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And here's the worst episode of Season 2 IMO, but it gets better after this fortunately, since after this, there's no episode in this Season that I think is bad. 2x14 was also decent IMO, due to Anne. Rest, they are either amazing, or great, or just good, and of course hilarious too once we look beyond 2x16.
Guest: Thanks for the review and makes sense on the clone's personality.
Agent N: Thanks for the review and yup. Also, look, I get it, Steve's ending sucked, it was horrifying, but you rant about it and how much Steve in Endgame sucks too much. Don't want to sound like a dick, but at some point, you got to let go, buddy. And the guy you said is 'copying' my MCU watch-it fic took my permission, okay? Okay.
Hank Jones: Okay, for the Merl thing I admit I gave Merl too much leeway, which I won't repeat, but rest of what you said is a lot more absurd than me giving Merl leeway. You act like Angel's plan always was to give Anne the money, it wasn't. It was only to embarrass W&H, he got the money back because he got LUCKY that Boone returned to lay it on the line, he looked surprised when Boone came back. Plus, they had to fight too, he'd have lost the money again if Boone lost. Unless Angel had some vision of the future off-screen that Boone would return with the money and lose to him in the fight, your argument's laughable. And because W&H involved Anne, Angel should too? Sure Angel is one of their biggest priorities, if not biggest, but he's not their only priority either. Them involving Anne had nothing to do with Angel, that was its own thing, Angel just forced his way into it due to his vendetta. Maybe watch the episode properly, ya know?
Chapter 44- Happy Anniversary
"Boring, huh", Buffy muttered.
"Yeah, quite boring", Dawn said with a nod.
"Let's watch", Buffy shrugged as she started the recording.
At Hyperion, Angel stepped to the glass doors leading to the balcony and looked out at the city lights while Cordelia and Wesley were stacking strewn papers in their new office, saying now they'll have to do 'Angel Investigations' without Angel, Cordelia assuring they'll have steady business, only to hit her head on a planter on the ceiling and commented this didn't symbolize a bright future.
"It doesn't", Harris said in a grim tone, knowing how bad it was going to get for Cordelia in the future.
The past people noted his tone but didn't prod further.
Gunn arrived, saying the flyers had been put on, and Cordelia decided the calls could come now, but Gunn said there was no dial tone, so Wesley started checking the wires and eventually found it but all lights went out, Gunn sarcastically commenting he was glad to have met them, because it was entertaining.
"Please tell me their business works", Buffy begged.
"After some mishaps, it does", Rosenberg assured and she sighed in relief.
Angel lay on the bed but awoke on hearing someone singing 'The Star-Spangled Banner' downstairs, and walked down to see Lorne in the lobby, and after some chat, Lorne revealed the world was going to end the next night.
That horrified the past people.
"World's gonna end?" Xander asked.
"Kind of", Maclay said with a nod.
"How's it boring then?" Dawnster asked. "I mean, world ending is horrifying, but it's never boring."
"It's boring because this is the lamest way to end the world I've ever seen", Harris said to her.
"Really?" Willow asked.
"Really", Summers said with a nod.
"At least Lorne entered with a nice song to grace the occasion", Giles commented, loving Lorne's singing, as usual.
Lorne then talked about the world ending before saying how the three people Angel had fired were good company, but Angel wanted him to get to the point, so Lorne started describing what had happened, a flashback showing it too, with a young human male who'd curly hair and glasses being shown. Lorne interrupted to criticize his new bartender, saying he was suffering since Ramone had left but Angel asked him to get to the point again, so Lorne said this guy had sung 'All By Myself', the flashback showing it too, and it had knocked him out literally, the guy having left when he had woken up. Lorne then said he'd looked into the guy's future and he had none beyond 10 next night, and neither did anyone else.
The past people were confused.
"What's he gonna do?" Willow asked.
"Just watch, we don't want to talk about it", Harris said.
Lorne said they needed to stop this guy as Angel asked why Lorne had come to him, to which he said Angel was a champion and the other champions were dead or out of town, and they ended up talking about the previous errands Lorne had sent Angel on, but Lorne said he'd sent Angel in good faith, plus the world was ending, and eventually they worked out that the guy just wanted to sing Karaoke and didn't know a thing about Lorne, so they could get a lead on him in a nearby Karaoke bar, Lorne adding if Angel wasn't too busy getting lawyers killed or setting girls on fire.
"Harsh, but not undeserved", Buffy said.
"Yeah, which sucks because I was starting to like him before this", Xander said.
"Once he stops being a dick, you'll like him again", Harris assured and Xander just nodded with a sigh.
In a college campus, the guy who was called Gene stood in front of a board, contemplating the equations he'd written while 2 other students called Val and Mike discussed him and his achievements outside, before Val came in, and they walked down the stairs, Gene explaining 'Entanglement' to her, and then started speaking of the theory of freezing time, with Gene explaining it to her before looking up to see a redhead enter, and it was Denise, his girlfriend.
"How did this guy manage to get a girlfriend?" Dawnster wondered.
"People are attracted to brains, you know?" Rosenberg told her. "Though she's gonna regret it."
"Freezing time", Giles said. "Is that truly possible?"
"Ask this guy", Summers said with a shrug.
Gene and Denise then talked, their one year anniversary coming up the next night, as they shared a quick kiss, Denise telling Gene not to work too late but Val knew he would.
"I'm guessing there's something very wrong with his work", Tara said.
"Yup, a lot is wrong", Maclay said with a nod.
Angel and Lorne entered a dingy bar, looking around as Lorne commented on the singing guy, then talked to the bartender who knew about Demons and Vampires, and eventually started talking about students, and then Angel and Lorne described the guy they were looking for, the bartender remembering him and saying he was manic depressant. Lorne asked him to sing 'For He's A Jolly Good Fellow' and he did a little, Lorne complimenting his voice while saying they had the right guy, and then asked about the student's university name.
"Well, that wasn't too hard", Xander said.
"Didn't Angel say they went to 17 bars first?" Willow reminded.
"Right", Xander nodded lamely.
"And the bartender knows of Demons, that made it easy", Dawn pointed out and they nodded.
At the university, Gene was still working on his equations, then entered some stuff on his laptop. He watched as his machine formed a field where the four emitted beams intersected. He watched the mercury droplet fall - through the field, turning the machine off, walking out the lab as a weird Demon came out from behind some barrels and said this man was the one. There was another next to him. The demon caused the crystal on top of his staff to glow red. The red glow shone on a part of Gene's equation and changed it.
The past people were surprised as Tara asked. "Now what's that gonna do?"
"Just watch", Rosenberg said, almost yawning.
In the new office, Cordelia was setting up candles, trying to lighten the mood, but failed so she sat down with Wesley and Gunn, all three depressed, then Virginia arrived with a gift basket and champagne bottle, Wesley kissing her as Virginia said money could cure all but boredom and food could cure even that, which is why she didn't live in reality, unlike them, and then finally revealed she'd found a rich client, explaining her friend Patricia had a Wainakay Demon harassing her family and the eldest son had been taken, but they'd get payment for helping, and finally Virginia decided to call Patty but Wesley told her they had no phone, Cordelia adding no light, and Gunn adding there was a funky smell, and they walked out as Virginia said she wasn't gonna say anything.
"So, their mood is better, right?" Buffy asked.
"Yeah, looks like it", Willow said.
"They have a job!" Dawnster said. "From a rich family."
"Yeah, that bit was the more exciting one here", Dawn said to them.
Next day, Gene entered his lab, then noticed the new equation and entered the changes into his laptop. He turned to watch as the mercury dropped into the field and was suspended in it.
That did awe the past people.
"He can freeze time", Xander popped up.
"With science, that's something!" Willow agreed.
"He must be a genius", Buffy realized.
"Yeah, he looked like one", Dawnster shrugged.
"Mad genius sounds more appropriate", Giles noted.
"Yeah, it does", Tara said. "So he's gonna accidentally almost freeze the whole world, right?"
"And the prize goes to", Summers muttered as all chuckled.
Gene happily ran out of the lab, past the Reynolds Library, which Angel and Lorne entered, and Angel asked how he learnt to drive. Lorne said he'd just learnt while driving Angel's car, and he needed to drive since Angel was huddled in his blanket, and then Angel told Lorne to say he was a school mascot.
"Guess I'm a better driver than him", Buffy muttered.
"NO!" The future people except Summers said, making both the Buffies groan.
Lorne pulled out a book to hide his face as Angel first talked to the person at the reception, and Lorne ducked behind the book to completely hide from a passing. Angel then looked for yearbooks, one of those Demons watching them both.
"Narrow save", Xander said about Lorne ducking under the book.
Denise and Val were talking as Gene stepped behind them, unnoticed, while Denise revealed to Val she was planning to break up with Gene, but it was their anniversary, so Val realized Denise would give him the sympathy bone first, and then break up with him. Denise said Gene was sweet but this kind of love didn't last. Gene turned around and walked back down the steps.
"Is he gonna freeze time because she's breaking up with him?" Buffy asked and got nods. "Oh my God! He's pathetic!"
"I know right? As pathetic as Tucker, who let out those hellhounds on the prom because the girl of his choice didn't go with him", Summers agreed with her.
"Now I'm wondering who is more pathetic out of these two", Xander commented.
"Yeah, that's got to be hard to figure out", Rosenberg agreed with a nod.
"Both suck equally", Willow said.
Angel and Lorne were looking through the yearbooks before Lorne finally found Gene, so Angel asked the guy at the desk about Gene, who called Gene their own Stephen Hawking, Angel introducing himself as 'Leonard Taubman' from the Taubman foundation, and they'd freed up new grant money which he'd trademark for Gene, and so the guy told him where to find Gene while noticing something behind Angel and asked what it was. Angel didn't turn around and assumed he was talking of Lorne so he called him a school mascot. Angel dropped onto the desk as one of the raccoon-eyed demons buried a strangely shaped ax in his back then turned to where Lorne was sitting.
"They want the world to end?" Tara asked.
"Yeah", Harris shrugged.
"But they live in too", Dawnster pointed out.
"Some people are suicidal", Maclay muttered. "Or just stupid."
Gene entered his lab, looking at a picture of himself and Dennis, then at the suspended droplets, saying he'd give her the kind of love that lasted.
"You're creepy", Dawnster said.
"Creepy, pathetic all in one, and a genius to top it all", Dawn said.
"Which makes this even worse", Buffy sighed.
The raccoon-eyed Lubber demon was trying to free his ax from the back of a computer monitor. Lorne stood and watched as it and Angel fought. Lorne said something in demon, then picked up a book and threw it. The Lubber demon leaned to the side and the book hit Angel, knocking him back onto the stairs as Lorne apologized. Angel ducked another hit with the ax then kicked the Lubber over the railing of the stairs. The lubber picked up a chair, said something to Angel in demon, then threw the chair at him. Angel batted the chair aside and watched the demon run off.
"A nerd who wants to freeze time and has Demons worshipping him", Xander muttered. "He's luckier than he thinks."
"But still pathetic", Willow said.
Lorne then explained to Angel this was a Lubber Demon and that he did not want them to stop the golden child, before explaining about Lubber Demons who were a fanatical sect who wanted a messiah to end human life, and then the two decided to go to Gene's lab to find out more. Gene was singing 'All By Myself' while setting up his lab equipment in his apartment complex.
"That doesn't look like the lab", Tara muttered.
"Looks like he moved his equipment to his home", Giles spoke for everyone. "Since that's where he would want to freeze time."
Angel and Lorne entered Gene's lab where Mike was examining what was left of his setup, and he was shocked by Lorne's appearance but they passed him off as a school mascot, then Mike explained the Time Paradox that Gene was working on. Gene continued setting his equipment up in his apartment as Mike explained to Angel and Lorne how the whole thing would work, and if the field was improperly contained it would spill out and freeze everything, and so Angel and Lorne wondered where Gene would take his equipment.
"Home", Buffy muttered. "Still not over how pathetic he is."
"Yeah, it's honestly offensive", Rosenberg agreed. "People like these give nerds a bad name everywhere."
Gene was lighting candles for a romantic dinner while Angel and Lorne drove down the street in Angel's convertible, Lorne calling Angel out for his recent behavior, saying his heart wasn't in it anymore, and even if it didn't beat, it still counted as part of him. Angel wanted him to shut up as Lorne continued. "I'm the Host. Have you met me? I never shut up. You pushed your friends away. You went from helping the helpless to hunting down the guilty. Blood vengeance is a luxury of the lesser beings. You're a champion, Angel. I mean - you were, at least."
"Go Lorne", Dawnster said happily.
"He's got it right, he summed it up perfectly", Buffy said. "Really hoping Angel listens."
"Don't hope", Summers told her and they groaned. "He will listen, but not from Lorne."
Lorne offered to help Angel get back on track, while Gene continued setting things up, and Angel finally told Lorne. "You want to know what my problem is? I'm screwed. That's my problem. I can't win. I'm trying to atone for a hundred years of unthinkable evil. News flash! I never can! Never going to be enough. Now I got Wolfram and Hart dogging me, it's too much! Two hundred highly intelligent law-school graduates working fulltime driving me crazy. Why the hell is everyone so surprised that it's working? But no, it's 'Angel, why you're so cranky?' 'Angel, you should lighten up. You should smile. You should wear a nice plaid.'" Lorne said. "Oh. Not this season, honey." Angel sighed. "Redemption. Darla had a shot at redemption. They took it from her. Now I have to hunt her down and kill her. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna kill her, and then I'm gonna burn that law firm to the ground. My crew - they couldn't handle that. That's good. It means that they're still human. It means their better off fired."
"Nice justification", Xander said sarcastically.
"You're wrong", Buffy said to Angel. "You can atone for it, if you get back on track and stop whatever this is you're doing."
"Exactly my thoughts", Dawn muttered.
"At least Lorne's not sugarcoating anything", Willow said with a smile.
Lorne said Angel had left them in the cold, to which he said it was a lot colder in here, and then suddenly they accidentally hit someone. Angel and Lorne got out to check on who they just hit, but when they turned the body over it turned out to have been a Lubber demon. Angel and Lorne straightened up to see more Lubber demons converge on them from all sides, carrying more of their strangely shaped axes. At Gene's place, Denise arrived as he wished her a happy anniversary.
"Only one of your life if the pathetic nerd isn't stopped", Dawnster said.
"They need to beat up his even more pathetic worshippers first", Buffy said with a groan.
Gunn pulled his ax out of a horned Demon lying in Patty's house, and was thanked by her dad before Wesley said the Demon was the killer but not the murderer, looking at the whole family as he explained the Demon was just a puppet acting under someone's control. Cordelia eyed a tray of hors d'oeuvres as Wesley said that there had been a scent of foxglove and hellebore when they'd first come, and it was to keep the Demon in rather than out, so it could carry out the murderer's plan. Wesley looked at the dad, saying it'd require a master Wizard, but the dad said he didn't do that anymore, so Wesley said they'd footprints in soft soil under the window outside the solarium, too small and webbed for the Demon, and both the Aunt and Dad said those were of Kevin and he'd told them.
"What's he doing? Trying to be Sherlock?" Giles asked.
"Just wait, best part of this one", Summers said with a smirk, knowing what was coming.
Wesley said Kevin had returned loudly for all to hear from seeing the shop girl, but he was impotent too, and was either covering for the real killer, or was, since with Derek dead the inheritance fell to him, but he didn't have the opportunity or intelligence to do this. Wesley then apologized for the impotent remark, adding that if Kevin had control of the money, someone would have control on him, and they could be his sister or mother, but only one person knew the secret, and had taken pain to hide muddy shoes, and only one person reeked or foxglove and hellebore, and the person was none other than Aunt Helen! The family gasped as Helen ran out but Cordelia stopped her. Gunn found it cool while Wesley said they just had to keep uncovering till getting the evidence.
"That was cool", Buffy said, the past people awed by his deduction skills.
"Yes, that was quite smart", Giles agreed. "Looks like he was Sherlock this time."
"Oh yeah, go Wes!" Dawnster cheered.
"You're right, this was the best part", Willow said to Summers.
"Now I wish the recording was about their investigation rather than the pathetic nerd", Xander muttered.
"Yup, looked so much more interesting", Tara said with a nod.
"Unfortunately, we have to focus on Angel, even when he's being a dick", Summers said with a sigh.
"At least you got to see the Sherlock moment", Rosenberg quipped.
Angel was fighting Lubber demons fast and furious, while Lorne stood on the sidelines, watching as if it was a boxing match. Two of the Lubbers decide to go for him but he let out a loud high note, causing them to drop their axes and cover their ears in pain as glass shattered, then he kicked one between the legs and hit the other across the chin, dropping them both, before going back to watching Angel.
"So he uses music as a weapon…..literally", Giles commented, surprised by that move.
"His singing has a lot of uses", Maclay told him.
Gene and Denise talked at his place while Angel knocked out another Lubber Demon. Lorne told him to hurry so Angel ran to his car and jumped on the driver seat. Denise picked up a rose on Gene's bed, finding it sweet before she started stripping for sex, Angel making his way as Denise and Gene were kissing under his bedsheets, Gene saying 'I love you' to her. Angel's car then pulled up in front of Gene's building as he and Lorne got out, and Lorne pointed at a Lubber Demon, saying the machine would be here as the Lubbers guarded it.
"These Lubbers are just annoying", Dawnster groaned.
"I think they are more pathetic than Gene is", Dawn spoke up.
Gene was on top of Denise in bed. He reached over to the nightstand and flicked the switch that turned on the machine down in the basement. A beam shot straight up from it, bounced off a mirror in Gene's bedroom to another one. The time field began to form above the bed and slowly spread to cover first Gene then Denise, who froze in place. Down in the basement a Lubber demon was entering new control functions on Gene's laptop. The machine revved up and the field started to grow. The Lubber demon nodded to himself, then turned as another of its kind came crashing down through the window, followed by Angel. The field was growing down from the top apartment. It engulfed and froze a guy sitting down pouring himself a beer. Angel was fighting the two Lubbers in the basement, knocking one of them down, then smashed its head in the open door of a dryer sitting there knocking it out. The other Lubber hit Angel from behind, then hit him hard enough to send Angel flying to the top of the basement stairs. The Lubber charged up the stairs after him. Angel rolled onto his back and used his feet to catapult the Lubber into the wall, then jumped down to the basement floor. The Lubber launched himself into the air to stop Angel before he could reach the machinery, but the time bubble spreading down through the ceiling freezes it in midair. Ducking low, Angel scrambled over to the machine and pulled out some wires. The bubble shrank and the Lubber landed on the hard ground instead of on Angel. Angel picked up its dropped ax and buried it in its back. The bubble continued to shrink, unfreezing the guy pouring his beer, unfreezing Denise and Gene and vanished. Angel, breathing hard, looked around the basement.
"So, the world is saved", Buffy muttered. "That's nice!"
"Yay!" Dawnster said, though it sounded sarcastic.
"So let me get this straight, the world was saved because this guy happened to sing in Lorne's place", Xander pointed out.
"That is a horrifying thought", Willow realized.
"If he had chosen to sing someplace else", Giles trailed off.
"Yeah, it's insulting how a pathetic nerd almost managed to stop the whole world", Summers said with a sigh.
"This was weird", Tara muttered.
"I know right?" Rosenberg said.
"This honestly feels like a silly adventure we could have had in our first year together", Harris quipped to the rest. [1]
"Sounds like it", Dawn muttered in agreement.
"At least he is stopped now", Maclay sighed.
Denise was sitting on the edge of the bed with the sheet wrapped around her, her back to Gene, lying back on the bed, covered by a blanket. She then told him they had to talk, and he was in shock. Later, Gene was sitting on a table with Angel and Lorne, now fully dressed as he apologized to them both for what he had almost done, and Angel told him love was like a fire, it burnt one alive down to the bone, then turned the bone to ash.
"Speaking from experience", Buffy muttered, thinking about her relationship with him, the good and the bad both.
Lorne assured Gene things would get better, and he apologized again before leaving to get beer for them, and Lorne told Angel it was good that he was connecting with a human, though he should go easy on the metaphors. Angel said. "Well, the guy is a disaster at love, and nearly destroyed the world. I can relate. - Yeah, I guess I did kind of leave 'em in the cold." Lorne asked. "What, your buddies? By firing them?" Angel agreed. "Yeah. - Yeah, I guess I made it pretty hard for 'em."
"Finally, you understand now", Willow said. "Or at least you've started understanding."
"I think Gene got off too easy", Buffy said. "Even if he didn't want to freeze the whole world, he was willing to freeze his girlfriend with him because she wanted to break up. That's just messed up."
"Yeah, he's pathetic and messed up completely", Summers agreed with a nod. "And he got off too easy. It was honestly creepy."
"No kidding", Rosenberg muttered.
Cordelia, Wesley and Gunn were dancing in their office with several people as music played.
"They look happy", Tara said as all chuckled.
"I think we can safely say that while their team is better than us, we are better at singing and dancing, other than Lorne that is", Dawnster pointed out.
"Truer words have never been spoken", Buffy agreed.
"All things considered though, that's the least bad thing to suck at", Dawn pointed out, and no one could disagree.
Then Cordelia noticed a man arriving as she, Wesley and Gunn walked to talk to him, and he asked if this was Angel Investigations, to which they said it was and were just celebrating their new beginning, and offered to help him with whatever he needed. "Which one of you is Angel?" He asked. The three of them exchanged a glance. Wesley then said. "It's just a name." The screen went black.
"So the name remains the same", Xander said.
"I think it's fitting, Angel Investigations can run without Angel", Buffy agreed with a nod.
"At least this nightmare is over", Rosenberg said.
"Yeah, I was getting bored with this one", Harris agreed.
"Next one has things going south the usual way again, huh?" Dawnster asked.
"Yeah, that would be it", Summers agreed.
"Let's watch then", Buffy said as they came onto the next recording.
And we're done with my least favorite episode of the Season. Man, Gene is pathetic, if I was in his place, I'll just look at the mirror and say- "Fuck you, you goddamn loser!" Wait! I've already done that, LOL!
[1] Is it just me or does the plot of this episode feel like it'd be better suited for a Buffy Season 1 episode? Because that Season had quite a few silly plots, this episode's plot would fit right in with 'em.
Also, here's the deal- How about 2 updates per week from now on? Though if its a break chapter, then you'll only get one reaction chapter for that week, but outside of that, 2 reaction chapters for other weeks, so 2 updates per week, let me know what you think of it in the reviews, okay? Thanks.
Anyway, hope all enjoyed and see you all next time with another chapter. Stay safe from the coronavirus ya all!