Angel S3-04: The Short Review

'Carpe Noctem'

Written by Scott Murphy

Directed by James A. Contner

"Oh, I know what I’m getting into. You’re the one who doesn’t seem to know what you had. As far as I can tell, you were the world’s worst vampire. Vampires don’t help people, you moron! They kill ‘em. Here, let me show you" - Marcus.

'Carpe Noctem' is a step or two down from the other episodes so far this season, but it's not really a bad episode. It is, however, slightly frustrating to review, because it's also not particularly good - indeed, it's not really much of anything. It is a filler comedy episode - nothing more, nothing less.

Not that this is necessarily a bad thing; comedy episodes have their place, and after three episodes of fairly heavy going, this is as good a place as any. And it is funny; it's nice to see David Boreanaz play against type (every so often, at least…), because he does it with such enthusiasm, and because he seems to have developed a real knack for comic timing ("So I'm a…well, obviously", to pick one laugh-out-loud line; it's hardly an original joke for the show, but Boreanaz makes it work).

The problem, I think, is that I've come to expect more from even the light-hearted episodes of Angel. I wasn't the biggest fan of 'Guise Will Be Guise', but it was clever, and gave us new insight into both Wesley and Angel. Similarly, 'Disharmony' dealt with the reconciliation of Angel and the others, and with problems of betrayal and forgiveness - the Harmony/Cordelia situation was contrasted effectively with the Angel/Darla situation. Both, however, were still extremely entertaining episodes. Here, though, things just feel a little too lightweight, and I can't help thinking that the serious points were there for the making. For example, there is surely a part of Angel - even in his enlightened post-Epiphany state - that would love to be human again, and one of the most important things about being human is coming to terms with mortality. It seems like something of a missed opportunity, therefore, not to look in more depth at Angel's reaction to being confronted with this reality. That said, my guess would be that we were supposed to get our insight into Angel's character by comparison with Marcus in Angel's body - in effect, looking at what Angel isn't to get a sense of what he is. If that was the aim, however, I think it's only really the people who started watching at the start of this series that will have learnt anything new or interesting.

To be honest, for me most of the interest in this episode is in the little advancements to the ongoing story, rather than in the A-plot. We get some more on the new dynamic at Wolfram and Hart; the rivalry between Gavin and Lilah is heating up, and it's fun watching them undercut each other's efforts. I also like Gavin's approach to dealing with Angel; his "he's the rat and we're the maze" philosophy could be extremely interesting. Then there's more development for Fred, who has to start getting over her crush on Angel. I have to say, as much as I'm against the idea of romance on Angel, this issue has been played just right, because it's not romance for the sake of it. The fact that Fred would have a crush on Angel makes perfect sense, and it gives us a way into her character; at the episode's close, for instance, she may not have moved on completely, but she's certainly mature enough to realise when she's chasing a hopeless cause, and to deal with that.

Still, a couple of nice Fred moments do not a great episode make. Maybe I'm just expecting too much; after all, there are plenty worse ways to spend an hour than watching 'Carpe Noctem', and there's nothing really wrong with it. I'm going to hope for more next week, though.