Jack Harkness
Jack Harkness, also known as Captain Jack, is a fictional character played by
John Barrowman in the long-running
British science fiction television series
Doctor Who is a long-running British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
. A time traveller and confidence trickster from the 51st century, he first appeared in the episode
The Empty Child is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
and remained for the rest of the 2005 series as the third known of the
Ninth Doctor. He is the first companion who is openly
bisexual.
Encyclopedia
Jack Harkness, also known as
Captain Jack, is a fictional character played by
John Barrowman in the long-running
British science fiction television series
Doctor Who is a long-running British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
. A time traveller and confidence trickster from the 51st century, he first appeared in the episode
The Empty Child is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
and remained for the rest of the 2005 series as the third known of the
Ninth Doctor. He is the first companion who is openly
bisexual.
A charming rogue who seems to flirt with everyone he meets, Jack had many adventures through time and space on his own before he began to travel with the Doctor. He is obviously militarily trained, quite capable on his own and of using and constructing a variety of weaponry as well as possessing familiarity with advanced technology. He worked well with the Doctor and Rose as part of a smoothly functioning
TARDIS crew, and followed the Doctor's orders easily and willingly.
Character history
Doctor Who
The Doctor's companion
Rose first met Jack during the
London Blitz in 1941, where he was posing as an American volunteer in the
Royal Air Force. Rose and the Doctor had come to that time and place in pursuit of an
alien cylinder that had crashed on
Earth. Rose had accidentally hitched a ride on a
barrage balloon and was about to fall to her death when Jack rescued her with his ship's tractor beam. Jack's ship — a stolen time ship of Chula design — was capable of concealing itself by turning invisible, and included in its systems nanogenes, which could treat wounds.
Jack was a former Time Agent who left the organisation after discovering that two years of his memory had been removed, going in search of them and becoming a con man. Mistaking Rose and the Doctor for Time Agents as well, he tried to fraudulently pass off the cylinder as an abandoned alien warship with a view to selling it to them. Jack believed that the cylinder was nothing but a hollow and empty medical vessel, unaware that it was actually filled with billions of nanogenes, which began transforming everything they came into contact with .
Jack assisted Rose and the Doctor in deactivating the nanogenes, but lost his own ship when he transported a
German bomb on board to save the others from being killed by it. The TARDIS managed to rescue him before the bomb blew up his vessel, and he was taken on board as the newest member of the crew .
It became apparent in the
The Doctor Dances that Jack was bisexual, an orientation which the Doctor pointed out was more common in the 51st century, when mankind would deal with multiple alien species and sexuality would become more flexible. In
Boom Town he flirted with the Doctor in front of
Mickey, and the Doctor played along. He is the first companion to be anything other than openly heterosexual;
Steven Moffat suggests in the
Doctor Who Confidential is a documentary series created by the British Broadcasting Corporation [i] ...
episode "Welcome to Torchwood" that questions of sexual orientation do not even enter into Jack's mind. One term for this would be "pansexual", although the media still refer to the character as bisexual and the character has not described himself in terms of any sexual orientation.
In
Bad Wolf is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
Jack became the first regular character in the programme's history to appear naked on screen , albeit discreetly shielded by strategically placed props. However, the BBC vetoed the production team's original intention of showing Jack's buttocks. In
The Parting of the Ways is an episode [i] in the British [i] ...
Jack kissed both Rose and the Doctor good-bye on the lips, the latter being the first such same-sex kiss in the programme's history.
Jack organised the defence of the Game Station against the
Daleks in
The Parting of the Ways to give the Doctor enough time to construct a Delta Wave projector. With the rest of his volunteer squad killed, Jack was the last to be exterminated, facing down the Dalek guns with quiet defiance rather than the traditional screaming deaths of Dalek victims. Although Rose brought him back to life while she was suffused with the power of the time vortex, neither the Doctor nor Rose seemed aware of his resurrection and left the Game Station in the TARDIS, leaving Jack behind.
In the , Rose suggests to the recently-regenerated
Tenth Doctor they go back for Jack. The Doctor, in turn, replies that Jack is busy "rebuilding the Earth". How much either knows about Jack's status is unclear; the Doctor's comment suggests that he either knows that Jack survived, while Rose was not present when Jack died.
Executive Producer
Russell T. Davies stated in
Doctor Who Magazine is a magazine [i] devoted to the long-running British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
that Jack was left behind because they wanted to explore the effects of the Doctor's regeneration on Rose, since Jack would have taken the regeneration "in his stride."
Jack was originally reported as reappearing in the 2006 series, but did not do so due to scheduling conflicts. Barrowman, however, has confirmed that he has signed on to return as Jack for Series 3. The official
Doctor Who website at
bbc.co.uk announced on August 10 2006 that this appearance would come in the series finale, and Davies told
Doctor Who Magazine that Jack will appear in "multiple episodes" in the second half of the series.
Torchwood
On 17 October 2005,
The Independent is a British [i] compact [i] newspaper [i] published by Tony O'Reilly [i] ...
reported that the BBC had commissioned Davies to produce a 13-part spin-off series titled
Torchwood is a British [i] television science fiction [i] ...
, set in contemporary
Cardiff and investigating alien activities and crime. The series will feature John Barrowman playing Jack Harkness, and will premiere in Autumn 2006 on
BBC Three.
According to Barrowman, the series will not reveal how Jack comes to be in the 21st century . He also states that Jack works with Torchwood because he is "trying to find the Doctor. Because there is something that the viewing public won't know yet, there's something about Jack that nobody knows. And he needs the Doctor." Barrowman later suggested that Jack is angry with the Doctor , along with the fact that he may not recognise the Doctor due to his regeneration, and this will be made clear in
Torchwood. Barrowman also indicated that the audience would discover what happened during the two years missing from Jack's memory.
Other appearances
Jack features in the BBC Books New Series Adventures novels
The Deviant Strain by Justin Richards,
The Stealers of Dreams by Steve Lyons and
Only Human by Gareth Roberts. These novels take place between episodes of the 2005 series of
Doctor Who.
The name Harkness is shared by lead characters of
Century Falls and
The Grand , both
Russell T. Davies-scripted drama series.
Episodes
;2005 series
- The Empty Child is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
/ The Doctor Dances is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
- Boom Town
- Bad Wolf is an episode [i] in the British [i] science fiction television [i] ...
/ The Parting of the Ways is an episode [i] in the British [i] ...
References
