...Lots Of Screaming Optional

S02E02

The camera pans up a headstone to reveal Buffy sitting atop it. She bitches at the resident of the new grave to rise already as she absently, but fairly proficiently, plays with a yo-yo. How retro. I can't imagine Buffy ever having had the patience to learn how to use one, but whatever. Anyway, Buffy's startled by our resident stalker (and that's original version, not the redux of later seasons). She chews him out for scaring her, and I'm sure the fact that they have him made up to look as pale as death (heh) isn't helping matters. She says that he should make noise when approaching someone in a graveyard. "You stomp, or yodel." Maybe you should make up your mind here, honey. I've heard Angel sing. We're talking Something Wicked This Way Comes scary. Rosemary's Baby scary. Anna Nicole Smith with no make-up scary. On the other hand, I've also seen him dance, and that was one of the funniest things ever on television. And speaking of something that's both funny and scary, I've gotten through about ten seconds of the episode so far.

Anyway, Buffy complains that the vamp hasn't risen yet, but Angel says it's a little disorienting when you first awaken as a vampire. Disorientation that apparently lasts for hundreds of years in certain cases. Well, it's one explanation for the dopey looks he favors. He clumsily segues into asking her if she's there alone, saying he thought "Xander...or someone" might be there. I think Rayanne Graff was subtler than this guy. Buffy immediately picks up on the subtext, and asks if Angel's jealous. Angel gives the non-answer that Xander is just a kid. Buffy doesn't even acknowledge that, and asks if he's jealous because of the dance she and Xander shared. Angel snarks that it was more like they "mated." That's obviously a lie, since I've recapped that episode and my eyes are still intact. Buffy retorts that it was just one dance, which she only did to make Angel jealous, and notes that she was obviously successful. Angel sticks his fingers in his ears and yells, "LA LA LA! I can't hear you!" Buffy asks if vampires don't get jealous. Angel cracks me up by gritting out, "See! Whenever we fight you always bring up the vampire thing!" His delivery makes it sound like him being a vampire and her being human is just a philosophical difference between them.

By Couch Baron

Speaking of vampires, the vamp that Buffy was awaiting has now risen and is coming at them. Buffy tells Angel that she didn't come to fight, but the vampire knocks her and Angel down, and she revises that sentiment. She kicks the vamp to the ground, then looks for her stake, which she managed to drop. While she does, the vamp picks up a handy shovel and clocks Angel in the face with it. Hee. Champion, my ass. After a bit of shovel-fu, Buffy manages to get the weapon away and stake him with it. Even the metal part of the shovel vaporizes. Huh? I wish they'd be remotely consistent about that -- we've seen vamps combust right to people who have suffered nary a burn. Buffy, however, doesn't pay this any mind as she continues the spat, asking if Angel considers her a kid too. Faced with a question that makes sense, Angel does the mature, champion-like thing: he walks away. Buffy starts after him with this missive: "This is an obvious lead-up for a cheap sight gag!" Oh, sorry, that was just my notes. She actually melodramas something about it taking more than that to get rid of her. Anyway, she falls into an open grave. Angel comes back and asks her if she's okay, which she grumpily affirms. He muses that another vampire has risen tonight. Well, except for the fact that the dirt has been neatly excavated from the plot. We've seen numerous vampires rise on this show, and they've all simply pushed their way up out of the ground. A fact that Angel might be aware of, considering he's a vampire himself. Also, he got bashed in the face with the very shovel that was used to unearth the plot. Dolt. Not the Dolt, of course. Buffy, poking her head out of the grave, calls his attention to some tracks, and says that whoever was in this grave was dragged away. Dun dun dun! Or, yawn. I raise my head wearily from my keyboard to rasp, "Scene!" Credits.

Buffy and Xander enter the library to find Giles sitting in a chair, his back to them. As they walk in, it becomes apparent that he's rehearsing a speech with which to ask Miss Calendar out on a date. While the sentiment is cute, I hate to see the writers reverting to the Season One habit of using Giles for cheap comic relief. And the fact that he's doing such a bad job with the rehearsal that he feels the need to impotently call himself an idiot makes it worse. Buffy snarks about his relationship with the chair, then tells Giles to leave off the "idiot" part, as most people don't like being called that. Xander: "It actually kinda turns me on." Buffy: "I fear you." Hee. And Xander, nice try at getting me to stop calling you an idiot. She gives Giles advice on how to dumb down his pitch, to which he snarks, "Well thank you, Cyrano." Heh. She goes on that she's not finished, and that the hook is to ask her how she feels about Mexican. Uh, they're in a small town in California. I'd think anyone who doesn't like Mexican food might have some serious problems getting by. Anyway, Buffy and Xander tag-team poor Giles until he wisely decides to change the subject by asking Buffy about the night's patrol. She relates what happened, and Giles thinks the grave robbing is interesting. Buffy: "I know you meant to say 'gross and disturbing.'" Giles: "Yes, yes yes of course. Terrible thing. Must put a stop to it...dammit." As Sep can attest, that's the standard response to any customer service-oriented complaint in the U.K. Luckily, my boyfriend is an expert at making customer service reps cry. Xander wonders why anyone would take a corpse. Giles says it might help to know who the corpse was, but Buffy has that info: Meredith Todd, who was her age. Xander draws a blank. I know she didn't go to Sunnydale High, but as we soon learn that Meredith was a cheerleader, I'm still surprised he doesn't know her name, as I'd think if anyone would be familiar with every cheerleader in a ten-mile radius, it would be Xander. Not to say they would be familiar with him, except in a "there's that dorky stalker again" way. Giles, looking distastefully at the computer (and I know the feeling, because mine's being a serious diva right now) suggests that Willow could "fire this thing up" and get some information on Meredith.

Cut to a full-screen shot of a sign advertising the sign-up desk for the science fair. I'm not blind, camera people. Of course, I haven't seen what Cordelia's wearing yet, so let's just see how things play out. The camera pans across a hopelessly stereotypical science geek-type to rest on Willow, who's marking something down on a clipboard. Some kid who looks vaguely like the dead-badger hair (tm Sars) kid from "Nightmares," except a few years older and with awful chin pubes and a pink Hawaiian shirt, comes up to her and snaps a picture. He then checks out some girl: "Look at those legs." Willow: "No, thank you." Irony snickers and makes me shotgun a beer. Not that I needed much convincing, the way this episode is going so far. Eric snaps some photos of some random girl. A dude with dark red hair tells dead-badger kid, who's called Eric, to chill. I can already tell that no amount of Valium is going to make that happen. Eric stops clicking, possibly realizing that only photos of women featured in the opening credits are going to be of use in this episode. Willow greets dark red-haired kid, whose name is Chris. He's vaguely cute and vaguely simian-looking at the same time. Interesting. Willow banters a bit with him about how she always comes in second to him in the science fair. He's got quite a build for someone who's supposed to be a science geek. I know his brother's a football player and all, but still. He also pronounces "experiment" ex-PEER-a-ment, which is annoying. Chris advises Willow that if the teacher doesn't understand the ex-PEER-a-ment, he gives it higher marks. I think I've tried that. The results were less than successful, probably because I didn't understand it either.

Cordy appears on the scene, signs up, and bitches that participation in the fair is now mandatory. "I don't think anyone should have to do anything educational in school if they don't want to." No, dear, you're thinking of college. Willow peers at her topic. "The tomato: fruit or vegetable?" Cordy: "I wanted to do something I could finish in a weekend, all right?" Hee. Eric takes her picture, but she bitches at him for doing so under fluorescent lights. He assures her that it's for his "private collection." While the sentiment is "ew"-worthy, I kind of like this kid. He's got way more personality than most one-offs, and since deranged sociopaths don't even merit an eyebrow-raise on this show, I'm not going to hold that against him. Buffy approaches, and Eric takes her picture as well. Buffy tells Willow that the "Bat signal" has appeared. Nice idea to keep your secret identity intact by referencing an actual superhero, Buffy. Maybe you and Helena should hang out. Buffy and Willow walk off. Cordy looks at Eric, and he raises his eyebrows lasciviously at her. Hee. Disgusted, she walks off. Eric smarms to Chris that Cordy is perfect for them. Chris tells him not to be stupid, as she's alive. Sinister plot development, or biting commentary on how these two couldn't attract a girl who's breathing? To quote that random island woman in Trading Places, can't we have both?

Library. Willow, on the computer, says that she's probably the only girl in school who has the coroner's office on her "favorites" list. I wouldn't be surprised to learn she's mistaken. Cordy breezes in, snarkily apologizing for interrupting their "undead play group," and says she needs to ask Willow for help with her science project. Willow: "It's a fruit." Heh. And really, what more needs to be said? Cordy goes on that she would have asked Chris, but that would have brought back too many memories of "Daryl," her voice breaking at the end of the sentence. Everyone ignores her as Willow finds an article about Meredith Todd's death, saying that she and two other cheerleaders were killed in a car accident the week before. Cordelia, to no one: "Of course, I have learned to deal with my pain." Willow goes on that the girls' necks were broken, so they couldn't be vampires. Cordy, having taken a surprisingly long time to realize that no one's paying her any mind, whinges, "Hello! Can we deal with my pain, please?" Giles, having just come out of his office, pats her on the shoulder, says, "There, there," and walks off. Ha! Willow exposits a little more, and Buffy announces that this confirms that Meredith wasn't killed by a vampire, like, thank you very much, we know the process for siring someone. Of course, it wouldn't hurt the writers to brush up on it every now and again. The Scoobs wonder who would have wanted the body. Giles suggests that it could be a voodoo practitioner trying to make a zombie (not the drink, although that's a lovely idea), and that for ritualistic purposes he would need to make more than one. Buffy suggests investigating whether the corpses of the other two accident victims are missing. I'd like to take this opportunity to point out a teeny tiny flaw in this plot. So they start looking for other missing corpses because they think it's a voodoo person. Fine. Except, as we soon learn, it's not -- it's just two geeky boys. So why the need for the multiple bodies? I understand about the head, but it's never explained why they couldn't have taken one girl's body and grafted a head onto it. Perhaps we're to infer that the girls were so smashed up that it took three of them to get enough working parts. Great. Not only did I gross myself out with that fanwank, but I also ruined the joke I was going to tell. I really need to stop hanging out on the boards. And to top things off, I'm only ten minutes into the episode. Okay. Settle down. Attune.

By Couch Baron

Parking lot. Cordy, in uniform, soberly tells a couple other cheerleaders that unless they practice a lot by the day, "no one's gonna be led by our cheers." No one's going to be led by the passive voice, either. It's just not very peppy. "The game is going to be won by the Razorbacks!" See what I mean? The other girls take off, and Cordy starts to walk to her car when she hears a noise. A scary noise, if the music is any indication. She looks around dumbly for a minute, but then, perhaps influenced by her recent introduction to the occult world of Sunnydale, runs to her car. Unfortunately, the rules of TV contractually obligate her to fumble with her keys, and then drop them under her car. She lies on the ground to reach for them, but sees a pair of feet in black men's shoes walking toward her. She leaves the keys (good girl!) and runs. The shoes follow her. Funny -- I've never seen shoes have to chase after her before. We see the shadow of the shoes-wearer pass by a dumpster, out of which Cordy's head soon emerges. It's still attached to Cordy. I'm only clarifying that because of what's to come. She looks to the side, and when she looks back, Angel is there. She gasps, but is relieved to see him, and asks why he was following her. He says that he wasn't sure it was she, like, what the hell kind of answer is that, creepy stalker? He goes on that he's looking for Buffy, which is Cordy's cue to tell him she's at the graveyard, which is Angel's face's cue to go mopey, as Buffy told him she'd be home. So who's more dysfunctional -- Buffy, for not just telling Angel she wanted a night off from him, or Angel, for not believing her and skulking around the high school? Given the difference in their ages, my money's on Beetle Browley here. Cordy goes on that he's in luck, as her night's free (and I hear a groan from the Angel forums), and starts to get out of the dumpster, but realizes she's caught on something. She tugs, and comes up with a very fake-looking severed hand. They did at least remember to put nail polish on it, though. Cordy screams us Drew Barrymore-style into the commercial break.

Library. Xander exposits that both graves were empty. The four of them walk through the doors, and see Cordy clinging to Angel's arm. Angel says that he thought Buffy would be home. He and Xander hilariously greet each other. Buffy starts to hem and haw, but Angel says Cordy told him the truth. Xander laughs and says that's a first, although he's probably also laughing at the tension between Buffy and Angel. Giles defuses the situation by suggesting that Angel can help them, as long as he's there. Buffy comes clean about the investigation, and Angel adds his and Cordy's findings. Cordy: "It was horrible. Angel saved me from an arm." Instead of tee-heeing, as I did, Buffy looks chagrined. Cordy goes on, "Why are these terrible things always happening to me?" Xander coughs into his hand, "Karma!" Hee. Giles observes that whatever theories they had concerning the grave robbing are out the window. Buffy practically yells that she doesn't understand why someone would do this, like, dial it back a notch or fifty, dear. Angel says that what he saw in the dumpster didn't add up to three whole girls, and he'd know, wouldn't he. He speculates that whoever did it kept some parts. Giles wonders why the body parts would have ended up at the school, as it's miles from the cemetery, but Buffy ventures the idea that whoever's responsible might be an SHS student. Angel says that the culprit took apart the bodies with surgical precision. Angel, unless you're moonlighting (heh) on CSI, there's no need to look that closely. Giles thinks that rules out a student, but Willow says that a few kids in the science club have the requisite knowledge of human physiology, including -- surprise surprise -- her. Xander cutely tells her not to do it again. Everyone just stares. Something's wrong when I'm laughing at Xander's jokes and nobody else is. Buffy suggests that Willow get the science geeks' locker numbers, but Cordy whines that she has to go home. Xander: "You have to go? Aww, too bad. Keep in touch. Buh-bye." Ha! Even Buffy couldn't contain a smile at that one. Cordy says that she doesn't want to go alone, and asks Angel to escort her. He and Buffy exchange a horrified look, but Cordy hustles him out the door. Xander can't resist twisting the knife: "I always pegged him as a one-woman vampire." Xander, our new love is fragile. Don't push it.

By Couch Baron

School lab. Willow is trying to figure out if it's possible to reanimate dead tissue. Sounds like me on a Saturday morning. Xander, meanwhile, is holding up a model of a human head, saying things like, "For the love of God, can somebody scratch my nose?" Okay, heh. But our love is still of the past, Xander. Buffy comes in and informs them that Chris and Eric didn't come to school. Willow speculates that their project might be done. Giles comes in and says they can't be finished, as the coroner's office reported that all three girls' heads turned up. However, from what he can put together (thank you! Thank you very much!), the head is all they're missing. Ominous music plays as we zero in on the model head. If that anvil was for the slower members of the audience, the fact that it was a brain was a little ironic, don't you think?

Chris's basement. Eric is telling Chris that they have to move quickly and attach a head, or the parts they have will atrophy irreparably. He implies that their only option is to retrieve a head from a living person. "It's just one lousy girl." Looking at that hair, I'll bet he's got experience with being "lousy." Chris says he can't kill anyone. Turning to a heretofore unseen and unacknowledged person, he asks for understanding. A shadowy figure lumbers forth, saying that Chris promised he wouldn't be alone. He calls him "little brother" for clarification. Daryl steps into the light, and we see that his face has tire-track sutures all over it. He's also wearing a football jersey. Chris: "I love my dead gay son!" Well, it applies, except for the "gay" and "son" parts." And I suppose "dead" doesn't really tell the whole story either. So you don't think it's enough that he played football?

Eric tells Daryl that the body is perfect. Daryl begs Chris to go through with it, saying he needs some companionship. He's got sutures all over his arms, too. Is that really necessary? And I generally hate tragic-figure stories, so the rest of this episode may be an uphill climb. Chris suggests maybe Daryl could go out in public, but Daryl nixes that idea, although no one would give him any weird looks in Willy's bar. Daryl tells Chris that he was always the smart one. The Tinkly Piano Of Reanimated Brothers And The Science Geeks Who Love Them plays. They've got a tinkly piano for every situation, don't they? Daryl recites this to Chris: "Third and long. Seconds to go. Where do you throw? Where do you throw?" Chris echoes, "Number five. Daryl's gonna drive." I don't know whether to say "aw" or "ew." Maybe I could settle for "aew"? On the plus side, it looks like Daryl could make a living writing tree mail clues for Survivor. That rhyme was better than anything those hacks have ever come up with. Chris finally assents, and Daryl hugs him. He then asks Eric to show him the pictures. Daryl picks Cordelia, and Eric smarms that he's "a man of taste." Eric cuts up the photo and starts singing again. As he hits the high note on "My Girl," he snips off Cordy's head. Hee.

By Couch Baron

School. Giles tells Buffy that he can't condone the search. Buffy says his butt's covered (what a shame) and asks him if he wants to do a locker. He of course assents. Thanks for the "comic" "relief." Willow only finds back copies of Scientific American in one locker, and squeals that she hasn't read that issue. Giles similarly finds nothing interesting, but Xander finds some incriminating stuff in Chris's locker, including the article about the death of the three girls. They wonder what he's up to, but Buffy swings open Eric's locker to reveal a picture of a girl which is composed of clippings of pictures of several different girls. Gross.

A lab, somewhere. A sheet lies draped over a "body" that's clearly missing the head. Eric walks into the frame, singing "My Girl." Hee. He asks how his "baby" is, but Chris snaps that she's not his. Eric says they have to finish her soon, and Chris says he's working on it. Eric: "So am I." He hangs up photographs of Buffy, Willow, and Cordelia as ominous music plays.

School, outdoor balcony. Buffy joins Xander and Willow, and says she doesn't understand why anyone would make a girl. Honey, have you seen what people will pay for on the internet? Xander: "The things we do for love." Who in the what now? Buffy, rightly from what they know so far, points out that love has nothing to do with this, prompting Xander to go off on a further irrelevancy about how we never fall in love with what's right in front of us, like, now Willow looks sad, Buffy looks uncomfortable, and we freakin' get the group dynamic already, thanks. Buffy changes the subject and says that Eric is creepy enough to be involved in this, but that Chris seems like a decent guy. They walk down the stairs. Willow says that Chris talked about death a lot after his brother's accident. "Maybe he just wanted to get one up on it." They notice Giles. Xander: "And speaking of love..." Well, no one was, but thanks for another clumsy segue. And speaking of love, ours is over, Xander. Willow agrees with me again (about the segue, not the love being over). Xander: "Do I deconstruct your segues?" It's like I'm not even here. Giles appears very nervous, clearly waiting for Miss Calendar, and while this might have seemed cute at the time, I can't take it seriously at all now. Buffy gives him some last-minute coaching on his pitch, saying to personalize it. "She's a technopagan, right? Ask her to bless your laptop." I'd pay for that service, let me tell you. The kids leave, and Miss Calendar spots him and says hello. I've been looking for a part of this episode to speed through, and this fits the bill perfectly. Giles hems and haws until Miss Calendar says she has to go set up the lab, and rushes into the classroom. Giles calls himself an idiot again. Miss Calendar pops her head back out, invites him to the football game, and asks, "How do you feel about Mexican?" She takes the shock on his face that they would use such a crappy line twice in one episode as a "yes." She leaves again, and Giles goes from idiot to peacock in 0.4 seconds.

Girls' locker room. Cordy's putting on lipstick. Joy, the head cheerleader from "The Witch," asks Cordy if she's coming. Cordy says she'll be right there, and Joy and some other cheerleader leave. Suddenly, Chris appears in the mirror behind her. She asks if anything's wrong. He just looks guilty. Eric shoves a sack over her head from behind, and she screams. Shouldn't Chris be doing that? He's at least twice Eric's size.

Buffy catches Joy coming down the stairs, accompanied by the non-speaking cheerleader. Buffy asks where Cordy is, but Joy says Cordy has a game to worry about, and doesn't need "losers" like her. Buffy's about as fazed by that as she would be if Joy called her a stupidhead, and blocks her path with her arm. "I'm sorry. Where did you say?" Meanwhile, the other girl just stares at the camera with a Cindy Brady "I'm on TV!" deer-in-the-headlights look.

In the locker room, Eric is tying a still-screaming Cordy's hands behind her back when Buffy appears. I know the answer, but where the hell is Chris during all this? I know he's conflicted about it, but still. Buffy jump-kicks Eric in the face and attends to Cordy. Cordy tells her what happened, but then hears the fight song, and says she has to get out there for the cheerleader pyramid. "I'm the apex!" If Buffy is thinking, "Yeah, the apex of self-involvement and superficiality," she does a good job hiding it. After Cordy leaves, Buffy hears a noise behind her. She infers that it's Chris, and asks him to come out, saying she knows what he and Eric have been doing. He emerges from the row of lockers. She tells him that she knows what it's like to lose someone that you're close to (is she talking about "Killed By Death"?) but that what he's doing is wrong. Chris says he has to do this for "him," and that "he needs someone." Buffy mistakenly thinks he's referring to Eric, whom she snarks needs "industrial strength therapy." Physician, diagnose thy Season Seven self. Chris goes on that "he always looked out for me. Stood up for me. He's all alone. Everybody loved him. And now he's all alone." The kid playing Chris did a pretty good job with this role, I think. As Buffy finally gets it, shock covers her face, and she manages, "Oh my God." Remember when SMG cared about her line readings? Yeah, me too.

Epps basement. Daryl is freaking out at Eric, which seems misplaced, but whatever. I don't know what's in this whole deal for Eric other than indulgence of his sociopathic tendencies. I can appreciate that in a villain. Daryl grabs Eric by the collar, but Eric talks his way down, saying that he can create the girl by himself. Mollified, Daryl puts Eric down, who says, "Let's go scare you up a date."

By Couch Baron

Library. Willow checks to see if there have been any deaths lately that would be candidates for head donation, but she comes up with nothing. She tells them that the head has to be fresh, as formaldehyde accelerates neural decay in the brain, so any head treated with it is useless, and thanks for telling us this before the episode's over, dear. I'm all for minimizing exposition, but that's taking things too far. Eyes going wide, she starts to ask Buffy, "You don't think that they would..." Buffy: "I think anyone who cuts dead girls into little pieces does not get the benefit of any doubt." She orders Xander and Willow to Eric's house, and says she and Giles will take Chris's. Giles hems and haws about his date, like, isn't that a little ridiculous, Mr. Sacred Duty? Especially since your date knows about your other calling? Buffy doesn't have time to argue, however, and suggests they just meet at the game. Willow advises Buffy not to be too hard on Chris, as he's not a vampire. Buffy snits, "He's just a ghoul." Looks like someone needs to attend tonight's installment of the lecture series entitled "When Morality Isn't Black And White"!

Buffy and Chris re-converge at the spot where Daryl took Cordy. Buffy finds one of her pompoms, and demands that Chris tell her where she is. After some hesitation, he complies. She instructs him to find Willow and Xander and bring them. She leaves.

Cordy pleads with Daryl as Eric pours some gasoline into a container for some purpose that's probably obvious to anyone who hasn't written this recap, and therefore isn't me. Daryl tells Cordy that he has to do this so they can be together. She gamely tries to convince him that she'll be with him anyway, but he wasn't reborn yesterday. Geddit? Oh, shut up. He tells her that they'll hide together. Eric finishes sterilizing a knife in a large Bunsen burner and moves to do the deed, although that knife isn't going to be nearly big or sharp enough to cut bone. Maybe it's just for the initial cut. I'm tired, okay?

Buffy busts in. Eric throws the knife at her, but she catches it, nine kinds of kick-ass written on her face. She tries to reason with Daryl, saying that Chris sent her to stop him, but he doesn't believe that either. He grabs a cleaver-looking thing and tries to do the job on Cordy himself, but Buffy grabs him, and they fight. The gas can gets knocked over and starts leaking. Daryl flips Buffy over the gurney. Eric tries to leave, but Daryl tosses him across the room, knocking him unconscious. Buffy and Daryl fight some more. She knocks him into the Bunsen burner, which falls and ignites the gas. Xander shows up and attempts to rescue Cordelia. Daryl throws a canister of something that misses Buffy and goes into the fire, fueling it. This is getting a little ridiculous. Is Buffy going to wing a bottle of whiskey into the fire ? Cordy, in more and more of a panic, tells Xander to untie her, but the restraints are too tight. Giles and Willow arrive and drag the unconscious Eric out of there. Xander gives up on untying Cordy and pushes the gurney through the flames, lying on top of Cordy to protect her, although it was probably equal parts that and copping a feel. Daryl gets the better of Buffy, and is about to smash her skull with a desk when someone screams his name. It's Chris, accompanied by Miss Calendar. Daryl hesitates, then notices the Bride-to-be on another gurney. He goes to it, saying they'll always be together. Chris tries to go to him, but Buffy stops him. The flames rise up and consume the couple Frankenstein, but not before Daryl literally gets a leg over. Hey, that's what happened.

By Couch Baron

Basement, later. Buffy and Chris come down the stairs to find that Daryl is gone. They quickly figure out that Daryl is going after Cordelia himself, and leave.

Cut to the game. Cordy and company do their thing as the game plays out. Miss Calendar goes off on a very pretentious analysis of various American sports, as she and Giles walk to their seats, concluding that football is such a "rugged" contest. Giles chuckles and says he finds it odd that "a nation that prides itself on its virility should feel compelled to strap on forty pounds of protective gear just in order to play rugby." Hee. He looks so pleased to have gotten off a snap this episode. Miss Calendar: "Is this your normal strategy for a first date? Dissing my country's national pastime?" Okay, first off, before Sars blows an artery in her temple, our national pastime is baseball. Also, "dissing"? Shut up, Miss Calendar.

By Couch Baron

Giles starts to backtrack, but then notices that she used the word "date." She cutely cops to it. Aw. Willow and Xander appear and inform them that Eric's was a bust, Xander adding that the only thing of note was "a pornography collection so prodigious it even scared me." Again, what more is there to say, really? Giles tries none too subtly to get them to go away, but they don't take the hint, and sit down. Giles sulks, but Miss Calendar is gracious enough to smile.

Under the bleachers, Daryl skulks. He peeks through, and sees the game. The Tinkly Piano Of I Once Was A Football Star, But Now I'm Sort Of Dead plays. Daryl's lip quivers. Aw, Frankenstein has feelings. Wait, I already knew that, since I've read books and all. He spots Cordy coming off the field, and moves. Cordy comes under the bleachers and draws a cup of water out of a cooler, but Daryl grabs her just as a convenient cheer goes up from the crowd. Soon after, Buffy and Chris show up, and realize that Cordy's not on the field.

In the lab, Cordy's blindfolded and tied to a gurney. She begs them to take off the blindfold, promising she won't scream. Saying her name, Daryl takes off the blindfold. Of course she screams, but the fact that she does it so loudly that cats in the county run for cover makes me giggle. Eric tells her to scream all she wants, but reverses that opinion after another avalanche-causer and threatens to knock her out. Daryl apologizes for never noticing her before, which causes her to focus and recognize him. Eric says that they're ready, and leers that Cordy will feel a pinch around the neck area, but when she wakes up, she'll have the body of "several" seventeen-year-olds. He lifts up the sheet so Cordy can see her Bride body, which elicits another ear-splitter. Hee.

By Couch Baron

Later, several fire trucks are outside the lab. Chris tells Buffy why he brought Daryl back, saying he just wanted to look out for him, like Daryl did for him. Aw. I always wanted an older brother, so I'm a sucker for these stories. Angel runs up and interrupts the nice moment to ask if everyone's okay. Buffy affirms that, and Angel has the good grace not to look jealous of Chris. Elsewhere, Giles apologizes to Miss Calendar for their date. She tells him not to worry about it, but warns him never to do anything on a first date that you can't top on the second. Giles picks up on the "date" thing again, and they make goo-goo eyes at each other. I've finally figured out why I like Miss Calendar -- Giles just seems really happy when he's with her. Xander grouses to Willow how everyone's paired off, and they're not, like, we still get it, thanks. He goes on, "Do you ever think that the world's a giant game of musical chairs, and the music's stopped, and we're the only ones who don't have a chair?" Willow smiles. "All the time." Awwww. Cordy interrupts to offer Xander her completely sincere thanks, saying if there's anything she can ever do...Xander: "Do you mind? We're talking here." Cordy pulls a priceless "remind me not to do that again" face and walks away. Xander asks Willow again why she thinks they never get dates. A bit clunky, but funny nonetheless.

By Couch Baron

Graveyard. Angel and Buffy walk together, Buffy having filled him in on the events of the episode. Buffy espouses the now-relevant sentiment that love makes you do crazy stuff, and Angel takes the opportunity to admit that his jealousy of Xander would qualify. Angel, if it's any consolation, you're now beating him in the segue department. Clever, also, how he implied there that he was in love with Buffy without actually saying it, although I'd expect her to pick up on that. Angela Chase certainly would have. Angel goes on that Xander is in her life, and he gets to be with her in daylight. Buffy modestly says she doesn't look good in direct light. Angel notes that it'll be morning soon. Buffy offers to walk him home, and they tentatively interlace their fingers. Aw. You know, as much as I think most of Angel's arc in Season Three was forced and false, Season Two Angel was the only boyfriend of hers that I thought made sense. They might not have had the initial sizzle of Buffy and Spike, but that wore thin for me awfully fast. Anyway, as Buffy and Angel walk off, the camera pans down to show Daryl's tombstone. You can stop spinning now, Mary Shelley.