint and the Blowfish taunts them and dares Ianto to shoot him, but Ianto hesitates. A shot is heard, killing the Blowfish. When Ianto turns around, he sees Jack, who fired the shot. He greets the team with the words, "Hey kids, did ya miss me?"

At the Hub, the team want to know where Jack has gone. He tells them he has seen the right doctor. Ianto asks why he returned. He "came back for you (Ianto)", then widens this statement to include the whole team. Tosh notices that there has been Rift activity.

Captain John Hart walks through the Rift at the top floor of a multi-storey car park. He sees a man held at knife-point, and intervenes, grabbing the mugger's neck and dropping him over the edge to his death. Hart tells the victim he was never here. Hart goes to a nightclub and tells everyone who he finds unattractive to leave before pulling out two side-arms in front of the bouncers. Everyone panics and runs out. Torchwood Three sees the body of the dead mugger on the street. Tosh notices traces of Rift energy from his neck. Jack then gets a message on his wrist device; a hologram of Hart appears, telling him to come to the nightclub, alone. He does, but the others follow him in a taxi. When Jack arrives in the club, he and Hart approach each other and kiss, then fight. They stop for a drink. Hart tells him that the Time Agency is gone, and he has been to several rehabs for drink, drugs, sex and murder. Hart sees the others and realises that Jack has a new team now, called Torchwood. Jack explains that Hart was his partner. Hart also tells the rest of the team more about Jack than Jack himself said. He asks, "What are you doing here?"

Hart says that there are three deadly radiation cluster bombs scattered over Cardiff that could endanger everyone on Earth. They enter Torchwood Three station and John is checked for weapons. He has many, including several concealed knives and pistols. Jack takes Gwen to the side to tell her he has seen the end of the world. He shows signs of having fallen for Gwen, and jealousy when he realises Gwen is going to marry Rhys because "nobody else would have her", but they should go "back to work". Tosh finds the locations of three bombs all over the city. Gwen organises the team to go searching for the bombs in pairs: Jack and Ianto, Owen and Tosh, and Gwen and Hart. Jack has problems with this and talks to Gwen alone. Gwen explains she could get to know Hart better and to learn what he is really up to. Jack agrees and gives Gwen three rules on how to handle Hart: she should keep him in front of her at all times, she should never trust him, and she should not let him kiss her.

The teams split up and Gwen and Hart are in the container docks. After some flirting, they find a cluster bomb in a container. Once Gwen has it, Hart kisses her, paralysing her. Hart throws away her phone and tells Gwen she has two hours before her organs shut down and she dies. He runs away. Meanwhile, Owen and Tosh are in an abandoned building and find the bomb, but Hart arrives, knocks out Tosh, and shoots Owen in the hip.

Jack and Ianto are in an office building searching for the other bomb. Jack asks Ianto out on a date. He explains that John Hart is someone reminding him of his past and wants to be done with him. Ianto accepts. Jack goes to the roof. Ianto hears a noise and realises it is Hart, holding him at gunpoint. Hart tells him Owen and Gwen are in trouble.

Jack finds the last cluster bomb and is confronted by Hart again. Hart wants the cluster bomb, but Jack refuses. Hart wants Jack to join him running the Galaxy. Jack isn't tempted, and throws the bomb over the edge. Hart pushes Jack off the roof to another of his "deaths". Hart gets the bomb and tells the "dead" Jack that murder rehab never worked. He returns to the Hub.

Ianto goes to Owen and helps Tosh dress his wound. They then go to the docks and eventually find Gwen just in time and inject her with an anti-toxin, after running tests, on Tosh's laptop, and finding that Hart had poisoned her. At dawn, Hart goes to the corpse of the Blowfish, who worked for him, and takes out a small pyramid shaped object from his pocket. He is then surprised to see the rest of the team, holding him at gunpoint, and even more surprised to see Jack, who then explains that he is immortal. Hart then tells the truth; there are no cluster bombs. He was looking for an Arcadian diamond that belonged to a lover of his once, but he killed her. The "bombs" are actually a device that would lead him to the location of the diamond. However, once they've assembled the device, the woman's hologram says there is no diamond. A device shoots into Hart's chest, and the hologram explains that the device is a bomb that locks into the DNA of whoever killed her and it can't be removed without it prematurely exploding. There are ten minutes until the bomb goes off, but Hart cuffs himself to Gwen. She has a plan that would kill her and Hart, but would save the city. Tosh says that the Rift is still open from Hart's arrival. Gwen takes Hart there, but Jack and Owen stay behind and quickly work on a solution. They arrive at the car park, quickly followed by Jack and Owen, who inject Hart with the DNA of all Torchwood members, which will temporarily confuse the bomb. The bomb releases itself and they throw it through the Rift, with just one second to spare. Just as it explodes, they are shifted back in time to the same moment Hart arrived. Hart, impressed, agrees to let Gwen go and reluctantly agrees to go back home. Before he disappears, he says, "By the way, I found Gray". Jack, shocked, is asked who or what "Gray" is. He just says that it is nothing.

Cast

 * Captain Jack Harkness - John Barrowman
 * Gwen Cooper - Eve Myles
 * Owen Harper - Burn Gorman
 * Toshiko Sato - Naoko Mori
 * Ianto Jones - Gareth David-Lloyd
 * Captain John Hart - James Marsters
 * Rhys Williams - Kai Owen
 * PC Andy Davidson - Tom Price
 * Elspeth Morgan - Menna Trussler
 * Blowfish - Paul Kasey
 * Mugger - Crispin Layfield
 * Victim - Nathan Ryan
 * Hologram Woman - Inika Leigh Wright
 * Teenage Girl - Sarah Whyte
 * Bouncer - Robert Stone (uncredited)

Story notes

 * According to his memoir, Doctor Who: The Writer's Tale, Russell T Davies was originally scheduled to write this episode, but the job was passed on to Chris Chibnall. Davies conceived the opening segment of the episode featuring the blowfish and the sports car.
 * When Jack tells John that his team is called 'Torchwood', John seems disappointed and lists alternate and (he believes) more suitable names, including 'Excalibur'. This was the title of the original show that Russell T Davies created before turning it into a Doctor Who spin-off.

Ratings

 * Overnight - 3.7 million viewers.
 * Official BARB ratings - 4.22 million viewers.

Filming locations
to be added

Production errors

 * In the scene when the rest of Torchwood arrive at the bar after Jack and John's fight, the slide on Gwen's gun is locked back, showing that it was empty

Continuity

 * Gray is later revealed to be Jack's brother, whom he lost when aliens attacked the Boeshane Peninsula and captured him. Gray would also serve as one of the main story-arcs of the second series.
 * Jack says that he left because he found "the right sort of Doctor", referring to the Tenth Doctor. He also says he saw the "end of the world" (referring to events in DW: Utopia, The Sound of Drums and Last of the Time Lords). His comments to Gwen stating that he feels he belongs with Torchwood are consistent with his final words to the Doctor in Last of the Time Lords.
 * John Hart would return in Fragments and Exit Wounds.

Timeline
For Jack Harkness:
 * Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang occurs after DW: Last of the Time Lords.
 * Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang occurs before TW: Sleeper.

For Gwen, Tosh, Owen and Ianto:
 * Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang occurs after TW: End of Days.
 * Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang occurs before TW: Sleeper.

Home video releases

 * Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, along with the rest of Torchwood Series 2, was released in a complete series box set.