A young boy in a coma unintentionally makes bad dreams come true, and this is essentially an excuse for a series of weird things to happen. There is also an unsettling current of child abuse.
There are always so many lit candles in the Master's hideout. Who is in charge of them, and where do they get them? I picture late night visits to the local craft store, blood-stained dollars in hand.
Willow: "My parents don't even bicker." That's because they don't exist.
There sure is a lot of Wendell in this episode.
Then everyone screams and hugs the walls, as if spiders are the scariest thing ever to happen at Sunnydale High.
Then we get a little digression into the mechanics of cross-related vampire fear, and Colin, the Annointed One, talks with a weird altered voice that I can't remember him using before or after.
Joyce: "Are you worried that your father won't show?" What an absurd fear!
Wendell: "I had the best collection in the tri-county area." How would you ever know such a thing? At any rate, tri-county spider collection tracking sounds like a pastime for kids in the 1950s in Illinois.
Cordelia seems helpful here, letting Buffy know about the upcoming test and all, and not even going out of her way to make snide remarks.
Sneaking off to smoke alone in the poorly lit boiler room of Sunnydale High School is bound to be unhealthy.
See?
But the big ugly guy with a wooden club for an arm isn't her nightmare.
And after the commercial break, we're diverted into a scene from The Outsiders.
Why is the kid's astral body hanging out at the high school? I mean, why not his own school?
Later seasons would make more sense if this nightmarishly jerky version of Buffy's father was actually her father.
Maybe the kid's little league team plays at the high school.
Poor Cordelia just sort of gets dragged through these early episodes occasionally. In this instance, literally.
That's right Willow, maybe Buffy is the source of the disembodied voice calling you down to the creepy basement.
Xander's nightmare is weird, yet, with the Nazi-element, socially-conscious in a way that, say, giant ants are not.
Why opera singing specifically, Willow?
The Master who taunts Buffy sounds like the real Master, released by the power of bad dreams, but is he? How does all this dream business work? Also, I wonder who Buffy's immediate predecessor was.
Who's afraid of the plastic tarps that are all over the place now? It doesn't really signify nightmare to me, so much as it does remodeling.
Buffy's tombstone says she was born in 1981.
And, finally, where are Billy, that is, the coma kid's parents?
I guess not quite finally: Between punching the clown from earlier and now grabbing the child-beating coach, this was a pretty big episode for Xander.
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quote:A young boy in a coma unintentionally makes bad dreams come true, and this is essentially an excuse for a series of weird things to happen.
*sings* I've got a theory, some kid is dreamin', and we're all stuck inside his whacky Broadway nightmare! */sings*
That soundtrack will. Not. Go. Away.
quote:Why is the kid's astral body hanging out at the high school? I mean, why not his own school?
Hellmouth?
quote:Also, I wonder who Buffy's immediate predecessor was.
I wondered about that myself. You'd think she'd've asked at some point.
-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
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quote:There's this demon, right, and he gets stuck in a book (a magic book!)
He should've know Atrus wouldn't send an actual linking book back to D'ni...
quote:I'd like to know the story behind how Morgan the sad ventriloquist and Sid the dummy met up originally, and how Morgan decided he ought to listen to his talking dummy and go fight a demon.
I kinda wonder if it's related to "Smile Time" somehow. Because ANY relation to "Smile Time" is worth uberpoints.
-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
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quote:Why is the kid's astral body hanging out at the high school? I mean, why not his own school?
Hellmouth?
It's the answer that keeps on giving.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
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-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
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posted
I'm having some trouble getting my copy of "Out of Mind, Out of Sight" to play. I'm afraid the DVD may have a scratch on it.
So, I decided to make comments on the song "Outta Mind (Outta Sight)" by Wilco, only to discover just now that, once I found the CD case, the necessary CD was not in it. If you are hypothesizing that my inability to properly store digital media may have something to do with my inability to play digital media, well. . .
Luckily, it's a double album, and disc one has another take on the same song, though a few of the details have been changed. So, anyway:
"Outtasite (Outta Mind)"
quote:I know we don't talk much / but you're such a good talker / oh oh
I have a lot of trouble keeping up with my friends too, scattered as they are these days. Plus, I'm a bad correspondant.
quote:Well I know we should take a walk / but you're such a fast walker / oh oh
That's an odd complaint. Are you afraid she's just going to walk away from you, Jeff?
quote:well all right / I know where I'll be tonight / all right / out of mind, out of sight
Oh.
quote:well OK I know you don't love me / but you've still been thinking of me / oh oh / well all right / I know you probably hate me / that's OK with me
This is a pretty upbeat song, actually, all things considered. Smarmy, a little, but in a good way.
quote:all right / I know where I'll be tonight / all right / out of mind, out of sight / out of mind, out of sight / you don't see me now / you don't want to anyhow / look out here I come again / and I'm bringing my friends / look out / here I come again / I'm bringing my friends / OK all right OK all right / I know where I'll be tonight / all right / out of mind, out of sight / out of mind, out of sight / out of mind, out of sight
The other song, the one with the name that would make this post cutely amusing, instead of just, I fear, annoying, is more heavy on the piano and a little slower.
This is probably why that career as a trendsetting rock journalist has so far eluded me.
Hey, you can hear a few songs off this album, including this one, at Wilco's website.
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posted
Have you ever tried to get a job writing for a music/nerd magazine?
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
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posted
No, but it was a largely idle comment. Also I can't finish an essay or short story to save my life, which isn't a good sign of writerly productivity.
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Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
"Have you ever tried to get a job writing for a music/nerd magazine?"
Would you be happy if your reviews were read by only three people? Eh? I thought not.
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posted
I didn't mean writing fiction, but rather doing reviews and stuff like that. You've been doing it here without getting paid for a while, and your standard of writing is at least as good (and usually much higher) than that in magazines like the JMS favourite SFX.
And PC Format's circulation is an awesome 41,694. Which probably explains why they don't pay so well.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
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posted
It sounds like you're making excuses to me, Mr Sizer.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
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posted
Well, if any high powered media executives are reading this and want to hire me, I guess they can send me an e-mail.
Talent or no, I skipped past the bad spots on the DVD. Therefore:
"Out of Mind, Out of Sight"
Somebody is attacking people friendly to Cordelia, and it turns out to be a girl so unpopular she turned invisible. And mean. Unpopular in the no-one-notices-her sense, not in the everyone-dislikes-her sense, by the way.
Buffy should definitely not carry a mace around in her backpack, at school, while everyone is between classes.
Then, there is some continuity reference, only I only wrote down "continuity!" so I'm not sure what it was.
Some Shakespeare is thrown in to class things up a bit.
This is a TV school convention I suppose, but I've never had an instructor who tried to introduce new information to the class just a minute or two before the end of the period. By ten minutes to go, everyone usually had their stuff packed already.
When Cordelia goes to talk to her teacher I think it's the first scene she's been in that wasn't for comic relief and/or body-discovering.
Willow is really, really amused by this anecdote. And again with the novelty juices. I forget what this one was called, but I remember the commercials. Squeeze-its or something.
And Buffy was a May Queen, only they didn't call it that, but since when do freshmen get elected in these sorts of popularity contests?
Snyder: "Dead? Of course not. Dead; what are you, ghouls? There are no dead students here. This week." Then Buffy tells him some fake story about retrieving the beaten kid's comb, but Snyder was standing right there when she told Xander and Willow she was going to go investigate.
There are probably fingerprints on that bat. And the lockers. Shouldn't the police be handling this?
This is where my copy began to flip out. Have you noticed how these posts of mine are basically just a list of incongruous things followed by rhetorical questions?
Flashback! The grainy effect, and the lighting, is a lot like what gets used much later in a Firefly flashback.
Am I the only one who feels some sympathy for Snyder? I mean, he's got a high school literally filled with monsters, and students and teachers dying every other week.
There's an invisible girl who lives in the ceiling over the band rom. Which is odd. It would be great if she played the Lady in the Radiator song later.
"This girl's sort of petty for a god."
Wait, Cordelia and her friends are messing around with Cordelia's fancy dress at school? After hours?
Angel comes in, not particularly caring about the details of this episode. Luckily the Watcher's book that went missing five hundred years ago made it to Southern California. And, re invisible girls: "It's not really my area of expertise." Get used to that sort of thing.
I like how Cordelia keeps up her speech throughout this entire exposition scene. It's her episode and she isn't giving ground up to anyone.
What about this invisible girl's family?
She's not willing to stab Buffy, but she is willing to suffocate Cordelia's teacher. But then Cordelia comes in and surprisingly doesn't just stand there and freak out. It's like a whole new world for her this episode.
I like that Cordelia has realized on her own that Buffy is some sort of secret detective. Sort of. "I was kind of hoping you were in a gang."
I bet they named the invisible girl Marcie Ross just so that she'd be right next to Willow (Rosenberg) in the yearbook.
The dance that the May Queen thing is attached to is being held at The Bronze, and I was going to say that I thought it was odd that a school would hold an official function in a rock club, but on further reflection, not growing up near any rock clubs, I guess I'm not sure of how this might work. Our senior prom was held at a grange building, way out in the middle of nowhere. (I didn't go, but it's the same building that representatives from some commercial or governmental agency take in grape samples and report back to you the sugar levels, and I have been to that.)
No one in Sunnydale ever seems particularly surprised when confronted by the truth about vampires or invisible girls.
Marcie Ross can lift Cordelia through a hole in the ceiling like that? And she can drag two unconscious girls clear across town to The Bronze in a reasonable amount of time without anyone noticing? Well, maybe she borrowed Cordelia's car. It's being played like she's really strong, at least, because even with the advantage of surprise I'm not sure she should be able to knock Buffy around like that.
And then: slow motion ninja concentration powers!
The FBI showing up to take Marcie into custody is one odd plot twist. I guess we can pretend that they're actually with the Initiative. But a whole class full of invisible kids? Maybe the others are all from Cleveland.
Step one in becoming an invisible assassin apparently involves listening to the white album.
[ August 24, 2005, 02:02 AM: Message edited by: Sol System ]
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The Master is finally ready to break out of his prison, and Buffy is destined to die trying to stop him. There is also some heartbreak.
Poor Willow.
An artsy slow-motion fight sequence. But is that Mitch, Cordelia's boyfriend of the last episode, making out with her in the car, oblivious to the action outside?
For Xander: Tragic shutdown! This is the episode where the characters finally figure out that nothing good will happen to them ever.
But Willow stands up for herself, unwilling to be Xander's fallback option. Good for her.
The earthquake must have ruptured the school's blood pipe.
Angel: "Then you're reading it wrong." It's reading right, man!
This episode is approaching emotional boilover. (Also, Buffy's scene here sure is sad.) Incidentally, at 16, I guess she's born in 1981 after all.
OK, so Cordelia's boyfriend, who is now dead, was named Kevin. So much for Mitch, but he's probably glad he isn't dead. The bloody handprint on the TV is nice and creepy.
Joyce: "There's something on the news. Willow." This just sounds odd.
Willow discovers it's all fun and games until you stumble into a room filled with corpses.
And how will the Annointed One lead Buffy to the Master? Stand outside the school and wait for her. That was easy enough.
Sure, throw in a Locutus reference, but it's "of Borg," not "of the Borg." That's some kind of nerd foul.
Xander knows where Angel lives?
Really, why didn't everyone go with Buffy? Maybe not Willow, I guess, but everyone else. They could have brought weapons.
Having delivered the slayer, Colin goes to wait in the green room until next season.
Now it's prom that's going on tonight? It was Spring Fling earlier.
If a little slayer blood is good, you'd think all of the slayer's blood would be great. But I guess the Master doesn't want to be greedy. Just enough to break open the magical wall will be fine. I wonder if any vampire can get supercharged after eating a slayer? Spike sort of does. . . well, libidinously at least.
Angel's breathing heavily right here, you know. We can here him. Maybe vampires just don't know CPR; it's not like they'd need it.
How does the huge hole in the library get explained, or Cordelia's car parked in the hallway? I guess they could drive it out, but that leaves a car-shaped hole in the door. And I'm not entirely sure there's a hallway with an exit there prior to this episode. Oh well, here's a tenticle monster. Not, I'm afraid, a very good one.
Theme song! Huh.
So was showing Buffy in the Annointed One's whole purpose? Because he isn't around after that, but vampires who share the Master's religious beliefs follow him later. Maybe the Master just needed some alone time.
The Love Theme for Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
And, finally, an unexplained (and unrepeated) vampire skeleton.
Well, not quite finally. Buffy must have made quite an entrance at the dance, wet and beaten up and bloody and weirdly thrilled.
That wraps it up for season one. I don't think I've done the first few episodes of season two.
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Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
"I didn't go, but it's the same building that representatives from some commercial or governmental agency take in grape samples and report back to you the sugar levels, and I have been to that."
It sure is a relief that some of us still know how to have a totally nerdy good time.
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