Buffy

he expected actors to say the lines he had written for them

isn't this generally how it works?

i know there are directors who believe in improvisation and i imagine most actors enjoy having that extra input/freedom but i kind of thought that was fairly rare. particularly if the person who wrote the script is also the director

Depends on the kind of film/show, comedy that involves the actors riffing off each other obviously has a lot more room for off-the-cuff improv, sometimes to the detriment (e.g. Ghostbusters 2016)

If it's a gazillion dollar superhero movie with a troubled production, and things are already tense and difficult, you could see it causing some problems if some of the cast suddenly decide to go off-script.

xp

I got the impression that at a certain point Whedon lost interest in running a cohesive show or writing solid episodes that progressed the narrative and became more focused on showing that he could do anything he wanted to. Hence, he can write a Lynchian dream episode, or an existentialist drama, or a musical, or in this case, an operatic tragedy, and if the effect on the audience seems gross and manipulative well that’s too bad because he’s going to write his operatic tragedy.

don't forget the puppet episode of Angel

pic.twitter.com/vNBgoRPVOW

— charisma carpenter (@AllCharisma) January 18, 2022

xpost puppet episode was by Ben Edlund, bit of an undervalued contributor to the latter seasons of Angel (and Firefly)

<3 charisma carpenter forever

the Vulture profile was so so satisfying to read...novelistic!

and creator of the tick!!!

xxp

i will stump for williamson, cody, and specific sherman-palladino projects

me too. I know people hated Juno and in fact I can barely remember it, but Cody wrote the very very good Young Adult and Tully, which more than makes up for any other crimes. Also I like GG and Bunheads and yes, Maisel. Fuck you all!

jennifer's body is one of my favorite movies of all time

oh yeah that's good too, forgot about that one. I'd say Diablo Cody is good more often than not.

I do want to see Jennifer’s Body, Juno is horribly written but maybe that one is explicitly going for the grating vibe of the very bad screenwriters then in vogue such as sorkin and williamson

xxpost yeah i agree horeshoe, i thought it was v well written & constructed

Even Kevin Williamson's Dawson's Creek house style is, in retrospect, much less annoying than Whedonism.

lol i somehow didn't know williamson co-developed the vampire diaries, guy cornered the teen trash tv market over two separate decades

i didnt know that either

I love how when people talk about this dork, its like "the all-singing episode!" "the puppet episode!"

Yeah sounds great, sign me up for this shit

Scrubs was pulling that shit all the time too, yo

Yeah, I'm not out here trying to separate the art from the artist on whoever made Scrubs

the guy who made scrubs is bill lawrence who also makes ted lasso

Joss Whedon might be an abusive narcissist but at least he didn't foist Zach Braff upon the world?

it all just sucks

i was a huge fan of every whedon show, esp buffy - for a while i even lurked on the messageboard they reference in the vulture piece

now it’s like i can’t even rewatch an old episode of buffy without thinking of him & all of his bullshit. i dont always struggle separating art from artist but so much of him & his voice is in these shows that it’s almost impossible to even revisit them anymore

and to be clear i’m not saying this in an “oh poor me” way - it’s more just, i’m fucking mad that he has ruined my enjoyment of these shows that i genuinely loved. and that i never knew he was actively ruining them the whole time

I had a class with the professor they mention in the article who started Whedon Studies. He wrote a book about Bukowski!

now it’s like i can’t even rewatch an old episode of buffy without thinking of him & all of his bullshit. i dont always struggle separating art from artist but so much of him & his voice is in these shows that it’s almost impossible to even revisit them anymore

I can see that and it sucks indeed. I have less trouble with it myself as there were so many other people involved in the end products, especially the cast who also separate the art from the artist: see, for example, this which happened very recently. Several cast members -including Charisma Carpenter- fondly talking about the show and their characters.

Has managed to avoid the Whedon-stink more than Firefly for me, put it on today and skipped S1 still just pure fun.

SMG’s memorable smackdown of Whedon makes me retroactively like her performance a bit more

Realise I’ve never seen the second season - jumped on at S3 and never bothered with the first two

second season probably has the best overall season arc, and by far the best spike scenes, but the episode-to-episode execution was the best in season 3

you should def watch season 2, is what i'm saying, but maybe start with the episode called "school hard"

Booo the first episode of season 2 is great, don’t miss it. Also I recommend Welcome To The Hellmouth, The Harvest, Angel, The Puppet Show and Prophecy Girl from Season 1, all quality TV.