Jack’s so interesting to watch in Series 4. His lack of authority, compared to the earlier seasons, is tangible. He’s still the ‘leader’ of the group, but he’s got no official power or control over the others. They do what he says, provided they agree. His age and experience makes him an authority, but there’s no sense of them obeying him because he’s the ‘boss’. When the others do as he orders, it’s because they agree with him, not out of any deference for his authority.
His base his blown up, his team destroyed, and the official authority he held as head of TW3 is gone, because Torchwood is defunct. Jack, the Jack we’re introduced to, is defunct.
This began in Series 3, but the Government was still scared of him, he still had info and connections that meant he could pull strings and make demands.
The first episode, Rex pulls rank over his and drags him to America, along with Gwen. Episode 2, he’s poisoned, and it’s up to others to cure him. Gwen takes charge and literally tells him to shut up when he protests to the treatment.
Jack tries to take charge in Dead of Night, but Rex makes it clear he won’t follow his orders, and when Rex rebukes Esther he also shows authority over her. Even small things, like Jack trying to tell Gwen to gather info, results into Gwen snapping at him and telling him she knows what’s she is doing.
Jack ends up ditching Esther and Gwen to go to a gay bar, with Gwen trying to keep him focussed on work. During a hook up, his sex partner makes a comment about Jack taking the lead, which Jack firmly agrees with. This is the only place where Jack can find authority. But it’s only a weak facade of authority. He still ends up drunk, lonely, vulnerable, begging Gwen for validation, for comfort and assurance that they are as much a team as ever. Gwen; who not long ago was scared and vulnerable begging him to stay a team, to assure her she mattered to him, hangs up on him to speak to the husband who stayed with her, and the child that wlll always matter more to Gwen than Jack ever can.
During the undercover mission to the camps, Jack is forced to stay behind. The only one not going undercover. He wants to join the others, even suggesting he try to pass himself off as Vera’s subordinate, her assistant. Not only is he denied, he is denied by Vera; who is newest to the squad, and Esther, the most insecure and arguably lowest ranked member of the group. She smiles at him and teases him for being a mortal man, humouring him.
Compare this to Jack in season 1. The enigmatic, mysterious leader of the secret organization that can waltz onto any crime scene and take over. When the team disobey him, it’s a serious issue, and he usually has to be the one to fix the messes they make. Series 4 Jack, we know more of his past, more of his weaknesses, he’s no longer quite so mysterious, quite so untouchable. If the others don’t obey him, it’s not because they’re being disobedient, it’s because Jack isn’t owed obedience.
Of course he isn’t. Esther and Rex were not hired by him, they were not chosen by him. They were professionals in their own rights, and only ended up with Jack by chance, forced to band together. And Gwen, who was chosen by Jack, who was trained by Jack, who was taken into this world by Jack, was abandoned by Jack. He left her, broke his confidence in her, and since then she had to shift for herself. He isn’t even paying her. She owes him no more obedience than Esther or Rex or Vera.
And to underline all of this, he’s mortal. He goes from being the most invulnerable person on the planet, to literally most vulnerable person on the planet. Like COE, he is being hunted, but unlike COE, not for any intelligence or capability he possesses, but because of certain physical traits he came by without any merit of his. It’s his blood that is a priority, not him.
The climax of the series ends with Gwen giving the order to go ahead. When Esther is shot and Rex asks what they do next, Jack says he doesn’t know. It’s Gwen who says they go on. It is even Gwen who pulls the trigger.
Jack still has a lot to offer, he still plays a key role in defeating the Families and ending the miracle. But the power base we found him with in Series one is gone, broken, and it is a far way from being rebuilt.
