Angel [Spoilers]
Feb. 13th, 2003 11:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sinanjuNo spoiler spaces. The subject line is all the warning you get.
"Oh my God--you killed Lilah! You bitch!"
So--Cordelia is evil. Or something that looks and sounds but only sort of acts like Cordelia is evil. Or it's really Cordelia but she's possessed or enchanted or...something.
I am unimpressed, and I've finally figured out why.
Cordelia ascended to the higher realms last season. That may or may not have been a scam on her by Skip. But she disappeared. Then we got the amusing "God, I am _so_ bored" cameo at the end of an episode. Then we got the "What are you, mental? Get me out of here!" episode. And the ep where she watched Angel and company's adventure in Vegas. With the exception of the Vegas ep (where she _may_ have acted to aid Angel), her appearances were camoes unrelated to the events of the episode in question--just little teasers to let us know that she wasn't happy with her new gig.
Then the gang gets back from Vegas to find AmnesiaCordy standing in the hotel lobby. Only it turns out not to be our Cordy. it's an evil Cordy, or possessed Cordy or something. But the cameos of the _real_ Cordelia cease, helping to present the illusion that Cordelia is no longer in the Higher Realms (tm). But since those scenes existed solely for us, the viewers, and had no effect on anyone or anything else in the show, it feels like a cheat when we later discover that the Cordy who returned to Angel isn't really her.
It could have been worse, of course. We could have seen Cordelia stab Lilah to death and mutter her "That's why I let him out, you stupid bitch" line...then had the camera that pull-back-to-orbit trick and show us RealCordy (tm) in the clouds looking shocked and appalled. They didn't go quite that far, but almost.
I think this is part and parcel of a trend (first mentioned on the Television Without Pity website) at ME of writing for Great Moments! instead of writing great stories. The glacial pace of action on Buffy (not so much on Angel, but there are hints of it there too) comes down to structuring episodes so that we get a ShockingMoment! or a HorrifyingMoment! at the end of the episode. Of course, this means that they have to vamp til the end of the episode, lest the shocking moment come too soon.
If they wrote the "Angelus kills Jenny Calender" scene today, she would undoubtedly die at the very end of the episode, leaving us with a cliffhanger. When they wrote it then, she died much earlier in the episode, still giving time for Giles to have a horrible experience upon finding her body in his bed, _and_ for him to go after Angel in a fit of grief and rage, _and_ for Buffy to figure out what he was going to do and go save him. Does anyone here think they could do that in less than three episodes nowadays?
I would have very much preferred to see Cordelia continue her end-of-ep commentaries if (and it's an important if) they counterpointed the actions of EvilCordy (tm) back in L.A. When Faith went bad, they didn't keep it a secret from the viewers--we _knew_ she was working for the Mayor even while she continued to pretend to work with the Scooby Gang.
That set up dramatic tension...as opposed to setting up endless debate and confusion as to what the hell was wrong with Cordelia that we've had with the current story. Is she behaving out-of-character because of brain damage? Does she have ulterior motives? Is it just lousy continuity and bad writing? If we'd _known_ that Cordelia wasn't Cordelia, we would at least have had some clue that ME knew what the hell they were doing and that it wasn't just a major brain cramp on the part of the writers and producers. We'd have been on pins and needles waiting for her to do something awful.
Instead of "Why the hell did she sleep with Connor?" we'd have known why, and speculated about her evil purpose instead of about whether the character and/or the writers were idiots. Talking Angel into becoming Angelus becomes a clever ploy, not an ill-considered attempt at just the opposite. Instead of "did she _mean_ to do that?" we wonder "WHY did she want him to become Angelus?" Her actions become meaningful rather than a source of constant discontent with seemingly pointless and out-of-character behaviors.
As it stands now, we've had a Big Revelation (tm) that Cordelia is eeeevil, which might be shocking to some but doesn't begin to make up for months of wondering if the IQs at ME had just dropped sharply over the last couple of years.
"Oh my God--you killed Lilah! You bitch!"
So--Cordelia is evil. Or something that looks and sounds but only sort of acts like Cordelia is evil. Or it's really Cordelia but she's possessed or enchanted or...something.
I am unimpressed, and I've finally figured out why.
Cordelia ascended to the higher realms last season. That may or may not have been a scam on her by Skip. But she disappeared. Then we got the amusing "God, I am _so_ bored" cameo at the end of an episode. Then we got the "What are you, mental? Get me out of here!" episode. And the ep where she watched Angel and company's adventure in Vegas. With the exception of the Vegas ep (where she _may_ have acted to aid Angel), her appearances were camoes unrelated to the events of the episode in question--just little teasers to let us know that she wasn't happy with her new gig.
Then the gang gets back from Vegas to find AmnesiaCordy standing in the hotel lobby. Only it turns out not to be our Cordy. it's an evil Cordy, or possessed Cordy or something. But the cameos of the _real_ Cordelia cease, helping to present the illusion that Cordelia is no longer in the Higher Realms (tm). But since those scenes existed solely for us, the viewers, and had no effect on anyone or anything else in the show, it feels like a cheat when we later discover that the Cordy who returned to Angel isn't really her.
It could have been worse, of course. We could have seen Cordelia stab Lilah to death and mutter her "That's why I let him out, you stupid bitch" line...then had the camera that pull-back-to-orbit trick and show us RealCordy (tm) in the clouds looking shocked and appalled. They didn't go quite that far, but almost.
I think this is part and parcel of a trend (first mentioned on the Television Without Pity website) at ME of writing for Great Moments! instead of writing great stories. The glacial pace of action on Buffy (not so much on Angel, but there are hints of it there too) comes down to structuring episodes so that we get a ShockingMoment! or a HorrifyingMoment! at the end of the episode. Of course, this means that they have to vamp til the end of the episode, lest the shocking moment come too soon.
If they wrote the "Angelus kills Jenny Calender" scene today, she would undoubtedly die at the very end of the episode, leaving us with a cliffhanger. When they wrote it then, she died much earlier in the episode, still giving time for Giles to have a horrible experience upon finding her body in his bed, _and_ for him to go after Angel in a fit of grief and rage, _and_ for Buffy to figure out what he was going to do and go save him. Does anyone here think they could do that in less than three episodes nowadays?
I would have very much preferred to see Cordelia continue her end-of-ep commentaries if (and it's an important if) they counterpointed the actions of EvilCordy (tm) back in L.A. When Faith went bad, they didn't keep it a secret from the viewers--we _knew_ she was working for the Mayor even while she continued to pretend to work with the Scooby Gang.
That set up dramatic tension...as opposed to setting up endless debate and confusion as to what the hell was wrong with Cordelia that we've had with the current story. Is she behaving out-of-character because of brain damage? Does she have ulterior motives? Is it just lousy continuity and bad writing? If we'd _known_ that Cordelia wasn't Cordelia, we would at least have had some clue that ME knew what the hell they were doing and that it wasn't just a major brain cramp on the part of the writers and producers. We'd have been on pins and needles waiting for her to do something awful.
Instead of "Why the hell did she sleep with Connor?" we'd have known why, and speculated about her evil purpose instead of about whether the character and/or the writers were idiots. Talking Angel into becoming Angelus becomes a clever ploy, not an ill-considered attempt at just the opposite. Instead of "did she _mean_ to do that?" we wonder "WHY did she want him to become Angelus?" Her actions become meaningful rather than a source of constant discontent with seemingly pointless and out-of-character behaviors.
As it stands now, we've had a Big Revelation (tm) that Cordelia is eeeevil, which might be shocking to some but doesn't begin to make up for months of wondering if the IQs at ME had just dropped sharply over the last couple of years.