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May. 7th, 2003 06:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katallisonA few random Buffy reactions, but let me just say first, from the shallow grave of my still-festering XF bitterness, that no matter how short of perfection last night's episode may have been, at least BtVS is not using its third-to-last episode ever for a lame send-up of The Brady Bunch.
Ahem.
OK, first of all, I am *not* someone who follows external plotty stuff with a sharp analytical eye, so if *I'm* sitting there shaking my head and saying "Huh?", you know you've got some serious plot gappage. But that didn't bother me nearly as much as the incoherences in the emotional plotlines--the characters and their relationships.
The sex scene with Faith and Wood made me think of so many, many pieces of fanfiction I've seen which seem to grow out of nothing more than "Hey, those two would be so HOT together!" And, yeah, conceptually they are, but on the screen? Not so much, to me. Because I got *zero* sense of what was bringing them together. No meaning, hence no passion. Pretty eye candy with a hollow core.
I liked Xander and Anya eating ice cream together and bitching. Xander and Anya rolling around on the floor? Left me muttering "Would you two just get *over* it, please?" Which is sad, because I have a soft spot for these two, and I usually love bittersweet one-last-time what-the-hell sex between ex's. But this just felt arbitrary.
Willow and Kennedy ... aggghhh. That scene was off for me, in so many ways, but primarily because--as with Faith and Wood--I have no idea of what's supposedly drawing those two together. I've never been given any sense of what Willow sees in Kennedy (who's someone totally unlike her two previous loves). And with Kennedy--I can't escape the feeling that she's fucking her way up the power ladder, or else that she enjoys pushing Willow's boundaries, and neither of these things are going to endear her to me.
Giles--aggghhh, again. OK, we'd better get *some* resolution of what the hell's up with him, or I'll be *very* peeved. When he first showed up, post-axe-swipe, I was convinced (like many others) that that wasn't really him, which was enjoyably creepy although sad. Then it was, "OK, he's not the First, so I guess that *is* him, and I'll just assume he suffered a head injury that left him not himself, quite." But now -- well, if he *has* been evil all along, he's been damn ineffectual at it. He's been damn ineffectual, period, and it pisses me off that they'd do that to Giles.
The Buffy/Spike scene -- I wanted to like that more than I did. But for me it kept slipping, again, into not-so-good fanfic. The whole plotline of Buffy's confrontation with the Scoobs, getting punted, being despondent, having this talk with Spike, all felt manufactured to me, without any feel of it flowing naturally out of who these characters really are and how they'd be acting and reacting. I felt that what was being set up all along was this conversation, and Buffy's recovery of her belief in herself, but the whole journey to that point wasn't believable to me, and when they finally got there a lot of stuff had to be conveyed by speeches. I though JM and SMG did a good job with what they were given, but...
And Buffy herself as a character just seems to be lurching around randomly. The breaking into the guy's house? WTF? The Matrix-moves? The going from whimpering-fetal-ball to super-woman in no time flat? OK, whatever.
My emotional investment in this show has fluctuated over the two-three years I've been watching it, and right now it's pretty low. I've moved past expecting a wrap-up that I'll find emotionally satisfying, because at this point there just isn't the time to conclude the plotlines and also give the various characters the kind of emotional resolution that I want, something which matters far more to me than seeing Buffy ass-kick Caleb. But then, satisfactory characterological/emotional resolution is what fanfiction's for, eh?
Ahem.
OK, first of all, I am *not* someone who follows external plotty stuff with a sharp analytical eye, so if *I'm* sitting there shaking my head and saying "Huh?", you know you've got some serious plot gappage. But that didn't bother me nearly as much as the incoherences in the emotional plotlines--the characters and their relationships.
The sex scene with Faith and Wood made me think of so many, many pieces of fanfiction I've seen which seem to grow out of nothing more than "Hey, those two would be so HOT together!" And, yeah, conceptually they are, but on the screen? Not so much, to me. Because I got *zero* sense of what was bringing them together. No meaning, hence no passion. Pretty eye candy with a hollow core.
I liked Xander and Anya eating ice cream together and bitching. Xander and Anya rolling around on the floor? Left me muttering "Would you two just get *over* it, please?" Which is sad, because I have a soft spot for these two, and I usually love bittersweet one-last-time what-the-hell sex between ex's. But this just felt arbitrary.
Willow and Kennedy ... aggghhh. That scene was off for me, in so many ways, but primarily because--as with Faith and Wood--I have no idea of what's supposedly drawing those two together. I've never been given any sense of what Willow sees in Kennedy (who's someone totally unlike her two previous loves). And with Kennedy--I can't escape the feeling that she's fucking her way up the power ladder, or else that she enjoys pushing Willow's boundaries, and neither of these things are going to endear her to me.
Giles--aggghhh, again. OK, we'd better get *some* resolution of what the hell's up with him, or I'll be *very* peeved. When he first showed up, post-axe-swipe, I was convinced (like many others) that that wasn't really him, which was enjoyably creepy although sad. Then it was, "OK, he's not the First, so I guess that *is* him, and I'll just assume he suffered a head injury that left him not himself, quite." But now -- well, if he *has* been evil all along, he's been damn ineffectual at it. He's been damn ineffectual, period, and it pisses me off that they'd do that to Giles.
The Buffy/Spike scene -- I wanted to like that more than I did. But for me it kept slipping, again, into not-so-good fanfic. The whole plotline of Buffy's confrontation with the Scoobs, getting punted, being despondent, having this talk with Spike, all felt manufactured to me, without any feel of it flowing naturally out of who these characters really are and how they'd be acting and reacting. I felt that what was being set up all along was this conversation, and Buffy's recovery of her belief in herself, but the whole journey to that point wasn't believable to me, and when they finally got there a lot of stuff had to be conveyed by speeches. I though JM and SMG did a good job with what they were given, but...
And Buffy herself as a character just seems to be lurching around randomly. The breaking into the guy's house? WTF? The Matrix-moves? The going from whimpering-fetal-ball to super-woman in no time flat? OK, whatever.
My emotional investment in this show has fluctuated over the two-three years I've been watching it, and right now it's pretty low. I've moved past expecting a wrap-up that I'll find emotionally satisfying, because at this point there just isn't the time to conclude the plotlines and also give the various characters the kind of emotional resolution that I want, something which matters far more to me than seeing Buffy ass-kick Caleb. But then, satisfactory characterological/emotional resolution is what fanfiction's for, eh?
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(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 07:02 am (UTC)There is just too much for the gang to deal with in the remaining two hours, though. Fanfic will indeed have a *lot* of gaps to fill.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 07:19 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 09:59 am (UTC)Dude! So did I, in
(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 07:24 am (UTC)Off to natter in my LJ about ideas about leadership in Buffy and wider culture.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 11:19 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 11:59 am (UTC)Willow/Kennedy I could see, because there's a bit of a history of attraction there, but they'd had a bit of a falling out that never seemed to get resolved (unless I missed something in the couple of eps I haven't seen in the middle of the season). It just felt too casual.
In fact, it all felt too casual. End of the world sex should feel like there's more riding on it that just getting off. There was no desperation (except maybe with Anya and Xander on the floor of the kitchen, but that was just frantic humping, too, and not really emotional at all), no 'this may be the last time we're going to have for this so let's make it count' feeling.
I think you're right in that they've got a lot of things to tie up in two hours. It will be interesting to see how it all happens.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-05-07 01:53 pm (UTC)I do feel like they're sending us down a path though for the next two eps that isn't going the way I want -- where the characters get to resolve their lives, and go into the sunset. I fear it's the plot that's being resolved, the setup, not the characters. For me, it's all about the relationships and love (whether romantic or friendship or family), and at this point, I can tell that's not a factor anymore.