MOAR Torchwood stuff - plus! an SF challenge!

[dreamer_easy]

OK kids, I have an SFnal challenge for you.

You'll remember controversy over Owen's use of an alien spray in the very first episode of Torchwood to seduce first a woman he fancies, then her boyfriend. Owen sprays himself with the stuff, and anger and indifference turn at once to overwhelming lust, in a parody of those Lynx ads.

Now, RTD and Julie Gardner are completely blithe about this in the DVD commentary. And it suddenly hit me: the spray doesn't affect the couple; it only affects Owen - at least, that's the intention.

Every theory I've come up with about how the spray works has assumed it somehow affected the couple - meaning this was a variety of drug rape. Even if it made Owen shoot out superpowerful pheremones or something, that's still affecting the other people rather than him.

So thinking caps on: what the heck could the spray do only to Owen that made him suddenly irresistable?

In the meantime, some links for u:

Ianto and Jack both make afterelton.com's list of Ten Best Gay and Bisexual Science Fiction Characters. "...Jack and some of the other characters in the series represent an almost “post-gay” approach to sexual themes, in which sexual identity is represented as fluid and complicated, and, more importantly, as not a big deal. It simply is what it is."

Some really terrific analysis of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang from crabby_lioness.

And some icons that are just gosh darn funny. :-)

Comments

[catsparx.livejournal.com]

I've only seen that episode once, but my impression was that the couple were affected by the spray.

Owen is the biggest spunk in Torchwood if you ask me!

[the-cockfighter.livejournal.com]

Come out with me on a night out on Oxford St and I'll show you.

[ireactions.livejournal.com]

A disgusting scene.

... amusingly, I've heard a lot of defences of Owen, all of which were along the lines of, "Well, the writers didn't mean for Owen to be a rapist, so he isn't."

*shudders* "Torchwood" troubles me greatly, acting as though its banality, shallowness and self-obsession are all attributes to be proud of. Presenting these appalling, unprofessional, squabbling idiots as heroes to impress us. Dismissing a fascinating mythology established by "The Unquiet Dead" and "Tooth And Claw" in favour of who's shagging who behind whose back. The cast of "The Sarah Jane Smith Adventures" can be trusted to protect the Earth. Torchwood can't be trusted to run a gas station without getting in a fight.

[jvowles.livejournal.com]

Ah, but Doctor Who is about heroes, and Sarah Jane is about heroes. Both of them idealize their central characters for the most part; even at its angstiest, Doctor Who rarely delves into the really dark parts of the Doctor's life -- though the "angry god"/"sometimes you need someone to stop you" bits stand out. And Sarah Jane? At most she worries about whether she's needlessly imperilling the kids.

Torchwood is about broken people who happen to fight aliens. The show is about the wonderfully messy, screwed-up nature of humans, about bad choices and misunderstandings. Any heroism is accidental.

As for the Owen scene -- is a pheromone spray any more of a cheat than makeup, hygiene, nose job, hair coloring, working out, etc.?

Clearly he's *cheating* at the dating game; that's the point. Whether it amounts to rape depends on whether the spray overrides the "victim's" self control completely, or merely lowers their inhibitions like booze can....or indeed, whether the thing boosts Owen's creepy sex appeal rather than altering the other person's perceptions.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

If it lowers their inhibitions, that would still be rape - like slipping something into someone's drink. The same would be true of a pheremone spray with an affect as overwhelming as what we see on screen! So what I'm after is an SFnal way the spray could affect only Owen and still do its job.

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

I'm still left wondering.... In the middle of a crowded bar, if this spray somehow affects people (overriding their inhibitions, or whatever) why isn't everyone around Owen suddenly compelled to jump his bones?
The pheromone idea seems most plausible. If a spray made Owen infinitely more attractive somehow, that's not the same as saying it lowered another persons inhibitions.... Although, admittedly, we would have to assume that the woman he comes onto found him more attractive than she initially let on... and we would also have to assume that she and her husband are (at least deep down) interested in having "an adventure" with someone else....

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

is a pheromone spray any more of a cheat than makeup, hygiene, nose job, hair coloring, working out, etc.?

...yes?

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

How?

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Introducing chemicals into someone else's body without their knowledge or consent!

[jhg.livejournal.com]

But this happens all the time naturally.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

I'm no expert on this, but if Wikipedia can be believed over the claims of the snake oil merchants, human sex pheremones have yet to be discovered.

[jhg.livejournal.com]

Hmm.

Well, what about bateria and viruses passed from person to person?

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

Not done deliberately with intent to alter their will.

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

It's the whole "alter a person's will thing" that seems the assumption here. As there are no real human pheromones, and as it isn't explicitly stated how the spray works, why would it necessarily follow that the spray would somehow change a person's will? Or, for that matter, introduce chemicals into another persons body without their consent? It's just as easy to assume based on what we see in the episode that the spray works on Owen alone, after all, he sprays himself. The result of the spray, IMHO, simply makes him more attractive.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Sure: but how?

So far all I've come up with is a complex telepathic exchange and something to do with body language and facial expressions.

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

Oh dear... wibbly-wobbly-he's-so-hot-who-wouldn't won't do? ;)

Ok... people use scents to make themselves seem more attractive all the time. All our senses are tied into arousal... perhaps this spray efficiently augments those parts of you that (unconsciously) project you as an attractive person (in scent, perhaps something in harmonics, maybe even in appearance itself) to someone else... I know, it's not terribly hard Sci, but I'd put this kind of technology in the "sufficiently high tech enough as to be indistinguishable from magic" category...

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

wibly wobbly sleazy slimy lol

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

Ha!
Giving it a little more thought...
Owen's real sleaziness if it doesn't come from actual rape is certainly apparent in his taking pleasure in breaking up other people's relationships. An argument can be made that this is due to the spray's influence on Owen, similar to how the glove changed Suzie. Repeated use might have compromised Owen's will, making him take some form of sadistic pleasure in other's pain. He even laments it in a future episode once he's out of the spray's influence....

[outsdr.livejournal.com]

I think you're on the right track with the telepathic aspect. Suppose it's not a scent at all, but simply a vapor? A drug delivery system for a telepathic chemical that allows the telepathic expression of the desire the host feels for the object of affection? And it's used as a spray so that the user has to consciously utilize it, as opposed to something that always must be controlled to prevent sub-conscious expression of desire and wild uninhibited surprise shagging on the subway.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

It could be a glamour - tricking the subject into seeing the user as the Man of Their Dreams or whatever. That would at least be more in the direction of seduction than rape.

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

Cos it was a magic one they couldn't resist?

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

If the spray was so magical that no one could resist him, how come the whole bar doesn't want to jump him? And, again, that the spray acted on another person's ability to resist is an assumption....

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

I really don't think there's a way out of the Owen thing. He becomes suddenly irresistable to people who had no interest beforehand, and uses it knowing the effect it has. It's possible that "he only used it on himself" is why it slipped past the production team in terms of the implication of rape, but when you get right down to it it was a poorly-conceived joke where Owen bypassed consent.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

You could well be right - that the effect of the spray is so sudden and dramatic that there's just no way to explain it as working only on the person who gets sprayed. Still, trying to think of an Owen-only mechanism is an interesting SFnal puzzle.

[nostalgia-lj.livejournal.com]

Maybe he... became magically attractive in terms of his looks?

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Oh but Nos, he already was. ;-)

[the-cockfighter.livejournal.com]

People are attracted to other people for very particular reasons. Often it has nothing to do with beauty (of some kind of absolute sense). I know some people who find me more attractive when I have a beard and others who find me more attractive when I'm beardless. Same clothes, hair, smell, personality but it can simply come down to whether they find bearded/non-bearded me more attractive.

The spray could have be a "see what you want to see".

[the-cockfighter.livejournal.com]

And further on this point I'll exploit this fact, for my own fun and games. :-)

[the-cockfighter.livejournal.com]

and even further on these points.

There are the twinks, those young men in their early 20s who don't find me attractive, mainly because they're only interested in guys around their own age. However there are also some who do find me attractive because I am at least 10 years older than they are.

[matthewwolff.livejournal.com]

And you can change your look back and forth to appear more attractive to one or the other group...

[outsdr.livejournal.com]

I vote for the beard. ;)

[hexacontium.livejournal.com]

I never considered the spay to be much worse than many other things shown in Torchwood to be honest. I only learnt on the net later that a lot of people appearantly had an issue with it. So I ask: is this so much worse than letting the only child go with some monsters who just killed the girl's father? There where more morally questionably issues in last night's episode which I won't recap here to prevent spoilers.

[jhg.livejournal.com]

Well Owen is (at least at the start) supposed to be a complete and total wanker: in a laudable case of 'show don't tell', this confirms it.

[pbristow.livejournal.com]

Here's how I see the scene:

Owen sprays his face. His face momentarily... *changes*... then settles back to normal. However, during that moment, something has made the girl and/or the bloke start to fancy him above and beyond their inclination to resist.

So maybe... it's a spray of intelligent nano-machines that are programmed to seek out the features of the spray-ee that are most likely to be considered attractive by the onlooker, and draw attention to them. Like make-up, it directs and magnifies the viewer's attention to the things that are most likely to make them *continue to look*, and thereby fall in love/lust.

Compare with the way that people develop huge crushes on actors/actresses etc. whom they've spent a lot of time looking at, wheras if the same people had passed them in the street they might never have got further than thinking "nice smile..." and instantly forgotten them.

So, it's basically an accelerant for the attraction that would eventually happen anyway, *if* you could somehow arrange to spend the necessary amount of time in the person's company with them looking at you properly. But by the same token, if the other person was never going to be attracted to you however well they got to know you (or however long they spent watching your face on a screen), then the spray won't help - making Owen's use of it a bit of a gamble, but at least a huge timesaver.

Isn't Owen's line just before he uses the spray something like "I haven't got time for all this..."?