Blessed Arms That Hold You Tight, Freezing Cold and Alone – Carissa’s Wierd
I know this is theoretically a music blog, but if you’ve been around here for any length of time you know it’s also where I talk about other things I find interesting. In particular, as I’ve mentioned a few times, one of my leisure-time activities for the last year has been watching the whole series of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
I finally slogged my way to the end of season 7, so wanted to give a few concluding thoughts. If you’re not interested, skip along, but be aware that you’re missing out on one of the best TV shows of all-time (seriously).
Let me begin by saying that while I like the premise of season 7, and thought the conclusion was satisfying, there are two very serious problems.
First, the finale simply doesn’t stack up all that well to the last episode of season 5 (“The Gift”), which in my mind is a far more meaningful and complete ending. I don’t quite want to say that they should have just stopped after five seasons because there were some great episodes afterwards, but it was all a bit anticlimactic. And the show took a noticeable dip in season 6 in part because Buffy’s arc was really already complete.
Second, and far more unforgivable, is the travesty of the Willow/Kennedy relationship in season 7. I’ve commented in the past that my favorite character on the entire show was Tara, and while I was dismayed enough at the fact that they killed her, I could at least accept that as a meaningful plot device. It was a reasonable demonstration that even that she who is the most pure, and love that is the most perfect, is no assurance of happiness or security. It didn’t make me happy, but I could deal with it.
Then, having Willow exhibit virtually no signs of grief in season 7 was frustrating, but I justified it by believing that she was simply keeping it hidden and that they would devote a full episode to the issue eventually. But then, when they finally did, it was beyond my worst nightmare. To have her seek solace with someone else is perfectly reasonable, as was her response to feel incredibly guilty for that brief moment of forgetfulness. It’s an important lesson about how we begin to deal with loss, and a recognition that we can’t simply hang on forever, but also that grief and guilt are so powerful because the emotions underlying them are so strong. It does no good to dwell on them endlessly, but neither is it good to simply forget.
Letting You Go – Tom Petty
However, that’s precisely what Willow does. The big “revelation” at the end of the episode is that she has to let Tara go and get on with her life, including dating a (presumably high-school age) bratty, obnoxious girl. Never again is Tara mentioned or apparently even thought about. And instead of taking the time to let a new relationship grow, with all the awkwardness and discomfort that this entails, they simply throw Willow and Kennedy together and leave it at that.
This ignores everything that made the Willow/Tara story so compelling in the first place. It was beautiful to watch it emerge subtly, over time, without artifice or overt scenes of lovy-doveyness. They felt like real people, learning to love each other shyly but truly. And it was beautiful because it was one of the most honest and fair depictions of a good relationship (of any kind, let alone a lesbian one) I’ve ever seen on television.
Willow and Kennedy are exactly opposite. We are beaten over the head with the assertion that being with Kennedy is somehow good for Willow (violating the “show don’t tell” principle about as badly as it was ever done on Buffy), and then Kennedy immediately becomes a main character, popping up in war councils and significant scenes despite having nothing useful to contribute, and demonstrating that she is a terrible influence on Willow by egging her on to use magic (which is precisely what invited the catastrophe at the end of season 6).
Even all of this I could (maybe) forgive, if there was anything in season 7 that let me believe that they were trying to communicate some of these problems. If we were able to take away from the relationship that it was a rebound situation – an unsuccessful attempt to replace Tara – I would be far more willing to accept the plot decision. There certainly is something to be said for not living entirely in the past, and Buffy is a fantastic show in part because of their capacity for showing relationships in all their complications and shades of gray. A show that can give us the self-loathing, love, hate, sadness, and hope for redemption that is the relationship between Buffy and Spike should surely be able to communicate some of these more complicated elements about Willow.
Instead, she becomes a cardboard cut-out. It does such a disservice to a character they’ve spent years making into a complex, almost real person that we came to know and love.
I know I’m fixating on this, but it really did almost remove my desire to actually finish watching the show. I took a two-month break after watching the first Willow/Kennedy episode and only finally regained the will to see it through now, and really just because I love the whole show so much that I couldn’t justify quitting this close to the end.
Beyond that, I feel like it’s a bit of a microcosm of the whole last two seasons. They ran into the classic problem after the fifth season of “we’ve done it all.” Buffy fights a God, achieves a sense of self-awareness and purpose, recognizes her final role, and accepts the finitude of existence. She commits the ultimate self-sacrifice, with full awareness of what it entails, and passes beyond this world to her final reward.
However, they want to make more episodes so they drag her back to life, despite making it very clear only a few episodes before (when Dawn tries to revive her mother) that death is final and it is not our place to mess around with it. They were able to extract some interesting plots (and a couple great episodes) from the aftermath, but the show was never the same again. We were treated to several years of emo-Buffy and escalating soap opera plots that got in the way of the two larger plots which really were quite interesting (Willow’s magic addiction and the First Evil).
A Sorta Fairytale – Tori Amos
Which brings me to my radical idea that I can’t help but wish they had had the guts to try out. Instead of bringing back Buffy, I wish they had continued the show but left Buffy dead. At the very least, it gets 10 points out of 10 for sheer audacity (continuing a show after you kill off the title character), if perhaps minus several million for good sense. And sure, it probably would have angered enough fans that they would’ve been canceled after a season, but you have to admit that if anyone could have pulled it off it would have been Joss Whedon and company.
I just think it would have been fascinating to watch them struggling to deal with the loss of their friend and leader, of trying to put the pieces of their lives back together, learning to rely on each other for things they used to need Buffy for. And it would have given these side characters each far more chance to shine. Buffy always worked because it was a strong ensemble cast, and I think that by the end having Buffy as the central character became a crutch that inhibited the continued growth of the other characters.
Anyways, I could really go on forever talking about Buffy, but I have a feeling most of the people reading here are not that interested, so I’ll conclude by listing my ten favorite episodes (in approximate, though not exact, order), and inviting anyone who is interested to chime in and comment on their favorites, or anything else about the show.
1. Hush (season 4)
2. Doppelgangland (season 3)
3. Once More With Feeling (season 6)
4. Becoming Part II (season 2)
5. New Moon Rising (season 4)
6. Innocence (season 2)
7. Tabula Rasa (season 6)
8. Lovers Walk (season 3)
9. The Body (season 5)
10. Earshot (season 3)
Alright, that last one probably isn’t really one of the ten best episodes, but I absolutely love some of the gags (particularly hearing Oz’s thoughts) and, like most of the funny episodes, it has a surprisingly strong serious message, too. If I was going to include a more significant episode as #10 it would probably be Passion or The Gift or something like that.