Overall Rating: 8.5
Glory continues to be highly amusing and just creepy enough to retain her credibility and edge - but this week, the personal story takes point and is pretty effective.
Plot Synopsis:
The full story can be read here courtesy of BuffyGuide.com.
The Skinny:
Favorite Glory moment:
DREG: Forgive me, Glory, your most radiant splendiferous one! I beg you to rip out my unworthy tongue!
GLORY: Gimme!
DREG: (tiptoes closer to her and reluctantly sticks out his tongue - Glory takes the spell from his hand instead) *uncomfortable laughter* (hilarious!)
Anyway, apart from the hilariously evil Glory and her menacing presence in this episode, we have other creepy humor - such as the now fully pathetic Spike sniffing Buffy's unmentionables and then trying to deny it to Riley. And on top of the fun...there is the impending end of the Marc Blucas era (can't come soon enough as far as I'm concerned)...done in a way that's very believable. If you're superhero guy...and then you start dating a girl who's even more superhero than you've been...and then you lose YOUR superpowers...and to make things worse, your girlfriend is horribly closed off because she has a martyr/God complex and thinks she has to be the only one shouldering tough emotional burdens...and you can understand why Riley might go looking for a thrill - not that I condone his actions, but it is a believable story.
But the most important plot point this week is of course, Joyce's illness and the way the Summers family deals with it (not to mention the scoobies). Buffy can only think in terms of fighting back when she's in trouble - first she tries to find a magical way to heal her mother, then she resorts to killing the HELL out of Glory's new best friend...I mean that sucker was dead about 100 stab wounds before Buffy stopped with the killing. It protects Dawn for another week, but that big reveal is coming soon - Dawn herself can't possibly be clueless enough to miss the clues she's getting that something is up with her (they do eventually pile up enough to make her go hunting for info and find out the truth).
Hey...this is only the beginning of the season, and already they've set up a number of really powerful themes to be explored - there's a reason that these episodes were the ones that hooked me on the show - it's the best-organized, most consistent season of Buffy...good from the word GO unlike other strong seasons (2, 3 and 7 in particular start a bit weak but end well).
Writing: 8.0
Good solid plot-mover episode, though the dialogue doesn't quite zing the way some of the feature-worthy episodes do.
Acting: 9.5
Marc Blucas doesn't really sell the thrill he's supposed to be getting from his vampire friend, but apart from that, there isn't a missed beat here. The acting will only get better from here to the wire.
Message: 8.0
We all deal with fear and grief in different ways. Buffy is a woman of action, Dawn is filled with a desire for closeness and family (and clings much harder to her big sister in this time of crisis), Joyce remains stoic, and Giles (not far removed from the Summers family in spirit), tries simply to be sympathetic, but wise. This is just the beginning of Joss's exploration of grief and loss...but it's a good beginning.
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