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Angel

Mmm, Fred...

I felt so bad for Fred, didn’t you? With Angel “not quite himself” and the crew clueless we “seize the night” in...

"Carpe Noctem"
Season III, Episode 4
Written by Scott Murphy
Directed by James A. Contner

So as we begin, Fred and Angel are off to see a Charlton Heston double feature (Soylent Green & The Omega Man), and we witness a young, viral young man in between sessions with two beautiful escorts. However all is not as right as it seems. Our viral young man suddenly collapses into a little puddle and a strange orange electric stream flies out of his eyes and mouth. Screaming women, nasty puddle of skin, good stuff...

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Fred is ecstatic about her “date” with Angel, but he’s not quite up to the task of telling her that it wasn’t a date, but just a movie between friends. Cordy tries to get him to fess up to our lovely Fred, but instead he notices an article about a dead young man. Wes pipes up with another article from 10 days earlier. Angel instructs Cordy to open a case file, and they’re off.

When they find out that a third man has died under similar conditions, and that all three belong to the same health club, Angel and Cordy go to investigate. Wes goes off to meet with his contact at the coroner and Gunn leaves to interview staff at the hotels where the bodies were found, leaving Fred alone to watch the hotel.

At the health club, Angel finds out that the three men were all members of the evening ”Pilates” class. Once inside the classroom, he notices a set of binoculars peering from a window across the street. A window that happens to belong to Marcus Roscoe, an older gentleman that just happens to own a Dothian Herb Jar. An herb jar that allows him to transfer into Angel’s body... Dun Dun DUN...

So we’ve got the typical body-switching story. Our old guy is attracted to anything with two legs, including Cordy. And when she mentions his “talk with Fred” and “no romance in the workplace”, he assumes that Angel is gay, and that Wes is Fred. There’s some pretty good dialogue, but the best is yet to come.

So after Marcus (in Angel’s body) finds out that Fred is a girl, and a HOT one at that, he puts on the moves. And when she runs upstairs to get changed, Angel Investigations is paid a little visit by Wolfram & Hart’s own Lilah... She’s there to drop off building code paperwork, but ends up in a passionate embrace. And Fred witnesses the two rolling around on the desk, it’s not a pretty scene.

And as it turns out, Marcus finds out that he’s inside a vampire’s body and just goes nuts. Fred is heartbroken, Angel is trapped inside a body that’s about to run out of gas, and the crew can’t seem to find out what’s happened. And yes, you guessed it... I’m not telling how it ended!

This episode was pretty good. We got to see a lot more of Fred, and that’s always a great thing. The whole Body-Switching thing has been done before, and this story had its cool twists, but it’s still a body-switching episode with all the body-switching mania. The laughs were there, but something was lacking. The thing that saved this episode was the performance by Fred. I know she’s quirky, and that I’m insanely attracted to her, but the end of the episode when she was talking to Angel was awesome. And I feel so bad for her...

This week Fred goes missing in “Fredless”!

Episode Rating: 7 out of 10

- The guy who wants to comfort Fred in any way possible, PunkJr

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