"Slouching Toward Bethlehem" is the fourth episode of the fourth season of Angel and the seventieth episode in the series. Written by Jeffrey Bell and directed by Skip Schoolnik, it was originally broadcast on October 27, 2002, on The WB network.
Synopsis[]
Cordelia returns, but since she has no memory of who she is or that Angel is a vampire, everyone tries to keep their demon-hunting business a secret. After rescuing Cordelia from a demon, Connor takes on the role of her protector and Lorne reads Cordelia's future to help restore her memory but sees an approaching apocalypse involving Angel.[1]
Summary[]
Cordelia abruptly returns from her higher dimension in the lobby of the Hyperion Hotel, but she has no memory of who she is and who her friends are despite Angel's attempts to jog her memory back. Connor, who has secretively sneaked back into the hotel, overhears everything from the upper balcony. Not wanting to make her feel uncomfortable, Angel and the group decide to keep their demon-hunting business a secret as well as the fact that Angel is a vampire.
Cordelia becomes increasingly mistrustful of Angel, Fred and Gunn due to their secretiveness. Lorne tries to read Cordelia's future and sees jumbled visions of apocalyptic horror, which scares him to the point that he flees to his room and is reluctant to tell Angel what he saw. Cordelia has an encounter in the lobby with one of Lorne's clients, a nasty demon who wants to snack on her, and she is saved by Connor, who appears and kills the demon. She flees from the hotel and ends up with Connor at his run-down loft, where she asks him to be her protector.
After one of their trysts in his apartment, Wesley overhears Lilah talking to her subordinates at Wolfram & Hart over her cellphone about Cordelia's reappearance and sending a team to kidnap her. He goes to the Hyperion Hotel to tip Angel, Fred, and Gunn about it.
An armed team from Wolfram & Hart forcibly enters Connor's loft and fight with Connor and Cordelia. The two are almost on the verge of losing when Angel, Fred, and Gunn burst in and even the odds. Lilah, who has been remotely monitoring the events, tells her team to leave. Cordelia tells Angel that she prefers to stay with Connor rather than go back with him, Fred, and Gunn.
When Angel and his team arrive back at the Hyperion, they find Lorne gagged and tied to a chair. Lorne reveals that, while they were gone, another Wolfram & Hart team came and used a demon to forcibly extract his visions about Cordelia from his mind since they believed that she had direct contact with the Powers That Be and wanted information about it.
Wesley later confronts Lilah, who admits that she used him to separate Angel and his team from Lorne by making sure he overheard her talking about Cordelia so that they could extract the information from Lorne.
As Connor guards Cordelia as she sleeps, Angel watches over Cordelia's empty bed.
Continuity[]
- Angel tells Cordelia about their night at the ballet ("Waiting in the Wings").
- Cordelia's yearbook contains references to the school "burning down," a "giant snake," and "flaming arrows." These events all occurred when the Sunnydale High School student body fought Mayor Wilkins in "Graduation Day, Part Two."
- After looking through some past photos, Cordelia said "yikes" when looking at a photo of her hair when it was first cut short in "The Shroud of Rahmon."
- Cordelia learns she was a cheerleader ("Witch") and a princess ("Through the Looking Glass").
- Cordelia sings the same song she chose to sing for the talent show six years earlier in "The Puppet Show."
- Gunn is dismayed when Cordelia threatens to turn him into a rat, his musophobia first revealed in "Apocalypse, Nowish."
Appearances[]
Individuals[]
- Angel
- Winifred Burkle
- Carlo
- Cordelia Chase
- Connor
- Krevlornswath of the Deathwok Clan
- Charles Gunn
- Lilah Morgan
- Murray (Only voice)
- Wesley Wyndam-Pryce
- Demon broad (Only mentioned)
- Olvikan (Only mentioned)
- Unidentified demon (Slouching Toward Bethlehem)
Organizations and titles[]
- Angel Investigations
- Wolfram & Hart
- Sunnydale High cheerleading squad (Only in picture)
- Sunnydale Razorbacks (Only in picture)
Species[]
- Demon
- Half-demon
- Human
- Old One (Only mentioned)
- Vampire
Locations[]
- Los Angeles
- Connor's loft
- Hyperion Hotel
- Lilah Morgan's apartment
- Pearson Arms Apartments (Only mentioned)
- Pearson Arms apartment 212 (Only mentioned)
- Wesley Wyndam-Pryce's apartment
- Wolfram & Hart Los Angeles branch (Only mentioned)
- Sunnydale (Only in picture)
- Sunnydale High School (Only in picture)
Objects[]
- Charles Gunn's axe
- Holy Bible (Only mentioned)
- Sunnydale High Yearbook
Death count[]
- A vampire, staked by Connor.
- A vampire, burned by Connor.
- Unidentified baby demons, killed by Gunn and Fred.
- Carnivorous demon, killed by Connor.
Behind the scenes[]
Production[]
- The title of the episode is a reference to the following verses of W. B. Yeats's poem "The Second Coming": "And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?"
Broadcast[]
- "Slouching Toward Bethlehem" had an audience of 2.6 million households upon its original airing.[2]
Music[]
- Charisma Carpenter — "Greatest Love of All"
- Robert J. Kral — original score
International titles[]
- Czech: "Kráčet do Betléma" (Walking to Bethlehem)
- Finnish: "Cordelian laulu" (Cordelia's Song)
- French: "Mensonges et vérité" (Lies and Truth)
- German: "Der Hölle entgegen" (Heading Towards Hell)
- Hungarian: "Betlehemi zarándok" (Pilgrim of Bethlehem)
- Italian: "Avvicinandosi a Betlemme" (Approaching Bethlehem)
- Portuguese (Brazil): "Arrastando-se para Belém" (Slouching Toward Bethlehem)
- Russian: "На пути к Вифлеему" (On the Way to Bethlehem)
- Spanish (Latin America): "El segundo regreso" (The Second Coming)
- Spanish (Spain): "Sin recuerdos" (Without Memories)
- Turkish: "Bethlehem'e Doğru" (Toward Bethlehem)
Gallery[]
Promotional stills[]
Behind the scenes[]
Advertisement[]
References[]
- ↑ "angel: Slouching Toward Bethlehem." TheWB.com. Archived from the original on May 7, 2004.
- ↑ "Nielsen Ratings for Angel's Fourth Season." Nielsen Ratings for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, & Firefly. Archived from the original on July 6, 2008.