Angel

As TV shows on DVD become more popular than two disc special editions timed with the release of the theatrical sequels, Angel Season Two joins the pack of shows that fans are paying for long after their free television airing. Cynicism aside, these sorts of episodic series are perfect for DVD, so you can watch an entire season-long arc in a few days.

Plus you get all the neat extra features.

Joss Whedon didn’t do a commentary for Angel Season Two, and in fact is not specifically involved in the extra features. He was however happy to answer broader questions about Season Two as an evolution from Season One, and even defended the Pylea subplot. We’ll get to all that, but first, I had to do my fanboy schtick.

I’ve always wanted to ask, a vampire doesn’t reflect in the mirror, but why don’t their clothes reflect?

It’s the same reason their clothes turn to dust. They have a sort of aura, sort of the energy around them is affected by them. We had one line, and this is something that would have been useful, in the first season that had to be cut, which was when Buffy asked why Angel appeared on film when there are mirrors and cameras and what not. And it’s simply, "It’s not physics, it’s metaphysics." And I was like, "Oh my God, that’s such a great line, it covers everything. It’s the biggest fanwank ever."

In the Buffy finale, why did Anya die and Andrew live?

I didn’t want to kill Anya. I had to kill somebody. I couldn’t kill any of the core group, I couldn’t kill any of the originals and have Buffy smile at the end. But I had to kill some people and Emma was clearly moving on in her career, and so I thought, "Well, Anya’s probably the person to do it to and to do it as brutally and swiftly as possible."

What do you eat for breakfast?

You know, it’s not the same thing every day.

What did you have today?

Today, I had a bagel.

How involved are you in the DVDs?

Generally, I sort of leave them to themselves. There have been only a few times that I’ve put my foot down, and it hasn’t been on the Angel DVDs. Like when they wanted to release Buffy DVDs widescreen, I said no. Generally speaking, they do a good job.

When you do a commentary, do you set out to be funny?

I always think my commentaries are the most boring things on earth but I forget that people don’t already know the things that I’m saying about how the show gets made. I don’t sit there and thing of "What jokes shall I make during this?" I just sort of spew whatever comes out. If it’s funny, that’s a huge plus. If it’s informative, that’s nice too. If it’s both, I rule. Very often, it’s just incredibly dull.

What about talking about Tony Head not wearing pants?

Tony Head and his no pants, that was my first commentary and I really didn’t know what I was doing. I just ran out of things to say, so I just started talking about Tony and his no pants. I try not to do that. I know I can do that with Tony and he’ll have a hearty laugh, but you never know.

Who’s the brunt of ridicule on Angel?

Gosh, if I’m not making fun of Greenwalt and Tim Minear, I can’t think who I’d make fun of. I like to be cruel to everybody, but that’s more to their face really.

Pylea and establishing the show

Are there different issues in the second season, since the spinoff has been established?

Yeah. The show sort of has established itself. It exists in and of itself. The second season was one where we really found out footing, started to build the ensemble.

By the end of it, we had Amy. We had all our key pivotal players in place. So, the first season we spent trying to be something we ended up not being. The second season we said, "Okay, we’re really going to play the emotion of the characters and the arc rather than just monster of the week."

The Pylea subplot took hits from the fans. How do you respond?

I do know that it’s a very sort of strange out of left field experience, but we’d had a show that had been very dark and almost relentless. And we also had the guest actors who we couldn’t get for the last four episodes. So come episode 18, everybody was kind of wrapped up. So we sat there and said, "Okay, well we still actually are contracted to make four more of these." And rather than just riffing on what we’d already been doing, I was like, "Can they go to Oz? Can we just go to Oz? Can we go through the looking glass and just get insane?" And we all had so much fun with that concept that we went there. It was a big shift. I think the last two episodes of that are hilarious. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with hilarious. But I think Angel had established itself as more melodramatic than Buffy at that point and to take that kind of a whimsical turn I think took people by surprise. But at the end of the day, they were directed by Tim and David. They were written by them and they’re just two of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.

Why aren’t we seeing deleted scenes from the episodes?

When they started out, they didn’t realize the potential [of DVD]. I don’t even know if some of that stuff was saved anywhere where it can be found, but now it’s sort of de rigeur.