The Cabin in the Woods (Drew Goddard, 2012)

[Warning: Contains mild first-act spoilers after the jump]

Drew Goddard made his feature debut with 2008's Cloverfield, penning the film's ambitious but misguided script that sought to comment on modern mindsets regarding the documentation of our lives via the kaiju film genre. His idea, clever on paper, was that a group of privileged New York yuppies contending with 9/11-esque frenzy would nevertheless ensure that their bewilderment and horror was caught on video for posterity, or at least for YouTube hits. Unfortunately for Goddard, director Matt Reeves' muddled direction and some dire acting performances sapped whatever potential the script contained, resulting in a lifeless film that only occasionally hinted at just how far it wanted to go with its metaphor.

By teaming up with his old Buffy and Angel boss Joss Whedon, however, Goddard got a second chance to say something with horror, and The Cabin in the Woods truly delivers on his promise. At times recalling Sam Raimi's 2009 return-to-form Drag Me to Hell, The Cabin in the Woods differs from that film, and other self-aware horror movies, by not merely calling attention to horror tropes but breaking them down, working out how they apply to the genre, as well as how filmmakers (and participatory audiences) apply them to it. To oversimplify it into a pitch, where movies such as Drag Me to Hell or the Scream series are about horror films, The Cabin in the Woods is about horror itself.

Dollhouse — Unaired Pilot and "Epitaph One"

I'll be honest: I picked up the Blu-Ray for the first season of Dollhouse as much if not more for the exclusive episodes as it did the season proper. While the back half of the season certainly grabbed my interest and mostly held it through the end, I found myself far more taken with the idea of watching both the original pilot, dumped when the networks called it "too dark and confusing" in favor of that tepid and largely pointless iteration that uneventfully debuted the show, as well as the fabled 13th episode, the post-apocalyptic "Epitaph One." When I got home to my PS3 I didn't even watch any of the aired episodes before diving into these bonus treats, and my thoughts on them are as follows:

[Note: This review avoids spoilers for the two episodes under discussion, but it assumes that you've seen the season's aired episodes]

Unaired Pilot -- "Echo"

The studio notes for this episode cited it as too confusing to appeal to a broad audience, the first sign that FOX would end up meddling with this show just as they had with Firefly before it. It (perhaps justifiably) put people on the defensive months before the show ever came out, and got the ball rolling on all the cancellation talk as well.

For all my love of artistic freedom, though, and especially for someone I adore as much as Joss Whedon, I'd have told him to re-write it as well. Where the studio feared that its tone would turn off the Idol crowd or something, I would have suggested that he simply cut the thing down a tad. For you see, "Echo" is a two-hour pilot extravaganza crammed into your average one-hour time slot. Even with the 5-10 extra minutes offered by that Remote-Free TV business, it simply contains too much plot, too many character moments and far, far too many answered questions.

For example, in this version of the pilot, we see Saunders' hatred of Topher, the Feds knowing too much about the Dollhouse to dismiss it, Boyd saying too much about the Dollhouse's evil before Whedon has fully established what a disgusting organization it is and, worst of all, Echo meeting Ballard. These scenes pepper the first five or six episodes of the season, and condensing them into one hour of TV gives us too much information about what should be a shadowy organization.

Nevertheless, it's a massive improvement over the version we got. "Ghost" didn't even feel like a Whedon-penned episode: its exposition was obvious to the point of cringe-inducing, this interesting world was ill-defined and, most surprising of all, it lacked humor. "Echo," as a strange contrast, contains too much of these elements. It's nice and clever, but it gives us too man details, and a running gag concerning Topher's use of the phrase "man-friend" simply grates (it actually builds to a nice dark one-liner from Boyd, then Topher uses the phrase once more later). Other lines contain real, working humor though, and for all the flaws of the Echo/Ballard interaction, it clearly set up Caroline's story far earlier, something that would have silenced a number of critics who cited the show as misogynistic for not immediately establishing a strong female lead. Rather than a revelation of Whedon's original, assured vision, "Echo" is more the polar opposite of the flaws of "Ghost" -- somewhere between the two lies the perfect pilot, but I'd likely place it on that line far closer to this.

Epitaph One

Now this is what I'm talking about. Joss Whedon is nothing if not bold: his four shows each contain wildly different tones, styles, approaches to humor, and themes, yet they all feature certain flourishes that make them immediately recognizable as his. His best work (as well as the best work of his finest writers) stands in open defiance of what might normally pass on TV, or that which takes him far out of his comfort zone (though the jury's still out on this show, which is one giant removal). I'm of course speaking of episodes such as "The Body," "Hush," "Objects in Space," and "Not Fade Away."

"Epitaph One" belongs on this list. Though neither written nor directed by Whedon, you can feel his guiding hand behind the script more than anywhere in the season's aired episodes, including one of the two that he wrote. It, more than "Man on the Street," "Spy in the House of Love" or either of the two parts of the finale, demonstrates that the show, despite its rocky opening and a continued set of unanswered, important questions (such as "What's the point of this anyway?"), indeed has a direction, and Whedon is a steady hand at the helm.

Set in 2019, ten years after Echo started exhibiting problems with her programming, "Epitaph One" shows us a world in chaos. A small band of filthy survivors moves through the streets of L.A., carrying with them a small child and her wiped father. At some point between now and the first season timeline, the Rossum Corporation (the owners of the Dollhouse) sold or allowed their technology to fall into other hands, and China discovered a way to imprint massive sections of the world populace in a manner similar to the cell call in "Gray Hour."

This group heads for the Dollhouse to find the imprinting chair to see if they can piece together what went wrong. They don't know what the construct really is, and when they discover that the institution that brought about the apocalypse was originally nothing more than a glorified whorehouse they don't know whether to laugh or find something to shoot.

They discover two things, though, that are far more important that the Dollhouse's original design. One is Whiskey, now scar-less and wiped, and the other a set of memories waiting to be uploaded into an Active. Through these memories we are given brief glimpses into the events that link the present with this horrible future, as well as character moments and even some relationship news. My favorite moments involved De Witt and Topher finally accepting the evil of their profession and their role in this cataclysm.

Giving us this information in the form of memories is a masterstroke, because memory is subjective. Some, perhaps all, of the scenes Whedon shows us could be slightly different if not outright false. We know that he's the king of continuity jokes, with callbacks and cross-references abounding in the Buffyverse, but this presentation ups the stakes: now the fans will look not only for these scenes to unfold but check up to see if anything differs.

"Epitaph One" is many things: thrilling, horrific, cerebral, gripping and darkly witty. Most of all, though, it is fearless. Written by his Doctor Horrible cohorts Maurissa Tancharoen and brother Jed Whedon, it's based on a pitch by Joss, one that would bring the high concept of the show to the fore while slashing the budget down to peanuts. Its predominantly hand-held direction (courtesy of David Solomon) lacks the spastic nature of shaky cam footage, and instead successfully creates a feeling of tension and realism without making us reach for the barf bags. Only someone with a firm grasp of a show's direction -- and let's not forget, Whedon also sowed hints for more than one future season in Buffy episodes "Graduation Day" and "Restless" -- would be so bold as to give away so much detail for a show's future. In anyone else's hands, something like "Epitaph One" would cause me worry. With Whedon holding the reins, however, it is a promise to the fans who stuck with this series out of faith in him that Dollhouse is going places, and I for one can't wait until September.

Dollhouse — Season 1

[Contains minor spoilers]

Has it really been five years since Joss Whedon graced T.V.-land with his presence? After the twin blows of both Firefly and Angel’s cancellations only a year apart from one another, Whedon seemed to retreat from the limelight somewhat, delivering only a magnificent Firefly spinoff and one of the best sci-fi films in recent memory and some great works on a handful of comic books (including launching series continuations of Buffy and Angel). At last, he decided to return to television, and the Internet rejoiced. Until we learned that he was working for Fox.

Fox, as you are no doubt painfully aware, canceled Firefly almost out of the gate, giving it only enough time to shuffle airing orders and time slots. The resulting resentment had absolutely no effect on Fox, whose primary demographic tunes in for exploitative “reality” programs and whatever half-assed pop collage Seth McFarlane is passing off as funny. So, when Joss came out of exile, only to wind up with the very studio that crushed him the first time around, many assumed the worst. And when Dollhouse first hit the air, all the cynics’ predictions were seemingly confirmed.

Dollhouse revolves around the titular construct, a near-mythical organization that hires willing (after a fashion) volunteers, hollows out their personalities, then inserts a new personality and traits to loan out to high-paying customers. Set at the L.A. branch, the show’s central character – protagonist may not be the right word – Echo. Played by Eliza Dushku, Echo is the most-requested “Active” in the Dollhouse; she works as a high-class escort, an FBI negotiator, even the target of some demented sport hunting. When the engagement is over, a handler calms her done and takes her to have her mind wiped.


It’s a concept that opens a number of thematic possibilities; far more than ever introduced in a Whedon show, in fact. The Dollhouse clearly stands for human traffickers, but their M.O. allows for commentaries on modern society: the anonymity allowed through increasing technology and impersonal communication, the desensitization that such anonymity engenders, and the very nature of free will.

I say possibilities, because for the entire first half of the season, not a damn thing happens. Fans got their first taste of dread when Fox announced that Joss’ initial pilot was “too dark” and “confusing” and Joss offered to make a more straightforward version to prevent episode shuffling (which ended up happening anyway). So, when the neutered pilot debuted in February, anxious fans got an occasionally interesting but overall tepid offering that barely introduced its characters satisfactorily, much less established any themes.

In it, Echo plays an FBI negotiator helping a wealthy man rescue his kidnapped daughter, which is a ridiculous way to start things off. We are given no solid reason for a man spending millions on a negotiator when the actual FBI would likely have gotten involved (and for free!), and when we discover that Active programmer Topher (Fran Kanz) also imprinted Echo with the memory of an abducted child which gives her an insight, it comes off more a pathetic justification for the plot than an intriguing development.

The early episodes all suffer from this problem: useless assignments that offer absolutely no insight into why anyone would pay millions for such a service. Easily the most absurd of these is a backup dancer for a hit-prone pop star, chosen to provide security while befriending the star. O.K., couple of things: 1) Why not just hire her as a bodyguard? 2) Why not just hire a real bodyguard for a lot less? 3) Are you kidding me? And it gets even worse when we learn that the star is actually suicidal and wants to burn out rather than fade away. A Britney Spears-knockoff has dreams of immortality. The episode as a whole is the most unbearable and useless piece of preaching since Angel’s “She” reminded Americans that female genital mutilation was wrong.

The constant personality shifts also require a lot of chops, and Dushku has come under fire from a number of critics for a perceived lack of range. While the actors playing Dolls Victor (Enver Gjokaj) and Sierra (Dichen Lachman) always seem to hit their marks and receive kudos, Dushku gets singled out for being too Faith-y. I presume they mean that she looks and speaks like Faith and therefore Eliza Dushku, so I'm a bit puzzled. Is Echo off in her imprints? Yes. That's the point. Truth is, Dushku has handled the majority of her imprints well, though some don't quite work. See über-writer Tim Minear’s first credit on the show, “True Believer”: Minear’s dark humor pervades the B-plot (involving Victor exhibiting emotion and sexual attraction to Sierra while in his wiped state, leading to a hilarious investigation by Saunders and Topher), but the main story concerning Echo infiltrating a cult via an imprint of a blind follower falls on its face. Even then, I'm less willing to lay the blame at Dushku's feet when the writing clearly lacked -- which, coming from Minear, was shocking.

Despite the relative ennui of these first five “Doll of the Week” episodes, their chief shortcoming is the complete failure to link the plots to the overarching mythology and thematic drive of the Dollhouse. FBI agent Paul Ballard (Tamoh Penikett) investigates the organization, but he seems to risk everything just because he’s captivated by a video of Echo with her true personality, Caroline. Ex-cop Boyd (Harry Lennix, Jr.), Echo’s handler, voices his concerns for how they manipulate Actives to branch manager Adele DeWitt (Olivia Williams), but he just sort of drops his protests after awhile. DeWitt explains it away by reminding him that people volunteer for the job and are paid well when their contracts expire, but for too long no one calls her on the hypocrisy of the statement.

When that changes, the show itself kicks off at last. The sixth episode, “Man on the Street,” intimated to us by Dushku and Whedon as the beginning of a true arc, so suddenly thrusts Dollhouse to the next level that the preceding five weeks of mediocre to downright arduous programming seem like a parody that hit the airwaves before the subject of its travesty. Apart from providing the first touching incident of Doll use (a wealthy man hiring Echo, not for sex but so he could show his “wife” the house she never got to see because she died in a wreck) as well as juxtaposing the rape of one of the Dolls by her handler with the heretofore unspoken reality that DeWitt and her employees send these people to be raped on a daily basis (just because you sign a contract doesn’t mean you give sexual consent for five years). I’m not entirely pleased that it took a “real” rape to finally put the truth out there, but it was an incredibly effective move. Also, we learned something about Paul’s neighbor/crush Mellie (Miracle Laurie) that proves that Joss could still surprise the hell out of us when he felt like it.

From there the show builds, if not thematically, then at least literally: “Echoes” manages to balance a key insight into Caroline’s past via a thrilling main plot and a simply hysterical side story involving a gas leak in the Dollhouse. “Needs” fizzles with its end reveal, but we learn what drove our Actives to sign up for the Dollhouse and it explains some of their earlier behavior, even if its hard to count it as character development when the purpose of the show is to suppress identity. “Spy in the House of Love” trumps even MotS in its gripping plot and story advancement, only for the late-game standalone “Haunted” to kill the momentum.

Happily, things rebound with force with the season enders. Whedon’s shows have never lacked for strong season finales, but Jane Espenson’s “Briar Rose” is the first definitive argument for the potential greatness of Dollhouse as opposed to sixth and ninth’s episodes, which simply argued that the show actually deserved to stay on the air. At last, we met the Big Bad Alpha, an Active that went insane when he “composited” all of his prior imprints and slashed his way out of the building, including giving Saunders her scars. Sadly, his identity was revealed long before when Fox’s constant meddling resulted in a number of spoilers hitting the web; nevertheless, Espenson and Whedon structured the episode in a way that kept it completely pulse pounding.

It’s so good that even the mighty Tim Minear (the man behind every almost every great episode of Angel in the first three seasons) cannot match it, though I suspect he was hindered by the fact that Dollhouse has rested on the bubble of cancellation since the get-go. Thus, the first 40 minutes, in which Alpha imprints Echo with an imprint of his old Active partner (whose identity was rightly guessed by me and many others before we learned it) and attempts to “awaken” the person who drove him to his rebellion. Then it ends with a whimper that leaves the story open and thankfully doesn’t box the series in, but it also clearly sets up the possibility that these 12 episodes are all we’re going to get.

Taken as a self-contained product (which it happily isn’t), “Omega” contains the best and worst of what Dollhouse has given us so far: it’s got flashes of too-rare Whedon humor (seriously, where were the jokes for most of the season?), the suspense that defined its best episodes, and someone finally gets to the bottom line of the Dollhouse’s hypocrisy: “You can’t sign a contract to be a slave.” On the other hand, it displays the show’s shallow side (Sierra and November get imprinted as bounty hunters to track Alpha, then are never seen again); its clumsy – especially for Whedon shows – dialogue; and the fact that it never gets around to explaining the actual purpose of the Dollhouse. I imagine that’s something that Whedon wants to take entire arcs to explain, but it’s frustrating that he wants us to just buy such an organization. And at the end, as with all things in the Dollhouse, all epiphanies are seemingly wiped away in an instant, leaving us wondering "What was the point of it all?"

At this stage, I like Dollhouse more for what it can be that what it is, which is a silly reason to like something I’ll grant you. Even a show that centers around a lack of identity must give us a reason to care about its characters, through its direction if not its lines. Dollhouse, to put it mildly, fails to do this; at this stage the only character I give a toss about is Saunders, which is almost entirely attributable to Amy Acker, who buoys the scarce writing devoted to the character with mystery and humanity. Characters like Ballard, DeWitt, Topher and Boyd should have been fleshed out, and only Ballard and DeWitt got any development at all. Combined with its skin-deep analysis of a handful of its many potential themes, it makes Dollhouse a show that you really have to will yourself to like rather than grabbing you with its interesting characters and its unique universe.

Still, when Dollhouse hit its stride, I found myself glued to the screen in a way I haven’t been since The Wire. It’s a far cry from classic Whedon, but he’s never tried something so ambitious. I attribute its lack of character development and its weak first half to Fox; remember, Firefly was nothing but character development, to the point that main plots really only served to advance its characters and its universe. It could have been Whedon’s magnum opus, but Fox canned it. Therefore, I believe that Dollhouse is Whedon playing to Fox’s M.O., though not in a subversive but desperate manner. On the other hand, a part of me believes that Joss made the show to challenge himself: I mean, who does character growth better? By forcibly removing character evolution, he's thrust himself into a bold, new territory that could reap big rewards.

Nevertheless, that does not excuse him for letting the show stumble along for weeks without even attempting to find a voice and the rest of the time laying the foundations that should have been established after a few episodes. The biggest mistake fans can make is to lay the blame solely at Fox's feet (somewhat hypocritical coming from the guy who devoted space in each of his first three paragraphs to disparage them, I know). The simple truth of it is: Joss himself admitted he wasn't sure how to proceed at first, and he acknowledged that he failed to tie in the plots of the early episodes into the larger story. I've seen some fans give it a pass, saying, "Well, Buffy was shaky its first season, too." But that notion ignores the glaring fact that Buffy was Joss' first foray into television, before he found the writers best suited to his vision and his style. This is his fourth series; by now he's accumulated some of the finest writing talent around, most of whom put in their best work with Whedon. I will agree with the comparison, however, when you consider that, like Buffy, Whedon and co. have a show with more potential than they perhaps realize at the moment, and only when left to their own devices and allowed to stretch the boundaries will the show grow.

As of this writing, I don’t know whether or not Dollhouse will come back for a second season, but, if we get lucky, I can only hope that someone lights a fire under Joss’ ass that forces him to build on these last few episodes and to carve a television program truly worthy of his name. Fingers crossed, everyone. [Ed: It is coming back! Huzzah!]

Angel — Season 5

**Warning- contains spoilers**

Well, here we are: the end of "Angel." After suffering through the fourth season the first time I could barely bring myself to even care about the show anymore. But once I start something I have to finish it, so I popped it these discs expecting to either feel totally indifferent or to somehow get even angrier at the series that had rewarded me so often only to take so much away in only one arc. Instead, I was treated to the single best season of TV I've ever watched, one that —though not without weak moments— contained no weak episodes. It took the characters into territory far darker than they had ever gone before, but also featured many of the funniest moments of Whedonverse television. On a second viewing, I amazingly like it even more.

The writers had a lot of pressure on them this season. After the operatic bombast of the fourth season, "Angel" enjoyed great ratings but still couldn't bring in enough advertising money to pay for its hefty budget. So, when the Fang Gang moved to Wolfram & Hart, they also went back to basics. On a related note, WB execs told the writers to focus more on standalone episodes after the lengthy, dense arcs of the past two seasons. Normally, forcing shows to abandon the formulas that won them their fanbases leads to a big downturn in quality, which allows the studio to cancel the show guilt free, but "Angel" excels even in these early episodes.

The season opens with "Conviction," which shows our heroes adjusting to their new jobs at Wolfram & Hart, with Angel unable to go out and help the helpless without a squad of protectors around him. The main plot of the episode (a violent gangster threatens to unleash a virus on L.A. if Wolfram & Hart fails to convict him) is fairly incidental, but it brings about two major changes: 1) Gunn, feeling useless in this new, more elite world, undergoes a procedure that fills his head with full knowledge of the law and 2) Spike materializes in Angel's office.

The former is an interesting development into a late-bloomer of a character. Gunn mainly served to move forward others (chiefly Wesley) up until the fourth season, when he killed Fred's evil professor in order for her to keep her innocence. The resultant emotions over the event destroyed their relationship, and we really got a deep look into Gunn's masked sensitivity. Here, we get to see a man deathly afraid of being left behind, perhaps because it took so long for his character to go somewhere in the first place. His decision would have terrible repercussions down the line and would make him more central to the plot than ever before.

This won't end well, my little droogies.

But nothing compares to Spike’s appearance. Somehow, his essence was contained in the amulet that he used to destroy the Hellmouth in Buffy’s series finale, and that same amulet makes it way to Angel before Spike pops out as some sort of incorporeal ghosty type thing. Spike’s reappearance could have so easily undone his emotional end in “Chosen” (and some believe it did), but his instant rival siblings/old married couple rapport with Angel is a total riot, and he manages to grow just a little bit more throughout the season.

The best thing they could have possibly done.

I’d rather not dwell on the standalones since they all have their various strengths and weaknesses. “Life of the Party” is a terrifically funny Halloween episode, while “The Cautionary Tale of Numero Cinco” has such an absurd concept that I get a kick of out no matter how empty it is. The best of the first half of the season is unquestionably “Destiny,” in which Angel and a freshly corporealized Spike do battle to determine who has the rightful claim to the Shanshu prophecy. Not only does it contain the best fight sequence in the show by far, it gets deeper into the Spike/Angel relationship than we’ve ever seen. The worst of these episodes by default would have to be “Soul Purpose,” which is actually a great episode but features an atrocious dream sequence in which Angel hallucinates that he “loses” Buffy to Spike. This isn’t bad at all, but factor in the obvious stunt double to make up for SMG’s absence and the non-sequitur lines ripped from the old season 3 episode “The Prom” are the absolute worst. It is the only moment of the season that really grates me.

The first half was strong enough in a Season 1 kind of way, but starting at about the halfway mark, Whedon and co. knew the show’s days were numbered, and they went all out. “You’re Welcome” brings back Cordelia for only one painfully brief episode, but it restores her character back to the person we came to love. The final scene is one of those simple, heartbreaking moments that brings you tears every time.

Apart from a slight stumble in execution in the interesting “Why We Fight,” season 5 hits the throttle. First up is the single funniest, most absurdly brilliant episode Joss Whedon has ever penned: “Smile Time.” A story of the seedy side of the show business, the emptiness of TV and how it enslaves our children, and puppets, “Smile Time” alone should have guaranteed “Angel” another season.

Good.

Better.

I came.

At the end of the episode Wesley finally gets with Fred, and we all should have known that would spell trouble. Enter “A Hole in the World,” quite possibly the most depressing hour of TV Whedon’s ever penned. Yes, even above “The Body.” When Whedon kills his characters, he tends to do so in the most abrupt ways, but when he does allow for melodrama, he does so in inventive ways. After Fred is infected with a mysterious pathogen when she opens a coffin, she spends the entire episode slowly dying. However, instead of her spouting out tearful monologues, she has more subdued (and therefore more affecting) moments with Wesley while the rest of the Fang Gang desperately searches for a cure. Those final scenes where Angel and Spike realize that they can do nothing and Fred’s final, innocent last line will tear out your heart and puree it in front of you.

Fred’s death ushers in an amazing new character: Illyria. An ancient demon resurrected in Fred’s body, Illyria is disgusted to even have to reside in such an unworthy “shell” and even more repulsed that she is surrounded by everyone’s grief over losing Fred. Their grief is only more compounded with the knowledge that Illyria’s resurrection not only killed Fred but also destroyed her soul. It’s a testament to the writing that this revelation devastated me, that I was so into the show that even thinking about it purely on its surface, supernatural level could affect me.

Amy Acker didn't win an Emmy for this. Emmys mean nothing.

The end run of “Angel” is stronger than any other run in the Buffyverse: above the original Angelus arc., above Buffy’s third and fifth season, above the beige Angel arc. Wesley turns into a pathetic wretch who clings to Illyria as his only link to the only thing he ever loved on this planet, and his feelings seem to bring out latent remnants of Fred in a clearly vexed Illyria. Wesley’s not the only one who suddenly has nothing to lose. Angel, fed up with sitting by, plans a last-ditch attack on Wolfram & Hart, leading to the epic two-part finale.

In “Power Play,” we cannot be sure that Angel has truly snapped over his grief for Fred and has turned evil. He goes so dark that the Circle of the Black Thorn, the highest agents of the Senior Partners on Earth, invites him to join. When his friends confront him on his sudden change, he reveals his plan: gain entrance to the Circle in order to kill every member. This plays out over the final episode, “Not Fade Away.” The finest and truest series finale I’ve ever seen, NFA shows our heroes mount a large-scale attack on an unbeatable foe while still keeping to the central theme of the series: a daily struggle against evil as a means to redemption. The seedy depths that the characters stoop to (Lorne’s final act for the gang still turns my stomach because of what it means to him), the beautiful parting moment between Illyria and Wesley and that much debated final scene display everything that made the show great. If this is not my all-time favorite episode of TV I can’t tell you what is.

I’ve been trying to make these things more concise because let’s face it, no one reads this anyway and it’s never fun to surf through a big essay online. But I can’t help myself. If I went into even half the moments of this season that affected me deeply it would be four times as long. Apart from a few moments in a couple of episodes, I love every second of this. Even “The Girl In Question,” which I completely agree should have been moved earlier in the season (even though Buffy threw in a comic relief episode plenty of times in the middle of a dark arc), is so damn funny I don’t even mind that stupid stereotypical Italian Wolfram & Hart executive.

When you boil it down to its essence, Angel’s fifth season mixed the best of the solitary quality of Season 1 with the emotional impact of the big arc structure of the other three seasons. The fact that I have to resort to pointing out individual scenes to demonstrate any dip in quality is a testament to at the very least my undying love for it, if not the actual quality. “Angel” became my favorite show the instant I watched it (yeah, even including the fourth season), but even when I take a step back from it I can do nothing but shower this season with adulation.

Let's get to work.

Angel — Season 4

**warning contains spoilers**

You know the thing that made me love "Buffy" and "Angel" the most? It wasn't just the strong female characters, the emotional resonance, the relatable quality of even the most supernatural of characters, or the pop culture-laced wit; it was for a very simple reason- they were both just so damn good. Even the weakest episodes of each could outclass just about every other show on TV, and the writers managed to make even the lesser episodes worth watching.

After I ran through Season 3 for the first time, I was so insanely high on this show that it couldn't possibly let me down. In retrospect that season suffered from a great deal of empty tension and had a severe problem with episode consistency, but at the time it managed to gleefully misdirect from its problems and, apart from its terrible letdown of a finale, was one of my favorite seasons of either show. But nothing could prepare me for the shock of what was in store.

Season 4 starts things off by magnificently fixing everything that was wrong with the previous season's finale. "Tomorrow" had been chock full of interesting developments, but threw them together so sloppily that it played like the most generic episode of TV that Mutant Enemy had ever put out. "Deep Down" brings it back from the abyss (in some cases quite literally) by firmly establishing Wesley's new attitude, bringing back Angel from the briny deep, and laying out Connor's plan for all to see. It was the darkest episode since "Sleep Tight," if not season two's existential nightmare "Reprise."

Then we hit the skids almost immediately. "Ground State" introduces Gwen, a bizarre combination of the X-Men Rogue and Storm (anyone who touches her skin gets fried), who works as a expert thief. It's fun enough filler, but nothing of note happens other than setting Gwen up as a possible love interest for Angel. "The House Always Wins" is one of the all-time worst episodes of the series; it points out that gambling is risky and can ruin lives, all with metaphors about as subtle as the neon lights of the casinos. It could have been so interesting too; Lorne's dream had always been to perform at Vegas, and to see that dream so thoroughly perverted could have set up a killer character arc. Instead, he gets rescued and is exactly the same as he always was.

Things begin to get back on track with the superb episode "Spin the Bottle," a wholly irreverent standalone that came about simply because Joss wanted to see the old bumbling Wesley again. The result is the second funniest of the series (after "Smile Time") and one of the funniest in the Buffyverse.

"Spin the Bottle" marks the start of an incredible run that rivals anything Mutant Enemy's ever done. "Apocalypse Nowish" introduces the Beast, an unstoppable creature who brings with him all sorts of plagues. We sense immediately that he is not the brains in charge of the operation, however, which serves the story much better (remember how lame Adam was when left to his own thought-processes?).

Not half as sinister as the writers.

The best development of the Beast arc? The return of Angelus. Oh, it's been a long time coming indeed, and Boreanaz looks like he's been waiting for it too. Mix the Beast's rampage at Wolfram & Hart with the unleashing of the greatest villain in the Buffyverse and you've got a cocktail for success. Things couldn't get any better right? WRONG. Enter Faith, sprung from prison by Wesley to save Angel from turning permanently evil. Faith's reapperance cements the journey of her arc, proving that she, like Angel, has learned to live with her sins and to live a life of goodness not to redeem herself but because it's the right thing to do. Faith would go from here back to Sunnydale to make peace with "Buffy" in some of the better moments of that show's final season, but this is the true payoff of her character.

The Beast/Angelus arc is such a long, consistent arc that I got the feeling that "Angel" is on top of the world and that anywhere the story went from here was going to be epic. I was wrong Dead wrong. "Angel" goes from great to bad so fast it makes your head spin.

Thank Christ for Faith.

Signs of trouble were present even in the excellence of the middle arc. Connor, who was such an interesting character in the third season, is destroyed. Last season, he came back from Qu'or Toth after a few weeks suddenly a full-grown teenager brainwashed against his father by Holtz, who used Connor as his avenue for revenge; upon his return Connor adamantly hated Angel but retained his father's moral code. Even when he locked Angel in a crate and threw him into the ocean, you pitied him.

Not so in Season 4. Instead of the complex, tortured character who promised so much, the writers lock Vincent Kartheiser into playing Connor as a one-note, insufferably annoying bitch who pushes emo teenage angst so far into the red it leaves you begging for someone to hand him a razor and a copy of "The Virgin Suicides." After Angel proves beyond shadow of a doubt his love for his son no matter what he did, Connor hates him more than ever, just because. At every turn he tries to convince everyone to kill Angelus not because he's evil, but because he just doesn't like his dad.

Compounding Connor's descent is the utter destruction of Cordelia. Cordy's arc was certainly one of the more surprising of the show. She had started her journey at the very start of Buffy as a vain, stereotypical valley girl and matured into a more intelligent yet no less biting character by the time she left Sunnydale impoverished by her father's illegal business practices. When she arrived in Los Angeles, Cordy still had that crazy dream of becoming a star, but came into her own. She went from a bitch to a caring, almost motherly individual, and while her acension in the Season 3 finale was so insulting and stupid that it defies reason, it was a nice touch for her.

Then Cordelia returns, possessed by a higher power. She manipulates Connor into sleeping with her in order to impregnate her so the higher power can be born into a body of its own. She takes Angel's bottled soul to keep Angelus around. She stabs Lilah. Finally, when you couldn't possibly be any more outraged with the treatment of her character. Cordy gives birth to Jasmine and slips into a coma.

Even screencaps of this piss me off.

If the undercurrent ruination of two major characters wasn't bad enough, the Jasmine arc is enough to tip things over the edge into downright badness. It all starts with "Inside Out,"{ an episode that so fearlessly tackles a range of philosophical questions and features such great acting all around that it never hit me at first that it set up the worst development of this or any other show in the Whedonverse. Jasmine's appearance is the result of her tampering with all of the events of the show to make possible her birth; everything that moved the characters forward, led to emotional and thematic breakthroughs was all predestined. I must admit a bias against predestination; it is the philosophy that resulted when real logic collided with Bible logic, and I think it's the stupidest concept in the world. It also has no place in a show, because it strips events of their importance and resonance.

It also doesn't help that Jasmine is perhaps the worst major villain I have ever seen in a TV show. A goddess, she inspires tranquility in all who gaze upon her. Unless some of her blood mixes with yours, that is. If so, you look at her and see not a beautiful goddess but a rotting, maggot-infested corpse. I don't know why either. Oh, and Jasmine eats people, who consider it an honor to be feasted upon by her.

Eventually the Fang Gang all snap out of it and fight Jasmine and kill her fairly easily. Yet for some reason it takes them four episodes to do so. Four. Looooooooonnnnnnnnnnnggggggg. Episodes. I just watched this three days ago and I can't remember anything about this arc that would necessitate more than two episodes. Then again, I wish it had never happened at all. Part of me thinks that the writers used Jasmine as a placeholder for the writers, much as the Trio in Buffy's sixth season represented the more nitpicking fans.

But don't count out Tim Minear, who swoops in after an entire season away to write one last episode for the show he made so great. His season finale, "Home," is every bit as redeeming as "Restless" was for Buffy's own weak fourth season. Lilah returns as a ghost and deliciously turns Angel Investigations' victory on them; by killing Jasmine, they effectively ending the possibility for world peace. Ergo, the Senior Partners were so impressed that they offer Angel and co. the L.A. branch of Wolfram & Hart.

"Home" rights so many wrongs it looks like Minear kept tabs on everything that went wrong and found a way to twist almost all of it into a positive. Giving Angel the keys to Evil on Earth is just about the most interesting thing he could have done, and it makes the fight against Jasmine darkly ironic. The fact that Angel agrees on the condition that everyone's memory is erased so Connor can live with a normal family and have a happy life calls to mind the agonizing finale of the early classic "I Will Remember You," and it reinforces his heroism.

Despite this incredible end note and the promise it contains, Angel Season 4 is unbelievably frustrating and even moreso on a repeat viewing. It continues to push forward Wesley's arc, and it FINALLY develops Fred and Gunn and splits up their initially promising but ultimately banal relationship. However, Angel remains stagnant (apart from the re-emergence of Angelus) and the utter bungling of both Cordelia and Connor is unforgivable. The saddest thing about those two is that both get one episode's worth of attention in the fifth season ("You're Welcome" for Cordy and "Origin" for Connor), and both of those episodes fix just about all the problems that an entire season piled upon them, which tells me that all this could have been avoided. I understand that Charisma Carpenter's pregnancy threw the writers off a bit, but this was the best solution?

The operatic tone of the season is a bold new direction for the show, and the Beast arc still ranks among my favorites, and it's got enough to make the season worth owning. But this is the first and only season of Whedonverse TV that has not only failed to entertain me over the course of more than one episode but has actively put me off. I was reluctant to watch the final season after this, but thankfully the fifth season more than redeems the show and stands as the best season of TV that Mutant Enemy has ever produced.