Angel: Provider

"Just don't lose sight of the mission!"

There's no denying it; there's definitely some mid-season water treading going on here as a light-hearted and fairly inconsequential episode plays out, the nearest the season has come to a disposable episode. Still, it has its moments.

The conceit, played for laughs but not really written with the polish to really convince (as we might expect from a Joss Whedon show) is that Angel is a father now and the mission takes a back seat to making money, with lots of advertising ad lots of cases going on simultaneously, only one of which makes any money, albeit a lot. It's fun, but not as fun as it seems to think it is.

We get an appearance from a young Jeffrey Dean Morgan in a guest role but, in an episode otherwise with relatively little arc stuff, we get a rather interesting, twisty and kinky relationship between Holtz and Justine, whose name is certainly intended to evoke De Sade: why else would Holtz insist on her spending hours with her had stuck to a table with a knife through the fleshy bit? This is surprisingly edgy stuff.

We also see more of how both Gunn and Wesley fancy the pants off Fred, while Cordy is still waiting for the inevitable price to be paid for being part demon. And an example of what zombies are like in the Buffyverse, with no munching of grey matter. But it's an episode that won't particularly come to mind when I think of the season.