Review of Episode 8, Season 4 "Habeas Corpses" Writer and co-executive producer, Jeffrey Bell (Billy,That Vision Thing) again shows his panache for creating true suspense and genuine creeps in the first episode back from the winter break Habeas Corpses. You'd think with a title as witty and spoilery as that, I would have guessed some serious trouble was about to hit our favorite evil lawyers at Wolfram & Hart but alas I was slow on the uptake. The episode takes right up from where Apocolypse, Nowish left off, the proverbial lines in the sand are being drawn for each character with each of them on a quest to determine where their allegiances are going to belong. You may have thought this season's Big Bad had an impressive introduction last episode but The Beast (Vladimir Kulich) tops himself by sweeping through Wolfram & Hart like he's shooting ducks in a barrel, wiping out the barristers in a particularly gruesome fashion. It almost makes you feel bad for the sorry lot. More importantly, his swath of devastation leaves no doubt how much our heroes are up against this season and the lengths to which The Beast will go to get what he wants. What that is exactly ">= ins a mystery but Bell gives us a clue in the words of the little girl who is revisited in the fantastically creepy White Room. As her essence is being drained by The Beast, she turns to the Angel crew and whispers "The answer is among you." Chilling stuff. Some serious props again to Lilah this episode as she continues to surprise us. From her badass confrontation with The Beast to her almost vulnerable response to Wes's dissolution of their 'relationship', she is consistently compelling. While her customary catty dialogue is expected, Stephanie Romanov brilliantly continues to show just the barest hint of Lilah's soft heart buried beneath her umpteen layers of cast iron bravado. Bell also gave her a particularly revealing speech about the graying of personalities in the Angel universe which can be applied to just about every character in the series and serves as an underlying theme of the story. As a writer for The X-Files and now with Angel, Bell's episodes display his forte for capturing the dark and disturbing. Watching Angel and company milling about the darkened halls of a W&H littered with dead bodies and splattered blood was inspired and maybe one of the scariest set pieces yet for the show. And the resurrection of the W&H staff in zombie form was as wryly comedic (no matter how many lawyers you kill, there are always more) as it was frightening. There was a lot of set-up in this episode for what's to come. The mystery of The Beast, Connor's connection to it, the root of Cordelia's frighteningly bad decision making of late and how Angel is going to deal with all of the escalating madness is just beginning and it looks to be one hell of a ride. Fun Fact: Did ya happen to notice the poor Wolfram & Hart's employee whose severed head was in the grasp of The Beast during his reek-havoc-and-run rampage of the Second Act? Well, if you had looked just a tad more closely you may have recognized him from various CoA features for it was actually a head cast of Angel's Special Effects Makeup artist, Robert Hall of Almost Human! Here he is--not quite himself, as Freddy for his Halloween party--with said 'head' on pike! I guess two heads are better! I give it... Review by CoA Staff member, Phoenix

CoA Stakes Rating Guide   = Disappointing, stake it, bury it!     = Not too bad, Lacking a few graves.       = Typical Dark Avenger saves the day Saga.         = Better still, Quality Headstones.           = Outstanding! Reward it with mortality!

Wesley: And you're all right? Lilah: Yeah, I'm fine. Slept at Wolfram & Hart. FYI, best place to be in case of an apocalypse. Wesley: There is a line, Lilah. Black and white. Good and evil. Lilah: Funny thing about black and white: you mix it together and you get gray. And it doesn't matter how much white you try and put back in, you're never gonna get anything but gray. And I don't see your Texas gal pal wearing that color. Come to think of it, she prefers black. Lilah: Gavin, ask yourself this question. What are you more afraid of, a giant murderous demon, or me? Gavin: Be right back. Lilah: Do you have any idea what this thing wants? Connor:: Everybody dead. Wesley: (re: hearing screams) What's that? Lilah: Oh, it's the fat lady singing. Angel: You know where it is. The Beast. Wesley: Inside Wolfram & Hart. And so is... Gunn: That answers a lot of questions. They're probably having a big sit down, breaking bread. Wesley: It's killing everything that moves in there. Gunn: (glibly) I've heard worse news. Angel: Somebody should stay here and mind the store Lorne: (enthusiastically) Ooh, me, me me. Sergeant stay-at-home volunteering for duty, sir. Angel: Gunn, let's go. Gunn: Angel, uh, assuming we can even get in the evil empire, same big beastie's in there that spiked our asses six ways to Sunday. What's gonna be different this time? Angel: What's different is we're not going for the monster, we're going for Connor. Gunn: So, you've phoned ahead so the Big Bad understands that? Angel: Look, I don't know the answers. Don't even know most of the questions. But what I do know is that I have to go into Wolfram & Hart and find my son. Now, as far as us versus the Big Bad is concerned, there's only one smart way to play it. We see it, we run like hell. Gunn: I don't get it. Wolfram & Hart is evil. The Big Bad is evil. Why go all Terminator on your own team? Angel: Maybe all it want is to eliminate the competition. Fred: Doesn't give us much to look forward to, does it? Connor: He looks dead. Angel: He is dead. Technically undead. A zombie. Connor: What's a zombie? Angel: It's an undead thing. Connor: Like you? Angel: No. Zombies are slow-moving, dimwitted things that crave human flesh. Connor: Like you. Angel: No. It's different. Trust me. Gunn: So, fight seven floors of evil lawyer zombies or sweet talk a little girl. You know where my heart's at. Fred: Yeah, I've got to disagree. I vote for the White Room. Gunn: So what's it say about the Big Bad Wolf if it can just stride right in and suck the energy out of evil Red Riding Hood? Wesley: I don't know. Other than it's going to take a force far smarter and stronger than us to defeat it. Lorne: (sarcastically) Oh, like there's a lot of that just lying around. Cordelia: I'm just glad that everyone's safe and together again. Angel: Me too. Now take your new boyfriend and get the hell out of here. Cordelia: (whispers) Oh! God! Quotes by CoA Council member, Seeker