The Categories of Life

Lore & Background

In the episode, the government panels are cancelled after PhiCorp and the world's governments implement a categorization system regarding life. Those who should have died and are brain-dead are assigned Category 1 status, and those with persistent injuries or diseases are Category 2, while Category 3 status are normal people with no or minor injuries. Category 1s and 2s are sent to Overflow Camps which resemble concentration camps with hidden modules not appearing on satellite footage, and Torchwood suspects these modules have a dark purpose. Vera travels to California to assist Torchwood, and Rex investigates a camp as a Category 2 patient while Esther sneaks in and administratively assigns Rex a Category 1 status and smuggles him a camera to film evidence. Using her medical panel credentials, Vera attempts to inspect the treatment of Category 1 patients and discovers that many conscious people are being assigned Category 1 status. Vera threatens to prosecute Colin Maloney, the man overseeing the overflow camp, after seeing inhumane conditions; he panics and shoots her, then transports her to one of the modules and places her inside. Elsewhere, Jack tries to convince Oswald to use his fame to expose PhiCorp's advanced knowledge of the Miracle, but Oswald gives a pro-PhiCorp televised speech. Gwen returns to Wales to rescue her father from an Overflow Camp; during the escape attempt, her father suffers another heart attack and doctors give him Category 1 status. When her husband Rhys reveals that camp personnel are taking Category 1 patients to the "burn unit," Gwen deduces the modules are incinerators. This is confirmed when Maloney activates the incinerator on the module containing Vera; Rex comes across Vera but cannot free her, and is forced to watch her being burned alive, reluctantly video-recording her agony.

Reader's Guide

The episode received critical attention for its dark themes and execution. Writing for the Guardian, Dan Martin described it as the episode in which "Miracle Day finally realized its potential," noting its success in "looking at humanity through a camera contact-lens, darkly." AfterElton's Heather Hogan praised the writing, stating that although she knew Vera was going to die, the ending left her with her mouth "completely agape." Hogan found the use of Nazi imagery relating to the in-universe final solution particularly unsettling, and concluded that the final scenes would continue to haunt her. Writing for io9, Charlie Jane Anders praised the set-up, stating it illuminates a basic truth about the perils of rationing healthcare, and praised how the failures of protagonists Vera and Gwen play into the episode, calling it "'The Categories of Life' exposes human vanity in the way that only a script by Jane Espenson could." The episode is notable for its grim depiction of a government categorization system and the use of incinerators to dispose of those deemed non-living.

Did You Know?

• The episode was first broadcast in the United States on Starz on 5 August 2011 and in the United Kingdom on BBC One on 11 August.
• In the episode, Category 1 patients are those who should have died and are brain-dead, while Category 2 patients have persistent injuries or diseases.
• Vera is shot by Colin Maloney after threatening to prosecute him for inhumane conditions, then placed in a module that is later activated as an incinerator.
• Gwen Cooper returns to Wales to rescue her father Geraint from an Overflow Camp.