#i guess willow and tara had a nice sex metaphor going on but it was kinda subtle

[theskyexists]

I dont really understand why films always insist on making pubescent sex metaphors nasty and bad. Like, ginger snaps, jennifers body. Its neither a power fantasy nor an accurate metaphorical depiction of female sexuality, because it doesn't generally kill the boys in real life, just you, the girl, possibly. That's the point, horror turns the violence outward etc. Actually generally sex is depicted as nasty and bad anyway, i feel. Except in the lion king

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 6x19 Seeing Red

aka dick move joss

Welcome to this dailyish (weekly? bi-weekly?) text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and go on an impromptu rant about it for an hour. Is it about one hyperspecific thing or twenty observations? 10 or 3k words? You don’t know! I don’t know!!! In this house we don’t know things.

And after today’s episode, who’s ready to get drunk and do some math? *points to self* It me. I’m drunk.

Seeing Red has not one, but TWO of the show’s most controversial scenes in the entire series, so that’s a distinction I guess. One that I should probably be talking about, but… you know. Turns out that when you drink the rest of your apple liquor in one sitting, your ability to form critical thought exponentially deteriorates with each and every second.

But math? Math is easy. You can do math drunk while walking on your hands. So let’s do math.

So, did you guys know that Amber Benson appeared in the most Buffy episodes per season while not being in the credits? It’s true. I made a very detailed excel sheet.

(Yes, these are all the actors who appeared at least 14 episodes of the show. I didn’t really need to include all of them to prove my point, but I did it anyway.)

Those purple highlights you see? Those are for actors who appeared at least 70% of the episodes while not being part of the main cast in a season. Apart from a few special cases where someone has been promoted to the main cast during a season (like Michelle Trachtenberg after one episode in season 5 or Marc Blucas following the first 10 episodes of season 4), the only ones this applies for is Kristine Sutherland and Amber Benson. And the latter’s 18 appearance during season 5 (aka 82% of the season) is our biggest outlier among those even.

Now, to be fair, actors who are part of the main cast never actually go below 83% in their own respective season appearances on Buffy (see the blue highlights that show the two instances that goes below 90% even), but like… Appearing in 16-18 episodes of at least two 22-episode seasons in a major capacity is still a fucking lot by any TV standards.

So the fact that neither of these actors have been promoted to regular status during their run is kind of weird. Maybe Joyce was often forced into the background, but Kristine Sutherland was a huge presence in season 5 in particular. Up until Joyce’s death in The Body, she appeared in all episodes, and had a cameo later in The Weight of the World. She should’ve been in the credits for that period, imo.

Similarly, if you look at other characters who occupied a comparable role to Tara – so, basically characters who were introduced as love interests to one of the Scoobies –, each and every one of them have been promoted to the main cast by their 3rd year at the very least. And Emma Caulfield, who was one of those third year joiners, only appeared in 5 episodes in her first season. Seth Green, who with his 10/22 appearance is much closer to Amber Benson’s 12/22 in their respective debut seasons, was part of the credits by his second year on the show.

In conclusion what I’m saying is that fuck you Joss for pulling that opening credits shit on us. No. This should’ve happened two seasons ago, and now you’re using it to play on the audience’s attachment to this character, dangling that promise of having more of her on the show just to take it away.

Not cool, my dude. So very not cool.

In other bad news, making that excel sheet sobered me up a bit (damn you, math), and now I’m just kinda tired and sad. It’s starting to dawn on me that this is the last I’ll see of Tara during this rewatch.

Maybe I should just start over from Hush? There’s an idea…

There’s also a reason why this episode is cited as such an egregious example of the Bury Your Gays trope even after almost two decades. With the show having been limited on what they can show of Willow and Tara’s relationship early on, the inclusion of the many sexual moments in this episode especially jumps out. Having that precede Tara’s death somehow manages to maximize the negative impact of it even more, reinforcing pre-existing harmful associations in the audience.

But then again, would it have been better to not have these moments at all? I don’t know the answer to that.

In any case, when I talked about character deaths earlier on this show, I mentioned that there are two criteria that I judge those: story impact and social impact. Meaning on one hand, that when you kill off a character, you want that to have a meaningful impact on your story and characters. It needs to have a purpose and long-lasting effects for it to satisfy your audience’s emotional needs. And on the other hand, there’s also the bigger media and societal landscape to consider. Especially when you’re killing off a character, who’s already part of an underrepresented group.

I think I probably already alluded to how I consider Tara’s death to be well-executed story-wise, despite being extremely poorly done in the latter regard. There are arguments to be made of course about how maybe the show could’ve killed a different character to achieve the same effect in the story, etc. – but I find the following arc captivating as it is regardless.

Then again, I also love Tara, and definitely wouldn’t have complained if the show just randomly brought her back from the death, story be damned. Unbury your gays, you cowards.

I guess I’ll also need to touch on the other controversial scene in the episode, huh? Well, I don’t want to.

But fine.

Hot take, but I just don’t connect to Spike. Not during this rewatch. And looking back at my feelings on it, I think that part of that is the very association that’s textualized here.

See, vampires are giant rape metaphors. Well, they can be metaphors for a lot of things, this is Buffy after all, but that’s definitely a big part of them. And the show’s been playing up this aspect with Spike in the past – usually it’s just been done for comedy.

Think about his scenes with Willow in Lovers Walk or The Initiative. The latter is especially chilling with the way he attacks Willow on her bed and turns up the music, right before we cut to black… and then we find out that Spike’s “impotent” and can’t bite her, and suddenly she’s comforting him? And it’s a comedy?

That scene is super weird. And uncomfortable. And that was probably part of its purpose, but it also means that I’m just not shocked by what he almost does here.

Spike’s a romantic, but he’s also a soulless vampire who can’t differentiate between love, death, sex and violence. He tells Buffy in a previous episode that he wouldn’t hurt her, but while he may believe that, it’s not true exactly. He doesn’t understand what Buffy needs. They share an understanding, but in this, he’s unable to empathize with Buffy beyond a certain level.

Afterwards though, he does seem to understand what he’s done, and given what we know of vampires, that’s pretty fascinating. He finally realizes that he can’t love Buffy without that empathy. And he can’t be the monster he used to be with these conflicts. So he’s off to rectify that.

Meanwhile Buffy’s out there, fighting superpowered nerds right after that fucking traumatic experience. Which… don’t get me wrong, I can definitely see how beating up Warren can be therapeutic, but there is also something to be said about the show not giving Buffy enough space to process certain traumas, and focusing more on Spike’s development instead.

Again though, it’s not that I don’t get it. Spike’s an intriguing character, and I can definitely see how a lot of people connect with him. His more negative traits are balanced out by his vulnerability, and his ability to self-reflect and grow. Just because I have a hard time relating to him, doesn’t mean that others shouldn’t enjoy his character. God knows that I have plenty of problematic faves...

Oh yeah, and Xander and Buffy share a nice scene by the end of the episode. Still, I guess I wanted a bit more out of it? Like Xander acknowledging how putting Buffy on a pedestal leads to him judging her more harshly, and how it’s something he should be working on in order to be a better friend to Buffy? Maybe I just want too much.

A character who was just perfect in this episode though? Dawn. Actual picture of Dawn Summers looking at Tara and Willow.

Same, Dawn. Same.

The last three minutes of Seeing Red? I don’t know her.

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 5x17 Forever

aka who’s gonna take care of us and the emotional traumas this show put us through?????

Welcome to this dailyish text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and go on an impromptu rant about it for an hour. Is it about one hyperspecific thing or twenty observations? 10 or 3k words? You don’t know! I don’t know!!! In this house we don’t know things.

And in today’s episode Dawn and Buffy are a mess, and nobody ever listens to Tara. Seriously guys, so many of your issues could be resolved if y’all just listened to Tara.

I’ve complained about my own emotional numbness last time with The Body, that appears to prevent me from sobbing out loud during some episodes these days… But what I ended up with after this particular episode was maybe a bit more layered explanation.

It’s true, it seems that currently I’m just not in the right mood to release my emotions about these episodes in such way. It doesn’t hit as close to home to who I am and where I am in my life. However, that doesn’t mean that I don’t feel all this deeply.

I first watched through Buffy in my late teens, early 20s, right as I was starting college. Those years perhaps more than others shaped me into the person I am today, good and bad. And Buffy is part of that DNA.

In that sense, watching Forever I felt like Tara, sticking out at the funeral in her red leather jacket. Not as a sign of insensitivity, but as one of distinction. Tara’s already been through this. She understands and is ready to be the only goddamn responsible adult in a sea of messy emotions.

Well, fine, Giles actually helps out a lot too, supporting Buffy when it comes to the day-to-day tasks. And that means a lot, as it takes some of the responsibility off of Buffy’s shoulders, and makes her feel like she doesn’t need to do it alone, as Angel put it.

Still, the truth is that Giles is grieving too. And as much as he tries supporting Buffy or Dawn, they seem to be dealing with their own grief and the emotions arising from them on their own.

Of course, this is what ends up being the issue here - Buffy and Dawn trying to deal with things alone. There’s this wonderful shot of both sisters sitting in their rooms before the funeral. Isolated, lost in their own little bubble of pain.

It’s only when they open up to each other in the last few minutes that they can finally start to move on. Understandably, they both relied on their mom for emotional support, so much so that Dawn was ready to do anything to have her back. It didn’t matter how Joyce came back - she just wanted to have a mother again.

And Buffy… That moment when Resurrected!Joyce knocks on the door, and Buffy’s face immediately transforms into a lost little girl, asking for her mother? It breaks my heart. It broke my heart 10 years ago and it’s still broken.

For Buffy, this is all about her taking on these new responsibilities. A situation that she was now violently thrown into with the death of her mother. She doesn’t feel ready and she doesn’t know what tomorrow will bring now. Everything’s unstable and full of uncertainty with no one there to make sense of it all.

Essentially, Buffy is now officially an adult. And it sucks.

There’s also this wonderful moment of switch happening in Buffy and Dawn’s relationship, when Dawn tears up their mom’s photo, reversing the spell in the last minute before Buffy can see Joyce like that. In that instance, Dawn is the one looking out for her sister, once again taking inspiration from Buffy’s example.

In the end, Buffy falls apart in her little sister’s arms, as they finally embrace each others pain and fall to the floor together. It’s fine.

That feels like the perfect point to end this post at I guess, but there are so many more themes going on in this episode that I just have to touch upon.

(For some reason I always regarded Forever as a more traditional exploration of death in television as opposed to The Body, but God was I wrong. Or maybe I just watched a lot of bad TV since that could’ve never risen to the thematic complexity of this episode to begin with…)

There’s an interesting discussion happening for instance between Xander and Anya here about sex as a way to make life, and how that feels empowering for Anya after her encounter with death. What’s more intriguing to me however, is how this discussion is sandwiched between the back-and-forth with Dawn, Willow and Tara about bringing Joyce back with magic.

First of all, the discussion between Anya and Xander is very specific to a relationship between two people with certain anatomies and whatnots. So seeing that juxtaposed with a scene involving Willow and Tara and their relationship already had me raise an eyebrow, but then I thought more about the context of the scene and it made it… worse? More intriguing?

Xander and Anya are discussing - for lack of a better word - the “natural” way of things. People die, people get born, and we’re all part of the Big Circle of Life.

Meanwhile the argument between Dawn, Tara and Willow is about creating life in an “unnatural” way. And if you add our old metaphor of magic and spells as a stand-in for sex between two women, there are some possible interpretations here that are… interesting. Possibly not good.

Still, in case you haven’t figured it out yet, this is not Pitchforks out for Buffy and Whedon, the text post series. I enjoy discovering and pointing out hidden themes like this, not as an attack on the show and its writers, but as a discussion topic. Like, see, that’s a possible reading of something in that thing you love. Let’s sit and think about it and what it means to our society for 40 minutes.

Okay, so now that we had that moment of silence, let’s also just acknowledge the real MVP of this episode (and I guess pretty much of every episode, according to me) - Tara.

First of all, I find it an interesting choice to have Dawn shut down Tara’s “I know how bad you hurt”, without reminding the audience that Tara actually does know what the fuck she’s talking about. But it’s also a nice feeling to have a script that assumes that the audience has been paying attention. Not to mention that this was actually brought up last episode when Buffy and Tara had their talk, so it seems reasonable to expect us to remember these details about the characters.

Part of me wants to see the scene with that talk between Tara and Dawn too though. But I also understand that this wasn’t what they were going for in this episode. Dawn needed to re-connect with her own sister in their shared grief. There’s plenty of time for Dawn and Tara to relate in the same way.

(Well, not plenty, but… you know. At least a whole season.)

Regardless, I loved watching Tara putting down her foot about the resurrection spell. When Dawn brings it up first, she’s just standing in the background with an expression that screams “NOPE”.

Willow… isn’t helping though. She’s more interested in thinking about how would that even work. Very INTP of her, if I might say so.

(I feel like there’s a Giles - Willow - Dawn line on this show of nerds we love with a propensity for destruction. Often self-destruction at that. I don’t know yet if I’ll ever be able to expand on that, but I wanted to leave that idea here.)

In any case, Tara has to carry that whole argument of RESURRECTION BAD on her back, because her useless girlfriend has supervillain ideology tendencies. Sure, she’ll somewhat backtrack on this anti-resurrection stance by season 6, but that’s because it’s Buffy. Nobody can let go of Buffy.

There’s also plot stuff with Glory and Ben, we meet creepy demon magic guy, Spike is teaming up with Dawn, and Angel’s here to be a soundboard for Buffy’s feelings I guess.

Essentially what I’m saying is that there’s so much we could talk about with Forever, but I’ve already been sitting here randomly ranting about it for at least 2 hours, so let us end it there.

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 5x18 Intervention

aka is weird love better than no love???

Welcome to this dailyish text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and go on an impromptu rant about it for an hour. Is it about one hyperspecific thing or twenty observations? 10 or 3k words? You don’t know! I don’t know!!! In this house we don’t know things.

And in today’s episode, Spike does something super creepy and surprisingly decent at the same time, which pretty much sums up his whole character. Meanwhile Buffy should go to therapy, and Sarah Michelle Gellar seems to be having the time of her life as BuffyBot.

You know, it’s my fault. I got into a rant about how Tara is the only one who always treated Buffy without judgement and with understanding, and the next episode on my rewatch naturally ended up being Intervention. The one that has the joke of Tara trying to be considerate of Buffy’s situation post-Joyce’s death, and then going “are you kidding, she’s nuts” upon the whole revelation that Buffy was supposedly sleeping with Spike.

(Which kind of has the same energy as Uncle Iroh’s “No, she’s crazy and she needs to go down” from A:TLA if you ask me tbh.)

But you know what, I’m still gonna be doubling down on my Buffy/Tara feelings, because Tara’s not wrong in assuming that it was a weird turn for Buffy to take at this point in her character arc. And a season from now, when Buffy will actually be sleeping with Spike, and judgement will be the last thing she’ll need, Tara will be right there to offer her understanding.

Anyway, that’s it for that segue. Let’s talk Buffy.

It’s all fun and games, with me talking about my own emotional numbness, until Buffy starts repeating those words back at me. There really is a reason why I feel so close to Buffy as a character to this very day - and in many ways, now more so than ever.

I talked about this a lot with Riley’s departure, about how that whole conflict and Buffy’s emotional unavailability wasn’t about Riley (just as Riley’s insecurities weren’t really about Buffy), but I love that we’re exploring this out loud now.

It’s just good storytelling and character building. We understand that Buffy has been closed off for a while now. Going back to the Riley angle, I will say that while it wasn’t Riley’s responsibility to make their relationship work, he certainly didn’t understand Buffy’s struggles at the time. He was too caught up in his issues to realize and internalize that it wasn’t about him.

So yeah, that relationship wasn’t going to work out, but it still weighs on Buffy that she felt unable to open up and take that step to try. It’s not about Riley, or even romantic relationships in general. Buffy fears that she’s unable to express her feelings to all of her loved ones.

She’s even scared that her mother didn’t know how much she loved her. (That’s absolutely not a soul-crushing thought that makes me over-identify with Buffy’s current emotional state on a whole new level. It’s fine. I’m fine.)

Buffy then attributes this process of her “turning into stone” to her being the Slayer. Which... I’d argue isn’t truly the case for her, both in the story and on a metaphorical level. At least not directly. What made Buffy become more guarded was trauma, plain and simple. Being a Slayer is a part of many of her traumas, but in itself, it’s neutral.

At least that’s my interpretation. For the most part. We’ll find out of course in season 7 that the Slayer power actually comes from demons, which re-affirms Dracula’s point earlier in this season about there being “darkness” to Buffy’s power. Then again, as season 7 generally revolves around the theme of power, one might ask if power can even ever be neutral?

We’ll circle back to that in season 7.

The point being is that while there are definitely darker elements attached to being the Slayer, in this case, Buffy misses a nuance by singling out Slayerhood as the root cause of her emotional detachment. Sure, being a Slayer who kills things doesn’t help ones mental health - but that’s also because it’s a traumatizing experience.

You need therapy, Buffy.

Which I guess is kind of what this Slayer quest thing works as. Kind of. When the First Slayer starts talking about how Buffy’s full of love, and how she just had some painful experiences that now stops her from opening up, and how she’ll needs to embrace all of that, pain and all... That was nice. It was a nice validation for Buffy about her feelings.

But then it was all “love will lead you to your gift” and “death is your gift” and “our time’s up, your questions were answered, now scram”, so that was some overall shitty therapy session if we’re being honest here.

And then there’s Spike.

I have no idea what to do with Spike.

The whole Buffybot thing is super gross, and just thinking about how Warren programmed and probably tested all of that... Yikes, yikes, yikes.

Is it funny and well-written? Yes, it is, I’m not even gonna lie. But it’s also just super gross.

By far the most interesting scene that happens because of this whole scenario is that last one between Buffy and Spike. I like how it’s set up in the script too. I mean, well, “like” may not be the right word, as part of that is Xander making this whole argument about “poor Spike, he’s got beat up and his toy is gone, boo-hoo”... But I like that that’s the red herring to the audience to make us believe that they actually fixed up Buffybot and sent her back to Spike.

As opposed to what actually happens with Buffy pretending to be Buffybot to try and find out what Spike told Glory. Which is also set up by the same scene between the Scoobies.

Watching that scene, knowing that it’s Buffy is a very different experience. You start noticing the thoughtful looks Buffy’s giving to Spike, and the ways she’s manipulating the conversation to make sure that she gets an honest response out of him. It’s intriguing, to say the least.

In an episode that’s filled with Spike at its worst, this one scene is somehow enough to bring me back to that porch scene between the two. As Buffy puts it, what Spike’s done for her and Dawn in this episode, and his words to who he thought was Buffybot about his devotion to Buffy were real. And Buffy accepts that.

The kiss itself gives me a pause though. It feels too much like Spike is being rewarded for being a decent person for once, not ratting out a 14-year-old girl to a demon god. Especially since at this point, it doesn’t feel like something Buffy would initiate or want on her own.

Then again, it’s also a reveal. It’s how Buffy lets Spike know that he was being played, and that he’s not gonna get his sex robot back. But she won’t forget what he’s done for her and Dawn regardless.

And I think that once again, as with the porch scene, we can see that there’s a connection of honesty and understanding between Spike and Buffy’s characters that goes both ways. So maybe there’s a way to look at that kiss as not just a reward, and not as a confirmation of Buffy’s own feelings for Spike at this point... but as a sign of that connection.

Meanwhile Dawn’s kleptomania is becoming a problem. Giles is cooking dinner for Buffy and Dawn, and no one’s appreciating Tara’s protection spells. As is the case with many episodes of this season, there’s a lot of fun stuff going on with the entire gang and their dynamics, which I greatly enjoy.

Next episode is gonna be a bit of a tough one, especially since I plan to touch upon some super non-controversial fandom topics like Willow’s sexuality. Should I open up that can of worms? Probably not. But will I? Most likely.

Almost certainly.