2.2 - Some Assembly Required

Students of Sunnydale are digging up parts of people for a Frankenstein project. Then they decide to go after the living as well.

Yeah...as for the A plot, this didn't really do much of anything for me. I'm pretty bored by "build a person" stories like Frankenstein, and I didn't find this particularly engaging at all.

The B story, on the other hand, was great. Giles and Jenny Calendar on a date. I just want it to work out for them, you know? They are both extremely likable, and you just can't help but root for them. I know. I'm a sissy. I've been told this before. I'm also a bit of a romantic (see my thoughts on episode 1.7) so this should surprise no one.

I rate this one a 5/10.

2.1 - When She Was Bad

Buffy's been gone all summer, but now she's back, and she's got a bad attitude. Plus, the Anointed is planning on resurrecting the Master.


This episode establishes a fairly dark tone for the second season, and has some really good teases for things to come later. There's a bit of "will they or won't they" with Willow and Xander, and Giles and Ms. Calendar are really starting to get close.

Most of the rest of the episode fails to really ignite my fire, though. The Anointed is trying to bring back the Master, and he has to be stopped. The most entertaining thing about the episode to me was the last line of dialog, delivered by the Anointed just as the credits hit. If there's one thing Buffy as a show does well (and let's face it, there are dozens), it really knows how to end an episode.

I give it 5/10

Season One: Looking Back

Honestly...season one of Buffy was not as good as I had remembered it being. I guess I had elevated it to mythical status in my mind based on my memories. To be fair, when I remember Buffy as a show, I don't think of it in terms of seasons, just story arcs. I remember what happened around a certain point in their life. There were certainly episodes that I remembered from this season, but there were also things that I'd forgotten.

I'd forgotten that Ms. Calendar made her first appearance in this season, as well as Harmony. I'd forgotten that we didn't know the truth about Angel until the 7th episode. I'd also forgotten that this first season is comprised of mostly monster of the week bad guys. It follows a formula that shows like Smallville, Supernatural, and the X-Files have throughout the years, giving us freaks of the week while occasionally slipping in mythology. Later, if memory serves, that mythology becomes more and more the key of the show, but it wasn't really cooking yet in season one.

Still, the hallmarks of a great show are all here. Most of our major players have appeared, and we've got the stage set for fantastic things to happen.

For a mid-season replacement show with a funny name, it had a lot of charm, and it started something wonderful. This is evidenced by the fact that I cannot wait to start season 2. As soon as I finish this post, I'm off to pop the DVDs in. A greater compliment would be hard to find.

1.12 - Prophecy Girl

A prophecy is revealed that Buffy will face the Master...and die.


Great finale to this first season. Jenny Calendar is back, Giles is ready to go risk his life for his slayer, and Cordelia has now seen so much that she's pretty much got no choice but to be included in the action.

As season finales go, there are two kinds of them. One kind gives you a cliff hanger and a whoa moment that makes you want to come back for more, and you can't stand the fact that there's a whole summer before new episodes air. The other type wraps things up nicely and your heroes walk off into the sunset. This second option is what we are presented with here. I wonder if the show didn't know if they'd be back or not?

Either way, it's very satisfying.

I give this episode a 7/10

1.11 Out of Mind, Out of Sight

There's an invisible person knocking off Sunnydale students.

I rather enjoyed this one. The idea of an invisible girl knocking off her enemies is par for the course, but I love the change that Cordelia starts to make in this episode. She's slowly becoming one of the Scooby Gang. I also love what happens at the end of the episode and where our invisible hitman ends up.

I give it a 6/10

1.10 - Nightmares

People's nightmares are coming true.

Hm...this one is alright, but it's no standout. There's a few things that are pretty cool and pretty creepy here, like Xander's killer clown, but by and large, this is kind of monster of the week again. Not too much to set it out.

I give it a 6/10

1.9 - The Puppet Show

There's a living ventriloquist dummy loose at the high school.

Oh yeah! Now we're talking. Killer ventriloquist dummy, that's what I wanted! I love stuff like this. There's not too much creepier than a doll that people make talk. While this concept was handled better (and scarier) in the movie Dead Silence, for a tv show a decade ago, this is not bad at all.
It's got some great suspenseful scenes, and we are introduced to the new Principal, Armin Shimerman (the guy who played Quark the Ferengi on Star Trek) as Principal Snyder.

My favorite part of this is the end credits where Buffy, Willow and Xander act out a play about Oedipus for the talent show. It's hilarious.

I give it a 7/10

1.8 - I Robot...You Jane

Willow unleashes a demon into the internet.

Yeah....this one is okay, but it's not that great. The idea is kind of cool, but it just ends up playing like a monster of the week show, which it pretty much is. Still, when I say things like this, I do love it still. I'd watch Anthony Steward Head read the phone book.

However, I have to applaud this episode for introducing us to the VERY lovely computer science teacher Jenny Calendar. Hello nurse! Thank goodness she's not going anywhere for a while.

I give it a 6/10

1.7 - Angel

Buffy finds out who and what Angel really is.


Oh, man! What a fantastic episode! I'll admit it, I turn into very girly puddles of angst over this whole thing. It's just so poetic and beautiful, yet tragic at the same time. The vampire slayer in love with the one thing she can't be with: a vampire. Seems almost cheesy now, but it's not.

Here there be spoilers.

There's so much going on in this episode, this is really the first one of this first season that blew me away and made me think "oh, wow, this show is great." First off, we find out who Angel really is. He's a vampire who is roughly 240 years old of Irish descent. Next we find out why he's helping her. He killed a gypsy girl about 80 years ago and the tribe restored his soul. He had guilt over every single murder he'd ever committed and vowed never to drink the blood of a human again. He's living on bottled blood.
Then, on top of this, we find out that Darla was the vampire who made him, and the legacy of terror that they created is hinted at as they speak about laying waste to Budapest.

Darla gets dusted in this episode, but thank heavens that they bring her back. She's just a fantastic character, and when you add this amount of depth to a show like this, you get something deeper, something you can sit there and think about for a long, long time. It's cool to have a slayer, but when you've got a character that you know is over 200 and who has a vast and checkered history just waiting to be explored, then you know you've added a great element to the show.

This episode really took a mediocre series with potential and launched it into fantastic TV. This show is still not what it will become, but it's pretty freaking great.

I'm going to start rating these.

9/10

1.6 - The Pack

Xander and some guys get possessed by a hyena. Xander gets to act evil.


Man, this first season is rough. It's very "freak of the week" in it's presentation. This episode is fine if you put along side anything else from that time, but when you hold it up to a modern show or to Buffy in the next season or later, it's just not very good.

One notable thing did happen though.

Spoiler.

The principle gets eaten by the possessed kids. It's not something you expect to see happen, but they're establishing early on that bad things happen in this town and no one is safe.

I give it a 6/10. I would have given it a 5, but I am adding a point for what they did to the principal.

1.5 - Never Kill a Boy on the First Date

Buffy tries to balance a normal date with preventing the Annointed from rearing his head.


There's not too much to say here. There's some good funny dialog, love the Willow, and think that it's pretty cool how we find out who the Annointed is, which I don't think I should spoil. It's unexpected, though.

I give it a 5/10

1.4 - Teacher's Pet

Xander has a crush on a new substitute teacher who is not what she appears to be.


The dynamic in this episode feels really strong. Xander and Willow really feel like they've been friends since they were 5.

One thing I've forgotten to mention that I missed in the later episodes is the library. In these first three seasons, the library was the hub of all the research and monster discussion. There's something cool about it in a very bookish, Giles-ish way. I loved the library, and I missed it when they moved on. It's REALLY good to be spending a lot of time back in it again. Need a book on how to slay a Praying Mantis Woman? It's over there, in the P's.

I rate this episode 6/10

1.3 - The Witch

Buffy tries out for cheerleading with Amy, but when other cheerleaders start getting hurt, Buffy must get to the bottom of what's going on.

It's all starting to click into place. Xander's funny bits come naturally in this episode, and I already feel the kinship between Buffy, Xander, and Willow. It's like they'd known each other for a few months already, even though this is only episode 3. The Whedon dialog is really flowing too.


Here we are introduced to Amy, who I had not realized came into the show so early.

Not too much to say about this one, other than it starts of as a baddie of the week episode and manages to throw a serious plot twist at me that I didn't remember and was surprised by all over again.

I've said it several times before, but I feel it should be said again. While these early episodes aren't representative of the show that it would become, it's still great and the writing is really stand out on so many episodes. This is just another example of that.

6/10

1.1 and 1.2 Welcome to the Hellmouth/The Harvest

Buffy moves to Sunnydale, meets her supporting cast (Xander, Willow, Cordelia, Angel, and Giles) and learns about the Hellmouth and the Master.

Man, I was shocked at how dated these first two episodes felt. The last time I saw them, they felt fresh and trendy, while now they feel like a time capsule of my teen years. It's weird...Buffy is a huge part of geek pop culture, even now, with many a nerd quoting Whedon's witty dialog or saying something like "don't go all Willow on me." Eh, they probably don't say that, but they do in my head.

Anyway, as of this writing, the pilot episode two parter is 11 and a half years old. It's really scary how time flies.

One thing that I noticed as the episodes went on was that in these two opening chapters, the actors CLEARLY do not have the ear for the Joss Whedon snarky dialog. Whedon's chatter doesn't exactly flow off the tongue unless you know how to say it, and they didn't get it here. Also, David Boreanez is terrible! He's wooden and amateurish. No worries, though, in a few years, he'd be strong enough to headline his own show.

What I hadn't realized from my previous viewings was how far back many of the characters that I'd grown to love were in this first two parter:

Darla is here, played by Julie Benz, but she's a throwaway at this point. Later....later she will shine and be a lynch pin of the Buffyverse, but here she's really a minor supporting character.


Harmony, played by Mercedes Mcnab, appears in one of these two episodes as well. Again, she's going to be a major player down the road.

It's really interesting to me to see just how many elements of the show are here, but they aren't to the level that they will become. The pieces of the puzzle are almost all here, but it's just not assembled yet.

The big standout to me is the ever watchable Anthony Head as Giles, one of my all time favorite characters. He's completely engaging and you just know somewhere deep inside his British bumbling is a warrior.

It's good to go back and revisit this show. It's been a long time, and it's brought back a lot of memories about a lot of things. Fashion, music, and trends.

I'm trying not to be impatient to get to the great stuff that I know will come, and it's really hard. I need to just enjoy the foundation being laid here so I can take the trip all over again.

I give this 2 parter 5/10

So Begins the Journey

9/27/08

I started watching Buffy with the very first episode of the very first season, way back when I was a senior in high school, 1997.

Being in high school at the time, the show really had an impact on me and I related to it immensely. As the seven years unfolded, the characters of this show as well as it's spin off, Angel, became like family. And like family, there were losses and tragedies. It was the first time I'd ever been affected this way by a TV show. Really caring about the people I was watching like they weren't just characters, but were real people, with all the faults and flaws of humanity itself.

So I watched for years, and when the show was over, I mourned it. I bought the DVDs years ago, and I watched those too, but it's been a long time since I've thought of digging my DVD sets out and giving them a repeat viewing. Recently, I've been craving the show, not just because I want to relive the tragedies and the laughs, but because I want to go back to the time in my life when this show was extremely important. When these characters were my friends, and I was living much of what the characters were living. High school, college, relationships...my life echoed the events of the show.

So my friend said since I was going to watch them again, I should blog about my thoughts on the episodes. Well, here it is. For any who choose to follow my humble opinions, I thank you. It's going to be a heck of a ride.