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Wednesday, November 7, 2001

Part 2 - Review: Buffy's best episode ever

By STEPHANIE McGRATH -- AllPop

...shoplifted items and puts on the necklace she stole from the Magic Box.

"Does anybody even notice?/Does anybody even care?," she sings. [She's not bad but is obviously uncomfortable singing.] But before Dawn can begin singing again she's kidnapped by some truly scary looking puppet-type demons.

What ensues is a truly classy ballet number that features Dawn doing a stylized trying-to-escape dance with the puppet-demons. It's fantastic.

Then we're introduced to the demon that's been causing all the havoc and chaos and such. He makes his grand entrance with a fancy tap-dance and a theme song. It's very good, but he's not a regular so I don't really care about him.

It turns out that someone summoned the demon, he thinks Dawn did it, and he's going to take her down to hell to be his queen. The musical spell means that people will continue to reveal their secrets and bare their emotions through song until it all gets to be too much for them and they simply dance to their death.

When the demon learns that Dawn's sister is the slayer, he decides he'd like to see Buffy dance until she burns before he takes Dawn to be his queen.

Buffy

"What I mean/I'm fifteen/So this queen thing isn't legal," Dawn sings/argues.

Back at the Magic Box, Buffy is training and says she knows Giles will figure out the singing problem. As Buffy trains, Giles sings "Wish I", which explains that he wishes he could stay and slay Buffy's demons for her and act as her father figure but that he has to go in order for Buffy to move forward and begin looking after herself and growing up.

Tara eventually joins in Giles' song. She realizes that Willow has been messing with her memory. Both Tara and Giles sing about how they don't want to leave the ones they love but they know they have to. (Oh no! Tara and Willow look like their heading for splitsville.)

At the end of the song, one of the puppet demons bursts into the shop and tells all the Scoobies that Dawn is kidnapped.

"Dawn needs rescuing," quips Buffy. "Must be Tuesday."

Buffy expects her pals to go with her to help, but Giles tells her it's something she needs to do on her own. Sadness.

Our heroine wonders through the dark streets.

"When I touch the fire it freezes me," she sings sadly and then a large-scale, major musical number (think "Les Miserables") is born in the song "Walk Through The Fire".

Buffy is sad, she tells us in song. She feels nothing, she can't get her fire back. She doesn't want to be this way anymore. She's miserable and alone. She misses heaven.

Then, back at the Magic Box, Giles realizes he's made a mistake and that they should all go and help Buffy, so the entire cast joins in "Walk Through The Fire".

Willow's one line? "I think my lines are mostly filler" (hee hee hee).

Spike is sulking in a corner. He's hurt.

"I hope she fries/I'm free if that b**** dies/I wonder if she needs help," he sings before running off to try to help Buffy too.

Buffy kicks open the door to the demon's home and finds Dawn and the demon waiting for her. The demon is very happy.

Now it's time for Buffy's really big number.

"Life's a show/And we all play our parts/And when the music starts/We open up our hearts," she sings. The Scoobies arrive in time to help her, and Tara and Anya start dancing to Buffy's song. Buffy goes on to say/sing that all the things that should make her happy -- friends, family -- aren't helping her.

The demon gives Buffy a look. It's time for her to reveal her really big secret. It's going to be so big she won't be able to deal and will dance to death.

Her song morphs into: "Give me something to sing about," which is all about how nothing makes her happy, how life has no meaning for her because ... (yep, she's going to say it, they're all going to find out,) her friends pulled her out of heaven and now she's in hell.

Willow looks like she's going to throw up. Giles looks shocked, and Xander looks upset.

Then Buffy starts to dance hysterically and smoke starts rising from her body. Oh no! She's going to burn up!

But it's Spike who saves her. He grabs her and sings: "Life isn't bliss/Life is just this/Living/You have to go on living/So one of us is living".

He seems to snap Buffy out of her dancing trance.

The demon prepares to go and take Dawn with him but Xander reveals the fact that he was the one who summoned the demon (by accident), not Dawn. The demon decides to wave the clause about taking the person who summoned him to be his queen.

Willow-is-turning-evil alert: Willow tells him to leave, and the demon looks right at her and says "Hmmm, I smell power".

So the demon sings a little goodbye song, but he's not one of the Scoobies so who cares about that.

Once he leaves, the group looks stunned and shell-shocked.

"Where do we go from here?," Dawn sings.

Then the rest join in for the grand finale.

"Understand/We'll go hand in hand/But we walk alone in fear/Tell me/Where do we go from here?"

The cast starts doing synchronized dance moves but Spike shakes it off, yells: "Bugger this" and leaves the finale.

Buffy races outside to follow him. He turns on her, he's angry and heartbroken (or would be if he wasn't a vampire).

Now, time for the ABSOLUTELY BEST MOMENT OF THE WHOLE SHOW. To all those "Buffy" fans who've been waiting anxiously for Buffy and Spike to get together, here's your moment.

"This isn't real/But I just want to feel," sings Buffy and then she and Spike throw themselves into a major-motion-picture-style lip-lock.

THE END.

Overall: This episode was so much fun. The song and dance numbers were great but weren't just a gimmick to grab ratings. They actually contributed to the overall "Buffy" story. Now Tara knows for sure that Willow is using too much magic, Willow knows her spell did a terrible thing by pulling Buffy out of heaven, and Anya and Xander have acknowledged that they're nervous about the wedding while Giles thinks it's time for him to leave Buffy and, best of all, Buffy might be snapping out of her heaven-induced coma and besides, she got together with Spike! Hooray!! This episode deserves a million stakes out of five.

"So Joss, about that part on "Buffy"... oh, okay not now then. How about now? No? Maybe tomorrow? .... Please?".

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