Episode Report Card 12 USERS: B+ YOU GRADE IT Welcome To The Hellmouth (1)
By Sep | Season 1 | Episode 1 | Aired on 03.09.1997
Willow and the vamp from the Bronze walk through a dark park. Willow chatters on to the silent vamp, but when she tries to tell him he's taking the wrong way to the ice-cream parlor, he grabs her hand, saying he knows a shortcut. They enter a cemetery. Back outside the Bronze, Buffy is still searching for Willow. It's good to see she's improved in her Slayer skills since those days, don't you think? Entire episodes full of "Buffy incompetently looks for her new friend for a long time" would have gotten a little dull. As she looks for Willow, Buffy runs into Xander, who is looking awfully Parker/Ethan-like with his floppy hair and ungroomed brows. Xander's excited to hear that Willow left with a guy until Buffy expresses a desperate need to find her. He then sarcastically hopes Willow didn't leave with a vampire and that Buffy won't have to do any slaying. Buffy is shocked that Xander knows her secret identity and wonders if there was an announcement in the newspaper. Xander doesn't really believe what he's heard about Buffy's supernatural calling, but does realize she's serious about finding Willow.
Willow is still trailing the cross-eyed vamp through the cemetery, babbling about how scary it is. The vamp teasingly asks if she's ever been in a mausoleum, and when she declines, he grabs her and shoves her inside. As Willow panics, the vamp teases her a little, and when she tries to run, she encounters Darla in the doorway. Darla sneers at the vamp's choice, saying that Willow is "hardly a mouthful" and then calls in her own prey, Jesse, who holding his neck and wobbling. That boy's so skinny, I doubt he'd be much more of a meal than Willow. Jesse falls into Willow's arms, and Willow demands that Darla and the cross-eyed vamp let them go. Darla morphs into her game face, and at that moment Buffy and Xander enter the mausoleum. Finally, Buffy! Buffy throws around a few wisecracks about the interior design of the crypt and tells the cross-eyed vamp to "live in the now," a favorite quote of our very own Sports Night recapper, Daniel. The vampires don't know Buffy's identity, and the cross-eyed one moves in to attack her.
She quickly stakes him, which seems to surprise Darla. Buffy tells Xander to get the others to safety, and then Buffy and Darla begin to fight. Outside, Xander, Willow, and Jesse flee though the cemetery. Buffy cracks wise to Darla about how she just wanted a quiet life, and when she's about to tell Darla she's the Slayer, Luke comes from behind and grabs her by the neck. He throws Buffy across the crypt and then bitches Darla out for not bringing the Master his snackies. Luke tells Darla to leave and seems pretty assured that he can take care of Buffy himself.