Angel: Reprise (2.15)

Up to this point, Wolfram & Hart had been depicted as pretty darn evil. Their brand of evilness has always been written with a neat streak of black comedy, but nonetheless they've been this show's biggest of big bads, so calculating and nasty that you don't give a damn when Angel allowed them to get slaughtered a couple of weeks back. But in just one scene in Reprise, our collective opinion of Wolfram & Hart is radically altered. I'm talking, of course, about Angel's elevator ride down to hell in which Holland explains to him that W&H isn't a company with walls and offices that can be easily taken down, its existence has always been connected with man's natural desire to be cruel and evil, W&H a 'being' that has always been around and always will be around, thriving off the worse inclinations of humanity. It's beautifully profound, and successfully subverts our expectations once again. Everything we have here -- this is hell, not some imaginary place full of fire and brimstone. And it can't be taken down with an axe or an explosion or a mass murder of a bunch of lawyers. It's a chilling moment.

Reprise is all about the wheels flying off. Each character experiences something soul-destroying and potentially dangerous, and all we can do is hope that somehow things will turn around again in good time. Darla's involvement in the magic-glove hoodoo is pretty ancillary, but her appearance turns out to be far more challenging than at first presumed. Angel sleeping with her marks his rock bottom, the moment when he feels so low and beaten down that he has dangerous, angry sex with a wingnut. Then there's that cliffhanger, which looks like Angelus has once again returned. As if the world of Angel Investigations couldn't get any worse than it already is...

The supporting cast also experiences a truckload of misery. Wesley is dumped by Virginia, who decides that she can't be with somebody whose professional life is so threatening and dangerous. I liked Virginia a lot, and it's unfortunate she got written out so quickly. Then again, she did dump the guy literally one or two days after he was shot, which is... mean timing. And poor Wesley. That guy's just going to suffer and suffer.

Kate, too, is hitting rock bottom. I feel for her, ridiculed by her superiors, something made even more glaring when they bring up how noble and strong a police officer her father was. I hated Elisabeth Rohm's 'drunken phone call' acting, but Kate's story this season has been really impressive. She's had a lot more depth given to her by the writers compared to her shallow characterization last year.

Reprise is a remarkable hour, the show once again switching things up and hitting the ground running. This season has just been a barrage of plot twists and shockers, all of which have redefined everything we once thought we knew about Angel as a series. Damn. A+

Credits
Guest stars Elisabeth Rohm (Kate Lockley); Christian Kane (Lindsey McDonald); Andy Hallett (Lorne); Stephanie Romanov (Lilah Morgan); Sam Anderson (Holland Manners); Brigid Brannagh (Virginia Bryce); Thomas Kopache (Denver); Gerry Becker (Nathan Reed); Julie Benz (Darla)
Writer Tim Minear Director James Whitmore, Jr.