To decide on one’s favourite episodes, in order, is a tricky thing to do. I wouldn’t have, except that I sensed an imbalance in the Grapefruit concerning tv program focus. So I will insist that people look at my given positions with an error of plus or minus five. In the end, it really depends which way the wind is blowing as to which is my favourite… I will also not take any episodes from season four. I don’t want to have to hide spoilery things, and besides, you haven’t really watched an episode until you’ve seen it on TV.

And so, without further ado, we’ll work our way up, using the same format Shannon did. Thanks to sites like The Sanctuary for rejuvenating my memory of some things. Today, it’s the honourable mentions…

I’ve Got You Under My Skin (114)

Written by Jeannine Renshaw and David Grossman, Directed by R.D. Price

We may as well get my small Wesley obsession right out into the open now. There’s almost no character in the Buffy and Angel universe that has had such a careful, consistent character development as this ex-Watcher. At this point, very early in his story, we see some hints as to his pathetic childhood, and an exploration of his confidence issues, which is very welcome. Cordy also shines — as normal for season one — in her scene at the magic shop.

It also explores Angel’s desire to keep his ‘family’ safe — a theme revisited a few times in season one — and his relationship with Wesley. “I know you’re not trying to kill me, Wesley. But you’re willing to. And that’s good.” Angel respects the side of Wes that knows what has to be done, and will do it — but this will come back to haunt him later…

Of course, one of the best things is that this episode features a self-contained plot, with guest characters, and resolution. Something that I do hope they haven’t forgotten how to do.

ANGEL: Wesley, you don’t even have sales resistance. How many thighmasters do you own?
WESLEY: The second one was a free gift with my buns of steel!

I Will Remember You (108)

Written by David Greenwalt and Jeannine Renshaw, Directed by David Grossman

This might have been higher up in the list, but then it’s almost a Buffy episode, so I wasn’t sure. It’s definitely a beautiful coda to the Buffy/Angel relationship, giving us a glimpse of what might have been, while examining their responsibilities to the world. Angel spends a lot of the first season rejecting the ‘easy’ resolution to his eternal torment, and this story shows once more that his dedication to redemption is more powerful even than his love for Buffy.

Still, I dare anyone to come out of that last scene without crying just a wee bit.

However, this episode introduced those daggy Oracles, and for that alone it shouldn’t be in the top ten proper.

CORDELIA: Oh, please. They’ve got the forbidden love of all time. They been apart for months. Now that he’s suddenly human, I’m sure they’re down there just having tea and crackers.

Sleep Tight (316)

Written by David Greenwalt, Directed by Terrence O’Hara

Your boss is starting to look peckish around his kid, and you’ve just read an ancient prophecy that says he’ll kill the brat. And this time, you’re fairly sure you read it right. What do you do? Running off with it might seem the best plan? Well, yes and no.

Thus begins Wesley’s big character arc of rejection by the man he swore to help, and it begins damn well. He’s not afraid to do what must be done, as his brutal beating of Lorne demonstrates. And he’s finally got the confidence to stand up to the villain, and to seriously embark on a new life without any of his friends, to save Angel and Connor from their destinies.

The episode is also (as I’ve mentioned in our archives) a tribute to the absent Cordelia’s character. With no one there to spot Wesley’s pain, or Angel’s weird blood issues, things fall apart. One could really call this her last great episode, as once she returns from her holiday, she never talks to Wesley again. Which doesn’t sit well with me.

Meanwhile, Angel suffers yet another massive heartbreaking failure. Poor guy.

JUSTINE: What you’re about to do to your friend. I imagine it’s easier to hate Holtz than yourself.
WESLEY: There’s enough to go around for both him and me.

Waiting in the Wings (313)

Written and Directed by Joss Whedon

One of Joss Whedon’s incredible writing/directing shows. Nicely self contained (well, except for the Groo at the end), yet developing each of the characters solidly. Yet it didn’t really hit all the notes for me, which is why it’s not so high. Certainly it has some brilliant set pieces — Cordy and Angel getting all huggy, Wes swordfighting, and everyone getting dressed up for the ballet. A very smart and clever episode.

Sadly, it began the most cloyingly sugar sweet relationship ever seen — Gunn and Fred. So it loses valuable points.

CORDY: You know, there was a time when you thought I was the loveliest thing in the world.
WESLEY: Well, I… you’re an extraordinary woman! I —
CORDY: At ease, soldier. Just like to hear it every now and then. I was the ditsiest bitch in Sunnydale, coulda had any man I wanted; now I’m all superhero-y and the best action I can get is an invisible ghost who’s good with a Loofah.

Continued in Part Two…

…continued from part two. The countdown begins…

05 | Fool For Love (507)

Written by Douglas Petrie, Directed by Nick Marck

I love flashbacks. I can’t get enough of them. In fact, I say the new Buffy spinoff should be purely flashbacks to assorted (demon related) events. Oh come on, it would be cool. Admit it. Ok, so having established flashbacks are the best thing since sliced bread (which really is very cool also), of course an episode that not only shows Spike when he was human, but how he was sired, what his life with his crew of Angelus, Darla and Drusilla was like for a few hundred years, and also how he killed two slayers would make it into my good books. AND all this crossed-over into an intertwining episode of Angel. Very cool.

Some other nifty stuff in this episode: The scoobies tailing after Riley on patrol, noisily munching on chips and musing over the meaning of his covert signals. Angel/Angelus’s inclusion in the ep cannot be looked over as a high point either.

So do I have a focus to these odds tidbits of coolness (and yes I’m aware I’ve overused that word far beyond its limits in the past two paragraphs)? Not really. I can’t put my finger on what makes this one so good. I just love being given the background information that I hunger for to these characters you invest yourself so much in. I like to see their history, know about their past. Not just the bad guys either, I would love to see more LA Buffy or even junior high Willow and Xander. It’s just my greedy and I guess defunct imagination that cant make up backgrounds for these characters on its own and yet wants to know all the details of their lives. Which brings me back to: Flashbacks are cool.

Also worth noting, I cried again in this one — at the end where Buffy throws the money at Spike and leaves him all alone in an alley to wallow in his rejection. Ok, I cry in Disney movies, it’s not that hard to jerk and tear from me but I stand by it as my indication of good TV.

Willow’s assessment of Riley’s covert hand signals:

WILLOW: It’s code. I think it breaks down to ‘choo-choo’.

04 | The Body (516)

Written and Directed by Joss Whedon

Buffy comes home to find her mother Joyce motionless and cold on their couch. She calls 911 and Joyce in pronounced dead. The rest of the synopsis should speak for itself — they are all grieving, and show their trauma in different ways. A very nice character episode, and I like it all the more for its artistic genius.

The subject matter of death is dealt with so frequently on Buffy, that one almost tends to forget the death toll of every episode. Yes, usually it is evil monsters dying, but certainly these characters are no strangers to death. When humans die on Buffy, characters react with a bit more regret than when its slimey gooey demons, to be sure, but they are still somewhat incidental occurrences in the world where death is their lives, to create a most tragic of puns.

Yet ‘The Body’ is the one episode of the series which you might say is purely about death. Ok, and maybe ‘Prophecy Girl’. And ‘The Gift’. Oh shut up. My point is, they deal with it in a totally different, and rather beautiful way. There is little (if any?) underscoring through the episode which adds to the feeling of emptiness, and is almost deafening in its volume. If that’s possible…

Choices #4 through to #2 are all Joss/Joss creations, and this is no coincidence. The man in a genius. Or at least, in the realm of the Buffy and Angel universes… universi… whats the plural for universe?… I stray from the matter… Since I started compiling this list weeks before finishing it, I have lessened in my resolve that these five are the cream of the crop (especially after Tom pointed out a few vitals that I missed completely) but I regain confidence from the backing that so many fine Joss/Joss creations made it this far.

TARA: Did I miss something?
ANYA: Xander decided that he blames the wall.

03 | Amends (310)

Written and Directed by Joss Whedon

It’s Christmas time in Sunnydale, Angel is being ‘haunted’ by victims of Angelus, Willow and Oz have thoughts of doing the wild thang, and Xander has a go at intimidating info out of Willy the snitch.

This episode is awesome. It contains all the elements I have previously set up as paramount to a top episode. In hindsight, perhaps it should be number one, but just like number one, I have only seen this episode once about 3 years ago when it was on TV and so cant remember it well enough to say that for sure. But on paper, it certainly looks like one of the grooviest.

Lets start with: Flashbacks. Again I will state for you, gentle readers, put very simply, flashbacks are cool. Especially the ones featured in this episode — Ireland in the 1830’s, past victims of Angelus, whose deaths Angel must relive through dreams. He is haunted by his victims in his waking moments also, with the first ever appearance of The First Evil, a key player in the final series of Buffy. We learn the basics about The First Evil all the way back here in Season Three — that he/she/they/it/evil cannot take corporeal form, and that he/she/they/it/evil only appears under the guise of someone who has passed away. Who better to return to torment Angel than… Jenny! Remember my rant when she died? Naturally, her reappearance here for the torture of Angel’s conscience is a golden moment in the series. We also meet the eyeless Bringers for the first time in the episode, whom also play pivotal roles as servants of the First in the final season.

Willow and Oz get back together in this episode, and I challenge any Buffy fan out there to say they didn’t yearn for that. “This is what I do know: I miss you. Like, every second. Almost like I lost an arm, or worse, a torso.” — Oz.

Now the real highlight of this truly marvelous creation by that legend of a bloke Mr. Whedon, is the final scene where Angel is determined to kill himself. Jenny/The First has tried to convince him to kill Buffy, and being tempted by this he decides his only course of action is to stand on a hill out in the open and wait for the sun to rise. Picture this: its Christmas Eve just before dawn. Angel in all his tormented soul glory is waiting to end his life, and his greatest love is tying to convince him not to. Angel sobs. Buffy sobs. Softly snow begins to fall, preventing the sun from shining. And in a great sobbing blubbering mess I hoist both my thumbs in the air before I dash away to get more tissues. Pure Excellence.

THE FIRST: Hmm. You think you can fight me? I’m not a demon, little girl. I am something that you can’t even conceive. The First Evil. Beyond sin, beyond death. I am the thing the darkness fears. You’ll never see me, but I am everywhere. Every being, every thought, every drop of hate….
BUFFY: Alright, I get it. You’re evil. Do we have to chat about it all day? …
THE FIRST: You have no idea what you’re dealing with.
BUFFY: Lemme guess. Is it… evil?

02 | Once More With Feeling (607)

Written and directed by Joss Whedon

Why summarize this episode? We all know the one I’m talking about — they were singing and dancing, its very hard to miss. Ok well if you want some plot reminding… A tap-dancing demon was summoned by Xander who wanted to see if he and Anya would ‘get a happy ending’, but this demon wrongly assumes it was Dawn who called him, as she has stolen his amulet (because she’s the rebellious, attention-seeking teen type) from the Magic Box. So Dawn is taken hostage, but instead of taking her to the underworld to be his Queen immediately, this demon decides to wait around a little while so that she can be rescued. Phew! That’s lucky, cos here comes Buffy with her back-up singers in tow…

Alright well this one had a head start to begin with, in that not only was it about the most anticipated hour of television I ever watched, but I am mad (in the unhealthy, deranged sense) about musicals in general. It would have been easy for this episode merely to be a frivolous addition to the season with no real story nor addition to the overall arc. But not when we are in Joss’ hands. While stunningly entertaining, with humour abounding (‘They Got the Mustard Out’, or Anya’s bunny song), a good dose of pervalicious grunge with Spike’s number, and a reasonable justification for why they were all singing and dancing, Joss still managed to squeeze in necessary overall arc developments — Tara discovering Willow’s memory manipulation spell, and Giles’ resolve to leave Sunnydale.

The direction in this episode is quite mesmerizing. At times, it’s a bit over the top, the camera shifts its focus within a frame so many times that it almost seems like Joss is showing off, but it does also look very effective. The long tracking shot during which Giles is explaining the severity of the circumstances to Xander and Anya, which shifts focus between their conversation and a parking dispute, all the while with dancing janitors making wonderful artistic use of their broomsticks in the background shows the dedication to making this episode great for while it is both a mastery of choreography and timing, it would have taken a lot of resources to get right. It’s also very pleasing to see Joss shooting scenes from different angles. Back in the library, we were always seeing at the gang’s ‘evil of the week’ conversation from the same angle — as though we were standing in front of the entrance to the library. In the Magic Box, these same conversations, that are a must in act one of every Buffy episode, seem far less stagnant owing to the various ways these scenes can be shot. This can be seen throughout the season, but is most obvious during the ‘evil of the week’ talk in this episode, which turns into the group number ‘I’ve Got a Theory’.

The lyrics to the episode are what makes it so great. The wit in “I’ll never tell” and the character insight of “Going through the motions” really are worth both thumbs up on their own, but then there are the little things like: Buffy — “Doesn’t mean a thing”, Vamp — “She ain’t got that swing” that really make me smile.

All you non believers who think this episode is crap (cough MATT cough) I challenge you to come up with as many reasons for its lack of merit. There are none. Well, unless you count that most obvious of plot devices, Giles insisting Buffy face the dancing demon on her own. Or that hideous, totally unbelievable, suck-face kiss at the end between Buffy and Spike. But that lead to a good storyline, you see, so it all works out for the better in the end.

SPIKE: First I’ll kill her, then I’ll save her / No I’ll save her, then I’ll kill her!
WILLOW: I think this line’s mostly filler…

01 | Normal Again (617)

Written by Diego Gutierrez, Directed by Rick Rosenthal

The first thing that needs to be stated is that my opinions of the different episodes of Buffy are never constant, as such. Since I compiled this list over a month ago (before writing it up properly) I’ve lost some resolve in regards to the merit of the top few, however I shall stick by the mood I was in that fateful day several weeks ago, otherwise my conclusion to this article won’t match my introduction, and my editor will get cranky.

As you can see by this chart showing the distribution between seasons of this top ten rundown, it would appear that someone forgot to tell me how crap the later seasons were. The general arc of this graph shows that my preferences lay in the later seasons, and to my abject horror that the most popular season during this undertaking turned out to be season four during which I whinged the entire time. If I recall, this was also the beginning of the end in terms of the never-ending whinge-machine that became one Buffy Summers. I feel the need to redeem myself before I state my argument for the underrated 617 as the numero uno.

I intend to redeem myself by explaining what I consider to be the only possible explanation for this apparent backward thinking: I do not have the Buffy series on record to revisit these episodes and remind myself of their greatness. The last and only time I saw ‘Amends’, for example, was when it appeared on television four years ago. As a result, I don’t remember it very clearly at all, and was relying on transcripts and episode summaries to remind me of its greatness. ‘Normal Again’ however, I have also only seen the once, but remember quite clearly. This could be for a couple of reasons; either attribute this to the fact that it aired only last year and so is fresh in the memory banks, or take into consideration that this episode had an effect on me that I cant recall any other episode every having. When it ended, with its possible and plausible, open-ended conclusion, that the Buffy universe in all its fantastical facets could be the delusioned escape of a mentally unstable youth, I was left with a lot to ponder. And ponder I did. I think I sat on my couch for about an hour, by myself, in the dark (ok, stop giving me that look) just thinking and going ‘Huh. Well… huh’. I’ve cried at the ends of episodes, I’ve wanted to hit the screen in frustration, I’ve cowered in the corner with a pillow half over my eyes, but I count that as my best reaction of all. It got the cogs of this old brain working. A mighty feat. Not that I don’t ponder the mysteries of the Buffy universe every now and again, but usually in conversation or heated argument over some dispute of mysticism and mythology.

I loved the concept of this episode. I’m not saying by any means that I feel the fantastical nature of the show needs to be explained at all in terms of its relationship to reality. I’m a huge sci-fi and fantasy fan of all mediums, and my imagination is quite capable of accepting the unrealistic scenarios of fantasy as ‘other’ to what is ‘real’. This is perhaps the reason the idea of explaining Buffy‘s relationship to reality appealed to me — I had never seen the need, and so the concept had never so much as occurred to me. I’d (yes, like the geek I am) considered a lot of things about Buffy from lots of angles, but never that.

I suppose its wrong of me to base sigh a high ranking on that one thing — initial reaction, as opposed to it possessing all the elements of an episode that I love (ie. flashbacks, good fight scenes, character developments, really great humour), but as I’ve only seen many of the episodes once, initial reaction is the best thing I have to go on. See my above argument with the pretty demonstrative graph for reiteration of this. If you are going to come at me with an axe, then just tell yourself that ‘Once More with Feeling’ was the top cheddar. No wait, that won’t help.. Ok all the homicidals can see ‘Amends’ as the one with the best of the goods. No doubt Tom will be forcing me to sit down and watch this episode again next week and I’ll be clamouring back to this article to nock everything else up a notch and it off the charts, but for today, this is my pick.

Just a quick synopsis reminder for those who thought ‘Normal Again’ was ordinary enough not to bother with a second glance: The Evil Trio (Jonathan, Warren and Andrew) have a venomous demon sting Buffy, which incurs hallucinations that she is in fact in a mental asylum, back in LA, told by her mother, father and doctor that Sunnydale with its monsters, demons, watchers, Snyders, witches, giant-lizard-mayors, and slayers is the result of a chronic case of schizophrenic psychosis that Buffy is suffering from, and all a false illusion. To get well and escape this delusion Buffy must cut the ties she has created for herself to this unreal world, by killing Willow, Xander, Dawn (and one assumes, Spike, Giles and Tara too). Though she tries to, in the end Buffy chooses the ‘delusion’ and does not kill her chums. The episode closes with a scene in the asylum with a doctor looking into a non-responsive Buffy and pronouncing “We’ve lost her.”

BUFFY: I was, uh, checking houses on that list you gave me, and looking for Warren and his pals … and then, bam! Some kind of gross, waxy demon-thing poked me.
XANDER: And when you say poke…
BUFFY: In the arm.

And that’s it, gentle readers. I hope enjoyed this production of Shannon’s General Thoughts and Musings, as much as we enjoyed bringing it to you. Have a nice day.

‘Redemption, Part One’ showcases some nifty plot devices. A hugabye moment for Teal’c with his son Rya’k, a heart wrenching plea from the nauseating Jonas Quinn about wanting to rid the universe of evil, and a corny apparition of a big bad goa’uld. Throw in some inter-stellar flight in an Area-51 doozie, and a grumpy Russian Colonel whinging about the injustice of the week and you have the season six opener. And yet, all this is still not enough to make this a crap episode. What pulls this episode through is the extra dose of wit from character Jack O’Neil, and of course, Teal’c bashing Jonas in the head a few hundred times in the boxing ring.

The following concept occurred to me while watching this episode: When casting Rya’k for his first appearance several years ago they went for a local child actor who could pull it off and look about as much like Christopher Judge as they could get. Unfortunately, he’s not dead yet and so they still have the character and actor making occasional appearances. If Neil Dennis was still 7 and a crap actor I could understand. But by season six he’s about 13 or 14 and still a crap actor and it just grates my cheese. It spoils every scene — you are wrenched from the nice fantasy world to be reminded that it is all in fact a work of fiction. It nice every now and again to be able to believe tv actors. I realize casters make mistakes and once in a while you get a Tara (‘Buffy’) or Rya’k, and to err is human. But honestly, it deflates the whole illusion. Poor boy. Sorry to put this all on you.

A remarkably well-played character, in counterpoint, is that of Dr. McKay (David Hewlett). He suits his purpose perfectly. Here is a character designed to irritate, and if ever I were to throw my popcorn at the screen (figuratively, of course) it would be at that shmuck.

Overall, this episode is not one of the greatest of the series, though there are lots of greats out there. To be fair, it is a two-parter so I have only cooked half the ingredients here (ooh, I’m making up sayings!), but SG-1 will be hard pressed to save this mission from its inevitable disaster.

So, it’s another of those ‘arc-moving’ episodes. In the case of the last few episodes, they’ve been genuinely exciting, fast-moving and involving in a self contained way. But sometimes you get an episode that contains more exposition than story. And this is one of them. It seems no sooner have we heard of the Ra-Tet than they’ve all been munched. I can’t help feeling that it would have been more dramatic to establish the Ra-Tet in an earlier episode. But this is ultimately minor quibbling.

Perhaps my problem with the episode was the depressing fact that the team achieve virtually nothing — they don’t save the Ra-Tet, they don’t stop the sun from going out. Useless bunch. At least they did manage to send the Beast through that portal. I loved his re-entrance.

And it was nice to see Gwen again, especially to give Angel someone to spark off a little — it’s much more fun to watch than him being grumpy. The ‘super-powered’ pair in many scenes were the only ones keeping me interested. However it must be said that the cliffhanger was pretty intriguing too — we now have a solution to “The answer is among you”. And I was SO SURE it was Gunn.

Basically, my problem with the episode was that it was dull. But if they’re reintroducing Angelus soon, then this may no longer be a problem.

Hmmm. This isn’t turning out to be a ‘happy’ season of Angel, is it? Last week, we had a rain of fire and the complete defeat of our heroes. This week we had the mass slaughter of folks who, while not innocent, were almost certainly not evil enough to deserve what they got. Although Gavin did, for his heinous crimes against believable acting in the past.

Tensions in Angel Investigations are still running high, and this is generally entertaining. Though Wesley and Fred’s willingness to leave Gunn to fight off a dozen zombies was puzzling. As was his subsequent, miraculous survival. Angel’s tantrum over Connor and Cordy’s horizontal mambo was fun too.

As for plot this week… well, there wasn’t really much of one. Big Monster go Wolfram and Hart, kill many and strange girl. But this was nevertheless well presented and occasionally scary — especially with Lilah, one of the few ‘expendable’ characters, running from the Beast. There were still problems — despite Angel (and Wesley, one assumes) knowing to decapitate zombies to kill them, the gang seemed remarkably keen to hit them repeatedly with the blunt ends of their weapons, as well as fists and feet.

Regardless of the odd logical miss, the episode advanced the main plot nicely, if not actually doing very much itself. And we’re still left with a very evil nasty wandering around.

Things to ponder: How did the Beast know Connor’s name? Did he raise the corpses, or was it a Wolfram and Hart safety measure? Is this truly the end for Wolfram and Hart? And what does the girl mean when she says "The answer is among you…"?

Please let me keep reviewing. I’m so sorry about my previous lax efforts. I don’t know what I’d do without this job. I’ve got 5 kids to feed and a mortgage to pay and my wife’s sick and we’re snowed in for the winter with no food or firewood and there’s wolf outside and I think my mother-in-law’s a zombie…

As for that reviewer last week trying to drop hints and spoilers about the rest of the season; how unprofessional. About Tara (may she stay dead for ever), this site appears to have the shooting scripts for Buffy rather than transcripts of the episodes and it has Tara written in last episode instead of Cassie. I don’t know if it’s significant and frankly I don’t care.

Following last week’s allegedly good episode, we had another strong one this week. There was some witty dialogue (which has always been one of Buffy’s strong points), some classic non-communication between the group and a good demonstration of how much they distrust each other.

I can understand why they don’t trust Spike. He’s still evilish, insane and has a thirst for blood so naturally if they need a likely suspect… In my my opinion Spike hasn’t changed much at all since getting his soul. He might spend a little time brooding over his past wrongs, but his actions still seem to be reformed. The chip gives him more trouble than his soul.

But I’m still surprised at what a well-knit group the rest of them all aren’t. After this many years of evil fighting, I would have thought that they’d all share info and get some real teamwork going. It’s not like they’re on Angel and actively betray each other but neither do they fully trust each other… I realise that without this there’d be a much shorter show each week but it still annoys me.

A better plot device to the keep them busy is this mysterious shapeshifter. The ambiguity over who’s the bad guy is more satisfying than the group’s mistrust, when you know at the end of the episode they’ll just go “Ooh why didn’t I trust you in the first place. We’re such good friends. Let’s not fight again, at least until next episode.”

Another thing that annoys me is Anya. All I’ve got to say about her is this: Why isn’t she dead yet?

Buffy has a deadly aim with that broomstick. A couple of them died as she just wiggled it around in their general direction. I guess the anonymous vampires have a larger kill zone in their chests.

Yay Giles! Yikes Giles!

It’s building up to be a good season. Hopefully it won’t loose the plot like last season after a few good initial episodes.

Andy: I was just sitting down to watch another episode of this hilarious series full of optimism, when I had this tip off from an reliable informant: “dont watch Buffy tonight. it sucked.”

So I didn’t.

[Right, that’s it. I warned you. Didn’t I warn you? — Ed]

Jackson: Vampires. The relationship between the human being and the demon within is one of the key concepts that form the foundation of the Buffy universe. Sadly however, it appears the writers don’t agree with me, and it is too often neglected or abused. Such is the case in ‘Conversations with Dead People’.

From the first episode we were presented with a very simple, rigid definition — a vampire was a demon in a human body. Beyond memory, nothing of the original human remained. Now it is natural that as time went on the writers would want to blur the line between these two entities — and they have, although perhaps inconsistently.

Such redefinition if it is subtle and used to increase the shows moral complexity is great. However flagrantly disregarding established rules merely for comic effect is not. The implications ripple out across the entire Buffy universe — which is annoying for those of us who like to take there shows vaguely seriously. It’s a shame because I actually found this episode quite entertaining.

The vampire that Buffy spends the entire episode talking to seems nothing more than himself coupled with an overpowering desire to kill — similar I suppose to vampires in the Anne Rice universe, minus the moral anguish and gradual acceptance of what they have become. It’s convenient for Buffy that they did remove the internal conflict factor, because then she might of had to think about it before she staked him. Besides, if the writers went with that road, however interesting, Angel would have a LOT of explaining to do.

But surely if even a fragment of the human remains, then it raises some disturbing ethical questions. And that’s why Buffy often seems at times to almost contradict itself. While everything around the protagonist becomes more grey and muddy — that moral landscape the characters themselves is still very much black and white. Angel handles this sort of thing much better. But such inconsistencies are what Buffy is about these days it seems — with superpowers, characters whatever. It’s almost like the writers don’t care sometimes, and just want to make us laugh. It’s a pity. There is a lot of potential there. That being said — the sequence was very funny.

Anyway enough of that. This I believe is the first episode that features the First in full swing — and it’s fairly impressive. Although it must have drained it for the next half a season because it doesn’t like appearing as that many people again. I find the concept of the First more difficult to swallow than most, because obviously it doesn’t have a consciousness the way we do — I mean, it can hold conversations with several people at once and act as completely separate entities. I think it’s bigger than a person can comprehend.

Dawn manages to pull in a less-annoying-than-usual performance. Maybe I just enjoyed it because she was shit-scared the entire time. Who knows? The exact nature of the Joyce apparition that appeared to Dawn is subject to rampant speculation on the net, and on hindsight is one of the more intriguing parts of this episode. Was it the first, and the entity trashing Dawn’s house trying to protect her? Or was it something else? I get the feeling we’ll never find out.

And of course, in typical Buffy style, Dawn won’t mention the apparitions ‘revelations’ to anyone else. Because we all know in this show that if everyone talked to everyone else, a lot of their problems would be fixed.

Another point of intrigue, which probably isn’t because they couldn’t get the actor — is the absence of Tara. Surely if the First wanted Willow to kill herself, it would have been more effective impersonating Tara. Is there a reason the First didn’t choose Tara? Probably. But perhaps more interestingly, maybe it couldn’t impersonate Tara for some reason. Although the idea that Tara’s ghost could hold that power seems unlikely. They probably just couldn’t get the actor. I honestly don’t know.

Jonathan’s death was quite shocking — he didn’t quite get a friendly send off. He got one line where he sort-of-almost redeemed himself. This was definitely a highlight. Oh and Buffy/Vampire sequence which I spent most of the ‘review’ complaining about… All in all, I remember enjoying this episode. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, hence my rather long rant to hide the gaps in my memory.

The trouble with reviewing things that friends perform in, is that if you want to bag it it gets tricky. However, Shannon was in tech crew for this one, and not officially involved artistically, so strictly speaking I’m free to rubbish it. Also, this is my first ‘high class’ review, and I may show my ignorance at any or all points as I review a play by a man demonstrably far cleverer than I.

I say demonstrably, because Arcadia is a brilliant play.

It deals (in part at least) with the opposition between personality and progress, between the intrigues of the individual and the mathematics of the universe. Straddling two time periods — and it’s well known that everything worth reading or seeing straddles at least two time periods — it explores both a tragic love story with science at its centre and the struggles of people in the present to understand the events in the past. The intelligent script hardly waits for the audience to catch up, and certainly never patronises them, as it lets us spot links and the answers to riddles with little signposting.

It also engages quite openly and in depth with many mathematical and physical concepts. This is a fairly brave step, and one I’m not in a position to judge the success of, having studied all the concepts investigated. I can’t be sure that the maths wouldn’t be alienating or irritating to a non-mathematically inclined person. It certainly worked for me.

The play gets more dramatic in the second half, where we see the characters from both time periods overlap, sharing the same space yet not interacting — with the enigmatic exception of Gus Coverly (Robert Edwards). This manages to notch up the tension and excitement without actually affecting the narrative, and leads up nicely to the melancholy final scene of Gus and Hannah dancing alongside Septimus and Thomasina.

The characters are all brilliantly drawn — and was only enhanced by the acting in the Leonardian Players’ performance. James Martin stole all his scenes as the dry Septimus Hodge, though Isabelle Brennan held her own as a pretty believable genius. Both managed to make their attraction at the end transcend age boundaries and the tutor/student relationship. Nathan Bell’s Ezra Chater was completely over the top, and went rather against the atmosphere of the piece… but then, I can’t imagine that anyone expected him to do it differently.

In the present, Kate Shearman’s affected accent as Hannah confirmed my suspicions that she is, in fact, a clone of Kate Winslet. Her anger and awkwardness were brilliantly shown. David Palliser’s sleazy, arrogant academic played against her wonderfully, and the scenes between the two were hilarious: “I was looking between her legs and saw something that reminded me of you.” Nick Stein, as usual, turned in an eccentric yet empathic performance, and Erica Johnson assumed the role of the flirty Chloe very well indeed. If there was any main criticism of the players, it was that initially many of the lines were somewhat hurried. But as the audience laughed more and more they became far more relaxed, and this became far less of a problem.

There was a funny blue screen with moving stuff in it that I think was supposed to be a window. The patterns of clouds kept on changing, but for the life of me I couldn’t actually SEE them change. This was a source of constant frustration for me. It was hard to notice the direction, but the trickier scenes were done flawlessly, so someone must have been organised somewhere…

A fascinating play, and a cut above average for the Leonardian Players.

My obsession with the Black Heart Procession started in 1999 when I bought their second album, 2, based only on a favourable review in the EG section of The Age. While its music reviews are somewhat more reliable than its movie ones (largely since Jim Schembri has yet to write any), it was still the sort of gamble which often results in a wasted $25. However, of the many words to describe this CD, ‘wasted’ was not one which jumped to mind. This was some of the most beautiful, sparse, bleak, melancholy music I had ever heard. With a name like the Black Heart Procession, it was clear that ‘uplifting’ was another word that would rarely be associated with them but their particular brand of lost love and broken hearts was told with such perfection that it was never depressing and often inspiring.

Thus my obsession with BHP began. After much effort I managed to buy their first album, 1, online. It was equally enthralling, albeit presenting the band at a more embryonic stage. I eagerly awaited their next album, Three, but would eventually be somewhat disappointed by its arrival. For while all the features I had loved so much in 1 and 2 were still present, there was nothing much new. In fact when looking for any development in the band since 2, the only obvious advancement was the switch from album titles written numerically to having the word spelt out. It seemed BHP might have been a one trick pony which would now slowly fade away.

How wrong I was. With ‘Amore del Tropico’, the band’s creativity goes beyond the radically different album title. The band have discovered a whole new kind of love-gone-wrong. They have become proactive in their brokenheartedness. Bleak lost love has been replaced by murderous lost love.

It is clear from the start that things are not going to work out well with the first 10 second track called ‘The End of Love’ followed by ‘Tropics of Love’ with the lyric “was it here where we left our hearts, in the tropics of love” and most ominously on ‘Broken World’,

I know that you are through with me,
I know you want to get rid of me,
I know that you have a plan for me,
I know that you want to torture me,
Now we’ll never meet again,
Not in this broken world.

This change is paralleled in the music. While the first three albums were slow, spacious and at times despondent often recalling a sea shanty, ‘Amore del Tropico’ has a fuller sound and stronger driving beat with occasional Mexican influenced sounds. Several of the songs are in 3/4 and 6/8 time, urging you to get up and waltz along even as they sing

Love is a poison ring,
And love has poured you drinks,
Now love waits for you to sleep,
Don’t lend it to a friend,
Cause you may never see that friend again

The band’s leading duo, Tobias Nathaniel and Pall Jenkins, still play a wide variety of instruments, including the haunting musical saw but are now joined by other instrumentalists on cello and violin.

The ‘crime of passion’ which is the subject of the CD is only ever hinted at and it is left to the listener to connect the very few dots we are given. Our clearest sign of what has happened is on the penultimate track ‘Fingerprints’ when the culprit is presumably found out. It is the final track however which is perhaps the most intriguing. Having kept up their new livelier sound for the entire album, this last track returns to the slower bleak sounds of 2:

I know I’m the one who has disappeared
When I write my name no words appear
And in your heart I will appear
And when it’s my turn I turn away.

It seems as though after taking the gamble of being more proactive in their search for love, and having failed again, the band have reverted to their former ways. The basic message of BHP remains the same. Your love life won’t work out. But at least now you can dance along to their music while you wait for the inevitable.

(The band plan to shortly release a silent movie, with the album as soundtrack, telling the story of the songs. We will see then if I managed to join the dots in the right order.)

A few weeks ago, in his Buffy review, Andy reminded us that everything man touches is a mixture of good and evil. Of course, he was talking about Buffy, so really the mixture was of ‘not bad’ and ‘lame’. This week’s episode of Angel, however, truly is such a mixture. A lot of the episode is as good as any episode of Angel ever gets — incessant foreboding, pus jokes, tensions between the gang — but some of it is so incredibly bad… I’ll come to that bit.

Gunn and Fred’s uncertain relationship was handled nicely, with good acting on both sides that almost made me more tolerant of how damn happy and painfully cute they’ve been recently. It’s always nice to see Gunn angry. Wesley’s smug entrance and the resulting conflict with Gunn was good stuff too. It was also excellent to see Angel torture Gavin. I hope it hurt. And nice to see Angel using logic and not force to get Lilah to help him. She’s very giving, as he reminded Wes. Speaking of which, Lilah’s spot of dressing up was one of the funniest moments this season. "Keep them on!"

Angel Investigations’ deduction of where the risen beast was slaughtering was fairly convincing too. Vaguely believable and a nice image at the end. Although the whole ‘putting all the points on the map’ thing always reminds me of an Inspector Gadget episode. Even Connor was vaguely watchable this episode — his concern about his link to the danger was well handled. Perhaps he’s going to get interesting soon. And the final fight scene! Go Wes! Go Angel! Yeah, too bad Gunn and Lorne. The stake through the neck looked painful.

But now the bad. Cordelia. While her anxiety about the beast was nicely done, other bits … weren’t. You know what I’m talking about. Ick. How did the writers ever think that was a good idea? I don’t care what they’re setting up, it’s just wrong. Still, I’m trying not to let it colour my opinion of the whole episode. In general, it was great. Just with one awful bit.

Some unanswered questions… Why did the Beast simply grin at Cordelia? And why did he ask Angel if he thought she was safe with Connor? There’s something peculiar going on here…