They’re not? I was wondering how they reconciled their vastly different characterizations. I guess that explains it, then, but it’s unfortunate. From what I know of both, After the Fall sounds like a more interesting story and more faithful continuation of the series it followed. I liked what they did with Wesley, anyway. Poor guy can’t ever win at anything.
I’m holding that the comics are canon up through Buffy
sleeping with another Slayer and the return of Dracula.
after that it’s garbage.
I take a literalist view with canon. I might not like what happened (and I don’t like what I was obliquely referencing in my previous post), but if the creator or owners to the rights say it’s so, and there is something produced to that effect, then so it is.
I haven’t read the most recent ones (I think I’m three behind in Buffy Season 8, and more than that in After the Fall (which isn’t called After the Fall anymore?), but Season 8 started off strong then…fizzled.
After the Fall was much better. It kept with the theme of Angel more so than Season 8 kept with the theme of Buffy. The artwork was terrible for most of it’s run, though.
Gotten any further, olives?
Huh, and here I always loved 4 as the best season.
I have to agree with silenus, though…even if your interest in it starts waning, you’ve got to see the Season six episode “Once More With Feeling” before you stop.
Although here’s hoping you don’t quit at all. I enjoyed the series from beginning to end (along with Angel), recently finishing them all myself.
And the following episode “Tabula Rasa.” I think that one is where they finally address the last of the clues laid out in Season 4’s finale “Restless.” Until the end of Season 7, that is.
Yes. I’m sorry I didn’t update sooner – I was on vacation for two weeks.
It is taking a bit longer now as we are watching both Buffy and Angel.
Buffy Season 4 is not blowing me away. So far there have only been a couple of good episodes - Fear Itself was fantastic. Prior to that, the episode with Spike (The Harsh Light of Day) was fantastic. The rest are pretty ‘‘meh.’’
The last episode we watched, Wild at Heart, I thought was well-done but Sr. Olives thought it was too melodramatic.
I was like :dubious: ‘‘As opposed to all the other episodes of Buffy?’’
I felt Oz and Willow sold the whole story with solid acting, so I didn’t mind so much. Very sad.
I personally love Angel, it has been working for me since the beginning. My husband says Angel is like Batman, so he refers to him as BatAngel. I think it’s more like watching a crime drama. Either way I appreciate the older/more mature feel of the show, and how they’ve fleshed out Cordelia’s character. I feel all the episodes so far have been pretty entertaining. We just finished ‘‘Rm w/a vu’’ which was great… I hope the poltergeist sticks around.
Right now Angel is kind of helping me deal with Season 4 of Buffy sucking.
We soldier on!
RE: Buffy
You’re at the exact nadir of the season - next episode lays the groundwork for the season’s main arc, and in 4 more you’ll get one of the best eps ever in a Whedon show.
I get exciting just thinking about it. It’s amazing how well the episode worked with that premise.
Logo is now a handful of episodes into season 7. It is much stronger than I remember it. I was particularly impressed with Same Time, Same Place.
olive, you’re in the transition stage; season 4 marks a huge turnover in the cast, with Angel, Cordelia, Faith, Wesley, and someone else gone while several new characters fill the roles they served. I rather prefer the second set of characters to the first, which is why I think I like season 6 more than many other fans.I like Tara better than Oz
I’ll take Spike over Angel any day
Love Anya to death, while I could take or leave CordeliaNote that Angel also experiences significant cast changes after the first season or two, but for the most part it’s just adding more and more characters, most of which are awesome.Though I was never a fan of Connor.
(Season 4 Buffy Spoilers and Season 1 Angel Spoilers to follow.)
Just finished Hush! At first was terribly confused because I got it mixed up with the discussion of Once More, With Feeling and thought it was going to be a musical episode. Hush! is most definitely not a musical episode.
It is the most creeptastic episode of Buffy I’ve ever seen. Jesus, those dudes were freaky. Yeah, I slept well that night. Loved the reveal between Riley and Buffy, loved that he triumphantly smashed the wrong object right before saving the day. My overall feelings about Riley are decidedly ‘‘meh,’’ but I feel like the quality of Season 4 has improved dramatically over the last few episodes so I’m not complaining. It was cute how they were speechless at the end of the episode.
We are curious to know, but afraid to actively look for fear of having something spoiled… was Oz leaving related to Seth Green doing other projects, or was it deliberately written into the show for plot development? We feel the show has gotten better since he left, which is no slight intended against Oz because he’s one of our favorite characters.
On the Angel side of things, we just finished I Will Remember You, Hero and Parting Gifts. All of these were pretty important episodes for the series I think.
I don’t know how you guys feel, but I Will Remember You just seems to underscore how doomed Buffy and Angel’s relationship really is. Especially since the Angel spin-off, you’re beginning to see that they occupy completely different universes, and the idea of them together is beginning to feel absurd. The push-pull is starting to feel old, I don’t even want them to get together. They don’t belong together. I see that now.
As far as Hero, [MAJOR SPOILER]… they killed DOYLE?! Are you freakin’ kidding me? He was a great character. Totally not expecting that. And kind of pissed about it, to tell you the truth.
Parting Gifts… I will be happy if I never see another episode involving eyeball extractors. shudder Anyway, it’s Wesley! And he made me laugh with his incompetence. But I don’t understand why they had to kill Doyle to bring in Wesley.
As we were falling asleep last night, I commented to **Sr. Olives **that Cordelia is the most 3-dimensional superficial character I’ve ever seen written into a show. I also love that despite being shallow, she possesses real intelligence (as in Hero when she tells the captain of the ship that only half of his debt is forgiven, despite the fact that Angel told her to forgive all their debt. This allows her bargaining power to keep the ship from leaving too soon. Clever girl!)
Holy crap that episode kills me. Heart-wrenching. I both love and hate Joss 
I don’t know for sure, but I think they killed off Doyle because the actor was having issues (he died not too long after of a heroin overdose, I believe). Sad, because I liked him and Doyle, but it does work in the long run plot-wise as you’ll see.
The actor playing Doyle had a major drug problem, which was getting in the way of his work (and eventually killed him a few years later). It’s too bad he had to go, but if he hadn’t, they probably wouldn’t have gotten Wesley - and as you’ll see, it was more than a fair trade.
I don’t think Oz was ever a main castmember, but rather a prolonged guest star. But a quick google revealed an answer from the man himself:
Before reading that quote I would have guessed he was written out purely for story reasons. You’ll understand why I would think that within the next half-dozen or so episodes.
EDIT: Here’s a link to that quote for those not worried about spoilers.
I remember from the commentaries to either the “Oz leaves” episode or a later episode Whedon saying that he’d been planning to write Oz out, but that his exit was rushed for non-story reasons.
Yes.
That’s very tragic.
I love that episode, and I think it’s a great story. It even made me cry, and I’m a guy. However, there’s something that doesn’t quite make sense to me upon second thought. Angel supposedly thought that he couldn’t just be a normal human being and be together with Buffy because, without his superpower, they would be vulnerable and it would put them in danger, or something like that. However, how was that any different from Buffy just dating some normal Joe in college? In fact, she was trying very hard to look for just such a normal relationship right around that time. Did Angel think that Buffy must never date a normal human being, ever? 
Angel knew that because of who he is/was, he will always be involved in the supernatural, people trying to kill him, and he always feels an obligation to fight evil. In theory, if Buffy was just dating some normal dude, that normal dude, while in danger because he was close to Buffy, wouldn’t be bringing in any of his own danger.