Lizbet's Synopsis

It's hang-out in Angel's apartment night as Wesley brings Angel a present -- a knife with a magical mark that is the only way to kill a Keck demon. Too bad Keck demons are extinct. Meanwhile, Cordelia is making brownies, or, rather, brown globs of violated chocolate that neither Angel nor Wesley want to touch. Wesley makes the mistake of saying that outloud and he and Cordy begin to bicker. Angel tries to difuse the argument and break them up -- and accidentally calls Wesley "Doyle".

Meanwhile, somewhere in Suburbia, the Anderson family is settling in for the night. Two children, Stephanie and Ryan, are arguing over their toys. Their mother tries to soothe them, but their father breaks in, ordering them both to bed -- and locking their doors to makes certain that they stay there.

Cordy does up to Angel's office and prods him into talking about Doyle, a subject he has been predictably closed-mouth about. She finally gets him to admit that me misses Doyle, and feels guilty about his death. (Yes, yes, of course he is and of course he does, but getting the boy to admit it is the problem!) While Cordy is reassuring him that Doyle's death was not Angel's fault, she gets a vision -- of the little boy, his father looking scary, and the house and street number.

Armed with that information, Angel and Wesley reach the house in time to see Ryan sleepwalk in front of a moving car. Angel saves him, and is gushed over by Paige, Ryan's mother. Paige babbles endlessly about being grateful and new in town and how much she loves angels, and invites Angel to dinner the following night over her husband Seth's objections. Meanwhile, Wesley has been doing some snooping and finds traces of ectoplasmic excretions of an adult Ethros demon outside Ryan's window.

Back at the office, Cordy tells Angel and Wesley that the Andersons have moved several times in three years, usually in a cloud of violence and death. Wesley tells them that one of the family must be possessed with an Ethros demon, which are known for their perchant for mass murder (which would kind of go with the violence and death thing). Lizzie Bordon, for instance, was possessed by an Ethros demon. The only option is to find someone to exorcize the demon. Cordy points out that they don't know who in the family is carrying extra baggage, and Angel points to the father, saying that everyone seemed to be afraid of him. Wesley mutters that a father doesn't need to be possessed to terrorize his children, and cuts himself off when he realizes what he was saying. He suggests using Silus Eucalyptus powder to get the demon to show himself, and Angel has Cordy make a batch of brownies with it.

At the very uncomfortable dinner table, Angel watches as everyone eats -- and chokes -- on the brownies. Except for Ryan, who does demon-faced on them. Angel confesses that the brownies had something in them to make the demon show himself, and Paige rips into him for doing this to her son. Surprisingly, Seth backs Angel up. He's been aware that something was very, very wrong with his son for a long time, and he's desperate to help him. He'll even follow Angel's advice.

Angel takes Seth, Paige and Ryan to his apartment and he, Wesley and Cordy surround Ryan with a circle of powder that will bind him to Angel's bedroom. Angel and Wesley go looking for a priest who does exorcisms… and find that he's been dead for six months, after the last one killed him.

Back in Angel's apartment, Ryan begins calling pitifully for his mother. Seth and Cordy have to hold Paige back from going to him. Wesley and Angel argue over Wesley's determination to perform the exorcism. If the priest died doing it, Angel argues, what makes Wesley think he can succeed. Wesley casually flips a cross in Angel's direction, watching as Angel winces and drops it, and asks who else can perform the ritual. Angel concedes the point, but stubbornly says he is going to be right there to back Wesley up.

Doing research almost literally on the run, Wesley discovers that, when an Ethros demon is banished, it immediately enters another host, usually with such force that it kills the host it enters.

Paige finally manages to break free of Seth and Cordy and runs to Ryan's side, breaking the binding circle around him as she does so. Ryan begins to choke his mother, and Seth, Cordy, Wesley and Angel try to break Ryan's hold. He doesn't let go until Wesley holds up a very ornate crucifix and spouts some Latin.

Left alone with Ryan, the binding circle reestablished, Wesley begins the exorcism, Angel, Cordy and Ryan's parents just outside the door. Cordy discovers that an Ethros demon can be bound into an Ethros box, and Angel sends her off to the local oogaty-boogaty shop to track one down.

Ryan taunts Wesley with his uselessness, saying nothing Wesley does will make his father proud of him. Wesley shakes it off and continues with the exorcism. Then Ryan begins speaking Wesley's greatest fears -- in Wesley's own voice, saying no one wants him around, why doesn't he just go away. Angel comes in and tells Ryan that he wants Wesley there, backing Wesley up, and Ryan begins speaking in Angel's voice, saying Wesley is planning to kill Angel. Rattled, Wesley accidentally breaks the circle and Ryan thrusts one of the ornate rays on the crucifix into Wesley's neck, knocking him across the room in the process.

At Rick's Magic Shop, Cordy finds a Shoreshack box. Reassured that it will do the job for an Ethros demon, Cordy buys it and heads back to the apartment.

Patching up Wesley in Angel's kitchen, Angel refuses to let Wesley continue with the exorcism. But that still leaves Ryan possessed, and his parents want him cured. While they are arguing, Ryan's marbles on the table spell out "Save Me." From the bedroom, Ryan tortures Angel by using Doyle's voice, and saying that Doyle is with him, that Doyle is asking why Angel let him die. Do not taunt unhappy pissed-off vampire. Angel wraps his hand in a rag, grabs the cross, and confronts Ryan. Rage lending him power, he performs the exorcism, vamping out at the end, and the demon leaves Ryan's body. Unfortunately, it breaks the Shoreshack box on its way.

The demon is obviously loose, as they find traces of demon poo in the office. Angel speculates that it might have manifested physically in an effort to regain strength, and would be heading for a primordial place to gather the power of elements. He and Wesley go hunting and find the demon in the sea caves, and it claims that it was more afraid of Ryan than Ryan was of it, that in Ryan there was a great void of nothingness that is more terrifying than anything the demon ever thought up.

At home, Ryan complains that his sister has more marshmallows in her cocoa than he does, but it is taken as childish nonsense by his parents, who are relieved that Ryan seems to have come through the ordeal unscathed. Angel and Wesley makes for the Anderson's house, but not until after Ryan has set his sister's bedroom on fire. Angel manages to get Stephanie out.

The cops come and Social Services take Ryan away. Angel thanks Kate for showing up. Seth tells Angel that he feels he failed to hold his family together. Angel looks at Paige and Stephanie and tells him that he has.

Lizbet's Review

SunSpeak

"< Lizbet falls down on her knees in hosanas of thankfulness > Yes, I disliked She. A lot. Read my review on the Angel Annex if you were in doubt. Thank you God (and Joss), this was back to what I expected of Angel; horror movie with a twist, and characters acting like, well, characters and not walking (bad) plot devices." -- Lizbet

"The episode hit its stride in the teaser with Cordy and Wesley bickering and Angel's exasperated, "Doyle!" < wince > Was there anyone that moment didn't hurt? Reminding Cordy of Doyle (and also hinting that he's easily replaced in her life), making Angel face the fact that no, he hasn't spoken much of Doyle, and making Wesley feel that, yet again, he's only there on sufferance and they'd really rather have someone else there (and an extra-serving of painful for yes, they really *would* rather have Doyle)." -- Lizbet

"The attempts to get us to think that the father was the bad guy were amusing... um, people? Did you not see the same promo I saw? Not to mention years of X-Files have trained viewers that adorable small child = demon spawn from hell. < Lizbet pauses for the obligatory "children are demons" jokes > But once Ryan started demonizing, Daddy stopped trying to come off evil and instead came off as loving parental figure."
"But dad never came off as evil. Mom kept contradicting him and ignoring his orders (e.g., when she invited Angel to dinner despite dad's No). It was pretty obvious that he wasn't a big meany. Mostly, he seemed worried, scared, and very aware that he was helpless against whatever was happening to his family." --Lizbet & Betsy

"< Lizbet offers up sacrifices of video tapes to the hungry gods of TV > And they *listened*! Wesley *has* a character! I always knew he did! I was hoping and praying, and look, there it is! The only slightly heavy-handed bit about child abuse in his past, and the outstandingly rocking scene in the church where he tosses Angel the cross. < wince and giggle at the same time > Although I want to know how Angel knows Wesley well enough by now to know he's a sucker for telemarketers. < giggle > Angel and Wesley (and David and Alexis) seem to be finding their own pace."
"And they *listened*! Wesley *has* a character! I always knew he did!"
"And again with the obvious. I've been saying that since his first appearance on Buffy."--Lizbet & Betsy

"The end of the episode... OK, so they're saying the kid's just evil, and that the Ethros demon was just squatting in there. So what was making the kid look all demony, and whose voice was speaking through Ryan? (And, speaking of voices, I want to check my tape; Dee and I were too busy screaming to analyse whether that was Glenn Quinn.) Diving for an extra twist at the end just got me all confuzzled."
"Not going to explain this right, but I'll try: It was the kid's evil, personified. When he's being a regular evil kid, he doesn't have the skills (verbal, mental, and philosophical) to articulate or control his evil. But when the eucalyptus brownies screwed up the physical balance by making the demon stuff visible, the kid's evil was no longer restricted to the kid's abilities. Suddenly, it was free to speak and articulate, and it could also tap into the demon's evilness and power. The kid was on a power trip."
"Gee, look, remember-this-is-Kate-we-haven't-seen-her-in-a-while-so-we're-bringing-her-bac k-for-30-seconds. *g*" --Lizbet

"This episode worked as an inverted look at child abuse. Paige's, "It's better now, can't we just go on as before?" is such the textbook for abused people."
"Really? How's that?"
"I don't know, I'm just repeating what I've heard. Usually, though, the reaction is, 'Things are better now, so I'm going to try to believe that they won't ever be bad again. ' A lot of abused wives (where I am drawing my no-doubt poor conclusion) refuse to press charges against their husbands and go back to them, saying, 'He's promised he will be better, it won't ever happen again.'"--Lizbet, Amy, Lizbet

"Of course he has a character. Which may actually be at the root of my annoyance with his presence...or, more accurately, with the way he's used. (As in, a la Joxer. Another perfectly good character about whom we almost never get to *see* that he's a perfectly good character because they're too busy using him as an all-purpose dumping ground for abuse and painfully unfunny sight gags.) This sudden revelation about abuse in Wesley's background, unfortunately, strikes me a little too much as the creative PTB saying 'See? There's somebody in there--you should be nicer to him!' Which just makes me grump '*You're* the ones treating him badly!!'" -- Val, on Wesley

"The end of the episode... OK, so they're saying the kid's just evil. . ."
"Worse. The kid was a walking definition of nihilism. The implication seemed to be that he was somehow born without a soul, which just *gheeeeEEEEEEeeeeeEEEEEEeeee*, and ranks among Things It's Probably Just As Well They Don't Get Into Too Much. Took me a little bit to realize that was why I wasn't upset that they just tossed something that heavy-duty in at the end of the ep and didn't really deal with it. How *would* you?"
"See, I just figured the Ethros demon was exaggerating. Antisocial Personality Disorder much? Well, at least the kiddie version of it, the name of which I forget. The kid was entirely human, just...conscienceless, which was what was so terrifying. The Ethros demon wasn't necessarily exaggerating, now that I think about it, but didn't have a frame of reference for purely human evil, and that was the only thing he could thing of to frame it--his imprisonment--as." -- Lizbet, Val & Tina

"Did anyone else think they were taking an awful big risk, making the little kid a psychopath? Sheesh. Talk about never-saw-it-coming. The only hint I had was that 'Save me' spelled out in marbles or whatever; and I thought the demon was just messing with their heads. Also, I was kind of uncomfortable with the idea that a psychopath can just 'happen' --- that there's not necessarily a terrible childhood or trauma involved--- but someone pointed out to me that yeah, sometimes sociepaths *do* come from "nice" families with no problems, and there's no visible explanation for their soullessness. Still creeps me out, though."--Kiki

"A word about the direction, cuz, well.... I can. :-) This was the first directorial effort of R.D. Price -- formerly a production assistant on Buffy, then Associate Producer on Angel (and sometimes second unit director). I must say . . . . it didn't show. While I'm not really that knowledgeable on directing, I thought the show was visually interesting (especially the scenes in the church), the acting was amazing (some great stuff between Angel and Wesley, especially), and all the main story and dialogue beats were nailed. Kudos to R.D. . . . and congrats on a job well done. *g*" --Mary Beth