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Original Air Date: September 26, 2000

Teleplay by David Greenwalt
Story by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt
Directed by Michael Lange

Summary

Cordelia's in the middle of an audtition and she's doing really well. Her pager goes off with the message 911 and she leaves immediately. Wesley's in a bar wen he gets the same message. The two meet up with Angel at an exercise club, they dispatch of demons in the middle of a huiman sacrifice then leave.

Angel, Cordelia and Wesley are now using Cordelia's apartment as an office. Cordelia has a vison of a nasty demon. Meanwhile at Wolfram & Hart, Darla is in Lindsey's office and she can sense that Angel is in town. Darla remembers that Angel killed her and she's looking forward to seeing him again. Back at Cordelia's, Angel is sketching the demon from Cordelia's vision. They locate the demon in a book and it's a pretty vicious demon called a prio moto. Wesley says that they can get info from a demon club that he's been to before. Wesley brings them to a demon karaoke club where the club owner is anagogic and once demons have sung he can tell them a little about their future. Wesley finds an informant, a merle demon, and for a nice sum of money the demon tells them about the prio moto and that he should be found in subway tunnels and that they're extremely vicious. They're about to leave when the bar owner tries to get Angel to go up on stage but he refuses.

Angel goes hunting in tunnels for the demon. He finds a woman running, followed quickly by the demon from Cordelia's vision. After a fight Angel kills the demon but much to the woman's dismay who tells him that the demon was her protector from the Tribunal. She runs away from Angel telling him to stay away from her. The trio gathers back at Cordelia's apartment and Angel tells them about the incident. Angel vows to take over the prio moto's duty to save the woman. Angel finds the merle demon again and finds out that the woman is carrying a sacred child. Angel then finds Gunn on the streets and after a quick explanation, the two go in search of the prio moto's old living quarters. Gunn finds the place in some underground tunnel. In a box Angel locates a round metallic engraved disk that he gives to Gunn and tells him to run it over to Cordelia's apartment. Gunn leaves and a few minutes later the woman shows up. She's looking for the disk and Angel guiltily tells her that he knows where it is but he doesn't have it right at the moment. She gets pissed off at Angel's inability to help her but becomes a little more grateful when he saves her from a demon that was hunting her down.

Gunn makes it to Cordelia's apartment and after introductions he gives them the disk and mentions the Tribunal connection. Meanwhile Angel and the woman are attacked by more demons and he fights them off as she runs away but not before telling him that the prio demon was her champion and he was to fight till the death for her life and her baby's life in front of the Tribunal. After the fight, Angel finds that the woman didn't go back to Cordelia's as he'd told her to and she's now out there unprotected. Wesley says that the disk is to be presented in front of the Tribunal, which is also known as the court of judgment. They need to find the woman immediately, so Angel goes to the karaoke bar and after singing "Mandy" onstage the bar owner tells him where she is and that the Tribunal will be wherever she is.

The woman is on the street when the three members of the Tribunal appear. Their fighter tosses his disk to the ground and the woman's life is forfeit until Angel appears and tosses his disk to the ground and says he will be her champion. Angel mounts his horse, pulls on a shield and holds his lance in attack position. Angel and the fighter ride towards each other. Angel is eventually knocked from his horse. Angel then knocks the fighter down from his horse and they fight with their swords. Angel is stabbed through the stomach with the fighter's sword. Thinking Angel's dead, the fighter moves to kill the woman but Angel gets to his feet and uses his sword to cut the fighter's head off. The woman is now under the Tribunal's protection as well as her daughter until she comes of age.

Later on Angel goes to the jail and visits Faith who is there trying to rehabilitate herself. She's happy to see him and they talk for a little about redemption, among other things.

Summary written by Nika

Quote of the Week

Trainer: That guy has horns...
Cordelia: Steroids. Not good for you.

Rating

2/5

Nika's Comments

Ugh, how uneventful was this episode of Angel? I can't even believe they used this episode as a season premiere. It did raise a couple good questions for the season but all in all I was none too impressed with this episode. I didn't like that woman (who I don't think even had a name) and I don't know enough about her backstory and what exactly her child is for (maybe a Slayer? It's a possibility.) that I really didn't care one way or another what happened to this woman. Personally I found her annoying. Though it was funny to see Angel bumbling around and seeing him through a different light (really NOT helpful). The horses outside in the middle of LA? Highly unlikely and would NOT go by unnoticed. The demon karaoke thing was painful to watch and Angel singing on stage was extremely cringe-worthy. Ugh. The only thing that piqued my interest was the woman and her child and what the woman is going to do with her child. What exactly is this child for and why is she being so protected? They could have at least given the woman a name or at least some sort of indication as to what this was all about. Maybe it'll come up in the future.

Niki Bartl's Comments

I totally did not like this episode. Due to the fact that my best friend got asked out that night, I spent ten minutes on the phone with her, and I totally wasn't concerned about missing the show, mostly because I thought it stank. The whole premise of Angel messing everything up was a good one, but it just didn't turn out right, I think. And why do they insist on making Angel funny? First with the dancing, now with the horrible, horrible, horrible singing. He's Angel, broody and quiet, don't make him funny. Did anyone else notice the cars which were stopped in the background during the horse fight? Can you imagine being in that car and just being completely confused! And they didn't even explain what this girl was for and what she was going to do, maybe if they had made it more about that, this episode would have been salvagable, but at the moment, I didn't really care.

Cast

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