Reception
The episode received critical praise and is often included on lists of the best episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In Entertainment Weekly's list of the 25 best Whedonverse episodes—including episodes from Buffy, as well as Angel, Firefly and Dollhouse—"Restless" placed at #20, where they called it "Visually lush and trippy," and said, "...it reestablished that this genre show was really and truly a deeply affecting character drama with a delightfully bent sense of humor." At Syfy.co.uk, the episode was listed as the seventh best episode in their list of the top 10 Buffy episodes, saying "This surreal episode marks the show's turning point, as it moved from a very well-executed urban fantasy drama series to something more creative, more thoughtful, and more surprising than pretty much anything else on television." In The Futon Critic's list of the 20 best episodes of 2000, the episode was placed at #1, with the author calling it an even more daring episode than "Hush", another acclaimed episode from the fourth season.
At Slayage.com, the Online Journal of Buffy Studies, author Daniel Erenberg placed the episode as the second best of the series; stating that the episode "lends itself to infinite interpretations. No one watches it the same way. That's the mark of a true masterpiece." When Noel Murray of The A.V. Club reviewed "Restless" in 2009, after beginning his first look at the series in 2008, he praised Joss Whedon's ability to represent what dreams are actually like. The A.V. Club also included "Restless" as an "essential episode" of the series in their list of the best TV series of the 2000s, in which Buffy the Vampire Slayer placed at #25. The episode was listed as #1 in Daily Kos' list of the top 10 episodes of the series, and the episode was listed as the second best episode featuring dream sequences by USA Today. In series creator Joss Whedon's own list of his favorite episodes, he includes "Restless", saying "Most people sort of shake their heads at it. It was different, but not pointless."
Read more about this topic: Restless (Buffy The Vampire Slayer)
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