| "The Freshman" | |||
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| Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode | |||
Buffy, now a college freshman, explores the campus feeling overwhelmed |
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| Episode no. | Season 4 Episode 1 |
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| Directed by | Joss Whedon | ||
| Written by | Joss Whedon | ||
| Production code | 4ABB01 | ||
| Original air date | October 5, 1999 | ||
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| List of Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes | |||
"The Freshman" is the first episode of season 4 of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The episode was written and directed by series creator Joss Whedon. The narrative follows Buffy Summers as she attempts to fit into her new college environment at UC Sunnydale. She first encounters several problems (getting kicked out of lectures for talking) and struggles with her feelings of isolation: Willow is blossoming with Oz in the environment; Giles has his "friend" Olivia over and doesn't aid Buffy, telling her she should become "self-dependent"; Xander is on his tour of America, in which he intends to visit all of the States. Her situation is not helped by the vampire Sunday haunting her new Campus.
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Buffy, Willow and Oz begin attending the University of California at its fictional Sunnydale campus. Buffy feels overwhelmed and disoriented by the new experience, but Willow is excited by the bigger library and the opportunities to advance her learning, while Oz seems typically unfazed. Meanwhile, Giles is a retired "gentleman of leisure" now that the Sunnydale High School library has been destroyed, and Xander is still out of town on his much-anticipated cross-country road trip.
Buffy and Willow go to the campus bookstore for supplies, where Buffy accidentally knocks a pile of psychology textbooks onto the head of Riley Finn, who introduces himself as a TA for Professor Walsh's Psych 105 "Intro to Psychology" class. Buffy then goes on to her new dorm in Stevenson Hall, where she has already moved in and her new roommate Kathy is in the process of doing the same. Kathy expresses her belief that the upcoming year will be "super fun", but Buffy is unconvinced when she sees Kathy hanging a poster of Céline Dion on the wall. During the night Buffy has trouble sleeping because Kathy snores, laughs, and smacks her lips in her sleep.
On the first day of classes, Buffy is humiliated at being ejected from a class by a bullying professor in front of dozens of other students, and in the next class she feels overwhelmed by the heavy workload promised by Professor Walsh, wondering how she will find the time to both study and slay vampires. Feeling increasingly lonely and isolated on campus, she is relieved to strike up conversation with a fellow freshman student named Eddie (who is also taking Psychology with Professor Walsh) when they are both lost. They discuss the need for a "security blanket" in unfamiliar surroundings, and he says that the novel Of Human Bondage serves this purpose for him. After Buffy and Eddie separate, he is killed by a group of vampires and this group then go to his dorm room, steal all of his belongings, and leave a fake note from Eddie claiming that he decided he couldn't handle the stress of college and went home.
The next day, Buffy is disappointed to find Eddie missing from class. She goes to his dormitory, finding it empty but for the note and the novel "Of Human Bondage", which is still in his nightstand. Considering their conversation of the previous day, she does not believe that he would leave the book behind, and goes to Giles for advice. However, Giles is in his dressing gown with a half-dressed female visitor called Olivia, and seems reluctant to offer Buffy any active assistance because he is no longer her Watcher and feels she is capable of handling the situation herself.
That night during a patrol, Buffy comes across Eddie in a deserted part of campus and is horrified to realise he is now a vampire. The group of vampires that turned Eddie are watching and now attack. Buffy is soundly thrashed by their leader, spraining her arm and causing her to flee for her life. Buffy's confidence is greatly shaken by this encounter, and she decides to visit her Mom and some familiar surroundings. Joyce did not expect to see Buffy home so early in the semester, and because of this she has been using her daughter's room as extra storage space for the gallery.
When Buffy returns to her dorm room on campus, she finds all of her belongings missing and a note similar to that found in Eddie's room. Buffy goes to the Bronze and mopes around, feeling even worse when she sees a man with a pronounced physical likeness to her former boyfriend Angel. However, she is greatly cheered by the appearance of Xander, who reveals that his tour of America never happened because his car broken down in Oxnard and he spent the rest of the summer washing dishes at the fabulous "Ladies' Nightclub" to earn money for repairs. Now he has returned home, where he lives in the basement of his parents' house and is expected to pay rent. Buffy tells Xander about her negative early experiences of college, and expresses a fear that she cannot adapt to the college experience, but Xander greatly moves her by describing her as "my hero" and explaining that he always thinks "What would Buffy do?" whenever he is in a bad situation. They then agree to track down the vampire lair and reclaim Buffy's stolen belongings.
Using the college computer system, the pair locate the vampire gang in a disused frat house. While Buffy angrily watches the vampires using and abusing her belongings through the glass roof of the frat house, Xander leaves to round up the assistance of Willow and Oz. Unfortunately, the roof breaks and Buffy lands on the floor in front of the vampires. They fight and she is once again losing, in part because of her sore arm from their previous encounter, but seeing Sunday damage the Class Protector award she was given at her senior prom angers Buffy enough to regain her confidence and soundly trounce the vampires, taking out Sunday with a bankhand throw of a broken tennis racket. As Buffy and friends return to the dorm with her belongings, Giles makes a belated appearance with weapons, apologising for his earlier dismissal of her fears and promising that they will fight the evil together.
Meanwhile, one of the vampires from Sunday's gang is hit with a taser by three masked men in camouflage fatigues.
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