Buffy the Vampire Slayer - Band Candy - S03E06 Review

BAND CANDY
SEASON 3 EPISODE 6

Here's a fun episode!  One thing that Whedon shows do especially well are the "characters you know and love suddenly change a lot and hilarity ensues" episodes as seen here, in S6's Tabula Rasa, and S4 of Angel's Spin the Bottle.  These episodes usually hinge around the personality of certain characters changing due to a wacky spell or mishap.  It's sort of a funnier version of Halloween from Season 2, because as the series goes on, these kinds of episodes get sillier and sillier.

This episode starts out with Buffy and Giles in the graveyard both patrolling and studying for the SATs.  Buffy clearly isn't the best with tests, but what she is good at is slaying, which she does.  Buffy remarks that they're probably the only ones up this late, but a trip to the Mayor's office proves her wrong.  Trick and the Mayor are talking about a demon that needs a tribute, and Trick says he knows just the guy who can get the job done.  At school, Buffy and the gang are talking about the SATs and everyone puts their two cents in.  Buffy also talks about how she's being watched 24/7 by either her mom or Giles ever since she got back.  The group soon runs into Snyder, who forces them to sell "band candy" to raise money for new uniforms for the marching band.  Notice that the candy is "Milkbar" brand chocolate; sounds like a crappy brand you'd buy at the Dollar Store.

Later that day, Buffy successfully pawns half of the candy bars to her mom, though they do have a slight argument about Buffy finally getting to drive.  This sort of stems from the Buffy running away thing, but she brings up the good point that if she wanted to bolt, she could just take the bus.  She leaves and heads to the library to train, where she cons Giles into buying the other half of the candy.  She trains for literally thirty seconds (including a really funny gag where she makes a fool of Giles, as usual), then leaves, saying she has to be home.  But she's obviously playing the two against each other as she goes to see Angel, who has now recovered enough to do yoga alone in his creepy mansion.  They're wildly awkward this episode, and Angel mentions Scott, clearly a little jealous.

She gets home to find both her mom and Giles waiting there to confront her.  They're both also eating the candy...hmm, interesting.  The two berate her, but they also seem a little different; less tactful, more annoying.  Then we see at the "Milkbar" factory, Ethan Rayne is behind the distribution of the candy bars.  And if we've learned anything, it's that Ethan Rayne plans are often very odd and specific.  This one is even weirder than the Halloween one though.  Enchanted candy.  He must have known how ridiculous that was.

The next day at study hall, Cordy and Buffy are all buddy-buddy again, and Cordy is really head over heels for Xand.  Of course, this is made more tragic when you see that Willow and Xander are continuing their semi-affair by playing footsie under the table right behind her.  But when Cordy looks over the two hilariously throw their legs into the other sides of the table with the loudest thud of all time.  When the teacher comes in, it's obvious that she ate the candy too, because she dismisses the kids to go have fun.  Buffy heads to Giles, worried about him, only to find her mother there with him.  They get her out of there (by giving Buffy the keys to the car) and get back to what they're really doing: listening to records and partying like a couple of...teenagers.

So Buffy is driving Will to the Bronze, and it turns out that Buff is the worst driver of all time.  It's impressive how awful she is.  They somehow make it to the Bronze in one piece and discover that all the adults in town are there partying while the Dingos play.  They book like every show ever.  Soon after, Snyder comes up to Buffy and Willow, acting like a complete dork.  He's actually really funny; it's a nice break from his superjerk persona.  He even compliments Oz's hair, which changes like every single episode.  I'm surprised this doesn't come up more than it does, really.  It'd be such an easy thing to joke about.  Buffy, Will, and Oz decide to head to Giles's to see what's going on, and Snyder, just wanting to be included, goes with them.

A lot of the episode is just old people doing teenage-y things, like racing and playing in the park; you know, all the things that kids do.  Giles breaks into a department store and steals an outfit for Joyce, but soon get held up by a cop (with candy, no less).  Giles knocks him out and then the couple make out on the cop's police car.  The two actually have surprisingly good chemistry.  Meanwhile Buffy wrecks the car due to the other guy opening candy and not paying attention.  This finally clues in Buffy that it must be the candy.  Uh DOI!  Will and Oz go to research at the library with Xander and Cordy while Snyder and Buffy go to the warehouse or whatever it is.  There they find Giles and Joyce making out, which rightfully disgusts Buffy.  The real hilarity of this episode lies in Giles being really funny and douchey; that Ripper must have been painful to be around.

Buffy knocks out the distribution guys, who I assume are just regular warehouse workers; how do they not know what's going on?  Or are they just evil?  Is there an evil hiring temp agency or something in Sunnydale?  Anyway, in the warehouse they find Ethan, who runs like a little girl and is soon caught by Buffy.  She finds him in a big box, which she has to kick through to get open.  My question is: how did he get in there?  Buffy beats the crap out of Ethan, much to young Giles's amusement; he eventually explains that the demon (named Lurconis) needs a huge tribute of newborn babies, so the candy was made as a diversion tactic.

Buffy calls Willow, who relays the info that Lurconis likes the baby meat, so they head out to find it after handcuffing Ethan.  Giles's knowledge eventually shines through and determines that Lurconis must be in the sewers.  So they head there after sending Snyder home to find some vamps led by Mr. Trick and the Mayor blessing the children for the ritual.  The Mayor immediately escapes while Buffy fights and Joyce and Giles get the babies to safety.  Some rumbling occurs and finally Lurconis shows himself as a CGI'd snake thing.  It doesn't look too awful for the late 90s; especially considering the show's budget.  But before she can deal with the snake worm thing, Buffy and Mr. Trick have a fight.  And by have a fight, I mean they almost fight and then Lurconis comes back, so Buffy nukes him with a gas pipe + torch combo.  Then Trick runs off like the Mayor, making sure to taunt first, of course.  Pretty quick and anticlimactic ending this time, but there's not much you can do with a CGI monster, really.

Meanwhile, the Mayor reprimands Mr. Trick for his failure, and Ethan gets away yet again.  Interesting that Mr. Trick pays him; it shows a sort of loyalty from Trick that we don't really see anymore.  Kind of admirable in an evil sort of way.  The next day at school, Snyder proves he's back to normal by making everyone else clean the lockers, while Buffy and Giles have a talk about the SATs.  Soon Buffy's mom arrives to pick her up, and the episode ends on Joyce and Giles sharing an incredibly awkward moment.

Overall this is a really funny episode, but not really one of the best personality swap ones.  I do find Something Blue, Tabula Rasa, and Spin the Bottle to be much funnier, but this is still a solid one.  It's got a lot of great moments, mostly from Anthony Stewart Head, and it's nice to see that evil douchey Ethan Rayne again.  It's also, interestingly enough, devoid of any Faith.  It's a nice, lighthearted jaunt before a couple weighty episodes coming up pretty soon.

****