Sorry to go back to rehashing Not Fade Away now that everyone seems to have moved on to brighter and better (?) things, but the oddest things seem to set me off. Here goes:

our rationalization was that as one tasted nothing like cheese, and one tasted nothing like cookies, it would be safe to try 'em together.

Sounds like a good theme for a Spike poem.

Seriously, though, I think Spike's poetry reading, especially coming after major drinking as it did, was the best part of the finale. It was such a fulfillment of his human dream, especially since it was well received.

Wes was sad, although Illyria's/Fred's reaction was even more so. Gunn was satisfying (getting back to his roots in a positive way with Anne). Lorne was bitter and broken, as he lost his anchor, and in a sense his soul, in doing what needed to be done. Harmony was Harmony. And Angel continued to focus on doing what needed to be done, without regard to himself, in actions that were part atonement and part the thrill of the kill. But Spike, Spike was sublime. Before the finale, I hadn't been a fan of Spike on AtS, but this made it all worthwhile.

Whether or not you liked the finale, and I am ambivalent about much of it at this point, it certainly did not fade away. I can't wait for the first movie.

I usually do a fair job of catching some of the more subtleties in the jossverse, but I come here to read the interesting analyses of said subtleties. Plus, I was really confused about the Lorne/Lindsey interaction and I like the idea that Lorne has known for a while how it would all go down and that's why he's been SO depressed and disillusioned. I still feel the whole Lindsey offing is weird, though. I know he kept stabbing Angel in the back, but it just felt wrong, somehow.

Thanks to the Mutant Enemy folks for making me actually care about tv, and allowing me to get drawn in to the meatier aspects instead of just enjoying it on a surface level. Thanks for making me care, sometimes a little too much. Thanks for providing other fans with such a need to discuss that I got to lurk at b.org for many a year. Much well-wishing to all your future projects (and please hurry up with creating new tv shows!).

d.

Catching up.

Regarding Joss and being bitter, he had this to say at the Beta ...

joss says:

And on the subject of Jordan Levin, i do want to say this much: I'm not down with his decision and I never will be, but I've worked with jordan since the start of Buffy and he has always been a supporter and a decent guy. His job is a soul-sucking nightmare. And he's not prom king tonight, no sir, but he's part of why we got to have ten years total of shows on that network -- shows that wouldn't have lasted for... well imagine if they were on Fox. So factor that in. Later on.

Welcome, d.

Plus, I was really confused about the Lorne/Lindsey interaction and I like the idea that Lorne has known for a while how it would all go down and that's why he's been SO depressed and disillusioned. I still feel the whole Lindsey offing is weird, though. I know he kept stabbing Angel in the back, but it just felt wrong, somehow.

I was thinking about this when I was trying to write my finale thoughts in one place (ain't happening). Part of my problem is that I was trying too hard to make each person/team's assignment (of which Black Thorn member s/he killed) fit into an artificial shape.

Thinking about it last night, I decided that Lindsey and Lorne's assignment is not important in and of itself. For Lindsey, what is important is that (as far as he knows), Angel has made him part of the team. Admittedly though, I'm still having trouble finding Lindsey's arc and even his motivation this season. Lorne killing him tells me that eventually, Lindsey was going bad, but it's hard to make that fit with how he left the series in season whatever (2? 3?), at least if the going-completely evil involved any sort of intent. I feel like I have to take jumps to get there. How do the rest of y'all explain Lindsey? I need some spoon-feeding on this one, I think.

For Lorne, it is the second assignment that is most significant—killing Lindsey. When we first meet Lorne, he uses his abilities to help any old monster face destiny. Lorne does not limit himself to helping good monsters like Angel. He helps baby eaters, too. He considers himself above the fray. His nightclub has a non-violence spell on it, probably mostly for practical reasons. It was a sanctuary for the evil though, and Lorne sort of ignored that—just grooved on the peace vibe.

Think of Lorne's words to (or about) Fred when she was still recovering from her Pylean captivity. They may have been spoken during Fredless. He was advocating not for Fred to face and come to terms with things, but rather to run even further. Why—because it was "working" for him. That's why.

Lorne has usually reveled in relativity. Throughout much of the series, in addition to acknowledging his cowardice, Lorne sees himself as peaceable. He might even believe in peace at any price. It is not until the gang travels to Pylea, that we start to see why Lorne might feel this way. He escaped from this brutal universe, and only by not fighting can he feel fully separated from it, even in L.A. The more involved Lorne becomes with Angel, the more he can see the need to fight, but really still can't stomach it, because he does not want to be as ugly as some of the creatures we met in Pylea.

Even considering what the Pylea fieldtrip showed us about Lorne's history, doesn't take me all the way, though. I think perhaps the key to Lorne's psyche is hiding out in the open, in Life of the Party (the S5 Wolfram & Hart Halloween party episode). Remember how his sub-conscious was basically the Incredible Hulk? He was just Smash!Lorne. Now, we can view that as a stand-alone, and chalk up Smash!Lorne to the fact that he had his sleep removed, but maybe we shouldn't.

It's funny, I've always enjoyed Lorne, I think in part, because of AH's charisma. But he never mattered much to me in the narrative. I never saw much from him that I couldn't have gotten elsewhere. His actions in the finale finally made him matter to the series (for me). For me, Life of the Party is the key, provided I tilt my head just so, and look at him from this new angle. To get into the fray would have (has/did/whatever) required Lorne to tap into his inner demon that is every bit as scary as Angel's. The realities of his inner demon may be the source of his cowardice. He doesn't want to be strong, because he's afraid of himself when he is.

I'm trying to remember his arc this season. I'd wager Lorne doesn't like himself, when he is threatening Eve (as Fred is dying). Until then, until it gets personal (I'm sort of being repeato girl, here) I think Lorne is in a place where he thinks he can be good, just by letting Angel to be good for him. He was hoping to stay above the fray, and be one of the good guys, but by association, skipping all the wet work. Understanding the compromises Angel makes by fighting—how Angel taps into his inner-demon for strength, and being compelled by his (Lorne's) own love of Fred, to make his own compromises, and seeing where and why they are necessary (and sometimes not)—if ugly—really undoes Lorne, in the end.

Lorne's whole world view is askew. He understands that he has to kill Lindsey. He has to, because he has read Lindsey, and knows as horrible as it is to shoot this boy, it is more horrible to let him live. He is in the same position Giles was in, when he killed Ben, but Lorne never had—never wanted, either—Giles' conviction. Giles had a lifelong journey that prepared him, and fortified him such that he could make and live with his decision to kill Ben in The Gift.

Lorne never had that. He had to think quick, act quicker and at the behest of someone he still loves, but no longer trusts or admires very much. In doing so, he has to abandon principles (about the world, and about himself) that took up such a large part of his psyche. Now, he's just floundering. Poor Lorne.

Upstream, someone (probably Micole) compared him to Rick Blaine in Casablanca. Lorne is Rick, but I would say he is now at the place Rick was when he first arrived in Casablanca. Whether he'll ever be able to bring himself to jump into the fray again, and with real, personal purpose, is still up in the air for me.

cereal...

UTTAD, thanks. That's what I read by Joss (that I mentioned yesterday). I couldn't find it for the life of me. I thought I'd read an interview.

You pretty much speak for me on Lorne, Cindy. That makes much sense.

Lindsey is a problem, isn't he? I think something must have happened while he was away to make him want the powerful but evil life of W&H that he gave up. Maybe he just got tired of being an ordinary guy and doing his own laundery and so forth, and couldn't remember why he ever wanted to leave. I don't know. But the Lindsey that got all tatooed and came back to LA isn't the same LIndsey that drove off in Season 2 (I think it was Season 2, it was "Evil hand - I'm outta here", wasn't it? Just before Pylea? Still haven't had coffee...)

I keep coming back to Pylea being a black&white world, in the sense of not having shades of gray, not Pleasantville. And, yes, Lorne left that, but it still shaped him. So he naturally gravitates to absolutes - no violence, all are welcome, I'm not a fighter. But his sanctuary is a world of grays and that's taking it's toll. Without the gray, no music;with the gray, gotta shoot Lindsey.

I think that absoluteness colored Fred's world, too. But my VCR needs tending, so I will have to get into that another time.

Maybe he just got tired of being an ordinary guy and doing his own laundery and so forth, and couldn't remember why he ever wanted to leave. I don't know. But the Lindsey that got all tatooed and came back to LA isn't the same LIndsey that drove off in Season 2 (I think it was Season 2, it was "Evil hand - I'm outta here", wasn't it? Just before Pylea? Still haven't had coffee...)

His stated reasons (to W&H during the evil-hand scene of Dead End) for leaving were that he had evil hand issues, and was bored. It's not much to go on. My memory of the episode itself is that it indicated he'd been a bit sickened by W&H, once their evil really involved his own life. And of course, what happened between him and Darla did a number on him, too.

My current Lindsey fanwank is that he came back this season, to do what he saw as (or was able to rationalize as) "good." It involves a whole lot of fanwanking or at least filling in the blanks, regarding W&H--particularly the senior partners. My fanwank-version-Lindsey (back in season two), Lilah, Holland, et al thought the members of the Circle of the Black Thorn were the senior partners*.

After my fanwank-Lindsey left town in season 2's Dead End, he set to doing a lot of research, recognizing that although he was intimidating enough to escape the humans at W&H that day, the senior partners weren't going to fear him, his evil hand, or any information he had for very long.

In doing so, he discovered the truth about the Circle of the Black Thorn (CotBT), and that they were just the emissaries for the S.P. Perhaps he'd even kept tabs on Angel and crew, and somehow found out about their Pylean expedition, and that was his key.

When he heard Angel was suddenly working for W&H, he was filled with what felt like righteous indignation, and intended to do what Angel & Co eventually did—infiltrate the CotBT, and somehow wipe them out, and best Angel in the process.

Seeing as Lindsey had never really cut the ties he needed to cut, in order to live clean though, we get an indication that had he managed to get that far on his mission, he would have ended up just taking over W&H's power—somehow replacing the CotBT, whether or not this was his intention. His greed, and lust for power would have overcome him. He'd never beaten back his demons; he just felt like he had, because when he'd run from them, he did so in his old bomb of a truck.

Basically, the kid didn't even know how to live clean, and was not motivated to do so. His primary motivation seems to have been to best those who had bested and/or humiliated him. I don't think Lindsey was necessarily written as being aware of this, but I still think it's likely true. Our primary indication of this is his continued involvement with Eve. Had he dumped her once she was no longer of use as a source of W&H information, I wouldn't include this statement in my fanwank. But I'm weak on the earlier episodes of this season, so I can't even buy into my own fanwank as much as I should.

* This fanwank sort of involves some handwaving on some of the statements Lindsey made about the senior partners in Dead End. He said in Dead End that he would have chosen Lilah, not himself, because Lilah had logged all sorts of hours gathering files on their (human W&H management) personal misdeeds: stock manipulations; off-shore accounts, and the like, and that if that information got back to the SP, they would devour the lot of them. So it really is a vigorous wank.

The videotape I've been putting the last 6 Angel episodes on seems not to be 6 hours long. Grr.

I'm gonna have to go back and watch Dead End again, I think. I definitely got the vibe that Lindsey was gonna go off and be not part of the problem, if not part of the solution, if that makes sense. Maybe he came back thinking he could be above this petty good/evil thing? Hmmm. Your wank definitely gives me food for thought, Cindy, though I'm not ready to wholeheartedly endorse it yet :-)

(edited because even with coffee I apparently can't type)

Your wank definitely gives me food for thought, Cindy, though I'm not ready to wholeheartedly endorse it yet

Neither am I. I know it has a dozen holes and half of those are due to my own problems with seeing all of this season. This is really a tide-me-over fanwank. I'll either use it 'til I don't care any longer, or until I figure out something better, or become convinced it's unwankable.

Upstream, someone (probably Micole) compared him to Rick Blaine in Casablanca. Lorne is Rick, but I would say he is now at the place Rick was when he first arrived in Casablanca. Whether he'll ever be able to bring himself to jump into the fray again, and with real, personal purpose, is still up in the air for me.

I'm loving this analogy (which I missed from upthread) and on the Lindsey front, Cindy remains the best fanwanker I've ever known.

I'm of the mind at this point, that Lindsey's motives were deliberately left ineffable. HE may not even have known what he wanted, except either to hurt (or perhaps join) the senior partners, and to seriously fuck up Angel's cabbage patch.