Previously: Wesley rolled into town but he still wasn’t Doyle. Cordelia started having visions, but she wasn’t Doyle either.
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Somnambulist
Kirsti: SURPRISE!!!! Lor didn’t get the chance to watch today’s episode of Angel before she flew out to California to hang out with Sweeney and DAMMIT WHY AM I ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE WORLD RIGHT NOW. Anyway, Lor and I have done a swap, so you’re stuck with me today. Which is absolutely fine by me, because today’s episode has a spectacular guest star.
Sweeney: HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
Lorraine: Seriously, thank you for doing this so Sweeney and I could hang out on the right side of the world. AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
K: THANK YOU <3 And like I was going to pass up on the chance to cover this episode!!
We open with a woman running through the streets all panicky like. A man grabs her, and caresses her face with his long creepy metal finger covering thing before we zoom in on his fangs and he bites her and apparently drains her in two seconds flat. He drops her body to the ground and the camera zooms out to show that it’s Angel. Except that apparently it’s also a dream because he wakes in the Brooding Basement.
Sweeney: Fully clothed! In shoes! He’s taking this eternal punishment thing a touch too seriously.
Lor: IDK. Pajamas give me moments of happiness.
K: Cut to Kate arriving at the crime scene. She turns the dead girl’s head to show a crucifix scratched onto her face. Apparently this makes three victims. Welp, so much for that dream, Angel! Roll credits, which now no longer include any Glenn Quinn and WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
Sweeney: It’s going to be a while before I get over this. Particularly since all I have is the promise of Traumateers that Wesley one day becomes awesome. Right now, whenever I see him I’m all, “YOU’RE NOT DOYLE. BRING BACK DOYLE.”
K: Right there with you, and I’ve seen AtS before.
After the credits, Cordy is talking to an empty chair and practicing either her interrogation skills or her please-hire-us-we-need-the-money skills. Wesley turns up to snigger and also deliver the mail. He wants to compare notes, but he has nothing to report. Cordy’s all “Okay, buh-bye now,” but he talks about what a great team the three of them make and mentions how he has wikkid powers of deduction. Except he brought in the wrong mail. Womp womp. Helpfully, it allows Wesley to see the newspaper headlines, and he rushes out just as Angel emerges from the Brooding Basement in a super cranky pants mood. Cordy’s all “DUDE. You look like shit.” which Angel takes about as well as could be expected. She mentions that she’s had no luck tracking down a license plate and wonders if maybe he could ask Kate to check it out. He says that he’ll do it now and heads towards the door, earning a “Um, are you SURE you’re okay?” from Cordy. He bitches that he’s fine and then opens the door and steps into the blazing sun. WHOOPS. Obviously, it leads to sizzling sounds and an “I’ll take the tunnels.” Pan out to the corridor where Wesley is lurking with a “Hmm” face.
Seizure cut to the police station. Kate’s all “HA!! As if!” about the license plate query, and Angel gives her puppy dog eyes until she relents. She then proceeds to be a terrible police officer by immediately spilling all the details of all three murder victims. A uniformed officer comes up with crime scene photos, which Kate immediately goes through in front of Angel because of CONTRIVANCE. He gets a facial expression that bears a striking resemblance to this emoticon: O.o and the camera zooms in on the crucifix on the girl’s face before seizure cutting to her dumped body and then back to Angel again. Kate lays out the photos across her desk, and says that the tabloids are calling the killer “The Pope” because he probably thinks he’s doing God’s work. Angel says that she’s wrong and it’s about mocking God, then does his mysterious vanishing act while Kate’s distracted.
Lor: If I were Kate, I’d be thinking that disappearing thing were awful murdery.
K: Truth. Now we start a montage of sorts, cutting between Kate briefing a roomful of detectives on the suspect’s profile and Angel walking through the streets alone. Kate’s basically describing Angel, even going so far as to say the suspect may have a split personality and retain no memory of the crime after he commits it. She also mentions that the suspect has probably just gotten out of a relationship that ended badly, and we cut to Angel watching a blonde girl in the park. It’s not even remotely Buffy, but he still gets mopey. (S: You know, because of Kate’s speech.) Kate finishes her lecture by noting that the suspect has been doing this for a long time and will clearly do it again.
Lor: Basically she describes Angel but doesn’t actually provide any useful information for a police investigation. Thanks Kate!
K: A+ police work! Over at the office, Cordy’s packing up for the night. She opens the door to leave and is greeted by Wesley with a stake raised. Cordy’s all “WHAT THE HELL, DUDE?!” and Wesley asks where Angel is. He then scurries around the office, closing blinds and not putting his stake away. He shows Cordy the article from the newspaper and says that back in his Watcher days, he read up on Angel. He pulls out a fat manila folder marked “ANGEL” and hands it to Cordy, saying that the whole cross-carved-in-face thing was Angel’s MO back in the 1700s. Cordy tells him to get out and that nothing will make her turn on Angel. At that, the Champion Lurker himself appears from the shadows, saying that Wesley’s right. Cordy’s response? “You stake him and I’ll cut his head off.” LOL.
Angel tells them that he has no memory of doing anything, but he’s been having dreams about stalking and killing people. And he enjoys the dreams. Wesley suggests that maybe he’s sleepwalking in the wee small hours of the morning. Angel gets “OH SHIT” face, and says there’s only one way to be sure. Cut to Wesley and Cordy chaining Angel to the bed. Everyone take an “UGH, 50 Shades” shot! (L: AKA cry into your alcohol because you see 50 Shades everywhere…) Cordy’s all “I’m gonna go because if you ARE killing people in your sleep, I’d like to not be here” and leaves. With that, we head into a 1700s!Angel flashback, in which he kills a girl wearing a hideous bonnet and gets to use his awful “Irish” accent. I’m gonna go ahead and add the bad accent to the AtS drinking game because I need alcohol to listen to it. (S: Absolutely.) As 1700s!Angel finishes getting his murder on with “There now. Isn’t that better?” Angel snaps awake, still chained to the bed. It’s morning and Cordy enternounces that there’s been another murder, so clearly Angel isn’t the killer. Except that Angel says he did, and we fade to black.
After the Not Commercial Break, we’re hanging out with 1700s!Angel again. Except that it turns out his “There now. Isn’t that better?” wasn’t directed at himself or Ugly Bonnet Girl, but at 1700s!Jeremy Renner. Excellent – I’ve been looking for an excuse to use this gif in a Snark Squad post!
1700s!JRenn is Angel’s latest vamp conversion and just made Ugly Bonnet Girl his first kill. My beloved JRenn is sporting a hideous mullet, and I’m gonna go ahead and show you this photo which I’m sure he wishes didn’t exist now that he’s got two Oscar nominations under his belt:
Sweeney: It’s Angel’s show, so I assume they used his hair as the benchmark. “See this awful hair? Right, well, we somehow have to make it the least awful hair, so just take this other wig and start chopping haphazardly.”
K: Head canon accepted. Ugly Bonnet Girl was JRenn’s sister, but he and his vaguely convincing English accent ain’t bovvered that he just killed her. Angelus suggests that it’s time to pay a visit to JRenn’s father and get all massacre-y.
Lor: And Angel says, “ah” a lot, because see, he’s Irish and stuff.
K: And we all stop and pine for Doyle and his ACTUAL Irishness. With that, we cut back to the present where JRenn looks frighteningly like Michael Weatherly in Dark Angel. He’s got a nice gloat wall of newspaper clippings about the murders going on. Angel voiceovers that he taught him well, and we head back to the Brooding Bungalow to have the gaps filled in. Cordy wonders why JRenn hasn’t changed his routine in 200 years, while Wesley wonders if JRenn knows that Angel’s in town and is trying to draw him out. Angel says that the dreams mean JRenn is close by, seeing as how he has a connection to anyone he sired. Shots for further vampire inconsistencies! Cordy’s all “UGH. We don’t stand a chance and neither do the cops,” and Angel rushes off on account of Kate’s in potential danger.
Seizure cut to the police station. Kate tells Angel that she’s got the license plate details he asked for before realising that he has SRS BSNSS face. Angel asks if he can talk to her in private, and they head to an interrogation room, where Kate has a murder board set up. He asks how the investigation is going, and then we seizure zoom around photos of the victims before heading back to the 1700s for a couple of shots of JRenn’s family all dead at the dinner table and all with crosses carved on their cheeks. Seizure zoom back to the present and Angel staring at the photos in horror. He postulannounces that JRenn is reliving it by killing people who look like his family members. He then asks Kate if she trusts him, and pins a drawing of JRenn onto the murder board. She’s all “How the hell do you know who’s responsible and what he looks like?” and Angel says she’ll just have to trust him on the fact that the next victim will be a young white male taken from near a bar or liquor store. Hella specific, dude.
Angel leaves the station and heads to his car where Wesley’s waiting. Angel conveniently stole the world’s most enormous police radio so that they’ll know if Kate finds anything. Back in the station, Kate’s telling other detectives where to add extra patrols. Seizure cut over to a kid with a skateboard standing outside a liquor store and asking people if they’ll buy him beer. He looks about 15, so the answer is overwhelmingly “LOL, NOPE.” Until JRenn turns up and makes this face:
Lor: That’s either his murder face or his YAY ALCOHOL face and either way, I am perturbed.
K: Conclusions reached during this episode? JRenn was clearly like a fine wine and has only improved with age. A couple of cops are in a patrol car nearby, and see JRenn leading the kid away from the liquor store. Quite how they realise that it’s him is beyond me, because 1) it’s dark, b) they’re at least 100 metres away, and cat) they mostly see his back. Nonetheless, they make the call. Down a dodgy back alley, JRenn tells the kid that he reminds him of his brother, then gets his vamp on. But numerous cop cars appear, and he has to abandon the kid and jump like 10 metres into the air and through the boarded up window of a nearby building. It’s very much like a super shitty scene from Breaking Dawn of Bella going after a deer or some shit, but when I tried searching for it, there were so many gifs of Edward and Bella boffing that I had to stop and throw up and then pour bleach into my eyeballs.
Sweeney: #unfortunategooglesearchoftheday
K: Angel and Wesley arrive, and see the kid being wheeled away on a stretcher. He’s bleeding, but alive. Angel climbs up the drain pipe of the warehouse as Kate heads in through the door. Inside, Kate sees JRenn walking down the stairs. She threatens to shoot him, and he’s all “LOL, AS IF” because apparently this is Clueless. She shoots him three times and he falls to the ground. She goes over, checks his pulse, and then pulls out her radio. At which point he grabs her, says “OUCH” and throws her across the room. He’s wandering over to have some fun when Angel jumps through the roof. Kate wonders WTF while JRenn is all “OMG, ANGELUS???” and then wonders what kept Angel from meeting up with him in Italy a millionty years ago. The answer? Romania, gypsies, the usual. Kate calls for back up while JRenn asks Angel to join him in a nice tall glass of Kate blood. Angel says that he’s not here for that, he’s here to kill JRenn.
They both vamp out, and the fight is on. It’s pretty hardcore, with breaking of ceilings and walls and whatnot. Angel yells at Kate to get to safety, and JRenn is all “Dude, what the hell, why are you talking to the food?” He throws Angel into Kate and disappears. Kate stares at Angel’s vamp face in horror and we fade to black.
After the Not Commercial Break, officers are all over the warehouse. Kate’s talking to herself about how she definitely shot him and what the hell is going on. Then Angel – wearing his human face – appears. She pulls her gun and asks what he is. “You already know the answer, Kate” is his answer.
Lor: I’m getting more Twilight vibes. Unfortunately, I don’t have Sweeney’s Twilight-gif skillz, and this is the only gif of the scene I found:
K: Good Lord. I think that was done by a deranged 12 year old. I particularly enjoy the moment where it looks like Bella’s crying blood. She’s been keeping the whole bite-marks-on-neck-and-drained-of-blood thing out of the press reports. Angel lists off things that can kill vampires, but Kate refuses to believe him. Until he proves it to her by grabbing the cross she wears around her neck and letting his hand sizzle a little. I can’t imagine that smells pleasant…
As the sun sets that night, Kate is staring at the murder board. The uniformed cop from earlier comes in, carrying a bunch of old books. Apparently it’s every crime with that MO dating back as far as she could find. Yeesh. Good thing you’re not a cop in Sunnydale, Kate. You’d be going through those reports until your retirement party! Cut to the office where Cordy has a shiny new client – JRenn. Ruh roh. He says that a police detective recommended their services, but that he can’t remember her name. Cordy obligingly fills him in, then realises that she’s being grilled and refers to JRenn as “apt pupil boy.” He says that she’ll never make it to the door, and she pulls the blinds, flooding the room with sunlight. Just then, Angel appears from the Brooding Basement and this happens:
Cordy then realises that he means a stake and not a steak, and rushes off to get one. Quite why he didn’t grab one on his way through the Brooding Basement is beyond me. While she’s out of the room, JRenn does the obligatory Villain of the Week Speech about how just because Angel’s good doesn’t mean everyone has to be. Angel calls him a cheesy hack, and the “How DARE you?” look on JRenn’s face is pretty priceless. Angel then goes on to call him prosaic and that makes me laugh hysterically because I know someone with a PhD in English literature who once repeatedly used the word “prosaic” to describe a poem she’d written when she actually meant “prose poetry.” As is probably obvious, we didn’t get on very well.
ANYWAY. Wesley and his very inconvenient timing choose that moment to walk through the door, and JRenn puts him in a headlock. JRenn tells Angel that he appreciates the feedback and that he’ll now switch up his act with, “just think of the worst possible thing you can imagine, and I’ll see you there.” He throws Wesley at Angel and runs out, coat over his head.
With that, we head into a moody music montage, cutting between a bookstore called The Ancient Eye, where Kate is reading up on vampires, Angel walking the streets alone, and JRenn wearing his Michael Weatherly glasses and planning new evil deeds. We end at Kate’s apartment where she’s going through books and underlining key points. There’s a knock at the door. It’s Angel, and now that she’s been doing her research she refuses to let him in. She tells him that in the course of her research, she found out that JRenn has been in LA twice before – in 1929 and 1963. Also, she’s read up on Angelus, so GTFO before there’s a staking.
Lor: I’m guessing being all, “but I gots me a soul now!!!” wouldn’t really help the situation.
K: Probably not. Back at the office, Angel’s got Cordy and Wesley researching JRenn’s previous trips to LA in old newspapers. They realise, courtesy of pointless pictures in the newspapers, that he’s been tracked to the same hotel/apartment building on both occasions. Angel’s all “You predictable bastard!” and we cut to Angel and Wesley breaking into his room at the same building. Conveniently, JRenn has left all his plans lying out in plain sight – pictures of school buses, middle school bus schedules, and a map with bus routes and big red Xs and the time of sunrise scribbled on them.
Seizure cut to the police station where Kate’s briefing a bunch of detectives. She distributes photos of Angel, telling everyone that he’s the way they’ll find JRenn. At that, a voice in the corner says, “This is a TERRIBLE likeness,” and JRenn stands up, holding the sketch Angel gave Kate. She looks on in horror as he throws the rest of the detectives around the room like bowling pins, and then grabs her and uses her as a shield before she can get to the stake in her handbag. Meanwhile, Wesley is driving into the garage of the police station while Angel hides under a blanket. A bunch of police cars go screaming past them, and Angel says “He’s here.” He jumps out of the car and heads into the sewers. Because of course there’s a convenient manhole in the police station garage…
Down in the sewers, Kate asks JRenn what his plan is. He’s all “Yeah, because I’m totally going to tell you” and throws her across the room. He goes to bite her, and she says that he’s not afraid to die. “Oh, I’m not going to kill you. But when I’m finished, Angel will,” he says. With that, Angel arrives and is all “You thought I’d fall for that school bus plan? Oh pu-LEEZE.” While JRenn’s distracted, Kate reaches into her pocket and grabs a vial of holy water. She throws it in his face, which turns into a mass of blisters. He throws her to one side, and announces that he’s realised he shouldn’t be getting revenge on his human father – he should be getting revenge on his sire instead. With that, he attacks Angel. They fight, and Angel tells him that he’s grounded. (L: Weird.) They fight some more while Kate grabs a piece of nearby wood to use as a stake. Angel grabs JRenn, but he runs up a wall and flips over Angel’s head which must have required some limbering up beforehand and gives me a half arsed excuse to use this gif:
BECAUSE OF REASONS, DAMMIT.
Sweeney: Your gratuitous Jeremy Renner gif count this post is way lower than I expected. Gif on, girl.
K: I was trying to restrain myself. Perhaps I shouldn’t have.
JRenn grabs Angel from behind, and starts talking about how one should never give up the advantage. Kate takes her stupidly long chunk of wood and stabs it through Angel’s stomach and into JRenn, who promptly turns to dust. Shame. On the plus side, it results in this shot which is kind of hilarious:
Angel’s all “Oh, cool. I’m not dead.” and then collapses on account of the giant gaping wound in his guts.
Later, he sits on the roof watching the city. Cordy, wearing a hideous poncho, comes up and tells him that she’s had a vision, and hands him a piece of paper. He wonders if anything ever really changes, and Cordy’s all “You totally changed. Also, those dreams weren’t even yours. Also also, the Powers That Be Contriving wouldn’t give me visions of situations for you to fix if you were still Angelus.” He awkwards that if he ever ends up like that… And Cordy’s reply?
Sweeney: I love Cordelia on this show. She’s just the best. Aside from when she was hating on poor Doyle. That was not the best.
Lor: And when Buffy showed up and Cordy was hating on her. That was also not the best. But otherwise!
K: Angel gives a little smile and they walk off together as we fade to black.
Well. A nice dose of JRenn certainly helped with all those residual Doyle feels. Shame he couldn’t have hung around longer than one episode. I had so many more gifs I could have used…
Next time on Angel: Sensing that he’d made us sufficiently adore Cordelia, Whedon decides to give her a tragic magic pregnancy. Thanks, asshole. Find out all about it in S01 E12 – Expecting.
I'm a 30-something librarian and I still live with my parents because I'm super broke. Leader of Team Heartless Cow. I have an inexplicable love for 90s television, eat too much chocolate, and read more than is good for me.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
Nicole is the co-captain of Snark Squad and these days she spends most of her time editing podcasts. She spends too much time on Twitter and very occasionally vlogs and blogs. In her day job she's a producer, editor, director, and sometimes host of educational YouTube channels. She loves travel, maps, panda gifs, and semicolons. Writing biographies stresses her out; she crowd sourced this one years ago and has been using a version of it ever since. She would like to thank Twitter for their help.
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