Hush (Buffy episode)

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"Hush" is the 10th episode of season 4 of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer. See also List of Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes.

Contents

1 Plot synopsis

1.1 Summary
1.2 Expanded overview

2 Writing and acting
3 Production details

3.1 Music

4 Quotes and trivia
5 Continuity

5.1 Arc significance
5.2 Timing

6 External links

Plot synopsis

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details about some or all of the Buffyverse productions (Buffy, Angel, Fray, etc.) follow.

Summary

The Gentlemen, some very Brothers Grimm-style monsters, steal the voices of the population of Sunnydale, none of the town (including the Scooby Gang) can speak. Sunnydale is under a quarantine caused by the "mysterious" lost voices.

The Gentlemen, accompanied by The Footmen, wearing un-tied straitjackets, are trying to gather together seven human hearts from the residents of Sunnydale, who, of course, cannot scream or alert anyone to their being attacked and can't leave the city. Giles reveals using an overhead projector, music, and drawings that the only way to defeat The Gentleman is a real human scream, so the focus turns to how Buffy can regain her voice.

Expanded overview

Professor Walsh talks about communication in class and then asks Buffy to come and lie on her desk for a demonstration. Riley steps forward and kisses Buffy, then the sun goes down and it is night. Buffy then hears a young girl's voice and walks out of the classroom and into the halls where a girl holding a small box stands chanting a rather disturbing nursery rhyme.

Can't even shout, can't even cry

The Gentlemen are coming by.

Looking in windows, knocking on doors,

They need to take seven and they might take yours.

Can't call to Mum, can't say a word,

You're gonna die screaming but you won't be heard.

Buffy wakes up to see she was dreaming in class. As they're leaving, Riley overhears Buffy and Willow talking about a dream, and then Willow leaves them to talk. Riley inquires about Buffy's dream and then they talk about their plans for the night. Both make up excuses for their real plans.

Giles tries to research the information Buffy got from her dream about the Gentlemen. Spike makes himself very comfortable at Giles' place and complains about there not being any more Weetabix, since Spike claims he likes the occasional adding of Wheatabix to his butcher's blood for added texture. Xander and Anya arrive where Giles informs Xander that he has to keep Spike with him for a few days. Willow goes to her Wicca meeting but finds that all the girls in it are just wannabe Wiccas with no knowledge of the real magic. One girl, Tara, seems to be interested in magic, but she's shy and very quiet. After the meeting, Buffy and Willow chat about how things are going slowly with Riley while Riley discusses the same with Forrest.

While he's sleeping, Xander ties Spike down to a chair and Spike talks continually to annoy Xander. Olivia shows up at Giles' apartment and after some brief talking, they get right to kissing. That night, at the clock tower, one of the Gentlemen opens a box, and the voices of all the people in Sunnydale are taken from them and put into the box. When Buffy and Willow wake up the next morning and find they have no voices, they panic. Leaving their room, they see that nobody else in the dorms can speak, either. Riley and Forrest try to enter the underground lab, but without his voice Riley cannot activate the voice-based security system on the elevator door. Professor Walsh opens the elevator and they see a sign that says they should have used the stairs.

Buffy and Willow walk through the town, seeing that everything is closed down. Armed with dry-erase boards to write down their words, Buffy and Willow show up at Giles' and meet with everyone else. The news states that everyone in Sunnydale has come down with a case of laryngitis and the town has been quarantined. The threat of chaos looming that night, Buffy goes out to patrol, and Professor Walsh sends Riley and his team out. Riley and Buffy meet while walking out on the streets and as Riley is about to leave, he turns and kisses Buffy for the first time. The Gentlemen travel, floating a foot up into the air with their demon assistants following with them on the ground. Olivia wakes up in the middle of the night, and through the window she spies one of the Gentlemen.

A couple of the Gentlemen travel through the dorms until they find a freshman boy. The demon assistants hold the boy down while they cut out his heart. The next morning, Olivia draws a picture of the creature she saw, and when Giles recognizes it, he gets out a book of fairy tales. In one of the lecture rooms at the college, Giles tells the story of the Gentlemen through drawings and text on an overhead projector, with musical embellishment. The sound of a real human voice—not recorded—can kill them, so they took everyone's voice so that they could get the seven human hearts they need. Riley suits up and then goes out to patrol, while Buffy is doing the same thing.

Tara from the Wicca group tries to get to Willow while the Gentlemen chase after her. She finally makes it to Willow's dorm and the two girls make a run for it. Riley is attacked by several of the Gentlemen's demon assistants in the clock tower, until Buffy shows up and starts fighting along side him. The two are first shocked to see each other, but have no time, let alone ability to speak. Spike gets a mug of blood out of the fridge at Giles' apartment and vamps out in the process of drinking it. As he's bending down to pick up some dropped books, Xander sees this from a different angle and thinks that Spike is biting Anya. Xander attacks Spike and punches him several times before Anya and Giles stop him.

Willow and Tara combine their powers to move a vending machine in front of a door and protect them from the Gentlemen. Buffy gets caught by the Igor-like assistants and the Gentlemen are about to cut into her when Riley shoots them with bolts of electricity. They fight and one of the demons grabs Buffy as she spots a box on the table and recognizes it from her dream. She points it out to Riley and after one false try he smashes the box and everyone's voice is returned. Buffy lets out a loud and long scream, which causes the Gentlemen to explode into green slime. Willow and Tara talk about being witches while Giles and Olivia talk about how many scary things there really are out there. Riley goes to Buffy's dorm to talk, but neither know what to say.

Writing and acting

This episode earned Buffy its first Emmy nomination (for best original writing), but did not win.

Actor and former personal assistant to Joss Whedon Andy Hallett appeared as an extra in the opening classroom scene of this episode. He would later go on to play Lorne a.k.a. "The Host" in the Buffy spin-off Angel.

Production details

This episode contains very little actual dialog. The actors succeed in expressing the storyline without using words, and the "background" music also plays a huge role in the critical success of the episode.

The gentlemen monsters in this episode look similar to the Der Kindestod monster seen in Season 2's "Killed by Death".

Christophe Beck mentions, on DVD interviews, that he thoroughly enjoyed the task of writing the episode's soundtrack; one scene also uses Camille Saint-Saëns's "Danse Macabre" to somewhat melodramatic effect.

Music

Camille Saint-Saëns - "Danse Macabre"
Christophe Beck - "Hush Suite"

Quotes and trivia

The electro/shoegaze group, The Very Hush Hush, has alluded in interviews to receiving inspiration for their name from Buffy the Vampire Slayer (presumably the episode, Hush), rather than the more obvious reference of the tag-line for L.A. Confidential ("Off the record, on the QT, and very hush-hush").

Joss Whedon created this episode after hearing repeatedly that the crucial part of his series was the dialogue.

Joss Whedon wanted "The Gentleman" to be very nightmarish, hoping that they would be a monster children would remember being scared of later in their lives.

This episode is one of three episodes not shown in the regular line up, in the UK and Ireland, before the nine o'clock watershed. (The other two are "The Body" and "Tabula Rasa".)

The original rating of "Hush" received 6.6 million vieweres, the highest rated episode of the season.

Continuity

Arc significance

The episode is notable for containing the start of Buffy's relationship with Riley and each character's discovery that the other is not what they seem — again playing out the theme of the characters' inability to communicate with each other. At the start of the episode, it is made clear that each character is attracted to the other, but neither knows how to broach the issue. Equally, neither character knows of the other's "secret identity" — that Buffy is a vampire slayer and that Riley also slays demons and vampires, for the US government.

Whilst muted by The Gentlemen's magic, the two characters run into each other and enjoy their first kiss. Subsequently, whilst fighting The Gentlemen and their goons, they encounter each other again, their mutual secrets revealed. Similarly, Anya and Xander start the episode arguing, as Anya believes Xander does not love her; later, though, his actions when he believes Spike has bitten her resolve her doubts.

That the episode is all about communication is highlighted when Buffy and Riley sit down to talk about their feelings for each other and their respective secrets, once The Gentlemen have been vanquished, and they sit in uncomfortable silence until the credits start.

This is also the episode where Willow's girlfriend Tara Maclay first appears. Willow's homosexuality had first been hinted at in the Season 3 episode "Doppelgängland".

Timing

Stories that take place around the same time in the Buffyverse:

Location, time (if known)	Buffyverse chronology: Fall 1999 - December 1999 (non-canon = italic)
L.A. 1999	Angel comic:
L.A. 1999	A1.01 City of (Angel episode)>City of
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.01 The Freshman (Buffy episode)>The Freshman
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.02 Living Conditions (Buffy episode)>Living Conditions
L.A. 1999	~~A1.02~~ Corrupt (unaired Angel episode)>Corrupt (unaired)
L.A. 1999	A1.02 Lonely Hearts (Angel episode)>Lonely Hearts
L.A. 1999	A1.00 Unaired Angel pilot
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Not Forgotten (Angel novel)>Not Forgotten
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.03 The Harsh Light of Day (Buffy episode)>The Harsh Light of Day
L.A. 1999	A1.03 In the Dark (Angel episode)>In the Dark
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.04 Fear Itself (Buffy episode)>Fear Itself
Sunnydale, 1999	Buffy graphic novel: Blood of Carthage (Buffy comic)>Blood of Carthage
L.A. 1999	Angel graphic novel: Surrogates (Angel comic)>Surrogates
L.A. 1999	Angel comic: Strange Bedfellows (Angel comic)>Strange Bedfellows story, Angel #4
Sunnydale, 1999	Buffy video game: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Game Boy Color)
Sunnydale, 1999
L.A. 1999	A1.04 I Fall to Pieces (Angel episode)>I Fall to Pieces
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.05 Beer Bad (Buffy episode)>Beer Bad
L.A. 1999	A1.05 Rm w/a Vu (Angel episode)>Rm w/a Vu
Sunnydale, 1999	Buffy books: Lost Slayer (Buffy novel)>Lost Slayer series
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.06 Wild at Heart (Buffy episode)>Wild at Heart
Sunnydale, 1999	Buffy graphic novel: Oz (Buffy comic)>Oz
Sunnydale, 1999	Buffy book:
L.A. 1999	A1.06 Sense & Sensitivity (Angel episode)>Sense & Sensitivity
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.07 The Initiative (Buffy episode)>The Initiative
L.A. 1999	A1.07 Bachelor Party (Angel episode)>Bachelor Party
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Close to the Ground (Angel novel)>Close to the Ground
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Soul Trade (Angel novel)>Soul Trade
L.A. 1999	Angel graphic novel: Earthly Possessions (Angel comic)>Earthly Possessions
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Redemption (Angel novel)>Redemption
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Shakedown (Angel novel)>Shakedown
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Hollywood Noir (Angel novel)>Hollywood Noir
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Avatar (Angel novel)>Avatar
L.A. 1999	Angel book: Bruja (Angel novel)>Bruja
L.A. 1999	Angel book: The Summoned (Angel novel)>The Summoned
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.08 Pangs (Buffy episode)>Pangs
L.A. 1999	A1.08 I Will Remember You (Angel episode)>I Will Remember You
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.09 Something Blue (Buffy episode)>Something Blue
L.A. 1999	A1.09 Hero (Angel episode)>Hero
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.10 Hush (Buffy episode)>Hush
L.A. 1999	A1.10 Parting Gifts (Angel episode)>Parting Gifts
Sunnydale, 1999	B4.11 Doomed (Buffy episode)>Doomed
L.A. 1999	A1.11 Somnambulist (Angel episode)>Somnambulist

External links

PLEASE DISCUSS CHARACTER ADDITTIONS/REMOVALS BEFORE MAKING CHANGES AT (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Buffyverse#Buffyverse-box_character_inclusions)

This box cannot/shouldn't be including every Buffyverse character. Some suggested guidelines are:

"The people who appeared in the opening credits (Scooby Gang & Fang Gang/FG) appear in the box, and the most important villains/friends who had a significant emotional impact on multiple of those opening credits characters - as long as they have a significant episode count, and preferably if they appear in three or more seasons."

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