This is a classic episode of BtVS and is also, for the most part, a stand alone episode. The only season arc things that happen in this episode are small moments between the Mayor and Faith. He gets her an apartment, she tries to treat him like a sugar daddy and he shoots her down, thereby starting their strange father-daughter relationship instead. The rest of the plot has nothing to do with the Mayor or with Faith. (Although, I would be curious to see Faith’s reaction to vamp Willow…)
Instead, this episode is about Willow. And why not? Xander got “The Zeppo” recently, it’s only fair that Willow gets her own episode – and there will even be two Willows in this one!
The episode starts with Willow feeling like “doormat person, homework girl” as she is forced by Principal Snyder to tutor Percy West (who thinks Willow will just do his work for him). She continues to feel this way as both Buffy and Xander refer to her as reliable. She wants to do something dangerous and unexpected. Enter Anya.
Yes, Anya from “The Wish” who is trying to get back to the wish dimension from that episode. If she can get back, she can get her necklace back and then go back to being a demon, rather than a human teenage girl. She asks Willow to help her with a spell, which of course goes awry. Enter vamp Willow from the wish dimension.
And now, shenanigans! Vamp Willow doesn’t like our world and upon entering the Bronze, likes it even less. She manages to turn the tables on Percy though, which results in him being scared of Willow and finally doing his own work (and presenting her with an apple – it’s a great moment at the end of the episode). In the process, Xander (who sadly for vamp Willow is not vamp Xander) and Buffy think that Willow’s been turned and go to tell Giles.
It’s actually pretty funny when Willow walks in on the three mourning her. And then Xander uses a cross. I mean, I get it, classic vampire lore… but Willow’s Jewish, a cross had no meaning to her in life, so why would it scare her now? Instead of digressing, I invite you to read my “Passions” blog where I talk about this from my soap box. Before I end this topic, I will say that Willow also uses a cross on vamp Willow later in the episode. Ugh. (I forgive Wesley for using a cross because he might not realize that Willow is Jewish yet.)
Back at the Bronze, vamp Willow is “bored now” and ends up killing a girl named Sandy. The only reason I mention this is that the Sandy actress played Emma on several episodes of Dawson’s Creek during its final season. Vamp Willow also teams up with Anya (since they both want to get back to the other dimension) and several vampires. This Willow is exacting and cold, as we see when she gets said vampires on her side. “Who do you work for?,” she asks several times as she breaks their fingers, until they finally reply, “You.” Good strategy.
Also at the Bronze? Oz (and the rest of Dingoes Ate My Baby) and Angel, who don’t have many opportunities to hang out. But they do in this episode. They also think that Willow’s been turned, so Angel goes to tell Buffy and to get her help as there is clearly a vampire situation about to go down at the Bronze. When he finds Buffy, he also finds Willow and is confused, as one might be, and happy to find out that Willow has not been turned.
One great part of this episode is when Willow and vamp Willow are face to face. V.W. and Anya need Willow’s help with the spell, and V.W. wouldn’t mind turning Willow. This all prompts the “and I think I’m kinda gay” conversation that is a funny throw away line… or is it?
Okay, so I get that the writers don’t always have everything planned out seasons ahead, but sometimes they do. Seth Green left the show half way through season 4, in part because he felt that the writers didn’t know what to do with him anymore and that was leading to his character being somewhat out of, well, character. After a conversation with Joss Whedon, Oz was written out of the show. In the aftermath of that, Willow meets Tara and eventually starts a relationship with her, realizing that she’s gay. Part of me feels like if the plan at this stage was not to write Oz out of the show then there would be no reason to plan ahead for Willow to be gay, and yet, I wonder. Angel has a response to Willow’s comment where he starts to say that vampires are a reflection or enhanced version of their human selves, but stops after a look from Buffy tells him to.
So here we have a clue: the way Willow is as a human will be a little bit of a predictor of what she would be as a vampire. At this stage of the game, Willow is bad at being bad, as evidenced when she swaps places with her doppleganger, leaving V.W. in her classic fuzzy pink sweater, btw. However, anyone who’s watched through season 6, at least, knows that Willow can be very bad indeed. We also know, from “The Wish”, that vamp Willow and vamp Xander are a team, romantically involved, and that V.W. is clearly in charge of their relationship. Our Willow is really good at taking charge of a situation and we obviously know about her feelings for Xander. If Willow was turned into a vampire in the alternate dimension during the Harvest, which I think she would have been, she would not yet have realized she was gay, but her vamp self would still have acted on some of those impulses, making her vampire at least bisexual, which is what she seems based on the two episodes she appears in.
So, did Joss Whedon and company plan on making Willow gay all along? Okay, I don’t have an answer for that, but I suspect that, if nothing else, once they wrote it, they realized they had to do something with it. Or, maybe it was planned all along. No matter the answer, despite my love of Oz and sadness at his departure, I’m glad that Willow ended up being gay because of Tara. (It is also worth noting that the glimpses we see of Liam before he become Angelus and crazy Drusilla before she is turned are good predictors of the vampires they became. Even William had some Spike in him before he was turned.)
The other big thing this episode gives us is another chance for V.W. (you all got that this is short for vamp Willow by now I hope) to kill Cordelia. It’s pretty funny, especially since when Cordelia find her she’s been locked up. Cordy uses this as an opportunity to have girl talk with Willow after the whole cheating with Xander thing. Cordelia is totally right about this, by the way. The two of these girls had actually become friends, so Willow didn’t just betray Oz, she also betrayed Cordelia and it was time for them to have it out (I wonder if Cordy and real Willow ever do have this conversation now). Unfortunately for Cordelia, her timing is off and, as usual, she doesn’t really pay attention to other people and totally misses all signs that this is not her Willow. The only thing that prevents her from being eaten is Wesley showing up at the right time with a cross and V.W. deciding that they are not worth it. And then of course, these two think that Willow’s been turned – I wonder when they found out the truth. Was it the next day when Willow bounced into the library? Anyways, Wesley gets to actually be a hero in this episode, sort of – good for him.
In the end, Giles and Willow are able to get V.W. back her dimension, just in time for her to be staked by Oz, as she was in “The Wish.” Anya gets nothing. Unless of course you count the fact that now the Scooby Gang knows who she really is. And that’s that.
This is a funny and very satisfying episode that is a break from the usual arc, but still fits in as it ties to a past episode and brings Anya into the fold for the first time (although she’s still a villain at this point).
Bored Now.
The Great Buffy Re-watch 