Angel: Every Main Character Ranked Worst To Best

The fact that Angel ranks here shouldn't be seen as an insult, but rather a shout-out to the greatness of the rest of the show's characters.

Angel is one of TV's most twisting, complex and intriguing characters, an evil vampire cursed with a soul, forced to atone for his sins, and thrust into a world where he must now right his wrongs by becoming a hero. In Buffy, he fell in love, turned evil and was sent to a hell dimension. In Angel, thanks to some new and old faces, he finds purpose by "helping the helpless."

Thus begins his journey as a brooding hero. But there are issues with the vampire - he's inconsistent, messing with his personal relationships whenever he has a bad day, struggling to decide if he's the champion the Shanshu Prophecy speaks of, and constantly torn between being alone and surrounding himself with friends.

He never really grows throughout the show, ending the series on much the same ground he started - a hero taking on evil, unsure about his future but willing to fight for it.

All of this is easy to ignore, though, really. Angel is a selfless hero when the big moments come knocking, and his quest to seek redemption is often the most compelling aspect of the entire franchise. It's just not consistent enough to rank him any higher.