I am on a roll at the moment! It's fun, but I'm afraid it means that all fic writing is delayed.
This week
peasant_ is
discussing the Angel/Angelus conundrum. (Why do I have a feeling that having her on my flist is going to get me even *more* obsessed?) Anyway, she was proposing two theories:
A: Angel is basically one vampire who behaves in two different ways.
B: Angel and Angelus are two distinct personalities, distinct beings.
I've always gone with A, alhtough there are a few - or more precicely ONE BIG - problem. As she put it:
I was perfectly happy accepting the integrated model A, assuming Cordy was just deluded in maintaining Angel and Angelus were separate, right up until AtS4 when episodes like Awakening (why does Angel not remember something that Angelus does?) and Orpheus threw a right spanner in the works.
I'm not going to deal with Orpheus - he's under the influence of a magical drug and chatting with Faith somewhere in his own brain. It can all be taken as a metaphor or something. No - it's the other thing:
Why can't Angel remember the Beast, but Angelus can? It would seem the definitive proof of model B. Except... I think I've worked it out! And hey - IT ALL MAKES SENSE! *does somersaults*
(ETA: I'm sure loads of you have thought of this already btw.)
First of all, Season 4 of Angel is the big ret-con season. Skip claims that Jasmine had a hand in pretty much everything since Angel came to LA (maybe even before?). Also - nothing is as it seems. It plays on people, this season. The entire thing is one big giant enormous complicated plot. Now in the light of this, lets examine what we know:
-Jasmine wiped away *every* knowledge of The Beast in an entire dimension, except for a tiny unimportant fragment, somehow hidden where souled-Angel couldn't access it. Rather sloppy, don'tcha think?
- The Beast (who barely speaks 3 words in its entire time on screen), bothers to greet Angel by name, after having met him once for 5 minutes a few centuries before.
- Cordy/Jasmine is the one who manipulates Angel into having his soul removed - and being the Beast's Master she knows full well what took place between him and the Beast, and that it is of NO importance.
- Angelus is (somehow) crucial to Jasmine's plan.
So - I propose that the whole thing was an elaborate plot to enable Cordy/Jasmine to steal Angel's soul:
- She made the big forgetting spell *specifically* so there would somehow be a bit 'hidden' in Angel's head. (If the military can make a chip sensitive enough to sense whether someone is human or not, then I'll happily buy that a Power gone awry can design a spell like that.)
- She instructed the Beast to speak to Angel, which was the only way they'd begin to puzzle things out. Once they worked out that it might be 'Angelus' who was the key to the whole thing, they began wondering about removing Angel's soul and boy howdy but Cordy/Jasmine did a good job of making Angel doubt himself.
- Once the soul had been extracted (and after she had stolen it) - Cordy/Jasmine made Angelus an offer she knew she wouldn't have to go through with. He promptly told the truth, making everyone scratch their heads, since y'know - nothing happened when Angelus met the Beast. Anyway, now they needed to re-soul him, since they had no further use for Angelus.
- Then - when the soul was (gasp!) gone - she got her "vision" that lead to the fake souling spell. Once Angel(us) had convinced everyone that he was souled again (my personal take is that it was a localised spell that made him act souled as long as he was in the cage), Cordy/Jasmine could safely let him out, knowing that the others wouldn't blame her.
- Finally, Cordy/Jasmine now had one Angelus running free in LA, ready to be blackmailed into doing her bidding.
And there you have it! As far as I can remember, it's only Cordy who keeps nattering on about the Angel/Angelus split. ETA: About Cordy - I think she's very aware that she's 'the main girl' in Angel's life, and that if he loses his soul, she'll be pretty much top of the list. Which can't be a nice thought...
Anyway, all you have to do it piece it together backwards and it all makes sense. It was a ret-con that took place before our very eyes!!!! :)
And because I thought it'd be nice to get a lighter layout for summer, and because I've had this header sat in a folder for far too long, I did up my LJ and it now features lovely Angel. :)