Angel 10/20 - "You met the rat pack?"

Cafe Society
1

Ok let’s try this again. Last week my Angel thread sunk like a stone. My fault, stupid thread title. We try again.

Things I liked
• Cordy watching over Angel watching over Connor. Quite a neat scene.
• Liliah and Wesley’s phone conversation. They should have their own show. Well not really but I’d like to see the censors’ reactions to the scripts.
• Lorn working the subtle readings into the show.
• Transition between casino head schmoozing Lorn and forcing him to identify the fate.
• Angel’s memories. How he “casually” name dropped.

Things I’m iffy about
• People becomming truly directionless after their destiny was stolen.
• Cordy’s chopping in and out. Besides the first scene the transition wasn’t smooth enough.
• Connor. In general I’m not overly fond of him as a character and the show hasn’t done anything to make me mind if he just got killed crossing the street.

Things I didn’t like
• Break the ball, free the futures. You have to out trick the thief to fix these sorts of situations.
• Like last week the pacing was way off. They are doing too much set-up with not enough pay off.

All in all I’d say 7.5 out of 10. I enjoyed it but I felt the episode needed a few more rewrites and a stronger emphasis on the creepiness of the future stealing gamble. It would have been neat if the guy convinced the people that he could play for futures. They wagered their current uncertain one against the one Lorn read, at least that’s what he’d tell the people (“You want to be a chef with 3 five star restraunts? Wager your current fate against that. You win you trade up. You loose we get you current future and keep the good one.”)

As for the preview of next weeks, well they gave no new information. I mean no shit next week’s is about Cordy comming back and what the hell is up with her lack of memory? Did they even show a new scene?

On the plus side I have no idea what they are going to do with her, which I like. There is a lot of potential and while I hope that next episode narrows it down it doesn’t just go away in an episode.

2

OK, I’m twenty minutes in.

1)You cannot drive north on The Strip, leaving Paris and the Flaming O behind you and arrive at the Tropicana. Tropicana is south of the aforementioned hotels, and The Tropicana is not on the Strip. I know, I’ve been there, I’ve applied for a job there.

  1. Angel met the Rat Pack. Twice. For drinks. and this would have been, when, back in his smelly, back alley-dwelling rat-eating days? Hello, I saw “Becoming, Parts 1&2”. Continuity, anyone?

One thing he did get right- this town was friendlier when the Mob ran it.

I’ll check in tomorrow and give you my thoughts on the rest of the episode.

3

“You met the rat pack?”
Wow, Angel took some time out of his busy schedule of living in sewers, eating rats, and brooding over the guilt of his soul to hang out with the Rat Pack in Sunny Las Vegas?
Impressive.

4

Well, now hang on a second, people. Y’all are overlooking the key phrase of the episode, when Angel brags about attending Elvis’ wedding: “They might have thought I was part of the band; I was drunken and surly.” I’m thinking he was more of a homeless gatecrasher than swinging hipster. Of course, it doesn’t sound as cool when you say it like that. Elvis was married in '67. That gives Angel a good thirty years to wind up living in a sewer in L.A.

Anyway, good episode over all. Would have been better if as soon as Angel had lost his green token on the big spin, he had ripped the throat out of that smirking villain and gone on a rampage through Vegas while Gunn, Fred and Lorne try and find the bad guy’s glowy orb and get Angel his soul back, but I guess you can’t have everything you want.

5

Well, now hang on a second, people. Y’all are overlooking the key phrase of the episode, when Angel brags about attending Elvis’ wedding: “They might have thought I was part of the band; I was drunken and surly.” I’m thinking he was more of a homeless gatecrasher than swinging hipster. Of course, it doesn’t sound as cool when you say it like that. Elvis was married in '67. That gives Angel a good thirty years to wind up living in a sewer in L.A.

Anyway, good episode over all. Would have been better if as soon as Angel had lost his green token on the big spin, he had ripped the throat out of that smirking villain and gone on a rampage through Vegas while Gunn, Fred and Lorne try and find the bad guy’s glowy orb and get Angel his soul back, but I guess you can’t have everything you want.

6

Ya I have the strong feeling (hence the “casually”) that Angel is trying to avoid his new friends knowing how much of a loser he was. Thus the name dropping and trying to make it seem like he was part of history. Like real old vampires claiming they had primo seats for the Crusifixion.

On the other hand Angel hung out with Darla, Dru and Spike for a while after getting his soul back. I think last we see him in their company is sometime shortly after the boxer rebellion. Next we see him at all is being a smell rat eater. That leaves the period in question out and it leaves a lot to be answered. It seems possible that Angel tried to pick up his party life style. Especially if he tried to drown the guilt. This may include trips to places like Vegas. Every once and a while he has a real bad couple of years, or maybe even a bad decade. During that time he’s a bum in the sewers eating rats. Since I haven’t watched Angel much I don’t know how much of his history is out there and verified.

On preview and respone to Miller since destiny was being stolen it makes sense that he didn’t. Though I thought it was souls at first and that the villian was going to have a real bad time as a result. Oh well. Hopefully Angelus comes back eventually, he’s just a cool villian.

7

Well, when he talked to Whistler and was smelly ally guy, that was in the early-to-mid 90’s right? (the time gap between the movie and the show throws me a bit. I guess in the show it’s around 96’) We have no sense of how long it took him to go from evil vampire to pitful street vamp, so the fact that he was on the streets in the 90’s does not negate the possiblity of him hanging out with the rat pack back in the day. Like The Tim notes, it was not an immediate transition, given that he still yucked it up with the old gang for a while there.

I didn’t really like the premise of the episode that much. If it had been stealing one’s sense of purpose, I could see how they could become a hopeless zombie and trapped in the casino, but to steal their destiny? Even if destiny did exist, the lack of one would not necessarily make your life come to a stand-still. In some stories (think: David Eddings) being without a destiny makes you freer since you can pick and chose your own path instead of following the one you were set on. Blah.

I have to admit, though, this show has a lot more depth to it now than it did when I stopped watching it at some point during season one :slight_smile:

8

So I’ve got a question… what’s the gossip on Charisma Carpenter? They obviously planned this whole storyline out a ways, and it looks an awful lot like plot-contrivance-scheduled-around-a-pregnancy. Anybody know what’s going on behind the scenes? I did a google search and just came up with a LOT of pictures.

9

OK, more griping.

So, Fred, Lorne and Gunn find Angel playing slots at the Trop. He gives them the keys to the car, and Gunn tells him, “Meet me at the end of the block in front of the Nugget.” As in Golden. As in downtown, and the next time we see the happy trio, they’re on Freemont Street. Nice shot of the Horseshoe, BTW, but, well…

I’ve walked from Flamingo Road to Charleston, it’s about an hour and a half walk (or more- when I walk, I boogie). Figure about another half-mile to Tropicana Road, then there’s another twenty minute hike from Charleston to Fremont Street. That’s a helluva walk, even for a vampire who hasn’t lost his destiny and been turned into a slot zombie. Last time I checked, vampires in the Buffyverse can’t fly, (except for Dracula, and he has to turn into a bat first.) So, why didn’t Gunn ask Angel to meet him somewhere closer to the Tropicana, like, maybe the San Remo, which is only about a block away?

Stuff like this ruined the whole episode for me. I will never understand why producers and directors can’t just set a movie/TV show in Vegas as it is. Why do they have to screw with the geography, put off-the-Strip hotels on the Strip, more than a mile from where they actually are (or, move the whole freaking Fremont Street Experience, hotels and all, up to, well, about where the MGM Grand sits)

I missed the part where the gang got captured because I was in my mom’s room telling her what Vegas looks like in the Buffyverse.

People who live in Las Vegas should not watch TV shows or movies that are set in Las Vegas. It only annoys us.

10

I didn’t care much about the geography problems. Only when shows are set in Boston do I care.

I don’t much care for the name dropping by Angel, but I think it does show a bit of his insecurity. He knows that he’s name dropping, I think he’s trying to slyly build himself up to Gunn and Fred. He doesn’t need to, but he’s still a bit unsure of his role in the human world and uses this as a crutch.

Or maybe that’s too much analysis for a TV show about vampires.

The villian was too one-dimensional. No greater aspirations for himself, just money from the futures options? And how come no one Lorne picked ends up as the night manager at a Des Moines 7-11? The “smash the Destiny Globe, save the losers” ending was too pat, but you could see it coming.

Looks like Cordy paid a price for interveneing. I liked her comments when Gunn and Fred showed up on the rooftop with Angel. Not sure about phone sex with Lila, sounds like it still could be dangerous.

11

An enjoyable episode- but the globe being out in the open for easy smashing was a bit to pat. However, seeing the security was tight normally I can let this go.

“Take them into the desert and shoot them!” Excellent. No overly complex villan plan for once. Angel “losing his destiny” was a bit contrived.

Pluses:

The acting on Angel remains much stronger the BTVS. The story arc is more interesting and compelling as of late.

Cordy watching Angel watching Connor. Cordy making fun of Angel.

I liked it, but it was not as strong as the last two episodes.

12

I was happy when I saw Clayton Rohner as the villain; I had a big thing for him back when he was in Just One of the Guys. Anyway, I liked the episode, overall. Lots of Lorne, which I’ve been looking forward to; but did anyone else thing his singing (apart from the blowing out the bulbs note in Glitter Gulch) sounded a little strained?

Although it verged on the cheesy, I did like the aspect of futures trading. More of a “heh” than an “ooh, clever.”

I liked the implication that Fred was counting the cards. If their financial troubles are so bad, maybe they should go to Vegas more often and let her loose at blackjack.

I didn’t like the Cordy in the clouds scenes; Charisma Carpenter seemed for the most part stilted and dead without anyone to interact with. Next week looks interesting, though.

Absolutely, elf6c.