Sarah's Sober Second Thought Series: The Old College Try

[Primetimer]

Veruca. Cave Buffy. That's the worst of it, but the rest of Season 4 so far isn't a whole lot better as the Buffy Rewatch heads to UC Sunnydale.

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[Sandman]

"... and other times it doesn't ring true (a tenured professor as well known as Walsh isn't going to bother humiliating a freshman in the very first lecture)."

Boy, howdy! That just rang all sorts of false for me. We are supposed to dislike Professor Walsh, fine; but it felt like one of those times the writers gave the audience no credit at all. Talk about inexplicable. I feel you on the clumsiness of the Veruca character, in both design and execution, and on how Hannigan and Green handle the breakup scene -- really wrenching work from both of them. Sombrero Giles is making me grin from ear to ear. (Spike not so much. Ech.)

[Chaos Theory]

I loved Beer Bad

[angelwoody]

Giles in a sombrero is always going to make me smile.  :-)  I HATED the Veruca character and hated that Oz left so abruptly.

[Loandbehold]

Most of the college professors came off poorly during the college year and a half.

 

I couldn't stand Kathy and resented being subjected to Cher over and over and over.

 

I don't know how you can talk about the beginning of Season 4 and not even mention Sunday. I thought she was one of the better and funnier one-off villains.

 

Finally, I also love Beer Bad. Yes, it was a PSA, but it was a really subversive one. Beer isn't bad. It's foamy. Now, that's a life lesson. As is Xander telling Giles not to make Cave!Slayer angry and Willow's wonderful smackdown of Parker. Now, to see an awful one joke episode, just wait until Superstar. An episode that, among other things, glorifies date rape. But, I'll hold off on that rant until Sarah gets to it.

[Spartan Girl]

I really hated how they ended Oz and Willow with the character assassination of Oz.  Whatever the circumstances, him cheating on Willow was just so unlike him.  And his only solution is to leave until he figures out how to handle the wolf.  IMHO, he had no right to expect Willow to wait for him after he cheated on her, then left and never bothered to contact her until he showed up months later.

[Sarah D. Bunting]

I don't care for Sunday, myself. One of a bunch of things the show seemed to think was much cleverer than I did.

[ladyrott]

Oh, I loved Sunday and her gang!

[ferretrick]

I've heard people make excuses for Season 4 many times by saying everything got derailed when Lindsay Crouse unexpectedly quit and they had to revamp a lot of the season arc on short notice, which is how Adam ended up playing a much bigger part than was intended. I've never bought it. I think the early episodes of Season 4 show that they were in trouble from the very beginning; that the show, as so many high school shows do, was failing with the transition to the college years.

[ferretrick]

Also, let's not talk one idea episodes until we get to Restless. HATE!

[stagmania]

"So if you don't buy that she's at sea generally, and I don't, you don't buy that she'd fixate on a B-minus like Parker "Gayoda" Abrams. "

I think the idea was supposed to be that she was at sea because of Angel leaving. Thus, Parker. Once Angel left she became very obsessed with the idea of being a "normal" girl with a "normal" relationship, perhaps so she would feel like Angel leaving had a purpose. This is why she was so quick to jump into something with the first dude who smarmed at her.

[Sarah D. Bunting]

It's not the first time she's fixated on the "normal"-guy idea, though (viz. Scott Hope). That worked even if (possibly because) Scott was kind of a drip; Parker worked for me back then because it manifested a bad pattern for her of sleeping with guys once and then it all going awry, but now, it just seems like treading water...and after everything she went through with Angel, her response to Parker doesn't quite track for me.

[helent]

A question for the American viewers: I recently read somewhere that, in the US, the name Veruca just a quirky name from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Is that true? Because is British (and Australian) English, a veruca is a type of wart. So that adds something extra to the introduction of a character called Veruca, which I always assumed was deliberate, but may not have been.

[Fat Elvis 007]

YES to the Anya analysis. The "I'm Anya and I don't know how to talk to people" act is so abrupt and retconny if you watch S3 and 4 in such quick succession. It doesn't even make sense when you consider the type of demon she was--her entire job was manipulating women, which she showed she could still do after turning human by manipulating Willow in "Dopplegangland." You have to be socially adept and good with language to do that. I can buy that she'd be awkward and not know what to say around men, especially since she has all these new feelings, but she shouldn't sound like an alien who has been isolated from humans for thousands of years.

The bigger problem is her lack of remorse, especially paired with Xander's anti-Angel fervor. At least that dork felt bad about the people he murdered. I understand the writers wanted Anya to be comic relief, but that excuse assumes there's no comedic value in exploring a person adjusting to feeling guilt for the first time, and that's a false assumption.

[Sandman]

A question for the American viewers: I recently read somewhere that, in the US, the name Veruca just a quirky name from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Is that true? Because is British (and Australian) English, a veruca is a type of wart. So that adds something extra to the introduction of a character called Veruca, which I always assumed was deliberate, but may not have been.

 

I would guess that the choice of the character's name (by Mutant Enemy, I mean) was not a deliberate invocation of its original meaning; but I am sure that Roald Dahl's use of it was. If I were a betting man, I'd say that Charlie and Chocolate Factory was the first instance of "Veruca" used as a proper name -- although I haven't checked -- but most of Dahl's North American readers probably didn't realize that he was giving the character a name as awful as she deserved. 

[gingerchick]

I am the same age as Buffy, so season 4 first aired when I was starting college as a freshman, and it has always been one of my favorite seasons. Although some of the individual episodes are weak, I felt that on the whole they did a good job creating the feeling of being slightly overwhelmed by the whole college experience. But I think that's what makes "Buffy" such a great show, different people can get different things out of it.

[VCRTracking]

The problem for me is that I didn't see the point of Buffy going to college in the first place. College is where you find out what you want to do with the rest of your life and Buffy's destiny is to be the Slayer. 

Edited August 28, 2014 by VCRTracking

[stagmania]

The problem for me is that I didn't see the point of Buffy going to college in the first place. College is where you find out what you want to do with the rest of your life and Buffy's destiny is to be the Slayer. 

 

You bring up an interesting point about how the show sometimes framed the Slayer gig: like it was something Buffy could do on the side. This whole idea that she should still pursue all the trappings of a normal life-education, career, having a family someday. I always thought that was so odd; obviously those things were not really attainable for her within the framework of being The Chosen One. This really came to a head in Season 6, when she came back to life and had a mountain of debt dumped on her with the expectation that she needed to get a job and deal with it herself. It always made me wonder: how is the Council not paying her bills or giving her a salary? What is even the point of that institution if not to facilitate things so that the Slayer could perform her duties unimpeded by mundane concerns?

[manbearpig]

One of my favourite things about the show was the struggle between Buffy the girl and Buffy the vampire slayer, which is partially why I love the episode School Hard. Slaying was her destiny and it gave her life meaning, but it wasn't necessarily the path she would have chosen for herself. It made sense to me that she would try to live as normal a life as she possibly could even though that wasn't something she could realistically achieve while living on a hellmouth.

[stagmania]

Oh, I completely agree, and understand why Buffy would want to try to live a normal life. What I don't get is why the other characters, and apparently the people who wrote the show, also thought this was a realistic expectation.

[Sandman]

Did the show really present Buffy's desire for a relatively normal life as something achievable? I'm not sure. "Doublemeat Palace" (sort of randomly) I would count as an episode against that theory. I think a lot of what happens in Season Six and after is actually about how destructive the tension becomes between the normal girl Buffy wants so much to be and the Slayer she must be regardless. In my more charitable moments I think the show wants to be about the gulf between a young woman's aspirations and society's expectations of her. But then I think, Nah... because Noxon.

[Dianthus]

Add me to the list of those who love 'Beer Bad.' It's low-brow to be sure, but immensely satisfying. I've always thought of Parker as Angel-light. Seeing Buffy bonk him over the head with a stick - priceless.

Giles in a sombrero & Giles with a chainsaw - love!

Spike is my guy.

I love 'Beer Bad.' Watching Buffy clobber Parker (Angel - lite) over the head with a stick is deeply cathartic.

I didn't care for Anya at first either, but she grew on me.

There's definitely a power struggle going on between 'normal' Buffy and Slayer Buffy, especially in s6.

[Chaos Theory]

Was Buffy leading a normal life strictly realistic? Probably not but Giles and co didn't wan't her to be like Kendra either. Buffy was always straddling the middle ground. She was trapped by destiny but she wanted at least the appearance of a normal life.

[harrie]

The problem for me is that I didn't see the point of Buffy going to college in the first place. College is where you find out what you want to do with the rest of your life and Buffy's destiny is to be the Slayer. 

 

i think of it kind of like the athlete thing - a college/professional athlete isn't going to play forever, and the smart ones think ahead and have something lined up for when they retire, whether due to injury or age.  Is Buffy still going to be slaying at 40 or 50?   Do we assume that at some point. maybe in her 30s or something, she gets a little slower and is taken out?  

 

The writers have indicated more than once that Buffy isn't the typical slayer.   Kendra is horrified and/or fascinated by Buffy's lackadaisical attitude, desire for a social life, and the fact that she goes to high school, IIRC.  Numerous times in future seasons, it's underscored that Buffy is different, largely because she has a support system/friends  -- I think Spike mentions it when describing how he slayed the two slayers; I think Nathan Fillion's villainy priest guy  made note of it, but I'm fuzzy on that; and, in the S5 episode where Buffy has to justify herself and points out what each Scoob brings to the table, the Council appears baffled by the concept of a slayer with helpers.  If Buffy is the atypical slayer, why not go to college?  Just my take. 

 

Speaking purely personally, I went to college to party.  Still trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my life. 

[Writing Wrongs]

Why did Lindsay Crouse leave?

[satrunrose]

I don't know, Buffy's freshmen angst was one of the things that I really identified with in season 4. My university was a six block walk from my old high school. I took the same bus as I did in high school and lived at home, but I remember feeling all at sea for the first couple weeks. Like Buffy, I felt like everyone seemed so much more confident and knowledgable and sophisticated than I did and it was hard to find where I fit. (Where was I on 9-11 aka my 3rd day of college? Hiding out on the top floor of the Biology building. I didn't even know anything was wrong until about 5 hours later). 

 

Really, I wish the show had kept the college focus going into the later seasons, or at least have more discussions over Buffy dropping out. 

[taanja]

Something Blue? Anyone? To this day it remains one of my favorite episodes ever!

 

Spike in the bathtub! Buffy and Spike getting married. Blind Giles drinking through the ep and tripping over the couch. Xander: "what? who? what?"

The only problem I have with that ep was the ending where Buffy decides that dating the nice guy Riley was the way to go.