Fairies

I thought this week's "Torchwood" episode, "Small Worlds", was probably the best in the series yet. It was written by Peter J Hammond, who also created "Sapphire and Steel", one of my favourite ever fantasy serials. "Small Worlds" had a similar feel to "S & S" and was a rather eerie tale of fairies appearing in some local woods in Cardiff. However these fairies are far from good or innocent and periodically visit to take a "chosen one" i.e. a human being who has been selected to become one of their number, in this case, a young girl called Jasmine. The fairies will kill anyone who tries to harm the chosen one or stand in the way of their mission and throughout the story we see a number of their human opponents dying in a nasty fashion - suffocated by rose petals! At the end of the story Captain Jack is presented with a horrendous choice - allow Jasmine to join the fairies (and so be lost to her mother and normal existence forever) or, the fairies will use their powers to destroy all life on earth. Thinking of the greater good, Jack hands Jasmine over to the fairies and permits them to spirit her away, much to her mother's distress and the disgust of his Torchwood colleagues. But dear God!! What a choice!!

I found the concluding scenes to be tense, moving and well played - the whole difficulty of the choice that Jack had to make, Jasmine's yearning desire to join the fairies and the mother's grief at losing her daughter were all convincing. The scene in which the fairies reek havoc at the barbeque was gripping stuff too. The "real" fairies, as we see them unveiled toward the end, were quite horrible - all green and twisted, evil features - who's to say they must always look angelic and innocent?

The story did a good job of subverting established ideas. Fairies are something we normally associate with childhood and innocence and we tend to think of them of doing good, as in classic kiddies' fables. However "Small Worlds" turned the whole notion on its head, protraying the fairies as a force of harm and destruction. Although, from the little girl's point of view the fairies were her friends - which was rather sinister considering what they were up to and it also wasn't really explained why they had chosen her! Was it because children are more innocent and trusting than adults? And was Jasmine really happy about the fairies going around killing other people, including her step father? Rather problematic and not really addressed. Nevertheless I thought the inversion of the fairies myth and the idea of them breaking through into our world to "kidnap" was a good one. A bit like the first ever Sapphire & Steel story, in which a simple nursery rhyme read by a little girl (Ring a ring o'roses) acts as a trigger that brings evil forces into her family's home, causing her parents to disappear without a trace. I distinctly remember watching that story as a child and being scared sh*tless. When something alien or unknown enters your own surroundings it can be unsettling. And it's even creepier when apparently ordinary things like nursery rhymes and fairies turn out to be not so ordinary after all ....uuughh!

If you want to find out more about Sapphire and Steel try here.

Have a fab weekend.

OC xxx