"Graduation Day, Part 2," written by Joss Whedon, season three, episode 56.
"I Will Remember You," written by David Grossman and Jeannine Renshaw, Angel, season one, episode 8.
"Graduation Day, Part 2" is the kind of episode every season of Buffy had to end on: the climatic fight with the season's "Big Bad," as the reigning monster of that season became called. Our heroes triumph, a few quips are tossed out, and life goes on. But not for all. Larry—the big guy who we saw bully Xander earlier in our viewings. and who became a vampire hunting "white hat" in the alternate world of "The Wish," and who later expressed a crush on Xander—is killed, as is Harmony, Cordelia's "best friend," eaten by a vampire. Harmony will return to the series as a vampire, and even later become a regular on Angel as the receptionist at the evil law firm Angel ends up running (don't ask, just watch the series on your own—you'll enjoy it).
"I Will Remember You" is perfectly in keeping with the general tone of Angel. It is a much darker, more tragic and violent show than Buffy. If the main theme of Buffy is growing up, then the great theme of Angel is redemption. Can someone who has committed as many terrible acts as Angel redeem himself? The show is more serious, dare we say more mature than Buffy we've watched in both theme and presentation (though by the sixth and seventh season Buffy will take its own dark corners—as we will see to some extent).
So: 1. What was your reaction to both episodes? Like? Dislike? What jumped out at you in each of them?
2. If we take "Graduation Day" as the show's final take on high school—and the next time the show shows Buffy she is going off to her first day of college—what is it saying about the high school experience?
3. Is the Buffy we see in "I Will Remember You" the Buffy we've been seeing so far? Is she actually an older, more mature figure? If so, how so? If not, why not?
Tomorrow, we get very serious. Bring some tissue paper. See you then.
I liked the first episode of graduations day, but I feel like I could have enjoyed it more if we had seen some more of the previous episodes (and the previous part) just to get some of the context of what was happening. Watching it on its own was kind of like starting a book in the middle and I had big plot questions like, What was the crazy plan Buffy had come up with in the beginning? How come did all the kids suddenly learn about demons and start fighting with Buffy and the others? Who was the mayor and why was he over 100 years old? Some of these mysteries, I felt, took away from the emotional impact of the events in the episode, in short, it felt more anticlimactic than I suspect it was supposed to be. However, some of these events still were pretty stunning due to our prior knowledge of them, such as when Larry (a character we were pretty familiar with by now) dies.
ReplyDeleteI don’t know exactly what the metaphorical deeper meaning of blowing up the school is, but maybe it has to do with the pain of high school finally being left behind. High school is no fun experience, the emotional negatives often outweigh the positives. However, how this theme relates into exploding a giant demon snake, unfortunately, still escapes me.
She starts out as a more mature figure, but being back in angels presence seems to awaken all those school girl feelings of love that she has been exhibiting in recent episodes. In angel however, something about their relationship seemed more sad and emotionally intense than it did in Buffy. In Buffy the love between Angel and Buffy (perhaps it was the over excess of smacking) just caused me to tune out. Not so now. Perhaps it was the fact that in BVS, we could never really get an emotional read out of Angel, he was just a sideshow as Buffy worked through her problems with growing up and her relationship issues. In Angel, Angel was the focus of attention when it came to the relationship between Buffy and Angel, and seeing them both crying in the end (rather than just mainly Buffy) felt really powerful.
anyway they still need to learn how to kiss better.
1. I really liked both of them but, if I were too choose, I would say that the Angel episode was the one that I enjoyed more. While the themes in Buffy are definitely relatable as most of them are major issues that many teens have to struggle with, I find that Angel's struggles to hold more weight. Buffy spends a lot of her time avoiding major personal decisions or, at least, trying to hold them off until it is crucial that she deals with them. I'm not saying that Buffy is self-centered, she just holds the same flaws as many other young people do: to live in the moment and live like there is no tomorrow (YOLO?). Angel, on the other hand, has more experience than Buffy and is able to sacrifice himself for the person he loves. He is realistic about things and knows that he can't just "make it work." Even while there is no apparent danger in the present, he thinks forward to protecting Buffy from what lies ahead, something that Buffy would never be able to do. The thing that jumped out at me was how, in "Graduation Day," the episode really glazed over the fact that many of the students (many of the students who we came to know well) were killed in the fight against the Mayor and the vampires. The episode, as it usually does, ended on a happy note. There was no mourning, at least not over the lives of those couple of students. The thing that really surprised me about the Angel episode was how human Angel seemed, even before he actually became human. He seemed like much more of an emotional character then we had seen in the Buffy episodes.
ReplyDelete2. I think that this episode says how hard High School life is. Of course at Sunnydale High it is much, much more difficult to survive High School. This episode gives us yet another metaphor littered with monsters and magic. It presents to us how exhausting it is to go through High School and, at the same time, how fleeting it is. High School forces a person to grow up but, though school may seem neverending, it is a very short time for one to do so. A person matures so much and changes so much as a person in the short span of four years. "Graduation Day" shows how draining High School life is and how small a blip it is compared to the rest of one's life.
3. I think that Buffy seemed a lot older in this episode but hardly more mature. Yes, she is responsible and the fact that she visited Angel and seemed level-headed about the whole situation (at least at first) shows how different she had become. When she first appeared in this episode I was under the impression that she was much older and more mature. However, when Angel and Buffy ventured down into the sewers together, it seemed as if no time had passed at all. It was the same-old Angel and Buffy bicker, the same argument they always had. I believe that, while Buffy may have experienced a lot since Angel left her, she still is the same old Buffy.
1) I liked them both, but I really enjoyed Graduation Day pt 2. I really liked how Buffy’s plan really came together in the end. If the show were to end with that episode, I would have been perfectly fine with that decision. With the Angel episode, I felt that the creators were trying to make amends with Buffy/Angel. It felt like they just wanted to wrap up the relationship once and for all (is that the right wording?) What jumped out at me was the fact that David Boreanaz had not gotten better as an actor in Angel.
ReplyDelete2) Oz says at the end of the episode, “we survived,” and Buffy responds, “yeah, it was a great battle,” and Oz disagrees, “we survived high school.” This short dialogue, for me, sums up Buffy’s whole high school experience in Sunnydale.
3) I felt that Buffy was a lot older, like she is seeing Angel for the first time in years, rather than just a few months, at first. She may have looked older, but she certainly was not more mature. She goes back to being a teenage girl who wishes to be normal. I think that she should have faced the facts long ago that she was never going to be a normal girl.
I thought the first episode was kind of silly, and the second one was depressing. I thought the whole fight scene in the graduation episode wasn’t very exciting, but that is consistent with most fight scenes in Buffy. What stuck out to me in this episode was how little emotional stuff there was, uncharacteristic of most episodes. The fighting is usually a minor plot, but in this it was the main focus. The episode of Angel was okay. It wasn’t too good but it wasn’t boring. The episode showed Angel’s selflessness and his love for Buffy. He could live a normal life, something he probably has always wanted, but he gives it up to protect Buffy.
ReplyDeleteI thought “Graduation Day” was saying that high school isn’t too important. The whole ceremony is destroyed, but everybody is concerned with stopping the end of the world. It puts into perspective how high school may seem like the end of the world, but it isn’t too important. When Giles gives Buffy her diploma, he kind of looks at her like it’s just a stupid diploma and it doesn’t mean anything.
Buffy is more mature in “I Will Remember You” but she still shows signs of the same young Buffy. She handles Angel in a very mature way in Angel’s office and doesn’t get too emotionally involved. In Angel’s house, Buffy is less mature. They realize Angel is human again, but Angel is hesitant to do anything about it, in case there is something they don’t know. Buffy gets upset with Angel for this, and it shows she doesn’t always think things through at first.
I thoroughly enjoyed both of the episodes, predominantly due to the continued introduction of increasingly serious thematic elements that mimic many of the conflicts faced during one’s coming of age. While the primary focus of “Graduation Day, Part 2” was placed upon the monsters, it is arguable that the true monster defeated in the episode was high school itself, as alluded to by Oz’s comments at the conclusion of the episode. “I Will Remember You” essentially removed many of the comedic elements of “Buffy” and instead took a much more realist and morbid approach, and although not my preference, it allowed me to view the universe of “Buffy” through a lens much more relatable to life itself.
ReplyDeleteWhile high school is often a seemingly impassable obstacle in one’s life, “Graduation Day, Part 2” conveys the notion that despite all the apparent horrors (taken in a somewhat literal sense in this case), fears and anxieties surrounding the high school experience, it truly bears little applicability to one’s life as a whole. Many often get entirely immersed within the social hierarchy of their respective high schools, only to have it taken from under them upon their graduation. High school is, from a social perspective, an entirely superficial and fabricated experience. The notion of “popular” does not exist in the real world. Nor does the notion of a clique. Once removed from the high school environment, many are allowed to come to this realization, granting them a newfound sense of freedom previously thought unimaginable.
Buffy appeared to have matured considerably, losing her innocence in place of the persona of a mature powerful woman. During a moment in which Angel was patronizing her to an extent, she made a remark that she was a “big girl” and was fully capable of making her own decisions. It appears that after graduating, Buffy has matured into a capable young woman without much need for outside guidance or instruction, which vastly differentiates from the Buffy we have seen so far.
1) For Graduation Day Part 2, it was a good end to the season by having the major reoccurring monster, the mayor, be killed finally. It also brought closure to other things such as having Cordelia and Wesley’s fling come to an end, as well as showing Willow and Oz still going strong. Though it brings closure, I found Angel leaving without speaking to Buffy obnoxious. I know he stood there just so she would know he was alive and well, but he should have given her some sort of good bye, or anything that would allow her to know he cares for her. I would have enjoyed that at least as a viewer. Then for Angel, I really didn’t like it. Buffy is a great enough show on it’s own, so I find it hard to try and make a spin off of it. Through out the entire episode you also know that Angel was going to have to turn into a vampire again because that would be too happy of an ending, so that also ruined it a bit for me. Then the fact that the episode shows this entire experience of how happy Buffy and Angel would be if he were human and then just rip that away from them at the end makes me angry and annoyed. I would rather just not even be presented with the idea that they would be happy since it obviously isn’t possible.
ReplyDelete2) Since by the end of the episode the school is burnt down, the show is signifying high school ending as well. Oz even stops them all to take a moment and realize their journey through high school as ended and they have survived it. This displays how hard going through high school can be, and though when it ends it can be upsetting, you have conquered a large battle in your life.
3) I didn’t see much of a difference in Buffy’s behavior. I thought she was handling the situation of seeing Angel once again maturely, yes, though I think she gained that maturity by distraction and time. For instance, when the situation of Angel leaving presented itself again towards the end of the episode, Buffy displays the same reactions as she did in episodes of Buffy when Angel changes, or leaves. So, all and all, I don’t think she matured very much, but just healed from him leaving more so than when he first left.
Seeing the characters graduate was unfortunate and has made me even more skeptical as to exactly what else this show can do before it runs itself in to the ground. I feel like school is what kept this show from being too mystical and too otherworldly, and created an anchor for the characters to deal with actual, relatable issues. It’s not clear what any of their plans are after high school, I assume that they are going to college, but for the sake of keeping these characters I doubt any of them will really “leave” Sunnydale or move on with their adolescent lives as the show suggests now that they have graduated college. This isn’t just a problem for Buffy, many shows featuring teens face it because eventual its leads will have to graduate and leave the world enclosed in the premise of the show. I am curious to see what the characters actually do after high school, and hopefully it is a rewarding next step for all of them. With the episode of Angel we watched, I have never found Angel to be that watchable of a character due to his overly broody and melodramatic nature, so I was surprised that he was actually able to carry his own show. I didn’t have faith that David Boreanaz could manage to lead an ensemble the way Sarah Michelle Gellar does, but I thought he did a pretty good job.
ReplyDeleteOz says that high school is something that they survived, just as they had survived countless monsters and vampires and Synders, and I think comparing the two is indeed accurate. For a good chunk of our lives, high school is the dominant and controlling force, and it definitely is a monster that we all have to slay. Sometimes high school can feel like hell, and Buffy and Co. not only had to deal with real hell, but the high school hell. High school being hell is depressing, but what makes high school great is that you can share the experience with people you know and like (sometimes dislike). Knowing that you are not alone is comforting, and I think the communal struggle makes high school doable.
To be honest, I couldn’t really see a different Buffy. While see originally held her ground against Angel, she quickly caved and became his again. She got so emotionally involved so very quickly, and I think that this exactly what Buffy would done since the beginning. She cannot distance herself from Angel once she knows he’s around, she just can’t resist him. Maybe that’s a reflection on their relationship and not on Buffy as a person, but still not much growth has been made.
1. I like the end of Graduation Day part 2 better than the Angel episode. Although it is a pretty good episode of Angel, it just doesn't interest me like most episodes of Buffy. I always miss the familiar characters of Xander and Willow and tend to get bored by Angel more than I do by Buffy. I'm just not a fan of the Angel-Buffy romance I guess, and that's really all I Will Remember You is about. There are funny moments and I like Cordelia and Doyle pretty well, but I'm not that interested in the main plot line of the episode which doesn't make watching it that interesting. I did enjoy seeing Angel's reaction to being human because it makes us think of fundamental things we experience as humans that we kind of take for granted, like eating or having a beating heart. In Graduation Day Part 2, I think the final battle scene with all of Buffy's classmates is really interesting. Not only does it show all these people who we may have seen as unimportant helping Buffy out and fighting back against the evil that's bothered them their whole high school career, we also see some of them die. Larry and Harmony, not main characters, but people who we know well enough to know their names, die in this battle. I think this shows the more human cost of some of the battles Buffy fights, that they don't have purely happy endings. Yes, they saved the world again, but some of these people will never experience life outside high school, something they were so close to achieving. I don't like that these people die, but I think it was a good decision to include these deaths.
ReplyDelete2. I think the show shows how high school is such a big part of your life, it's such a big deal, then suddenly it's over. The way they walk away at the end almost seems anti-climatic. Everything is different, but at the same time remains the same. It's sort of a conflicting message. It shows there's life after high school for Buffy and her friends, but for some of the people who died in the battle, that's all there is. I think this episode shows both how important and unimportant high school really is.
3. I do think Buffy gets more mature in this episode. She's not happy about Angel no longer being human, but she accepts it more easily than the younger Buffy would have. She's starting to really recognize the larger purpose they both serve and accepts his decision more easily. The way we see her greet Angel is also less love-struck and open than she might have been earlier. All in all, she's behaving less like a love-struck teenager and more like a reasonable, sadly slightly cynical adult. She's not completely grown up; she's still bitter when Angel first becomes human and wants to wait and weigh their options. But she understands his motivation more, and I think that's a big change from the earlier Buffy who would probably have been furious and refused to accept his actions in the end.
1. I liked both episodes that we saw today. Some of the effects for the Ascension weren't all that realistic, but it was interesting to see the end of the season. As always an apocalypse is averted and life goes on. The part of the episode that stood out to me was after everything had happened and the Ascension was over and they were all looking at the wreckage that was their school. And then they have a moment of silence to recognize not that they had won the battle, but that they had conquered high school. The minute lasts about 5-10 seconds, but it still it concludes the high school careers of Willow, Buffy, Xander, Cordelia, and Oz with thought and finality. They all realize that life moves on after the Ascension and more likely, high school, and they will have to move on as well. In the second episode Angel's qualities as a human stood out to me. It was funny to see him eat so much, but it was scary to watch his weakness at battle. Angel becoming human is everything that Buffy and Angel could have ever wanted, but it as the saying goes, "be careful what you wish for." Angel's choice is heartbreaking, but understandable when he decides to go back to being a vampire. Also it was interesting to see all of the emphasis on the clocks throughout the episode. I didn't even think that much of them until Angel went back in time so that he wouldn't have to be changed into a human. Living with the fact that you let the person you loved go, would be tough, but Angel doesn't need all that much sadness to affect his brooding manner. Both episodes represent an end to an era.
ReplyDelete2.The episode shows the end to high school life for Buffy, Xander, Willow, Cordelia, and Oz. The demolished school shows the finality of graduation. They all have to move on with their lives. High school and the high school experience are tough and they seem long, but once they are finished they are finished. This episode showed the end of, in this show anyways, Angel and Buffy's relationship, high school, Cordelia's presence in Sunnydale, and many other characters on the show. Everything leads up to the looming Graduation and then its done. This is shown through the foreboding Ascension and the apocalypse that the characters thought it would bring. They didn't have time to worry about the real meaning of graduation itself. In the end, Buffy gets her diploma and goes on her way to college.
3. Buffy has definitely grown up since the end of the third season when she talks to Angel. She has more confidence in herself and her decisions. Even so, Angel keeps making them for her. He didn't say anything to her when he helped her in Sunnydale and he turned back time without even talking to Buffy a little bit. Buffy starts to face the non-monster related issues that are in front of her head on, now. She is willing to protect Angel and herself while he is in human form. It is very clear that Buffy can handle herself and has become more self reliant. Even before she graduated Buffy had to grow up faster than other people because she was the slayer. Buffy now has more maturity than she did before and she is growing up as she has done throughout the series.
The first episode however cheesy and inexpensive was necessary to have in the show. Although the series wasn’t ending, Buffy’s high school experience was ending. It was great to see the whole high school coming together to fight the mayor. Buffy’s plan worked seamlessly of course and everything became all right after all that. Oz’s line was very fitting: "Guys take a moment to deal with this: - we survived… Not the battle, high school!” School is a hug part of growing up and getting through high school is a huge stepping-stone. The episode of Angel was a lot heavier than most episodes of Buffy. There was little to no humor in the episode. Instead, Buffy and Angel went on another emotional roller coaster. Showing us what could have been, what their relationship could have been like if Angel was alive. It was cool to see everything from Angel’s perspective. What his life is like away from buffy, if only for one episode.
ReplyDeleteLike Oz said, they survived high school. Just like the demons and apocalyptic threats they keep fighting, high school is just another thing to slay. It can be stressful, complicated and downright scary. But, as Buffy shows us, High School really isn’t a big deal. It’s just an education. It is what you make of it; you can make it easy you can make it hard. You can do well and you can fall on your face. You have your friends, teachers and family with you to support you along the way just like Buffy has Willow, Xander, Giles, etc. The message that the show is sending out is that there’s no need to freak out, all you have to do is survive.
The Buffy in “I Will Remember” seems just about the same to me. She is confused by everything Angel still. She visits LA to see her Father and ends up visiting her ex boyfriend along the way. She definitely wants to see Angel underneath her excuses of seeing him stalking her. I think that Buffy is kind of foolish sometimes. She uses her rational, intellectual side to fight demons. When it comes to boys, though, she is just a regular teenage girl. She gets right back with angel incredibly quickly, hardly thinking twice. She is the same buffy and I think she needs a lot more time and experience to mature.
I defiantly liked these two episodes a lot. Even though, "I Will Remember You" is a heart-wrenching episode I defiantly liked how well thought out the episodes were. In Graduation day I was a little confused about the Mayor being so badass and this horrible monster thing due to the fact I have never seen the previous episode before it. In "I Will Remember You", this episode really brought up one of the points in our discussion today about why Joyce had come to talk to Angel and him and Buffy's relationship. This episode very well gives the explanation that their relationship is so difficult and miserable because Angel is a vampire and therefore they cannot ever be a in a "normal relationship".
ReplyDelete2. The line that Oz said at the end, when they're taking a long stare at the abolished school and Oz says, "We made it through High School". To me, that was the big key point and great wrap up of the season and also connecting with the theme of growing up, yes, you will sooner or later or hopefully "survive high school"
3. I do believe Buffy seemed older , but she seemed more childish in the sense of how she totally wanted to show her fantasy of having a "normal relationship" actually come true. However, in the beginning of the episode, she does seem a little more mature as she is making her own decisions and taking things more seriously than she has ever before.
1. what i liked about the graduation episode was when we saw the whole senior class work together to fight the evil monster demon dude. they weren't the helpless mortals we consistently see throughout the show, but an army fighting to save both themselves and each other. "i will remember you" was kind of an odd episode for me. i think it had to do partly with the fact that the show Angel was so almost Buffy, but not quite the same, i got a bit thrown off. however, despite the parallel shows, this episode was yet another that had me caught with a few tears at the end. the constant off and on of Buffy and Angel's forbidden love is so hard to keep up with but still hits hard each time the heartbreak comes around.
ReplyDelete2. i guess one could say that this last episode of Buffy we watched could be seen as an analogy for slaying the horrible beast which is high school. although in my world, hummus definitely does help with the conquering of hissing papers and evil assignments, Buffy and her gang have to fight a more living demon to gain their right of passage out of school. as i stated above, i loved watching the whole class fight the Mayor together, showing that high school is not a one man battle, but one that affects every member of the class and how everyone has to get through it together.
3. in the episode we watched of Angel, i do think Buffy seemed older since last we saw her with Angel. however, i think they have such a strong affect on each other when they're together, Buffy seemed to revert back into a more juvenile version of herself once she's with Angel again. i found it odd, for some reason, that she kept calling him her "boyfriend" and saying things like, "hey! you hit my boyfriend!" and other lame things like that. i thought it was odd that after just one night together, and seemingly no conversation about it, she was once again the sweetheart of her high school days.
1) I found "Graduation Day" to be well balanced between the present dangers of the mayor's ascension crisis and the emotional struggle of graduating and things ending. I really liked its continuity and, once again, the balance. The villian, the mayor, really stuck out to me, as in the end, his weakness is Faith. We didn't watch any episodes including her in class, sadly, but she ended up being like a daughter to Mayor Wilkins. When Buffy tricks the demon form at the end by luring him with Faith's knife, and you can even hear his human voice cry out last words, that's really powerful for the series, as it depicts a grey between the black and white good and bad.
ReplyDeleteI've never seen any "Angel" episodes before, so I can finally write an actual first reaction!! The episode was funny, I laughed pretty hard quite a few times, watching it, mostly about Angel's reaction to food. However, its emotional pull, giving perfection of love and then taking it away without even the memory, was really tragic. The last part when Buffy cried, saying that she'd always remember, then her forgetting, struck me hard. My dad has the early symptoms of dementia/Alzheimer's and I fear that I will too, so moments like this are always personally moving in my life.
2) In short, Graduation Day says that high school is a battle, from beginning to end, and like Oz says, it's amazing that we survive it. Graduating is the finale, it may seem like the easy part, but it also is the way to let all of the emotional buildup from 4-13 years explode. They have fun doing it it, but it's tough.
3) I feel like the Angel Buffy seems older and more mature, which she is, as time affects her, but not by too much. She still stays to be vulnerable, as she gives in to Angel's mortal temptation, showing creases in the callous. However, there is a hardened sense about her, and she does say that a lot had happened since Angel left (like college? not much it seems, honestly). She has gone to college which is, in anyone's life, a big maturity step.
I liked both episodes. Graduation made for a very good ending in my opinion. It wrapped up a lot of stuff I was waiting for (Hell mouth to be destroyed, Big Bad to be defeated, Angel to go away, Buffy to graduate, and Snider to get eaten) and left me with a happy/ content/sad feeling of seeing Buffy graduate and grow up (in a rite of passage sort of way). I have to admit, I was really happy when Snider was eaten by the giant snake-demon-thing. Faith’s death-coma thing though… made me so sad. Later in the series it made me even more tearful. I think it took its toll on Buffy as well. Buffy’s fine with killing demons, but people are different.
ReplyDeleteThe Angel episode made me sad as well. It was a serious case of so close yet so far… for both Buffy and Angel. They were so close to being together and Angel really wanted to be human. But Angel realized that he needed to stay a vampire in order to do the things expected of him and to do the things he feels obligated to do. Over all it sucked and Angel had to shoulder the grief yet again.
Before graduation and at graduation, a student may be waiting for high school to be over and just want to leave the school in as much of a permanent way as possible. After graduation, though, that same student (oh wait, you’re not a student anymore…) may realize that high school was his or her last four years of his or her life. Now what? We blew up the school. Now what?
The Buffy in Angel is older and more mature than the Buffy before graduation. She has gotten older and been forced (at least a little bit) to grow up. Her general approach is slightly more mature, though her need to be with Angel, even if it is not good for those around you, is slightly childish. She’s more grown up, but she’s not a grown-up yet.
1. I really enjoyed the BVS graduation episode for several reasons: for one thing it contains one of my favorite lines of the series, “We attack the Mayor with hummus”. Also, there’s an exciting battle between the Mayor and Sunnydale High’s graduating class. But maybe most important, this episode marks the end of an era: Buffy is done with high school. Dealing with all the troubles of high school has been a huge part of the show since the beginning, but after the third season Buffy is off to the big leagues: college. What really stuck out to me in this episode was when the Mayor went through metamorphosis and simultaneously all of the students rose and prepared to fight. It was a really touching seen that showed the students uniting to fight evil. I loved it.
ReplyDeleteI wasn’t a huge fan of the episode I Will Remember You. Whether it was because Angel had a very different feel from Buffy, or because I’ve just never been a big supporter of the two’s relationship, the episode just rubbed me the wrong way. I found it to be a lot of talk and lovey-dovey goo, and not enough of the witty, action-packed, and entertaining content that makes up BVS. What stuck with me most was the reiteration of how impossible Buffy and Angel’s relationship is. If anything this episode just proved to me even more how much they’re just not meant to be.
2. The Mayor was very much a metaphor for high school itself: a giant, terrifying monster prepared to take down every student one at a time. But much liked they were forced to do in high school, the students of Sunnydale High banded together and used all of their strength and provisions to fight the beast. Although they win in both circumstances, Buffy realizes that there will be many evils to battle in her future, and college will hold many of the same challenges as high school. However, because she’s conquered high school and the Mayor, there’s hope that she will conquer college and the many monsters of her future.
3. I think Buffy is more mature in the episode we watched today of Angel. When faced with relationship issues in the past, Buffy was blinded by love and unable to deal with the problem in a mature way. She wanted to stay with Angel no matter what: the fact that their relationship may put him, her, or others in danger was not a concern of hers. In the episode we watched today though, Buffy was thinking clearly and rationally. Although it was sad to not see the carefree and deep love she had for Angel, she made the responsible decision by suggesting they keep their distance. She’s come to learn that the two of them do not work well together and there’s no use trying to mend what they used to have.
I thought that “Graduation Day”, part 2 was appropriately epic. With the music and the inspirational battle scene when all the students rose together to fight evil. I really liked Cordelia’s role in Angel. When I first saw that she was in this spinoff I was afraid that she and Angel would be dating. I was relieved that they weren’t, although they might in later episodes, I haven’t seen any others. She seemed more mature. She is still the same shallow Cordelia, but she knows how things work. She even knows more than Doyal at some points. She has the knowledge of years of experience with Buffy, Angel, and other supernatural creatures.
ReplyDeleteIt says that high school is more than just one battle. It is a war. We see this at the end when Oz tells them all to take a minute to reflect that they survived. And he’s talking about high school instead of the huge battle they just fought. They survived it together. I liked this finale better than the previous ones we’ve watched because all the students banded together to fight the “Big Bad.” When their parents fled, the students stood their ground and fought and won. It just goes to show the immense power of young people. As I go into my senior year of high school, I find this episode very encouraging. It shows the power of a community and a group of people with the same goal.
In some ways I would say she is more mature at first in “I Will Remember You” because she faces the conflict calmly, and she and Angel maturely decide that separation is best for both of them. Buffy has become more adult in the absence of Angel, who helps protect her. But when Angel regains his life, she reverts to the same Buffy that we see in the BVS. But ultimately she stays the more adult person she has become, because Angel turns back time in order to be a vampire again, and to keep the role of protector.
I really liked the graduation episode. It contained lots of humorous bits, and even the large animated snake was more laughable than scary. However, it still had some really touching moments. One in particular for me was, when expected to scream and run away, the entire student population pulled back their graduation garb to expose a whole slew of weapons strapped to their chests, ready to take on this monster together. I found I Will Remember You to frustrating, with far less humor and lightheartedness, and seeing what could have been with Angel (even though I would not consider myself a fan) all the while knowing their happiness wouldn’t last just left me just discontent with the whole episode. It was nice to see Angel, though, ready to give up all his current happiness with Buffy and make that sacrifice for the wellbeing of the people.
ReplyDeleteIt show’s high school as a series of battles, difficult and scary, but in the end beatable. Surrounded by the rubble of the institution that controlled a good deal of their lives for the past four years, the group takes a moment to appreciate the fact that they, as Oz puts it, survived. Not just the most recent fight, but high school in general, which gives hope that we too can survive and go on to win the subsequent battles of life as well.
In ways, Buffy is more mature. When we first see her, it looks as if she is going to be able to keep her cool around Angel. And without Angel’s transformation to human, she does. But once given the prospect of a real future, she shows some old Buffy tendencies. However, when Angel tells her he must change back, she is clearly upset but eventually accepts that it is inevitable and necessary for them to end their relationship and for Angel to once again become an impossibility.
1. Graduation Day, similarly to Prom, was very touching to me. Some of the students were evil, some were just mean, but they're all also incredibly brave. The way they listen to this girl many of them have never spoken to shows just how much they need her. It's gotta be pretty scary to not only be finishing high school but also having to fight a giant snake monster before you can actually graduate. But the moment they all pull out the various weapons and attack just makes me want to stand up and clap. Meanwhile, I Will Remember You just makes me angry. While it's in keeping with the idea that Buffy actually does have to have a supernatural boyfriend, I think Angel has gone through enough not to be considered normal, at this point. Buffy risks herself to save everyone she loves, not just him, and I think this was just showing that their relationship could never work, not because he was a vampire, but because they just weren't meant to be.
ReplyDelete2. The blatant metaphor throughout the first three seasons is high school=hell. Oz's line about surviving is one of my favorites, because that really is kind of how it works. I'm only on my first, but so far high school is really just about making it through. Marcie was so ignored that not only did she become invisible, but she became evil. In "Earshot", which we skipped, Jonathan attempts to kill himself. BTVS is much more literal, but also very honest in how the high school years are probably not the golden ones.
3. Buffy is definitely more mature, but also a lot angrier. That seemed to be the main reason she was being so calm. The timeline during that episode is Season 4, where she was a college student and had to have even more responsibility. She definitely grew up a little bit without Angel, I honestly feel that when he kept coming back it really just sets her back. Once he's human, I was happy but also a little irked that she technically cheated on Riley--not that I care about Riley. Undoing the day was probably the best choice, as it allowed her to move on and not be held back.