Angel Season Five - Episode Twelve - You're Welcome (part 3)
Part 3 of 3
What source, Angel wants to know. And so Spike tells them about his guy, the visions and the connection to the Powers. It all hits a little too close to home for Angel and Cordelia. Spike refers to the faux Doyle as ‘Tattoo Boy’ causing the proverbial shit to hit the proverbial fan. As the trio talk a very nervous Eve watches from the end of the corridor. Eve is right to be concerned. Angel quickly zeros in on her as a likely source of information. It’s the parasite from Soul Purpose that proves to be her undoing; the fact that Spike’s informant told him to rescue Angel from a bug that she put on him in the first place. The whole team is bought in. This is serious.
Meanwhile, the office has been deserted, whatever Lindsey is doing deep in the basement has triggered an evacuation warning. Without too much prompting Eve spills the beans about the ‘fail-safe’, a device that was designed to destroy Angel just in case he couldn’t be controlled by the Senior Partners, which to date, hasn’t been a huge problem, it’s still not a problem since the device has been artificially activated by Lindsey, not by Angel’s rabid insubordination. They quickly realise that the impostor must be the one behind it, so ask for more information from Spike. He doesn’t have much to add just that he’s an urban cowboy who once had a hand chopped off. The light bulb goes on; they’re in the dark no longer. They know exactly who they are about to face. Wes says he can try and remedy the concealment spell and takes Fred and Lorne to assist. Fred doesn’t want Angel to go alone but he doesn’t want to risk anyone he cares about. Spike volunteers and Angel quickly, too quickly, agrees. OK, so he doesn’t care about Spike, much, but on the flipside, he might just be beginning to realise that there are worse things than having Spike watching you’re back in a rumble. Cordelia is going too - Angel tries to dissuade her but she’s determined. She’s a warrior and she wants to see a lawyer. Nobody gets away with messing with her guy!
The trio go down to the basement and set off the security system that Lindsey was able to deceive. It releases a horde of zombies. Spike volunteers his services to hold them at bay while Angel and Cordy go forward. They find Lindsey. He acts glib at their arrival. Should he get weak at the knees, promise to be a good boy?
Angel: It's a little late for that, Doyle.
Lindsey: There's always time for redemption. Isn't that your whole thing?
To which Angel delivers his cutting rebuttal:
Angel: You had your chance. I guess some people, they just never change
Angel finds it hard to believe anyone can change and even though Lindsey is making no pretence of real repentance, Angel’s belief that a leopard can’t change its spots, particularly a Lindsey-shaped leopard, will come to prominence later in the season. Angel wants to finish things so he goes to punch Lindsey, but surprisingly, Lindsey is able to stop it mid-thrust and sends him flying across the room. Huh, looks like he’s learnt a new trick or two in his absence. Lindsey threatens Angel with a small pen knife. Angel draws a samurai sword. Lindsey magically transforms his little bitty blade into once comparable to his foe’s. Angel charges Cordelia with shutting down the strange machine that Lindsey had activated.
So they start to fight, sword-play, acrobatic moves and banter. They remember the first time they met, when Angel kicked his client out the window of a sky scraper. Good times. It’s another backward glance; what they were back at the beginning, the day he made an enemy of Wolfram and Hart, another reminder of the strange and unexpected journey they’ve taken.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Wesley, with assistance from the team, is working the mojo, reading the weird language, casting the spell. It’s another instance of looking back, returning to their roots; Wes, Fred and Lorne. Gunn is with them too but he’s a bit like a fish out of water. He remarks:
Gunn: Man, I should be down there. Got enough Betty Crockers. I should be throwing some hurt.
That’s what he used to do. What bought him into Angel’s world was his hunting and fighting skills. But he’s not down there ‘throwing some hurt’, he’s upstairs with the suits. Unlike the others who actually return to their roots, Charles merely looks at his from a distance, observes the irony but does nothing about it. He is unable to reconnect with what he was because he has been fundamentally changed by Wolfram and Hart.
Angel and Lindsey continue to fight, continue their punch strewn stroll down memory lane. Lindsey gains the advantage by plunging his sword into Angel’s heart. But it’s not the sword that stings, its Lindsey’s words:
Lindsey: Who is this? Who is this? I came to fight the vampire with a soul. Guess you shouldn't have sold it, huh? Look at you, from champion to pathetic corporate puppet in just a few months. You used to have fire in your heart. Now all you got in there is that big honkin' sword. How's that feel, champ?
Fire in his heart? That seems so long ago, now all that’s left is a dried up old walnut of a thing, or so it seems. But there’s life in the old nut yet. Angel pulls out the sword to continue the fight. As Angel re-engages, Cordelia has some success with the giant machine. It begins shutting down and returns to an unanimated state. Lindsey’s power diminishes with it - he can’t even throw a straight punch any longer. Angel, through this battle with the past personified is able to find himself again, the self he wants to be, confident, assured, purposeful and is freshly reminded of what it was he was fighting in the first place.
Angel: I'm Angel. I beat the bad guys
This is no solo effort. Angel is able to win because of the efforts of his team. Sure, Angel did the actual fighting but Cordelia cracked the machine, Wes and co. were able to make Lindsey’s protective tattoos evaporate and even Spike was able to take on the mundane task of holding off the zombies that enabled Angel to progress to the main feature. Teamwork wins the day, again.
So now the Senior Partners are alerted to Lindsey and the games he’s been playing. Angel is only too happy to let them have him. Oh yeah, Senior Partners are firmly in control here. Lindsey is sucked up through a smoky portal up to where the Partners hand out their punishment, perhaps never to be seen again. Eve is sent packing too. The whole family, including Spike and Harmony see her to the door and off the premises with the parting promise of vengeance courtesy of the Senior Partners should she ever show her face again, should she carry through with her threats of retribution. Lorne suggests a drink which meets with general agreement, if not enthusiasm, particularly from Spike who readily admits:
Spike: Well, I've been prancing around thinking I had a destiny. Love to drown my embarrassment in a few pints.
With the admission comes a sense of relief. He’s been released from a lie, a charade that never quite fit. His compass has been placed squarely back in his own hand, the needle points magnetic north. He needs no destiny to find direction. He can go wherever he likes. Even Angel wouldn’t say no to a drink. It’s been a big day. It’s about to get bigger.
Cordelia says that she and Angel will catch up to the others. Her first question, once they are alone, is how does he feel? He feels good, like Harmony in Harm’s Way earlier in the season, he finds that the unbridled hatred of another is quite a handy reminder of ones self-worth, though admittedly, he doesn’t think that beating up little old Lindsey qualifies as a real big deal. Cordy laughs at his obtuseness:
Cordelia: Boy, I really do fall for the dumb ones. You know how you're always trying to save, oh, every single person in the world? Did it ever occur to you, you were one of them?
Helping the helpless was the original mission, saving souls and in the process he just might save his own. He needed some help to remember that and Cordelia was there to give it to him, get him back on the tracks. She’s just about succeeded.
Angel: Lindsey wasted a lot of energy trying to make me doubt myself. I know it's not even close to over, but I do feel like I can do this. Wolfram & Hart, whatever's coming, I feel like we can beat it.
Through Cordelia’s mediation self-belief and confidence are found. They fertilise the seed of hope and it germinates allowing a sense of purpose to be reborn. So did she really mean all that stuff about him having made a deal with the devil? True to the last, she doesn’t salve his bruised ego by lying to make him feel better:
Cordelia: Was God's honest truth. But you're bigger than that. You'll win this in the end.
The deal was wrong but, if he remembers who he is, he won’t be corrupted and he’ll come through in the end. She has absolute faith in him. Then Cordy breaks the bad news - she won’t be around to see the outcome. This is not her gig anymore; he can explain it to everyone once he understands:
Angel: That's gonna be never. I need you here.
So Angel, who never needed anybody admits that he needs this one; Cordelia, who has been his best friend, his constant, his conscience, his guide, his support, his ally, his partner. How will he go on without her? But she’s given him the toolkit; be true to himself, remember who he was, remember who he is. Easy.
Cordelia: Don't make it hard, Angel. I'm just on a different road... and this is my off-ramp. The Powers That Be owed me one, and I didn't waste it. I got my guy back on track.
Angel doesn’t understand. There’s more he needs to say but Cordy knows she’s slim on time. She touches Angel’s face tenderly:
Cordelia: We take what we can get, champ, and we do our best with it. I'll be seeing you . . . Oh, what the hell. One for the road?
As she walks back to him Angel smiles. It’s a genuine, real, emotional smile - an event that is rare in Angel’s history. It is, perhaps, the happiest we ever see him, even though the moment is steeped in bittersweet sadness. As they kiss the telephone rings. Cordelia says he really must answer it, which Angel reluctantly does. It’s the hospital with the news that Cordelia has died. At first he doesn’t believe, says it is impossible, says she’s standing right in front of him…
He looks for Cordelia only to discover that she’s disappeared. He chokes back tears and hears the truth. She never did wake up from the coma. Suddenly all her words take on a new significance. Her parting gift has been to get Angel back on track. The Powers owed her one and she didn’t waste it. So the Powers don’t seem particularly interested in Angel per se. It was for Cordelia, used and abused at their hands that they stepped in and interceded (and perhaps to usurp the pretensions of the audacious Lindsey and his false claims to Power provided visions).
And it’s interesting too, the perpetual use of the descriptive “back on track” when describing Angel’s need to regain a sense of purpose. ‘Tracks’ imply a specific destination and thus a destiny. The ‘tracks’ take you somewhere pre-determined, you have no choice in the way the journey unfolds, the tracks make the decision for you. Contrast this to Spike and his metaphorical compass with which he is free to choose his own direction, destination and route and it’s not hard to see that Angel is still bound by his apparent ‘destiny’, no matter how much he denies adherence to such belief. But still, Cordy has worked a miracle here; she’s managed to recover a smidgen of self belief and encouraged the regrowth of hope and what could be bad about that? What can he say but whisper a simple ‘thankyou’ to the woman who had such a profound influence on his very existence.
End
What source, Angel wants to know. And so Spike tells them about his guy, the visions and the connection to the Powers. It all hits a little too close to home for Angel and Cordelia. Spike refers to the faux Doyle as ‘Tattoo Boy’ causing the proverbial shit to hit the proverbial fan. As the trio talk a very nervous Eve watches from the end of the corridor. Eve is right to be concerned. Angel quickly zeros in on her as a likely source of information. It’s the parasite from Soul Purpose that proves to be her undoing; the fact that Spike’s informant told him to rescue Angel from a bug that she put on him in the first place. The whole team is bought in. This is serious.
Meanwhile, the office has been deserted, whatever Lindsey is doing deep in the basement has triggered an evacuation warning. Without too much prompting Eve spills the beans about the ‘fail-safe’, a device that was designed to destroy Angel just in case he couldn’t be controlled by the Senior Partners, which to date, hasn’t been a huge problem, it’s still not a problem since the device has been artificially activated by Lindsey, not by Angel’s rabid insubordination. They quickly realise that the impostor must be the one behind it, so ask for more information from Spike. He doesn’t have much to add just that he’s an urban cowboy who once had a hand chopped off. The light bulb goes on; they’re in the dark no longer. They know exactly who they are about to face. Wes says he can try and remedy the concealment spell and takes Fred and Lorne to assist. Fred doesn’t want Angel to go alone but he doesn’t want to risk anyone he cares about. Spike volunteers and Angel quickly, too quickly, agrees. OK, so he doesn’t care about Spike, much, but on the flipside, he might just be beginning to realise that there are worse things than having Spike watching you’re back in a rumble. Cordelia is going too - Angel tries to dissuade her but she’s determined. She’s a warrior and she wants to see a lawyer. Nobody gets away with messing with her guy!
The trio go down to the basement and set off the security system that Lindsey was able to deceive. It releases a horde of zombies. Spike volunteers his services to hold them at bay while Angel and Cordy go forward. They find Lindsey. He acts glib at their arrival. Should he get weak at the knees, promise to be a good boy?
Angel: It's a little late for that, Doyle.
Lindsey: There's always time for redemption. Isn't that your whole thing?
To which Angel delivers his cutting rebuttal:
Angel: You had your chance. I guess some people, they just never change
Angel finds it hard to believe anyone can change and even though Lindsey is making no pretence of real repentance, Angel’s belief that a leopard can’t change its spots, particularly a Lindsey-shaped leopard, will come to prominence later in the season. Angel wants to finish things so he goes to punch Lindsey, but surprisingly, Lindsey is able to stop it mid-thrust and sends him flying across the room. Huh, looks like he’s learnt a new trick or two in his absence. Lindsey threatens Angel with a small pen knife. Angel draws a samurai sword. Lindsey magically transforms his little bitty blade into once comparable to his foe’s. Angel charges Cordelia with shutting down the strange machine that Lindsey had activated.
So they start to fight, sword-play, acrobatic moves and banter. They remember the first time they met, when Angel kicked his client out the window of a sky scraper. Good times. It’s another backward glance; what they were back at the beginning, the day he made an enemy of Wolfram and Hart, another reminder of the strange and unexpected journey they’ve taken.
Meanwhile, upstairs, Wesley, with assistance from the team, is working the mojo, reading the weird language, casting the spell. It’s another instance of looking back, returning to their roots; Wes, Fred and Lorne. Gunn is with them too but he’s a bit like a fish out of water. He remarks:
Gunn: Man, I should be down there. Got enough Betty Crockers. I should be throwing some hurt.
That’s what he used to do. What bought him into Angel’s world was his hunting and fighting skills. But he’s not down there ‘throwing some hurt’, he’s upstairs with the suits. Unlike the others who actually return to their roots, Charles merely looks at his from a distance, observes the irony but does nothing about it. He is unable to reconnect with what he was because he has been fundamentally changed by Wolfram and Hart.
Angel and Lindsey continue to fight, continue their punch strewn stroll down memory lane. Lindsey gains the advantage by plunging his sword into Angel’s heart. But it’s not the sword that stings, its Lindsey’s words:
Lindsey: Who is this? Who is this? I came to fight the vampire with a soul. Guess you shouldn't have sold it, huh? Look at you, from champion to pathetic corporate puppet in just a few months. You used to have fire in your heart. Now all you got in there is that big honkin' sword. How's that feel, champ?
Fire in his heart? That seems so long ago, now all that’s left is a dried up old walnut of a thing, or so it seems. But there’s life in the old nut yet. Angel pulls out the sword to continue the fight. As Angel re-engages, Cordelia has some success with the giant machine. It begins shutting down and returns to an unanimated state. Lindsey’s power diminishes with it - he can’t even throw a straight punch any longer. Angel, through this battle with the past personified is able to find himself again, the self he wants to be, confident, assured, purposeful and is freshly reminded of what it was he was fighting in the first place.
Angel: I'm Angel. I beat the bad guys
This is no solo effort. Angel is able to win because of the efforts of his team. Sure, Angel did the actual fighting but Cordelia cracked the machine, Wes and co. were able to make Lindsey’s protective tattoos evaporate and even Spike was able to take on the mundane task of holding off the zombies that enabled Angel to progress to the main feature. Teamwork wins the day, again.
So now the Senior Partners are alerted to Lindsey and the games he’s been playing. Angel is only too happy to let them have him. Oh yeah, Senior Partners are firmly in control here. Lindsey is sucked up through a smoky portal up to where the Partners hand out their punishment, perhaps never to be seen again. Eve is sent packing too. The whole family, including Spike and Harmony see her to the door and off the premises with the parting promise of vengeance courtesy of the Senior Partners should she ever show her face again, should she carry through with her threats of retribution. Lorne suggests a drink which meets with general agreement, if not enthusiasm, particularly from Spike who readily admits:
Spike: Well, I've been prancing around thinking I had a destiny. Love to drown my embarrassment in a few pints.
With the admission comes a sense of relief. He’s been released from a lie, a charade that never quite fit. His compass has been placed squarely back in his own hand, the needle points magnetic north. He needs no destiny to find direction. He can go wherever he likes. Even Angel wouldn’t say no to a drink. It’s been a big day. It’s about to get bigger.
Cordelia says that she and Angel will catch up to the others. Her first question, once they are alone, is how does he feel? He feels good, like Harmony in Harm’s Way earlier in the season, he finds that the unbridled hatred of another is quite a handy reminder of ones self-worth, though admittedly, he doesn’t think that beating up little old Lindsey qualifies as a real big deal. Cordy laughs at his obtuseness:
Cordelia: Boy, I really do fall for the dumb ones. You know how you're always trying to save, oh, every single person in the world? Did it ever occur to you, you were one of them?
Helping the helpless was the original mission, saving souls and in the process he just might save his own. He needed some help to remember that and Cordelia was there to give it to him, get him back on the tracks. She’s just about succeeded.
Angel: Lindsey wasted a lot of energy trying to make me doubt myself. I know it's not even close to over, but I do feel like I can do this. Wolfram & Hart, whatever's coming, I feel like we can beat it.
Through Cordelia’s mediation self-belief and confidence are found. They fertilise the seed of hope and it germinates allowing a sense of purpose to be reborn. So did she really mean all that stuff about him having made a deal with the devil? True to the last, she doesn’t salve his bruised ego by lying to make him feel better:
Cordelia: Was God's honest truth. But you're bigger than that. You'll win this in the end.
The deal was wrong but, if he remembers who he is, he won’t be corrupted and he’ll come through in the end. She has absolute faith in him. Then Cordy breaks the bad news - she won’t be around to see the outcome. This is not her gig anymore; he can explain it to everyone once he understands:
Angel: That's gonna be never. I need you here.
So Angel, who never needed anybody admits that he needs this one; Cordelia, who has been his best friend, his constant, his conscience, his guide, his support, his ally, his partner. How will he go on without her? But she’s given him the toolkit; be true to himself, remember who he was, remember who he is. Easy.
Cordelia: Don't make it hard, Angel. I'm just on a different road... and this is my off-ramp. The Powers That Be owed me one, and I didn't waste it. I got my guy back on track.
Angel doesn’t understand. There’s more he needs to say but Cordy knows she’s slim on time. She touches Angel’s face tenderly:
Cordelia: We take what we can get, champ, and we do our best with it. I'll be seeing you . . . Oh, what the hell. One for the road?
As she walks back to him Angel smiles. It’s a genuine, real, emotional smile - an event that is rare in Angel’s history. It is, perhaps, the happiest we ever see him, even though the moment is steeped in bittersweet sadness. As they kiss the telephone rings. Cordelia says he really must answer it, which Angel reluctantly does. It’s the hospital with the news that Cordelia has died. At first he doesn’t believe, says it is impossible, says she’s standing right in front of him…
He looks for Cordelia only to discover that she’s disappeared. He chokes back tears and hears the truth. She never did wake up from the coma. Suddenly all her words take on a new significance. Her parting gift has been to get Angel back on track. The Powers owed her one and she didn’t waste it. So the Powers don’t seem particularly interested in Angel per se. It was for Cordelia, used and abused at their hands that they stepped in and interceded (and perhaps to usurp the pretensions of the audacious Lindsey and his false claims to Power provided visions).
And it’s interesting too, the perpetual use of the descriptive “back on track” when describing Angel’s need to regain a sense of purpose. ‘Tracks’ imply a specific destination and thus a destiny. The ‘tracks’ take you somewhere pre-determined, you have no choice in the way the journey unfolds, the tracks make the decision for you. Contrast this to Spike and his metaphorical compass with which he is free to choose his own direction, destination and route and it’s not hard to see that Angel is still bound by his apparent ‘destiny’, no matter how much he denies adherence to such belief. But still, Cordy has worked a miracle here; she’s managed to recover a smidgen of self belief and encouraged the regrowth of hope and what could be bad about that? What can he say but whisper a simple ‘thankyou’ to the woman who had such a profound influence on his very existence.
End