Antiquated: "Old-fashioned or outdated." This is how I'd professionally describe the travesty that is "I Robot, You Jane," in brief. How would I describe it unprofessionally? Well, it's shit. A story with emotional resonance and lasting value could have overcome the fact that it's dated from a technology standpoint, but it's sadly nowhere close to subtle and emotionally resonant. This is also the only Buffy episode in the entire series that actually leaves me bored for most of its running time. Only Jenny Calendar and the laugh-at-it moments kept me interested from time-to-time. Not even the reliably fun characters had their mojo going for this one. The episode has all the worst qualities of S1, amplified, and only a hint of its more positive qualities. I'd be curious to hear what Whedon thinks about this episode nowadays.

Literally the only positives to talk about revolve around Jenny Calendar's introduction and subsequent arguments with Giles over the advancement of technology, a handful of good quotes, and the final foreshadow-y scene. I genuinely enjoyed Jenny and Giles' spirited debate and can sympathize with both positions as, while I'm definitely into modern technology, I'm also quite a bit old-fashioned in many ways. Jenny flirting with Giles a bit in the background is a nice added layer to their banter.

Beyond simply being incredibly outdated, most of "I Robot, You Jane" has abysmal dialogue, execution, and pacing. The dialogue – usually one of the positives of the show – is so boring outside of a handful of quotes that I'm actually pretty shocked. Most of it is entirely plot-based and there to help the viewer and the characters from plot point A to plot point B to plot point C. Perfunctory is the word I'm looking for.

Then there's the problem of the demon of the week, Moloch. This is an ancient demon that is apparently smart enough to understand and control computers and spread itself across the internet. This strikes me as entirely unbelievable and completely ridiculous. Somehow the episode craps on itself even more with the big climax involving Robo Moloch. There is no tension, no real stakes, a poor setup, and absolutely no subtext or subtlety to the entire proceedings. It's all laughable at best and blehhh at worst.

At this point one might ask what the episode was trying to do? Well, I think that's explained early on and is followed by heavy-handed silliness. In the Italy flashback, the demon Moloch asks, "Do you love me? I can give you everything. All I want is your love." Once he has their love he snaps their necks (even though it looks more like polite turning than snapping). "I Robot, You Jane" is pretty transparently about the dangers of the internet, but more specifically the dangers of getting emotionally invested with people who you haven't met in person before. Online dating is heavily implicated here as well even though chat rooms appear to be the episode's focus. The concept behind how love can be used to manipulate others, made particularly easy with modern tools of communication, is one that is actually somewhat interesting. As a fellow geek who is all-too familiar with online dating, this is a theme that had the potential to resonate with me. This theme, however, is woefully under-developed, lacks subtlety, and is just horribly outdated in its presentation.

Back in the day online dating was something to be terrified of. There was a perception that only completely anti-social lunatics participated in it. Times have changed a lot though. Online dating is now much more modern, much more accepted, and much less scary. With that said, the dangers of naïve girls (or anyone, really) in chat rooms getting tangled up in a mess of a situation with a molester or abductor is certainly all-too real, although there's generally only a risk for the seriously gullible and weak-willed among our youth. Of all the people to get caught up in something like this, Willow would be the last one I'd think of. I think I'll just blame it on the fact that Moloch was influencing her to act abnormally which then, of course, strips away any hope of lasting character relevance.

Another problem I have is with the portrayal of the computer science guys. I should disclose that I'm a professional software developer and that I know my reaction will be stronger than others, but my God did those guys grate on me. They weren't just displayed as stereotypical geeks; they were displayed as complete lunatics who spoke in a way that's totally foreign to me. I grew up in the thick of that era of technology and nobody talked like that. If anything, there should have been less talk about being "jacked in" and more talk about who would win in a fight between a couple Borg Cubes and the Death Star (easy answer, by the way: one cube left standing due to adaption technology). These S1 techies make the Trio in S6 look like high class geeks.

So to sum all this up, what we have here is a complete mess of an episode. "I Robot, You Jane" is a pain and a bore to sit through in every phase of the episode with only brief reprieves from Jenny and Giles. The underlying concept behind the episode – manipulation through love tangled with the dangerous side of the internet -- is worth a careful, lasting, and relevant discussion but, alas, all of those attributes are absent here. Its portrayal of computer geeks (demon's thrall or not, it's painful), general lack of ability to hold my interest for most of its running time, long-term irrelevance, and shoddy production values all add onto the pile in what is my easy pick for the 'honor' of being the worst episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Only a couple other episodes ("Teacher's Pet" [1x04] and "Where the Wild Things Are" [4x18]) come close. To quote Xander, "Shoot me. Stuff me. Mount me."