Buffy The Vampire Slayer: The Worst Episode From Every Season

Season five is full of episodes that don't quite work with the tone of its overall story, but none more so than Listening To Fear, which finds Riley drawn back to the military whilst the gang are confronted by an alien-like demon intent on terrorising Joyce and the Summers' household.

What should have been a compelling hour digging into the distress of Buffy and Dawn about their mother's upcoming surgery is instead turned into an unconvincing monster of the week disaster, ruined by poor effects, an uninspired villain, and the reveal that Riley's started letting female vampires feed on him.

Listening To Fear does little to justify its existence, only seeming to be in place to hurt the Summers women some more even when they're at their most vulnerable, and continue to alienate Riley from the audience with his selfishness. The ending might be quite sweet, but everything up to it is just dismal.