N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!

Out of Time is yet another seemingly atypical Torchwood episode (insomuch as anything can be atypical in as varied a fictional universe as Doctor Who‘s). Even Jack remarks on the lack of threat faced here.

“There’s no puzzle to solve, no enemy to fight. Just three lost people who have somehow become our responsibility.”

Jack, Out of Time

Whereas Random Shoes and They Keep Killing Suzie used alien tech as a catalyst for their stories, Out of Time doesn’t even have that much. The Sky Gypsy passes through a blip in the rift and dumps its passengers in Cardiff over half a century late and Torchwood is left to deal with the consequences.

I assume Emma hadn’t been introduced to Tetley’s new-fangled tea bags before she left 1953. Otherwise, why would she be tearing them up and tipping the dust into the teapot?

Out of Time is a low-key episode in many ways, one that you might be tempted to call — if you’re in a somewhat cynical, reductive mood — The One With All the Feels, and while it never quite manages to reach the level of a Father’s Day or The Girl with the Fireplace, the episode does manage to make us feel a modicum of sympathy for Owen, which given how much of an arse he’s been thus far, is a remarkable achievement really.