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Power Play.
AOQ is up to ‘Power Play’ now, and I have some thoughts. Only I have very little time, so you just get parts of my response to his post. (And I’m too tired to re-format.) Sorry about repeating lots of stuff.
> Angel’s practically waving signs around, giving some of the
> ludicriously over-the-top speechifying that he mocked Illyria for a
> couple episodes ago. If there's a drinking game built around clunky
> speeches, the "get to the top, be the best" rant is sure to get
> everyone in the room trashed.
Ah, but here's the thing - every word in that speech is true. In S2 he was the ant, trying to kill a giant, and he failed miserably. Re-read this, knowing what he was up to:
ANGEL: None of it makes a difference. I wish it did, but, you know, an ant with the best intentions or the most diabolical schemes is just exactly an ant. There is one thing in this business, in this apocalypse that we call a world that matters: Power. Power tips the scale, power sets the course, and until I have real power, global power, I have nothing. I accomplish nothing.
WESLEY: And how you get this power...
ANGEL: Isn't pretty. Isn't fun. You think it's Wolfram & Hart getting to me here, and maybe you're right, because they've shown us what power is. From day one, they've been calling the shots, and all we've done is get shot at. I have a chance to change that.
It's not about right, it's not about wrong... it's about power. Don't play their game, get them to play yours.
ANGEL: Let them fight the good fight. - Someone has to fight the war.
'Redefinition'
> Yet again, I'm appreciating the scope of the plot
> (don't know where the obsession with betraying a friend comes in, but
> after all the harping on it, it turns out to have allegedly already
> happened weeks ago. I like that kind of thing), and the way the
> actors are behaving (Denisof is a standout, as always)
What struck me this time was Spike. They're all of them upset and angry of course (and Wesley does indeed stand out - and we finally see how his restored memories help him deal with a situation) - but Spike is hurt. He stayed in LA because of Angel - because he believed in Angel's fight (no sweet deal with W&H for Spike!). For him the betrayal is personal. At the final confrontation (when they all barge in brandishing weapons) Spike is the one who punches Angel. And I suddenly realised that it could have become almost an exact replay of 'School Hard':
Spike: You think you can fool *me*?! You were my sire, man! You were my... Yoda!
Angel: Things change.
Spike: Not us! Not demons! Man, I can't believe this!
Only this time the conversation would have gone like this:
Spike: How dare you fool *me*?! You were my sire, man! You were my... Yoda!
Angel: Things change.
Spike: Not us! Not champions! Man, I can't believe this!
But of course Angel hasn't changed - and Spike is the first to raise his hand.
> Which in part involves a cocktail party (of DOOM!) with some of Season
> Five's schmoozers, helping retroactively give more significance to the
> episodes in which they debuted.
Stealth-arc!
> Even though the payoff for now is
> just another ritual and villain group,
THE group.
> Bringing it all back to
> Cordelia feels very appropriate. "You're Welcome" and everything
> after it makes a new kind of sense as part of this bigger design of
> putting him on this path.
Ah, but you can see it long before - thematically the season hangs together *beautifully*!
> As I hope the show realizes, there's an irony that I kinda like in the
> fact that it brings its own layer of moral issues. It's only by
> starting his plan to take down the Black Thorn that Dead Boy becomes
> what they want him to be - taking an active rather than a passive role
> in refusing help to people in need, handing out human blood, giving
> away babies to be sacrificed, and, of course, killing.
This is where 'Why We Fight' is such a thing of beauty. I remembered it as a bit dull, but it seriously knocked me out, because the foreshadowing is scary.
LAWSON: We wouldn't do that. You don't win a war by doing whatever it takes. You win by doing what's right.
Oh but Angel doesn't, does he? He turns Lawson, as good and noble a young soldier as ever there was, for the sake of the mission. Just like he will go on to kill Drogyn, bonafide hero.
> He never did
> that stuff while he was complacent with the corruption. The grandiose
> nature of the plan itself is vintage Angel, a mix of Buffy-esque
> changing the rules with ATS's thing about endless fights and cruel
> Universes. Lindsey in a way helps inspire our hero to make it his
> game and send a message to the gods that've helped shape the past five
> seasons.
I know that a lot of people complain about Angel's plan. They say it's stupid and suicidal. That he's forgotten about helping the people and is going for all-out mayhem instead, and why?
It's all about choice. Angel has the choice to stay (playing the SP's game, being digested by the beast) - or to go. Except he can't leave, can he?
GUNN: Any thought about what would happen to us if we tried to say bye-bye? The ramifications, I mean. You think the senior partners are just gonna let us breeze on out the front door?
FRED: You're saying we're trapped here?
Going back to running a detective agency and helping girls in alleys quite simply isn't an option anymore. If he leaves, he ends up dead. So... he'll make sure to create maximum damage as he goes. He knows he can't kill the SP - but...
ANGEL: Killing them [his friends] is not going to change the past.
LAWSON: But it'll hurt you. Maybe that's enough.
WWF
ANGEL: The senior partners may be eternal, but we can make their existence painful.
Power Play
Yes it's a suicide mission, but that doesn't mean that Angel's suicidal. Let's go back to the beginning of the season:
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.
Angel figured out how to wield the weapon - and it will most likely kill them all in the process. But it's a price he's willing to pay. As I said, he has a choice: To wield the weapon, or not. Which again ties in with that speech of his from 'Deep Down':
ANGEL: 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.
His scheme is all about 'showing the world what it can be'. Refusing to accept the world as it is.
You must now go read![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
the_royal_anna's thoughts on this ep, my favourite bit probably being this:
"It's a bleak and joyless world where heroes do not fight because they have hope, but fight because fighting is their only manifestation of hope. But here they agree to fight because as long as they still have a choice to make, they will make a choice. My dear boys, my sweet Illyria, all of them so much lost, so much found. And what I always loved best about the Buffyverse was that it wasn’t always about getting out of the hole. Sometimes you can't get out of the hole, and you can’t sit around waiting until you do. You have to make a difference where you are, as you are. That's the point."
There's a lot of 'Serenity' in this scheme... (spoilers for the movie):
MAL: And I do not hold to that. So no more running. I aim to misbehave. Shepherd Book used to tell me: "If you can't do something smart... do something right."
We know that at the end of Serenity The Alliance was still in power - that nothing had changed fundamentally. But does not mean that what our Big Damn Heroes did was for nothing.
> Angel’s practically waving signs around, giving some of the
> ludicriously over-the-top speechifying that he mocked Illyria for a
> couple episodes ago. If there's a drinking game built around clunky
> speeches, the "get to the top, be the best" rant is sure to get
> everyone in the room trashed.
Ah, but here's the thing - every word in that speech is true. In S2 he was the ant, trying to kill a giant, and he failed miserably. Re-read this, knowing what he was up to:
ANGEL: None of it makes a difference. I wish it did, but, you know, an ant with the best intentions or the most diabolical schemes is just exactly an ant. There is one thing in this business, in this apocalypse that we call a world that matters: Power. Power tips the scale, power sets the course, and until I have real power, global power, I have nothing. I accomplish nothing.
WESLEY: And how you get this power...
ANGEL: Isn't pretty. Isn't fun. You think it's Wolfram & Hart getting to me here, and maybe you're right, because they've shown us what power is. From day one, they've been calling the shots, and all we've done is get shot at. I have a chance to change that.
It's not about right, it's not about wrong... it's about power. Don't play their game, get them to play yours.
ANGEL: Let them fight the good fight. - Someone has to fight the war.
'Redefinition'
> Yet again, I'm appreciating the scope of the plot
> (don't know where the obsession with betraying a friend comes in, but
> after all the harping on it, it turns out to have allegedly already
> happened weeks ago. I like that kind of thing), and the way the
> actors are behaving (Denisof is a standout, as always)
What struck me this time was Spike. They're all of them upset and angry of course (and Wesley does indeed stand out - and we finally see how his restored memories help him deal with a situation) - but Spike is hurt. He stayed in LA because of Angel - because he believed in Angel's fight (no sweet deal with W&H for Spike!). For him the betrayal is personal. At the final confrontation (when they all barge in brandishing weapons) Spike is the one who punches Angel. And I suddenly realised that it could have become almost an exact replay of 'School Hard':
Spike: You think you can fool *me*?! You were my sire, man! You were my... Yoda!
Angel: Things change.
Spike: Not us! Not demons! Man, I can't believe this!
Only this time the conversation would have gone like this:
Spike: How dare you fool *me*?! You were my sire, man! You were my... Yoda!
Angel: Things change.
Spike: Not us! Not champions! Man, I can't believe this!
But of course Angel hasn't changed - and Spike is the first to raise his hand.
> Which in part involves a cocktail party (of DOOM!) with some of Season
> Five's schmoozers, helping retroactively give more significance to the
> episodes in which they debuted.
Stealth-arc!
> Even though the payoff for now is
> just another ritual and villain group,
THE group.
> Bringing it all back to
> Cordelia feels very appropriate. "You're Welcome" and everything
> after it makes a new kind of sense as part of this bigger design of
> putting him on this path.
Ah, but you can see it long before - thematically the season hangs together *beautifully*!
> As I hope the show realizes, there's an irony that I kinda like in the
> fact that it brings its own layer of moral issues. It's only by
> starting his plan to take down the Black Thorn that Dead Boy becomes
> what they want him to be - taking an active rather than a passive role
> in refusing help to people in need, handing out human blood, giving
> away babies to be sacrificed, and, of course, killing.
This is where 'Why We Fight' is such a thing of beauty. I remembered it as a bit dull, but it seriously knocked me out, because the foreshadowing is scary.
LAWSON: We wouldn't do that. You don't win a war by doing whatever it takes. You win by doing what's right.
Oh but Angel doesn't, does he? He turns Lawson, as good and noble a young soldier as ever there was, for the sake of the mission. Just like he will go on to kill Drogyn, bonafide hero.
> He never did
> that stuff while he was complacent with the corruption. The grandiose
> nature of the plan itself is vintage Angel, a mix of Buffy-esque
> changing the rules with ATS's thing about endless fights and cruel
> Universes. Lindsey in a way helps inspire our hero to make it his
> game and send a message to the gods that've helped shape the past five
> seasons.
I know that a lot of people complain about Angel's plan. They say it's stupid and suicidal. That he's forgotten about helping the people and is going for all-out mayhem instead, and why?
It's all about choice. Angel has the choice to stay (playing the SP's game, being digested by the beast) - or to go. Except he can't leave, can he?
GUNN: Any thought about what would happen to us if we tried to say bye-bye? The ramifications, I mean. You think the senior partners are just gonna let us breeze on out the front door?
FRED: You're saying we're trapped here?
Going back to running a detective agency and helping girls in alleys quite simply isn't an option anymore. If he leaves, he ends up dead. So... he'll make sure to create maximum damage as he goes. He knows he can't kill the SP - but...
ANGEL: Killing them [his friends] is not going to change the past.
LAWSON: But it'll hurt you. Maybe that's enough.
WWF
ANGEL: The senior partners may be eternal, but we can make their existence painful.
Power Play
Yes it's a suicide mission, but that doesn't mean that Angel's suicidal. Let's go back to the beginning of the season:
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.
Angel figured out how to wield the weapon - and it will most likely kill them all in the process. But it's a price he's willing to pay. As I said, he has a choice: To wield the weapon, or not. Which again ties in with that speech of his from 'Deep Down':
ANGEL: 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.
His scheme is all about 'showing the world what it can be'. Refusing to accept the world as it is.
You must now go read
the_royal_anna's thoughts on this ep, my favourite bit probably being this:"It's a bleak and joyless world where heroes do not fight because they have hope, but fight because fighting is their only manifestation of hope. But here they agree to fight because as long as they still have a choice to make, they will make a choice. My dear boys, my sweet Illyria, all of them so much lost, so much found. And what I always loved best about the Buffyverse was that it wasn’t always about getting out of the hole. Sometimes you can't get out of the hole, and you can’t sit around waiting until you do. You have to make a difference where you are, as you are. That's the point."
There's a lot of 'Serenity' in this scheme... (spoilers for the movie):
MAL: And I do not hold to that. So no more running. I aim to misbehave. Shepherd Book used to tell me: "If you can't do something smart... do something right."
We know that at the end of Serenity The Alliance was still in power - that nothing had changed fundamentally. But does not mean that what our Big Damn Heroes did was for nothing.
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