Bargaining – Life Serial
601 | Bargaining, Part One
Written by Marti Noxon Directed by David Grossman
Andy: Poor old Buffy. She’ll suffocate trapped in that coffin. Oh well, they’ll just have to try something else. I liked the bit when Tara went grrr argh in the airport with the little finger monster.
Mattt: I didn’t like this episode. Didn’t like Tara, didn’t like Anya, didn’t even like much of Xander, or… anyone. Except Willow — I like where she might be going. She’s the only one who shows signs of growing this season. I liked the fighting the vampires at the start also.
Tom: Bit of a disappointment. Takes so long to get anywhere, and then ends fairly abruptly. I was a little shocked to see Buffy’s emaciated corpse. Ew. I’m embarassed to say that Giles’ farewell made me a little teary. Even though I know he’s coming back later.
602 | Bargaining, Part Two
Andy: Poor old Buffy. She’s a bit confused about what’s going on. No- one’s really explained what’s going on and why she isn’t dead.
Mattt: Lame. I liked the bit where she was trapped in the coffin. The suspense was rather killed by having seen Buffy do all the stuff that the others were working out slowly. I suppose that Buffy being reincarnated was the point, but as we knew it was going to happen all the little revelations throughout the episode were ruined.
Tom: An episode of sitting around talking leads into an episode of constant action. That’s what you get when you split up a double length episode I suppose. For the first time in a while I was really impressed with Sarah Michelle Gellar’s acting. I wish Xander could get vaguely good at fighting. Heck, just vaguely good at SOMETHING. He seems to have even dropped the ball in the going for doughnuts department.
603 | Afterlife
Andy: Xander and co. are boring.
Mattt: A very tense episode. I liked the eyes, and the final revelation. Nice to see Buffy fighting something non-corporeal for a change. Very interesting revelation about Buffy in heaven. Tara still looks dopey. I believe she is ruining this series, and possibly has an IQ of 80.
Tom: At last, a good, run-of-the-mill episode on Buffy. And pretty scary in places. Recently the only good ones have been the ‘event’ ones. Great stuff from SMG and Michelle Trachtenberg this week. And Spike is back in form. Awww. I’m worried that he might be getting just a little too cuddly though. And the final scene — fantastic.
604 | Flooded
Andy: Now that the interesting characters (Giles and Buffy) are back things are looking good. But one of the nerds on Buffy is called Andrew — lowering the average coolness of Andrews anywhere.
Mattt: I loved the nerds. Very funny, but a little too close to the bone at points. So far so good for the season. I am impressed. Nice to see Giles back, and a good scene between Spike and Buffy on the steps.
Tom: Average. The argument between Giles and Willow is the highlight — especially after their sweet farewell only three episodes ago. Buffy has gone from the most boring character to the most interesting. The evil nerds are alright, but I hope they don’t outstay their welcome.
605 | Life Serial
Andy: Are those nerds this season’s villians for Buffy? They can’t be too
hard to vanquish. It is about time Jonathon was killed. Too bad
that the death star picture on the side of the van was painted over.
It was pretty good although conspicuous. Buffy has ‘on previous
episodes’ at the start of each episode almost every week at the
moment often showing the same stuff as the previous week’s one.
Are lots of fans only tuning in now and need to be updated?
Tom: Very funny. Loved Buffy’s reaction to the whiskey, the nerds’ Bond conversation/argument, the death star, the kittens. Willow’s tutorial looked like the tutorial from hell. My postmodernism one is a little similar but not nearly as fast. Someone needs to do something about how boring Tara, Xander and Anya are though.
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