“Bad Girls”

Okay, so things just got good, or bad, depending on your take.  Buffy delves back into the moral quandary pool, only this time Buffy herself is the one toeing the line.

As I’ve mentioned in at least one other previous blog, the slayer’s job is to kill, therefore Buffy is a killer. However, because she only kills monsters and demons (and evil robots) she is not seen as a villain. This episode, along with its companion, “Consequences,” takes this idea and plays with it.  With power comes great responsibility, and on this show, who has more power than the slayer (you know, other than the other slayer)?

There’s a lot going on in this episode.  It starts off with Buffy and Faith working really well together in their fight against vampires.  It’s actually really great to see them fighting together and being all friendly, cause you know, that won’t last long. After the whole evil watcher thing, Faith seems to have come back around nicely, just in time to be a bad influence on Buffy.

What allows Buffy to slowly start losing (or at least testing) her moral compass? Well, that would be the arrival of new Watcher, Wesley Windham-Pryce.  First of all, Alexis Denisof is awesome, and I have been waiting to see Wesley on Buffy since “Helpless.” And, wait, is his British accent more proper here than it was on Angel? Hmmm… it definitely sounds different than I remember, maybe it’s just been a while since I’ve seen his character on either show. Second, his character is such a great buffoon (“Preparation, preparation, preparation” says it all) that Giles now looks extremely cool by comparison. I do appreciate that Giles is still the school librarian.  I mean, the Watcher’s Council obviously got him that job to put him in the slayer’s orbit and give him a place to hide all the occult books he would need in his capacity as Watcher, yet, Wesley just shows up at the school, starts hanging out in the library and goes unquestioned? I know that schools were much more lax about these things in the 90s, but the Watcher’s Council could have made him some sort of teacher or assistant librarian as a cover – don’t you think?

Anyways, Buffy’s reaction to having a new Watcher is great – “Is he evil? The last one was evil.” Faith’s reaction is better – “Screw that.” And then she turns around and walks out of the library. Clearly Wesley has an uphill battle here. He is also the cause of Buffy being more open to rebellion. She never liked taking orders from Giles, but he was able to find teaching moments to get her to take responsibility and never treated her like a lackey. Think back to the very first episode. Buffy is at the Bronze, still resisting the whole slayer thing, when Giles shows up. She teases him, he puts up with it and then gets her to try to hone her senses to see if there are any vampires at the club. She spots one easily and explains to Giles how she knows that he is a vampire.  Giles is a bit flummoxed, as Buffy is not doing things in the traditional way, but he accepts that and he accepts her. Wesley, on the other hand, goes straight in for the orders. And he’s super uncool. She’s having none of that, so when Faith’s bad girl approach calls, she listens.

Interestingly, this is all against the backdrop of college talk. Although Buffy has applied for colleges, she still sees her future as limiting. She understands Xander, who is definitely not going to college. And Willow, of course, has early acceptances from Harvard, Yale, and Wesleyan (didn’t Joss Whedon go to the latter?). During the career fair in season 2 (the same episode that introduced Kendra) Buffy was also not feeling so great about her future.  She has a better outlook now, but it is interesting that when a story about 2 slayers working together comes along, the gang’s future is being discussed yet again.

Speaking of Kendra, Buffy is the Kendra to Faith’s Buffy.  Last season, Kendra had to remind Buffy that slaying isn’t a job, it’s who she is. Kendra was also a rule follower and Buffy was the impulsive one. Now Faith is reminding Buffy that slaying is who she is, but taking it a whole lot further. And because Faith is so impulsive, it puts Buffy in a more responsible position, the position that Kendra used to fill. Doug Petrie, who wrote this episode, says something to the effect that Faith is Buffy’s darker side in his episode commentary. This will come up again when Buffy is learning about Othello in English class. Comparing Buffy to other slayers is interesting.  Obviously, all people are different, and therefore so too are slayers. But seeing how different slayers perceive being the slayer, and what that means, is what makes this and the next episode so important.  And it’s all centered around the idea of how far a slayer can go and how far a slayer should go.  Faith takes this to the extreme with her mantra of, “Want, take, have.”

Doug Petrie also talks about Buffy’s rebirth in this episode. There’s a moment when a vampire seemingly drowns Buffy and she reemerges from the water with, “I hate it when they drown me,” recalling “Prophecy Girl.” This almost drowning serves as a baptism of sorts. When Buffy emerges, she changes and is more open to bad behavior. From that moment on, she makes horrible choices up until the moment when Faith accidentally stakes a human.

This is an understandable mistake. Vampires are coming at them as they walk down an alley, and Alan, the deputy mayor, probably shouldn’t have been in that alley. Buffy sees him as he reaches for her, pushes him away, and then Faith picks up the slack, ready to pounce. As she’s about to stake him, Buffy realizes that he’s not a vampire and tries to warn Faith, but it is too late.

Brief pause: why was Alan there? He must’ve been there to tell Buffy and Faith about the Mayor, right? We’ll never know for sure unfortunately, but he did look pretty uncomfortable in the Mayor’s office with Mayor Wilkins and Mr. Trick. How did he become the Deputy Mayor? When did he find out that the guy he worked for was evil? What made him stay and why decide to speak out now? Unfortunately, we are left with a lot of questions. Of course, none of these really matter in the grand scheme of things.

Back to the murder. I have to wonder, what if their roles were reversed? What if Faith was the one who pushed Alan, and Buffy was the one who tagged in with the stake? Would Buffy have realized he was human before shoving the stake into his heart? Would Faith have noticed from afar or would she have continued moving, knowing that B can handle herself? Since Buffy is more of a thinker and more of an observer than Faith, who again is more impulsive and more about the action, would Buffy have been able to stop the murder from taking place if their roles had been reversed? This doesn’t really matter. We don’t want the hero of our show, who will always be Buffy, killing anyone, so it had to be Faith. However, how Faith handled this crisis, versus what Buffy would have done, is how you know that Buffy is a moral character and Faith is not.

I have to believe that this event affected Faith, even if she won’t admit it. She goes back to look at the body and seems genuinely upset. But then, like a Vampire Diaries vampire turning off his humanity, she makes a decision off-camera to not care. She disposes of the body (and honestly, not very well as he pops right up again in the next episode), and moves on, not wanting to discuss what happened, not wanting to think about it, and, as she tells Buffy, not even caring that she killed someone.

What follows is fodder for the next blog.  While this feels like a natural ending point there is so much more to discuss here that I haven’t really even touched on.

I mean, Buffy is pushing Willow, her best friend aside.  And using the same lousy excuse the whole gang used on Xander in “The Zeppo.” Doesn’t Buffy get that just by being her friend Willow and Xander will always be in danger? Poor Willow. Or what about when Xander’s eye twitches every time Faith’s name is mentioned? Or how about when Joyce says that she doesn’t want to meddle in Buffy’s slaying? I guess she learned her lesson after “Gingerbread,” huh?

I haven’t even talked about what a bad influence Faith was on Buffy.  I mean, I skirted the topic, but then went straight to the murder, leaving out all the class skipping (when there’s an important test to be taken) and store robbing.  For the first time, Buffy breaks the law for fun, rather than out of necessity. And then, while escaping police custody, she and Faith injure the police officers and against Buffy’s better judgement, they leave without calling for help. Buffy gets so caught up in the whole bad girl behavior thing that she actually freaks Angel out by being way too sexual with him. Sure, they’re back together, but no one wants Angel to lose his soul again and it seems as if Buffy’s too caught up in her own feelings to realize that her behavior with Angel is inappropriate. Angel has to remove himself from Buffy and get all business-like with her.

Oh, and Wesley! Yes, I talked about him, but I didn’t mention what a horrible Watcher he is. Aside from all the negative things I’ve already mentioned, he thought that the demon of the week was dead, then got kidnapped by said demon, and then was ready to blurt out everything to that demon in order to try to save his life – what an amateur! And then, because he lacks fighting skills, Giles had to save him. Now, this isn’t entirely Wesley’s fault, the Watcher’s Council doesn’t really field train their guys. You know, cause that’s the slayer’s job anyways.

And speaking of the demon of the week, when Buffy kills him he utters one more ominous line –  “When he rises you’ll wish I’d killed you all.” We know that he is referring to the Mayor, but our characters haven’t figured that out yet. And Mayor Wilkins has that whole dedication ceremony that makes him invincible. A sword-wielding vampire slices his head in two, and the Mayor lives (and magically heals).  This does not bode well for our hero.

At the end of this episode there is also a not-so-sneaky Shakespeare reference. Faith is washing blood out of her shirt and, metaphorically, off of her. Here, she is like Lady MacBeth, only Faith’s conscious doesn’t seem to be in play here. Faith washes out the blood, but Buffy is the one who’ll have the hard time dealing with the murder, which I’ll talk more about in the next blog.

“The Zeppo”

This is one of my favorite episodes of the series.  It might even be my favorite episode of season 3.  Why?  Well, for starters it is Xander-centric, but it also turns the regular Buffy formula on its head by telling a B-story as the A-story and relegating the A-story to the B-story for the week.  It’s just a fun episode!

There are so many little things from this episode that I could talk about, like that fact that all television pastry boxes are pink for some reason.  Or the fact that I appreciate Willow’s marshmallow joke when the other characters don’t seem to.  Not to mention, who names their knife, “Katie”?  Who names a knife, period? And – wait, Sunnydale has gangs? And while I could go on to talk about these insignificant things a little longer – this episode has so much meat to it.  It’s different than “Helpless,” which was certainly a meaty episode, as well.  This one is so much lighter, despite the episode featuring yet another apocalypse.

Xander is threatened by “Katie”

Okay, I honestly don’t know where to start with this episode, so I guess I’ll throw a dart and land at… Xander and Cordelia.  Surprisingly, Cordelia is still talking to Xander, even after the whole cheating thing (although, Oz and Xander seem to be friends again and Oz forgave Willow and got back together with her, so this isn’t so far-fetched) – of course she’s mostly just taunting him which is classic Cordelia. However, her teasing strikes a particular chord in this episode.  She compares him to Jimmy Olsen, which is down on Xander’s level, he even made a joke about the same subject with Giles, who just didn’t get it (oh, if only Oz had been there).  When Cordelia says it though, it is suddenly an insult. She also says, “Can you say “expendable”?” – which I find particularly funny since she ended up being in a movie called The Expendables.  This all leads to Xander obsessing over being cool.  Here’s the thing though, although Cordy was being mean, when compared with Jack O’Toole’s threats moments earlier, one can see that at least Cordelia still cares.  Her taunting comes from a place of wanting to hurt Xander for what he did to her, sure, but re-watching this makes me certain that these two can be friends again (and they will be before she moves on to L.A. and the spin-off series).

It’s also fun to compare this scene at the beginning of the episode, with the scene at the end when Xander does find his cool.  He leaves Cordelia hanging, as he walks away with a big smile on his face.  What a great ending!  Xander really grows during this episode and it shows.

Okay, we have to talk about one more thing having to do with these two former love birds, and I know I’ve mentioned it before.  Xander loses his virginity in this episode, which I think is proof that Cordelia is a virgin.  I know, this shouldn’t matter, but it does because of certain events in Angel’s first season.  Xander may have been Cordelia’s first love.  She is never shown, before or after Xander, having another committed relationship on the series.  The one possible exception to this is Darryl, who we find out about in “Some Assembly Required.” She loved him, he treated her badly, then he died.  And then he became Frankenstein’s monster and tried to make her his bride.  He died while Cordelia was a high school freshman, when she was maybe 15 years old.  Now it’s completely possible that she lost her virginity to him, but if she did, it stands to reason that she would have had sex with Xander, too.  Likewise, if she had had sex with any of the other random guys she dated in season 1, there’s almost no good reason for her not to have also had sex with Xander.  Since they didn’t have sex, Cordelia must have lost her virginity to that guy on Angel who impregnated her with a demon baby.  Which again, means that Cordelia’s first time having sex got her pregnant!  Can you imagine – that must have been so traumatizing.  Yet, Angel, being a more grown-up show and making Cordelia seem more like a twenty-something than a 19-year-old (if not 18-year-old) glosses over her loss of virginity, which is a really big deal.  I understand that there wasn’t really room in that episode for this discussion, but at the same time – can you imagine?

Alright, I’m done, so back to the Xander portion of this conversation.  Yep, Xander manages to help Faith out of a jam, she has some energy she needs to get out and they have sex.  It’s actually kind of funny how one second, they’re shown in post-coital bliss with the cuddling and the next minute she’s kicking him out of her motel room without any emotion.  I wonder if Cordelia ever found out about this and what her reaction was.  We see Willow’s reaction in a couple of episodes, but never Cordelia’s.

So, jumping all over the place, I want to go back to talking about Xander’s search for how to be cool.  It reminds me of this episode of Beverly Hills 90201 when Valerie was going to be written up in some magazine for being cool and she kept asking about it (and therefore, being uncool).  Xander’s obsession with it is very similar.  The more you think about being cool and ask questions about how to be cool, the less cool you are apparently.  I mean, take Oz.  He has hardly anything to say on the matter and doesn’t even know that he is cool when Xander asks him about it.  And so Xander, in his quest to be cool, ends up looking for a thing – which ends up being a car (and some penis jokes).  And that car is what ends up getting him in trouble and eventually leads him to finding his cool – without the aid of a “thing.” But the car isn’t what makes him cool at all.

The other thing that leads Xander towards his strange night is the abandonment of his friends.  I mean, I get it, they want to keep him safe, but why now?  I mean it’s great that Faith is in the mix and working well with Buffy, but that doesn’t mean that Xander can’t be useful (in a non-snack capacity way). What his friends do to him in this episode is actually kind of mean. Also, Xander is actually pretty good at staying cool and collected in the face of danger. He doesn’t buckle under pressure. Sure, over the years he has his moments and sometimes runs away screaming (only in “Go Fish” though) or gets pummeled, but overall, he keeps his cool when it really counts. Sure, by not running away he is a liability as much as he is an asset, but what does Willow contribute?  Can’t she do her spells from a safer room/distance?  Xander could at least work to protect her during these tense moments. And honestly, his cool head in these matters is what allows him to save Faith.  He sees that she is in trouble and maneuvers the car just so, without missing a beat, to hit one of the demons and allow Faith a quick get-a-way.  Clearly, he is being underestimated in this episode by those who know him best. And, after this episode, without his friends ever finding out about his own adventures, he’s back in the mix without a question.  Weird, no?

After all is said and done, this episode is a zombie episode. I am not a zombie fan, but here they are used for comedy and are completely different from the zombies seen in “Dead Man’s Party” – thank goodness!  One of them is even played by Michael Cudlitz – one of those actors that you’ve definitely seen in at least one other thing between the 90s and now. The majority of the Xander-centric episode is played for laughs.  Sometimes it is in the physical humor (see Xander accidentally decapitate a zombie with a mailbox), and sometimes it is through the typical Xander method of talking.  For example, “Two guys wrasslin, but not in a gay way “– oh Xander.  I don’t think this would fly anymore, but it is amusing to hear Xander try to be cool and then have to backtrack and say too much.

• 

  MIchael Cudlitz on Buffy

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  Michael Cudlitz in real life
  

This is juxtaposed with the overly dramatic apocalypse scenes sprinkled throughout the episode. The most obvious example of this is, of course, the Buffy-Angel scene.  It seems pretty typical, but then once Xander interrupts we see how the over-dramatic can be played for laughs.  Especially since, as soon as Xander leaves, the romantic music swells up once again – right where it left off.

Imagine this with dramatic music swelling

Music actually plays a really important part in this episode.  As soon as Xander’s scenes get serious, there is no music.  The apocalypse battle has music and is very loud, but Xander’s scenes are quiet. This signals a change, both in tone and in Xander. The lack of music shows Xander’s inner-calm (or, cool, if you will) – the music stops, the rest is silence. It is in these moments that we see just how much Xander is worth.  After all, unbeknownst to his friends, he is the one saving those who save the world. If not for Xander (with an assist from werewolf Oz that he doesn’t know about), anyone in the high school would have been killed in an explosion.  Xander stops a bomb from going off and rescues his friends – and the world. No wonder he’s my favorite guy on this show!

I do wonder though why Jack isn’t a better fighter.  I mean, you’re telling me that he can’t take Xander? Or maybe, against regular threats, Xander can hold his own? Last season Xander almost got pummeled by Larry, but maybe he would have been okay without Buffy’s interference.  Or maybe he’s learned some fighting over the past 2 years. Or maybe Jack’s not as tough as he seems.

It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Xander is cool and he gains some much-needed confidence through his own hero’s journey in this episode.  Also, Oz is strangely full the next day. 

“Helpless”

Buffy does not have good birthdays.  I mean, I get that the slayer doesn’t get a day off (although, with Faith around, why not?), but you can’t tell me that the world’s best secret superhero can’t have a nice quiet birthday at the very least.  But then, of course, where’s the drama in that?

This episode is pretty much about men trying to control Buffy while at the same time bringing up daddy issues.  Let’s start with the latter.

Hank Summers up until now has been a pretty good father for someone who lives an hour or so away.  He visits, Buffy spent a summer with him, and he genuinely seems concerned about her well-being.  The first time that his absence was odd was when Buffy runs away and he is nowhere to be found at the beginning of season 3.  That doesn’t mean he doesn’t care though.  Off camera it’s entirely possible that he and Joyce talked on the phone about Buffy while she was gone.  He may have even gone to Sunnydale for a few days.  Maybe Hank even talked to a bunch of Buffy’s former Los Angeles friends to see if they had heard from her.  We don’t know, but I’d like to think he was somewhat involved – even if we didn’t see it or hear about it.  And that brings us up to this episode where he cancels on Buffy on her birthday.  They had plans – and tickets – to go see an ice show and he flakes on her.  This is the first time that we start to see that Hank isn’t a great dad.  Maybe it was just easier for the writers to villainize him in order to help viewers forget his existence.  Maybe it was hard to schedule the actor to come back at any point in season 3.  My guess is that it was the former, which also allows for more drama. Besides, there is no doubt that Giles has become Buffy’s father figure, especially since “Band Candy” when he and Joyce, um, spent some quality time together.  So, having Hank Summers in the picture would just complicate that relationship and would make for some boring/non-existent drama.

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  Hank Summers last seen in season 2

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And that brings us to the other daddy issues that Buffy has in this episode with Giles.  So, first, Buffy’s actual dad cancels on her and then Giles, seeming very distant, is oblivious to all of Buffy’s hints that he should take her to the ice show.  Her purpose in asking him is that he is like a father to her, but Giles seems to be not paying attention.  The sad reality is that he is trying very hard to follow through with his duties as her Watcher and feels the need to make himself more distant and colder in order to protect himself, as he does see Buffy as a sort of daughter.  What results in this episode leads to the betrayal of two fathers.  The only thing that redeems him is his firing from the Watchers’ Council for disobedience.

Speaking of the Watchers’ Council… as we find out later in the series, this entire operation is a bunch of men using and controlling women to do their dirty work for them. On one hand, it’s very empowering that men in ancient times chose a woman to be the first slayer, but in order to do so, they had to first put her in chains.  That’s the irony of the slayer – this woman seemingly has all the power, but is always doing the bidding a man, her Watcher.  Now, of course we know that there are female Watchers, but at this point the only one we know of was evil (see “Revelations”), and that sends quite a message. Also, the majority of Watchers and members of the Council that we know about, from the beginning of the series through the end of season 3, are all men with that one evil exception.  Buffy’s 1^st Watcher was a man (both according to show and movie lore), as is her current Watcher (obviously).  The members of the Watchers’ Council that we meet in this episode are all men, as was Kendra’s Watcher.  I will admit to not remembering what Faith said about her Watcher back in Boston, so perhaps she had a female Watcher, but the fact that I don’t remember also says volumes about this issue.  And finally, the new Watcher we meet after the events of this episode is also, you guessed it – a man.

Now I don’t want you to think that I have a huge problem with this.  The Council is an ancient order (and a secret one at that) and probably only started bringing women aboard in more recent times.  Also, BtVS is from the 90s and while I’d love to say that the 90s were a wonderful time, clearly, we still had a lot to learn then, as we do now, about gender relations.  We’ve come a long way, but not far enough.  A few years ago, I watched a documentary about Anita Hill, who is a wonderfully nice and intelligent human being (yes, I met her and spoke with her back when I worked at the same university where she teaches, which also happens to be my alma mater).  I was shocked by exactly what went down between her and Clarence Thomas, as I was too young to know or understand the details of those hearings as they were happening.  What was even more shocking to me though, was that “pubic hair” was not a common thing to say aloud.  Not that I say this out loud on a regular basis, but it has definitely lost its shock value, in part because Anita Hill was forced to talk about it on Capitol Hill.  My point being, that a lot has changed since the 90s.  A lot changed in the 90s, and Buffy was a direct cause and effect of that.  So, having an almost all-male Watchers’ Council doesn’t bother me – what bothers me is the control they assert over their all female slayers.

In this episode, that control is deadly, mean, and just the worst.  And Giles, as an instrument of the Council, goes along with it – mostly.  What he does to Buffy leading up to the Tento di Cruciamentum (or slayer rite of passage) is despicable and horribly controlling.  He basically hypnotizes her in order to inject her with something that slowly takes away her slayer powers.  And then, he continues to send her out hunting by herself!  I mean, she could have died before the stupid Cruciamentum test!  But that’s missing the point.  He hypnotizes her to put her in a trance where she doesn’t see or feel anything and then drugs her – literally taking away her power.  What?  As a high schooler I didn’t see the full implications of this, but now it’s just awful.  Giles is following ancient orders. This has been done, as Quentin makes clear, to every slayer upon her 18^th birthday – assuming she lives that long in the first place.  (Side note: there is at least one slayer that we hear about who was older – if you are called when you are over 18 does that mean that you are spared this barbaric ritual or is there one for when you turn 30, too?)

• 

  Giles hypnotizes Buffy

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  and then drugs her…

Before continuing, I think it’s important to note that this is the first episode in which we meet anyone else from the Council, and more importantly, the first episode in which we meet Quentin Travers, who is the head of the Council.  He actually, and surprisingly, becomes a beloved character in the future.

Quentin Travers played by Harris Yulin

Okay, back to what I was saying before.  Giles is going along with his orders, taking away Buffy’s powers and sending her out to slay, knowing that she is getting weaker and weaker.  When Buffy finally says something to him about it, on the heels of Cordelia having to rescue her (which is actually really funny – don’t mess with Queen C guys), he appears unsympathetic as he plays his part in Buffy’s test.  When Buffy says to him, “I throw knives like a…”, Giles tries to finish her sentence by saying, “girl?”  Luckily for us, Buffy gives him an evil look and finishes her own sentence with, “slayer.”  Giles is certainly from another time, and as such, his perspective is colored by the same sexism that keeps the Council in control.

This whole test that Buffy goes through is a way of controlling slayers, but why and how?  At 18, children become adults, but not so in ancient times.  This is a relatively new concept.  Teenagers are also a relatively new concept. Perhaps, at some point, the Council realized that women are capable of learning and controlling their own lives and this test was a convenient way to get rid of problematic (aka non-controllable) women.  Of course, those who survive, like Buffy, do so because they are resourceful and able to think for themselves, but perhaps it is the rare slayer who survives, which is the whole point.  Or maybe, 18 was convenient for Joss Whedon and he just went with it.  Either way, this story shows that Buffy is now an adult, she is resourceful (remember that time she killed a vamp with a pencil? Even Spike admired this quality in her), and she is better than the Council and will not be controlled.

Giles, who does care for Buffy, eventually does break the rules of this test and goes to try to save Buffy from death.  He is too late as Buffy doesn’t need a man to save her.  However, in doing this, Giles is fired from the Council.  This just isn’t okay as he is clearly a better person than all the other men in the Watchers’ Council, but again, future drama.

A couple casting notes from this episode: Zachary Kralik is the first character that Jeff Kober plays on Buffy.  He will back for multiple episodes in season 6 as a different character.  Also, David Hayden-Jones is one of the men that Quentin brings to help prepare for the test.  He is now a recurring character, Mr. Ketch, on Supernatural where he also uses a very real sounding British accent.  Thanks to DVD commentaries, I now know that he is, in fact, American.

• 

  Jeff Kober as Kralik

• 

• 

  Jeff Kober as Rack (season 6)

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  David Hayden-Jones now and then

On another note, before Joyce is kidnapped by Kralik in order to get Buffy to play along, Buffy is wearing a red coat with a hood that makes her look very much like Little Red Riding Hood, which Kralik acknowledges when he sees her wearing it.  In season 4, Buffy will dress up as Little Red Riding Hood for Halloween.

In more episodic connections, Amy the rat is officially Willow’s pet, with a wheel in her cage and everything.  If only Willow knew how to reverse the spell to make Amy a human again.

A fun moment in this episode is a kryptonite conversation between Oz and Xander. This is a true geek conversation, as I had never heard of gold kryptonite before and I had been watching Superman, Superboy, and Supergirl since I was a child and read plenty of comic books. Buffy wouldn’t be Buffy without these geeky moments.

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  I was raised on reruns like this classic.

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  This show was in syndication when I was young.

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  This movie might be considered bad, but I love it.

And finally, speaking of Xander, while bringing the conversation back to male control… the end of the episode when Xander tries to help weak Buffy out by opening a peanut butter jar and can’t is priceless.  I mean, he means well, but this is such a stereotypical thing for a man to do.  But, of course, on Buffy, women are always the strong ones, and so Xander can’t open it either, and that’s what makes this moment okay.

I feel like a said a whole lot in this blog, and most of it was kind of depressing.  However, it’s important for me to also say that when I first saw this episode, I was unable to even think about many of these things and was able to enjoy this on a much simpler scale.  Because of this blog, sometimes I say a lot, especially as the world continues to change around me.  At its core, this episode is wonderfully dramatic, opens up the Buffyverse, and has wonderful character arcs.  At the end of the day (and this blog), that’s what I want to remember.

“Gingerbread”

I always enjoy watching shows take on fairytales and giving them a modern-day twist.  Charmed did it on more than one occasion, and while I can’t think of any non-Charmed examples at the moment, I know there are some.

This episode is also the first one in which it is clear that Willow has moved on from computer geek to witch.  She’s obviously been doing spells since Ms. Calendar died, but now we see that she is part of a witch community (I hesitate to say coven, as I don’t believe that Willow is actually in a “coven”) – something she tries to find again in college.  And, since this episode centers around witches, Amy’s back!  One episode in season 1, one episode in season 2, one episode in season 3.  I’m sensing a pattern, which gets broken after this.  We also meet a new witch – a male witch.  Some don’t like the word “warlock” even though that is the word typically assigned to a male witch, so I won’t use it.  If Harry Potter isn’t a warlock neither is new character Michael, played by Blake Soper from Boy Meets World and Salute Your Shorts.  These three witches are working together to perform a protection spell for Buffy’s birthday, but it all goes horribly awry when the latest demon comes to town.

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  Blake Soper as Michael on BtVS

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  Boy Meets World

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  The cast of Salute Your Shorts

But this episode is about more than witches and demons.  It’s about how communities deal with tragedy, and more importantly, about mothers and daughters.  Joyce is heavily featured in this episode.  She tries so hard to be a good mother, but just doesn’t get it.  She’s clueless, despite knowing Buffy’s secret.  I mean, she wants to watch Buffy work (a.k.a. slay).  Doesn’t she get that it’s dangerous?  Juxtapose that with Willow’s mom, who we finally meet, who doesn’t even pay attention to her daughter.  She doesn’t realize that Willow changed her hair months ago and refers to Willow’s best friend as “Bunny.” She seems to care, but only when Willow is doing something wrong.  Because Willow has been so perfect all these years, her mom has ceased to pay her any attention and thinks her new interest in witchcraft is a phase that can be related to a paper she just published.  This all definitely paints Joyce in a better light, despite her well-meaning cluelessness.  On the subject of Joyce, I have to mention how adorably awkward she and Giles are together.

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  Willow and Buffy’s moms unite for a common cause.

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  MOO headquarters

Joyce ends up spearheading the MOO (Mothers Opposed the Occult) movement in the wake of the death of two young children.  The community rallies around this tragedy, trying to cause good, but inadvertently prevents Buffy from doing her job.  This whole storyline actually reminds me of the witch finder general, who I was unfamiliar with when first viewing this episode. In the wake of Malleus Maleficarum and James VI and I writings on witchcraft, a man named Matthew Hopkins took it upon himself to track down witches and bring them to justice.  His methods were sketchy at best and he became rich by exploiting superstitious, 17^th century, English folk.  He was eventually found out and things did not end well for him, but there is a sort of pop-culture mythos that has built around the idea of the witch finder general in the same way that one thinks of Van Helsing.  So having an episode dedicated to a witch hunt certainly reminds me of that now.

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  Witchfinder General Matthew Hopkins

It is worth noting that, according to BtVS, the type of demon responsible for the chaos in Sunnydale is probably the same type of demon that started the Salem Witch Trials.  Growing up in Massachusetts and loving all things witches you know I know my Salem Witch Trial history, so I appreciated this reference.  I also appreciated that Buffy didn’t say any more than just that.  Cuz that would have ruined it.  BTW – totally in Salem as I’m writing this blog, but that’s just a coincidence – I promise.

Since I’ve mentioned Salem, I should make sure that you all know that no witches were burned at the stake in America – not in Salem, Connecticut (where there was an outbreak around the same time), or anywhere else.  Why mention this fact?  Well, a lot of people think that witches in Salem were burned at the stake and I find that super annoying, but more importantly, because in Sunnydale, the plan is to burn the witches at the stake.  Why would they do this in Sunnydale in 1999 though?  Isn’t there a more modern, and more efficient way of killing witches?  It seems a little odd to me.  Also, who would burn anyone at the stake indoors?  That’s just unsafe – I’m sorry, but it is.

Now, any true witch would find a way to escape this predicament, and Amy, having been at the witch thing for a lot longer than Willow, does just that.  She turns herself into a rat and escapes.  Don’t worry – she becomes Willow’s pet, because Willow can’t figure out how to change her back… so yeah, Amy the rat is here folks!  And as such, technically, Amy will be appearing in more than one episode per season now.

Amy the rat

A more troubling feature of this episode, you know, other than the witch hunt itself, and burning teenagers at the stake, is how the parents of these witches are reacting.  These are your children people! How are you less concerned about them than about the murdered children?  And that’s how you know that the town is once again under a spell.  I mean, Joyce, who knows exactly what’s going on thinks that Buffy’s the problem?!  That’s insane!  And, as Buffy points out, no one even knows who these children are.  They appear out of nowhere, dead, and the entire community goes bonkers.  Parents are choosing children that don’t exist over their own children!  This episode is extremely disturbing for this reason, and this reason alone.

Not disturbing? Cordelia and Giles forced to work together.  These two are hilarious.  I mean, can we get more of this please? (I know we won’t, but a girl can still dream, right?)  Also, toad stool.  It’s the little things that make me laugh.