av Mr Chase » tis mar 02, 2004 0:58
Mr Chases recension av "When She Was Bad":
13. When She Was Bad
A great return of our favourite vampire slayer and her gang, for some reason this episode is not that well liked among reviewers, mainly because Buffy is acting, well, bad. But that's the whole point! She was clinically dead, remember, and fought off the terrible Master she still has nightmares about (the Giles-as-the-Master disguise, *shudder*). Give her some slack even if she was a real bitch, sorry, bitca, to her Slayerette friends.
It is only fitting that the reigning bitch champion Cordelia is the one who confronts her and tells her to "spank her inner moppet" if she doesn't want to lose the friends she's got. And Buffy is outright mean, especially to Xander and poor Angel. But the "undead American" insult was funny (love it when they make fun of PC speech). The line "I moved on. To the living" was not however. Ouch, that gotta hurt! Her sexy dance with Xander just to make Angel jealous also hurt Willow, who still has a thing for Xander -- silly girl! But I can forgive her for that since it just blew my mind (and the minds of all the viewing male audience) away. Can I just say wow -- and drool!
I didn't like the Xander/Willow thing and never have, so that "cute" scene with the ice cream on the nose and the almost-kiss in the beginning just screamed NO, DON'T to me.
For those that watch carefully, and perhaps are reading to much into things, like I tend to do, we get to see how lonely Cordelia really is. She obviously has thought about her experiences from last season's finale over the summer but has no one to talk to about it. That's why she gets a little careless with words when she sees the Scoobies again. Buffy: "Cordelia, your mouth is open. Sound is coming from it. This is never good." Cordelia deals with her "inner moppet" by playing the superficial bitch. But now that she has realized that seriousness of vampire slaying and all, her carefully maintained world is starting to come tumbling down and it gets harder for her to stay away from the gang. What Buffy and her friends do actually mean something, with saving the world, a lot, and everything. Cordy's world is just pretty meaningless by comparison.
For what it's worth I don't think that Buffy is intentionally cruel to her friends. It's more like what she said about not wanting to look out for the three of them while she's fighting because she doesn't want them to get hurt. And in order to accomplice that she must draw them away. It is only when they come in danger because of her act that she realizes that she needs them, and they need her. As Angel said, she's got to trust someone. And her friends being real friends they forgive her at the end. Very moving.
On the lighter side watching principal Snyder and Giles talk at the beginning was hilarious, especially when the adorable Ms Calendar shows up and poor Giles goes all schoolboyish. Those two are so cute together. Sigh!
Oh, I almost forgot, the Master's resurrection was thwarted and his bones ground to dust by a sledgehammer, courtesy of Buffy. I guess no one will use his skull as a horrible conversation piece. But the annoying one still remains. I hate that boy! And not in a good way.
Rupert Giles: "I'll be back in the Middle Ages."
Miss Calendar: "Did you ever leave?"