Gingerbread

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bigmoneygrip

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I've read in other places that this episode didn't get the best reviews. I liked it a bunch, for its theme about fearing the unknown and how mob mentality causes people to engage in the worst kinds of irrational behavior. I especially like the touch of the demon that feeds on fear and stokes it to where normally lucid people are now vicious and irrational. Did anyone notice how subdued the Mayor was? I kinda like that angle, how he stayed out of MOO's way - he had his own agenda and didn't want to jeopardize it by becoming "one of them". I also like how it didn't pull any punches - the locker raid, hauling students off to the office for having dillweed in their locker, kidnaping Buffy, Amy and Willow (and attacking Giles). Willow's abduction was particularly disturbing. I suppose the "burned at the stake" thing was a little overdone, but that was definitely the weakest part of what I thought was a very good episode that made me think "what if" and "could it happen here"?

Kind of reminded me of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", which is a great and creepy film in its own right (the 1950's version)

Also, I remember a very good "Twilight Zone" that used this theme called "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street"

Thoughts, comments?
 
I love Gingerbread. I'm not sure what I like about it, I guess the fact that they're showing innocent fairytales can be evil too in the fact there are a lot of Hansel and Gretel references. This was one of the first episodes I remember watching and thinking 'God, this show is amazing'.
 
I love Gingerbread. It's so funny

Buffy: "Did I get it? Did I get it?"

Xander: "Oh, man, it's Nazi Germany, and I've got 'layboys in my locker."
Willow: "I have stuff in my locker. Henbane, hellebore, mandrake root."
Xander: "Excuse me. Playboys. Can we turn the sympathy this way?"
 
I think burning at stake part was way too harsh and unjustified. No court, no reading, just like one day Mom woke up with the thought: "Why, my daughter bugs me.. Oh, I should burn her! he-he"... This whole "trial" feels weird.
Still, it's one of my favorite and mostly rewatched ones.

Mayor was in his good shape too.
 
"Did I get it??!? Did I get it?!??"

Best. Love it.

I enjoyed the episode, though I can understand why it might have had low ratings. I think it gets better with repeated viewings.
 
i love gingerbread too. it was one of the episodes of buffy that really convinced me that the show was amazing and so multi-dimensional. i'm not sure if i'm thinking of the same twilight episode the poster mentioned, but i think it must be the same--it used the same mob mentality theme and it ended in a little village basically destroying a family that lived on their street who they were convinced were evil in some way just because they kept to themselves. things spun rapidly out of control and they ended up torching the house. then it pans out to show that the whole thing was actually a government experiment on the effect of fear and the unknown in a small community. it was great and gingerbread taps into that so well, too.
 
I just watched this episode like an hour ago 🙂
I did like seeing Joyce go all over protective and seeing Willows mum! But i didn't really get why it took Giles and Co so long to realsie Joyce was under some kind of influence. That kind of bugged me but i did love the ending
Buffy "Did i get him?,did i get him?!"
Then Xander and Oz falling through the roof,why couldn't they find the door? Giles and Cordy found it really quickly!
 
Oh, forgot my favorite quote from the ep:

Cordelia: Things are way out of control, Giles. First the thing at
school, and then my mom confiscates all of my black clothes and scented
candles. (Giles sits up) I came over here to tell Buffy to stop this
craziness and found you all unconscious... again. How many times have
you been knocked out, anyway? (Giles finds his glasses) I swear, one of
these times, you're gonna wake up in a coma.

Giles: (puts his glasses on) Wake up in a... Oh, never mind.
 
I'm really not sure what it is. But I don't like Gingerbread. I think it's because of how dark it is, then again I love a bit of Darkness.

Just not one of my favourites I guess.
 
I didn't think Gingerbread was one of my favourite episodes but i didn't not like it either. I thought like all Buffy episodes it had it's really good bits, actually thinking about it i actually did really like Gingerbread. I liked the parents all turning on their own kids because of some evil fairytale creatures....genius lol 😀

I really did like Joyce's speech on behalf of MOO (nice acronym mum lol), saying something like, This is not a good town. How many of us have-have lost someone who-who just disappeared... or-or got skinned or suffered 'neck rupture'? And how many of us have been too afraid to speak out? I-I was supposed to lead us in a moment of silence, but, silence is this town's disease. For too long we-we've been plagued by unnatural evils. This isn't our town anymore. It belongs to the monsters, and the witches and the Slayers.

Brilliant!
 
this episode actually creeped me out a lil with the kids and that, not the worst or best but its enjoyable especially with the hilarious mistake of calling buffy bunny from ms rosenberg " hi bunny" lol
 
I don't see why this episode is so disliked.
I wouldn't call it one of the best but I just really enjoyed the whole background to it and anything that has creepy children in it always sends a shiver down my spine.

A quickie. I wonder if the mayor knew that the children were some sort of demon?

Willow's mum had some brilliant lines bless her. She should have been in more episodes ha.

I also think the show should've done more with fairytales.
 
bigmoneygrip said:
I've read in other places that this episode didn't get the best reviews.
Click to expand...
Hmm, I've experienced the opposite, actually. People I've come across really seem to love this episode, while I don't like it so much. I don't really know why I don't like it; it just totally rubs me the wrong way. It's one of those episodes that just seems so out of place within the rest of the season. S3 is running smoothly, la de da, then suddenly WILLOW'S MOM APPEARS (who she's only mentioned a handful of times..a woman we hadn't met and never meet again) AND JOYCE IS ALL TRANCEY!!! I don't know. The episode jars me, in not a good thought-provoking disturby kind of way, but in the bad "where did this come from?" way.
 
So far nobody has mentioned the best quote (unless I overread it):
Giles: We need to save Buffy from Hansel and Gretel!

I always liked the episode, although it is pretty scary. And talking about scary, those German skills presented in this episode (and actually, all over the show whenever they try to mix some German in) were abysmal. Seriously.
 
Great episode, IMHO. It manages to be both funny and creepy. Mob/police state mentality was portrayed in an over the top fashion but that was the point, I think - how easy people could get outraged by certain things without knowing the details. Like the people who think rock bands have devil worshipping subliminal messages in their lyrics without ever listening to rock. Or fundamentalists (not just religious ones) who call for bans of certain types of books without having much of a clue what these books are about. Joyce Summers and Willow's mother working together were scarier than most villains in the series.
 
I always found it troubling as why Buffy dismissed the possibility that the kids deaths could have been caused by humans. I mean Buffy was right in the end, but does she assume that its a demon just because those would be easier for her to fight? In "The Puppet Show" it was mentioned that a human could have been the culprit to begin with but in the end it was also a demon. In "Some Assembly Required" the two student were behind the murders. It looks like she would have been more willing to accept that it could have been caused by a cult, but she was shocked instead about humans with souls causing it.
 
I enjoyed the ep 'gingerbread'. i thought it was good idea they based it around a fairytale.
 
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