If you ignore everything but the flashback scenes in Italy, it's a very engaging, beautiful and entertaining story.
Daniele Favilli, who plays Angelo, and John Barrowman, who plays Jack, have very intense chemistry. That alone makes it worth a watch: you see them and you can believe they're really falling in love; they make you forget they're actors.
Now the story itself, while I loved this episode, didn't matter much in the larger picture as it seemingly was a way to introduce the idea that three Italian families are behind the Blessing. Half an episode dedicated only to this reveal wasn't warranted. It felt a little bit like it was a way to throw some gratuitous sex and violence scenes in there. (Although the sex scenes were shot and directed beautifully).
We see Angelo once more in 4x8 (spoilers) as an old man, bedridden. He was inspired by Jack to find a way to live forever, evidently so he can be with him. That's quite romantic, isn't it? But no. Boom, he dies. Jack mourns him briefly, which is more than can be said about Ianto (or Tosh, or Owen, or his grandchild whom he killed himself).
So we see Angelo die, then never he is never mentioned again. Not by Jack, not by anyone, even in passing. I don't get how you spend an entire episode building a character only to throw him out after barely using him. Admittedly that's one of the writers' biggest fault (as seen with Tosh, Owen, Ianto, etc: they die and everyone moves on quickly) but I digress.
I based my 10/10 rating solely on the Angelo part of the story, which frankly was the best part of the entire Torchwood run, albeit dedicating half an episode to him was a weird decision (as I said earlier).
Daniele Favilli, who plays Angelo, and John Barrowman, who plays Jack, have very intense chemistry. That alone makes it worth a watch: you see them and you can believe they're really falling in love; they make you forget they're actors.
Now the story itself, while I loved this episode, didn't matter much in the larger picture as it seemingly was a way to introduce the idea that three Italian families are behind the Blessing. Half an episode dedicated only to this reveal wasn't warranted. It felt a little bit like it was a way to throw some gratuitous sex and violence scenes in there. (Although the sex scenes were shot and directed beautifully).
We see Angelo once more in 4x8 (spoilers) as an old man, bedridden. He was inspired by Jack to find a way to live forever, evidently so he can be with him. That's quite romantic, isn't it? But no. Boom, he dies. Jack mourns him briefly, which is more than can be said about Ianto (or Tosh, or Owen, or his grandchild whom he killed himself).
So we see Angelo die, then never he is never mentioned again. Not by Jack, not by anyone, even in passing. I don't get how you spend an entire episode building a character only to throw him out after barely using him. Admittedly that's one of the writers' biggest fault (as seen with Tosh, Owen, Ianto, etc: they die and everyone moves on quickly) but I digress.
I based my 10/10 rating solely on the Angelo part of the story, which frankly was the best part of the entire Torchwood run, albeit dedicating half an episode to him was a weird decision (as I said earlier).