Transmat:Torchwood
John Barrowman (born 11 March 1967 in Glasgow) appeared as Captain Jack Harkness, beginning in TV: The Empty Child in 2005, leaving the series after the Series 1 finale, The Parting of the Ways. Barrowman subsequently portrayed Captain Jack in a spin-off series, Torchwood, which aired four series. Barrowman has also reprised Captain Jack in several episodes of Doctor Who from 2007 to 2010 and in a number of audio dramas produced for BBC Radio.
Categorisation of our Torchwood material is done in two categories, because Torchwood is both the name of the series and the name of the central organisation within the series. If you're looking for information about the Torchwood Institute, go to Torchwood. If you want behind-the-scenes information, the top-level category is category:Torchwood (TV series).
From the time when it became apparent that aliens on Torchwood would be trying to take over the world using sex gas, it was apparent that Torchwood was a little different from Doctor Who. But did you know that Torchwood is about more than just Captain Jack's little gang in Cardiff? That's just Torchwood Three. It's got multiple branches around Britain, and even an Indian subsidiary.
Just like its parent programme, Torchwood has spawned a range of novels and short stories. Writers known for their work with the classic version of Doctor Who have even written some of these prose stories, including former script editor Andrew Cartmel and prolific 1990s author Kate Orman.
People who work for the fictional Torchwood Institute are called Torchwood personnel. People who work on Torchwood are called Torchwood crew.
Torchwood has a unique record in DWU history: all of its series (or, if you like, seasons) have had strong continuing story lines. While there have been occasional standalone episodes, each series is narratively continuous, and leads to a payoff of some kind. Whether those payoffs are actually satisfying is, of course, nobody's business but your own.
Want to check out all the killer tech Torchwood gets to play with? Head on over to Torchwood Three's items and look inside the toybox!
If you've been around any kind of fandom, you know that people who are really into a programme love to make lists. It's not everybody's bag, of course — but if it's yours, we can provide a few. A common type of list you'll find on this site is the "list of appearances". These pages provide a quick reference sheet for the stories that featured a particular character. Torchwood's is at Category:lists of appearances by Torchwood regular characters.
It may surprise you to know that the more "adult" Torchwood did have some comic adventures. Most of them were in the pages of Torchwood Magazine, a short-lived companion of Doctor Who Magazine. The longest of these stories even made it into a trade paperback, Rift War. And some of the show's stars, like John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd even wrote a few comic stories.
