The gang are in a park, having a nighttime picnic with Chinese food. Fred scans everyone for bugs, since the gang are trying to meet without Wolfram & Hart listening in. She tries to tell the others that not everyone at the firm is evil; Wesley wonders if she can really trust Knox. Angel points out that the Senior Partners are evil and have put them in this position for a reason they still don't know. Fred wonders if Gunn knows more than the rest of them do, since the firm put a bunch of knowledge in his head (see "Conviction"). Gunn says that they all made deals and everyone got something out of it. Angel got "fear, mistrust, a great motor pool," and Lorne got "the Nancy Sinatra collection." Wesley got a nice pen. Gunn accuses the others of thinking that he's a spy for the Senior Partners; Angel replies that they just need to be prepared. As the others talk about Spike (see "Just Rewards"), Angel asks Wesley if he can borrow his pen. Nearby, a young woman named Nina is attacked by a werewolf. The werewolf bites the woman, then gets attacked by Angel, who shoves Wesley's silver pen into his chest. The werewolf turns back into a human and the woman runs off. At Wolfram & Hart the next day, Angel has a sketch of the woman from the park and tells Gunn that the werewolf bit the woman. Gunn notes that there are two more nights in which the woman will transform into a new werewolf. They need to find the woman, since she will not know what happened to her.
Spike pays Fred a visit, asking her to consider his condition a priority over the woman from the park. He tells her that his disappearances "to the netherworld" are lasting longer. Fred suggests that Spike let Wesley help him, but Spike says that he and Wesley have a history. Fred does not believe him, so Spike admits that he just does not want anyone else to know what he is going through. Fred assures him that they will figure things out.
At her home, Nina wakes from a restless sleep and heads to the kitchen, where her sister Jill and niece Amanda are cooking. Nina discovers that her hearing is improved and she does not remember the bruise on her neck. She studies hamburgers cooking on the stove and imagines slashing Amanda's neck. At the science lab, the gang tracks down Nina's address. That night, Nina baby-sits Amanda; she starts feeling sick and goes upstairs, where she begins turning into a werewolf.
Angel pulls Nina through her bedroom window and Wesley tranquilizes her. The next day, Nina wakes up naked in a cell. Angel tries to tell her that she is safe, and shows her a video of herself as a wolf in the cell the night before. She is upset with her condition and the fact that she wanted to hurt Amanda. He tries to tell her that it was the monster inside her that caused the violent impulses, and tells her that she can control herself - he does it every day. Nina asks if he can cure her and Angel admits that he can not, but says he can protect her. Angel meets with Fred and Royce, telling them Nina agreed to stay in the holding cell that night. Royce warns that Nina might hurt herself, but she might be okay if they take her back to her place; the familiarity will calm her. Angel agrees to let Nina go home; Fred and Nina head to Nina's place. Fred tries to tell her that her life does not have to change too much, since she is only a werewolf three nights out of the month.
As Fred and Nina are about to enter Nina's house, Nina says that she is not ready to face Jill and Amanda yet. Inside, Fred introduces herself and makes up a story about Nina leaving because Fred needed her help. Nina and Jill fight and Nina leaves while Fred grabs some things for her. They head back to the van they came in, but Fred notices that the door is open, then sees that the security guards are dead. She tells Nina to run before a man knocks her out and kidnaps Nina. Nina is taken to the basement of a mansion and chained up, and a matronly woman cuts off her clothes and washes her. At Wolfram & Hart, Royce sings "Jessie's Girl" for Lorne, who confirms that he is clean. In Angel's office, the others try to figure out who might have grabbed Nina. Fred criticizes herself for going near the van when it was obvious that something was wrong; she also worries that Spike has not materialized for a while. As Royce arrives, Fred spots Spike in the hallway and goes to talk with him. She tries to follow him, but he does not seem to hear her. She winds up in an office and sees something in a trash can, but is interrupted by Royce. Fred babbles for a little while, then knocks Royce out with a lamp.
Fred found a vial in Royce's trash that contained Calendula; Royce suspected that he would have to sing for Lorne, so he took a drug that would make him appear clean. Gunn discovers that Royce's desk holds photos, papers and a knife. Angel interrogates Royce for Nina's location as Fred shows the others her discovery, a menu for a banquet hosted by restaurant entrepreneur John Crane, whose employees abducted Nina after Royce informed him of her availability. Crane has rapidly assembled several like-minded gourmets willing to pay top dollar to dine on werewolf meat. At moonrise, in about 15 minutes, Nina, chained to a serving platter, will be the main course.
The gang heads to the banquet hall and Angel starts to rescue Nina, who tells him to let her get eaten. She does not think that she can go home and is resigned to being an animal. Angel frees her anyway, but before the gang can leave, they are surrounded by men with guns. As a confrontation begins Nina turns into a werewolf, providing some unexpected help to the group before Wesley tranquilizes her. Angel announces that they are leaving, but Crane declares that he promised his guests a werewolf. Werewolf Nina bites Royce's leg, and Angel points out that in a month, Crane will have another werewolf to eat: Royce, in whose welfare Angel has no interest. Crane considers this an acceptable resolution for both groups, although Royce is understandably less enthusiastic.
Fred returns to her office to find Spike. He tells her that he was not sure he would return from the netherworld this time. She wants to tell Angel what is going on with him, but Spike refuses. Fred tells him that she will find a way to keep him in the world. Angel drives Nina home as she asks how he can live with knowing that he has killed people. Angel tells her that eventually she will accept being a werewolf. She does not want to tell Jill and Amanda and Angel says that she does not have to, but she can if she wants to. The gang meet up in Angel's apartment and order Chinese food again, which Angel offers to buy, shocking the others. Gunn wonders if Angel has a shot with Nina; Angel says that she gave him "a look". The gang settle in to spend a laid back evening together.
Tropes
- 90% of Your Brain: Gunn clarifies that his mental capacity wasn't "enhanced" when Wolfram & Hart made him a lawyer; the Senior Partners just "revved up some idling brain cells."
- Bad Boss: Gunn and Wes have guns to their heads.Angel: We're not leaving without the girl.Crane: I'm willing to let my men die. Can you say the same?
- Beware the Quiet Ones: Once Fred finds the empty drug vial, she distracts the doctor then knocks him out with a desk lamp.
- Birds of a Feather: Angel identifies with the werewolf dilemma of cutting oneself off from loved ones so they won't be harmed, vs. the risk of surrendering to the monster within because they're now cut off from humanity.
- Book Ends: Team Angel gather for a pretend picnic, and end up arguing. At the end they come together for dinner and a genuine Friendship Moment.
- Bound and Gagged: As the page image shows, Nina is restrained and gagged before her transformation. While the gag won't help when she transforms, the metal shackles will.
- Call-Back: To Doyle explaining to Angel in "City of..." that if he cut himself off from society, the monster wins.
- The Confidant: Fred is the only one Spike confides in, even though Wesley could also help with his occult knowledge.
- Continuity Nod:
- When discussing how organised Nina's kidnappers were, Wesley considers "an underground monster-hunting military organization... it's happened before," referring to The Initiative from Season 4 of BtVS.
- Wesley's preference for a motorbike harks back to Season One.
- Cool Car / Better Living Through Evil: The Teaser shows Team Angel have all helped themselves to muscle cars, and in Wesley's case a Cool Motorbike.
- Daydream Surprise: Nina imagines attacking her niece.
- Dramatic Gun Cock: Team Angel hitting a snag.
- Driven to Suicide: Nina's so depressed over having become a werewolf that she's fully prepared to let Jacob Crane and his clients eat her at a fancy dinner. After Angel saves her, she grows out of it.
- Dysfunction Junction: Fred describes Team Angel as a demon-hunting, helpless-helping, dysfunctional family.
- Eaten Alive: Since werewolves by default revert back to their human form upon dying, the only way to eat werewolf flesh is to resort to this. Nina is narrowly saved from this fate by the protagonists.
- Enhance Button: After being handed a visual image taken from the psychic imprints of a blood sample, Angel asks if it can be cleaned up at all. He's cut off by Wesley, who sternly states that it's not a photograph.
- Exotic Entree: Nina is served up as dinner for a club who like to dine on werewolves. Note that every werewolf is a human with a curse, and the curse dissipates (returning the werewolf to human form) when the werewolf dies.
- Failed Attempt at Drama: Spike going on about battling a werewolf for hours, only for Fred to reveal that Angel just killed one with a pen. Also Spike saying that he's got a blood feud going with Wesley, only for Fred to tell him he's full of it — he just doesn't want anyone to find out about his problem.
- Fanservice: Nina is chained up, sprayed with a fire hose, stripped naked, Bound and Gagged and finally garnished. Kinky...
- Forehead of Doom: When Angel tells Nina he's not human, Nina guesses; "Frankenstein?"
- Foreshadowing:
- The mutual attraction between Angel and Nina is followed up in "Smile Time".
- Spike says that something is trying to drag him into Hell. We find out what in the next episode.
- Wes questions whether Knox and Gunn can be trusted. It turns out to be otherwise in "A Hole in the World".
- Freudian Slip: Wes reveals his feeling of jealousy over Knox.Fred: But still, it's not like everyone there's evil. I mean, we work with these people. Some of 'em I see more than I see you guys, at least lately, anyway.Wes: (curtly) And you think you can trust him? (Fred gives him a look) Them.
- Friendship Moment: The end of the episode has Angel showing his True Companions his apartment, Wes and Gunn kidding him about Nina being a possible Love Interest, and Fred ordering Chinese. Which Angel says he'll pay for, much to Lorne's amazement.
- Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: Royce lists possible kidnappers of Nina, including paranormal hunting groups. "Vampire hunting in Eastern Europe. That kind of thing."
- I Am a Humanitarian: Crane runs a cult who eat freshly turned werewolf as a delicacy. Angel manages to save Nina, but when she bites Dr. Royce, Angel tells them that now they just have to wait a month.
- Idiot Ball: Fred moans about how stupid she was walking up to her van after noticing its lock was broken, instead of just running like hell.
- It's All My Fault: Fred blames herself for Nina getting captured.
- Laser-Guided Karma / Good is Not Nice: Dr. Royce gets bitten by Werewolf!Nina, and Team Angel watch as he's hauled off by Crane's mooks as next month's course. Probably averted though, as the next scene has them discussing how they shut down the restaurant that wanted to do this. They let Royce be taken away because at the time it was just a few of them surrounded by guards. Once they got back to their interdimensional superfirm the power dynamic changed.
- Living Forever Is Awesome: Even Angel has to admit that being nearly indestructible is kinda cool.
- Living Lie Detector: After Nina is kidnapped, Lorne makes the W&H employees sing for him — it later turns out that Royce is taking a drug that enables him to pass the test.
- Mexican Standoff: Crane points out in this situation that "I'm willing to let my men die. Can you say the same?"
- Naked on Arrival: Nina when she wakes up from her first transformation in a Wolfram & Hart holding cell. They leave some clothes for her.
- Nonverbal Miscommunication: Ghost!Spike is mindlessly wandering around Wolfram and Hart in silence. Fred mistakes his movement through a desk and then a wall for him leading her to a clue, and by luck there really is an important plot item in the desk.
- Not What It Looks Like: When Nina wakes up after reverting to human form, she's in a cell, naked, with no memory of what happened the night before. It takes Angel a moment to convince her that she hasn't been kidnapped by a psycho.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: For one thing, it doesn't look like a
gay possum.Dr Royce: Lycanthropus exterus. Undocumented in North America... until now, obviously.Fred: How is it different from a standard werewolf?Dr Royce: Oh, biped, for one thing. Walks upright. Canines are a bit longer than normal. - The Pen Is Mightier:Spike: I had a wee spat with a werewolf myself once. Fought for over an hour! Brutal. Vicious. I almost lost my—
Fred: Angel killed him with a pen. - Perp Sweating: Dr. Royce says he's more scared of Crane than Angel — after all, he's a good guy. Angel promptly brings out the Game Face.
- Pre Ass Kicking One Liner:Angel: Hey doggie. Come and get it.
- Properly Paranoid: Team Angel re their own employees. Unfortunately it's starting to spill over into their own gang, with Wes questioning whether Gunn can be trusted with his enhancements. Ironically it's not the enhancements that make Gunn unreliable, it's the fear of losing them.
- Pun:Lorne: Hey Atlas, give us a shrug!
- Race Against the Clock: Lampshaded with Spike with the appropriate tick-tock noises.
- Running Gag: The leprechaun gag, carried on from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.Gunn: (reading the menu) What, no leprechaun souffle?Crane: There's no such thing as leprechauns.
- Shameful Strip: When Nina is kidnapped, she chained up, sprayed with a hose, and her clothes are cut off with scissors. She is understandably miserable the entire time.
- Ship Tease: Nina/Angel. After all she's not only a creature of the night torn between her good and evil sides, she's also a blonde.
- Shotguns Are Just Better: This episode features one of the few occasions where we see Gunn deliberately using a firearm, bringing a pump action shotgun to help rescue Nina.
- The Triple: "Fear, mistrust, a great motor pool." Angel on what he got out of the deal with Wolfram & Hart.
- That Came Out Wrong:Fred: (re Knox) Uh, we're, you know, heh heh, friendly, but he's under me— or I'm on top of him. Professionally.
- This Is the Part Where...Angel: This is the part where we take our friend and go.Crane: I'm afraid not.
- Tranquilizer Dart
- Van in Black: Nina is taken home in one.
- You Did Everything You Could: Gunn tells Angel this regarding Nina. Angel replies that he's not in the mood for a pep talk.
