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Post by partcynic on Nov 18, 2014 17:16:56 GMT -5
2x18 "Dead End"
I think I've mentioned this before, but as much as we're told Wolfram and Hart is evil, so much of its discussion centres on offscreen events that it's hard to see exactly what's so bad. "Dead End" is a huge step in remedying that problem, combining real horror with a fine exit story for Lindsey, as well as beginning an interesting new arc for Cordelia.
Likes
- Fully showing the visions' impact upon Cordelia. "To Shanshu In LA" showed us what a nightmare version could look like, but this ep portrayed just how upsetting a single instance could be. It's also great that it pointed out the potential differences/consequences of a half-demon and a regular human having the sight.
- The body parts plot. It was intended to be disturbing, and it was. The man 'rejecting' his transplant by stabbing himself in the eye; the cleaved up human beings kept in stasis for organ harvesting - it was genuinely sick, and thus effectively evil.
- Lindsey. It's sad we had to lose him (at least for now), but his character progression worked. What always made him great was that he wasn't caught up in the morality of it all - instead, he just wanted power and control, and when he realised that he could never truly have that at Wolfram and Hart, it was time to leave.
- Cute plot structure, with the gang and Lindsey's separate concerns turning out to involve the same thing. Having Angel interact with Lindsey also allows for some contrast between the two (one post-epiphany, and one in the midst of one), and also some good, playground-bicker type comedy (Angel's petty comments on Lindsey's music).
- Humour. For a dark and disturbing ep, this is quite funny. Lorne continues to be the star of even his briefest scenes, and Lindsey's 'evil hand' rant at the end is a minor classic.
Dislikes
- The fuss made about Lindsey's music. Christian Kane is certainly talented (and I get that the show wants to support him), but given the relationships between the characters, I can't see Cordy - or even worse, Gunn - stepping forward to congratulate him, even if he was the best musician on Earth.
- Wolfram and Hart's security is terrible. Lindsey and Lilah are able to go file-stealing far too easily - shouldn't such sensitive information have proper concealment/protection? Let's not even mention Nathan Reed's account being hidden behind a three-letter password.
- Some of the plot points are handled a bit too rapidly. I wouldn't expect the writers to slow the ep down, but you have to be paying very close attention for it all to make sense.
- No-one at Wolfram and Hart noticed Lindsey's role in blowing up a (costly) medical facility prior to his promotion. Did they not have remote cameras/monitoring on that place?
Summary
A solid ending to both Lindsey's original story and many of the themes of the season (I like Pylea, but let's face it - it's a lesser story forced in to compensate for problems had in concluding the original arc). Another winner in a season already stuffed with them.
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Post by cyclica on Dec 4, 2014 16:53:08 GMT -5
- The body parts plot. It was intended to be disturbing, and it was. The man 'rejecting' his transplant by stabbing himself in the eye; the cleaved up human beings kept in stasis for organ harvesting - it was genuinely sick, and thus effectively evil. I like it when the show (with its roots in horror) actually gives us something dark and disturbing, rather than just bad guys with prosthetic horns and green skin. The show needs that kind of 'edge' to prevent it from becoming just a lightweight fantasy. I'm glad Wolfram and hart in particular were portrayed as genuinely evil, rather than just lawyers with humorous schemes. - Lindsey. It's sad we had to lose him (at least for now), but his character progression worked. What always made him great was that he wasn't caught up in the morality of it all - instead, he just wanted power and control, and when he realised that he could never truly have that at Wolfram and Hart, it was time to leave. I took from this episode that Lindsey realised W&H were more evil that he was willing to be aligned with, and after what he saw he couldn't tell himself it 'wasn't so bad' anymore. - The fuss made about Lindsey's music. Christian Kane is certainly talented (and I get that the show wants to support him), but given the relationships between the characters, I can't see Cordy - or even worse, Gunn - stepping forward to congratulate him, even if he was the best musician on Earth. Yeah, that part annoyed me too. Especially as I wasn't especially enamoured with his music to begin with. I like Pylea, but let's face it - it's a lesser story forced in to compensate for problems had in concluding the original arc I'm not sure if we've discussed this before, but I'm curious, what problems did the original storyline have? |
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Post by partcynic on Dec 6, 2014 14:11:16 GMT -5
Agreed 100%. I think that out of both shows' three cornerstones, horror was always the one that got neglected. Maybe because it's the hardest to do well?
Maybe six of one, half a dozen of the other. I think that regardless, this was the ep that made him realise the rabbit hole went far deeper than he could imagine.
It's been many years now, and this was conjecture at the time (a lot of the dodgier behind the scenes stuff has had a remarkably good lid kept on it - only the Joss/Charisma fight seems to have leaked). But apparently the intention was for Drusilla to be more involved with the ending than she was, and for Spike to have possibly had a role too. However, there was supposedly some kind of conflict that led to them 'losing an actress' (Juliet Landau - what exactly that means is unknown), and thus the creation of the Pylea arc to fill out the remaining eps.
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Post by partcynic on Dec 6, 2014 14:15:04 GMT -5
The Pylea Arc
2x19 "Belonging"
2x20 "Over the Rainbow"
2x21 "Through the Looking Glass"
2x22 "There's No Place Like Plrtz Glrb"
This might be considered cheating, but I'm going to review these four eps in one go. There's little wavering in quality between them (though "Over the Rainbow" is the weakest, and probably the poorest of the season), and the fact that they focus on a single story means there's little point hunting for per-ep specifics. Anyway, my pronouncement on Pylea is that it's great fun - I watched the whole lot together, and enjoyed it in the same way I might enjoy a B-movie. The plot is unimpressive and the attempts at meaning/development repeat things we've already seen, but it's made up for by the lighthearted tone and a steady stream of funny jokes. Pacing could definitely be tuned up (nothing happens for about half of "Over the Rainbow"), but it's otherwise a cute little excursion from S2's darkness.
Likes
- Humour is the arc's biggest positive, and it rarely lets up. Sure, things occasionally veer into camp, but a bit of that's okay. I enjoyed things like Angel's horror at his hairstyle; the return to Lorne's home (plus meeting his mother, and hearing her insults!); Numfar (Joss Whedon) doing his dances; Pyleans' reactions to singing; and everything with decapitated Lorne. This is the single most important quality of the arc, so imagine that this paragraph amounts to five or six sets of 'likes' - otherwise, the brevity of this section coupled with the length of my dislikes list might give the wrong impression of my overall opinion.
- As stated in the intro, the arc is pleasantly lighthearted, and you need that every now and then.
- Remembering Cordy's desire to act (which seemed to have been mostly forgotten), though I guess that the commercial experience was the writer's way of putting paid to her ambitions (not that I blame her!)
- Fleshing out Lorne by giving him a proper backstory.
- Fred is easily the high point of the arc. She's the most interesting character, has the story's cleverest lines (and some of its wittiest), and is its only source of real meaning or emotion. Love her interactions with the Angel-beast, and it's good to have a second main female character, whose main 'energy' is very different from Cordelia's.
- Seeing the real demon in Angel. Really cool - I would have liked more time spent developing and examining this, as it appears to have no effect on Angel past his initial panic.
- Wolf, Ram and Hart. A neat elaboration on the theme we saw in "Reprise". As with Angel's demon, I wouldn't have minded more on it, but the idea was certainly communicated.
Dislikes
- The arc is too slow. Given the pacing, you could chop out a whole ep's worth of material without losing anything.
- Wesley's daddy angst. Kate version two, and just as boring and cliched.
- Gunn's gang. I'm pleased the writers remembered that there's a legitimate source of conflict there, but I don't care about the story; still don't understand what exactly motivated Gunn to ditch them; had no emotional response to the guy's death; and know that the payoff from this is going to be one of my least favourite eps of the show.
- I appreciate that this arc attempted to develop the characters, but it did so by creating inferior versions of things we'd already seen. Cordelia rejected her princess persona in favour of helping the helpless a good year ago; and we saw Wesley's ability to lead and make tough decisions in "Guise Will Be Guise" and most of S2's midsection. And as per usual, Gunn got nothing of value - I like the actor and could like the character (though I don't dislike him), but if the show isn't going to do anything with him, why's he in every episode?
- For the first time, watching Lorne wasn't guaranteed fun. The whining about returning to Pylea was irritating, and made him look like an ass when we saw what the place was actually like. The melodramatic statements about it being like Hell were incredibly thoughtless when he knew that Angel and Wes would be likely to hear that and have visions of Cordy in eternal fire - and while being dramatic is in his character, he's not usually so clueless. And what was up with the filler scene visiting the psychic friend who we'd never heard about and never got mentioned again?
- Ubiqitous dimension-hopping problems. Beings from another world all speak perfect American English circa the early 21st century; are all humanoid; live in societies resembling our medieval times, etc.
- We needed much more on Pylea's social structure. We seem to have a large number of different demon species cohabiting, and though we're told they hate each other, we get little feel as to what life there's actually like. Given that a demon resembling Lorne was high up in the military, does that mean Lorne's group is a privileged caste?
- How large is Pylea? There's talk of controlling 'the world', but the world appears to consist of a town, a castle and a couple of fields.
- What's going on with all the rebels? They magically appear two thirds of the way through the story. Are they all humans who were sucked through portals? Are they escaped 'cows' who've banded together? If they're such weak fighters and strategists, why weren't they squashed long ago? If they were born in Pylea, wouldn't photographs have been bewildering to them? And how did they know what Cordy looked like? She'd been princess for a few days, and it doesn't seem like Pylea has a mass media to spread info about her.
- Gunn having a 'moment of realisation' when Wesley tells him he knows that the men sent as a diversion will die. Gunn is a leader himself, and has seen his own friends/family be killed - he should both know this and be past such naivete.
- The heavily guarded castle appears to have about five guards, and Wesley's plan appears to be luring the two sentries from their posts while everyone else scales a wall ten feet away. Then they get in, meet zero resistance, and both Wes and Gunn prove better swordfighters than the guards (when exactly did they get so proficient?)
- Cordy's reaction to Groosalugg is good, but the character himself is so dull and flat that he makes Riley look complex.
Summary
Given the discrepancies in my list lengths, I'll reaffirm that the Pylea arc is good, clean fun, and the kind of thing that only a completely humourless person wouldn't be able to derive enjoyment from. That said, there's no denying that this is quite a bit weaker than "Angel"'s prior standard, and I expected more from the show at this point. Consequently, I'd say that the Pylea arc comes towards the bottom of S2 - but let's just remember that S2 is generally so good that that's no real criticism.
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Post by cyclica on Dec 27, 2014 17:00:02 GMT -5
Once again more agreements than disagreements, though I'd put the pylea arc higher than many other season 2 episodes. Regardless of the circumstances surrounding the change in plan for the end of season 2, I have to admire the descicion to make the last 4 episodes a mini, self contained story, after wrapping up the main plot 4 eps early. I appreciate any time a tv show varies the formula like this. - Remembering Cordy's desire to act (which seemed to have been mostly forgotten), though I guess that the commercial experience was the writer's way of putting paid to her ambitions (not that I blame her!) I'd say the season 3 episode Birthday was the final nail in the acting coffin. Though it is nice to see her 'real job' being referenced now and again. - Fred is easily the high point of the arc. She's the most interesting character, has the story's cleverest lines (and some of its wittiest), and is its only source of real meaning or emotion. Love her interactions with the Angel-beast, and it's good to have a second main female character, whose main 'energy' is very different from Cordelia's. Definitely. I like how she was set up in the first episode of the four, appearing only in cordy's vision, before her reveal later on. My favourite fred moment though has to be her non-reaction to seeing lorne's severed head when it springs to life, startling everyone around except her. - Seeing the real demon in Angel. Really cool - I would have liked more time spent developing and examining this, as it appears to have no effect on Angel past his initial panic. Ever since 'The Dark Age' on buffy, I have wondered what the demon inside angel really looks like, and it's nice to finally know. Though it does raise further questions. Is this what 'vampire demons', for lack of a better term, really look like? How did they become incorporeal and able to possess human corpses to become vampires? Do any still exist, do they still feed on humans? Are they bound by the same rules as vampires? If angel bites someone in this form, will they become vampires, or vampire demons, or what? - Wolf, Ram and Hart. A neat elaboration on the theme we saw in "Reprise". As with Angel's demon, I wouldn't have minded more on it, but the idea was certainly communicated. I like knowing that W&H exists in other dimensions, it really adds to their menace and makes them seem 'inescapable'. Knowing there is a planning, scheming intelligence at work in this dimension makes it a lot more intimidating than there just being demon villagers and guards. - Wesley's daddy angst. Kate version two, and just as boring and cliched. At least we had a better payoff to the Wesley subplot.  - For the first time, watching Lorne wasn't guaranteed fun. The whining about returning to Pylea was irritating, and made him look like an ass when we saw what the place was actually like. The melodramatic statements about it being like Hell were incredibly thoughtless when he knew that Angel and Wes would be likely to hear that and have visions of Cordy in eternal fire - and while being dramatic is in his character, he's not usually so clueless. I'd like to think lorne was complaining purely because of the lack of music and personal issues, and doesn't really consider pylea to be hell overall. Especially if the only other life he knows is being a bar owner for murderous demons in the lonely big city. A village of demons hardly seems like hell in comparison. And what was up with the filler scene visiting the psychic friend who we'd never heard about and never got mentioned again? That was bizarre. It felt like she was to become a recurring character, or at least get referenced again, but no. Actually, it felt like this is the kind of scene where any other character would go to lorne for help, but since he can't go to himself, they had to add a new character for him to talk to. Incidentally, the actress was the same one who played one of cordy's friends way back in buffy season 1. Beings from another world all speak perfect American English circa the early 21st century; are all humanoid; live in societies resembling our medieval times, etc. I wasn't surprised they spoke American. Everyone speaks American, star trek aliens, talking animals, even people who lived before the English language was invented, pick a tv show or movie, everyone speaks American. - How large is Pylea? There's talk of controlling 'the world', but the world appears to consist of a town, a castle and a couple of fields. It reminds me again of star trek, where kirk would save an alien village from a threat, and it's presented as him saving an entire world. Though I'd buy that hell dimensions are much smaller than our own. Perhaps pylea really is that small? - What's going on with all the rebels? They magically appear two thirds of the way through the story. Are they all humans who were sucked through portals? Are they escaped 'cows' who've banded together? If they're such weak fighters and strategists, why weren't they squashed long ago? If they were born in Pylea, wouldn't photographs have been bewildering to them? And how did they know what Cordy looked like? She'd been princess for a few days, and it doesn't seem like Pylea has a mass media to spread info about her. Ha, those humans always raised questions for me. Given that they all appear to be men, I'd imagine they haven't lived in pylea for generations. I assume they were sucked through portals, and have lived here long enough to know how this world works. Though I do wonder why angel didn't try to take any of them back with him to LA (other than fred). Or why they seem to consider pylea their home. |
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Post by cyclica on Dec 27, 2014 17:00:41 GMT -5
Btw... Merry Christmas! And a happy new year. |
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Post by partcynic on Dec 30, 2014 16:17:54 GMT -5
Hello, cyclica! A belated Merry Christmas to you, and best wishes for the New Year. I hope all is well! Agreed. It's one of the factors that adds to the coolness of "Restless" and "Home", too. Yes! That's a very charming and funny moment. Those are all really interesting questions - I would have given a lot to see them get dealt with in the show. A S3 arc building on this and exploring what it really is to be a vampire could have been amazing. Definitely! Wolfram and Hart is basically the Jungian shadow of humanity. It makes sense that wherever there are people (or humanoids), they're present too. We'll discuss that when we get to "Lineage" in 2020.  That's absolutely what was meant, and how I interpreted it. I just think that Lorne was a bit thoughtless in crying out that Pylea was hell to people he should have known would interpret it in one way, when he meant something very different. I hadn't noticed that - the acting world appears to be even smaller than Pylea! Yeah - even when considering that this arc isn't meant to be taken seriously, they stand out in silliness. It's like the writers wanted the obligatory 'fantasy film' group of rebels so badly that they threw sense out of the window. |
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Post by partcynic on Dec 30, 2014 16:20:10 GMT -5
3x01 "Heartthrob"
Knowing where this season is going to go, I always receive this episode warmly - it's fresh, has solid character development, and does a very good job of dealing with the impact of Buffy's death on Angel at a time when the network would have likely been concerned about promoting a rival.
Likes
- Good dialogue in the teaser, effectively reintroducing all of the characters, showing their basic personalities and the general structure of the Angel Investigations team. The closing line about Vegas is great, too.
- Fred's post-Pylea behaviour is very believable, and establishes her "Fredless" arc well. There's also a funny joke when she finally emerges from her room, only for an under-siege Angel to order her back there.
- Holtz's arrival is very adequately foreshadowed. Between the mention back in "The Trial" and the in-the-flesh flashback here, his eventual touchdown in LA was clearly planned for.
- Continuing to show the effects of the visions on Cordelia. And it's always good to 'see' Phantom Dennis.
- A worthwhile plot with James and Elizabeth that allows for meaningful examination of Angel's mental state following Buffy's death. The contrast between the two men's responses to losing their beloveds is very interesting, and the confrontation on the subway train has both action and emotion.
- Excellent theme. James grieved liked a child denied his favourite toy - his sadness was not for Elizabeth's death, but his own loss and abandonment. In contrast, Angel grieved for the loss of Buffy's person, and not because of self-pity.
- All of Cordelia's interactions with Angel. Each of their scenes is excellent, and Cordy's balance of humour, friendly affection and bluntness makes her seem incredibly strong and likeable - in fact, this may be one of the very best outings for her 'mature' self.
Dislikes
- Not a major issue, but the show needs be more careful and considered when elaborating on Angel's past. It's conceivable that he and Darla could have known Elizabeth and James, but the writers keep on adding things to their histories, and the characters get more and more unstable as they do so.
- More is needed on what exactly happened at the doctor's office. I'm presuming some magic was involved in allowing James to have his period of invincibility, and would have liked some additional info on it (though what we got was fine).
- Pregnant Darla. Connor's the approaching truck; the audience is the fearstruck deer. We know it's horrible and it's coming, yet are powerless to do anything about it.
Summary
A very good opener, which deals with an interesting and important topic, and does so with action, humour and excellent character insight/development.
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Post by cyclica on Feb 6, 2015 16:01:54 GMT -5
... and does a very good job of dealing with the impact of Buffy's death on Angel at a time when the network would have likely been concerned about promoting a rival. I always think of buffy and angel as being two halves of the same show, it seems so bizarre to me that they would be on different networks. I wonder to what extent the two networks co-operated, especially regarding things like the faith arc in season 4 / buffy season 7, making sure the episodes aired at the right times to have the plot make sense. - Good dialogue in the teaser, effectively reintroducing all of the characters, showing their basic personalities and the general structure of the Angel Investigations team. For the benefit of the many new viewers, who just love to start watching a show in it's third season. I realise it's a new network, and they may be hoping to grab new viewers who were watching the show before it, but does this tactic ever actually work? Why would anyone want to start watching the show if they haven't seen any of it up to this point? The closing line about Vegas is great, too I did enjoy the vegas running joke, and was surprised when we actually had a vegas episode in s4. It was a clever move disguising a foreshadowing as a joke. - Fred's post-Pylea behaviour is very believable, and establishes her "Fredless" arc well. There's also a funny joke when she finally emerges from her room, only for an under-siege Angel to order her back there. I love all of fred's scenes in season 3, she was a great addition to the core gang. Shame she didn't appear much in this ep though, but it makes sense for her to be eased slowly into the gang, both for the character and the audience. - Not a major issue, but the show needs be more careful and considered when elaborating on Angel's past. It's conceivable that he and Darla could have known Elizabeth and James, but the writers keep on adding things to their histories, and the characters get more and more unstable as they do so. Hey, remember when the main character had best friends, who were never seen or mentioned before or after the one episode they were in?  Even angel falls into TV cliché's now and again. It is understandable given angel's long life, that he must have known people other than Darla, spike and dru. But they could have been eased into episode better, like have them appear in the flashbackin 'The Trial', or at least a mention. I wonder if angel was hanging out with james and elizabeth at the same time as penn, the vamp from 'Somnambulist'? - More is needed on what exactly happened at the doctor's office. I'm presuming some magic was involved in allowing James to have his period of invincibility, and would have liked some additional info on it (though what we got was fine). I found that plot point fascinating. A vampire dies when it's heart is stabbed by a stake... but what if the heart was removed? I love when the show explored aspects of the vampire myth like this and asks what -if's. I am curious though if james could have been killed by going into the surgery and staking his heart, sitting on a table somewhere? - Pregnant Darla. Connor's the approaching truck; the audience is the fearstruck deer. We know it's horrible and it's coming, yet are powerless to do anything about it. At this point the pregnancy is a decent twist, and I am glad they addressed Darla's whereabouts so soon into the season, given how her s2 story ended rather abruptly, with the audience eager to know what she would do next. |
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Post by cyclica on Feb 6, 2015 16:08:29 GMT -5
We'll discuss that when we get to "Lineage" in 2020.  I finally have a decent new computer now, so hopefully I'll be able to visit the forum more often. |
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Post by partcynic on Feb 14, 2015 8:03:45 GMT -5
I give credit to the networks for not messing with things anywhere near as much as they could have. I don't recall there being a single mess-up with either show's airing - now contrast that with what Fox did to "Firefly". Funnily enough, it was "Angel" that stayed put, so they weren't even reintroducing them for a reason. Still, I like those scenes simply because they're such good demonstrations of each character's character. Agreed. You can tell they're being smart and testing the waters to see the response to Fred as a regular character. I like this mini-arc, and I actually think "Fredless" is the best ep of the season. Yep. I understand the temptation (because when a character has been around for so long, there's always vague plausibility for some heretofore unheard-of friends or enemies to make an appearance), but the writers should know when enough's enough. Eventually, the core vamps (and Anya) ceased having cohesive or believable pasts. Good to hear, but no worries! As fun as it is to talk about the show, real life responsibilities have to take precedence over 15-year-old TV. It's honestly impressive that we can still talk about it after so much time. |
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Post by partcynic on Feb 14, 2015 8:09:59 GMT -5
3x02 "That Vision Thing"
A second robust S3 episode, "That Vision Thing" combines a neat fake-out plot with some good emotional material for Cordelia; Lilah in one of her agreeably nasty modes; and an interesting - if underplayed - moral dilemma as Angel assists evil in order to protect a friend.
Likes
- Clever plot structure. The story looks as though it's going to be the next step in the 'problem with visions' arc, but it turns out that it's Lilah manipulating Angel through Cordelia. This is a nice step up for Ms Morgan, positioning her as a figure to be wary of in her own right, and not just as part of Wolfram and Hart.
- Lilah pointing out just how pathetic Gavin is. That said, his line about her only getting the 'head of special projects' post because Lindsey left is completely accurate.
- Good make-up on Cordy's cuts/burns etc. The demon-guy's pulsating brain wasn't as effectively done, but still looked cool.
- Nice emotional material with Cordy not wanting the visions any more (and everyone's responses to her pain). Post-"Dead End", we got lots of talk about the horrors of the visions, but not much content, but this ep really makes her fear and uncertainty real.
- Fred's funny and charming. She's not perfect (see negatives), but her scattiness makes sense based on her experiences in Pylea - she's not just awkward for the sake of it. And it's good for her to play a role in figuring out what was going on (the 'celestial telephone' bit) - it played on her physics knowledge, and pointed out that her character could be more than a female Wesley.
- Angel has to assist evil in order to do good/save his friend. Excellent grey area, and it's believable that someone might try to come for him via Cordy (no-one's even tried it since Faith in "Five By Five"). I also loved his ruthlessly killing the brain-guy and warning Lilah to never go down that route again.
- Skip. An amusing one-off demon - shame his character got spoiled later on.
Dislikes
- Couldn't the Powers have intervened during the case by sending Cordy a vision of Lilah, or some kind of clue as to what was actually going on? Their sitting back and doing nothing certainly fits their established personae, but you'd think that they'd want to stop Billy being released, even if they didn't care about Cordelia's welfare.
- The writers have to be careful with Fred. Small portions of her 'ramble endlessly while the others stare blankly at her' dialogue are cute and make sense for the character, but let's not pretend that this is that different to the tripe we got served with Andrew - the only real difference is that Amy Acker is a far better actor than Tom Lenk.
- I'm not particularly conservative, but this ep had four swear-related jokes. It's not the kind of thing that would usually bother me, but I'm getting "Buffy" flashbacks here - once the writers there stopped being able to pen witty lines, they brought on the 'lol, someone almost said a bad word' jokes.
Summary
A good, solid ep. Its main story is entertaining and has a few surprises, the characters are utilised well, and we get a mystery established for later. These are all things I like and want from a standalone story, so I have no qualms about giving "That Vision Thing" a thumbs-up.
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Post by cyclica on Feb 14, 2015 11:23:26 GMT -5
Funnily enough, it was "Angel" that stayed put, so they weren't even reintroducing them for a reason. Still, I like those scenes simply because they're such good demonstrations of each character's character. Oops. I misremembered, thinking it was angel that moved to another network. You're right though, it is good to get a scene where every character gets to be 'at their best', showcasing their characters. Agreed. You can tell they're being smart and testing the waters to see the response to Fred as a regular character. I like this mini-arc, and I actually think "Fredless" is the best ep of the season. As opposed to the new second season of Agents of Shield. They introduced 4 new main characters in the first ep! Come on joss, you should know better. As fun as it is to talk about the show, real life responsibilities have to take precedence over 15-year-old TV. It's honestly impressive that we can still talk about it after so much time. Don't remind me how long it's been, you'll make me feel old. Next episode comments coming soon! |
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Post by cyclica on Feb 22, 2015 8:14:31 GMT -5
This is a fun episode, mostly for the firsts- first appearances of skip, gavin and a good mysterious intro for billy (cool fire cage!), and also good re-introductions for lilah and fred, who are both becoming a bigger part of the show. I much prefer lilah to lindsay, and having her in a position of power makes her a more interesting character, more so in her interactions with angel and the gang than with her own collegues though. For the next 2 seasons, scenes in W&H feel to me more like 'lets see what lilah is up to', rather than presenting W&H as an intimidating entity on it's own. I also enjoyed the final scene with Darla, it's a decent set up to her proper reappearance later on. The main plot of the episode however, I'm not especially a fan of. It was ok I guess, I liked angel having to do the wrong thing to help cordy, and it's good to have a reminder that the visions have a drawback and aren't just a main characters' 'power'. However, I was a little fatigued at having yet another story revolve around visions, and cordelia's questioning if she deserves this fate feels like it should have happened earlier. She's been helping to save lives for years now. I wouldn't say I dislike the episode (it had a lot of humour I liked too), but my feelings towards the plot make me consider it average to me overall. - Lilah pointing out just how pathetic Gavin is. That said, his line about her only getting the 'head of special projects' post because Lindsey left is completely accurate. I don't mind gavin as a character, but I had little interest in seeing lilah get another rival (not to mention another boss later on with linwood). I suppose it makes sense that anyone who would work for this evil law firm would have to be at least a little nasty as a person and would give their colleagues a hard time, but the way it's presented makes in feel like a re-hash, only with more focus on lilah than we had in season 2. I also loved his ruthlessly killing the brain-guy I would like the show to have clarified if brain-guy counted as a demon, or if angel just killed a human, albeit one with abilities. I find it a little awkward in the buffyverse whenever there is no hesitation or discussion of morality when it comes to killing humans that have some kind of supernatural element to them. They are still humans after all. - Couldn't the Powers have intervened during the case by sending Cordy a vision of Lilah, or some kind of clue as to what was actually going on? Their sitting back and doing nothing certainly fits their established personae, but you'd think that they'd want to stop Billy being released, even if they didn't care about Cordelia's welfare. Perhaps they knew that would have been too painful to send a vision, on top of what cordy was going through already. Or maybe they had faith that the gang could sort this out without the need of a vision. - The writers have to be careful with Fred. Small portions of her 'ramble endlessly while the others stare blankly at her' dialogue are cute and make sense for the character, but let's not pretend that this is that different to the tripe we got served with Andrew - the only real difference is that Amy Acker is a far better actor than Tom Lenk. I loved fred in this episode (comparing cordy to lassie!), but you're right, there were some failed jokes too. Forking with gunn? Who talks like that? |
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Post by partcynic on Feb 24, 2015 18:10:59 GMT -5
I'd never thought about it that way, but you're right - it does feel like Lilah-time rather than Wolfram and Hart time. Perhaps it's because she was the only strong W&H character left after Holland and Lindsey's departures.
That's close to my feelings on this ep. I'd put it as above average (the plot makes sense, the characterisation is good and there are a lot of funny lines), but still some distance from the great stuff.
Agreed. Gavin is one of the more bemusing characters in the show - I don't ever understand why he's there. And it feels like once the writers realised the rivalry wasn't compelling, they stopped bothering (until the time came to kill him off).
Yep. A bit of the babbling is endearing (and it makes sense that Fred's social skills would be off at this point), but it's the kind of thing that gets old fast.
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Even angel falls into TV cliché's now and again. It is understandable given angel's long life, that he must have known people other than Darla, spike and dru. But they could have been eased into episode better, like have them appear in the flashbackin 'The Trial', or at least a mention.