Willow

Buffy, episode 3.13

("The Zeppo")

 

 

Vague storyline that bears little in common with the actual storyline... :-)

 

This was a very Xander episode (and, if I read the French version of Buffy magazine correctly, Nicholas Brendon's favourite episode). There is a Big Bad which comes up, it is very big and very bad, the end of the earth, yada yada, but it seems to be a bit of a side issue and isn't really that well explained.

 

We start in caves or tunnels or somesuch, fighting a demon. Faith slams it with a very very long sword (spot the sexual innuendo!).

zep01.jpeg; 15K

 

Willow's okay. The shaking is merely a side effect of being scared.

zep02.jpeg; 16K

 

Cordelia, having dumped on Xander (again), causes Xander to ask Oz what it means to be cool. Oz is cool, Xander isn't. Why? What's the special catch? Who decides what is cool and what isn't.

zep03.jpeg; 26K

 

<aside>
I was 'cool' in school, but in an unexpected way. I was a geek (nerd to you Americans), and was happy and unconcerned with being anything else. A peaceful weekend for me would be to break into the computer lab (crap security) and do some hacking (crappy security) or just program something really obscure to do weird stuff on the network. My mind vs. the system administrators mind.
For a few people I'd known, like, forever, that wasn't really geeky it was rebellious. So I was a 'cool geek', if you can imagine such a thing. Or course, I was blasé, how many more things to worry about than how my 'street cred' was doing.
Hell, even watching paint dry (37 minutes for dulux emulsion on a plaster wall in favourable weather) was of greater importance.
Still, it holds true. Those who define 'cool' are often the least cool of all, and are only defining 'cool' to be akin to themselves because they have nothing else to offer besides illiterate moronity and baggy slacks that even rappers don't look good in.
</aside>

So Xander borrows a flash car. A '57 Mustang (I think).

zep05.jpeg; 21K

 

Xander bumps into psycho-boy again.

zep06.jpeg; 17K

 

And the demon bar is overturned, I guess to prove how Big and Bad the Big Bad is. Or something.

zep07.jpeg; 22K

 

Let's get beeeeer!
We learn psycho-boy has raised a few of his friends from the dead. They seem like stereotypical jocks obsessed with beer (were they from Dartmouth?).

zep08.jpeg; 16K

 

Willow, meeting Xander coming out of the magic shop, gives him a quick hug and says she loves him.

zep09.jpeg; 16K

 

Xander splits, has sex with Faith (!).

Willow, darting Oz (they're moving him away from the hellmouth, conveniently located right under the library).

zep10.jpeg; 19K

 

Psycho-boy has placed a bomb in the boiler room (how Heathers), Xander walks in.

I didn't realise it when I took the picture, but Xander looks kinda like my friend Glenn Richards, thus I guess the boiler room with the bomb in it is like my bedroom. Mmmm...

zep11.jpeg; 20K

 

Xander psyches out psycho-boy. And the gang (sans Xander) defeats the Big Bad.

Next day, sitting outside.

zep13.jpeg; 18K

 

Xander walks by Cordelia. She makes a nasty comment. Xander just smiles and walks on, leaving Cordelia shouting "What? What!?". She just doesn't have a clue...

 

Just in case you didn't catch the title reference, Zeppo was one of the Marx brothers. He wasn't allowed to talk, all he could do was honk his horn.

 

 


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HTML and text © 2001 Richard Murray
Images digitised by Richard Murray (August 2001) from a broadcast on Sky One
Storyline and images © 1999 20th Century Fox, WB, Mutant Enemy, Sandollar Television, & Kuzui Enterprises
Characters created by Joss Whedon (the man!)
This episode written by Dan Vebber and directed by James Whitmore Jr.