The New World (TV story)

The New World (TV story)

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The New World
Featuring:	Jack Harkness (returns) Gwen Cooper Rhys Williams Rex Matheson (introduction) Esther Drummond (introduction) Oswald Danes (introduction) Vera Juarez (introduction)
Main enemy:	Central Intelligence Agency
Main setting:
Key crew
Writer:	Russell T Davies
Director:	Bharat Nalluri
Producer:	Kelly A Manners (US) Brian Minchin (UK)
Release details
Release number:	32
Premiere broadcast:	8th July 2011

The New World was the first episode of the fourth series of Torchwood. It showed the first meeting between Captain Jack Harkness and Gwen Cooper since his departure from Earth at the end of Children of Earth: Day Five, and introduced new major characters Rex Matheson, Esther Drummond and Oswald Danes. It also introduced Gwen and Rhys' daughter Anwen.

Discounting flashbacks in Adam and Exit Wounds, it was the first Torchwood television story to be even partially set outside the United Kingdom. It was only the third DWU episode (in terms of date of release) to feature first unit principal photography in the United States, following DW: Day of the Moon. It was the first episode in the history of the DWU to feature any work done in the state of California.

Synopsis

One day, nobody dies. All across the world, nobody dies. And then the next day, and the next, and the next. People keep ageing – they get hurt and sick, but they never die. The result: a population boom, overnight.

With all the extra people, resources are finite. It’s said that in four month’s time, the human race will cease to be viable. But this can’t be a natural event – someone’s got to be behind it. It’s a race against time as CIA agent Rex Matheson investigates a global conspiracy. The answers lie within an old, secret British institute. As Rex keeps asking: “What is Torchwood?”, he’s drawn into a world of adventure, and a threat to change what it means to be human … for ever.

Plot

Oswald Danes is about to be put to death by lethal injection. As he is receiving the fatal concoction, he thrashes on the gurney. At the CIA, Esther Drummond is on the phone with Rex Matheson, who keeps asking, "What is Torchwood anyway?" As Esther is talking he is impaled by metal rods that fall from the truck ahead. Suddenly, the word 'Torchwood' is wiped from the system. Esther claims it must have been a virus. Gwen Cooper, former Torchwood agent, has woken from a nightmare. Oswald is talking to a governor's assistant. Oswald says he can't be held and executed again because of the Eighth and Fifth Amendments. Gwen is telling her daughter, Anwen, about a singing alien she once met. Rhys walks in, upset she is talking to their baby about Torchwood. They complain about the helicopters that fly over their private estate, and quickly pick up guns when the doorbell rings. Rhys placates Gwen as she has a panic attack, telling her the Torchwood days are over. Andy Davidson phones, to say her father is in hospital. They rush back to Cardiff, despite Rhys' warnings. He is still alive due to the Miracle but unwell. Her parents tell her that she shouldn't have come; "What if somebody sees you?"

Rex Matheson is taken to hospital and Esther is told his survival is a "Miracle". There have been a lot of in the last day. Soon all the headlines are naming this Miracle Day. No-one on the entire planet has died. Rex is soon recovering and talking to Esther on his mobile. The Torchwood files were uncovered at the exact moment the last person died. Esther looks for hard copies of the lost data, all categorised under 456. She finds the buried hard copies of the data in boxes and files, pictures of Captain Jack Harkness and Gwen, but is interrupted by Jack. She runs away. Esther finds someone has "killed" the archivist and is set upon by an armed man. Jack appears and shoots the man, who opens his coat to reveal bombs strapped to his body which he detonates. They escape by jumping from a window into a fountain below. Jack tells Esther everything about Torchwood, Gwen and extra-terrestrial lifeforms, and gives her a dose of the 'smart drug' Retcon - a selective amnesia pill.

Esther wakes up and finds a bruise on her body, a product of jumping from the CIA building into the fountain with Jack. Jack goes to the hospital Rex is in, where they have the remains of the suicide bomber. The man is still alive even though his whole body was burnt by the explosion. They try to take off his head to see if he will live. Rex secretly watches the operation, hacking into the security cameras. He tells Esther to book him a flight to the UK. He drives to Gwen and Rhys's house in Wales, and demands they tell him about Torchwood, but a helicopter flies up and the pilot fires a missile at the house. Gwen, Rhys and Rex see Jack firing at the helicopter; as they drive away, Gwen shoots the helicopter down with a missile launcher. The group arrive in Cardiff and Rex orders the police to arrest Jack, Gwen, and Rhys.

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
• Anwen Williams - Unknown
• Dr. Vera Juarez - Arlene Tur
• Noah Vickers - Paul James
• Alexander Peterssen - Brian Guest
• Geraint Cooper - William Thomas
• Mary Cooper - Sharon Morgan
• Andy Davidson - Tom Price
• Senior professor Victor Louis Santini - Ron Butler
• Rosita - Bunnie Rivera
• Joan Cabina - Heather Ann Smith
• Senior Guard Cole - Rocky McMurray
• Female hiker - Penny Bunton
• Male hiker - Phil Nice
• Charlotte Willis - Marina Benedict
• Male professor - Clint Jung
• Female expert - Laura Gardner
• Female anchor - Nischelle Turner
• Female anchor #2 - Jackie Torres
• Female anchor #3 - Jessica Matthews
• Male anchor - David Grant Wright
• Male anchor #2 - Jim Castillo
• TV journalist - Ellen Fox
• Senior male anchor - Rick Chambers
• Archivist - Van Epperson
• British Professor - Robin Sachs
• Angry nurse - Lauri Hendler
• Teenage girl - Carla Jeffery
• Nurse - Charlene Lovings
• Male nurse - Hymnson Chan
• Flight attendant - Laura Morgan

Crew

Created by Russell T Davies

Executive Producers   Russell T Davies, Julie Gardner and Jane Tranter with Bharat Nalluri

Co-executive producer   Vlad Wolynetz

Written by Russell T Davies	Produced by Kelly A Manners	Directed by Bharat Nalluri	Director of Photography Nathaniel Goodman	Production Designer Gregory Melton	Visual Effects Lion Visual Effects, Inc.
Key Make-up Artist Todd McIntosh	Casting by John Frank Levey, CSA and Melanie Burgess	Score Murray Gold assistant composer Stu Kennedy	Costume Designer Shawna Trpcic	Edited by Hunter M. Via, A.C.E.	Key Hair Stylist Susan Boyd
Science Advisor - John Sotos, M.D.

General production staff Production Executive - Shelley Stevens Associate Producer - Skip Schoolnik Location Manager - Joe Akerman Unit Production Manager - Robert D. Nellans Production Accountant - Vince Robinette Transportation Coordinator - Heath Culp Camera and lighting department 1st Assistant Director - W. Scott Wolf 2nd Assistant Director - Carla Bowen Script Supervisor - Anne Melville Camera Operator - Jeff Greeley Key Grip - Isaac Chee Chief Lighting Technician - Don Mosley	Art department Set Decorator - Natali Pope Set Designer - Arthur Chadwick Property Master - Eric Bates Construction Coordinator - Chris Forster Computer Graphics - Twisted Media	Make-up and prosthetics Special Make-up Effects - Greg Nicotero and Howard Berger General post-production staff Post-production Supervisor - Kenneth Requa High Definition Post-Production - Modern Videofilm, Inc. Special and visual effects Visual FX Supervisor - Michael D. Leone Sound Production Sound Mixer - Julian Howarth Supervising Sound Editor - Walt Newman Co-supervisor - Ken Young Music Editor - Tom Trafalski Re-recording Mixers - Dan Hiland, Gary Rogers Post-Production Sound - Warner Bros.

UK crew

General production staff Producer - Brian Minchin UK Production Designer - Edward Thomas Line Producer - Debbi Slater Production Executive - Julie Scott Unit Manager - Paul Davies Production Coordinator - Sam Baker Production Accountant - Sarah Hulls Stunt Co-ordinator - Lee Sheward	Camera, lighting and sound departments 1st AD - George Walker Camera Operators - Ian Adrian, Richard Stoddard Grips - John Robinson, Clive Baldwin Sound Recordist - Gareth Meirion Thomas Casting Original series and UK casting - Andy Pryor CDG	Make-up Make-up Designer - Claire Pritchard-Jones Costume Associate Costume Designer - Lindsay Bonaccorsi Effects Special Effects - Real SFX

Not every person who worked on this adventure was credited. The absence of a credit for a position doesn't necessarily mean the job wasn't required. The information above is based solely on observations of the actual end credits of the episodes as broadcast, and does not relay information from IMDB or other sources.
The Starz broadcast carried a final credit of "Originally Developed and Produced by BBC Cymru Wales. The BBC One broadcast says, instead, "BBC Worldwide Productions for BBC Cymru Wales and STARZ Originals".  The BBC One credits were different from the Starz credits inasmuch as the UK unit were concerned. The BBC One credits noted the grips, whereas the Starz credits noted the UK camera operators. BBC One credited unit manager Paul Davies, while Starz did not.

References

• Jack uses the alias Owen Harper.
• Gwen and Rhys have gone into hiding, seemingly under a witness protection program.
• UNIT and Geneva are referenced.
• Rendition is when an individual is taken from one legal jurisdiction to another. Matheson justifies his rendition of what remains of Torchwood Three by citing US Code 3184. In real life, this section of code actually does have to do with taking fugitives from another country to the United States.

Story notes

• Oswald Danes's release from prison plays with the audience's expectations. According to old American frontier legend, anyone who survives an execution is automatically set free. As this legend is actually untrue, the episode depicts a series of legal arguments — including unlawful imprisonment and force majeure arguments — that lead to Danes's release.
• The concept of people not dying and their wounds not healing if they're injured expands on the experiences of Owen Harper in the second season, although in his case he really was dead.
• Unlike broadcasts of Doctor Who and previous series of Torchwood this series was broadcast in the United States, Canada and Australia before the United Kingdom.

• United States - 8th July, 2011
• Australia and Canada - 9th July, 2011
• United Kingdom - 14th July, 2011

Ratings

• 1.51 million (Starz)
• 4.83 million (BBC)

Myths

to be added

Filming locations

to be added

Production errors

If you'd like to talk about narrative problems with this story — like plot holes and things that seem to contradict other stories — please go to this episode's discontinuity discussion.

• The first time Rex has his phone taken from him on the plane, the arm is bare. However, during the flashback, the arm is covered with Jack's vortex manipulator and sleeve. This is apparently deliberate to keep Jack's identity hidden.
• A television station covering Danes' parole, KCNU, has an on-screen graphic identifying it as being based in Kentucky. This is an impossibility, as all Kentucky stations (and nearly all US broadcast stations east of the Mississippi River) start with the letter "W". (Though, there actually is a 'grandfather' clause which allows stations established before the law mandating the use of the letter "W" to retain their original call letters.)

Continuity

• Esther finds files that show pictures of the 456 incident. (TW: Children of Earth)
• Esther also sees a picture of Jack, actually a publicity still from DW: The Empty Child, in which he was introduced.
• Gwen is said to have joined Torchwood in October 2006, the month that the first episode of Torchwood aired. However, it was actually 2007, as Gwen joined Torchwood a year after the Ninth Doctor accidentally brought Rose Tyler to 2006 instead of 2005. (TW: Everything Changes, DW: Aliens of London)
• Jack's comment about being "plain old human" after losing his immortality is similar to comments made by the Meta-Crisis Tenth Doctor in DW: Journey's End.
• After Esther comments about how she feels responsible for Rex's life-threatening accident, Jack replies he knows the feeling, possibly referring to the deaths of many Torchwood members and his grandson Steven Carter, for which he previously claimed to feel responsible. (TW: Children of Earth: Day Five)
• Esther asks Jack if the old photos she found of him were of his father. Rose Tyler previously used this to explain the Ninth Doctor's presence in the Kennedy assassination. (DW: Rose)
• The scene where Gwen ties Rex to a radiator is similar to when Amy Pond handcuffed the Eleventh Doctor to a radiator after he came back into her life in 2008. (DW: The Eleventh Hour)
• Jack uses the alias Owen Harper when infiltrating the hospital to study the incapacitated bomber. Owen Harper was the Torchwood Three medical officer who died (for the second and final time) at the conclusion of TW: Exit Wounds.

Timeline

For Jack

• This story occurs after his scenes in: DW: The End of Time
• This story occurs before: TW: Rendition

For Gwen and Rhys

• This story occurs after: TWN: First Born
• This story occurs before: TW: Rendition

For Rex and Esther

• This story occurs after: TWN: The Men Who Sold the World
• This story occurs before: TW: Rendition

For Oswald

• This story occurs before: TW: Rendition

Home video releases

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

External links

to be added