Overall Rating: 6.3
The writers chose, IMHO, the most boring way to deal with the initiative imaginable - military psychologist trying to create a mutant super-soldier...where have I seen that before? Oh yeah...EVERYWHERE.
Plot Synopsis:
The recap can be found here.
The Skinny:
Well...they almost had me thinking they would do something creative with this initiative plot...that is until the only possible source of tension got killed off by a walking cliche. So...for one whole episode, they tried to meld Buffy's classic demon-fighting training with a military outfit. If they'd stuck with that for a while, it could have been an interesting portrait in contrasts. For one sweet episode, they played with the idea of having Buffy get betrayed by her first college mentor...but we didn't get to explore that because the evil mentor got spiked in the back three seconds after Buffy survived a murder attempt. For a short while, there was even the chance that Dr. Walsh's duplicity might drive a wedge between Buffy and Riley (not that I'd shed a tear over that...Blicas frackin' sucks and these two never had any chemistry)...it would have even been consistent with classic BtVS "no joy allowed" doctrine. :)
But, alas, the writers decided to go the most uninteresting route imaginable. Boring...boring...BORING. Oh noze!! There's a big honking demon cyborg that you can't slay by hand out to create a "new world order" and he's after Buffy!! Wait...didn't we do this one? In the second season? With "The Judge"? See...that was actually appropriate, since it was a bad guy designed to last one two-part episode. They tried to make "Adam" into the star villain...and no one gave a frak. We'll deal with the anti-military message in the big finale to this plot, but for now, this episode gets credit for ALMOST being interesting. Almost.
Writing: 5.0
Utilitarian plot that twists and turns its' way into the forest of the blinkin' obvious cliche. Started well, ended with premature articulation. And it went over with me like a wet fart.
Acting: 8.0
Nothing wrong with the acting though...everyone did their best to turn a yawner into something worth watching...especially Alyson Hannigan in her side plot about feeling left out.
Message: 6.0
The anti-military thing is actually held at bay this week with Sergeant Snoozefest siding with Buffy against Dr. Evil. But we can all see where this is oh so predictably going.
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