Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Freshman

"Uh, are we gonna fight? Or is there just gonna be a monster sarcasm rally?"

Time to take a deep breath; I'm about to embark on forty-four consecutive episodes of Buffyverse (including the first season of Angel) with nothing else except a film on Saturdays, if I happen to be blogging on that particular Saturday. Otherwise there'll be no interruptions (real life aside).

So…. Buffy is back. And in some ways it's back to the beginning, with Buffy having to adjust to a new environment, just as she did in Season One, except that everything's that much bigger in scale and more grown-up.  With no Angel, of course. Oh, and no Cordelia. Wonder where she's gone, he asked rhetorically?

We're back to the examination of teenage life, both through metaphor (well, ish) and through straight-up depiction. The first few days of University are always overwhelming and stressful, and this episode depicts this really well with its many shots of huge, huge rooms- lecture halls, libraries and the like- crammed with loads and loads of people. You really get a sense of how huge and overwhelming is the world of the campus. And so is the work, which I can certainly remember being overwhelmed by in my first semester until I finally realised that I was doing ok, and I could do it. There's a real contrast between Willow, who's excited about no longer being somewhere knowledge is "frowned upon", and is enthusiastic and organised, and Buffy, who's stressed, intimidated and humiliated by it all. She's singled out, shouted at and thrown out of one lecture hall, intimidated by the scary Professor Walsh in another, and embarrassed by her own clumsiness in the library while meeting Riley, who for the moment is still just a big question mark.

And the vampires are part of this, being a rather neat metaphor for those students who bail out in the early days, unable to cope. They prey on the vulnerable, the uncool. And their leader, Sunday, is forever critiquing peoples' fashion choices and even their posters. She and her gang all seem to be metalheads; speaking as a member of the metalhead community I'm not sure what to make of that!

These vampires are part of a bigger, more adult world in which Buffy isn't sure she can cope. She gets her ass kicked. Worse, she's alone. Willow and Oz are busy with their own introduction to University life, and she's pretty much abandoned by both of her parent figures. Joyce has shoved some stuff in her room for storage while Giles, now a "gentleman of leisure", is now living with Olivia, who seems to be an old flame, and without the resources of a library there's not much he can do to help. His message is clear; as her "father" he'll be there for her, but only if he's needed. Buffy has to stand on her own too feet now. She's an adult. He's probably right, but this isn't a good time. Buffy's forced to go to the Bronze and mope, alone.

(Are we going to keep seeing the Bronze this season? It feels odd that they would keep going to the same place. Still, I suppose it makes sense to use existing sets when you can.)

All this changes when Buffy meets Xander, and she really is glad to see him. By his own admission, he hasn't been a particularly good friend in the past. But this time he really comes through with some much-needed perspective; for all the typical Xander humour, his life, and his prospects, seem pretty grim at the moment, whereas Buffy has real opportunities to seize.

Ok, the plot was a bit blah and perfunctory, but this script had a lot of stuff to introduce and a lot of donkey work to do. There are some intriguing things set up, too. How's Buffy going to get on with her roommate Kathy, she of the (gulp!) Celine Dion poster? Who made that phone call, and why didn't Buffy just 1471 it, or whatever the equivalent is in America? Was that course on American popular culture a metatextual joke on Buffy itself being taught at Universities? And who were those mysterious black ops ninjas…?

Oh, and why is everyone being referred to as "freshmen", even if they happen to be female?