I almost hate to admit it, but I kind of understand the temptation to put cowboy vampires (vampire cowboys?) in Buffy … at some point. Maybe not in this episode, which is the Buffy equivalent of when you try to make pasta sauce out of whatever’s in your cupboard and while it might technically contain tomatoes, at least, and hold together in some way, that doesn’t mean it was a good idea.

“Ted” is a character episode, and another moment for Buffy to be right (eventually). To get a win — if one that comes after a lot of struggle. This is either the show building her up before it tears her down so cruelly, or giving her a cushion of confidence from which to bounce back from Angel’s impending betrayal. Which it looks like to you is probably some sort of Buffy Rorschach test: do you see cruelty, or kindness?

This two-parter was Marti Noxon’s first appearance as a writer for the show. Her episodes are not universally perfect (“Bad Eggs” is rushing down the pike at us), and Noxon took a lot of the blame for the things fans hated about season six… But given how often I’ve noticed that Buffy’s weakest episodes are written by, well, men, Noxon’s appearance here, in a two-parter dedicated to bolstering Buffy’s sense of chosen-one self-worth, is more than notable; it’s a sort of signpost, indicating the kind of influence Noxon will have on the show as the seasons progress.

Joyce gets left out too often in early Buffy, which is less than ideal but also understandable from a Slayer perspective; she and Buffy have already had 16 years to try to see each other as people, and we’re picking that up mid-process. The Slayer is busy finding her Slayer footing, and looking to her Watcher for advice and guidance. And she has to come to see her Watcher as a full, flawed human—a human who’s made mistakes, and reinvented himself, and may continue to do both—as well.

“Lie to Me” is an odd one. Is Ford’s story sad, or is he a creep? Does Buffy essentially murder him when she leaves him in the club, or does she give him what she wants? Is that the same thing? And, on the nitpicky level, did Spike turn Ford on purpose, to torture Buffy? Or did that little bit of vampire mythology—the whole big sucking thing—get a little handwaved, this time around?

In the Buffyverse, Halloween is amateur night. Fake ghouls and goblins only; the real ones take the night off. Except when they don’t. The episode’s cold open is all Buffy, fighting a random vamp (her stunt double’s hair has improved notably!) while another vamp lurks in the shadows, filming so Spike can study up on his new Slayer opponent. Smart man.

Over the course of Buffy’s first season, I — sometimes to my own surprise — found redeeming qualities in even some of the least-respected episodes. At the very least, something like “I Robot, You Jane” made me think about the state of the internet circa 1997, which, oddly enough, is something I rarely tire of thinking about. “Inca Mummy Girl” has very, very little to recommend it.

The bad guy who enjoys being who and what he is is hardly a Buffy invention, but it’s something this show needed. And Spike, despite Giles’ later discovery of the history of his name (note: we never actually see him use railroad spikes on anyone), isn’t just living for torture and biting people and random cruelty. Sure, he might enjoy a spot of it now and again. But he’ll enjoy other things, too. Like Drusilla.

Buffy, having worked out (some of) her issues, is doing a lot better this week. Now that I’m really watching for it, it will be interesting to see how/if this season remembers the level of trauma it started with. Memory tells me it’s hit or miss but mostly miss, but memory has been faulty before. Memory also thought this episode was terrible, and it’s not. Its plot is terrible, but around the edges there’s some delightful character work and the occasional perfect snappy Buffy dialogue.

PREVIOUSLY, ON BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER… all of season one happened, Buffy died, the Master died, Buffy didn't stay dead, Angel and Giles made some dubious choices about trying to protect Buffy, and it’s all better now, because did we mention dead Master?

When the internet shitstorm in which I live (we all have our own, don’t we?) pushed the pause button on politics long enough to talk about the Whedon News, I cursed my procrastinating self even more than usual. I would’ve liked to have thought about “Prophecy Girl” before that, as small a concern as that is, in the grand scheme of things. But in that grand scheme of things, I was not terribly surprised.

“Out of Mind, Out of Sight” is a very Cordelia episode for season one—in fact, it opens on Cordy, who loves spring, primarily because it gives her the chance to campaign to be the May Queen. She’s a peculiar genius at making things about herself, from the very turning of the seasons to The Merchant of Venice. “Shylock should get over himself,” she opines, in a glorious moment of obliviousness.

“Nightmares” is one of season one's stronger entries, though it doesn’t hang together perfectly. It feels a bit like two halves of different sandwiches; they line up, but they still don't match. (One of those halves is the Master, and the other half is the nightmare plot, in which the Master essentially has a meaningful cameo.)

“So, we think school events are stupid, and we think authority figures are to be made fun of.” Why, hello, Principal Snyder, clearly no one saw you there. “The Puppet Show” is not one of Buffy’s high points—though it does contain a Buffy high point at the very end—but it does feature the hideously, deliciously authoritarian debut of Armin Shimerman as Sunnydale’s new principal, who has almost as little patience for smug librarians as he does for rebellious students.

“I, Robot… You, Jane”—which I am going to call “IRYJ” from here on our, because it’s easier and it looks like a new Meyers-Briggs type—was never a good episode. Not ever. It was dated from the moment it was written, and on top of that, it contains some of the clunkiest you-don’t-support-my-relationship dialogue ever written. But I kind of love it.

Angel, when it comes right down to it, introduces the complexity that eventually leads the show to season six and the trio and the horrible problem of monsters who are also just people. We’re a long way from that, at this point. But he’s a bug in the system, in the Slayer mythology that says what she does is right and what they do is wrong. He’s helped her and cared about her and sure, been mysterious and annoying, but generally, it’s seemed clear that he’s a good guy. Just a good guy with fangs.

And in its own very first-season way, “The Pack” is so Buffy. The show didn’t really excel until it stepped out of the “make a high school thing monstrous” zone, but these early episodes do serve as a kind of worldbuilding baseline. You never know what you’re dealing with in Sunnydale. It might just be Cordelia—or it might be a gang of apparent 30-year-olds in the most astonishing ‘90s fashion, possessed by hyena spirits and ready for lunch.

I regret to inform you that “Never Kill a Boy on the First Date,” despite the title, is one of the most forgettable Buffy episodes. Ever. That title, in fact, might be the most Buffy thing about it, a play on a thing girls aren’t supposed to do, rewritten for a slayer’s lifestyle.

There have been a lot of arguments that Xander is Buffy's Joss Whedon insert character, but that’s too simplistic: Xander is part of Whedon, but so is Willow, so is Buffy, so—even—is Cordelia, and on down the line. But Xander is the lone teenage boy (at least until Oz appears on the scene), and is presented as his own kind of cliche.

Cheerleading is the perfect stage for an episode that, in broad strokes, is about the harm parental pressure can do—not just to one kid, but to those around her. It’s a sport that’s widely disdained as superficial and dumb (a perception that's changing, sure, but this was the '90s), and one done mostly by women. “Cheerleader” is common teen movie shorthand for “popular, perfect, unattainable, probably mean unless she’s the really sweet one.”