When main idea gets undermined by setting (or Why I dislike Angel finale)

[rbfvid]

I strongly dislike „Not Fade Away”, but I never took the time to pinpoint why exactly. It’s not just because I hate cliffhanger endings. That cliffhanger ending fits main idea of „Angel” pretty well... And then it hit me - the main idea. Fighting the Good Fight. That’s the problem

Comments

[rbfvid]

If you think about it, most of the "evil plans" of W & H were aimed on solely pissing Angel off and nothing more. I wonder, what they were trying to achieve. Well, other than pising Angel off... (On the other hand, pissed off Angel was fun to watch and that was probably all that Senior Partners needed from him. They were bored.)

[waddiwasiwitch]

Wow - I think you've hit the nail on the head there!! Great points.

[rbfvid]

Thanks)

[rbfvid]

I never really bought that thing with Angel playing pivotal role in Apocalypse. Come on, he got that scroll from Wolfram & Hart, and it so well hit major Angel's weak point (desperate need to be important, to have some higher purpose). Come on, Angel, how gullible you are, why do you think W&H fed you that prophecy?

[infinitewhale]

Thing is, S4 and S5 imply the prophecy was more or less just a carrot to maneuver Angel to where Jasmine/PTB wanted him, no?

Yeah, I never got what the motivation for all of it was, either. If W&H were cross-dimensional entities, why care about 1 little dimension in a million.

[zhuhell]

A+++

[rbfvid]

=)

[tei_lj]

Hmm, interesting! This was never really stated in the show, but what I kind of filled in in my head was always the assumption that the reason wolf, ram and hart had never destroyed or taken over the earth was because there have always been champions fighting them to the same extent that Angel is. And that all of the things that have gone wrong in human history are little pockets of WRH getting the upper hand and sowing discord before whatever slayers/champions/fighters of the good fight existed back in the day were able to stomp it out.

Which makes Angel's quest-- not necessarily commonplace, but situates it in a lineage kind of like Buffy's, if that makes any sense?

[rbfvid]

Yeah, it's pretty much canonical interpretation. "World is OK, because there are champions to protect it." And I can get behind that explanation for the most part of the series. A.I. team are one of those who protect the world from the baddies who really cross the line. They help to maintain status quo.

But in NFA it's A.I. team itself who crosses the line and brings the literal hell on the city. Their "good fight" won't achieve anything. They simply lost everything during past couple of years and seek self-destruction. And they don't care if the rest of L.A. populace don't want to die with them.

[tei_lj]

Ah, true. Obviously I have forgotten most of that rather forgettable plot :P

[rbfvid]

As long as "noble suicide" finales go, "The Gift" was so much better crafted. Buffy at least was really saving the world. Angel (and Gunn, and Wesley, and - for some mysterios reason - Spike) was just... commiting suicide.