Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV Show Talk Goes Here

[Poli]

K, thanks.

By the way, I watched every show (and Angel) with my ex-wife a few years back. I considered the shows terrible outside of "Once More, With Feeling". Outside of that one episode, I wish I could have that time erased from my life.

[MikeVic]

Buffy/Angel is one of my favourite series ever. The writing was good, the dialogue was good, the characters were good.

Echoing what Marmel said in the Lost thread, Anya became one of my favourite characters, along with Spike. I recall both of them having a little fling in a later season? That was awesome.

[Kodos]

I've only seen the musical episode, but I know most of the songs by heart, as we sing them in the car quite a bit.

[Marmel]

Originally Posted by MikeVic

Echoing what Marmel said in the Lost thread, Anya became one of my favourite characters, along with Spike. I recall both of them having a little fling in a later season? That was awesome.

Yeah, they had a one time thing a few episodes after the wedding episode in Season 6. Xander saw it all on a webcam type of thing.

Did we ever find out why she was petrified of bunnies? One of the funniest, WTF moments in the series was a Halloween episode where everyone was dressed in a scary costume, so naturally she wore a bunny costume. Her reference to bunnies in the musical was funny too.

[MikeVic]

Originally Posted by Marmel

Yeah, they had a one time thing a few episodes after the wedding episode in Season 6. Xander saw it all on a webcam type of thing.

Did we ever find out why she was petrified of bunnies? One of the funniest, WTF moments in the series was a Halloween episode where everyone was dressed in a scary costume, so naturally she wore a bunny costume. Her reference to bunnies in the musical was funny too.

There was an episode (forget the season) where they showed her as a human still. She lived on some farm or something, and I know there was something involving a bunny there... It might have been nothing more than just her saying "I don't like those things."

[Kodos]

There's nothing we can't face, except for bunnies.

[Honolulu_Blue]

I love Buffy/Angel. I fell in love with Buffy after the second season. A friend copied a bunch of the episodes on two VCR tapes and I watched them over the summer. I was hooked from that point on. I have seen every ep of both series, must multiple times.

Great, great show.

I still think Buffy had 3.5 great seasons, seasons 1-3 and half of 4 and then declined from there. I think the loss of characters like Oz, Cordy and Angel were hard to overcome. I love Spike and liked he was in it more, but the whole Buffy/Spike thing really annoyed me. By the end, Spike was more of an irritant than a great character. I think Anya filled the Cordy shoes very admirably. Oz was Oz. Hard to replace.

[claphamsa]

Buffy was the best show ever put on TV, that is all!

[Mustang]

I don't find this thread as odd as the Mount Rushmore of Sax solos.

[Rizon]

Wiki

Bunny phobia

Anya's irrational fear of rabbits (leporiphobia) is established for the first time in "Fear, Itself", and becomes a running joke for the remainder of the series. In "The Gift", Anya sees a stuffed rabbit in the basement of The Magic Box (while looking for the Dagon Sphere with Xander), causing her to scream and exclaim, "Who would put something like that there?!" In "Once More, With Feeling", Anya sings, "Bunnies aren't just cute like everybody supposes. They got them hoppy legs and twitchy little noses, and what's with all the carrots? What do they need such good eyesight for anyway?", a verse reminiscent of Willow's speech about spiders ("Nightmares"). In "Tabula Rasa", while suffering from memory loss, she repeatedly casts a spell that does nothing more than cause rabbits to appear. The phobia also manifests itself in her final moments. As the final battle approaches, Andrew Wells suggests she "picture happy things: a lake, candy canes, bunnies..." The change is drastic and instantaneous. She confidently raises her sword, musing coldly, "Bunnies. Floppy, hoppy, bunnies."

Strangely enough, a flashback to her human times ("Triangle") shows her surrounded by bunnies. As stated before, she raised rabbits to give as gifts leading to the rest of her village to consider her weird and a bit of an oddball, perhaps explaining why she fears them, as a reminder of the long-ago human existence that ended in heartbreak.

Although she has a phobia towards bunnies, she seems to love monkeys. In the episode "Into the Woods" she tries to convince Dawn and Xander to go and see a movie about a monkey who plays ice hockey and in "Bargaining, Part One", after Willow tells the group she's ready to resurrect Buffy, Anya states, "But Discovery Channel has monkeys! And our tape machine's all wonkey..." Furthermore, in "Once More, With Feeling" Anya says that she and Xander were watching Monkey Trouble when they started singing.

[cthomer5000]

Buffy is the better series, but I actually think Angel has the brightest moments in the entire universe. I think it was Season 2 that was pretty insanely great.

And David Boreanaz sort of learns how to act in that series - he was made of wood in Buffy.

[Sun Tzu]

Can't we just combine this thread with the Glee thread?

[Danny]

Originally Posted by Sun Tzu

Can't we just combine this thread with the Glee thread?

Express yourself! Hey. hey, hey, hey

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by cthomer5000

Buffy is the better series, but I actually think Angel has the brightest moments in the entire universe. I think it was Season 2 that was pretty insanely great.

And David Boreanaz sort of learns how to act in that series - he was made of wood in Buffy.

I liked "Angel" well enough. The show definitely lost its way at times. I was never a fan of Connor really. The whole pregnant Cordelia with a demon baby didn't work. That said, the second season was pretty great when Angel was getting all evil and dispondent, like when locked those evil Wolfram & Hart guys in the room with the vampires or demons. Having re-watched the first season, it's not nearly as bad as I thought it was. It was actually pretty good. Doyle was fantastic.

Still, I think both in terms of overall and brightest moments, Buffy wins hands down. Buffy had so many moments, both shocking in terms of plot and character, and genuine emotion that I can't think of many shows that match it.

Just a few: the death of Jenny Calendar, Angel going bad, Spike killing the Annointed One, Giles speech to Buffy at the end of the two arc episode when Angel first went bad, Buffy sending Angel to hell, The Body, the alternate reality in "The Wish", Once More With Feeling to name but a few.

[Sun Tzu]

Originally Posted by Danny

Express yourself! Hey. hey, hey, hey

...what the...

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by Poli

K, thanks.

By the way, I watched every show (and Angel) with my ex-wife a few years back. I considered the shows terrible outside of "Once More, With Feeling". Outside of that one episode, I wish I could have that time erased from my life.

Wow, really makes me want to post in a thread that the person that creates it hates the show...

I think I'll just make a Whedonverse thread and we can just talk Joss Whedon stuff there.

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by Sun Tzu

Can't we just combine this thread with the Glee thread?

Sorry no, the shows aren't at all related, regardless if Whedon directed an episode of Glee.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Poli

By the way, I watched every show (and Angel) with my ex-wife a few years back. I considered the shows terrible outside of "Once More, With Feeling". Outside of that one episode, I wish I could have that time erased from my life.

I feel sorry for you.

[Poli]

Originally Posted by DanGarion

Wow, really makes me want to post in a thread that the person that creates it hates the show...

I think I'll just make a Whedonverse thread and we can just talk Joss Whedon stuff there.

I just did it to take it out of the Lost thread. Knock yourself out.

[Poli]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I feel sorry for you.

It never once crossed my mind that men would actually like this show. I suppose I underestimated the alure of Gellar, Carpenter, and the girl from American Pie.

[MikeVic]

Originally Posted by Poli

It never once crossed my mind that men would actually like this show. I suppose I underestimated the alure of Gellar, Carpenter, and the girl from American Pie.

Yes those (as well as Dushku and Emma Caulfield) were nice reasons, but the writing is what I enjoyed most.

[Poli]

Shoot, I forgot the Dushku girl. Emma, is that the one who played Anya? She wasn't bad to look at, either.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Poli

It never once crossed my mind that men would actually like this show. I suppose I underestimated the alure of Gellar, Carpenter, and the girl from American Pie.

While there was certainly some eye candy, that's not the reason I watched the show. At all. I don't watch shows just because there are attractive women on it. Great writing, characters, plots, etc. I know a ton of men who love this show. Just because there was a female lead and it was called "Buffy" doesn't mean that it's "women's only" viewing.

[Poli]

I just can't recall anyone, I mean anyone, I worked with in the Navy watching this show. Maybe Chris Rodriguez, but if he did it was clearly for the hot chick/wicca angle...as he was going through his wicca phase/girlfriend at the time.

The only people I knew that watched the show was my ex-wife and her dad...and honestly, I pretty much thought the dad just watched it for the women as well.

Not knowing any guy that seriously watched the show, I simply wrote it off as a chick thing. To be honest, I'm surprised...very surprised to see so many people on this board liked the show...all ten of you.

I'll give you this: I liked Spike in Angel...I thought he did a great job antagonizing Angel. I thought the David guy did a great job as Angel in his own series. CT was right, he was a stiff in Buffy. I thought the Anya chick was under-utilized and was disappointed to see her killed in the finale. Whedon may have wanted to kill someone off, but why not go for one of the "scooby gang" characters? Anya was more of a supporting role, in my opinion.

Her death led an interesting discussion with the ex. The ex believed that Andrew lied to Zander to make him feel better. It's my opinion that the little twerp told the truth, that Anya did die saving him...saving everyone as I recall.

Still, outside of a few moments for me, this show will never be "Lost" for me. There were times in both shows I felt like they were just spinning their wheels, killing the Monster of the Week, and not advancing any storyline whatsoever. At times one of my favorite shows of all time, X-Files, did that, but I felt there was a lot more substance to that show. On the other hand, besides Lost's episodes with Nikki and Paulo, I felt Lost did a great job of not doing the Monster of the Week. I was actually disappointed the powers that be gave in to the cries of the fans and killed off the Nikki and Paulo storyline. I wasn't a fan of "everyone can be a Slayer" concept, either.

I'll never watch one of the episodes again, but I will admit having the "Walk Through the Fire" on my Ipod. I just can't see either series being better than the X-Files, Lost, or The Wire.

[Ryno]

Originally Posted by Poli

It's my opinion that the little twerp told the truth, that Anya did die saving him...saving everyone as I recall.

I just watched the last few minutes.

Spike (with his amulet) ended up being the one to wipe out the majority of them.

The slayers held them off for 10 minutes or so before some of them escaped upstairs. Anya and Andrew were one of the pairs left back to deal with the overflow. Andrew ran and cowered at first sight. The uber vamps largely ignored him, and he accidentally killed a bringer that was about to take him out. They showed Anya killing 2 of the vamps before being killed, so she died fighting, but they didn't really show enough to say whether she actually saved him or not.

Originally Posted by Poli

I wasn't a fan of "everyone can be a Slayer" concept, either.

Agreed. Joss got a little overzealous at times with the whole girl power thing. Bestowing the potentials with a temporary boost would have been reasonable (given the universe), but making every girl on the planet a slayer was pretty absurd.

[Marmel]

Originally Posted by Ryno

I just watched the last few minutes.

Spike (with his amulet) ended up being the one to wipe out the majority of them.

The slayers held them off for 10 minutes or so before some of them escaped upstairs. Anya and Andrew were one of the pairs left back to deal with the overflow. Andrew ran and cowered at first sight. The uber vamps largely ignored him, and he accidentally killed a bringer that was about to take him out. They showed Anya killing 2 of the vamps before being killed, so she died fighting, but they didn't really show enough to say whether she actually saved him or not.



Agreed. Joss got a little overzealous at times with the whole girl power thing. Bestowing the potentials with a temporary boost would have been reasonable (given the universe), but making every girl on the planet a slayer was pretty absurd.

I mostly agree, but it wasn't every girl on the planet. It was just the ones that had the potential to become a slayer. Hundreds? Maybe Thousands? but only a tiny percentage of the overall female population.

[MikeVic]

Originally Posted by Marmel

I mostly agree, but it wasn't every girl on the planet. It was just the ones that had the potential to become a slayer. Hundreds? Maybe Thousands? but only a tiny percentage of the overall female population.

This. And if you read season 8 in comic book form, they explore it further I believe.

[MikeVic]

So this thread made me want to re-watch Once More, With Feeling... and at the beginning of that episode, the choreographer was listed as Adam Shankman. I thought that was pretty cool.

[Poli]

Who is that?

[MikeVic]

Originally Posted by Poli

Who is that?

I knew that he's a judge on So You Think You Can Dance, directed the Hairspray remake, and produced a few other movies... but checking out his IMDB, he's done quite a bit more than that.

[Poli]

Oh no kidding? Pretty cool.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by cthomer5000

Buffy is the better series, but I actually think Angel has the brightest moments in the entire universe. I think it was Season 2 that was pretty insanely great.

And David Boreanaz sort of learns how to act in that series - he was made of wood in Buffy.

This thread convinced me to go back through and watch the old Buffy series, they are all available on Instant viewing in Netflix so was easy to do!

I'm most of the way through season 3 now and just wanted to say that I disagree with cthomer's comments about David Boreanaz. I thought most of his acting was rather sluggish but I assume he wanted to try to portray the soul in torment type of thing. The episodes where he had his soul removed, I really enjoyed his character. I've never seen Bones and don't think I watched Angel that much (or even later Buffy episodes), but I liked him in the early Buffy years myself.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Alan T

This thread convinced me to go back through and watch the old Buffy series, they are all available on Instant viewing in Netflix so was easy to do!

I'm most of the way through season 3 now and just wanted to say that I disagree with cthomer's comments about David Boreanaz. I thought most of his acting was rather sluggish but I assume he wanted to try to portray the soul in torment type of thing. The episodes where he had his soul removed, I really enjoyed his character. I've never seen Bones and don't think I watched Angel that much (or even later Buffy episodes), but I liked him in the early Buffy years myself.

He definitely shines when he's playing Angelus. I just watched "Suprise" and "Innocence", the episodes with The Judge and when Angel first loses his soul. Great stuff.