Season 6, Episode 7
First Aired November 6, 2001
Speaking of episodes that could be bad gimmicks, we come to the #2 episode, "Once More, With Feeling", the famous musical episode. Whedon is a huge musical fan, and he always wanted to do some kind of musical, and this episode was his first foray into the genre (he would do it again with Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog). When I first heard that there was a musical episode, I thought it was a silly idea, but as you can see, I no longer think that.
The arrival of a demon has caused the citizens of Sunnydale to sing their secrets to each other. Xander and Anya sing about their nervous attitude toward their upcoming wedding, Spike reaffirms his feelings for Buffy, and Buffy tells all her friends the truth about her afterlife experiences. The events of the episode are pivotal, and set the course for the rest of Season 6, but the episode wouldn't be memorable if the songs weren't good. I'm actually listening to "Walk Through the Fire" as I write this. The songs are well-written, well-performed (especially for the fact that all of the actors do their own singing, and most of them aren't trained singers), and are both humorous and dramatic.
This episode is kind of the gold standard of musical episodes; when the rare musical episode is produced, it is invariably measured against this. I remember when the Scrubs musical aired, every reviewer brought up "Once More, With Feeling". And, this episode is always brought up whenver people discuss Buffy. Season 6 was very polarizing, but I have not met a fan yet who dislikes this episode.
Up next: Buffy #1...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment