YMMV / Buffy the Vampire Slayer S 4 E 5 "Beer Bad"

• Alternate Aesop Interpretation: The episode is supposed to have its heavy-handed moral in the title. But the plot would have gone exactly the same if everyone were drinking soda. The real moral is "Be courteous to bartenders and others in similar roles, because if they snap they can do some serious damage." Not a bad moral, really.
• Anvilicious: The episode at least had the decency to hang an amusing lampshade on that aspect:
  Xander: And was there a lesson in all of this? What have we learned about beer?
  Buffy: Foamy!
  Xander: Good. Just so that's clear.
  • Ironically, the episode was intended to have a clear moral, as the writers participated in a competition to write a storyline that (realistically) brought up the dangers of drinking... and were disqualified, because every complication is caused by supernatural influences rather than the beer itself.
• Broken Base: The worst episode of the show or So Bad, It's Good?
• Narm: Giles of all people disapproving of Buffy drinking beer. Looks like Joss and co forgot he's from a country where the drinking age is 18, and it's socially acceptable for teenagers to start drinking before then, and that he's made fun of cultural differences between England and America multiple times before.
• Retroactive Recognition: One of the frat boys is Kal Penn.

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