''An assassin without sight searches for her next
victim.''
Blind Date - 1ADH21
Written by Jeannine Renshaw - Directed by Tom Wright - First Aired on May 16, 2000
Synopsis -
Creature Feature -
Cool Quotes -
References -
Continuity -
Goofs -
Trivia -
The Morgue -
Cast -
Famous Faces -
Points Of View
Synopsis
The Short: From the WB11 home
page: Angel agrees to help legal but not so
ethical whiz kid Lindsey McDonald crack the
secret files of Wolfram & Hart to save a group of children from a demonic
assassin. Said assassin also happens to be legally blind, quite the lethal
weapon and on the Wolfram & Hart's payroll. Angel asks vampire hunter, Gunn
to help him break into the Wolfram & Hart
building and along with the assistance of Lindsey, our undead hero makes it
in successfully even though the firm is full of traps.
Along his journey through the law firm's secret vaults Angel finds himself
attracted to an ancient scroll and he grabs it as he runs out the door.
Little does Angel know, the scroll holds a prophesy about the vampire
with a soul. Ultimately, Lindsey isn't quite sure if he can stick by his
decision to betray the firm and sabotage the deadly mission. In the end,
he chooses to stay with the firm, getting himself a nice raise and a much
bigger office.
The Long: After a ''Previously on Angel'' segment showing Angel
meeting Lindsey McDonald (see Continuity #1), we go to
the street at night where a toy vendor sells motorized army guys to some
kids as a blind woman with a cane walks by. He
clears the sidewalk for her.
Somewhere in a warehouse Angel fights two vampires. He stakes one then wraps
a chain around the neck of another, lifting him up and impaling him. Angel
then goes to save a bleeding man when
the blind woman jumps him from nowhere and proceeds to beat the hell out of
Angel. During the fight her sun glasses are knocked off and Angel sees she
has all-white eyes. Angel is knocked down and when he gets up the woman is
gone and the bleeding man is dead.
At Angel Investigations Wesley is perplexed at his inability to find a blind
demon (see Reference #1). They figure maybe she's
a human with extrasensory powers. Cordelia looks up the L.A.P.D. On Line web site
and is able to find the records of Vanessa Brewer, a blind woman who has
been accused of multiple crimes, but never has been convicted (see Goof #1). Cordelia also
notices that Wolfram & Hart are defending her. In the court room Vanessa
sits as Lindsey McDonald defends her. Angel walks in and throws Vanessa her
glasses, which she catches without looking. As the judge protests Angel
quickly exits. At Angel Investigations Wesley concludes she can see, just not the way they do
(see Reference #2). Angel walks in and says Wolfram &
Hart are volunteering their services for her. At the Wolfram & Hart office Lindsey and
Lee Mercer talk as Vanessa talks with some other Wolfram & Hart officials (see Continuity #2). Lindsey
greets Vanessa and she thanks him for getting her off the charges. A Wolfram & Hart big
wig talks privately with Lindsey, asking is everything is okay. They mention
Lindsey's failure with sending Faith against Angel. The executive tells him
he's happy with Lindsey's recent work, and tries to give him some advice
about life (see Reference #3). He then tells Lindsey to start working on a defence for
Vanessa's next crime, which will be assassinating some children who threaten
Wolfram & Hart. Lindsey seems shaken by the idea of killing children. At Angel Investigations
Angel throws a fit when he learns Vanessa was acquitted because of a hung
jury. He rants that he can't testify against her last murder because he
can't go to court. Angel likens the pure evil of Wolfram & Hart to his old bad vampire
days, which he misses. Lindsey then walks into Angel's office asking for
help, saying he wants out.
Angel talks to Lindsey about why he is doing this. Angel says
Lindsey made his choice, but Lindsey describes his destitute childhood,
saying how he swore how he would never let that happen again. Angel doesn't
care why he choose to be evil. Lindsey tells him about Vanessa's next job,
killing some children. He has no details, but says they would be in the
vault at Wolfram & Hart. Angel tells him to go get them, but Lindsey says he can't
return because Wolfram & Hart employ mind readers, and he would be killed. Angel,
Lindsey, Cordelia and Wesley plan to get Angel access to the vault. They
have a demon guarding it, and shamans who can tell when a vampire enters the
building. Angel says that won't be a problem. On the street that night Angel
talks to Gunn about helping him. After telling how dangerous it will be Gunn
agrees. The next day Lindsey goes to work as Angel begins to cut into the
sub basement with a torch from the sewers. Lindsey bumps into Lilah Morgan
and they talk briefly (see Continuity #2). Lindsey leaves a key card for Angel to pick up as
Angel finishes cutting the hole in the floor to enter the building. Lindsey
goes to the security office and makes small talk with the guard watching the
monitors. Gunn enters the office lobby and starts
to put on a show of words
(see Cool Quote #1 & Reference #4).
He checks his watch and has his men
bring in a vampire under blankets and in ropes, entering right as Angel
enters from the sewers. The shaman in the guard office starts to squeal to
the guard, who informs security there is a vampire on the premises, as
Lindsey secretly changes a monitor that shows Angel near the vault. The
vampire runs panicked through the offices. Security guards chase the vampire
and stake him. Angel opens the vault and is jumped by the demon. He merely
blows a powder in it's face and the demon collapses, he quietly thanks Wesley
for that trick. Lindsey makes his way out the office, watching over his
shoulder and running into Lee. Angel gets the documents from the vault, then
sees a scroll case on a display, which he feels compelled to grab. Alarms
sound and he runs for the closing doors, barely escaping. Angel tells
Lindsey to get out on the cell phone as Angel makes his escape, but security
start to round up people on the floor for a random sweep. Lindsey, Lee and
Lilah end up together seeing the mind readers being ushered in.
In a Wolfram & Hart office the employees are lined up and the mind readers walk past
each silently. They go past then return to Lindsey and then tell the
executive something. The executive nods to a security guard and then
looks to Lindsey, then to Lee. He apologizes to Lee and says Lee has been
in secret talks with another law firm. The guard shoots Lee in the back
of the head, and blood spurts all over Lindsey. As the people leave,
the executive tells Lindsey to hang around. Angel returns to Angel Investigations and he gives
the files, some computer backups, to Cordelia and the scrolls to Wesley.
Cordelia puts a disk into her drive. Wesley says he'll decipher the scrolls
as Cordelia discovers the files are encrypted. At the Wolfram & Hart office they
remove the body of Lee as the executive confronts Lindsey with what he did.
Lindsey says he didn't want to betray Wolfram & Hart, he just wanted out. The executive
says he is impressed with his cool, but says he needs direction. He
lets Lindsey go to think about it. At Angel Investigations Cordelia talks on the phone to
Willow about the computer files (see Continuity #3 & Goof #2).
She helps Cordelia get in through a back door and they read the personnel
files for Vanessa. In the records they learn Vanessa lost her sight on
purpose, spending five years with monks learning to see with her heart.
The look up the job to kill three blind children before they can meet with their
mentor. The three blind children can see into the heart of things. Lindsey shows up and pretends he
escaped. Wesley and Cordelia are sent to intercept the mentor as Angel
and Lindsey go to protect the children. At the children's safe house the
children eat as Vanessa shows up and kills the man watching over them
(see Goof #3 & Reference #5).
At the safe house Angel and Lindsey attack Vanessa as she is about to kill
the children. Vanessa seems to have Angel out classed until Angel
falls to the floor and she can't seem to spot him. Angel realizes she
can only see him while he moves so he moves quickly and then stand still
until he has a good shot, hitting her hard. He does this repeatedly until
he shoves her walking cane into her, killing her. Lindsey reassures the
children that all is all right. At Angel Investigations Wesley tells Angel the kids are with
their mentor and then tells Angel the scroll is an ancient lost prophecy
that mentions the children and Angel. At the Wolfram & Hart headquarters Lindsey
confronts Holland, the executive. He returns the disks, but says he
has copies to keep him safe from Wolfram & Hart. Holland tells Lindsey he has potential
and is impressed with his nerve (see Reference #6). He says he needs people like that
working for Wolfram & Hart. He offers Lindsey a promotion, saying he can have the
executive's job, as he was promoted upstairs. Lindsey thinks about it
and seems to decide to take the offer. Outdoors Angel looks over the
city at night but says nothing.
Creature Feature
The main villain in this episode is Vanessa Brewer, a blind assassin with
mystical powers. She seems able to sense movement around her, as well as
being stronger and faster then the average human. According to the personnel
files of Wolfram & Hart she lost her sight at the age of 21, she spent
five years with cave dwelling monks reaching enlightenment.
Among the employees of Wolfram & Hart are shamans who monitor the threshold
of their office building for vampires entering.
In the vault of Wolfram & Hart is a Preggothian demon which guards it from
intruders.
Wolfram & Hart employ a staff of mind readers to insure the loyalty of
their members. These mind readers a reminiscent of the Psi-Corps from the
television series Babylon 5.
Cool Quotes
- Gunn: ''Whoo-whoo! My god! They told me it was true, but I
didn't believe them. Damn, here it is! Evil white folks really do have a
Mecca. Now, now, girls, don't get all riled up. OW! Did you just step on my
foot? Is that my foot you just stepped on? Are you assaulting me, up in this
haven of justice? Somebody get me a lawyer, because my civil rights have
seriously been violated. Oh, I get it, I get it. You all can cater to the
demon, cater to the dead man, but what about the black man! I'd love to stay
and chat, but, yo, fellows!''
Maybe Gunn should take up acting?
References
- Wesley: ''Perhaps Angel has discovered a new species?''
Cordelia: ''What? Helen-Kelleris Homocidilus?''
Helen Adams Keller (1880-1968) was an American author and educator who was
blind and deaf. Her education and training represent an extraordinary
accomplishment in the education of persons with these disabilities.
Also referenced by Cordelia in Invisible Girl.
- Wesley: ''If Brewer was somehow equipped to see outside that
range...''
Cordelia: ''She'd be Superman''.
Superman is a costumed crime fighter from
DC Comics that inspired several television
shows, cartoons and films. He was seen on Angel's television in Sanctuary. Among his powers are the ability to
see through objects, which he calls his x-ray vision. I wrote a conversion of Superman for Champions 4th edition role playing game at http://mathew.fcpages.com/cssuperman.html.
Superman was also referenced by Buffy in Never
Kill A Boy On The First Date, by Xander in Helpless and The
Zeppo and by Forest in The Initiative and Doomed. Superman was seen on televisions in Angel's home in The Sanctuary.
- Holland: ''Ah. Well, that's a big part, the perspiration, but
the other part, the inspiration, you've had kind of a rough year on that
end.''
Holland is referencing a quote by Thomas Alva Edison: ''Genius is
one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.''
- Gunn: ''Whoo-whoo! My god! They told me it was true,
but I didn't believe them. Damn, here it is! Evil white folks
really do have a Mecca. Now, now, girls, don't get all riled
up.''
Mecca is a city in western Saudi Arabia, located in the Sirat Mountains,
inland from the Red Sea coast. It is the holiest of Muslim cities. Muhammad,
the founder of Islam, was born in Mecca, and it is toward this religious
centre that Muslims turn five times daily in prayer. All devout Muslims
attempt a pilgrimage, or hajj, to Mecca at least once in their lifetime.
Because it is sacred, only Muslims are allowed to enter the city.
- The center blind child plays with an Etch-A-Sketch, which has it's
own web site at http://www.etch-a-sketch.com/.
- Holland: ''I handpicked you when you were a sophomore at
Hastings, not because you were smart, not because you were a poor kid who
had to do better than anyone else, but because you had potential, potential
for seeing things as they are.''
University of California Hastings College Of Law is a located in San
Francisco was founded in 1878. They have a web site at http://www.uhastings.edu/.
Continuity
- Angel: ''Previously on Angel.''
City Of - Angel meets Lindsey, who threatens
to bring him into the light of day.
Five By Five - Faith asks who she is supposed
to kill. Angel meets Lindsey in his office.
War Zone Angel tells Gunn he'll be around.
Gunn surprises a vampire.
- The Sanctuary - Lindsey McDonald, Lee Mercer
and Lilah Morgan, the trio of lawyers from Wolfram & Hart, were last seen
when they hired an assassin to kill the assassin they hired to kill
Angel.
- Cordelia: ''Okay, I'm back to desktop Willow, what do I do now? Okay, done that, back to file list, yeah... yes...''
Welsey: ''Any luck?''
Angel: ''She been on the phone for an hour and 45 minutes.''
Cordelia: ''Hey, guess what they've been doing all day?''
Wesley: ''Ahhh... saving the world?''
Cordelia: ''Well yeah, but they've been breaking encrypted computer files too!''
Angel: ''What are they odds huh?''
The Yoko Factor and Primeval - Willow was working on breaking files Spike
supposedly stole from The Initiative.
Goofs
- When researching Vanessa's history they say she was born on July 19,
1967 and at the age of 21 joined a group of blind monks in another country
for five years, but her police record says she was arrested for driving
without a license on July 12, 1993, which was only a little over four years
after she joined the monks. It is possible she left them to visit the U.S.,
but this seems like a mistake.
- There is a bit of a problem with the timeline when you consider Cordelia
calling Willow and saying Willow spent the day breaking encrypted files. If
these are the same files Spike gave Willow in The Yoko Factor, Angel was in
Sunnydale that night. Willow decrypted those files the next day, but then
Angel came back to Los Angeles where several days passed in Warzone before Cordelia
got the files. So when Cordelia called, Willow would have already broken the
files days earlier.
- Okay, I realize this might not be a mistake, but one of the blind kids can
clearly be seen playing with an Etch-A-Sketch! Then again they did have
mystical powers.
- The credits for this episode say Jennifer Badger Martin played the part
of Vanessa Weeks, but they clearly call her Vanessa Brewer all throughout
the episode and we see that name on the computer screen several times, so
obviously the credits are in error.
Trivia
were supposed to take
place.
The web site Cordelia accesses is http://lapd.gov/ which doesn't
exist. Their actual web site is at http://www.lapdonline.com/ but it's
nothing like the site Cordelia went to.
Lee Mercer seems to have healed nicely from the last time we saw him,
when Faith left him in a cast and neck brace.
Charles Gunn is the 13th reoccurring non-star character on this show. He
was last seen in Warzone.
The files on Vanessa Brewer's assignment say that the kids will come
in to town on April 28, 2000. Since Wesley says they came into town that
day that sets this episode starting before this date and ending that night.
The Morgue
- Anonymous vampire: In a warehouse, staked by Angel.
- Anonymous vampire: In a warehouse, staked by Angel.
- Anonymous man: In a warehouse, killed by Vanessa Brewer.
- Anonymous vampire: In the Wolfram & Hart office, staked by a security guard.
- Lee Mercer: In the Wolfram & Hart office, shot in the back of the head by a security guard.
- Man taking care of the children: In the safe house, stabbed with a cane by Vanessa Brewer.
- Vanessa Brewer: In the safe house, stabbed with her cane by Angel.
Cast
Starring:
David Boreanaz as Angel
Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase
Alexis Denisof as Wesley Wyndham-Pryce
Guest Starring:
Christian Kane as Lindsey McDonald
Thomas Burr as Lee Mercer
Stephanie Romanov as Lilah Morgan
Sam Anderson as Holland Manners
J. August Richards as Charles Gunn
Co-Starring:
Jennifer Badger as Vanessa Brewer (Credited as Jennifer Badger Martin as Vanessa Weeks.)
Keilana Smith as Mind Reader #1
Dawn Suggs as Mind Reader #2
Charles Constant as the Security Center Guard (Howard)
Scott Berman as the Vendor
Derek Anthony as the Dying Black Man
Rishi Kumar as Blind Child #1 (Center)
Karen Lu as Blind Child #2 (Left)
Alex Buck as Blind Child #3 (Right)
Eliza Dushku as Faith (Left, uncredited, seen in flashback from Five By Five.)
Sven Holmberg as Ty (Uncredited, seen in flashback from War Zone.)
Famous Faces
Scott Berman, who played the vendor, later played the part of mover #2 in Buffy vs. Dracula. It is unknown is this was supposed to be a different character or the same one.
Sam Anderson, who played Holland Manners, played the part of the assistant manager in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode The Royale 2.12.
Jennifer Badger, who played Vanessa Brewer, played the part of bridesmaid #1 in the Charmed episode The Wedding From Hell 1.06. She worked as a stunt double for Cordelia, Willow, Jenny, Anya, Faith, Drusilla and the Inca Princess on Buffy The Vampire Slayer. One particular stunt of note she did was the fall Faith made in Graduation Day Part 1. Jennifer has an online stunt resume at http://www.stuntnet.com/women/jenniferbadger.htm.
Points Of View
Mathew:
I am really enjoying the development of Wolfram & Hart. They really
have their act together. Shamans, mind readers, technology, all working
together to make a powerful company. The minor crossover to Buffy was
wonderful, if somewhat badly done. Too bad Vanessa had to die, it's
rare that Angel kills human foes.
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Special thanks to The Complete Buffy Episode Guide for
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