Hi All:

I am sure this has been talked about before but I am relatively new to these
newsgroups. Does anyone know the reason that the "Angel" series was
cancelled? Was it the ratings? Money? Actors not getting along? Maybe a
combination of all these things? It seems that the last few episodes were
very good but the series finale left me feeling the way I felt when I
watched the series finale of "The Soprano's". Lots of unanswered questions
etc. One thing that really bothered me was Wesley dying. You would think
that going into a "battle" as they all did, he would have went to see Vail
(sp?)backed up by another member of the team or would have had a spell or
some type of magic preformed on him to protect himself from harm. (I.e. the
sanctuary spell). Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

On Tue, 10 Jun 2008 09:35:10 -0400, "Paul DiPietro"
<nickieyes1@optonline.net> wrote:

>Hi All:
>
>I am sure this has been talked about before but I am relatively new to these
>newsgroups. Does anyone know the reason that the "Angel" series was
>cancelled? Was it the ratings? Money? Actors not getting along? Maybe a
>combination of all these things? It seems that the last few episodes were
>very good but the series finale left me feeling the way I felt when I
>watched the series finale of "The Soprano's". Lots of unanswered questions
>etc. One thing that really bothered me was Wesley dying. You would think
>that going into a "battle" as they all did, he would have went to see Vail
>(sp?)backed up by another member of the team or would have had a spell or
>some type of magic preformed on him to protect himself from harm. (I.e. the
>sanctuary spell). Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.
>
>Thanks in advance
>

It was a combination of okay, but not fantastic, ratings and network
politics. Whedon asked for an early decision on whether or not the show
was going to be picked up for a sixth season, so he could plan the second
half of the season better than the previous two seasons where they had not
known whether or not they would be picked up until May. When pressured,
the then President, Jordan Levin, informed Whedon in early January that the
series would not be renewed. Levin himself left the network in June, and
his replacement, David Janollari, said he would not have cancelled Angel
(of course that's easy to say after the fact).

The ending would have been very close to the same if they had been told
they were going to be picked up. The Fred/Illyria storyline was already in
the works. If they had been told they would have a sixth season, Wesley
would have probably not so unambiguously died.

As for the ending, I always equate it to the ending of Animal House (we
can't win the real battle, so let's do one last insanely stupid thing and
declare victory).


--
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On Tue, 10 Jun 2008 09:35:10 -0400, "Paul DiPietro"
<nickieyes1@optonline.net> wrote:

>Hi All:
>
>I am sure this has been talked about before but I am relatively new to these
>newsgroups. Does anyone know the reason that the "Angel" series was
>cancelled? Was it the ratings? Money? Actors not getting along? Maybe a
>combination of all these things? It seems that the last few episodes were
>very good but the series finale left me feeling the way I felt when I
>watched the series finale of "The Soprano's". Lots of unanswered questions
>etc. One thing that really bothered me was Wesley dying. You would think
>that going into a "battle" as they all did, he would have went to see Vail
>(sp?)backed up by another member of the team or would have had a spell or
>some type of magic preformed on him to protect himself from harm. (I.e. the
>sanctuary spell). Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.
>
>Thanks in advance
>

You may or may not be aware (it comes up often in this newsgroup), but
the series has recently been continued as a comic book called Angel:
After the Fall...it is co-plotted by series creator Joss Whedon and
considered the official season 6...and it's excellent...Joss has also
continued Buffy in comics (and he's far more heavily involved in that
book).