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Wacky Watches: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel

Reprise - It's back to Angel vs Wolfram and Hart as he plans to go on a suicide mission to kill the Senior Partners. The guy from the Commie episode is back as an old man which is a nice moment. Then Darla kills him right in front of Angel. Ouch. Also Kate is kicked off the police and ready to kill herself and demons with three eyes are out to get Cordy. But this episode is of course remembered for the excellent scene between Angel and Holland in the elevator. This is a good episode.

The Body - It's hard to say something like "good episode" about this because it's so disturbing? There's lots of little details that make it feel more real and it's so completely different from any other episode in the Buffyverse. Like characters kind of saying weird things but they're saying them because Joyce has just died and that's the kind of thing that happensin real life. SMG is really great in it but everyone else gets a chance too. The Anya speech seems to particularly stand out? There's even some humour when Xander gets his hand stuck in a wall. But yeah this is a brutal episode of television and not one you watch "for fun". The vampire bit is totally unnecessary but doesn't hurt the episode either.

Epiphany - Angel is back to Nice Angel again and saves the others from the eye demons. But they're not ready to just go back to normal. Lindsey is kind of pathetic? Like in a good way. This is the last time Kate appears and at least she gets a good final scene but it's kind of weird that we never find out what happened to her (COMICS DON'T COUNT.) This episode is good but not in the spectacular way other episodes have been good this season.

Forever - The Body was a realistic look at how people react to death, this is a look at how people react to death in a supernatural tv series. It's still good! I like Doc. He's good and creepy. Spike/Dawn is always fun. Angel makes a cameo. Hank doesn't show up for the funeral which is pretty fucking cold. What are we supposed to make of the bit where Willow shows Dawn the book? Is she telling the truth when she says she thought it would just put Dawn off doing the spell? Or was she actually being naughty and trying to help Dawn along?
 
I liked Joss' commentary on the DVD, when he said he put in the vampire thing so that the episode would be grounded in the Buffyverse, and so it wouldn't be so unique that people would complain it wasn't really a Buffy episode (paraphrasing).
 
I remember reading somewhere that THE NETWORK ordered that there had to be at least one supernatural thing in every epiosode and that's why they put it in. But a lot of stuff you read is bullshit!
 
I like it because it feels like a gross intrusion in the episode. Buffy doesn't get to stop being the Slayer in order to mourn, and we don't get to not have a dissonant vampire attack in an otherwise very unsupernatural episode.
 
I found a transcript of the commentary (thanks to this guy for doing it):

[A vampire rises on one of the other tables]

And then that. That's not helping anybody. Now, some people were like, "Why a vampire in this episode?" But I was very specific about it. I wanted a vampire, first of all, who looked more like a corpse than anything else. And here's young Dawn confronted by, not only a vampire but a naked man. It's an intrusion. It's offensive. And completely physical. And that's what I…

[The Scoobies return laden down with food and drink]

And then of course they're so cute with their food. And believe me, the giving of food is a huge ritual of death. It's usually not vending machine food but it often is.

And I'm explaining death, like anybody who's watching this hasn't experienced it. I'm just explaining why I did that.

But the idea of the vampire was partially that it is an intrusion, it doesn't belong here. The way Tara finds herself being the only one sitting with Sarah and feels she doesn't belong – but then actually has something to offer. The way they're getting a parking ticket. Life goes on. And on 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' that means horrible things happen.

[Buffy goes looking for Dawn, sees the vampire attacking her]

And this fight was done differently than any other fight I'd done before. I made it as much of a gross wrestling match as I could. Hands in the face. And then of course pulling the sheet off of Joyce in the worst way possible. But rather than a great, cool kick-boxy fight I made this like a genuine struggle. Because again I wanted to stress the reality of it and killing the guy.

[Dawn sees the sheet has been pulled off Joyce's body]

Dawnie is getting what she was looking for. Again, she can't quite – the frames are never as clean as we want them to be in this show.

[Buffy fights the vampire]

You see, we really painted him up to look dead. And when I kill him again I do it the worst way imaginable, because I wanted… ugh… to be in your face with it. If I say "physical" again, or "real", you guys are just going to turn this off, so I won't.

And then we're into the end.

[Buffy and Dawn look up at their mother's body]

This was a very difficult shot. We didn't have room for dolly track but we had Bill Brummond, cameraman– Steadicam extraordinaire, basically aping a dolly shot by walking up onto a ramp so I could get the three-shot that I desperately wanted. To go from Buffy, to Dawn, to the three.

["Where did she go?"]

The fact of death being physically real and physically unreal is expressed here… this isn't the last shot, it's expressed in the last shot after Dawn says those words – words that cannot be answered by anybody – and reaches out to touch her mother. In a show that's been all about physicality, this girl who needs to know, to understand… never touches her.

[The show cuts to black just *before* Dawn touches Joyce's body]

And that was done very specifically. And some people said, "Oh, that means next week, Dawn's going to heal her with her Key powers!" And I was like, "What show were you watching?" No. It meant "We want to touch it, but there's nothing there." And to go out just before she touches her was to express that. To express what I've been talking about the whole way. There is no resolve, there's no resolution, there's no ending, there's no lesson. There's just death.

Well, I hope you've had a good time. I know I have. Bye!
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I may have conjured up the word "intrusion" from listening to that commentary, but it's been over ten years so I'm not sure.
 
Disharmony - How do you do a light-hearted episode about getting the gang back together? You add Harmony, that's how! I mean, they could have done it without Harmony. But Harmony's great. She's very funny in this episode. Why didn't Mercedes McNab get more comedy roles? Willow makes a cameo and it's nice. The goofy vampire cult are funny. I just keep saying things in this episode are funny but it's because THEY WERE, OKAY? Cordy's "I get new clothes" dance and Angel nodding up and down with her is funny. Don't say that it isn't.

Intervention - I love the Buffybot. Sarah Michelle Gellar is great at playing a robot. When she askes Anya how her money is and Anya is delighted that someone has finally asked...that's great. Buffy goes to the dessert and has a vision of the First Slayer and hears "death is your gift" and it's all a bit like Restless so that's cool. Spike does a good thing in the end by not giving Dawn up and a funny scene with Buffy pretending to be the Buffybot then turns into a touching real moment between Buffy and Spike. The show does things like that well.

Dead End - It's good how they've been building up Cordy's visions getting more painful for a while now. Lindsey sings his "Pretty as a Picture" song and he's a good singer! Angel is funny with the petty jealousy. Lindsey is an interesting character. I think the first time I watched it though I probably saw this as a simple "Lindsey's a good guy now!" moment, but really just becaue he's getting away from Wolfram and Hart doesn't mean he's going to dedicate his life to doing good. It's also WORTH NOTING that Lorne seems to know Lindsey a bit (he used to be a regular) and they're quite friendly and Lorne doesn't seem worried when he hears Lindsey sing. The "evil hand issues" scene is great.

Tough Love - Willow and Tara have a fight and maybe I'm biased but I thought Willow as in the wrong and being unfair. Willow goes black eyed doing revenge magic and she's quite powerful and Tara is a bit scared of what she'll become and this is foreshadowing but also just good character work! Glory finally finds out Dawn is the Key. Glory isn't really that great, is she? Like she's fine in the scene she's in but she doesn't have any personal connection to the characters other than "I WANT MY KEY AND YOU HAVE IT." What does Glory mean to Buffy thematically?
 
CaptainWacky said:
What does Glory mean to Buffy thematically?
Click to expand...
I DON'T KNOW. In a lot of ways, season 5 is just a disconnected series of pretty solid episodes, without the ambition or thematic consistency of even seasons 6 or 7. It's *fine*, but it's definitely the blandest Buffy season.
 
Glory is a device. Glory is Bane. When DC wanted to break Batman's back and put him in a wheelchair for a while, they went to such lengths as to invent Bane as the instrument. Glory is the instrument Joss invented when he decided he wanted to kill Buffy as a clever anti-cliffhanger.
 
So I'm not watching them in airdate order anymore as I didn't want to switch between the final Buffy arc and the Pylea episodes and I won't be watching them in airdate order next season because there's really no point with them being on different networks and no crossovers. Sorry!

Spiral - This is a very good non-stop action episode. I like when the Knights of Thingy show up on horses to attack the RV and Buffy's just like "oh, of course." Speaking of the Knights what are they? Like what do they do most of the time when they don't have anyone to fight? Just hang out with swords? Why do they not use guns? Who are these guys? I don't feel like I know them! Anyway, this episode is good. Surely when Ben went to "help" he would have known there was a good chance he'd turn into Glory and be right where she wanted to be?

The Weight Of The World - I like how they've built up Willow becoming more powerful over the years. You get more shots where people look scared of her power now. This episode...it's good but I don't find the Buffy dream scenes all that compelling. And the scenes with Ben and Glory arguing with each other must have been hard to do but would have been better with better actors playing Ben and Glory? Why does Joss sometimes cast bland pretty guys like Ben and Riley and (Helo in Dollhouse)?

The Gift - Here are some problems with The Gift: Olaf wasn't a troll God and his hammer barely even hurt Xander before (and I think the Hammer might even have disappeared in Triangle but I can't remember.) What's Buffy doing while Glory is having quite a long fight with the BuffyBot? Shouldn't she be running up to save Dawn at that point double-teaming Glory with the bot? And let's not get started on "Summers blood." BUT WHO CARES THIS EPISODE IS GREAT. Everyone does great stuff from Xander proposing to Anya to Willow saving Tara to Spike's "you treat me like a man" to Giles going all Ripper on Ben (who deserves to die for being willing to kill Dawn) and Michelle Trachtenberg does her best acting yet. Oh and Buffy! She realises that being a Slayer isn't just about killing things and the death that's her gift is giving her own life to protect the world. So Slayers aren't just killing machines! That's a theme! Also I like this music a lot.

[youtube]C0a9b2ucnrU[/youtube]

One thing about this season I forgot to mention before: Giles has kind of faded into the background? He's still in every episode but he doesn't really get as much to do as the others (until The Gift anyway) and doesn't even get a centric episode. This is bad because I liked Giles. Are they preparing us for him not being a regular in the last two seasons?
 
Belonging - Wesley has a sad phonecall with his father. One of Gunn's old friends dies and he feels guilty for not being there. Cordy shoots a commercial and it goes badly. Lorne's cousin (this is the first time we find out he's called Lorne but I hate calling him "The Host" I guess so I've been calling him it all along) arrives and Lorne doesn't want to go home. They all have trouble with belonging! This episode is okay. It's not bad. It's not great. It's okay. Amy Acker appears for the first time (only in Cordy's vision.)

Somewhere Over The Rainbow - I like the idea of Team Angel having a wacky adventure in another dimension. But one episode of it would be enough. It's obvious they're stretching the story out because they still have another two episodes after this one. It's not bad but it drags. Amy Acker does appear again as Fred and she's awesome for about a minute so that's good.
 
Through The Looking Glass Numfar does the Dance of Joy. So there's that! This episode again isn't bad. Amy Acker is in it more, Groo appears for the first time (someone probably likes Groo) and Lorne dies at the end so that's sad. A thing I don't really like is Angel's "true" vampire face which just looks like a generic demon and not awesome like The Master. A BIG MISTAKE.

There's No Place Like Plrtz Glrb - This one ups the wackiness a bit as Lorne is still alive but he's just a head. Welsey sends a load of non-speaking extras to their deaths. Again it's not bad but I don't think there's anyone that LOVES the Pylea episods and wanted more, is there? Willow appars at the end and Buffy's dead!

Heartthrob - A season premiere has to set up the current state of things and hint at the future so we get scenes of Angel as a demon monsetry that are amusing and Fred is writing on the walls and Wes and Gunn are the same and Cordy's mouth looks different. Also there's flashbacks where we see the previously mentioned Holtz for the first time and he looks cool. Really the weakest part of this episode is the crybaby vampire who has his heart removed because Angel killed his true love. Him and the girl vampire just feel like weak versions of Spike and Dru (and it's a bit like the Jeremy Renner episode.) But this is a perfectly fine premiere and we get PREGNANT DARLA at the end.

That Vision Thing - This one's pretty good too as Lilah manipulates Cordy's visions to get Angel to free someone from a fiery prison. Skip appears for the first time and he's awesome.
 
I just looked at a list of Buffy season 6 episodes.
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That Old Gang Of Mine - Merle the snitch demon dies so if you loved him, I'm sorry. I liked the demon drinking the squishee as well. But yeah I always found this episode a bit annoying. Maybe I'm RACIST but Gunn's gang saying "what's up G, you be rollin' with demons now?" and stuff is kind of tedious. And Gunn says "you lost the mission, bro." It's a bit heavyhanded. It's not really all that bad though.

Carpe Noctem - A pervy old guy jumps into Angel's body. David Boreanaz is good at comedy. But this episode never really goes anywhere? The most interesting part is that Lilah secretly wants to fuck Angel AND WHO CAN BLAME HER REALLY.

Fredless - With the exception of Joyce (and even she was problematic for the first few seasons!) main character parents are usually evil or just not seen very much in the Buffyverse. So it's very refreshing that Fred's parents are actually really nice and funny and well written and her mum runs an insect demon over with a bus. This is a very good episode and Amy Acker is an awesome actress and has several awesome scenes here. I love how much all the character loves Fred because she is so damn lovable. And Angel being excited that it's his turn to be bandaged. This is good!

Billy - This is also very good! I BET TUMBLR LIKED IT. The scene with Cordy talking to Lilah is great. Alexis Denisof does a great job as psycho woman-hating Wesley and it's genuinely disturbing when he's terrorising Fred. And Lilah gets more depth than she has before while still being unapologetically evil.

Gavin's supposed to be a bit lame, right?
 
Bargaining: Part 1 - Buffy's back! On a new network! It feels kind of different! Is it because Willow and Tara can kiss now? Maybe. But also this episode feels slow. I like the Buffybot but it's just used here for comedy other than the sad scene where Dawn cuddles it in bed. They should have done more with the creepiness of Dawn living with a robot version of her DEAD SISTER. Giles leaves but I know he comes back in three epsidoes then leaves again so it's hard to be sad about it yet. Buffy obviously isn't going to be revived until the cliffhanger so the episode needs to spend time on other things before then and we get a demon biker gang. They're really lame. Maybe Angel is to blame for featuring demons doing normal human things a lot (they're in a bar just out in the open drinking like normal people even though they're a demon biker gang) but they feel out of place in Buffy. And they're not funny. At least in the past the villains would be funny. These guys suck.

Bargaining: Part 2 - Buffy's back in that she's back alive! But we can't really have the gang meeting her until the end of the episode so we get...everyone running around the woods for a while. Seriously it's fucking boring. Twenty five minutes into the episode and finally Xander's like "hey we've been in the woods for a wahile" but then he spends like a minute saying "OH MY GOD WHAt'S THAT LIGHT COMING TOWARDS US" when it's obviously magic Tara's done. Buffy clawing her way out of her grave is a good part. Then she walks around for a while looking confused thinking she's in Hell and maybe I'm just cranky but this seems to take too long as well. She sees the Buffybot die and more people should mourn the Buffybot. Dawn finds her on Glory's tower (which hasn't been torn down yet? Even though it's really unsafe?) and cries at her a lot and finally Buffy saves her from the tower collapsing. There's a REALLY LONG fight with the demon bikers. This is slow.

After Life - This one starts off like it's Bargaining Part 3. I understand the need to show Buffy adjusting to being alive but it's not all that great to watch. It picks up when the demon of the week jumps into characters and they do creepy things (Dawn breathes fire!) and it's a bit creepier than the usual Buffy demon. It's good that Buffy isn't just back to being okay at the end and the scene where she reveals to Spike that she thinks she was in Heaven is good.

Flooded - Buffy has money problems. She goes to the bank then patronisingly tells off a guard who was trying to help her that using guns is bad. Giles comes back so that's nice! The best scene is where Willow's all "maybe you should be afraid of me" to him. The nerd trio appear for the first time. I don't know if I buy Jonathan going back to being a villain (even if he thinks it's all a laugh) after what happened in Superstar but he's still funny. The episode ends with Buffy fighting a demon at home like last week. This is better than the previous three but still slow.
 
Life Serial - This is another episode about how Buffy doesn't fit in anymore and is depressed but it also manages to be fun! The nerds take turns testing Buffy. The best part is the time loop where she has to please a customer in the Magic Box. This is the best part of season six so far. It's vintage Buffy! She also gets drunk with Spike and it's pretty funny and Klem appears for the first time (he's just a sleazy demon gambling for kittens though!) See, Buffy being in a bad place emotionally can actually be entertaining to watch. This episode is good.

All The Way - The third Halloween episode...and the weakest. I wanted it to be good because I wanted there to be a good Dawn episode but this is not good. There's a misdirection that some creepy old man is going to be the villain but actually the boys Dawn and her friend (played by Amber Tamblyn!) are with are vampires. It's not really much of a twist. There's some humour near the end but really this is just pretty dull and does nothing for the "see Dawn is good!" arguments. Willow mind-wiping Tara is the most important thing that happens here. Oh and Xander finally announces he's going to marry Anya so I guess he was having doubts or something.
 
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