Guise Will Be Guise

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"Guise Will Be Guise" is the sixth episode of the second season of Angel and the twenty-eighth episode overall. Written by Jane Espenson and directed by Krishna Rao, it was originally broadcast on November 7, 2000 on the WB network.

Following the guidance of the Caritas Host, Angel leaves town to meet with a swami to try to help him contend with some personal problems, while Wesley impersonates Angel when a shrewd and powerful businessman, Bryce, asks him to guard his daughter Virginia from assassins from a rival corporation. The impostor pretending to be the swami has been hired by the rival corporation to keep Angel away from Los Angeles in order for them to kidnap the girl, while it turns out that Bryce actually wants to keep his daughter safe so that he can ritually sacrifice her to a demon on his 50th birthday in order to gain great power.

Synopsis

Angel tries to hunt down Darla at Wolfram & Hart, but Cordelia and Wesley stop him. Angel consults the demon host at the karaoke bar Caritas, who refers him to Swami T'ish Magev for help. Cordelia and Wesley hold down the office while Angel is away, glad that he is seeking help to calm his obsession with Darla.

At the office, a thug holds Cordelia at gunpoint, demanding to see Angel, and Wesley is forced to pose as their vampire boss in order to save her. Magnus Bryce, a shrewd and rich businessman, is in need of Angel's services to protect his daughter from assassins from a rival corporation fronted by Paul Lanier. Wesley meets Mr. Bryce's daughter, Virginia, and then the two go shopping. Over the course of the day, Wesley finds himself encountering many problems in his efforts to pretend to be a vampire: his employer forces him to drink blood, he forgets to wait to be invited into a house, and he has to contend with the problem of being in mirrors. Virginia and Wesley talk about how she wants freedom from the prison her father's created for her, then the two kiss. Virginia initially stops, believing Angel's curse is an obstacle, but Wesley claims it is more of a 'recommendation' than anything else — and the two have sex.

Meanwhile, at a quiet cabin, Angel talks with the swami, who looks like an average Joe. Initially, the swami's advice seems insightful: he points out that driving a convertible when the sun turns him into ash, wearing all black when he should be trying to blend in, and using hair gel, all betray Angel's inability to accept himself as-is. But the swami's advice turns odd as he advises Angel to find a blond woman and break her heart, so he will feel better about his situation with Darla. Later, the Swami talks to Paul Lanier over the phone, revealing to the audience that he's an impostor hired to keep Angel away from Virginia for the weekend, so that they can abduct her. Throughout their conversation, they both believe Angel is with them, but then they deduce that Wesley is not Angel.

Gunn sets off to find Angel, but when he arrives at the cabin the fake swami knocks him out. Angel witnesses this, and uses a fishing pole to pull the man out of the sun and into his grasp. Cordelia arrives at the Bryce home, but before she can rescue Wesley, Virginia finds out that he's not really Angel when Lanier calls and informs Bryce that there is an impostor protecting Virginia, and Wesley and Cordelia escape.

Back at Angel Investigations, Cordelia, Wesley, and Angel talk, and they realized that, in order to gain enormous power from from the demon he worships, Bryce plans to sacrifice his daughter on his 50th birthday. Angel and Wesley conclude that Lanier was trying to prevent the sacrifice so that Bryce wouldn't get the power. Bryce starts the ritual sacrifice, but Angel and crew interrupt. The demon appears, but before they get to battle her, the demon rejects Virginia and leaves because Virginia is not a virgin. It turns out that Bryce had wanted to hire Angel because he considers him to be a "eunuch", much to Angel's dismay. Wesley, for his part, is disquieted that he deflowered a virgin. Then Virginia, furious about her father's actions, punches him and reveals that she hasn't been a virgin since she was 16. Later, Wesley is featured in a magazine article. Both Cordelia and Angel are jealous that Wesley is getting so much publicity as Virginia's bodyguard.

Continuity

• In "Heartthrob," Angel again tries to seek out spiritual guidance after Buffy's death at the end of Season 5. This time he visits a group of Sri Lankan monks, who turn out to be Shur-hod demons.

• The newspaper calls Wesley "bodyguard to the stars", which is what Cordelia called Angel after he saved Rebecca Lowell. ("Eternity")
• Angel is able to enter Bryce's house without being invited in. In Rm w/a Vu he is able to enter Cordelia's house before she invites him in, explaining that she had told him he was always welcome once she found a place and the invitation had taken effect once she signed the lease. This suggests that when Wesley had been invited in, the fact that the invitation had been intended for Angel was sufficient to allow him to enter the house.

Body Count

• T'ish Magev, killed by an impostor

Appearences

Locations

• Los Angeles, CA
• Ojai, CA

Behind the Scenes

Production

• Guest star Brigid Brannagh was a main cast member of the short-run vampire drama "Kindred: The Embraced", playing the role of Sasha.

Goofs, Bloopers & Continuity Errors

• Wesley tells Gunn that The Host reads the souls of demons, although it's generally accepted demons don't have "souls" in the human sense. Wesley is more likely referring to a general aura associated with a creature's life force.

Pop Culture References

• Lorne is referring to the 3 Rocky movies: "You're Rocky. And Rocky II. And half of the one with Mr. T."

Music

• Eiji Inoue and Michael Yama - "I Got You Babe"
• Robert J. Kral - original score
  
  

Other

• This episode is included in The Vampire Anthology: Wesley DVD.

Quotes

Angel: "There's no Wyndam-Pryce Agency."

The Host: "You're Rocky, and Rocky II, and half of the one with Mr. T."

Wesley: "Did you encourage this?"

Gunn: "I'm just going along for the ride."

Cordelia: "Gonna be a pretty short ride. They have vampire detectors!"

Gunn: "We know. It's cool, he's got a plan."

Wesley: "A plan?"

Angel: "Yeah, I get to the offices before they stop me."

Gunn: "See? What?! That's the plan? Walking real quick was the plan?"

T'ish Magev: "You need to get over her. Okay, what does she look like?"

Angel: "She's beautiful. Small, blonde."

T'ish Magev: "Right. So here's what you do. You go out and you find yourself some small blonde thing. You bed her, you love her, you treat her like crap, you break her heart. You and your inner demon will thank me, I promise."

Angel: "Um..."