Angel

In "Destiny," the Wednesday, Nov. 19, episode of The WB’s "Angel," the love story of Spike and Drusilla (James Marsters, Juliet Landau) continues ... more or less.

Introduced in season two of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" as the "Sid and Nancy" of the vampire set, the British bloodsuckers’ saga has been played out in present-day episodes and flashbacks ever since, both on "Buffy" and its spin-off, "Angel," now in its fifth season.

In the current version of the tale, Angelus (David Boreanaz) — the name the good-guy vampire Angel goes by when he doesn’t have a soul, and is therefore very, very bad — drove innocent Cockney girl Drusilla mad and then turned her into a vampire. She then turned lovelorn Victorian poet William (Marsters) into a vampire just because he caught her eye on a London street.

This twisted lineage is also a romantic triangle, and that angle gets fleshed out, so to speak, in "Destiny." On top of their competition for Dru, Spike and Angel also shared the affections of the slayer Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar). This has not made for a harmonious situation since Spike has been forced to join Angel and his evil-battling team.

"We’ve had the Spike-Angel-Dru triangle," Landau says, "and we’ve had the Spike-Angel-Buffy triangle."

"Destiny" heads back in time to show what happened the first time the two vampires (both of whom now have souls) fought over a woman.

"It’s always fun to visit London 1880," Landau says. "I have some different wardrobe that’s really gorgeous. I’m always excited to go back and work, and this is a particularly fun episode, because I’m back with the boys."

Is Dru being a bad girl again? "Well, you know," Landau says, "you’ll have to see. It’s not exactly like that. There’s the vampire rules and all that, but Spike touches me in a different way, so it’s kind of nice ... figuratively," she hastily adds.

"That’s the part that’s so fun about the role. There are so many different colors and dimensions. Even though we are the villains ad we are evil, there always has been this very sweet love story between us."

Although she’s appeared in flashbacks and as one of the guises of the incorporeal First Evil on "Buffy," Drusilla’s last appearance in present day was in a February 2001 episode of "Buffy" called "Crush."

After being set on fire and driven out of Los Angeles on "Angel," Dru headed back to Sunnydale in hopes of rekindling old embers with Spike.

"I see he’s too far gone on Buffy," Landau says, "and I leave. I haven’t reappeared anywhere, so I’m obviously somewhere else at the moment, still undead and kicking."

Which means she could return. "They have actually talked about it," Landau says, "but I don’t know of any concrete thing. It is definitely a possibility. It would be fun."