Writer: Tracey Forbes
Director: David Solomon
Guest star: Amber Benson (Tara), Leonard Roberts (Forrest Gates), Bailey Chase (Graham Miller), Emma Caulfield (Anya) , David Engler (Intiative Guy), Danielle Pessis (Christie), Jeffrey Sharmay (Drowning Boy), Bryan Cuprill (Roy), Jeff Wilson (Evan), Neil Daly (Mason), Casey McCarthy (Julie), Kathryn Joosten (Mrs. Holt), James Michael Connor (Scientist)

not one of my favorite episode

i think if they wanted buffy out of the picture (because SMG was fiming her appearance in angel), they should have found a better idea (but i can't imagine riley alone around the scoobie at that point <_< ) so a week end away to "improve their relation" :naughty: (it worked when giles was gone in lover's walk) :unsure: , of course the manifestation of the spirits wouldn't have been as strong :unsure:

and yet a few good scenes:

the scoobies reaction to giles singing :lmao:

anya-spike at the bronze

spike voluntering to help and explaining why he shouldn't and noticing that they are all good points

giles and co talking to the nurse and discovering she is the one responsible

xander and anya to the rescue and buffy reaction "xander, don't you knock?" :lol:

I will freely admit to being somewhat surprised by WTWTA as it was much sassier and more coherent than I remembered.

The shot with the ice cream van trundling along instantly put a smile on my face as it effortlessly conveyed the humiliation being endured by Xander. Later on Xander's delightful "smelt it dealt it" comment hit the mark.

The whole thing probably does not quite work but it had a sense of narrative drive and foreboding that Superstar lacked. That held my attention.

I have always wondered exactly what Tracey Forbes was trying to do. Is she a Christian fundamentalist or some kind of Rousseau like fantasist desiring a return to nature? I am not sure but I am swaying toward the latter. The story seems to be saying that peoples natural drives should not be suppressed and that there are serious consequences if people cannot express themselves as they would like to. All that is given a none too coherent Buffy spin but maybe it just about works.

I have been thinking about the marks for both Superstar and WTWTA. Superstar I found disappointing so maybe 4/10 but a substantial increase for WTWTA seems appropriate so 5/10. sk

the only thing that move the arc along is the information that adam had pep talked vampires and demons to work together

that maybe buffy is putting giles in second position when it come to important things ( :ermm: :naughty: ), this will have consequences later (spike playing with it in the yoko factor)

i think there is a difference between a parent lecturing his child about doing something wrong (not sure if looking in the mirror too much is really wrong :rolleyes: ) and overeacting like the nurse did :unsure:

As usual I had not really thought about the story arc so your comment is interesting. Fairly obviously I was thinking about the internal drivers of Tracey's script. Some things still baffle me such as why Buffy and Riley are singled out to be the 'batteries' or whatever somehow driving the events. The story metaphysics are irritatingly vague. A bit of exposition from Giles would not have gone amiss.

As you hint in your last paragraph being overly authoritarian is not a good thing. Some philosophers wonder if 'weak' government is a good thing for instance. I touched on this idea in my review but as I said it is all none too clear. sk

the fraternity house (or the initiative HQ) was full of marines (we don't know how long they used the house as entrance to the initiative)

i think the "spirits" were able to use buffy and riley due to their ............. :unsure: potentials ........... a normal couple would have stop or died probably earlier :unsure: but a slayer and a guy still having stuff in his body (see out of my mind) gave more time and powers :unsure: :ponder: :shrug:

Cor! :mad:

Was enjoying this thread yesterday and wrote my own chunk. Trouble was, it got a bit long and stuff happended at work (I now have 50 new and entirely unexpected essays to deal with that I knew nothing about till they arrived; good job I am RedPenWoman). Came back, finished it off but my log-in had expired in the downtime and when I tried to post it, it ate the ruddy lot :shrug:

Will try to do it again v. soon.

Forgot how much I liked this one (don't rewatch it much 'cos of the aged parent's bad eyesight and need for additional commenary e.g.

MUM What are they doing?
ME Having sex.
MUM What are they doing now?
ME Still having sex/ having more sex/ that's the condom drawer mum...

You're never too old to cringe at conversations like this with a mother....)

:ph43r:

i didn't know the log in had an expiration time :blink: :unsure:

Seems to, but I couldn't tell you how long it has to sit all logged in but unused to go into its sulk. Yesterday was at least half an hour I think.

have you ever gone a whole half hour without posting PG? Even on an off day? :thumbsup:

:lmao: i think so :unsure:

usually it's my yahoo log in that run out of time <_<

Trying again- if the cyber goblins eat my post a second time, I shall be peeved.

Love the fact that Giles leads from the front in vicious-old-biddy denunciation.
fascinated by the idea of childhood (not children's) ghosts- a sort of stine tapes idea of haunting but not over-complicated.

VERY glad that the determined twosome are practising safe sex (probably couldn't have f ilmed the scene whithout adding the 'message'). Come to think of it, Miss G. never seems to have complained about Buffy's raunchiness here, whereas she did whinge about the Spike-ness. Hmmm :ponder:

Silly jungle.

Great seance.

Hi Mehitabel. It is nice to have a review from someone other than the 'regulars'.

I always thought the old biddy was twisted rather than vicious as it seemed to imply she thought she was doing the right thing.

The great thing about Riley has to be that he was a nice guy whereas with Spike the whole relationship was so self-destructive and nihilistic even.

What is a stine tape? sk

riley was too nice. when faith (in buffy) tried to spice things :shifty: , he refused :rolleyes:

It's what's known as a spelling mistake- sorry!

I meant stone tapes- you know the idea of 'ghosts' being memories (usually traumatic) embedded in the places they haunt?
Must have caught on long before I became computer reindly, but when smart chaps were working out the clever stuff stone can be made to do.

You're right about the biddy too i think- but with the sort of self-righteous twistedness that adds up to viciousness anyway.


NOTE TO SELF: be less irregular hereabouts
NOTE TO JB: at least Buffy didn't kid herself that time around that Spike was nice. But I don't think Riley was worth the angst in any case. And not the sort of nice I had much use for as often as not. In fact, overall, come to think of it.

It is interesting that people can have such different takes on what I thought was straight forward.

I must try not to push too hard. What I had in mind about Faith in Who Are You? was Sartre who said, in regard to sadomasochism, that it is a "reef upon which desire may founder". What Sartre had in mind was that "the look" of the other can be destroyed in sadomasochistic practices rendering them obscene. It is tremendously difficult to say what the "the look" is exactly but Sartre is extending the thought of Hegel whereby people engage in social interactions. Hegel argues 'consciousness' is reinforced in various directions. Sartre continues the argument via Heidegger. There is no doubt that Sartre is expressing a sincere existential horror when "the look" is destroyed.

What I am getting at is the not very controversial idea that Riley's desire was healthy in every sense and his 'natural' aversion to engage in dubious practices with Faith was strong evidence of some kind of moral sense. sk

It would be nice to have input other than from prophecy girl and me.

Do you subscribe to the view that Riley was simply rebound guy and Buffy had no real feelings for him anyway? I am not sure but there is probably something in that and I wish it had been expressed in Into The Woods.

I suppose utilitarianism is a bit convincing when it expresses the desire for benevolence rather than malevolence but if that means total blandness and a kind of denuding of human being it is less convincing. In other words I am a bit sympathetic to Riley's corn fed(is that the right expression) Iowa values rather than some kind of nihilism. After all Riley was hardly a prude so he was not exactly some kind of repressed square guy. sk

:lmao: i think the only other time someone mentionned protection was anya in the harsh light of day (and that was "more romantic than faith") :rolleyes:

Not really- I think Parker was the perfect rebound guy if she'd done the using up and walking away- but that wouldn't have been Buffy-behaviour anyway.

Need to think about this- everything I dislike about Riley can be roughly heaped into to piles- the modest he's not Angel and be definition not interesting in comparison pile, and the much bigger slagheap of double-life/two-faced Captain America/ Initiative's geek/Maggie's bitch pile.

Must sort out my piles soon- today I have 3 Shakespeare's to watch. Just come out of Richard II minutes ago, grabbing lunch before Julius Caesar, and stoking up on much coffee before the evening's Midsummer Night's Dream. So narrative lines are spinning out of control a bit right now.

So, you were not a big fan then....... :lol:

That could get uncomfortable....... ;) :ph43r:

doofus farmer boy= riley :lmao: (i think riley is the buffy character who got the most nickname ever)

:blush:

If I wasn't currently floating gently around planet Shakespeare, I'd think of something clever to say :shrug:

Big fan of the writing- sometimes fun to have someone you love to hate, and for that pompous and self-deluded are must-haves.

But does Riley actually have real fans out there? I never thunk it. :ponder:

a fan club for marc blucas maybe, but a riley finn fan club :shrug:

link

:o :lmao:

I would not say I am a fan of Riley but I have always thought he was exactly the right idea after Angel. Surely Riley was the walking antithesis of Angel showing the writers had thought about giving us something original which makes sense with the radically different direction the show took in S4.

Am I alone in preferring Riley to later Spike? I feel Riley was the right idea though mishandled while Spike was wrong idea though handled well. sk

riley was starting to be interesting when the writers tried to give him a darker side (but it just to give him a better way out than just having a normal brake up ............. buffy went through that with angel .................) :ermm:

Handling Spike?
Mishandling Spike!

:naughty: :blush: :lmao:


be still my wossname, for I am sinking into the marking swampt and allowed to let my mind wander. This need a proper reply JB, and the brain can't do it right now.
Can I owe you one?

Only just back Mehitabel. See my post to prophecy girl.

Seeing as you have a 'proper job' and I am a near basket case addicted to psychiatric pills I can hardly dish out the brickbats. Post away when you have a quiet hour to string together a couple of cogent paragraphs.

I am still trying to allow your defence of S6 to percolate down my chemicalised consciousness. Your idea about S6 that roughly the writers had nowhere else to go is still the best defence I have come across. I still think the show was not really geared to deliver what they attempted. I feel the show was about brilliantly silly metaphors fused to a supernatural soap opera. The life and death metaphysics of S6 was a bit beyond the shows raison d'etre though your defence is a strong one. sk