From: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org (stillpt-digest) To: stillpt-digest@smoe.org Subject: stillpt-digest V2 #15 Reply-To: stillpt@smoe.org Sender: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk stillpt-digest Thursday, January 20 2000 Volume 02 : Number 015 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: b/doomed [GHighPine@aol.com] Re: b/doomed [GHighPine@aol.com] Re: b/doomed [GHighPine@aol.com] Re: b/doomed [GHighPine@aol.com] other stuff (Bill Dana) [Kathleen Woodbury ] Re: b/doomed ["David S. Bratman" ] Re: b/doomed ["David S. Bratman" ] b/ Giles seemed strange? [GHighPine@aol.com] Re: b/doomed [GHighPine@aol.com] b/ speculative thoughts [GHighPine@aol.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 11:00:22 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: b/doomed In a message dated 1/18/00 10:41:04 PM Pacific Standard Time, dbratman@genie.idt.net writes: << Aha, the guess we made earlier -- that Sunnydale occupies the locale of Santa Barbara in the primary world -- is pretty well confirmed. >> I think that that is based on an actual statement by Joss. Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 11:00:21 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: b/doomed A content-packed episode with lots of surprises, lots to comment on when I have more time -- Donald, I sure hope you are going to do one of your detailed synopses, because my tape ran out halfway through and a lot of the details will fade from my mind. (And a phone call made me miss a chunk of show -- evidently, from David's comments, the conversation in which Riley tells Buffy to walk away -- but luckily that part is waiting for me on the tape.) I was wrong in my speculations about Riley's role -- pleasantly so, as his role is more complex than what I had expected. (If I am wrong in my predictions and speculations, I expect that Joss has to do something =better= than what I had guessed.) Like Faith, Riley is a skewed reflection of Buffy and her role in life. I'm getting it now -- Joss introduces characters who are Buffy's reflection in a funhouse mirror. But one prediction that turned out on-target (I'm =pretty= sure I posted it, but I haven't always had time to post stuff I think about) was that the Initiative folks don't believe in Slayers and would look down their noses at the medieval-folklore nonsense represented by the Watchers' traditions. Note the implications of that for future Initiative / Slayerette relations. Buffy's conviction that she can't have a romance with a fellow demon-hunter is interesting. A non-demon-hunter would seem to be in at least as much danger, but I think that emotionally she wants her romances to be an escape for her. Spike was a satisfying surprise, a great story complication, and the irony that he and and Riley will be fighting side by side -- yum. My predictions for next week weren't =exactly= on the money. From the previews, Buffy doesn't know that demon is Giles. Due to expected thematic foreshadowing from "Pangs," I had anticipated that she =did= know it was Giles and the spell affected Giles' =behavior=, not merely his appearance, so that she was forced to fight him reluctantly. But part of my speculation was a hit, at least. Lots more to comment on this ep (and ANGEL, which was excellent too -- ANGEL's really hitting its stride) when I have time -- Capricorn / Aquarius cusp puts Buffy's birthday in late January, like next week's ep should be her birthday ep? Feb sweeps coming. Some of the setup from last season has to start paying off by then; I can see the Giles arc setup possibly not =fully= paying off till next season, but I expect =something= to have happened in that dept by end of Feb. The Faith setup, OTOH, I can't see waiting that long. So, prediction: there will be another Faith dream during Feb sweeps, and it will happen in connection with a crisis that causes Buffy to question herself, and I still think it must involve her killing or causing the death of a human, per last season's setup -- with Riley in the opening credits (I didn't see that, I was busy teaching my dog to dance to the opening theme) he can't be the one to die, so the best candidate seems Prof Walsh. And I'm speculating that Forrest and Riley's other friend will be hunting Buffy before the end of sweeps, and Riley will be caught in the middle -- will they regard Riley as a traitor? That could go various ways. What number ep are we on? How many to go? If anybody can get a list of ep titles and guest appearances -- actor guest appearances are good clues, like if we see Eliza Dushku's name or that of the actress who played Willow's "love interest," that would tell us something. Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 11:14:18 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: b/doomed In a message dated 1/18/00 10:41:04 PM Pacific Standard Time, dbratman@genie.idt.net writes: << I'm on Buffy's side on this one: I think she's correct about the nature of the world and Riley is wrong. (This is a philosophical point transcending Slayerhood and vampires.) >> Elaborate? Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 11:36:00 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: b/doomed In a message dated 1/18/00 8:36:40 PM Pacific Standard Time, dgk@panix.com writes: << And that this was the first 3-byline =Buffy=--all staff writers? Didn't have the feel of a patch job, however.) >> Undoubtedly plotted by Joss, with the actual script coming out of active collaborative conversation among the three. "I think he'd say this!" "Yeah, and then she'd react like this!" Point of information: in screenwriting credits, "&" and "and" are not synonyms. "Written by John Doe & Jane Roe" means that John and Jane collaborated; "written by John Doe and Jane Roe" means that Jane rewrote John's script (and on a big screen movie, chances are that John and Jane never even met, let alone actually discussed their respective intentions and interpretations). Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 08:52:34 -0700 From: Kathleen Woodbury Subject: other stuff (Bill Dana) At 04:50 AM 1/19/00 -0500, David S. Bratman wrote: >That was a guy named Bill Dana.... [snip] Oh. That's right! I remember the name now. Thanks. I guess I've only seen Andy Kaufman when he was on TAXI (which I hardly ever saw), then. >Glad to see you made it over here, Phaedre. Thank you. Glad I made it. (And thanks for the other welcomes.) sign me "I taped last night's episodes and haven't seen them yet, so I'll read ya'll's comments on them later" Phaedre/Kathleen workshop@burgoyne.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 17:02:42 -0500 (EST) From: "David S. Bratman" Subject: Re: b/doomed On Wed, 19 Jan 2000 GHighPine@aol.com wrote: > In a message dated 1/18/00 10:41:04 PM Pacific Standard Time, > dbratman@genie.idt.net writes: > > << Aha, the guess we > made earlier -- that Sunnydale occupies the locale of Santa Barbara in > the primary world -- is pretty well confirmed. >> > > I think that that is based on an actual statement by Joss. Regardless, I think the identity of the map is _very interesting_. I have to say, though, that downtown Sunnydale doesn't look very much like Santa Barbara, which is a broad, big, open SoCal town a bit like a less snobby Beverly Hills; whereas downtown Sunnydale as we've seen it is, even given that this is usually at night, more gloomy, narrower, funkier, more like a NorCal town: among college towns, Davis or Arcata. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 17:10:00 -0500 (EST) From: "David S. Bratman" Subject: Re: b/doomed On Wed, 19 Jan 2000 GHighPine@aol.com wrote: > In a message dated 1/18/00 10:41:04 PM Pacific Standard Time, > dbratman@genie.idt.net writes: > > << I'm on Buffy's side on this one: I think she's correct about > the nature of the world and Riley is wrong. (This is a philosophical > point transcending Slayerhood and vampires.) >> > > Elaborate? Just that Riley is one of those incurable optimists who have generalized the psychological truism that one's mental state can affect one's relation to the outside world into the common falsehood that it's the only thing that does. If Buffy is closed off from "human experience", it's through bad experiences. Even her statement that Slayers rarely live to be over 25 is dismissed by Riley as a negative attitude, where it is simply (as far as she and we know) a historical fact. However, Buffy is less interested in arguing Riley's attitudes than in showing that he knows nothing about Slayers. His remark is probably more because he doesn't really believe in Slayers than because he thinks they all died young because of a lack of an unbeat attitude. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 21:51:21 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: b/ Giles seemed strange? BTW, anyone else think that Giles sounded odd? I thought the actor might be sick. He seemed to be sleepwalking through his lines, not really mentally into the character. Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 21:51:23 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: b/doomed In a message dated 1/19/00 2:06:19 PM Pacific Standard Time, dbratman@genie.idt.net writes: << Regardless, I think the identity of the map is _very interesting_. I have to say, though, that downtown Sunnydale doesn't look very much like Santa Barbara, which is a broad, big, open SoCal town a bit like a less snobby Beverly Hills; whereas downtown Sunnydale as we've seen it is, even given that this is usually at night, more gloomy, narrower, funkier, more like a NorCal town: among college towns, Davis or Arcata. >> I agree: I have been to Santa Barbara several times and it is really beautiful, as well as strikingly unified architecturally. Anybody know where the downtown Sunnydale scenes are actually filmed? (Sunnydale High is Torrance HS, IIRC; I've wondered if the downtown scenes are from the same town.) Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jan 2000 21:51:20 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: b/ speculative thoughts Some new speculations just popped into my head: I've been looking for ways that the Faith theme set up last season (killing humans and consequences of that) might play out, and I am still convinced that "Pangs" is thematic foreshadowing, since it fits so well with the Faith thematic setup. Another speculation about how this could play out has occurred to me. Spike is becoming more of a "person" to the Slayerettes. There are any number of different ways in which this could contribute a subplot supporting the main theme. There is a rich field of plot possibilities around the likelihood that the Slayerettes will probably be reluctant either to kill Spike or to turn him over to the Initiative. In fact, ponder the implications of the fact that Buffy =could= turn Spike over to Riley, or blow Spike's cover, but she doesn't. Even though she knows that their intention probably is not to kill Spike, and she knows that the Initiative is responsible for turning Spike into a harmless cuddly bunny. Logically, she should be grateful to the Initiative, right? Yet, at this point in time, she is already siding with Spike against the Initiative -- in fact, whether she is conscious of it or not, as little as she trusts Spike, she obviously trusts Spike more than she does the Initiative. Speaking of the Initiative, during last week's rerun I was struck by the informative content of Walsh's line, "Everything we've worked for could end tonight." Makes it clear that they have some specific goal in mind and what they have already done with the vampires is no more than a means to an end. It also reinforces the impression that they have not been around very long. I love the fact that BUFFY gives my brain something to chew on, and the fact that trying to perceive the subtle workings of Joss's mind is such a superlative challenge. It'd be funner if other people would add their own speculations, or at least agree or disagree with (or rate the likelihood of) my speculations -- especially given that the Season 4 arc has now gone into high gear. Gayle ------------------------------ End of stillpt-digest V2 #15 ****************************