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Date Posted: 09:37:55 11/26/01 Mon
Author: Blue
Subject: Shanna's Commentary on "Lullaby"

from the Angel newsgroup:

Spoilers for "Lullaby"

















Having just survived Thanksgiving weekend, I'm thankful for (among other things) Tim Minear (even if he abandoned us here. And I already had abandonment
issues. But as long as he keeps episodes like this one coming, I'll forgive him). Wow, what an episode. And I didn't see that big finish coming.

I've never had strong feelings one way or another about Darla, but she was at her best here. I loved her confusion that at first had her teetering between her usual edge and the tenderness the baby's soul gave her. I liked that there was a distinct difference between human Darla with a soul and Darla affected by
the baby's soul. Darla's soul was too harsh and jaded to ever really get any impact from her sins as a vampire. She just didn't like the weakness that came from being human. She never really showed any signs of regret. But the purity of the baby's soul couldn't deal with everything she'd done.

I also like Holtz, who makes for a very complex antagonist (he's not, strictly speaking, a villain). He's fighting for the same things our heroes are, but he
just happens to have a personal problem with Angel -- and for very good reason. It wasn't just that Angelus and Darla killed Holtz's family. They turned his
daughter into what he despised most and left him with the ugly task of destroying the monster they made of her. I hope to continue to see their past fleshed out, with some more glimpses of why Holtz came up against them in the first place and what happened before Holtz gave up hope and was found by Sahjan. I'm also intrigued by whatever game Sahjan is playing, using Holtz as a pawn. I'll hazard a guess that Sahjan is an evil-evil thing whose gripe is actually with Angel (the ensouled version) and he's just using Holtz's hatred of Angelus as a tool. All of this makes the interplay between Holtz and Angel, and the potential interplay between Holtz and all our other players, really
fascinating. Oh, and Holtz's voice sends shivers down my spine that are almost enough to distract me from the usual Wesley lust. :-)

This ending wasn't a cliffhanger in the traditional sense, but it left a lot of questions hanging. We still don't know how two vampires were able to procreate.
We don't know the role of the child. We don't know what they're going to do with the child. Meanwhile, our heroes are in a heap of trouble. They've got a vampire cult after the baby (but I wonder if they still want to kill the humans, since it no longer needs blood for nurturing). They've got Holtz cooking up some kind of revenge scheme. Sahjan wants Angel dead for some yet unknown reason. W&H has the hotel bugged and wants the baby (preferably dead). Caritas is in ashes, eliminating their one potentially safe place. W&H has the scrolls and Wesley's notes (boy, is he gonna be ticked). Oh, and they have a baby to take care of.

My biggest fear is that they'll rely too heavily on the "single people have wacky misadventures in childrearing" humor in this situation. Let's just hope
it doesn't turn into, "Two men, two women, a vampire and a baby." But seriously, Angel doesn't have a lot of experience taking care of living things. Cordy's interest in babies probably doesn't extend far beyond dressing them in cute little designer outfits. It's possible that Gunn has some experience from having to take care of his younger sister. Judging from the fact that they were
so knowledgeable about obstetrics, it's not a huge leap to think that Wes and Fred will be the ones most clued into what they need to do to take care of a baby. If he survives, that kid is gonna need therapy.

This episode was full of strong emotional moments. There was Darla's initial sobbing breakdown in the back seat of the car. Holtz's discovery that his little girl had been turned into a vampire. Darla's tearful admission that she loved this child and was afraid she wouldn't be able to after it was born. Holtz having to kill his daughter. Darla's final moments. And then that
staredown in the alley.

The two storylines, with Holtz in his past and present and Darla and the AI gang, seem to be setting up some parallels. I must say I'm intrigued as to how this all turns out.

Characters:

Angel -- As much as he's seen, he still seems quite the idealist. He still believes in miracles and happy endings. He couldn't accept the idea that he would get half a miracle. And he seemed genuinely pleased with Darla's "redemption." He's said he didn't love Darla, but I'd say his feelings for her are rather complicated. I'm curious to see how he responds to this child now
that it's born. I also enjoyed his initial encounter with Holtz. He never tries to justify himself. He doesn't try to offer explanations. I have to respect the fact that he never tries to get out of his fate, saying only that things have changed.

Cordy -- Cordy was moved more to the background in this episode. I can't think of too much defining about her that came from this episode.

Wesley -- Dr. Wesley is still on duty, and he remains calm in a crisis. Angel and Cordy may be bonding as friends, but it seems that when Angel needs to talk
about something work-related, it's Wes he pulls aside. Angel seems to have a lot of trust in Wesley. We also got outside verification of his translation skill, courtesy of the W&H translator.

Gunn -- His best stuff was the testing of the security system. He's pretty good-natured about that. Otherwise, nothing too defining.

Fred -- Dr. Fred is now working in partnership with Dr. Wesley. She seems to keep her wits about her pretty well. But how does she carry her glasses around
in those little outfits? She was wearing them when reading the instructions to Lorne in Caritas, but they weren't around, otherwise, and she doesn't have a
lot of room in the pockets of her skirt.

Darla -- Wow, talk about layers. We've seen so many incarnations of Darla, and each of them has taught us something about who Darla is. There was bitter,
jaded Human!Darla v. 1. There was saucy, wicked Vamp!Darla v. 1. Then there was confused, frightened and ultimately resigned Human!Darla v. 2. Vamp!Darla v. 2 seemed a little more world-weary than the first version. She didn't seem to be in it just for the pleasure. And then we throw in BabySoul!Darla, who is
compassionate, considerate and aware of her crimes in a way that her second human incarnation never seemed to be. Her death in that mode was particularly
poignant. You had to wonder what kind of woman Darla would have been if she hadn't faced whatever hardships had hardened her so much, if she'd known real love as a human.

Coast Guard Report (Watching the 'ships)

This episode had too much other stuff going on to focus on relationships. The Angel loves Cordy stuff seems to have gone right out the window, as his
focus was more on Darla and her child. This may get me tarred and feathered (then again, if I haven't already been attacked by the B/A contingent, I'm probably not in huge danger, and they're probably all distracted by the
Buffy/Spike stuff right now), but I think the scene between Angel and Darla in "The Trial" when she accepted her death just before Dru showed up and the
scenes between Angel and Darla in this episode showed (in my opinion) a deeper connection than any other pairing I've yet seen involving Angel. And not only
was there a real depth, but there was more of a sense of equality than he's had with anyone else. I suppose they are soulmates, in a way. Nobody else could
understand either of them enough to have that kind of connection.

I don't think Fred's staying behind with Angel and Darla should necessarily be taken as a sign of her crush on him. It may have had more to do with her Dr. Fred role.

Gunn didn't seem to mind Fred sitting in his lap or hitting him repeatedly. She did rely on him to come to her rescue in the fight against the demons.

And Wes and Fred seem to be on the verge of a mind meld or the second coming of the Bobbsey Twins. Maybe they're too much alike for a relationship.

Random comments:

How did Wes get his coat back during the Caritas fire? He didn't have his coat on when they had to run out of the club into the bedroom, nor when they were
knocking the wall down, but when he was running out into the alley, he had his coat on. I guess he could have put it in the bedroom while he was working with Darla and had a chance to grab it before they left.

Any old hotel worth its salt has a lounge or a nightclub. Maybe they should offer space in the Hyperion to Lorne. He'd be handy when they had a question, and if they got a cut of the bar bill, it could help pay for the hotel.
Otherwise, I guess he gets a full remodeling. And do the Caritas security measures remind anyone of US airline security? Something bad happens, and they
hurry to change things to prevent that from happening again, only to have something else happen that fits another loophole in the system.

I guess they were making fun of all the comments here about the handling of ancient texts with their jokes about Lilah highlighting the scroll. In yellow.
Meanwhile, the translator is wearing gloves while handling it, which is an improvement.

Judging from my experience with baby boys, Angel is going to need a new coat pretty soon.

The lullaby Holtz sang has been used in an Air Force or Air National Guard (or some form of military service that involves flying) commercial. Interesting choice given current events.

In this episode, I think they must have been working on some sort of full employment of actors of eastern European descent. Look at the credits. We have
Alexis Denisof, Stephanie Romanov, Keith Szarabajka and Kasha Kropinski (who played Holtz's daughter). Slightly more seriously, it's nice to see proof that
Hollywood no longer seems to force actors to take bland, non-ethnic screen names like they did during the so-called golden age.

They were going to let the guy with the (probable) concussion, the one who'd been unconscious the longest and who'd most recently regained consciousness, drive?

And now we have to survive an insipid special (that I won't be watching) and a rerun before we find out what happens next. They pulled this trick on us with the 3 Rs, didn't they?

Shanna

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