In the immortal words of Mahatma Gandhi:

[yendi]

"Jesus motherfucking Christ, it's cold outside."

Yep. Cold I don't mind that much. Windy I can handle. Cold and windy, however, sucks ass. Especially in a city far from any tall buildings. In NYC or Chicago, the wind may be fierce, but the buildings make it much easier to handle. Here, it's nothing but hills and plains, with a few shacks if you're in a civilized part of town. Nothing to keep the freezing wind out.

Anyway, last night was a blast -- I caught a ride with jet_li_wannabe to game night at chelona and voltbang's, and learned how to play Tigris and Euphrates, which is just an incredible game, and one I really really want to play again. It's a diceless strategy game, and one in which (unless you've got amazing memorization skills) it is just about impossible to know who's winning until the end. A fun time was had by all, or at least by me. And for the record, blueingenue won. We all had lots of fun, and then headed upstairs to help the fluffy gamers with Trivial Pursuit.

Got home, and watched Angel on the Tivo.



So, overall, I really liked this episode. I loved the false twist with Gavin -- make us think that they were pulling an annoying "oh, he's not really dead," before bringing on the zombie plotline.

And I loved how they handled zombies -- slow, basically incompetent, more of a nuisance. Again, they made us feel like there was going to be more of a threat than there was, but in a well-done manner.

Of course, the next question is, why did they all become zombies? I mean, was it because the Big Bad killed them? For the most part, he didn't do anything that looked like he was "infecting" them in any way (Gavin just had his neck broken, for instance). I doubt it was because they were W&R employees -- we've seen plenty of them die. Was it something in the building -- part of the lockdown procedure, maybe? Will we ever know?

A few other thoughts -- who from W&R is alive? Obviously, Lilah is. The Senior Partners are extradimensional, so some of them may well be around. And I can't imagine that some folks didn't manage to escape. The escape passage was known to people as low as on Gavin's level, and since there were two staircases, there's no reason to believe that the Big Bad could have gotten everyone. So is the firm out of the picture, or just licking their wounds?

And if the Big Bad wasn't really after Conner, but rather after the power of the Demon What Walks Like a Brat, what's its ultimate goal? Is it going to head out of the dimension to kill the senior partners or maybe threaten Pylea ("Numfar, do the dance of Oh Shit!")?

Notice that I'm not really talking about the Conner/Cordy/Angel triangle. Because it's stupid and soap-operaish. Ditto the Fred/Wes/Gunn stuff. They just need to kill off Cordy and Wes (and maybe Conner), and rein in the crappy b-plots.

And has anyone really talked about the whole fire-from-the-sky thing? I mean, is it still going on? Has the LA Times noticed anything? Etc?

Anyway, plot holes aside, it was a fun episode. And with the imminent return of Gwen and Faith, the Chicks in Leather Pants quotient on the show is about to go way up, which (of course), only increases the fun factor.

I can't wait to read Strega's recap at TWoP.

Comments

[auryn29a.livejournal.com]

My only problem with the zombie thing is that didn't they establish in Buffy that zombies really don't crave human flesh? It's just one of those myths? Oh well.

I think the Big Bad was just going for more evil power. Like Willow sucking all the black magic books last season. I think the fire rain was just a small shower. It stopped after a while.

Ditto on the triangles. That's the most annoying part of the show.

Who's Gwen? Wait...was she the metahuman thief?

[blueingenue.livejournal.com]

The windiest part of Chicago is right around the Sears Tower, where all the wind gets funneled through a corridor of steel and glass at high velocity. And the shadow of the buildings put you in the cold shade, too. Brrrr!

[piratejenny.livejournal.com]

Buildings make the wind/cold much easier to handle??? You obviously haven't experienced the wind tunnel effect, which is very much at work at Hudson/Houston. Where I work. Coldest corner in the damn city. Windiest too.

The fire raining from the sky was on the news Fred was listening to.

[cissa.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm gonna miss Gavin. I enjoyed him. Going after Angel et al. using zoning??? That's thinking outside the box!

We saw Gavin recently on another show-- 24? Anyway both of us were going, "What?? What's an evil Wolfram & Hart lawyer doing there?" And then we started speculating. Fun!

[yendi]

Who's Gwen? Wait...was she the metahuman thief?

The yummy metahuman thief, to be exact. Even if she can't really act all that well. :-)

[yendi]

I didn't end up anywhere near there, I guess. I figured that the Navy Pier would be as windy as it got. But then again, it wasn't quite this cold when I was there. :-)

[yendi]

Hell, I grew up with the wind tunnel effect. Maybe I can handle it because it's in my blood, or something.

[yendi]

He was also on Crusade!

[mycroftca.livejournal.com]

As what?

[cissa.livejournal.com]

And Charmed, where he was an evil martial arts-wizard type. Not as much of a stretch, that, as playing a good guy. (Or is he?? Actually, probably, yes; it was a really minor role in 24 or whatever.)

He was a pretty decent good guy, tho' I think Gavin is his best work. The Charmed one was really stupid, as one would expect. Scenery was chewed.

[toratigris.livejournal.com]

I totally agree with you about the two love triangles. The Wes/Fred/Gunn thing is old, lame, and needs to go. The Angel/Cordy/Connor thing doesn't even make sense and isn't remotely believable. She wants Connor to "have something real", so she has sex with him even though she doesn't love him, doesn't want to do it again, and could (and should) easily have predicted that it would hurt him quite a bit, given how he feels about her? WTF?

However, I totally disagree with your proposed solution. Personally, I think Wesley's tranformation and his affair with Lilah have been the most interesting things that have happened this season. Getting rid of him would be a big mistake, IMO. Getting rid of Fred would be my solution there.

And while Cordy's role this season has sucked, she was the best thing about previous seasons. As a rule, Angel (the character) bores me, the whole brooding, I must atone, I'm so tortured, see me suffer thing is a big eye-rolling snooze-fest. He is, in my opinion, at his best and most interesting when he and Cordy are playing off each other. Or when he's evil.

So IMO they shouldn't get rid of Cordy, they should take her back to being a little snarkier. That would improve the show immensely.

[toratigris.livejournal.com]

I'm going to miss Gavin, too. His and Lilah's competition was entertaining.

But I like Joss' willingness to kill off characters, so I'm not complaining too much. :)

[toratigris.livejournal.com]

My only problem with the zombie thing is that didn't they establish in Buffy that zombies really don't crave human flesh? It's just one of those myths?

Yup. They sure did -- Giles says that clearly. I wondered about that, too. Maybe these were special cannibal zombies. *g*

[yendi]

Maybe the zombies had heard the myths. :-)

[yendi]

Ditto. No one is safe. Ever. The only thing interesting about Gavin's death is that he wasn't happy before he died, and his death didn't make anyone on the show sad or angry, a Joss rarity. :-)

[yendi]

True about Wesley. Although he still starting acting like a brat as soon as he was in the room with Fred. But I love his darker side now.

Cordy's just been annoying me this year. But yeah, she's been interesting in previous seasons, when she wasn't just Little Miss Nice (who also gives teenagers pity fucks). She needs some more shallowness.

Out of curiosity, have you read any of the spoilers for later this season?