Due to a mildly unusual circumstance, I had some time, and so decided to watch all 5 seasons of Angel as close to back-to-back as I could. With a little help from "time-stretching" in Windvd, each ep ran about 28 minutes...
I post all the thoughts here, rather than thread-spamming over 5 different sections...
Season 1. All about the Doyle. I do not know what happened as to why they had to get rid of him, but I liked him, and always thought the season suffered a little bit with the loss... Wes is a wimp, nothing more to say. For me, the bright spot was always Cordy. As a viable character, she really came into her own.
Season 2. You know, I don' thave much to say. Darla is great as always, and I enjoy Lorne, although when he was introduced, I never could figure out what he was going to do long-term. Guess I was wrong...
Season 3. For me, the weakest... Babies make for bad television. However, the transition of Wes as a mensch as opposed to a mouse made things interesting. The romance between Angel and Cordelia was nice, and frankly, those two kids getting together woulnd' tbe the worst thing.
Season 4. Now *this* is television. Angelus, complex plots, some nice distractions, and while the jasmine sequence wasn't my favorite, I thought som eof the dialog discussing the human condition was great.
Season 5. Getting better and better. I admit, I was not sure how the W&H thing was gonna work, and the first few eps, I will be frank, I was very skeptical. It would be easire to say all the eps were good, and just list the few lame ones, rather than the other way around. (Although I did like the number 5 ep, although tv.com it got rated the worst of the season). I thought the Girl in Question was funny, and a nice reminder that Joss can be light and funny, before what was sure to be a hard-hitting finale. I am really starting to have respect for Wes, even though I don't particularly like him, but at least he's becoming more clearly defined.
I actually thought that David/Angel turned in the weakest of his performances in all 5 years, with a couple notable exceptions. But the recap with Cordy was well done, and his expression at the end during the phone call, I think I might've teared up... Spike was great, but then again, when wasn't he?
ep 21 and 22? On one hand, a surprise, and my biggest fear was that the ending was going to be Angel going over to the dark side, and that would be how Joss left it. Nothing that boy does surprises me anymore... I love Angel's double-cross of Lindsey, I thought getting Lorne to do it was quite a surprise, you can see his (Lorne's) distaste for what he's become and been asked to do. I'm a little surprised he didn't offer Angel and the gang the same exit he was going to take to avoid the alley.
I do not understand sending Wes up against the sorcerer. Possibly he was th eonly choice, but Wes wasn't known for his spellcasting ability. HOwever, the Wes death scene was extraordinary. Illyria changing to Fred, what a nice way to send Wes off, thinking the lie tha the's going to be with Fred forever. ANd her "Would you like me to lie to you now?"... Ah, a tug on the old heartstrings...
With that said, in some ways, I wish Wes could've been carried to the ally by Illyria, and then at least died surrounded by his friends. Illyria still could've done Fred, and then wanted to do her violence thing. Wes just spent a lot of time being separated from his friends, sometimes by his own actions, sometimes due to misunderstanding. And while I didn't expect a happy ending, I was hoping that perhaps all of them would be in the alley together (dead or alive), Angel would quote some pithy Doyle-ism as a tribute to him, say "this one's for you cordy", and then boom, curtain closed.
I think what was striking about this ep, was that while Angel tells Spike they'r enot going to make it (although how would the prophecy work out? Unless he (one of them) regained his humanity, and then died inthe ally...), the group never really says goodbye to each other. Angel doles out assignments, and off they go.
I guess all in all, I'd have to say I enjoyed 5 years of Angel more than 7 years of Buffy (just watched buffy back to back a couple months ago), and the loss of joss to TV is a loss that is not easily replaced. I don't currently have any shows on my plate that I find myself enjoying as much as these, with the exception of firefly/serenity, and of course, we all know what happened there.
What's interesting about this whole thing is that I watched angel and buffy when they wereon TV, but for some reason, did not see the last 3 or 4 eps of Angel (the last ep I watched was the one where Angel was a puppet), and I just couldn't bring myself to watch the end. I think I was afraid of how it was going to end. I desparately did not want to be disappointed with a campy ending. So I denied myself the enjoyment for a coupl eyears... 🙂
I have tried the angel/buffy fiction, and it just doesn't do it for me, and so I think for a while, I will be doubly bummed, as I go for a long stretch now, with no characters that I really care about in any TV show I've tried so far. And that makes me sad...
I post all the thoughts here, rather than thread-spamming over 5 different sections...
Season 1. All about the Doyle. I do not know what happened as to why they had to get rid of him, but I liked him, and always thought the season suffered a little bit with the loss... Wes is a wimp, nothing more to say. For me, the bright spot was always Cordy. As a viable character, she really came into her own.
Season 2. You know, I don' thave much to say. Darla is great as always, and I enjoy Lorne, although when he was introduced, I never could figure out what he was going to do long-term. Guess I was wrong...
Season 3. For me, the weakest... Babies make for bad television. However, the transition of Wes as a mensch as opposed to a mouse made things interesting. The romance between Angel and Cordelia was nice, and frankly, those two kids getting together woulnd' tbe the worst thing.
Season 4. Now *this* is television. Angelus, complex plots, some nice distractions, and while the jasmine sequence wasn't my favorite, I thought som eof the dialog discussing the human condition was great.
Season 5. Getting better and better. I admit, I was not sure how the W&H thing was gonna work, and the first few eps, I will be frank, I was very skeptical. It would be easire to say all the eps were good, and just list the few lame ones, rather than the other way around. (Although I did like the number 5 ep, although tv.com it got rated the worst of the season). I thought the Girl in Question was funny, and a nice reminder that Joss can be light and funny, before what was sure to be a hard-hitting finale. I am really starting to have respect for Wes, even though I don't particularly like him, but at least he's becoming more clearly defined.
I actually thought that David/Angel turned in the weakest of his performances in all 5 years, with a couple notable exceptions. But the recap with Cordy was well done, and his expression at the end during the phone call, I think I might've teared up... Spike was great, but then again, when wasn't he?
ep 21 and 22? On one hand, a surprise, and my biggest fear was that the ending was going to be Angel going over to the dark side, and that would be how Joss left it. Nothing that boy does surprises me anymore... I love Angel's double-cross of Lindsey, I thought getting Lorne to do it was quite a surprise, you can see his (Lorne's) distaste for what he's become and been asked to do. I'm a little surprised he didn't offer Angel and the gang the same exit he was going to take to avoid the alley.
I do not understand sending Wes up against the sorcerer. Possibly he was th eonly choice, but Wes wasn't known for his spellcasting ability. HOwever, the Wes death scene was extraordinary. Illyria changing to Fred, what a nice way to send Wes off, thinking the lie tha the's going to be with Fred forever. ANd her "Would you like me to lie to you now?"... Ah, a tug on the old heartstrings...
With that said, in some ways, I wish Wes could've been carried to the ally by Illyria, and then at least died surrounded by his friends. Illyria still could've done Fred, and then wanted to do her violence thing. Wes just spent a lot of time being separated from his friends, sometimes by his own actions, sometimes due to misunderstanding. And while I didn't expect a happy ending, I was hoping that perhaps all of them would be in the alley together (dead or alive), Angel would quote some pithy Doyle-ism as a tribute to him, say "this one's for you cordy", and then boom, curtain closed.
I think what was striking about this ep, was that while Angel tells Spike they'r enot going to make it (although how would the prophecy work out? Unless he (one of them) regained his humanity, and then died inthe ally...), the group never really says goodbye to each other. Angel doles out assignments, and off they go.
I guess all in all, I'd have to say I enjoyed 5 years of Angel more than 7 years of Buffy (just watched buffy back to back a couple months ago), and the loss of joss to TV is a loss that is not easily replaced. I don't currently have any shows on my plate that I find myself enjoying as much as these, with the exception of firefly/serenity, and of course, we all know what happened there.
What's interesting about this whole thing is that I watched angel and buffy when they wereon TV, but for some reason, did not see the last 3 or 4 eps of Angel (the last ep I watched was the one where Angel was a puppet), and I just couldn't bring myself to watch the end. I think I was afraid of how it was going to end. I desparately did not want to be disappointed with a campy ending. So I denied myself the enjoyment for a coupl eyears... 🙂
I have tried the angel/buffy fiction, and it just doesn't do it for me, and so I think for a while, I will be doubly bummed, as I go for a long stretch now, with no characters that I really care about in any TV show I've tried so far. And that makes me sad...
