Angel ep by ep; THE PRODIGAL-Kate and corruption

[saturn5]

THE PRODGAL

The Good;
Clever opening scene with Liam. Darla, yay! Her words about love infecting the heart always are just incredible. Some nice paralells with Kate and some nice comedy with the alarm system.

The Bad;
The head demon looks stupid and looks rather like the guy Cordy will save Gunn from in season 2

Best line:
Liam's dad; "I was never in your way boy" (the most tragic line in the whole of Angel AND Buffy!)

Jeez, how did they get away with that?
Cordy sawing up the demon. Angelus slaughters Liam's family, even his little sister which we thankfully don't see.

Apocalypses: 4

Angel Cliches

Damsel in distress; 15,

Inverting the Hollywood cliche;

In disguise; 3 no Angel but love Cordy as a blonde, only in Hollywood would that mean you could blend in.

DB get's his shirt off;
4

Cordy's tattoo;3

Cheap Angel; 2

Fang Gang in bondage:
Cordy: 5
Angel: 5
Wes: 1

Fang gang knocked out:
Cordy: 8
Angel: 7
Wes: 2
Doyle; 1

Kills:
Cordy: 3 vamps, 1½ demons
Angel: 1 demon and 3 vamps for Angel so 11 vamps, 5 and 1/2 demons, 2 humans.
Doyle; 1 vamp
Kate; 2 vamps for Kate making 3 in all
Wes; 1/2 a demon

Fang Gang go evil:
Cordy: 2
Angel: 1

Alternate Fang Gang:
Cordy: 2
Angel: 5

Characters killed:
25

Recurring characters killed; Trevor Lockley
2;

Total number of Angel Investigations:
3, Angel and Cordy and Wes

Angel Investigations shot:
Angel: 6,

Packing heat;
Wes; 1
Doyle; 1

Notches on Fang Gang bedpost:
Cordy: 2 ?+Wilson/Hacksaw Beast
Angel: 1;Buffy

Kinky dinky:

Captain Subtext;
Trevor asks if Angel is 'West Hollywood', the term for LA's famous gay district

Know the face, different character; 2

Parking garages; yep, that's how Angel gets into the police station
4,

Guantanamo Bay;

Buffy characters on Angel; Darla
7; Angel, Cordy, Oz, Spike, Buffy, Wes, Darla

Questions and observations;
All the scenes between Kate and her dad are heartbreaking but pale compared to the tragedy of Liam and his family. We find that Trevor Lockley does care about Kate, he's on the take partially to provide for her (which explains how she can set herself up as a supernatural version of The Punisher in season 6). It seems that Angel(us) got the idea for his name from his sister.

Marks out of 10; 7/10, the flashback scenes a lot better than the modern day stuff

 

[TheChosenTwo]

I totally agree with the flashbacks scenes being a lot better than the modern day thinks. Overall I think this was a really good and heartbreaking episode.

 

[PrincessBuffy16]

I loved this episode. I was glad to see more of Liam, since we saw only that one little thing in BtVS. I always thought Angel's first victim was his sister, now I found out she's not.

 

[Taake]

I love the Liam flashbacks in this epsiode which also has one of my favorite lines ever from the show. Darla "What we once were informs all that we have become"

 

[PrincessBuffy16]

But, why is Angelus breathing here? I mean, when he comes out of the grave, he's breathing really hard, like he has been running for one hour without stopping. Vampires don't have breath.

 

[Marisa]

During this episode I felt bad for Kate because of the circumstances. I was like aw that is so sad. The flashbacks like a lot of you said were great. PrincessBuffy16 I have the same question about the breathing.

 

[Wesley]

I say he was breathing because he had JUST BEEN made. He had no idea how to be a vampire and probably wasn't even yet aware that he didn't have to breath. It was a reflex from his 20+ years of life before being dead.

 

[VisionGirl]

Trevor asks if Angel is 'West Hollywood', the term for LA's famous gay district

I had no idea that's what that meant LOL!

This was such a great, incredibly sad episode. Sad for Liam/Angel, sad for Kate. I really thought that a friendship between Angel & Kate was going to happen. I now have no interest in them together as a romantic relationship, but I think a friendship would've been nice.

Since I have seen both series in their entireties, the flashbacks all get blurred to me. I can't remember if we see Liam's father in flashbacks on BtS. I'm puzzling over his relationship with his father, and I'm sure as I continue my rewatch it'll become clearer to me. There are times when he seems cold, hypercritical, & uncaring; & other times that he genuinely cares. And I don't quite get what drives Liam, since we obviously don't see flashbacks of their relationship from when he was even younger.

And I'll be honest: I don't completely understand Darla's comments, although they are beautiful. "What we once were informs all that we have become. The same love will infect our hearts – even if they no longer beat. Simple death won’t change that.” Again, I'm sure that it'll make more sense as it goes along.

 

[VisionGirl]

I'm loving this interview with Tim Minear. Here's what he has to say about Prodigal:

`"˜Prodigal', in some ways, was a reaction to "˜Hero',` he details. `For me, a lot of criticism we got was that [in "˜Hero'] here are these Nazi demons marching through the streets of Los Angeles, and no one seems to notice. But I think that's part of our show; that these things exist side-by-side in Los Angeles and no one notices. So part of the point of that story for me was that people see what they want to see; everyone saw what they wanted to see in that episode. Angel saw his father as a prick, but he really wasn't. His father saw Angel as a loser, which he didn't need to be, and Kate saw her father as distant, when Kate's father was doing everything because he loved his daughter. Of course on a larger scale, demons are running rampant through Los Angeles, and Angel says, "˜You've probably seen this kind of thing before, you just didn't have a name for it.' She didn't realize it, but it was true.
http://www.timminear.net/archives/angel/000042.html

 

[Taake]

very wise words from Mr. Minear, thanks for sharing. 🙂

 

[Bungle Jerry]

What I love about this episode - it's so easy to see vampirism as a 'superhero' thing especially on Angel. Being a vampire transforms him into a supercool action hero. But we rarely get to see how being a vampire can cripple him too. Mr Lockley's (lack of a)reaction when he's in his home with two trusted accomplices and a guy he barely knows starts screaming 'Let me in! Let me in!' is perfectly understandable, but it leads to his death. It's really clever how instead of Angel being able to save people because he's a vampire, this time he's helpless because he's a vampire. We only see that again with Groo in the sunshine.

 

[Lilah]

This episode doesn't rank well with me, I dunno what it is about it but it just didn't affect me.

 

[VisionGirl]

But, why is Angelus breathing here? I mean, when he comes out of the grave, he's breathing really hard, like he has been running for one hour without stopping. Vampires don't have breath.

"Producer Tim Minear explains it was cold while they filmed this scene, shot on location at Hollywood Forever Cemetery behind Paramount Pictures, and there wasn't a large enough budget to remove the actors' breath digitally.[1]" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prodigal_(Angel)