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Date Posted: 22:42:52 08/12/05 Fri
Author: DawnsMan
Author Host/IP: 152.163.100.137
Subject: Rewatched "Freshman" and "Living Conditions"...
I rewatched the first two episodes of Season 4 last night. I have always thought these two episodes were highly underrated, but last night really cemented it for me. I think the "Freshman" is the best season premiere of Buffy. I also think "Living Conditions" is one of the funniest episodes of the series, if not *the* funniest. Kathy is just one of the funniest characters I've ever seen on television. SMG seemed like she had a lot of fun with the whole episode. How can you not laugh while watching this episode?
Anyone else agree that these two eps are highly underrated? Anyone not like these eps? If so, why? I love them both, for different reasons.
Kathy: EEW! Who left their gum here?
Buffy: ...Gum gnome?
:)
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Yes agreeing with you here 100% -- Christian, 23:12:00 08/12/05 Fri [1] (209.240.205.62)
I really loved "The Freshman" and "Living Conditions"
I think the physical fight between Buffy and Kathy was hysterical! Especially when Buffy thinks she has Kathy by strangling her with her sweater and Kathy tears it in two from behind and Buffy is like Buffy: "OOhh!!"
LoL!
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Lately I've gained a whole new appreciation for season 4 -- Ramses 2, 02:48:53 08/13/05 Sat [1] (69.242.120.180)
I always liked it but my kids keep prodding me to watch it tons of times.....it's probably their favorite season.(Well, actually I'm sure it's 5 but the oldest's girlfriend got a mad crush on Spike and has kept our season 5 for months and months:))
I agree, the Cathy episodes that seemed like floss at first viewing are just delightful. I love season 4....there I've said it.
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I liked maybe more than liked season 4. -- Christian, 13:15:11 08/13/05 Sat [1] (209.240.205.62)
I also liked Riley. I just thought he had better chemistry with Willow and not Buffy.
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I completely agree. -- Marie, 20:42:32 08/13/05 Sat [1] (4.228.141.164)
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Oh, absolutely -- Eurydice, 06:25:45 08/14/05 Sun [1] (141.154.26.144)
From the way things started out, I was expecting something very different - Buffy didn't seem interested in Riley and there wasn't any UST - and it seemed as if the only reason Buffy started looking at him like a real prospect was because Willow liked him. I thought we'd get some kind of girlfight over Riley which would bring out Willow's underlying jealousy of Buffy and Buffy's need to be top dog in her little Scooby circle.
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Re: Rewatched "Freshman" and "Living Conditions"... -- Rosalind, 14:12:36 08/13/05 Sat [1] (154.20.231.210)
Season 4 has always been my favorite season. Chani's too, if my memory is correct. Too many TV shows have come to grief when it is time to make the characters' transition from one stage of life to another. The characters stay in high school to the point it becomes ridiculous or the writers attempt to keep everything the same even though the characters' life circumstances have changed completely. "Oh look, gang, it's Mr. Giles and he's our librarian at UCSunnydale, too!"
BtVS handled this brilliantly. The characters were allowed to grow in ways that perfectly fit their new lives. Both Giles and Joyce are empty-nesters with mid-life crises and there is a real possibility that Xander, Willow and Buffy will never regain the closeness they had in high school. By the end of the Season all these issues are resolved and it is exciting to watch this unfold. Plus the absolute brilliance of Spike and his behavior modification chip thus giving Buffy a new vampire without going the Angel route. The Freshman set this new tone beautifully. It raised issues that were not fully resolved until the end of the season with The Yoko Factor and Primevil.
Living Conditions was a very exciting episode for me personally in that it began to answer at a few questions I had about demons. Kathy is in every way a normal girl, except she's a millennia's old demon of course. She wants an education, she wants the full college living in a dorm being a freshman experience. She has a mother and a father who love her and don't think she's quite old enough to leave home. Her father is a bit of an old school patriarch type and her mother is worried sick. Kathy doesn't quite "get" it but she's willing to try.
Also it seems, from Giles's remarks, that some demons are souled. And, most exciting to me, demons have a way of looking just like us to get the good things our world can give them. In Living Conditions, we never learn exactly how Kathy gets her human covering -- this isn't explained until Season 5, episode 2 of Ats -- but it opens up the possiblity that almost any character we see as human could potentially be a demon encased in human flesh. As I say, exciting and unfortunately never fully addressed as a plot point, probably because of the sudden cancellation of Angel.
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Re: Rewatched "Freshman" and "Living Conditions"... -- TheDeb40, 15:00:40 08/13/05 Sat [1] (172.155.196.136)
Season 4 is the season I started watching Buffy on FX in reruns. I like most of the Season 4 epis - even Beer Bad. Of all the seasons, Season 4 brought the most laughs.
So I can overlook the sucky "Big Bad" of Adam.
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I love season 4.. -- Eurydice, 19:51:25 08/13/05 Sat [1] (151.203.55.238)
And Living Conditions is one of my favorite episodes - maybe because in my freshman year I had two roommates who were clearly demons, probably from that clan on motorcycles in Bargaining. I tried to tell everybody that they were evil, but people just said I was spoiled and selfish and a little princess (I wish). It wasn't until I started sleeping in the library and keeping my valuables in a bus locker that folks got a clue. But I digress...
Anyway, I loved the season, and the Initiative, and Riley, and Maggie, and chipped Spike, and poor Harmony, and (god help me) even Adam. I love that for all her science and technology and resources, Maggie only managed to create an old fashioned Frankenstein's monster. Leave it "nature" to create the truly scary stuff.
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Well said! -- Ramses 2, 20:33:24 08/13/05 Sat [1] (69.242.120.180)
" I love that for all her science and technology and resources, Maggie only managed to create an old fashioned Frankenstein's monster. Leave it "nature" to create the truly scary stuff." Excellently put. I dearly wish ME had been able to continue the story they intended.
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What had they originally intended? -- Marie, 20:45:30 08/13/05 Sat [1] (4.228.141.164)
I remember rumblings at the time that things had worked out differently than expected, but I haven't a clue what the original plan was. What was it?
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They really wanted "Maggie" as the "Big Bad". -- Christian, 23:37:22 08/13/05 Sat [1] (209.240.205.62)
I'm not 100% sure but I think that's what it was.
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Re: Nope Season 4 is where the writers and fans parted -- keeping faith, 05:37:47 08/14/05 Sun [1] (81.139.14.101)
To Joss and Co The Riley finn charachter was the next Gary Cooper of the Buffy verse who was Buffys new love interest. To all types of fans he was just a bland charachter who ate up screen time/had no chemistry with the lead charachter. Was highlighted to the detriment of others. The fact that both the Brilliant ASH and JM and the enjoyable NB were reduced to one scene per week where they each did and said the same thin was terrible
There were some good ideas in S4 but failed in excecution.
Some of the plots like the Gang drifiting apart then getting back together was handled so badly and so rushed it was pianful espeically when you compare it to the Ats version which was fantastic.
Then you had Adam complete with floopy disk drive yay!
Season 4 was a bad season but it looks better when you compare it to 6 annd 7 but its still a bad season.
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Well, not this fan. -- Eurydice, 06:52:39 08/14/05 Sun [1] (141.154.26.144)
As far as I can tell, there've been complaints about every one of Buffy's love interests, including Angel. When he first came on the scene there was all this whining about how DB couldn't act and how he was wooden and boring and paternalistic and evil and taking up screen time. With Spike, he was an evil slut and shirtless and a drama queen and taking up too much screen time. I imagine if Xander ever had the misfortune to hook up with Buffy, he'd end up being called stupid and boorish and fat and all he does is fix windows all day long and eat with his mouth open and TAKE UP TOO MUCH SCREEN TIME. That's The Curse of Being Buffy's Boyfriend.
And yes, Riley was bland, a little bit dull, kind of clueless and totally white bread. That was the whole point of him. Buffy wanted normal; well, that's what normal buys you. She thought she could compromise with a guy who could walk in the daylight and still kind of knew about the dark, but he didn't really know and he really couldn't help. And when it came time for her to deal with a normal human problem, something a normal human like him could help with, she didn't know how to ask. There was never any question in my mind that this relationship wouldn't last, nor do I think the writers intended it to.
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Re: Rewatched "Freshman" and "Living Conditions"... -- Joann, 09:56:15 08/14/05 Sun [1] (152.163.100.195)
Season 4 isn't one of my favorites but I prefer it to the Seasons of 5, 6 and 7 except for certain special episodes in each season. The whole cavernous feel of Freshman was intended to make Buffy seem lost and tiny in the big scheme of things -- ok, but that wasn't my image of the Buffy that I loved. Living conditions upon many additional viewings has come to typify to me something known to everyone -- the annoying person who is too close for comfort -- guess that happens at work too.
I didn't like the fake situations the characters were in: Giles was out of work way too long for his background, Xander seemed capable of getting to it instead of flopping around so long. I thought the characters should have all been in stronger situations and maybe they would have been if the screen time was not so focused on Riley and Buffy as a couple or as someone bringing her into a normal life which from the get-go IMO you could see was a waste of time.
IMO Riley was pushy - always twisting Buffy's arm to do something *normal* . The *picnic* he insisted taking Buffy on was another way that he had of being IMO overbearing and controlling. The relationship faded because he couldn't control the Slayer.
As luke warm about Spike and Buffy as I was it was a relief to see him rescue Buffy with situations she was familiar with and had power over --
As over the top as the association became with Spike and as creepy as the relationship with Riley became, I am ready to take Xander for a spin.
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Hmmm Riley, pushy? Twisting an arm? Regarding Buffy? Doesnt seem to fit. -- Christian, 23:05:15 08/14/05 Sun [1] (209.240.205.62)
It sounded more like what Spike was doing to Buffy in season 6. Trying to keep her away from her friends and keep her in the dark.
You see Riley never twisted Buffy's arm to do anything. Buffy was the one "forging" a relationship with Riley. As everyone says Buffy wanted "Normal" she forced the relationship.
I always felt that after Angel left, and what Parker did to her Buffy had trouble in the "Men/romance department. Wasn't able to "love" or to be exact "be in love" with a man again.
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I also believe some people can't understand Buffy IS still HUMAN -- Christian, 23:19:52 08/14/05 Sun [1] (209.240.205.62)
She is a Slayer NOT a VAMPIRE! Does she have to have her picnics at midnight? Her powers are DERIVED from a demon essence it doesn't make her a demon. She was born to human parents. Which is why the writers made sure that a Slayer, one Nikki Woods was a mother, one who gave birth to a normal human being with no powers.
What I could never understand why most fans wanted Buffy dark. We had Faith for that.
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Re: Hmmm Riley, pushy? Twisting an arm? Regarding Buffy? Doesnt seem to fit. -- Rosie, 16:54:33 08/15/05 Mon [1] (170.97.167.60)
"You see Riley never twisted Buffy's arm to do anything. Buffy was the one "forging" a relationship with Riley."
And Buffy was the one who had initiated her S6 relationship with Spike, as well. She's guilty on both counts. And Buffy was the one who used Riley as rebound over her breakup with Angel. She also used Spike in S6 to escape her dark moods. A lot of people seemed inclined to blame Spike for trying to push her away from her friends, because of one scene in "Dead Things". Buffy had already began to distance herself from the Scoobies right after she had returned from the dead. And in this particular situation, they were as much to blame as she was.
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I stand corrected on that she used both Riley and Spike. -- Christian, 20:51:40 08/15/05 Mon [1] (209.240.205.62)
But i'm sure if the Scoobies knew she was in "Heaven" they would have left her there.
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Just because some of Buffy's needs were being met . . . -- Marie, 21:17:18 08/15/05 Mon [1] (4.228.141.160)
doesn't mean that all of those people were being used. In fact, in those relationships, like most relationships there were needs being met on both sides.
The story may be "all about Buffy", but that doesn't mean everything is Buffy's fault or that she's always the villain just because she's not always super-nice and likeable for everyone.
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Picnics are overbearing and controlling? -- Kashmanik, 11:02:36 08/15/05 Mon [1] (81.153.15.6)
Interesting point of view. Particularly when that took place an episode *before* Riley found out she was the Slayer.
Or do you just find picnics in general overbearing and controlling?
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Where have you been? Picnics are a universal symbol of paternalistic oppression!! -- Eurydice, 13:03:14 08/15/05 Mon [1] (141.154.26.83)
I mean, Riley planned everything and brought all the food and the beverages and utensils and the blanket - and he expected Buffy to just sit back and enjoy herself. How *dare* he?!!!
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cNtuJtMiDcgNIzjgrmZ -- arsksdp (iKIgiIjkLNUkYj), 14:21:28 11/14/08 Fri [1] (168.187.11.130)
UWOqHY uqyfydpxjcqg, [url=http://evmobetohezl.com/]evmobetohezl[/url], [link=http://djamxkyfxsum.com/]djamxkyfxsum[/link], http://jlkumdlrsfwo.com/
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Well it was Buffy's story, not Faith's. -- exoticmushroom, 09:15:33 08/15/05 Mon [1] (195.153.138.69)
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Re: Rewatched "Freshman" and "Living Conditions"... -- Rosie, 16:51:16 08/15/05 Mon [1] (170.97.67.91)
"And yes, Riley was bland, a little bit dull, kind of clueless and totally white bread."
When I read these comments about Riley, I realize that not many fans have bothered to view the character underneath the so-called "bland" facade. Riley was a hell of a lot more than that. But since he seemed "normal" on the outside and he dated Buffy after the over-appreciated Buffy/Angel romance, many fans tend to put him down.
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You just looooove to think the worst of me. -- Eurydice, 18:34:41 08/15/05 Mon [1] (141.154.22.57)
I like Riley a lot, but that doesn't blind me to what the writers were doing, which was to paint a direct contrast to Angel. Compared to Angel, Riley was bland. Compared to Buffy's life, Riley's was dull. Compared to what Buffy knew about the "real" demon world, Riley and the Initiative were clueless. And there's never been a character in the Jossverse so scrubbed and shiny and stereotypically American White Bread.
And having said that I'll go back to my post in this and earlier threads. I always liked Riley and I sympathized with him more than I did with Buffy, and that wouldn't have happened if he didn't have additional layers. But the point of his existence as a character wasn't about additional layers, it was about Buffy's perception of normal, and Riley embodied that.
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And while you're searching for those layers... -- Eurydice, 18:38:20 08/15/05 Mon [1] (141.154.22.57)
You might toy with notion that real live people have layers, too - and that you can't instantly judge everything they say as black or white.
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loved season 4! especially the first two eps -- spiritus, 18:02:05 08/15/05 Mon [1] (4.252.144.10)
those are some good comedy eps, imo. i love buffy drinking out of the milk carton WHILE staring cathy down. that was too much. also buffy's talk with oz..being the replacement best friend for willow.
i also like how this was one of the first seasons where buffy had to be somewhat on the down low with her slayerness. this led to them all having to be more covert..."evil puppies", or , "her friends, who sleep all day and have no tan". i loved it when they were badly covert
i also loved willow when oz left and she busted in on said picnic. she was so mundane and morose at their happy time. then she made that one comment about the apples being brown.(can someone help me out?) that was exceedingly funny.
and i gotta say, for all the riley snarking my friends and i do, the best riley ever was, imo, was during something blue when he just runs into manic-bride-buffy. his confusion was the best. i think they misued marc b., as he was so good with the comedy. that's the best scene in something blue, if you ask me. also, remember when xander was speaking latin to the books and he was doing something with the flamey book?(i believe) it was - like a two second shot, but, again soo funny.
but yes, i loved cathy. oooo!! and that blonde gothy vampire, what was her name again? (brain problem) loved her!
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I loved his stealthy sneaking in the cemetery while Willow and Xander ate chips. :-) -- Eurydice, 18:40:19 08/15/05 Mon [1] (141.154.22.57)
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