Props to me, cause it's my birthday. Or was, when I started writing this.
Apparently Angel learned whatever spells Doyle used to gain entry to the Oracles' Hallway of Minimalism, because the show opens with him asking them to bring Doyle back to life. Mr. Oracle says, "He doesn't so that you may." Ms. Oracle says, "You do so that others will." You know, technically speaking, I haven't seen them do one oracular thing. Angel says Doyle was his friend, and Mr. Oracle says that's of no consequence. Angel makes one last bid, saying that without Doyle's visions, "I'm fighting blind." Yeah, because those visions were such a big help. The Oracles say that for every door that closes, another opens, and vice versa. Exit the Oracles. Cut to a demon running through an alleyway. He hides as a motorcyclist enters the alley. The biker is clad in leather, and we can't see his face because of the helmet. Away runs the demon. Guess he's a fast demon, or his pursuer is on a really slow motorcycle. Credits.
If Angel's so set on battling the forces of darkness, why doesn't he do something about Oliver Stone?
Cordelia continues the ongoing coffee leitmotif by examining the office supply of mugs. Angel pokes his head through the door and asks what she's looking for. Cordy finally answers, "Doyle's special coffee mug." Angel says that Doyle didn't have one. Cordy says, "Don't you think he should have?" and I don't know if it's the question or the way she says it, but that strikes me as a very Johanna thing to say. And if you knew Johanna, you'd agree, and think that was pretty funny. But you probably don't, so I'll move on. Presumably to honor Doyle's memory, Cordy is dressed in a relatively sane outfit. Her belly button and back and shoulders are all completely covered. She goes on to add, "it would make me feel better if I could hold something tangible that he left behind." Angel suggests that Cordy take a day off. Cordy says, "You're trying to push me away! Close yourself off! Well, I've got news for you, broody-boy: We're all we've got now." She goes to talk about the necessity of sharing their loss, and insists that she isn't going anywhere, when of course her alarm goes off and she declares that she has to go to a commercial audition. She opens the door to discover the demon from the teaser. He's got pointed ears that droop at the end, little horns on his temples, and is wearing a shirt even Pacey wouldn't touch. Cordy screams in surprise, as does the demon. He says that she scared him, so she asks if he's looked in a mirror lately. His response is, "Every chance I get," which he says in a Vinnie Barbarino way. He spies Angel and begins begging for help. "That's what you do, right? You help the helpless? You protect the...what do you call them? The helpless?" Cordy starts to leave again, and the demon tells her to break a leg, and mentions that he senses that she feels some "performance anxiety." Exit Cordy.
Angel leads the demon, who introduces himself as Barney, into his office. Why bother to have a demon named Barney on the show if you're not going make him a purple dinosaur? I mean, apart from the lawsuits? Barney says, "I just realized, it's 3:45 in the afternoon -- the middle of the day. You're a vampire, why aren't you in your coffin?" Angel gets testy, and asks if Barney knows anything about vampires. "Only what I learn from TV," says Barney. Angel grouses, "Vampires don't sleep in coffins. It's a misconception made popular by hack writers and an ignorant media. In fact, you know, we can and do move around during the day, as long as we avoid direct sunlight." Good effort at a retroactive explanation, but I'm not buying it. If only direct sunlight is a problem, why weren't Spike and his minions taking advantage of every rainy day? Whatever. Barney apologizes for his faux pas.
Cordy auditions for a detergent ad. As she describes how Stain-Be-Gone eradicates every trace of dirt -- so that it's as if the stain never existed -- she begins crying, presumably because she is reminded of Doyle. I'm sure Doyle would find it very comforting to know Cordelia equates him with a stain. ["And...'Stain-Be-Gone'? Why is Cordelia auditioning for a commercial in 1958?" -- Wing Chun] Anyway, the casting folk suggest that she use a cheerier approach, and ask her to try again. She does so, just as a blurry vision begins pounding its way through her skull, so that she ends up screaming her lines out in agony, which is funnier than it sounds. The casting folk do their interpretation of the classic line, "Don't call us, we'll call you."
The Lone Motorcyclist of the Apocalypse (tm the Coen brothers) drives through town. Back at the office, Angel asks Barney what he needs protection from. Barney says that he doesn't know, but someone has been trailing him across several states. Angel asks if his nemesis is a demon, and Barney says he could be, since he knows where all the demon gathering-places are. The biker parks and pulls out a crossbow. When Angel asks why someone would want to track Barney down, Barney says he doesn't know that either. Angel says, "It's been my experience that when one is being pursued that tenaciously, it's generally because the pursuer has a strong grievance against the pursued." "Tenaciously?" Is Angel channeling Dawson? Barney concedes that he's an "empath demon," which means he can sense emotions, in case you weren't sure what the word "empath" meant. Then Barney says, "I'm a demon; sure, I'm evil, but hey, I'm not, you know, evil," further clouding the issue of demonic moral alignment. The biker finds some yellow goo dripping on a wall. Barney asks if Angel will help him.
A quick blipvert provides time for Cordy to change into one of her customary ridiculous outfits. Her olive-green shirt has huge cut-outs around her armpits so that there's just a tiny bit of material attaching the sleeves to her top. And, of course, her belly button is showing. She enters Angel's office and walks up to him, while he asks if everything's okay. Without saying a word, she kisses him. Ew. He pushes her away, and says, "I think that you're acting out of grief..." Cordy interrupts to say, "I didn't feel anything. Did you feel anything?" When Angel says no, she groans and says, "That means I still have it! Damn, I can't believe he did this to me." She explains that she thought when Doyle kissed her it meant something, but Doyle just used it to pass his gift to her. She whines, "Why couldn't it have been mono or herpes?" Heh. She also complains that she has nothing to atone for, and says that the "PTB" (Powers That Be, for those coming in late) should stay out of her head. Angel sits down to let the enormity of this revelation sink in. Yawn. Finally he asks what her vision showed, and Cordy says, "Who knows? It was a thing. An ugly, gray, blobby thing." Those Powers That Be have a wacky sense of humor, don't they? Angel points out that it could be "an ugly, gray, blobby, dangerous thing." Beware the demonic hippo! Cordy says that she wants to get rid of the visions, and she'll kiss "every damn frog in this kingdom" to get rid of them. Cue Barney's entrance. Cordy walks up and plants one on him. Barney says, "I like the way you people treat your clients," and wanders out again. Cordy makes icked-out noises, and Angel explains that someone is stalking Barney. Hey, it's not a girl being stalked this time! Angel asks Cordy to try drawing a picture of the blob, and asks Cordy to keep an eye on Barney while he goes to check out Barney's apartment. Before leaving, Angel tells Cordy, "Behave yourself. I don't want to find you two necking on the couch when I get back." Cordy and Strega make identical, "ha ha, very funny, NOT" grimaces at Angel.
Angel steps out of an elevator into a hallway intermittently lit by a flickering light. How very David Lynch. We see the motorcyclist's boots climbing the stairs. In a vain attempt to make us jump, a cleaning woman suddenly pops out of a room and then, her work here complete, goes off to menace Steve Martin. Angel opens the door to Barney's room and is suddenly shoved inside by the silhouetted biker. He turns to see a dark figure leveling the crossbow at him. The figure steps into the light...revealing...oh, it's just Wesley. Who looks almost attractive, until he makes the mistake of opening his mouth to say, "Hello, Angel."
Post-break. Clad in a leather jacket, leather pants, and a black t-shirt, Wesley says, "I'll wager you never thought you'd see me again." Angel smirks, and says, "To tell you the truth, I hadn't given it much thought one way or the other." So he's been spared the ongoing dread that the rest of us have been suffering under. Wesley, still holding the crossbow, starts telling Angel not to make any sudden moves, so of course Angel has to swat the crossbow against the wall. Damn you, Wesley, for Angel seem marginally cool by comparison. Angel notes that Wesley has adopted a different look, and asks if the Watchers' Council is trying a new image. Wesley says that he doesn't work for the Council any more, and implies that he decided to strike out on his own to battle evil. "They fired you," summarizes Angel. Wesley denies this, and insists that since Buffy had turned her back on the Council, there was no one to Watch, "And that's why I became a Rogue Demon Hunter." Angel manages not to laugh. Wesley says he's on the trail of a "particularly nasty bugger" at the moment, and tells Angel to stay out of his way. Angel insists that Wesley has the wrong demon. Wesley says he's followed a trail of mutilated corpses: "Each of the victims possessed some unique power: telepathy, poison tongues, healing hands...Whatever the physical source of their power it was ripped, gouged, torn from their corpses." They conclude that the murderer is taking these powers for some nasty purpose. Angel describes Barney to find out if that's who Wesley is after, but Wesley describes the killer as "quite enormous, and powerful. More of a yellow-green. And it seems lately to be secreting some sort of viscous fluid." "Like that?" asks Angel, noting some goo that has been dripping onto Wesley's shoulder. Wesley and Angel look up just as the new demon drops down onto them from the ceiling. He's not actually that enormous, but he seems to be reasonably powerful. Wesley is hurled across the room, and Angel is kicked to the floor. Wesley shoots the demon with his crossbow, causing it to jump out through the window and run away.
In Angel's vamp-cave, Cordy tries to sketch a picture of her mysterious blob. Barney suggests that drawing can be therapeutic, and explains that he sensed Cordy's pain. Cordy says, "My kind thinks that some things are private. So maybe you shouldn't be nosing around other people's feelings without asking them." Why didn't anyone ever say that to Counselor Troi? Barney apologizes, then Cordy apologizes, and then they talk about Doyle. Cordy describes Doyle by saying, "He drank too much. And his taste in clothing was like a Greek tragedy. And he could be really sweet sometimes." She goes on to mention that Doyle was half-demon, and speculates that this explains why "he sometimes smelled weird." Cordy tells Barney that he reminds her of Doyle, which Barney decides to take as a compliment for some unknown reason. Wesley and Angel, the leather twins, arrive. Barney panics upon seeing Wesley, and leaves the room, saying, "That's the guy that was after me!" Angel points Wesley toward his home library and goes to reassure Barney.
Cordy again wordlessly approaches and gives Wesley a kiss. It goes better than their last one did, but afterwards Cordy shakes her head and complains, "It didn't work!" Wesley is a bit disappointed to hear that, and Cordy starts to explain that it was an experiment, before suddenly realizing who she just kissed. "Wesley? What are you doing here?" she asks. Wesley explains about being a Rogue Demon Hunter, leading Cordy to ask what a Rogue Demon might be. Angel and Barney return, Angel having explained that Wesley is hunting another demon, who is, presumably, hunting Barney in hopes of stealing his empathic ability. Wesley has taken the past ten seconds to consult Angel's library, and announces that the demon they fought is a Kungai. Wesley says that the Kungai are "of Asian origin," even though my impression was that all demons were of Hellish origin, and is "very deadly," not just sorta deadly. Also, each Kungai has a horn which can consume his opponent's life force. I have no comment about the Freudian implications there. Barney starts to panic. Angel pries the book out of Wesley's grasp, while Wesley mentions that he tracked the demon to an "Asian district" nearby. Cordy declares this to be Koreatown. Angel prepares to go seek out the Kungai, Wesley insists that he's going along, Angel says he works alone, Wesley protests. Angel says, "I had somebody at my side. He's dead now. I'm not gonna let that happen again. I work alone." Except for Cordy. And Kate. Angel leaves, and Wesley complains that his leather pants are chafing him. He also adjusts himself. Look, I had to watch it, so you have to read about it.
At a spa, an attendant talks to Angel in what I assume is Korean. The subtitles indicate that the attendant is insisting that they wouldn't hide a Kungai demon, since that would scare away their other customers. Angel offers the attendant one of the wad of bills he's carrying, and is allowed to search through the building. Guess he sold another one of his vases. Angel walks down the hallway, carrying a battle-axe because he's subtle like that. Suddenly a demon enters behind him. Angel spins to see a pretty impressive bit of full-torso prosthetic makeup. The bumpy green demon asks Angel where the shiatsu massages are. Angel silently turns around and moves on.
Cordy finishes her blob-sketch. Barney asks what it is, and Cordy says she doesn't know. Barney says she's frustrated. Cordy responds, "That's one spooky talent you've got there. You can just look at me, grinding my teeth, sighing, grunting, and sense that I'm frustrated? Amazing." Barney says, "It's pretty good at sensing sarcasm, too." Cordy explains that she's drawing something from one of her visions. Barney asks about the visions, so Cordy explains about Doyle passing them to her, and how bitter she is about that. Barney points out that Doyle trusted her with a big responsibility, and that he found her "worthy of such a rare and important gift." Barney concludes, "Seems like he gave you the most valuable thing he had." Cordy pauses to ponder this new perspective. Luckily, it doesn't occur to Cordy that Doyle didn't seem really pleased at having the visions himself, and viewed them more as his penance for screwing up in the past.
Angel pulls aside a curtain and discovers the Kungai lying on a table. An old woman is tending the groaning demon, and tells Angel, "He's dying." While Cordy makes coffee, Barney pulls out a cell phone. He says, "Hank, it's me. Of course I got the Kungai horn! In a safe place, but listen, I think I just found something even better." Gracious, it appears that Barney is the bad guy after all! Did you see that coming? You did? Me too. Barney not-at-all subtly unplugs the phone while Cordy pours the coffee. She warns him that it is "Kind of strong, and a little clumpy." Just like Angel! Barney asks Cordy how old she is, causing her to indignantly declare that her age is none of his business. In reality, she doesn't want to admit how very, very old she is. Barney guesses she is in her twenties, which isn't even close, and goes on to describe her as "all self-absorbed, full of regret -- oh poor, poor you. Poor little Cordelia with her delusions of an acting career." I'm starting to like this guy. Cordy tries to run past Barney, but he blocks her. He tells her "You don't want to hear the truth. No wonder your friend never told you about his demon half." Cordy hisses, "You don't know anything about me or Doyle." Barney says, "I know you let him die." Cordy says that isn't true, but Barney says that he can sense Cordy's guilt over Doyle's death. He grabs Cordy and says, "So, you hate your gift. The visions? You probably would love to rip those pretty little eyes right out of your head. I know I would." Instead, however, he just throws her over the kitchen table.
Angel finds the broken end of the arrow Wesley shot the demon with and, inexplicably, sniffs it. The Kungai grabs Angel and starts saying something, but Angel doesn't understand Kungai. "I do," says Wesley, entering the room. Wesley took the time to change into a fawn-colored suit, so he looks more comfortable now, but I still want to punch him. Wesley is surprised that the arrow could cause a fatal wound, but Angel says, "It wasn't the arrow. Look at his head." The Kungai's horn has been broken off. Wesley exchanges click-click noises with the Kungai, and says, "I think he's trying to tell us his horn was taken." Oh yeah, Wesley's going to be a huge help.
Meanwhile, Barney is tying Cordy's hands behind her back. The Kungai gasps and hisses a few words, which might translate as, "Help me take...this mask off." Angel impatiently asks who is responsible for killing the demon. Cordy gasps, "A vision! I'm having a vision!" Barney pulls her to her feet as she continues. "A demon! A creepy little demon. You! It's definitely you. You're in great, great --" "Danger?" asks Barney, who isn't too bright. "Pain!" declares Cordy, and knees him in the groin. Cordy makes it as far as the stairs before Barney grabs her again. She screams for help, and Barney punches her. Wesley continues trying to translate the Kungai's dying words: "Red. Heart. Reader?" The Kungai dies testily. Wesley says, "He was trying to describe his killer. Demon, heart, reader." Angel figures out that this can only mean: "An empath demon. Barney." Wesley gazes in stupefied wonder at his first blipvert.
Cordy returns to consciousness to discover she has been bound and gagged. Bet Xander wishes he'd thought of that. She opens her eyes and sees a big gray blob. It's a sculpture. Well, that clears everything up. In the room with her is a still-beating heart under glass, an eyeball, and a severed head. So, they're hiding her in one of those Halloween prop stores. Barney and another guy, probably Hank, enter, arguing about whether or not they should remove Cordelia's eyes now. Barney declares that she's worth more money if her eyes are intact. Hank drops the gadget he was holding, which looks like one of Ichabod's creepy tools in Sleepy Hollow, and looks irritated. Barney asks, "Shouldn't you be cataloguing gypsy flesh?" which is a question I immediately resolve to use in conversation sometime.
Angel and Wesley discover that Barney and Cordy have vanished from Angel's place. Wesley blames himself: "All this time I've been tracking the wrong demon." Angel declares, "Nothing's going to happen to Cordelia. I won't allow it." Time for eyeball aerobics: Let's all roll our eyes as far back as we can, and hold, and to the right, and hold, and straight ahead again. Angel pokes around the kitchen and explains, "In case you're wondering, this is me looking for a clue." Oh Angel, if you haven't found one after all this time, maybe you should just give up. Wesley is busy thinking about himself, and says, "The Council was right to sack me. Yes, I was fired. I had two, two slayers in my care. One turned evil and now vegetates in a coma, the other's a renegade." He goes on to describe himself as useless, and a fool. No argument from me about any of that. Angel finds the sketch Cordy made of her blob, and says that he knows what it is. "It's a sculpture by Van Gieson, 'Maiden with Urn.' If Cordelia saw this in a vision, it could be telling us where Barney took her." That seems logical. For this show. Wesley mopily tells Angel that if they find the statue, they can figure out where Cordy is, and "you can go rescue her." Angel says, "We can go rescue her," and claims that he needs Wesley to figure out why Barney wanted the Kungai horn. The Kungai said it was for a "Klu [click] ka," so Wesley starts looking for a translation.
Of course, it takes only moments for Angel to locate that sculpture through the vast resources of the internet. It is owned by a hotel chain. The only translation Wesley has managed to come up with is "caller sale." He finally figures out that it means "auction." Sure enough, Barney has just finished selling the horn for twenty thousand bucks. In attendance at the auction are an interesting variety of humans, demons, and what looks like a Drazi. A young black woman watches the proceedings, and according to her embossed briefcase she works for Wolfram & Hart. They're evil, you know. up is Cordy, and Hank removes her gag before bringing her in. Can you say, "big mistake?" I knew you could. She immediately begins insisting that she's not a seer, and she only had a vision once, and it might have been something she ate. Barney describes her uses, and says that her buyer can "Keep the girl as a slave, remove the head as a trophy, or simply harvest the eyes. In any case, a unique party icebreaker." The bidding starts.
By the time we've come back from the commercials, offers for Cordy have reached eight grand. A goth transvestite and a punk albino get into a bidding war. Angel gets off the phone, having determined which particular hotel has the sculpture, while Wesley tapes a knife to his shin. Yes, we saw Wesley's naked shin. Try not to dwell on it. Barney is prepared to close the bidding at eleven thousand when Cordy speaks up. "Hey, you know you'd pay twice that for cataracts." Huh? She continues, "These eyes are flawless, even without the stupid visions! [Is] that the best you can do?" The goth she-male goes to twelve thousand. When no one offers a counter-bid, Cordy stammers that her eyes can "see, uh, stuff. Danger! And, and, and evil, and locations of buried treasure!" The albino bids thirteen, and when the goth hesitates, Cordy insists, "C'mon, have some huevos, guy! Whitey here is stepping all over you! You gonna take that from his kind?" "Huevos"? The goth and the albino bid some more, and when the albino offers nineteen thousand, the goth clubs him over the head and stabs him. Barney takes the goth's bid of twenty thousand. Just then, the Wolfram & Hart lawyer suddenly shouts, "Thirty thousand!" As the rest of the audience gasps, Barney closes the bidding.
After the auction has ended, Barney prepares to hand a re-gagged Cordy over to the lawyer. The lawyer says, "We won't be needing the body." Barney demands an extra thousand to extract Cordy's eyeballs. Where's that astral-projection-master/eye surgeon now that they could use him? Barney asks Hank for the eyeball scissors, causing Hank to mope since he's been begging to perform the deed.
Angel and Wesley have finally made it to the hotel, and rush toward the convention hall. They run into some hotel flunky, and ask where the auction is. When the flunky is not immediately forthcoming, Angel vamps out and repeats the question.
Hank holds Cordy down while Barney aims the scissors.
Another flunky tries to stop Angel from going any farther. Cut to the flunky being flung into the room where the baddies are. Barney tells Hank to get the stakes. Angel makes with the vamp-fu while Wesley hops around, trying to unstick the knife from his leg. Wesley takes the gag out of Cordelia and returns to trying to free his knife. I suspect this was meant to be funny in some way. While flailing about, Wesley finds some kind of claw, which has been knocked to the floor during the scuffling. Wesley uses the claw to cut through the ropes binding Cordy. The lawyer decides it's time for her to skedaddle. Cordy starts to run away, but Wesley runs straight into Barney's fist. Upon recognizing Barney, Wesley furiously declares, "I'm gonna thrash you within an inch of your life. And then I'm going to take that inch!" As she leaves, the lawyer speaks to someone on her cell phone. "Our merchandise was just taken off the market. Three guesses by whom." She must be evil -- she uses proper grammar. Say, you didn't think they were going to mention how the Kungai horn sucks people's life force and then not have anyone use it, did you? Sure enough, Cordy picks it up off a table, says, "Feel this, feeling creepo," and stabs Barney in the back with it. Barney groans and gasps a bit, then melts into black dust. Angel promptly finishes his battle, and joins them. Cordy gives Angel a hug, declaring, "I never doubted for a moment you'd find me." Angel says that he was lucky, "I had a Rogue Demon Hunter on my side." Wesley simpers his gratitude.
While Wesley packs, Cordy irons her crumpled-up drawing so that it lies flat. She complains that in addition to his other evil characteristics, Barney started the bidding on her "at a paltry two thousand dollars." Cordy puts the sketch in a frame, explaining, "This I frame for saving my life, and as a reminder that something of Doyle's is here in our office." It's a strange kind of closure, but whatever works for her. Wesley says he should be on his way, and starts making his goodbyes. Angel offers him a brusque handshake before he starts cooking up something in the kitchen. Cordy asks if Wesley knows where he's going. Wesley responds, "Rogue Demon Hunters rarely do. Wherever evil lurks, wherever the forces of darkness threaten humanity, that's where I'll be." Henry Fonda he ain't. Both Angel and Cordy busy themselves by cooking and drinking orange juice, respectively, and seem not at all troubled by the prospect of Wesley's departure. Which is perfectly understandable to me. Wesley heads, far too slowly, for the door, continuing with the "lurking evil bidding me onwards" stuff. Cordy looks over her shoulder to call, "Take care!" Wesley disappears around a corner, and as we all start to breathe a sigh of relief, he suddenly pops back to continue, "No rest for the wicked-fighters. Through storm and rain, heat, famine...deep, painful, gnawing hunger." Wesley watches as Angel begins scooping out portions of scrambled eggs. "I go," Wesley repeats, and as he starts to turn for the door, Angel finally breaks down and asks, "Breakfast?" Wesley drops his bag, pulls off his jacket, and rushes to the table. Cordy declares that Angel regularly makes breakfast when they've pulled an all-nighter of evil-fighting. She adds, "He's a good cook for someone on a liquid diet." Angel sets down a plate of toast, which Cordy and Wesley grab for.
Wesley's not leaving, is he? On the bright side, maybe we can look forward to his agonizing death.