Angel (TV Series) The House Always Wins (2002) User Reviews

An okay episode

[katierose295 · 7/10 · 2 March 2007]

This is an okay episode. It's pretty funny and it's always a joy to see Lorne front and center. Still, this isn't the most important, dramatic episode of the season. It doesn't play into the main story arc, except for the last few seconds. But, it does bring Lorne back to LA and get Cordy back among the living. (Sorta. I guess.) Anyway, I recommend that you give it a shot.

This is an episode about Lorne. It turns out that he hasn't been ignoring Team Angel. He's being held hostage by an evil Casino on the Veags strip. They're making him read people's fortunes and then they're stealing the destinies of the successful ones. When Angel, Gunn and Fred come to Vegas looking for him, they quickly realize that something's wrong. Angel's destiny is accidentally stolen and Fred, Gunn and Lorne have to try and get it back. Cordy finally lends a hand from Floaty-Magic land and Team Angel stops the evil casino. Meanwhile, Wes and Lilah continue to see each other. Back in LA, Team Angel enters the Hyperion and finds Cordelia standing in the lobby, with no idea where she is or who they are.

There are some good parts to this episode. I love Lorne and he's great here. Really, Lorne doesn't get enough screen time, so it's nice to see an episode that revolves around him. You just have to laugh when he starts singing "It Ain't Easy Being Green." And I like Angel all destiny-less and addicted to slot machines. He's so vacant and agreeable. And I enjoy his Old Time Vegas stories, about Elvis, Bugsy Segal & the Rat Pack. I wish we'd gotten some flashbacks. Finally, I like Cordy yelling at him from up in Floaty Magic land. She wants to come home and she's trying to tell him. Angel kinna hears her and he even sort of thinks that she's the one who helped with the slot machine thing. It's sweet. I'm not sure about Cordy for most of this season, but I know that that's the real her in most of this episode. I love Cordelia and Angel together.

On the down side, I wish Wes had gotten to go on the Las Vegas trip.

My favorite part of the episode: Wes on the phone with Lilah. They're scheduling their dates between her world domination plots and his rouge demon hunting business. Wesley is stealing all of Angel's clients, talking dirty to Lilah on the phone, buying deadly weapons and trying to arrange dinner. I just love the whole scene.

Viva Las Vegas

[Joxerlives · 6/10 · 14 March 2012]

THE HOUSE ALWAYS WINS

The Good; Lorne's performance is wonderful and love Fred's excited squeal. The Vegas stuff is all great

The Bad; The actual story is not that good.

Best line: Angel; "Boy, Vegas was a lot friendlier when the mob ran it!"

Jeez, how did they get away with that? Apocalypses: 5

Angel Clichés In disguise; 8

DB get's his shirt off; 12

Cordy's tatt; 10

Fang Gang in bondage: Cordy: 5 Angel: 12 Wes: 6 Gunn; 4 Lorne; 3 Fred; 2 Connor; 1

Fang gang knocked out: Cordy: 12 Angel: 15 Wes: 5 Doyle; 1 Gunn; 1 Lorne; 3 Groo; 1 Fred; 1 Connor; 1

Kills: 1 vamp for Connor and another human for Angel Cordy: 5 vamps, 3 demons Angel; 41 vamps, 57 and 1/2 demons, 8 humans Doyle; 1 vamp Wes; 13 demons+3 vamps, 2 humans Kate; 3 vamps Faith; 16 vamps, 6 demons, 3 humans. Gunn; 11 vamps+ 11 demons. Groo; 1 demon Fred; 3 vamp Connor; 6 vamps and 1 demon

Fang Gang go evil: Cordy: 2 Angel: 2 Gunn; 1 Wes; 1

Alternate Fang Gang: Destinyless Angel Cordy: 2 Angel: 9 Fred; 1

Characters killed: 46

Recurring characters killed; 8;

Total number of Angel Investigations: 4 Angel, Gunn, Fred, Lorne

Angel Investigations shot: Angel: 11 Wes; 1

Packing heat; Angel uses the guard's gun to kill the casino owners' assistant Wes; 6 Doyle; 1 Angel; 3 Gunn; 1

Notches on Fang Gang bedpost: Cordy: 4 ?+Wilson/Hacksaw Beast+Phantom Dennis+Groo Angel: 5; Buffy, Darla and The Transcending Furies Wes; 3; Virginia, the bleached blonde and Lilah Gunn; 1 Fred Fred; 1 Gunn Groo; 1Cordy

Kinky dinky: Fred in her Lornette costume is a revelation. Hands up who else was thinking what a shame we don't get to see CC in the same? (and Charisma is a Vegas girl after all). Lilah and Wes have some pretty explicit phone sex.

Know the face, different character; 4

Parking garages; 5,

Buffy characters on Angel; 16 Wetherby, Collins and Smith. Angel, Cordy, Oz, Spike, Buffy, Wes, Faith, Darla, Dru, The Master, Anne, Willow and Harmony

What the fanficcers thought; Once read an interesting one where Angel introduces Elvis to the delights of wearing black leather whilst Elvis teachers him karate.

Questions and observations; Angel in pinstripes, interesting look for him. Good enough, especially the musical numbers, glad to have the gang back together and Gunn get's to achieve his ambition, as indeed does Lorne. But you want them to get back to LA and crack on with the season. Wes seems quite happy to take AI's business when they're out of town suggesting he was partly responsible for their lack of clients during the summer. Also Fred seems to win pretty good at the blackjack table which might explain why AI's money problems seem to be over. Weird to hear Andy Hallet's commentary when you know he's no longer with us.

Marks out of 10; 6/10

Reuniting with Lorne

[Samuel-Shovel · 6/10 · 29 October 2018]

In "The House Always Wins", the gang (or what's left of it) heads to Las Vegas to reconnect with Lorne and figure out what Angel's destiny entails. They discover that Lorne's hit the big time singing at a large casino pretending to be covered in makeup like some kind of Blue Man Group routine. He snubs Angel, Gunn, and Fred and something about the casino feels off... Angel investigates and ends up getting his destiny stolen from him. A magician is holding Lorne captive and forcing him to read people during his show. The magician steals the good destinies (or something) after the show through a rigged game and uses it to profit? I'm not sure, it's not 100% explained.

Cordy watches on from her higher vantage point and prods the now mind-numbed Angel to help his friends as they are about to be killed by the magician casino owner. Lorne bashes the crystal ball that holds all the power, releasing everyone's destinies back to them and killing the owner. The group heads back to LA where they find Cordy in the hotel with some type of amnesia, unaware of who they are.

The show made a big deal about Lorne's departure and then he's right back in LA after a handful of episodes. I found that kind of weird. But I'm glad he's back; we've been working with a real skeleton crew as of late.

Does this mean we're done with those scenes of Cordy on a cloud complaining? I love her character but those were getting a tad annoying. It's hard to hear someone complain that much. Hopefully this will bring a new phase to her character arc.

I don't really have much to say about this episode. Nothing really to shout about here. Some of the dialogue felt a bit forced; Cordy's dialogue was a bit much and Angel constantly talking about the rat pack gave me an eye-roll.

Another mediocre casino episode

[nightwishouge · 6/10 · 4 April 2021]

Coming hot on the trail of "Double or Nothing" is another episode about the dangers of gambling. This one at least makes more sense, versus the vague waffling about selling one's future/soul/love/life or whatever was going on in the Gunn-centric episode.

Speaking of Gunn, he's being quite unlikable lately. First he gets all self-righteous about Wesley doing the wrong thing (kidnapping Connor) for the right reasons, and now, ever since Lorne left for Vegas, Gunn keeps grumbling about how he "abandoned them" and "lost the mission". Fred joins in because she's a lap dog. Maybe they both have a selective memory about how poorly Lorne was treated by everybody when he was there helping. And Gunn, remember how your divided loyalties resulted in Caritas getting shot up? And yet everybody forgave you anyway? Probably don't have the moral high ground here.

Next to giving Lorne more screen time than he's had recently, the best part of the episode is getting Fred into a campy showgirl outfit (painted green, with horns like cat ears) to go undercover. It's such a not-Fred thing to do it becomes awkwardly endearing. Yet as the episode progresses, she somehow finds time to wipe off the green paint, but keeps on the skimpy outfit. Maybe she finds it weirdly empowering in a "stays-in-Vegas" kind of way?

Lorne in the spotlight

[limetalhead · 10/10 · 30 September 2008]

Even though this episode was a bit corny, it was still pretty enjoyable. Lorne on a billboard, The Lornettes, Angel knowing all the past figures in Vegas. Even series with a darker aspect to it like Angel have to have an episode once in a while that's a little slapstick. Still though, the episode still had its "Angelesque" side to it be because of what was happening to Lorne. Being held prisoner and forced to read people so someone could steal their destinies. Vegas not being everything that Lorne thought it would. My favorite parts definitely had to be ones involving Wes and Fred. Fred looked so damn hot dressed up as a Lornette. She always looked good but this was an extra nice visual. Wesley on the phone with Lilah was classic. We already knew that their relationship was dirty but for them to basically be having phone sex made it even more so. All in all, a different episode than usual but still enjoyable.

The One Where Lorne Is Held Prisoner...

[taylorkingston · 10/10 · 27 September 2014]

I really love this episode.

So, as you know, Lorne moved to Las Vegas to become an act at the Tropicana. So the whole gang decides to go pay him a visit. Once they're in his show, Lorne completely ignores them. And gets others to sing. We later find out, when the people are singing, Lorne is actually reading them and finding out their futures and destinies. Then, his boss, tells Lorne to tell him they're futures. If he doesn't, he'll "pink slip" one of his dancers, but pink slip, means kill, not fire. So Lorne tells him three people futures, then those people get chosen to go in a special game. Where the house always wins. They don't lose money, they lose their destinies. And very few ever leave the casino. Angel, eventually gets caught, and forced to play the game. Lots of stuff goes down. But in the end, the destinies were returned, and Lorne went home with his friends.

Overall, I give this episode a 10 out of 10.

Viva Las Vegas

[SleepTight666 · 9/10 · 27 January 2007]

Viva Las Vegas - And yet another excellent season 4 episode, this time 'Angel' and what's left of his gang go to Las Vegas, the episode we had all been waiting for. Andy Hallett has such a great voice and so much charisma, it's always a treat to watch him perform, especially with the Lornettes, god, i loved the Lornettes, especially when 'Fred' dressed up as one. This episode revealed what the hell 'Lorne' meant with Fluffy, apparently he meant it as a code to say that he was in trouble, he had to read his audience's future so that they would play a game where they would lose and become futureless. 'Angel' gets himself into trouble again and looses his future after accidentally playing that game, nice to see Angel being the one who needs to be rescued for once. 'Cordelia' also got a few more scenes than in the previous episodes, she watches her friends screw up like they always do from above but she couldn't do a thing about it, i'm still not sure if she made 'Angel's coin machine win 3.000 dollars but if she did, then she was the one that saved the day. When 'Angel' saw that his friends were going to be executed he automatically vamped to save them, so even if 'Angel' didn't have a future anymore, seeing the people that he loved in trouble woke something up in him and made him save them because those people are also a part of his destiny and nothing can take that a way, which is kinda pretty. Both 'Connor' and 'Wesley' only had one scene but I enjoyed both, especially Wes' having phone sex with 'Lilah'. Another humorous thing was 'Angel' talking about playing tennis with Bugsy Siegel having drinks with the Rat Pack and being at Elvis Presley's wedding. A very fun episode that brings back the beloved 'Cordy' at the end, only without her memories. GUNN: Something starting to feel a lot not right about this. FRED: That's what I've been saying, only with better grammar. (9.0 out of 10)

The best Angel episode ?

[nicofreezer · 9/10 · 1 October 2023]

It's definitely up there with the best episode of the Buffy universe, because it is a great standalone story, because it's one of these episodes you can show a new watcher. Episodes about Darla or spike or sad Buffy or bad Connor, any of the " main story" are fine but never really reach greatness.

"The house always win" is a great story, full of fun, full of energy. A clever plot.

Like I said , one of the few episodes in the Buffyverse, that you can show to your friend and make him fall in love with the show.

I wish Buffy and Angel had have more standalone episode because that's what make a show great, just like the far superior The X files.