Buffy: 2.19 ‘I Only Have Eyes for You.’

A video of the episode with a song by Evanescence

Writer: Marti Noxon
Director: James Whitmore Jr.

What's the sitch?

A school dance is imminent, but for understandable reasons Buffy isn't feeling the least bit romantic. Heading to the school library, she stops a student from killing his girlfriend with a gun. But neither the student nor his girlfriend have any memory of why they were fighting. And the gun has disappeared too. The next day, Xander is attacked by a disembodied arm coming out of his locker, while later in the evening Giles witnesses another couple fight in exactly the same way Buffy did. But this time the man shoots the woman and she falls over the balcony…only for the man to have no memory of what he did and for the gun to have yet again disappeared. Buffy and co. decide that a poltergeist is to blame, and they try to exorcise it. But it doesn’t work and the gang are subjected to individual scariness that sends them fleeing the school. It turns out that the ghost is that of a Sunnydale student called James from back in the 1950’s who killed his lover, Grace, a teacher in the school, and then killed himself out of guilt. Later, Ghost James lures Buffy back into the school…just as Angelus turns up to kill her; however, the evil vamp immediately becomes possessed by Grace’s spirit, while Buffy becomes possessed by James. They argue and she shoots Angelus. But being a vamp it doesn’t kill him and therefore gives the spirit of the murdered teacher the chance to forgive James/Buffy and to stop him/her from committing suicide. This act of forgiveness finally gives Ghost James the peace he’s needed and both spirits leave their hosts and ascend to who knows where leaving behind a highly confused Buffy and Angel, who rushes off overcome by disgust at having played such an intimate loving role with Buffy. Meanwhile, Spike has secretly recovered from his spinal injury.

What's the sitch beneath the sitch?

It’s all about guilt and forgiveness. And the sometimes dark and overwhelming passion that can drive people to do the things they do, a major theme of this season. But the episode tells us that no matter how terrible and burdensome guilt can be, it’s the simple act of forgiveness that carries far more power. Here we see that Buffy carries such terrible guilt over what happened to Angel, because she believes it was down to her why he lost his soul. And in this episode she rages at Ghost James for his selfishness and his destructive behaviour when it is really herself that she hates. The plot device of having Angel possessed by Grace works brilliantly. It is a distinctly weird thing to see Boreanaz playing the frightened fragile Grace and Gellar the furious, heart broken spurned lover James. But it works. They both act their socks off. And although it falls in to high melodrama, the simple, beautiful theme and the weight of the Buffy/Angel story behind it makes for genuinely touching stuff. This episode could easily have been a disaster, a silly, overwrought Kleenex-fest. It is still a blatant tearjerker but in writer Marti Noxon’s skilful hands the script holds more weight and meaning than it otherwise might and helps set up the grand season finale very well indeed.

Who's giving us the wiggins this week?

Ghost James and Angelus

Why it rocks

This isn’t just the run of the mill monster of the week show. It is about something intrinsic to the characters and where they find themselves approaching the end of the season. Ghost James is not evil. He made a tragic mistake (the gun went off accidentally it transpires) and he can’t rest because of what he did. His anguish infects others and manifests as scary things in the school. There is no beastie to be fought here, only the beasties within - the guilt and the self loathing, which can only be overcome by forgiveness.

Marti Noxon’s script is a beautifully crafted, densely plotted and thematically and emotionally weighty affair.

Sarah Michelle Gellar and David Boreanaz. Together in their usual roles the chemistry always sizzles. Together in new and even more tragic roles playing the deeper meaning the chemistry boils over and the pain is palpable.

Nice spookiness. The ghost tries his hand at scaring the gang in individual ways with Cordy undergoing a Poltergeist-y mirror shock, Willow sinking through the floor and a zombie arm attacking Xander from his locker.

The lovely Meredith Salenger (Natty Gann herself) plays Grace.

Why it sucks

Contrary to Giles' explanation, poltergeists are supposedly entities that cause mischief merely for the chaotic fun of it and are not ghosts undertaking a haunting per se. This same mistake was made by the trio of Poltergeist films. Another mistake was making two rubbish Poltergeist sequels after the classic original.

It's Buftastic

Angel’s repulsed, horrified reaction when the spirit of Grace leaves him holding and kissing Buffy.

Dialogue to die for

Xander: Something weird is going on. Isn't that our school motto?

Xander: I defined something? Accurately? Guess I'm done with the book learning.

Giles: To forgive is an act of compassion, Buffy. It's not done because people deserve it; it's done because they need it.
Buffy: No. James destroyed the one person he loved the most in a moment of blind passion. And that's not something you forgive. No matter why he did. And no matter if he knows now that it was wrong and selfish and stupid, it’s just something he's gonna have to live with.
Xander: He can't live with it, Buff. He's dead.

Angelus: What do you know about it? I'm the one who was friggin' violated. You didn't have this thing in you.
Drusilla: What was it? A demon?
Angelus: Love!

And another thing

James listens to the song "I Only Have Eyes For You" as he prepares to kill himself in 1955. But the recording he's listening to is the Flamingos' version, which wasn't released until 1959.

The lovely Meredith Salenger, who played doomed teacher Grace Newman, had her name misspelled in the credits as "Meredith Salinger."

Meredith Salenger starred in the Disney film The Journey of Natty Gann opposite John Cusack back in the early eighties.

This episode originally aired with a public service announcement at the end regarding teen suicide. Co-sponsored by Cedars Sinai Medical Center's TeenLine and the American Association of Suicidology, the PSA was voiced over by Sarah Michelle Gellar.

John Hawkes who plays George the janitor has been Oscar nominated this year (2011) for his role in the film Winter’s Bone.

How many stakes?

I’m an old softy. 4 (out of 5)

Fangers, Digby and Casper: True Blood vs. Being Human

(True Blood's Jessica getting frisky...not in a good way.)


I've just finished watching the finale of True Blood series 3. And it was great, a lot of fun, just like the season overall and a marginal improvement on season 2.

But though this season had its fair share of inspired and messed up 'HOLY C**P!' moments (head twisting sex springs to mind) I didn't find myself particularly involved in what was going on. Part of the problem for me has been the werewolves. The furry critters made their début on the show this year. And that's cool. I love werewolves. They are by far my favourite mythical monster. Unfortunately the werewolves in True Blood ended up being a bit crap. They were mostly shallow and dimwitted trailer trash thugs. And as for the vampires... Well, Bill proved himself yet again to be a right arse. Luckily Eric is still pretty cool and I do still love Jessica. Other than that I don't much like the vamps in this show, though I did appreciate seeing more of their supernatural side this year. I loved it when their invitation to a home gets revoked and they then get invisibly dragged in reverse back outside. The series ended with several plot threads and a couple of cliffhangers ready for series 4.

Don't get me wrong, True Blood is still a highly watchable and enjoyable series full of great actors, high production values and messed up creativity. It even manages the odd good scare. Perhaps it's the format of fast paced plotting, loads of characters, gratuitous sex and gore that is starting to wear a tinsy bit thin with me. I kinda need something more for long term viewing. A bit more depth and a bit more weight maybe?

Speaking of vamps and werewolves I've also been re-watching series 1 of the BBC's Being Human. It is easy to forget just how awesome this show is. True Blood is a lot of fun but for my money we Brits here in Bristol (though now Cardiff for series 3...Boo!) have the superior show. It may not have the budget or gloss of True Blood but the writing to my mind is sharper, more focussed, more considered and a lot more meaningful. It is also primarily a character driven show whereas True Blood is mostly plot and incident driven, possibly suffering somewhat from too many characters and disparate story threads. For instance, in True Blood I like Lafayette but I wasn't remotely interested in his story this year nor really in the story of Sam and his family. In contrast, the beauty of Being Human is that the focus of the show is always on the three main characters: Annie the ghost, Mitchell the vampire and George the werewolf, and on their simple desire and struggle to have a quiet ordinary life. Being Human takes the trials and tribulations of real everyday life and gives them a supernatural twist. But it remains always utterly relatable. The point of the show is in its title. It acts as a mirror and an ode to what being human on a day to day level means. It's pretty much what Joss did with Buffy and why that show still works and resonates so well. Oh yeah, it also doesn't hurt that Being Human's main bad guy Herrick is simply one of THE best vampire villains ever. Jason Watkins rules! Plus the werewolves in Being Human are waaay better than the ones in True Blood.

In the end True Blood and Being Human are very different shows doing different things with the supernatural. And I appreciate them both. Though, for me, Being Human is the superior entity as it manages to do so much more with a lot less. Plus its local to me so I'm bias.

Keep away from men with sticks and rope...

Being Human: Episode 2.2


Bloody hell! How brilliant was this second episode of the second series of the sublime Being Human? Pretty bloody brilliant is what! Episode two gives us more great character stuff with the arrival of Mitchell’s old friend Carl who has done something awful to someone he loves and now needs Mitchell’s help to clear up the mess. New werewolf Nina is struggling with coming to terms with her changed life and is becoming more and more at odds with George and some of the decisions he now has to make. And poor Annie really knows how to pick her men as Saul turns out to be not what she or we expect.

In this episode the utterly terrifying view of death that this series presents makes a shocking return. It is no warm white light and happy hereafter here, just a dark horrible tunnel lined with men bearing rope and sticks…and something awful waiting for you at the end. Understandably, Annie wants nothing to do with it. She wants to stay on earth where everyone can now see her and she is almost entirely corporeal (though still having her ghost powers so as to teleport when needed.) She arguably has a better life now than when she was alive. There is an awesome scene both scary and tense as anything where Annie is being dragged screaming towards the open door in to the corridor of death that had me on the edge of my seat hoping against hope she wouldn’t be thrown through. “NO! NOT ANNIE!” I nearly cried out. “Hurry up George, get in the room and save her…” The episode ends with poor Annie having had a major relapse in her condition. I felt so sorry for her. The other storyline of Mitchell helping his old friend Carl is excellent too and not a very hopeful sign for our recovering bloodaholic regarding his future prospects for controlling his addiction. Here we get the return of Ivan too, this time sans wife Daisy, to lend a helping hand. Ivan is a fascinating character. He has a talk earlier with George where you think it might kick off…but he is just keen to find out what it felt like for George to kill Herrick as well as to have made whoopee with Daisy. It seems Ivan has a hard time ‘feeling’ emotional connections anymore. And yet he still loves Kate Bush…the music he plays in his car.

This was a seriously fabulous episode full of character development, character backstory, plot twists, deepening mysteries, horrific happenings, surreal story telling (loved Sir Terry Wogan as the voice of death), cracking dialogue and brilliant humour, all produced with very strong production values. This show looks great. Some of the photography was darkly lush and wonderfully moody. Yep, Being Human just gets better and better. I so love this show.

Being Human, Being Brilliant!

Being Human: Series 2

The awesome supernatural house-share drama and my favourite TV show of last year returned for series 2 last night. A vampire called Mitchell, a ghost called Annie and a werewolf called George all live together in a shared rented house in Bristol and together gain mutual support in circumventing their supernatural natures so as to live like normal regular everyday people, to just be…well…human.

After the battle against the vampire revolution and the defeat of vampire leader Herrick at the end of the last series, only a short time has now passed. About a month to be precise. And there is fallout to deal with including the exact lycanthropic status of werewolf George’s girlfriend Nina and the power vacuum amongst the remaining vampires after Herrick’s death. Plus there is a group of humans doing nasty secret experiments on supernaturals, one of which results in the particularly gruesome death of a werewolf in a hyperbolic chamber. And then there's the arrival of two new vampires in town with their own weird agendas. They are a married couple of which the husband seems to want to taunt and torture Mitchell and George for Herrick’s death while his wife apparently just wants to make dirty vampire/werewolf sex with George while also looking to kill off any living remnants from her human past. Yep, the stage seems set for a very interesting and hopefully bizarre new series of Being Human.

This first episode was great. It did a very good job reintroducing the characters and setting up ideas and threats for the new series. The main focus of the story was about Nina, George’s spiky nurse girlfriend who he accidentally scratched in the last episode of series one. It was about her fear that she is now a werewolf too and how she'd deal if she is one, and how George would deal with being the one to have cursed her. The episode was also about the three main characters looking for new meaning and purpose in their lives. Annie the ghost has become more confident and less afraid. As such she’s now visible to everyone and almost 100% corporeal when she wants to be. So much so that she goes and gets herself a job as a barmaid in a local pub. It’s a crazy idea - a ghost getting a job. But it is very funny and Lenora Crichlow as Annie is so sweet and charming that you just go with it. Her excitement over finding a new lease of life in death is infectious. Meanwhile Mitchell the vampire makes a connection with a new female member of staff at the hospital where he works in a cute scene involving pet goldfish. And then there is George the werewolf. Previously, George was very ordered and reticent about life in general as well as hateful of the monster he'd been turned in to. But now he seems to have embraced his werewolf nature despite still protesting how much he hates it. Those protestations sounded a little hollow with his temperament appearing rather arrogant, cold and aggressive. He even went and got jiggy with the naughty vampire lady…something he’d never have done before. But then I guess it was the night before the full moon.

Writer/creator Toby Whithouse provided another great character based/led script that was as rich in human themes as it was in fantasy plot and horrific incident. The characters were all great and the dialogue funny, sharp and meaningful. Toby can write great lines just as well as any top US writer. I especially loved his little nod to Buffy when Annie, trying to console Nina over her fears of being a werewolf, said: “There was a werewolf in Buffy called Nina.” Nina replied that she never watched it. Annie then said: “Yeah, well, I stopped watching it when I started living it.” Great! Although being a Buffy geek I have to point out that Nina the werewolf was actually in season five of Angel and not in Buffy at all. But appreciated all the same Toby :D

And talking of werewolves…the beasties in series 2 look even better than they did last year with the transformations still up to the same high standards. Very creepy in An American Werewolf in London style. Wicked!

All in all a great start to (hopefully) a great second series. Bring on episode 2 already.

Two strangers arrive…