Torchwood: Ianto's Mother
Mar. 30th, 2012 17:18![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eldabeSo, we got no information about Ianto's mom in the show. I mean...none, not even in COE. Nada. We had tantalizing bits about his father, so we did make a lot of shared fanon stories about him.
But being that we're all obsessed with Ianto's background, fandom latched onto Ianto's oddly emotional-laden admission that he knew of Providence Park as a hint of what happened to his mother. And we had all sorts of shared theories.
As she was never part of the story, most stories seemed to end up with her still in Providence Park, or dead by the time the show happened.
But then, House of the Dead came out. And all of a sudden, a whole tangle of theories that Ianto's dad put his mom in a psychiatric facility, or Ianto's mom died when he was a kid or she jumped off a bridge or what-have-you seem to suddenly not work as well.
(I'm not going to address the difference between canon and expanded universe stuff. We can all feel free to ignore the radio plays. But this one, more than anything, has been embraced by fans. So.)
The unclear implications in the radio play is that Ianto's parents separated, and it was Ianto's father's fault. It's not hard to leap from that to divorce. And why? Well, did Ianto's dad cheat on his mother? (Could tie into Ianto's COMMITMENT tendencies.) Or perhaps we could tie that back into the failed tailor theory?
On top of that, it seems Ianto's mother was alive when he left home. (Why would that have been the final moment if Ianto blamed his dad?) Although it seems she was probably dead circa CoE. But she was still in touch with Ianto's father before Mr. Jones died.
Either way, it seems to be a time to update discussions like this. Thoughts?
(And a transcript of The House of the Dead can be found here for those that want a quick reminder without listening to the whole thing.)
But being that we're all obsessed with Ianto's background, fandom latched onto Ianto's oddly emotional-laden admission that he knew of Providence Park as a hint of what happened to his mother. And we had all sorts of shared theories.
As she was never part of the story, most stories seemed to end up with her still in Providence Park, or dead by the time the show happened.
But then, House of the Dead came out. And all of a sudden, a whole tangle of theories that Ianto's dad put his mom in a psychiatric facility, or Ianto's mom died when he was a kid or she jumped off a bridge or what-have-you seem to suddenly not work as well.
(I'm not going to address the difference between canon and expanded universe stuff. We can all feel free to ignore the radio plays. But this one, more than anything, has been embraced by fans. So.)
The unclear implications in the radio play is that Ianto's parents separated, and it was Ianto's father's fault. It's not hard to leap from that to divorce. And why? Well, did Ianto's dad cheat on his mother? (Could tie into Ianto's COMMITMENT tendencies.) Or perhaps we could tie that back into the failed tailor theory?
On top of that, it seems Ianto's mother was alive when he left home. (Why would that have been the final moment if Ianto blamed his dad?) Although it seems she was probably dead circa CoE. But she was still in touch with Ianto's father before Mr. Jones died.
Either way, it seems to be a time to update discussions like this. Thoughts?
(And a transcript of The House of the Dead can be found here for those that want a quick reminder without listening to the whole thing.)
no subject
Date: Apr. 3rd, 2012 01:05 (UTC)I usually go by The Torchwood Archives, which was written by Gary Russell and uses a lot of material from the show and the BBC Torchwood site. In it states about Ianto: "Mum alive, in Newport, dad passed away in 2002."
This came out before CoE, and it has Ianto's sister as Rhiannon Evans, thus why I use Evans for her last name in my fic.
To be honest, I never gave it a second thought about Ianto's dad and his parents being separated when I listened to HotD. I'll admit I got one thing out of it (other than Jack telling Ianto "I love you" which was second) and that was Ianto does not necessarily have to be dead (after all the Rift does grab people).
Anyway, I just wanted to share the part from The Torchwood Archives.
I never bought into the Providence Park theory myself. Of course, I went way out there with Ianto's background. LOL!