For the first time, we delve into Sunnydale's extensive sewer system. I hope you like it, since we'll be spending a long time in here, as we explore this town. Welcome to A Tour of Sunnydale.
Today I'll be discussing The Harvest, the second episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The Harvest is the second part of the two-parter set up in Welcome to the Hellmouth, and is also written by showrunner Joss Whedon. It's one of the two episodes directed by John T. Kretchmer, along with Season 2's School Hard. According to The Phi Phenomenon it is ranked 67th best episode in the series as an average of lists around the Internet, putting it just slightly above average.
As I mentioned in my review of Welcome to the Hellmouth this leaves me somewhat confused, since The Harvest has always struck me as the more enjoyable of the first two episodes. Welcome to the Hellmouth is a lot of fun and it does a good job of introducing our cast, but it's somewhat bogged down by just how many characters there are to introduce, and how much backstory and lore is needed to understand what's going on. As a result, it was somewhat slow and uneventful. The Harvest can take advantage of the setup in Hellmouth, and is largely unencumbered by the nitty gritty details, allowing it to dive straight into a fun little adventure.
That said, the episodes begins very rocky. Welcome to the Hellmouth to The Harvest is the only complete cliffhanger in either Buffy or Angel, as we very literally freeze-frame on Luke attacking Buffy in a coffin. Buffy quickly fights him off thanks to the cross Angel gave her in the first episode. She catches up to Xander and Willow, whom she effortlessly saves. They realize Jesse is missing, and we cut to credits.
Now, was it really necessary to leave that for this episode's cold open? It feels like a perfectly fine way to end the previous episode, and just makes the cliffhanger feel completely cheap in every way. This is exacerbated when the first couple of scenes after credits are Giles expositing in the library in a much less cleverly concealed fashion than in Welcome to the Hellmouth and the vampires bringing Jesse to the Master.
It's not that these scenes are bad. Giles' exposition is actually pretty cool, setting up the unique backstory of the Buffyverse: Not a paradise gone wrong, but a hell that humans took over and made better. Similarly, Mark Metcalfe's Master carries his scene with decided aplomb, masterfully (forgive the pun) walking the line between affably camp and terrifying. They just feel out of place when we've started on action scenes that are directly involved with the plot, and it kills the episode's momentum.
That said, The Harvest feels completely like an early episode of Buffy in a way that Hellmouth didn't. We have all the things that make the show great here: Willow gets a brilliant character beat in the computer room, screwing Cordelia's program up through very simple manipulation, and Xander earns his spot within the roster, both displaying his stupidity and uselessness and the bravery, heart and emotional conection with his friends that make him indispensable to the team.
More importantly, The Harvest sets the blueprint that most of Buffy and Angel will follow all the way up until the end of their respective penultimate seasons: The cycle of Buffy (or Angel in Angel) going out, getting some info, coming back to discuss it with the rest of the gang, rinse, repeat with the stakes slightly upped each time. This is the beginning of the Scoobies as a team, and I absolutely adore the way The Harvest makes it natural for them to fall into their respective roles: It just makes sense for Willow to do the information gathering, Buffy to do the slaying, Giles to be the mentor figure and guiding hand and Xander... to be around, I guess? In that green mushroom shirt of his? Seriously, what even is that thing? I get it's the 90s and Xander is the dumbest creature ever but... yeesh.
The Harvest provides everything that you expect from a Buffy episode: There's a bunch of fairly mediocre action scenes underground that are made more effective by potent character beats (In this case, Jesse's betrayal hurting a surprising amount because of Xander's struggle with it), potent character beats around those action scenes, and dialogue that's delicious to the ear because of Whedon's trademark style. There's a few moments that I'm not sure if I think are awesome or hilarious, like the vampires rolling into the Bronze in slo-mo as a power ballad plays, Buffy's cymbal decapitation of that one vampire, and Xander's accidental dusting of Jesse, and a few moments that are decidedly one or the other, like the way Buffy tricks Luke into thinking the sun is up, or the way Willow is constantly on the edge of passing out in the library. It also ends absolutely perfectly, with the Scoobies preparing for the tide of monsters before taking the calm before the storm to relax, revealing themselves to be the same goofballs they have always been queueing Giles' signature, nigh-on perfect line "The Earth is doomed."
In many ways, The Harvest is the "vanilla" Buffy episode. It's just Buffy versus some vampires with a very simple plan, where Willow does the Willow thing, Giles does the Giles thing, and Xander does the Xander thing. Basically every monster-of-the-week episode from now on can be reasonably described as "The Harvest but...". As such, it's surprising just how engaging The Harvest is, thanks to its incredibly solid command of character and a serviceable plotline that proves a great starting point for the entire show.
Here's ranking and rating: The ranking is of all episodes of Buffy and Angel I've watched so far, with 1 being the best one, and the rating is out of ten in context of the quality of the show: I'm essentially trying to decide what 10% of quality of that particular show the episode belongs in. Because both shows are so good, this means negative ratings are not neccesarily a diss on the episode - I just think it's one of the show's weaker ones.
Ranking, for now, is still incredibly simple. I like The Harvest more than the one other episode on the list, so I'm putting it at Number 1, just above Welcome to the Hellmouth. Good job, The Harvest, and relish your position: You'll likely keep it for only a couple more episodes.
Ranked List
Rating: 4/10. This one was actually pretty tough, since The Harvest is actually a lot of fun, but I think liking up to 80 episodes of Buffy more than it is fairly likely for me, so it just drops into the 4/10 range. This is really a testament to the quality of Buffy as a show.
Today I'll be discussing The Harvest, the second episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The Harvest is the second part of the two-parter set up in Welcome to the Hellmouth, and is also written by showrunner Joss Whedon. It's one of the two episodes directed by John T. Kretchmer, along with Season 2's School Hard. According to The Phi Phenomenon it is ranked 67th best episode in the series as an average of lists around the Internet, putting it just slightly above average.
As I mentioned in my review of Welcome to the Hellmouth this leaves me somewhat confused, since The Harvest has always struck me as the more enjoyable of the first two episodes. Welcome to the Hellmouth is a lot of fun and it does a good job of introducing our cast, but it's somewhat bogged down by just how many characters there are to introduce, and how much backstory and lore is needed to understand what's going on. As a result, it was somewhat slow and uneventful. The Harvest can take advantage of the setup in Hellmouth, and is largely unencumbered by the nitty gritty details, allowing it to dive straight into a fun little adventure.
That said, the episodes begins very rocky. Welcome to the Hellmouth to The Harvest is the only complete cliffhanger in either Buffy or Angel, as we very literally freeze-frame on Luke attacking Buffy in a coffin. Buffy quickly fights him off thanks to the cross Angel gave her in the first episode. She catches up to Xander and Willow, whom she effortlessly saves. They realize Jesse is missing, and we cut to credits.
Now, was it really necessary to leave that for this episode's cold open? It feels like a perfectly fine way to end the previous episode, and just makes the cliffhanger feel completely cheap in every way. This is exacerbated when the first couple of scenes after credits are Giles expositing in the library in a much less cleverly concealed fashion than in Welcome to the Hellmouth and the vampires bringing Jesse to the Master.
It's not that these scenes are bad. Giles' exposition is actually pretty cool, setting up the unique backstory of the Buffyverse: Not a paradise gone wrong, but a hell that humans took over and made better. Similarly, Mark Metcalfe's Master carries his scene with decided aplomb, masterfully (forgive the pun) walking the line between affably camp and terrifying. They just feel out of place when we've started on action scenes that are directly involved with the plot, and it kills the episode's momentum.
That said, The Harvest feels completely like an early episode of Buffy in a way that Hellmouth didn't. We have all the things that make the show great here: Willow gets a brilliant character beat in the computer room, screwing Cordelia's program up through very simple manipulation, and Xander earns his spot within the roster, both displaying his stupidity and uselessness and the bravery, heart and emotional conection with his friends that make him indispensable to the team.
More importantly, The Harvest sets the blueprint that most of Buffy and Angel will follow all the way up until the end of their respective penultimate seasons: The cycle of Buffy (or Angel in Angel) going out, getting some info, coming back to discuss it with the rest of the gang, rinse, repeat with the stakes slightly upped each time. This is the beginning of the Scoobies as a team, and I absolutely adore the way The Harvest makes it natural for them to fall into their respective roles: It just makes sense for Willow to do the information gathering, Buffy to do the slaying, Giles to be the mentor figure and guiding hand and Xander... to be around, I guess? In that green mushroom shirt of his? Seriously, what even is that thing? I get it's the 90s and Xander is the dumbest creature ever but... yeesh.
The Harvest provides everything that you expect from a Buffy episode: There's a bunch of fairly mediocre action scenes underground that are made more effective by potent character beats (In this case, Jesse's betrayal hurting a surprising amount because of Xander's struggle with it), potent character beats around those action scenes, and dialogue that's delicious to the ear because of Whedon's trademark style. There's a few moments that I'm not sure if I think are awesome or hilarious, like the vampires rolling into the Bronze in slo-mo as a power ballad plays, Buffy's cymbal decapitation of that one vampire, and Xander's accidental dusting of Jesse, and a few moments that are decidedly one or the other, like the way Buffy tricks Luke into thinking the sun is up, or the way Willow is constantly on the edge of passing out in the library. It also ends absolutely perfectly, with the Scoobies preparing for the tide of monsters before taking the calm before the storm to relax, revealing themselves to be the same goofballs they have always been queueing Giles' signature, nigh-on perfect line "The Earth is doomed."
In many ways, The Harvest is the "vanilla" Buffy episode. It's just Buffy versus some vampires with a very simple plan, where Willow does the Willow thing, Giles does the Giles thing, and Xander does the Xander thing. Basically every monster-of-the-week episode from now on can be reasonably described as "The Harvest but...". As such, it's surprising just how engaging The Harvest is, thanks to its incredibly solid command of character and a serviceable plotline that proves a great starting point for the entire show.
Here's ranking and rating: The ranking is of all episodes of Buffy and Angel I've watched so far, with 1 being the best one, and the rating is out of ten in context of the quality of the show: I'm essentially trying to decide what 10% of quality of that particular show the episode belongs in. Because both shows are so good, this means negative ratings are not neccesarily a diss on the episode - I just think it's one of the show's weaker ones.
Ranking, for now, is still incredibly simple. I like The Harvest more than the one other episode on the list, so I'm putting it at Number 1, just above Welcome to the Hellmouth. Good job, The Harvest, and relish your position: You'll likely keep it for only a couple more episodes.
Ranked List
Rating: 4/10. This one was actually pretty tough, since The Harvest is actually a lot of fun, but I think liking up to 80 episodes of Buffy more than it is fairly likely for me, so it just drops into the 4/10 range. This is really a testament to the quality of Buffy as a show.
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