AOQ Review 3-15: "Consequences"
Arbitrar Of Quality
threads.
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
(or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
this one?")
Writer: Marti Noxon
Director: Michael Gershman
Well, given the stuff that's come, I'd certainly hope that
there'd be some consequences. It's a good sign when we start with
Buffy dreaming about a dead Deputy Mayor. And he's found in real
life too, so we know that this is the necessary direct followup to
"Bad Girls." No keeping Dushku off-screen for three weeks this
time.
Amidst all the insanity regarding Faith, you know, killing a guy,
it's good to know that our heroes haven't also forgotten to ask
certain other questions, like what he was doing there in the first
place, and what City Hall might know. And they figure a few things
out, but also end up getting the attention of the Mayor and his vampire
ally. Depressed Wilkins is one of the funnier moments. It was a
little surprising for me to see how clearly the Mayor is the one in
charge here, since I'd still imagined Trick would march more to his
own beat. Angel watching from the shadows and piecing things together
is okay (maybe he should go into investigative work or something), but
I don't think we really needed the repeated clip from BG.
Meanwhile the growing distance between B and Willow as established in
the previous episode gets addressed, *before* it can build up too much
for once. This scene is interesting for its mix of right and wrong.
The feelings are right: Willow's learned that letting personal stuff
fester is a problem, so she puts everything on the table. I was
wondering since when Buffy thought she "wouldn't understand" too.
But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
into tears doesn't feel quite right, and the way Hannigan plays the
aftermath, well, the less said the better. How can an actor be so
perfect most of the time and then just massacre a scene like that?
(And oh, by the way... "I was too hard. Sometimes I unleash... I
don't know my own strength." Here it's played for comedy since
there wasn't much actual unleashing. But I do you recall how not
long ago, someone who hadn't seen this episode described Willow's
personality in basically those terms? Well, he's sticking with that
assessment.)
With each scene, Faith gets more and more frightening. She's sorry
about the dead guy, but she really seems to not care. For the first
few scenes, there still seems to be a chance that she doesn't mean
all that she's saying ("it's not your real face..."), that
she's burying her pain beneath the indifference and all it'll take
is for Buffy to say the right thing. But that begins to come crashing
down once we get to the masterful sequence in the library. Faith's
"I already told him" is great, since at first we think that she's
felt the need to tell the truth, and then the betrayal sinks in. We
momentarily feel Buffy's panic when Giles seems to swallow it, and
relief when we realize that yes, of course he's too smart for that.
What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
punishment isn't the right approach. I was expecting for Wesley to
overhear the conversation from the moment Buffy entered the library,
but the writers save that for the end of the scene, after we have time
to forget about him.
Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
before"), but then she's, shall we say, somewhat less happy the
next time we see her. Huh. I guess being on this kind of show can
give anyone Gross Emotional Problems. I feel like Willow's been in
the background a lot lately, so if the busy season allows it, I'd
like a little more time to see where her head's at.
This time around I dug the use of an acoustic-guitar song, and that
leads us right into our next key scene with Xander and Faith. Xander,
as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
underneath. I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
(Like many of us, she'd liked the character a lot before she went
dark and kinky). We've known for awhile that Faith is "crazy,"
"out of control." But she's damaged, after all. Just needs a
little love. "Out of control" in a sexy
invite-her-over-to-your-house-afterward kind of way. But now the
viewer has to realize that on some level she really is out of control,
no quotation marks needed. This has been there all along to those
paying attention, and it's become impossible to ignore or dismiss.
Angel's arrival is neatly timed (side-note: I wonder if Faith
intentionally set up shop somewhere that practically invites vampires
to take a shot at her). He gets a few of the episode's best lines
while trying to talk to her - "actually, it *is* that I don't
trust you," "I'm not getting any older," etc. And more than
anyone else, he seems to be the closest to understanding her and
getting to the core of the matter ("she's taken a life... she's
got a taste for it now"). (Maybe he should go into inves... yeah.)
Sadly, the Watchers break things up and continue to prove completely
inept at everything they do.
Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
totally see why some wouldn't.
The adrenaline roller-coaster of this episode isn't over yet. We get
a last bit of stuff happening almost too fast to keep track of. Buffy
tries to help her potential friend one last time, but ends up just
having her head screwed with. "See, you need me to toe the line
because you're afraid you'll go over it, aren't you, B? You can't
handle watching me living my own way, having a blast, because it tempts
you! You know it could be you!" That could've come from my
description of "Bad Girls." Then Faith kills Trick to save Buffy
(same dying-vamp camera angle as at the beginning of BG, I believe).
This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
gone.
Don't you generally have to actually pick out books rather than giving
the librarian a general topic and getting immediately booked? (Yeah,
yeah, whoosh.) Also, Wesley looks like Stephen Colbert to me.
You know it's SF/F when: the black guy gets killed. That's three
out of three so far.
Things are happening so fast here. I'm, sure I'm missing lots of
details, and could use a breather... but there ain't no getting'
offa this train we on. If the ending is as good as the middle parts,
Season Three may become one of my high-water marks for great
television.
So...
One-sentence summary: And you thought the last one gave us things to
chew on?
AOQ rating: Excellent
[Season Three so far:
1) "Anne" - Decent
2) "Dead Man's Party" - Excellent
3) "Faith, Hope, And Trick" - Good
4) "Beauty And The Beasts" - Decent
5) "Homecoming" - Good
6) "Band Candy" - Weak
7) "Revelations" - Good
8) "Lovers Walk" - Excellent
9) "The Wish" - Decent
10) "Amends" - Good
11) "Gingerbread" - Good
12) "Helpless" - Excellent
13) "The Zeppo" - Decent
14) "Bad Girls" - Good
15) "Consequences" - Excellent]
Don Sample
"Arbitrar Of Quality" <tsm...@wildmail.com> wrote:
> A reminder: Please avoid spoilers for later episodes in these review
> threads.
>
>
> BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
> Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
> (or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
> this one?")
> Writer: Marti Noxon
> Director: Michael Gershman
>
> Depressed Wilkins is one of the funnier moments.
Ah yes, who hasn't cheered up a bad day at work by playing with the
office equipment:
"It's supposed to cheer me up. Usually using the shredder gives
me a lift. It's fun. Guess it'll take more than this to turn my
frown upside down. I just don't understand why Allan would
leave such a paper trail about our dealings. Do you think he
was going to betray me? Oh, now, that's a horrible thought. And
now he's dead, I'll never have the chance to scold him."
> It was a
> little surprising for me to see how clearly the Mayor is the one in
> charge here, since I'd still imagined Trick would march more to his
> own beat.
Who was in charge has been pretty clear from the end of 'Band Candy'
with the Mayor's whispered warning "In the future I'd be *very* careful
how many favours you do for me."
> Don't you generally have to actually pick out books rather than giving
> the librarian a general topic and getting immediately booked? (Yeah,
> yeah, whoosh.) Also, Wesley looks like Stephen Colbert to me.
I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
*is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
should be investigating.
>
> So...
>
> One-sentence summary: And you thought the last one gave us things to
> chew on?
>
> AOQ rating: Excellent
And we see that Amy hasn't been forgotten. She's still a rat.
--
Quando omni flunkus moritati
Visit the Buffy Body Count at <http://homepage.mac.com/dsample/>
Apteryx
news:1143179111....@z34g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>A reminder: Please avoid spoilers for later episodes in these review
> threads.
>
>
> BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
> Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
> (or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
> this one?")
> Writer: Marti Noxon
> Director: Michael Gershman
>
> little surprising for me to see how clearly the Mayor is the one in
> charge here, since I'd still imagined Trick would march more to his
> own beat.
That won't be a problem
> Meanwhile the growing distance between B and Willow as established in
> the previous episode gets addressed, *before* it can build up too much
> for once. This scene is interesting for its mix of right and wrong.
> The feelings are right: Willow's learned that letting personal stuff
> fester is a problem, so she puts everything on the table. I was
> wondering since when Buffy thought she "wouldn't understand" too.
> But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
> into tears doesn't feel quite right, and the way Hannigan plays the
> aftermath, well, the less said the better. How can an actor be so
> perfect most of the time and then just massacre a scene like that?
> (And oh, by the way... "I was too hard. Sometimes I unleash... I
> don't know my own strength." Here it's played for comedy since
> there wasn't much actual unleashing. But I do you recall how not
> long ago, someone who hadn't seen this episode described Willow's
> personality in basically those terms? Well, he's sticking with that
> assessment.)
The less said the better? What ails you man? You couldn't possibly be under
the impression that Buffy breaks down because Willow was "too hard"? No,
sorry I asked.
>
> Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
> Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
> before"), but then she's, shall we say, somewhat less happy the
> next time we see her.
"Apparently" to who? Willow certainly leaves the gang with the impression
that she takes it well, but they are distracted by the news itslelf, and
aren't paying attention to Willow. If you do, its never possible to say
she's not hit hard by it, from the moment she realises what Xander means.
> This time around I dug the use of an acoustic-guitar song, and that
> leads us right into our next key scene with Xander and Faith. Xander,
> as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
> actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
> you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
> underneath.
The interesting question is whether Faith is trying to kill Xander, is just
indulging in a little asphyxiation sex, or something in between (like
aspyxiation sex without caring whether Xander lives or dies)
> trust you," "I'm not getting any older," etc. And more than
> anyone else, he seems to be the closest to understanding her and
> getting to the core of the matter ("she's taken a life... she's
> got a taste for it now"). (Maybe he should go into inves... yeah.)
Of everyone we have seen on BtVS so far he does seems to be the one with the
knack for investigation. But of course Wesley doesn't know that when he asks
the Slayers to investigatge the murder.
>
> One-sentence summary: And you thought the last one gave us things to
> chew on?
>
> AOQ rating: Excellent
It was OK. It got the job done. I'd go as far as Good. 69th best BtVS ever,
16th best in Season 3. But if you have noted my ratings for Season 3, there
only 7 more epidodes left, and places 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 10 are still to be
allocated. Also 17th.
--
Apteryx
Apteryx
news:dsample-E6D962...@news.giganews.com...
> In article <1143179111....@z34g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>,
> I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
> *is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
> should be investigating.
Why? It is a human death, by apparently (and actually) human hands. And the
Slayers are a high school girl and a high school drop-out. When they have
investigated in the past, its been a matter of patrolling and seeing if
anything attacks them. They certainly don't have the investigatory finesse
of the police officer who questions them.
--
Apteryx
BTR1701
"Apteryx" <apt...@extra.co.nz> wrote:
> "Arbitrar Of Quality" <tsm...@wildmail.com> wrote in message
> > This time around I dug the use of an acoustic-guitar song, and that
> > leads us right into our next key scene with Xander and Faith. Xander,
> > as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
> > actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
> > you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
> > underneath.
>
> The interesting question is whether Faith is trying to kill Xander, is just
> indulging in a little asphyxiation sex, or something in between (like
> aspyxiation sex without caring whether Xander lives or dies)
I think it's quite clear she's trying to kill him, although the probably
hadn't thought through the consequences (pun intended) of such an act.
KenM47
>A reminder: Please avoid spoilers for later episodes in these review
>threads.
>
>
>BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
>Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
>(or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
>this one?")
>Writer: Marti Noxon
>Director: Michael Gershman
>
<SNIP>
>
>Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
>Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
>before"), but then she's, shall we say, somewhat less happy the
>next time we see her. Huh. I guess being on this kind of show can
>give anyone Gross Emotional Problems. I feel like Willow's been in
>the background a lot lately, so if the busy season allows it, I'd
>like a little more time to see where her head's at.
The Willow Xander stuff got, I thought, overdone and tiring here. BUT
it could be I just felt so bad for Willow in tears that I had had
enough already.
AH does cry good.
>
>This time around I dug the use of an acoustic-guitar song, and that
>leads us right into our next key scene with Xander and Faith. Xander,
>as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
>actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
>you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
>underneath. I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
>well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
>(Like many of us, she'd liked the character a lot before she went
>dark and kinky). We've known for awhile that Faith is "crazy,"
>"out of control." But she's damaged, after all. Just needs a
>little love. "Out of control" in a sexy
>invite-her-over-to-your-house-afterward kind of way. But now the
>viewer has to realize that on some level she really is out of control,
>no quotation marks needed. This has been there all along to those
>paying attention, and it's become impossible to ignore or dismiss.
Really? I mean I got it, but I always felt it was still a tad rushed.
It wasn't that long ago Faith was bringing newspaper wrapped Xmas
presents over to Casa Summers.
As for the crazy? When does a room become a home that a vampire needs
an invite? Somewhere would have been nice to see that Angel had been
invited in to Faith's place at some point. A line of dialog somewhere?
It was one thing when Faith was just moving in with Kakistos on her
tail, but she's been living there quite a bit at this point.
>
>Angel's arrival is neatly timed (side-note: I wonder if Faith
>intentionally set up shop somewhere that practically invites vampires
>to take a shot at her). He gets a few of the episode's best lines
>while trying to talk to her - "actually, it *is* that I don't
>trust you," "I'm not getting any older," etc. And more than
>anyone else, he seems to be the closest to understanding her and
>getting to the core of the matter ("she's taken a life... she's
>got a taste for it now"). (Maybe he should go into inves... yeah.)
>Sadly, the Watchers break things up and continue to prove completely
>inept at everything they do.
Yup. Seemed convenient they were such idiots having been around longer
than any Slayer or Slayer's Watcher.
Just anti-institutions?
>
>Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
>twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
>totally see why some wouldn't.
Boy, I have no idea what you are talking about here. I'm not sure what
you've heard or thought you heard. If you're responding to any tidbits
you've heard about the split over later seasons, I think you're being
a tad jumping to conclusions on lots of information you do not as yet
have (unless you've spoiled yourself).
<SNIP>
I'll go with Excellent(-). Faith going to the dark side, to the Mayor,
seemed totally out of nowhere to me despite what had happened. Looked
like maybe we were possibly going undercover Slayer? I won't say
where this plot line goes.
Ken (Brooklyn)
Stephen Tempest
>(or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
>this one?")
>Writer: Marti Noxon
Heh.
> But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
>into tears doesn't feel quite right,
It does seem melodramatic, but I think it's actually quite realistic -
Buffy's in a severe state of shock and stress, and has been bottling
it up all day. She starts to lower her defences because she's with
Willow, and then she's suddenly hit by the line "I can't kill people
with my bare hands like you can." I think an extreme reaction to that
particular comment, in these circumstances, is predictable...
>What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
>preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
>punishment isn't the right approach.
I think the question is still left open at the end of this episode -
but if Faith *is* in denial, it's buried really, really deep beneth
her shell of bravado. She did seem to be responding to Angel just
before the Watchers' Council team broke in.
I also think that she's feeling hurt and angry at Buffy's attitude,
which to her must seem condescending and holier-than-thou. Over the
last few episodes, we've seen Faith gradually breaking out of her
self-imposed isolation (all those 'unannounced walkabouts') to spend
more time with Buffy, and finally to relate to her as a friend and
equal. ("We're Slayers, girlfriend. The Chosen Two") Now, though,
she knows she's in big trouble - but instead of helping her out with
an alibi Buffy is whining about turning themselves in to the police.
Not to mention standing there in her expensive clothes and looking at
Faith as though she's just crawled out of a sewer.
I think there's an argument to be made that Faith's two betrayals of
Buffy in this episode - first telling Giles she killed Allan, and then
going to work for the Mayor - are a direct reaction to the fact that
*Faith* feels betrayed by *Buffy*, and is trying to strike back at
her.
Plus, added to that there's Angel's comments on the sense of power
involved in killing someone. Faith's never been in control of her
life, she's always been running away from something or other. Now,
she's discovered what it's like to hold absolute power over someone
else, to decide whther they live or die entirely at her whim. I think
the scene with Xander can be understood as her testing that out, and
discovering that she does like it. So maybe she's hoping that working
for the Mayor will give her more opportunities.
>Angel's arrival is neatly timed (side-note: I wonder if Faith
>intentionally set up shop somewhere that practically invites vampires
>to take a shot at her).
Very interesting thought, and not one I've seen mentioned before.
(People have questioned why Faith would live in a motel room
vulnerable to vampires... the idea that it's a deliberate (or
subconsious) choice is new to me)
>Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
>twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking
Hu bu. Qbrf guvf zrna NbD jvyy or n ovt sna bs Fchssl naq frnfba fvk?
:)
Stephen
vague disclaimer
"Arbitrar Of Quality" <tsm...@wildmail.com> wrote:
> Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
> Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
> before"),
I invite you to rewatch the scene, paying attention only to Willow. Then
try to say she took it well, apparently or otherwise.
--
A vague disclaimer is nobody's friend
Bruce
>
> Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
> twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
> totally see why some wouldn't.
Vs Ze Dhnyvgl ernyyl unfa'g frra gur fubj orsber ur pbhyq irel jryy or
n ovt sna bs Fchssl nsgre nyy. (Rkprcg sbe Pbeql, V bsgra svaq uvz
irel qvssvphyg gb cerqvpg uvf ernpgvbaf gb fbzr bs gur zber
pbagebirefvny ryrzragf va gur fubj.)
Bruce.
chr...@removethistoreply.gwu.edu
>> I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
>> *is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
>> should be investigating.
>
> Why? It is a human death, by apparently (and actually) human hands. And the
> Slayers are a high school girl and a high school drop-out. When they have
> investigated in the past, its been a matter of patrolling and seeing if
> anything attacks them. They certainly don't have the investigatory finesse
> of the police officer who questions them.
Don't they suspect the Mayor is up to *something* by now? I can't
remember when they first picked up on this. If the gang is suspicious of
the Mayor by now, then they (well, except for Faith and Buffy) really need
to assume that the Deputy Mayor's death might be related to something
nefarious.
Having said that, I think Wesley was as much interested in asserting his
authority as anything else here. He was right in spite of himself.
Re: the police, one sometimes suspects that any interested amateur with an
hour to spare could do a better job than the Sunnydale PD.
--Chris
______________________________________________________________________
chrisg [at] gwu.edu On the Internet, nobody knows I'm a dog.
Arbitrar Of Quality
> The less said the better? What ails you man? You couldn't possibly be under
> the impression that Buffy breaks down because Willow was "too hard"? No,
> sorry I asked.
I have no idea where you're getting that impression.
> "Apparently" to who? Willow certainly leaves the gang with the impression
> that she takes it well, but they are distracted by the news itslelf, and
> aren't paying attention to Willow. If you do, its never possible to say
> she's not hit hard by it, from the moment she realises what Xander means.
You're right, "apparently" isn't a good word choice. She's trying not
to reveal the extent to which it bothers her when around the others,
though.
> The interesting question is whether Faith is trying to kill Xander, is just
> indulging in a little asphyxiation sex, or something in between (like
> aspyxiation sex without caring whether Xander lives or dies)
I'd go wiht the last explanation, but it's open to speculation because
sometimes it's hard to tell what exactly Faith is thinking.
-AOQ
gree...@gmail.com
Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
> Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
> into tears doesn't feel quite right...
Buffy was present at a death by misadventure. That's gotta get a girl
into an emotional state. And, well, let's face it, Buffy's not the most
stable person around either in the best of times.
> Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
> Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
> before")...
We have radically different definitions of 'well' and 'with humor'.
> Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
> gone.
Faith's turn to the dark side caused more than a bit of controversy
when it first occured. I'm of the opinion that you had to surmise a lot
of stuff happened off-screen, but this wasn't an entirely unexpected
turn of events.
> If the ending is as good as the middle parts,
> Season Three may become one of my high-water marks for great
> television.
> AOQ rating: Excellent
This is one of those episodes I've always just thought of as "there",
like "Band Candy". It's better than "Band Candy" though.
Terry
Arbitrar Of Quality
> Over the
> last few episodes, we've seen Faith gradually breaking out of her
> self-imposed isolation (all those 'unannounced walkabouts') to spend
> more time with Buffy, and finally to relate to her as a friend and
> equal. ("We're Slayers, girlfriend. The Chosen Two")
I didn't think it was that clear; she was a little more gust cast for
me. She's presumably sulking along, then next episode she's exchanging
presents with the Summers family, then she's off on an unannounced
walkabout, then she's right back to synchronized Slaying... not a
"problem" per se since some people do act that way, but it just makes
it harder to write a progressive character arc.
I do see the rest of what you're saying about Faith feeling betrayed.
> Plus, added to that there's Angel's comments on the sense of power
> involved in killing someone. Faith's never been in control of her
> life, she's always been running away from something or other. Now,
> she's discovered what it's like to hold absolute power over someone
> else, to decide whther they live or die entirely at her whim. I think
> the scene with Xander can be understood as her testing that out, and
> discovering that she does like it.
And true.
-AOQ
vague disclaimer
chr...@removethistoreply.gwu.edu wrote:
> Re: the police, one sometimes suspects that any interested amateur with an
> hour to spare could do a better job than the Sunnydale PD.
"In case you haven't noticed, the police of Sunnydale are *deeply*
stupid."
KenM47
<SNIP>
>>Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
>>twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking
>
>Hu bu. Qbrf guvf zrna NbD jvyy or n ovt sna bs Fchssl naq frnfba fvk?
>:)
>
>Stephen
I'm thinking, not.
Ken (Brooklyn)
Scythe Matters
> Well, given the stuff that's come, I'd certainly hope that
> there'd be some consequences. It's a good sign when we start with
> Buffy dreaming about a dead Deputy Mayor. And he's found in real
> life too, so we know that this is the necessary direct followup to
> "Bad Girls."
And in real time, making the two-parter nature of "Bad Girls" and
"Consequences" rather clear. The dream is interesting because it works
two metaphors at once: being dragged down by Finch, and being
deliberately drowned by Faith. One is Buffy's guilt, the other is
something more prophetic, which is in line with Buffy's now-growing
number of prophetic dreams.
> Amidst all the insanity regarding Faith, you know, killing a guy,
> it's good to know that our heroes haven't also forgotten to ask
> certain other questions, like what he was doing there in the first
> place, and what City Hall might know.
One of the joys of this episode is that it misses almost nothing. All
the stuff that should happen, does happen.
> Depressed Wilkins is one of the funnier moments. It was a
> little surprising for me to see how clearly the Mayor is the one in
> charge here, since I'd still imagined Trick would march more to his
> own beat.
Remember back to their first meeting in "Homecoming," though...and I
think I pointed this out somewhere...the Mayor obviously had some sort
of power to intimidate Trick. Why wouldn't Trick just have killed him
(pre-invulnerability) otherwise? After "Bad Girls," the extent -- though
not the nature -- of that power is clear: if the Mayor could defeat
Balthazar and drive out the Eliminati, he must have some serious resources.
> Angel watching from the shadows and piecing things together
> is okay (maybe he should go into investigative work or something)
What a great idea.
> Meanwhile the growing distance between B and Willow as established in
> the previous episode gets addressed, *before* it can build up too much
> for once. This scene is interesting for its mix of right and wrong.
> The feelings are right: Willow's learned that letting personal stuff
> fester is a problem, so she puts everything on the table. I was
> wondering since when Buffy thought she "wouldn't understand" too.
> But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
> into tears doesn't feel quite right, and the way Hannigan plays the
> aftermath, well, the less said the better. How can an actor be so
> perfect most of the time and then just massacre a scene like that?
> (And oh, by the way... "I was too hard. Sometimes I unleash... I
> don't know my own strength." Here it's played for comedy since
> there wasn't much actual unleashing. But I do you recall how not
> long ago, someone who hadn't seen this episode described Willow's
> personality in basically those terms? Well, he's sticking with that
> assessment.)
That's why it's not all wrong, though. Hannigan's being honest here
("sometimes I unleash"), something she isn't always when it comes to her
inner nature.
Buffy's tears are natural because she's bottled everything up, and this
is the first time she can unleash her emotions; plus, she feels that
vulnerability with Willow is OK. I do agree that Hannigan takes the
stammering a little too far here, but I dislike it much less than you.
Oh, and overalls? That's consistent costuming-for-emotional-effect (re:
here and "Helpless").
Every other element of the Buffy/Willow interaction in this episode is
played perfectly. Even the second half of that scene is.
> With each scene, Faith gets more and more frightening. She's sorry
> about the dead guy, but she really seems to not care.
I think I'm in the minority here, but I still think it's an open
question how much of all this is what she actually believes, how much of
it is lying, and how much of it is covering and rationalization...which,
I think, eventually becomes "fact" in her emotionally twisted brain.
Remember that Faith has no trust, and also that she has precious little
self-esteem. She creates the latter from whole cloth for her own
momentary protection, but before...pre-"FH&T," or
post-"Revelations"...she's had it ripped to shreds by events. This whole
"power makes us right" riff is obviously yet another thing that's
actually (meta-textually) about Buffy, but from Faith's perspective I
think it's an idea she's created *after the fact* to justify her actions
and her emotions. I could show my basis for this from these two episodes
if I had more time, but I don't. So let's just say it's my opinion.
> But that begins to come crashing
> down once we get to the masterful sequence in the library. Faith's
> "I already told him" is great, since at first we think that she's
> felt the need to tell the truth, and then the betrayal sinks in.
Yes. It's the first moment of real, sinister evil from Faith. And yet,
as we see later with Angel, still not irredeemable. How one views this
scene depends on how much one takes Faith at face value; if you think
she's honestly like this, it means one thing, but if you think (as I do)
that it's all about self-protection, it means something slightly
different. I *do* think that the Faith/Angel scenes demonstrate wavering
and less-than-entire conviction on her part, but again I don't have the
time to show the work.
> What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
> preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
> punishment isn't the right approach.
It's what's wrong with the Council's preferred method of Watching, and
what's *right* about Giles' method. He understands the human aspects of
being a Slayer. Man-of-the-Council Wesley doesn't, and you see what happens.
> I was expecting for Wesley to
> overhear the conversation from the moment Buffy entered the library,
> but the writers save that for the end of the scene, after we have time
> to forget about him.
The scenes here and following, with Wesley on the phone, showed a
different and more menacing possibility for the character. He's cold and
calculating and has absolutely no hesitation in taking strong action. At
the time, it made me wonder if they in fact intended something more than
just comic relief from him. Vg gheaf bhg: abg, ng yrnfg va gur pbagrkg
bs OGIF. Va gur fcvabss, ubjrire, guvatf ner n yvggyr ovg qvssrerag...
> Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
> Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
> before"), but then she's, shall we say, somewhat less happy the
> next time we see her. Huh. I guess being on this kind of show can
> give anyone Gross Emotional Problems. I feel like Willow's been in
> the background a lot lately, so if the busy season allows it, I'd
> like a little more time to see where her head's at.
It's twofold. First, in case you'd forgotten, she's loved Xander for a
very, very long time. She was extremely bitter about Cordelia, and
here's yet another moment where someone else got the thing that, for so
long, she actually wanted. Oz doesn't even really enter into this
equation; one just can't turn these sorts of emotions on and off. The
scene works quite well on that level.
Where it works even better is the other level, the one that Willow
explains quite clearly:
Willow: Can I... I-I'm just wondering. Why? (gets a look from Buffy)
I'm not the most objective, I know. I kind of have an issue with Faith
sharing my people.
It's the source of her bitterness re: Buffy and Faith, and now Xander
and Faith. It's completely understandable. And also, if you step *way*
back and look at it objectively, something that may in fact be a bit
worrisome. Despite the aforementioned love for Xander, she's *not* going
to leave Oz for him (by current appearances, at least). Is it *really*
her business what (or who) Xander does? Is it *really* her business that
Buffy and Faith should have a close relationship? This is a fantastic
character moment, because her pain is real and justifiable, and yet in
one respect maybe it's not.
Anyway, she doesn't take it well from the first moment she realizes it.
The facial expression is pretty evocative of her true feelings, and note
that she looks away for the rest of the scene, looks sadly stone-faced
when she's finally addressed, and speaks in a dead and non-stuttery
tone. That's her being hurt and sort of covering it.
> I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
> well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
> (Like many of us, she'd liked the character a lot before she went
> dark and kinky).
Interestingly, I think most people like her more "dark and kinky." I do.
Not so much the kinky, though that's fun as far as it goes (and man,
does she really throw herself into this and the previous sex scenes),
but the darkness. It's incredibly "fun" to watch.
> We've known for awhile that Faith is "crazy,"
> "out of control." But she's damaged, after all. Just needs a
> little love. "Out of control" in a sexy
> invite-her-over-to-your-house-afterward kind of way. But now the
> viewer has to realize that on some level she really is out of control,
> no quotation marks needed. This has been there all along to those
> paying attention, and it's become impossible to ignore or dismiss.
Yes, absolutely. She's had no grounding, and arrived in Sunnydale lying
about really important stuff. Her possibilities for connection -- Buffy,
Gwen -- betrayed her in one way or another. Giles has *not* been a true
Watcher to her (there's the downside of his emotional attachment to
Buffy). No guidance, no love, no connections...just sitting alone in the
dark nursing her pain, and finding release and actual *feeling* only
through violence, self-justified crime and (we presume) casual sex. It's
not that she's fundamentally bad, it's that she's so unbelievably
fucked-up that she's almost beyond saving. And maybe, now, is. We'll
have to see.
We just don't know if she's telling the truth or not when she claims to
have just been fooling around with Xander. It's the not knowing that
makes the character so incredibly dangerous.
> Angel's arrival is neatly timed (side-note: I wonder if Faith
> intentionally set up shop somewhere that practically invites vampires
> to take a shot at her).
Maybe, but more functionally she didn't have a choice; one has to, after
"Bad Girls," assume that she's renting the room with money acquired via
stealing, or worse. It has been suggested elsewhere, in threads you
haven't seen, that maybe Buffy or even more importantly Giles should
have done something about that (not the stealing, the conditions in
which she lives). But here, also, remember that she's somehow taken
Gwen's description of a "warrior" to heart...because the notion
re-emerges in this episode. Even though Gwen betrayed her, that little
bit of sense and structure and (apparent) caring made such a deep
impression on her. That, too, says a lot about how desperate Faith is.
> He gets a few of the episode's best lines
> while trying to talk to her - "actually, it *is* that I don't
> trust you," "I'm not getting any older," etc. And more than
> anyone else, he seems to be the closest to understanding her and
> getting to the core of the matter ("she's taken a life... she's
> got a taste for it now").
What we're finally seeing, after all this time, is Angel starting to
have definition as his own character, not just as an adjunct to Buffy.
He's finding his role in life.
> Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
> twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
> totally see why some wouldn't.
Some certainly don't. I think -- I'm guessing based on years of watching
online discussions of this point -- that most people are fine with it in
balance. What they don't like is when it takes over the narrative. BTVS
*should* be dark -- it's horror, after all, and it's vampire fiction as
well, which is almost always darkly sexual -- but it also has to be
light, too ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer" -- the lightness is right there
in the deliberately silly title). "Consequences" is a very dark episode,
so we only get the dark parts here, but it all works really well. At
least for me.
> The adrenaline roller-coaster of this episode isn't over yet. We get
> a last bit of stuff happening almost too fast to keep track of.
The pace of this episode is breathtaking.
> "See, you need me to toe the line
> because you're afraid you'll go over it, aren't you, B? You can't
> handle watching me living my own way, having a blast, because it tempts
> you! You know it could be you!" That could've come from my
> description of "Bad Girls."
Or from "Bad Girls" itself, since it's a restatement of the dialogue
with the resentful element added. ;-)
But yes, this is the whole key to the developing Faith subplot, in
(somewhat) the same way it was with Kendra. In Kendra, we saw something
about what Buffy *should* have been, were she to have taken the usual
path, and it helped Buffy realize something about herself. In Faith, we
see yet another potential path, but this one holds incredible appeal for
Buffy because it feeds into her long-time resentment of the restrictions
and demands of her calling. And even the parts that don't say something
about some rather fundamental aspects of Slayerhood:
Buffy: But it does *not* mean that we get to pass
judgment on people like we're better than everybody else!
Buffy's certainly been guilty of this on occasion, hasn't she?
Anyway: remember this whole conversation. Remember it for a long, long
time. Trust me.
> This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
> on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
> Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
> gone.
I tend to believe that, at any point previous to killing Trick, it
wasn't her intention to actually take the final turn towards the dark
side. But everything we've seen with Faith this season, and especially
the events of the last two episodes, serves to put her in an impossible
position. She doesn't trust Buffy, or anyone else for that matter. She's
hurt Xander. She obviously can't go back to either Watcher. She doesn't
*want* to be helped by Angel, because he's hitting too close to the
heart of things. So what are her options? Leave, sure, but what does she
have in the next place she goes? Also, the Council's resources are
myriad, and who can say if she'd ever be able to escape their pursuit
(not even to mention what Buffy might try to do)? However, at the docks,
she's obviously leaning towards flight...you can see her wavering, her
hesitation, as she watches Trick strangle Buffy...and then, all of a
sudden, she's there and staking him. In the moments between that
wavering and the staking, she's come up with a plan. A desperate and
awful one, but a plan nonetheless.
Just great stuff, on every level.
> Don't you generally have to actually pick out books rather than giving
> the librarian a general topic and getting immediately booked?
Plot contrivance, but it can be explained: she trusts Giles. This was
shown in "Gingerbread." If she trusts him with such important stuff,
certainly she'd trust him with picking out a good text for her purposes.
> You know it's SF/F when: the black guy gets killed.
Not a point lost on everyone else, either. :-/ At least they gave him
one meta-joke before the sendoff:
Trick: I hear once you've tasted a Slayer, you never wanna go back.
> Things are happening so fast here. I'm, sure I'm missing lots of
> details
Actually, you did pretty well here, I think.
, and could use a breather... but there ain't no getting'
> offa this train we on. If the ending is as good as the middle parts,
> Season Three may become one of my high-water marks for great
> television.
It is for me. Not to spoil things. ;-)
Notes:
1) Willow: (puts her book away) I'm late. I-I'm meeting Michael. The
warlock guy? We're still trying to de-rat Amy.
Thank goodness. And you were worried they might not revisit this topic. ;-)
2) This episode marks a change in Hannigan's look. Personally, I find
Willow just impossibly cute for the rest of the season. Of course, in
retrospect, we can all see the reason for the change in Hannigan's look
and demeanor. She's in loooooooove...
3) This episode marks the final nail in the "Mayor wants Buffy around"
theory's coffin:
Mayor Wilkins: (closes the report) Well, this *is* exciting. A Slayer
up for Murder One. That's sunshine and roses to me. It really is.
If he wanted her around, he wouldn't be so gleeful. (Naq vs vg'f Snvgu,
fur'f abg va fpubby, fb fur qbrfa'g nccyl gb jung ur zvtug jnag.)
4) Faith blows into town and leaves everyone a wreck from the chaos in
her wake. Hey, didn't Spike just do the same a few episodes ago?
5) Angel: People who genuinely wanted to do right. (looks at her) And
they make mistakes. And they fall down. You know, but they keep caring.
Keep trying.
That's the third time on this point, in a short number of episodes.
6) The true scariness of invulnerability:
Faith: (accusingly) You sent your boy to kill me.
Mayor Wilkins: (unfazed) That's right, I did.
To just stand there, indifferent, with a pissed-off Slayer. Fun.
> AOQ rating: Excellent
For the first time since "Prophecy Girl," we agree on one of your
"excellent" ratings.
One Bit Shy
news:dsample-E6D962...@news.giganews.com...
> In article <1143179111....@z34g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>,
> I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
> *is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
> should be investigating.
Really? Based on what he knew at the time it's just the first interesting
event to come up. Maybe with more to compare to we might recognize judgment
and discrimination. But right now it looks like grabbing at the biggest
headline in the newspaper.
If you mean that the reality behind the story justifies his judgment, then
I'd have to point out that the same judgment led to asking the slayers to
investigate their own crime.
OBS
One Bit Shy
How about starting with intimidating Xander (and redirecting Xander away
from why he came, which she doesn't want to deal with), but then discovering
she liked how it felt and not being able to let go? Angel - the witness to
this - will shortly say that she's gotten a taste for it.
I think a case can be made that she made her big step through the door to
her dark side while her hands were around Xander's neck.
OBS
OBS
Jeff Jacoby
[snip]
> The scenes here and following, with Wesley on the phone, showed a
> different and more menacing possibility for the character. He's cold and
> calculating and has absolutely no hesitation in taking strong action. At
> the time, it made me wonder if they in fact intended something more than
> just comic relief from him. Vg gheaf bhg: abg, ng yrnfg va gur pbagrkg
> bs OGIF. Va gur fcvabss, ubjrire, guvatf ner n yvggyr ovg qvssrerag...
Erjngpu "Pubvprf", va gur yvoenel fprar jura gurl
svaq bhg gur Znlbe unf Jvyybj.
Jeff
Espen Schjønberg
> "Don Sample" <dsa...@synapse.net> wrote in message
>>I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
>>*is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
>>should be investigating.
>
>
> Really? Based on what he knew at the time it's just the first interesting
> event to come up.
What do they know? Brutal stabbing. Corpse sunk in water.
It does not sound like "seemingly drained of blood, unexplained marks on
neck". With the exception of the totally dead boy, the vampires does not
tend to hide the corpses, do they?
It is so much Wesley wanting to give the order, if not Giles had
concluded it not merited research, they wouldn't have been told to do
the research.
--
Espen
Scythe Matters
> Erjngpu "Pubvprf", va gur yvoenel fprar jura gurl
> svaq bhg gur Znlbe unf Jvyybj.
Yes, I agree, but in the main the rot13 comment is true, isn't it?
Don Sample
Espen Schjønberg <ess...@excite.com> wrote:
> On 24.03.2006 18:11, One Bit Shy wrote:
> > "Don Sample" <dsa...@synapse.net> wrote in message
>
> >>I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
> >>*is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
> >>should be investigating.
> >
> >
> > Really? Based on what he knew at the time it's just the first interesting
> > event to come up.
>
> What do they know? Brutal stabbing. Corpse sunk in water.
>
> It does not sound like "seemingly drained of blood, unexplained marks on
> neck". With the exception of the totally dead boy, the vampires does not
> tend to hide the corpses, do they?
Lots of other things in town besides vampires. And how many brutal
stabbings does Sunnydale have? (The only other one that we know of, was
committed by a demon.) As far as we've seen Sunnydale is pretty much
mundane crime free.
chr...@removethistoreply.gwu.edu
>
> I didn't think it was that clear; she was a little more gust cast for
> me. She's presumably sulking along, then next episode she's exchanging
> presents with the Summers family, then she's off on an unannounced
> walkabout, then she's right back to synchronized Slaying... not a
> "problem" per se since some people do act that way, but it just makes
> it harder to write a progressive character arc.
Faith's character progression in the middle of season 3 seems so
complicated because she's wavering back and forth between her better and
baser sides. Her character arc isn't a smooth curve, it's more like a ...
sine wave? ... with the ... amplitude? ... of each curve getting
gradually bigger. The terminology is probably off (my last math class was
many years ago), but you get the idea. Christmas with the Summerses was
one swing toward her positive side, while in Consequences we see an
unusually large swing in the other direction. These shifts back and forth
might be confusing, but they really are part of a definite progression --
it's just a stage in that progression that is characterized by wavering.
How long will this stage continue? Will the next stage also be wavery?
Does she have any more hot sex scenes? You'll see....
Don Sample
Scythe Matters <sp...@spam.spam> wrote:
There are two Slayers in town. That might be one too many for him.
Getting rid of one would be a good thing.
Plus, the Dedication has now taken place. His plan is getting closer to
fruition. The situation is not static. As time progresses the Slayer
will become less and less useful to have around, and more and more of a
threat.
Arbitrar Of Quality
> The dream is interesting because it works
> two metaphors at once: being dragged down by Finch, and being
> deliberately drowned by Faith. One is Buffy's guilt, the other is
> something more prophetic, which is in line with Buffy's now-growing
> number of prophetic dreams.
Anyone noticed trends in the way the Slayerdreams fluctuate? Sometimes
they tell her exactly what she needs to know (IOHEFY), sometimes
they're straightforward, if non-literal, prophecies (here), and
sometimes they're vague/indirect foreshadowing ("Surprise").
> I *do* think that the Faith/Angel scenes demonstrate wavering
> and less-than-entire conviction on her part, but again I don't have the
> time to show the work.
I'd agree with that, and the general ideas that she's wavering and
possibly lying to herself throughout the episode. That comes with the
provision that I don't think I entirely understand Faith at this point
in the series. But I like OBS's notion that her cotnrol over Xander
plays a big part in getting her to enjoy that kind of power, and my
redemtion-loving side wants to think that Angel had a chance to get
through to her before the Council Of Plot Devices got involved.
> Willow: Can I... I-I'm just wondering. Why? (gets a look from Buffy)
> I'm not the most objective, I know. I kind of have an issue with Faith
> sharing my people.
Ooh, forgot about that line. Yes, that's a good taste of Willow's
worldview, and yes, it has an undercurrent of selfishness that's in
line with her past behavior.
> We just don't know if she's telling the truth or not when she claims to
> have just been fooling around with Xander. It's the not knowing that
> makes the character so incredibly dangerous.
And we thought she was such a bad liar? Actually, I find it's hard to
tell where the truth lies when the issue concerns whether of not Faith
really believes what she's saying.
> For the first time since "Prophecy Girl," we agree on one of your
> "excellent" ratings.
"Becoming I." Also, doesn't everyone love "Innocence?" (Or would that
one get a special rating from you?)
-AOQ
William George Ferguson
wrote:
>A reminder: Please avoid spoilers for later episodes in these review
>threads.
>
>
>BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
>Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
>(or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
>this one?")
>Writer: Marti Noxon
>Director: Michael Gershman
Everyone else has had sometime to chew on this so, coming late to the
party, let's see if I can come up with some different points.
This is one of the Noxon episodes that Noxon-haters swear up and down must
have been rewritten by Whedon.
But the Faith/Xander scene is pure Noxon.
>Amidst all the insanity regarding Faith, you know, killing a guy,
>it's good to know that our heroes haven't also forgotten to ask
>certain other questions, like what he was doing there in the first
>place, and what City Hall might know. And they figure a few things
>out, but also end up getting the attention of the Mayor and his vampire
>ally. Depressed Wilkins is one of the funnier moments. It was a
>little surprising for me to see how clearly the Mayor is the one in
>charge here, since I'd still imagined Trick would march more to his
>own beat. Angel watching from the shadows and piecing things together
>is okay (maybe he should go into investigative work or something), but
>I don't think we really needed the repeated clip from BG.
As someone else commented, Wilkins is an Evil Overlord who has read the
List. He is a whole lot of people's favorite Buffy Big Bad because he's
actually competent, not some silly bwa-ha-ha type.
As for Angel, I guess some basic knowledge of the spinoff is unavoidable
(either that or you're a Bones fan).
>Meanwhile the growing distance between B and Willow as established in
>the previous episode gets addressed, *before* it can build up too much
>for once. This scene is interesting for its mix of right and wrong.
>The feelings are right: Willow's learned that letting personal stuff
>fester is a problem, so she puts everything on the table. I was
>wondering since when Buffy thought she "wouldn't understand" too.
Buffy has always tended to think that, even when she doesn't say it.
> But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
>into tears doesn't feel quite right, and the way Hannigan plays the
>aftermath, well, the less said the better. How can an actor be so
>perfect most of the time and then just massacre a scene like that?
>(And oh, by the way... "I was too hard. Sometimes I unleash... I
>don't know my own strength." Here it's played for comedy since
>there wasn't much actual unleashing. But I do you recall how not
>long ago, someone who hadn't seen this episode described Willow's
>personality in basically those terms? Well, he's sticking with that
>assessment.)
And note that Willow lays out her complaint against Faith very honestly
(incredibly honestly for her, she gunnysacks even more than Buffy). Willow
is extremely territorial with the things that she actually cares about.
Faith is poaching on her territory, first with Buffy and now with Xander.
(there's also this, given how she already feels about Faith, because of
Buffy, Faith is the one girl who Xander having sex with would hurt her even
more than with Cordelia. To quote an Al Stewart song, "Why did it have to
be with him? Anyone else wouldn't have hurt, half as much as him.")
>With each scene, Faith gets more and more frightening. She's sorry
>about the dead guy, but she really seems to not care. For the first
>few scenes, there still seems to be a chance that she doesn't mean
>all that she's saying ("it's not your real face..."), that
>she's burying her pain beneath the indifference and all it'll take
>is for Buffy to say the right thing. But that begins to come crashing
>down once we get to the masterful sequence in the library. Faith's
>"I already told him" is great, since at first we think that she's
>felt the need to tell the truth, and then the betrayal sinks in. We
>momentarily feel Buffy's panic when Giles seems to swallow it, and
>relief when we realize that yes, of course he's too smart for that.
>What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
>preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
>punishment isn't the right approach. I was expecting for Wesley to
>overhear the conversation from the moment Buffy entered the library,
>but the writers save that for the end of the scene, after we have time
>to forget about him.
And I agree with Giles, not necessarily that she isn't a bad person (I tend
to hold to the view that your actions speak loudest, and she's doing bad
things regardless of the underlying reason), but that punishment isn't the
way to get her headed in the right direction.
>Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
>Faith well (and with humor - "I don't need to say 'oh'. I got it
>before"),
As you say in a response, 'apparently' isn't really the right word. As
I've said before, Hannigan is a Robin Williams/Jim Carrey level
rubber-faced comedian who, left to her own devices, will mug and overplay
terribly. This was a great example of what she can do with a firm
directorial hand. You can see the exact second when she gets it. She's in
the background looking a little worried, and suddenly her face just goes to
stone, and she turns her head slightly away. She doesn't look at Xander or
the others until Buffy and Giles both look at her, and she explains in a
flat, emotionless voice why she doesn't have to say "Oh!".
Another comment about that moment: In the replies it has been described at
indicating Willow's pain and sorrow, but that isn't how I see it. We've
seen Willow, scared, or worried, or sad, or hurt. She tends to get
flustery and stuttery, and starts to babble, basically (probably
unconsciously) tries to overwhelm or hide with a torrent of words. We've
only seen her use this voice once before that I can recall of the top of
head, in Prophecy Girl when Buffy comes to see her after the A/V room.
It's cold blind fury.
>but then she's, shall we say, somewhat less happy the
>next time we see her. Huh. I guess being on this kind of show can
>give anyone Gross Emotional Problems. I feel like Willow's been in
>the background a lot lately, so if the busy season allows it, I'd
>like a little more time to see where her head's at.
Well, you have said you've generally watched an episode or two ahead by the
time you post the review :)
>This time around I dug the use of an acoustic-guitar song, and that
>leads us right into our next key scene with Xander and Faith. Xander,
>as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
>actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
>you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
>underneath. I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
>well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
>(Like many of us, she'd liked the character a lot before she went
>dark and kinky). We've known for awhile that Faith is "crazy,"
>"out of control." But she's damaged, after all. Just needs a
>little love. "Out of control" in a sexy
>invite-her-over-to-your-house-afterward kind of way. But now the
>viewer has to realize that on some level she really is out of control,
>no quotation marks needed. This has been there all along to those
>paying attention, and it's become impossible to ignore or dismiss.
Don Sample, I think, was the first person to posit that Faith was either
going to go evil or die heroically redeeming herself, or both, a day or so
after FH&T aired. I'd say that by the end of Revelations, that was the
popular theory.
>Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
>twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
>totally see why some wouldn't.
Oh my God! Where did all those worms come from?
Next up, the Adventures of YellowDogGeyserPerson and Beerless.
--
HERBERT
1996 - 1997
Beloved Mascot
Delightful Meal
He fed the Pack
A little
Scythe Matters
> my
> redemtion-loving side wants to think that Angel had a chance to get
> through to her before the Council Of Plot Devices got involved.
I guess we'll never know.
> And we thought she was such a bad liar? Actually, I find it's hard to
> tell where the truth lies when the issue concerns whether of not Faith
> really believes what she's saying.
Whence the fun.
> "Becoming I." Also, doesn't everyone love "Innocence?" (Or would that
> one get a special rating from you?)
"Innocence" gets a "superlative" from me, but I'd forgotten about
"Becoming the first."
Don Sample
William George Ferguson <wmgf...@newsguy.com> wrote:
> As someone else commented, Wilkins is an Evil Overlord who has read the
> List. He is a whole lot of people's favorite Buffy Big Bad because he's
> actually competent, not some silly bwa-ha-ha type.
Ohg ur fbzrubj zvffrq #34: V jvyy abg ghea vagb n fanxr. Vg arire urycf.
hopelessly devoted
> BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
> Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
> Well, given the stuff that's come, I'd certainly hope that
> there'd be some consequences. It's a good sign when we start with
> Buffy dreaming about a dead Deputy Mayor. And he's found in real
> life too, so we know that this is the necessary direct followup to
> "Bad Girls." No keeping Dushku off-screen for three weeks this
> time.
I've always felt that this was the first time we actually got to view
B's nightmare. We've seen her dreams and her prophecy's, but just a
simple nightmare? I don't think we have until now. B drowning in a
sea of guilt, can't escape a dead man, and driven down by a face she
knows. Add in Mom's That's Terrible and (Gingerbread) Option 1 out
the door.
As others have already said, I will now pick the side of Murder by
human hands is not the the Slayer's agenda. Wesley needing to exert
some authority in his new position. Nothing more.
As for the book issue, small school, senior year Psych, Freud and
Young.
On First Viewing: Cordelia attracted Wesley. Hmmmm. Wesley attracted
to Cordelia. Hmmmm. Anybody else seeing Cordelia's parents???
> Angel watching from the shadows and piecing things together
> is okay (maybe he should go into investigative work or something), but
> I don't think we really needed the repeated clip from BG.
Angel putting the blood on B's hand with the blood on the dumpster, I
got that one. A outside of F's motel room and not B's house? That was
a little more of a Hmmmm for me. 1 + 1 = Faith. What????
> The feelings are right: Willow's learned that letting personal stuff
> fester is a problem, so she puts everything on the table. I was
> wondering since when Buffy thought she "wouldn't understand" too.
> But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
> into tears doesn't feel quite right, and the way Hannigan plays the
> aftermath, well, the less said the better.
I'm going to have to go with the group on this one. For me the scene
was predictable but very well played by both.
> With each scene, Faith gets more and more frightening. She's sorry
> about the dead guy, but she really seems to not care. For the first
> few scenes, there still seems to be a chance that she doesn't mean
> all that she's saying ("it's not your real face..."), that
> she's burying her pain beneath the indifference and all it'll take
> is for Buffy to say the right thing. But that begins to come crashing
> down once we get to the masterful sequence in the library. Faith's
> "I already told him" is great, since at first we think that she's
> felt the need to tell the truth, and then the betrayal sinks in. We
> momentarily feel Buffy's panic when Giles seems to swallow it, and
> relief when we realize that yes, of course he's too smart for that.
> What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
> preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
> punishment isn't the right approach. I was expecting for Wesley to
> overhear the conversation from the moment Buffy entered the library,
> but the writers save that for the end of the scene, after we have time
> to forget about him.
Faith's plummet felt exactly like that. A plummet. On First Viewing,
there were certain signs in her behavior, but the last two ep, IMO, was
a whole new Faith. My opinion of her over the last two eps changed
drastically. Breaking and Entering, Stealing, Want Take Have. Add in
I Don't Care and the new found I go down you go down attitude and the
old Faith seemed no where to be found.
When Faith comes out behind Giles, there is a pointed stare. Yet in
the admission that she already told him, the stare (Game face Off???)
is immediately replaced with something new (game face on??). Giles
pulls off the same trick in reverse; Game face on / Game face off.
Brilliant scene.
> Going back to Willow, she apparently takes the news about Xander and
> Faith well
Stop! U-Turn. That was the quietest shattering of broken hopes and
dreams ever before seen on network television.
> Xander,
> as always convinced that he's better suited for a situation than he
> actually is, easily brushes past her initial hostility ("see,
> you're just trying to hurt me,") and finds something scarier
> underneath.
Back to the Xander Arc: Relationships - No!
No Buffy, No Willow, No Cordy, No Willow, No Faith. Although at this
point he hasn't completely accepted the last.
Peacock - X's learned a little bit of control in TZ and maybe??? now
would be a good time to put his new found confidence to the test.
Result - Xander also ends up in the shattered hopes and dreams
department.
Faith takes away any and all hope that there was "a connection" in the
first sexual experience of his young life. With that she also takes
away the possibility of any further connection, sexual or otherwise.
When it comes to relationships, Xander's batting a firm 0.
Faith also seems to have the biggest peacock of them all (backed by a
little mental instability) which, if it does not prove that X needs to
think a little bit longer before going off half cocked (pun intended)
he certainly needs to come up with a better plan than completely
disregarding what everyone else has already said in pursuit of his own
personal missions. Faith wrinkles and plucks a few feathers for her
own cap.
Add on top of this, X is saved by A. Some have already pointed out
that he's been less venomous towards the en-souled one, but I feel his
"suppressed" feelings are a result of trying to maintain his friendship
with Buffy as opposed to any real lost animosity towards A. It can't
sit well with X that in a very clear way, this one person, of all
people, saved his life.
> I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
> well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
I prefer the term Psycho Bitch! But I'll accept Mrs. Quality's
rendition of the same shocked surprise.
> Angel's arrival is neatly timed
[snip]
> Sadly, the Watchers break things up and continue to prove completely
> inept at everything they do.
On First viewing: Faith's issues aside. Faith's fears aside. Faith's
loneliness aside. I'll be the first to say it. At this point, she
became Psycho Bitch. No, that sentence was correct. PB for short.
Her following scene with Angel shows that there was something hidden in
Faith, something very dark that wanted to come out and play. Up until
Strangling Xander, she kept it at bay. It's unclear from her facial
expressions with A if she were coming around or plotting her next move.
> Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
> twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking, although I can
> totally see why some wouldn't.
Hmmmm.
> The adrenaline roller-coaster of this episode isn't over yet. We get
> a last bit of stuff happening almost too fast to keep track of. Buffy
> tries to help her potential friend one last time, but ends up just
> having her head screwed with. "See, you need me to toe the line
> because you're afraid you'll go over it, aren't you, B? You can't
> handle watching me living my own way, having a blast, because it tempts
> you! You know it could be you!" That could've come from my
> description of "Bad Girls."
And very much the trust as we've already seen in The Wish.
Then Faith kills Trick to save Buffy
> (same dying-vamp camera angle as at the beginning of BG, I believe).
> This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
> on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
> Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
> gone.
More like being side swiped by a freight train. All the reasons and
all the rationale aside. Faith now trusting the person who tried to
kill her????? Brilliant twist but What the HELL what that?
> Don't you generally have to actually pick out books rather than giving
> the librarian a general topic and getting immediately booked? (Yeah,
> yeah, whoosh.) Also, Wesley looks like Stephen Colbert to me.
I may have already said this but......Senior Class, Senior Psych, Small
School, Freud and Young. That's about all he would need to know.
> You know it's SF/F when: the black guy gets killed. That's three
> out of three so far.
I don't know if it had been bought up before, and I was sort of waiting
for it. BTVS did something in that department that, until the show
aired, no other prime time show had bothered to do. Black people. You
get shows that are all one or all the other. You get shows that have a
guest spot every now and then. But this show actually had Black
people. Not the typical angry black man or the fat saucy black woman.
Real people. Kendra - powerful, a calling, intelligent and very
beautiful. Her first appearance and ep ending "I'm Kendra the Vampire
Slayer" was a beautiful moment. (Tvan Gbeerf nf gur ornhgvshy obj
orsber zr Tbqqrff jnf nyfb n snagnfgvp zbzrag va gur oynpx crbcyr pna
or fbzrguvat bgure guna...uvfgbel bs gur Jurqbairefr nf jryy nf Jbbq va
fivv.) Mr. Platt was an absolute joy, different, someone to be
remembered. And Trick - a black vampire with an attitude, you gotta
love it. Sure they're all dead now, but what do you expect, it's
horror. I'd rather watch the astereotypical black person on BTVS than
the typical stereotype on just about everything else on television then
or now.
> Things are happening so fast here. I'm, sure I'm missing lots of
> details, and could use a breather... but there ain't no getting'
> offa this train we on. If the ending is as good as the middle parts,
> Season Three may become one of my high-water marks for great
> television.
Bwahahahahah!!!!!!!
Stephen Tempest
>How long will this stage continue? Will the next stage also be wavery?
>Does she have any more hot sex scenes? You'll see....
Qbrf gur ubg frk fprar pbhag vs Snvgu vf orvat cynlrq ol Fnenu
Zvpuryyr Tryyne ng gur gvzr?
Stephen
Stephen Tempest
>> Willow: Can I... I-I'm just wondering. Why? (gets a look from Buffy)
>> I'm not the most objective, I know. I kind of have an issue with Faith
>> sharing my people.
>
>Ooh, forgot about that line. Yes, that's a good taste of Willow's
>worldview, and yes, it has an undercurrent of selfishness that's in
>line with her past behavior.
Selfish, yes - but it also shows self-awareness, emotional honesty,
and her acknowledgement that such feelings are wrong.
Let's not get too hung up yet on pointing out the darker side of
Willow's character. :) She's not Faith...
Stephen
>And we thought she was such a bad liar?
She's bad at lying to other people. At lying to herself, she's world
class.
Stephen
KenM47
Isn't it time for the next one yet? Just rewatched it. I'm very
curious to see the comments.
Ken (Brooklyn)
Apteryx
news:1143210940....@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> Apteryx wrote:
>
>> The less said the better? What ails you man? You couldn't possibly be
>> under
>> the impression that Buffy breaks down because Willow was "too hard"? No,
>> sorry I asked.
>
> I have no idea where you're getting that impression.
I guess the combination of your not liking the scene together with the
observations on lashing out being part of Willow's character.
>
>> The interesting question is whether Faith is trying to kill Xander, is
>> just
>> indulging in a little asphyxiation sex, or something in between (like
>> aspyxiation sex without caring whether Xander lives or dies)
>
> I'd go wiht the last explanation, but it's open to speculation because
> sometimes it's hard to tell what exactly Faith is thinking.
I tend to go with that one too. But Xander could be forgiven for thinking
deliberate attempted murder. It's the wisest assumption to make when someone
starts to strangle you. And propbably the more you identify with Xander and
the less you identify with Faith, the more likely you are to think so too.
--
Apteryx
Apteryx
news:12280l9...@corp.supernews.com...
> Apteryx <apt...@extra.co.nz> wrote:
>>> I will point out that despite his pompousity and everything else, Wesley
>>> *is* right that the Deputy Mayor's death is something that the Slayers
>>> should be investigating.
>>
>> Why? It is a human death, by apparently (and actually) human hands. And
>> the
>> Slayers are a high school girl and a high school drop-out. When they have
>> investigated in the past, its been a matter of patrolling and seeing if
>> anything attacks them. They certainly don't have the investigatory
>> finesse
>> of the police officer who questions them.
>
> Don't they suspect the Mayor is up to *something* by now? I can't
> remember when they first picked up on this. If the gang is suspicious of
> the Mayor by now, then they (well, except for Faith and Buffy) really need
> to assume that the Deputy Mayor's death might be related to something
> nefarious.
>
> Having said that, I think Wesley was as much interested in asserting his
> authority as anything else here. He was right in spite of himself.
>
> Re: the police, one sometimes suspects that any interested amateur with an
> hour to spare could do a better job than the Sunnydale PD.
That's when they don't want to solve the crime. Here they get not only
approval to investigate from the Mayor but a tip as to the likely suspects.
The officer interviewing them is doing just fine. They have given each other
alibis (at this point Buffy is probably accessory after the fact to murder,
or whatever other charge Faith may be guilty off) but he has exposed
inconsistencies in that alibi and offered each of them hope of exhoneration
if they name the other. I don't think he's far off cracking the case,
especially given Faith's willingness to rat on Buffy to Giles (supposing the
Mayor let him continue with it after Faith joins his side).
--
Apteryx
BTR1701
"hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote:
> Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
> > Then Faith kills Trick to save Buffy
> > (same dying-vamp camera angle as at the beginning of BG, I believe).
> > This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
> > on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
> > Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
> > gone.
>
> More like being side swiped by a freight train. All the reasons and
> all the rationale aside. Faith now trusting the person who tried to
> kill her????? Brilliant twist but What the HELL what that?
Who says Faith had decided to trust him? She may have just decided that
him being evil and all, his cards were already on the table in full view
and she knew exactly what she was dealing with. That doesn't mean she
actually trusted him right at the beginning.
Don Sample
"hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote:
> Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
> > BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
> > Season Three, Episode 15: "Consequences"
>
> > Well, given the stuff that's come, I'd certainly hope that
> > there'd be some consequences. It's a good sign when we start with
> > Buffy dreaming about a dead Deputy Mayor. And he's found in real
> > life too, so we know that this is the necessary direct followup to
> > "Bad Girls." No keeping Dushku off-screen for three weeks this
> > time.
>
> I've always felt that this was the first time we actually got to view
> B's nightmare. We've seen her dreams and her prophecy's, but just a
> simple nightmare? I don't think we have until now. B drowning in a
> sea of guilt, can't escape a dead man, and driven down by a face she
> knows. Add in Mom's That's Terrible and (Gingerbread) Option 1 out
> the door.
>
> As others have already said, I will now pick the side of Murder by
> human hands is not the the Slayer's agenda. Wesley needing to exert
> some authority in his new position. Nothing more.
Have we seen a murder in Sunnydale that wasn't committed by inhuman
hands? And how are they to know if the hands were human or not if they
don't investigate? Should they wait for the police report, and just
believe whatever it says?
> > Angel watching from the shadows and piecing things together
> > is okay (maybe he should go into investigative work or something), but
> > I don't think we really needed the repeated clip from BG.
>
> Angel putting the blood on B's hand with the blood on the dumpster, I
> got that one. A outside of F's motel room and not B's house? That was
> a little more of a Hmmmm for me. 1 + 1 = Faith. What????
I figure he just followed the cops.
> > Don't you generally have to actually pick out books rather than giving
> > the librarian a general topic and getting immediately booked? (Yeah,
> > yeah, whoosh.) Also, Wesley looks like Stephen Colbert to me.
>
> I may have already said this but......Senior Class, Senior Psych, Small
> School, Freud and Young. That's about all he would need to know.
Or maybe Jung.
BTR1701
Scythe Matters <sp...@spam.spam> wrote:
> The scenes here and following, with Wesley on the phone, showed a
> different and more menacing possibility for the character. He's cold and
> calculating and has absolutely no hesitation in taking strong action. At
> the time, it made me wonder if they in fact intended something more than
> just comic relief from him. Vg gheaf bhg: abg, ng yrnfg va gur pbagrkg
> bs OGIF. Va gur fcvabss, ubjrire, guvatf ner n yvggyr ovg qvssrerag...
Somewhat of an understatement, that.
> > I think Mrs. Quality summed up why this scene works so
> > well: "I didn't know she was this much of a fucking psycho!"
> > (Like many of us, she'd liked the character a lot before she went
> > dark and kinky).
>
> Interestingly, I think most people like her more "dark and kinky." I do.
> Not so much the kinky, though that's fun as far as it goes (and man,
> does she really throw herself into this and the previous sex scenes),
> but the darkness. It's incredibly "fun" to watch.
"V guvax V jnag gb urne lbh fpernz..."
"Abj, abj, qba'g cbbc bhg ba zr, qnza vg! Bgurejvfr guvf vf nyy whfg
tbvat gb or bire gbb snfg naq lbh'yy or qrnq naq V'yy orŠ oberq."
Great stuff.
> However, at the docks,
> she's obviously leaning towards flight...you can see her wavering, her
> hesitation, as she watches Trick strangle Buffy...and then, all of a
> sudden, she's there and staking him.
Well, I have my own personal theory about why she killed Trick and it
has nothing to do with saving Buffy. Remember, she did watch Kakistos
murder her Watcher and Trick was Kakistos's right-hand man. Presumably
Trick had a hand in what happened.
Killing Trick could easily have been a matter of simple revenge on
Faith's part. Saving Buffy was just incidental (and perhaps not even
desirable from Faith's point of view, hence the hesitation).
Don Sample
BTR1701 <btr...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
There is another theory to explain Faith's behaviour: Faith is really
still one of the good guys and has decided that the best way to redeem
herself is to go undercover to get the dirt on the Mayor.
BTR1701
Stephen Tempest <steph...@stempest.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> "Arbitrar Of Quality" <tsm...@wildmail.com> writes:
>
> >> Willow: Can I... I-I'm just wondering. Why? (gets a look from Buffy)
> >> I'm not the most objective, I know. I kind of have an issue with Faith
> >> sharing my people.
> >
> >Ooh, forgot about that line. Yes, that's a good taste of Willow's
> >worldview, and yes, it has an undercurrent of selfishness that's in
> >line with her past behavior.
>
> Selfish, yes - but it also shows self-awareness, emotional honesty,
> and her acknowledgement that such feelings are wrong.
>
> Let's not get too hung up yet on pointing out the darker side of
> Willow's character. :) She's not Faith...
Ab, fur'f vasvavgryl zber qnatrebhf guna Snvgu rire jnf.
BTR1701
Don Sample <dsa...@synapse.net> wrote:
Fher, vs lbh'ir arire frra gur fubj orsber gung zvtug or n ernfbanoyr
gurbel.
Don Sample
BTR1701 <btr...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
Juvpu vf jul fbzr crbcyr chg vg sbejneq, svefg gvzr nebhaq.
hopelessly devoted
Naq trgf fhpxrq va ol gur pbafgnag onentr bs ybir obzof. Abj gung'f
fbzrguvat V unqa'g pbafvqrerq orsber.
hopelessly devoted
Crosby, Stills, Nash and Jung. Latin and Psych. Not my forte. :->
Mel
Stephen Tempest wrote:
> "Arbitrar Of Quality" <tsm...@wildmail.com> writes:
>
>
>>(or "Hmm, sex games, then violence, then bondage. I wonder who wrote
>>this one?")
>>Writer: Marti Noxon
>
>
> Heh.
>
>
>>But the execution goes awry. Something about Buffy abruptly bursting
>>into tears doesn't feel quite right,
>
>
> It does seem melodramatic, but I think it's actually quite realistic -
> Buffy's in a severe state of shock and stress, and has been bottling
> it up all day. She starts to lower her defences because she's with
> Willow, and then she's suddenly hit by the line "I can't kill people
> with my bare hands like you can." I think an extreme reaction to that
> particular comment, in these circumstances, is predictable...
>
>
>>What's interesting in retrospect is that even here, Giles is
>>preaching that Faith isn't a bad person, she's just in denial, and
>>punishment isn't the right approach.
>
>
> I think the question is still left open at the end of this episode -
> but if Faith *is* in denial, it's buried really, really deep beneth
> her shell of bravado. She did seem to be responding to Angel just
> before the Watchers' Council team broke in.
>
> I also think that she's feeling hurt and angry at Buffy's attitude,
> which to her must seem condescending and holier-than-thou. Over the
> last few episodes, we've seen Faith gradually breaking out of her
> self-imposed isolation (all those 'unannounced walkabouts') to spend
> more time with Buffy, and finally to relate to her as a friend and
> equal. ("We're Slayers, girlfriend. The Chosen Two") Now, though,
> she knows she's in big trouble - but instead of helping her out with
> an alibi Buffy is whining about turning themselves in to the police.
> Not to mention standing there in her expensive clothes and looking at
> Faith as though she's just crawled out of a sewer.
Buffy never said they should go to the police. She said they should tell
Giles, which Faith absolutely refused to do. Btw, Buffy _did_ lie to the
police so the alibi excuse doesn't work either. She never turned Faith
in to anyone until Faith accused her, falsely, first.
Mel
>
> I think there's an argument to be made that Faith's two betrayals of
> Buffy in this episode - first telling Giles she killed Allan, and then
> going to work for the Mayor - are a direct reaction to the fact that
> *Faith* feels betrayed by *Buffy*, and is trying to strike back at
> her.
>
> Plus, added to that there's Angel's comments on the sense of power
> involved in killing someone. Faith's never been in control of her
> life, she's always been running away from something or other. Now,
> she's discovered what it's like to hold absolute power over someone
> else, to decide whther they live or die entirely at her whim. I think
> the scene with Xander can be understood as her testing that out, and
> discovering that she does like it. So maybe she's hoping that working
> for the Mayor will give her more opportunities.
>
>
>>Angel's arrival is neatly timed (side-note: I wonder if Faith
>>intentionally set up shop somewhere that practically invites vampires
>>to take a shot at her).
>
>
> Very interesting thought, and not one I've seen mentioned before.
> (People have questioned why Faith would live in a motel room
> vulnerable to vampires... the idea that it's a deliberate (or
> subconsious) choice is new to me)
>
>
>>Now that it's becoming a trend, let me say that I really like the
>>twisted sexually-charged direction the series is taking
>
>
> Hu bu. Qbrf guvf zrna NbD jvyy or n ovt sna bs Fchssl naq frnfba fvk?
> :)
>
> Stephen
Mel
Scythe Matters wrote:
<snip>
>
> I tend to believe that, at any point previous to killing Trick, it
> wasn't her intention to actually take the final turn towards the dark
> side. But everything we've seen with Faith this season, and especially
> the events of the last two episodes, serves to put her in an impossible
> position. She doesn't trust Buffy, or anyone else for that matter. She's
> hurt Xander. She obviously can't go back to either Watcher. She doesn't
> *want* to be helped by Angel, because he's hitting too close to the
> heart of things. So what are her options? Leave, sure, but what does she
> have in the next place she goes? Also, the Council's resources are
> myriad, and who can say if she'd ever be able to escape their pursuit
> (not even to mention what Buffy might try to do)? However, at the docks,
> she's obviously leaning towards flight...you can see her wavering, her
> hesitation, as she watches Trick strangle Buffy...and then, all of a
> sudden, she's there and staking him. In the moments between that
> wavering and the staking, she's come up with a plan. A desperate and
> awful one, but a plan nonetheless.
>
I don't see that as hesitation because her first reaction when the crate
fell on Buffy was to help her but she got attacked by vamps before she
could.
Mel
Mel
hopelessly devoted wrote:
There was probably a point off-screen where B and A talked about what
happened because Buffy is there when he brings Faith in.
Mel
hopelessly devoted
I would buy that except, Willow seems to be the first person she's
broken the news to and that happens after the interrogations.
hopelessly devoted
Don Sample wrote:
> > Angel putting the blood on B's hand with the blood on the dumpster, I
> > got that one. A outside of F's motel room and not B's house? That was
> > a little more of a Hmmmm for me. 1 + 1 = Faith. What????
>
> I figure he just followed the cops.
I can handle that one.
chr...@removethistoreply.gwu.edu
>
>>How long will this stage continue? Will the next stage also be wavery?
>>Does she have any more hot sex scenes? You'll see....
>
> Qbrf gur ubg frk fprar pbhag vs Snvgu vf orvat cynlrq ol Fnenu
> Zvpuryyr Tryyne ng gur gvzr?
Jryy, grpuavpnyyl V jnf gnyxvat nobhg Snvgu, abg Ryvmn. Cyhf vg jnf rnfl
ba gur rlrf. Fb V fnl lrf, vg pbhagf.
OGJ, lbh znqr zr ernyvmr ubj srj frk fprarf Snvgu npghnyyl unf. Cyragl bs
FRKL fprarf, ohg srj npghny FRK fprarf. Juvpu vf n funzr.
--Chris
______________________________________________________________________
chrisg [at] gwu.edu On the Internet, nobody knows I'm a dog.
Mel
hopelessly devoted wrote:
Here's the time line as I remember it:
Buffy tells Willow, then she goes to Giles.
Faith is there, then leaves, apparently goes back to her place.
Buffy and Giles find Willow and Xander and tell them what's going on.
Xander, at some point after this meeting, goes over to see Faith.
(Btw, didn't it look like she was dressed to go out and maybe waiting
for a date to show? She had her hair up, which we haven't seen very often.)
Angel hits Faith and saves Xander, then takes her back to the mansion
where we see him talk to her and then go meet with Buffy around the
corner so Faith can't see them.
We don't know what happened elsewhere while Xander is pondering whether
to go see Faith. Willow is in the bathroom crying, but we don't know
what B and A are doing. Maybe Angel followed Xander at Buffy's request
to make sure he didn't get in trouble??? To me, it really seemed like
Buffy knew Angel had Faith there, had agreed that he should try
something since nobody else was getting through, and was waiting to see
if there was anything she could do to help.
Mel
One Bit Shy
news:1143237828.9...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> Faith's plummet felt exactly like that. A plummet. On First Viewing,
> there were certain signs in her behavior, but the last two ep, IMO, was
> a whole new Faith. My opinion of her over the last two eps changed
> drastically. Breaking and Entering, Stealing, Want Take Have. Add in
> I Don't Care and the new found I go down you go down attitude and the
> old Faith seemed no where to be found.
This is where I think the long gap where Faith didn't appear much hurts.
Yes, you can point to her isolation and lack of follow-up over Revelations
as represented by the time off the screen, but I don't think it really
needed that, and in the meantime it's hard to keep fresh in one's mind where
she was in FH&T and Revelations.
One example. Remember her scenes with Xander in Revelations. How quick she
was to decide on killing Angel (who she *knew* Buffy had a thing for) and
how dismissive of Xander she was when he started having doubts. The
situation is very different from Bad Girls, but I'm not sure the attitude is
all that far from Want Take Have.
Some things did change over time - such as Faith getting fed up with what
she saw as Buffy's prissy attitude and deciding in Bad Girls to take
charge - to essentially replace Buffy as the queen slayer. (Yes, I think
part of that was a power move by Faith.) But she wasn't a whole new Faith
IMO.
The plummet you refer to is the product of it getting completely out of
hand - mainly the killing. But that's event driven within these two
episodes, not because a new Faith showed up at the start. So I remain of
the school that her emotional instability (or however you want to describe
it) has been there for a while just waiting for the right catalyst to send
her careening down the wrong path.
> Then Faith kills Trick to save Buffy
>> (same dying-vamp camera angle as at the beginning of BG, I believe).
>> This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
>> on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
>> Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
>> gone.
>
> More like being side swiped by a freight train. All the reasons and
> all the rationale aside. Faith now trusting the person who tried to
> kill her????? Brilliant twist but What the HELL what that?
mmmm. I don't assume trust yet. It was a gambit by Faith. She didn't know
what to expect for sure. She clearly hoped that it would lead to getting in
with the real power in town. But I expect she also arrived prepared for a
fight or a tense sizing each other up. Faith had some advantages going
there. First, she's a slayer, so she probably thinks she's got the fighting
edge. (She doesn't know he's invincible.) And she's got the drop on him
because Trick was supposed to kill her. And she may have some leverage on
him since she knows he's dirty. Evidently engough leverage to worry the
mayor enough to attempt a hit on her. So I think it was a calculated move
with some escape hatches. (She could *still* hop a freighter if the meeting
doesn't go well.)
It's still a huge surprise. But maybe not so strange.
Part of what gets me about that scene though, is not the surprise of Faith's
choice, but her innocence in walking through the door. No matter what led
her to him, she can't know what the mayor is really about. When the door
shuts to end the episode I'm always thinking of how Faith is well and truly
trapped now.
OBS
Jeff Jacoby
[snip]
> Angel hits Faith and saves Xander, then takes her back to the mansion
> where we see him talk to her and then go meet with Buffy around the
> corner so Faith can't see them.
>
> We don't know what happened elsewhere while Xander is pondering whether
> to go see Faith. Willow is in the bathroom crying, but we don't know
> what B and A are doing. Maybe Angel followed Xander at Buffy's request
> to make sure he didn't get in trouble??? To me, it really seemed like
> Buffy knew Angel had Faith there, had agreed that he should try
> something since nobody else was getting through, and was waiting to see
> if there was anything she could do to help.
Here's a possiblity.
Angel clocks Faith over head, knocking her out
good and cold. He checks to make sure Xander
is alive. Then he telephones Buffy from
Faith's room, or from the nearest payphone.
"Hey Buffy, Faith just tried to kill Xander,
I'm taking her to my place, meet me there."
Jeff
KenM47
the Chem test, got Buffy to steal, got Buffy to resist arrest, and
mistakenly killed a human guy and lied about it and tried to get Buffy
in trouble for it, and then she unmercifully teased a not struggling
until strangled Xander, and then disobeyed the CoW idiots, but still
saved Buffy's life (altho' that might have just been a lucky break
with Faith in revenge mode to Mr. Trick), and then she seemed to offer
herself up as an ally for the unknown bad of the Mayor.
We get it!
Lu-ceee! You got some 'splainin' to do!!
Can we move on to Dopplegangland now? Please! Life is short!
Ken (Brooklyn)
One Bit Shy
> Scythe Matters wrote:
>> I *do* think that the Faith/Angel scenes demonstrate wavering
>> and less-than-entire conviction on her part, but again I don't have the
>> time to show the work.
>
> I'd agree with that, and the general ideas that she's wavering and
> possibly lying to herself throughout the episode. That comes with the
> provision that I don't think I entirely understand Faith at this point
> in the series. But I like OBS's notion that her cotnrol over Xander
> plays a big part in getting her to enjoy that kind of power, and my
> redemtion-loving side wants to think that Angel had a chance to get
> through to her before the Council Of Plot Devices got involved.
My thoughts about how squeezing Xander's throat pushed her to her dark side
does not mean she didn't waver. I very much agree that she wavered
throughout the episode. I believe she has many forces pulling on her. The
Xander moment is special, though, because she learns how much she likes it.
As Angel said, she's got a taste for it now. So the wavering switched from
will she go over the edge to can she be pulled back.
Angel made a good stab at it. That's one of my favorite scenes with him -
and he's positively talkative in it. Having someone talk to Faith who
genuinely knew the joy of killing is really smart.
>> Willow: Can I... I-I'm just wondering. Why? (gets a look from Buffy)
>> I'm not the most objective, I know. I kind of have an issue with Faith
>> sharing my people.
>
> Ooh, forgot about that line. Yes, that's a good taste of Willow's
> worldview, and yes, it has an undercurrent of selfishness that's in
> line with her past behavior.
It's a weird line. It actually makes me uncomfortable to hear it. As some
people have pointed out, it may point to Faith with Buffy as much as it does
to Faith with Xander. But I can't help but think of the Xander part as
being bigger - it did generate the big cry after all - so this comes across
almost as assertng possession of Xander.
Part of the impact to me is that the moment is an echo of Xander's
confrontations with Buffy over Angel. But in Willow's way. Quiter, more
controlled, deadlier. (I wonder how she would have acted with Oz around.)
>> We just don't know if she's telling the truth or not when she claims to
>> have just been fooling around with Xander. It's the not knowing that
>> makes the character so incredibly dangerous.
>
> And we thought she was such a bad liar? Actually, I find it's hard to
> tell where the truth lies when the issue concerns whether of not Faith
> really believes what she's saying.
Does she even know if she believes it?
OBS
Mike Zeares
Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
>
> One-sentence summary: And you thought the last one gave us things to
> chew on?
>
> AOQ rating: Excellent
Yeah. By the way, I've been absent for the last few threads because 1)
I've been feeling under the weather, and 2) we are now into the part of
S3 that is so good that I simply can't come up with anything to say
about it. I articulate dislike much better than love. I'm sure that
says something about me.
Also, you haven't said anything lately that I vehemently disagree with,
which makes it really hard for me to participate. ;-)
-- Mike Zeares
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
KenM47 <Ken...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> OK.OK. Yeah. We get it. Faith was "bad," cause she talked Buffy out of
> the Chem test, got Buffy to steal, got Buffy to resist arrest, and
> mistakenly killed a human guy and lied about it and tried to get Buffy
> in trouble for it, and then she unmercifully teased a not struggling
> until strangled Xander, and then disobeyed the CoW idiots, but still
> saved Buffy's life (altho' that might have just been a lucky break
> with Faith in revenge mode to Mr. Trick), and then she seemed to offer
> herself up as an ally for the unknown bad of the Mayor.
>
> We get it!
>
> Lu-ceee! You got some 'splainin' to do!!
bored now
> Can we move on to Dopplegangland now? Please! Life is short!
>
> Ken (Brooklyn)
arf meow arf - nsa fodder
al qaeda terrorism nuclear bomb iran taliban big brother
if you meet buddha on the usenet killfile him
Arbitrar Of Quality
> OK.OK. Yeah. We get it. Faith was "bad," [snip]
> We get it!
>
> Can we move on to Dopplegangland now? Please! Life is short!
Dude, what's your deal? The "Consequences" review has been up for less
than 24 hours and you've been at this since the afternoon. And this
wing of the thread isn't just about whether Faith is bad. It's about
how much of the groundwork for this character turn has been in place
since F/H/T and "Revelations," how surprised people were, how well it
works, how the pacing of S3 might deract from it... I thought it was
an interesting discussion.
-AOQ
~"Dopplegangland" review is posted, BTW. Enjoy~
Arbitrar Of Quality
> Yeah. By the way, I've been absent for the last few threads because 1)
> I've been feeling under the weather, and 2) we are now into the part of
> S3 that is so good that I simply can't come up with anything to say
> about it. I articulate dislike much better than love. I'm sure that
> says something about me.
>
> Also, you haven't said anything lately that I vehemently disagree with,
> which makes it really hard for me to participate. ;-)
I tried to talk some smack about "Dopplegangland," just for you.
-AOQ
~no, it doesn't actually have anything to do with you, but let's
pretend~
One Bit Shy
I don't have time for the full response now. And I'm going to be gone for a
couple of days... Rats! This is one of the great episodes for my tastes.
Oh, well, let me toss a few things out...
--
Another agreement on Excellent. That's 3 out of 4. The 4th you chose DMP,
while I chose Revelations. Other than Lovers Walk they all went straight
for the pain. Hmmmm.
--
One question people often have is whether Faith killed Trick to save Buffy.
There *are* other reasons to kill Faith.
-- As Scythe pointed out, she may have constructed the plan to go to the
Mayor in that moment of hesitation before dusting Trick.
-- BTR1701 reminded that Trick had been associated with Kakistos. There may
be a revenge factor.
-- There's also a rather more immediate motivation. Trick is there to kill
Faith - not just Buffy. Dusting him while his back is turned may be the
prudent thing to do if she plans to stay alive.
So saving Buffy is not a necessary motive for her to kill Trick.
However, I don't end up there. I do believe that Trick's threat to Faith's
life is sufficient motive in itself. And I do think it's possible that she
worked out her plan to approach the mayor before staking Trick. (She didn't
have to. She could easily have come up with that plan afterwards. But it's
a lot more dramatic to imagine it coming to her in a flash during battle.
<g>) I don't buy the Kakistos theory because I don't see evidence that
Trick made much of an impression on Faith. She did see him in the hallway
at City Hall, and the only reaction I notice to that is being intrigued that
the Mayor is a "black hat".
I also think she was motivated to save Buffy. As mad as she was at Buffy, I
don't think she had reached the point yet of wanting her dead. (I believe
the next episode will support that opinion.)
But it goes deeper than that, I believe. In spite of the gulf that has been
dug between the two since the killing, I still think there's a real bond
between them. I won't go into all of that now, but I'd like to return for a
moment to a question I asked back in FH&T. Why did Faith come to Sunnydale
to begin with?
I suppose, obviously, to meet Buffy. But look a little deeper. One
imagines that Faith lived a pretty isolated life before Sunnydale. Indeed,
what with her dropping out of high school, and her drunk mom relegated to
some forever cut off past, did she actually have an ongoing relationship
with anybody but her watcher? It's possible that once her watcher died that
there were only two meaningful individuals that she knew of. Kakistos - out
to kill her. And Buffy - a legend.
Perhaps there were others we don't know about. But I don't see how there
could have been much. And unlikely anyone that could actually help her.
The only useful name she knew was Buffy, who she probably knew of solely
through tales told to her by her watcher. Tales that probably sounded
pretty cool. So she took off to find a legend, only imagining what that
hero might do for her. (Emphasis on imagine.) And nowhere else to go. She
came to Sunnydale on hope alone.
(Side note. Faith's world is incredibly small - still. When asking why she
would turn to the Mayor, part of the question should be who else could she
turn to? It's a short list. Incredibly short. It's either Buffy's gang.
The Mayor. Or...run away to nowhere? The thing is, that until the day
before, the Mayor wasn't even on it. That's a new idea. Intriguing. And
based on hope alone. Something she's acted on before.)
Well, we've seen what she found in Sunnydale. Not quite what she expected
or hoped for. Yet some of the unexpected she must have yearned for all that
much more. (Joyce alone must make her ache.) And though Buffy wasn't the
hero she imagined, she turned out to be a hero none the less. Buffy still
represents hope.
There's more, but in the end I think Faith must have been compelled to save
Buffy. And that feeling for Buffy is now part of her schism. Now she can't
let go of the evil pulling on her. But can she let go of Buffy either?
The Faith/Buffy story is to a very large extent one of holding mirrors up to
each other. They are each other's example of what they might have been in
different circumstances.
But such an abstract concept invariably falters as the people involved
establish their own personality and character. It's still an important idea
to think of, but for me, I think of Faith and Buffy as sisters - not twin
sisters. And they have a connection as sisters that can never be fully
severed.
OBS
One Bit Shy
news:0ne922h4pq840aa6u...@4ax.com...
> OK.OK. Yeah. We get it. Faith was "bad," cause she talked Buffy out of
> the Chem test, got Buffy to steal, got Buffy to resist arrest, and
> mistakenly killed a human guy and lied about it and tried to get Buffy
> in trouble for it, and then she unmercifully teased a not struggling
> until strangled Xander, and then disobeyed the CoW idiots, but still
> saved Buffy's life (altho' that might have just been a lucky break
> with Faith in revenge mode to Mr. Trick), and then she seemed to offer
> herself up as an ally for the unknown bad of the Mayor.
>
> We get it!
Well, gee. Then I guess I'll just have to regale you with my theory of
Faith, the ultimate innocent. heh-heh
> Lu-ceee! You got some 'splainin' to do!!
>
> Can we move on to Dopplegangland now? Please! Life is short!
Now what might you want to look at there? I simply can't imagine.
>
> Ken (Brooklyn)
hopelessly devoted
Actally it's not the second lurking outside of the hotel room that gets
me. It's the lurk right after the police questioning Faith. The
second lurk I would have to go with Jeff Jacoby's scenario. Angel
clocks Faith, tends to Xander and goes to Buffy for some answers.
However in my scenario, he ties her up first, and calls second. See
B&TB.
It's the first lurk that seems to go 1+1=Faith.
:->
KenM47
KenM47
Thanks. I got anxious over all the angst and was looking for the fun.
Your review proves again one must always be careful what one wishes
for.
I didn't expect you to speed up posting the Doppelgangland review
because of my little display of impatience (which was also an effort
to be humorous, but perhaps wasn't; I ain't no pro writer).
Ken (Brooklyn)
BTR1701
"One Bit Shy" <O...@nomail.sorry> wrote:
> I suppose, obviously, to meet Buffy. But look a little deeper. One
> imagines that Faith lived a pretty isolated life before Sunnydale. Indeed,
> what with her dropping out of high school, and her drunk mom relegated to
> some forever cut off past, did she actually have an ongoing relationship
> with anybody but her watcher? It's possible that once her watcher died that
> there were only two meaningful individuals that she knew of. Perhaps
> there were others we don't know about.
Well, there was Delilah... wait, never mind. ;-)
> The only useful name she knew was Buffy, who she probably knew of solely
> through tales told to her by her watcher.
Or perhaps her Watcher didn't tell her any tales at all. Perhaps her
Watcher told her about Buffy at the point of extremis, moments before
she was murdered. Sort of like "if you survive this, go to California,
find the other Slayer Buffy Summers and her Watcher. They'll look after
you."
Faith's Watcher may have only mentioned Buffy once for all we know and
Faith, with nowhere to go and a really brassed off master on her trail,
figured that Sunnydale was her only option.
Don Sample
BTR1701 <btr...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
Faith had heard about the rocket launcher, so it isn't likely that her
watcher waited until the last moment, and told Faith about Buffy as she
was dying.
BTR1701
Don Sample <dsa...@synapse.net> wrote:
We don't know where Faith heard about the rocket launcher. We see her
introduce herself in the alley, then commercial break, then the next
scene opens in the Bronze with Faith in mid-anecdote. Obviously an
indeterminate amount of "get-to-know-you" time had elapsed that we never
got to see. The rocket launcher may have been mentioned by Xander or
Willow or Buffy herself at any point during that conversation.
hopelessly devoted
One Bit Shy wrote:
> "hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote in message
> news:1143237828.9...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>
>
> > Faith's plummet felt exactly like that. A plummet. On First Viewing,
> > there were certain signs in her behavior, but the last two ep, IMO, was
> > a whole new Faith. My opinion of her over the last two eps changed
> > drastically. Breaking and Entering, Stealing, Want Take Have. Add in
> > I Don't Care and the new found I go down you go down attitude and the
> > old Faith seemed no where to be found.
I'm starting to change my view of this in light of a new improved
theory. ;->
> This is where I think the long gap where Faith didn't appear much hurts.
> Yes, you can point to her isolation and lack of follow-up over Revelations
> as represented by the time off the screen, but I don't think it really
> needed that, and in the meantime it's hard to keep fresh in one's mind where
> she was in FH&T and Revelations.
>
> One example. Remember her scenes with Xander in Revelations. How quick she
> was to decide on killing Angel (who she *knew* Buffy had a thing for) and
> how dismissive of Xander she was when he started having doubts. The
> situation is very different from Bad Girls, but I'm not sure the attitude is
> all that far from Want Take Have.
New Theory. To prove something. To prove that she can succeed where B
failed. B failed to take care of a potential problem. F will not fail
in that respect and in the end she will be viewed as the better slayer.
> Some things did change over time - such as Faith getting fed up with what
> she saw as Buffy's prissy attitude and deciding in Bad Girls to take
> charge - to essentially replace Buffy as the queen slayer. (Yes, I think
> part of that was a power move by Faith.) But she wasn't a whole new Faith
> IMO.
Newly Agreed!
> The plummet you refer to is the product of it getting completely out of
> hand - mainly the killing. But that's event driven within these two
> episodes, not because a new Faith showed up at the start. So I remain of
> the school that her emotional instability (or however you want to describe
> it) has been there for a while just waiting for the right catalyst to send
> her careening down the wrong path.
Sort of coming to the same conclusion. I still think the Breaking and
Entering, Stealing, Want Take Have is radically new, but, and again, if
the new theory holds water, F is proving herself.
> > Then Faith kills Trick to save Buffy
> >> (same dying-vamp camera angle as at the beginning of BG, I believe).
> >> This would seem to suggest that, as Buffy says, she shouldn't give up
> >> on her. But of course she also proceeds to try for Trick's old job.
> >> Again, we the audience probably hadn't realized that she was so far
> >> gone.
> >
> > More like being side swiped by a freight train. All the reasons and
> > all the rationale aside. Faith now trusting the person who tried to
> > kill her????? Brilliant twist but What the HELL what that?
>
> mmmm. I don't assume trust yet. It was a gambit by Faith. She didn't know
> what to expect for sure. She clearly hoped that it would lead to getting in
> with the real power in town. But I expect she also arrived prepared for a
> fight or a tense sizing each other up. Faith had some advantages going
> there. First, she's a slayer, so she probably thinks she's got the fighting
> edge. (She doesn't know he's invincible.) And she's got the drop on him
> because Trick was supposed to kill her. And she may have some leverage on
> him since she knows he's dirty. Evidently engough leverage to worry the
> mayor enough to attempt a hit on her. So I think it was a calculated move
> with some escape hatches. (She could *still* hop a freighter if the meeting
> doesn't go well.)
I'm having a thought. Why didn't she hop the freighter to begin with?
B passed her by completely. F revealed HERSELF. Why? Because she had
something to prove to B and possibly to herself. My theory regarding
the Open Discussion, in a way, I still believe. But now, going back,
and in light of new BG evidence (so to speak), Faith has been trying to
prove herself since day one.
> It's still a huge surprise. But maybe not so strange.
>
> Part of what gets me about that scene though, is not the surprise of Faith's
> choice, but her innocence in walking through the door. No matter what led
> her to him, she can't know what the mayor is really about. When the door
> shuts to end the episode I'm always thinking of how Faith is well and truly
> trapped now.
Two things. One way to prove yourself is to walk right into the lions
cage. Also, fighting for the good guys has gotten her no where in
terms of respect. She's been unable to prove herself to B or to the
Council.
Vs fur pna fheivir jvgu gur rarzl, ba uvf grezf, fur fgvyy pbzrf bhg
gur orggre fynlre fb gb fcrnx. Erzrzore, fur qbrfa'g fgbc fynlvat va n
znaare bs fcrnxvat.
hopelessly devoted
One Bit Shy wrote:
I know. You're gone. And I'm REALLY annoying.
> One question people often have is whether Faith killed Trick to save Buffy.
>
> There *are* other reasons to kill Faith.
>
> -- As Scythe pointed out, she may have constructed the plan to go to the
> Mayor in that moment of hesitation before dusting Trick.
> -- BTR1701 reminded that Trick had been associated with Kakistos. There may
> be a revenge factor.
> -- There's also a rather more immediate motivation. Trick is there to kill
> Faith - not just Buffy. Dusting him while his back is turned may be the
> prudent thing to do if she plans to stay alive.
>
> So saving Buffy is not a necessary motive for her to kill Trick.
By saving B, F becomes the better slayer. Again on the proving herself
theory that I wrote somewhere in here. I know, I know.
> However, I don't end up there. I do believe that Trick's threat to Faith's
> life is sufficient motive in itself. And I do think it's possible that she
> worked out her plan to approach the mayor before staking Trick. (She didn't
> have to. She could easily have come up with that plan afterwards. But it's
> a lot more dramatic to imagine it coming to her in a flash during battle.
> <g>) I don't buy the Kakistos theory because I don't see evidence that
> Trick made much of an impression on Faith. She did see him in the hallway
> at City Hall, and the only reaction I notice to that is being intrigued that
> the Mayor is a "black hat".
>
> I also think she was motivated to save Buffy. As mad as she was at Buffy, I
> don't think she had reached the point yet of wanting her dead. (I believe
> the next episode will support that opinion.)
>
> But it goes deeper than that, I believe. In spite of the gulf that has been
> dug between the two since the killing, I still think there's a real bond
> between them.
In light of new evidence, I invite you to return to the last minute of
BG and watch the bedpost specifically.
I won't go into all of that now, but I'd like to return for a
> moment to a question I asked back in FH&T. Why did Faith come to Sunnydale
> to begin with?
>
> I suppose, obviously, to meet Buffy. But look a little deeper. One
> imagines that Faith lived a pretty isolated life before Sunnydale. Indeed,
> what with her dropping out of high school, and her drunk mom relegated to
> some forever cut off past, did she actually have an ongoing relationship
> with anybody but her watcher? It's possible that once her watcher died that
> there were only two meaningful individuals that she knew of. Kakistos - out
> to kill her. And Buffy - a legend.
>
> Perhaps there were others we don't know about. But I don't see how there
> could have been much. And unlikely anyone that could actually help her.
> The only useful name she knew was Buffy, who she probably knew of solely
> through tales told to her by her watcher. Tales that probably sounded
> pretty cool. So she took off to find a legend, only imagining what that
> hero might do for her. (Emphasis on imagine.) And nowhere else to go. She
> came to Sunnydale on hope alone.
Not throwing her trust issues aside by any means, I challenge you to a
duel of theories. Faith came to Sunnydale to compare. Her first
scenes in FH&T: very cocky slay of the vampire "Thanks B. I couldn't
have done it without you." Her tall tales with the gang. "What was
your toughest kill?" Again, if this theory holds water, B helping her
with Kakistos, being the stronger and braver of the two at the time,
probably didn't sit too well with F. But now she has a reason to stay.
She has to stay so she can prove herself better.
> (Side note. Faith's world is incredibly small - still. When asking why she
> would turn to the Mayor, part of the question should be who else could she
> turn to? It's a short list. Incredibly short. It's either Buffy's gang.
> The Mayor. Or...run away to nowhere? The thing is, that until the day
> before, the Mayor wasn't even on it. That's a new idea. Intriguing. And
> based on hope alone. Something she's acted on before.)
Addressed above or below. I can't remember.
> Well, we've seen what she found in Sunnydale. Not quite what she expected
> or hoped for. Yet some of the unexpected she must have yearned for all that
> much more. (Joyce alone must make her ache.) And though Buffy wasn't the
> hero she imagined, she turned out to be a hero none the less. Buffy still
> represents hope.
Bedpost.
> There's more, but in the end I think Faith must have been compelled to save
> Buffy. And that feeling for Buffy is now part of her schism. Now she can't
> let go of the evil pulling on her. But can she let go of Buffy either?
By saving B, from being thrown around like a rag doll and nearly
killed, F walked away a winner.
> The Faith/Buffy story is to a very large extent one of holding mirrors up to
> each other. They are each other's example of what they might have been in
> different circumstances.
>
> But such an abstract concept invariably falters as the people involved
> establish their own personality and character. It's still an important idea
> to think of, but for me, I think of Faith and Buffy as sisters - not twin
> sisters. And they have a connection as sisters that can never be fully
> severed.
Agreed.
Arbitrar Of Quality
> I don't know if it had been bought up before, and I was sort of waiting
> for it. BTVS did something in that department that, until the show
> aired, no other prime time show had bothered to do. Black people. You
> get shows that are all one or all the other. You get shows that have a
> guest spot every now and then. But this show actually had Black
> people.
Huh. When I was watching S1 I remember being a little surprised that,
given SF/F conventions of mixing races, the show seemed to be strictly
the caucasian persuasion. We're comparing it to different things.
-AOQ
Eric Hunter
> Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
>
>> that one get a special rating from you?)
>
> "Innocence" gets a "superlative" from me, but I'd forgotten about
> "Becoming the first."
Isn't the actual title of "Becoming the First", "Amends"? ;-)
Eric.
--
One Bit Shy
>
> One Bit Shy wrote:
>> "hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote in message
>> news:1143237828.9...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>> One example. Remember her scenes with Xander in Revelations. How quick
>> she
>> was to decide on killing Angel (who she *knew* Buffy had a thing for) and
>> how dismissive of Xander she was when he started having doubts. The
>> situation is very different from Bad Girls, but I'm not sure the attitude
>> is
>> all that far from Want Take Have.
>
> New Theory. To prove something. To prove that she can succeed where B
> failed. B failed to take care of a potential problem. F will not fail
> in that respect and in the end she will be viewed as the better slayer.
I see that you're heading towards the general idea that she's been trying to
prove herself all along.
Yes, absolutely I agree with that. This goes back to questioning what she
was doing in FH&T. If she came looking for Buffy (I believe for help), why
did she introduce herself in the way she did and put on the face she did and
hide her problems the way she did? The most rationale answer that I know of
was a need to look good to Buffy, to prove herself worthy as a slayer.
After all, she *is* a slayer, but not famous like Buffy, and at that time,
she likely felt like a failed slayer. She didn't want to approach Buffy
saying she couldn't do her job with Kakistos.
One thing led to another and Faith found herself constantly trailing behind
Buffy in some fashion, including in Buffy's eyes - right up to, "Count to
three isn't a plan. It's Sesame Street." So, yeah, major motivation.
In the Revelations moment, I think proving herself was aimed mainly at
Gwendolyn (it sure wouldn't get on the good side of Buffy), but it's still a
motivation.
The way she did it was pure Faith, though. The pre-emptive strike. And
*not* how Gwendolyn would approach it (if she were a watcher). Faith had
just been mildly rebuked by her for being so unprepared for her previous
demon encounter. And you can see then that there's no such thing as too far
or wait a sec when she gets revved up. In the category of of presaging,
Xander said wait. Then in Bad Girls, Buffy said Wait.
>> The plummet you refer to is the product of it getting completely out of
>> hand - mainly the killing. But that's event driven within these two
>> episodes, not because a new Faith showed up at the start. So I remain of
>> the school that her emotional instability (or however you want to
>> describe
>> it) has been there for a while just waiting for the right catalyst to
>> send
>> her careening down the wrong path.
>
> Sort of coming to the same conclusion. I still think the Breaking and
> Entering, Stealing, Want Take Have is radically new, but, and again, if
> the new theory holds water, F is proving herself.
I've wondered how new it was. But considering her continued Spartan
existence and lack of fancy weapons, I guess it was new. And I suppose that
the philosophy has grown out of her conclusion that she can't trust people.
So some things are changed. How radical the changes are... well, I see that
more in impact than being all that much closer mentally to her dark side.
In Faith logic she was simply facing reality and had no idea how she was
shutting doors behind here, since she didn't believe those doors ever
existed.
Possibly. It's hard for me to speculate on that since there are likely
multiple possibilities and all I really can see for sure is that there's no
scene if she doesn't show.
>> It's still a huge surprise. But maybe not so strange.
>>
>> Part of what gets me about that scene though, is not the surprise of
>> Faith's
>> choice, but her innocence in walking through the door. No matter what
>> led
>> her to him, she can't know what the mayor is really about. When the door
>> shuts to end the episode I'm always thinking of how Faith is well and
>> truly
>> trapped now.
>
> Two things. One way to prove yourself is to walk right into the lions
> cage. Also, fighting for the good guys has gotten her no where in
> terms of respect. She's been unable to prove herself to B or to the
> Council.
Mmmm. I'm not convinced of that. I'd still go with diminished options -
she was ready to hop the freighter. So there has to be desperation
involved. However, I will concede that she probably thought it was a clever
plan.
> Vs fur pna fheivir jvgu gur rarzl, ba uvf grezf, fur fgvyy pbzrf bhg
> gur orggre fynlre fb gb fcrnx. Erzrzore, fur qbrfa'g fgbc fynlvat va n
> znaare bs fcrnxvat.
Perhaps as 1 of a bunch of wild hopes. But as calculation that's more than
I would expect of her.
OBS
One Bit Shy
news:btr1702-988EA9...@news.giganews.com...
Granted. I'm making a lot of speculation based on presumption of
circumstance. I think it's likely that she would have hung a lot of hope on
the idea of Buffy and worked up an image in her mind before showing up. But
even without that, you still have her very diminished range of choices - she
lives in a small world - and a precedent for reaching for a vague notion of
a solution. It still kind of presages a radical choice like going to the
Mayor.
OBS
One Bit Shy
>
> One Bit Shy wrote:
>
> I know. You're gone. And I'm REALLY annoying.
I'm back, and challenging me to an annoy fest is a dangerous thing to do.
heh-heh
>> So saving Buffy is not a necessary motive for her to kill Trick.
>
> By saving B, F becomes the better slayer.
It doesn't hurt... But the thing is, that Buffy is in trouble because she
was hurt from the fall of the cargo - the fall that Buffy saved Faith from
receiving the brunt of. I think Faith knows that, so I struggle to think
that this would prove much. But it doesn't hurt.
>> Well, we've seen what she found in Sunnydale. Not quite what she
>> expected
>> or hoped for. Yet some of the unexpected she must have yearned for all
>> that
>> much more. (Joyce alone must make her ache.) And though Buffy wasn't
>> the
>> hero she imagined, she turned out to be a hero none the less. Buffy
>> still
>> represents hope.
>
> Bedpost.
You like that post. (Are you sure it's part of the bed?)
Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
it could be perceived as breasts.
I'm not sure how far to take it - or more to the point, I'm not sure what it
alters. I'm sure she's wanted to whale away on Buffy at times. (Among
other things, she couldn't have been happy with the Revelations fight.
Afterwards, she appeared to have gotten the worst of it.) It wouldn't
terribly surprise me if she used Buffy sometimes as the object of a workout.
She's a conflicted emotions gal. And maybe the image was used to point to
them as becoming adversaries.
But, uh, so what? What does that change?
>> There's more, but in the end I think Faith must have been compelled to
>> save
>> Buffy. And that feeling for Buffy is now part of her schism. Now she
>> can't
>> let go of the evil pulling on her. But can she let go of Buffy either?
>
> By saving B, from being thrown around like a rag doll and nearly
> killed, F walked away a winner.
As you can see near the end, it made Buffy feel more favorable to her, and
even gave Giles some hope. (Largely based, I think, on Buffy wanting to
help Faith.) I don't know what precisely Faith thought at the moment of
killing Trick. (We are asking an awful lot of a few seconds depiction and a
script.) But her expression and history does suggest to me that at the
least there was a storm of multiple feelings. Triumph likely was part of
it. Especially as she puts together the idea of going to the Mayor.
(Whether that happened right then or upon reflection.) Even so, I don't
think she needed craven reasons to not want to see Buffy die. There are
genuinely good things to be gotten for it. It does make up a little for the
hurt she's done. (This might be as simple as assuaging her guilt so that
she's free to pursue her new course with a clean concience.) For all her
anger at Buffy, Buffy's still done good things for Faith too. And even
though not living up to it has driven Faith crazy, I thnk Buffy is still
Faith's model for slayerdom.
>> The Faith/Buffy story is to a very large extent one of holding mirrors up
>> to
>> each other. They are each other's example of what they might have been
>> in
>> different circumstances.
>>
>> But such an abstract concept invariably falters as the people involved
>> establish their own personality and character. It's still an important
>> idea
>> to think of, but for me, I think of Faith and Buffy as sisters - not twin
>> sisters. And they have a connection as sisters that can never be fully
>> severed.
>
> Agreed.
>
OBS
hopelessly devoted
One Bit Shy wrote:
> "hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote in message
> news:1143369549.0...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
> >
> > One Bit Shy wrote:
> >> "hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote in message
> >> news:1143237828.9...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>
> >> One example. Remember her scenes with Xander in Revelations. How quick
> >> she
> >> was to decide on killing Angel (who she *knew* Buffy had a thing for) and
> >> how dismissive of Xander she was when he started having doubts. The
> >> situation is very different from Bad Girls, but I'm not sure the attitude
> >> is
> >> all that far from Want Take Have.
> >
> > New Theory. To prove something. To prove that she can succeed where B
> > failed. B failed to take care of a potential problem. F will not fail
> > in that respect and in the end she will be viewed as the better slayer.
>
> I see that you're heading towards the general idea that she's been trying to
> prove herself all along.
>
> Yes, absolutely I agree with that. This goes back to questioning what she
> was doing in FH&T.
That one question has been driving me crazy since you asked it. :->
For me, this always seemed like it was a huge jump. Until now. Now it
seems like a very natural progression.
hopelessly devoted
Down boy.
> I'm not sure how far to take it - or more to the point, I'm not sure what it
> alters. I'm sure she's wanted to whale away on Buffy at times. (Among
> other things, she couldn't have been happy with the Revelations fight.
> Afterwards, she appeared to have gotten the worst of it.) It wouldn't
> terribly surprise me if she used Buffy sometimes as the object of a workout.
> She's a conflicted emotions gal. And maybe the image was used to point to
> them as becoming adversaries.
>
> But, uh, so what? What does that change?
I really don't believe I ever noticed it before. But something in
seeing the bedpost has led to this new line of thinking for me. I was
actually working on the assumption of Faith accepting her darker side.
Since for me, the BG Faith seemed so new, and the acceptance was
pre-Allen, I went back to it looking for a trigger for that acceptance.
I found that instead. I'm not exactly sure if it's a bedpost, but
after seeing it, I had to watch it a couple of time to make sure it
wasn't an accident. I watched, I posted, I watched again. Things just
suddenly started to make sense for this twisted little mind. Mine, not
Faith's.
> >> There's more, but in the end I think Faith must have been compelled to
> >> save
> >> Buffy. And that feeling for Buffy is now part of her schism. Now she
> >> can't
> >> let go of the evil pulling on her. But can she let go of Buffy either?
> >
> > By saving B, from being thrown around like a rag doll and nearly
> > killed, F walked away a winner.
>
> As you can see near the end, it made Buffy feel more favorable to her, and
> even gave Giles some hope. (Largely based, I think, on Buffy wanting to
> help Faith.) I don't know what precisely Faith thought at the moment of
> killing Trick. (We are asking an awful lot of a few seconds depiction and a
> script.) But her expression and history does suggest to me that at the
> least there was a storm of multiple feelings. Triumph likely was part of
> it. Especially as she puts together the idea of going to the Mayor.
> (Whether that happened right then or upon reflection.) Even so, I don't
> think she needed craven reasons to not want to see Buffy die. There are
> genuinely good things to be gotten for it. It does make up a little for the
> hurt she's done. (This might be as simple as assuaging her guilt so that
> she's free to pursue her new course with a clean concience.) For all her
> anger at Buffy, Buffy's still done good things for Faith too. And even
> though not living up to it has driven Faith crazy, I thnk Buffy is still
> Faith's model for slayerdom.
Good points.
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
>
> You like that post. (Are you sure it's part of the bed?)
>
> Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
> it could be perceived as breasts.
im wondering if theres any significance to buffy showing up
dressed like fifties suburban mom
BTR1701
Seems to me that given Faith's personality, she would have built up a
not-very-flattering image of the girl once she found out her name was
Buffy.
Don Sample
<mair_fheal-69197...@sn-ip.vsrv-sjc.supernews.net>,
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
<mair_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > Bedpost.
> >
> > You like that post. (Are you sure it's part of the bed?)
> >
> > Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
> > it could be perceived as breasts.
>
> im wondering if theres any significance to buffy showing up
> dressed like fifties suburban mom
Buffy has been dressing like that all season. It's one of her ugly "I'm
a good girl" outfits.
Stephen Tempest
>Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
>it could be perceived as breasts.
>
>I'm not sure how far to take it - or more to the point, I'm not sure what it
>alters. I'm sure she's wanted to whale away on Buffy at times. (Among
>other things, she couldn't have been happy with the Revelations fight.
>Afterwards, she appeared to have gotten the worst of it.) It wouldn't
>terribly surprise me if she used Buffy sometimes as the object of a workout.
>She's a conflicted emotions gal. And maybe the image was used to point to
>them as becoming adversaries.
I'd not noticed the bedpost at all until hopelessly pointed it out -
but I didn't get the impression it was supposed to be Buffy. For one
thing, it appeared to have fangs - and the style of drawing the eyes
as crosses instead of circles is usually used to represent something
that's died. And the extra padding in the chest area could just be
because that's where Faith would hit it most often...
(Fcvxr'f Natry chapuvat ont va F7 unq pebffrf sbe rlrf gbb - jbaqre vs
gurl jrer cercnerq ol gur fnzr cebcf crefba?)
However, when Buffy stepped forward so that her face was directly in
front of the punching bag's face - *that*, I think, was deliberate
directing...
Stephen
Jeff Jacoby
> "One Bit Shy" <O...@nomail.sorry> writes:
>
>>Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
>>it could be perceived as breasts.
>>
>>I'm not sure how far to take it - or more to the point, I'm not sure what it
>>alters. I'm sure she's wanted to whale away on Buffy at times. (Among
>>other things, she couldn't have been happy with the Revelations fight.
>>Afterwards, she appeared to have gotten the worst of it.) It wouldn't
>>terribly surprise me if she used Buffy sometimes as the object of a workout.
>>She's a conflicted emotions gal. And maybe the image was used to point to
>>them as becoming adversaries.
>
> I'd not noticed the bedpost at all until hopelessly pointed it out -
> but I didn't get the impression it was supposed to be Buffy. For one
> thing, it appeared to have fangs - and the style of drawing the eyes
> as crosses instead of circles is usually used to represent something
> that's died. And the extra padding in the chest area could just be
> because that's where Faith would hit it most often...
>
> (Fcvxr'f Natry chapuvat ont va F7 unq pebffrf sbe rlrf gbb - jbaqre vs
> gurl jrer cercnerq ol gur fnzr cebcf crefba?)
Nppbeqvat gb pbzzragnel, Wbff qerj vg.
Jeff
Don Sample
Stephen Tempest <ste...@stempest.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> (Fcvxr'f Natry chapuvat ont va F7 unq pebffrf sbe rlrf gbb - jbaqre vs
> gurl jrer cercnerq ol gur fnzr cebcf crefba?)
Joss did the one in season 7.
One Bit Shy
Stephen Tempest wrote:
> "One Bit Shy" <O...@nomail.sorry> writes:
>
> >Well... I do note that the way the pillow is squished out at the top, that
> >it could be perceived as breasts.
> >
> >I'm not sure how far to take it - or more to the point, I'm not sure what it
> >alters. I'm sure she's wanted to whale away on Buffy at times. (Among
> >other things, she couldn't have been happy with the Revelations fight.
> >Afterwards, she appeared to have gotten the worst of it.) It wouldn't
> >terribly surprise me if she used Buffy sometimes as the object of a workout.
> >She's a conflicted emotions gal. And maybe the image was used to point to
> >them as becoming adversaries.
>
> I'd not noticed the bedpost at all until hopelessly pointed it out -
> but I didn't get the impression it was supposed to be Buffy. For one
> thing, it appeared to have fangs - and the style of drawing the eyes
> as crosses instead of circles is usually used to represent something
> that's died. And the extra padding in the chest area could just be
> because that's where Faith would hit it most often...
That's pretty much what I always took for granted. I was just trying
to imagine what else it might signify once Hopelessly Devoted got me
looking at it and, well, the pillow was the best I could come up with.
(I guess I've got a dose of Xander in me. Thank heavens it wasn't made
of linoleum.)
> (Fcvxr'f Natry chapuvat ont va F7 unq pebffrf sbe rlrf gbb - jbaqre vs
> gurl jrer cercnerq ol gur fnzr cebcf crefba?)
>
> However, when Buffy stepped forward so that her face was directly in
> front of the punching bag's face - *that*, I think, was deliberate
> directing...
All the framing and movement is deliberate. But does it signify
anything special beyond them becoming adversaries?
OBS
Opus the Penguin
> I don't know if it had been bought up before, and I was sort of
> waiting for it. BTVS did something in that department that, until
> the show aired, no other prime time show had bothered to do.
> Black people. You get shows that are all one or all the other.
> You get shows that have a guest spot every now and then. But this
> show actually had Black people. Not the typical angry black man
> or the fat saucy black woman. Real people. Kendra - powerful, a
> calling, intelligent and very beautiful. Her first appearance and
> ep ending "I'm Kendra the Vampire Slayer" was a beautiful moment.
> (Tvan Gbeerf nf gur ornhgvshy obj orsber zr Tbqqrff jnf nyfb n
> snagnfgvp zbzrag va gur oynpx crbcyr pna or fbzrguvat bgure
> guna...uvfgbel bs gur Jurqbairefr nf jryy nf Jbbq va fivv.) Mr.
> Platt was an absolute joy, different, someone to be remembered.
> And Trick - a black vampire with an attitude, you gotta love it.
> Sure they're all dead now, but what do you expect, it's horror.
> I'd rather watch the astereotypical black person on BTVS than the
> typical stereotype on just about everything else on television
> then or now.
Star Trek TNG had Geordi. Sports Night had Isaac Jaffe. Law & Order
had the Jesse Martin character and the S. Epatha Merkerson character.
The Practice had Eugene. Boston Public had the Chi McBride character.
ER had Dr. Benton, Haleh, the Lisa Nicole Carson character and her
husband, and probably others I'm forgetting. Ally McBeal had Lisa
Nicole Carson as a character as well.
I'm not sure your thesis stands up, in other words. In fact, Buffy
was probably a little week in this department. Angel and Firefly
provide better examples.
--
Opus the Penguin
The best darn penguin in all of Usenet
hopelessly devoted
Opus the Penguin wrote:
> hopelessly devoted (cry...@cinstall.com) wrote:
>
> > I don't know if it had been bought up before, and I was sort of
> > waiting for it. BTVS did something in that department that, until
> > the show aired, no other prime time show had bothered to do.
> > Black people. You get shows that are all one or all the other.
> > You get shows that have a guest spot every now and then. But this
> > show actually had Black people. Not the typical angry black man
> > or the fat saucy black woman. Real people. Kendra - powerful, a
> > calling, intelligent and very beautiful. Her first appearance and
> > ep ending "I'm Kendra the Vampire Slayer" was a beautiful moment.
> > (Tvan Gbeerf nf gur ornhgvshy obj orsber zr Tbqqrff jnf nyfb n
> Opus the Penguin
> The best darn penguin in all of Usenet
Star Trek TNG had Geordi.
And Gynan
Sports Night had Isaac Jaffe.
Does that involve a ball of any sort?
Law & Order had the Jesse Martin character and the S. Epatha Merkerson
character.
I'll give you that one.
The Practice had Eugene. Another Angry black man.
Boston Public had the Chi McBride character.
ER had Dr. Benton, Haleh, the Lisa Nicole Carson character and her
husband
Ally McBeal had Lisa Nicole Carson as a character as well.
True, but there is a difference. There's the "token and typical" and
then there's the atypical and non token (what people don't normally
expect). Here, they're in the background as well as in the the lead.
Granted, Law and Order does do alot. But your average prime time show
does it once. And when it's over, the idea is usually, "Thanks, but
we've alread had ours." The Matrix does something similar. Not just
one good guy, but many. And the bad guys? Wow. Of course, the
pleather gets alittle old.
But then again, I remember when the only time you saw a "black face
doing a commercial" was during the breaks of Oprah or the Cosby Show.
Yeah, I'm that old.
As far as ER, Boston Public, and Ally McBeal........Not enough vampires
for my taste. I never did understand the dancing baby.
What.....The.....Hell was that?
Arbitrar Of Quality
> True, but there is a difference. There's the "token and typical" and
> then there's the atypical and non token (what people don't normally
> expect). Here, they're in the background as well as in the the lead.
> Granted, Law and Order does do alot. But your average prime time show
> does it once. And when it's over, the idea is usually, "Thanks, but
> we've alread had ours."
I don't understand the distinction. BTVS has had a grand total of like
four black people with speaking roles over three years. And not even a
token semi-regular before Trick. Ageed that our "ethnic" types (on the
rare occassions that we see any) aren't pure "types," which is more a
trait of BTVS in general.
-AOQ
Rowan Hawthorn
> hopelessly devoted wrote:
>
>
>>True, but there is a difference. There's the "token and typical" and
>>then there's the atypical and non token (what people don't normally
>>expect). Here, they're in the background as well as in the the lead.
>>Granted, Law and Order does do alot. But your average prime time show
>>does it once. And when it's over, the idea is usually, "Thanks, but
>>we've alread had ours."
>
>
> I don't understand the distinction. BTVS has had a grand total of like
> four black people with speaking roles over three years.
I've avoided getting into this type of discussion for a while, but I
keep hearing this from others who are a good deal more strident about
it, so let's put it into real-world perspective: The US is overall about
13% black, with the south having the highest overall concentration and
New York the single highest percentage by state. California's black
population, by contrast, is about 7%, or half the national average, and
just slightly less than Kentucky's.
Sunnydale is a relatively small town, and it's pretty easy to find small
towns all over the US where it's possible to see no more than one or two
black people in the entire town in a given day. Consider that
*real-life* Santa Barbara has a black population of less than 2% (as of
2000 census.) Compare that to Bowling Green, Kentucky, which has a
population slightly larger than Sunnydale's (about half of Santa
Barbara's) but a black population of around 14%.
There's no particular reason why *every show on TV* needs to have a
significant portion of it's major roles be African-American, because
that would be no more realistic than having none at all - and for some
geographic areas, a good deal *less* realistic.
--
Rowan Hawthorn
"Occasionally, I'm callous and strange." - Willow Rosenberg, "Buffy the
Vampire Slayer"
Opus the Penguin
> Opus the Penguin wrote:
>
>> Sports Night had Isaac Jaffe.
>
> Does that involve a ball of any sort?
Er, no. It involved an office where writers, directors, and producers
reported to him.
--
William George Ferguson
Of course, when you go down that road, you have to deal with the fact that
Santa Barbara, like most southern California cities, has a very high
percentage of its population hispanic. So, its understandable that there
might not be a large black population unless you're set in a traditionally
black neighborhood, but no latinos is somewhat more problematic.
--
HERBERT
1996 - 1997
Beloved Mascot
Delightful Meal
He fed the Pack
A little
Rowan Hawthorn
No arguments there - it makes *far* less sense that there aren't more
hispanics. There were a few, just not very prominent. But y'know, I
don't generally hear that many complaints about the lack of hispanic
characters...
Arbitrar Of Quality
>
> There's no particular reason why *every show on TV* needs to have a
> significant portion of it's major roles be African-American, because
> that would be no more realistic than having none at all - and for some
> geographic areas, a good deal *less* realistic.
I don't think anyone's trying to argue otherwise. It hasn't come up
until now, and we wouldn't expect many black people in a town like
Sunnydale is (Trick even comments on it in his first scene). The point
under discussion was whether BTVS represents some kind of
landmark/anomaly for prime-time TV in terms of the exposure or nuance
it gives its black characters, and I'm simply not seeing that so far.
-AOQ
Scott Lurndal
Particulary when you considert prime-time stuff from the 80's,
like Magnum P.I. with the T.C. character. BTVS did nothing new
or groundbreaking in this respect.
scott
Rowan Hawthorn
> Rowan Hawthorn wrote:
>
>>There's no particular reason why *every show on TV* needs to have a
>>significant portion of it's major roles be African-American, because
>>that would be no more realistic than having none at all - and for some
>>geographic areas, a good deal *less* realistic.
>
>
> I don't think anyone's trying to argue otherwise. It hasn't come up
> until now,
Not in your reviews, no, but this has been an ongoing complaint on the
'net for quite a while, which is why I mention it.
> and we wouldn't expect many black people in a town like
> Sunnydale is (Trick even comments on it in his first scene).
Yes, he does. Most of the complainers tend to ignore that, despite
being reminded of it on numerous occasions. It seems to be difficult
for some people to grasp that there really *are* towns without a huge
minority population (well, *official* minorities, that is; there's a lot
less "racial purity" anywhere than some people would like to believe.)
> The point
> under discussion was whether BTVS represents some kind of
> landmark/anomaly for prime-time TV in terms of the exposure or nuance
> it gives its black characters, and I'm simply not seeing that so far.
Well, the black characters on BtVS don't fall into the category of
Stereotypical Black TV Character, for the most part, although one might
argue that Evyrl'f ohqql Sbeerfg pbzrf pybfr. But since there aren't
many that are major or prominent recurring characters, we haven't really
seen enough to say with any certainty that it would be *unique* in their
treatment if there were. How about, "it's in the minority"?
alphakitten
Five words - Homicide: Life on the Street.
~Angel
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
also its basically a story of a how dumb blonde airhead cheerleading valley chick
saves the world
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
> > Santa Barbara, like most southern California cities, has a very high
> > percentage of its population hispanic. So, its understandable that there
> > might not be a large black population unless you're set in a traditionally
> > black neighborhood, but no latinos is somewhat more problematic.
>
> No arguments there - it makes *far* less sense that there aren't more
> hispanics. There were a few, just not very prominent. But y'know, I
> don't generally hear that many complaints about the lack of hispanic
> characters...
theres kennedy
hopelessly devoted
Rowan Hawthorn wrote:
> Arbitrar Of Quality wrote:
> > Rowan Hawthorn wrote:
> >
> >>There's no particular reason why *every show on TV* needs to have a
> >>significant portion of it's major roles be African-American, because
> >>that would be no more realistic than having none at all - and for some
> >>geographic areas, a good deal *less* realistic.
> >
> >
> > I don't think anyone's trying to argue otherwise. It hasn't come up
> > until now,
>
> Not in your reviews, no, but this has been an ongoing complaint on the
> 'net for quite a while, which is why I mention it.
>
> > and we wouldn't expect many black people in a town like
> > Sunnydale is (Trick even comments on it in his first scene).
>
> Yes, he does. Most of the complainers tend to ignore that, despite
> being reminded of it on numerous occasions. It seems to be difficult
> for some people to grasp that there really *are* towns without a huge
> minority population (well, *official* minorities, that is; there's a lot
> less "racial purity" anywhere than some people would like to believe.)
>
> > The point
> > under discussion was whether BTVS represents some kind of
> > landmark/anomaly for prime-time TV in terms of the exposure or nuance
> > it gives its black characters, and I'm simply not seeing that so far.
>
> Well, the black characters on BtVS don't fall into the category of
> Stereotypical Black TV Character,
and quite noticibly so.
for the most part, although one might
> argue that Evyrl'f ohqql Sbeerfg pbzrf pybfr.
But since there aren't
> many that are major or prominent recurring characters, we haven't really
> seen enough to say with any certainty that it would be *unique* in their
> treatment if there were. How about, "it's in the minority"?
Also for the genre. While some have brought up the more serious shows,
*serious drama*, yes absolutely inclusive on many levels. BTVS is very
different and already taking many risks, yet chose to risk even more by
going against the *norm*. Had Kendra been the only one, that would
have been expected. But they went even further, while there are still
some programs on, even today, that are all one, or all the other, or
the token *black, hispanic, gay, midget*, ME always seemed to say,
"let's try this". I don't think it was trying to be *more inclusive*,
but definately unafraid to take risks at every turn, including casting
and characterization. Not something most shows are willing to do.
Take that risk.
Mel
alphakitten wrote:
::sigh:: I miss Frank and Tim.
Mel
hopelessly devoted
When it comes to tv, I am fluent in 4 languages
Soap, Quantum Leap, Star Trek TNG, BTVS
Everything else is Martian.
;->
mariposas rand mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges
"hopelessly devoted" <cry...@cinstall.com> wrote:
aahhh
uncle martin in his silver suit
Rowan Hawthorn
>>>Of course, when you go down that road, you have to deal with the fact that
>>>Santa Barbara, like most southern California cities, has a very high
>>>percentage of its population hispanic. So, its understandable that there
>>>might not be a large black population unless you're set in a traditionally
>>>black neighborhood, but no latinos is somewhat more problematic.
>>
>>No arguments there - it makes *far* less sense that there aren't more
>>hispanics. There were a few, just not very prominent. But y'know, I
>>don't generally hear that many complaints about the lack of hispanic
>>characters...
>
>
> theres kennedy
Not forgetting her. There were also a couple of others: Chloe and Caridad.