Oh, and I loved the slo-mo of Buffy training during OMWF. I agree with UTTAD that it was supposed to be a play on the 80s training montage thing - but even without the parody - I still liked it. I have very little taste and like most things that are corny and overdone.

I really disliked the slo-mo in DeKnight's ep of Ats this year (Inside Out) - the one where Angel fights Skip. I thought that was really gratitutous. Best slo-mo ever on Ats is in City of with Angel getting off the bar stool in the teaser. That is my personal hottest DB moment EVAH.

edited to get the right writer/director and ep title

Nah - the slo-mo when the ex-protege attacks the police station in the one with the protege the name of which escapes me is the best.

I think you are talking about Penn in Somnambulist, but I don't remember the slo-mo very well from that.

I am indeed. He whooshes, Matrix-style, through the crowd of cops to grab Kate. It's a great visual summation of the difference between vamps and humans.

Wasn't that supposed to be crap slo-mo? Buffy was talking about crap 80s films just before they launched into song after all.

I think he meant that the punches were crap, not ther slo-mo.

I think he meant that the punches were crap

Yes. And "mouse punches" is a Madrigal coinage that was part of a rant which also included SMG's "2 mph spin kicks." Sarah's slacking off on the martial arts training plus Pruitt's departure really started to show up in the later seasons. In the early years she looked halfway credible (like in the scenes where she's training in the library with Giles).

Sarah's slacking off on the martial arts training plus Pruitt's departure really started to show up in the later seasons.

Grrrr.

But we all know how I feel about that.

And I don't think it's slacking off. I can go three years between punches and look better than her. And if I didn't? Someone would yell at me and make me do it right.

So I do kinda put blame on the Pruitt departure.

Chicks and fighting hits (predictably) close to home, so I admit I have made up my own rationale for this which has no basis in any fact to which I've been made privy -- she just didn't care any more, and no one dared call her on it..

My narrow little mind can fathom no other explanation.

slacking off on the martial arts training

Still not convinced there was any to slack off on.

Still not convinced there was any to slack off on.

And there is also that. She's certainly not the brown belt they claimed (this claim is what got me to watch the show, BTW).

I think that SMG probably was taking classes the first couple years, and between that and Pruit's very grounded-in-real-fighting choreography it looked better. She does have good, limber dancer extension in her kicks.