Carpe Noctem

Previously on Angel, not-handsome Angel saved Fred from the monsters, Fred hid in her room, Gavin and Lilah discussed strategy, Cordy got bumpy, and Angel got protective.

The MoG are hanging out in the Hyperion's lobby. Wesley's hunched over the front desk, reading. Gunn's hunched over the front desk, playing with his unostentatiously product-placed electronic game, and Cordy is hunched over the round sofa, reading a magazine. Okay, they don't have tables, fine, but there are two perfectly serviceable couches in the lobby! Well, don't come crying to me when you all have backaches. Fred strolls up behind Cordy and startles her. Cordy screams. Wesley flails about in surprise. Gunn says, "Hey Fred," without looking up. While this won't win any comedy awards, it's worth noting that this gag didn't rely on misdirection, and its basic premise is that Gunn is cool. I appreciate both of those things. Fred looks at the magazine Cordy's flipping through, and asks, "Why do girls want to look like that? I spent years in a cave, starving. What's their excuse?" Okay, heh. And it's nice to acknowledge Fred's skeletal appearance in a way that doesn't glorify it. On the other hand...Fred's culture-shock seems a little peculiar, since she was still basically an adult when she went to Pylea. It's not like supermodels of the living dead are a new trend. Fred looks around and asks if "everyone's just readin' and hangin' out?" Cordy takes the hint and says that Angel's upstairs. Fred dreamily supposes that Angel is reading "The Brothers Karamazav, Joyce, a little Goethe to round things out...." The misdirection-based-comedy alarm goes off as Angel wanders our, holding a newspaper, and begs someone to explain Blondie to him. Well, no, he's just excited about a "Charlton Heston double feature at the Nu Art: Soylent Green and The Omega Man!" Angel's a Charlton Heston fan? I wouldn't have guessed that. But I never would have guessed I'd mention Heston in two consecutive recaps, so what do I know? It makes plenty of sense that Angel would enjoy The Omega Man, although I kept expecting someone to explain that, because I bet a large portion of the audience won't get that joke. Maybe they do, because they heard about the possible remake. Now that I've depressed myself, let's move on. Angel asks whether anyone else wants to go, but only Fred is interested. Angel tells her, "You may not know this, Fred, but certain friends and co-workers have been known to accuse me of being the quiet, stay-at-home, sulky one." Fred smiles dizzily and takes his arm as they head for the door.

We cut across town to a mnage à trois, already in progress. Or technically, not in progress, thank goodness. Two women are begging their beefy companion for a time-out. One woman is still wearing a teddy, while the other drapes herself with one of those special L-shaped sheets. The stud, who we'll eventually learn is named Woody Raglan -- bwa ha ha! Uh, sorry. Hee. Mr. Raglan gets out of bed and fixes himself a martini so that we can admire his various bulgy muscles. Ew. After chugging his martini -- again, ew -- he heads back to the bed and asks, "Ready for round four?" We haven't even gotten to the credits and I've already hit my "ew" quota. Luckily, he suddenly winces in pain. He tells the girls, "It's been fun," and starts chanting a spell. After a minute of this, the Vorlon he was hiding leaps out of his eyes and mouth in a blaze of light and scurries away. The girls look on as his body melts in on itself in a effect that isn't too bad until we see it finally collapse into a puddle of flesh-covered latex. Maybe you should have cut that last shot, guys.

My friend Kelly came over to visit, and so during the credits, I try to explain who all the characters are, since she's never seen the show before. Nor has she seen Buffy. Thank goodness I could keep on explaining things during the commercial break. Anyway, when we return to the show, Fred is in the office, yammering all about her movie-going experience to a patient Wesley. Fred's very enthusiastic, and I start to wonder if maybe she has a crush on Angel or something. It's probably just my imagination. She says, "Even though we didn't talk a lot, it was still okay. It was comfortable. It wasn't that awkward kind of quiet. You know that awkward kind of quiet?" There's a beat before Wesley lies, "No, that's never happened to me." I wonder if Wesley has ever experienced a quiet pause that wasn't awkward. In the lobby, Angel has picked up his newspaper and is sounding out the big words in Marmaduke when Cordy says that he should talk to Fred "about the big date [they] had last night." Angel insists that it wasn't a date, and Cordy explains that Fred might not realize that. Cordy says, "She's got the big puppy love. I mean, who wouldn't? You're handsome, and brave, and heroic..." Angel starts smiling at his wonderfulness until Cordy continues, "Emotionally stunted, erratic, prone to turning evil, and let's face it, a eunuch." Hey! Check out the alliteration! Shout-out? Angel gets particularly huffy at the last item on that list. Cordy says it's a figure of speech, which is news to me, and Angel snaps, "Find a better one!" Cordy gamely goes over the curse again for new viewers, although I don't think it cleared anything up for Kelly. Cordy finally gets back to the point, which is that Fred's got to let go of her crush. Angel finally admits that "a short talk" might be in order, and turns back to the paper, asking, "How soon can you do that?" Cordy says Angel has to do it, and hauls him to his feet. I can understand why Angel wouldn't look forward to that chat, but if you're trying to have a delicate conversation with Fred without hurting her feelings, Cordy isn't the person I'd put in charge.

Exhibit A: Cordy shoves Angel into the office and announces, "Angel has something to say!" Fred and Wesley look up expectantly. Angel wisely decides this isn't the right setting to shatter Fred's heart into a billion pieces. He looks at the paper in his hand, and asks, "Did anybody else see this?" He shows Wesley an article about the incredible wilting Woody. I can't believe I said that. You know: the melting guy from the teaser! Wesley recalls seeing a similar case last week, and starts pulling out notes. Cordy points out that nobody hired them to investigate this case. She is ignored. Wesley pulls out an article describing another melted corpse that was found ten days ago, and agrees that they should look into it. Angel tells Cordy to "open a case file," and hurries out. Cordy blinks and then follows after Angel, preparing to yell at him.

At Wolfram & Hart, Gavin is tagging along behind Lilah. He tells her, "I know I'm going to have to earn your respect, but give me a little time. You'll see [that] I'm a creative guy." Lilah teases Gavin about his insidious plan to "torment Angel with building-code violations." Gavin insists that he has other ideas: "One of them being, does Angel even exist?" Lilah worries that Gavin's getting metaphysical on her. He explains that Angel doesn't have a social security, a taxpayer ID, or even a last name. "How can he go down to the building department -- or anywhere else in officialdom for that matter?" "Officialdom"? Gavin asks whether Lilah wants to see what Angel will do , and Lilah suggests that Angel might rip out Gavin's throat. Gavin doesn't think Angel would do anything so clichd. I laugh bitterly to myself. Gavin wanders off, and Lilah asks her secretary to track down "Carter Williams, the graphic artist." The secretary looks bewildered until Lilah clarifies, "Look under 'F' for 'Forger.'" That's an interesting way to organize your address book.

Everyone gathers around the stupid front desk as Cordy pulls out a printout of a news story about another mysterious death. Wesley sums up the situation: "They were all young healthy males, and they all died in expensive hotel suites." Wesley asks Gunn to interview staff at the hotels while Wesley meets with one of his contacts from the coroner's office. One of his what? Fine, whatever. Wesley spent the summer networking. It'd have to be coroners, too; it couldn't be, say, funeral directors. Would a Six Feet Under crossover be so wrong? Angel could stake Brenda, and everybody wins. Cordy announces that all of the victims went to the same health club, which I guess she learned through of one of her contacts on the writing staff. Angel and Cordy agree to check out the gym. Everyone heads out, except Fred. She twitches by herself for a moment and announces, "I'll just stay here." I really wish she'd stop giving me flashbacks to high school.

At the gym, Cordy keeps nagging Angel about talking to Fred. She's distracted by the hunky men, though, and goes off to hit on...I mean, "interview" them. Angel approaches a dopey guy working there, who immediately tries to sell Angel a trial membership. Angel explains that he's investigating the deaths, and says, "So I need to ask you, Phil, does the club condone steroid use?" Phil appears to be wearing a name tag, in case you were wondering how Angel knew his name. I certainly was. Angel says, "We should probably keep this to ourselves, don't you think? I'll just look at their records and get out of your hair." Phil is agreeable.

Cordy asks several guys, "Did you ever see anyone come in who looked suspicious? Or really pale? Or maybe green and scaly?" The guys turn and look at each other meaningfully. A blipvert attacks before we can see them kiss.

Phil informs Angel that all three victims attended the same evening Pilates class. Angel asks whether Pilates is anything like Tae-Bo. Phil chuckles, "Yeah, if you're living in 1999." I think that was supposed to be funny. I'm just trying to figure out how Angel heard about Tae-Bo. I mean, the "oh that wacky out-of-touch Angel" gags have him making more and more contemporary references. It's confusing.

Angel strolls through the Pilates class, and the instructor fails to ask what on earth he's doing in their class. Angel walks over by the window, looks out, and sees a flash of light reflecting through a window across the street. The light flashes again, and we can tell that it's reflecting off a pair of binoculars. Angel notes that the building is part of the "Montserrat Retirement Community."

Cordelia has gathered an even larger crowd of healthy young men to question, and is asking for their phone numbers in case she has "follow-up questions." Angel walks up and informs her that he wants to check out the retirement home across the street. Cordy replies, "Bye." Angel starts to leave, then leans back to add, "Maybe when you're done with your work here, you can pick me up." Cordy smiles tightly, and as Angel departs, informs the guys, "He's just someone I work with."

In the retirement home, Angel knocks on the door of room 316. Visiting hours sure run late at this place. A card on the door reads "Marcus Roscoe." The door opens, and it's Rance Howard! Who's been in, like, everything. Angel introduces himself, hands over a business card, and manages to wheedle an invitation into the room from Marcus. Angel heads over the window and asks whether Marcus spends any time enjoying the view. Marcus starts to deny it until Angel picks up the binoculars. Marcus oozes folksy charm as he admits that looking is "about all [he] can do," and asks what Angel wants. Angel pulls out the newspaper printouts and asks whether Marcus remembers seeing any of the guys. Marcus says he's more of a girl-watcher. Marcus looks down at the clippings again and says, "Jeez, they all died? How?" Angel explains that he's trying to answer that question. He says, "I'm a private investigator; I work with a team." What an odd thing to say. "I work with a team!" Bully for you, pal. Marcus says, "I was a salesman, worked alone for fifty years." Angel purses his lips and gets an inexplicably smug expression as he looks over at some trinkets on a bookcase. He walks over, picks one up, and says, "Nothian herb jar. That's a pretty exotic item. Did you deal in the occult?" Marcus replies, "Occult, shma-cult." He claims that he picked up some "trinkets" in his travels. Then Angel eyes a pile of magazines. The only one we can see is about skiing, which makes Angel's question, and its suspicious tone, especially jarring: "Do a lot of bungee jumping, Mr. Roscoe?" How dare an old person read about sports! He's up to something! Marcus replies, "More than you might think, Mr. Angel." Angel says, "It's just 'Angel.'" Marcus says he'll remember that, removes his glasses, and starts the mystic chanting. Angel, who can't decide whether he's supposed to have figured out what's going on yet or not, chuckles, and says, "You might want to think twice before trying to cast a --" He's cut off when he and Marcus trade glowy colored blobs of light. So Angel thinks magic won't have an effect on him? Has he noticed that he owes his existence to magic? The beams stop; Marcus looks at Angel and, confused, announces, "You are me." Angel head-butts Marcus and sets him down in a chair.

Before things get any more confusing, I guess I'm going to have to come up with some terminology here. Unfortunately, I can't duplicate the Fuffy/Baith magic with these names, because I end up with "Mngel" and "Aarcus." Humph. I was hoping I could find some combination that would allow me to refer to Angel as "Man-gel," but alas, that didn't work either. The best I can do with these names is "Marcel" for Marcus-in-Angel's-body, and "Angus" for "Angel-in-Marcus's-body." Got that? Okay, moving on.

Marcel leaves the retirement home and starts to mosey down the street when Cordy calls him. Marcel eyes Cordy and says, "Hel-lo!" She asks what he found at the home, and after a moment, Marcel nervously says, "Nothing. Didn't pan out. How 'bout you?" Cordy says she got a trial membership and some new friends, but no leads. She tells Marcel to get in the car, so she can take him back to the hotel. Marcel hops in and leeringly repeats, "You and me! Goin' back to the hotel!" Cordy stares at him and asks whether he's okay. Marcel says, "Honey, I've never been better." And then Cordelia stakes him. Well, she doesn't, but she totally should have at that point. As the car pulls away, Marcel leans over so that his head is outside the car. Maybe he actually swapped bodies with a dog. Oh! Or maybe it's a remake of The Shaggy DA! That'd be quite exciting.

Marcel strolls into the Hyperion lobby and, after looking around, says "Nice!" He says that a lot. Cordy heads into the office, which confuses Marcel; he's busily ringing the bell at the front desk. He calls, "Hellooo, paying customer? Slow night." It's convenient how Cordy only hears the remarks that would make sense coming from Angel. Anyway, she agrees, adding, "Maybe Wes or Gunn found out something." Marcel tries to force his new brain to think, and looks at the business cards on the front desk. He talks to himself as he puts the pieces together: "Wes or Gunn. They're a great part of our investigating team. Working here with us, in this old, abandoned hotel." His delivery is pretty amusing, and reminds me of someone in a bad role-playing game. And from his point of view, that's what it is, but you'd think he'd be better at it. Oh well. Angel pulls out one of the cards, and hey -- they've all got personalized cards! Even Gunn! Except Angel doesn't, I guess because it would look dumb, with his lack of a last name and all. Angel picks up Cordy's card and reads the name: "Cordelia." She looks up, and he continues, "Have I ever told you that you're a very beautiful woman?" Cordy obligingly provides her own context, and says, "Very funny. I know you never said anything that tacky and overt to Fred. But you're still going to have that talk, whether you want to or not." Is it tacky to tell someone they're beautiful, now? I'm so far out of touch. Marcel plays along to figure out what Cordy's talking about. She advises him, "Just keep it simple. One: you're not like other men. Two: there's no room in the workplace for romance." Marcel mutters, "Romance with Fred. So I'm a --" He looks down at the clothes he's wearing, and nods. "Obviously." Tee hee. Cordy is once again oblivious, tells Marcel to get some rest from his long hard day of talking to people, and leaves. While Marcel's goofball delivery of his lines is entertaining, I do have trouble imagining Rance Howard talking the way Marcel does.

As a paroled prisoner is returned to the retirement home, the security forces are distracted and Angus sees a chance to escape. He gets up from the couch and moves to the door, but is interrupted by another old man who says, "I got someone I want you to meet." Angus says he's busy, but the man displays his granddaughter, Katrina. He puts the teeny baby in Angus's arms and says, "Girl's gonna rule the world!" Angus makes a mental note: possible antichrist spotted at retirement home. He admires the baby and then looks up to see that the guard has returned to the front desk. Drat.

Marcel finishes shredding the papers about his victims and relaxes with a martini. There are martini fixings in the hotel? Fred suddenly asks, "Whatcha doing?" Marcel grins at the sight of her and says, "Hey, sweetheart! Where have you been hiding?" Fred giggles that she was up in her room but everyone keeps telling her to get out more, so here she is. Incidentally, "Fred giggles" is rapidly closing in on "Darla simpers" in my list of most-used-phases. Marcel gulps his martini and asks, "Have I ever told you [that] you're a very bee-yootiful woman?" Fred grins and admits that he hasn't. He asks if she likes olives, and offers her the one from his drink. Fred snaps it up. Marcel tells her that he needs to finish something, but she should "go on upstairs, put on something pretty," and he'll take her out. Fred gasps, goggles, giggles, and gibbers. And then runs off to change clothes. I hope she remembers to wear something fire-retardant, in case she's standing close to Marcel when he walks outside with her. He returns to his shredding, but then looks up to see Lilah walk into the room. In a total lounge-lizard tone, he asks, "What can I dooo for youuuuuu?" Lilah tells him not to go "night-stalker" on her. Heh. She says she wants to do him a favor, and confirms that there aren't any hard feelings about that business with Cordelia. When Marcel goes along with that, she deposits a big stack of paper on the desk. She explains, "It's all in there: earthquake-safe certification, statement of asbestos level compliance, all of it." Marcel stands up, and she hurriedly explains, "It's not about you, it's about Gavin. He thinks he's so smart." Then she realizes that Marcel is just pouring a martini, and finishes, "You're welcome." Marcel says, "That's a really thoughtful favor," and offers her a drink. She takes it as he tries his "you're a very bee-youtiful woman" line again. He needs some new material.

Angus sneaks about the retirement home of the damned, dodging bear traps and slipping past the razor wire. He sees a guard on duty in a watchtower, and ducks out of sight. Then he gets an idea, and tosses Peter Graves into the center of the compound. While the guards rush out to see who's violating curfew, Angus escapes with the rescued fighter pilot. Hold on. I got a little confused in there. Angus sets off a fire alarm. Yes. That's what happens. Honest. And then he hurries toward the door, but is unexpectedly sidetracked by a heart attack. He falls down. Whoops.

Lilah finishes her drink while Marcel strikes an amazingly dorky pose on the edge of the desk. He's leaning back on his arms, so his shoulders are all squished up, and maybe he's thinking that if he leans back his head will look smaller because of the forced perspective. It's not helping any. Anyway, Lilah starts to leave, but he lifts a leg up to block her path, saying, "Oops." Lilah looks a bit nervous, and well she might. She asks what he wants, and Marcel strokes her hair and answers, "You. Don't tell me you never thought about it." He stands up and kisses her, and Lilah hesitates for a few seconds before diving in. Ack. She starts to tear his shirt off, and Kelly's quite entertained by the way I throw my hands up in front of my eyes and scream, "No! Don't take his shirt off!" Luckily, they settle for unbuttoning it before moving on to Lilah's clothes. They scuffle about, and gasp, and collapse on the desk, and of course that's when Fred strolls in, wearing a strappy red number that does nothing for her. She looks at the intertwined pair for a moment, then runs away. Marcel nuzzles Lilah's neck, then vamps out and sinks his teeth into her. Lilah squeals in the bad way as we go to commercial.

During the ads, Johanna calls, and speculates that things will be mighty awkward the time Lilah runs into Angel. I point out that they won't be awkward if Marcel kills her. Then I giggle a bit, because it'd be pretty funny if Lilah got killed and Angel never found out how it happened. He'd ask Gavin, all innocently, "Whatever happened to Lilah?" and Gavin would take it as a threat. It could lead to more wacky mix-ups! We love those! Er, so when the show starts up, Lilah manages to toss Marcel off of her. Presumably because Marcel is confused himself, because I don't believe she'd be strong enough to do that if he was really holding her down. She grabs her purse and sobs, "You son of a bitch!" Again with the language! Cool. Marcel apologetically explains, "It felt like the thing to do!" She pulls a cross out of her purse and holds it up, causing Marcel to ask if she's suddenly been born again. Ho hum. Lilah says, "I don't know what kind of sick game this is, Angel, but I hope you enjoyed it, because you're never getting this close to me again." Still holding the cross, she hurries out. Marcel tries to sort himself out, and reaches up to smooth his hair. Which reminds me that his hair is looking less ridiculous this episode. To the point that I went back to look at the pre-body-swapping scenes, wondering if it was supposed to be a little plot point, but it didn't look different. I'm not saying it looks normal, but it's not as randomly spiky as it used to be, and I think that's for the best. Just felt like I should give a nod to the marginally less goofy hair. Anyway, Marcel is about to smooth it even more, but stops when he realizes that his brow is even bumpier than usual. He feels his prosthetic and notes, "This is new." He experimentally feels his fangs and then yelps when he cuts his thumb. He sucks the wound, and notices that he enjoys the taste. Sadly, he doesn't keep wandering around with a thumb in his mouth like a big baby. Damn. Instead, he hurries to the bathroom and gazes at his lack of reflection.

Marcel and his new friend kiss outside on a patio-ish thing. She laughs that her boyfriend is probably looking for her: "He could catch us at any moment! Sorta makes it more exciting, doesn't it?" See, she's a tramp and deserves to die! Marcel vamps out and agrees about the exciting part. He bites down, she screams, and then the boyfriend and two other guys spot them. Marcel lets her go and de-vamps as the boyfriend asks what he's doing. The girl yells, "He bit me!" The boyfriend tries to punch Marcel, but Marcel catches his fist and then knocks the boyfriend back toward his pals. Marcel looks down at his own fist and exclaims, "Nice!" There's more fisticuffs, and he knocks out the two pals and taunts the boyfriend: "Is that all you got?" The frightened boyfriend asks, "What are you on?" Marcel decides to answer: "I'd say I'm high on life, only I ain't alive. Which means [that] I'm never gonna die. I'll be young, handsome, and strong forever!" He says there's just one thing he has to do first, and then leaps down over the patio railing to the street below. He runs away, laughing. He has to do a high-jump before he can live forever?

At the Hyperion, Wesley groans, "I don't believe it. On my desk?" Gunn suggests that maybe Angel was just "reclaiming" the desk. Wesley asks, "How, by marking it?" Ewie. As Wesley notes that this isn't typical Angel behavior, we see that Cordy and Fred are also in the office. Cordy says it's totally like Angel to do "the mystery dance with some cheap blonde." Fred corrects Cordy, noting that the woman was a cheap brunette. Cordy changes her mind and tells Wesley, "You're right -- this isn't like him." Gunn wonders who the woman was, but Wesley says that the question is, "Who was he?" Cordy sadly agrees: "We're all thinking it. He's Angelus again." Gunn tells Fred who Angelus is, but I doubt his explanation cleared anything up for her. Oh well, it spared us some repetition, at least. But Wesley vetos the Angelus theory by holding up the books that were tossed about in the room and wondering, "Why would Angel -- or Angelus for that matter -- need to read about vampires?" So the short version is, Wesley figures out that they're after someone who's hopping bodies, and that Angel's the latest victim. He asks Cordy if anything unusual happened when she and Angel were at the gym. Cordy fills Wesley in on the retirement home. Well, that was easy to sort out. Once they finally noticed something was wrong.

Angus is off on another midnight campaign. The grandfather who helped him up earlier spots him and asks if he's trying to "bust loose again." Angus tells him, "I can't really explain this, but I need to get out of here. Just don't turn me in." The man tells him that he doesn't have to turn Angus in: "Your kid was signing in at reception when I came down." "My kid?" Angus wonders. He turns around in time to see Marcel chatting with Ryan. As Ryan wanders off to make sure nobody's playing mah-jongg after hours, Marcel turns and grins at Angus. "Hi, Dad!" he says. Not a good situation, but you gotta figure that Angus is happy to see that Marcel didn't decide to take his body out sunbathing or anything.