Ianto deals with the death of his father the way everyone does; one step at a time and by coming apart. But Ianto Jones didn’t know ‘Disco’ Jones at all and that can’t stand.

In the interviews after the story, director Lisa Bowerman praises this story to the skies and I agree completely. Gareth David-Lloyd has always been a great writer but this is his best work to date. It’s both intensely complex and stripped back to the bone and he cleverly uses our confusion to set up the stakes but leaving them unsaid for three quarters of the story. It feels, as a result, quintessentially Torchwood in a way that few stories in this always strong range quite reach. This is a deeply Welsh story about a brilliant, troubled young man coming home and trying to make his peace with an impossible to reconcile past. It’s a kitchen sink drama until it isn’t, and even then the humanity and flaws of the characters remain central. The ending here is sweet and honest and may be the moment where Ianto finally breaks down. He makes a choice here that’s understandable, agonising and contemptible. He knows all these things. He does it anyway and David-Lloyd’s script, and performance, both land knockout punches in those final scenes.

Bowerman’s direction is always subtle and this story is no exception. She and David-Lloyd’s script dial down constantly onto the relationship between ‘Disco’ Jones and Tom to create a story that’s intimate but also confined and tense. Disco is a brilliant, gregarious party monster. Disco’s a coward. Disco, we find out in the opening minutes, permanently injured a ‘friend’. The story is tiny in scale and vast in scope, covering the complex nature of its four characters with an eye that’s never judgmental and also never looks away.

Those four characters are one of the strongest casts ever assembled for this line. David-Lloyd is always top notch and this is some of his best work. The others all get a lot to work with too, with John Bale’s reformed bully registering particularly hard. Ginge has been confronted with who he is and the consequences of it. That knowledge led Disco to his grave. It led Ginge to a seat at the bar and a long talk with himself. A better man at a tremendous cost, or a better man at every cost. Dezzy has just as complex a journey, and Sara McGaughey plays her wide-armed charm and lust for life brilliantly in both time periods.

But the stand out here is Rhys ap Trefor as Disco. Jones Sr is a Falstaffian monster. He’s a terrible dad who loves his kids. The life of the party who never quite clears his tab. He’s a legend in his own lunchtime and the way Ianto changes his life is sweet and heartbreaking and deeply realistic. It’s not a happy ending, for anyone, but Disco dances when he can anyway because that’s what the Jones men do. And Ianto is much closer to his dad than he thinks.

Verdict: This is superb. Torchwood is always at its best when it’s focused on its characters and this is no exception. A fantastic story and a fantastic end to the Ianthology. 10/10

Alasdair Stuart

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