Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Halloween (2x06)

[fajrdrako]

I'll swear I posted this on Saturday (to no reaction), but janne_d pointed out I hadn't - who knows what bizarre corner of the LJ Void it slipped into instead of my LJ. Luckily I kept a copy. Nice to know you weren't all just ignoring me, and thanks for bringing it to my attention, janne_d. I wondered why gillo thought it was a while since I'd commented on Buffy. And here you are:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Halloween (2x06)

Interesting to watch this at this time of year: about as much the opposite of Halloween on the calendar as it's possible to be. Since the autumn equinox is my favourite time of year, and the spring equinox my least favourite time by far, it was good to get an unseasonal glimpse of October.

I have a confession about this episode. It was one of the ones I'd seen before. I think it was Harry that showed it to me, maybe eight years ago. All my friends seem to be Ethan fans, and Giles fans, and they find this episode interesting. I realized I'd seen it before as soon as Ethan came ono the screen.

Now, when I saw it back then, I didn't exactly understand the story - because most of the episode is about the characters acting out of character, and becoming the inverse of themselves. Since I had no idea what their normal characters were like, the rest was lost on me. I missed the whole point of the inverted personas, and the story didn't make a lot of sense. I wasn't bored or anything, I just didn't know what to make of it. Spike made no impression at all.

I get the feeling that there are a lot of things beginning here: it's like a trailer or teaser for things to come.

1. For some reason, I love the opening scene where Buffy lands on the jack-o-lantern.

2. So much for the theory (mentioned in the pilot, or "Harvest") that Buffy can instinctually tell when a vampire is around. There's the vampire with a camcorder through the whole scene, and she has no idea. She's busy, but still.

3. Does Cordelia really think she has any chance with Angel? I can't tell.

4. Angel's shirt makes it look as if he's wearing pajamas. In the spiffy-vampire-fashion stakes, Spike wins, hands down.

5. So Buffy sees Angel with Cordelia, and tries to retreat. Buffy is such an idiot. She wants Angel, she pines over him, she complains that he doesn't talk to her, but when she sees him, she runs. It's an understandable sort of idiocy, but there's a huge a level of self-sabotage in it, and she does it over and over: she meets Angel, argues with him, and stalks off. Then complains he doesn't talk to her. He does Batman-like disappearing acts with other people, but she's the one who consistently walks away from him. No wonder he looks pained a lot.

6. Cordelia says: "Buffy. Love the hair. It just screams street urchin." I know she's trying to be snarky, but I think that's kind of cute.

7. Buffy says:

...Who am I kidding? Dates are things normal girls have. Girls who have time to think about nail polish and facials. You know what I think about? Ambush tactics. Beheading. Not exactly the stuff dreams are made of.

Does she really believe that? Because if so, she's deluded. It seems very clear to me that she only thinks about ambush tactics and beheading when she has to - usually, when Giles forces her to. Otherwise she thinks about Angel and hanging out at the Bronze and the various sorts of things she talks about withXander and Willow. I've seen her talk about lipstick and hair conditioner. I don't recall too much idle chat about ambushing.

In other words, her self-image and the reality don't seem to match up, and she hasn't noticed.

So she walks out on Angel again.

8. I like Snyder's snarky description of how he expects Buffy to spend Halloween. I liked Willow's panicked expression as she realizes she's in Snyder's line of sight.

9. Why is Halloween quiet for vampires? I suspect that is just a sort of ironic joke - Joss's little game of twisting stereotypes - but it would be fun to think there's more to it.

10. I liked Xander's line to Larry: "Hey, Lar. You're lookin' Cro-Mag as usual." And then he feels called upon to defend Buffy's honour, and Buffy comes and saves him, and he's angry with her for interfering because of his rep. Ungrateful wretch. Seems more like that Larry would have trounced him, and what good would that have done for Buffy or her reputation? Or his? Xander needs to stop worrying about what people think about him.

I love Willow's comment on it, though: "Boys are so fragile."

11. So Willow and Buffy go to steal the Watcher Diaries from Giles - and why am I tempted to call it "The Very Secret Diaries of Angel"? I'm unclear what this book is. Angel's diary? Some Watcher's account of Angel's actions? Why would they have a portrait of a woman Angel knew before he was ever a vampire? Who drew the picture anyway?

12. I did enjoy this exchange:

Giles: I enjoy cross-referencing.
Buffy: Do you stuff your own shirts, or do you send them out?

Though I think it's once again very rude of Buffy and I don't like it in the least when she disses Giles.

13. As a ploy, she asks Giles about why Halloween is so quiet, and he says: "it's interesting, ac... Not, I suspect, to you." That is a terrible tease - it's interesting to me, I want to know! C'mon, Giles, give!

14. So Buffy cites Jenny Calendar calling Giles 'a babe', which is cute, but it makes me like Jenny even less than before, because she is associated with tricking Giles. I also like the phrase that he's a 'burning something or other'. Heh. And when Buffy says, "But I've overstepped my bounds. It's none of my business, you know," it's the phoniest thing I ever heard!

15. Buffy admires the picture of the 18th century girl and says, "Musta been wonderful. Put on some fantabulous gown and go to a ball like a princess, and have horses and servants, and yet more gowns." Buffy seems about four years old here.

16. Cordelia doesn't believe Angel is a vampire. I like that.

17. Good lines:

Buffy: It's just... you're never gonna get noticed if you keep hiding. You're missing the whole point of Halloween.
Willow: Free candy?

I love Willow's priorities.

18. So they get costumes of the selves they would like to be: Buffy a pretty noblewoman, Willow as someone who can hide under a sheet and never be seen, Xander as a tough soldier. And Ethan encourages Buffy to go for the dress - I'm unsure of his motivations. Just to cause chaos, or something more complex?

19. Buffy zooms in (and zones out) on the dress. I am reminded of Kaylee seeing the dress in the shop window in "Shindig". Strikes me that Buffy thinks she's Kaylee and wants to grow up to be Inara, but she's in denial about the part of her that's Zoe.

20. So we meet Ethan. I know a lot of fans who love Ethan. I couldn't get a handle on him, though I loved his scenes with Giles. I don't know what I think of him, but I'm intrigued.

21. My favourite scene in the episode: Spike's warehouse, with high-tech twin monitors showing him the video footage of Buffy's fight. I love it that Spike bucks tradition and goes for all the modern tools.

22. Spike says, "She's tricky. Baby likes to play." How does he manage to make that sound so menacing, so clever, and so sexy?

23. Drusilla comes in and Spike says, "C'mere, poodle." That's hilarious: because in Torchwood, Captain John Hart (the James Marsters character) admired a poodle. I hadn't known it was another Buffy joke. I love it.

24. Wonderful bit of dialogue:

Drusilla: Do you love my insides? The parts you can't see?
Spike: Eyeballs to entrails, my sweet.

That's such a wonderful mix of creepy and bizarre and romantic. The thing that really clinches it, that makes it something spine-chilling instead of something silly, is the sincerity with which Spike says it. To him, it's not silly at all.

25. When Drusilla is oracular, she makes me think of River. Are you all tried of me making these analogies and comparisons to other Whedon works, or Whedon-inspired works? I find it fascinating, the way he and the other writers involved mix and match words and phrases and ideas in different ways, a constant cycle of shifting reuse in which these things grow in meaning all the time., taking on different levels and nuances. For me, it makes both the Firefly characters (for instance) more interesting, and the Buffy ones too, to see the correspondences.

26. Drusilla says, "Someone's come to change it all. Someone new." Lovely because a few episodes ago, Spike was the new boy, overturning the old order. Now there's someone else. Does she mean Ethan? that is the most likely interpretation, though I'd love to think it went deeper and twistier than that.

27. The quick scene-shift to Ethan emphasizes the notion that this is who Drusilla is talking about. He seems to serve Chaos as represented by Janus - which is interesting, because I never thought Janus represented either chaos or duality: he represents the past and future as seen from the present, and doorways and gates, and transitions. But I like the way the show reinterprets myth. This is cool. When Giles comes along he says, "Primarily the division of self. Male and female, light and dark." It's an interesting perspective on the episode.

28. Ethan says, "Chaos. I remain, as ever, thy faithful, degenerate son." I love that phrase. It's thrillingly evocative. It's the first line in the show that I've thought had as much power as Spike's dialogue. "Faithful, degenerate son."

29. The scene between Cordelia and Oz seems oddly pointless. I know they're setting Oz up for future use and they seem to keep mentioning Devon (why?) but there's no impact here. Even Cordelia isn't important enough to the picture yet to make this the least bit interesting. We are, of course, reminded that Oz likes Willow. But obviously hasn't approached her yet - again, it's a non-event, so far.

30. Love Buffy's comment on the lady who gives the kids toothbrushes for Halloween: "She must be stopped."

31. I love it that Ethan invokes Janus in Latin. So suitable. More fun that demonic or just mysterious. And I could understand the Latin, though he didn't speak it as if it were a language, he used it more as a ritual. Definitely not ecclesiastical Latin, though it has some echoes of familiar Christian keywords.

32. "Showtime!" - wonderful.

33. So people turn into whatever they are costumed as. Xander becomes the touch soldier he wanted to be - and it's probably bad and sad that I like him better as a mindless soldier than as an insecure boy. Buffy turns into a blithering idiot in an 18th century dress. Willow turns into herself, only noncorporeal. I love the moment where she couldn't turn pages in Giles' book. Kitty Pryde has days like that.

34. I love it that Xander-soldier obeys Willow when she says "it's an order'.

35. Love the scene where Buffy comes along and they look to her for leadership and she faints. Mind you, I feel a little cheated that we didn't get to see Buffy's transformation, or her viewpoint of what was happening - we go to Willow's viewpoint instead.

36. It's funny, though, when Buffy thinks the car is a demon and wonders what it wants. This is almost Neil Gaiman-like.

37. I like the way Willow describes the situation to Cordelia - and doesn't need to. Cordelia isn't transformed.

38. So Spike sees his chance and takes advantage of the situation. I like his assessment: "This is just... neat!"

39. Giles sees Ethan and orders Willow out. I like his sudden assumption of authority - something we've never seen from him before. I've wondered why not. It's as if he carefully avoids taking an authoritative role with Buffy, even though it's what I would have expected.

40. So Ethan calls Giles "Ripper". And then: "Rupert". They know each other. Well, it seems. Giles says, "It's sick, brutal, and it harms the innocent." - which seems to sum up his principles, but Ethan implies he's got a totally different side. "It's quite a little act you've got going here, old man." Why "old man"?

41. Wonderful line from Xander: "It's strange, but beating up that pirate gave me a weird sense of closure." It took me a while to recognize the pirate as Larry.

42. Giles remains authoritative:

Giles: Break the spell, Ethan. Then leave this place and never come back.
Ethan: Why should I? What's in the bargain for me?
Giles: You get to live.

So they fight. We've never seen any indication before that Giles actually can fight well, as he is usually a punching-bag for Buffy, or thrown around the room by her. Suddenly we get a Giles who is not only willing to fight, but can fight. Now, there's a wonderful parallel here to Xander, who, caught up in Ethan's magic, is a soldier. But it's a false version of Xander, stripped of his personality and his memory, even his name. Giles, in contrast, seems to be taking on a new name and personality, as if revealing an inner self, or a dual self, or a hidden self. As if Giles-the-Librarian was a costume he'd taken off. This Giles is aggressive and has a forceful will, unlike the ego-less, idea-oriented intellectual we are accustomed to with our meek Giles.

And Ethan articulates this - both the strangeness of this other side of Giles, and its hidden nature: "I know what you're capable of. But they don't, do they? They have no idea where you come from."

Since this isn't explained, it's another instance of this episode feeling like a teaser, a trailer, a preview of things to come. Not really showing us a new level of characterization, but implying that it might exist.

Big surprise: Giles really can fight, and he can fight as if he means it. The fact that we really don't see Ethan fighting back or trying to defend himself makes it all the more anomalous: it doesn't take a lot of threats or violence to make Ethan tell Giles what he wants to know.

43. Spike to Buffy: "Look at you. Shaking. Terrified. Alone. Lost little lamb. I love it." Nice Spike moment.

44. Buffy: "Hi, honey. I'm home." Wonderful! And: "You know what? It's good to be me.?" I love Buffy much more this way than when she's in little-girl-wannabe mode.

45. At last, Buffy just... spends time with Angel. And listens to what he has to say. He points out that he never even liked 18th century girls. (Which doesn't quite ring true, but probably has a root of truth in it.)

46. A lot of this episode felt like a tease for me - a rather delicious tease, but there's a remarkable lack of closure on every level, and a sense of new directions. Spike, who comes on with enormous personal impact, just runs away - so we know he'll be back. Ethan never reveals his motivations or his background, leaving his "Be seeing you..." note for Giles. Willow doesn't put her ghost-sheet back on: is her new-found confidence permanent?