Sometimes the smallest moments are the most important...
So I've been watching Angel in my DVD rotation lately. And while for a little while my main thought about it was how much I can't wait for Cait to get to the last four episodes of season two, because I LOVE them so, those thoughts changed to much more interesting thoughts once I got to season three's "Dad." They always do, I guess. Because that was my first episode.
It may not seem like that big a deal at first. So that was the first episode of Angel I ever saw. So what? The thing is, before that, the biggest-- and really only-- television obsession I had going for me was Invader ZIM. Now, I still love ZIM, don't get me wrong, but it's definitely true that there's not really much to it. It's a great show for a laugh, and as a source of many-a-quote to use in your everyday life to make people think you're completely crazy in an awesome way, but there's not much debth. A ZIM obsession is really nothing in comparison to the TV obsessions I have nowadays.
And Angel was the start of all that. But the way it started was all so... happenstance.
It was in the summer of 2002. July, I think, maybe August. Nah, prolly July. Back then I would always spend my nights sitting at the computer (back when there was only one computer in the bloody house) until the wee hours of the morning, IMing, doing tons and tons of online quizzes and god knows what else. Sometimes, when it was quiet and I felt I needed something to break up the silence, I'd turn the TV on low and put something on, mostly just for some background noise since I knew there was never really anything good on that late.
That particular night, I probably channel surfed around the dial and didn't really find anything I wanted to put on. I got back to... I think it was FOX43. Back then they used to run WB shows from the previous week late at night-- like syndacation, only not. So I knew whatever I was seeing there was something from the WB. I guess I just happened to tune into the channel right before someone said Angel's name, and then I was like, "Oh, is this Angel? I don't know anything about that, but I've heard of it..." And by 'heard of it,' I mean I saw promos for it during commercials when watching Smallville. Well, not even promos, actually. Like... like this year how the CW will do promos for the Tuesday night lineup where they talk about Gilmore Girls for thirty seconds, and then go, "Oh, by the way, then there's a new Veronica Mars." It was like that.
But anyway, I digress.
Moments after having that thought, the theme song started and I found that yes, this was Angel. I don't know what it was that made me keep that channel on once it went into commercial. Maybe I knew there was nothing else on. Maybe it was the stupid joke they went into the theme song with. Maybe it was something about that open, some spark, that told me that this was something special. I have no idea. But I did keep it on.
As first episodes go, this prolly wasn't a bad one. Lilah's Angel-research along with Cordy's talk with Angel in the garden both gave me some really good exposition about the show, and a lot about Angel's character. I got to see the whole AI team come together to fake-out and beat the bad guys, and then be all happy together in the end. After Angel and Cordy, Lorne was the other character to have a lot of good moments in the episode, which I think really worked to my advantage, because I think the wrong scene of him could make the character seem really cheesy and dumb to an outside observer, so much so that it could have turned me off the series. But he was cool in this one. In fact, I think the one thing I remembered most about this episode was the cool thing Lorne did with fooling the bad guys, putting the note in Angel's pocket and such.
I bet what really helped me feel the show from this episode was that it really showed Angel's heart. If I had first tuned in to say, an episode in the middle of season two, say in the area of "Redefinition," when Angel was being all dark and mean and such, I wouldn't have felt anything for him, wouldn't have connected to the show. And if I had first seen an episode in the middle of season four, when everything was so serialized and one episode didn't completely make sense without knowing what came before. But this episode was more of a beginning. It was the episode when Holtz found Justine and that whole part of his storyline started up, not to mention the beginning of everything with Connor, which would become a giant part of the show for the next season and a half.
Basically, it sucked me in and didn't let me go. A week or two later I watched it again. "Provider." I enjoyed that, it was fun. I remember, after that, I decided that I'd definitely make sure I watched it again the next week. But then I forgot. The next week I remembered, tho, and saw "Loyalty." And that was it. I was hooked. I was watching every week, and luckily, I was then at the point in the summer when they didn't have to skip anymore episodes to get the season three finale the week before season four was to start. (That's right-- back in those days, networks actually ran these things called RERUNS during the summer that allowed a person to catch up on a show. Imagine that.)
Not long into watching and loving the new episodes of seaon four, I found out that Angel was actually a spin-off of that show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I didn't know anything about that show, but like most other people, I judged as being not worth my time by the silly-sounding title. But as I grew to love Angel more and more, I figured that perhaps I should give Buffy a chance, too. It was mid-late December by then, so since I had no new episode to tape, I found a random episode in syndication and taped that.
Now, remember when I said how great an episode my first Angel was to start with? How it was all a beginning and stuff? Yeah, not the same story with Buffy.
I didn't know much about the show at all going in. Really, all I knew was a few things from this Angel book I'd read, a book that was basically the first episode in novel-form, including some flashbacks to Angel's past AND some events that happened on Buffy. So all I knew was that there was a character named Willow who did magic--who gave Angel back his soul when he lost it-- and that Angel and Buffy had been in love, but one time Buffy sent him to hell for some reason. Also, I knew that Darla, Drusilla, and Spike were other evil vampires that played parts in Angel's past, and I'd heard somewhere that Spike was a character on Buffy.
So that random Buffy episode I recorded? Turned out it was the season five finale, 100th episode, "The Gift." Of course I didn't know that at the time. But needless to say, my initial confusion of why the evil vampire Spike was helping Buffy, and trying to figure out what relation Tara was to Willow, it all quickly became much bigger confusion as this giant event of an episode went on, and the end left me completely going, "Wait... what!?"
But still, there was something there. A spark. Something left me wanting more. So a watching a few more random episodes. "Restless," "Buffy Vs. Dracula," "Real Me," and "The Replacement," I believe.
Then, New Year's Day, something incredible happened. FX ran a Buffy marathon. The entire first season in one day. And I watched every episode.
After than, I was more than hooked. FX kept running the episodes in order after that, two every weekday. I excitedly watched them every day. Along with watching Buffys in FOX syndication (which started with season four's "Where the Wild Things Are"-- the one where Buffy and Riley spend the entire episode having sex. A great random episode to tune into, lol.), new episodes when they started up again with "Showtime," and renting the first season of Angel on DVD. By the time the new Angel episodes got to the Faith arc in March or whenever, I knew pretty much all there was to know about Faith and was all excited for it. By the time Buffy got down to its final five episodes, I had seen every single episode that came before.
And that's how it started. The obsession. It led to me saving every episode of these shows that I could on tape, and then gradually buying them all on DVD. It made me gain this new appreciation for television shows. Showed me what they could do on both a technical and an emotional level that I had never understood before. As a result I gained a new appreciation for some shows I was already watching, especially Smallville, which I then let myself re-obsess with. And I found new shows to love and appreciate.
And since then its kind of become my identity. I now own thirteen different shows on DVD, and I plan on getting the first seasons of Heroes, Eureka, The Dresden Files, and Studio 60 (although that'll prolly be its only season... *grumble*) when they come out, too. I put on one of my TV DVDs whenever I get the chance. Watching a new Lost or Supernatural is always the highlight of my week. I'm a TV gal, plain and simple.
And so that brings up a question. The one that this whole long story was leading up to. The one that pops into my head everytime I watch that tenth episode of Angel's third season...
Where would I be-- no, that's not right.
Who would I be... if I hadn't turned on the TV that night in July of 2002?
It really blows my mind to even think about it. I mean, I really didn't turn on the TV most of the time before that. But I just happened to turn it on that night. I just happened to be on the exact right channel at the exact right time. If I hadn't seen Angel that night, would I have ever seen it? And if I'd never seen that show, how many of the shows I love now would I have ever take the time to watch?
Like I said, TV has become my identity. Who would I be without it? Take that away, and what's left?
Despite my usually thought process, I'm not asking this in a depressive way, or even in an identity-crisis type way. It's just... so weird to think about that I had to share it. It's been nearly five years since that one tiny coincidence that probably set so much of the course for my life. It's an interesting thing to think about is all. It makes my brain do cartwheels.
Of course, I would never ever want it to be different. I love the TV-obsessed part of myself. But sometimes you just can't help but wonder, right...?
~RP~
It may not seem like that big a deal at first. So that was the first episode of Angel I ever saw. So what? The thing is, before that, the biggest-- and really only-- television obsession I had going for me was Invader ZIM. Now, I still love ZIM, don't get me wrong, but it's definitely true that there's not really much to it. It's a great show for a laugh, and as a source of many-a-quote to use in your everyday life to make people think you're completely crazy in an awesome way, but there's not much debth. A ZIM obsession is really nothing in comparison to the TV obsessions I have nowadays.
And Angel was the start of all that. But the way it started was all so... happenstance.
It was in the summer of 2002. July, I think, maybe August. Nah, prolly July. Back then I would always spend my nights sitting at the computer (back when there was only one computer in the bloody house) until the wee hours of the morning, IMing, doing tons and tons of online quizzes and god knows what else. Sometimes, when it was quiet and I felt I needed something to break up the silence, I'd turn the TV on low and put something on, mostly just for some background noise since I knew there was never really anything good on that late.
That particular night, I probably channel surfed around the dial and didn't really find anything I wanted to put on. I got back to... I think it was FOX43. Back then they used to run WB shows from the previous week late at night-- like syndacation, only not. So I knew whatever I was seeing there was something from the WB. I guess I just happened to tune into the channel right before someone said Angel's name, and then I was like, "Oh, is this Angel? I don't know anything about that, but I've heard of it..." And by 'heard of it,' I mean I saw promos for it during commercials when watching Smallville. Well, not even promos, actually. Like... like this year how the CW will do promos for the Tuesday night lineup where they talk about Gilmore Girls for thirty seconds, and then go, "Oh, by the way, then there's a new Veronica Mars." It was like that.
But anyway, I digress.
Moments after having that thought, the theme song started and I found that yes, this was Angel. I don't know what it was that made me keep that channel on once it went into commercial. Maybe I knew there was nothing else on. Maybe it was the stupid joke they went into the theme song with. Maybe it was something about that open, some spark, that told me that this was something special. I have no idea. But I did keep it on.
As first episodes go, this prolly wasn't a bad one. Lilah's Angel-research along with Cordy's talk with Angel in the garden both gave me some really good exposition about the show, and a lot about Angel's character. I got to see the whole AI team come together to fake-out and beat the bad guys, and then be all happy together in the end. After Angel and Cordy, Lorne was the other character to have a lot of good moments in the episode, which I think really worked to my advantage, because I think the wrong scene of him could make the character seem really cheesy and dumb to an outside observer, so much so that it could have turned me off the series. But he was cool in this one. In fact, I think the one thing I remembered most about this episode was the cool thing Lorne did with fooling the bad guys, putting the note in Angel's pocket and such.
I bet what really helped me feel the show from this episode was that it really showed Angel's heart. If I had first tuned in to say, an episode in the middle of season two, say in the area of "Redefinition," when Angel was being all dark and mean and such, I wouldn't have felt anything for him, wouldn't have connected to the show. And if I had first seen an episode in the middle of season four, when everything was so serialized and one episode didn't completely make sense without knowing what came before. But this episode was more of a beginning. It was the episode when Holtz found Justine and that whole part of his storyline started up, not to mention the beginning of everything with Connor, which would become a giant part of the show for the next season and a half.
Basically, it sucked me in and didn't let me go. A week or two later I watched it again. "Provider." I enjoyed that, it was fun. I remember, after that, I decided that I'd definitely make sure I watched it again the next week. But then I forgot. The next week I remembered, tho, and saw "Loyalty." And that was it. I was hooked. I was watching every week, and luckily, I was then at the point in the summer when they didn't have to skip anymore episodes to get the season three finale the week before season four was to start. (That's right-- back in those days, networks actually ran these things called RERUNS during the summer that allowed a person to catch up on a show. Imagine that.)
Not long into watching and loving the new episodes of seaon four, I found out that Angel was actually a spin-off of that show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I didn't know anything about that show, but like most other people, I judged as being not worth my time by the silly-sounding title. But as I grew to love Angel more and more, I figured that perhaps I should give Buffy a chance, too. It was mid-late December by then, so since I had no new episode to tape, I found a random episode in syndication and taped that.
Now, remember when I said how great an episode my first Angel was to start with? How it was all a beginning and stuff? Yeah, not the same story with Buffy.
I didn't know much about the show at all going in. Really, all I knew was a few things from this Angel book I'd read, a book that was basically the first episode in novel-form, including some flashbacks to Angel's past AND some events that happened on Buffy. So all I knew was that there was a character named Willow who did magic--who gave Angel back his soul when he lost it-- and that Angel and Buffy had been in love, but one time Buffy sent him to hell for some reason. Also, I knew that Darla, Drusilla, and Spike were other evil vampires that played parts in Angel's past, and I'd heard somewhere that Spike was a character on Buffy.
So that random Buffy episode I recorded? Turned out it was the season five finale, 100th episode, "The Gift." Of course I didn't know that at the time. But needless to say, my initial confusion of why the evil vampire Spike was helping Buffy, and trying to figure out what relation Tara was to Willow, it all quickly became much bigger confusion as this giant event of an episode went on, and the end left me completely going, "Wait... what!?"
But still, there was something there. A spark. Something left me wanting more. So a watching a few more random episodes. "Restless," "Buffy Vs. Dracula," "Real Me," and "The Replacement," I believe.
Then, New Year's Day, something incredible happened. FX ran a Buffy marathon. The entire first season in one day. And I watched every episode.
After than, I was more than hooked. FX kept running the episodes in order after that, two every weekday. I excitedly watched them every day. Along with watching Buffys in FOX syndication (which started with season four's "Where the Wild Things Are"-- the one where Buffy and Riley spend the entire episode having sex. A great random episode to tune into, lol.), new episodes when they started up again with "Showtime," and renting the first season of Angel on DVD. By the time the new Angel episodes got to the Faith arc in March or whenever, I knew pretty much all there was to know about Faith and was all excited for it. By the time Buffy got down to its final five episodes, I had seen every single episode that came before.
And that's how it started. The obsession. It led to me saving every episode of these shows that I could on tape, and then gradually buying them all on DVD. It made me gain this new appreciation for television shows. Showed me what they could do on both a technical and an emotional level that I had never understood before. As a result I gained a new appreciation for some shows I was already watching, especially Smallville, which I then let myself re-obsess with. And I found new shows to love and appreciate.
And since then its kind of become my identity. I now own thirteen different shows on DVD, and I plan on getting the first seasons of Heroes, Eureka, The Dresden Files, and Studio 60 (although that'll prolly be its only season... *grumble*) when they come out, too. I put on one of my TV DVDs whenever I get the chance. Watching a new Lost or Supernatural is always the highlight of my week. I'm a TV gal, plain and simple.
And so that brings up a question. The one that this whole long story was leading up to. The one that pops into my head everytime I watch that tenth episode of Angel's third season...
Where would I be-- no, that's not right.
Who would I be... if I hadn't turned on the TV that night in July of 2002?
It really blows my mind to even think about it. I mean, I really didn't turn on the TV most of the time before that. But I just happened to turn it on that night. I just happened to be on the exact right channel at the exact right time. If I hadn't seen Angel that night, would I have ever seen it? And if I'd never seen that show, how many of the shows I love now would I have ever take the time to watch?
Like I said, TV has become my identity. Who would I be without it? Take that away, and what's left?
Despite my usually thought process, I'm not asking this in a depressive way, or even in an identity-crisis type way. It's just... so weird to think about that I had to share it. It's been nearly five years since that one tiny coincidence that probably set so much of the course for my life. It's an interesting thing to think about is all. It makes my brain do cartwheels.
Of course, I would never ever want it to be different. I love the TV-obsessed part of myself. But sometimes you just can't help but wonder, right...?
~RP~