I Want to Discuss Buffy the Vampire Slayer Episodes

I enjoyed the dark sixth season as well, it might be my favourite one, right after the fifth. However, I find the first two seasons unwatchable now, they're just so dated.

Joss Whedon got cancelled to all hell. I never could decide if he deserved it or not.

R2 Well, he def deserved the karma but I'm not a fan of cancellation.

I really disliked Dawn so there was no crying buckets for me. I was hoping Giles would have slit her throat and dumped her into that hole. Glory is probably my favorite big bad tho. I do think the show peaked in this season.

The spin-off series Angel serves a a great complement if you’re doing a full Buffy re-watch. Plenty of crossover with Faith’s road to redemption as well as coordinated flashbacks for backstories to Angel, Darla, Spike, and Drusilla.

Once More With Feeling remains a brilliant piece of television

[Quote] I really disliked Dawn so there was no crying buckets for me.

Dawn and Connor sucked ass. And it's worse because they weren't as annoying in the final season of Buffy/Angel. But in Buffy's case they had to undo Dawn's progress by having her kick Buffy out of her own house. That was not a good episode.

I disliked Dawn so much, I got lots of pleasure out of seeing the actress turn into a fat has-been over the years.

Buffy Summers: Dawn, listen to me. Listen... I love you. I will *always* love you. But this is the work that I have to do... Tell Giles that... tell Giles I figured it out, and, and I'm okay... And give my love to my friends. You have to take care of them now. You have to take care of each other. You have to be strong. Dawn, the hardest thing in this world... is to live in it... Be brave. Live. For me.

Ugh the Angel stans remind me of the DS9 stans, always pushing an inferior product.

Five was a natural ending. Six and Seven simply played with puzzles created by all of the rules they created.

Seven was truly the pits.

Angel also had a shitty final season, as well.

Season Six is my favorite in hindsight, but watching it when it was originally aired was somewhat challenging. It's rarely mentioned in these discussions, but I think that the darkness of the season went down harder because it aired right after 9/11. People were already heartbroken and probably not in the mood to watch Buffy suffer for an hour each week.

Some favorite individual episodes (excluding the universally beloved ones like Hush, The Body, Once More With Feeling, etc.) are Band Candy (hilarious), Family (initiating Tara into the Scoobies), Lie to Me (with the foolish vampire groupies), and Storyteller (Andrew finally maturing enough to face the consequences of his fuckery).

My season rank from best to worst: 6-5-3-2-4-1-7.

R12, we are kindred spirits. I have always loved season six. Everyone is spiraling and discovering that adulthood and all its accompanying weight can be unbearable. Money woes, addiction, and death replace the teen crushes of the first three years (I loved them as well, though I’d rank 2 higher than you for the Angel/Angelus terror and drama). I get why people hate the sixth season; they’re the same reasons that I love it.

[Quote] Angel also had a shitty final season, as well.

I wish Angel could have got a 6th season. But Joss had to fuck that up. I like the finale, poor Lorne would probably disagree though.

[Quote] Some favorite individual episodes (excluding the universally beloved ones like Hush, The Body, Once More With Feeling, etc.) are Band Candy (hilarious), Family (initiating Tara into the Scoobies), Lie to Me (with the foolish vampire groupies), and Storyteller (Andrew finally maturing enough to face the consequences of his fuckery).

Band Candy is a classic thanks to Schneider. But yes Lie To Me is one of my favourite episodes. And i know season one is cheesy as hell but i still love it.

The college season is the absolute worst. The best episode is the Spike-centric episode where they are playing pool and he tells her about his past slayer kills and then goes over to comfort her on the back porch.

I love season 2 as well, R13. The first year that Buffy was syndicated to local stations, I got the biggest kick out of the new viewers coming to the Usenet group to talk about the show and then watching their heads explode once they got to Becoming. My rankings for season 2 and 3 are pretty much interchangeable, but I give season 3 an edge because that's the year the production quality went up with I assume a higher budget.

Yes, seasons one and two both look low-budget, and on a contemporary television, they look really dark and grainy. I was relieved to get to season three just for higher production values.

And to meet Mayor Wilkins and Faith.

R6 THAT part of the season really did me in. The idea that Buffy would get kicked out of her OWN HOUSE simply because she was preparing those ungrateful bitches for the end of the world cemented--for me--that S5 or S6 should've been the end. It was a struggle to get through.

R10 AGREED. S5 would've been a fine ending for Buffy. I wish Eliza wasn't so paranoid about getting typecast (which she did anyway!!) and agreed to come back and they could've built a show around Faith replacing Buffy. I mean...SMG CLEARLY wanted out after S2--according to Hannigan.

R11 I cannot stress how much I disagree. The final season of Angel was SO GOOD. It BLEW Buffy's out of the fucking water. It was rushed but that final episode was EVERYTHING.

Man, J. August Richards is gay. He did IT for me. Still does.

I got zero gay vibes from JAR, was so shocked when he came out. I also loved the last season of Angel, it looked so polished and the Illyria stuff gave it some of that cosmic feel we're currently used to getting from big-budget comic movies.

[quote]Joss Whedon got cancelled to all hell.

For now. When the pendulum swings back, he will be welcomed back with open arms.

Cancel Culture is like the Red Scare witch hunts of the late '40s and most of '50s. The difference is, the far-right led the Red Scare charge, while the far-left is leading Cancel Culture.

But Cancel Culture will eventually run its course, too. Definitely by decade's end. Some popular people now may even be pariahs then.

The final season of Angel was fantastic, especially the back half, which is miraculous, considering how hard they had to steer to get out of the wreckage left by season four, which had some great episodes, but as a continuous story was a disaster.

R18 i don't know why they had to make most of the potentials so unlikeable. Although i'm probably the only one who didn't hate Kennedy with Willow. And there was supposed to be a Faith spin-off with Spike. But Eliza chose to do Tru Calling instead.

I'm glad that we at least got to see Faith's growth on Angel. She was great during season 4.

Was it season 6 when Spike fucked Buffy on Balcony at the dance club while they looked down at all of the Scooby Gang? I loved that scene.

Yeah, that was a good scene despite my dislike for S6. Actually, the whole idea that Buffy was "Pulled from heaven" was brilliant. I mean..who wouldn't assume that she was in a hell dimension?

Hmm...time for some re-evaluation.

The scene where Buffy tells Spike what heaven is like is so good.

That whole season nails what depression looks and feels like.

I loved Buffy contrasting our “bright, hard” reality with the heaven reality she was pulled from. Still gives me chills.

One of the best scenes in the series.

Also, recall when she was first resurrected and stumbling around a Sunnydale besieged by a vampire/monster biker gang, she witnessed herself as the Buffybot being ripped in half by motorcycles. She thought she had landed in hell.

And then later, the truth about heaven comes out in Once More With Feeling, in song. It’s another great moment.

My favorite thing about this series is it being about women empowerment and yet if you think about each season finale, it was essentially Xander who does the thing, or most of the heavy lifting, to save the world!

^ Xander’s crayons speech with Dark Willow in the season 6 finale is one my least favorite scenes in the series.

They stunted the Zander character too long and then had to jump through hoops to give him a life.

Oh, man. Poor Nicky. I wonder how the cast feels about him. That Dr. Phil appearance. I mean...that's probably a lower point for an actor than getting arrested for wrecking a hotel room.

I wanted to get into it but I could not stand the sound of Willow's voice. "Angel" was awesome.

R32? How do they feel about him? I think they made that clear in the EW Reunion photoshoot/interview when none of them would be in the same room as him?

I saw most of the cast at a Comic-Con. Nicholas B was there with his twin, who did all the photos with him, including the cast photos. In retrospect, I wonder if he was there just to keep his brother in line.

[Quote] They stunted the Zander character too long and then had to jump through hoops to give him a life.

Well that was because of the issues Nicholas was dealing with off-screen. But the sarcastic sidekick doesn't usually get alot of growth on these types of shows.

[quote]How do they feel about him? I think they made that clear in the EW Reunion photoshoot/interview when none of them would be in the same room as him?

It was Boreanaz who made sure he was 86ed from the group photo.

Wow that’s a bit surprising r37. Boreanaz was very compassionate towards the actor who played Doyle, on his show Angel, who later died of drug addiction.

It's funny how David didn't get any backlash when all of the stuff came out about Joss.

Source, R37.

The rest of the cast clearly has issues with Brendan.

R37 Yup. I was gonna post that. I saw a photo of Brendan and Aly post-reunion. Nicky believes that it was Boreanaz.

R37 Source? This ain't the New York Times. GTFOH

That's what I thought, R41.

So basically, no one has actually said it anywhere, thanks.

If the only source of it is Nicholas Brendon, then you'd have to take it with a grain of salt.

I find it interesting that Brendon went out of his way to bitch about the Angel series. He questioned why Angel even got his own show saying it was weird because Angel was the most boring character and it didn't make sense for him to get his own show...

Apparently he had no ability to reflect on the Xander character being even more boring than Angel.

I only started watching Angel after Spike came along.

I loved the puppet episode, “You’re a wee little puppet man”. Hysterical.

Seasons two and most of three of Angel are fantastic. Did you ever go back and watch from the beginning?

[Quote] I find it interesting that Brendon went out of his way to bitch about the Angel series. He questioned why Angel even got his own show saying it was weird because Angel was the most boring character and it didn't make sense for him to get his own show...

Did he? Because i thought Nicholas wanted to join Angel and Joss said no. Watching Xander and Angel bicker was always fun buy i can't see him fitting in with the rest of the gang.

No, actually, R45, I never did.

I never cared for Angel, the vampire, honestly. Didn’t like the actor for whatever reason.

Although, I did totally cry during that prom episode when they gave Buffy her “Class Protector” umbrella. Plus is was a nice moment when she danced with Angel.

R46, maybe that's why he's actually mad, because he didn't get to join that show. But he did say all that stuff fairly recently.

Brendon's recollections seem a bit suspicious to me. He's been on hundreds of miles of bad road, mentally, since the show wrapped. He was probably heavily using while it was still on.

R48 it doesn't really make sense to break up the trio. Or explain Xander would want to work with Angel and Cordelia.

R51, none of it makes sense. I think the only thing that is clear is that you really can't trust Brendon's accounts of anything.

I guess the question though is when did Brendon want to join Angel? Maybe he was hoping he would get put on Angel after Buffy ended.

David Greenwalt had to fight Joss to get Cordelia on Angel. Joss conceived it as just Angel and Whistler (demon) fighting crime in LA but Greenwalt successfully argues Angel was too dark and brooding/serious on his own and Cordy would "lighten" him up a bit. It also made sense she would leave Sunnydale cause her parents went broke and not only could she not afford college with the group but she would want a fresh start in a new city.