In "Beer Bad," episode 5 of Season 4, Buffy is depressed after breakup with boyfriend Parker, who has dumped her after a one-night-stand. Depressed, Buffy starts hanging out in the local bar where Xander works, and soon begins to drown her sorrows in beer with some philosophy students.
The beer is literally a "brew" called "Black Frost" that has been hexed by vampires to turn the local kids into Neanderthals. Thus, College Buffy turns into Cave Slayer, and is taken home to her dorm by Xander. Meanwhile, Willow decides to put glib Parker in his place by letting him believe she can be seduced, then criticizing his way with women. But they both get trapped after the Cave Boys rush in and start a fire in the coffee shop. Buffy rescues them, but later knocks Parker on the head with a stick, showing she has her mojo back and he can't make her feel bad anymore.
This is one of my favorite episodes of Buffy. It's a cautionary tale about boys and alcohol, capturing the archetypal college experience of getting dumped by a boyfriend, feeling alone, and seeking solace at a bar with strangers. Drugs and alcohol make everyone act differently, so this script takes that to a new level with the cave-dweller imagery. Some fans and critics have called it a preachy message, and resented that Buffy "caved" in to depression and self-doubt, but I think the episode works best for people with a sense of humor. Lighten up and be entertained! If this happened on Gilligan's Island, people would just laugh. Wait a minute, it did happen on Gilligan's Island!
The Buffy Guide has some cool insight:
There are traces of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, in which Jekyll drank a potion which unleashed his monstrous dark side. The cave guys, which remind us of the apes in 2001: A Space Odyssey, are a pretty stereotypical depiction of the common-man's concept of cave men and Neanderthals.
From a BBC Interview with Producer Doug Petrie:
Doug Petrie: Beer Bad. Again, light and fluffy, as we say. It came from the brain of Tracy Forbes, a Canadian writer who was on our staff. We were just trying to mine the college experience as much as possible and what happens there. Well, very young people get unlimited access to alcohol and become horrible! We all do it - or most of us do it - and live to regret it, and we wanted to explore that. So the metaphor of college boys - intellectual college boys who drink and become Neanderthals - is pretty straight up. It's a metaphor.
BBC : At this point in the season we are seeing the fallout from the relationship between Buffy and Parker too.
Doug Petrie: We did want - and Joss wanted - a kind of harsh college experience. Of giving your heart and body to someone when you're not experienced in either, and having them use you and split, you know.
BBC : Do you think it was very cut and dried who was right and who was wrong, or do you think Parker to a certain extent had a point: that Buffy shouldn't have got so emotionally involved?
Doug Petrie: I think in reality the right and wrong of it is very fuzzy. I think that on our show Parker was portrayed as a little more... I think that those things do happen and I think that Parker had a little bit of a responsibility to listen to Buffy and he owed her at least a good solid conversation, and I think he just kind of blew her off. Also, the fans had a very strong response to it. We were surprised. I'm pretty sure from the internet and from what I've heard, the fans just hated it.
BBC : Hated what?
Doug Petrie: That Buffy was jumping into a relationship and that this guy would treat her so callously. But also we were getting a lot of stuff from the first half dozen or so episodes of the first quarter of the season where people were saying, "We're tired of Buffy being abused and Buffy being wimpy and Buffy being battered about by the forces of college." There was a pretty strong fan response. They felt that she was being kicked around by Spike, by Sunday, and by Parker, Not at all the strong character that people love to see.
This was a very conscious choice - we had to ride that out because we didn't want her to find her strength immediately in this new setting. But fans were pretty outspoken about how to find her sea legs now and eventually she did.
Episode Clips - notice Buffy's hair, which earned the stylist an Emmy nomination!
Music:
Kim Ferron ~ Nothing but You
Xander plays this on the Jukebox
Luscious Jackson ~ Ladyfingers
This is the Video Buffy watches on TV
"I want pretty people."
THC ~ Overfire
Oz's werewolf friend Veruca plays this with her fake TV band "Shy"
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