3.17- 'Forgiving'

And immediately, we are bombarded with the fall-out of the happenings of 'Sleep Tight'. The rubble on which we focus to start with is the rubble of relationships, aspirations and hopes. And it all leads to the centre-piece of all the different splintering factions' concerns. The burnt-out crib, the absence of Connor, and Angel's broken spirit. Then the teaser hits the viewer with several short, snappy scenes, full of questions and emotional intrigue. Angel's deadened face makes way for Fred and Gunn, unable to accept Wesley's decision, then Wesley himself, making faces at Death, and finally Justine- who has turned from betrayer to betrayed, thus completing a tidy chain all the way from Angel to Sahjhan. Sahjhan betrays Holtz betrays Justine betrays Wesley betrays Angel. And in the resulting almost mathematical schematic, the cross-resonances are set themselves up almost accidentally, with Bell merely needing to do the menial work of writing the scenes. He does it with great aplomb, in undoubtedly his best effort to date. -Fred's portal. It's a tiny nuance which could have been lost in the maelstrom, but ME tend to be very good at using these. Fred's terror of the repetition of her portal experience with Connor is truly moving. So many people attempt to connect with Angel in the episode, but it is only really Fred, (and obviously the grieving Angel himself), who are thinking about Connor's future in Quortoth.

-Angel's grief, which fills the Hyperion with surplus for the rest of LA, is shown so powerfully as to warrant comparison with Buffy's loss of Joyce. For me, the events of 'The Body' and 'Forever' are the rawest place the shows have dared to go. Angel's loss is tempered in these three episodes by the differing anxieties of the supporting characters, so we are given a little more breathing space as an audience. And yet, with great acting from David Boreanaz and tidy writng, the story of Angel's grief has a harrowing effect. Those solitary scenes, back brooding, are oddly recognisable yet different. While Angel brooded earlier in his growth, it was always about himself- his journey, his misdemeanours, his redemption. While a trade-mark I enjoyed, it was a very self-absorbed, almost self-isolating trait. Here, the echo of earlier brooding adds power. For again, Angel is self-isolated. Yet here he is so because his recourse to humanity has been torn away from him. Connor was not only a baby, (although that it certainly enough), but also an investment of Hope in his re-integration with society and humanity. Just as his need for 'Family' was so important in Season One. And to add a final, weighty emphasis to this correlation in Angel's brain, his two most prized previous links with humanity- the Family he temporarily succeeds in building by 'To Shanshu in LA', are both missing. Wesley, the betraying heartless coward, [in Angel's mind]. Cordelia, on a holiday which he very deliberately set up, ironically with the assurance in his mind that the only couple he needed was his one with Connor.

-Wonderfully, however, we are not forced to stay in this consuming emotion throughout the episode- we see all sorts of other causes and effects of the pivotal moment of the Season at the end of 'Sleep Tight'. In my last post, I argued rather circuitously that Sahjhan's lack of known motives to the viewers made the ending, where his will was done more than any of the other factions, superbly perverse, unpredictable and powerful. Yet there is always a desire to know more- and here the irony of Sahjhan's motivations adds weight to the Angel/Wesley scene at the end. For Sahjhan is attempting to escape a prophecy. He believes that, given time, he might just worm his way out of his fate. And yet it is ultimately Wesley's failure to have Sahjhan's ability to believe he can change fate that leads to Connor's exile. For if Wesley, like Sahjhan, had trusted that Angel would never intentionally harm Connor, and that AI were strong enough to protect the baby from any unintentional harm by the Father, then he might have scuppered Sahjhan's plans. It became a question of who was least fatalistic, of who had the least fear, and most temerity to change things, and Shajhan, temporarily won. Of course, there is an even headier irony to be had later in the season, now that I have, (I imagine), seen a grown-up Connor returned. Because it is highly likely that the demon dimension will have been a direct cause for Connor having the ability to kill Sahjhan. Sahjhan could not defeat a true prophecy, and Wesley was conquered by a false one. What this is supposed to say about free will and a deterministic universe is probably better left to others.

-'I like trouble, but I hate chaos'. So who exactly is the evil power incarnate in the little girl supposed to be? This line is an interesting comment on whomever has said it. The scene itself is well-conceived. We have the discomfiting opposites. The symbol of innocence and virtue, the little girl, being the evil being. The apparently older beings treated as the patronised children. And of course the black of Angel against the white of the room. Linwood is revealed as rather spineless compared to most of his colleagues, although Angel's resoting to torture probably did seem particularly threatening from his position. I was scared sitting safely at home.

-Justine, while notionally a character with Evil on the back of her shirt, is of course a much more rounded character than generic Good/Evil will allow. We start to see her reaction to Holtz' betrayal bringing out that humanity resident in all ensoulled characters in the Angelverse. She becomes Angel, the betrayed. Angel, aside from deep grief, cannot believe that Wesley would have done what he did. And Justine, aside from her loss of direction and faith in Holtz' justice, actually just a front for his personal vengeance, cannot believe that Holtz is gone. The charismatic person who helped see her out of utter despair. But as she rather perceptively realises, she chose the wrong man. Wesley was the one with the good intentions. And her guilt over Wesley's apparent death stops her slashing Gunn's throat in the same way as he did in the previous episode. I will be interested to see if she can start on that rocky ol' pat to redemption.

-We have another painfully well-executed false ending. Firstly, Angel forgives the man in grief on the pavement for knocking Sahjhan down. We wonder whether this is a prefigurement of reconciliation with Wesley. The we hear Lorne's moral- which I, who still believe Lorne is largely Greenwalt, took as good advice to Angel, that he should take. Yet actually, Lorne's speech, the pavement man, the title of the episode, and the horribly insipid calm initial speech that Angel has at the hospital with Wesley are all mis-leads. Because while forgiving may be best, there is no way that Angel is ready for it. We understand his emotions, wrong though the results of them are. As Masq mentioned in reply to an earlier post, it is crucially important that it is not Angelus on two counts. Firstly, because it doesn't give Wesley that thought that simple evil can explain away Angel's actions. And secondly, because it's an action caused directly by the most direct human thing his life has ever supplied his child. Angelus is the artistic killer, the disloyal hedonist. Angel is something completely different, and his relationship with Connor is perhaps the greatest achievement of any of the Liam/Angel/Angelus trio, even though it is nascent when it is cut short. Angel might just be becoming human, but he is certainly becoming able to pin his hopes and truly pure love on a human thing, as he never found himself entirely able to do even with Buffy. And Wesley, he perceives, stops that process. Angel the human has his latest and most powerful development ripped from him.

As you may have gathered from the above review, I have watched 'Double or Nothing' and 'The Price', but will review them tomorrow when my tiredness is less likely to lead to jaundiced ranting about missed opportunities. Because both episodes, particularly the latter, had beautiful moments, but I was not overwhelemed by either as a whole.

3.18- 'Double or Nothing'

Which came first- the reviewer or the demon? This jenoff question was what I was thinking about throughout much of this episode, which is never a good sign. I think that if, after an mini-arc as climactic as the previous one, you decide to go off in a completely different direction, then you are under obligation to make the story interesting and poignant, and here I didn't feel the writing was very successful. One person I would like to compliment highly though is David Grossman, who is one of the few directors on either show who really shows creative and original flair for moulding the script into something more.

-There were three classic Grossman moments in this episode. To start with, we again see that broken crib, dominating the room. A little later, in the conversation between Angel and Cordelia, we have only half of Angel's face. He is squeezed into the corner, feeling trapped in destiny, even sometimes so torn that it feels like half of him is gone. Finally, there is an extremely wonderful little shot in the apparent Fred/Gunn break-up scene. We cut from one to the other, and then, just for a second, there is a shot with neither of them in, but only the space between them. Inhabiting the space is the bag full of their shopping- the bounty of the relationship. And yet that emotional distance is highlighted tidily, almost without bringing any attention to itself. Lovely directing. I felt the Gunn plot dragged in this episode. I wasn't ever really interested that he had sold his soul. It didn't seem to have significance, which is odd, because it ought to be such a big plot twist. We had a horribly uncharacteristic over-egging of the suggestion that Gunn felt he had no future. Not only does Gunn himself explicitly state it twice, but there is the too-ironic scene with the returned Cordelia, and several scenes with Fred. One of my favourite aspects of the story telling in Angel, (perhaps even more so than Buffy), is how much the themes and ideas are lying a little under the surface. Here I felt there was a lapse in concentration. The flashback scene to me seemed a little unnecessary and lacking in tautness, although I was momentarily amused that they picked the old '95 Coolio song 'Gangsta's Paradise' for Gunn's backing music. And the resolution of the plot seemed pretty much inexplicable and pointless to me, although I trust someone will have some ideas as to its relevance. So let's leave my moaning and focus on some of the things I did notice and enjoy:

-The Fred/Wesley scene is an exceptionally interesting moment. It is a really big turning point for both Fred and Wesley, and is an important precursor to his excellent scene with Gunn in the next episode. This season we have always scene Fred justify Wesley's actions, often perhaps overlooking some of the reality in order to back up her belief that he is simply 'a Good Man'. Wesley has decided that it is not that simple by the end of 'Billy'. And yet Fred's support helps him through. Then in 'Forgiving', Fred is desperate to find why Wesley is acting as he did, and appears to come to the conclusion that he was justified in his actions. And yet here, we see that Fred has not let him off as lightly as she did last time. When Wesley hid himself away in the Pylea-cave of his room at the end of 'Billy', it was Fred who saved him, becoming the hero Angel was to her. But now, when Wesley needs the support of somebody, anybody, even Fred will not exonerate him. He is told never to come back, and now he feels the pain of his exile from his blood kin even more bitingly. Once again, as with his parents, he feels he has lost something precious, and the onus is on him to re-gain it. It's a cruel old world, where small mistakes are exacerbated, but that has always been the way this universe operates. Meanwhile, Fred's decision to do what she does is important in relation to the later plot twist. Because she has distanced herself from Wesley, and has left herself firmly in Gunn's hands. And for a while, it appears this may have been a very dangerous decision.

-The demons in this episode reminded me of the shady Dickensian figures one imagines in 'Nicholas Nickleby' or 'David Copperfield', particularly the bespectacled worker in charge of Gunn's case. There's certainly a suggestion of a rather archaic, almost Victorian English undeground to Los Angeles, to contrast with the gang warfare that is so much part of Gunn's life in the mid-90's. -Some of David Boreanaz' acting in his big, expressive face is really starting to work wonderfully. As much as I love 'Amends', it is Sarah Michelle Gellar who has to take up all the slack in that final scene. Here Boreanaz gets to command every scene he's in, which is no mean feat when you consider how mediocre he was as an actor back in 'Welcome to the Hellmouth'.

-Gunn goes through the classic scene of attempting to lessen Fred's pain by hurting her deeply. It's interesting to consider whether, like Wesley in 'Billy', some of the insults he comes up with are really inside him. Because it is difficult to invent insults which are entirely false to what you feel and make them seem real. So, a little like Xander and Anya in 'Once More, With Feeling', we see a relationship which is apparently tight with all its underlying insecurity and doubt. Of course, Fred with a mixture of intelligence and intuition, realises that Gunn must be acting under an ulterior motive.

-When Angel says 'We are not losing another member of this family', there is a clever little ambiguity. Of course we initially think of Connor, but how much are we supposed to imagine Angel is thinking of Wesley? At all? Certainly the two interpretations are played for the audience. -The whole 'Double or Nothing' aspect of the episode alluded me, really. There was the suggestion that Angel had a really ingenious plan up his sleeve, and yet in the end it was just a strategic use of violence based on a kind of poker-face; bluffing so that even the House believes it could just lose. And then the decaptation not working, and the leader being sorted out by all the people about to be dis-ensoulled? Just boring for me.

-We have the Gunn/Fred conclusion with the truck, which hit all the wrong notes for me. If we are hammered on the head with the idea that Gunn believed he had no future, to then make the idea that it was a truck not a girl into a big joke just seems incongruous. If they'd played slightly more heavily on the idea that that vehicle was Gunn's way of making something of his life, and eased off on the humour, it could have been alright, but as it was it seemed jarring.

-And then finally, we have Angel dismantling the cot. This reminds me very much of what happened in Season Three's 'Faith, Hope and Trick' where, as soon as Buffy had let go of the Claddagh ring, and said goodbye to Angel, he returned. Here Angel starts to finally accept Connor's loss, only for him to return at the end of the next episode. Could have been fine. Instead pretty disappointing.

3.19- 'The Price'

Let me get one thing straight here. I don't have any particular vendetta against David Fury. Every time I tune in to one of his episodes, I hope to see something as tidy and compelling as his first shot 'Helpless', and I'm usually a little frustrated. This episode is far from his worst: and is a distinct improvement on 'Double or Nothing'. Part of the reason why this episode in particular wasn't one of my favourites was actually due to the suspense thriller kind of style of the episode. This has nothing to do with anything accept my personal preference for more character and theme based episodes. There was a lot which was well-executed in this episode, but I didn't quite feel it recaptured the genius of the Loyalty/Sleep Tight/Forgiving trilogy.

-'It doesn't ever snow in South California'. 'It did, once'. Here we have the highlighting of something I believed cjl mentioned before. That the two most defining moments of Angel's life since the start of the series are linked in the lack of explanation. The snow at the end of 'Amends' is a concession from the Powers that Be, and a calling. They do what Buffy on her own was failing to do. They let him see Hope again, and save him from suicide. Then in 'Reprise', in his next moment of 'perfect despair' another impossibility happens to Angel, the conception of his son. Here, Angel has sub-consciously linked the two together. He may claim that 'I don't know why I brought him this', but the engaged viewer does- he's linked together those two moments of Pain and Hope. When Fred starts to drink from the snow-scene later, everything once again starts falling apart. Angel has momentarily decided to focus on new cases rather than Connor, but he is starting to lose everything again. Even his ability to conquer apparently relatively harmless, parasitic evil. His family. His son. And that hope from 'Amends'. Cracking that snow-scene is not a drink of convenience from the writer.

-Could Gavin Parks be even more annoying as a character? He is conceived by the writers as the buzzing hornet around Lilah throughout the series, always threatening to sting like a bee, but never quite managing it. He grates on nerves superbly, and, while the audience is interestingly in Lilah's perspective, we see jsut how wearisome he really is. However, finally the sting does come, and it appears that this time Lilah could be in big trouble with another rather irritating character- Linwood. The days of the more engaging Holland Manners and Lindsey are gone, and now even Lilah's deviousness is looking under fire from W+H.

-'The Price' occurs at the same point in the Season as 'Seeing Red', and it is worth considering the idea in respect of Willow. She is the one who decided to bring Buffy back, and the cosmic price was, eventually, Tara's life, as indirect as it may seem. However, initially it appears to just be the rather here-today-gone-tomorrow thaumogenesis of the hitch-hiker, which aside from Dawn's dry mouth caused little real damage. Here in 'The Price', we are expected to believe for the moment that the price from Angel's consolidation of Sahjhan was just the nasty drinking bugs. But we must expect, like the similar case in Buffy, (and all Lorne's references to 'dark magicks' are hardly accidental), that there is to be a much more large, character-changing consequence, which I would gamble on being before the end of the Season.

-Gunn's rampage at Angel is noteworthy if not particularly spectacular. He is trying to keep the current situation in hand, while Angel is still brooding on the past. His attempts to move on with his new clients are seen to be ephemeral and without real heart.

-There's that tiny little snip of of a scene where Wesley opens the door and Gunn says 'Need you help'. We are expecting a complex, psychological master-piece, and we're given Gunn, as emphasised by the writers, being short and efficient. However, in the next scene, where we do get what we originally expect, we get Wesley's motivation for living- for explaining his consequences. It is clear that the group cannot get along without him- and that Fred has realised that she isn't Wesley. Wesley is another price of Angel's reactions to his loss, a Pryce in fact, and I suspect the under-played pun was deliberate. Those words from Wesley are beautifully acted, as always. Alexis Denisof has had a stunning Season.

-Cordelia's shininess sets up more questions than it answers, and, in the context of the episode's style being largely about the suspense of the parasites, seems a careless ending to me. I wouldn't mind if the plot was simmering along in the background, but as it is crucial to the episode's interest, it deserved a little less convenient an ending for me. However, it's nice to see that Cordelia's powers have not been entirely forgotten. I think she's been a little shakily written since she returned with the becoming-tedious Groo, as too empathetic and caring, and not quite spunky enough. That may be deliberate for all I know, but she's just seemed a touch over-the-top with her advice to Fred, Gunn and Angel. Interested to see if this strand continues to the end of the Season.

-The ending was good, but I have no idea what's going on, and frankly have given this episode quite enough attention, so instead of speculating idly, I think I'll scuttle off now to see the final three episodes. With the excellent Bell/Minear/Greenwalt credits, I have great hopes that a super season can see itself out of a temporary dip.