The Trial (Angel)

"The Trial (Angel)"

"The Trial" is episode 9 of season 2 in the television show Angel. See List of Angel episodes for a complete list.

Plot synopsis

Summary

After Darla discovers that she is again terminally ill with syphilis and will soon die, she begs Angel to turn her back into a vampire to halt the disease's progress. When he refuses, Darla seeks another sire. Angel intervenes and, following the guidance of Lorne, engages in a series of three mysterious trials to win Darla a second chance at life. Angel is dismayed but undaunted to learn that, win or lose, either he or Darla will die. Meanwhile, Lindsey devises a diabolical plan to turn Darla dark.

Expanded overview

Fluff And Fold: Cordelia and Wesley discuss Angel's state of mind while he is down in the basement, where he has remained for a worrisome amount of time. Soon enough, though, Angel appears with an armload of clothes and Wes and Cordy are relieved to learn that their friend has been doing nothing more ominous than his laundry. Moreover, Angel appears to have achieved some degree of balance regarding his obsession with Darla. Their hope turns to distress when Gunn, under Angel's orders all along, charges into the Hyperion with news that he has located Darla at the very seedy Royal Viking Motel. Cordelia protests that Angel lied to them and he candidly admits, "I did, I know." When Wes asks why, Angel lightly replies, "I figured you'd nag." Nearly as abruptly as Gunn arrived, Angel leaves with him to rescue Darla from falling (back) into the clutches of Wolfram and Hart.

All Made Up And Nowhere To Go: Meanwhile, Darla sits at the vanity in her dingy motel room, removes her cross pendant, and applies coral lipstick that contrasts starkly with her pale, pale face. As she wipes her mouth in despair, Darla hears a knock at her door. Before she can speak, keys jingle and the door opens, but it is not Angel. Lindsey, bribing the desk clerk to let him in, has found her first.

Back In The Fold: Lindsey takes Darla back to his office under guard. They are joined by a strangely solicitous Holland Manners just as Darla, in response to Lindsey's empty politeness, cynically asks whether she has a choice about being there, or even a choice to be in the world at all. She scorns Holland's philosophical answer and bluntly asks how the firm wants her to mess with Angel this time. She is hardly reassured when Holland tells her, "You're not our prisoner, Darla. You are, however, our moral responsibility." Aghast at news of her reactivated illness, Darla looks to Lindsey for some indication of foreknowledge. Shaken, she seems uncertain how to interpret his complete lack of response. Meanwhile, Angel and Gunn check out Darla's motel room. Gunn learns that vampires need no permission to enter public accommodations. Sensing that Darla was there not long before, that she was afraid, but that her departure involved no bloodshed, Angel fails to mention to Gunn whether he can also smell Lindsey's recent presence.

Proper Companions: In France, 1765, Angelus and Darla are on the run from a relentless vampire hunter named Holtz. Believing themselves well ahead of any pursuit, and in need of rest for their spent mare, they take refuge from the swiftly approaching day in a dilapidated barn. Before they can get comfortable, however, their pursuers shoot the first flaming arrow into a beam just beside Angelus' head.

In Need Of A Makeover: In a dingy L.A. dive, Darla finds an unimaginative dork of a vampire that she almost fails to manipulate into siring her. Upon hearing his opinion that the idea of creating a companion for himself is "just weird," Darla replies in exasperated disbelief, "Weird? It's mythic." Finally, Darla drags the hapless vamp into the alley out back, but before he can bite her, Angel stakes him to dust. In response to his ire, Darla tells Angel she's only here because he refused to turn her himself. He refuses again and tries to reason with her, only to be utterly poleaxed when Darla reveals that she is terminally ill and has scant weeks left to live.

Soulless Blood-sucking Demons: As Holtz and his mob close in on the burning barn, Angelus steels himself for a fight to the finish. Unwilling to go out in a blaze of glory, Darla knocks Angelus down with a weighted blow to the back of his head and rides away on their only horse. Over her shoulder, she calls to him, saying she hopes he survives and perhaps they'll meet in Vienna. His face a study of fury and comprehension, Angelus watches his soulless companion abandon him to his doom. In L.A., Angel brings Darla to the Hyperion, where she'll be safe while he hunts for proof that her "illness" is a scam perpetrated by Wolfram & Hart. Believing that the firm is telling the truth, Darla tries once again to convince Angel of this. She reminds him that their century or so of expertise in mind games makes them difficult marks. Cordelia says, "Yes, but you were just soulless blood-sucking demons. They're lawyers." Angel looks at Darla. "She's right," he says. "We were amateurs." Darla wanly acquiesces when Angel asks her to give him a chance to investigate. As soon as Angel is out the door, Cordelia and Wesley ruthlessly inform Darla that she is on a very short leash.

Lawyers In Love: Expecting a fight, Angel kicks Lindsey's door in and is nonplussed when the young lawyer quietly extends an invitation to enter. Angel learns that Lindsey didn't believe Darla's diagnosis either, and obtained not only a second opinion, but a third, and a tenth, and even had her examined by his own doctor. Eloquently, Lindsey also tries to convince Angel to sire Darla, but Angel is adamant in his belief that killing Darla is not the way to save her. Angel returns to the Hyperion, where Darla again begs him to make her undead before she dies. Understanding that Wolfram & Hart is using Darla's illness to set a trap for them both, Angel refuses yet again. Suddenly, something Darla says gives Angel an idea.

Singing For Her Life: He takes her to Caritas where, with heartbreaking beauty, she sings the blues for Lorne. Observing that his friend is unusually agitated, Lorne reluctantly divulges that he sees only one way that Angel might save Darla. Even though Lorne warns that it will be "a bit of a quest" and will probably kill him, Angel accepts the challenge without hesitation and hovers impatiently as Lorne writes an address on a slip of paper.

Leap Of Faith: When Angel and Darla arrive at the address, however, there seems to be nothing but an empty swimming pool. Secretly disappointed, Darla cannot understand why Angel trusts a "green-skinned, horned lounge singer" and wants to leave, but Angel explains that he is being tested and must literally "take the plunge." Mounting the diving board and really not needing to draw a deep breath, Angel dives headfirst onto bare concrete. Instead of smashing his skull, Angel disappears in a flicker of bluish light and, without transition, rolls athletically to his feet on the stone floor of a large, low-ceilinged, torchlit room. In what looks like part of a castle's dungeon, a master of ceremonies -- the dapper, tuxedoed Valet -- immediately approaches Angel and says, "Well, you certainly have faith. Now we'll test your valor." Darla has magically arrived as well and, when Angel objects to her presence, the Valet explains that as the prize, she is also his "collateral." The contest is to the death and unless Angel passes all three trials Darla's life is instantly forfeit. The Valet proceeds to offer Darla "an iced beverage," then teleports her to the "antechamber," a waiting area set up like a castle's banquet hall.

The First Test: Taking Angel's coat, shirt, socks and shoes, the Valet cryptically answers "the challenger's" insistent queries. For the first trial, Angel will be unarmed against an armed opponent whom he must kill. When Angel presses for more detail, the Valet claims to have no idea what the remaining trials might entail, because no one has ever survived the first. With a final farewell, the Valet disappears to join Darla, leaving Angel to face a large, lumpy, puce-colored demon armed not only with a sword, but with huge hooks on long, heavy chains as well. Angel dodges several swings of the chains before being hooked through the calf and dragged toward the leering demon. In the antechamber, the Valet checks his pocketwatch and notes that Angel has survived a wholly unprecedented 17 seconds. Distraught, Darla demands to see what's happening and the Valet, with a predictably cryptic warning, touches her forehead. Clearly able to feel what Angel feels, as well as to see what he sees, Darla flinches and flinches as she finds her champion currently enduring a succession of heavy punches and kicks. When the demon draws its sword for the killing blow, Angel unhooks himself and blocks the thrust with the demon's own chain. Escaping into a narrow corridor circling the challenge floor, Angel ambushes the demon, grabs its sword and slices it in two at the waist. Believing he's won, Angel shouts and furiously pounds on the portcullis blocking the exit. Turning at a noise behind him, he watches (as does a despairing Darla) the revived demon literally pull itself together and renew the attack, hooked chains swinging. Avoiding the whirling chains, Angel retrieves the sword and chops the demon in half again, this time hooking its torso separately from its legs and chaining them to handy brackets on opposite sides of the room. The portcullis slowly lifts and Angel moves on to the second trial.

Crosses To Bear: As the gate slams down directly behind him, Angel faces a dark stretch where no torches have been lit. Above him, the stone ceiling slowly grinds open to show the late night sky. A gibbous moon rides high, and its light reveals the long corridor before him. To Angel's (and Darla's) consternation, the walls and floors are completely covered with crosses of all types and sizes, some huge and wooden, some inlaid in gold and silver, some carved and embossed in relief into the stone blocks themselves. Knowing the moon won't be overhead for much longer (and that the sun will eventually rise), Angel gathers himself and limps as fast as he can over the burning floor, stifling screams as his bare feet sizzle and smoke. Unwilling to touch the cross-covered walls for support, he falls, and screams aloud as the burning crosses brand his bare chest and belly. Lunging upright, he reaches the relative safety of the door at the corridor's far end, only to find it solidly locked. Looking over his shoulder at the font he passed in the middle of the corridor, Angel bolts back and sees a key lying deep on the bottom of its fluid-filled basin. Still watching, Darla breathes, "Holy water," just before Angel plunges his arm into the font. Screaming in agony, Angel fishes the key from the furiously boiling water. Still screaming, he stumbles back to the door and opens it with the costly key. In the antechamber, the Valet again consults his pocketwatch and meditatively says, "He's quite remarkable." With a faraway look on her face, Darla says, "Yes. He is."

Raising The Stakes: Angel cautiously turns the corner into the next torchlit room, but the stones here are just plain, unadorned blocks. As he limps a few steps forward, manacles magically snake from the walls and, leaving no slack, attach themselves to his wrists and ankles. Finding himself chained spread-eagled in the middle of the smallish room, Angel is unsurprised to see the Valet arrive through a narrow stone doorway. The Valet congratulates Angel on his prowess while a wall of wooden stakes -- many dozens of horizontal, spring-loaded stakes -- materializes before his eyes. Angel learns that the third trial requires his life in exchange for Darla's.

The Final Challenge: When Angel comments that the final test is hardly sporting, the Valet explains the terms in more detail. Passing the first two trials has earned Angel the choice of whether or not to undergo the final ordeal. At this point, if he so wishes, Angel is free to leave unhindered. Upon learning that Darla would die instantly were he to forsake this last test, Angel unhesitatingly tells the Valet, "No deal." The Valet steps across to the safety of the doorway, then turns back and proceeds to wonder aloud if the world wouldn't be a better place having in it a heroic Angel rather than a decidedly unheroic Darla. In his vulnerable state, Angel is unable to conceal his doubt and uncertainty, but is nevertheless determined that Darla live at any cost. When the Valet asks, for the final time, whether Angel chooses to go through with the test even though Darla can promise him nothing, he replies with quiet intensity, "Yes." In the antechamber, Darla whispers, "No." Even the insouciant Valet seems subdued as he signals for the stakes to be cocked. Struggling for composure, Angel says, "Do it." The Valet fractionally nods, the stakes release with a rumbling rush, and Darla shrieks in anguish both personal and vicarious. Suddenly she catches her balance, stops screaming and opens her eyes. Her champion, alive and fully clothed, struggles to stand upright before her. "Angel!" Darla cries, and seems unaware that, perhaps for the first time, she hasn't called him Angelus. Hearing that by accepting death he has won the third trial, Angel brushes aside the Valet's apparently sincere kudos. "Pay up," he says. When the Valet rests his fingertips on Darla's head, however, he discovers that she has already been restored to life by supernatural means and that he is, therefore, unable to grant the boon Angel has won. When Angel protests that Darla has earned a second chance, the Valet replies, "She's living her second chance." With a glance, the Valet manifests a brightly lit stairway leading up, then disappears himself. With nothing left to fix or risk or give, Angel holds nothing back. He explodes with fury, destroying the antechamber's luxurious appointments and thrashing its two previously immobile guards. Darla, still, can only watch as Angel punches a pillar over and over and over, then sinks to his knees against the unyielding stone.

Acceptance: In Darla's motel room, Angel mopes in a chair by the window while she perches on the edge of the bed. When he begins to mutter that maybe he could bite her after all, Darla cries "No!" with reflexive alarm. Angel doesn't quite realize that their moral positions have reversed. Not ready yet to accept their mutual inability to change Darla's fate, he protests the apparent whimsy of the Powers. In response, Darla tries to explain that her new understanding of how deeply Angel cares for her is truly enough. She has come to believe that perhaps she really is living her second chance. "To die?" Angel asks hoarsely. "Yes," Darla replies. "To die the way I was meant to die in the first place." After a moment, Angel seems to grasp that his wrenching sacrifices have not been entirely in vain. Getting stiffly to his feet, he limps across to sit on the bed beside her and gently promises to stay with her until the end. When she nods, Angel puts his arm around her shoulders and Darla, in the circle of his embrace, begins to weep. "You'll never be alone again," he promises once more.

A Bite To Remember: At that moment, four black-clad commandos break down the door and immediately taser Angel nearly senseless. Forcing him to his knees, two of the commandos secure Angel's hands behind his back with duct tape, while the remaining two catch and hold Darla's arms before she can do more than stand and turn. Following his assault team in, Lindsey notes that Darla is secure, then brutally yanks Angel's head back. "How did you think this would end?" he hisses. Throwing Angel's head back down, Lindsey turns his gaze toward the door. Needing no more permission to enter than Angel did, beautiful, predatory Drusilla glides gracefully into the room. As Lindsey impassively looks on, Drusilla passes Angel without a glance and focuses on a weakly struggling Darla. With mad glee, Drusilla vamps and bites Darla, then completes the siring by drawing her own blood for Darla to drink in turn. Silent and immobile, Angel watches in despair as Darla's precious, newly-saved soul is lost forever.

Writing and acting

• Given Angel's brief confession to Buffy in "Lie to Me," Drusilla's actions here transcend poignance and assume a tragic significance of near-mythic proportions. The history between Angel and Dru is revealed piecemeal throughout both series, but in that episode, Buffy demands to know for herself Angel's connection with Drusilla. Reluctantly, he tells her that in a career of doing many "unconscionable things" as Angelus, "Drusilla was the worst. She was an obsession of mine. ... On the day she took Holy Orders, I made her a demon." Drusilla's extreme spiritual torment of Angel is even more dramatically ironic than the notion that she achieves it by re-siring her sire's sire. It certainly surpasses the unmistakable irony inherent in Dru's dallying torture and attempted blood sacrifice of Angel during "What's My Line, Part Two."

Production details

Music

• "Ill Wind" - Ella Fitzgerald
• "The Trials for Darla" - Robert Kral

Quotes and trivia

• Holtz is mentioned for the first time in this episode's first flashback. He will later appear in episode one of season three, and become that season's major threat.

• After the trial, Angel wonders what effect his siring of Darla would have on her. "Maybe it would be different. We don't know. Maybe because, you know, I have a soul, if I did bite you..." This contradicts the flashback in "Why We Fight", in which it is revealed that an ensouled Angel sires a young sailor who becomes an evil, soulless thing regardless.

• Talking about Wolfram & Hart playing mind games, Cordelia makes a lawyer joke.

Darla: "I don't trust them -- but I know a thing or two about mind games. [turning to Angel] So do you -- we played them together for over a century."

Cordelia: "Yes, but you were just soulless blood-sucking demons. They're lawyers."

Angel: [turning to Darla] "She's right, we were amateurs."

Translations

• German title: "Auf Leben und Tod" ("Between Life and Death")
• Italian title: "Diagnosi Mortale" ("Deadly Diagnosis")
• Spanish title: "La Gran Prueba" ("The Great Test")

Continuity

Arc significance

• In the fourth season episode "Shiny Happy People", Jasmine claims that Angel is successful in these trials, earning the life of his son, Connor. For murdering psycho narcissist Jasmine, of course, the important thing about Connor's life is that it ultimately allows Jasmine herself to be born. For the principles, however, her advent is an unparalleled catastrophe. Still, Jasmine may be right for the wrong reason. Perhaps Connor is the key. Because she directly experiences Angel's compassion and integrity during these trials, Darla realizes that her second chance is not about living, but about dying with grace. Angel despairs too soon when Dru sires Darla. He is wrong to believe his fragile gift is obviated by the loss of Darla's soul, because the "second chance" he inadvertently teaches her to value -- and which they both had to learn (from the Valet, no less) began the moment Darla was summoned back -- is merely deferred for several months. Darla is not fated to passively waste away, but is given the chance to actively choose to do good. Contact with her unborn son's soul allows her to once again feel love and to remember Angel's strength of purpose. In the third season episode "Lullaby", Darla finds the redemption Angel so desperately seeks for her. As for Connor himself, though, the "life" he gets is so far from ideal that he never has a single chance, let alone a second. In the final episode of season four, "Home", Angel, by now intimately familiar with the cosmic life-for-a-life drill, makes an equally heartwrenching sacrifice to win his son his own second chance.

Timing

• Stories that take place around the same time in the Buffyverse:

External links

• The Trial at IMDb