(S01E8) To explain the origins of this week's fantastic episode of Torchwood, we need to go all the way back to episode one ("Everything Changes") and the resurrection glove employed in the opening act, which not only revived the dead for brief spells, but also brought about the death of a Torchwood member.

The important thing to remember is that this is science-fiction folks, and the dead don't sleep for long when technology such as a metal gauntlet which can raise stiffs exists -- even if it's only for a minute or two.

And especially if it's a former member of the Torchwood team.

If you cast your mind back to the first episode, we had Suzie Costello, a key member of the Torchwood team, who was discovered to be killing people in an attempt to discover more about the resurrection gauntlet which appeared to revive the recently-dead.

Essentially, the glove had possessed her, and when confronted by Gwen about her activities, she attempted to cover up her crimes with more murder when Captain Jack arrived, only to get himself shot in the head.

However, due to his immortality streak, Jack got up again, whereupon Suzie committed suicide by placing the muzzle of the gun under her chin and shooting the back of her head out. She was subsequently placed in the cold storage at Torchwood and replaced by the gap-toothed, but strangely attractive Gwen.

So, when bodies started showing up all over Cardiff, with words like 'Torchwood' daubed in blood all over the crime scenes, the team decided to bring back the gauntlet and see if they could track down the killer. After a few false starts, Gwen picked up the knack of the glove, with one corpse revealing that Suzie was part of the whole scheme, in addition to helping the team track down a burly skinhead chap who reacted violently to the utterance of the word "Torchwood".

In one of those fantastic leaps of imagination on the part of the script writers, the team realised that they had been talking to the wrong corpse, and decided to revive Suzie -- but not without the help of the knife she had been using to murder her victims -- which was required to be stabbed into her dead body when the glove was being applied to her head.

Not only was Suzie's revival a bit on the creepy side, but it was also a master-stroke in plot terms; for Suzie appeared to have devised the entire plan from the beginning; including her own death, planting a post-hypnotic trigger phrase into the mind of the burly skinhead, and devising a complex scheme to have herself revived by the glove in order to wreak revenge on her dying father.

Unfortunately for the team, revenge on her father was the least of her intentions, and it soon became evident that Suzie was drawing Gwen's very life essence from her as her own body became stronger.

I won't spoil the ending for you, but we were given another glimpse of Captain Jack's ruthless streak, and a few bizarre insights into some kind of relationship going on between Jack and Ianto (if anyone is able to explain exactly what the two of them were on about at the end of the episode in relation to the stopwatch, I'd be very interested in hearing more).

Of course, I knew exactly what Ianto meant when he said gloves always come in pairs, even if one of them had now been destroyed...

In all, this was another sterling episode from Russell T. Davies and co, with eight down, and five to go -- which should rather neatly take us to the end of the year, a Doctor Who Christmas special notwithstanding.