Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Wait, what was wrong with that episode? I loved it.

Everyone takes a break from wherever the plot is to have sex, except for Buffy (because she is PURE AND RIGHT). And Buffy, who was rightfully kicked out because of how terrible she was being towards everybody (SO TERRIBLE), is shown to be always right, while Faith (who was being reasonable and proactive) fails utterly.

A perfectly human reaction to a crisis, and something the show did before in The Gift. Buffy was excessively harsh, no question, but she was also right in many ways and Faith wasn't. Taking a break to relax is fine - getting drunk and beating up policemen is really not, and it's definitely neither reasonable nor proactive. It's war, and to keep an army running, sometimes the generals need to kick a little ass. No one wants to be involved but good people have to do good things whether they want it or not; being a potential isn't a choice, and there's always the grave for those who can't or won't handle it. Such in this show as is the case in the worst of real life examples.

And Buffy was also herself treated like crap by people who had no business doing so - like Anya, who was contributing nothing but bitchiness and sarcasm at the business end of the series.

I also actually did like the way the Buffy Spike thing was handled. He's clearly still obssessed with her, but even if for questionable reasons he gave her what she needed - friendship - respecting that. I can't imagine anything causing her to want to sleep with him again, not after the attempted rape, but the soul and his genuine steps towards redemption make friendship viable.

edited 18th Nov '15 9:47:08 AM by EruditeEsotericist

No, in "The Gift," Xander and Anya have sex. In "Touched," everyone has sex, Xander and Anya, Faith and Principal Wood, Willow and Kennedy. Every single couple, except Buffy and Spike. It was bizarre and completely out of place.

They didn't beat up a policeman, they went clubbing. Buffy was against them going out and having any fun at all.

This makes no sense. They were all handling it better than Buffy was.

That would have been better if Buffy hadn't treated everyone else like crap, too, in Season 7. Hell, she walks into a stranger's home in "Touched" and demands they leave. She doesn't go to an empty house, no sir, just a house that was already inhabited and then tells the person there they should leave like everyone else.

See, the biggest problem in Season 7 wasn't the Big Bad (even though the First Evil was nebulous and it's plan was...vague), it was Buffy herself. She was always sympathetic in previous seasons, but in Season 7, for most of it, she wasn't. She only really became sympathetic again in the finale.

edited 18th Nov '15 10:24:26 AM by alliterator

This is exactly why it was such a good idea to pair him with Cordelia like they did at the start of Angel. For a character as lifeless as Angel was coming out of B3, he needed someone with life to spare, and Cordelia is lively enough for three people.

Incidentally, this is also why my opinion is that A1 is Angel's weakest season. It was still stumbling around trying to find its sea legs and Angel himself is definitely at his whiniest. The show grows its beard at the Faith arc, A1.18 "Five by Five" and A1.19 "Sanctuary", when Angel finally grows out of Buffy's shadow, lets go of his angst, and comes into his own as a character - all by finally standing up for what he represents against Buffy, here in his town to do what she represents.

• Buffy: You should have told me what was going on.
• Angel: I didn't think it was your business.
• Buffy: Not my business?
• Angel: I needed more time with Faith. I'm not sure—
• Buffy: You needed? Do you have ANY idea what it was like for me to see you with her? That you went behind my back—
• Angel: Buffy, this wasn't about you! This was about saving somebody's soul. That's what I do here, and you're not a part of it. That was your idea, remember? We stay away from each other.
• Buffy: I came here because you were in danger.
• Angel: I'm in danger every day. You came because of Faith. You were looking for vengeance.
• Buffy: I have a right to it.
• Angel: Not in my city.

One of Angel's best moments.

edited 18th Nov '15 10:35:26 AM by TobiasDrake

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God, I can't get over how much I love Angel.

Buffy was great while it lasted, but other than a handful of gimmick episodes not something I revisit much.

Angel, on the other hand, I rewatch in full every once in a while. Just seemed a lot more tightly written as a whole to me.

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I mean, don't get me wrong, I love that they mock Angel for it. But he's at the core of the series, behaving the way he does, and I just couldn't find it in myself to come back for that episode after episode.

Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.

Wackd perhaps you could skip the rest of season 1 and try watching it from later on? Okay a large part of S2 is about Angel's angst but that's in the context of the rest of his team having a different vision of how to help people and it works really well. It's as much about the team growing as people as it is Angel. Also S2 has Holland Manners who is just amazing.

I could but I kinda don't want to?

Like. I guess if I knew more about other characters I could look forward to. Because I feel like my chances of ever liking Angel or Wesley are slim to none. Man cannot live on Cordelia alone.

Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.

Oh, man, Wesley changes so much. Sure, he is pretty annoying in Season 1, but then in Season 2 he starts getting better and then by Season 4 he is completely different.

Plus, you need to see the episode where they all revert back to their teenage personas called "Spin the Bottle." It's hilarious.

edited 18th Nov '15 4:13:05 PM by alliterator

Seriously though there are other characters right

I've heard tell of a "Fred"

Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.

My issue with "Angel" is that none of the seasons are good all the way through.

Season 2 is very strong for the first half, but the final episodes are (despite Fred) ridiculous and annoying. Season 3 is also good for about half the season, but becomes less good once teenage Connor shows up.

There's also a lot of episodes with weak overall plotlines but great individual moments of the main characters interacting with each other.

If you strung together all the good parts of "Angel", you'd have maybe one season.

Fred is awesome! She's like Willow but with the liveliness of Cordelia.

Behold! Amy Acker's hilarious screen test that got her the job of Fred:

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Galadriel: I see your point, but I think it's kinda one of the things I like about Angel... the seasons are a lot less rigid than Buffy, where it was "Introduce Big Bad, filler episodes, meet Big Bad, beat Big Bad, the end." Angel's arcs were a bit broader, and less limited to a single season. Take the first season finale... it didn't really resolve anything. All it did was set up an arc that would span the next few seasons. Conversely, the middle of most seasons had Wham Episodes that would be more than enough to call a finale.

I rather liked that, it made for some Innocuously Important Episodes.

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A1 was the weakest but it did have its charms.

edited 19th Nov '15 9:26:10 AM by TobiasDrake

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I can't see that video at work, but if it's not Angel dancing in the dorkiest way possible, I will be disappointed.

One of the funniest jokes in the series, even though an Imagine Spot (vs an actual dream) is kind of out of place. For how moody Angel could be, David Boreanaz had amazing comic timing.

Boreanez is great.

I always thought he'd make an excellent Batman. Though I feel like his ship has sailed on that.

Can't forget the end credits... don't want to leave Wes out.

edited 19th Nov '15 12:18:45 PM by Larkmarn

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Not a good episode, but a great scene.

Also, all of the moments in Season 1 with Wesley's return are fantastic, seeing him go from pathetic (but pretending to badass) to somewhat competent. But they're just individual moments, and the episodes they occur in aren't very strong in terms of the major plotlines.

The two Season 1 episodes with Faith are incredibly good; the only two episodes of Angel that I've purchased. They exemplify what Angel should be about, contrasted with the fact that every season has him losing his way for the majority of the episodes.

edited 21st Nov '15 8:48:13 PM by Galadriel

Wesley takes until series 2/3 to really get going. Specifically in S2, when he becomes leader of the group. By S4, he's totally unrecognisable, but in a good way. I love that for all his coldness, he still goes out of the way to help Angel and the others even when he doesn't directly benefit.

It's also interesting that he essentially goes back to being a watcher with Justine and Faith, only in the darker way that befits Angel rather than Buffy.

And I have to say, Wesley's romance with Lilah is one of the best romances on the show, there being a lot of genuine chemistry there. The both of them are messed up human beings but they actually care for each other.

Wesley's a good guy with a Fatal Flaw he never entirely grows out of: he considers himself the hero of the piece. He has a habit of not listening to the input of others because he considers himself the ultimate authority and them to merely be advisement. Worse, he's all too willing to go full-on Cowboy Cop at the drop of a hat - to make the sacrifices he's decided need to be made, to face the foe he's decided needs to be faced, even when everyone else is begging him not to. It never ends well.

Even his comedy is heavily derived from the contrast between how inept he is versus the fact that he is clearly the main character of an internal narrative that exists in his head.

edited 23rd Nov '15 12:03:55 PM by TobiasDrake

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Aren't we all?

Though his ineptness does fade - he's among the most competent characters in the series by mid-S4. He's not the world-changer he necessarily thinks he is (his ego grows more than his actual competence) but he's not exactly unjustified in some of his assertions of himself by late-Angel.

If anything his emotional problems in S5 (drinking himself to death essentially) help ensure that he can't sort out the problems of the plot by means of his intelligence. In the same way that Willow and Giles had to be hampered at times in Buffy, so did Wesley. He initially failed to save Lilah, and then Fred. Both had a huge impact on him, and the fact that Lilah was Alas, Poor Villain doesn't mean the fact that he never forgot her should itself be forgotten.