Some Assembly Required

Some Assembly Required
Written by
Directed by

Original Airdate:

Plot: Someone or something is robbing graves in Sunnydale, stealing girl's bodies....

Review

Warning: No instructions needed here to put the SPOILERS together. They are just around the bend.

In short: The first fifteen minutes are the stuff of greatness but the rest of the show is largely forgetable...

I wasn't too hopeful for Some Assembly Required, based on the information I'd seen in the preview and heard about the episode. It sounded, for the most part, like a retread of the Frankenstein monster myth. And while this can be interesting, I'll have to admit that it was better done this year on the X-Files's "Post Modern Promenthius." Part of it may have been that that episode was filmed in black and white, but I think the real test was that episode held my interest for the entire story, while Some Assemlby Required really failed to do so.

But, I have to admit that the by the time the first commerical break rolled around, I was really hoping that this episode would win out over my expectations. And to that point it was. It's everything good Buffy should be--witty, intelligent, funny, interesting. I loved the fact that the Scooby gang was following every possible lead in the book about just who had done these girls in or why were they digging up corpses. And the plotline of Cordy trying to steal Angel away from Buffy was nicely done. It added some nice, humorous moments to the show and really made the first fifteen or so minutes really hum.

And from there on, it pretty much feel apart. Once Cordy found the dumpster full of body parts, it became pretty much standard fare. And that's pretty much a shame. There was a lot of potential plotlines, that quite frankly the script could have and should have followed up on. One of the biggest to me was the mother's inability to deal with the death of her son and how that was apparently affected her younger son. Seeing her re-watching all the football highlights of her son and talking about as if were alive had some potential. As did the scene with Buffy where she casually dismisses her when the mother finds out Buffy is there to see the son who has survived. Surely, this was some kind of set up for some kind of deep seated sibling rivalry of the most gruesome and ugly kind. It all goes to character motivation for the villains of this week's episode. I honestly think our budding young Dr. Frankenstein would have been a lot more entertaining had his main motive been some kind of misguided, desparate attempt to win himself back into his mother's good graces. I found myself wondering at some point if she blamed her surviving son for the death of the football hero in some shape or form. Maybe I missed some dialogue that addressed this but it seems unlikely since I went back, looking for such a segment specifically.

This line of reasoning also raises another question for me. Why did they re-animate the dead brother? To prove they could do it? It just doesn't seem to make much sense that the two guys would go through this long, complicated procedure to bring back the brother without some kind of good reason. Was it hero worship? A way of dealing with the pain and loss? What exactly was it? And did they have to dig up the brother as well? If so, why did Buffy not see that open grave as she did with the other girl? It is pretty well established that her Slayer duties take her close to the cemetary on a regular basis. Of course, the obvious explanation to this is they did it this summer while she was gone. I'm just not sure based on how the internal timetable of the episode played out that this is the best or most reasonable explanation.

It's the attention to details that has impressed me about Buffy to this point. And it was the lack of attention to details in this episode that really took it down from good to just a standard episode.

I've also got to admit that the ending was fairly pedestrian. Oh sure, I loved Buffy kicking in the doors and kicking butt on the Frankenstein guy, but other than that, what did we learn? I am seeing a few things that might come to fruition later, but am hesistant to comment on them just yet. Basically I don't want to look like any more of fool than I am by idle speculation. I have some ideas, though. I will hint that most most of them come out of that final scene with Cordy, Xander, and Willow when Xander brushes Cordy off. I wonder if something will ever be made of his rescue of her in the future. I guess we'll just have to stay glued to our sets and find out, huh?

As they say on Seinfeld, "Not that there's anything wrong with that..."

(Sorry, had to throw that in there!)

So, that about wraps it up for now. Except for some small things....

--I loved the scene with our heroes digging up the grave. That was a nice one, esp. Buffy's line about the gender roles involved.

--Giles and Ms. Calendar's first date was nice. I really like how this relationship is developing. I also really liked the way Willow and Xander just sat in front of them at the football game like that. Which begs the question of why with the seats packed for the game like that, why were prime seats open? I know, I know, it's a nitpick.

--Buffy's advice to Giles on asking Jenny out was priceless. "I've got a thing...you've got a thing..." Hysterical.

Basically, you leave in all the character moments and remove the Frankenstein plot, you've got a pretty darn good episode. Otherwise, it's pretty much strong B plot, not so great A plot. Not one I'm ready to declare a waste of time, but not an episode I'd describe as an absolute keeper.

Final score: 6.0 (out of 10.0)

Next up: A new villain is in town. This looks good...