Halting Hex

Jay has just gotten here, and as always, he maintains his delightfully over-emphatic devotion to his favorites. Which are not always my favorites: I don't even 'ship BAngel, truly, whereas Jay is so heartbroken by Angel's turn that he winces when he even mentions it, much less when Angel is on-screen. But we do agree on Willow, so I enjoyed this: Amen, Jay. To not appreciate the Willow is to fail at life. ************************ You have to feel for Oz getting screwed so badly; last week he went from "hi, the supernatural exists" to "we need to kill Angel; let's steal weapons from the Army, which could get you at least a decade in Federal prison!*" in just two days, and now he's a freaking werewolf and all Giles can think to say is "lock yourself up, this is your life now, kid." *-(remember, everyone else is underage; Oz is looking at full weight, though.) I grant you that Giles is bummed about the whole "Jenny lied to me the whole time; for all I know, she doesn't even like me!" deal, and is quite possibly knocking back a few shots on the sly, as theorized above, but still. It's a pity he isn't talking to Jenny, otherwise she might tell him about this useful thing they've just launched called "Google", which is apparently even better at searching those "fabulous web pages" than AskJeeves, which has been around since 1995. If they tried it, they might notice a whole book's worth of ideas on how to control/end lycanthropy, rather than "chain yourself up, see you Tuesday!" as Giles basically defaults to here. But still; major fail, G-Man. You haven't effed up this badly since you blithely told Kendra "No, no, [Angel's] good now" and nothing more. ************ That said, the ending is cute, but I don't know if (preferences aside) I should be getting behind Oz/Willow as a couple here: It's literally been a week and one movie date since both of them knew Willow was mostly trying to make Xander jealous; should we really be heading into "newly romantic" territory so fast. Much as Willow has a rough history Cordelia, would she be all "skanky ho" if she wasn't rather jealous about what she just saw in the stacks last episode? I mean this cut in the teaser makes it as explicit as you can get: Xander and Willow are territorial and jealous and more interested in each other than they are in their own separate "love interests". It's pretty plain that there's a parallel there. (It would be even plainer if the "Xander hears about Willow inviting Oz to the party and is instantly jealous" scene hadn't been cut from Surprise, but even without it, you can see what's going on.) So yes, Oz and Willow go through a bonding experience here and end up much closer. But Buffy and Xander go through similar bonding at the funeral home.and we're left wondering if we should rooting for them, or if this is too fast for Buffy, considering that Angel and her just broke up. Therefore, shouldn't we also be wondering if this too fast for Willow, given that she just found out about X/C in pretty much the worst way possible? Still, it was a sweet finish: Yeah, it's only been five episodes since that, too. Don't want that to become a habit, I wouldn't think.

Excuse me! That's Future Academy Award™ Nominee Drew Goddard, Hex! Put a little respect on the name, yo! (Yeah, still not impressed. I get that The Martian was one of those sprawling novels that's a real pain to adapt, but Drew only got like 50% of the way there. Too many of the pieces [like dealing with the Chinese space program] only show up when it's convenient, too many of the characters aren't well developed enough, mostly because Drew wanted to the film with the big boom that leaves Matt Damon [25 years into his career and I still have to pause to be sure it isn't Mark Wahlberg…not Damon/Wahlberg's fault, but still…] and didn't do enough exposition in Act 1. I get that adaptations are a real pain, but still. L.A. Confidential puts all its pieces in place before the Nite Owl Cafe massacre, and that book required a lot more hard choices to trim it to movie-size. And can you imagine if Apollo 13 had hit us with "Houston, we have a problem" five minutes in? Sorry, Drew.)

Cordelia's line comparing saying that Xander wouldn't suffer from making the relationship public is actually "What do you have to be ashamed of? I, on the other hand, have everything to be ashamed of!" Not far different from what I misremembered. but still. Accuracy is a good thing. (Likewise, wrt to the Judge, what Giles actually says is "a creature of pure evil can survive the process, but no one else ever has." Again, pretty much the same, but I might as well clean it up, too.)

Looking over it, I do see that Angel spends an awful large amount of time in alleys, to wit: • Darla bites him in an alley • Whistler finds him in an alley, and sends him off to fall for 14/15 year-old Buffy • A year after that, he first meets Buffy in an alley • And a year after that, he loses his soul in an alley. Apparently the moral here is that if you want to live a simple and uncomplicated life, keep to the Main Streets.

You know, that's a nice forward roll the guy in the alley does when Buffy kicks him in the back. Most people would just fall to their hands and knees, rather than rolling through and landing face up. I doubt he's actually been practicing (how would one do that, anyhow?) but it's nice to know he's spry, at least.

Ah yes, puts me in mind of one of my "Lines You'll Never Hear on BtVS" creations. Working from memory, as I'm too lazy to look it up: Hey, at least I'm consistent, right?

Checking some of Tyler Alexander's old vids, and not only does he go on a bit about (as he tends to) about parenting styles and how Giles is a bit of a surrogate for Hank (but not a true parent, since Hank wouldn't be risking the "nightmare" Giles thinks Buffy's death is to him), but he also notes that this is a strong episode for Xander. Not only he the first to "face his fear", Tyler notes that Xander v. Clown is necessary in the story structure to show us that the solution is for Billy to face his fear, and that Xander's "I get it" is to remind the audience of that, not as a "bone to Xander" that sometimes gets interpreted as "everybody else already figured it out, dummy" moment that I've seen anti-Xander comments claim. Tyler also gives Xander (and Giles) marks for moving to block the door way as the Coach advances towards Billy's hospital bed, so the Coach can't run away. I don't know if I've ever spotted that before. Lastly, Tyler notes that Vamp!Buffy fights differently than regular Buffy, preferring shoulder-tackles to Buffy's usual kick-boxing style. I guess using the feet limits the chance of getting bitten?

Also, not to be unkind, but Melanie was a bit…larger in her youth. (Not Riff Regan-esque, perhaps, but not in Aly's size 1 range, either.) Did the WB just tell Joss, "Hey, no more fatties, okay? Willow can be shy…just in a cute way!" I mean, the WB may not have had specific casting rules as such, but we know what kind of young actors they were looking at, er, for. (David Boreanaz got his part simply because various people at the audition were having A Reaction to his physicality, you'll recall. Joss swears David never even had to read for the part.)

And more… On the supporting cast front, there was this coda to the Xander/Cordelia scene that got cut: So, since they ARE going to try and "date" officially, there's this whole sequence in Act II. ( It was supposed to go between the scene with Jenny and her uncle and the scene in the Library where Buffy tells Giles about her mom breaking the plate and then Giles tells Willow and Xander they're having the party, anyway.) Well, that went poorly. Is Xander having any better luck? And here's The Lost Xillow Moment, putting the lie to Cordelia's "Well, of course you want to tell everybody! What do you have to lose? I, on the other hand, have everything to lose." misunderstanding from the earlier scene. Xander has more to lose, because he could lose Willow, and even she's "not the kind of girl that I think about her lips so much" (LIAR!!), losing Willow would mean more to Xander than losing Harmony and her assorted Birdbrains would mean to Cordelia…even if CC doesn't get that yet. Oh, but wait. Xander's day is about to get MUCH worse. Pretty damn significant here, given that Buffy nearly explicitly stated in Act I that Oz's entire purpose in the show is to make "Xander wake up and smell the hottie" wrt Willow. And here it is. But of course, the problem is…this is too damn long. We've got a major Buffy-centric plot to get back to, here. We can't be spending scene after scene after scene on the supporting cast's romances. (Could have put all of this in Bad Eggs, Marti. Or at least some of it. I'm just saying.) So this all has to go. Even though the resonances from these missing scenes echo throughout the rest of the episode: In the aired episode, the disdain that Alyson Hannigan puts on Cordelia's name here seems to just be about their history in general…but with the cut scene, it flows logically from Willow having just made a judgment about whether Cordy is worthy of being in the group. I mentioned this next bit a few posts ago, but I may as well include it with the others: Not just exposition to show how cool Oz is about this; this is Xander really not liking being around W/O being cute together. And we're not done yet! And this isn't just Xander being sad he can't tell people about Cordelia…it's that he can't tell Willow because he would lose her and now, it looks as if he's losing her anyhow. He wants to have his Official Girlfriend and his Best Bud AND to ignore why he doesn't want Willow to be dating…and it's all going to crap. And, finally… Now for a good bit of time, I thought this was pretty crappy of Xander to make this joke about his girlfriend (whom he hasn't told the others about) and I'm still offended on Cordelia's behalf, but now we can see that this is a bit performative; Willow told him earlier in the day that Cordelia will always be The Enemy as far as she's concerned, so Xander plays into that. Doesn't make the joke any better, but more understandable. All the little shades definitely make me appreciate the episode more. (Even if the "round-robin" bit still sucks, IMO.)

See, Marc's original haircut doesn't look so bad in the promo pictures, but they had to change it PDQ IRL. (Something Blue, IIRC.)

Anyways, it's been years, so let's get more cut-scene goodness up there! A little awkward (Jenny didn't know Buffy has prophecy dreams? We're only a few scenes from seeing that Willow and Xander do. Way to keep your girl in the loop, G-man) and the final cut from Giles talking about a birthday present to Dalton telling Drusilla "I have your present" may be overdoing things, but it's nice to get some depth on Giles (he doesn't want to refuse Buffy because she's already died and probably will again, within a decade) and that explicit "I'm not her father" would have sent tingles up the spines of the B/G 'shippers, it's true. More to come…

I hope they're still together (I hadn't checked), because that's such a great "meet-cute" story. ("Well, we were working on this TV series and he killed me." lol.) Way back in the Bye Bye Love days. I'm guessing Eliza was a bit bummed that she came back to guest, but Baith didn't get any scenes with her old pal, Amber.

Jay just watched the G/J fest that is Ted, and here is his excited recap at the start of Bad Eggs Ah, Jay. And now we have entered the "countdown to trainwreck" portion of the season. So it goes. (*sniff*)

If you can't do anything other than insult other posters, this might not be the place for you. Treating other posters with respect is not "a circle jerk", it's basic forum courtesy, as requested in the rules. I deferred to lemberg because Xander is his favorite character (mine is Willow), so I was interested in what he had to say, rather that insert my opinion first. Also the "nice guy" trope is bullshit, and Xander is hardly a sexist, given that the only time he ever assumes that men can do something that women can't or argues for men getting special privileges is when he tries to open the mayonnaise jar at the end of Helpless, which is a) comedy b) said ironically "admit it, sometimes you need a big strong man" in the first place, given that Xander knows that under normal circumstances, Buffy is several times stronger than he is, and c) leads to Xander failing the task, and a laugh at his expense. Xander far more rolled his eyes at Cordelia's sexism (in her attitude towards feminists in I Only Have Eyes for You ) and Anya's sexist conceptions of men ("Yes, men like meat. Men eat of the beef and look at the bosoms. Men like to watch the sports movie. A thousand years of avenging our wrongs and that's all you've learned?") in Graduation Day Part 1 than he has ever displayed any sort of sexist attitudes. He's been rejected in love and had three failed romances, none of which came about because he inherently thought women were inferior. You may call him a jerk, but to claim he's sexist is as silly as saying he's racist for not liking vampires. (Which indeed people have. The world doesn't lack for simplistic opinions, alas. It could use a bit more in the way of manners, though.)

What, no Dushku-fest? This cannot stand! Eliza shows off her Albanian passport after taking dual citizenship in 2011. As well as her back tattoo of the Albanian double-eagle symbol. Earlier (2009), she attended an event by her stylists (the Byron and Tracey Salon)