Hey now- she did kill the Spider demon, and the Narl (eye pokage!!), and she did make an Anya wall display as well. Anya was a tough fight, but in the end her butt would have been the Slayers.
This is still the girl who opened a case of whoop ass on a god, and easily knocked aside the creepy old wizard guy who whipped Spike’s skinny English butt. 
My favorite line was “That’s not Olaf. It’s a troll doing an Olaf impression!”
I loved last night’s episode. Anya’s quickly becoming my favorite. I was actually getting teary-eyed at the end there.
I am growing a little tired of poor-crazy-Spike-in-the-basement and REALLY tired of grumpy, short-tempered Buffy. I did like the way she killed the spider in the tree though.
Yeah, she did all those things, but how often since she’s been brought back has she saved the day? It used to be a weekly occurance, but now you have only 3 examples (2 of which were not actually saving the day) for like the past 8 episodes.
Even if she had killed Anya, all those boys would have remained dead. Anya was the real hero of the piece. Just like Xander was the real Hero of the Piece in 6.22, 7.1, 7.2, and there wasn’t a hero in 7.4 (though she would have had a hell of a time killing the demon and protecting Cassie if Spike wasn’t there.)
She killed Narl–but that didn’t bring back Willow (though it helped him from stopping Willow.) She killed the spider–though that didn’t change anything. She almost killed Anya–wouldn’t have brought back the boys.
So, what’s going on?
Wow. Let me say that again. Wow. I liked most of the things folks have already mentioned–the Iceland flashbacks, the musical number. I loved that they showed Willow back on campus, making an effort to get back to her normal life. I also really liked the continued Anya/Willow interaction. I must also confess that I’m enjoying a break from the extreme Spike-yness of last season.
Favorite line: “You are small and toylike!”
Yeah, I really like how quickly Olaf, once changed into a troll, disintegrated into troll-logic. From “It’s me! Olaf!” to “You are small and toylike!” in a matter of seconds.
Great episode!
Daniel
What extreme Spike-yness? I read last season (on another MB) he had less than 1/2 of the screentime as the other characters. (I haven’t ran this experiment myself, but I am tempted to. Though I don’t doubt it.)
We haven’t had a Spike-centric episode since Fool For Love (Maybe, at a stretch Crush) and in the grand 2 hour Season finale last year, I think he had about 5-7 total minutes of screentime. Even if you factor in Beneath You this season, I’d say he probably only gets, on average, 4 mins an ep since Villains.
I think the longest amount of time he spent in a episode from start to finish last year was in Tabula Rasa. Typically the screen time with Spike is thrown at us almost as an after thought, or in some way directly relates to Buffy. (Which makes sense, cuz its her show and his universe revolves around her.)
New job jitters maybe? , or
After Buffy took out all those knights and then Glory herself, Buffy was too powerful. All the stories could end in 10 minutes with a 8 second Buffy butt-kicking of the villan of the week.
Buffy Season 1-3 was not like that. Buffy had to fight hard to win, and took her share of whippin’s.
To me this seems to be a “nerfing” to return Buffy’s power to a more managable level for plot purposes. Not much suspense when all powerful Buffy (or Willow for that matter) can solve a problem in 20 seconds.
Your thoughts?
re: Xander’s so-called lie from “Becoming Part 2”
This is a distinct minority opinion, but Xander telling Buffy to that “Willow said to kick Angel’s butt” was actually only a white lie and was the right thing to do. Xander never liked Angel, that’s true, however, Xander couldn’t take the chance that Willow’s spell to restore Angel’s soul would fail again, like it did the first time Willow tried it, or that it wouldn’t work in time before Angelus killed Buffy, particularly if Buffy was only fighting for time and not fighting to kill Angelus. With 20/20 hindsight and the knowledge that we were watching a tv show where the heros win in the climax of the show, we the viewers knew that Willow’s spell would work, that the world wouldn’t end and that Buffy would survive the fight. Xander Harris, coming upon Buffy Summers at that place and time, didn’t know those things and couldn’t take those chances. Xander’s “lie” was the morally right thing to do.
Further, I think that’s one of the things that makes BtVS such a great show.
I agree with PatrickM about Xander’s lie. And Buffy did know that Angel had his soul back before she thrust the sword through him. In fact, they kissed one last time.
I still think Xander lied because he didn’t like Angel, period. He betrayed Willow. If he didn’t want Angel to have his soul back, he should have stood up to Willow, not betray her.
The consequences do not justify Xander’s action… he didn’t know the gate was opened, in which case he couldn’t have known that Buffy would have to kill Angel. From his point of view, his only motivation for lying was to get Angel out of there to satisfy his own hatred.
Yah, and that’s really pissing me off. No Halloween episode?!! To me, they are as much of a holiday tradition as The Simpson’s Treehouse of Terror
::kicks dirt::
Sua
I wouldn’t mind if they were making Buffy weaker to serve plot purposes because otherwise the show would be over in 10 mins. If that’s what they are doing though (and have been doing since last season) perhaps a bit of an explanation is in order? Like maybe the first tiem she died, she grew strogner (beat the master) but the second time she grew weaker? I don’t know.
I think Xander’s lie does matter, not because it could or could not have changed anything, but because Buffy might think it would have. Even if it’s not all together logical, she may convince herself that she woudl have been able to stall Angelus, or distract him, or attack differently, or something if she had known about Willow’s spell. Could she have changed anything with that knowledge? Probably not, but we’ll enver know. What matters is if she thinks she could have.
Well, I for one think it’s about damn time Buffy showed some concern about Spike being holed up in the SHS Basement with TETD playing with his mind. And, yeah, Insane Spike is definitely wearing thin, but he does seem to be getting progressively more lucid. Loved the bit where TETD-Buffy was talking to him, and he was waxing nostaligic about Drusilla. Real Buffy’s harshness toward him in telling him he needed to get out of the basement kind of echoed her harshness toward Dawn back in S5, when she learned that Dawn had been skipping a lot of school, and that if she couldn’t make Dawn go to school, CPS might take her little sis from her.
But, what’s up with Spike’s “I have nowhere else to go” line? Has Clem claimed squatter’s rights to the crypt since Spike was gone so long? And how come we haven’t seen Clem this season? I was getting fond of that demon.
I’m with PatrickM on Xander’s lie. It was the right thing to do. Already, Buffy had held back from killing Angel because she hoped he might be cured, and it got Jenny Calender killed. If she got her hopes up and held back again, the world ends. Yeah, he probably should have trusted Buffy to do the right thing, but considering the stakes, I think he can be forgiven for playing it safe. And I don’t think he betrayed Willow, either. I don’t think any of that occured to him until he caught up with Buffy; when he left Willow, I think he intended to do what she asked. Otherwise, he would have just not run as fast and passed it off as “Oops, I couldn’t get there in time.” However, I seriously doubt Buffy’ll be half as forgiving. I hope they don’t drop this story line for another five years.
About Anya’s surprisingly strong showing against Buffy: I think Buffy was holding back for most of that fight. There’s that moment when she looks at Anya, says, “I’m sorry,” and prompty runs her through. She could have done that anytime, she was just steeling herself for it. Along those lines, I don’t think Anya herself expected to beat Buffy. She watched Buffy kill a god, for God’s sake! She knew she had no chance. I think she was trying to commit suicide by Slayer. Certainly didn’t take her long to decide she wanted to sacrifice herself for the dead Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue.
Finally, I think they should make Olaf part of the permanent cast. I hate the thought that we might never see him again. It makes me so mad, I bend at the knees and flex. Anyone with me on this?
Wasn’t Giles more or less technically the guy that killed a god?
As for the weakening of Buffy, well, maybe it’s because I’ve been listening to the OMWF CD for so long, but maybe she’s still just going through the motions?
Okay, so she beat a god up so badly she couldn’t defend herself against a middle-aged librarian. In its way, even more impressive.
I’d like to point out that Giles is far more bad ass than the average middle-aged librarian. Either that or I have been grossly misinformed about the bad assitude of the average middle-aged librarian.
Giles is no ordinary middle-aged librarian. He is still Ripper, able to deal out damage. Just ask Ethan.
Err, what The Tim said.
Me, I liked that when the flashbacks shifted from subtitles to understanding the language, you could hear the villagers yelling “Get him. Asshole!”
I don’t think we’ll see a compassionate Buffy for another 6 or 10 episodes… But Spike will work out his own psychoses without her, and realize that being a slave to love is not the way to be.