Angel Season 5 - Episode 17 - Underneath (part 1 of 2)
Episode 5.17 - Underneath
Written by Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain
Directed by Skip Schoolnik
Part 1 (of 2)
Secrets lie…underneath
Below the surface
Layer down deep
Away from pretence, facades,
What you really think is
Underneath
The soft chewy centre
Hidden from view
Plans and schemes and things to do
Memories stolen, things unknown
Where fears creep…
Underneath
UNDERNEATH (un-der-neath)
1) Below the surface; directly or vertically beneath; at or on the bottom of.
2) Under the control of; in a lower position in a hierarchy of authority
3) Hidden, disguised or misrepresented, as by a false appearance or pretence.
The word ‘underneath’ has a number of connotations all of which are applicable on some level during this episode in which the layers of Angel’s world are partially revealed, or at the very least are certainly hinted at. With these disclosures the inherent danger of living and trusting in the surface picture becomes all too apparent.
Angel sits at the big table in the conference room all by himself. The ranks of his team have thinned considerably; Fred is dead, Gunn is still in hospital, Wesley is babysitting the hell God and Lorne is MIA, still grief stricken over the loss of his dear friend. Angel is not alone for long. Spike arrives, carrying a briefcase, which, it must be stated, looks extremely odd. He inquires after the whereabouts of the team; this is an important meeting, his first as a ‘very loosely affiliated’ member of the group. He sits at the big desk and asks what’s on the agenda, opens his briefcase and, while Angel begins discussing assignments, he pops the top on a can of beer. Angel is appalled and irritated causing Spike to protest saying he’s listening, with beer.
Angel: Forget it. You know what? This isn’t a meeting. This is you being annoying.
This little incident with the briefcase speaks volumes of the relationship that has developed between the two vampires. Spike craves acceptance from his mentor; he has relished the opportunity to team up with Angel in an equitable partnership thanks to the recent ‘family’ emergency and is enthusiastic about making his union with Angel’s team official, so to speak, hence the briefcase (this is the corporate world of evil-fighting after all). But then, Spike worries that Angel with laugh at him, reject him and won’t welcome him into the team at all so he tempers his eagerness with the beer. Spike sabotages his own efforts to protect himself from possible (or expected?) rebuff. But, ironically, it also allows him to conform to Angel’s expectations and not upset the status quo (any more than he already has) and so Spike wins again. The reality is that he is the one there for Angel, he is the one in whom Angel confides - it’s becoming a bit of a habit. To Spike, Angel confesses the guilt he feels about bringing Fred from one hell into another and, ultimately, for bringing her to Wolfram and Hart. Not surprisingly, Spike champions choice; it was her choice to be here but Angel knows better. He knows that it was him alone who made the decision to go there; the others just fell into line behind him. Spike suspects, instinctively knows that Angel is looking for payback, to do ‘something stupid’. Angel demurs:
Angel: Done it. Came here, spend every day lying to myself about making the world a better place.
Spike: Welcome to the planet. We all paint on our happy faces everyday, when all we really want is to pound the neighbour’s missus, steal his Ben Franklins and while we’re at it, not think about the third of the world that is starving to death
Spike explains that life is all about pretending, keeping our true thoughts hidden, about secretly desiring what other’s have and blocking out the misfortunes of others that are too big for even vampire superheroes to contemplate. Angel is not the only one with secrets underneath that underpin his daily reality of existence. (Spike’s considerable personal growth must be noted here too. He’s come along way from the newly chipped creature that, in the BTVS, Season 4 episode ‘Pangs’, remarked that he found starving people in those ‘far off, dusty countries’ humorous.)
Angel protests, he knows he can’t fix everything but he has to do better with the patch that he’s sworn to protect, especially with the Senior Partners yet to reveal their hand. Angel still doesn’t get it. He’s looking for an external assault yet to be launched. He doesn’t realise that the game is in full swing and that the partners are well ahead. But Spike is supportive; if Angel wants to get serious then he’s happy to tag along, just not on a pointless wild goose chase. If only they had somebody who had a direct line to the big guys….
A light bulb goes on for Angel and without further delay the boys pay a visit to Eve. She is still hiding at Lindsey’s apartment, concealed behind the mystical glyphs. At first she plays dumb, says she has no information to share but then, suddenly, the walls begin to shake and the protective symbols dissolve to nothing. Eve is suddenly willing to tell them anything they want to know in return for asylum. Angel agrees and the three of them are gone before a well dressed, very tall and very intimidating man comes crashing into the room.
Meanwhile, Lorn is at a bar trying to drown his grief in a bottomless glass of Sea Breeze. His melancholy drinking is interrupted by people who want him to perform his special party tricks by reading their futures. But Lorne is jaded; he’s sick and tired of wearing bells on his toes and making like everything is a-ok and telling people what they want to hear rather than the god-awful truth that life sucks a lot of the time. But, just as he did in ‘Life of the Party’ Lorne pushes his misgivings and less than peachy feelings way down underneath a façade of jolly humour and droll remarks because that’s what the green guy does.
Angel leaves Eve in Spike’s protection while he goes to see Gunn about his jurisdiction over the troublesome liaison. But Gunn, still in hospital, isn’t in the mood to talk or supply legal information. It hurts too much. Angel ain’t buying it:
Angel: Gunn, you paid a high price for what’s in that brain, so use it.
Gunn reluctantly, and with very little effort is able to tell Angel that yes, there is a proviso in his contract that may be able t be used to protect Eve. As he’s about to leave the room Angel offers a few words of sage advice. He says that Charles will (and should) feel bad about what happened to Fred for the rest of his life because he is a good man. Gunn protests that he shouldn’t be forgiven so easily - he knew that there would be consequences yet he was prepared to take the upgrade anyway. Angel replies:
Angel: You know, the thing about atonement is you never run out of chances but you’ve got to take them. You can’t hide in some hospital room and pretend its all going to go away, because it never will.
It will never get better until he does something constructive to make it better. Angel is, of course, an expert in matters such as these. He tried hiding away with only his guilt for company. He tried it for years on end and it got him exactly nowhere. Atonement is an active, ongoing process that can’t be achieved sitting around feeling sorry for your self.
Angel tries to interrogate Eve but now that she’s temporarily safe she’s not so forthcoming with the goods.
Angel: What are you? What do you do for the Senior Partners?
Eve: I’m liaison. I liaise. Look, what do you want me to say? I’m a leprechaun from Brigadoon? … There are layers upon layers at Wolfram and Hart Angel, things you’ll never understand.
Eve is a child of the Senior Partners created to do their bidding but strictly on a need to know basis. She only knows what they want her to know, only when she needs to know it, but:
Eve: Ready for the funny part? There was someone who could’ve told you everything you want to know…and you let the Senior Partners take him away.
Lindsey. Last seen being sucked up into a smoky black portal in ‘You’re Welcome’, he has apparently devoted years of his life studying the Senior Partners and their layers and plans. That knowledge made him dangerous, so dangerous that they nabbed him before he and Angel could have a conversation. So now Eve laments that her dearest darling Lindsey must be in some hideous hell being punished for his audacity in some god-awful way...
Um, ‘hideous’ is not exactly the first words that spring to mind when we do finally get a glimpse of Lindsey in his ‘hell’. ‘Domestic’ and ‘bliss’ may be more appropriate. Lindsey and an attractive blonde cuddle and kiss in bed, then are joined by a cute kid who snuggles between them completing the charming family picture. The congeniality continues as Lindsey goes to get the morning paper. The sun shines on an a seemingly endless piece of suburban heaven as countless gentlemen exit their identical houses in perfect synchronisation, in harmonious union they wave a morning greeting to their cross road compatriot before making their way back into their respective houses.
We know this can’t be real. It’s all too perfect and we heard Spike’s earlier words about the ugly truth hiding in the underbelly of everyday life. No this can’t be what it seems; we’re learning not to trust the surface view, Wolfram and Hart have taught us that much.
Meanwhile, Angel and Spike are wrestling with how to find Lindsey with the needle-in-a-haystack dimensional odds they are up against when Gunn arrives with the information they need. He’s not dressed as lawyer Gunn in a suit and tie. He’s in his street clothes, head shaved, very much reminiscent of pre-Wolfram and Hart Gunn. Charles reclaims the identity he was so ashamed of, the one he was desperate to bury with his brain upgrade. Gunn has learnt that street-fighting Gunn might have been thuggish and not renowned for his intellect but at least he was brave and principled and carried a conviction in the work of Angel Investigations that dwarfed all his frequent propaganda filled defence of his accomplishments with Wolfram and Hart.
Back in the suburban dreamland Lindsey is putting his son through his paces with his geography:
Lindsey: Ok, from the top. The earth’s outer layer is called…
Son: The crust
Lindsey: And what’s underneath that?
Son: ummm….the mantle?
Lindsey: Yup, and under that? Come on, you know this one.
Son: The outer core?
Lindsey: And under that?
Son: The inner core
Lindsey: And under that?
Ok. We get it. There are a lot of layers, all the way down to the soft chewy centre; layer upon layer upon layer - with things happening, unseen, and unknown in each and every one. Then Lindsey’s ‘wife’ asks him to get something from down in the cellar but rather than happily acquiesce her simple request (as one would expect in the land of domestic happiness) he makes an excuse; he wants to hear Zach (his ‘son’) tell him about the lithosphere. Lindsey is reluctant. He doesn’t want to go down to the basement. But the missus is mildly insistent and there is no avoiding it. He grudgingly does as she bids. He hesitates as he reaches for the doorknob. Lindsey is scared. Something happens below in this cellar, underneath this façade of suburban splendour …
So Spike, Angel and Gunn head out together. Charles reveals they are going to a Wolfram and Hart holding dimension - a place where Lindsey (and presumably other unfortunates who have displeased the firm) is being held until his punishment can be decided on. The only way in is to take the magical Camaro. Even though Angel sits in the driver’s seat his services are not required at all; the car is steered and directed by an unknown magical force (it’s another neat allusion to Angel’s situation at Wolfram and Hart really). Gunn rides shotgun while Spike takes the backseat, in the place traditionally occupied by the child. He even bobs his head between the ‘parental’ figures in a classically child-like action spouting pop culture knowledge they don’t fully appreciate (in this case he likens the Camaro to Knight Rider’s KITT, Gunn would be too young to remember while Angel, well he’s Angel and never seems to get these things). The car will take them into the holding cell but then they’ll have to find ‘the wrath’ in order to get out. This is a subtle piece of foreshadowing for what is to come. Cars arrived and took Angel’s crew to Wolfram and Hart and inevitably, this suggests, the remaining members of the team will have to face the ‘wrath’ of the Senior Partners to make their escape, and you just know that’s not going to be a giggle.
The car goes through a tunnel and night instantly becomes day as they enter the new dimension.
Spike: This isn’t hell. It’s the ‘burbs. Close enough.
Angel: This is Lindsey’s punishment for trying to kill me? Huh! Maybe it’s a reward.
Lindsey’s perfect neighbourly morning ritual repeats exactly the way it did the morning before, except this time as the men return indoors the scene is sullied by the oddly menacing sight of the black Camaro driving slowly down the street. It is alien and out of place in this white-washed world of lies. The car pulls up at Lindsey’s drive and they make their way to the door just knowing that they’re going to be facing something ugly….Only it’s not, ugly that is. They are met by Lindsey’s very pretty ‘wife’ and she’s all smiles and happily invites them in.
( Part 2 here)
Written by Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain
Directed by Skip Schoolnik
Part 1 (of 2)
Secrets lie…underneath
Below the surface
Layer down deep
Away from pretence, facades,
What you really think is
Underneath
The soft chewy centre
Hidden from view
Plans and schemes and things to do
Memories stolen, things unknown
Where fears creep…
Underneath
UNDERNEATH (un-der-neath)
1) Below the surface; directly or vertically beneath; at or on the bottom of.
2) Under the control of; in a lower position in a hierarchy of authority
3) Hidden, disguised or misrepresented, as by a false appearance or pretence.
The word ‘underneath’ has a number of connotations all of which are applicable on some level during this episode in which the layers of Angel’s world are partially revealed, or at the very least are certainly hinted at. With these disclosures the inherent danger of living and trusting in the surface picture becomes all too apparent.
Angel sits at the big table in the conference room all by himself. The ranks of his team have thinned considerably; Fred is dead, Gunn is still in hospital, Wesley is babysitting the hell God and Lorne is MIA, still grief stricken over the loss of his dear friend. Angel is not alone for long. Spike arrives, carrying a briefcase, which, it must be stated, looks extremely odd. He inquires after the whereabouts of the team; this is an important meeting, his first as a ‘very loosely affiliated’ member of the group. He sits at the big desk and asks what’s on the agenda, opens his briefcase and, while Angel begins discussing assignments, he pops the top on a can of beer. Angel is appalled and irritated causing Spike to protest saying he’s listening, with beer.
Angel: Forget it. You know what? This isn’t a meeting. This is you being annoying.
This little incident with the briefcase speaks volumes of the relationship that has developed between the two vampires. Spike craves acceptance from his mentor; he has relished the opportunity to team up with Angel in an equitable partnership thanks to the recent ‘family’ emergency and is enthusiastic about making his union with Angel’s team official, so to speak, hence the briefcase (this is the corporate world of evil-fighting after all). But then, Spike worries that Angel with laugh at him, reject him and won’t welcome him into the team at all so he tempers his eagerness with the beer. Spike sabotages his own efforts to protect himself from possible (or expected?) rebuff. But, ironically, it also allows him to conform to Angel’s expectations and not upset the status quo (any more than he already has) and so Spike wins again. The reality is that he is the one there for Angel, he is the one in whom Angel confides - it’s becoming a bit of a habit. To Spike, Angel confesses the guilt he feels about bringing Fred from one hell into another and, ultimately, for bringing her to Wolfram and Hart. Not surprisingly, Spike champions choice; it was her choice to be here but Angel knows better. He knows that it was him alone who made the decision to go there; the others just fell into line behind him. Spike suspects, instinctively knows that Angel is looking for payback, to do ‘something stupid’. Angel demurs:
Angel: Done it. Came here, spend every day lying to myself about making the world a better place.
Spike: Welcome to the planet. We all paint on our happy faces everyday, when all we really want is to pound the neighbour’s missus, steal his Ben Franklins and while we’re at it, not think about the third of the world that is starving to death
Spike explains that life is all about pretending, keeping our true thoughts hidden, about secretly desiring what other’s have and blocking out the misfortunes of others that are too big for even vampire superheroes to contemplate. Angel is not the only one with secrets underneath that underpin his daily reality of existence. (Spike’s considerable personal growth must be noted here too. He’s come along way from the newly chipped creature that, in the BTVS, Season 4 episode ‘Pangs’, remarked that he found starving people in those ‘far off, dusty countries’ humorous.)
Angel protests, he knows he can’t fix everything but he has to do better with the patch that he’s sworn to protect, especially with the Senior Partners yet to reveal their hand. Angel still doesn’t get it. He’s looking for an external assault yet to be launched. He doesn’t realise that the game is in full swing and that the partners are well ahead. But Spike is supportive; if Angel wants to get serious then he’s happy to tag along, just not on a pointless wild goose chase. If only they had somebody who had a direct line to the big guys….
A light bulb goes on for Angel and without further delay the boys pay a visit to Eve. She is still hiding at Lindsey’s apartment, concealed behind the mystical glyphs. At first she plays dumb, says she has no information to share but then, suddenly, the walls begin to shake and the protective symbols dissolve to nothing. Eve is suddenly willing to tell them anything they want to know in return for asylum. Angel agrees and the three of them are gone before a well dressed, very tall and very intimidating man comes crashing into the room.
Meanwhile, Lorn is at a bar trying to drown his grief in a bottomless glass of Sea Breeze. His melancholy drinking is interrupted by people who want him to perform his special party tricks by reading their futures. But Lorne is jaded; he’s sick and tired of wearing bells on his toes and making like everything is a-ok and telling people what they want to hear rather than the god-awful truth that life sucks a lot of the time. But, just as he did in ‘Life of the Party’ Lorne pushes his misgivings and less than peachy feelings way down underneath a façade of jolly humour and droll remarks because that’s what the green guy does.
Angel leaves Eve in Spike’s protection while he goes to see Gunn about his jurisdiction over the troublesome liaison. But Gunn, still in hospital, isn’t in the mood to talk or supply legal information. It hurts too much. Angel ain’t buying it:
Angel: Gunn, you paid a high price for what’s in that brain, so use it.
Gunn reluctantly, and with very little effort is able to tell Angel that yes, there is a proviso in his contract that may be able t be used to protect Eve. As he’s about to leave the room Angel offers a few words of sage advice. He says that Charles will (and should) feel bad about what happened to Fred for the rest of his life because he is a good man. Gunn protests that he shouldn’t be forgiven so easily - he knew that there would be consequences yet he was prepared to take the upgrade anyway. Angel replies:
Angel: You know, the thing about atonement is you never run out of chances but you’ve got to take them. You can’t hide in some hospital room and pretend its all going to go away, because it never will.
It will never get better until he does something constructive to make it better. Angel is, of course, an expert in matters such as these. He tried hiding away with only his guilt for company. He tried it for years on end and it got him exactly nowhere. Atonement is an active, ongoing process that can’t be achieved sitting around feeling sorry for your self.
Angel tries to interrogate Eve but now that she’s temporarily safe she’s not so forthcoming with the goods.
Angel: What are you? What do you do for the Senior Partners?
Eve: I’m liaison. I liaise. Look, what do you want me to say? I’m a leprechaun from Brigadoon? … There are layers upon layers at Wolfram and Hart Angel, things you’ll never understand.
Eve is a child of the Senior Partners created to do their bidding but strictly on a need to know basis. She only knows what they want her to know, only when she needs to know it, but:
Eve: Ready for the funny part? There was someone who could’ve told you everything you want to know…and you let the Senior Partners take him away.
Lindsey. Last seen being sucked up into a smoky black portal in ‘You’re Welcome’, he has apparently devoted years of his life studying the Senior Partners and their layers and plans. That knowledge made him dangerous, so dangerous that they nabbed him before he and Angel could have a conversation. So now Eve laments that her dearest darling Lindsey must be in some hideous hell being punished for his audacity in some god-awful way...
Um, ‘hideous’ is not exactly the first words that spring to mind when we do finally get a glimpse of Lindsey in his ‘hell’. ‘Domestic’ and ‘bliss’ may be more appropriate. Lindsey and an attractive blonde cuddle and kiss in bed, then are joined by a cute kid who snuggles between them completing the charming family picture. The congeniality continues as Lindsey goes to get the morning paper. The sun shines on an a seemingly endless piece of suburban heaven as countless gentlemen exit their identical houses in perfect synchronisation, in harmonious union they wave a morning greeting to their cross road compatriot before making their way back into their respective houses.
We know this can’t be real. It’s all too perfect and we heard Spike’s earlier words about the ugly truth hiding in the underbelly of everyday life. No this can’t be what it seems; we’re learning not to trust the surface view, Wolfram and Hart have taught us that much.
Meanwhile, Angel and Spike are wrestling with how to find Lindsey with the needle-in-a-haystack dimensional odds they are up against when Gunn arrives with the information they need. He’s not dressed as lawyer Gunn in a suit and tie. He’s in his street clothes, head shaved, very much reminiscent of pre-Wolfram and Hart Gunn. Charles reclaims the identity he was so ashamed of, the one he was desperate to bury with his brain upgrade. Gunn has learnt that street-fighting Gunn might have been thuggish and not renowned for his intellect but at least he was brave and principled and carried a conviction in the work of Angel Investigations that dwarfed all his frequent propaganda filled defence of his accomplishments with Wolfram and Hart.
Back in the suburban dreamland Lindsey is putting his son through his paces with his geography:
Lindsey: Ok, from the top. The earth’s outer layer is called…
Son: The crust
Lindsey: And what’s underneath that?
Son: ummm….the mantle?
Lindsey: Yup, and under that? Come on, you know this one.
Son: The outer core?
Lindsey: And under that?
Son: The inner core
Lindsey: And under that?
Ok. We get it. There are a lot of layers, all the way down to the soft chewy centre; layer upon layer upon layer - with things happening, unseen, and unknown in each and every one. Then Lindsey’s ‘wife’ asks him to get something from down in the cellar but rather than happily acquiesce her simple request (as one would expect in the land of domestic happiness) he makes an excuse; he wants to hear Zach (his ‘son’) tell him about the lithosphere. Lindsey is reluctant. He doesn’t want to go down to the basement. But the missus is mildly insistent and there is no avoiding it. He grudgingly does as she bids. He hesitates as he reaches for the doorknob. Lindsey is scared. Something happens below in this cellar, underneath this façade of suburban splendour …
So Spike, Angel and Gunn head out together. Charles reveals they are going to a Wolfram and Hart holding dimension - a place where Lindsey (and presumably other unfortunates who have displeased the firm) is being held until his punishment can be decided on. The only way in is to take the magical Camaro. Even though Angel sits in the driver’s seat his services are not required at all; the car is steered and directed by an unknown magical force (it’s another neat allusion to Angel’s situation at Wolfram and Hart really). Gunn rides shotgun while Spike takes the backseat, in the place traditionally occupied by the child. He even bobs his head between the ‘parental’ figures in a classically child-like action spouting pop culture knowledge they don’t fully appreciate (in this case he likens the Camaro to Knight Rider’s KITT, Gunn would be too young to remember while Angel, well he’s Angel and never seems to get these things). The car will take them into the holding cell but then they’ll have to find ‘the wrath’ in order to get out. This is a subtle piece of foreshadowing for what is to come. Cars arrived and took Angel’s crew to Wolfram and Hart and inevitably, this suggests, the remaining members of the team will have to face the ‘wrath’ of the Senior Partners to make their escape, and you just know that’s not going to be a giggle.
The car goes through a tunnel and night instantly becomes day as they enter the new dimension.
Spike: This isn’t hell. It’s the ‘burbs. Close enough.
Angel: This is Lindsey’s punishment for trying to kill me? Huh! Maybe it’s a reward.
Lindsey’s perfect neighbourly morning ritual repeats exactly the way it did the morning before, except this time as the men return indoors the scene is sullied by the oddly menacing sight of the black Camaro driving slowly down the street. It is alien and out of place in this white-washed world of lies. The car pulls up at Lindsey’s drive and they make their way to the door just knowing that they’re going to be facing something ugly….Only it’s not, ugly that is. They are met by Lindsey’s very pretty ‘wife’ and she’s all smiles and happily invites them in.
( Part 2 here)