Angel - Season 2 impressions (episode 15)
Jan. 12th, 2006 08:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thalia_seawoodReprise
For a summary click here.
- The first scene is rather funny. So you can actually get a kit for ritual sacrifices! The store for this is probably directly next to IKEA where you can get the build-it-yourself furniture.
Ah, the familiar feeling of not finding all the things that should be in the box. :-)
2.Man reading from a booklet: "Make sure all troths are securely fastened and sacrifices tilted as shown in diagram F-12 to ensure full drainage into sacred offering bowl."
1.Man: "Yes, yes, and?"
2.Man: "Using a clean, diagonal motion slit throat of sacrifice with the pre-blessed ceremonial dagger provided. - I didn't see that in the box."
- Francine refuses to pay for the "third eye removal" that Wesley performed for her daughter.
I like it a lot that what first appears as a small side story, becomes an important plot point later on.
- The seventy-five year review at Wolfram & Hart:
W&H is the company where the writers let off steam over whatever they may have suffered in their own worklife. Annual reviews in your average company may be a pain, but really they are very small peanuts compared to the practices of W&H. :-)
Lilah: "They should be. I dug up everything I could find on the last seventy-five year review. It's all in there. Makes the Christmas purge of sixty-eight look like fun old times. Nearly half of mid-management was sacked. And Lindsey, they use actual sacks."
Lindsey: "I'll read it, Lilah."
[...]
Lilah: "I've included some suggestions on how we could plump up our portfolio before Friday."
Lindsey: "Look, either we pass the review, or we won't. You really think that a few last minute dark rites and rituals are gonna make a difference now?"
Lilah: "Everybody else seems to think so. I heard Henderson actually pulled her firstborn out of company daycare to offer it up to... Brown noser. My mother was right. I should have had children."
- Not only didn't Angel stop the death of the W&H lawyer, the caterers, etc., he also pushed Kate into a very difficult position:
Kate: "Hmm, so it's funny how these dead people were threatened by an intruder at their offices. An intruder *I* picked up and released on the street three hours before the complainants were found massacred."
Angel: "You know who's responsible for that."
Kate: "Yeah. But I can't figure out though is why forensics is now telling me that it looks like the suspect or suspects *didn't* break in. - They had to brake out. - The victims were locked in that wine cellar with their attackers and I think I am *done* helping you now."
- Angel crashing in on Cordy and Wesley because he wants to borrow a book. Not his best moment...
- The conversation between Darla and Lindsey is fascinating. Darla allows Lindsey to take care of her right now, even tells him he is the only one who hasn't deserted her.
I'm pretty sure that she's playing him, however. She has a certain tolerance for him and likes to observe him, but she has no real affection for him. He's useful, that's all. I think the scene I quote below shows this. Darla can't abide Lindsey's fashionable guilt, it's just so trite.
Hey, Lindsey, if you *really* feel dirty for working at W&H, stop working there or die for your conviction. But don't pretend you're the victim who's defiled by W&H. Like Darla, I just can't take this attitude.
Lindsey gets up: "I'm gonna take a shower."
Darla: "You always take a shower when you come back from that place. Don't know why. You're never dirty."
Lindsey unbuttoning his shirt: "I'm always dirty."
Darla rolls her eyes, then as Lindsey closes the door to the bathroom behind him, she pushes the blanket aside and gets up.
As for Lindsey: I don't think what he feels for Darla is genuine love. He needs her to feel more important and more powerful. She's his guarantee to feeling special.
For now, Lindsey is the one character in the Jossverse I dislike. There are some characters towards which I feel indifferent, but Lindsey gets the price for actually getting on my nerves.
- Angel managed to annoy me in this scene. Just popping in without saying either hello, please, may I, thanks or goodbye - all this after ignoring your former friends for months. Really not in good style.
Angel opens the door and walks into the new Angel Investigations office, not bothering to close the door behind him.
Wesley: "Good Lord."
Cordy: "Angel."
Wesley: "May we - help you?"
Not even looking at them, Angel walks to the bookshelf behind the desk and starts looking at the books there.
Wesley: "Excuse me, that - that area is for employees only!"
Angel: "Yeah. You took all the books."
Cordy: "Yeah, well, you got the waffle iron."
Angel takes a book and starts to leave but Cordy snatches it our of his hand.
- Not only the W&H employees have to face a review, Kate is in a similar situation.
The whole hearing is an extremely painful scene as being a police officer meant so much to Kate. It was her whole identity and in some short moments this is all taken away from her.
The final comment "I'm just glad your father's not around to see this." is the most cutting comment you could make to her.
- Angel has reached the point where he feel so much self-contempt that he tries to ruins any good opinions people still held of him. (I guess if he stayed a bit longer with Wesley and Cordy in the scene before, he would probably have started to tell them about things Angelus' did in the past.)
Denver: "You know you changed my life that day. I mean, a vampire comes into my place looking to kill a demon to save human beings? I figured if something like *that* could happen there really must be good in the world."
Angel: "Right. So you never heard of that term before 'home office?'"
Denver: "Hey, how'd that go anyway? It was a Thesulac, paranoia demon, if I recall."
Angel: "Yeah. I don't know. I think he killed everyone."
Denver: "Oh. - Well, point is, you tried."
Angel: "Actually, I pretty much walked out and let the demon have the place and everyone in it.
Since the scene with the Thesulac demon foreshadows the death of the W&H lawyers, I think it shows that Angel is not proud of what he did but tries not to care about anything any longer.
- Denver wants to give Angel the glove that will kill the Kleynach demon, the senior partner of W&H. Things go wrong, however, when Darla intervenes, kills Denver and takes the glove.
I see Denver as representing hope here. He still believes that Angel fights for a good cause. He also believes that things will turn out fine this time around, ironically just before he dies. So Denver's death stands for the momentary death of hope, IMO. Which totally fits the mood of the episode. For most characters we see in this episode, things get *very* bleak. The scene right afterward, for example, shows us Virginia ending her relationship with Wesley.
- Wesley & Virginia:
The "no hope" attitude has infected these two as well. Virgina doesn't believe that Wesley will ever give up his job as a demon fighter for her. And she doesn't have enough courage or love to stay by his side despite Wesley's work.
Wesley is equally hopeless. He doesn't even try to win Virginia back.
Virginia: "I don't suppose you'd ever consider - maybe giving it up - for something else?"
Wesley: "Could you be with someone who would?"
Virginia: "I don't know. - But sometimes I feel like I should be wrapped in bandages - to keep *my* insides from falling out."
Wesley swallows: "This is difficult for you, isn't it?"
Virginia: "I just don't like to see you hurt."
Wesley: "No. - I mean - I mean breaking up with me."
Virginia looks up at Wesley, but doesn't say anything.
- Poor Kate!
Interesting parallel between Buffy and Angel. While Buffy has to deal with the death of her mother, Kate is grieving for her dead father.
Kate walks into her apartment carrying a box with the stuff from her desk. Puts the box down, takes off her jacket and pours herself a stiff drink. Sees the shelves holding her trophies and plaques and goes to knock them off while trying to hold back tears. Picks up a photo of her dad and starts to cry.
- Angel defeats the senior partner, but it's an empty victory.
- I really like the next scene, i.e. Angel taking the elevator to the homeoffice of Wolfram & Hart with Holland as his sole companion.
Holland: "Oh, no. I'm quite dead. Unfortunately my contract with Wolfram and Hart extends well beyond that. (Gives Angel a big smile, then motions his head) Hop on in. You certainly earned it."
More and more I am convinced that Holland and Wilkins are related or dealt with one another in the past.
And since I find the conversation between Angel and Holland so fascinating, here's more quotage:
Holland: "Hm-mm, now tell me just what do you think that would accomplish? In the end, I mean."
Angel: "It'll be - the end."
Holland: "Well, the end of you, certainly. But I meant in the larger sense."
Angel: "In the larger sense I really don't give a crap."
Holland: "Now I don't think that's true. - Be honest. - You got the tiniest bit of 'give a crap' left. Otherwise you wouldn't be going on this Kamikaze mission. Now let me see, there was something - in a sacred prophecy, some oblique reference to you. Something you're supposed to prevent. Now what was that?"
Angel: "The apocalypse."
Holland: "Yes, the apocalypse, of course. - Another one of those. Well, it's true. We do have one scheduled. And I imagine if you were to prevent it you would save a great many people. Well, you should do that then. Absolutely. I wasn't thinking. - Of course all those people you save from that apocalypse would then have the next one to look forward to, but, hey, it's always something, isn't it?"
The elevator shaft and cable dissolve as the elevator continues to plummet into a hellish red glow.
Angel: "You're not gonna win."
Holland: "Well - *no*. Of course we aren't. We have no intention of doing anything so prosaic as 'winning.'"
Holland laughs and for the first time Angel turns his head to glance in Holland's general direction.
Angel: "Then why?"
Holland: "Hmm? I'm sorry? Why what?"
Angel: "Why fight?"
Holland: "That's really the question you should be asking yourself, isn't it? See, for us, there is no fight. Which is why winning doesn't enter into it. We - go on - no matter what. Our firm has always been here. In one form or another. The Inquisition. The Khmer Rouge. We were there when the very first cave man clubbed his neighbor. See, we're in the hearts and minds of every single living being. And *that* - friend - is what's making things so difficult for you. - See, the world doesn't work in spite of evil, Angel. - It works with us. - It works because of us."
And with that the elevator comes to a screeching halt.
The doors open and Angel looks out to see a homeless person pushing a loaded shopping cart across the plaza in front of the Wolfram and Hart Office building in LA.
Holland: "Welcome to the home office."
Okay, what this scene tells me is: It's not about the end at all. To say "The end justifies the means." is plain wrong. It should always be about the next step and then the step afterwards. To do the best you can with each step and to be true to yourself and your moral guidelines all the while. And yes, that's much less satisfying than a big victory of light over dark, but it's what ultimately counts.
The irony is that according to Holland, the W&H company that represents darkness follows the same directive. Little evil, big evil - doesn't matter. As long as they keep it coming and never stop producing more evil.
All that Angel sees right now is despair and the feeling that nothing he does matters in the big plan. He really needs to think about this first to understand that the little things matter just as much. For now, it seems as if W&H finally managed to truly devestate him with their mind games.
- Kate tries to kill herself, but still calls out for help when she leaves a message on Angel's answering machine. Who turns down the volume instead of listening to her...
- Darla: "What're you doing?"
Angel: "It doesn't matter. (Strokes the side of her face) None of it matters."
He kisses her again and she responds.
Not good. Not good at all.
For Angel sleeping with Darla is an act of despair. However, I'm convinced that Darla still loves Angel so for her it actually means something positive. It means that Angel will come back to her again and that all her dark dreams will come true.
- Love the final shot that mirrors the scene in Surprise where Angel loses his soul.
A loud crack of thunder rings out and Angel suddenly sits up with a gasp.
For a summary click here.
- The first scene is rather funny. So you can actually get a kit for ritual sacrifices! The store for this is probably directly next to IKEA where you can get the build-it-yourself furniture.
Ah, the familiar feeling of not finding all the things that should be in the box. :-)
2.Man reading from a booklet: "Make sure all troths are securely fastened and sacrifices tilted as shown in diagram F-12 to ensure full drainage into sacred offering bowl."
1.Man: "Yes, yes, and?"
2.Man: "Using a clean, diagonal motion slit throat of sacrifice with the pre-blessed ceremonial dagger provided. - I didn't see that in the box."
- Francine refuses to pay for the "third eye removal" that Wesley performed for her daughter.
I like it a lot that what first appears as a small side story, becomes an important plot point later on.
- The seventy-five year review at Wolfram & Hart:
W&H is the company where the writers let off steam over whatever they may have suffered in their own worklife. Annual reviews in your average company may be a pain, but really they are very small peanuts compared to the practices of W&H. :-)
Lilah: "They should be. I dug up everything I could find on the last seventy-five year review. It's all in there. Makes the Christmas purge of sixty-eight look like fun old times. Nearly half of mid-management was sacked. And Lindsey, they use actual sacks."
Lindsey: "I'll read it, Lilah."
[...]
Lilah: "I've included some suggestions on how we could plump up our portfolio before Friday."
Lindsey: "Look, either we pass the review, or we won't. You really think that a few last minute dark rites and rituals are gonna make a difference now?"
Lilah: "Everybody else seems to think so. I heard Henderson actually pulled her firstborn out of company daycare to offer it up to... Brown noser. My mother was right. I should have had children."
- Not only didn't Angel stop the death of the W&H lawyer, the caterers, etc., he also pushed Kate into a very difficult position:
Kate: "Hmm, so it's funny how these dead people were threatened by an intruder at their offices. An intruder *I* picked up and released on the street three hours before the complainants were found massacred."
Angel: "You know who's responsible for that."
Kate: "Yeah. But I can't figure out though is why forensics is now telling me that it looks like the suspect or suspects *didn't* break in. - They had to brake out. - The victims were locked in that wine cellar with their attackers and I think I am *done* helping you now."
- Angel crashing in on Cordy and Wesley because he wants to borrow a book. Not his best moment...
- The conversation between Darla and Lindsey is fascinating. Darla allows Lindsey to take care of her right now, even tells him he is the only one who hasn't deserted her.
I'm pretty sure that she's playing him, however. She has a certain tolerance for him and likes to observe him, but she has no real affection for him. He's useful, that's all. I think the scene I quote below shows this. Darla can't abide Lindsey's fashionable guilt, it's just so trite.
Hey, Lindsey, if you *really* feel dirty for working at W&H, stop working there or die for your conviction. But don't pretend you're the victim who's defiled by W&H. Like Darla, I just can't take this attitude.
Lindsey gets up: "I'm gonna take a shower."
Darla: "You always take a shower when you come back from that place. Don't know why. You're never dirty."
Lindsey unbuttoning his shirt: "I'm always dirty."
Darla rolls her eyes, then as Lindsey closes the door to the bathroom behind him, she pushes the blanket aside and gets up.
As for Lindsey: I don't think what he feels for Darla is genuine love. He needs her to feel more important and more powerful. She's his guarantee to feeling special.
For now, Lindsey is the one character in the Jossverse I dislike. There are some characters towards which I feel indifferent, but Lindsey gets the price for actually getting on my nerves.
- Angel managed to annoy me in this scene. Just popping in without saying either hello, please, may I, thanks or goodbye - all this after ignoring your former friends for months. Really not in good style.
Angel opens the door and walks into the new Angel Investigations office, not bothering to close the door behind him.
Wesley: "Good Lord."
Cordy: "Angel."
Wesley: "May we - help you?"
Not even looking at them, Angel walks to the bookshelf behind the desk and starts looking at the books there.
Wesley: "Excuse me, that - that area is for employees only!"
Angel: "Yeah. You took all the books."
Cordy: "Yeah, well, you got the waffle iron."
Angel takes a book and starts to leave but Cordy snatches it our of his hand.
- Not only the W&H employees have to face a review, Kate is in a similar situation.
The whole hearing is an extremely painful scene as being a police officer meant so much to Kate. It was her whole identity and in some short moments this is all taken away from her.
The final comment "I'm just glad your father's not around to see this." is the most cutting comment you could make to her.
- Angel has reached the point where he feel so much self-contempt that he tries to ruins any good opinions people still held of him. (I guess if he stayed a bit longer with Wesley and Cordy in the scene before, he would probably have started to tell them about things Angelus' did in the past.)
Denver: "You know you changed my life that day. I mean, a vampire comes into my place looking to kill a demon to save human beings? I figured if something like *that* could happen there really must be good in the world."
Angel: "Right. So you never heard of that term before 'home office?'"
Denver: "Hey, how'd that go anyway? It was a Thesulac, paranoia demon, if I recall."
Angel: "Yeah. I don't know. I think he killed everyone."
Denver: "Oh. - Well, point is, you tried."
Angel: "Actually, I pretty much walked out and let the demon have the place and everyone in it.
Since the scene with the Thesulac demon foreshadows the death of the W&H lawyers, I think it shows that Angel is not proud of what he did but tries not to care about anything any longer.
- Denver wants to give Angel the glove that will kill the Kleynach demon, the senior partner of W&H. Things go wrong, however, when Darla intervenes, kills Denver and takes the glove.
I see Denver as representing hope here. He still believes that Angel fights for a good cause. He also believes that things will turn out fine this time around, ironically just before he dies. So Denver's death stands for the momentary death of hope, IMO. Which totally fits the mood of the episode. For most characters we see in this episode, things get *very* bleak. The scene right afterward, for example, shows us Virginia ending her relationship with Wesley.
- Wesley & Virginia:
The "no hope" attitude has infected these two as well. Virgina doesn't believe that Wesley will ever give up his job as a demon fighter for her. And she doesn't have enough courage or love to stay by his side despite Wesley's work.
Wesley is equally hopeless. He doesn't even try to win Virginia back.
Virginia: "I don't suppose you'd ever consider - maybe giving it up - for something else?"
Wesley: "Could you be with someone who would?"
Virginia: "I don't know. - But sometimes I feel like I should be wrapped in bandages - to keep *my* insides from falling out."
Wesley swallows: "This is difficult for you, isn't it?"
Virginia: "I just don't like to see you hurt."
Wesley: "No. - I mean - I mean breaking up with me."
Virginia looks up at Wesley, but doesn't say anything.
- Poor Kate!
Interesting parallel between Buffy and Angel. While Buffy has to deal with the death of her mother, Kate is grieving for her dead father.
Kate walks into her apartment carrying a box with the stuff from her desk. Puts the box down, takes off her jacket and pours herself a stiff drink. Sees the shelves holding her trophies and plaques and goes to knock them off while trying to hold back tears. Picks up a photo of her dad and starts to cry.
- Angel defeats the senior partner, but it's an empty victory.
- I really like the next scene, i.e. Angel taking the elevator to the homeoffice of Wolfram & Hart with Holland as his sole companion.
Holland: "Oh, no. I'm quite dead. Unfortunately my contract with Wolfram and Hart extends well beyond that. (Gives Angel a big smile, then motions his head) Hop on in. You certainly earned it."
More and more I am convinced that Holland and Wilkins are related or dealt with one another in the past.
And since I find the conversation between Angel and Holland so fascinating, here's more quotage:
Holland: "Hm-mm, now tell me just what do you think that would accomplish? In the end, I mean."
Angel: "It'll be - the end."
Holland: "Well, the end of you, certainly. But I meant in the larger sense."
Angel: "In the larger sense I really don't give a crap."
Holland: "Now I don't think that's true. - Be honest. - You got the tiniest bit of 'give a crap' left. Otherwise you wouldn't be going on this Kamikaze mission. Now let me see, there was something - in a sacred prophecy, some oblique reference to you. Something you're supposed to prevent. Now what was that?"
Angel: "The apocalypse."
Holland: "Yes, the apocalypse, of course. - Another one of those. Well, it's true. We do have one scheduled. And I imagine if you were to prevent it you would save a great many people. Well, you should do that then. Absolutely. I wasn't thinking. - Of course all those people you save from that apocalypse would then have the next one to look forward to, but, hey, it's always something, isn't it?"
The elevator shaft and cable dissolve as the elevator continues to plummet into a hellish red glow.
Angel: "You're not gonna win."
Holland: "Well - *no*. Of course we aren't. We have no intention of doing anything so prosaic as 'winning.'"
Holland laughs and for the first time Angel turns his head to glance in Holland's general direction.
Angel: "Then why?"
Holland: "Hmm? I'm sorry? Why what?"
Angel: "Why fight?"
Holland: "That's really the question you should be asking yourself, isn't it? See, for us, there is no fight. Which is why winning doesn't enter into it. We - go on - no matter what. Our firm has always been here. In one form or another. The Inquisition. The Khmer Rouge. We were there when the very first cave man clubbed his neighbor. See, we're in the hearts and minds of every single living being. And *that* - friend - is what's making things so difficult for you. - See, the world doesn't work in spite of evil, Angel. - It works with us. - It works because of us."
And with that the elevator comes to a screeching halt.
The doors open and Angel looks out to see a homeless person pushing a loaded shopping cart across the plaza in front of the Wolfram and Hart Office building in LA.
Holland: "Welcome to the home office."
Okay, what this scene tells me is: It's not about the end at all. To say "The end justifies the means." is plain wrong. It should always be about the next step and then the step afterwards. To do the best you can with each step and to be true to yourself and your moral guidelines all the while. And yes, that's much less satisfying than a big victory of light over dark, but it's what ultimately counts.
The irony is that according to Holland, the W&H company that represents darkness follows the same directive. Little evil, big evil - doesn't matter. As long as they keep it coming and never stop producing more evil.
All that Angel sees right now is despair and the feeling that nothing he does matters in the big plan. He really needs to think about this first to understand that the little things matter just as much. For now, it seems as if W&H finally managed to truly devestate him with their mind games.
- Kate tries to kill herself, but still calls out for help when she leaves a message on Angel's answering machine. Who turns down the volume instead of listening to her...
- Darla: "What're you doing?"
Angel: "It doesn't matter. (Strokes the side of her face) None of it matters."
He kisses her again and she responds.
Not good. Not good at all.
For Angel sleeping with Darla is an act of despair. However, I'm convinced that Darla still loves Angel so for her it actually means something positive. It means that Angel will come back to her again and that all her dark dreams will come true.
- Love the final shot that mirrors the scene in Surprise where Angel loses his soul.
A loud crack of thunder rings out and Angel suddenly sits up with a gasp.
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no subject
Date: 2006-01-12 08:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-12 09:21 pm (UTC)The "no hope" attitude has infected these two as well. Virgina doesn't believe that Wesley will ever give up his job as a demon fighter for her. And she doesn't have enough courage or love to stay by his side despite Wesley's work.
Wesley is equally hopeless. He doesn't even try to win Virginia back.
This is one of my 2 or 3 favorite Wesley scenes in the whole series -- I already mentioned the one where he sees Angel comforting Faith at the end of "five by five." This one is up there, because it's so typical of him -- and I read it differently than a lot of people do. I don't think she has any intention of breaking up with him, at least not at that point. Wesley is the one who jumps a step (or two or seven) ahead to what he sees as an inevitable point of conflict. And I imagine he's probably right, and you're also correct that she doesn't fight it (though I don't know if I would at that point either -- since he's basically saying, "my friends and my job mean more to me than you do"). But if he is right about the future, it's at least partly a self-fulfilling prophecy. A friend of mine has observed that Wesley has a consistent behavior pattern of believing that the hardest thing to do is always the right thing to do -- just BECAUSE it's the hardest thing -- and I've extrapolated that to relate to the Watchers' Council culture of stiff upper lip/honor/noble sacrifice etc. Very English :).
Whether he is right about Virginia or not, the key thing is that he doesn't give her the opportunity to push him away but pre-emptively does it for her. In this sense, he's a bit like those guys who keep telling Buffy what's good for her.
This episode overall -- so much great stuff. I'm always surprised when I go to review it how much there is in it; the W/V scene, Wes/Cordy interaction that warms my 'shipper heart, Darla and Lindsey, Lilah, and OMG Holland! One of my very favorites overall.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-15 10:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-15 10:47 pm (UTC)Very cool comparison!
no subject
Date: 2006-01-13 07:21 am (UTC)W&H is the company where the writers let off steam over whatever they may have suffered in their own worklife.
Oh yeah. My friend
Not only didn't Angel stop the death of the W&H lawyer, the caterers, etc., he also pushed Kate into a very difficult position:
Yes, and just when she started to trust him again. *hugs Kate*
Darla and Lindsey: well, you know from my fictional take on the relationship that I basically agree with you about Darla's pov. As for what Lindsey feels, I think he's obsessed with Angel and Darla both, and she matters to him in as much as anyone can, but - see the way he dealt with her re-siring - he would sacrifice her for something that matters to him more. I also stand by my claim Darla and Lindsey never had actual sex because Darla knew part of Lindsey's fascination with her was in her being someone he couldn't have.
I don't like Lindsey, which I feely admit is at least partly due to an overabundance of "poor Lindsey!" reactions at the time, which is unfair of me - they don't reflect on the character, after all - but I find him interesting now and then, and there are at least two Lindsey centric stories I can recommend to you as a must. One once you've finished the second season, and one after you've watched all five.
Since the scene with the Thesulac demon foreshadows the death of the W&H lawyers, I think it shows that Angel is not proud of what he did but tries not to care about anything any longer.
Yes.
Wesley and Virgina: what
Interesting parallel between Buffy and Angel. While Buffy has to deal with the death of her mother, Kate is grieving for her dead father.
Reprise ran in tandome to I was made to love you and Epiphany to The Body, partly, according to the ME scribes, because after the bleakness of The Body, the audience was meant to see something uplifting on the other show. However, this justification was later extended to the rest of AtS' second season...
Holland is great in the elevator scene. Alas, it's his last appearance on the show. Well, in season 5 we get a flashback in which his younger self recruits someone, but he's not seen, just his calling card, so that is the last time we see him.
Angel turning down the volume in order not to hear Kate, not Angel having sex with Darla later, is to me when he truly hits rock bottom. Like I said, his and Kate's arcs are somewhat in parallel, and at this point, they both try self annihilation.
Darla and Angel afterwards: again, you know my fictional take on this scene, so some quick additional observations: one of the more chilling factors is that I can't make up my mind as to whether, if Darla hadn't started to respond, Angel would have stopped, because the impression he gives? Is that he might have carried on regardless, and forced her to have sex. Of course, Darla does respond eventually, and yes, for her this means something different.
Oh, and in retrospect, this particular night also means something different for Angel (other than causing his epiphany, I mean), but you'll have to wait for season 3 to find out what. *veg*
no subject
Date: 2006-01-15 10:28 pm (UTC)My aversion for him is growing and I haven't read any comments that defend him. I just get the feeling that the writers want me to like him and it irks me. Dead End really bugged me.
However, this justification was later extended to the rest of AtS' second season...
Yes, I've watched up to episode 20 today and I'm not that impressed so far. Oh, there are entertaining scenes, but after the engrossing Darla arc it is all rather meh. Especially when compared to the glorious final shows in season 5 of Buffy.
because the impression he gives? Is that he might have carried on regardless, and forced her to have sex.
I agree. That's my impression as well. At this moment, he hates Darla for making him what he is and also hates himself. He has no longer any compaction to follow moral guidelines or to act decent in any way. Darla has made him a monster and so this is exactly how he will behave.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-16 07:15 am (UTC)Yes, I've watched up to episode 20 today and I'm not that impressed so far. Oh, there are entertaining scenes, but after the engrossing Darla arc it is all rather meh.
This makes it likely your reaction to season 3 will be similar too, so, chin up: it's a rather mixed affair (Angel lite, up to a point), but it has some great episodes, and most importantly much set-up for the imo best written (and darkest) of seasons, season 4, so it can't be skipped. I didn't know that at the time, which made it harder to watch (safe for the great eps).