24A) Bad Eggs. WHAT'S IN A NAME?: "The title of the episode obviously refers to the Bezoar eggs, and their nasty habit of possessing people for mama. But it could also mean the Gorch Brothers, who slaughtered and burned a Mexican village...and that was before they turned into blood-sucking demons (see 24Z). A third 'bad egg' could be Buffy herself, who frustrates Joyce no end with her seeming lack of responsibility. Of course, Buffy has a keen sense of responsibility, a testament to Joyce's loving care and perseverance in the face of daunting obstacles. (At this point in the series, Joyce has no idea how big some of those obstacles really are.)"--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:17:57
Teaser
24B) Sunnydale Mall. LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION!: "Buffy and Joyce at the mall. A rare location shoot for our mother/daughter team; we'd revisit the mall one more time this season for the climax of Innocence..."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
"The stores we see are B. Dalton's, a chain bookstore, and Dairy Queen, which now sells hamburgers and fries, as well as the frozen custard cones and sundaes which gave it it's name. We also see a piece of a sign with the word Robinson. This is Robinson May, part of the May department store chain, which includes Famous-Barr in the St. Louis area, and Lazarus in Ohio."--Cactus Watcher, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:57:16
24C) "You looked like a streetwalker." LINKAGE: "Subsequently reversed with Dawn's seduction costume in Him."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02
24D) "Why don't you just go to Muu-Muus R Us?" POP CULTURE TIME: This is a parody of the American chain of toy and clothing stores for children: Toys R Us, Kids R Us, and Babies R Us.
24*2) ...and then notices that the cowboy's reflection is missing from the mirrors... BUFFYVERSE MYTHOLOGY: See 11CC.
24E) She walks around one side of a bank of game machines... FUN N' GAMES: "The arcade. A place of childhood games, and one of a number of times this episode that adolescent love/lust and the symbols of childhood are linked. The Scoobs and the other teenagers in Sunnydale High are just starting on the long road to adulthood, with the awakening sex drive the first, most conspicuous sign."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
24F) "Lyle Gorch. Pleased to meet cha!" CONTINUITY CHECK: "Lyle…later reappear[s] in Homecoming."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41 See 39UU.
24G) "Honestly, don't you ever think about anything besides boys and clothes?" DOUBLE LIVES: "Not at all fair- although Joyce doesn't know it. This teaser is one of the baldest examples of the continual balancing act Buffy has to pull off- pretending to be a normal girl, and fulfilling Slayer duties."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
24H) "Saving the world from vampires?" DEBATEY GOODNESS: "This is one of many moments which tend to suggest that Buffy's past stay in the mental institution, that was mentioned in Normal Again, was part of the demon-induced delusion (see 3NN). It would be difficult to believe, Buffy constantly joking at something that got her put in a mental institution, and also difficult to believe this scene would be Joyce's reaction to such joking."--Cactus Watcher, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:57:16
"There seems to be general agreement that Buffy would never joke with Joyce about vampires if she had spent some time in a mental hospital, but I don't know... In my family, such a thing would never be uttered again. But my former sister-in-law, for example, used to make comments all the time that floored me. She would make slightly nervous jokes about incidents like, oh, getting arrested at the age of fifteen, for example. Her mother tended to ignore her. Buffy has a tendency to say just the wrong thing when she's nervous. I could imagine her making 'me and my vampire fixation' jokes even knowing that that would be the worst possible thing to say to her mom. Eventually, Joyce would learn to ignore her - after all, Buffy wasn't insisting that vampires were real, she was just making an uncomfortable joke at her own expense."--dream of the consortium, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 09:37:03
"This is especially true of something disquieting like mental illness. The 'problem' person may say something like 'but, as everyone knows, I'm crazy' and most family members will ignore this or even make some light remark ('I don't know why you say such things'). The 'crazy' person will usually stop talking about it and everyone will pretend the conversation didn't happen. So, in my view...there isn't any inconsistency between early episodes and Buffy's statement about the clinic."--Ixchel, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 14:49:36
"I think the point is that...[some people who have been institutionalized want others] to know about their experiences. Buffy doesn't. She's just bad at keeping secrets. (Which is another reason to distrust the story in Normal Again.) She's not always purposely bringing up the subject (as she certainly does in this ep) for a running joke, and she's not trying to challenge her mother by throwing the institutionalization in her face. And I think...that [if this were true, Joyce's]...reaction to that topic from...[Buffy would be different if no one] else was around. Joyce's reaction to Buffy's babbling always is the same."--Cactus Watcher, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 20:15:49 See 23CC, 28GGG, 30ZZ, 34JJ, 34YY, 34ZZ, 34BBB, and 35WW.
Act
One
24I)
"We're repulsed by each other, we,...we hide from our friends..."
STAYING IN THE CLOSET: "More closet groping for Xander
and Cordy, continuing their hidden hormonal attraction. They're trying to deal
with their feelings and what it means to their lives outside the closet. The
argument spills over into classroom."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
Cordy and Xander hiding in the closet is also a subtle reference to the phrase, "in the closet," which refers to a gay person who has not yet revealed his secret to everybody and thus "come out of the closet." "Come out of the closet" can also be used for someone revealing any long-kept secret.
24J) ...and their hands meet there. FROM THE ORIGINAL SHOOTING SCRIPT: "Their hands touch. That's all it takes. They're all over each other - wild with...inexplicable...passion."--"Bad Eggs" by Marti Noxon, available through Pocketbooks, Inc. as Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Script Book, Season Two, Volume 2
24K) Cut to teen health class. FROM THE ORIGINAL SHOOTING SCRIPT: "There are posters an the wall about vegetables, teen pregnancy, that sort of stuff. Mr. Whitmore is pacing while the assembled class looks on."--"Bad Eggs" by Marti Noxon, available through Pocketbooks, Inc. as Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Script Book, Season Two, Volume 2
24L) "...it's often difficult to remember that there *are* negative consequences to, uh, having sex." FORESHADOWY GOODNESS: Which Buffy will learn first-hand in the upcoming two-parter, Surprise/Innocence.
24M) "Because I have a friend, not me, that was in a Miata..." CORDY VIRGINAL?: "Is Cordy a virgin? Her little story suggests that the mover and shaker in Expecting (Angel S1) probably wasn't her 'first.'"--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46 See 18F, 21Qx4, and 27Q.
24N) "What about the heartbreak of halitosis?" TWISTY LANGUAGE: Halitosis is a term for chronic bad breath. Xander here is riffing on the phrase, "the heartbreak of psoriasis." Psoriasis is a skin disease marked by itchy, red, scaly patches and cuts.
24O) Cordelia is incensed. FROM THE ORIGINAL SHOOTING SCRIPT: "ON CLASS Who are all intently watching them. Xander and Cordy suddenly realize they are in the spotlight. Oops."--"Bad Eggs" by Marti Noxon, available through Pocketbooks, Inc. as Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Script Book, Season Two, Volume 2
24P) "I present you with...your offspring." WHO'S THE BOSS?: "This episode is a new spin on the idea of young people playing parents. Often, eggs are used, as they are easy to break, and therefore must be looked after especially careful. In Anne Fine's book Flour Babies, the children in a secondary school class adopt a bag of flour. While this leads to some powerful emotional occurrences, it is surely only in the Buffyverse that the pretend children could possess their surrogate parents."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
"The class where the eggs come from is a Health Class - where the assignment is to become a parent to your egg. I never took this class in school - but most of my friends did. I remember them wandering about with their egg kids, some made clothes for them, painted eyes and mouths on them. They woul partner up and be parents. In BtVS - the eggs take over the kids. Instead of the kids killing the eggs, the eggs do the reverse. The metaphor is great."--shadowkat, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 09:33:35
"Some American high schools have gone beyond eggs to introduce computerized artificial babies that scream and need changing and feeding at regular intervals. Reportedly, a number have actually been thrown from upper-storey windows..."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02
24Q) "Then teach it that Dreidel song." JEWISH VALUES: "Xander shows how deep his friendship with Willow runs when he mentions a tune traditionally sung during the 8-day Jewish festival of Chanukah (the festival of lights). I imagine Xander spending a whole lot of time at the Rosenbergs during December, in a valiant attempt to avoid his own dysfunctional household during Christmas-time. A dreidl, by the way, is a four-sided top marked with Hebrew letters, spun for fun in a children's game of chance during Chanukah. Willow teaching her child the dreidl song is yet another combination of children's toys and looming adult responsibility."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
Other examples of Xander being down with Jewish culture: See 16B and 20P.
24R) "I can't do this! I can't take care of things!" MOTHERHOOD: See 3Q.
24S) "I killed my Giga Pet." STUPID VIRTUAL PET TRICKS: "A fortunately short-lived obsession, the Giga-pet was copied from the original Japanese 'tamagotchi's. The small, irritating and pointless mini-computers would act as pets, making you feed, walk and play with them for appropriate amounts of time. If you neglected your duty, they would become ill, or in the worst case scenario die."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
24T) "Do you know what this says about me? That I am doomed to lead my mother's life!" FORESHADOWY GOODNESS: "No truer words ever spoken. Buffy becomes a single mom in Season 5 after Joyce dies and leaves Buffy as sole caregiver to Dawn."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
24U) "That's, um, Lyle Gorch, and that one's his brother, Tector." POP CULTURE TIME: "Lyle and Tector Gorch are the names of two characters in Sam Peckipah's notoriously ultraviolent western The Wild Bunch. Lyle was played by Warren Oates and Tector by Ben Johnson."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02
"There's a good case for this film being an influence on Joss -- aside from the Firefly-esque outlaws living by their own moral code theme, two of the gang are named Pike [the name of Buffy's boyfriend in the movie] and Angel. Anyone who's seen the bloody climax of The Wild Bunch would say that Giles' description of the Gorch's wiping out an entire Mexican village is pretty accurate."--ponygirl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 12:12:07 See 2JJ and 2KK.
24V)
"That was before they became vampires." BUFFYVERSE
VAMPS: This is one of the rare instances on either show where vampires
were known to be evil in their former human lives prior to being vamped. See
2LL.
24W)
"Hey, maybe you can have Angel help you find the Gorches." WILLOW--THE
#1 B/A SHIPPER!: "Willow is deeply into the breathless, romantic
love between Angel and Buffy; Xander is a little less enthusiastic. Turns out,
Xander has a point: lots of smoochies, not much hunting. If Buffy and Angel
had acted responsibly, and devoted even thirty seconds to the hunt, they would
have spotted the Gorches watching them."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
24X)
"You know, this isn't hunting in the classical sense." THERE'S
THAT WORD AGAIN: See 12I and
19L.
24Y) The Gorch brothers are crouched on top, watching them. FROM THE ORIGINAL SHOOTING SCRIPT: "As in the picture, Lyle's older brother, TECTOR, is a large, graceless guy. He's not the sharpest tool in the shed - but what he lacks in brains he makes up for in sheer, brutish power. Like Lyle, he speaks with a Texas drawl."--"Bad Eggs" by Marti Noxon, available through Pocketbooks, Inc. as Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Script Book, Season Two, Volume 2
24Z) "Ain't that Angelus with her?" BUFFYVERSE MYTHOLOGY: "It seems fairly frequent canon that although Angelus is well known, his souling is not widely known among other vamps even a century later. One suspects that Darla kept it secret out of sheer embarrassment."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02
24AA) "I'm the one that does the thinkin', 'member?" FROM THE ORIGINAL SHOOTING SCRIPT: In the original script, Lyle follows this line by saying, "Don't I always take care of you?" which was excised from the final product, perhaps because too many overt signs of affection between the two brothers might make them too sympathetic.--"Bad Eggs" by Marti Noxon, available through Pocketbooks, Inc. as Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Script Book, Season Two, Volume 2
Act Two
24*1) "Ain't a decent whore in the whole city limits." WHORE-IBLE: "Echo back to Joyce's 'streetwalker' comment in the teaser (see 24C). The continued prostitution theme complements the theme of sex being discussed in class (see 24L)."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
24BB) "Burden that you were, maybe I shoulda left you on that doorstep when Momma blew town." LOYALTY: Interestingly, in an episode about the fears of parenting, we are presented with two villains who were abandoned by their mother when they were children. One can even theorize that their lives took the dark courses that they did because of their lack of a mother figure. On the flip side, it did cause the brothers to grow fiercely loyal to each other, so even now, centuries after being sired, they still presumably act and behave in the same love/hate brotherly relationship they did when they were human. See 2LL and 2MM.
24CC) "Wait till it starts dating." FORESHADOWY GOODNESS: "Of course, the first time Dawn starts seriously exploring her sexuality, the lucky man will be a vampire [in All the Way]," not to mention the strife Joyce goes through upon finding out about Buffy's relationship with the seemingly stalkerish Angel in Passion.--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02, with some additions by Rob
24DD) "...but sometimes you gotta be cruel to be kind!" THE PLAY'S THE THING: "Phrase dropped into common usage from Shakespeare. It comes from Hamlet, Act Three, Scene Four. Interestingly, although there appears to be some truth in the idea, considering the aphorism's popularity, Hamlet is really using it only as a (lame) excuse to himself. He has just stabbed Polonius mistakenly in front of the Queen his mother, and tries to justify it as being necessary in order to kill Claudius and restore equilibrium to the castle. Here, Xander is using the phrase in a similarly ridiculous way."--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
24EE) "I suppose there is a sort of...Machiavellian ingenuity to your transgression." THE ARTIST FORMERLY KNOWN AS PRINCE: Niccolo Machiavelli was a "famous Italian statesman and political theorist of the sixteenth century. Machiavelli viewed human nature as corrupt, greedy, and self-serving. In his famous treatise, The Prince, he argued based on this 'reality' that governments should be cunningly self-serving as well. To maintain his rule, a monarch must be stingy rather than generous (or greedy), harsh rather than merciful, feared rather than loved (or hated). However, to prevent his overthrow, a monarch's subjects should perceive him as ethical, merciful, and humane. The word 'Machiavellian' is now often used to mean self-serving and deceitful."--Masquerade, "As You Were" Analysis, from http://www.atpobtvs.com
CONTINUITY CHECK: "Xander's short-cut is so very typical of our Mr. Harris. The worst example of this is his summoning of Sweet in Once More, With Feeling, when Xander attempts to bypass all the hard work of relationships and cut to the happy ending."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
24FF) "Well, his body could fall out of a closet somewhere." LINKAGE: Cordy and Xander's excuse that they are going to search through the school closets, when they're actually just sneaking off to make out is later echoed in Once More, With Feeling, when Willow and Tara sneak out the same way, saying they have to find a magical "volumey text."
This is also an "oblique reference to [both] Welcome to the Hellmouth, where a body falls out of...[Aura]'s locker" and Teacher's Pet, when Cordy discovers the headless Dr. Gregory shoved in a fridge.--Tchaikovsky, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:50:41
24GG) "Are they getting weirder?" GETTING WARMER...: "Of course, the Xander/Cordelia ship is unlikely, but this little incident following their discussion during the sex-ed class leaves Buffy and Willow looking very slow on the uptake."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02
24HH) "I don't... Well, you know, I, I can't." BUFFYVERSE MYTHOLOGY: See 1V and 11DDD.
24II) "Angel, when I look into the future, a-a... all I see is you! All I want is you." EVER AFTER?: "Angel and Buffy's first discussion of their future together, and the first hints that it's not going end happily ever after. (The camera pans off the happy couple to a gravestone that reads 'In Loving Memory.') Angel eventually leaves in Season 3, the main reason being that he can't give Buffy a normal life or children. Ironically, Angel would father a child in S3 of his own series with Darla."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
24JJ) ...a purplish-gray thing with tentacles is curled up inside of it. ...NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU SCREAM: The "baby Bazoar, of course, resembles the first-stage creepy crawly that burst out of John Hurt in [the 1979 film classic] Alien."--cjl, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 00:11:46
"I personally think that the parasitic bezoar form looks less like the creature from Alien and more like the similar mind-controlling parasites that appeared in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and the different but similar entities in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode Conspiracy."--KdS, Thurs, 02/27/03 at 07:55:02