Angel (television series) plot summary
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This is a plot summary of the series Angel.
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Season One
In the series premiere ("City of"), Angel, who has just moved to Los Angeles, is visited by Doyle, who is half human, half Brachan demon. Doyle explains to Angel that he experiences visions from the Powers That Be (also referred to as "The PTBs") of people who are in danger or in trouble and that 'The Powers' have sent him as a messenger on their behalf so that Angel can investigate these visions. (Doyle is reminiscent of Whistler, a character Angel had met on Buffy.) While on his first investigation, Angel bumps into Cordelia Chase, who has also moved to L.A. to escape Sunnydale and become an actress.
When Cordelia later is attacked by a vampire, Angel comes to the rescue and after that Cordelia comes up with the idea that she, Angel, and Doyle should start up a detective agency "to help the helpless — but charge a fee," as she puts it.
Partway through the first season (in "Hero") Doyle dies, sacrificing his life to save a group of mixed-race demons being hunted down by an army of pureblooded demons. Just before he dies he passes on his dangerous visions to Cordelia in a kiss. She finds the visions to be extremely painful ("Parting Gifts").
Wesley Wyndam-Pryce (who had held a recurring role as the new Watcher in Season 3 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer) then makes an appearance as a "rogue demon hunter" and gradually becomes a vital part of the team. Late in the season (in "War Zone") we meet Charles Gunn, a street tough who leads a gang of vampire-hunters. Initially determined to kill Angel, Gunn slowly comes to accept him and join his cause.
In the season finale ("To Shanshu in L.A.") several important events occur. Wesley translates the ancient Shanshu Prophecy, which states that after that after a final battle, the vampire with a soul will live (that is, become human). Meanwhile, Wolfram & Hart try to raise a powerful creature from the dead. Angel slices off Wolfram & Hart employee Lindsey's hand, but is unable to prevent the raising of the creature. At the end of the episode the viewer (but not Angel) sees who this is: Darla, Angel's ex-lover and sire whom we first met in Buffy.
Season Two
In Season 2, Wolfram & Hart's Lindsey preens Darla as its weapon to bring down Angel. But Darla is brought back as a human, not a vampire, and her conscience prevents her from doing terrible evil. But as a human, she also suffers from a terminal case of syphilis--which she had contracted in her original life before being sired. (We learn, in "Darla," that she was an early settler in the Virginia Colony, where she was sired by the Master, a vampire Buffy would later face.) After failing to get Angel to turn her back into a vampire, Lindsey brings in Drusilla, a vampire originally sired by Angelus, to restore Darla to the cause of evil. Enraged by this, Angel begins to grow darker. He cuts himself off from his staff and attempts to go after the pair himself. But after repeated despair, he goes to bed one night with Darla (in "Reprise"). In a seeming replay of his night with Buffy, he wakes up with an epiphany. This time, instead of losing his soul, he sees the error of his ways and reunites with his group and banishes Darla.
Meanwhile, Lindsey is given a magical prosthetic to replace his lost hand. But the hand doesn't work quite right and in the process of investigating, he meets up with Angel and in the episode "Dead End," he sees the error of associating with Wolfram & Hart. After talking things over with his superiors, he leaves town.
Towards the end of the season, the group joins forces with Lorne, the demon owner of a local karaoke bar and sanctuary Caritas. After Cordelia is accidentally transported to Lorne's home dimension Pylea (in "Belonging"), the entire gang follows, where they meet Lorne's family and Winifred "Fred" Burkle, a young former physics student who has been trapped in the dimension for five long years. There, Cordelia--who had been struggling for her place at home--becomes a princess after it is revealed that she has "the curse"--the visions. All other humans in Pylea are enslaved, including Fred. The group manages a daring overthrow of the shadow government of Pylea, and frees the slaves. Cordelia, realizing that she needs to use her visions for good on Earth, abdicates her throne and returns home along with the rest ("There's No Place Like Plrtz Glrb"), including Fred. But their joy is tempered when they learn that in Sunnydale, Buffy has died.
Season Three
To get over the loss of Buffy, Angel spends three months in a Sri Lankan monastery, where he encounters some demon monks ("Heartthrob"). He returns to L.A., as does Darla-- now heavy with child ("Offspring"). This has never happened to a vampire before, and no one--not Angel's gang nor Wolfram & Hart--can understand why this is. Prophecies reveal that a death will take place at the moment of the child's birth; he cannot be born through conventional means. It appears that the unborn boy might perish, but instead Darla (in "Lullaby") sacrifices her life to give birth to Angel's son Connor (magically conceived during their one night stand in season 2). The gang is willing and eager to care for the infant, but Wesley soon learns of a frightening prophecy that suggests that Angel will murder his son. Fearing that Angel cannot bear the truth, and feeling disconnected from Gunn and Fred (who have fallen in love), Wesley does not share this information, and quietly kidnaps Connor (in "Sleep Tight"). This backfires as he is attacked and the child is seized by an old enemy named Holtz, whose family Angelus and Darla slaughtered over a hundred years ago. Holtz enters a portal to a hell dimension (Quar'toth) to raise the boy as his own. Angel feels that his son is lost forever. He attacks Wesley and banishes him from the group. (It is later revealed that the prophecy which spurred the kidnapping is false, created by a demon, Sahjhan, that is destined to be killed by Connor.)
Near the end of the season ("A New World"), Connor comes back as a teenage boy, having been raised by Holtz in a dimension where time moves more quickly. But all is not so sweet as Connor has been brainwashed by Holtz to believe that Angel is still the evil vampire Angelus that Holtz once knew. In order to gain his final revenge on Angel, the greatly aged Holtz has his closest follower, Justine, kill him and frame Angel. The grieving Connor uses his inherited super-strength and his father's unsuspecting love to defeat Angel (in "Tomorrow") and imprison him in a casket on the bottom of the ocean. Cordelia, who had planned a romantic rendezvous with Angel, disappears the same night, having been elevated by the Powers that Be to a Higher Plane. Meanwhile, Lorne leaves for Las Vegas to pursue a singing career. This leaves a very confused Fred and Gunn to carry on at Angel Investigations.
Season Four
At the start of Season 4, we learn that Wesley has captured Justine; he uses her to find and recover Angel ("Deep Down"). Wesley, exiled from the group, has also been having a love affair with Lilah, an old colleague and rival of Lindsey's at Wolfram & Hart. Angel and Connor meet up again, but the father is not willing to forgive the son--he kicks him out of the hotel. Needing a retreat, Angel, Gunn and Fred head to Las Vegas to see Lorne's act ("The House Always Wins") only to learn that he is actually being held hostage. They rescue him and return home and find Cordelia--who has complete amnesia.
Frightened and confused, Cordelia takes refuge with Connor ("Slouching Towards Bethlehem"), where she struggles to piece together her life story before a spell finally restores her memory ("Spin the Bottle"). A hellish Beast appears on earth, blocks out the sun, and rains fire from the skies ("Apocalypse, Nowish"); and incidentally, wipes out the Los Angeles branch of Wolfram & Hart, leaving Lilah as the sole survivor. Cordelia, feeling that this may be her last night alive, sleeps with Connor as fire continues to fall. They turn out to live another day, but the absence of sunlight makes L.A. a party town for vampires. Cordelia receives visions which convince the group that Angelus is the only one who knows how to stop the beast ("Awakening"), so they extract Angel's soul.
Shockingly, we then find out that Cordelia is actually evil, and secretly controlling the Beast . While the gang isn't looking, she releases the evil Angelus, kills Lilah, and frames Angelus ("Calvary"). Then Cordelia reveals to Connor that she is pregnant with his child. Short on powerful fighters, the gang springs vampire Slayer Faith from prison ("Salvage"). But Faith turns out to be no match for Angelus, who feeds on her. But unknown to him, Faith had previously taken a powerful psychoactive drug, which neutralizes them both and causes them to re-live moments from Angel's past ("Orpheus"). Willow Rosenberg (from Buffy) visits, restores Angel's soul, and takes Faith back with her to Sunnydale (where she appears in the final five episodes of Buffy's Season 7).
Meanwhile, the gang figures out that Cordelia is the one behind the season's events. But before they can capture her, Connor, deluded into thinking that the gang must be somehow evil, grabs Cordelia and takes her into hiding ("Inside Out"). Angel eventually tracks them down and is about to kill Cordelia when she gives birth to an adult woman named Jasmine, and then slips into a coma. Angel stops, in total awe of the new being.
Jasmine, it turns out, was one of the Powers That Be. She explains to the gang ("Shiny Happy People") that she is a renegade of sorts who has decided to leave the "sidelines" and take an active part in fighting evil, and that the apocalyptic events of prior weeks were "birth pains". Jasmine's winning smile makes all who see it fall under her spell of total happiness. Jasmine brings the promise of true world peace--but at the price of complete enslavement under her. But her blood (along with that of Cordelia) breaks the spell and lets people see her for who she truly is. By accident, Fred discovers this on her own and becomes an outcast in a city otherwise in love with Jasmine ("The Magic Bullet"). Slowly she manages to innoculate Angel and the gang (except Connor), though they remain hopelessly outnumbered. They learn however, that revealing Jasmine's true name will destroy her spell over everyone. Angel visits a demon dimension Jasmine had previously conquered, gains access to the name, and reveals it just as she is about to take over the world. A despondent Connor (who had known Jasmine's true nature the entire time, but went along with her anyway) then kills her ("Peace Out").
In the season finale ("Home"), they are met by a resurrected Lilah, who congratulates them on preventing world peace, and says that as a token of their appreciation, Wolfram & Hart would like to give them the LA branch. Skeptical at first, the gang is eventually won over, and takes the offer. As part of it, Angel receives an amulet with instructions to deliver it to Sunnydale (from whence it will play a role in the Buffy series finale). But while this is happening, a despondent Connor finds no reason to live without Cordelia and Jasmine, and has tied himself and the unconscious Cordelia up to several large bombs. To save both their lives, Angel allows Wolfram & Hart to give Connor a life as a normal child and erase him from everyone's memory, except his own.
Season Five
In Season 5, the gang begins to get used to their new life at Wolfram & Hart — and the presence of Eve, their conduit to the Senior Partners — ("Conviction"). Gunn undergoes a special cognitive procedure that transforms him into a brilliant lawyer. The group receives a package. It turns out to be the amulet Spike used to destroy the Hellmouth, and once opened, Spike appears, in mysterious non-corporeal form.
Spike soon finds that spectral forces threaten to take him to hell ("Hellbound"), but he struggles his way out. Though he bonds with Fred, he is skeptical that they can do good at an evil law firm, so he goes off to work on his own once he is mysteriously re-corporealized by an anonymous package ("Destiny"). Spike learns of the Shanshu Prophecy and wonders if he, in fact, is the one. He and Angel battle for a Cup of Torment (which proves a fake), and for the first time, Spike has the upper hand. Soon thereafter ("Soul Purpose"), Spike is approached by a returning Lindsey, who claims to be Doyle (Spike had never seen or heard of Doyle, and so is unsuspecting) and gets Spike to help the helpless the way Angel once did. But Cordelia returns ("You're Welcome") and helps Angel find and stop Lindsey, who is attempting to release a giant monster to devour his old nemesis Angel and destroy the L.A. Wolfram & Hart branch. It transpires that Lindsey was responsible for bringing Spike back, both times, all a part of his plan to get revenge on both the Senior Partners and Angel, with the assistance of Eve. The gang reveal Lindsey's location to the Senior Partners, and he is promptly captured.
At last, Cordelia and Angel share a kiss. Then, they are interrupted by a phone call, which informs Angel that Cordelia has just died without ever waking from her coma. When he turns around, Cordelia is gone.
After helping Angel return to form after being transformed into a puppet ("Smile Time"), Fred finally declares her affections to a thrilled Wesley. But Fred then receives a mysterious sarcophagus in the mail ("A Hole in the World"), and when she touches it, it infects her with a virus that hollows her out and gives birth to the ancient Illyria. (We learn, later, that Gunn has unwittingly caused this chain of events to occur, in return for a renewed cognitive upgrade.) Illyria, who has super-strength and can slow down her perception of time, uses Fred's body to try to raise her army and destroy Earth, but discovers that her army has long ago returned to dust ("Shells"). Wesley is devastated by Fred's death, and agrees to help Illyria adjust to her new world — mostly because she reminds him of Fred.
After realizing that they lack the information needed to fight the Senior Partners, Angel, Spike, and Gunn seek out Lindsey, who is being held captive in a Wolfram & Hart holding dimension designed as a hellish suburb ("Underneath"). They free him, but only after Gunn, guilt-ridden over the indirect role he played in Fred's death, agrees to stay behind in his place. Angel returns to W&H just as the well-dressed and incredibly-strong Hamilton corners Eve. Hamilton forces her to sign an agreement forfeiting all her duties and privileges as the Partners' liaison to Angel — including her immortality.
Wesley is approached by a middle-aged couple seeking help for their teenaged son — who seems to exhibit supernatural strength ("Origin"). Wesley refers them to Angel who is shocked to see the "parents" of his son, Connor. He eventually discovers that the sorcerer Cyvus Vail, who built Connor's new memories, wishes for a common enemy of theirs, Sahjhan, to be killed. And according to an ancient prophecy (mentioned in Season 3), only Connor can do the deed.
Angel agrees to let Connor fight Sahjhan, but the battle is not going well when it is nearly interrupted by Wesley. Mistakenly believing that Angel traded Fred's life for Connor's, he smashes a magical jar which releases lost memories. Connor suddenly decapitates Sahjhan in one swift move, and Wesley is guilt-stricken by his memories of betraying Angel. Connor thanks Angel for his help, and then leaves — he is still needed to protect his family. He appears to have both his real and phony memories intact, and is a well-adjusted person now.
Illyria, meanwhile, is becoming more and more unstable, as her human body struggles to contain her demonic essence. She frees Gunn from his prison and is about to wipe out Angel and his team for their perceived attempts to kill her when Wesley "cures" her by siphoning off most of her energy ("Time Bomb"). Despite his misgivings, Angel agrees to allow the severely weakened Illyria to remain at W&H.
As the weeks go by, Angel seems to make a number of uncharacteristic decisions. These include sleeping with werewolf/art student Nina, playing sports with demons, and allowing a human baby to fall into the hands of the Fell Brethren, who plan to sacrifice it. His team is becoming more suspicious by the day, especially after Drogyn, Keeper of The Well, arrives and reveals that Angel tried to have him killed ("Power Play").
It seems that Angel's thirst for power has overwhelmed, and that he had Fred killed in order to be accepted by The Circle of the Black Thorn, a secret society responsible for engineering the Apocalypse. After murdering the captured Drogyn, Angel becomes a member, and is subsequently attacked by Wesley, Spike, Gunn, and Lorne. Angel hurriedly explains that the entire deal is a ploy — Cordelia's kiss had given him a vision alerting him to the Circle's existence, and he had decided to use Fred's seemingly meaningless death as a means to gain the Black Thorn's trust. He asks the crew for their help in destroying the Circle, and despite knowing that it will bring the full wrath of the Senior Partners down upon them, they agree.
After meeting with the Circle one last time ("Not Fade Away") and signing away the Shanshu Prophecy, and thus any hope of regainging his humanity, Angel hands out the assignments and tells his people to spend the day as it were their last: Lorne sings, Spike performs at a poetry slam, Gunn does charity work in his old neighborhood, Lindsay spends it with Eve, Wesley tends to the wounded Illyria, and Angel meets with Connor.
That night the team launches its attack on the Circle, dividing up their targets. Illyria wipes out four members after dinner, and Spike destroys the Fell Brethren and rescues their human sacrifice. Lorne, after watching Lindsey cut down a demon, shoots him in cold blood. Having performed this one last job at Angel's behest, Lorne abandons the good fight and leaves for parts unknown. Gunn walks into the campaign headquarters of an evil Senator, killing her and her coterie of vampire staffers. Wesley is unable to defeat the powerful Cyvus Vail, and is stabbed. Illyria, concerned for his safety, arrives and grieves for Wesley in the form of the woman he loved, as he breathes his last. Vail challenges "Fred," and Illyria shatters his skull with one punch.
Angel poisons his foe, then encounters Hamilton, who is aware of the plan, as the vampire Harmony (ostensibly on Angel's side) has revealed it to him. The two fight, with Hamilton gaining the upper hand until Connor joins the battle. After Hamilton inadvertently reveals that the Senior Partners' power flows in his veins, Angel bites him and uses that power to kill him. As the building begins to collapse, he orders both Connor and the despondent Eve to go home.
Angel arrives at the rendezvous point, a seedy alley, to find Spike waiting. Illyria arrives with news of Wesley's death, and Gunn walks up badly bleeding from a stomach wound. The survivors watch as the Senior Partners' army of warriors, giants, and dragons descends upon them. The series ends with Angel and his crew rushing into battle, saying, "Let's get to work."