rewatch notes: BtVS 3x12 - 4x09 (selected eps)
I'm still working on my VVC posts, but today I'm having the urge to start clearing out my giant pre-VVC backlog of Stuff To Post. Let's start with Buffy.
I've been rewatching Buffy (more slowly than I'd like) for the past several months, and at various points during the process I've been inspired to scribble down notes about some of the eps. So here you go: snapshots of my brain on Buffy.
Warning: lots of spazzy enthusiasm under the cuts.
3x12 Helpless
This ep just kills me. I'm not sure I'd call it one of my favorites, exactly, because it's so hard for me to rewatch, but it's one of the best - the insane vampire is perhaps the most truly terrifying vamp they ever came up with aside from Angelus, and Quentin is, for me at least, one of the series' most horrifying villains. Buffy's horror that Giles is the one who made her helpless, his guilt and shame about it - heartbreaking to watch. And although the ep belongs to the two of them, the other characters get wonderful moments as well: Xander and Oz discuss kryptonite, Willow tries to help Buffy imagine a life without her Slayer powers. And Cordy, who waltzes into the library being her usual self-involved and slightly clueless self, but when Buffy says "Cordelia, could you please drive me home?" Cordy takes one look at her tear-stained face and says "of course" without hesitation; this is the moment where I always, ALWAYS start to cry.
3x14 Bad Girls
This ep is such a mix of the dire (Balthazar demon WTF?) and the sublime. It's got all of BtVS packed in there: love, betrayal, shock, pain, hilarity, violence, tenderness. The Wesley stuff is particularly funny ("Are you not used to being given orders?" "Whenever Giles sends me on a mission, he always says 'please.' And afterwards I get a cookie!"). The Mayor is scary, but checking off "become invincible" on the to-do list is hilarious. And of course Faith - gah. I'm not sure I have words for poor messed-up Faith here. Maybe that's why I vidded her. Heh.
3x19 Choices
I'm not sure they ever did a more explicit anatomy of the workings of patriarchy than they did in the first scene of this ep. The Mayor's all jolly smiles and gifts, until Faith gets mouthy - then it's "this isn't a free ride, young lady" and "somebody's getting a lit-tle spoiled" and threats to take away the gift, and Faith has to say "Sorry... Sir" to make it better - and then she LITERALLY gets a cookie. This is The Rule of The Father, all right. The Mayor's never cruel to Faith; he doesn't have to be. She knows what he can do, and he knows she knows. And she also knows that he cares about her; his affection is genuine. ("That look on your face is my reward.") Clutching her box and looking up, wide-eyed: it's as child-like as we ever see her.
Contrast this to Buffy and Giles, especially his reaction when she tells him she got into Northwestern: "That's wonderful news - good for you!" He's so quiet, so very Giles, but the profound affection in his voice and smile... their relationship at this point is worlds away from Faith and the Mayor.
And then Wesley, doing his "Everyone stop! I'm in charge here!" thing in the middle of the plan: ineffectual patriarchy.
And Buffy, oh, Buffy - immediately ready to trade the box for Willow, because the certain fate of one person she loves matters more than the abstract possibility of apocalypse; after all, she's averted apocalypse before. That's our girl: love comes first. Preview of the end of S5, right here. (And she's right: they DO find another way to avert disaster.)
And then after Faith throws her knife at one of the creepy spider-beetle things, the Mayor just summons Faith to go with him, doesn't let her KEEP the knife - can't see how much it means to her. I really hate him in that moment.
3x20 The Prom
This episode makes me cry and cry and cry. Buffy's hurting so badly from the news that Angel's going to leave town, but she steps up to save the prom - she could be bitter, but she's not. And Giles is so affectionate, so sorry for her and so proud of her. And her classmates DO appreciate her. ::sob::
I love that she gets her perfect moment, and it isn't what she thought it would be; and then she also gets her moment dancing with Angel all dressed up in a tux.
3x21 Graduation Day, Part 1
The Mayor walking into the library freaks me out EVERY SINGLE TIME. HE SHOULDN'T BE THERE. GAH.
3x22 Graduation Day, Part 2
I love that the Mayor does genuinely and completely go postal when he realizes that there's been a fight at Faith's apartment and she's missing. "Find them; put everybody on it." "But sir, the Ascension-" "FIND THEM." He really does care. Best villain ever.
4x03 Harsh Light of Day
I love this ep SO MUCH. The structure and thematic stuff is terrific. It's a total continuity fest ("I kind of - drowned," "Still more romantic than Faith," all the stuff about Dru, B's reaction when she wakes up alone after her night with Parker, the yearbook she's showing people with Harmony's picture). It's frequently hilarious (this is where Anya really becomes Anya, and oh, that conversation with Xander; and god, HARMONY with SPIKE). It's got some great dialogue ("Devon dated her for a while, but she was too flaky for him - which, stop and marvel at the concept"). And the stuff with Parker? PAINFUL. Because he SEEMS like a sweet guy, a charming and self-deprecating guy; it's been so long since I rewatched the ep that I'd forgotten how straight they play that. Yeah, he's a jerk in subsequent eps and you can see it in retrospect, but Buffy doesn't see it coming, has no REASON to see it coming, and she's totally and legitimately spun.
Still one of my favorites.
4x04 Fear Itself
"I worked long and hard to get this pompous." I LOVE YOU, RILEY FINN.
Seriously, I love Riley so much. I realize that this is not a widely shared position, but there it is. I don't even care that the show is beating me about the head and shoulders in a completely unsubtle attempt to make me like Riley; it TOTALLY WORKS. I am SOLD.
4x05 Beer Bad
Okay, this ep's pretty terrible... but those first few minutes, where Buffy imagines Parker apologizing to her with flowers and ice cream? HILARIOUS. And Buffy running into Riley at the bar? So cute! So sweet! Again, I can see the writers setting me up to like Riley and IT WORKS EVERY TIME. He is adorable. He is a total doofus. Also, watching Buffy conk Parker on the head at the end? NEVER NOT FUNNY. So yeah, five minutes of AWESOME separated by 38 minutes of "oh god, make it stop," but those five minutes? COMEDY GOLD, PEOPLE.
4x06 Wild At Heart
Okay, I love my show, but every now and then it just gets things WRONG. Like, why no office for Walsh or Riley? College classrooms are not offices, people! I can and do handwave this by reminding myself that BtVS is fundamentally about, to steal a phrase from Hawthorne, the truths of the human heart; it consistently and unabashedly prioritizes emotional truth over literal truth, which is one of the reasons I love the show. But every now and then I find myself rolling my eyes when the writers fail to address something so basic as the fact that professors and TAs have offices.
Back to the ep itself: Oh, Willow. The attempt to dress like Veruca is a particularly sharp bit of understated continuity, I think: Willow in her leather pants and dark shirt - so alarmingly like vamp!Willow, and also looking ahead to S6, when she'll actually be able to pull off a version of this look even before she goes evil.
I'd completely forgotten about Riley saving Willow by pulling her out of the street as a car bears down on her! The show is relentless about making Riley a good guy, and I DON'T CARE - it works, he's there, he's right: "Whatever it is, it's not worth hurting yourself over."
And, okay, once more with feeling; oh, Willow.
4x07 The Initiative
Buffy calling out Prof Walsh ("for someone who teaches human behavior, you might try showing some") is SO AWESOME. As is the fact that Riley thinks it's awesome too - he is literally awed by her. As well he should be!
Riley punching Parker? Also made of win. And Riley's total disbelief afterwards! And his little moment of realization that he likes Buffy! (Though, okay, the fact that they never deal with the fact that he's Buffy's TA? Kinda creepy. Also, Riley going to Buffy's dorm room? Kinda squicks me in the abstract, even though there's nothing creepy about it in the ep itself.) And Forrest, "You're kind of like a moron"? HILARIOUS. "I'm gonna go see a girl" - that's so Riley, so blessedly straightforward. He uses the word "courted"! He asks Willow if Buffy talks about him! And he makes the guys at the party skip the Dingos song when it upsets Willow! ::loves::
And let us not forget the Harmony-Xander slapfight - complete with action music and slo-mo! ::dies::
More priceless moments: Buffy shooing Riley away because she's trying to hunt Spike, and Riley responding "Are you drunk?" The entire Spike/Willow conversation, especially "Don't patronize me!"
And oh, show - not real consistent about how much damage Spike can do to a human before the chip stops him - he's punching commandos here. ::handwaves::
4x08 Pangs
"It's a ritual sacrifice. With pie." NEVER NOT FUNNY.
"I'm powerful, and I'm beautiful, and I don't need you to complete me. And you're mean!" Still one of my favorite lines ever. Oh Harmony.
"So this is Angel. He's large and glowery, isn't he." ::dies:: I love you, Anya.
4x09 Something Blue
Riley hanging the Lesbian Alliance banner! This is adorable on so many levels! It's great setup for what happens with Willow, but it's also a nice character bit for Riley: he's helpful and friendly to everybody, and he makes a joke about being a lesbian - he's just totally comfortable with himself. And bless him, he's so sweet to Willow when she's hurting - inviting her to the picnic, offering apples, even though he and Buffy are finally starting to get somewhere.
I want to weep for drunk!Willow and smack her at the same time. "We have to go through the pain," Buffy says, so patiently, and Willow responds "Isn't there some way I can make it go away? Just 'cause I say so?" No, honey. That way lies badness. Every single time. And, okay, for all that I wish S6 had handled its iteration of this aspect of Willow's character with more finesse, I love that this is one of those things that Willow doesn't learn - we all have mistakes that we just keep making, and this is Willow's.
"How? What? How?" "Three excellent questions." Xander being a dork and Giles being sarcastic FTW!
In conclusion: STILL MY SHOW.
I've been rewatching Buffy (more slowly than I'd like) for the past several months, and at various points during the process I've been inspired to scribble down notes about some of the eps. So here you go: snapshots of my brain on Buffy.
Warning: lots of spazzy enthusiasm under the cuts.
3x12 Helpless
This ep just kills me. I'm not sure I'd call it one of my favorites, exactly, because it's so hard for me to rewatch, but it's one of the best - the insane vampire is perhaps the most truly terrifying vamp they ever came up with aside from Angelus, and Quentin is, for me at least, one of the series' most horrifying villains. Buffy's horror that Giles is the one who made her helpless, his guilt and shame about it - heartbreaking to watch. And although the ep belongs to the two of them, the other characters get wonderful moments as well: Xander and Oz discuss kryptonite, Willow tries to help Buffy imagine a life without her Slayer powers. And Cordy, who waltzes into the library being her usual self-involved and slightly clueless self, but when Buffy says "Cordelia, could you please drive me home?" Cordy takes one look at her tear-stained face and says "of course" without hesitation; this is the moment where I always, ALWAYS start to cry.
3x14 Bad Girls
This ep is such a mix of the dire (Balthazar demon WTF?) and the sublime. It's got all of BtVS packed in there: love, betrayal, shock, pain, hilarity, violence, tenderness. The Wesley stuff is particularly funny ("Are you not used to being given orders?" "Whenever Giles sends me on a mission, he always says 'please.' And afterwards I get a cookie!"). The Mayor is scary, but checking off "become invincible" on the to-do list is hilarious. And of course Faith - gah. I'm not sure I have words for poor messed-up Faith here. Maybe that's why I vidded her. Heh.
3x19 Choices
I'm not sure they ever did a more explicit anatomy of the workings of patriarchy than they did in the first scene of this ep. The Mayor's all jolly smiles and gifts, until Faith gets mouthy - then it's "this isn't a free ride, young lady" and "somebody's getting a lit-tle spoiled" and threats to take away the gift, and Faith has to say "Sorry... Sir" to make it better - and then she LITERALLY gets a cookie. This is The Rule of The Father, all right. The Mayor's never cruel to Faith; he doesn't have to be. She knows what he can do, and he knows she knows. And she also knows that he cares about her; his affection is genuine. ("That look on your face is my reward.") Clutching her box and looking up, wide-eyed: it's as child-like as we ever see her.
Contrast this to Buffy and Giles, especially his reaction when she tells him she got into Northwestern: "That's wonderful news - good for you!" He's so quiet, so very Giles, but the profound affection in his voice and smile... their relationship at this point is worlds away from Faith and the Mayor.
And then Wesley, doing his "Everyone stop! I'm in charge here!" thing in the middle of the plan: ineffectual patriarchy.
And Buffy, oh, Buffy - immediately ready to trade the box for Willow, because the certain fate of one person she loves matters more than the abstract possibility of apocalypse; after all, she's averted apocalypse before. That's our girl: love comes first. Preview of the end of S5, right here. (And she's right: they DO find another way to avert disaster.)
And then after Faith throws her knife at one of the creepy spider-beetle things, the Mayor just summons Faith to go with him, doesn't let her KEEP the knife - can't see how much it means to her. I really hate him in that moment.
3x20 The Prom
This episode makes me cry and cry and cry. Buffy's hurting so badly from the news that Angel's going to leave town, but she steps up to save the prom - she could be bitter, but she's not. And Giles is so affectionate, so sorry for her and so proud of her. And her classmates DO appreciate her. ::sob::
I love that she gets her perfect moment, and it isn't what she thought it would be; and then she also gets her moment dancing with Angel all dressed up in a tux.
3x21 Graduation Day, Part 1
The Mayor walking into the library freaks me out EVERY SINGLE TIME. HE SHOULDN'T BE THERE. GAH.
3x22 Graduation Day, Part 2
I love that the Mayor does genuinely and completely go postal when he realizes that there's been a fight at Faith's apartment and she's missing. "Find them; put everybody on it." "But sir, the Ascension-" "FIND THEM." He really does care. Best villain ever.
4x03 Harsh Light of Day
I love this ep SO MUCH. The structure and thematic stuff is terrific. It's a total continuity fest ("I kind of - drowned," "Still more romantic than Faith," all the stuff about Dru, B's reaction when she wakes up alone after her night with Parker, the yearbook she's showing people with Harmony's picture). It's frequently hilarious (this is where Anya really becomes Anya, and oh, that conversation with Xander; and god, HARMONY with SPIKE). It's got some great dialogue ("Devon dated her for a while, but she was too flaky for him - which, stop and marvel at the concept"). And the stuff with Parker? PAINFUL. Because he SEEMS like a sweet guy, a charming and self-deprecating guy; it's been so long since I rewatched the ep that I'd forgotten how straight they play that. Yeah, he's a jerk in subsequent eps and you can see it in retrospect, but Buffy doesn't see it coming, has no REASON to see it coming, and she's totally and legitimately spun.
Still one of my favorites.
4x04 Fear Itself
"I worked long and hard to get this pompous." I LOVE YOU, RILEY FINN.
Seriously, I love Riley so much. I realize that this is not a widely shared position, but there it is. I don't even care that the show is beating me about the head and shoulders in a completely unsubtle attempt to make me like Riley; it TOTALLY WORKS. I am SOLD.
4x05 Beer Bad
Okay, this ep's pretty terrible... but those first few minutes, where Buffy imagines Parker apologizing to her with flowers and ice cream? HILARIOUS. And Buffy running into Riley at the bar? So cute! So sweet! Again, I can see the writers setting me up to like Riley and IT WORKS EVERY TIME. He is adorable. He is a total doofus. Also, watching Buffy conk Parker on the head at the end? NEVER NOT FUNNY. So yeah, five minutes of AWESOME separated by 38 minutes of "oh god, make it stop," but those five minutes? COMEDY GOLD, PEOPLE.
4x06 Wild At Heart
Okay, I love my show, but every now and then it just gets things WRONG. Like, why no office for Walsh or Riley? College classrooms are not offices, people! I can and do handwave this by reminding myself that BtVS is fundamentally about, to steal a phrase from Hawthorne, the truths of the human heart; it consistently and unabashedly prioritizes emotional truth over literal truth, which is one of the reasons I love the show. But every now and then I find myself rolling my eyes when the writers fail to address something so basic as the fact that professors and TAs have offices.
Back to the ep itself: Oh, Willow. The attempt to dress like Veruca is a particularly sharp bit of understated continuity, I think: Willow in her leather pants and dark shirt - so alarmingly like vamp!Willow, and also looking ahead to S6, when she'll actually be able to pull off a version of this look even before she goes evil.
I'd completely forgotten about Riley saving Willow by pulling her out of the street as a car bears down on her! The show is relentless about making Riley a good guy, and I DON'T CARE - it works, he's there, he's right: "Whatever it is, it's not worth hurting yourself over."
And, okay, once more with feeling; oh, Willow.
4x07 The Initiative
Buffy calling out Prof Walsh ("for someone who teaches human behavior, you might try showing some") is SO AWESOME. As is the fact that Riley thinks it's awesome too - he is literally awed by her. As well he should be!
Riley punching Parker? Also made of win. And Riley's total disbelief afterwards! And his little moment of realization that he likes Buffy! (Though, okay, the fact that they never deal with the fact that he's Buffy's TA? Kinda creepy. Also, Riley going to Buffy's dorm room? Kinda squicks me in the abstract, even though there's nothing creepy about it in the ep itself.) And Forrest, "You're kind of like a moron"? HILARIOUS. "I'm gonna go see a girl" - that's so Riley, so blessedly straightforward. He uses the word "courted"! He asks Willow if Buffy talks about him! And he makes the guys at the party skip the Dingos song when it upsets Willow! ::loves::
And let us not forget the Harmony-Xander slapfight - complete with action music and slo-mo! ::dies::
More priceless moments: Buffy shooing Riley away because she's trying to hunt Spike, and Riley responding "Are you drunk?" The entire Spike/Willow conversation, especially "Don't patronize me!"
And oh, show - not real consistent about how much damage Spike can do to a human before the chip stops him - he's punching commandos here. ::handwaves::
4x08 Pangs
"It's a ritual sacrifice. With pie." NEVER NOT FUNNY.
"I'm powerful, and I'm beautiful, and I don't need you to complete me. And you're mean!" Still one of my favorite lines ever. Oh Harmony.
"So this is Angel. He's large and glowery, isn't he." ::dies:: I love you, Anya.
4x09 Something Blue
Riley hanging the Lesbian Alliance banner! This is adorable on so many levels! It's great setup for what happens with Willow, but it's also a nice character bit for Riley: he's helpful and friendly to everybody, and he makes a joke about being a lesbian - he's just totally comfortable with himself. And bless him, he's so sweet to Willow when she's hurting - inviting her to the picnic, offering apples, even though he and Buffy are finally starting to get somewhere.
I want to weep for drunk!Willow and smack her at the same time. "We have to go through the pain," Buffy says, so patiently, and Willow responds "Isn't there some way I can make it go away? Just 'cause I say so?" No, honey. That way lies badness. Every single time. And, okay, for all that I wish S6 had handled its iteration of this aspect of Willow's character with more finesse, I love that this is one of those things that Willow doesn't learn - we all have mistakes that we just keep making, and this is Willow's.
"How? What? How?" "Three excellent questions." Xander being a dork and Giles being sarcastic FTW!
In conclusion: STILL MY SHOW.