You talk, I'll menace
Feb. 12th, 2004 11:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwynI didn’t write anything about last week’s Angel episode, You’re Welcome, because I didn’t enjoy it very much (though there were some parts I loved) and I didn’t want to kill everyone’s buzz. This week, everyone seems unhappy with Why We Fight, and again I’m in a minority because I liked it for the most part, though there were things I was definitely unhappy with.
It started off badly for me for two reasons: one was the intro, which seemed far too reminiscent of an X-Files episode to be a coincidence, with the closing of hatches and the men trapped with an unknown terror and WWII and all. Homage can be a good thing, but sometimes you have to be careful when you’re creating something that hews that closely to another show with an obsessed, detail-minded fan base. It wasn’t helped by the obvious Cigarette Smoking Man stand-in who explained about the precursor to the Initiative. The other thing that bothered me was purely personal, based on my military history interests -- I just wish once in a while people who write stuff set in WWII would look up their details. It’s not that hard, it’s possibly one of the most-written-about wars ever, so yeesh, can you just try to get the facts straight?
One of the reasons I did like the ep, though, was the reiteration within another different setting of what Angel’s big deal is this season. Like Orpheus, like Home, like Soul Purpose, like a lot of other eps farther in the past, Angel battles with the reasons. It’s been hammered on a lot, but for me, it works because we’re seeing this ongoing struggle in Angel (which I thought they wrapped up way, way too neatly in last week’s) as the theme of the show, and the pieces along the way will come together to form a whole picture puzzle. Each piece of the puzzle is a little different, and adds something to the character of Angel.
Yeah, I know, most fans think this is the anvil, but this is always how ME tells their stories -- pick an emotional theme, and work with it all season. Lawson is another bit of Angel’s conscience saying, what is the greater good, and how would you know? Whether you’re soulled or unsoulled, you can only see one side of the equation, so how do you know which choice is right? There is no completely rounded view of life for these folks. I’ve always enjoyed this aspect of the show, the struggle to understand how elastic or accommodating atonement might be -- can you slip off the path sometimes, and still be right or good?
I also enjoyed the vampire archetypes in contrast to the ME world of vampires, which was a fun touch and added a nice connection to the larger picture of a world with vampires in it. The Nosferatu-like Prince of Lies, and the more traditional Dracula/Vlad the Impaler-like Nostroyev (and really, how could a person not laugh when he declared “I was Rasputin’s lover!”) are the classic vampire archetypes, who even in their brief scenes bear out the mythos of the vampire in the world of that time period. Contrasted with the almost anti-vampire of Angel/Angelus (who dresses normally, acts like anyone else, and can be easily mistaken for an average guy -- and one who just happens to look smashing in a black turtleneck), and the completely post-modern vampire of Spike (who adopts absolutely none of the trappings of either world and in fact perverts them for fun), it made for an entertaining vision of monsters at the crossroads of change.
Which made Lawson an interesting new ingredient in the little soup pot there. He’s the more modern, romanticized version of the vampire, the Louis of Anne Rice’s universe, the kind of vampire the stupid kids in Lie to Me were so into. He’s the one carrying around Angel’s soul-searching purpose without understanding he has a need to feel more and believe in something, he’s the one sickened a bit by what he is without getting why, he’s the one who simply wants an end to this life he didn’t choose to take. He contrasts nicely with Spike in a way, especially with the comments made at the end of Damage -- about choices and demonhood. Lawson can’t really understand the purpose, because he never really embraced evil, or wanted it. Both Angel and Spike were seduced by the vampires who made them, and while they made a choice without full benefit of knowledge, they did make the choice. Lawson had no such choice, really, and so he’s left without a sense of his purpose in the world of monsters, and excluded from the world of men. (And I have to agree with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hecatehatesthat’s comments about the missed opportunity for a sense of vampire backstory, or... ecology, if you will, that keeping Lawson around might have given us.)
Overall, production-wise, no, it wasn’t a stunning ep, really. The story felt like it had been banged out too fast (how else to explain the unbelievably stupid threat to Angel of Lawson’s ace in the hole?), and once again the terrible, terrible looping jobs were in evidence. Characters are being wasted (though clearly they’re setting something up with Gunn and his potential loss of knowledge without the big cat around, which could be very interesting), and so on. But as a standalone ep (which Angel has not often done well throughout its history), it was fairly solid, I thought, just not above average.
What bothers me most is something I know is a personal reaction, and that’s to Spike. While he admits he’s not always the most clever boy in school, he’s also not stupid. He’s not a moron, and never has been. He’s rash and impulsive and a blowhard and misguided and childish, but he’s not an idiot, nor is he a buffoon. Whenever he’s portrayed this way, I just don’t get the decision to bring him on the show if this is how they want to reduce his character. It’s hard for me to understand how they can give him the highs of Hellbound or Damage, where he makes his usual mistakes and does his usual act-first-ask-questions-when-it’s-too-late foolishness, but then turn him into a fool in episodes like this. Aside from the retconning again of meeting up with Angel, having him petulantly demand to be called captain and generally act like an ass just to piss Angel off struck me as pointless and demeaning. At this point I’m utterly baffled by his presence if they can’t figure out themselves what they want him to be. (And what a strange choice for Spike to black his hair in a time and place where his sandy brown hair would have made him far less conspicuous. I don’t know if it was simply stupid characterization by people who really didn’t get the Nazi agenda, or something so perversely Spike-like to do. It’s hard to tell because of the way they write him.)
Damage was one of the best episodes ever on the series, to my eye. Everything worked there -- all the characters, the guest characters, all of it. It was funny yet deeply tragic and disturbing, all the things Angel should be. It’s hard to believe Why We Fight came from the same writing team, and I wonder if they were written too close together for them to really flesh things out? In the end, Angel says that Lawson wanted a reason (as a stand-in for Angel’s and Spike’s search for a reason). But I didn’t feel like that’s what the writers or the actor communicated. To me, it felt like he was trying to simply find an end, to reach a resolution. And I’m not sure I know what that says about the story, or the show itself.
It started off badly for me for two reasons: one was the intro, which seemed far too reminiscent of an X-Files episode to be a coincidence, with the closing of hatches and the men trapped with an unknown terror and WWII and all. Homage can be a good thing, but sometimes you have to be careful when you’re creating something that hews that closely to another show with an obsessed, detail-minded fan base. It wasn’t helped by the obvious Cigarette Smoking Man stand-in who explained about the precursor to the Initiative. The other thing that bothered me was purely personal, based on my military history interests -- I just wish once in a while people who write stuff set in WWII would look up their details. It’s not that hard, it’s possibly one of the most-written-about wars ever, so yeesh, can you just try to get the facts straight?
One of the reasons I did like the ep, though, was the reiteration within another different setting of what Angel’s big deal is this season. Like Orpheus, like Home, like Soul Purpose, like a lot of other eps farther in the past, Angel battles with the reasons. It’s been hammered on a lot, but for me, it works because we’re seeing this ongoing struggle in Angel (which I thought they wrapped up way, way too neatly in last week’s) as the theme of the show, and the pieces along the way will come together to form a whole picture puzzle. Each piece of the puzzle is a little different, and adds something to the character of Angel.
Yeah, I know, most fans think this is the anvil, but this is always how ME tells their stories -- pick an emotional theme, and work with it all season. Lawson is another bit of Angel’s conscience saying, what is the greater good, and how would you know? Whether you’re soulled or unsoulled, you can only see one side of the equation, so how do you know which choice is right? There is no completely rounded view of life for these folks. I’ve always enjoyed this aspect of the show, the struggle to understand how elastic or accommodating atonement might be -- can you slip off the path sometimes, and still be right or good?
I also enjoyed the vampire archetypes in contrast to the ME world of vampires, which was a fun touch and added a nice connection to the larger picture of a world with vampires in it. The Nosferatu-like Prince of Lies, and the more traditional Dracula/Vlad the Impaler-like Nostroyev (and really, how could a person not laugh when he declared “I was Rasputin’s lover!”) are the classic vampire archetypes, who even in their brief scenes bear out the mythos of the vampire in the world of that time period. Contrasted with the almost anti-vampire of Angel/Angelus (who dresses normally, acts like anyone else, and can be easily mistaken for an average guy -- and one who just happens to look smashing in a black turtleneck), and the completely post-modern vampire of Spike (who adopts absolutely none of the trappings of either world and in fact perverts them for fun), it made for an entertaining vision of monsters at the crossroads of change.
Which made Lawson an interesting new ingredient in the little soup pot there. He’s the more modern, romanticized version of the vampire, the Louis of Anne Rice’s universe, the kind of vampire the stupid kids in Lie to Me were so into. He’s the one carrying around Angel’s soul-searching purpose without understanding he has a need to feel more and believe in something, he’s the one sickened a bit by what he is without getting why, he’s the one who simply wants an end to this life he didn’t choose to take. He contrasts nicely with Spike in a way, especially with the comments made at the end of Damage -- about choices and demonhood. Lawson can’t really understand the purpose, because he never really embraced evil, or wanted it. Both Angel and Spike were seduced by the vampires who made them, and while they made a choice without full benefit of knowledge, they did make the choice. Lawson had no such choice, really, and so he’s left without a sense of his purpose in the world of monsters, and excluded from the world of men. (And I have to agree with
hecatehatesthat’s comments about the missed opportunity for a sense of vampire backstory, or... ecology, if you will, that keeping Lawson around might have given us.)Overall, production-wise, no, it wasn’t a stunning ep, really. The story felt like it had been banged out too fast (how else to explain the unbelievably stupid threat to Angel of Lawson’s ace in the hole?), and once again the terrible, terrible looping jobs were in evidence. Characters are being wasted (though clearly they’re setting something up with Gunn and his potential loss of knowledge without the big cat around, which could be very interesting), and so on. But as a standalone ep (which Angel has not often done well throughout its history), it was fairly solid, I thought, just not above average.
What bothers me most is something I know is a personal reaction, and that’s to Spike. While he admits he’s not always the most clever boy in school, he’s also not stupid. He’s not a moron, and never has been. He’s rash and impulsive and a blowhard and misguided and childish, but he’s not an idiot, nor is he a buffoon. Whenever he’s portrayed this way, I just don’t get the decision to bring him on the show if this is how they want to reduce his character. It’s hard for me to understand how they can give him the highs of Hellbound or Damage, where he makes his usual mistakes and does his usual act-first-ask-questions-when-it’s-too-late foolishness, but then turn him into a fool in episodes like this. Aside from the retconning again of meeting up with Angel, having him petulantly demand to be called captain and generally act like an ass just to piss Angel off struck me as pointless and demeaning. At this point I’m utterly baffled by his presence if they can’t figure out themselves what they want him to be. (And what a strange choice for Spike to black his hair in a time and place where his sandy brown hair would have made him far less conspicuous. I don’t know if it was simply stupid characterization by people who really didn’t get the Nazi agenda, or something so perversely Spike-like to do. It’s hard to tell because of the way they write him.)
Damage was one of the best episodes ever on the series, to my eye. Everything worked there -- all the characters, the guest characters, all of it. It was funny yet deeply tragic and disturbing, all the things Angel should be. It’s hard to believe Why We Fight came from the same writing team, and I wonder if they were written too close together for them to really flesh things out? In the end, Angel says that Lawson wanted a reason (as a stand-in for Angel’s and Spike’s search for a reason). But I didn’t feel like that’s what the writers or the actor communicated. To me, it felt like he was trying to simply find an end, to reach a resolution. And I’m not sure I know what that says about the story, or the show itself.
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no subject
Date: 2004-02-12 11:34 am (UTC)So I guess that's why I don't really have a problem with seeing Spike act this way around Angel. I see it as a family thing.
(I have more trouble accepting that he wouldn't know at least a little German, but I can overlook that if I turn off my anal compartment.)
no subject
Date: 2004-02-12 12:07 pm (UTC)This is a facet of his character that has been around since School Hard.
It's part of his charm, it's continuity, and it has nothing at all to do with making him buffoony. For godsake, Angel is a godamn muppet next week. THAT is buffoony.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-12 12:23 pm (UTC)Like I said, I know it's a highly personal reaction. I'd been hoping for more for him on Angel, and I feel like that was kind of a stupid thing to wish for. All mixed up.
no subject
Date: 2004-02-12 02:18 pm (UTC)Re: siblings - and pov
Date: 2004-02-12 10:08 pm (UTC)So I guess that's why I don't really have a problem with seeing Spike act this way around Angel. I see it as a family thing.
That's exactly how I see it. Which is why I may also be in the minority of Spikefans who have had no problems with how his character has been portrayed this year. Actually, oddly enjoying it. Why? Because it's how I act around my kid brother - who is hardly a kid, he towers over me and is having a baby in two months. But still. When my brother and I get together, after about 20 minutes? We have the same banter as Spike and Angel. And like Spike? I make a complete fool out of myself.
ME is actually quite good at showing sibling relationships - Spike/Angel reminds me a great deal of Buffy/Dawn - the same banter, the same jealousy, the same annoyances. Remember Dawn in S6 or S7? Compare that to Spike with Angel?
Also, something people keep forgetting about ME's writing style - they have a tendency to depict other characters based on one character's point of view. Instead of using camera angles to show pov, they often use dialogue or other types of clues. In Harm's Way - the characters were portrayed how Harmony viewed them. In Why We Fight - we are in two points of view: Lawson and Angel, so we see Spike, Fred, Wes, Gunn, everyone else through those two pov's. Angel thinks of Spike as a buffoon - so he looks like a buffoon.
Now when we are in Spike's pov - he appears very different - such as Hellbound and Damage which were almost entirely in Spike's pov. ME used the same technique on Firefly and BTVS - granted they can be subtle about it, but if you track back through the episodes - checking whose the main focus, and how they appear when they are the main focus and how they appear when they aren't - you'll note there's changes in character. Most TV series writers don't attempt this - actually BTVS, Firefly and ATS are amongst the few I've seen attempt it. It's one of the reasons I love them so much. I love how they explore one character, for example Spike, by showing us what other characters think about him - literally showing us how Spike appears to the other characters
on screen. Hard to do, fascinating to watch.
So buffoon Spike? That's how Angel sees him.
Sweet Spike? How Fred sees him.
etc.
It's an interesting writing technique very few people attempt, probably because it is so difficult to convey on screen without fancy camera angles or gimmicks.
PS: Great review gwyn r - agreed with most of your comments.
Re: siblings - and pov
Date: 2004-02-13 02:35 am (UTC)Yup. My brother and I are exactly the same way, as well. I'm a professional, I deal with conflict a lot at work, I have to be pragmatic and sensible. But at home, with my little brother? I get into screaming matches, I seethe with jealousy and I generally act about 10. It's the relative thing – it usually brings out the worst in all of us, but occasionally it also drags the best out as well (usually kicking and screaming...). So, I'm happy with Spike this season too, although truth be told I love him so much they could probably have made him evil and I'd still be happily fanwanking away ;)
Re: siblings - and pov
Date: 2004-02-13 09:49 am (UTC)I should probably explain one thing that's a lot of where I'm coming from -- I have no greater squick than humiliation and embarassment. It causes me actual physical pain to watch people behaving like asses on a consistent basis, or being humiliated for a joke. Most people squirm at horror and thriller movies; what does it to me is humiliation humor and people doing embarassing things. So watching Spike get reduced again to the humiliation and stupidity is really hard. I'd hoped after all this time it might have progressed, but regardless of his motivations, I still find it impossible to watch him do things like demand to be called captain and stuff like that. I had a hard time with much of season 4, as you can imagine.
I can't watch most sitcoms, either, because most of them are predicated on people embarassing themselves. When Angel's stuck in embarassing or goofy situations, they haven't really reduced him to the level of humiliating humor they have often with Spike (and sometimes Xander, too), and when Spike's more simple black and white, ass or not, then I get tummy rumblings. I don't know if that explains it any better, but it's a lot of why I *hate* ass-face Spike.
Re: siblings - and pov
Date: 2004-02-13 09:59 am (UTC)LOL! Oh god. Me too. Something I try not to say too much online. ;-)
Same thing on the brother thing. He also will bring out the best in me. I totally understood Angel's reactions at the end of Hellbound and Damage to Spike. No one messes with my brother - but me! Dang it! He's somewhat the same way.
Oh completely understand
Date: 2004-02-13 10:43 am (UTC)Completely understand. Have exactly the same issues, actually. And to be honest, the bits with Spike asking to be called Captain, made me squirm as well. (I was able to deal with them by reminding myself that we are looking at this through Angel and Lawson's eyes...Spike would no doubt remember it differently). I also had troubles with how he was shown in Unleashed and Lineage - I don't do embarrassment well. It's one of the reasons I can't stand the episode Storyteller, parts of the episode Him (the Dawn bits, loved the Spike/Xander, Spike/Buffy bits though), or have ever been able to enjoy the Xander centric episodes where Xander is completely humilated - Go Fish, Buffy vs. Dracula, or Reptile Boy. I could deal with Spike being humilated in Season 4 better, because Marsters dealt with it so well - sort of snarky and it was almost "just desserts". The falling into the grave in Out of My Mind for instance, or the wearing of Xander's shirt in Doomed, those scenes worked. But his humilation in S6 and S7? Painful to watch, when they did it.
So I do understand - most physical comedy doesn't work for me, because I can't handle "embarrassement" or seeing others being embarrassed. I will literally switch channels when I see it on screen sometimes. It's why I can't watch most of the episodes of Friends and prefer British Situation Comedies. And despise movies such as Meet The Parents and Dumb and Dumber - both of which are completely based on humilation comedy.
Luckily ME doesn't do it that often and when they do - they at least seem to use a pov approach.