Angel # 10: Waiting In The Wings

Season 3, Episode 13
First Aired February 4, 2002

Welcome to the Angel list. As with the Buffy list, there were a ton of episodes that I considered, but I had to pick 10. The same rules apply as before, so let's begin.

"Waiting In The Wings" was a pivotal episode for a lot of the relationships on the show. Angel realized that he was falling in love with Cordelia, Fred and Gunn began their relationship, and Wesley was forced to watch as the woman he had fallen in love with (Fred) chose another man. Also, the cast looked great in their tuxes and evening dresses.

Angel got tickets to a ballet from a very respected theater company; he related a story about how he saw the company's performance of Giselle (the same show they'd be going to that night) when he was still Angelus, and it was still able to move him to tears. When the rest of the group acknowledged that the show was indeed wonderful, Angel made a startling realization: it was the exact same show as the one he saw in the 1800s. The exact same actors made the exact same movements, the same mistakes. Angel, Cordelia, Wes, Gunn, and Fred investigated backstage to discover that the owner of the company had a powerful spell that kept the actors alive and performing the same show for eternity. While backstage, the group began feeling the effects, and Angel and Cordelia and Fred and Gunn began acting out scenes together.

The consequence of Angel and Cordelia's scene is that the two of them become even more uncomfortable about the growing mutual attraction (it doesn't help that the Groosalug shows up at the end and sweeps Cordy off her feet again), while Wes witnesses Gunn and Fred kissing, which broke his heart. However, Wes proved that he constantly puts everyone else above himself when he saved Gunn's life (he would prove this again later in the season, but with much different results).

There was definitely humor in the episode, but it was few and far between, and it became one of the saddest episodes of the series (until "A Hole In The World", that is).

Also, this episode introduced us to Summer Glau, who played the Prima Ballerina.

Up next: Angel #9...