The one where Riley leaves for good.

the "we need to talk" scene, if you compare angel/buffy and riley/buffy, you do care a lot more about the breaking up between angel and buffy and i think writers knew we did as the story ran for three episodes when the riley/buffy couple was solve in a single episode .......... not that big of a shocker (for us) but they did the argue when you can more or less agree with both side.

of course if they had given time to develop that dark side of riley and have something more interesting than him going to visit some vampire to "give blood" :rolleyes:, we might have like him a bit more .............. maybe

someone need to explain me why did riley waste his time to get a fake stake before going after spike? (maybe in the back in his mind, he knew that maybe spike might be useful even if a little too much of a stalker for buffy own good so ok he needed to give him a warning).

now the writers have their time to work on spike and his "nasty" interest in the slayer which is a tough job because it is hard to work with a souless vampire even with his chip, his poetic past and his new found crush on Buffy. he knew there was going to be consequences by showing buffy riley's secret (he did show a bit of guilt outside the building but i think it was because buffy gave him an upset look :unsure: )

i did like how buffy worked part of her frustation on the vampire gang, a short but quite good fight and how she took her time to deal with the lady vampire that she saw with riley.

buffy running after riley was a bit too long unless they wanted us to worry that maybe just maybe buffy was gonna caught the helicopter just in time to tell riley enough to make him stay

Did we really need to have xander giving her a speech about riley? it was for good intention and yes xander seem to know buffy better than anyone, able to see that something wrong between buffy and riley (first time we really see xander as the one who see, the heart of the scoobies), his romantic speech to anya was better and kinda give a balance between a couple who exploded and couple that should definitly work (on a long term ........ well until the wedding episode)

Marti Noxon, in her directorial debut, did quite a good job for an episode outside of the story arc

Into The Woods is soppy, unmitigated tripe. Somehow Marti expects us to care about Riley when he has been marginalised for the entirety of S5 rendering his departure distinctly prosaic.

I loved Dawn's goofing about with the anecdote where Buffy chased her while she played the vampire. I also loved Willow and Giles teasing Anya about her idea to give away chicken feet as a free gift. I suppose that sets up the Willow and Anya conflict in Triangle to a small degree.

I am still not sure about Riley's psychology. Surely with all his education he should be aware of the possibility of being self-deluded about his relationship with Buffy. He seems to say he is jealous of Dracula but I am not sure what to make of that. It is almost as if he is saying he wants to be Buffy in some gender bending switcheroo. It is not obvious to me what Marti is trying to do exactly. Xander says Riley is rebound guy but Buffy is making a mistake as he is really 'the one' in some sense as he is the kind of guy who is sincere and would always be there. I am not sure who is in the wrong. I think the problem here could be my enforced 'solitude' as my mental illness makes relationships difficult hence I am low on empathy here.

Compared to the genius of The Prom there is no doubt Marti Noxon does not deliver anything like as compelling a break up. There is nothing to compare to Buffy's heartrendingly sincere sentiments as Angel delivers the bodyblow in the sewer.

I feel the whole episode needed to be much harder and more original. Buffy should have been utterly hard in relation to Riley showing he was indeed merely rebound guy despite his sincerity. That would have shown Buffy had moved on from Angel in a radical way and also show that her supernatural travails have hardened her heart.

One thing I did like here in relation to The Body is that the core scoobies of Willow, Xander and Giles were present at the hospital showing a concrete emotional investment mostly to Buffy, surely, but by inference to Joyce as well. So the reactions of the scoobies in The Body does make a bit of sense.

The fake staking of Spike is such a cop-out that I wish the scene had been ruthlessly edited on principle. Riley should have used his psychology training to rub in the fact that Buffy, seemingly, would never be his. Riley should have engaged in mental warfare not crude physical shenanigans.

Do women really buy the treacley lovey dovey twaddle Xander spouts at the end? I would have thought it is subtle outer behaviour that confirms what someone really feels? If I had been Anya the first thing I would have thought was is Xander having an affair.

All in all the worst episode of S5 and I am glad it is out of the way. All the Marti Noxon efforts in S5 are quite frankly rubbish. I wonder what blunted her ability in later seasons. Maybe taking over from Joss was a bridge too far. The incredible efforts Marti made in S2 and S3 seem a world away. 3/10. sk

:rolleyes: it was kinda shown in restless how much the gang was relax around/with joyce (a bit too much for xander :lol: :rolleyes: )