Day 4: My Favorite Episode
Feb. 2nd, 2011 07:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blackfrancineThis was another difficult choice. I kept thinking of an episode that I love—and then I’d start to write up an explanation of why it’s the GREATEST EPISODE EVAR, and then suddenly I’d remember another episode. And I was like, D’oh. I think I like that episode more than the other one.
Yeah… repeat these steps about four times, and you have an idea of the evolution of this post.
So, I made a little list of the runners up, because I think they deserve some recognition as well.
Once More with Feeling
Checkpoint
Dead Things
Fool For Love
And the winner is...
INTERVENTION.
First, I would be remiss if I didn’t address the acting in this episode. Oh, the acting. SMG is perfection. PERFECTION, I tell you. She’s Buffy—grieving, scared, putting on a brave face; she’s BuffyBot—perky, unassuming, robotic yet human; and, OH MY GOODNESS, she’s Buffy pretending to be BuffyBot—slightly more assuming, slightly more human, still so perky—down to the placement of her hands on the sarcophagus, you guys, she nails it.
But I don’t want to ignore the other actors—there’s moments of absolute perfect delivery from James Marsters (the final scene, obviously, but also the escape from Glory's--from "Yeah... but it was fun" to "Good plan, Spike" to his exhausted fall down the elevator to his bucking himself up for a fight with the hobbits), Anthony Stewart Head (the warmth and love in his eyes when he says "I should think so" to Buffy's declaration that telling him she loved him feels weird and his good humored annoyance in the desert as he shakes the gourd and gets teased by Buffy), and Alyson Hannigan (trying to support Buffy, but gently correct her).
But what I really love about Intervention is that, for me, it perfectly encapsulates what BtVS is about. It's like a little Buffy microcosm. It has the zany villains acting zany ("We will bring you Bob Barker! We will bring you the limp and beaten body of Bob Barker!"); It has a wacky twist ("She's acting just like the robot that Warren guy made."); it has humor out the wazoo. But it also has Character Development.
It has Buffy searching—literally questing—for her identity. It has her beseeching the first slayer and then questioning the first slayer—looking to her calling and then challenging it. It has Spike being pushed to the limit--and choosing to be loyal rather than taking the easy way out. Taking yet another step--a big step-- on the road to redemption.
It has lovely, natural conversations between Willow and Tara ("Discovery Channel has koalas") and Xander and Anya ("I must've inhaled a quart of vampire dust. That can't be good.").
It has moments of just pure, perfect tenderness between Buffy and Giles (And I'm an absolute sucker for warm, loving Giles. But my favorite Giles/Buffy moment--maybe in the entire series--is when Giles is setting up the questing materials, and Buffy comments that a search party will find her bleached bones in a week. And he says, "Buffy, please. It takes more than a week to bleach bones." I love this so much! SO MUCH. Because we get to see how Giles's love for Buffy has led him to learn her language--he comforts her with banter and humor. He assures her of his love by teasing her. And by accepting her teasing of him. This is my perfect Giles/Buffy moment.), and Buffy and Dawn ("Weird love is better than no love"), and Buffy (Bot) and Willow.
And then, of course, Intervention has this moment of pure delight and power and sweetness.
Spike’s loyalty and sacrifice touches Buffy so deeply—it inspires her to forgive him, to accept him, to trust him. And I love how we see Spike not realizing--and then realizing--the significance of what’s happening. The question in his eyes. The tenderness in hers. OH MY HEART.
And then—in true Spike fashion—he futzes up the tender moment, asking about his robot. Oh, Spike.
I love it. I love how this episode gives you the tenderness—so much softness and sincerity—and then it topples it over with humor . But, here, in this scene, even when the tenderness gets toppled over, there’s so much of it, that it rises up again. Buffy expresses her disgust about the robot--but Spike's act of friendship and devotion mean too much. She gives him a crumb. More than a crumb. She gives him recognition, appreciation. Trust.
And so, in this scene the foundation for the rest of their relationship is laid—“That was real.”
I love this episode more than words can say. ♥
Yeah… repeat these steps about four times, and you have an idea of the evolution of this post.
So, I made a little list of the runners up, because I think they deserve some recognition as well.
Once More with Feeling
Checkpoint
Dead Things
Fool For Love
And the winner is...
INTERVENTION.
First, I would be remiss if I didn’t address the acting in this episode. Oh, the acting. SMG is perfection. PERFECTION, I tell you. She’s Buffy—grieving, scared, putting on a brave face; she’s BuffyBot—perky, unassuming, robotic yet human; and, OH MY GOODNESS, she’s Buffy pretending to be BuffyBot—slightly more assuming, slightly more human, still so perky—down to the placement of her hands on the sarcophagus, you guys, she nails it.
But I don’t want to ignore the other actors—there’s moments of absolute perfect delivery from James Marsters (the final scene, obviously, but also the escape from Glory's--from "Yeah... but it was fun" to "Good plan, Spike" to his exhausted fall down the elevator to his bucking himself up for a fight with the hobbits), Anthony Stewart Head (the warmth and love in his eyes when he says "I should think so" to Buffy's declaration that telling him she loved him feels weird and his good humored annoyance in the desert as he shakes the gourd and gets teased by Buffy), and Alyson Hannigan (trying to support Buffy, but gently correct her).
But what I really love about Intervention is that, for me, it perfectly encapsulates what BtVS is about. It's like a little Buffy microcosm. It has the zany villains acting zany ("We will bring you Bob Barker! We will bring you the limp and beaten body of Bob Barker!"); It has a wacky twist ("She's acting just like the robot that Warren guy made."); it has humor out the wazoo. But it also has Character Development.
It has Buffy searching—literally questing—for her identity. It has her beseeching the first slayer and then questioning the first slayer—looking to her calling and then challenging it. It has Spike being pushed to the limit--and choosing to be loyal rather than taking the easy way out. Taking yet another step--a big step-- on the road to redemption.
It has lovely, natural conversations between Willow and Tara ("Discovery Channel has koalas") and Xander and Anya ("I must've inhaled a quart of vampire dust. That can't be good.").
It has moments of just pure, perfect tenderness between Buffy and Giles (And I'm an absolute sucker for warm, loving Giles. But my favorite Giles/Buffy moment--maybe in the entire series--is when Giles is setting up the questing materials, and Buffy comments that a search party will find her bleached bones in a week. And he says, "Buffy, please. It takes more than a week to bleach bones." I love this so much! SO MUCH. Because we get to see how Giles's love for Buffy has led him to learn her language--he comforts her with banter and humor. He assures her of his love by teasing her. And by accepting her teasing of him. This is my perfect Giles/Buffy moment.), and Buffy and Dawn ("Weird love is better than no love"), and Buffy (Bot) and Willow.
And then, of course, Intervention has this moment of pure delight and power and sweetness.
Spike’s loyalty and sacrifice touches Buffy so deeply—it inspires her to forgive him, to accept him, to trust him. And I love how we see Spike not realizing--and then realizing--the significance of what’s happening. The question in his eyes. The tenderness in hers. OH MY HEART.
And then—in true Spike fashion—he futzes up the tender moment, asking about his robot. Oh, Spike.
I love it. I love how this episode gives you the tenderness—so much softness and sincerity—and then it topples it over with humor . But, here, in this scene, even when the tenderness gets toppled over, there’s so much of it, that it rises up again. Buffy expresses her disgust about the robot--but Spike's act of friendship and devotion mean too much. She gives him a crumb. More than a crumb. She gives him recognition, appreciation. Trust.
And so, in this scene the foundation for the rest of their relationship is laid—“That was real.”
I love this episode more than words can say. ♥
