Angel - 1x19 "Sanctuary" FULL REACTION

100% agree, well said.

cs

This episode is so important to me, but there's one exchange in particular that stands out above the rest. Buffy: "I gave you every chance! I tried so hard to help you, and you spat on me. My life was just something for you to play with. Angel - Riley - anything that you could take from me - you took. I've lost battles before - but nobody else has -ever- made me a victim." Faith: "And you can't stand that. You're all about control. You have no idea what it's like on the other side! Where nothing's in control, nothing makes sense! There is just pain and hate and nothing you do means anything. You can't even.." Buffy: "Shut up!" Faith: "Just tell me how to make it better." So many of my best friends relate to Buffy, but I've never felt connected with Buffy at all. This sequence was the first time I've ever felt represented in fiction, and actually the only time until I watched The Legend of Korra in 2017. Thing is, Buffy has never been out of control. It's not about herself or her choices, it's about the fact that she has Joyce and Giles and the Scoobies and a home and a school and everything else. Those are foundational things that she can take for granted and often does. No matter what happens, no matter how Buffy messes up, she has always had her safety net. But for Faith? Her father was abusive, her mother was neglectful and recently died, her first watcher was brutally murdered in front of her, her second watcher was a homicidal maniac, and her third watcher was a bumbling idiot who actually pulled her away from getting help. She had no home, no family, no authority figure, and some shitty excuses for friends. Buffy says she tried to help, but only up to the point of inconveniencing herself at all. When Faith needed a home, Buffy wasn't there. Neither were Joyce or Giles. Buffy didn't even like sharing her french fries with Faith, let alone her world. Bottom line, Faith had no foundation. There was nothing in her life but pain and hate, and nothing has ever made sense. Whenever I try to make this argument, people jump all over me about how Faith is still a bad person who did bad things. And I'm not disagreeing! Yes, Faith deserves blame and deserves to face the consequences of her actions. But you can't ignore how the system failed in order to produce someone like her. She never had Buffy's foundation. No one appreciated her for the good she did, no one forgave her for the mistakes she made, no one ever gave a damn in any direction at all. And when no one gives a damn about your existence, you just do what you can to cope. See, I've been where Faith is, I've taken beatings from all sides. I was abandoned by family for no reason, I've been robbed and raped and abused by people I trusted, I've been badly beaten by police, I've been accused of and scapegoated for crimes I didn't commit. When the entire world doesn't give a fuck about your existence, right and wrong and good and bad all become meaningless, all that matters anymore is survival. The Buffys in my life will never understand that; they simply can't comprehend what it means to be out of control.

Rachel Espiritu

There must be lots of people who ship Angel and Wesley... but I don't remember noticing people talking about it. I ship them platonically, but not romantically. I don't know if it's clear what I mean by that. lol.

UTU49

For some reason I can't watch any of your videos from Google drive on my phone. I have to watch on my computer which is a little harder to hide during work lol

Mel Saville

I like your reading. It does feel cruel to me, but I don't think it was 100% Buffy trying to be cruel. It felt like something that she needed to say and she just picked the wrong time and way of saying it. I don't think Buffy was thinking about Angel's feelings at all, it almost felt like she was saying it to herself. She had established a boundary with him in I Will Remember You and then crossed that boundary to get at Faith, which sort of burned her. Talking about Riley feels like an attempt to establish a harsher but more emotionally sound boundary, as their previous ones had been based on time and space and forgetting how much they love each other. What's weird is that even though Buffy is my favorite character on Buffy, I kind of dig Angel having the upper hand in their fight. We're always so grounded in Buffy's perspective that it's refreshing to identify more with Angel feeling attacked by her.

KT

Wesley:  "Angel, it wasn't for her."  Angel:  "I know."  Wesley:  "It's because I trust you.  Angel & Wesley 4EVA ❤️

Rachael

My interpretation of Buffy telling Angel about Riley is different. Earlier, when Buffy asks Angel if he knows what Faith did to her in Sunnydale, he answers with a quiet “yes” and they share a long pause. I take it that Buffy realizes that he does know about Riley now and about what Faith did. Then, near the end, after things have calmed down, she says it herself so that it's out in the open and not just something he heard about from Faith. Her bringing the trust issue into it does feel a little like turning a knife though, so maybe my view is wrong. Maybe that whole part of the conversation was about hurting Angel. I just don't feel it that way.

Bruce Trogdon

It's amazing how much your feelings about a character can change. In Buffy season 3, I thought Wesley was kind of a twit. Since showing up on Angel, I've been liking him better and better, but here, where after being brutally tortured by Faith, he comes to help her when he finds out the council goons are after her... that's the moment I fell head over heels in love with him. Even if he did it more for Angel's sake than for Faith's, the fact that he did it at all just touches me in a way I can't even explain. If someone had told me in Bad Girls that one day Wesley would be one of my favorite characters in the history of television, I never would have believed them, but here we are, I love him beyond all reason, and this is the storyline that made that happen.

peggin

My nickname for this episode is "Guest-Star-Palooza". Faith, Buffy, Kate, the 3 W&H lawyers, and the 3 Council goons: that's NINE! And 5 of them were also in the last Buffy episode with Faith in it.

UTU49

So much "oOoOOohh!" in this one, loved it 😂

Arianne Kay

I love the entire Faith crossover arc, but this episode is my least favorite only because I expected more time to be spent with Faith and Angel. The episode becomes more about Wesley and Buffy and also their relationships to Angel, and Buffy's (deserved) confrontation with Faith. Oh yeah, and there's also Wolfram & Hart and Kate and the most incompetent wetwork team ever. Cordelia was smart to realize that there wasn't enough room in this episode for her, so she wisely skedaddled in the most hilariously Cordelia way possible. Faith gets lost in the chaos that, granted, she created, and maybe I'm just being selfish because I wanted more Angel and Faith time. I do love the final shot of Faith sitting in her jail cell that is a callback to Faith sitting in the train car at the end of "Who Are You?" For once, Faith is not running, and she made her own choice to do this. It's a beautiful full circle to when Faith falsely confessed (blamed Buffy) to Giles and then Angel had Faith chained up in "Consequences," but I would be lying if I said that I'd rather have Faith voluntarily atoning in jail instead of joining Angel Investigations -- she fits so well on this show.

Rachael

This episode is fantastic, mostly because of Faith's development, but all the characters get their due (with the possible exception of Buffy). Does anyone else wonder why the Council's hit squad is so crappy, though? These guys are supposed to be elite, and both Buffy and Faith have tied them in knots multiple times. (Oh, and did anyone else see the YouTube vid posted before getting a notice for this? Odd.)

Bean's friend

I agree with all you said, but Buffy did walk in on them in what looked like a post coital cuddle and then when Angel stepped away from Faith, he began to button his shirt, like he was just getting dressed after having made love to her.

Richard Lucas

She was going for the hurt... I don't think she cared about being honest.

Bisibia

I always get emotional at the end when Faith turns herself in. She's finally doing the right thing but I kind of wish they had of stretched this story out a bit longer. I loved seeing Buffy back, it was important for her to get some sort of closure with Faith and I totally understand why she would be so unforgiving towards her yet I hate the way she took her anger out towards Angel, especially at the end where she throws her happy love life in his face. It was really unnecessary and cruel. I also love Wesley's loyalty towards Angel, its through Angel that he's became more confident in himself and he feels he finally fits in. I just wish Cordelia had of been in it more but overall it was a great episode

Donna

This all just hits me so well in my memory zone. The first season of Angel was great and here was one of the best reasons why. Angel was the fourth of my big four and the crossover moments are always fun, and the episode in particular carried so much weight, and multiplied by a factor of four when the whole story of Faith’s return (twice on Buffy and twice on Angel) played out. How cool it was, I must declare. Plus Wesley is more and more impressive (and his “hello, Buffy” was a simple and terrific moment.)

Koz

Faith is my favorite character in Buffy so I was so sad to see her locked away at the end of this ep. But you're right, it was a great 4-parter.

HuntingSwan

Isn't it strange that Buffy says she loves Riley but hasn't actually said that to Riley 🤔

scorpion-demon thing 👀🤣🤣😂😂😂