< Angel

Angel/Tropes U-Z


U

  • UST: Between Cordelia and Doyle. Though they did come close to resolving it. (Stupid demon Nazis.)
  • Ultimate Evil: The Wolf, Ram and Hart (AKA the "Senior Partners").
  • Unpredictable Results: A giant egg that apparently might do anything, but... turned Angel into a puppet?
  • Unstuck in Time: Illyria in "Time Bomb."
  • Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Ryan Anderson's reaction to Angel shoving him out of the path of a speeding car. Noticing the bloody scrape on Angel's shoulder, Ryan, who seems completely unfazed by his brush with death, asks Angel if he's going to cry. This is an early sign that this kid belongs in a padded room.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Pretty much everyone as far as Jasmine's concerned.

V

  • Vader Breath: Cyvus Vail.
  • Vagueness Is Coming: The Beast's arrival in season 4 of Angel is foreseen in vague implications of blood, and fire from the sky, and all that good stuff.
    • In Season Five, Lindsey reveals that Wolfram & Hart are laying the groundwork for the upcoming apocalypse by, um...not telling anyone about it.
  • Vampire Detective Series
  • Vampire Hunter: Both good and evil varieties.
  • Van Helsing Hate Crimes: Most prominently seen in "The Old Gang of Mine", in which Gunn's old vampire-hunting crew begins hunting anything non-human.
  • Villainous Demotivator: The head vampire in "War Zone", Knox, claps his buddy Ty on the shoulder and says its not his fault for getting ambushed by Gunn's crew. Right before he stakes him.
  • Virgin Sacrifice: Magnus Bryce has this in mind for his daughter, Virginia. It didn't work because he didn't watch her closely enough--she'd lost her "purity" a long time ago.
    • Connor crosses his Moral Event Horizon when he agrees to slaughter a female virgin, furthering Evil Cordy's goals.
  • Viva Las Vegas: "The House Always Wins" from Season 4, filmed on location in Sin City.
  • Voice Changeling: The Ethros demon possessing Ryan displays this ability. It taunts Wesley in a voice identical to his own, reminding him of his unceremonious sacking from the Watcher's Council; then it strikes out at Angel by channeling Doyle's voice, playing on Angel's guilt. And also makes him angry.
  • Volleying Insults:

Spike: Never much for small talk, were you? Always too busy trying to perfect that "brooding block of wood" mystique. God, I love that.
Angel: Not as much as I loved your non-stop yammering.
Spike: The way you always had to be the big swingy, swaggerin' around, barkin' orders--
Angel: Never listening.
Spike: Always interrupting.
Angel: And your hair, what color do they call that? "Radioactive"?
Spike: Never much cared for you, Liam, even when we were evil.
Angel: Cared for you less.
Spike: Fine!
Angel: Good!
(long pause)
Angel: There was one thing about you.
Spike: Really?
Angel: Yeah, I never told anybody about this, but I liked your poems.
Spike: You like Barry Manilow!

  • Vomit Discretion Shot: During the acid trippy sequence of "Spin the Bottle", the camera cuts to Fred, who is petting a potted fern with fascination. Right before she vomits off to the side.
    • Following the rooftop showdown in "Lineage", Wesley expresses shock at shooting his father by shambling over to a nearby air conditioning unit. This is followed by the sound of him retching.

W

  • Waif Prophet
  • Walk in Chime In: When Angel warns his buddies about how Buffy would react if she found out he'd been stalking her in Sunnydale, Buffy pops into his office to finish his thought. "A little upset." Oh boy.
    • Happens quite a lot in Season 4, when the main arc requires the cast to reunite and spout exposition quickly.
  • Wall of Weapons: Angel's basement in Season 1. After he joins agrees to run Wolfram & Hart, Angel's office comes furnished with one.
  • Watching the Sunset: Angel allows himself to watch one last sunset before smashing his Ring of Power.
  • Watching Troy Burn: Heroes and villains alike look on with fear as The Beast rains fire on Los Angeles.
  • Waxing Lyrical: Cordelia wonders aloud why anyone in their right mind would try dating in L.A. You'll just end up being stalked by a surgeon with anatomic limbs or impregnated with demon spawn.

Doyle: People need people. And people...who need people...are the luckiest peo-- (Cordy glares, Doyle shuts up)

    • A Call Back to this line occurs in "The Magic Bullet", via Connor of all people. Cue incredulous stares from everyone in the room.

Lorne: You been sneakin' peeks at my Streisand collection again, kiddo?
Connor: (defensively) It just kinda popped out.

Wesley: I have no idea where Angel is, Lilah, or what happened to him. And I really couldn't care.
Lilah: Wow. That was cold. I think we're finally making progress. Come on. Doesn't it bother you just a little bit? The not knowing?
Wesley: That part of my life is dead. Doesn't concern me now.

  • Weakened by the Light: The "Beacon" is a weapon which emits a light deadly to humans and demi-humans alike. The Scourge intend to use to annihilate every half-breed demon within a quarter-mile radius.
  • Welcome to My World: Darla's first words to Angel following his 'rebirth' as a vamp.
  • "Well Done, Son" Guy: Trevor Lockley was always cold to Kate, having shut down all emotion following his wife's death. Despite this, Kate is deeply distraught at the murder of her father. In response to Trevor's death, she begins to hate all paranormal creatures (especially vampires) and turns openly-hostile towards Angel.
    • "The Prodigal" is interspersed with flashbacks to Angel's upbringing in Ireland, revealing a not-dissimilar relationship with his own father.
    • Roger Wyndam-Pryce manages to wear down his son's spirit every time he opens his mouth.
  • Wham! Episode: For starters, "Reunion", "Reprise", "Sleep Tight"/"Forgiving", "Home", A Hole In The World".
  • Wham! Line: "And yet somehow, I just can't seem to care."
  • Whammy Bid: The item for sale: Cordelia's visions, or more specifically, her eyeballs. To stall for time, Cordelia incites a bidding war by claiming to be able to see the locations of buried treasure. This escalates until one of the two highest bidders kills the other one. Finally, a female attorney for Wolfram & Hart closes the auction with a whopping bid of $30,000.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: The rest of Angel Investigations calls Angel out after he lets Darla and Drusilla massacre a lot of Wolfram and Hart lawyers.
  • Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Have fun waiting around for an explanation, because there isn't one. Angel ditches most of his cool accessories in the second season, though a few random ones still pop up now and again.
    • Gunn's original street crew included one guy who's armed with a flamethrower. Where did they get that?
  • Where When Who
  • White Void Room: The conduit room.
  • Who Shot JFK?: A conspiracy theorist is informed by Jasmine that there was no second gunman.
  • Who Wants to Live Forever?
  • Whole-Episode Flashback: The heroes relocate to the defunct Hyperion Hotel in "Are You Now or Have You Ever Been". In the process, they must uproot a demon who held some connection to Angel in The Fifties.
    • Darla's eponymous episode shows her rise from syphilis-stricken prostitute to big-league vampire.
    • And in "Why We Fight", Angel and Spike punch some Nazis.
  • Why We Can't Have Nice Things: Harmony is not to be trusted with ancient books.
  • Wicked Cultured: Most of the high-class baddies on this series are fond of classical music -- even Lindsey. In their first scene together, he and Darla shoot the breeze about Frédéric Chopin.
    • Marcus the vampire plays a Broken Record of Mozart's Symphony #41 to interrogate Angel.
  • Wife-Basher Basher: The Cold Open for "In the Dark" follows Angel saving a woman from her drug addict boyfriend, who Angel proceeds to pound unconscious. Ouch.
  • Wilhelm Scream: Heard at the beginning of "The Cautionary Tale of Numero Cinco", when the Red Shirt is tossed into the air.
  • Willfully Weak: It's established that Angel is stronger in Game Face, and that he sometimes holds back rather than scare off the people he's trying to save. Occasionally, a character will punch him repeatedly in order to make him vamp out. This happened once with Buffy (in "Graduation Day"), and again with adult Connor.
    • "Guise Will Be Guise" hints at Angel's inner fear. In a stick-fighting match with a hermit, Angel repeatedly gets beatenback while his opponent asks him why he's holding back. "Because if I let it, it'll kill you."
    • The Season Two finale puts Angel on Pylea, an alternate dimension where his Game Face manifests as a crazed, spiked monster. He accidentally switches over while trying to protect Fred, and doesn't revert back until he catches his reflection in a pool of water. The sight of it traumatizes Angel so much that he has a nervous breakdown, and refuses to fight anyone else.
    • Doyle has much the same problem: He's ashamed of his demon half and will even allow himself to be beaten to a pulp rather than transform. This despite Doyle being practically invulnerable in demon form.
  • Wire Fu: One of the things that made the fights in this show more distinct from Buffy
  • With a Friend and a Stranger: Initially, with Angel and Cordelia as "friends", and Doyle as the stranger.
  • With Due Respect: At Wolfram & Hart, no one dares contradict a senior manager. Except Lindsey.
  • With or Without You

Wesley Wyndam-Pryce: I thought you'd like to know that we're keeping the agency open. With or without you.

  • Wolf Chick: Nina Ash.
  • Woman in Black: Jhiera in "She".
  • Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Connor by the end of Season 4.
  • Worf Had the Flu: Faith's big fight with Angelus in season four. Angel finally wins a fight with a Slayer... who's previously injured and high on magic heroin.
    • Wins? Try lost. As Faith said, "Kicked his ass."
    • Somewhat brilliantly applied in-universe by Hamilton. Hamilton completely avoids Illyria until she (partly at Hamilton's instruction) gets zapped with a depowering weapon. He then mocks and unloads on a extremely depressed, Crash Bandicoot-playing "big scary Old One" and chalks it up. Notable here because the last time Illyria was around, she was at least two tiers higher in power, was presumably feeling a hell of a lot better, and would have eaten the Senior Partners themselves.
  • Workout Fanservice: Angel's Tai Chi involves him doing it shirtless.
  • World of Cardboard Speech: The entire point of "You're Welcome."
  • Would Hit a Girl: Angel decks Buffy in the face in an effort to keep her from running upstairs to kill Faith. ("Sanctuary")

Angel: Not to go all schoolyard on you, but you hit me first. And in case you've forgotten you're a little bit stronger than I am.

Y

  • You Can't Fight Fate: Both played straight as a key point of the Myth Arc, and subverted when a baddie makes up a fake prophecy to screw with Angel.
    • Sahjhan learns it the hard way, despite his relentless chessmastering.
  • Yank the Dog's Chain: "I Will Remember You", "Awakening", and "You're Welcome".
  • Year Inside, Hour Outside: Doyle comments on this after Angel returns from the Oracle's realm.
  • You Are in Command Now: Lawson is briefly put in charge of a captured German submarine following the murder of his captain by Spike. Once aboard, Angel assumes control of the sub thanks to the command codes provided for him by the U.S. military.
  • You Have No Idea Who You're Dealing With: A skinhead vampire gets in Angel's face for proposing a truce between his pack and Gunn's street gang. Without so much as blinking, Angel jams a stake through him ("I wasn't actually talking to you.") and proceeds with the rest of his speech.
  • You Are Too Late: Invoked in the very first episode, for cripes' sake.
    • The same thing happens to Angel again in "The Prodigal": Realizing Kate's father is in danger, Angel rushes over to his apartment, but is unable to convince Trevor to invite him in. Angel is then forced to watch as Trevor is killed by his vampire associates, who were invited inside a mere minute earlier.
    • The good guys seem to be constantly running late in Season Four. Angel and co. fail to catch The Beast before he blots out the sun, prevent the deaths of the Ra-Tet (one of whom is massacred right under their noses), or stop Cordelia from birthing Jasmine. In the case of the latter, Angel makes it in time to stop Cordelia and raises his sword to kill her, but hesitates for a crucial moment.
  • You Are What You Hate: In the end, Holtz was engaging in actions that were the reason he hated Angelus and Darla in the first place.
  • You Can Keep Her: Jack McNamara steps a bit too close to the red line in "The Ring", giving Angel an opportunity to grab him without disintegrating. When Jack's brother (Darin) shows up, Angel demands to be set free or he'll break Jack's neck. Darin casually pulls a gun and shoots his brother, and Angel is knocked out by a barrage of cattle prods.
  • You Killed My Father: Adopted father in this case, but Holtz kills himself to deliberately set Connor against Angel because of this reasoning.
  • You Know I'm Black, Right?: Cordelia calls up Willow (from Buffy) to inquire about Harmony's weird behavior... before learning that Harmony's been turned into a vampire during her absence. Along with some other developments.

Cordelia: (on the phone) Oh! Harmony's a vampire! All this time I thought she'd become a great big lesbo! (beat) Oh. Really? ...well, that's great! Good for you!
Willow: Thanks for the validation.

  • You Look Familiar: Harriet Doyle's rebond boyfriend, Richard Straley, is played by Carlos Jacott. He previously played Ken, another (seemingly) milquetoast villain on Season 3 of Buffy ("Anne").
    • The guy who played Knox previously played Holden in Buffy ("Conversations With Dead People") and Kal Penn played an obnoxious college student in "Beer Bad" before appearing in Angel as a guy with an exposed brain.
    • The "Mustard" guy (executive producer David Fury) from "Once More With Feeling" reappears on "Smile Time" as the human puppet.
  • You Need to Get Laid
  • You Remind Me of X: Penn selects his victims based on their physical resemblance to his family members. Like Angel says, he's "been getting back at (his) father for over 200 years."
    • Holland delivers this spiel to Lindsey in "Blind Date", implying that he once had an Ignored Epiphany of his own.
    • Faith's journey is an obvious parallel to Angel's, even moreso when she becomes The Atoner. Angel's rehabilitation of her is a Call Back to his earlier (thwarted) attempt to do so in the third season of Buffy.
  • You Said You Would Let Them Go: Wesley's reaction to the Watcher Council's Ops Team after they go back on their word to protect Angel from harm. Ha ha....no. ("Sanctuary")
  • You Will Be Assimilated: Despite his non-threatening appearance, Barney is an auctioneer of stolen body parts from demons and other empowered beings.
  • You Taste Delicious: Lorne, after he's obliged to swill down some of Sebassis' favorite beverage.
  • Your Head Asplode: Illyria dispatches Cyvus Vail in this manner.
  • You Look Familiar: Carlos Jacott, who plays Richard in the Season 1 episode "Bachelor Party", previously appeared as Ken in the Buffy Season 3 opener, "Anne". He would later appear in the first two episodes of Firefly as Lawrence Dobson.
  • Your Princess Is in Another Castle: This is the gist of Season Four. By episode 16, Angel and co. have bested Wolfram & Hart, the demon hordes, the Beast, and Angelus, and it's looking like the job is finally sewn up. -- O hai Preggo Cordy.
    • As Angel later learns, the heroes didn't really accomplish anything. Jasmine was busy snuffing out every supervillain in L.A., because she wants to be the only game in town.
  • Your Vampires Suck: Angel's irate reaction to anyone who mentions coffins.
    • After Angel confesses to being a vampire, Rebecca reacts in true Hollywood fashion: by listing off famous actors who have played vampires (Bela Lugosi and Gary Oldman). Angel remarks under his breath that "Frank Langella was the only performance I believed..."
  • Zombie Apocalypse: In the fourth season, Wolfram & Hart becomes a Zombie Apocalypse in a single building: Security Voodoo to hit anyone after a major attack.
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