BtVS - 2.04: Inca Mummy Girl

[wearing_tearing]

Original Air Date: October 6, 1997
Writer: Matt Kiene, Joe Reinkemeyer
Director: Ellen S. Pressman

Buffy and Giles are suspicious of Ampata, a Peruvian exchange student staying at Buffy's house, when a fellow student goes missing during a school field trip to the Natural History Museum and a broken Peruvian pictogram-cover plate is found in his place. Meanwhile, after Xander falls head over heels for Ampata, he faces certain death when his love interest is revealed to be an ancient mummy who must kill to stay alive.

And we’re back!

Okay, are high school exchange programs a real thing that happens in USAmerican schools or is that another TV/movie thing??? I’m familiar with them in college/university, but high school???? And for only 2 weeks???

Buffy’s outfit here is so cute, though. Congrats to the wardrobe/costume department.

I’m extremely uncomfortable with and against mummies being presented in museum exhibits, so this is a tough one. Considering the direction the episode takes, I’m on Inca Mummy Girl’s team.

Do they not take headcounts on the bus to make sure all teenagers are accounted for… Sunnydale High, what are you doing?

I loooove the Scoobies getting an idea of what’s going on right away! Implausible as it is for “real life”, they’re all aware they’re dealing with some creepy supernatural stuff and even the weirdest scenarios can be actually true.

Ah, a little bit of racism. Couldn’t have an episode with brown people without some of that.

OZ FIRST SIGHTING! With some horrible facial hair!

Gill Birmingham as Peruvian Bodyguard can get it. Also lovely that he just walks into school with a sword(?) and attacks a student with no issues.

“You are the Chosen One” is never a good thing. Chosen Ones only get their lives messed up and a bunch of trauma on top of it.

Shoutout to Dingoes Ate My Baby for being this episode’s band!

Okay, but Oz taking one look at Willow and going all heart eyes “who is she?” is pretty cute. Don’t think I like them all dressing up as ~another culture for a dance, though. Other people’s cultures aren’t costumes :)

Gotta admit Xander gives me secondhand embarrassment all throughout this episode. The slow dancing scene makes me want to look awaaaaaay.

Jonathan first sighting! Season 2 seems to introduce so many important Buffyverse characters??? I never realized that.

The Chosen Ones are fighting! Not for long.

I do think it’s interesting that Xander so far caught the attention of Ms. Frech (giant bug) and Ampata (mummy). Makes me wonder if he was always destined to have connections to supernatural creatures :P

Well, that was an underwhelming ending. But a good filler episode all around with some important people!

Vampires Slayed: 0.
Series Total: 26.

Giles Taking Off/Putting On Glasses: 0.
Series Total: 19.

Episode Quote:
Xander: Hey, maybe he awakened the mummy.
Willow: Right, and it rose from its tomb.
Buffy: And attacked him.

Comments

[author_by_night]

Okay, are high school exchange programs a real thing that happens in USAmerican schools or is that another TV/movie thing??? I’m familiar with them in college/university, but high school???? And for only 2 weeks???

It's a real thing, but usually lasts longer, and in my experience at least, our German exchange student was the only exchange student. But it was also a much larger school than Sunnydale High is supposed to be, so maybe I just never met the other exchange students. I'm also pretty sure her parents would've figured out if she'd never gotten to her host family. (Then again, parents in Buffyverse are basically... not a thing. Teens on the show really feel more like college students in terms of familial independence. But that's another rant.)

Regarding your dislike of Mummies in museums - is it ethical concerns, colonialism or both? Just curious.

I was also with Ampata here. I would have preferred a sympathetic portrayal where the parallels were fully recognized. I realize the writers probably didn't know where the show was going, but wouldn't it have been interesting if Ampta's mission were to protect girls and women like her, including Buffy? What if Ampata's herself had been a Slayer? Really, they probably just shouldn't have gone there, period.

[dolorosa_12]

I don't know about US high schools, but in my (Australian) high school, we had a sister school in Nara (Japan) and another sister school in Noumea (New Caledonia), and students who studied either Japanese or French went on exchange to those places and/or hosted Japanese/New Caledonian students in their homes. I had five different Japanese exchange students staying with me for 1-2 week periods over the course of my six years in high school, and I went on exchange to Japan (we stayed with a host family for a week and were in Japan itself for two weeks in total) when I was fifteen. Obviously we had been learning the languages before our visits, but with exchange programmes of only two weeks in length, it's more about cultural exchange than language immersion.

I don't know of any school in Australia where the exchange would just be a free-for-all like in that Buffy episode, though (with exchange students from multiple different countries). In my experience, pairs of schools in two different countries enter into a 'sister school' arrangement (usually if their respective cities are sister cities) and send their students to each other on alternating years.

I remember this episode being our first introduction to Oz, but I didn't realise we met Jonathan for the first time here too!

[wearing_tearing]

It's a real thing, but usually lasts longer
Kind of surprised it's real considering the underage element of it all, but it makes much more sense if it lasts longer! 2 weeks is more vacation time for me.

is it ethical concerns, colonialism or both?
It is both! A bit more colonialism than ethics, I'd say.

I would have preferred a sympathetic portrayal where the parallels were fully recognized. I realize the writers probably didn't know where the show was going, but wouldn't it have been interesting if Ampta's mission were to protect girls and women like her, including Buffy? What if Ampata's herself had been a Slayer? Really, they probably just shouldn't have gone there, period.
This would have been a much more interesting approach to her character! Even more so with the struggles we've seen regarding Buffy and her role as the Chosen One/Slayer. But I guess that would be Too Much at this point in time both in-show and also in the '90s

[wearing_tearing]

Okay, sister schools also make more sense than whatever they did on the show! I feel like 1-2 is so short for an exchange, though? Maybe because that seems more like vacation time to me lol

I remember this episode being our first introduction to Oz, but I didn't realise we met Jonathan for the first time here too!
Season 2 sneakily introducing all the important people :D