Dead of Night (TV story)

Dead of Night was the third episode of Torchwood: Miracle Day.

Synopsis
Torchwood goes on the run and finds a new enemy, but as they launch a raid on PhiCorp headquarters, Jack must confront the mysterious Oswald Danes.

Plot
Rex and Esther have joined Torchwood out of necessity. The team successfully acquire the phone through which CIA Director Friedkin received mysterious orders to exterminate Torchwood, from Friedkin. The team follow leads and uncover a stockpile of painkillers at the pharmaceutical corporation PhiCorp, indicating they knew the Miracle was going to happen. At loose ends, Jack takes the night off and picks up a man in a bar, and Rex seeks solace in his surgeon, Vera Juarez. Juarez tells Rex that PhiCorp representative Jilly Kitzinger has invited her along to an important meeting the next day; Rex recruits Juarez to listen in for Torchwood, while Gwen goes on site with the special Torchwood contact lenses and steals information from Kitzinger's computer. The meeting turns out to be a seminar. There the PhiCorp CEO announces plans to make painkillers legal to purchase without prescription. At Torchwood HQ, Rex and Esther receive a mysterious phone call from Friedkin's anonymous superiors. Figuring their base has been compromised, they realise that Torchwood must now leave Washington, D.C. Released murderer Oswald Danes struggles to fit in the real world. After being assaulted by police officers he accepts Kitzinger's offer of representation. He attends a select board meeting at PhiCorp. PhiCorp award him personal security on the condition he promotes their new painkiller legislation on national television to his growing following. Suspicious of Danes, Jack confronts him at the TV station. Jack gets Danes to admit that he does not feel forgiveness, but also that he enjoyed the rape and murder of his twelve-year-old victim. Jack realises that Danes has a death wish that is being denied him. Danes' security assaults Jack and releases him onto the streets just as Danes tells the world about the need for PhiCorp's painkiller legislation.

Cast

 * Jack Harkness - John Barrowman
 * Gwen Cooper - Eve Myles
 * Rex Matheson - Mekhi Phifer
 * Esther Drummond - Alexa Havins
 * Rhys Williams - Kai Owen
 * Oswald Danes - Bill Pullman
 * Dr. Vera Juarez - Arlene Tur
 * Brian Friedkin - Wayne Knight
 * Congressman Morganthall - Richard Gilliland
 * Carla - Tasha Ames
 * Nurse - Michelle Wong
 * George Sayer - Richard Augustine
 * Local Reporter - Thea Andrews
 * Brad - Dillon Casey
 * Cop - Maurice Webster
 * Dr Rosenbloom - David Youse
 * Jilly Kitzinger - Lauren Ambrose
 * Dr Murphy - Brian Treitler
 * Sunroof Screamer - Jason Medwin
 * Senior TV Anchor - Mitchell Edmonds
 * Candice Perlmutter - Randa Walker
 * Young Man - Daryl Crittenden
 * Preacher - George Murdock
 * Atlanta Cop - Matt Eyde
 * Phi-Corp Rep. - Ted Mattison
 * Woman Tourist - Mary Garripoli

Drugs and medicines

 * PhiCorp has been stockpiling pain-killing drugs for over a year.

Individuals

 * Esther Drummond has an older sister for whom she cares.
 * Esther's job at the CIA was to read and search through blogs.
 * Jack Harkness has protected sex with a bartender called Brad.
 * Ianto Jones is referenced in dialogue, and the deaths of past Torchwood members is also referenced.
 * Rex describes Jack as being a man in his forties.

Technology

 * Gwen uses the Torchwood contact lenses, (which she kept following Torchwood's destruction) to infiltrate PhiCorp. She claims they are isomorphic, but this is a lie (as spotted by Esther and also as indicated by their use by Lois Habiba in Children of Earth .)
 * Jack states they are from a distant moon in a distant galaxy.

Theories and concepts

 * Jack states the PhiCorp warehouse is bigger on the inside.
 * Jack mentions doing a search for morphic fields.

Weapons

 * Gwen uses a spike strip to stop a police car.

Story notes

 * The two sex scenes in the episode, one involving Jack and Brad, and another involving Vera and Rex, were seen in the US (Starz), Canadian (Space) and Australian (UKTV) broadcasts, but were edited in the UK (BBC) broadcast, with the scene between Rex and Vera excised completely.
 * This is the first time in any of the Doctor Who spin-offs or main show that a woman's posterior is seen fully. In other shows like Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures, only a brief, plumber's crack is shown.


 * Unlike broadcasts of Doctor Who and previous series of Torchwood this series was broadcast in the United States, Australia and Canada before the United Kingdom.
 * United States - 22nd July 2011
 * Australia and Canada - 23rd July 2011
 * United Kingdom - 28th July 2011

Ratings

 * UK: 5.49 million

Myths
to be added

Filming locations
to be added

Production errors

 * Note the car that Rex is driving when he pulls away from Gwen and Jack - Leaving them behind. It's a four door car. In the next shot of Rex driving down the freeway the model of the car has changed and is now a two door car.
 * Noticeable continuity errors involving arm and prop placement are seen in the sequence where Vera smokes a cigarette as she speaks to Jilly.

Continuity

 * When Rex decides what the team should do, Jack rhetorically asks him who's giving the orders. Rex then asks Jack what they should do, and Jack repeats Rex's suggestion. Jack had a similar exchange (only with roles reversed) with the Ninth Doctor in DW: Boom Town.
 * When Jack, Gwen and Rex discover the massive stockpile of painkillers that PhiCorp has stored, Jack comments that the building is "bigger on the inside then on the outside. "

Home video releases
This episode will be released on DVD and Blu-ray on the 14th November 2011, alongside the other nine episodes.