Know what’s past due? An origins story for the Torchwood crew (minus Gwen since we know her story). We finally get it with “Fragments,” the first of the two-part season two finale. And for my money, it was AWESOMESAUCE.

The Torchwood time, minus Gwen who is running late, have tracked down a strange alien signal to an abandoned factory. The team splits up to individually sweep the building. Each member finds the source of the signal – a time bomb that goes boom on all of them.

Gwen arrives on the scene with Rhys, who gave her a lift and they begin digging each member out of the rubble. As each member is found, we see a flashback to how they first joined up with Torchwood.

It’s the late 1800s, the Victorian Age, and a drunken Jack Harkness stumbles out of a pub only to be killed by two women, Alice and Emily. He wakes up in their underground fortress, a very old version of Torchwood’s Hub. After observing his immortality and passing references to The Doctor for some time, they have captured him. Jack recognizes their technology as being advanced for the time period and they identify themselves as Torchwood (early on too, since Torchwood was formed by Queen Victoria in the “Blood and Tooth” episode of Doctor Who). They offer Jack an assignment for them, or he will be viewed as a threat.

Jack takes the job, capturing a Blowfish alien, just like the one we saw in the season premier, “Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang.” Once the alien is taken back to the holding cells, the women promptly shoot him in the head. He disagrees with how they handle things and refuses the next assignment. Jack attempts to drown his sorrows at the pub, and encounters a fortune teller who tells him he won’t meet The Doctor for 100 years. Having nothing to do, he decides to spend the next century working with Torchwood.

Flash forward to New Year’s Eve 1999. Jack enters the hub and sees his co-workers all shot dead. The director is holding some sort of locket and tells Jack he’s seen the future and that Torchwood isn’t ready. He killed everyone in a mercy killing, but since Jack can’t die, he’s leaving Torchwood to him for 100 years of good work and then kills himself.

Next up is Toshiko. Toshiko is working at the Ministry of Defense five years ago. One night her boss leaves and she sneaks into his office and steals some plans for a sonic device. She builds it at home and meets at a nondescript warehouse were some people have her mother held as hostage in exchange for the sonic weapon. The weapon is activated but just then UNIT soldiers break in and arrest everyone. Toshiko is held in a plain cell. One day, she is visited by Jack. He explains that she is going to be held forever, with no outside contact. He also tells her that the plans weren’t functional, but she had fixed them and made an operational device anyway. Jack offers her a deal – she can be free and have limited contact with her mother, if she will come work for him at Torchwood.

Ianto is next. One night Jack is fighting a Weevil and is about to lose when it’s shot dead by Ianto. Ianto asks Jack for a job, but Jack rejects him. The next day, Ianto is waiting outside the Hub to give Jack coffee and again asks for a job. Jack rejects him and doesn’t allow Ianto to explain anything. He knows who Ianto is – looked him up after he knew what a Weevil was. Ianto no longer has a job after Torchwood One was destroyed (“Doomsday”) but Jack doesn’t care because he severed all ties with Torchwood One. That night, Ianto stops Jack a third time by stepping in front of Jack’s SUV. Jack threatens to mind-wipe him, but Ianto says he’s hunting a pterodactyl and could use Jack’s help. Jack and Ianto have a quick adventure capturing it and letting it stay at the Hub. The flashback ends with Jack telling Ianto to show up for work the next morning on time.

Owen’s tragic backstory is last. Owen is a brilliant doctor, having trouble helping his fiancée, Katie. Katie is showing signs of Alzheimer’s, forgetting a lot of stuff. Eventually she goes in for an operation to excise a tumor. Owen hears a loud commotion and enters the operating room to find all the doctors dead. Jack enters and explains that his fiancée had an alien parasite in her head that gives off toxic gas when threatened. He then chloroforms Owen. When Owen wakes up, there is no evidence of what went on and Katie is dead. At her funeral, Owen sees Jack and confronts him angrily. Jack sees Owen’s potential and offers him a job as Torchwood’s resident medic.

The team is battered and bruised, but alive, and they head for the cars, which are missing. Jack receives a holographic message. The team looks on to see Captain John Hart claiming responsibility for the bombs and reveals something else – he has Jack’s long-lost brother, Gray. Hart says he’s going to hurt Jack by tearing down the world around him!

I give this ep the four out of five Cardiff flags it deserves:

photo credit: Ward