Original Air Date: November 10, 1998

Written by Jane Espenson
Directed by Michael Lange

Summary

Buffy's S.A.T. is coming up, so Giles helps her study for it at the cemetery while waiting for any vampires to rise from their graves. At City Hall, Mayor Wilkins enlists Mr. Trick's aid for an upcoming tribute to a demon. Mr. Trick just so happens to know a man who can help them.

      The next morning, Principal Snyder enlists students to sell candy in order to raise money for Sunnydale High's marching band, and Buffy and the gang are at the top of Snyder's recruitment list. After Buffy convinces her mother to buy some candy, she revives their long-standing debate over whether or not she can get a license and start driving. Joyce remains uncomfortable with the notion of her daughter behind a steering wheel. Buffy then heads off for the library, telling her mother that she has some more training to do with Giles. Joyce is not pleased with how much time Buffy has to spend working with Giles. At the library, Buffy trains briefly with Giles before leaving early, explaining to him that her mom wants her home early. Buffy then visits Angel at the mansion, bringing along a container of blood from the butcher shop. When Buffy finally goes home, she is surprised to find both her mom and her Watcher waiting for her in the foyer. They both have figured out that Buffy lied to them in order to go someplace else, although Joyce suspects that place was the Bronze. Unhappy with the way she's being treated, Buffy expresses how she can't fulfill both of their demands for the amount of time they want to spend with her. After Buffy goes to her room, Giles and Joyce relax on the couch, curiously eating one candy bar after another. Elsewhere, these same candy bars are being packaged in a factory. Overlooking the whole process is none other than Giles' old rival, Ethan Rayne.

      Buffy, Cordy, Xander, Willow, and several other students sit in study hall on Friday, waiting for their supervisor to arrive. The staff member assigned to study hall this day happens to be Giles, who is uncharacteristically late. While the students wait, Xander and Willow engage in a forbidden game of footsie under their table, apparently still hung up over each other after their kiss on Homecoming week. Principal Snyder talks one of the teacher, Ms. Barton, into filling in for Giles. Buffy is both surprised and dismayed to learn that Giles never showed up, but she and the rest of the students are even more surprised when Ms. Barton speaks to them loosely and freely, going so far as to refer to their principal as "Commandant Snyder". After school, Buffy goes to Giles' apartment to find out where he was, but that soon becomes irrelevant when she notices that her mother is there as well. Giles explains that he and Joyce have been working out a schedule to make it easier for Buffy to spend enough time with the both of them. Joyce then stuns her daughter by handing her the keys to her jeep, telling Buffy to drive herself home. After Buffy grabs the keys and leaves, Giles lights up a cigarette, dropping the charade that he and Joyce were putting on for Buffy when she arrived just now. Not one to pass up on an opportunity like this, Buffy picks up Willow in the jeep and drives off to the Bronze, displaying a horrific driving ability along the way. At the Bronze, Buffy and Willow immediately notice the vast number of adults present, which is unusual for any given night at the Bronze. Even stranger is that all of the adults are acting like rowdy teenagers, including Principal Snyder, who acts like he's just one of the Scooby Gang. While Buffy and Willow try to decipher this phenomenon, Giles and Joyce drink, smoke, and listen to old LP's before heading out into town. Giles and Joyce stroll by the store windows, one of which showcases a coat that catches Joyce's eye. Giles breaks into the window and steals the coat for the new "girl" in his life. A cop tries to stop them, but Giles makes short work of the cop and takes his gun before leaving the scene with Joyce. Back at the Bronze, Buffy decides that they need to get out and find some answers. As Buffy, Willow, and Oz leave the Bronze and get into the jeep, Snyder follows them into the car. Since time is definitely an issue, Buffy lets him tag along. Meanwhile, adults all over town are acting like teenagers, just like the people at the Bronze. Two guys even get into a drag race, and one of them smashes into Buffy's jeep. After everyone gets out of the car, one man runs by and steals Snyder's candy bar. Buffy realizes that there must be something wrong with the candy. Buffy instructs Willow and Oz to get Xander and Cordelia and head to the library, while she and Snyder drive to the candy bar factory.

      Buffy and Snyder arrive at the factory, where a huge mob of adults are gathered around the entrance to get more candy bars. On her way to the entrance, Buffy is distracted by the sight of Giles kissing Joyce right in front of her eyes. Unable to deal with them at this moment, Buffy knocks out the workers and enters the factory, with Giles, Joyce, and Snyder following closely behind. Inside, Buffy finds Ethan, who wastes no time in running away. He tries to lose them in the maze of candy bar boxes, but Buffy eventually finds him. Back at the library, the rest of the gang tries to find some useful information, but they can't do much without a good lead. Buffy learns from Ethan that his job was mainly to divert the adults from the main objective, which is to pay tribute to a demon named Lurconis. Oz and Willow discover that Lurconis feeds on babies. Unbeknownst to any of them, a group of vampires walk into the hospital nursery and steal four of the infants there. Buffy and the others are too late in getting to the hospital. However, Giles is able to recall that Lurconis means "glutton", and that they should be able to find him in the sewers. They go down into the sewer tunnels and find the babies, along with Mr. Trick, the other four vampires, and the Mayor. As soon as Buffy and Giles arrive, Mayor Wilkinson immediately flees the scene. While Buffy fights the vampires, Giles and Joyce move the babies out of harm's way. During the battle, Buffy throws one of the vampires into a large pool. A large rumbling soon follows, and Lurconis, a huge serpentine creature, emerges from an opening next to the pool and devours the hapless vampire. Mr. Trick challenges the Slayer to a fight, but her Watcher intervenes and attempts to take on the vampire. Mr. Trick easily tosses Giles into the pool and escapes. With Lurconis coming back for seconds, Buffy detaches a fuel line and ignites the open end on one of the torches that the vampires set up, creating a giant blowtorch. As Lurconis emerges from the opening once again, Buffy roasts the demon, sending it back into its dwelling. Afterwards, Mayor Wilkinson expresses his disappointment in Mr. Trick's failure, warning him not to make the same mistakes again.

      The following Monday morning, all the adults in Sunnydale are back to normal. Buffy laments to Giles after school about the disaster that was her S.A.T. They meet up with Joyce by the jeep, which is still wrecked. Buffy is relieved that she was able to stop Giles and Joyce before they went a little too far with their carefree romance... or so she believes.

Miscellaneous Info

 

Quote of the Week

Giles: Oooo. Copper's got a gun!

My Rating

5/5

My Comments

This was a really fun episode, tons of laugh was had by all and was really enjoyable to watch. Who didn't get a kick out of watching Tony Head acting like a teenager? I thought he did an excellent job of acting (hmm... are we sure he was acting?) like a younger Brit kid. Anybody else notice that his accent changed when he acted younger? Seemed to be more pronounced. As for outfits, Giles actually looked pretty good for a 40 something or 50 something year old. As for Joyce though; NO! She cannot wear knee high boots! I'm still a little bitter that Buffy doesn't wear hers anymore. Unfortunately, Sarah Michelle Gellar's stunt double is starting to get even more obvious. Hello to the platform scene and the scene where she broke the box. I believe that was Sarah Michelle Gellar at the beginning of the episode when she did a roundoff over the grave. There needed to be a lot more of Oz and Angel though. Angel is so not getting enough airtime this season. I'm glad to see that Ethan Rayne came back but unfortunately it didn't seem to develop much between him and Giles. Hopefully, we'll see more of Ethan in the fourth season...

Anyone else nervous about buying any candy from the band?

Cast