Me, with my heart ripped out
May. 20th, 2004 09:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwynNot that I wouldn't write something about this, anyway, but I also wanted to show off this stunning icon from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
awmp. And of course, I'm sure this won't be the last thing I write about this, for quite some time. No way, no how.
When I wrote about the last episode of Buffy, I started out by saying, “how do you write a review of a death?” Because it felt like that to me. Now, I feel, we’ve moved to the funeral, and I don’t know how to write a review of that, either. When Buffy ended, there was this shred still of the world -- there was death, but the family and friends lived on on Angel. Now it’s gone, and the funeral is over, and I don’t know exactly how you write about that, really. Not without the distance of time. So this will be disjointed, and taken in chunks of time and characters, because that’s all I really know how to do.
The ending: Initially, for a moment, I had a little attack -- how is this not a cliffhanger? I wanted to scream, because Joss had said he wouldn’t do such a terrible thing to the fans. But then it hit me in the middle of my tantruming -- this was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. That movie ended with Butch and Sundance trapped, knowing they were doomed and there was no way out, laughing in the face of their doom, and then running out into the bullets they knew would meet them -- no surrender. We hear the firing, but the frame stops as Butch and Sundance run, frozen in the light forever as the picture fades. I’ve always loved that ending, so I had to love the Angel ending. Butch and Sundance ran into the light; Angel and his team run into the night -- they are reverse images, light/fight and night/fight.
This is team Angel’s work. This is what they do -- they fight. Angel’s plan was terrible, and he knew it, but for once, he took his destiny into his own hands and made it what he wanted it to be. Bullheaded, stubborn, stupid -- but his own. For the first time, really, he bitchslapped fate right back in the face. No one is controlling his fate anymore: no soul, no curse, no prophecy, no one else, just him, just fighting. And that’s the right way to end it. I’m so sad right now that I can’t see them surviving it (because Angel believed they wouldn’t), but at the same time, Illyria has rediscovered a power in her rage and grief and humiliation that she may not have realized she had after she “lost” her powers, so who’s to say Big Blue didn’t take the whole army on at once and slaughter them? It’s fate, open to interpretation, but one that Angel, finally, after all these centuries, controls.
Angel as a series has often reminded me of a western -- the loner hero in the brutal world, the harshness of an uncharted realm. As a huge western fan, I was pleased by this, but I’ve never felt more that this show was Joss’s first attempt at a western than lately, as this moved inexorably toward a final showdown in the streets. There are no townspeople running for safety as the gunslingers prepare to throw down on each other, but those final moments are High Noon as we count the time to the battle, each step leading to that climactic moment when the guns are drawn.
Wes and Illyria: I’m sure that anyone who’s read my LJ recently knows just how much I adore Wesley, so it’s not going to be any surprise to hear me say how painful his death was. But it was also exquisite and heartfelt, and I can’t help thinking that Illyria was growing to love Wes, in her own inchoate way, and might just have rediscovered that ability to bend time back and save him. My mental season six, I guess. Their scenes together were perfect and poignant, tender and heartbreaking; Illyria’s growing understanding of his human nature, and Wes’s kind support of her, no matter how terrible she made him feel, were everything I could hope for in an emotional center of the story. When Angel is talking about betrayal, she stands behind him, watching him -- throughout, she only takes her eyes away from him when she is angry or upset. It’s Wes’s peculiar gift to connect to others, whether he’s the foppish watcher or the bitter, disturbed visionary. Though Wes says he’s not prepared to die, no one who’s seen him the past few episodes can truly believe that -- at the very least, he knew what he was signing up for, and that smile as he said “I’m in” would tell us it’s sacrifice, even if his actions hadn’t.
Wes has lost all that matters to him, there is no perfect day for him and nothing he wants except the one thing that’s gone forever, and that makes his sacrifice all the more important. If you have nothing left to lose, why bother with the fight? Why care? But Wesley does, always, over and over, and the world is killing him with the expectations of the fight. So he plays his part, knowing that it’s possibly futile, but the closest he can come to having something left to lose. I don’t know of any line on a Joss show as heartbreaking as Illyria’s “Would you like me to lie to you now?”, except maybe Wes’s own answer. Alexis Denisoff’s performance here was remarkable, the way he seemed almost amusedly bemused by Illyria’s continuing announcements of his impending death, the way he stared into the middle distance before she became Fred. He talked before about the need to hold on to the lies, and now he has this in his final moments, the perfect lie. Amy Acker had almost made me forget that she was ever Fred, so her appearance here, so truly Fred-like in her innocence and grief, reduced me to tears, she felt so real and new. The little electrical echoes of Fred would not have reduced Illyria to tears, I believe -- the more I watch it, the more convinced I am that those are Illyria’s tears for the first human she connected to, for the first being she may have truly ever cared about. Which makes the stunning brilliance of her transformation into Illyria as she throws the punch all the more breathtaking. And truly Vale has not been paying attention -- doesn’t he know that you never, ever sneer the words “little girl” at any woman on this show? You will pay when you do that.
The imagery of Wes’s sequences takes us back to the prophecy arc of season 3 -- the knife, again; blood on Wes’s hands in close-up, again. Alone and lonely, the semblance of betrayal, fate twisting his own plan against him. Magic and loss. But this time, I hope that Wes finds peace; I hope that W&H don’t have him spinning in a circle of hell or in the Inferno’s mouth, because he’s made up for his betrayal. He’s done good deeds, he’s even cared for a demon who murdered the love of his life -- he is a good man, despite his own misgivings about himself. His nod to Angel as he leaves, a knowing goodbye, reminded me of Faith telling Angel that Wes, as a Brit, knows how to say goodbye without emotion. But in that glance there was such love, I thought, between him and Angel, and it seems as if he would know that Angel’s love doesn’t come easily -- that he had earned it, over and over, and that he would earn an entrance maybe to heaven, as well. It may be foolish, but it’s what I have to believe, because I love Wesley so much.
Lorne and Lindsey: This was the one area I had possibly the most trouble with, but I’m starting to see it the way some others have talked about it. That inevitably, Lindsey would turn against Angel and that the pre-emptive strike was necessary. Because yes, Lindsey is always out for what he wants, he’s careful and smart and he does what he needs to get what he wants, and Lorne has heard him sing. Angel has, too, and as cruel and morally reprehensible as killing him is, this isn’t a fight about morality anymore, but about simple right and wrong. If Lindsey fights on the side of right for this moment, it isn’t because he wants to do right, and Angel knows that. Lorne must, too, or he would never agree to become what is essentially an assassin.
I loved the little shoutout to the ho-yay between Lindsey and Angel, and that the last word on Lindsey’s lips was “Angel” -- not simply that he expected Angel to have been the one to kill him, but because Angel was, for all intents and purposes, his all-consuming passion. Killing him, hurting him, wanting him... it doesn’t matter which, because it’s been about Angel since the day they met. I’m deeply sorry to see Lindsey go, especially right at the moment he discovers what it feels like to be on the good side; but Angel is right, it wouldn’t stick, and taking someone so dangerous and clever out of the equation is imperative if they roll lucky sevens.
I worry about Lorne, though -- he may believe he’s safer away from Angel’s dangerous commitment, but would the senior partners really let one of Angel’s lieutenants go? It’s hard to say. I have a tough time believing he could simply slip out, leave that life behind, no repercussions, but perhaps it’s really all about the survivors.
Spike: Everyone’s commented on the sheer brilliance of the poetry slam, so I don’t really have much to add except that the setup was brilliant (Spike drinking and acting as if he was going into a fight), and that it is long since past the time when Spike was shown some appreciation by humans. They may have bad taste in poetry, but who cares? They loved our boy, as they should. Spike the broken dreamer who still remembers the poem he wrote before he died his first death, Spike the fighter who wants to go out in a blaze of glory, Spike who’s still full of jealous vampire crap until the end -- he was all there, so perfectly realized once and for all. Held within the light of his past life, his soul effulgent and brilliant and blinding; he made me laugh and cry at the same time. And right where he should be at the end, by Angel’s side, ready to take on the whole world and hell, and truly believing that he can win even when no one else does. This is Spike’s gift: the courageous dreamer, the one who believes, always, no matter how cynical his words are. Spike doesn’t trouble himself with good and bad; for him, it’s simpler than that: he does what needs to be done. And if he can get a good fight in, well, that’s a bonus. I didn’t think it was possible for me to love him more than I did in Fool for Love, but I did last night. He is my champion, my adorable, wonderful, beloved vampire, and I will miss him more than words can say.
Angel and Connor: The perfect, perfect resolution to this story. I have never been happier with a second-line story than I was with this last night. Connor’s acceptance and understanding and ability, all rolled into a noble package because Angel did the right thing even when it was the wrong thing. Connor is grateful and understanding, a new person, the person he should have been before. I completely did not expect it to be him saving Angel from Hamilton; I cheered when he showed up, and the power that knowledge of Connor’s goodness gave Angel -- that his son loved him, and cared, and understood -- made me glow.
It was an exquisite touch that this was Angel’s idea of a perfect day -- just to have coffee and see his son, regardless of the outcome, and made even more exquisite that Connor knew how to give him that. The bit about Carol Burnett left me howling, too -- that had Joss written all over it, especially the part about Tim Conway being on fire. Truly one of the funniest lines I’ve ever heard them throw away on the show, and just a perfect example of why this show is so superior to anything else out there that this is a tossed-off joke squeezed into the middle of a significant, emotional scene.
The story: The structure of this was magnificent -- particularly the cross-cutting of stories in two places: first the cross-cutting of the perfect day stories, and then the cross-cuts to the individual fight scenes. Gunn’s especially resonated for the long-time Buffy and Angel fan -- so perfect that it would be Annie he would go to, pulling back the thread of his connection to the life he’s lost and the grounding influence he gave up, and so perfect for us because Annie is the legacy of Buffy. It’s her middle name that Chanterelle/Lily took and forged into a new identity, and her destiny of helping people that Annie took as her calling, too. It all comes full circle again, the way it did in Chosen, and it’s her hopefulness that reminds Gunn why he has chosen this fight. No matter what happens, there will be those who keep on keeping on, and it’s imperative that Gunn hear that from someone he believes in.
A lot of people have complained about the no soul thing and Harmony being yet another example of that endless harping on how you can’t do good unless you have a soul. But I’m not so sure that’s what motivated her; I got the sense that she really meant she would act like she had a soul if they treated her that way. Her actions with Hamilton seemed more about attention from him and being made to feel like she was playing an important role -- it didn’t matter to her if the role was good or bad, because she wanted what she’s always wanted: to be part of a group and to feel important. And anyway, on a shallow note, I didn’t mind that she did it in bed with Hamilton, because we got naked Adam Baldwin chest (though I noticed they made him shave his chest for this! I guess immortal beings can’t have chest hair).
All of the elements build and build, constructed carefully to lead our heroes to the alley in the downpour, the metaphor of the rain possibly telling us that their sins have been washed away just a little bit now. Angel’s taken the power Hamilton had, the blood of something bigger than all of them is flowing through him. He has his destiny in his own hands this time, no one controls him, he embodies the recklessness of the man making one last stand because he must. He’s accomplished what he set out to do, everyone has played their part and the end game is over. So this is where it has to end, because it could go any which way. This is what Angel’s always been about -- fighting fate, fighting the good fight, knowing your destiny could go any which way, but doing it all anyway even without any guarantee of an outcome.
They are heroes. Motivated by different things, wanting different outcomes. Willing to sacrifice whatever they can, each to their own abilities. But heroes, no matter what. And we leave them as they go into a heroic battle -- their last, or maybe just another one in a series? We can’t know, but we can believe anything, and that’s the perfect ending for this series that always told us we could believe anything.
I’m sad, of course. I lost my Wes, my Lindsey. Lorne has left bitter and hopeless. Fred is still gone, and Gunn may be dying. My darling boys are gone. But my dream for them is that they find a way out, and maybe dreams can come true in the endless infinity beyond that ending scene. For fans, I think, they will.
awmp. And of course, I'm sure this won't be the last thing I write about this, for quite some time. No way, no how.When I wrote about the last episode of Buffy, I started out by saying, “how do you write a review of a death?” Because it felt like that to me. Now, I feel, we’ve moved to the funeral, and I don’t know how to write a review of that, either. When Buffy ended, there was this shred still of the world -- there was death, but the family and friends lived on on Angel. Now it’s gone, and the funeral is over, and I don’t know exactly how you write about that, really. Not without the distance of time. So this will be disjointed, and taken in chunks of time and characters, because that’s all I really know how to do.
The ending: Initially, for a moment, I had a little attack -- how is this not a cliffhanger? I wanted to scream, because Joss had said he wouldn’t do such a terrible thing to the fans. But then it hit me in the middle of my tantruming -- this was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. That movie ended with Butch and Sundance trapped, knowing they were doomed and there was no way out, laughing in the face of their doom, and then running out into the bullets they knew would meet them -- no surrender. We hear the firing, but the frame stops as Butch and Sundance run, frozen in the light forever as the picture fades. I’ve always loved that ending, so I had to love the Angel ending. Butch and Sundance ran into the light; Angel and his team run into the night -- they are reverse images, light/fight and night/fight.
This is team Angel’s work. This is what they do -- they fight. Angel’s plan was terrible, and he knew it, but for once, he took his destiny into his own hands and made it what he wanted it to be. Bullheaded, stubborn, stupid -- but his own. For the first time, really, he bitchslapped fate right back in the face. No one is controlling his fate anymore: no soul, no curse, no prophecy, no one else, just him, just fighting. And that’s the right way to end it. I’m so sad right now that I can’t see them surviving it (because Angel believed they wouldn’t), but at the same time, Illyria has rediscovered a power in her rage and grief and humiliation that she may not have realized she had after she “lost” her powers, so who’s to say Big Blue didn’t take the whole army on at once and slaughter them? It’s fate, open to interpretation, but one that Angel, finally, after all these centuries, controls.
Angel as a series has often reminded me of a western -- the loner hero in the brutal world, the harshness of an uncharted realm. As a huge western fan, I was pleased by this, but I’ve never felt more that this show was Joss’s first attempt at a western than lately, as this moved inexorably toward a final showdown in the streets. There are no townspeople running for safety as the gunslingers prepare to throw down on each other, but those final moments are High Noon as we count the time to the battle, each step leading to that climactic moment when the guns are drawn.
Wes and Illyria: I’m sure that anyone who’s read my LJ recently knows just how much I adore Wesley, so it’s not going to be any surprise to hear me say how painful his death was. But it was also exquisite and heartfelt, and I can’t help thinking that Illyria was growing to love Wes, in her own inchoate way, and might just have rediscovered that ability to bend time back and save him. My mental season six, I guess. Their scenes together were perfect and poignant, tender and heartbreaking; Illyria’s growing understanding of his human nature, and Wes’s kind support of her, no matter how terrible she made him feel, were everything I could hope for in an emotional center of the story. When Angel is talking about betrayal, she stands behind him, watching him -- throughout, she only takes her eyes away from him when she is angry or upset. It’s Wes’s peculiar gift to connect to others, whether he’s the foppish watcher or the bitter, disturbed visionary. Though Wes says he’s not prepared to die, no one who’s seen him the past few episodes can truly believe that -- at the very least, he knew what he was signing up for, and that smile as he said “I’m in” would tell us it’s sacrifice, even if his actions hadn’t.
Wes has lost all that matters to him, there is no perfect day for him and nothing he wants except the one thing that’s gone forever, and that makes his sacrifice all the more important. If you have nothing left to lose, why bother with the fight? Why care? But Wesley does, always, over and over, and the world is killing him with the expectations of the fight. So he plays his part, knowing that it’s possibly futile, but the closest he can come to having something left to lose. I don’t know of any line on a Joss show as heartbreaking as Illyria’s “Would you like me to lie to you now?”, except maybe Wes’s own answer. Alexis Denisoff’s performance here was remarkable, the way he seemed almost amusedly bemused by Illyria’s continuing announcements of his impending death, the way he stared into the middle distance before she became Fred. He talked before about the need to hold on to the lies, and now he has this in his final moments, the perfect lie. Amy Acker had almost made me forget that she was ever Fred, so her appearance here, so truly Fred-like in her innocence and grief, reduced me to tears, she felt so real and new. The little electrical echoes of Fred would not have reduced Illyria to tears, I believe -- the more I watch it, the more convinced I am that those are Illyria’s tears for the first human she connected to, for the first being she may have truly ever cared about. Which makes the stunning brilliance of her transformation into Illyria as she throws the punch all the more breathtaking. And truly Vale has not been paying attention -- doesn’t he know that you never, ever sneer the words “little girl” at any woman on this show? You will pay when you do that.
The imagery of Wes’s sequences takes us back to the prophecy arc of season 3 -- the knife, again; blood on Wes’s hands in close-up, again. Alone and lonely, the semblance of betrayal, fate twisting his own plan against him. Magic and loss. But this time, I hope that Wes finds peace; I hope that W&H don’t have him spinning in a circle of hell or in the Inferno’s mouth, because he’s made up for his betrayal. He’s done good deeds, he’s even cared for a demon who murdered the love of his life -- he is a good man, despite his own misgivings about himself. His nod to Angel as he leaves, a knowing goodbye, reminded me of Faith telling Angel that Wes, as a Brit, knows how to say goodbye without emotion. But in that glance there was such love, I thought, between him and Angel, and it seems as if he would know that Angel’s love doesn’t come easily -- that he had earned it, over and over, and that he would earn an entrance maybe to heaven, as well. It may be foolish, but it’s what I have to believe, because I love Wesley so much.
Lorne and Lindsey: This was the one area I had possibly the most trouble with, but I’m starting to see it the way some others have talked about it. That inevitably, Lindsey would turn against Angel and that the pre-emptive strike was necessary. Because yes, Lindsey is always out for what he wants, he’s careful and smart and he does what he needs to get what he wants, and Lorne has heard him sing. Angel has, too, and as cruel and morally reprehensible as killing him is, this isn’t a fight about morality anymore, but about simple right and wrong. If Lindsey fights on the side of right for this moment, it isn’t because he wants to do right, and Angel knows that. Lorne must, too, or he would never agree to become what is essentially an assassin.
I loved the little shoutout to the ho-yay between Lindsey and Angel, and that the last word on Lindsey’s lips was “Angel” -- not simply that he expected Angel to have been the one to kill him, but because Angel was, for all intents and purposes, his all-consuming passion. Killing him, hurting him, wanting him... it doesn’t matter which, because it’s been about Angel since the day they met. I’m deeply sorry to see Lindsey go, especially right at the moment he discovers what it feels like to be on the good side; but Angel is right, it wouldn’t stick, and taking someone so dangerous and clever out of the equation is imperative if they roll lucky sevens.
I worry about Lorne, though -- he may believe he’s safer away from Angel’s dangerous commitment, but would the senior partners really let one of Angel’s lieutenants go? It’s hard to say. I have a tough time believing he could simply slip out, leave that life behind, no repercussions, but perhaps it’s really all about the survivors.
Spike: Everyone’s commented on the sheer brilliance of the poetry slam, so I don’t really have much to add except that the setup was brilliant (Spike drinking and acting as if he was going into a fight), and that it is long since past the time when Spike was shown some appreciation by humans. They may have bad taste in poetry, but who cares? They loved our boy, as they should. Spike the broken dreamer who still remembers the poem he wrote before he died his first death, Spike the fighter who wants to go out in a blaze of glory, Spike who’s still full of jealous vampire crap until the end -- he was all there, so perfectly realized once and for all. Held within the light of his past life, his soul effulgent and brilliant and blinding; he made me laugh and cry at the same time. And right where he should be at the end, by Angel’s side, ready to take on the whole world and hell, and truly believing that he can win even when no one else does. This is Spike’s gift: the courageous dreamer, the one who believes, always, no matter how cynical his words are. Spike doesn’t trouble himself with good and bad; for him, it’s simpler than that: he does what needs to be done. And if he can get a good fight in, well, that’s a bonus. I didn’t think it was possible for me to love him more than I did in Fool for Love, but I did last night. He is my champion, my adorable, wonderful, beloved vampire, and I will miss him more than words can say.
Angel and Connor: The perfect, perfect resolution to this story. I have never been happier with a second-line story than I was with this last night. Connor’s acceptance and understanding and ability, all rolled into a noble package because Angel did the right thing even when it was the wrong thing. Connor is grateful and understanding, a new person, the person he should have been before. I completely did not expect it to be him saving Angel from Hamilton; I cheered when he showed up, and the power that knowledge of Connor’s goodness gave Angel -- that his son loved him, and cared, and understood -- made me glow.
It was an exquisite touch that this was Angel’s idea of a perfect day -- just to have coffee and see his son, regardless of the outcome, and made even more exquisite that Connor knew how to give him that. The bit about Carol Burnett left me howling, too -- that had Joss written all over it, especially the part about Tim Conway being on fire. Truly one of the funniest lines I’ve ever heard them throw away on the show, and just a perfect example of why this show is so superior to anything else out there that this is a tossed-off joke squeezed into the middle of a significant, emotional scene.
The story: The structure of this was magnificent -- particularly the cross-cutting of stories in two places: first the cross-cutting of the perfect day stories, and then the cross-cuts to the individual fight scenes. Gunn’s especially resonated for the long-time Buffy and Angel fan -- so perfect that it would be Annie he would go to, pulling back the thread of his connection to the life he’s lost and the grounding influence he gave up, and so perfect for us because Annie is the legacy of Buffy. It’s her middle name that Chanterelle/Lily took and forged into a new identity, and her destiny of helping people that Annie took as her calling, too. It all comes full circle again, the way it did in Chosen, and it’s her hopefulness that reminds Gunn why he has chosen this fight. No matter what happens, there will be those who keep on keeping on, and it’s imperative that Gunn hear that from someone he believes in.
A lot of people have complained about the no soul thing and Harmony being yet another example of that endless harping on how you can’t do good unless you have a soul. But I’m not so sure that’s what motivated her; I got the sense that she really meant she would act like she had a soul if they treated her that way. Her actions with Hamilton seemed more about attention from him and being made to feel like she was playing an important role -- it didn’t matter to her if the role was good or bad, because she wanted what she’s always wanted: to be part of a group and to feel important. And anyway, on a shallow note, I didn’t mind that she did it in bed with Hamilton, because we got naked Adam Baldwin chest (though I noticed they made him shave his chest for this! I guess immortal beings can’t have chest hair).
All of the elements build and build, constructed carefully to lead our heroes to the alley in the downpour, the metaphor of the rain possibly telling us that their sins have been washed away just a little bit now. Angel’s taken the power Hamilton had, the blood of something bigger than all of them is flowing through him. He has his destiny in his own hands this time, no one controls him, he embodies the recklessness of the man making one last stand because he must. He’s accomplished what he set out to do, everyone has played their part and the end game is over. So this is where it has to end, because it could go any which way. This is what Angel’s always been about -- fighting fate, fighting the good fight, knowing your destiny could go any which way, but doing it all anyway even without any guarantee of an outcome.
They are heroes. Motivated by different things, wanting different outcomes. Willing to sacrifice whatever they can, each to their own abilities. But heroes, no matter what. And we leave them as they go into a heroic battle -- their last, or maybe just another one in a series? We can’t know, but we can believe anything, and that’s the perfect ending for this series that always told us we could believe anything.
I’m sad, of course. I lost my Wes, my Lindsey. Lorne has left bitter and hopeless. Fred is still gone, and Gunn may be dying. My darling boys are gone. But my dream for them is that they find a way out, and maybe dreams can come true in the endless infinity beyond that ending scene. For fans, I think, they will.
