This episode was about so much more then defeating Glory and worrying about Dawn’s fate. This episode was about life. I do not want to say that it was about life and death because I don’t feel it was. While death was a major part of this episode the way death was explored it had much more to do with life and the fact that death is part of life. This episode explored a part of the characters that we hadn’t seen before. All the characters have looked death in the face many times, have seen the coming of at least half a dozen apocalypses, but never was the threat of death quite so eminent. In every other case this far, they new how to stop it. They went in with a glimmer of hope that they could defeat their enemy.
This time they didn’t have that. They were facing an unbeatable foe and they knew that there only hope was to stall her. They knew that if they didn’t stall her that they would die. Buffy made that very clear to all of them. And so this episode showed us what life meant to every character on the show. It showed us what they loved and hated about it, it showed us what they were willing to do keep it, and it showed us what would be enough to make them give it up. And so I say that this episode is truly a masterpiece, the episode that we have been waiting for for 5 years and the episode that we will remember forever.
Now as if that wasn’t long enough I shall share with you my in depth review of the episode and the events that took place.
The previously on Buffy segment was truly something. It reminded me of a little proverb that I have heard before. “Life is like a roll of toilet paper, the closer you get to the end the faster it goes.” This segment started with scenes from the very beginning, in real time. It progressed through 5 years of shows getting faster and faster as it approached the end. This was the first indicator of the end of the episode. The last scenes went by so quickly that it could only have been the very last few sheet of toilet paper on the roll.
Next we have the teaser which was pure brilliance in its simplicity. With one short battle Joss managed to sum up what Buffy is about, what it has always been about. “But you’re just a girl” and it’s true. Buffy is just a girl. She represents each of us out there. Every day we go out and slay our own demons. We face things no one else should have to face, and things we are sure nobody else ever has had to face. But they have. Though we feel alone in this world just as Buffy was in that alley, we are never truly alone, Buffy walked back into a room full of people who share her pains and her joys.
That is what Buffy represents. Buffy carries this horrible burden. It is something that she is not supposed to share with anyone, she has been told that she must not let anyone know what is going on with her because it is her burden to carry and to tell people would to be placing the burden on there shoulders. I have felt like this so often in my life. I have felt unable to open up to others because I didn’t want to worry them. But Buffy does the brave thing, something we all must do, she opens her heart to others, and they don’t feel that Buffy has placed a burden on their shoulders by bringing them into her life. They feel honored to help such a brave and noble girl fight the evils that we face everyday in life.
Buffy and Giles are the two people in this who are expected to know what is right, are expected to know which decision is the one they must make. But now they have reached a situation in which neither choice is correct. This is why they are both so (excuse my language) bitchy in the beginning of the episode. They both have decided on the path they are going to take, but they do not know if it is right. They feel all this anger at themselves for not knowing and they misplace that aggression on the other person. This is only logical, both of them have differing view points and they want to feel justified in making the decision that they did so they shoot down the person with the differing opinion to validify their choice in their own mind.
Next we have Spike’s speech where he tells us “blood is life” this solidifies a major theme in this season. Blood is what keeps people alive. It is what vampires need to drink, it is what humans need to live, and it is what Glory needs to open the portal. But that statement has another meaning as well. Blood connects. Remember when you were a little child and you became “blood brothers” or sisters as the case may be, with your best friends. It was meant to solidify your relationship. Blood connects. It is what connected Buffy to Joyce and to Dawn. Which brings us to Buffy’s “Dawn is me” speech. Some people don’t seem to understand this. They say that we are never told how Dawn is made. It doesn’t matter how Dawn was made. She was made to be Buffy’s sister, which means she had to be made from the same genetic material as Buffy was and therefore she had the same blood. They were a part of one another physically.
And then there was Anya with her “uninfectious enthusiasm.” This was her way of dealing. She needed to fell helpful. She needed to have a reason for staying other than her real reason for staying, Xander. And so Anya enthusiastically tried to generate ideas among the group only to be shot down by not only Spike but Giles as well. I was very happy to see Anya prove both of them wrong. She really came through when challenged and it was another shining example of another girl being able to hold her own. Anya seems to be the only one of the girls in the show so far that have not stood up to a challenge and persevered and it was nice to see her do so.
So Tara led the way to Glory. Because it would have been so difficult to locate a giant scaffolding just sitting right in the middle of Sunnydale. But still from the moment Glory sucked Tara’s brain I knew she would be pivotal finding something out about Gory.
Next we get to see the differences between Ben and Glory. Dawn would rather face Glory then Ben. I’m not sure I blame her. At least with Glory she knew what she was looking at. Glory was evil and proud of it. She wanted what she wanted and didn’t care about anything else. She was up front about it and didn’t hesitate to tell Dawn exactly how she was going to kill her and bring about complete chaos on earth. Ben was different. He was a coward. He gave up on his morals and he didn’t even do it well. I mean if you are going to go bad at least go all the way. Don’t sit there and apologize and try to act like you’re not a villain. Just forgo your conscience totally instead of trying to rationalize it. Ben was the monster, not Glory. Glory was a god and she was evil but Ben was sneaky and underhanded.
The scene with Buffy and Giles was quite moving. Giles asked Buffy if she hated him and although she never answered him, the answer was yes. It wasn’t that she didn’t love him, love and hate are not mutually exclusive things. But as I said earlier Buffy had to hate Giles if she was to justify not killing Dawn if it came down to that. But Buffy did still love Giles and she needed him as much as ever. Thus came the apocalypse chat. Giles had said that they must have faced at least six apocalypses but it seemed like a hundred. Isn’t it always that way? When you are in a bad spot all you can remember is the bad. It seems like your whole life has been nothing but pain, you forget all the happy moments. And that’s how Buffy felt. She only remembered the times when everything was stripped away. I have no doubt that had Dawn died and Buffy lived we would have been dealing with the same aftermath of season two. Buffy quits until she remembers the good parts of her job and then she gets back on the bandwagon.
Will someone please explain to me why Dawn got changed? If it was me and I knew I needed to be in a certain outfit for the ritual I would avoid getting into the outfit. Now maybe I’m wrong, maybe Dawn changed out of shear fear, but it doesn’t seam likely because she was facing death if she did change.
And now we come to the much needed comic relief scene. Anya and Xander having “inappropriately timed sex” was very much in character. And the discussion about Anya’s “pleasure moment was great. The proposal had me squealing, literally. And Anya slapping Xander seemed weird at first but then it seemed absolutely perfect. The proposal had scared the begeezes out of Anya, rightfully. She saw it as Xander saying that they were all going to die and he wanted to make sure she knew how he felt before that happened. But that wasn’t what Xander had meant and it led to a line that in my mind can only compare to Oz “panicking” for Willow in the emotions that it elicited. “Give it to me when the world doesn’t end.” Anya asks of Xander. And of course there came Xander’s scare when he ran into the Buffy bot. Which would prove pivotal later in the episode. Xander wasn’t the only one who got frightened down there. Anya’s run in with the bunny has got to be one of my new all time favorite funny lines from Buffy. “A higher power trying to tell me through bunnies that we’re all gonna die.”
In the next scene we get some Buffy/Willow interaction. Willow shamefully admits that she had been concentrating on how to cure Tara when she should have put her priorities elsewhere. Buffy disagrees; she feels Willow’s loyalties lie in the right spot. How could she not? If she blamed Willow for putting Tara before the ending of the world she would be nothing more then a common hypocrite. She needed to say that Willow was correct in concentrating on Tara because she needed to convince herself that putting Dawn before the end of the world was right. And then Willow turns to Tara and gets a slap across the face. There seemed to be a lot of those going around. But this slap only made Willow more determined to face Glory and save Tara’s mind. And then we see Buffy talking to Giles, Anya and Xander and they seem to have a plan. A good one by the sounds of it but we don’t know. Well at least if you’re like me and a little dense you don’t. And then Buffy takes Spike and sets off.
We see Buffy and Spike at the threshold of Buffy’s house and Buffy in her haste and preoccupation forgets that Spike can’t come in. Spike is obviously upset but doesn’t let that show. He simply asks Buffy to pass the weapons over the threshold; never asking for the invitation he so desperately wants. And he gets it. And once again Spikes emotions that he shouldn’t be having bubble to the surface but he tries his hardest to control them. But as Buffy begins walking up the stairs he changes his mind. He decides to tell Buffy how he feels. “I know you’ll never love me… I know that I’m a monster…But you treated me like a man.” Now I don’t know about you but those don’t sound like the words of a monster to me. And why did Spike choose to tell Buffy this after trying so hard to hide those feelings just a moment ago. Did he realize what would happen? Did Buffy’s words about them not all making it through register and he knew then she would die? Maybe. It made for a squeal worthy moment over here at my house.
And back at the Magic shop it’s time to leave. Willow tells Tara that nobody is holding her down anymore, telling her to go. And as Tara walks out she looks at Giles holding a sword and tells him he’s a killer. Words that would very soon be true. So the gang follows Tara to their destination and when they get there it is Willows turn to do her thing. She’s asks for courage and gets a bottle of liquor handed to her by my favorite vamp, Spike. Seems even Vampires need a little extra courage sometimes.
So Willow goes in and meets a Glory who seems quite worried about seeing Tara. “She’s with me” Willow must have need to use every bit of courage in her to get that line out so commanding. Willow proceeds to grab Glory and Tara and the first of the amazing special effect ensues as the fabric of Tara’s mind transfers from Glory through Willow and back into Tara. It seems that Glory didn’t just lose what she’d taken from Tara but got a little bit of the crazy Tara as well. “Big day” Glory says. She needs a brain to replace the one Willow took from her and who better to take one form then Buffy who just happens to be standing right there. Some pretty awesome fighting ensues; Buffy throws Glory the dangensphere, which seems to make Glory just a little less then her best. But then Glory starts to feel better and boom off comes Buffy’s head. And finally we realize what Xander and Anya’s plan was. Use the Buffy bot. And so now we see the real Buffy standing behind Glory with Olaf’s magical hammer in hand.
Now I know she’s strong and all but did Buffy get super super powers or something because even a slayer should net be able to swing that around all night without getting tired. But now we see some more fighting Buffy swinging on the tower like she’s one of NaPs irrational monkeys. Until boom! Both she and Glory fall from the middle of the tower and land unscathed on the ground below. Now maybe I’m wrong but if a fall from the top of the tower kills Buffy then don’t you think a fall from the middle of the tower would at least hurt a little? So now Buffy and Glory are on the ground and Buffy’s hammer is a little too far away. So Xander comes to the rescue with…a wrecking ball? Perfect Xander battle moment.
How is Dawn doing up on top of the tower all alone? Oh will you look at that she’s not alone. Doc, the man she had thought a friend, who had tried to help her get her mother back was really in cahoots with Glory and he was there to start the bleeding. Down on the ground Spike realizes Dawn isn’t alone but he can’t get passed the flock of crazies blocking off the tower. Until Willow talks to him telepathically. And Willow told Spike to go and he did despite what appeared to him to be a hopeless cause. But Willow, with a little help from a now sane Tara, forces the group apart giving Spike a chance to get though. Spike charges up the tower to find Doc getting ready to kill Dawn. He can’t let that happen. He promised Buffy. But isn’t it more that that. He wasn’t just doing it for Buffy; he was doing it for Dawn. He loved Dawn as much as he did her sister, despite the fact that Doc couldn’t “smell a soul” on him. This was evident from the look on his face and the pain in his eye right before Doc threw him off the tower.
Back on the ground Buffy pounds Glory with the hammer a few more times before Ben emerges. Buffy can’t kill Ben, although we all know she should have. Turns out Giles wasn’t quite as “heroic” as Buffy. He wanted Ben to die. It was what he had to do to protect the world. “She’s not like us” he tells Ben. And Ben realizes that Giles was willing to take the life of an “innocent” us as Ben was.
Now Buffy is running up the tower to get to Dawn. She gets to the top where Doc has begun cutting Dawn. The ritual has started. But Doc is willing to stop for a second to greet the slayer who pushes him of the tower without a single thought about it. But it’s too late, Dawn blood drips on the portal and the gates begin to open. Now I have to say, they must have saved up quite a budget for this episode because those were some pretty cool special effects. That dragon was something else.
Meanwhile Dawn realizes that she has to kill herself but Buffy won’t let her. Dawn tries to explain that she has to die to make it stop and this time something about that statement registers with Buffy and Buffy remembers all the times that it had been evident that Buffy and Dawn share the same blood. Everything behind Buffy seems calm as the sun rises, even though it isn’t. But Buffy is calm because she understands. She can use her gift and save her sister and the world. Buffy gives a speech we don’t here and then jumps off the tower into the portal. This is when we hear Buffy’s speech. When we see how it pertains to everyone who survived.
The last words of the episode…”Live…for me.” Now maybe it’s just me but I think that this is telling us something. Giving us a clue to what will happen next season. They made it clear that Dawn was Buffy and I don’t just think it was because they needed to do that to have Buffy die instead if Dawn. It that had been the case they wouldn’t have ended that way. I think that Buffy will come back through Dawn. I’m not sure how but I would bet it has something to do with it.