Another thing we need to remember about the plot turns, and the characters, is that they didn't find out the series was ending until they were almost finished writing the entire season.

I've clarified this in some of the other comments, but I was actually talking about how the show plays now as a single piece, regardless of whatever was originally intended/planned. The impressions one gets from a continuous watch - and I've noted people saying the same sorts of things about other seasons once the DVD sets came out - tend to be a little different than one gets from watching them week by week at the time. This essay was about the impressions I got from that kind of rewatch.

And no, I'm not saying Spike is a better champion than Angel, only that's what Angel is afraid of, how it looks to him. His insecurities and doubts come through loud and clear throughout the season - he's put in a lot of time and energy and suffering into making amends and is worried that it might (as measured by some outside judge) not really amount to anything. His main complaint about Spike is that he's had it too easy (three weeks moaning in a basement). So yeah, there's no question that Angel has put more conscious work into the redemption tour, and you could definitely make a case for him having fulfilled the kind of redemption criteria his own subsconcious laid out in "Soul Purpose" - that he earned a reward by not doing it for a reward, because at the end he gives the Shanshu away, expects nothing from his last stand, not even fame. (Like Cinco, whose brothers were not even remembered as heroes.) The question left standing at the end of the season is not "who deserves redemption more" but "what kind of rules is this redemption thing being judged by?"

Personally, I'd say they're both pretty well redeemed by the end. Although I found Angel's loss of hope to be very sad.