I think you’re being too harsh here. Xander’s question wasn’t meant as a joke. It was meant in all seriousness, and even Willow echoed that very sentiment.
I know it wasn’t meant as a joke. That’s what’s annoying me. 'Cause he delivers it as a joke or his usual way of twisting the words.
Whatever. What’s this big deal about this Amie Mann? I’ve never heard of her before and the way she bugs her eyes out when she sings is creepy. If it hadn’t been for the amusing “vampire town” line it would have been no different from any of the other hundreds of melencholy young bands they’ve had on the show.
I do agree - Sarah Michelle Gellar playing evil is actually rather impressive.
Also, though it seems next week is more about Spike (again) I wold really like to see more of the other Scoobies (that not being Anya or Dawn).
We shall see … all in all, a pretty darn good episode.
I think that’s the point, everyone sees things through the prism of their relationships. If this was two years ago, Buffy would have staked Spike, no questions asked. He led her to a trap, where there were half a dozen vamps that he sired, it was only her feelings for him that held her back, IMO.
Of course Xander has a double standard, so does Buffy, they both are willing to welcome Willow back, Xander even did the crayon breaky-Willow speech. Spike has been a real badass in the past. He still is a powerful potential badass and it’s right to be wary of him. If it looks like he’s being corrupted and people are dying, it would be right to stake him, even if something else is controlling him. That’s the way it goes sometimes in the Slayer biz.
Good ep. Another season 6-esque show that is being praised by the very people who didn’t like s6. 
Buffy is going dark again, and it seems like everyone is relieved - I know my wife and I are.
IIRC, somebody was implicated in being a double agent for Morphy. If it isn’t a deader (see below), I think it’s going to be Xander, the one person unaffected by all the attacks. If Dracula can make Xander his love puppy, God knows what Morphy is capable of.
[rant]Why do people act so stupid on Buffy? You walk into your apartment/place of work and see a dead, obviously murdered, body on the floor. Why do your thoughts NEVER turn to the fact that the killer could still be there? Dammit Giles, look around![/rant]
Btw, I think he ought to bite it. Sorry, but to do otherwise is a cheat and I think that this could turn into an interesting turn of events. I agree that a dead Giles would play as another stooge for Morphy - all the better if nobody knows he’s dead!! Morphy resumes Gile’s life and then Giles makes it over to LA … a*hem!.. Sunnydale as part of Morphy’s plan.
Things aren’t looking good for Buffy. Morphy’s hitting her at all her weak points, and getting Giles would be a masterstroke.
Now hopefully all of the complaining about Buffy not giving poor Spike some kindness or benefit of the doubt is done.
Xander was right. Spike was killing in fact innocents and vamping them. Of course he was being “influenced” to do it-- but it was him the whole time. Not the big bad- him.
Spike slaughtered all those innocents and Xander’s the bad guy because he (correctly) said something bad about poor Spike. 
Well be that as it may, Anya was great, again. Xander’s lines were a bit boring. Dawn was reverting to last season’s completely predictable waste of plot time.
The cliffhanger finally addressed the running girls point-- yeah!
Of course, the biggest question- where is Clem and what happened to Spike’s crypt?
Next week’s episode looks like it should keep the Spike girls happy. I am sure his withdrawl will require lots of half undressed screen time.
Um, all this talk is very well and good, but no one’s addressed the most important question: Why in the name of Whatever would Buffy give Spike her cell phone number?
I am cringing at the thought of how they will handle the cliffhanger. One bound Jackery.
Why wasn’t souled Spike wearing his leather jacket? Is this how they’re going to differentiate between TETDSpike and the actual Spike?
Oh, and no killing off Giles!!!
I used to like Xander. But lately, since Once More with Feeling I think, he’s been going more and more towards the Dawn-i-verse, where everyone whines about everything.
As to the morality of the characters - The great thing with BtVS is that no one is totally evil or totally good. There is good in the bad guys and bad in the good guys. It’s, I guess, the one TV-show where the old Freedom of Choice is the ongoing theme, you might say the arc that spans all the seasons. And as a metaphor over real life, it works very well.
And one question that still bugs me, was stated in the episode: What if Morphy, in spite of being evil, is actually telling the truth? Since it can tap into the minds of our heroes (and anti heroes) and know their innermost secrets, wouldn’t thruth be something that hurts more, than lies? Maybe Morphy as Joyce was right? Maybe Buffy won’t help Dawn when it’s time for the big showdown. Maybe Morphy was in contact with Tara and she really thinks that Willow must give up all magic?
It’s gonna be quite a ride, like the Master said in ep. 7.01.
And BTW - do you guys remember the very first line in that episode? Buffy: “It’s about power.”
Otto she probably passed out her cell phone number to everybody after last week when she said something like “Something bad is coming, I want all my friends safe” (or words to that effect.) Well, one way to keep them safe is to make sure everybody is connected.
Look what happened to Dawn when they weren’t “connected.”
He wasn’t just being influenced, he was being controlled. Anya had a choice, Spike did not. Did you see what happened when Morphy!Spike started singing? Lights went out, and he turned on Buffy. You know, the woman he went to get a soul for so he would never hurt her again? The woman he still loves more than anything? “God help m Buffy, it’s still all about you.”
They drop an anvil on you like Pavlov’s Bell, and have that creepy song playing somehow every single time Spike is doing something bad, and people are still missing it? What the hell do they have to do? Does Whedon have to come out at the end of the episode and explain it all very, vrey carefully?
She’s not huge in the mainstream, but she was nominated for an Oscar for the Magnolia soundtrack. Which was, IMHO, genius.
It was actually a gigantic anvil being dropped on your head.
But it wasn’t a trap. He remembered what he was doing, and immediately called Buffy. THen he realized that she would kill him and he didn’t fight her. How was it a trap? The First didn’t even want him to take Buffy down there. “There’s an order, she’s not in order.”
Spike realized he did something wrong, and his first reaction wasn’t to run, wasn’t to hide, wasn’t to escape his punishment, but to call the one person who is supposed to punish him.
Interesting episode. My questions:
- We hear the Big Bad song three times, right? Spike hums it at the beginning, the crazy old harmonica man plays it in the middle, and Morphyspike sings it at the end. Was Morphy also the harmonicaman, or did I misunderstand the song harmonicaman started playing, or is Morphy controlling people?
- When Spike started fighting his progeny, the band suddenly started playing louder, as if to cover up the fight’s noises. Am I supposed to see Morphy’s hand in this, or just a bit of directorial convenience?
As for Giles, I’d be very suprised if next episode begins with Giles losing his head. If Joss wanted him dead, we woulda seen the head fly at the end of this episode, making the gutwrench as bad as possible. It’ll be very difficult to begin the episode with Giles’ death and sustain dramatic tension from there. I expect to see Giles pull his survival right outta his butt.
Daniel
FTR I almost cried at the Spike “kill me” scene. I have enjoyed Spike much more than Angel for all the wonderful complexity behind the Spike-Buffy continuum, but until now I never felt it. Well, now and when Spike was on the cross.
I love the way Spike stood up for himself, too, saying that he did it for her. Lovely.
Loved this episode, but one little nitpick to add…
Spike killed the girl in the alley while EvilBuffy egged him on, and then we see him run away leaving her there on the ground. But then, once Spike and Buffy are in the cellar she’s one of the vamps that pops up from the earthen floor. How the hell did that happen?
Your spoilers/comments had me waiting for X to be really jerky - but it never came IMO. Sure Spike was controlled by something else, but that doesn’t make him any less dangerous - or the folks he vamped any less dead - or X’s face any less sore.
My prediction, Giles will be saved by some accident - maybe he’ll notice something and drop his head just at the correct instant - causing the axe to miss - after which Ripper will rip him a new one. Mark my words.
Sure, Buff has never exactly been the sharpest knife in the drawer, but isn’t she becoming more and more obtuse? I guess her emotions and experiences may be clouding her ability to see some things clearly, but it kinda bothers me. Makes her more one faceted. "Point me in the right direction, and I’ll kick ass. But I DO need someone to point me."
Intresting to see Dawn find new ways to be stupid and irritating. Yep. Keeping things to yourself generally leads to good results.
Season 2’s Big Bad was Angelus.
Sua
As much as I liked 'Til Tuesday when I was younger (“Voices Carry” was a kick-ass tune) and like that Michael Penn “No Myth” album (he’s her husband), I couldn’t buy Aimee Mann playing The Bronze. I liked it when there were less-famous folks playing there, since then it seems more like the underage high-school hole it used to be. Until the emergence of UC Sunnydale. Now that Sunnydale’s a college town I can actually understand why Aimee Mann would play The Bronze.
Anyway, geesh–some thoughts. Good sound effect when Spike tossed the first body into the basement pit; that thud stuck with me. No explanation as to why Xander and Anya either did not receive or did not report any Morphing Fun and Games that fateful night. I’m growing suspicious. Although Anya did so very well infiltrating Spike’s quarters! Totally gratuitous Spike nekkidness, seeing as how when Buffy bursts into his room he’s wearing pants. I like this Bad. It’s sassy, mainpulative, devious, labor-intensive, and terrifying. In that way, it’s like the Mayor, my favorite Bad ever.
I have to confess, I still have a little confusion on the soul thing. I never thought Spike wanted to get a soul when he went to Africa; I thought he wanted to get the chip out of his head; with all the “Bitch thinks she’s better than me,” “Bitch is going to see a change,” and then when he finishes the trials, “So you’ll give me what I want. Make me what I was. So Buffy can get what she deserves.” Then I thought he got seriously screwed by the demon guy and that led to all the crazy in the basement. I never thought Spike’s motivations were that noble, that he went to get a soul so he could be everything for Buffy. But that’s a major hijack (I’ll search for other threads, but it’s taking a while right now and I don’t want to disturb the new board speed).
I had to close my eyes during the “previously” stuff when Joyce was on the couch and Cassie changed. 
I think Clem is sitting in a leather wing-backed chair, stroking Miss Kitty Fantastico and biding his time until he can make a grand entrance.
Spike going “Cold Turkey”? On Thanksgiving? I hate UPN previews.
I said that SMG comes across as less than bright. Buffy Summers got, what?, 1410 on her SAT’s. She is smart.
C’mon, guys. Dawn was just told by her dead mother that her sister and one remaining relative (absent-dad doesn’t count) is going to betray her. Then she’s offered some hope that mom was lying – and then she was told that mom may not have been really mom – and then she was told that even if it wasn’t mom, maybe it was the truth anyways.
She’s damned confused, and of course she doesn’t want to tell Buffy yet what she heard. If she tells her, best case scenario is Buffy saying, “Of course I won’t betray you!”, which Dawn may well not believe. Worst case is her saying, “Really? Wow – I wonder what’s going to happen that makes me betray you?”, which Dawn doesn’t really want to hear.
So Dawn’s not talking about it until she’s got a better idea what to do with the information.
Maybe not the brightest approach, but certainly understandable.
Daniel
This is as I thought it was too. But then let’s think on the words of the Rolling Stones:
“You can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometimes you just might find
You get what you need.”
I think he went there to get the chip out, got screwed over by the demon (he should’ve known better, you have to be SPECIFIC with these demons!) but upon reflection Spike now knows he did indeed really want to be what Buffy would need him to be to have a real relationship with her.
Just MHO.
Dr. R.