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Wednesday, November 21, 2001

Review: Buffy & Spike k-i-s-s-i-n-g

By STEPHANIE McGRATH -- AllPop

Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 8

What does it say about someone when his or her entire life revolves around a television series and his or her extreme fixation on Spike -- not James Marsters, mind you -- but Spike?

I'm thinking it probably means that I am no longer allowed to make fun of pro wrestling and Trekkies. That's too bad. I will miss that pastime.

Now that I am beginning to fill in the hole in my soul created when Joss Whedon gave me the musical episode and then brutally tore it away, I can begin to enjoy new episodes of the show without whining about how they're just not as good as "Once More With Feeling". So I promise not to even mention "OMWF" after this paragraph, and if I have complaints about the most recent episode its not because I'm comparing it to "OMWF".

Buffy

Note: Thanks to everyone who wrote me with feedback about last week's recap. According to some of AllPop's readers: Tara isn't gone for good, Anya's fear of bunnies dates back a few seasons and was mentioned during a past Halloween episode when she talked about how scary her bunny costume was, and the stupid shark demon from last week was probably a loan shark, not a card shark, like I said it was. You're all very clever.

Note #2: This episode wasn't suitable for some younger viewers.

So this week's episode, titled "Smashed", was rather uneven. In fact, there was a high percentage of sucking (and not in the vampire sense), mostly due to this stupid colour-wipe effect that the special-effects wizards on this show (and, yes, I use the term sarcastically) employed to demonstrate Willow's magical prowess. The stupid colour-wipe effect and last week's loan/card shark should leave right now, never to return to Sunnydale.

That being said, a fantastic finale more than made up for any stupidness that littered the earlier parts of the hour.

The show starts off with an event that will test the memory of loyal "Buffy" fans and utterly confuse new viewers. Willow is lonely. You see, Tara left her and she has no special magic friends left anymore. Willow takes a look at her pet rat, quickly conjures up a spell (a really stupid-sounding spell by the way that sounds like she's saying "poop-a, chupp-a") and turns the rat back into Amy, a girl from her high school who has magical powers and has made appearances in several episodes and finally turned herself into a rat when the Sunnydale population was on a mission to kill witches. Willow wasn't able to turn her back into a person until now.

So Amy is confused and has to be filled in on all past Sunnydale events.

Meanwhile, the geek trio is up to no good. The "Star Wars"-loving boys break into the Sunnydale museum and steal a large diamond. There's a few polite chuckles as one of them attempts a "Mission Impossible"-type move, but no real guffaws. According to the official "Buffy" website, the gem is a "mystical diamond that will help them defeat the Slayer", but I must have been absent when they were talking about the mystical part. Anyway, the boys freeze the museum guard with their freeze gun machine and run off.

Our little heroine (whose hair is in braids, thus disguising the fact that it seriously needs to be cut and could probably use a new dye job) is wondering around, looking for demons to slay when she comes across an average old mugging. When Spike rushes in to help her and attacks the muggers, his government-planted chip gives him a migraine because the muggers are human and the chip prevents him from attacking humans. (There's a lot of chip talk, so get ready).

After the muggers run off, Spike and Buffy have a little "We kissed," "It didn't mean anything," "I love you," "You're pathetic" conversation.

The Scoobies

Back at the Buffy palace, Buffy tries to talk to Willow about the vampire-kissing incident but is distracted by the presence of Amy. There are a few quips about the high school being destroyed and such, and then Buffy hears about the museum-freezing incident from the news.

Buffy rushes off to see if she can find out anything on the freezing and she meets up with Spike again and they have another conversation about the kissing that results in Buffy punching Spike and Spike punching her back. (Uh-oh, the punch didn't make his chip hurt his head, like it usually does when he hurts humans.) Spike fakes a headache. The two part ways.

Now Spike is tres excited because he has the ability to vamp-out and drink human blood again (or so he thinks).

Spike finds a lonely looking girl and corners her in an alley (there are a lot of alleys in Sunnydale). He tries to bite her but gets another wicked headache. Ah well. No vamping for Spike.

Willow's Turning Evil Alert: The next day, Buffy, Willow, Xander, and Anya are researching freezing demons while Tara takes Dawn to the movies for some quality time. The Scoobies get all excited when Willow pulls out her laptop to do research but are sad when she uses magic to search police files.

Willow leaves to spend time with Amy, and Xander and Anya tell Buffy they're worried because Willow is using too much magic. (Note: Sarah Michelle Gellar has a pretty shirt on in this scene. I covet that shirt.)

Meanwhile, Spike makes his way to the geek trio's abode and takes their Boba Fett figurine hostage until they agree to check on his chip and see if it is still working. There are some funny bits when Spike returns the figurine and the boys tell the toy: "It's okay, everything's going to be all right". Ha, jokes.

The geeks tell Spike there's nothing wrong with his chip and Spike realizes -- da-da-dum-da! -- there's something wrong with Buffy.

At the Buffy palace, Amy convinces Willow to join her for a night on the town and the two end up at the Bronze. (Quelle surprise. Are there any other nightclubs in this town? Oh right, sorry, any space that could be occupied by a nightclub is being used for alleys and the graveyard).

Tara brings Dawn home and Dawn tries to play match-maker and convinces Tara to wait with her until Willow gets back.

At the Magic Box, Buffy receives a phone call from Spike (who is apparently trying to disguise his voice). He orders her to meet him in 20 minutes. She doesn't. Buffy is confused as to why Spike would call her on the phone.

Willow Is Turning Evil Alert: Amy and Willow are casting spells all over the place at the Bronze. They put two boys who were harassing Amy in cages in their undies, change the band to music more to their liking, and dress people up in costumes. Each time they cast a spell it causes this lame colour-wipe effect. It's stupid, but what we learn from this little segment is that Willow is getting way too magic-happy.

When Buffy leaves the Magic Box for the night, Spike meets up with her. They call each other names and there is lots of sexual tension in the air. Spike tells Buffy that she "came back wrong" (from the dead, remember?) and this makes her very, very pissy.

The slayer and the vampire proceed to pummel one another and end up in some dilapidated house. More kicking, punching and name-calling ensues when something semi-disturbing but ultimately fantastic for the show's plot occurs. Buffy kisses Spike. More violence. Spike kisses Buffy. More violence. The house starts to collapse from all the punching and throwing of slayers and vampires against walls with tremendous force. More kissing.

And, OMG, in a move almost not suitable for prime-time (what with all the S& M connotations and such), there is an obvious zipper-being-pulled-down sound effect and, OMG, yep, Buffy and Spike are ... getting to know each other very well while at the same time, crashing through floors.

That's just odd and disturbing and wrong, and she's already done this with vampires before, and I still love Spike and this is so great because now the series is going to get super-duper interesting and now I can't wait until next week. I love Spike so much. (Note: There is quite a bit of realistic sexual chemistry between SMG and James Marsters. Hmmm, is Freddie Prinze Jr. happy about this? Discuss.)

THE END

Overall: This episode was semi-lame due to the stupid magical colour-wipes and the less-than-stellar geek jokes, but the "Buffy" team made up for it in the final few minutes. Hmmm, they seem to be doing that a lot lately. Also, Willow is sooooo turning evil. I hope so much for a Willow/Buffy showdown in the season finale. Please Joss, if you can hear me, make it so. This episode deserves three stakes out of five.