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Okay, so now we're finishing watching the Buffy Season 2 DVDs we got for Christmas. Apart from the special features, I suppose. We did try watching a few episodes with commentary, but it's not high on our list of priorities. (Spoilers follow, I suppose, for the first two seasons of Buffy...)
Good stuff, overall, I'd say. I liked the Xander & Cordelia romance, Angel's switching sides was a nice twist, and Spike and Drusilla were much more interesting than the Master and the Anointed One.
I did, in many ways, like the more plot-oriented ones over the "creature feature" ones. I liked to see the plotlines involving Spike and Angel, rather than ones like "Bad Eggs" and "Go Fish" with their one-off creatures. Indications are that I might thus like later seasons, when there are more established characters to play off of. Though I did like Ethan, and Giles's dark past; the "Halloween" episode was one of the strongest, perhaps especially because of the focus on the supporting cast.
We didn't get to watch 'Bad Eggs' on DVD, though, because we couldn't play it. The opening sequence, just before it brings up the menu that would allow you actually play the episode, had a glitch in it that our DVD player couldn't play. Sort of like my floor-model CD player, our cheapo DVD player is a little bit oversensitive. But we managed to catch it on "Space".
The season end was pretty harrowing. Buffy has been stripped of pretty much everything--thrown out of the house by her mother, expelled by the despicable Principal Snyder, and then sacrificed Angel to save the world from getting sucked into Hell. Kendra was dealt with a little shabbily, but then she wasn't the greatest character ever.
Hopefully things will improve next season. We've been debating it, and given that the Space channel weekdaily Buffy reruns are starting Season 3 on Monday, we're going to try it. Since we don't think Simon's ready to watch it yet, this will mean taping it every day, and watching it...sometime. Hopefully within a week, so we don't have too much of a backlog. We will still have to deal with new "24" and "West Wing" episodes(whenever they start playing them again), but if we can keep up with the reruns, we should be through the series before fall programming starts. My wife is skeptical, but I think it's worth a try.
It will be grueling, though. I'm still working on my NaNoWriYe first session, 50,000 words by the end of March. I've still got over a thousand words a day to go, which is far short of what I had to do in NaNoWriMo, but still non-negligible. Then I have a two-month break before I start another three-month 50,000 word session in June. I keep telling myself I should dig out one of my first drafts and do editing during that time, or keep going at a lower rate on the novel I will by no means be finished by the end of March, but I may just take a complete break. I have been chafing at the demands on my time.
And then there's "Angel". I don't think we'll tackle that at the same time as Buffy, so hopefully any crossovers won't be too confusing/spoilerific. I presume that he does get snatched back from Hell at some point. I think that he was a more interesting character as the villain, though. If the "curse" he's under now to restore his soul is the same as last time, then of course he and Buffy won't be able to consummate their relationship again, which may be what leads to the breakup I know is coming. But I guess I'll find out.
The last time we tried to catch up on a series at five episodes a week was "Babylon 5". Actually, that was when Space Channel was playing the first four season reruns on weekdays, and then new episodes from the fifth season on Saturdays. So that got a little interesting...when all we had seen was the second half of the fourth season. But at that time we had no kids, and I think I was unemployed for part of it, too. Are we up to the challenge again?
If so, we probably won't be renting any movies until we're finished...
Good stuff, overall, I'd say. I liked the Xander & Cordelia romance, Angel's switching sides was a nice twist, and Spike and Drusilla were much more interesting than the Master and the Anointed One.
I did, in many ways, like the more plot-oriented ones over the "creature feature" ones. I liked to see the plotlines involving Spike and Angel, rather than ones like "Bad Eggs" and "Go Fish" with their one-off creatures. Indications are that I might thus like later seasons, when there are more established characters to play off of. Though I did like Ethan, and Giles's dark past; the "Halloween" episode was one of the strongest, perhaps especially because of the focus on the supporting cast.
We didn't get to watch 'Bad Eggs' on DVD, though, because we couldn't play it. The opening sequence, just before it brings up the menu that would allow you actually play the episode, had a glitch in it that our DVD player couldn't play. Sort of like my floor-model CD player, our cheapo DVD player is a little bit oversensitive. But we managed to catch it on "Space".
The season end was pretty harrowing. Buffy has been stripped of pretty much everything--thrown out of the house by her mother, expelled by the despicable Principal Snyder, and then sacrificed Angel to save the world from getting sucked into Hell. Kendra was dealt with a little shabbily, but then she wasn't the greatest character ever.
Hopefully things will improve next season. We've been debating it, and given that the Space channel weekdaily Buffy reruns are starting Season 3 on Monday, we're going to try it. Since we don't think Simon's ready to watch it yet, this will mean taping it every day, and watching it...sometime. Hopefully within a week, so we don't have too much of a backlog. We will still have to deal with new "24" and "West Wing" episodes(whenever they start playing them again), but if we can keep up with the reruns, we should be through the series before fall programming starts. My wife is skeptical, but I think it's worth a try.
It will be grueling, though. I'm still working on my NaNoWriYe first session, 50,000 words by the end of March. I've still got over a thousand words a day to go, which is far short of what I had to do in NaNoWriMo, but still non-negligible. Then I have a two-month break before I start another three-month 50,000 word session in June. I keep telling myself I should dig out one of my first drafts and do editing during that time, or keep going at a lower rate on the novel I will by no means be finished by the end of March, but I may just take a complete break. I have been chafing at the demands on my time.
And then there's "Angel". I don't think we'll tackle that at the same time as Buffy, so hopefully any crossovers won't be too confusing/spoilerific. I presume that he does get snatched back from Hell at some point. I think that he was a more interesting character as the villain, though. If the "curse" he's under now to restore his soul is the same as last time, then of course he and Buffy won't be able to consummate their relationship again, which may be what leads to the breakup I know is coming. But I guess I'll find out.
The last time we tried to catch up on a series at five episodes a week was "Babylon 5". Actually, that was when Space Channel was playing the first four season reruns on weekdays, and then new episodes from the fifth season on Saturdays. So that got a little interesting...when all we had seen was the second half of the fourth season. But at that time we had no kids, and I think I was unemployed for part of it, too. Are we up to the challenge again?
If so, we probably won't be renting any movies until we're finished...
