Terrible episodes of great shows.

[Vendor-Lazarus]

Our Mrs Reynolds, from Firefly. I mean it was just obvious from the very first scene with her, at the festival, that Saffron was evil. And then the twist was she's evil, and really hot and...that's it. She's evil and hot, and there's nothing else to her character, and all the dudes just fumble over themselves with how hot she is. And then the women are confounded with how evil she is.
And its the same running joke for the entire episode - she's hot, says something sexual, the dudes blush, she knocks them out, the women roll their eyes.
Of all of Firefly that one felt the most like either an episode of Buffy, or just a regular sitcom episode.

Hard disagree.
That episode was great! Funny as hell.

It shows two sides of toxic femininity.
1. The "beautiful" woman playing a tease and using sex to get her way.
2. Other woman blaming men for "falling" for it because they're "beasts".

It is nicely subverted when he becomes wise to her plans and out-smarts her.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

I can see where people are coming from...sort of. If I agreed that was the actual moral of the episode, I'd agree, but I don't think that's what it's actually saying, even if it could have been phrased better by Twilight. What I took away from it is that it's less taking things on faith and more that sometimes you have to accept things function in certain ways, even if you can't explain how. The faith analogy doesn't really work because the pinkie sense is observable. It isn't something Twilight is taking on blind faith, it's something that she simply can't explain. Off the top of my head, it's observable that the universe is expanding, and accelerating as it goes, but so far we haven't had much luck explaining how apart from invoking "dark energy." That doesn't change the fact that the observation itself is valid.

Even if I accept that, that doesn't change the fact that the plot of the episode comes down to "Twilight Sparkle is repeatedly hurt and humiliated for absolutely no reason". That's the kind of plot I expect from Season 6 Spongebob episodes. Friendship is Magic is better than that, and that's also why I can't stand it.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Our Mrs Reynolds, from Firefly. I mean it was just obvious from the very first scene with her, at the festival, that Saffron was evil. And then the twist was she's evil, and really hot and...that's it. She's evil and hot, and there's nothing else to her character, and all the dudes just fumble over themselves with how hot she is. And then the women are confounded with how evil she is.
And its the same running joke for the entire episode - she's hot, says something sexual, the dudes blush, she knocks them out, the women roll their eyes.
Of all of Firefly that one felt the most like either an episode of Buffy, or just a regular sitcom episode.

You can't take the sky from me!!!

Firefly batted 1.000 (queued up) thank you very much!


I don't make the rules, Mikey does

 

[Hawki]

Avatar: The Last Airbender- The Great Divide. Dear lord, I don't know how the episode both before and after were as good as they were with this nothing episode in between. Two tribes fighting for so long they don't even know why they are fighting, as proven by the fact that a complete lie is enough to end their feud, was such a stupid idea in concept, and the execution felt even worse.

I dislike the episode as well, but not for the same reasons.

I actually like the setup - two tribes being at odds because they always have been, and Aang being the one to bridge the divide works for me. Especially the latter, because if the role of the Avatar is to maintain peace, then it's an important step in Aang's character development. However, I really dislike how he lies about history to get that to happen. I know it's a lie for the greater good, but it feels off for Aang's character at this point. Heck, arguably his entire character period, since Aang has shown himself to have strong moral principles, even if they're to his own detriment (e.g. refusing to kill Ozai). Here however, him lying feels at odds with that.

 

[Squilookle]

Usually South Park hits the nail on the head pretty damn well, but there was one episode where a cafe chain store moves in next to a local cafe and starts muscling in on it. The boys have to do an assignment about something in town, and basically everyone in town tells them to do it on the little cafe that's getting overrun. And yeah, it's pretty funny how they're just not interested at all but everyone is egging them on to do it.

throughout the episode, everyone talks up the virtues of the home grown taste of the local cafe's coffee, and at the end, when they actually try the coffee from the big megachain, they all admit it tastes great too, and everyone just let's it go.

So the episode is basically saying that a megachain franchise with huge logistical needs etc can create food and drink that tastes every bit as good as local/family run/specialist shops. Anyone who's been to a Starbucks outside America (or a McDonalds anywhere in the world) can tell you that's a load of utter crap, as the quality of the food standard always suffers when the business franchises itself across a wide area.

The episode also basically said that it's perfectly fine for a mega corporation to move in and squeeze out a local competitor. Yeah I get the whole free market capitalism thing, but the idea that a local shop could be working hard for years only for some megachain to come along and just throw money at a marketing campaign to strangle any local competition seems utterly wrong to me.

So it's basically the only episode I simply could not agree at all with.

 

[Hawki]

Usually South Park hits the nail on the head pretty damn well, but there was one episode where a cafe chain store moves in next to a local cafe and starts muscling in on it. The boys have to do an assignment about something in town, and basically everyone in town tells them to do it on the little cafe that's getting overrun. And yeah, it's pretty funny how they're just not interested at all but everyone is egging them on to do it.

throughout the episode, everyone talks up the virtues of the home grown taste of the local cafe's coffee, and at the end, when they actually try the coffee from the big megachain, they all admit it tastes great too, and everyone just let's it go.

So the episode is basically saying that a megachain franchise with huge logistical needs etc can create food and drink that tastes every bit as good as local/family run/specialist shops. Anyone who's been to a Starbucks outside America (or a McDonalds anywhere in the world) can tell you that's a load of utter crap, as the quality of the food standard always suffers when the business franchises itself across a wide area.

The episode also basically said that it's perfectly fine for a mega corporation to move in and squeeze out a local competitor. Yeah I get the whole free market capitalism thing, but the idea that a local shop could be working hard for years only for some megachain to come along and just throw money at a marketing campaign to strangle any local competition seems utterly wrong to me.

So it's basically the only episode I simply could not agree at all with.

Something missing in your analysis there - it's established that Tweek's coffee actually tastes like crap. The quality of the Harbucks coffee aside, the episode repeatedly emphasises that Tweek's coffee just isn't that good. Plus, Tweek does get employed by Harbucks as a result.

I'll be honest, I do like the episode, and not just because it gave us the ? - Profit! meme from the gnomes. It frankly surprised me that it would take the side of the megacorp, but even then, I can appreciate the message. I know the world isn't that simple, but if Company A sells a better product than Company B, then by most rights, Company A should win. After all, McDonalds for instance started out as a single store, and however you feel about Ray Croc, clearly there was a market for the food.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

Usually South Park hits the nail on the head pretty damn well, but there was one episode where a cafe chain store moves in next to a local cafe and starts muscling in on it. The boys have to do an assignment about something in town, and basically everyone in town tells them to do it on the little cafe that's getting overrun. And yeah, it's pretty funny how they're just not interested at all but everyone is egging them on to do it.

throughout the episode, everyone talks up the virtues of the home grown taste of the local cafe's coffee, and at the end, when they actually try the coffee from the big megachain, they all admit it tastes great too, and everyone just let's it go.

So the episode is basically saying that a megachain franchise with huge logistical needs etc can create food and drink that tastes every bit as good as local/family run/specialist shops. Anyone who's been to a Starbucks outside America (or a McDonalds anywhere in the world) can tell you that's a load of utter crap, as the quality of the food standard always suffers when the business franchises itself across a wide area.

The episode also basically said that it's perfectly fine for a mega corporation to move in and squeeze out a local competitor. Yeah I get the whole free market capitalism thing, but the idea that a local shop could be working hard for years only for some megachain to come along and just throw money at a marketing campaign to strangle any local competition seems utterly wrong to me.

So it's basically the only episode I simply could not agree at all with.

I always figured the main hit of the episode was Mr. Tweak manipulating the boys into being the mouth pieces for his campaign to get Harbucks out of South Park, and outright lying and acting out what were functionally smear campaigns. It might have worked better if the Harbucks coffee had been pretty ordinary and it failed on its own. Plus the episode gave us the Underpants Gnomes and their meme so......one all draw?

 

[Catfood220]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer was generally pretty great, but there was usually one dud of an episode a season. I think for me the worst episode they did was "Beer Bad". I this episode Buffy is drowning her sorrows with a bunch of other students and unbeknown to her, the barman has put a spell on the beer to turn them all into Neanderthals. Now why the makers of Buffy decided the show needed an anti-alcohol episode I don't know, but the result was really bad, didn't really fit the vibe of the show and added nothing to the season.

 

[dscross]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer was generally pretty great, but there was usually one dud of an episode a season. I think for me the worst episode they did was "Beer Bad". I this episode Buffy is drowning her sorrows with a bunch of other students and unbeknown to her, the barman has put a spell on the beer to turn them all into Neanderthals. Now why the makers of Buffy decided the show needed an anti-alcohol episode I don't know, but the result was really bad, didn't really fit the vibe of the show and added nothing to the season.

I thought overall that season was pretty good though (was it 4?). There were quite a few stinkers in the 7th season. They were so forgettable I can't even remember them.

Mine would be 'Back to Earth: Part Three' in Red Dwarf. Introducing Coronation Street was far too jarring, despite the fact it was a comedy.

 

[thebobmaster_v1legacy]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer was generally pretty great, but there was usually one dud of an episode a season. I think for me the worst episode they did was "Beer Bad". I this episode Buffy is drowning her sorrows with a bunch of other students and unbeknown to her, the barman has put a spell on the beer to turn them all into Neanderthals. Now why the makers of Buffy decided the show needed an anti-alcohol episode I don't know, but the result was really bad, didn't really fit the vibe of the show and added nothing to the season.

From what I heard, it was executives demanding an anti-drug or anti-alcohol episode. Joss Whedon doesn't really like being told what to make, so as a result, he made a phoned-in, half-assed anti-alcohol episode.

 

[CyanCat47_v1legacy]

Black Mirror: Crocodile. The main character somehow misses out on the fact that the police have had memory-reading technology for years and somehow thinks she can get away with her past crimes by killing more witnesses in a world where witnesses are no longer needed in police investigations

15 Million Merits: I know a lot of people like it, but I feel like it's one of the episodes whose premise is the weakest of the entire series. Crocodile botched a potentially interesting premise, but 15 Million merits completely misses the point. Nobody is being forced to watch reality television, it's so popular because it's easily consumable trash. If the main character was a reality-TV addict from the start it might have been a more interesting setting, however the satire looses something when it turns watching trash television into a compulsary activity rather than something that people do despite having better alternatives

 

[Baffle]

The Crow 2 and 3.

 

[Batou667]

From a cursory Google I understand there are many, many Simpsons episodes that are considered critical stinkers, but truth be told I stopped giving a damn about the Simpsons (or any TV, for that matter) the best part of a decade ago, so I can only speak from my personal experience. Anyway, it's the episode where Lisa becomes Bart's babysitter. I remember watching that without so much as smiling once, and when the end credits rolled I wondered how the hell such an unfunny script ever got greenlit. The idea that there are even WORSE episodes out there is concerning.