Torchwood: Among Us Volume 3 – Review

I have been incredibly pleased by the last two volumes of Torchwood from Big Finish. It’s been great to hear something that feels genuinely new and fresh and proves that there is still life in Torchwood as a franchise what has really worked in the previous two sets is that the stories have been largely character-driven, ignoring the action set pieces of the previous series like Aliens Among Us and focusing on the brand new characters that the producers of the range have been introducing since 2017 when the series continued on from the end of Miracle Day. That continues here, not only making it a perfect series for newcomers to the Torchwood range but also a genuinely brilliant and warped look at real life through a science fiction lens.

The final series of Among Us kicks off with How I Conquered the World. Written by the three main writers of the range, Tim Foley, Ash Darby and James Goss, it ignores the main characters and focuses on the life of the sentient social network that is taking over the world called Friend who, it transpires has been around since the beginning of the Torchwood team we saw on television.

Told mainly through the viewpoint of Friend, who is exploring various aspects of social media, in particular Twitter, to explore humanity. Friend believes it was designed to please the human race and looks at its users through their relationships as well as things like pornography, avocado toast and even the restoration of the Synderverse. It’s a fun and sometimes dark and disturbing look at humanity, but it does pose the question of how a sentient piece of software would look at humanity. As a result, the vast majority of this story makes for an uncomfortable listen as it forces you to ponder on your own use of the internet and social media and how that often says more about us than we are comfortable saying in person.

Director David O’Mahony also makes the bold decision here to use AI as an actor, using a lot of artificial voice synthesis as opposed to real actors. While I hope this isn’t something that becomes a regular thing throughout all the Big Finish ranges, here it works brilliantly, hammering home the inhumanity of Friend and making the story even more a brilliantly uncomfortable listen as it looks at various aspects of the human condition.

The Torchwood team appear pretty fleetingly at the end of this story, carrying on from the cliffhanger at the end of the previous story Pariahs. While this story is one gigantic exposition dump, it never feels like that. Friend becomes a character in its own right and the writers give the story enough depth and intelligence to stop it from feeling like a big piece of information being thrown at us, resulting in one of the strongest, thrilling and most original Torchwood stories to date.

Doomscroll, written by Ash Darby takes another well-deserved swipe at social media, this time looking at websites like Onlyfans as Friend continues its mission, certain it knows what’s best for the human race. If How I Conquered The World was disturbing enough, then Doomscroll gets even darker with the focus placed on Tyler Steele and Mr. Colchester who have to look after well-known influencers. Of course, Tyler can’t help by fall in love with his influencer Chris, played brilliantly by Jhon Lumsden and he and Jonny Green as Tyler have a fantastic chemistry that makes this story all the more listenable and heartbreaking.

Darby takes a good look at the idea of ‘influencing’ and what should and probably shouldn’t be considered suitable content for people to consume as well as how these influencers can use their content to value things in modern society. He also takes a long look at how influencers spread from platform to platform, from Twitter to TikTok, and in particular how Chris uses an app called After Dark which he runs alongside his other platforms but exclusively deals in the sort of things one might find on sites like Onlyfans.

Whatever side of the fence you might fall on when it comes to ‘influencers’, Darby does make sure that we do sympathise with the creators who, at the end of the day, are just people trying to make their money and live their lives like everyone else. Really, as Darby says here, it’s the tech companies who should be viewed as the villains and that good people do often end up working for them. Darby’s commentaries here are effective and he succeeds at highlighting the different worlds our characters live in, crafting another excellent story.

Tim Foley’s final entry into the Among Us storyline Heistland is another hit as we see Tracey Ann Oberman’s Yvonne Hartman taking on Deadcoin and a new cryptocurrency being used by world governments for nefarious means.

Over the course of this story, I’ve said many times how great Tracey Ann Oberman has been as Yvonne and that trend continues here as Foley pits her against the antagonist Kristen, played by Eva Eklof, the head of Torchwood’s Icelandic counterpart. The pair bounce off of each other in some very funny ways, but the story always makes sure that the pair find each other deeply unpleasant. And thanks to Gwen now working for Iceland, it incorporates Kai Owen’s Rhys brilliantly.

Heistland shows Torchwood going international in a much more successful way than the entirety of Miracle Day did with the story taking place in several different countries and if Foley’s story has one weak spot it’s that its plan to take down Deadcoin is pretty obvious and laid out from the beginning with no real chance for surprises. But his script is tight enough that it doesn’t really matter and the direction from David O’Mahony ensures that the many different settings don’t get in the way of a rip-roaring adventure which moves along at a pleasing pace.

Foley also handles the tie-ins to the rest of the Among Us plot well with Tyler having to come to terms with the death of his boyfriend Chris at the end of the previous story, which only happened because he was involved in Torchwood. But it’s another great use and look at Yvonne who, while she needs him to help complete the mission, allows him room to grieve, proving that she isn’t the monster she tries to make out she is.

There really isn’t anything to fault in Heistland and if anything it proves why Among Us has been one of the best things Big Finish has done in years and certainly one of the best series of Torchwood since Children of Earth as everything rapidly spins towards its conclusion.

The end of world it seems will end at 6PM in James Goss’ The Apocalypse Starts at 6PM. Following on from the three previous stories of this set, Goss’ script feels surprisingly grounded as Friend highjacks a television programme hosted by Janet Ellis, playing herself, in which Torchwood infiltrate to spread awareness of the sentient social network.

It might seem strange that following the trends of the previous stories getting bigger and bigger the grand finale should be limited to the confines of a television studio in Wales but Goss executes things perfectly. Following on from the action-packed and highly emotional endings to Aliens Among Us and God Among Us, it’s nice that this finale follows suit with Among Us‘ overall plot of being more character-driven and understated. All the cast is here too, working together as a pretty successful Torchwood team, tying together elements of the series that might have been otherwise seen as unconnected.

Janet Ellis does a brilliant job in her role, and her experience with magazine-style television series comes in handy here. It certainly doesn’t feel like she’s acting, instead, she’s just being herself as the madness of Torchwood unfolds around her. And her pleading for the viewing public to tear down television masts and do anything they can to defeat Friend feels very evocative of the 6PM COVID broadcasts we got used to over the course of the lockdown. Of course, things are played to more extremes here, playing into characters and possibly listeners’ fears of social media and the influence it has on people’s actions in real life. Misinformation is everywhere and Apocalypse sees Torchwood going to extremes to get the real truth out there.

Apocalypse is a great way of ending Among Us, cementing it as one of the best series of Torchwood, both on audio and television. It’s an episode that feels incredibly previous eleven of this series but Goss manages to encapsulate everything this series is trying to say and turn it into an incredibly exciting and thought-provoking finale into something that nears perfection.

As a series, Among Us has been a resounding success and there can be little doubt that this is the best continuation of the television series that Big Finish has ever done. Likewise, I think this is quite possibly the best Torchwood team since the originals and the series has excelled because of its quieter and more thought-provoking tones. Science Fiction should always make you think, no matter what the subject and Among Us succeeds at every level.