-City Of Demons-
Hey, this Your Eternal Wolverine again, and this is the commentary for City Of Demons. This is the crossover episode, where I get to write a story for 2 of my favorite TV characters.
The idea came about from my love of the show Angel, obviously. And I couldn’t have picked a better time, Angel has taken over the law firm, some of his friends have been offed. So I can basically do whatever I want with Angel, and keep it simple with the other main characters from his show.
I choose to keep Wesley in the mix, because I like his character. He is a great supporting character. Always finding the answers, usually just in the nick of time. Gunn is also a good character, but I feel not as useful. His character just took an injury, so it was easy to put his character out of the episode, logically.
There was also the looming threat of cancellation of Angel. I always wanted to do a cross over. I figured do it now. I wouldn’t feel right about a cross over after a shows ends. So I ran to Peter, and asked (more liked ordered) if we could fit an Angel cross over in the early part of season 2. He like the idea, and I jumped on the computer, and made it so.
Overall, I like how it turned out. Now when I write, I only have a basic idea of what will happen. I know I have point A, and point Z, but the details in between do not take full shape until I use my pen or my keyboard.
Sometimes I do have a clear idea, like in "Flame Of The Heart" (coming next season) & maybe a few others. But that is rare, usually the overview works for me. And I know I am just going to change things anyway.
There are a few things I did not intend. One, while I always wanted a fight between Wolverine & Angel here, I did not intend for them to just fall off the roof. I had intended for Angel to kick the crap out of Logan. Because I see Wolverine as me, I write for him an extreme version of what I would do. And if I tangled with Angel, I pretty much think I’d lose. However, I found a way of ending the fight, to show that Angel has abilities that Logan does not, he’s a vampire, he can sort of fly. And I did it without taking away from the Logan character.
Two I didn’t intend for them to keep saving each other. In fact no saves at all were planned, they just sort of fell into place as the story progressed, and seemed natural. They also build up for a great end where logan basically changes his mind about the city, and sees they do have an angel.
Third, I did not realize how much like the plot on Angel with the Ilyria demon it would seem like. Nor did I want it to be character like The Beast, in their last season. However, I wanted it to be this huge, unstopable foe. Actually, I needed it to be like that. I love apocalyptish plots.
Forth, oh is that more then a few, lol. I actually did not intend The Scourge to be the demon army. Originally, it was just an (unnamed) army of demons. But I got to watching “Hero,” the episode where The Scrourge appeared.
Now in the Angel series, there tends to be alot of good plots that go unfinished. Not that many, but several happen (at least one a season). So I said to myself, why not give some closure ot one of these plots, and a damn good one. And, what group of demons are better then The Scrourge to raise a demon to destroy the world?
I also, intended a bit more carnage from Kalashumar. I wanted him to destroy a bit more then he did. At least with The Scourge, but I toned it down a bit. Though does go on quite a rampage, he goes after everything that moves, even the demons, and even some things that don’t move. He recked some nice cars.
Then we come to the finish, Logan & Angel battle it out with the demon, and I held true to my original intenions here. Have Angel try to go for the boss demon, and Logan take on as many as he can of the others, especially the shaman.
Logan quickly kills the shaman with a ninja star. The shaman’s greatest trick was controling Kalashumar, so it was pointless to get physical.
I didn’t write much action for the Angel vs. Kalashumar part of the showdown for two reasons. 1, it’s about Logan, not Angel. 2nd, I know if this was to ever be filmed, a fight with a huge demon (7” Tall) does not give much room for an epic battle, the best fights are done by competitors of the same stature. This is a saying I picked up from sports, but if you watch TV fights, it applies there very much too. You wind up taking a guy on stilts, and they lose agility, or do trick photography, which can water down the action as well. A distant 3rd reason, even if it sounds cheesy, is sometimes it’s best to let our imaginations do the work. (Actualually, that 2nd & 3rd reason, even if true, is a bunch of BS. I just happened to write it that way, lol.)
One thing I need to talk about is the title. Which obviously, if you are a fan of Angel, I modified from the pilot episode. The name is “City Of,” and I always felt it was not right. I suppose they wanted to omitte the word Angels, because LA is not the city of Angels in the show, it is a haven for demons. Perhaps because it was the 1st episode, it left you wondering what was to follow, what is implied with the 3rd word that has not been penned. It leaves a mystery, as does the episode does with what is to follow. It works, but I always though it should have been “City Of Angel,” giving a singular version for the city’s slogan.
I thought about calling my episode “City Of Angel” but it seemed unright, like I would be copying. So I thought what could I do that would be more of a tribute then a rip off of the Angel series creators.
Well, that’s it for my comments on the Angel cross over. I hope you enjoyed reading it, as much as I had writting it.
*For those who were also disapointed, and pissed that Angel was cancelled, then see my Offspring spin-off: angelfire.com/film/brimstonia/offspring.html
Peter Gilmour's comments:
Hey its me Peter Gilmour again. Well, let me first thank W68 for a great episode. He did a great job. As you all know, me and W68 are HUGE Angel fans are were PISSED that it got cancelled. I knwo W68 was more pissed than me (or anyone). So he wrote this episode and emailed it to me. When i looked it over, i was like wow thats great! The meeting of a mutant and a vampire is always weird in way. You dont realy know whats gonna happen. But I see where W68 was going with this and I'm glad he put this in. I feel it was the turning point of the season cuz Logan began to change somewhat and start believing in ppl and get alot of help where he didn't really need it.
See u all next season. I got 2 commentaries coming up soon for MOB RULES and Fantastic Voyage. So drop by soon for them.
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