Allpop.com - A product of CANOE

Monday, November 5, 2001

Review: Have a Buffy Halloween

By STEPHANIE McGRATH -- AllPop

Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 5

To be completely honest, it's difficult to concentrate on last week's episode of "Buffy" with the musical episode airing this week. It's so exciting. It may be the best episode of "Buffy" ever.

So last week's Halloween episode was decent. Not great, but decent.

Sarah Michelle Gellar is Buffy

The show opens with a shot of a scary-looking old man gazing at a large butcher knife ... dum-da-dum ...

Meanwhile, the Scoobie gang is hanging out at the Magic Box, which is extra busy due to all the Halloween activity (people buying scary magic stuff and such).

There are a few funny moments: Willow gets annoyed with someone in a witch costume (she's offended by the stereotype, you see, because she is a witch), Buffy makes a crack about the wacky time loop from the previous season, and Anya gets all excited about money.

(Ahhh, the musical episode is going to be so amazing, check out the sound clips on the official website. Sorry.)

Xander, dressed as a sort of Captain Crunch-y sort of pirate, decides that the chaotic Magic Box is the best place to announce his upcoming nuptials to Anya. Anya is thrilled that her boyfriend has deemed it fit to make their engagement known. We know this because she throws money at Dawn. I, however, am confused as to why Anya would allow Xander to make all the decisions regarding the announcement. Call me crazy (or Anne Heche, whichever you like), but I think she might be involved in the actual wedding somehow.

So Buffy decides to host a happy little engagement celebration at her home. There's plastic cups and everything. (It's kind of sad that the Scoobies only know other Scoobies. Their parties must get kind of dull.)

[Note: Remember, according to Buffy-lore, demons and vampires and the like usually take Halloween off.]

Willow's-turning-evil alert: During the party, Willow does a tacky little spell to decorate the house in honour of Xander and Anya. Giles makes a concerned face and Tara gives her a talking to about over-using her powers and how she should only use magic to help people in trouble. Willow gets a touch huffy.

During the festivities, Dawn pulls the classic high school scam. She tells Buffy she's going to sleep at a friend's house, her friend tells her mom she's going to sleep at Dawn's house, and the two scamper off to go on a date with boys. (But as everyone knows, there are very few non-demon, non-vampire, non-geek-trio boys in Sunnydale. This can only mean trouble.)

Dawn and her pal meet up with two boys who look like every other actor who's been cast in the role of a high school jock since the birth of television. (They have letter jackets and everything.) Also, the boy Dawn is supposed to be interested in looks about 25 years older than she does. That's just creepy.

So the boys impress their dates by kicking over mail-boxes, smashing pumpkins, and throwing eggs. (Doesn't that make you nostalgic for high school? And if you're still in high school, fear not my young friends, it doesn't last forever.)

As a final prank, the two jock boys convince Dawn to go up to the house of a creepy old man (the same one from the beginning, with the knife) and smash his pumpkin. Dawn does, and the old man jumps out of the house. The kids are startled but agree to go into his house for a special treat.

Inside, he keeps referring to himself as "daddy", which is kind of yucky but not all that scary. He tells Dawn and her friends that he used to be a toy maker but for some mysterious reason, he was fired. He convinces Dawn's loser date to help him in the kitchen. Uh-oh, what's going to happen?

(If you thought the old man was going to be trouble, you were wrong.)

Dawn's date gets all vampy and kills the old man, whose butcher knife was only going to be used to cut some special Halloween rice krispie squares.

Dawn's boy convinces them to run out of the house before the others see what happened. (Gee, do you think the other boy is a vamp too?)

The boys say they're going to get the car, and the girls are all excited and semi-squealy about the fact that the boys have a car. (And then they all go over to the malt shop and share milk-shakes with Archie and Veronica. What the heck is this?).

The boys turn vampy when the gals aren't looking and bite the neck of a driver to steal a car.

Meanwhile, back at the Buffy pad, Giles gets a call from Dawn's friend's mom and the whole high school "I'm sleeping over at ____'s house" plot is discovered.

Buffy has already left to find Spike and go patrolling, so Giles has to break up the happening dance party that Anya, Willow and Xander are participating in. (See, they really need a few more friends.) Willow and Tara are sent off to the Bronze to look for Dawn, while Giles makes his way to the graveyard to look for her.

Dawn and the boy are parked in a car in the woods, while her friend and the other loser jock/vampire boy have run off to play kissy-face outside. (Have neither of these two girls seen any horror movies at all? Those who park, always get killed first.)

There's some awkward chatter, and then they start kissing.

Meanwhile, Buffy has arrived at Spike's classy abode where she learns that Dawn is out and about. This disturbs her because she knows there are vamps out because she spotted the bitten-driver of the stolen vehicle downtown.

She and Spike run off to save Dawn, who has just noticed that her boy is a vamp!

Willow's-turning-evil alert: During all of this, Tara and Willow have another fight about Willow's powers at the bronze. Willow used some spell to switch the sound off so he could hear better, and Tara gets very annoyed. They bicker about her using too much power and how it could lead to trouble. Willow gets very defensive and accuses Tara of betraying her trust and talking to Giles about the situation.

Our trusty pal Giles runs through the graveyard and hears girly screams. He rescues Dawn's friend from her vampy boyfriend and rushes off to save Dawn, who is about to be bitten. Giles faces the jock/vamp and makes some testosterone-filled comments about how the vamp is in trouble now when he finds himself surrounded by about six cars filled with teenage vampires. Bad news.

Guess who arrives just then? If you guessed Buffy and Spike, you'd be right. Buffy runs into the middle of the vamp circle, stares at the car, stares at Dawn and shrieks: "You were parking! With a vamp?" (It was very funny.)

There's a typical vampire-slaying scene. Giles gets very beat up, Spike and Buffy each slay them some vamps, but Dawn is the one who finishes off her vamp boyfriend.

Back at Buffy's house, the gang is quite unsettled. Tara stalks upstairs to the bedroom she shares with Willow, who instantly follows her, begging for forgiveness.

Buffy and Giles talk about how Dawn's behaviour has to be nipped in the bud, but Buffy tells Giles not to be too hard on her and runs upstairs. (You see, it is really Buffy who should be disciplining Dawn, not Giles. Giles has to leave soon, because he's only a recurring character now, and if Buffy is too dependent on him, she's going to find herself in some serious trouble.)

Up in Willow & Tara's room, the girls are still bickering about the magic issue. Tara goes to bed in a very foul mood, while Willow sighs that she wishes they could forget the whole fight.

Willow's-turning-evil alert: Will passes her hand over a dried flower and whispers something about "forgetting". Then she climbs into bed with Tara who, surprise, isn't mad at her anymore. See, Willow is messing with people's minds now. That is bad news.

The End.

The Halloween episode of Buffy rates 3 stakes out of five. It loses one stake for being pretty predictable and one for simply not being the musical episode, which is on this week and is going to CHANGE YOUR LIFE. It earns three stakes for good Willow-is-turning evil clues and some funny quips.