Torchwood: Smashed

Gwen travels to a (fictional) Welsh town where unemployment is rife and the residents have been complaining about problems caused by the local frakking industry. The result is grim, with some moments of gore once the true nature of the threat becomes apparent. The twist on the usual theme becomes apparent in the pre-title teaser, when it's revealed that the only defence against the threat is drinking alcohol... and lots of it.

On the one hand, this is partly a satire about communities blighted by post-industrial decline, and the rising rates of alcoholism that can occur when people find themselves with nothing else to do. But it's also in large part a straight-up monster story with Gwen unable to escape the decaying town and its escalating menace. The difference being, of course, that she has to spend much of the story drunk.

I suspect that's something that will make the story unpopular among a lot of people. Not so much because of the alcohol itself (although some will obviously find that an issue) but because of the slurred speech and rambling that we get from Gwen and some of the other characters. It certainly isn't played for laughs and there some unpleasant scenes along the way, even aside from the gore, and it's unlikely to appeal to anyone who has experienced the effects of alcoholism at close hand. It's also not entirely told in sequence, with plenty of brief flashbacks and spells where Gwen blacks out so that the narrative skips - some listeners might find this frustrating.

I found it worked, as a grim tale of urban decay and the debilitating effects of alcohol with an obvious sci-fi/horror twist. But it's one of those ones where I can well understand why others might not.