Orpheus

Previously on Angel, there were these same previouslys last week, plus Wesley and Faith came upon a weird vampire-druggie lounge; Cordy learned ventriloquism; and Angel played hacky sack with Wesley and quenched his thirst with Faith.

It's hard to tell when the new episode actually begins, because we start with the final scene from "Release." Angelus sucks on Faith's neck and then suddenly pulls away from her. He and Faith pant at each other. Not like that. Angelus gasps, "What did you do?" Faith clutches her neck and looks at him.

Flashback to the fight from last week. Faith is knocked out of the way, Wesley opens fire. While Angelus is distracted, Faith pulls a syringe out of her boot and injects herself, and then gets up to rejoin the battle. What a lame trick. I don't mean Faith doping herself up; that's fine. I mean keeping something from the audience solely to generate suspense, and then using a flashback to "reveal" it later. It's cheap, and it's not playing fair with the audience. I can let it slide a little, since on the other occasions when Mutant Enemy did exactly the same thing, the "surprise" was a lot more critical to the story, whereas this time it was just a cliffhanger ending. But it's still lazy, blatantly manipulative writing. Anyway. Angelus glares at Faith, then grunts, "You spiked --" and collapses, unconscious. Behind Faith, there's some rattling as Wesley finally crawls out of the broken scaffolding and falls onto the floor. He asks Faith if she's okay. Faith struggles to turn around, looks at Angelus, and smirks, "Kicked his ass." And then she, too, collapses.

Credits. This week's Boreanaz quote: "The gamut of my career will run in all facets as I progress."

Fred's all alone in the Hyperion's lobby, reading a book. Gunn bursts through the door, shouting for Connor as he drags a bound and unconscious Angelus inside. Gunn tells Fred to get her tranq gun and bellows for Connor again. Fred asks what happened, and Gunn says, "Wes called; I went." Really? Huh. I'd like to have heard that call. "Gunn? Wesley here. Things went really well, thanks to my brilliant plan, but now we're all having a bit of trouble remaining upright. Don't suppose you could come by, lend a hand?" Fred asks where Faith and Wesley are. Cary wanders out sleepily, wondering what the ruckus is about. Then he spots Angelus and screams, "Aaa! It's Angelus! He's in the hotel!" As Gunn asks Fred to get some shackles, Cary adds, "...But maybe we're already aware of that." Gunn explains that the rope was all he had in his truck, and then Connor finally arrives in the lobby in time to repeats Fred's question about Faith and Wesley. Having received his cue, Wesley enters, carrying an unconscious Faith. He orders them to take Angelus back to the basement and adds, "She captured Angelus." Faith and Connor stare at Faith, while Cary hurries to play nursemaid. Gunn reminds Connor that they've got a vampire to deal with.

Stupid-ass slow-motion shot of Wesley carrying Faith down the hall, escorted by Cary and Fred. Shut up, Wesley. And walk at a normal speed.

We cut back and forth between the basement (where Connor and Gunn are settling Angelus into the cage) and upstairs (where Cary and Fred are tending Faith). Cary spots the needle mark on Faith's arm, and gives Wesley a shocked look. Fred stares at the fang punctures in Faith's neck. As is traditional, Fred proceeds to bathe Faith's wound with a white towel and water in one of those bowls that you only see when someone is bathing someone else's wounds. Which I'm pretty sure you shouldn't do anyway, because the blood's sure not going to clot if you keep pouring water on the wound. And who has white towels? People who don't do their own laundry, I guess. Maybe Fred's just cleaning off the bloodstains, not the wound itself, and I don't want to fault her for tidiness, but that doesn't seem like the most important task. Right, so the montage finally winds down.

In the basement, Connor says, "He fed from her. There's blood on his breath." Oh, not again: what breath? Try "I can smell the blood." See? Same effect, sounds less dumb. Angelus suddenly stirs, and Gunn and Connor jump back. Gunn aims the tranq gun as Angelus mutters, "I'll kill you."

Faith whispers, "Scratch you out." Fred thoughtfully says, "She's not making any sense," like, yeah, oddly enough the doped-up, anemic Slayer who's talking in her sleep isn't quite Descartes's equal at the moment. And even at her best, I'm not sure "making sense" was ever Faith's strong point. Cary pulls Wesley aside to note that Wesley's a crazy psycho. Well, technically he says, "Tell me [that] you did not shoot that girl full of junk and then feed her to Angelus!" Wesley says that Faith knew the risks. Cary snaps, "She couldn't!" and says that he knows what the drug does to people, and so does Wesley. I like the fact that Cary's angrier on Faith's behalf than he ever has been for the things he's endured.

"A coma," Cordelia sniffs, up in her bedroom. Connor is there, too, and has presumably caught her up on all the gossip. Cordy skeptically says, "Like she hasn't pulled that one before." Hey, it's daylight outside! Finally. After some Angelus-related exposition, Connor assures Cordelia that he'll protect her and the baby. Cordy brushes that off with a quick "That's sweet -- is he guarded?" Connor smirks that Faith "did a number on him." Cordy suddenly shoves Connor and shouts, "What the hell is it with you and Faith? As if I didn't see the way you looked at her!" Connor denies whatever it is that he's being accused of, and then asks how Cordelia could hit him when the sanctuary spell is in effect. Cordy's explanation: "I told you, Connor: we're different!" She keeps complaining about Connor's disloyalty, adding, "I thought you were gonna be a better father than Angel was to you." Connor insists that he'd do anything for Cordy. Them's the magic words. Cordy turns back cheerfully and chuckles, "Are my hormones out of whack or what? Hello! Crazy pregnant lady, Aisle Nine!" She laughs at herself, which is refreshing since they don't get a lot to chuckle over on this show. One of things I liked about this episode was that almost everyone got to be amused by something at least once. Although not Connor, of course. Cordy finally suggests that he go check on Faith. She says, "I'm concerned. I want to know --"

"What's gonna happen to her?" Connor asks. He and the others are gathered around whatever bedroom they've dumped Faith into. Fred's still trying to find out what already happened. Wesley chooses to remain silent, so Cary gets the title again as he answers, "Orpheus." Which turns out to be a mystical drug. Cary says, "Humans inject it, vampires feed off the humans. Folks tried to deal it at Caritas -- only folks I ever banned from my club." Connor can't help pointing out that this is yet another item on the list of magic's drawbacks. Cary explains that between the drug and getting bit by Angelus, Faith is in for "some serious psychic psychedelia." Alliteration! Wesley finally opens his mouth to add, "It leads you down to hell." Thanks, that was very informative, Wesley.

Gunn locks up the cage. We pan down to Angelus, on the floor. Wesley finishes his insightful remarks in a voice-over: "And leaves you there." I can see why this drug would be really popular. Originally I thought, "Maybe it shows you the worst things you've ever done, so if you're a demon, you enjoy that, and that's why demons use it." But that doesn't mesh with what's about to happen to Angelus, so I'm afraid I still don't get it.

Boat-vert. Shots of a castle, and the Statue of Liberty, and then we're at Ellis Island. The caption reads, "New York, 1902." Cue the huddled masses. A long-haired Angel wanders through the crowd. Get a job, you damn hippie! Whoops, sorry. Angelus, in leather jacket, steps into the frame. Angel walks toward him, and then through him. Angelus whirls and growls, "Hey, what is that about?" "You tell me, it's your flashback," says Faith, who appears behind Angelus. Angelus immediately rushes to attack her, and dives through her instead. Faith giggles and tells Angelus that insanity is "performing the same task over and over and expecting different results." She adds that she learned that in "murder rehab." Angelus tells her to quit bugging him: "This is my flashback!" Hee. Faith guesses that she's there to enjoy the effects of her "incredibly simple ruse" and that Angelus is in for the This is Your life treatment. She eyes scruffy Angel, and asks Angelus if he missed the invention of the bath. Angelus grumbles, "All the way over here he crouched in the filth of animals just to avoid temptation! This isn't my life, it's his!" He complains that it was bad the first time and snaps, "This sucks! Why do you get to be Marley's ghost?" Faith answers, "Because I'm dying, dumb-ass." Angelus says she isn't doing it fast enough, and Faith guesses that her last job is to babysit "till they shove a soul up your --" Angelus interrupts to say that won't happen. Faith says, "Then I'm...whatever, dust in the wind. A candle in the wind. There'll be a general wind theme." I guess her time in Buffy's body had a permanent effect on her intelligence. How sad. Angelus wonders if Faith's still suicidal, but she says, "I rolled the dice. Paid even odds."

Which provides a handy segue to dice rolling in a street, and we're suddenly in the Roaring '20s. Outside a club called "The Blue Mood Lounge," some men are engaging in background color. Angelus and Faith look around, and Angelus guesses that they're in Chicago. He spots Angel sitting at a bus stop across the street. Angel got a haircut, thank heaven, and for some reason he looks like a chartered accountant in his three-piece-suit. Angelus moans that he remembers this, and he has to leave. A car squeals around a corner down the street. "I can't do it again, I won't!" Angelus groans as Faith watches curiously. The car races toward them, and Angel suddenly dashes out in front of the car. Faith shouts a warning, and the car misses Angel. We hear a high-pitched yipping, and Angelus looks furious as Angel turns to reveal that he just saved a puppy from getting run over. And it looks like a Pomeranian puppy, which somehow makes it that much funnier for me. Angelus, enraged, shouts, "No!" Ha! Faith snickers, "Dude, you just rescued a puppy!" A flapper outside the club coos over Angel for saving the dog. Angelus complains, "I'm in hell. This is hell, and I'm in it." If that were really true, he'd be watching the Oscars. While the flapper attempts to flirt with Angel, Angelus tells himself, "We haven't fed on a human in decades. She's begging for it, you moron!" I love how irritated he is. Angel tells the flapper to get lost, and she, offended, does so. With the puppy. Faith expositions for the benefit of slow viewers: "We're reliving Angel's good deeds! You are in hell! Wicked!" She chuckles.

Cut to unconscious Faith, lying in bed as Cary looks at her. Wesley voice-overs that all they can do now is finish what Faith started.

Cut to the lobby, where Wesley is speechifying. Fred guesses that they need to re-soul Angel. Connor says it's impossible: "No jar, no soul. No soul, no Angel." No horse, no wife, no moustache. Fred starts arguing, but Connor tells them, "You're lying to yourselves. You all think that I'm taking this personally so [that] you don't have to." I hope Connor gets to be right someday. I mean, I think he usually is right, but the story keeps proving him wrong. I'd like it if the story backed him up someday. Also, he and Gunn should hang out more. Connor adds that they need to kill Angelus, but then Willow says, "I don't think so." "Wuh?" everyone fails to say, as they turn to the door. Willow declares, "I think you need a witch." Shut up, Willow.

Willow approaches as Wesley greets her. Connor approaches her skeptically, and Willow guesses that he's "Angel's handsome yet androgynous son." Connor grumpily mentions his name, and Willow notes, "The sneer's genetic. Who knew?" Wow, Willow's short. Fred introduces herself, and then Willow looks at Wesley and says, "It's the Marlboro Man. Or, at least, his extra stubble-y, mentally unstable, insomniac first cousin, oh, for the love of Hecate, somebody stop me," because it seems to be literally true that she cannot stop running her mouth for a single second. Because she's an idiot. "For the love of Hecate" indeed. Wesley asks if Willow was drawn to the Hyperion by magic forces, and Willow explains that, actually, Fred called and gave her the scoop. Wesley acts like, ah, yes, it's so obvious that Willow was the person to call, nicely skipping over the question of why he didn't think to do that. ["Too bad the Buffy episode in which the phone call occurred didn't air until after this one. Oops!" -- Wing Chun] Fred and Willow burble about research, and I start looking for sharp objects. Willow asks where Cordelia is, and Connor interjects, "The guy you're all trying to magically reensoul shot her with a crossbow. She's not up for visitors." Wesley insists that Cordy would want to see Willow because of their long and loving history of close friendship. The hell? Okay, Cordy called her a couple of times. But I'm not sure even non-evil Cordy would feel too bad if she missed a chance to hang out with good ol' stupid blithering nonsensical Willow.

Cordy's in bed, with the covers pulled up to camouflage her tummy. Presumably Connor came up to tell her to expect a visitor. Connor knocks, and he and Willow enter. Willow and Cordy are perky. Connor is taciturn, and is quickly dismissed. Cordy and Willow share some backstory, and then Cordy asks, "You heard about Faith?" Willow doesn't quite roll her eyes as she says, "Coma again." Heh. They sound so bored by it. Again with the comas! Willow moves on to a discussion of her plan to re-soul Angel. Cordy feigns interest, and reaches under the blanket to grab a knife. So, Connor came up and said, "Some geek you knew in high school is here, and she wants to say hi. Name of Willow." And then Cordy said, "Great! Just let me get into bed, and you can bring her up. Oh, but first could you go get me a big knife? I need to, um, do my nails. Thanks!" Cordy asks about the magic jar o' soul. Willow admits that it's a problem, and blithers that a locator spell didn't help find the jar. Cordy agrees: "Tough nut to crack." For no readily apparent reason, that gives Willow an idea. She asks, "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Cordy grips the knife under the blanket and says, "I doubt it." I bet I'm thinking what Cordy's thinking. Willow exclaims that they can break the jar. Cordy suddenly asks Willow to hand her a glass of water from the nightstand, since that would put her conveniently within reach. Willow ignores Cordy and goes on about how they can use magic to break the jar, and then the soul will be free and they can put it back in Angelus. Well, what the hell was the point of putting it in a jar to begin with? Cordy whines, "Good idea -- I'm really thirsty!" But Willow continues to be totally self-absorbed, which is at least consistent. She exclaims that they'll get Angel back, and hurries through the door. As Willow closes the door behind her, the knife lands in it. So close. Damn. Try again, Cordy!

Faith's room. Cary says, "Don't you worry, princess, it'll all be over soon." He says he's seen other go through this, and holds her hand. Aw. I start muttering, "Sing to her, sing to her," because I like it when Cary sings. He starts singing "MacArthur Park." I blame myself.

Cut to...oh, there just aren't words. "MacArthur Park" plays on a jukebox as Angel enters what I thought was a diner, but turns out to be a donut shop. Angel's wearing striped pants, an incompletely buttoned shirt, a gold necklace, and a mid-length leather jacket with gratuitously wide collars. And then there's the hair. There just aren't words, but I think the wispy bangs are my favorite part. Maybe not being able to see your own reflection is a good thing sometimes. Angelus glares from a corner as Angel strides over to the jukebox, and then winces as "Mandy" starts up. Angel doesn't sing along with the song, but he's grooving to it with a wistful expression. So funny. Angelus stomps over to a table where Faith is giggling, "It must kill you [that] he's got a jones for the power ballads." There's a staticky noise, and Angelus swats at the air like a bee flew past him as he says that the concerts were even worse. A couple comes out of the back of the diner, and it takes me a while to figure out why they'd both be back in the bathroom together, but then the guy wipes his nose, and all becomes clear. As the couple passes Angel and exits, Angelus grumbles about the constant hunger for blood. When Faith taunts him, he asks whether she figures her mission is accomplished if she "put[s] the monster back in his cage." He suddenly pops across to her side of the table as he explains, "I'm always here, Faithy. Deep in." They're distracted when a new customer turns out to actually be a new robber, and not a customer at all. He pulls a gun out and tells the guy behind the counter to empty the register. Angel looks befuddled, and Angelus looks smug. The donut guy is so scared that he stammers nervously instead of opening the register, and eventually the gunman shoots him, then runs out. Angel hurries over to the bleeding donut guy and tries to help him. Or if not help, then at least reassure him. Unconvincingly. Over at the table, Angelus snickers, "Doc, I think we're losing him! God, I love this episode!" It's a mystery to me why they didn't put that clip in the commercials. There's more buzzing, and Angelus swats the air some more.

Cut to Cordelia, who is talking to her glowing voice-disguising marble. She orders Angelus to wake up. "Or just lay there and let that redheaded meddler put your soul back. Whichever." If this episode has a moral, it's that frustrated evildoers are funny.

In the lobby, Willow is preparing magical stuff for the "Denothrian's Arrow" spell that will break the jar o' soul. Wesley questions Willow about the mechanics of how the spell works, which allows her to provide some exposition I don't care about. And to babble, which I also don't care about. Shut up, Willow. I'll translate: she found a spell that will break the jar. Got it. Wesley fails to giggle appreciatively at something Willow says, and excuses himself by saying, "I think my sense of humor's trapped in a jar somewhere," instead of just pointing out that her stream-of-consciousness "whimsy" stopped being funny sometime during "Welcome to the Hellmouth." Great: Wesley finally decides to be polite to someone, and it's Willow. Willow admits that Wesley seems gloomier. He sighs, "I've been -- I've changed. I've seen a darkness in myself... I'm not sure you could even begin to understand." Willow chirps, "I flayed a guy alive and tried to destroy the world." Well, that exchange certainly highlights the differences between Angel and Buffy. Here are two characters (or, technically, one character and one collection of quirky mannerisms) who had season-long descents last year, who made bad decisions for selfish reasons, and whose behavior had significant consequences for the other characters. But one of them has been dealing with the personal and interpersonal fallout of his decisions in virtually every episode for a year now. The other one occasionally makes jokes about that time she tortured and murdered someone. I mean, I hate Wesley, but at this point he is at least a developed character that resembles actual human beings. Willow is more like a Real Doll. In a number of ways. Fine, so Wesley mentions, "I had a woman chained in a closet..." but admits that he can't compete with the flaying, and Willow tries to comfort him, and see my rant. Wesley changes the subject because he clearly won't win the "who's a bigger sociopath" contest, and tellingly observes that Willow seems exactly the same as she was when he left Sunnydale. My point exactly. "Any major changes I'm not up on?" he asks, and Willow mugs, "Little things." Because she's gay now, you know. Like Cordelia wouldn't have shared that tidbit? Whatever. Then Willow asks what Fred's deal is, and Wesley gives her a confused look. We cut away before he digs out the DSM IV.

Back in the dream-world flashback thingy, Angel is holding the dying donut guy. "Mandy" seems to have finally stopped, so at least that won't be the donut guy's last memory. Angel says he's sorry as the donut guy dies; Angel then gets up and stares at the body. Angelus asks Faith, "Who's your big hero now?" Faith defends Angel, noting that the shooting wasn't his fault. Angel starts for the door and then, as Angelus "uh oh"s, locks it instead of leaving. Faith, worried, says, "He won't..." Angel goes back to the body as Angelus says, "Deep in, Faith. Soul or no soul." Angel hauls the body up, vamps out, and drinks. Cool. Faith looks disgusted, and then grabs her neck, which is suddenly bleeding. As she wipes at the blood, she insists that Angel was going to save the counterman. "Or did he choose to be a little slow on the draw?" Angelus asks. He tells her, "You're a murderer; you know just how good that blurry line tastes. You didn't think my hell was private, did you?" Angel suddenly looks up from the body he's feeding on and screams.