OK, what on Earth was Bianca Lawson doing with that accent? Jamaica? You should have stopped her!
So, we've reached November 1997 and interesting things are going down in Sunnydale. With the Master defeated in the first season finale, the Scooby Gang (named for the first time as such here) are a well-oiled machine. Relatively speaking. They're as well-oiled as a group of teenagers fighting supernatural evil can get, which isn't always very much.
The pupils of Sunnydale High School have all had to fill out a multi-choice question to help with the upcoming career fair[1], which has resulted in Buffy being in a bit of a mood as her career path is already chosen for her - she's going to be a Slayer until she dies, which historically doesn't tend to be very long. It was only Angel and Xander saving her after she drowned in the finale that stopped her having the longevity of a Spinal Tap drummer... and this will be important later.
There's a new evil in town, consisting of a coven of vampires. They're led by Spike, a tall blond guy with a British accent, a penchant for sadism and a need to (mostly) tolerate his minions' frequent incompetence. James Marsters does a very good accent for an American actor - by all accounts, he was coached by Anthony Stewart Head [2].
Spike reminds me of Julian Sark in Alias, except he doesn't have the hots for Buffy. No, Spike has a girlfriend called Drusilla, who sounds a bit like a Victorian Cockney match seller. She is also a few pence short of a shilling. You see, she was "sired" by Angel in his pre-curse days, who before turning her vampire, killed her family and friends in front of her. Angel feels quite guilty about that now he has a soul. In any event, Drusilla is quite mad and Juliet Landau (daughter of Martin Landau and Barbara Bain) manages to be rather terrifying.
Anyway, Drusilla was badly injured escaping a mob in Prague and spends a lot of time in bed. Spike, whose relationship with her was inspired by Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen, has been looking for a spell to heal her strength, which involves breaking into a local mausoleum.
Buffy shows up at the break-in, dusting a vamp, but in her mood, doesn't think the break-in is worth investigating. Giles does, but they are playing catch-up. Especially as Spike has hired some assassins from the Order of Taraka to deal with Buffy so she doesn't get in his way.
Buffy spends much of this episode in a bit of temper, being snippy but funny with it. Sarah Michelle Gellar may not exactly be doing a lot of the actual on-screen fighting, but the acting is very much all hers. We also get to see her actually doing some ice-skating - indeed, she takes out one of the assassins with a blade to the neck. More on that later.
The rest of the Scoobies are on good form. Willow is generally adorable ("Don't wake the tadpoles!") and I can see why she's a fan favourite; she even gets to stake a vampire during the climax! Xander and Cordelia end up spending a lot of time together, dealing with an assassin who can turn into a load of worms. I'm not sure how that's a useful skill. The two have a clear disdain for each other... 10 Things I Hate About You, which hadn't come out yet, would be nowhere near a complete list. They end up kissing. Twice. This is arguably a relationship more toxic than Spike and Drusilla, which is saying something.
For his part, Xander manages to be funny... before veering straight back into inappropriate. His response to Cordelia complaining about having to drive people around by joking that people think she's promiscuous plays rather differently now. Cordelia manages to go into damsel mode (as is her regular wont in this show) where she lets in the wormy assassin - who is pretending to be a cosmetics salesman - because she likes that stuff. This ends up with her being covered in worms, which Xander then hoses off her, possibly enjoying that a bit too much. My note was "I'm a rich girl, get me out of here."
A character we're supposed to think is on the Order's payroll is introduced when she's found in the cargo hold of a newly arrived flight... and beats up the handler. Later on, she locks Angel in a storage area so the rising sun will kill him.
She's wearing a crop top with long sleeves, tight red trousers and big hoop earrings. She's also not brought a change of clothes with her either. This is odd considering who she turns out to be.
Kendra the Vampire Slayer. You see, Buffy's brief death triggered the activation of another Slayer, who unlike Buffy has spent her entire childhood being prepared for this, spending her life without natural parents, friends or even a last name.
She also possesses one of the worst Jamaican accents I've ever heard; mocked at the time and since disowned by Bianca Lawson herself. This seems to be have been sprung on her at the last minute, with a dialect coach who claims to have been going for an obscure regional variation - and with attempts by Lawson to use patois vetoed by the producers as it would make her even harder to understand. Jamaican patois has now become a part of the way young Londoners speak - it's called Multicultural London English (MLE) and now features regularly on streaming shows. A major failure here - commentators have pointed out this is one of the few non-white characters in the show as well. I was tempted, briefly, to show his to my colleagues of Caribbean descent, for their thoughts.
I found myself also reminded of Anna Espinosa from Alias, played by Gina Torres, who was a villainous counterpart to Sydney Bristow in that show. I wonder if Kendra inspired Anna.
The Buffy-Kendra relationship is rather reminiscent of whenever two Doctors meet up on Doctor Who. They have a fight when they first meet, which Buffy wins by pulling Kendra's hair. The two spend much of the second episode clearly disliking either other's personality, methodology and relationships, allowing SMG to get some fine comic insults in, like:
That's really good for you, Percepto Girl, but we're not gonna get anything out of him if he's, oh, say, unconscious.
However, they start to gel a bit later, with Kendra arriving to save the day when Buffy is captured going to rescue Angel. At the end, Buffy gives a new shirt, a taxi and a plane ticket home... one wonders how she dealt with Border Patrol at the airport - ICE having not been formed at this point.
Ah, Angel. The Slayer and the Vampire are getting closer; they arrange a date at the ice rink, then having a smooch next to the corpse of the assassin. OK... Angel then gets captured by Kendra... and rescued by Willie the Snitch, who hands him over to Spike. He's needed for this ritual too. Angel that is.
Drusilla is allowed to torture him a bit before the ritual, which is really an excuse for some shirtless David Boreanaz action. Being tied up by and with Juliet Landau might be appealing for some... but when she's in Drusilla mode, nope... not for me.
Anyway, Angel is ultimately saved, but Spike survives what can be called a massive organ failure and Drusilla is back to full health. That cannot be good.
As a final note, one of the assassins pretends to be a police officer and then tries to shoot Buffy in the middle of the careers fair, with Oz getting a bullet graze his arm. It comes out of the blue (so to speak) and one wonders if it would be done today. One of the show's later episodes, "Earshot" from Season 3, would air six months later than planned between seasons because of the Columbine massacre.
Conclusion
A highly enjoyable episode, but one let down badly by that dire accent.
8/10
[1]The episode title is a reference to a classic American panel show involving guessing what people did for a living.
[2]This is also the first episode I've watched since Anthony Head's death. He's a joy to watch here and would have made a great Doctor
No comments:
Post a Comment