THE POTENTIALLLLLLL

incredible character work for Ianto, holy s**t this episode could've been great if they leaned so much more into the body horror

you see a bit of what could've been with what happens to Dr. Tanizaki, but like, the idea of a half-converted Cyberman has so much potential for horror and they FUCKED IT UP

my friend had a great rant about this episode after I showed it to them:

Y'see. They made a rookie mistake. When you're tryin to score horny points with a monster that's not traditionally sexy - and there are traditionally sexy monsters and if you wanna do an extra-spicy version of one of them that's fine - but if you're going for horny with one that doesn't usually have sex appeal, then you don't go for mass-market appeal. Because for the people it works for, it's dime a dozen. It'll be mildly titillating and you can get it anywhere. And for the people it doesn't work for you're gonna look ridiculous. Real clown hours. It's gonna be an unnecessarily sexy Halloween costume. What you gotta do is you gotta go for the freaks. The real monster f**kers. It'll be a smaller demographic. But for the people it doesn't work for, they'll just be like "oh cool monster". But for the people it does work for, it'll really work for, and it'll work like nothing else. They'll be dedicated. Rookie mistake. Amateur hour. Embarrassing.

2.5/5 - 1 star for Ianto, 1 star for Lisa/Cyberwoman VS Myfanwy/Pterodactyl fight, 0.5 stars for what could've been