Quiet! You'll Miss the Humorous Conclusion!

Episode 4.22: Restless. Original Airdate 5.23.00

Men with your...SALES

"Buffy, Willow, Xander, and Giles experience dreams in which they are pursued by a mysterious figure."

Zelda's Thoughts:

• Oh, no pre-credits scene. I forgot about that. Weird.
• Awww remember VHS you guys?
• "It's the feel-good movie of whatever year it was."
• D'awwww they're all asleep they're so cute my babies.
• Oh right that was the teaser, get all the credits out of the way before the dreams begin.
• Man, this episode is so good. So many different textures.
• Also the music. So good.
• Awwww it's Oz. My Oz!
• The lockers and the late bell here at the University of Contrivance are the first clues about Willow's concern that she's still who she was in high school
• AAHHHHH I LOVE THIS SEQUENCE (apologizing now, there's so much of this ep that I love, I'm going to try to do analysis, but I may just flail a lot)
• "Your whole family's in the front row and they look really angry!" I love how much fun the actors are clearly having in this, SMG as the flapper, MB as Cowboy Guy.

• Giles as the director is perfect.
• "It's about hiding ... It's all about subterfuge." Hey remember when Buffy had that dream at the top of Hush that spelled out that we would be exploring communication in that episode?
• Props? No. Props? Yes.

• I fucking love it. I love it so much. I forgot how much I love this sequence because most of what I remember of Willow's dream is the Tara stuff.
• Oh look it's the Cheese Man, Joss's biggest laugh at his audience he ever achieved.
• "The play's already started, that's not the point." I wanted to say something really thought out and interesting about this line, because it's always struck me, and I am just blanking. I have been staring at the screen for half an hour, blank blank blank. But maybe it was something about how in Willow's mind, it's not just that she's been pretending for years to not be who she used to be, but that she's convinced everyone else is pretending too, at least on some level. She still doesn't know everything about Tara, Buffy doesn't share when things get hard, Oz left and she doesn't know if she'll ever see him again, Giles is the patriarch but he's been so directionless this season, and here he is a director who can't seem to give a coherent speech. Oh look I said a thing after all. Okay, go me!
• "I've coming lookin' for a man. A SALESman."
• This is the best acting Riley has done all season.
• Buffy's rant. Perfect.
• Also who's the dead guy on the floor? Just curious.
• "You must have done something." // "No, I rarely do anything. I'm very seldom naughty." Willow's lack of self awareness, ladies and germs! We'll see it out in full force in season six.
• Aw little baby S1 Willow! Even the hair!
• "It's exactly like a Greek tragedy." - shout out to the Scoobies' performance at the end of Puppet Show, the last time Willow attempted acting.
• Oh man I love the fake Apocalypse Now script. "Men? Oh my god, what's happened to my men? Aaaaaaaaah!"
• "I remember that it gets better." Xander about his liiiiiiiife.
• "What's her deal?" // "Big faker." Buffy summarizes the fear inherent in Willow's dream in two words, that nothing she does is the real her.
• "It's all about the journey, isn't it." Heyo, thesis for Xander's life (since it's certainly not about actual achievements, is it)
• Poor Xander. All doors lead to the basement, the one place he's most desperate to escape. "That's not the way out." I quote this line a lot, for no particular reason beyond I like the cadence of it.
• "Go on, put your back into it! A Watcher scoffs at gravity!"
• The simple absurdity of Giles and Spike on swings is just so charming to me.

• Also that was totally a Parking lot! Do a shot! scene.
• I suppose it makes sense that now that Xander knows about Willow and Tara, they'd show up in his dream and make out.
• "I've figured out how to steer by gesturing emphatically." If I could do that, I might finally get my drivers license.
• This scoooooooooooooooooore as he climbs through the set - back to the basement. Poor Xander.
• "I know what's up there!" Yeah, his dysfunctional family, the thing he fears to become, which will come back into play in S6. It's so upsetting.
• "These will not protect you."
• I love that we are still trying to explain things through the dream. "It's because of what we did, I know that." Within each subsequent dream, the other dreams are acknowledged and the Scoobies are still trying to solve it. I love it I love it and also sneaky way to give the audience a modicum of exposition in case we're completely lost because what the fuck is the cheese man.
• I remember enough French to know that Giles just called Xander an idiot.
• So this sequence is all Apocalypse Now-homage, yeah? Yeah
• SNYDER. OMG IT'S SNYDER. SNYDER I MISS YOU.
• "Where you from, Harris?" // "Well, the basement, mostly." Poor Xander. This sequence is making me feel really bad for Xander. He so clearly feels doomed to mediocrity.
• "Well, I'm supposed to meet Tara and Willow ... and possibly Buffy's mom."
• I seriously I just I love Snyder so much.
• It's the great connector-set sequence! All the sets are connected!
• But it still leads back to the basement.
• Oh hey apparently Xander's dad is Healy from Orange is the New Black! Also that dude from True Detective which I just watched in one day a few weeks ago. True story.
• "This is the way women and men have behaved since the beginning." It's both birds and the bees and the history of the Watchers and Slayers and I'd rather go with the latter so we don't go Greek tragedy with the Buffy/Giles relationship, 'kay? 'Kay.
• Buffy as the cute precocious daughter is the cutest effing thing.
• "Buffy you have a sacred birthright to protect mankind. Don't stick out your elbow."
• Oh oh Buffy's got the First Slayer face paint on.
• Spike striking poses, so cute. Kind of weird and random as part of Giles's psyche, but ... I dunno. I still enjoy it.

• "I wear the cheese, it does not wear me."
• "Honestly, you meet the most appalling sort of people." feels like an Alice in Wonderland allusion
• The Bronze! Haven't seen you in ages.
• Anya's joke. Is just. Yes. "Quiet! You'll miss the humorous conclusion."
• "I have a gig myself, you know." YES GILES WILL SING
• "That used to be us." // "Don't get linear on me now." metaaaaaaaaa
• YAY HE'S SINGING
• YES
• YES
• Everyone agrees with me
• If only he would clean those glasses he just took off
• I'VE GOT TO WARN BUFFY. THERE'S EVERY CHANCE SHE MIGHT BE NEXT.
• Giles is an actual rock star. It's a thing now.
• Buffy's turn!
• I wonder what the significance is of Anya being in Willow's bed. I mean, Joss may have just randomly wanted Anya to be there instead of Willow, because Willow is mostly with Tara now, but I still don't really get why she would be there? She and Buffy are never close. Whatever. This episode is inciting me to over analyze.
• Aw Buffy's old bedroom.
• It makes sense that most of the intentional foreshadowing is in Buffy's dream. She used to have all those prophetic dreams back in S1.
• Poor Joyce in the wall
• "Coffee makers that think."
• "A lot of filing, giving things names" gonna take that as a shout  out to biblical Adam
• "This could be trouble." / "We'd better make a fort." Reference to the boys and their toys, and to their complete lack of understanding of the scope of what they're fighting. Buffy has to be the grown up. "Wait, I have weapons!" she whispers after them.
• This is so pretty. Buffy in her sweet floral dress and sandals, against the desert mountains, alone in the harsh sunlight
• Tara's getting a lot of work this episode. Just ... not as herself.
• "You're not in my dream." // "I was borrowed."
• "The Slayer?" // "The first."
• I love Buffy's speeeeeeeech.
• "That's it, I'm waking up." Yeah, was the Cheese Man the last straw for you, Buffs?
• Here's how you know Buffy has truly defeated the dream that's trying to kill her - rolling her eyes and breaking out the sass.
• "You're not the source of me. Also, in terms of hair care, you really wanna ..."
• "I said there could be dire consequences." // "Yes but you say that about chewing too fast"
• I love their look of dawning horror when Buffy refers to the Cheese Man. Like it might actually have been significant. Meanwhile Joss is cackling to himself.
• BE BACK BEFORE DAWN, EVERYONE.

Daniel's Thoughts:

• No teaser. Straight to the credits!
• Last episode with “Emma Caulfield as Anya”! Cause she’ll be in the credits!
• Hey Joyce! Remember her?
• Did Xander just call Buffy’s mom “Joyce?”
• Hey videos! 90s thing! If we were still tracking 90s things…
• Buffy snorted in her sleep :)
• Willow’s dream first:
• OMG MISS KITTY I LOVE YOU AND YOUR KITTINESS
• This is really sexy, this scene. I love the drawing on Tara’s back. It looks so cool.

Tara just looks so gorgeous here

• I love the way Joss writes dreams. He’s so good at it. I have such a problem with the way people write dreams. It always reads false but this is so good.
• OZ!
• "Spells" is code. For Lesbian sex.
• IVE HAD THIS DREAM. THE ACTOR’S NIGHTMARE DREAM.
• Harmony!

• Buffy looks amazing with a black bob. --->
• RILEYS A COWBOY! BECAUSE THAT’S HOW WILLOW SEES HIM.
• He’s cowboy guy!
• Cheese man! – Because there’s always that one thing in dreams that doesn’t need to make sense.
• “I come looking for a man. A salesman.”
• Omg, this whole Buffy monologue. MEN WITH YOUR SALES. Omg, I love everything about this episode.
• The rooms turn into other rooms and the scenes turn into other scenes because that’s how dreams work!
• Wow. The costumes are so good. Kudos, wig department. Willow looks exactly like season 1 Willow.
• Even dream Xander is a dick.
• Oh man…well that’s a fear….ex boyfriend and current girlfriend getting it on….

• Xander’s dream! Xander in Apocalypse Now!
• Joyce in a nightie. Ahh…and it comes back. He called her Joyce and then corrected himself to Mrs. Summers. I guess that opening “Joyce” was on purpose.
• Stop being sexy, Joyce!
• Hahahah. I love that moment….Xander going to the bathroom and the initiative watching.
• Spike and Giles on swings!
• Like a shark with feet, but much less fins. Is that a play on words regarding Riley Finn? Probably not.
• I love this moment of Xander watching himself and the really bad fake greenscreen.
• “I’ve been thinking of getting back into vengeance”. A fear of Xander's.  Unintended foreshadowing?
• Oh the straight male fantasy that lesbians are somehow interested in them.
• You can write a dissertation on the fact that when the women are interested in Xander, you can hear them speak without them moving their lips. It's like he's putting words in their mouths; the words he wants to hear. It's also interesting that Buffy calls him brother and Anya, his current girlfriend doesn’t proposition him at all.
• STEERING BY GESTURING EMPHATICALLY. I love Anya.

• Oh the French! The purposeful bad dubbing like the bad green screen. It’s cool because it’s a reference to all the movies Xander watches. I wish I studied French more. I understood some of that.
• And more of the bad greenscreen. Apocalypse Nowish.
• IT’S PRINCIPAL SNYDER! I’m so glad Joss found a way to bring him back – even if it was just for one dream episode.
• Oh, the doors and the sets leading to one another. This must have been fun, yet really really hard for the set people to set up because it’s just one long shot. It’s Brilliant.
• Interesting that the first time we see Xander’s dad is in a dream. The line, “Are you ashamed of us” is telling.
• Giles’s dream!
• Giles hypnotizing Buffy. Guilt from Helpless.
• Olivia! It’s so cute, Giles thinking of He and Buffy as a family. With Olivia in tow.
• Hey! The Bronze!
• Yay! Anya’s joke! "Quiet! You’ll miss the humorous conclusion!"
• Yay! Foreshadowing for Giles singing!
• Giles’ dream is a bit deeper.
• Buffy’s dream!
• The first two people Buffy meets in her dream is Anya & Tara which I think is interesting.
• “You think you know…what’s to come…what you are…you haven’t even begun.” What a great line to let the audience know if they love Buffy, they ain’t seen nothing yet.
• Mom in the wall, metaphor for leaving her home all season.
• Adam out of costume!
• “The demons have escaped. Run for you lives.” Heh.
• Xander appears briefly but he, Willow & Giles barely enter Buffy’s dream which is telling. Because losing them is the one thing she’s so terrified of.
• And Buffy’s the one that realizes she’s dreaming.
• The music is so good in this fight scene.
• “I’m going to ignore you and you’re going to go away.” That’s how you kill Freddy too! At least in the first one…

Favorite Lines:

Daniel: "But what else could I expect from a bunch of low-rent, no-account hoodlums like you? Hoodlums, yes, I mean you and your friends, your whole sex. Throw 'em in the sea for all I care. Throw 'em in and wait for the bubbles. Men, with your groping and spitting. All groin, no brain. Three billion of ya' passin' around the same worn out urge. Men... with your sales." - Buffy
Zelda: "I walk. I talk. I shop, I sneeze, I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out, and I don't sleep on a bed of bones." - Buffy

Arc/Continuity Stuff:

• First appearance: The First Slayer, Xander's Dad (recast later)
• Recurring: Joyce, Tara, Miss Kitty Fantastico, Oz, Anya, Harmony, Snyder, Olivia, Adam
• Foreshadowing (intentional): "You don't know everything about me" (Tara), "Oh that clock's completely wrong" (Buffy's death clock), "You think you know, what's to come, what you are. You haven't even begun" (Buffy's interaction with Dracula, but also the origins of the Slayer line), "Be back before Dawn" (No clue, any ideas?), "We're not demons."/"Is that a fact?" (more on the Slayer origins)
• Foreshadowing (unintentional): Spike's Randy Giles suit, being like a son to Giles, and a shark with feet, much less fins, and on land, Anya thinking about going back into vengeance
• Reference to Willow's intention to take a Drama class. 
• Apparently the bag that Buffy gets the mud to paint her face with is the same bag Principal Wood brings, from his Mother, with the Slayer's heritage (we think?)
• Reference to Madame Butterfly, Willow's old nightmare, as well as to a Greek Tragedy, her only experience with performing.
• Joyce flirting with Xander as a callback to Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered. 
• Giles hypnotizes Buffy (reference to Helpless)
• Reference to the bed Buffy made with Faith in Faith's dream

Stats:

Anya's Hair - blonde, honey-colored
Xander's Job - Ice Cream Truck Driver (within the dream)
Dead Humans - 0
Dead Undeads - 0
Giles Unconscious - 0 (Dreams don't count)
Giles Cleans His Glasses - 0
Buffy Breaks a Door - 0
Evil Reveal - 0
Unevil Reveal - 0
Shenanigans Called -0
Apocalypse Called - 0