Because I need to solidify my Buffy The Vampire Slayer fanboy street cred., here is a partial list of my favorite episodes (I am in season 6).
*** Warning ***
Spoilers follow
1.) The Body, Season 5: Easily the most traumatizing hour of Buffy, this was, by any standards, a great hour of heart-wrenching television. Even if you did not know the characters, were not a fan, and couldn’t care lesss about the series, the subject is so deeply personal and the manner it was portrayed is so elegant that even non-Buffy fans could appreciate this. For those of us who are in love with the series and who have developed a deep and formidable parasocial relationship with the characters, it was, quite simply, gut-wrenching.
2.) The Gift, Season 5: This was it. This was the end. You could sense the finality, you could see all the loose ends pulledtogether, the emoital exhaustion of it all taking its toll, and the sense of release as Buffy finally gives and recieves her hard-earned and well-deserved ‘gift.’
3.) Prophecy Girl, Season 1: If you didn’t already have the bug at the end of the first season, this sealed the deal. We begin to understand the role Buffy will play from here on out, and the real basis for here reliance on her friends is made clear.
4.) Hush, Season 4: Simply one of the most original (this is where someone in the comments tells me the idea was stolen from something else) story lines in the entire run of the series.
5.) The Becoming (both parts), Season 2: For some reason or another, I hear a number of people who really don’t like Angel. I don’t know how anyone could watch the series with that attitude, and these episodes set the stage for the next five years of the show.
Others that I really liked were Once More with Feeling, Graduation Day (both parts), as well as many others, but I think this is the top 5 for now.
Create your list and put it in the comments, or send me the link to your site so I can link.
Whedon’s list is here.
iocaste
I don’t have a list per se, but while I am fond of many of the eps you name, one great and oft-overlooked ep is The Pack. I mean, for straight, MOTW eps that don’t contribute to the mythology, it doesn’t get much better. Perfect, scary mood; perfect metaphor for “high school horror,” and possibly Nick Brendon’s best performance of the series.
Geoduck
I’ve always thought that The Gentlemen from Hush are the only truly scary monsters the show ever featured. (And I say this as someone who loved the show; it was funny and creepy and heart-felt, but it was seldom scary…)
Stormy70
John, I have seen Season 4, but that is the first time I had watchd Buffy. I started watching Angel the first season it was on, and it drew me to watching Buffy. Hush was a great episode. And Becoming was extrememly emotional, and I was surprised that it affected me the way it did. I am now on season 3, right after “Revelations.” Then I will rewatch 4, and 5, which I think is where I stopped watching. It wasn’t my fault. We lived two years in Georgia, outside of Columbus, and our satellite did not have the local channels. It sucked! I missed tons of good TV. Now my double DVR is set to record as much as it can, to make up for the lean years.
Zzyzx
No Passion?
Harley
Well, certainly Doppelgangland — Bad Willow!. And Becoming, of course. (I still think Season Two was the best of them all.) And lastly, tho’ I can’t think of the title, the episode where Angel is haunted by Bad Deeds Past and wants to let the sun take away his pain, Buffy tells him she can’t live without him no matter how hard she tries. And it snows in Sunnydale.
Gets me every time.
M. Scott Eiland
My list (spoilers aplenty):
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1) Becoming, Part 2: The second part of the two-part second season finale, this episode shows things gradually falling apart for Buffy–with the law after her for a murder she didn’t commit, her being forced to ally with one of her worst enemies, being forced to deal with her mother discovering the secret that Buffy has been hiding for two years when she doesn’t have time to be gentle about it, and forced to fight the monster who wears the face of the man she loves to the death–not knowing that her friends are trying to restore his soul and bring back her love (cue the resumption of the epic “Xander Lied!” debates from alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer). The climax of all this is a moment that has to be considered the most gut-wrenching torment that a heroine has had to endure on series television–picture the “Star Trek” episode where Jim Kirk had to let the woman he loved die to save the universe, then imagine that instead of having to just let it happen, he had to kill her with his own hands (thus my habit of calling this Buffy’s “Edith Keeler moment”). There were many memorable moments before and after this one in the series–but as pure, undiluted angst it remains alone, and makes this episode the best that “Buffy” has to offer.
2. Prophecy Girl–If you’re a “Buffy” fan and want to get someone else hooked on the series, show them this episode first. If they’re not hooked by the time they’ve seen it, they probably never will be. It contains the whole essence of the show–and the first season–in one package: Buffy’s situation and the price it demands from her, her love of her friends and their love for her, the nature of the evil she fights, and that noble, indomitable spirit that makes her go on when she’s got some very good reasons to want not to. It’s also a good one for demonstrating very quickly why so many fans love Xander. Oh, and for those who have doubts about Sarah Michelle Gellar’s acting ability–watch the scene in the library after she finds out about the prophecy and confronts Giles and Angel. It’s a crime that she didn’t win an Emmy for it.
3. Hush–As John said, a brilliant concept that made for a great thriller of an episode. For those who watch the show largely for the soap opera elements, this episode was a major milestone in both the Buffy/Riley and Willow/Tara relationships.
4.Passion–Buffy’s failure to kill Angelus when she had the chance was bound to have a horrible cost, and this is the episode where it started to be paid. This was probably the episode where a lot of “Buffy” fans started mumbling under their breath: “Joss, you bastard.” Aside for Rosalynd Shays’ tumble down the elevator shaft on L.A. Law, it’s hard to remember a significant character being as casually and brutally disposed of as one was about midway through this episode, and the impact on her friends–and on the man who loved her–is played for every ounce of emotion that is in it, climaxing with Buffy and Giles sobbing in each other’s arms in front of a burning factory. Brilliant jobs of writing and acting here.
5. The Body–I concur with John: this one gets to you.
Honorable mention:
“Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” and “The Zeppo”–two humorous episodes featuring Xander. Of course, being “Buffy,” there are still deaths and threats to all existence here, but they’re still great fun.
“Once More, With Feeling”–Yes, Joss can write an entertaining musical without losing the ability to throw in a nice dollop of angst when Buffy is forced to reveal the secret she has been keeping from her friends since her return at the beginning of season six.
“Surprise” and “Innocence”–the central arc episodes of season two: Buffy and Angel discover that it’s a very bad idea for ensouled vampires to have sex.
“Dopplegangland”–A vamped, sexually voracious Willow from another reality with a fondness for tight leather clothing is accidentally summoned by a botched spell. Wackiness ensues.
Harley
Oh. And the Prom.
M. Scott Eiland
“Amends” was the magic snow episode, Harley.
Harley
Thanks, Scott. Great list, btw. One could simply focus on the comedic episodes (‘Beer Bad,’ ‘Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered,’ and don’t forget ‘Superstar’) And it seems wrong that there isn’t a Faith episode on the list.
M. Scott Eiland
“This Year’s Girl” and “Who Are You?” were certainly topnotch episodes (and a surprisingly non-cheesy treatment of one of the older cliches in fantasy/sci-fi entertainment). My three favorite Faith scenes:
1) The scene near the beginning of “Graduation Day, Part One” where she walks into view wearing the almost virginal-looking pink dress, and the Mayor is telling her how proud he is of her as she tells about how she would dive off the high rock into the lake when all of the other little kids wouldn’t. It’s a horrifying scene, because you can see the brave, bright little girl she had been before fate and life’s miseries ground her down and she became a monster, willing to do the bidding of a fiend because he understands just how to manipulate her (and, in a sick way, clearly cared for her, as the storyline of the rest of the episode demonstrated).
2) The dance scene with Buffy in “Bad Girls.” Enough said.
3) The last scene of “Revelations,” where Buffy goes to see her in the aftermath of the Gwendolyn Post fiasco, and she rejects Buffy’s overtures of trust and friendship–with a moment’s hesitation as Buffy is leaving that indicates that on some level she desperately wants what Buffy is offering her. In retrospect, it’s clearly the first step in her downfall.
physics geek
“Hush” and “Becoming” have been in my top five list of Buffy episodes since they aired. Some very high quality television.
HH
“Beer Bad?” Ep bad.
Quirkygrl
I concur with most of your choices, although Passion is a work of art and I’d add that to my list.
Tony Alva
??????!!!!!!!
This Buffy facination must be a WV thing….
CaseyL
Ah, damn you all for reminding me how much I loved this show, and what an arid wasteland TV has been since BTVS and Angel ended.
It wasn’t just the heartrending plots, the (mostly) careful continuity and consistency of character. It was that those shows, Joss’ shows, were willing to take *risks*. Narrative, philosophical, cinematic, and/or just plain wacky *risks.* Musicals! 2 count’em 2 EvilWillows! *Foam Puppets*!
I’m going to go away now and sob into my keyboard, remembering a pair of TV shows that were about more than delivering a key demographic to advertisers.
Ted Barlow
My very favorite Buffy moment is one I’ve never seen; I’ve only read the script. It’s at the end of The Gift:
Giles: Can you move?
Ben: Need a … a minute. She could’ve killed me.
Giles: No she couldn’t. Never. And sooner or later Glory will re-emerge, and … make Buffy pay for that mercy. And the world with her. Buffy even knows that… (reaches into his pocket, takes out his glasses) and still she couldn’t take a human life.
Shot of Ben listening.
Giles: She’s a hero, you see. (Giles puts his glasses on) She’s not like us.
Ben: Us?
Giles suddenly reaches down and puts his hand over Ben’s nose and mouth, holding them shut. Ben struggles weakly as Giles keeps him still. Giles keeps his calm expression throughout.
CaseyL
oooh, I remember that one. It gave me chills. Every time Ripper peered out from Giles’ eyes – not damnear often enough, BTW – I got chills. God, I love Tony Head.
Wait. Which episode was it that Ethan turned Giles into a monster, who promptly almost gets wasted by Buffy? That one was hysterical.
M. Scott Eiland
“Wait. Which episode was it that Ethan turned Giles into a monster, who promptly almost gets wasted by Buffy?”
“A New Man,” in season four.