DVD Shop: Buy Buffy the Vampire Slayer - The Complete Third Season Online

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This season boasts many of the show's strongest episodes such as "The Wish", where Cordelia unknowingly makes a wish to a vengeance demon (Anyanka, who becomes the Anya we all love to laugh at later) and wishes that Buffy never came to Sunnydale. This episode is grand, as we see an alternate reality where Buffy left California and never stopped the Master from rising and as a result, he succeeded in opening the Hellmouth. Truly one of the better episodes. We also are given a taste of foreshadowing in later episodes...Buffy's sister Dawn (to come in season 5) is mentioned in a glimmer of dialogue that will remain meaningless until two years later (can you find the episode? Hint...listen to both Faith and Buffy talk in the later epsiodes). Faith is terrific as Buffy's nemesis, a Slayer just like her. Oh, did I mention Angel returns from a hell dimension as well?

The scoobies get their own star time as well. In "THE ZEPPO", Xander proves that he is more than just the weak part of the group, adept at getting them donuts and not much else. In "THE WISH" and "DOPPLEGANGLAND", we get to see a Vamp Willow...very interesting and two of the season's best episodes. This season also brings us more of the Watcher's Council, the mysterious group that Giles works for including Wesley, who later leaves to aid Angel and Cordelia in Los Angeles in the spin-off show Angel. And finally, we get to see the Scoobies graduate in a very typical Sunnydale fashion...with a huge battle. It was hard to top season two, but this season is more of Joss Whedon's masterpiece of television; let people and critics shun it...we all know great TV when we see it.

This set contains all 22 episodes of the first season. They are:

"Anne" - After sending Angel to hell at the end of the previous Season, Buffy has run to L.A. and changed her name, abandoning her Slayer responsibilities. But when someone she's previously helped recognizes her and asks for her aid again, can she refuse?

"Dead Man's Party" - Buffy's back, but not all is right. She's still expelled from school, and her friends have some serious repressed anger that's just waiting to burst out. And then there's the zombies that crash her "welcome home" party...

"Faith, Hope and Trick" - Eliza Dushku (Bring It On) appears as sexy new Slayer Faith, whose camaraderie with Buffy's friends makes her a bit jealous. It also features the introduction of Mr. Trick, one of the funnier (and one of the few black) characters to appear on Buffy.

"Beauty and the Beasts" - Angel's back from Hell slightly feral and werewolf Oz may have been getting out of his cage during the full moon. When there's a series of brutal murders, Buffy and Willow have to consider the possibility that one of their boyfriends is the culprit.

"Homecoming" - One of the funniest episodes of Buffy ever, along with "Doppelgangland" (see below). Buffy and Cordelia are in a no-holds-barred race to become Homecoming Queen. But they're soon in big trouble when Homecoming coincides with Mr. Trick's new big game event, Slayerfest '98.

"Band Candy" - Another hysterically funny episode, in which a batch of magically enhanced candy makes all the adults in Sunnydale act like irresponsible teenagers - including Giles and Buffy's mother Joyce.

"Revelations" - The Scooby Gang has found out about Angel's return, and are not happy with Buffy for keeping it a secret. And Faith's new Watcher, Gwendolyn Post, arrives in Sunnydale.

"Lover's Walk" - James Marsters returns as a lovelorn Spike, who's lost Drusilla to a Chaos Demon. When he kidnaps Willow and Xander, and forces Buffy and Angel to work together with him, you know badness is going to ensue...and it does in a heartbreaking conclusion.

"The Wish" - Enraged by Xander's betrayal and her social ostracism, Cordelia wishes that Buffy had never come to Sunnydale. Little does she know that vengeance demon Anya (Emma Caulfield) is there to make it come true. Suddenly she finds herself in a world where Willow and Xander are vampires and the Master rules Sunnydale after dark.

"Amends" - When the ghosts of Angel's past victims appear to torment him, Buffy must find out what is doing this. Also, Willow and Oz reconcile.

"Gingerbread" - When Joyce finds two children's bodies, apparently killed by witches, the town gears up for a massive witch hunt. Buffy and Willow find themselves caught in the middle of it.

"Helpless" - On her eighteenth birthday, Buffy finds herself losing her Slayer powers. When her mother is kidnapped by a psychotic vampire unleashed by the Watcher's Council, Buffy must save her armed with only her wits.

"The Zeppo" - While Buffy and co. stave off yet another apocalypse, Xander finds himself hanging out with a bunch of zombies, saving the school from being blown up, and...losing his virginity!?

"Bad Girls" - New Watcher Wesley Wyndham-Pryce makes his appearance, and Faith shows Buffy a walk on the wild side that ends in tragedy.

"Consequences" - After the deputy mayor's death, Buffy and Faith find themselves feeling trapped and scared. Faith takes a decided turn for the worse, and joins forces with the cheerfully evil Mayor of Sunnydale.

"Doppelgangland" - A spell performed by Willow and Anya brings Vampire Willow from the world of "The Wish" (see above) to normal Sunnydale. Hysterically funny; the highlight has to be when Willow masquerades as Vampire Willow.

"Enemies" - Faith shows her true colors when she and the Mayor ask a demon to remove Angel's soul, returning him to the soulless vampire Angelus.

"Earshot" - Buffy gains telepathy after killing a demon, and hears a death threat aimed at the school's students. Unfortunately, the ability to hear others' minds is slowly driving her insane.

"Choices" - The Box of Gavrok, an item essential to the Mayor's Ascension, arrives in Sunnydale. The Scoobies manage to capture it, but in the process Willow is kidnapped. Stop the Ascension, or save Willow?

"The Prom" - It's prom time again in Sunnydale. But when hellhounds trained to attack people in formal wear are unleashed, Buffy must put her plans on hold to stop them. Also, Angel decides to break up with Buffy.

"Graduation Day, Parts One and Two" - The climactic two-part season finale. When Faith poisons Angel, the only cure is the blood of a Slayer. Buffy goes after Faith, but only succeeds in putting her in a coma. Angel must drink from Buffy to survive. And, of course, the Mayor Ascends into a gigantic snake.

In one sense he does not. "Becoming" remains the Mt. Everest of the series, a height that can never be scaled again, no matter how many times Buffy's gift of "death" plays to her advantage. However, what makes Season Three better than Season Two is not that the top is higher, but rather than this is also true of the bottom. Pick the worst episode from Season Three (my choice is the obvious pick, "Beauty and the Beasts") and it is still better than the worst of the first two seasons (e.g., "Teacher's Pet," "Go Fish"). Look at all 22 episodes and you should end up being convinced that this was clearly the show's best season.

By now there is clearly an extremely effective pattern to a season of "BtVS" as crafted by Whedon. The first episode, "Anne," reminds Buffy of why she is the slayer (i.e., function as a way of getting late comers to the party up to speed on the Slayer). Again the season is divided into two halves, the first focusing on Faith ("Faith, Hope & Trick") and the second on the Mayor's Ascension ("Graduation Day"). Like the previous season, the part of the first half (Spike & Dru) joins the party of the second half (Angelus), just like Faith joins forces with the Mayor. Consequently, a season of "BtVS" has a sense of overall narrative structure more developed than most television dramas. What also matters is that Whedon finds the actors to play the parts. Eliza Dushku makes Faith a ticking time bomb who represents the Dark Side of being a Slayer (not to mention being as far removed from Kendra as possible), while Harry Groener as Mayor Richard Wilkins III takes the traditional politeness of a villain to a new level of giddy charm.

The final element, which best defines the uniqueness of Season Three, is that arguably the very best episodes were actually those that did NOT have to do with the major plot threads. There are two fun return visits as Sunnydale is afflicted by another visit from Ethan Raine in "Band Candy" and comes back to kidnap Willow for some witchy help in winning back Dru's love. Fortunately we did not have to wait for Season Four for a visit to "Doppelgangland" after our first taste of the alternative Buffyverse in "The Wish." I was always surprised Whedon did not release those two on a videotape as an addendum to the Season Three Videotape set (double ditto for "Once More, With Feeling"). However, after the Senior gift given to Buffy at "The Prom," the no holds barred fight between Buffy and Faith in "Graduation Day, Part I" and Buffy letting Angel feed on her in "Graduation Day, Part II," the Mayor's actual Ascension seems rather anti-climatic.

Buffy supporting cast fares very well in Season Three. "Amends," the episode submitted for Emmy consideration, gives Buffy and Angel some of their best final scenes together as star crossed lovers while Xander finally has a moment of glory in "The Zeppo" (I find the background apocalypse scenes hysterical and love the fact the Zeppo reference is never explained in the episode at all). Cordy makes her own case for being a Slayer in "Homecoming," Giles touches on new meanings of his role as Buffy's father-figure in "Band Candy" and "Helpless," and the only thing more fun than watching Alyson Hannigan play Vamp Willow in "The Wish" was watching her play Willow playing Vamp Willow in "Dopplegangland."

"Buffy the Vampire Slayer" received a lot of unwanted publicity during the spring of 1999 when two episodes--"Earshot" and "Graduation Day, Part Two"--were pulled from being aired because of the shootings at Columbine High School. Ultimately, these proved to be overreactions, but certainly Whedon and the show were fortunate that Columbine happened the week before "Earshot" and not the week afterwards, because I really do not know if "BtVS" would have been able to survive that realignment of events. On balance and from the perspective of the middle of Season Seven, I think Season Three will ultimately be considered the best season of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."