Angel: Tomorrow

"Mind if I join you?"

"On many levels, and with great intensity..."

Some season finales are dramatic. This one is just cruel, evil and, I admit through gritted teeth, perfect.

There's tension from the start as we, but not Angel or any of the gang, know that Connor has been tricked into believing Angel killed Holtz. The whole episode is one big trap as a very cold Connor gets his revenge with some splendidly ambiguous acting by Vincent Kartheiser.

But we feel sympathy for the young, innocent, manipulated Connor, even Justine seems to feel a twinge of guilt as Connor, believing Holtz to have been killed by a vampire, beheads the corpse and burns the body on a pyre; a warrior funeral, yes, but hardly what a loving son would prefer. Even Angel, at the end, refuses to blame Connor and declares his fatherly love. There is a poignancy here beyond the betrayal itself.

There's a lovely juxtaposition of scenes as Groo gently tells Cordy that Angel, not he, is the one she loves, as a departing Lorne tells Angel that Cordy's feelings for him are the same as his for her. They finally arrange to meet in a romantic location. Happy ever after, right? Hah! This is a Joss Whedon show. There is no such concept.

Less romantic is Wesley (oh, Wesley!) sleeping with Lilah. It was clearly hate sex, though, and when she tells him not to be thinking about her when she's gone, he delivers the most withering riposte ever in the form of "I wasn't even thinking about you when you were here." Ouch.

Naturally in Angel, as for the Manic Street Preachers, there is no true love. Cordy has to ascent to become one of the Powers That Be just as she's about to get together with Angel, and he will never know why he never turned up. And we end with Connor, assisted by an equally cold Justine, sealing Angel in a coffin which he deposts to the bottom of the ocean. Even more ouch.

This is the season finale most perfectly crafted to break as many hearts as possible. It's evil. It's brilliant. And so was this season. Angel has truly come of age.

So, time for me to briefly turn to a short season of nothing else, then I'll be back with the final season of Buffy and the fourth season of Angel.

Angel: Benediction

“Well, aren’t you just sneaky with the subtext?”

Such a tragic episode, this; we can very much see how, behind the endearingly awkward scenes of Angel slowly connecting with Connor/Steven, things are about to go horribly wrong in all sorts of ways. Connor is confused, bewildered, hostile to Lorne as a visible demon, torn between his two fathers. He may fight by his father, but growing up in a hell dimension (“Who hasn’t?” asks Fred) is in many ways a very sheltered upbringing.

I think we shall be charitable and ignore the deeply unconvincing appearance of Prosthetic Holtz, as he does die, after all. But he’s devious, later upon layer, every word and every action crafted for maximum revenge on Angel, and he just doesn’t care about the collateral damage to the boy he supposedly loves and whom he has raised for the best part of two decades.

Things get more and more arse-clenchingly awkward between Corey and Groo, with Groo very much aware of his status as pet more than lover. I give them about, well, an episode. lol ah so to use her highly entertaining  plot to corrupt the lonely, unloved Wesley. Ironically, though, it would probably be best for all concerned if Justine had indeed died, and it’s doubly ironic, given the ending, that it should be Angel and Connor who save her.

The ending is ominous indeed; Connor believes Angel has killed Holtz and is now under Justine’s baleful influence. This superb episode is both intricately crafted and full of deep foreboding for the finale...

Angel: A New World

"Tell me we don't live in a soap opera..."

Last episode ended with a massive twist, and this one certainly begins energetically, with lots of weird slow motion and bad CGI wooden crossbow quarrels. But we soon settle down into a surprisingly contemplative episode about LA, betrayal, fathers and sons.

Wesley gets a visit from Lilah, offering him the inevitable job and handing him a gift that twists the knife; an early edition of Dante's Inferno with it's ninth circle of Hell being reserved for those who betray. He turns her down this time but, of course, these scenes would not be there if that were the end of it.

Cordy and Groo's relationship continues to be awkward, with Groo being jealous of Angel and Cordy continuing to have no deep feelings for him.But the episode is mostly about Connor's discovery of LA through its lowest underbelly, seeming to have exchanged one hell for another. The one friendly person this innocent boy finds soon dies of an overdose in squalid surroundings, and violence is everywhere. Angel finds his suspicious son and slowly seems to win him round- has he? We don't know by the end of the episode, but it doesn't look promising that Connor is with a prosthetically aged Holtz, one presumably mighty enough to zap both Cordy and Groo.

An interesting change of pace which makes one wonder: where are the last two episodes going? Good stuff as ever.

Angel: The Price

" Hi, Dad..."

Quite a very late season twist at the end of the episode here, but I suppose Angel has form for this sort of thing.

Before we get to the last few game-changing seconds, though, the episode concerns some horrible, moisture-devouring creepy-crawlies from another dimension that are the "price" (and yes, I'm sure the episode title also references Wesley) for the black magic used last episode by a desperate Angel. Most of the episode concerns an ever-deepening body horror threat posed by said beasties. But this is also a good excuse for some character stuff. So Fred lacks confidence in "hitting the books" and acknowledges that she lacks Wesley's skills. Cordy lacks any deep feelings for Groo, seeing him as a faithful "puppy" and faithful friend with benefits, caring far more about Angel. And Wesley is bitter, very bitter, and only agrees to Gunn's request to help because it happens to be Fred who is infected.

We also get some highly entertaining rivalry from Lilah and Gavin, and a subtle admission from Lorne that his nightclub days are over and he's on the team. And we also get a surprising resolution as Cordy's unexplained demon powers save the day.

It's a good episode. But what lingers in the mind s that last few seconds, with what looks like a terrifying stop motion monster, immediately followed through the portal by a young man who utters the above quote. That's quite the upending of the status quo...

Angel: Double or Nothing

"He is fortunate to have such a woman looking after his weapon."

Breathe. It’s all been rather heavy lately, with Angel losing his baby to a hell dimension, presumably forever, and trying to kill Wesley. So let’s have an episode of healing. Cordy and Groo being back helps- well, mainly Cordy, who gently decides things while being lovely, although the hapless Groosalugg supplies the above quote.

So we get a Gunn episode to get away from all the tragedy. Yes, there’s tension and conflict; Gunn sold his soul seven years ago and it’s time for a demonic wide boy to collect, and he even tries to protect Fred by (unconvincingly) breaking up with her. But in the end it’s all a bit of fun, serving to show what a lovely couple they are, and cheer Angel up a bit. It’s all about slow healing.

I note there’s a bit of awkwardness about Gunn as a character, mind you. Narrative means we have to distance him from his old gang in favour of his new one, but this means we take away his hinterland and start to define him only in terms of his present, arguably necessary but not good for the depth of the character. I wonder if we will see much, or any, of his past again?

A fairly quiet episode, then. But a necessary one.

Angel: Couplet

“Relax. If there’s one thing Groo knows, it’s how to handle a weapon.”

So, after last episode, it’s Jealousy, Part II, again with both Angel and Wesley. There’s some wit and some fun. And there is also, I gather from the final scenes, a hint of some impending darkness.

Angel’s jealousy of Groo is played largely for laughs. Angel is jealous, yes, and amusingly childish about it, but he’s old enough to have perspective, and is much reassured both by a nice little pep talk from Wesley and by saving the day from the rather token evil tree demon of the week. Wesley is less so; Gunn and Fred are in the cute early throes of love, and he feels it. And behind the learned exterior he’s young and less mature.

So their reactions are quite a contrast; Angel helps Cordy to get a potion allowing her to have sex with Groo without losing her visions, and ends the episode by paying for them both to have a holiday somewhere for a couple of episodes- a little strange from a father who wants to save for his baby son, but honourable. Wesley, meanwhile, strikes the wrong tone in a conversation with Gunn, until now his closest friend, and is beginning to look a little isolated. Not a good time, then, for him to find a prophecy that “the father will kill the son”...

An excellent episode, even if evil Cordelia does want her man to cut his hair short. No woman is ever getting rid of my flowing locks...!

Angel: Waiting in the Wings

"We all know you've got a thing for ex-cheerleaders..."

Here we have an episode both written and directed by the man himself, Joss Whedon, which immediately tells us that it's special episode. What we get, though, is surprisingly subtle; a meditation on jealousy and unrequited love, where both Angel and (especially) Wesley take rejection much more honourably than the villain of the piece. It's also about ballet, of which I know nothing, and has a young Summer Glau in a guest role; I never noticed her before.

It is, of course, an episode all about relationships. Yes, there's a plot with a baddie- this is the exact same ballet troupe that Angel(us) last saw back in 1890, as the rather sulky Count Kurskov, a wizard, has reacted rather badly to his prima ballerina wanting to be with another man by cursing her to do the same performance every night for more than a century. Rather spiteful of him. And this petulance of a Russian aristocrat contrasts with Angel's disappointment when a suddenly deposed Groosalugg arrives just as he's about to declare his feelings for Cordelia.

More heartbreaking, though, is how we're shown the extent that Wesley has his heart set on Fred, only for her to fall hard for a newly ballet-loving Gunn. This is all the crueller for the fact that Gunn is such a good friend and hasn't done anything wrong. Our team ends the episode very much still friends and as strong a unit as ever, though, because they're all good people and better than the likes of Kurskov.

Having said that, though... this is an excellent episode, and a brilliantly well-constructed drama about jealously and heartbreak, but it's not quite as much of an "event" as you'd expect from a Joss Whedon episode.

Angel: There's No Place Like Plrtz Glrb

"We all got our demons..."

On the surface this is a fun, fluffy little season finale in which the bad guys running Pylea get overthrown and everyone is happy ever after. But there are all sorts of little character moments suggesting problems ahead and, of course, the fluffy mood is instantly undercut at the end with the bad news from Sunnydale.

Even at the start, none of the gang want to be in Pylea any more, not even Cordy who begins to realise that, like today's European monarchs, she is nothing but a puppet in a gilded cage. Angel's initial enthusiasm for Pylea, with its straightforward black and white morals and disdain for all shades of grey has faded; he may be all white-hatted human hero, but his vampire side is all demon, whatever faith Fred may have in him. Meanwhile, Gunn and Wesley keep nearly dying in comical ways which neatly undermine Wesley's credentials as a leader.

In fact, Wesley's talents as a leader, or lack of them, are something of a subtext here. His revolutionary plans involve the sacrifice of the lives of some under him, and a particularly cynical usage of Angel. How very, well, Macchiavellian. This, along with hints to his kinkiness, seem to point to a deepening and darkening of his character to come.

But for now all is fluffy, Groo is in charge of Pylea and all the doubtless horrible stuff is still to come. But all that's for another season...

Angel: Through the Looking Glass

"Numfar! Do the Dance of Joy!"

Yes, that is indeed Joss Whedon playing Numfar. That alone is a good argument for this episode of Angel being the best ever. 

It looks as though Cordelia has been made Queen because of her prophetic powers, which connect her to the Powers That Be. There's a catch, however. She has to "Com-Shuk" with a creature called the "Groosalugg". I've never heard it called that before.

Here we continue the theme of Pylea allowing Angel to embrace his heroic nature fully, with Landok warmly welcoming him as part of the family while Lorne... er, Krevlornswath of the Deathwatch Clan... Is comically belittled by his bearded mother. All this is suddenly undercut, though, by his being invited to "swing the Crebbill" or behead Fred. Naturally, he rescues her, big old hero that he is, and makes himself an outsider.

The ensuing scenes with Angel and Fred serve both to emphasise how likeable and tragic Fred is and what an awesome actress Amy Acker is. 

It takes a while for Fred to accept that "the handsome man" did indeed save her from the monsters, LA is still real, she's not dead and there is indeed hope. She's having a very bad time in Pylea. Cordy seems to be ok, though, as it turns out that the Groosalugg is an even handsomer man who has fought an awful lot of monsters. He's a true, archetypal, uncomplicated hero and an obvious parallel of Angel, with all his doubts and shades of grey.

Doesn't he look a bit, er, wet in comparison? Still, that's something he has in common with Cordelia at the moment...