Why We Fight.

[elisi]

Why We Fight
(or: Angel and his boys)

This is a far better episode than I remembered. And the way the themes of the season and foreshadowing run through it are painful to watch. Painful in a good way, you understand - it just knocked the air out of me somewhat, in that ‘God they’re all going to die and they’re telling us right now!’ Not that they haven’t done that from the beginning:

ANGEL: We're gonna change things. We came to Wolfram and Hart because it's a powerful weapon, and we'll figure out how to wield it.
WESLEY: Or kill ourselves with it.
‘Conviction’

Because (as they will discover) it is not possible to wield that weapon without killing themselves in the process...

There's also this bit, with Corbin Fries' son:

BOY: They didn't have a lot. I got 'Punisher'.
MATT: My dad won't let me read that.
BOY: Oh, man! It's so good. He kills everyone.

Joss is *evil*! But he's very good at it!

Before I continue I must rec the_royal_anna’s post on 'Why We Fight'. Lots of gorgeous metaphors and the most hysterical imagined future of AtS!

ETA: Also check out frenchani's post. Lots of good thoughts!

But - back to my thoughts, such as they are. The episode really is very much a stand-alone in story terms. We get a few bits of continuity right at the beginning (Eve’s missing, Gunn can’t remember some legalese, Fred complains about Knox messing up with an experiment.)

And then Lawson shows up:

LAWSON: Actually, I came to see your boss. Angel and I are... old acquaintances. I was friends with him back in the day, back when he was in his patriotic phase.

At first I thought that he’d said ‘paternal’, but that was obviously just the subtext coming over a little too loud. ;)

I love the flashback btw - the ‘Demon Research Initiative’, the way they know exactly who Angel is...

MILITARY MAN: Something was on that ship. Have you ever heard dying men screaming for their lives, Angel?
MAN IN BLACK: Course he has.

Lots of good continuity in this episode:

Vampire : They starve you. When you're ready to bite your own arm, they shoot out one of those packets. You drink, and the next thing, you're gone. And that's when they do the experiments.
Spike : And, uh, they are? The government? Nazis? A major cosmetics company?
‘The Initiative’

Not to mention these fantastic lines:

ANGEL: Spike! We need them, OK? I'm not getting trapped at the bottom of the sea.
SPIKE: And I'm not getting experimented on by his government.

ETA: There's also Nostroyev claiming to have been Rasputin's lover, which proves Buffy's theory that there might have been a link between Rasputin and vampires ('Checkpoint'). Whether he actually was one is of course left unanswered!

Anyway, it all brings us to the sub and Lawson and Spike. Watching I think it’s fairly obvious that Spike does NOT know about Angel’s soul (or *if* he does he doesn’t think it has made any difference):

SPIKE: Angelus... this is Nostroyev and the Prince of Lies. Nostroyev, Prince of Lies, this is Angelus. (nods, grins) The Angelus.

We can see that he’s rather proud of being the one who knows the famous guy. And although he acts out, he obeys Angel throughout. And Angel plays his cards so that Spike won’t work out what side he’s on - Spike reckons he’s just on his own side, as usual.

LAWSON (to Angel): You knew about this?
SPIKE: He did?
ANGEL: It was part of the mission.
SPIKE: What mission? Oh. I get it. You're playing both sides against each other.
ANGEL: Spike—
SPIKE: No, I respect that.

And this is again very interesting. We’ve had a lot of mentions of Angelus/the monster inside so far in the season, and we see Angel walking the line beautifully here. Like he will at the end of the season - when he will again kill someone heroic for the sake of the mission...

Now I’m not going to go into all the Lawson/Connor parallels since I already wrote about them in my Spike on AtS essay - please check it out if you want to look at that side of it. (Lawson is Angel’s other failed son, unable to cope with life.)

But it’s not just Connor who looms over this episode - it is the concept of family - and Angel’s bonds to those he has sired:

LAWSON: May I speak freely, sir? I recognize there's a lot going on here that I don't understand... but those monsters butchered my crew... and apparently they're in the S.S.
ANGEL: Spike's not in the S.S. He just likes wearing the jacket.
LAWSON: Yeah, that doesn't help me understand why we're working with him or keeping him alive, for that matter.
ANGEL: I got him under control.
LAWSON: That's not the point. He killed my captain, sir.
ANGEL: We may be able to use them. We don't have much of a crew left.
LAWSON: I don't think we'll need 'em.
ANGEL: They're extra hands.
LAWSON: They're monsters. And I don't know why we—
ANGEL: You don't need to know why.

And again a little later:

ANGEL: He'll [Spike] do what I tell him.
LAWSON: 'Cause you know each other. From before this, right?
ANGEL: Something on your mind, son?

Nostroyev and the Prince of Lies get staked the moment they misbehave, but Spike... not so much. Or Lawson. They’re family. And - in another bit of beautiful continuity - Angel will have an almost identical discussion another half-century later:

Angel: (gets between Buffy and Spike) Buffy, we still need him to find the others.
Buffy: (lowers her stake) Need him? He's probably just got them locked up in the factory.
‘Lovers Walk’

I’ll get back to the family stuff, but first I’m going to look at the mission part:

ANGEL: We gotta bring this sub in. Those are our orders. Isn't that the point? Following orders?
LAWSON: There's a difference between orders... and purpose, sir. [...] And I've been scared out of my mind since I signed on for this duty, but I can keep it together, I can even handle dying, if I know it's for a greater purpose.

And Angel, at W&H, is of course searching for a purpose. As he tells Spike at the end:

SPIKE: Then what was he looking for?
ANGEL: A reason.

This is the episode after Cordy died. Remember at the beginning of ‘You’re Welcome’ Angel decided to quit - and then Cordy woke up. She tried to help him, but at this point he’s still lost - looking for a way to use W&H. To find some meaning to his life. And then (it’s never made completely clear, but I think it’s after Fred dies) he will get that vision - will be told how to wield the weapon that is W&H, and what the consequences will be. For him and his crew. And this is where this episode really shines:

LAWSON: Oh, put your hanky away. I know how important the technology they pulled from the sub was to helping us stop the Germans. Sounded like a fair shake. One person damned to make the world safe for future generations. (looks over at Angel's gang) Except these guys.

He has Wesley, Gunn and Fred tied up - the three who’ll be dead (or dying) by season’s end. And Angel will have damned himself, signing away the shanshu reward.

Lawson (pre-death) has a wonderful statement that really cuts deep and made me sit up and take notice:

LAWSON: We wouldn't do that. You don't win a war by doing whatever it takes. You win by doing what's right.

But as we know Angel will do whatever it takes to ensure a win - or the closest he can get. No matter the price. (He *wants* to do what’s right, desperately, but sadly his world doesn’t work like that...) And there is another exchange later on that is utterly chilling:

LAWSON: They [the crew] swore to give their lives for their country... just like me. Besides, I'm hungry.
ANGEL: They're still your men.
LAWSON: But they're not the mission... are they?

The mission is what matters... and Angel will ask *his* men to give their lives for the mission:

ANGEL: Power endures. We can't bring down the senior partners, but for one bright, shining moment, we can show them that they don't own us. You need to decide for yourselves if that's worth dying for. I can't order you to do this. I can't do it without you. So we'll vote. As a team. Think about what I'm asking you to do, think about what I'm asking you to give.
‘Power Play’

I know a lot of people dislike that ‘helping the helpless’ stopped being the mission, but Angel’s plan didn’t come out of nowhere:

ANGEL: Nothing in the world is the way it ought to be. - It's harsh, and cruel. - But that's why there's us. Champions. It doesn't matter where we come from, what we've done or suffered, or even if we make a difference. We live as though the world was what it should be, to show it what it can be.
‘Home’

He’s trying to 'show the world what it can be', which is the one thing he can’t do as CEO of W&H. He has that big shiny weapon - and there’s no one else to wield it. That power, that choice, is his alone. And he knows that there’s a world full of Slayers and Anne’s, each doing their bit to help people.

But this is all very sad and depressing. Let’s get back to the family stuff.

SPIKE: Air's about gone. Your new boy better get the engines running before the fish start flopping.

Angel’s new boy... that he really ought to have staked. Should we hold Angel responsible for Lawson's crimes?

Anyway, I noticed that at the end - when Angel sends his boys away - there are two clear groups. Angel and his offspring and the soldiers. Angel might have come to help the humans, but he’s still one of the demons. And not just that, but the one who created them. Angel can never, ever be the straight good guy.

But - he lets his new boy go. For someone with such a paternal streak, he really isn’t very good at bringing up his children. His only success (if it can be so termed) is Spike (and that of course was in great deal due to Spike’s own nature)... what I mean is, that Spike was the only one that he ‘brought up’.

At the end of the episode, we of course have that beautiful scene with Spike and Angel silently looking out into the sunshine. Angel’s other boys all lost - Connor mind wiped and Lawson dusted. (Not counting Penn. He was just dull.) But Spike is there still - the one son that Angel didn’t have to save.

But although I love that scene, that’s not where I want to end. Because I noticed something this time. It’s this moment:

SPIKE: Bloody brilliant. Turn the poor sod to save the ship. Then make him dash for dry land before Mr. Sunshine scorches him a new one. (cocks his head to the side) You're still a dick. (grins)
ANGEL: Yeah. I am.
SPIKE: Bollocks.

Because as Angel watches Spike climb up the ladder, he smiles. And I have no way of describing that smile except as affectionate!

I swear I’m not making it up - go look for yourselves! (hesadevil made a youtube vid here!) It’s the same smile I imagine a parent smiles when their teenage son has been caught smoking, crashed his motorbike, continually skipped school and then come home drunk at 3am before passing out on his bed. A ‘Yes he’s an idiot, but hey - he’s still my boy. Not like I wasn’t just as bad, back in the day. Sure he's a hell-raiser, but I gotta admit - the kid's got spirit!’

To quote germaine_pet’s wonderful fic Shanshu Blue:

He’d let out a howl of joy in mid-air, fit to rival a whole pride of lions. You had scowled in his direction, but inwardly you’d smiled.

That’s my Spike & Angel.

Comments

[elisi]

I couldn't help it, since that line popped up in my head as the *perfect* expression of what I was trying to say. And I think I'll have to bribe someone into capping Angel's smile and iconning it. It's just so sweet!

[lynnenne]

If you do, let me know. I would totally use that icon.

[elisi]

I'm currently wondering who to pester. It could even be animated and say something like 'there goes my boy'...

Damn but S/A has *totally* eaten my brain!