I'm pretty sure Shanty Town is, if not the absolute worst Village for a Torturer chain, pretty close to it. If you have Shanty Town and Torturer in your starting hand, which you probably need to get the chain started, than Shanty Town is just +2 Actions for $3- a pretty rotten deal. If you just have one Shanty Town in your hand, then okay it's better than Village, but if you're building a Torturer chain than you'll need a bunch and you're more likely to have it with Torturers, or with other Shanty Towns, and a hand with several Shanties is no good either. So, okay, maybe one Shanty Town can work as a soft counter to your opponent's Torturer, but it also makes your multi-Torturer hits much harder to realize.
Shanty Town is so anti-synergistic with Torturer that I will consider building something else if that's the only option for a Torturer engine, something that can be said about no other Village. Maybe the Natives, that's it.