The Lament of Alan Francis Doyle

[Joe Hellandback]

Doyle is a divisive character, I've never actually met anyone who dislikes him and he certainly had his fans, People were gutted when he was killed off, at the time it was claimed that Joss always intended to do so just like Tara and Jesse. Reading Slayers and Vampires however it seems it was Glenn Quinn's drunkenness and drug addiction on set that led to his demise. Similar story with CC being ditched in s4, they spread the story that there was nowhere else for her character to go when in fact it was her behaviour. Didn't hurt CC who went on to numerous TV and movie roles but Quinn never worked again (unlike NB whose private antics never seem to have affected his professional life). It was a shame that they could have CC back in s5 but not Doyle (I know they cleverly worked that in to a degree, how did the tape of Doyle survive the explosion at AI?). How would Doyle have developed had he stayed on the series? Would they still have had Wes as a regular character or would he have just been recurring or perhaps not turned up at all? Did they ever tell Harry what happened to him? Or his mother? Perhaps what was his most endearing quality was his vulnerability, this was a man caught between 2 worlds and riven with guilt over his failure to save the demons from The Scourge, the kinship between him and Angel is partly that they're both so desperately lonely characters who have been cut off from the love of their lives and are actually ecstatic to have found one another and their purpose, just Doyle shows it a little more (you could argue the same of CC although she's not actually quite so tragic) .   

[Joe Hellandback]

On ‎05‎/‎10‎/‎2018 at 12:19 PM, nosleepforme said:

Is Doyle a divisive character? I thought he was universally loved. I really liked Doyle and it's a testament to the writing and Glenn's acting that a character with so little screen time over only nine episodes was so well-liked among fans. I'm not entirely sure where they would have gone with the character, though I think they only scratched the surface of his mysterious backstory with Harry and the Scourge, I think there may have probably been more to him. I wonder if Cordelia and Angel would have ever been paired up with Doyle around, since Doyle's unrequited crush on Cordelia was such a big part of the first nine episodes.

 

Yeah, the impression I got was that they tried to protect Glenn Quinn from a bad reputation and that's why they stuck to the story that Joss always intended to kill him off. Only years later after Glenn's death, they admitted that there were difficulties with him that made production difficult. I find the one quote by David Greenwalt from "Slayers & Vampires" very sad where he talks about how Glenn busted into tears when Greenwalt told him to get his shit together.

 

We still don't really know what exactly led to CC's ouster. The persistent internet rumor to this day is that she was fired because she informed Joss too late about her pregnancy, but I think there should be more to it. Joss, while not without his own flaws, doesn't strike me as someone who would be THIS petty, especially since CC supposedly also had a miscarriage the season prior, which would make it perfectly understandable that she would wait to inform Joss. CC herself also alluded in "Slayers & Vampires" that she was going through things around the time.  But I guess we will never know what the exact reason was. However, I found lots of CC's quotes in the book really sad, especially the one where she wonders whether Joss and Alexis think that CC ruined Angel.

 

There are rumors that they considered bringing Doyle back as a Big Bad for season 4, which was also the year in which he died. I would not have wanted to see that.

 

I think Wes would probably not have been brought in as a regular character.  I think he may have guest starred on Buffy though, I'm sure they would have brought him back in one way or another. Not sure where they would have gone with Doyle, but I have a feeling he still would have died in the first two seasons, even if there had not been any problems with Quinn. I think him and Cordelia would have gotten together and then 1-2 episodes later, he would have probably been dead, since that's how Joss rolls.

I think he's divisive in the sense some people wished he'd stayed whilst others preferred to have Wes instead. I never knew about CC's miscarriage, that's tragic, nice to see her mother now.