Angel 4.8: Long Day's Journey

[thebratqueen]

Boy, not like the title gives away the ending or anything, huh? ;)

I find I don't actually have that much to chat about with regards to last night's ep. Much like Buffy's "Potential" a lot of this was just moving everybody into the right position for the sweeps stuff to start. So there wasn't anything huge to talk about in terms of development even in comparison to, say, last week's ep where at least we had Wes breaking up with Lilah to give us character development with. This week wasn't really about character development, it was about moving the plot along.

Which is fine - esp since it's such a kick ass plot.

I'm really happy that they're going whole hog with this apocalypse. And you know it's not even so much the blotting out the sun (which was cool) as it was the little details - Connor talking about people screaming, Wes mentioning the thousands killed by the earthquakes and the rain of fire. Little things that helped to paint the world as a bleaker place to inhabit. I liked that. It made it feel more real than the usual apocalypse on Buffy where yeah the world ends but really only the Scoobies tend to be aware of it. Even big stuff like the Mayor or the dimensions being ripped open never gets much of a mention after the fact - or if it does, not with any kind of seriousness. But this does make sense considering that Buffy is the lighter show. Angel the show is darker, and therefore can handle a darker daily universe.

As far as the characters go, I'm trying to come to terms with the Cordy thing. It occured to me last night that maybe she's being deliberately directed to not attach herself to any emotions. Here's why - and no spoilers here - but it's no secret that Charisma tried to get off the show last season and she's pregnant now. It's also known that her pregnancy wasn't something known going into this season. Therefore, it's entirely possible that the writers are having to make up things as they go to accomodate this real life stuff. Therefore (part the second) maybe it's a deliberate choice by TPTB to vague Cordy up as much as possible so that they've got lots of avenues open (in much the same way that James Marsters was deliberately directed to act as though Spike was going to get the chip out, when in fact he got his soul).

I dunno. I suspect that this is coming from the same place as my denial about the drowning Spike scene (it was diluted Holy Water I tells ya! It was! Now shut up and let me enjoy the pyramids!). Because frankly the problem is that the writers are in a tough spot. For whatever reason that they're writing this, they're writing a Cordy who's boning (or at least once boned) Connor while she supposedly had feelings for Angel and, frankly, this is nothing like the character that we know. It's not even like pod-person Cordy from season 3.

Now I know the reasons why the writers are doing this and I'm not going to share. But the point is, it doesn't even matter why. What matters is that it is and what is is a Cordy who's actively violating the two-step rule of fanfic (I know it's canon, go with me on this for a sec) who's therefore giving us nothing to hang on to. Esp because none of the steps (Step one: Feelings for Angel. Step Two: Sleeping with Connor) even follow a discernible logical progression. So we in the audience can't latch on to Cordy's actions as a way of being able to relate to and understand her plotline. Which leaves her emotions as pretty much the only way to relate to her, and right now she's not having any.

Bringing it back to my point, either the lack of emotions is due to Charisma's bad acting, or it's a deliberate directorial choice, or both, but either way the end result is the same which is that we're all sitting here going "Um... kay." Because all we're seeing is people move around on the screen and talk. We're getting no context. Even the Spike soul/chip thing still gave us some context, for all that I've got a beef about it being the wrong kind of context, even for a misdirection such as it was.

I dunno. I think I'm just going to have to shut up for now and wait to see how this plays out. If for no other reason then I can then get more specific than "And I know something happens" ;)

FWIW, this was a Mere Smith episode. It was actually pretty good so, you know, yay. A few people have the impression that I have it in for Mere and will therefore hate everything she does. This is not the case. I hate everything she does that sucks which, up to Loyalty was basically every episode that she ever wrote (and I still maintain Loyalty had an uncredited co-writer, just as Mere was uncredited for helping out Fury in The Price). But my feelings about Mere are the same as my feelings about Fred - it's not my choice to have her here, but since we have her I want her to be good. So if Mere churns out a good episode - huzzah! I didn't have to watch crap that week!

That being said, I've had requests to actually explain what was wrong with Mere's Pre-Loyalty episodes. Which, I've got to admit, makes me look at the people doing the asking in much the same way as I look at people who think Chris Rice is an excellent novelist. Because if the wrongness isn't flamingly self-evident, I don't know if I can help you ;)

Still, I did once promise that I'd try to do the rundown for something like Fredless or Birthday and.... guh. I just can't. Because that would mean watching them again and can we say a world of no?

But - Mere's got some very obvious writing weaknesses. Once you know how to spot them, you start getting the keys to unlock why her episodes suck. And there were some hints (note: just hints. full credit where it's due on her writing a good, solid episode. I'm just saying I noticed these much like I notice David Fury and the Thing).

1) She doesn't know how to juggle all the characters.

Mere tends to lose track of where all the characters are, and very often the ones not currently talking tend to fade away like a musician in Sting's 'If you love somebody (set them free)' video. The most painful example of this was probably Gunn in Fredless who kept leaving the room whenever Mere ran out of things for him to say. Subtle hints of it in last night's ep was the fact that 90% of Wes's actions last night could be described as "Wes walks in from the office and says something" (she didn't know what to have him do, so she kept him out of the room until he had a line, and she couldn't even come up with something new for him to be doing offscreen each time he did it). The rare exeption to this was when he was sitting on the couch near the office (but again still in the background until he had a line), and when he was in the background during the final scenes either casting the spell or talking about Angelus. Likewise notice how Mere couldn't even come up with something original for Fred to do during the spell casting, like throwing ingredients down to the floor or some such. Instead she did the exact same thing Wes did.

2) Attempts at so-called comedy through so-called humorous cuts

Mere loves either wacky misdirection (you think the characters are talking about one thing, then the camera pulls back to reveal they're talking about something else - granted, Mere wasn't the only one to abuse this back in the early seasons) or wacky jump cuts, case in point "As long as it's not some abandoned tenement" [cut to an abandoned tenement]. Get it? Do you GET IT?? Cordy said as long as it wasn't an abandoned tenement, and it WAS! Isn't that a HOOT?

3) Mary Sues

Granted, Gwen has yet to be a full-fledged Mary Sue and thank god for it, but the whole "I can sense that you're troubled about the British guy and your girlfriend, and will now attempt to advise you on it even though we don't know each other that well and by all rights you should hate me" is a total Mary Sue-ism. Esp since Gwen did it through a totally illogical and almost God-like (or dare I simply call it Colin Sense) talent - specifically "I'm a thief, I know how to read faces". Except no, because unless you're a con artist, pickpocket or stupid thief, you'd normally be stealing stuff when there weren't people around.

Which also relates to another of Mere's weaknesses, which is that her logic does not resemble our earth logic (normally shown in plotlines that make no sense in and of themselves, such as Fredless, Birthday, etc).

Now again, I want to emphasize that this was a great ep. These little flaws were maybe .01% of the whole episode. I'm not pointing them out to rag on the ep. Like I said, I'm just pointing them out b/c people asked me why Mere's old episodes sucked. These are 3 reasons why her old eps sucked, so if you see the examples of them here, maybe you can pick up on the huge examples there were back then b/c back then any good in a Mere episode was usually the .01%.

And, just to round it out, the other things that Mere tends to do are value so-called comedy over accurate characterization, have little to no awareness of canon or continuity, and to write the characters as though they had the IQ of cream cheese. Luckily, none of this was in evidence last night.

Mere also often has a problem writing the actual humor of the show (witness her writing of Skip in Birthday vs. Jeff Bell's in That Vision Thing) and often tries way too hard on the "it's funny because it's normal" humor. However I was pleased to see that last night she actually handled Manny fairly well, so here's hoping that now that she's got 3 years of writing under her belt, she's learned how to do it right.

Random thoughts:

Alexa and David continue to have chemistry. I continue to be hopeful that this means Gwen is going to be a regular and, in my ideal universe, replace Charisma (this is no spoiler, only my wish). Not because I'm an Angel/Gwen shipper or anything, but because I like how their characters relate to one another and I could watch pretty much any permutation of that, ship or otherwise, and believe it. Again - your storylines don't have to be what I, personally, would write, they just have to be good.

I felt the "it's Connor! It's Connor it's Connor it's Connor!" thing was a wee bit forced, but then again considering who was the worst offender in using Connor as their volley in non-sequitor tennis, I'm willing to forgive it. (No, not going to explain further. Rewatch the ep and pay attention. And remember that "worst offender" does not, necessarily, mean the person who did it the most. Then again, maybe it does... [TBQ laughs the laugh of the spoiled])

Gunn was at least a smidge more palatable this week then last, but how hard must it be for JAR to come in and have to deal with his character acting like this? Also, what was up with the "I thought we learned our lesson about portals" bullshit? Because you'd think Gunn of all people would A) remember that portals don't kill people, guys who snap other people's necks kill people and B) even if portals do equal bad, it's not exactly like they want to send the Beast a pick-me-up bouquet.

Alexis managed to convey Wes's feelings for Fred nicely. I still remain confused as to why he continues to have them.

Which reminds me - I can certainly forgive Gwen's bit of Colin Sense with the Fred/Wes/Gunn triangle, since what you want to do when the actual characters themselves don't convey the necessessary emotions is have unrelated, tertiary characters shore it up for you by constantly talking about it and - no, wait, you don't. Christ, gang, haven't you learned your lesson from season 3 yet???

wolfling is right, the beast knocking politely on Connor's door was cute.

WTF was up with that cheesy music during Angel's speech?

Angel in a hoodie? Kind of cute.

Wes in jeans? Hot.

Did you notice: Charisma forgetting herself at one point and patting her belly in the classic pat of proud mommys-to-be everywhere?

And, finally, a plea:

I'm giving away no spoilers, but please, please, please, PLEASE for the love of GOD guys, take this phrase and MEMORIZE it. Recite it constantly during next week's episode because believe me I know what y'all are going to be saying if you forget it. So, please, if you love me or even vaguely like me, REMEMBER THESE WORDS:

The ENTIRE EPISODE happens for a reason.

That's it. The ENTIRE EPISODE happens for a reason. No, not just that part. No, not just that part. The ENTIRE EPISODE. No, really, the ENTIRE EPISODE.

We'll talk more next week ;)