* Drew Goddard (DeKnight?s co-writer on "The Girl in Question") is headed to "Alias."

* Jeff Bell (Joss Whedon?s co-writer on the spectacular just-aired "Angel" series finale) is also headed to "Alias."

Damn. I guess I'll have to start watching again. (I watched up until about the 5th or 6th episode of this season and just lost interest.)

Did Transylvania make it on the schedule? Last I heard, it hadn't even made it to pilot.

Sigh. I guess I'll have to start watching Alias again too, at least as a stopgap until whatever Joss and Tim do next is ready to debut.

I'd rather more Angel, but it's nice to think that Alias may recover from the mis-steps of this year. Bell & Goddard could do lovely things with Spydaddy and Evil Uncle Arvin, and it's not like the gender politics on Alias have much lower to go. (Maybe in the penultimate Alias ep, Spydaddy will tell Sydney's half-sister, "Arvin and I have ever been intimate. Except for that one time in Istanbul, when he tried to drug me and I pretended to fall for it in a complex quadruple-cross that resulted in apparent SD-6 victory with the long-term strategic gain going to the CIA. And I only did it for my country, in any event."

Still thinking about the finale, and feeling more and more confirmed in reading it as a ambiguous last stand by unambiguously corrupted heroes--really, the corruption theme was right there in front of us the entire time. Also the tragic ending, because let's look at Angel season-enders past:

S1: Angel gains a family and a hope of shanshu; everyone ends well, except for Lindsey, now handless -- except that it's revealed to the audience, but not Angel, that W&H's ceremony succeeded after all, and Angel's nemesis is coming for him in S2.

S2: After seeing souled Angel go darker than unsouled Angelus, Angel reconciles with his friends, comes home victorious--and finds that while he's had a personal victory, Buffy saved the world and died.

S3: Angel's family is thoroughly destroyed, Wesley betrayed him and was cast out, Lorne gives up on the mission and goes to Vegas, Cordelia ascends to a higher plane, and Angel is drowned by his own son in revenge for sins committed by Angelus.

S4: Angel kills his son in order to save him and betrays his friends' trust to do it; the entire Angel gang, tentatively reunited, take a deal with the devil -- except for Cordelia, who's in a coma.

The most unambiguously happy ending Angel ever got was S1, and even there it's happiness born of ignorance. And we see Angel's own peculiar combination of self-righteousness/moral blindness enacted in violence on Lindsey, which I'm happy to claim as foreshadowing.

Does the Lindsey S5 arc recapitulate the S1-S2 arc in miniature, only with muddier characterization? And Eve hopelessly in love with Lindsey instead of Lindsey hopelessly in love with Darla?

This is crossposted from my LJ, apologies to repeaters. Also a bit stream-of-consciousness.

I keep thinking about alleyways and how they're outside the civilized spaces. About how by the end Angel has taken them back out of the ambiguity, removed them from the grey area. Which is why Lindsey had to die: Angel's last act as head of Wolfram and Hart was to reject all the compromises -- but in order to do that, he had to accept into himself the evil he was fighting, by killing Drogyn and Lindsey. It's a mobius strip of morality, twisting into darkness and back into the light.

But that last moment: despite the darkness, and the blood, and the looming disaster, it's all glittery with light reflected and broken by the rain. With the MoG seizing control of their own destinies again -- oh, that word. Maybe I mean fate? No. I mean, I think, that their armor and their honor has been tarnished by their willingness to listen to the whispering lies of compromise, of accommodation. Get along, go along: have some perspective. Consider the big picture. Let this demon live to keep the peace, set that one free because he balances the other, kill Drogyn or you'll both die.

Individual morality was chained by Wolfram and Hart, trammelled for its own purposes. Gunn with his secret deals, Angel with the cutting of his losses, with the loss of the respect of Buffy and her new Council, Wes held in place despite his suspicions. Keeping Harmony around because she's a familiar face, if a soulless one.

That's all gone at the end: things are simple again. And that's all Angel ever really wanted. Simple choices: Kill or die. Kill and die. Love Buffy, look after his friends, protect the world.

This is why, maybe, Wes had to die. Gunn, now, has stepped back to the world of absolutes. No more deals. Illyria has no room for subtle distinctions, or even human morality at all: she's all about personal loyalties, personal preferences. (Angel rejects the possibility of redemption for Lindsey -- perhaps because he only trusts Lindsey when he's in the room with him? But Lindsey doesn't have it in him to commit to a cause, or so Angel would see it.) The others could come back into an either/or world, the realm of black and white. But Wes? No: Wes has, for years, been the most subtle, the most concerned about the slippages, the ambiguities. The most aware of the greyness.

Even if Wes had survived, he has too great an awareness of the big picture, despite his Big Pile O Angst. And I don't think he would have fit in that last image, the picture of the heroes going out swinging. Standing in the light, making their own light, holding torches to keep the dark at bay just a little bit longer. Fighting because it's all they can do -- Wes can always find something else to do.

Civilized spaces are grey. Civilization is getting along, yeah? Lawyers and contracts and compromises. Biting your tongue ("Tact is just not saying true stuff. I'll pass."), ignoring your itchy conscience, keeping your eye on the bottom line.

Barbarians and primitives have no sense of perspective, no appreciation of subtlety. (My friend Minnow noted here the astronaut/caveman discussion.) Reject the lawyers, reject the ambiguities, stand with the light at your back, facing the shadows. Fight and die, go out with a bang.

The end of season 5 is a rejection of everything that they were forced to bear in season 5: working and living in the belly of the beast. Taking Fred's death and continuing to fight from within the creature that killed her. Being a grownup. But the ones who survived aren't grownups: Illyria's eight weeks old, Gunn is still sort of the guy who traded his soul for a truck, Angel's emotionally 17, and Spike is basically 12. (Well, maybe 13.)

Works for me.

I have never watched Alias, but I might have to start.

It's a mobius strip of morality, twisting into darkness and back into the light.

Beautifully phrased, Consuela. It's a wonderful way of saying you can't live in the grey. You have to chose, even if you occassionally make the wrong choice. Because you always have the option, next time, of chosing differently. It's how we all express free will. So, we all are on that same Moebius strip, only at different places at different times. The MoG at the very end found themselves finally together at the same point on the strip and it was "one brief, shining moment." Perfect.

Micole and Suela's brains are too spicy.

I haven't had coffee.

but one hears Edlund is being hotly pursued by one of the most promising new series of the coming season

Hmm... wanna know which ONE. I mean, I know which one I want it to be, but I doubt American Dad is considered promising.

The new season of Alias doesn't start until January.

I have never watched Alias, but I might have to start.

I'm watching the first season on DVD. It's very fun. Exciting and intriguing, even though I don't know what's really going on half the time (it's McGuffin city). Cliffhangers galore, reminiscent of Angel S4. I only liked it at first, but I'm about halfway through, and I'm starting to love it.

Plus, they get supermajorprops for using a freaking Garbage B-side in one episode.