Angel ends

I liked the last episode of "Angel" - but there was some oddness there as well. It had a rushed feeling to it - and it felt more like a season finale than a series finale. With the end of "Buffy", strings were tied up, loose ends dealt with, and a plausible explanation given as to why Buffy could take a break from the fight. With the end of Angel, there really wasn't any of that. Oh sure, with the effective decapitation of the Black Thorn, evil was disrupted - and I suppose it's more in tune with the leitmotif behind Angel - the fight is never over.

For me, the biggest loss here is that Joss Whedon is off TV next year - no Angel, no Buffy, no Firefly. The cheesy reality shows rule the airwaves - frankly, I'd rather surf the net than devote even a few minutes of my life to a "Survivor" style show. Ther may be some hope in the SciFi realm - SG-1 is still on (and it's still the best SciFi show out there). "Enterprise" is back, but the problems with that show are unlikely to go away - the writers haven't been fired en-masse yet. Last night's episode was the epitome of what's wrong with the series. Here's the weapon that will destroy the entire Earth - we have a team of marines who can infiltrate the ship carrying it. Do they bring any C4? No. Do they haul over a few nukes? No. They go off to rescue a captured crewman and return. Let's look at the stakes here:

• Fate of the entire planet
• One command crewman captured

Heck, the original Trek did better in those situations - Spock sacrificed himself to save the ship in "Wrath of Khan" (not that he stayed dead, but never mind that now). I can just imagine the SG-1 team given these options - nukes and/or C4 beamed aboard with short fuses, and the enemy ship disabled or destroyed - but in any case, the weapon no longer on the way to Earth. Someone contact UPN and beat the writers senseless, please.

I have some hopes for the SG-1 spinoff (Atlantis) - but a fair bit of spinoff wariness as well. We'll have to see if they can expand the universe of the show. After that, it's a vast wasteland. "24"? Jumped the shark eons ago - people have probably died trying to wrap their heads around the various improbabilities in that show. There's always "The Sopranos", I suppose...