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Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Lovers Walk

Willow: "He's out of control. I mean, not that he was Joe Restraint in the old days."

This one was called "Lovers Walk" and they weren't kidding: everyone broke up. It was lucky that Giles wasn't dating anyone.

My favorite scenes were of Spike unburdening himself to first Willow, then Joyce; that whole scene with Joyce, Spike, Angel and Buffy in the kitchen was just priceless. Spike is such a great character. His weakness for Drusilla and his self-deprecating sense of humor are so wonderful, and his lines in this episode were absolutely outstanding.

And James Marsters' delivery was right on the mark, every time. I think Spike telling Joyce his problems over a cup of cocoa was just delightful. Maybe Spike needs a mom, too. And he's even insightful, too. Certainly, we all knew that Buffy and Angel were still in love and shouldn't be, but it took Spike to make them face it.

The cemetery scene completely faked me out. I never fall for stuff like that, but I really did think Cordelia was dead. Very well done.

I blame that whole double breakup on Xander. If he hadn't gone all dog in the manger on Willow, knowing full well that she had had a crush on him for years, it would have never happened. You can't blame poor Willow; she just isn't used to having to fend off guys. And poor Cordelia. She gave up a lot of herself to be with Xander and it was quite an awakening and a sacrifice for her, and he can't be faithful to her? Geez.


Willow has certainly gotten more assertive — standing up to Spike, casting a de-lusting spell on Xander — and that confidence had to be at least partially due to poor Oz.

Bits and pieces:

— Spike's return to Sunnydale (knocking down the sign) echoed his initial arrival in "School Hard."

— Willow did well in the SATs, no surprise. It was sort of an anomaly for Buffy to have high test scores when she's had so much trouble with keeping up, though.

— I absolutely loved Spike, Angel and Buffy all on the same side in a fight.


— Loved Oz' van. It was so Oz.

— This was the second time we saw the magic shop, and the second time the proprietor was killed.

— Xander wanted to be a fireman when he was in sixth grade.

— In this week's hair report, Spike's was a lot curlier. Looked good on him.

— Obligatory dog reference: Oz: "I don't think they make a werewolf PEZ. You might have to settle for a wacky cartoon dog."

Quotes: (and there were many)

Willow: "This is a nightmare. This is... my world is spinning."
Xander: "It's not that bad, Willow, really."
Willow: "740? Verbal? I'm pathetic. Illiterate. I'm Cletus, the slack-jawed yokel."
Xander: "That's right. And the fact that your 740 verbal closely resembles my combined scores in no way compromises your position as the village idiot."

Oz: "Well, I can see why you'd be upset. That was my sarcastic voice."
Xander: "You know, it sounds a lot like your regular voice."

Cordelia: "I don't know. I just thought we were gonna do something... you know, classy."
Xander: "What's classier than bowling?"
Cordelia: "Apart from everything, ever?"

Giles: "I suspect your mother will want to put it on the refrigerator."
Buffy: "Yeah. She saw these scores, and her head spun around and exploded."
Giles: (after a pause) "I've been on the Hellmouth too long. That was metaphorical, yes?"

Buffy: "Okay. Be kind, rewind."

Joyce: "That's not it. It's just you belong at a good old-fashioned college with keg parties and boys, not here with Hellmouths and vampires."
Buffy: "Not really seeing the distinction."


Spike: "She wouldn't even kill me. She just left. She didn't even care enough to cut off my head or set me on fire. I mean, is that too much to ask? You know? Some little sign that she cared? It was that truce with Buffy that did it. Dru said I'd gone soft. Wasn't demon enough for the likes of her. And I told her it didn't mean anything, I was thinking of her the whole time, but she didn't care. So, we got to Brazil, and she was... she was just different. I gave her everything. Beautiful jewels, beautiful dresses with beautiful girls in them, but nothing made her happy. And she would fliiirt. I caught her on a park bench, making out with a chaos demon. Have you ever seen a chaos demon? They're all slime and antlers. They're disgusting. She only did it to hurt me. So I said, 'I'm not putting up with this anymore.' And she said, 'Fine!' And I said, 'Yeah, I've got an unlife, you know.' And then she said... she said we could still be friends. God, I'm so unhappy!"
Willow: (tentatively pats his knee) "There, there."

Spike: "You're not friends. You'll never be friends. You'll be in love till it kills you both. You'll fight, and you'll shag, and you'll hate each other till it makes you quiver, but you'll never be friends. Love isn't brains, children, it's blood... blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love's bitch, but at least I'm man enough to admit it."

Spike: "I want Dru back, I've just got to be the man I was, the man she loved. I'm going to do what I should have done in the first place. I'll find her, wherever she is, tie her up, torture her until she likes me again. Love's a funny thing."

Four out of four stakes. What a fabulous episode,

Billie
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Billie Doux reviewed all of Buffy and Angel, so she knows the plural of apocalypse.

25 comments:

  1. Thank Gos it's over. I neve bought the Willow/Zander romance, anyway. It was too out of character of them to do it.

    And I don't get why Spike had to go to Buffy's for other reason besides having another great scene with Joyce.

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  2. Seriously, just one Spike episode all season? Who's bright idea was that? Good things this is the best episode of season three otherwise there'd be hell to pay.

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  3. That should be Whose not Who's. I am going to get some sleep now.

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  4. I LOVE the "funeral" moment, one of my all-time favourite Buffy moments, and that's saying something!

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  5. In my opinion, Spike's "You're not friends" speech is the best in the entire 'Buffy' universe. But then, he always got all the best lines...

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  6. There are so many things I love about this episode! Even Buffy and Angel's zillionth not-quite-break-up is more bearable when it's prompted by Spike. Spike's speech about love is fantastic. As is Willow comforting him 'there there!'

    It's a shame this came straight after Revelations in a way - I've noticed a lot of tie-in books are set in this weird nether-time right between the two episodes where all the fan-preferred couples - Oz/Willow, Buffy/Angel, Xander/Cordelia - are together and interacting happily. It's a shame we never really got to see that.

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  7. “The last time I looked in on you two, you were fighting to the death. Now you’re back making googly eyes at each other like nothing happened. Makes me want to heave. Oh yeah, you’re just friends. You’re not friends. You’ll never be friends. You’ll be in love ‘til it kills you both. You’ll fight and you’ll shag and you’ll hate each other until it makes you quiver, but you’ll never be friends. Love isn’t brains, children, it’s blood -- blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love’s bitch, but at least I’m man enough to admit it.”

    This episode falls into one of my top five of all time. It is a complete joy to watch from beginning to end, because, Spike! He is one of the great characters on television and I love the fact that a vampire with no soul is actually the most romantic and insightful of anyone we have met to date. His speech to Buffy and Angel is the greatest speech in this entire series. That last line I have quoted to countless of my friends. “You may be love’s bitch, but be [wo]man enough to admit it.”

    The final montage, with all the heartbreak, gets me every time. Xander and Willow have brought this on themselves, yet it’s still hard not to feel for everyone involved. Oz and Cordy, obviously, have just had their hearts broken. Xander and Willow need to face the fact that they could do such a nasty thing to people they care about. And, poor Buffy. Lots of pressure from Mom, choices she didn’t think she was ever going to have to make and now she has to say goodbye to the man she loves. That's a tough couple of days!

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  8. You know for a long time I thought that Season 2 was the best Buffy season (not that they weren't all great, put down those stakes), but re-watching some of season three I begin to realize that absolutely everything great about the show is here.

    The Spike quote that Chris uses is an absolutely perfect example of how great this show was at being entertaining, silly and profound all at once.

    Did I mention I am a romantic at heart.

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  9. Definitely a fantastic Spike episode, and I, too, love the speech that everyone's been quoting. So great.

    But I'm going with Gus on this one: my favorite part of it is that it finally brings an end to the horrible Xander and Willow business. I so hated that plot thread.

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  10. A really good episode, though I wouldn't have minded more Giles. So far, my favorite episodes are always the heartbreaking ones - is that wrong of me?

    The whole Willow/Xander/Cordelia/Oz mess felt off to me. It seemed like it came out of nowhere these last few episodes and the pacing was rushed. That is something I continue to find distracting on the show. Some of the storylines show a really satisfying build to the pay-off - mostly Buffy's. But it seems like the secondary character's arcs are hit and miss for me. But the dialogue, yeah that makes up for everything.

    Like everyone else, I loved Spike's love lecture to Buffy and Angel. That kind of writing is what I was hoping for from a Joss Whedon show - it makes it worth the slog through the first season.

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  11. Spike's love speech is indeed awesome, but my favorite part of the episode is the scene between him and Joyce (particularly once Angel shows up). It's so funny!

    One thing really bugs me about this episode, though. Buffy's been expelled from school (twice), she misses more classes than she attends, and, despite being smart, maintains a rather unimpressive GPA (given in "I Robot You Jane" as 2.8), but suddenly she can attend any college she wants because she did well on the SATs? I don't know what applying to college was like in the nineties, but by the time I graduated high school, that certainly wouldn't have cut it to get into a semi decent school. Even a less than decent school. I know it was probably just a storytelling shortcut, but it really pisses me off...

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  12. Maybe Willow cast a spell, totally off camera and unacknowledged, that made Buffy ace the SATs.

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  13. I agree with what's already been said, brilliant episode with some fantastic scenes with Spike. I love the way his arrival mimics is first appearance to the point where the car door opens but instead of badass music and confident Spike sparking a smoke, we get a drunk Spike falling out of the car with the music grinding to a halt.

    The conversation with Joyce is a particular gem, and one of my favourite Spike scenes (although I do have a lot of favourite Spike scenes).

    Feel so sorry for Oz and Cordy, it would be bad enough catching them cheating anyway, but they were so worried coming to rescue them. I also totally fell for the funeral scene first time around, very cute. Xander doesn't deserve a second chance with Cordelia, he instigated the whole thing.

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  14. I loved this episode for so many of the reasons that every one else already mentioned. As Jane said, it only needed a little more Glles and, I might add, some actual shots of Dru to make it perfect! I loved Spike every time he was on screen and found myself wondering which quotes Billie would pick. I'm so glad you went for all 3 of those speeches because they were all around great and wouldn't mean as much in little snippets. "Beautiful dresses with beautiful girls in them" and "I've got an unlife, you know" we're just hilarious. I loved seeing all three of them fighting together on the same side, too.

    I've made it pretty clear how I feel about Willow/Xander so I'm glad they are through but I hate all the pain and hurt left behind. The upcoming pain and hurt was what I hated about the fooling around to begin with and it was as horrible as I knew it would be. I know, they are teenagers, and this kind of stuff happens, but I love Oz and I love Oz and Willow together so I hope they can work things out...I mean he gives her little gifts and thinks about her often and can smell her scent...so much heart break....

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  15. What everyone else said. Just a fun, action-packed episode but with the added Buffy twist of heartbreak. Love, love, love Spike.
    Ps. Never be a magic shop owner in Sunnydale.

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  16. I can't top the comments that other people have made. Love, love, love this episode- in fact, it might have been the one that made me fall in love with Spike. I don't think that James Marsters has ever acted better than he did in this episode. I laughed and cried at the same time.

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  17. I am a little late to the party, so I will just say that as an avid Spike fan, I adore this episode. Spike can't be beat when it comes to finding a character who combines awesome humor with profound wisdom about human nature. I loved when Buffy admitted at the end that she was fooling everyone but herself and then she added "and Spike for some reason." Spike is like that. He sees what others don't. Just one of the many reasons I love his character.

    All that being said, Spike's terrifying side came out in his scenes with Willow. I really liked that, too.

    The fakeout scene really got me the first time around, too.

    The brief scene with the Mayor discussing Spike's chaos from the prior year was fun, too. I loved when the Mayor analyzed whether his metaphor was mixed or not.

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  18. I love the shopkeeper: “Sorry, we don’t carry leprosy.” This is a good episode, but it’s made better by the number of times it is alluded to later in the Buffyverse. I love those lynchpin moments that people return to.

    And I really love it when Spike gets insightful, as everyone has pointed out.

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  19. Newbie report:

    I think Spike falling out of the car is about the funniest thing I've ever seen. Well, second funniest. Dean trying to pull the sword out of the stone is still #1. But this one knocked Sam losing his shoe out of second place, and that is saying something.

    Eep! Limerick time for Cordelia! Whew. Fake out. Good thing, too. What rhymes with Cordelia?

    And everybody's sad at the end. Except for Spike who is energized. Is he going to drive all the way to Brazil?

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  20. I'm almost caught up on the rewatch :) I am a newbie like pucklady (although much less skilled at limericks). I watched a few scattered Buffy episodes when they were on the air but never had time to get into the show, since I worked evening shift.
    I really enjoyed this episode. Spike is always entertaining and I agree with all the quotes above. I think my favorite scene was in the kitchen with Buffy's mom and Spike, then Angel and Buffy. I really don't understand why Buffy invited Spike into her home though in the other episode --- totally unnecessary at the time it seemed to me. I was wondering if there might be repercussions later on.

    And, I think that Spike went to Buffy's house because she was his other major connection in the town. Kind of "coming home".

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  21. Another Buffy newbie! Welcome to the Rewatch -- you're almost caught up, Nonei. A couple of others have said they're trying to catch up, too. I was thinking that although momentum is great, we might want to pause for a week or two at some point soon.

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  22. A PAUSE? Oh no...

    Actually a break might be good but I would love it if we could at least get to the end of season 3 first...though since you know the series so well, you might know the best place to take a break.

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  23. Thanks for the welcome :)

    I'm not sure about a pause... but I was just thinking about the fall season creeping up on us the other day, and that the rewatch might be affected with everything else you guys do.

    Maybe just slowing down to once or twice a week would be the answer? I don't know.

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  24. What a fabulous episode. I know James Marsters is usually considered Buffy’s finest actor, but I think Alyson Hannigan is his equal. That scene they had together was amazing, and Aly completely sold Willow’s fear and desperation.

    I’m glad the Willow/Xander thing is over, but I must admit their affair made a little bit of more sense this episode. Not sure why, maybe the actors were really good on selling it. Poor Cordelia. And poor Oz (although for some reason, I don’t care much about Oz).

    As everyone has said, the Cordelia fake out was really well done. And that final shot of gleeful Spike (after all those shots of the heartbroken members of the cast) was a great ending to the show.

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