Angel S2-05: The Short Review

'Dear Boy'

Written and Directed by David Greenwalt

As the first major arc episode of the season, 'Dear Boy' is something of a disappointment. Whilst it all moves along at a good pace, and there are some fantastic individual scenes - enough to guarantee it a high rating from me, at least - it is also flawed. When all is said and done, though, the overall impression is one of treading water, and it's hard to work out exactly what Wolfram and Hart hoped to achieve with this scheme.

The obvious interpretation - that they hoped to separate Angel from the A-team by way of a frame job - is a possibility, but not entirely convincing. Without giving anything away, we may be intended to take the fact that they change tactics somewhat in later episodes as a consequence of this failure; their realisation that they cannot hope to drive a wedge between Angel and his team via the use of such blunt measures. However, I find it hard to believe that they ever seriously thought such an elaborate and short-sighted scheme could ever succeed, and the later episodes themselves seem slightly at odds with such an interpretation. It's interesting to note that the last time we saw Darla as a vampire, in the S1 'Buffy' episode 'Angel', she attempted a similar frame. Given that that episode, too, was written by David Greenwalt, it's tempting to speculate that the plot is a deliberate thematic reference, perhaps intended to illustrate how different Angel and Darla's situations are now than they were then - she is a pawn, he has friends who will stand up for him.

More generally, this episode sees the first real revelations about the nature of Wolfram and Hart's ultimate goal. Crucially, it seems that Darla has been kept in the dark - and since our favourite evil lawyers seem to operate on a strictly need-to-know basis, it makes me very suspicious of Lindsey's apparent confidence that he knows what's going on. Apart from anything else, Angel is also now warned that they may be trying to turn him dark; hardly ideal conditions in which to experience a moment of true happiness. Wolfram and Hart are succeeding in one way, though: Despite the fact that the A-team stood up for him this time around, they are becoming increasingly isolated from their boss. It's notable that they have to seek him out at the end of the episode to ask him how things went; he hasn't filled them in or asked their advice. And when Cordelia tries to talk to him earlier in the episode, she gives up at the first sign of irritation from Angel ('Address, now'). Even Gunn's respect for Angel is a little dented by his distracted demeanour in the initial battle, and by the revelation that he can turn evil.

As I mentioned above, there are many individual moments to enjoy in this episode. Kate, for example, makes a welcome return, although her downward slide shows no signs of stopping just yet. The whole episode looks fantastic; the water tank, in particular, is a stunning set, and the latter scenes there between Darla and Angel fairly crackle with tension. Julie Benz delivers her lines wonderfully ('Isn't that against your cub scout code?' and 'She was just new' being my favourites), and there's a definite sense of the history between the two characters under the surface, unexplored. Drusilla was nicely reintroduced by way of the flashbacks - and for almost the first time, I say: More of those, please. I want to see the histroy of our famous four in more detail (yes, wigs, accents and all). I could have done without the karaoke, but at least it allowed another cameo by everyone's favourite lounge lizard - and gave us direct confirmation of the fact that Angel is walking down a misguided path.

Overall, 'Dear Boy' (naff ending aside) is a more than adequate launching pad for the rest of the arc; but I do find myself wondering if I'm missing some key point that's intended to make sense of the events of the past three weeks. How does it all fit into the larger design that Wolfram and Hart are surely advancing?