Stewart Pringle said: "We've really been enjoying writing for the characters who are slightly on the periphery of the Torchwood organisation. The ones who have a more ambiguous, precarious relationship to the weirdness that's going on around them. Rhys feels like the ultimate example of that.

“When we meet Rhys in Poppet he's also a man on the run, in hiding after the events of Children of Earth, and here he's briefly separated from Gwen and Anwen too. He's vulnerable, anonymous, he has none of the power or protection of Torchwood. He misses his family. He misses them so much. And he's going to meet something absolutely horrifying.”

Lauren Mooney added: “We've written about folk traditions before, like the Mari Lywd in our first Torchwood story, The Grey Mare, and poppets are from the same sort of world, I guess.

“They're little wooden dolls, human effigies used in sympathetic magic and, pleasingly, they sometimes turn up in the chimneys of old houses. Sometimes they’ve been put there for protection, and sometimes quite the opposite.

“There's something quite spooky about the thought that you could be living alongside these old charms and symbols for years and years without knowing they were there, and that was where the story began.”

Actor Kai Owen said: “The story of Poppet is an absolute belter. A story full of witchcraft and mystery and some very creepy characters. Rhys gets involved – as he always does – and finds himself landed in a world where he's sort of lost without his wife but his own experience of being in the world of Torchwood somehow gets him out of it.

“I think it's entertaining to see somebody out of their comfort zone – a normal guy in this extraordinary world and I think that's what makes it interesting. It's been a joy to record.”

Arbel Jones, Kai Owen, Scott Arthur, Emily Burnett, Sion Tudor Owen