Dru: "Spank us til Tuesday! We
promise we'll be bad if you do!"
And:
"So, mostly outside cemeteries then?"
This was a delightful episode. Dru was fantastic as always. And I loved the
oh-so-avuncular Holland Manners. Lilah actually displayed a little fear.
Dru: "You have beautiful skin"
Lilah: "I - I moisturize"
Dru: "That was very considerate"
And a Darla quote:
"I like this. Dru, in our new digs, we have got to lay in a
people-cellar."
Darla's transformation was intriguing. That soft baby whisper
"Angel?" to addressing him as "Angelus!" I'm not sure -- it
could be the pants but she hots up nicely.
Angel darkened too quickly. He was quite rational in figuring out where they
might be. ("Dru is a classicist.") And yay Gunn for the
crossword-style redirect on "nursery." So the winter of Angel's
discontent swooped through in less than an episode. I know Angel's been
obsessed for a while, living much inside his own head, but the mirror phrasing
of "And yet, I can't seem to care" was too much succumbing.
Anyone could see the justice. Even while ... *scolding* him, is probably the
best way of putting it, Wes admitted they'd brought this on themselves. The
Powers That Distract You were wrong in this case -- it was vital that they
track down Darla and Dru, who were not random circumstances in the universe. If
they could've found them before Holland's little 'do, he might have just staked
them both (bad for the show, good for L.A.) Confronted with them in control of
the cellar, Angel was at a tipping point and tipping he went.
I maintain that the Powers are good. Just not all-seeing. And Cordy is in such
thrall of her visions -- as were Wes and Gunn -- that other priorities seem to
fall by the wayside. But unless this guy was responsible for raising the Beast
a season later (and he was something of a plot cul-de-sac), he seemed to be
raising an apparently not spectacular demon at best, while D&D were busy
raising hell.
"She should've done that before we left."
Nice cameo by Kate, tied in with the arrest and the heads-up on the severe neck
trauma attacks. Having Angel arrested was out of character. Keeping Angel alive
is a wild card I don't believe plotting strategists like W&H would
seriously allow. They can't be sure his "major play" would be to *stop*
their apocalypse. "Major player in the apocalypse" I disagree. Not if
we *stake* him.
If they do need one, they could always
wait a few years and just get Spike to do whatever they need him for.
So. Fired. Intriguing.
We now move into some seriously floppy territory plotwise. D&D on the
loose, doing things they've never done (when has Darla ever needed an army of
anything to wreak havoc?), Angel running them to earth with greater and lesser
degrees of success. Meanwhile, our Karaoke Crew runs about being less than
useful, growing third eyes and not getting paid and mostly getting shot and
screwing things up.
A writing challenge. How do you keep viewers when none of the main characters
is especially sympathetic? It *has* happened. It did in this case. But
we seem to be moving in a very dark direction storywise, and I don't know if it
really works all that well.