Innocence

"Innocence" is the forteenth episode of the second season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and is the twenty-sixth episode altogether.

Synopsis
After making love with Buffy earlier that night, Angel escapes into the alley with a piercing pain in his heart, clearly in despair to realize he is losing his soul. When a women tries to help him a few minutes later, he immediately, and gleefully, kills her. When he shows up at the factory, Spike is surprised and Drusilla is pleased that the Judge cannot burn him—Angel has truly reverted to the evil Angelus, and lacks any humanity--even the small amount of humanity that remains in Dru and Spike is not present in Angel. The three are clearly pleased to be together again - grinning and gleeful, Angelus kisses Spike on the forehead in the only friendly moment we see between them this season, while Dru claps. Angelus expresses a desire to break Buffy for making him feel human.

Meanwhile, Buffy wakes up to find Angel missing, and starts a desperate search for him. Eventually finding him back at his apartment, Angelus begins his torment of her by hitting her with numerous cutting remarks about the previous night.



While researching a way to defeat the Judge, a demon whom "no weapon forged" can harm, Xander and Cordelia get caught kissing in the library by a crushed and furious Willow, who tells Xander that he'd rather kiss someone he hates than kiss Willow. Angelus terrorizes Buffy and the Gang at school, and after several realizations about what might have happened to cause it, an emotionally shattered Buffy leaves, unable to cope, and Willow and Jenny decide that she needs some time alone.

Buffy returns home and attempts to hold herself together, but after seeing the cross that Angel gave her and his ring still on her finger, finally suffers an emotional meltdown and collapses onto her bed, sobbing uncontrollably. Falling asleep, Buffy has another dream and confronts Jenny, who admits she is a member of the Gypsy clan that cursed Angelus so long ago. When Buffy, Jenny, and Giles arrive at one of the clan member's homes for advice, they find that Angelus has brutally murdered him, forcing Buffy to realize that she has to kill Angel.

Xander hatches a plan using memories from being a soldier on Halloween, pretending that he is a corporal in the army and he is sneaking around with Cordelia. Oz declines to "make out" with Willow at her request, given that it's obvious she only wants to kiss to make Xander jealous. Willow's respect and feelings for Oz grow. The four return to the library with their "present" for Buffy. Jenny offers to help in the confrontation with the Judge, but Buffy refuses to accept her offer.

Tracking down the Judge at the crowded mall, Buffy and her team blow him to bits with her new "present" -- a rocket launcher, while Angelus and Drusilla narrowly escape the blast. While the other Scoobies gather the Judge's remains, Buffy chases Angelus through the fleeing crowd, and is attacked by him in a snack shop, where they battle under the fire control sprinklers. Angel initially has the upper hand, but after absorbing several of his insults and narcissistic remarks, Buffy loses her temper and overpowers him. Ultimately, however, she is unable to bring herself to stake him, something that Angelus taunts her about, though she does settle for kicking him in the groin. Giles drives Buffy home and she feels awful for putting her friends in serious danger from Angelus. Giles assures her that, although she did act irresponsibly, it is obvious that she and Angel loved each other and that he hasn't lost his trust and respect in her. Later, Buffy and Joyce sit down to watch a movie. Joyce asks Buffy what she got for her birthday, and Buffy simply answers that she got older.

Starring

 * Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers
 * Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris
 * Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg
 * Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase
 * David Boreanaz as Angelus
 * Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles

Guest Starring

 * Seth Green as Oz
 * Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers
 * Robia LaMorte as Jenny Calendar
 * Brian Thompson as The Judge
 * Ryan Francis as Soldier

Special Guest Starring

 * Vincent Schiavelli as Uncle Enyos
 * James Marsters as Spike
 * Juliet Landau as Drusilla

Co Starring

 * James Lurie as Teacher
 * Carla Madden as Woman
 * Parry Shen as Student

Production

 * Asked about his decision to turn Angel evil, Joss Whedon said that he feels it was necessary to keep the story fresh. Although the fan base wanted Buffy and Angel to be together romantically, Whedon says, "What people want is not what they need."


 * The rocket launcher was originally going to be a tank, but that turned out to be too expensive.

Broadcast

 * This episode was the highest rated episode of Buffy ever, scoring a 5.2 Nielsen rating and a 6.7 overnight rating, with each ratings point representing 980,000 households. In millions of viewers this episode scored the biggest of the series (8.2 million).


 * With this episode, the show moved permanently from Mondays to Tuesdays.

Deleted Scenes

 * This exchange was cut for length:
 * Gypsy Man: "You! Evil one!"
 * Angelus: "Evil one? Oh, man, now I've got hurt feelings."
 * Gypsy Man: "What do you want?"
 * Angelus: "A whole lot. Got a lot of lost time to make up for. Say, I guess that's kind of your fault, isn't it? You Gypsy types, you go and curse people, you really don't care who gets hurt. Of course, you did give me an escape clause, so I gotta thank you for that."
 * Gypsy Man: "You are an abomination. The day you stop suffering for your crimes, you are no longer worthy of a human soul."
 * Angelus: "Well, that pesky little critter's all gone. So we can get down to business... Don't worry, it won't hurt a bit...after the first hour."

Other

 * Joss Whedon has listed this as his favorite episode. Whedon said of the episode "The scene where Angel has become Angelus but is pretending he's not and that he's just had a one-night stand with Buffy and that destroys her. When he came to her and said, "Why are you making a big thing out of it?" When he acted like a guy. I wrote that scene and thought, "I might be a worse person than I ever imagined because I am able to write this scene. I think I just tapped into somebody really horrible and it came rather easily." Ugh."


 * Kristine Sutherland told BBC that this is her favorite episode as a fan. She had the most fun shooting "Band Candy."


 * This episode is Angelus-centric.

Quotes
Dru - "I'm naming all the stars." Spike - "You can't see the stars, love; that's the ceiling. Also, it's day." Dru - "I can see them, but I've named them all the same name, and there's terrible confusion."

Spike - [to Dru] - "Do you know what happens to Angel?" Angelus - "Well, he moved to New York and tries to fulfill that Broadway dream, it's tough slaying but one day, he's working in the chorus when the big star twists her ankle."

Oz - "So, do you guys steal weapons from the army a lot?" Willow - "Well we don't have cable so we have to make our own fun."

Cordelia - "So does looking at guns make you wanna have sex?" Xander - I'm 17. Looking at linoleum makes me wanna have sex."

Willow - "My God! You people are all - well, I'm upset, and I can't think of a mean word right now, but that's what you are, and we're going to the Factory."

Xander - "Whoa, whoa! I-I think I'm havin' a thought. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a thought. Now I'm havin' a plan." [the light go out] "And now I'm havin' a wiggins."

Willow - "I knew it! I knew it! Well, not 'knew it' in the sense of having the slightest idea, but I knew there was something I didn't know. You two were fighting way too much. It's not natural!" Xander - "I know it's weird..." Willow - "Weird? It's against all laws of God and Man! It's Cordelia! Remember? The, the 'We Hate Cordelia' club, of which you are the treasurer." Xander - "Look, I was gonna tell you." Willow - "Gee, what stopped you? Could it be shame?"

Oz - "Uh... arm!"

Continuity

 * The Big Bad for season two has appeared and Buffy, of all people, helped make it happen.


 * After Angelus reveals himself at the school, Xander tells Cordelia to meet him at Willow's house in half an hour. However, the heist does not actually take place until the next day (in between the two scenes, Buffy falls asleep and confronts Jenny the next morning).


 * This is the first instance where Xander reveals he has retained military knowledge after the events of the Halloween episode.


 * Willow learns of Xander's and Cordelia's relationship.


 * The rocket launcher will be used once again in Buffy's (unsuccessful) attempts to kill Principal Wood in the season seven episode "Him".


 * You can see Drusilla reflecting off of the brass plate behind her when the explosion takes place.


 * The explosion of the rocket actually begins slightly before impacting the Judge. Joss' commentary explains it as necessary because "We had to mask the rocket bouncing off of the statue".


 * Although Buffy gets the drop on Angel when she first learns he is a vampire ("Angel"), and tries to goad him into fighting her when she comes back from visiting her father in L.A. ("When She Was Bad"), it is not until he reverts to Angelus in this episode that they engage in their first actual battle with one another.


 * Jenny's past and ulterior motives for being in Sunnydale are revealed.


 * Drusilla refers to Angel as "Angel" rather than Angelus. In Angel episodes, Drusilla almost always refers to him as "Angelus," even going so far as to call him "that Angel beast," when he has a soul ("Reunion").


 * This episode is the only episode of the series to focus on the Big Bad of the particular season.

Music

 * Christophe Beck - "What's That Do"
 * Ella Fitzgerald - "Goodnight My Love"