Buffy 4x18-4x21, small spoilers for S5

[oyceter]

Watched Where the Wild Things Are, New Moon Rising, Yoko Factor and Primeval for the first time yesterday. Well, I think I've seen New Moon Rising before, but maybe not in its entirety.

Buffy 4x18-4x21, small spoilers for S5

Amazingly, I am actually quite fond of Riley. Well, except when he is having the stupid testosterone fight with Angel and when he comments he is going to try to beat Buffy earlier in the season. But other than that, I think he's rather cute and almost painfully earnest. I think it also helps that I really didn't have much invested in the B/A relationship ever... I think it's also interesting to see Riley's "evil Spike" speech in As You Were in light of all this -- Riley's strongest memories of Spike probably include watching Spike and Adam pal around (well, in a minion-like way), which really would not endear Spike to him at all. I always sort of wonder if some characters always remember others at their worst -- maybe Giles will forever remember Jenny Calender when he sees Angel (ditto with Xander?) and Riley will always remember Spike in cahoots with Adam.

Anyhow, while everyone always quotes Riley's "Demons bad, humans good" attitude at the beginning of New Moon Rising, it seems as though not so many people go on to say that his views really drastically change by the end of the episode.

Also, does Yoko Factor take place right after Five by Five and Sanctuary on Angel? I can't remember, and it seems strange because there are a few eps between the Faith arc on Buffy and Yoko Factor.

Comments

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

Yes, The Yoko Factor took place right after "Sanctuary". Angel goes to Sunnydale to apologize to Buffy for what he said at the end of "Sanctuary" and runs smack dab into Riley Finn.

I found the ensuing cat-fight delicious! My Angel has a tendency to pick petty fights with Buffy's other boy friends, and that one was especially entertaining.

I never minded Riley much. As a boyfriend for Buffy, I found him dull, but as a character, especially into season 5, he was fascinating. Watch him crumble and fall because Buffy will never really love him. Watch him get back on his feet and get on with his life once he leaves her.

Good stuff man.

The upside to the cancellation of all the Buffy Universe shows is we will be able to revisit them all and make grand sweeping generalization essays about them. Fun, fun!

[buffyannotater.livejournal.com]

The upside to the cancellation of all the Buffy Universe shows is we will be able to revisit them all and make grand sweeping generalization essays about them. Fun, fun!

I've already made plans with myself to watch the entire Buffyverse saga, Buffy and Angel in their original airing order (with the exception of Lies My Parents Told Me, which will be watched in its proper place before Orpheus)). Oh man, it's gonna be a blast!*

Addendum...

[buffyannotater.livejournal.com]

I am being so anal about this that I printed out a list of airing dates for third season AtS/sixth season BtVS and fourth season AtS/seventh season BtVS, so everything lines up properly. Especially important in the early part of the third, where if I lined it up wrong, Angel returning from the meeting with Buffy wouldn't happen the episode after Buffy left to meet him. Okay, maybe I do need some sort of help. ;-)

Re: Addendum...

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

Do me a favor. Email that schedule to me?

Otherwise, I would have watched them according to the numbers (e.g., ep 10 with ep 10, etc)

Re: Addendum...

[buffyannotater.livejournal.com]

Check your inbox! :)

Re: Addendum...

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

That was a bit of busy-work, putting that together!

Yuh huh

[buffyannotater.livejournal.com]

Luckilly I didn't have to do it myself! I copy and pasted it from some site, but I didn't write down the url, so I don't remember where.

Re: Yuh huh

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

BuffyGuide.com is what i usually use, though BuffyWorld.com incldues airdates for all of Buffy and Angel (BG.comm only has Buffy).

P.S. oyceter, i got your e-mail. I haven't even begun unpacking, so it may be a while, but it will get sent to you.

Re: Yuh huh

[oyceter]

Thanks!

For me, it will be an "Angel" marathon

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

I have several projects that require my attention to AtS first.

(1) I want to do more LJ reviews on earlier seasons like I did Season 5.

(2) I have a Connor essay to write for ros_fod's new website.

(3) And let's face it, a detailed review of AtS won't hurt the Season 6 project!

But your idea of watching all the episodes in their original intended order sounds fantastic! Except for the part where you have to keep getting up for three seasons and switching out Angel and Buffy DVDs once every 43 minutes. ; )

[oyceter]

Gotcha!

Argh, I was so annoyed at the cat-fight! I absolutely hate scenes in which characters fight each other for the Romantic Interest -- it just feels humiliating to me for some reason.

Riley's not very interesting with conflicts and whatnot (at least, not yet), but I'm rather fond of him just because he's so nice. And I liked that in the beginning, he was just genuinely nice, no tortured past, no angst. Course, that all changes later!

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

The thing about the cat-fight is it would never have happened if a whole series of prior circumstances hadn't set these two up. Otherwise, I'm sure there would have just been some understated grumbling.

But instead, Riley hears some of his Initiative guys getting creamed by a vampire over the radio and rushes to help them. He comes across Angel, who was ambushed by Army guys and really just fought them off in self-defense.

Riley has also just gotten an earful from Xander about Angel losing his soul when he slept with Buffy. Riley is insecure about Buffy's visit to Los Angeles, not convinced it's just about tracking down Faith. He fears Buffy lit the old flame with Angel. He has an irrational fear that they even had sex, and when he sees Angel attacking "the good guys", he fears, irrationally, that Angel is soulless.

So he attacks Angel, and Angel defends himself. At this point, their brief conversation has let both of them know who each other are. It's vampire against Initiative soldier. It's the ex-boyfriend against the boyfriend.

They calm down pretty quickly after Buffy straightens out the misunderstanding, and we're back to the petulance we would have gotten under any circumstances.

[buffyannotater.livejournal.com]

Also, does Yoko Factor take place right after Five by Five and Sanctuary on Angel? I can't remember, and it seems strange because there are a few eps between the Faith arc on Buffy and Yoko Factor.

Yes, but the reason for the gap is that after Faith left Sunnydale in Who Are You?, it was another two weeks until Five By Five aired on Angel, immediately following the 8 pm showing of Where the Wild Things Are. The next week, New Moon Rising aired at 8, followed by Sanctuary at 9...so the next Tuesday, Angel visited Buffy in The Yoko Factor at 8.

So the schedule roughly ran like this (can't remember the actual dates)

Week One: Who Are You? (Faith leaves Sunnydale)/The Ring

Week Two: Superstar/Eternity

Week Three: Where the Wild Things Are/Five by Five (Faith arrives in L.A.)

Week Four: New Moon Rising/Sanctuary (Angel leaves for Sunnydale)

Week Five: The Yoko Factor (Angel in Sunnydale)/War Zone (Angel returns to L.A. at start of ep)

[oyceter]

Thanks!

Huh, wonder what Faith was doing in the interim...

Fanfic! ;)