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Buffy Season Two Episode Seven
Oct. 17th, 2009 06:46 am"OK, but do they really stick out?"
"What?"
"Sore thumbs. Do they stick out? I mean, have you ever seen a thumb and gone, 'Wow! That baby is sore!'?"
"You have too many thoughts."
Episode starts real shitty, then turns relatively good. Problem is the script's heavy-handed insistence that Buffy is jealous and doesn't trust Angel, and doesn't trust her own appeal, etc., and that Angel is also insecure and jealous, and there's new guy Ford to be jealous of, and Xander's jealous in his usual way, and the show gets mired in all this exposition.
The reason it feels like exposition is that the show has never sold us on Buffy's insecurities or on her* and Angel being anything but trustworthy, in relation to each other and to everybody else. Now, irl it would make sense that a 16-year-old who has mastery in one part of her life might feel plenty insecure in others, or that someone who has a basic nonnormal aspect to his being might wonder if anyone would really want to get close to him, even if he is strong and handsome. But as I said, the show has never sold us on this, so Xander is the only one whose jealousy believably emanates from his personality (since he does get overlooked and he really is vastly more interesting than sensitively morose hunkboy Angel; but Interesting isn't what Buffy needs).
( The misunderstood Lonely Ones )
"What?"
"Sore thumbs. Do they stick out? I mean, have you ever seen a thumb and gone, 'Wow! That baby is sore!'?"
"You have too many thoughts."
Episode starts real shitty, then turns relatively good. Problem is the script's heavy-handed insistence that Buffy is jealous and doesn't trust Angel, and doesn't trust her own appeal, etc., and that Angel is also insecure and jealous, and there's new guy Ford to be jealous of, and Xander's jealous in his usual way, and the show gets mired in all this exposition.
The reason it feels like exposition is that the show has never sold us on Buffy's insecurities or on her* and Angel being anything but trustworthy, in relation to each other and to everybody else. Now, irl it would make sense that a 16-year-old who has mastery in one part of her life might feel plenty insecure in others, or that someone who has a basic nonnormal aspect to his being might wonder if anyone would really want to get close to him, even if he is strong and handsome. But as I said, the show has never sold us on this, so Xander is the only one whose jealousy believably emanates from his personality (since he does get overlooked and he really is vastly more interesting than sensitively morose hunkboy Angel; but Interesting isn't what Buffy needs).
( The misunderstood Lonely Ones )
