Favourite Christmas TV Episodes?

Buffy reaching out to Faith, inviting her to Christmas and Faith acting like she doesn't particularly care one way or the other (though her attempt to be 'festive' shows just how alone she was really feeling).



This rather awkward moment between Buffy and her mother, when Buffy asks whether they should invite her Watcher, Giles, over for Christmas and Joyce is quick to shoot that idea down (still feeling uncomfortable discussing or around Giles after the two of them had sex...on the hood of a police car...TWICE in the episode earlier that season titled 'Band Candy' whilst under the influence of a curse).




That^ was a somewhat amusing awkward moment in the episode, but there was a far more serious/emotional awkward moment later on when Joyce asked an innocent enough question about which Christmas ornament should adorn the top of their Christmas tree...but it takes Buffy's mind someone else. A painful reminder of what she lost after sleeping with Angel and him losing his soul, turning into the monstrous Angelus.



Another great 'serious' moment was when Angel came to Giles for help in trying to figure out what was haunting him. There was so much tension there, since Angel - when he was Angelus - had murdered Giles' girlfriend, Miss Calendar, and left her body for him to find in his house in a very theatrical/cruel manner.






Giles could be quite the 'badass' when he wanted to be.

Thankfully, the episode had some other funny moments to lighten the overall rather 'heavy' mood - like when Oz approached Willow and wanted to talk about getting back together with her (this was after he and Cordelia had caught Willow and Xander kissing in an earlier episode of the season titled 'Lovers Walk'. Their excuse had been 'impending death situation'). Oz was pretty decent with how he'd acted around Willow immediately after the incident, I thought. He never yelled at her or anything, he just wanted space - and he was right on the money when he said that she was just wanting to make herself feel better by wanting to talk after he'd asked for some space. The fact that he approached her in this episode showed he'd had his space and was ready to begin on the road to forgiveness. It also allowed for this rather amusing moment when Willow, eager to show Oz how devoted she was to him, had 'the Barry White working for her' and made a suggestion...

 




Oz continued to show what a great boyfriend he was to Willow, gently informing her that she didn't have to 'prove' anything to him and that he was willing to wait for the right moment for them to 'do that thing' (which would turn out to be in the first half of the two-part Season 3 final).

This was also the episode that introduced us to 'The First' (aka 'The First Evil'). I thought Robia LaMorte did an awesome job of portraying this ancient evil. She was so good at playing something sinister that was disguising itself as Miss Calendar (and other people Angelus had murdered) to torment poor Angel. I don't think any other portrayal of The First ever matched hers.



But the crux of the episode was Buffy and Angel's argument on the hilltop just before sunrise (after The First had convinced Angel he needed to kill himself to pay for everything he'd done). I thought both SMG and David Boreanaz were excellent in this scene, with SMG portraying all of Buffy's conflicting emotions (anger at what Angel-as-Angelus had done to her, along with sadness at the thought of losing him and desperation at trying to convince him to keep fighting) and DB conveying some serious emotions as Angel, who felt so guilty (something the character of Angel excelled at). While some may have considered the miraculous snowfall of convenient timing to be a bit 'cheesy', I thought it suited the episode perfectly and it was a great way to end things - with the two of them walking off hand in hand.