The episode you mean is called Origin, the device Wesley shatters is an Orion's window.
Re: short cuts: well, Angel is someone for whom two of the most significant, shattering changes of his life happened in a "magical", so to speak, way: Darla making him from Liam into Angelus, and the gypsies giving him a soul. Now if you look at it more closely, in both cases the event itself is by no means a fix-it or a complete development. Becoming a vampire ends Liam's discontented life in Galway, but it doesn't actually already create Angelus, other than adding the demon part. But I'd say Angelus as we know him is the product of years as a vampire (the newborn vampire killing his family is still quite confused, the one challenging the Master actually not that dissimilar from Liam in brawling mode, only with added supernatural stamina though with the added knowledge Liam wouldn't have had, that the Master beating him physically still allows him to win Darla emotionally), a work in progress that's not complete until Darla leaves him to burn in the barn and he catches up with her later. Similarly, the newly souled vampire isn't Angel yet, either. He tries to go back to what he used to be at first, to what and whom he's used to, and he needs a century of various failed attempts (see also: Are you know or have you ever been?) to become his definite souled personality. But that's an outside pov. For Angel himself, what's true is that both Darla making him into a vampire and the gypsies cursing him radically and forever altered his life/lives. Now whether giving Connor different memories is more the equivalent of making him a vampire or giving him a soul for Angel is up to debate. But I think it's not surprising that the idea this could be the way to save him would occur.
I think if the boy that was doing those killings had been anyone else, like a stranger? Angel would have killed him. Angel sacrificed all this for a murderer who was his son.
Absolutely, with one caveat: I wouldn't say "anyone else", though I agree on the "stranger" part. Angel would have also done it for Faith; he'd definitely have done it for Darla; Spike and Drusilla are arguable, though I'm tending to "yes" (not least because he's responsible for making them killers to begin with); Cordelia, yes, Wesley, probably yes, Gunn and Fred yes except if the saving would have damaged more than people's memories.
But if Connor had been a complete stranger helping Jasmine for reasons unknown and then killing her for reasons unknown? He'd either have disarmed him and locked him up somewhere or killed him, agreed.
Something I do recall is that Tim Minear (who by all I've heard is the primary author of the Angel-Darla-Connor storylines, so I'm not sure how much this counts as a Joss Whedon tale anyway) says on the Home audio commentary that the original plan (back when they didn't know Charisma Carpenter was pregnant and s4 was still in the planning stage) was that de-possessed Cordelia, not Connor, would kill Jasmine, and Angel would kill Connor, going for an Arthurian ending, with Connor as Mordred, but the combination of the fact CC was not available for anything more than cameos in the last part of the season due to her condition and the fact VK put on such a great performance as Connor, the writers changed their mind, and decided that not only would Connor live but that, ironcially, this incredibly damaged, murderous child would end up as the one person who makes it out of the show definitely alive and with hope for the future.
no subject
Re: short cuts: well, Angel is someone for whom two of the most significant, shattering changes of his life happened in a "magical", so to speak, way: Darla making him from Liam into Angelus, and the gypsies giving him a soul. Now if you look at it more closely, in both cases the event itself is by no means a fix-it or a complete development. Becoming a vampire ends Liam's discontented life in Galway, but it doesn't actually already create Angelus, other than adding the demon part. But I'd say Angelus as we know him is the product of years as a vampire (the newborn vampire killing his family is still quite confused, the one challenging the Master actually not that dissimilar from Liam in brawling mode, only with added supernatural stamina though with the added knowledge Liam wouldn't have had, that the Master beating him physically still allows him to win Darla emotionally), a work in progress that's not complete until Darla leaves him to burn in the barn and he catches up with her later. Similarly, the newly souled vampire isn't Angel yet, either. He tries to go back to what he used to be at first, to what and whom he's used to, and he needs a century of various failed attempts (see also: Are you know or have you ever been?) to become his definite souled personality. But that's an outside pov. For Angel himself, what's true is that both Darla making him into a vampire and the gypsies cursing him radically and forever altered his life/lives. Now whether giving Connor different memories is more the equivalent of making him a vampire or giving him a soul for Angel is up to debate. But I think it's not surprising that the idea this could be the way to save him would occur.
I think if the boy that was doing those killings had been anyone else, like a stranger? Angel would have killed him. Angel sacrificed all this for a murderer who was his son.
Absolutely, with one caveat: I wouldn't say "anyone else", though I agree on the "stranger" part. Angel would have also done it for Faith; he'd definitely have done it for Darla; Spike and Drusilla are arguable, though I'm tending to "yes" (not least because he's responsible for making them killers to begin with); Cordelia, yes, Wesley, probably yes, Gunn and Fred yes except if the saving would have damaged more than people's memories.
But if Connor had been a complete stranger helping Jasmine for reasons unknown and then killing her for reasons unknown? He'd either have disarmed him and locked him up somewhere or killed him, agreed.
Something I do recall is that Tim Minear (who by all I've heard is the primary author of the Angel-Darla-Connor storylines, so I'm not sure how much this counts as a Joss Whedon tale anyway) says on the Home audio commentary that the original plan (back when they didn't know Charisma Carpenter was pregnant and s4 was still in the planning stage) was that de-possessed Cordelia, not Connor, would kill Jasmine, and Angel would kill Connor, going for an Arthurian ending, with Connor as Mordred, but the combination of the fact CC was not available for anything more than cameos in the last part of the season due to her condition and the fact VK put on such a great performance as Connor, the writers changed their mind, and decided that not only would Connor live but that, ironcially, this incredibly damaged, murderous child would end up as the one person who makes it out of the show definitely alive and with hope for the future.