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Rating: 
Summary: Jhaeman's Reviews
Review: ANGEL CHRONICLES VOL. 3By Nancy Holder (1999) based on teleplays "Surprise" by Marti Noxon, "Innocence" by Joss Whedon, and "Passion" by Ty King RATING: 4/5 Stakes SETTING: Season Two CAST APPEARANCES: Angel, Angelus, Buffy, Willow, Oz, Cordelia, Xander, Giles, Jenny Calendar, Dalton, Spike, Drusilla, Joyce, Enyos, The Judge BACK-OF-THE-BOOK SUMMARY: "For Buffy the Vampire Slayer, birthdays aren't all parties and cake--hers tend to involve a life-or-death battle with a big evil. Her seventeenth celebration isn't an exception. While Buffy's friends organize a festive gathering in honor of the special day, Spike and Drusilla are planning their own surprise party for the Slayer--with a devastating demon as the grand finale. But a passionate night with Angel changes everything. Suddenly, Buffy must deal with two forms of ultimate evil: the almost-indestructible Judge--and the legendary vampire Angelus, who is determined to exact his special brand of revenge on the young woman who showed him true love." REVIEW Of the books in the Angel Chronicles series, Volume Three is by far the strongest. The episodes collected--"Surprise", "Innocence", and "Passion"--are each among the finest stories ever written for the show, and each is almost required viewing to understand Angel, Buffy, and their tumultuous relationship. Like Joss Whedon, Season Two is my favorite season of the show, and this novelization helps to show why. In "Surprise", the Scoobies prepare a surprise party for Buffy's seventeen birthday--coincidentally, however, Drusilla is having a birthday party of her own, and the gift Spike gives her (The Judge) has the ability to literally burn the humanity out of people. This episode has all the good stuff: Spike & Dru at their finest, Angel & Buffy having sex for the first time, Willow and Oz going on their first date, and the dramatic truth about Jenny Calendar revealed. The adaptation by Holder of the episode is mediocre, with a rather slight framing sequence and occasional spelling mistakes, but the story itself is definitely strong enough to overcome these minor problems. The sequel, "Innocence", centers around Buffy's emotional turmoil over Angel going bad. We feel for her in a way few shows would be able to achieve; and just as heartbreaking is Willow's discovery that Xander and Cordelia are dating. When Willow tells Xander, tears in her eyes, that "It just means you'd rather be with someone you hate, than be with me," we see these characters and this fictional world as more real than we ever realized before. Other moments that make the episode great include Oz turning down a kiss (in the sweetest way imaginable) from Willow and Giles demonstrating just how much he respects Buffy. For more action-oriented fans, the famous rocket launcher scene takes place in this episode, as does the first Buffy-Angelus battle. The adaptation is marred only by Drusilla's interior voice coming off as far too pedestrian. "Passion" shows us Angelus at his worst (or best, depending on your point of view), as he stalks Buffy and her friends. After Angelus murders an important character and plants the body in another character's bed, Angelus watches through the window of Buffy's house just to see her reaction when she gets the call. It's clear--he doesn't want to just kill Buffy, he wants to destroy her. With this episode, the series gets darker than it ever had before, and it works beautifully. Another highlight is Angelus' needling of Spike over Drusilla--it is so damned funny but you can't help but feel sorry for the poor wheelchair-bound bastard. In the episode, excellent voiceovers by Angelus frame the story, but the effect is unfortunately lost in the adaptation. All in all, this is definitely the best of the Angel Chronicles and probably the best of the Buffy television novelizations as a whole. I give this 4 out of 5 Stakes only because the actual adaptation leaves something to be desired, but the stories themselves would get a 5. I'd write more, but I think I have to go pop these episodes into the DVD player . . . (...)
Rating:
Summary: Nancy Holder does the best novelizations of Buffy episodes
Review: Unlike the first two volumes in this Buffy sub-series, this third collection of a trio of adapted scripts from the second season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer really do all focus on pivotal moments in "The Angle Chronicles." Nancy Holder, clearly the top writer of the Buffy books, adapts the teleplays of "Surprise" by Marti Noxon, "Innocence" by Joss Whedon, and "Passion" by Ty King. These pivotal stories in the series cover the episodes where Angel spends the night with Buffy, is transformed into Angelus, and brutally kills Jenny Calendar. As the back cover notes, there are stories chronicling Angel's darker side. In fact, it never gets any darker than this, but it also sets up the fabulous of the series, the two-part "Becoming" episodes at the end of Season Two. Holden does a nice job of capturing the emotional depth of the conflict within these stories. It is a thankless job to put into words those things that transcend words, such as the emotional meltdown suffered by Giles and Buffy after she rescues her Watcher from his gallant but doomed attack on Angelus. Holden never disappoints in her efforts, which carry over to her original stories as well (Read Holder's comments above to see how committed she is to getting things right). As novelizations of Buffy episodes go, I have yet to read one better than this. One of the nice things about this volume is that these particular episodes are the first three on the Buffy and Angel Chronicles video collection. Hopefully the other three episodes will be novelized in the fourth volume of "The Angel Chronicles," although such sensible symmetry is probably too much to hope for on this side of the Hellmouth. Until then, think about given Nancy Holder's non-Buffy books a try as well. You have to support someone like this boys and girls, even if you go out and actually buy the books instead of downloading them.
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