Well, you’ve got to hand it to him.  Russell T Davies knows how and when to impress.  He did it abundantly with his reinvention of Dr Who, but dropped the ball somewhat with his own episodes.  Or maybe it’s just that he picked his team of writers well and was admirably outshone by some, most notably the amazing Stephen Moffat, whose contributions to the show have been outstanding.

And then there was Torchwood.  An intriguing concept for a spinoff, but which fell flat on its face in the first series, to such an extent that I didn’t follow all the episodes.  Second series was sexed up to better effect…and now we have a five part Torchwood in its premiere on BBC1.  And, wouldn’t you know it, Davies has played a blinder and done a fine job on the first episode.

It worked perfectly for people who haven’t seen the show before, and things have moved on in interesting ways for those who have followed the series.  The set-up was achieved convincingly, and Davies demonstrates how well he can write when he’s on a roll, seamlessly bringing together everyday events and emotions against a cosmic backdrop.  There’s that patented Davies sensawunda, the bit you always get in his scripts about how wonderful it is to be alive in a universe where there are aliens and love and that, and as ever it comes across as fresh and sincere, even if you’ve heard the sentiments expressed a few times by now.

The episode plays a clever game with viewers, setting up one character to be a new member of the team before revealing that he’s a plant from military intelligence, a baddy out to eek out Torchwood’s secrets.  Dastardly, huh?  But nothing compared to the trick they play on Captain Jack, opening him up to plant a bomb inside him that will destroy the team’s base.  All expertly set up, so that the tech used to do such things without a trace has already been shown in use by Captain Jack himself: an elegant display of how to give the audience information with maximum economy.

The story itself was creepy in the extreme, and a good example of how a simple concept can be used to good effect.  In this instance, all the children on the planet freeze at the same time, first for a few minutes at one point, and then again later where they all intone ‘We are coming’. Big time creepy: Midwich Cuckoos on a global rather than village scale.

It’s all brilliantly handled, and the balance of character drama with the big plot is perfect.  Gwen goes to talk with an adult mental patient who did what the kids were doing and, as well as discovering clues about something that happened to a group of kids in the 1960s, is told by him that she’s pregnant.  Captain Jack is a bit of a bastard to the daughter who looks pretty much the same age as he does, and is also dealing with being in a relationship with his colleague Ianto.  It’s that seasoning that gives Torchwood its character, and raises it above the standard of previous genre offerings such as X-Files.

Fingers crossed, this experiment in running Torchwood every night at 9 on BBC1 will prove a success.  I hope so: with each season, the series has upped its game, and it deserves a bigger audience than it’s been getting to date.  Tonight’s episode ended on a cracking cliffhanger, and I’ll be there tomorrow to see how it’s resolved.  Put it this way: I’ve not been shouting from the rooftops about Torchwood up till now for a very good reason, so if you’ve seen it before and been disappointed, give this week’s story a try — you might enjoy changing your mind.