But, of course, he never actually does anything to stand up to Wesley when he tries to take charge.  Instead when Gunn takes Wesley on he cheers him on:

"It's about time the English got what's coming to him. I'm rooting for the slave."

That is very weak.  Then when he discovers he is a vampire his immediate thought is:

“They're gonna kill me."

He then tries to flee the hotel only to be driven back by what appears to him to be even more frightening demons.  Poor TeenLiam is alone, surrounded by dangers and is utterly incapable of dealing with them.  He plans nothing, he never takes to lead and he looks to others for reassurance.  Even when as a result of his superior strength and speed he defeats Wesley and Gunn and chases Cordelia, his moment of triumph is short lived.  Her resistance is little enough but it pulls him up short.  And when he confronts Connor he clearly gets the worst of it at the start.  But, then his feelings of resentment and bitterness do spill over – into violence.  He says that he is tired of being bullied and at the same time starts to fight back with a vengeance.  He defeats Connor in the end quite comprehensively and crowns his triumph by saying:

"I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask to be attacked.  I didn't ask to be a freak. Hell, I didn't even ask to be born."

As with Wesley, Gunn and Cordelia we are not I think intended to conclude from this that all of the problems TeenLiam had have simply gone away because of this victory.  Angel’s isolation from humanity was a constant theme for the character both in BUFFY and earlier seasons of ANGEL.  So too has his feeling of victimhood a long history.  It was weakness in the face of Buffy’s determination that led to the disaster in “”Surprise”.  He was the sacrifice made in “Becoming”.  It is also implicit in “Amends” that  he was too weak to take ultimate responsibility for his own action.  And of course “Prodigal” was an episode in which the writers explored the idea that Liam’s original fault was his weakness of character and showed how that weakness has hugely disproportionate consequences for him.   Finally, when faced by the malign hand of fate Angel does have a history of letting his anger spill over into violence (as in “Reunion”).   We have of course seen his greater connection with humanity (the central theme since “Epiphany”), his increasing command of himself and his destiny and his greater self-control (as for example in “Deep Down”).  But we are reminded here that these are examples of his success in dealing with his feelings, not evidence that they have gone away.  They haven’t because they are too deep seated, too fundamental to the person that he is.

But this is not the only way in which the writers make use of the introduction of Angel’s teen persona.  Perhaps the real point here is not allow us to compare it with who AdultAngel is but to see what AdultConnor has the capacity to become.  As I have already said, the fears and insecurities that teenagers have are exaggerated in comparison with those of most adults because the former lack the experience and perspective that the latter brings to bear.  But in this episode we not only see and understand the Adult members of Angel Investigations through the prism of their Teen selves, we get to look at someone who really is a teenager.  By comparing the problems he has as such to the problems that Angel in particular had at a similar stage in his life we can ourselves put those problems into perspective.  So, at one point Lorne comments on Angel’s realization of his vampiric nature in the following terms:

“Is there anything worse than feeling like you're all alone, like you're the only person in the world who thinks the way you do, and if anyone else found out they'd drive a pointy wooden thing through your heart?”

Angel felt all alone, alienated from his father by the gulf of understanding between them and separated from the others in the Hyperion not only by his vampiric nature but also his own fears and insecurities.  Connor too feels alone.  His isolation from his father precisely mirrors TeenLiam’s own feelings.  To Connor his father is a self-righteous bastard who has done his fair share of sinning but assumes an air of moral superiority with him.  And as we see in the opening shot of him, the way he bulldozes his way through the streets shows how isolated he is in a crowded city.  But perhaps above all, there is a sense of being patronized and unappreciated just because he is a kid.  Even when he rescues a woman from a vampire gang, that is how she dismisses him.  All in all, Connor’s sense of being an innocent victim of a malign universe is every bit as powerful as TeenLiam’s.  And just like TeenLiam his reaction to it is to complain about how unfair everyone is to him.  But perhaps the fault really lies not in his stars but in himself.  Another point of comparison between himself and TeenLiam of them is their attitude to Cordelia.  TeenLiam as we have seen is only after one thing.  And even Connor’s attitude to Cordelia (though he may delude himself on the point) has more to do with lust than love.  The parallel encounters between himself and the prostitute and himself  and Cordelia make this clear.  In both cases his attitude is “I do something for you and you do something for me.”  Hardly the right attitude that.  Finally both Connor and TeenLiam find outlets for their frustrations in violence.  We have already seen the way TeenLiam’s resentments boil over. Connor’s charge along the mean streets of LA is itself an expression of anger and he describes his attack on the vampires as a product of his own bad mood.  But most tellingly of all whatever motives he started out with when he attacked TeenLiam, their fight soon became very personal indeed. 

All of these are signs of immaturity, that we have caught father and son at stages of their life before they have grown up.  But just as AdultAngel is a very different person to TeenLiam – largely because of his willingness to learn from his mistakes and in effect to grow up - so we can believe that Connor has the capacity to be better than he presently is.  He isn’t bad:  just hurt, angry, resentful and very young.  Put it another way he is a normal teenager who will – if he gets the chance – mature and learn to deal with his own demons in the same way that his father did.

The Frailties of Heroes

One thing that I have always appreciated about ANGEL is the care and attention that the writers have traditionally given to characterization.  This has many advantages.  First of all there is real pleasure in just seeing something done well – for fictional characters to come to life because of believable and consistent characterization.  Secondly in the main the characterization has been inherently interesting.  Angel has always been the focus of attention and his collection of obsessions, fears and ambitions has proved a vary rich mine.  Wesley too has never been less than interesting, especially since “Loyalty”.  Cordelia had started to worry me but I am more convinced than ever that the writers do not want to show in her a “moral center” but someone with her own share of failings.  I do not know where they are going with her here but the emphasis on her self-centeredness is for a purpose.   Only Gunn and Fred have consistently disappointed me and even with them I am at last beginning to feel that in the way they react to the events of “Supersymmetry” we are seeing something worthy of attention.  So, although “Spin the Bottle” is clearly a character as opposed to plot driven episode our interest never wanes.  We get to see what makes people tick and why they act in the way they do and such is the strength of the characterization this is itself interesting.  But the episode has one other thing to recommend it.  A heavy emphasis on characterization can be a mixed blessing.  As I have tried to suggest, what we see here is in many ways a logical continuation of the existing characterization of our heroes.  This is in one way a tribute to the consistency and believability of the writers’ work.  But at the same time there is a danger that familiarity with these matters will itself lead to a loss of interest.  So what we have here is a new perspective on old issues.  Allowing us to see new and unusual aspects of our heroes in the form of the teenage selves casts a fresh light on those old issues, thus helping maintain interest in them.

Plot

These considerations lead neatly on to the next issue.  Because there is such strong characterization in ANGEL, plot developments can be directly related to our heroes’ particular outlook on the world or on their colleagues.  The “Angel goes beige” or the “Wesley goes dark” arcs would never have made sense without very careful preparatory characterization.  And it is here that not only does the strength of the characterization but also its nature pay dividends.  I have said it before and I will say it again one of the reasons why this series hold interest for me is that we do not see morally superior people riding to the rescue of lesser beings.  Rather we get deeply flawed individuals for whom the struggle against evil is in large measure a struggle against their own baser instincts.  And "Spin the Bottle" is a wonderful example of this philosophy in action.  The situation created was one where there was no evil present.  Nor did the individuals concerned have any memory of the reasons they have all built up for hating or distrusting one another.  Each was, to the others, a blank page.  Even so they came very close to bringing disaster down on their heads because of their own selfishness and insecurity and the way they responded to those rather than properly listening and talking to the others.  Wesley and Gunn were each out simply to prove their own points.  Cordelia was too concerned about herself to pay attention to what was really going on and Angel was driven by his own sense of victimhood.  No-one tried to understand any one else’s point of view.  No-one seemed willing even to communicate in any meaningful way.  Indeed it was only when Fred was persuaded to put her own fears to one side and actually listen to Lorne (the creature she convinced herself had all sorts of nefarious designs on her)  that the situation was rescued.  But this was more than a morality tale.   The concentration on characterization and the way that the internal demons of the members of Angel Investigations nearly drove them to self destruction suggest that this episode is intended to serve as a set up for the arc to come.  And this feeling was strongly reinforced by the framing device – Lorne’s cabaret act played, as it turned out, to an empty room.  Here he acted as something of a Greek Chorus, commenting knowingly on events within the episode.  But more importantly from time to time he hinted at events to come – and what he was hinting at wasn’t very pretty.  So, at one point we get Lorne in the Hyperion all excited about his spell:

Lorne: "No pain, no side effects. I'm telling you, swingers, there is no way this can fail."

Then we get Lorne on the stage turning to look into the camera and

"So I'm an idiot. What are you? Perfect?"

But more importantly he goes on to comment

 "Well, the fact is I had every reason to believe the spell would work. And it did - after a fashion. What happened during it and what came after... Ooh., I'm gonna need a bigger drink.

The final shot was of him walking out through a deserted club.  Throughout his performance on stage we had heard the audience laughing and applauding.  But here we see the chairs are empty but the tables neat and clean.  No-one had ever been there.  The audience had all been in Lorne’s mind, suggesting that something was very wrong in his world.  It was all very…creepy.

Of course the forgoing remained very much in the background throughout the main storyline of this episode.  And this had little enough to offer by way of drama.  The obvious initial questions were, of course, would the spell restore Cordelia’s memory or would it go wrong?  For anyone who thought there was any doubt at all about the last question all I can say is that you obviously haven’t watched many ME programs.  That something would go wrong was so inevitable that the writers even made fun of it:

Angel: "I don't know. Spells, I don't trust them."

But even when things did go pear shaped the drama was almost deliberately downplayed.  There were three set pieces which saw their potential for real tension largely ignored.  The first was the confrontation between Gunn and Wesley.  The second was Angel’s discovery of his identity as a vampire and his realization of the implications.  The third was everyone else’s discovery of the fact that Angel was a vampire.  All three scenes were played for humor.  In the first we had Wesley’s pratfalling about which dulled any real edge to the fight he had with Gunn.  I just didn’t believe that either of them could come to any real harm.  It has to be said that the turn of events which pitted Angel against the others was very cleverly contrived.  Not least it made very good use of the Cruciamentum test to create a realistic perception of menace where none actually existed, thus seeming to vindicate Wesley's claims of danger while at the same showing him as an idiot.   But Angel’s highly comic reaction when he realized he was a vampire and Cordelia’s outrage at the difficulty he was having in deciding whether to after her or Fred effectively disarmed any real sense of threat.  One can only conclude that this was deliberate because when Connor and TeenLiam fought one another there was a real edge to it. I had no difficulty at all in believing that Connor wanted to kill his father and that the latter in his turn was boiling over in frustration.  But while in one sense it was a pity that this level of tension was not sustained throughout the episode there was some great comedy by way of compensation.  I have already mentioned the spectacle of our “Champion” being frightened of all the others.  I loved the way he passed the crucifix test.  Then we had Wesley at his most pompous being undermined at every step of the way.  I have to confess though I still do not warm to the slapstick element of his behavior which I had hoped was dead and buried with “She”.  Fred as conspiracy theorist pothead was simply wonderful and as I have already said the return of the Sunnydale Princess was like a breath of fresh air.  I suppose that in these circumstances Gunn had to play the straight man but I can’t help feeling it was a pity we didn’t see a little more of his comic potential.  It might have helped me warm to him – something I am still having difficulty doing.

Overview (B+)

It is I suppose the fate of set up episodes that they often fail to make a big impact themselves which helping to maximize the potential of later episodes.  That may indeed be the fate of “Spin the Bottle”.  There are no big developments here either in terms of plot or characterization.  Certainly although there is much foreshadowing, nothing happens which advances the coming Apocalypse.  And the only thing that happens to materially change the way that any one of our protagonists see themselves is the almost throw away line at the end where Cordelia claims she and Angel were in love – but by implication now no longer are.  I am not sure what to make of that.  But the rest of the episode is taken up with a series of reflections on the sort of people our main characters are and why this little band might have trouble sticking together on the right path.  Nothing here is new but if, as I suspect, the issues touched on here play an important part in future developments then reminding the audience about their existence is surely all to the good.  Moreover, it was all done in such a new and entertaining way that I never lost interest in it.  Besides, ANGEL as a series has been so relentlessly dark that a lighter more comic episode at this stage gives the audience a break and thereby serves more effectively to counterpoint what I am sure will be plenty more darkness to come.  So, while I wouldn’t describe the episode as outstanding it does deserve pretty high marks.