He's a Very Good Man. He's Just a Very Bad Werewolf.

I've finally started watching through the Buffy season 4 DVDs and, OK, maybe it's a bit of a comedown after season 3, which was a near-impossible act to follow, but it still has what are probably some of the best individual moments of the entire series. I just finished watching episode six, and, dammit, even on second viewing, Oz still makes me cry. Bastard werewolf. It's interesting, you know... If you listen to the audio commentaries and stuff, Joss Whedon is always going on about how they quickly figured out the secret to getting the audience emotionally involved: hurt poor little Willow and let Alyson Hannigan cut loose with the big sad weepy eyes in her adorable lil' face. It really, truly is blatant manipulation, and I'm perfectly well aware of it, and it still works on me every damned time. Now that, ladies and gentlemen, is art.

Speaking of commentaries, the commentary track for that particular episode is almost worth the price of the DVDs all by itself. Joss Whedon, Seth Green, and writer Marti Noxon are just having way too much fun, teasing each other and cracking very silly jokes... but also sharing some good insights into the characters and the themes along the way. Joss so needs to do more commentaries. I can't for the life of me figure out why he was so conspicuously absent on the season 3 discs.