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Wednesday, October 3, 2001

'Buffy' premiere hints at darkness to come

By STEPHANIE McGRATH -- AllPop

SPOILER ALERT! Please don't read this story if you don't want to know what happened during the "Buffy" season premiere! Okay...you're still reading. We gave you fair warning so NO complaining.

On Tuesday night, the "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" creative team set the scene for a "Buffy" season full of angst.

With Buffy gone for the first hour of the two-hour season premiere, the formerly quirky Willow (Alyson Hannigan) became the leader.

Looking 100% spooky standing in a graveyard and sending her friends telepathic messages, Willow is the one to watch this season. That girl has gone crazy.

Sarah Michelle Gellar is Buffy

Need proof?

1. The freaky telepathic ability she's apparently grown over the summer combined with the fact that she has no qualms about jumping into her friends' minds at any time.

2. Oh look, there's Willow in flowing, pastel clothes, sitting in a picturesque field, looking every bit like a princess from a shampoo commercial. And look there, a cute little fawn's approaching her. Oh, that's so serene ... Wait a minute! What are you doing, Willow? Umm ... what's the knife for? Okay, she slaughtered a baby deer. So it was for a spell she needed to revive Buffy. Still, that was pretty harsh. No remorse, either.

3. It's time to revive Buffy! Yay! One problem, though: Willow's spell causes large gashes to appear on her arms, and an enormous snake to crawl out of her mouth. (And she wasn't surprised by either event). That does not look like a happy, good-magic-inspired spell to me.

But even Willow's wacky powers and snake spells aren't enough to protect Sunnydale from a demon biker gang that knows Buffy is deceased. Led straight to Willow by the Buffy-bot introduced last season that the gang has been using as a Buffy decoy, the demons interrupt the spell and cause the Scoobies to scatter and run.

Now for the creepiest part of the episode. There's a close-up of Buffy's decomposing body in her coffin, and then poof! The spell revives her. Alas, the newly alive Buffy finds herself buried alive. Not. Good.

The Buffy who finally claws her way out of her wooden box and up through the dirt, is a shaken and severely traumatized shadow of the former slayer who finds life above ground isn't much better then under.

Her town is ravaged by a the demon gang who also, in another rather disturbing scene, chain the Buffy-bot to several different motorcycles and tear her apart.

When the Scoobies cross paths with Buffy, she barely recognizes them and cowers in a dark alley. (Acting Note: Sarah's Buffy-bot acting was funny and silly, while her portrayal of the "cowering Buffy" had a Shatner sort of flair.)

Eventually, when she hears her friends getting beaten up by the demons, Buffy springs into slayer mode and flattens the villains rather quickly.

Now it's time for emotional moment number two, the first being the departure of Giles, Buffy's Watcher, which happened early on in the episode and featured some sniffling, some very "Buffy"-eque quips, and some pretty decent acting.

The second emotional moment comes when Buffy's sister, Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg), realizes Buffy's alive again. Buffy has returned to the scene of her death and looks ready to take the jump off the tower yet again. There's some crying and pleading for Buffy not to jump, especially when Buffy asks Dawn if Sunnydale is "hell". When the tower begins to creak and tumble, Buffy jumps into action again and saves Dawn and herself.

The episode ends with Dawn throwing her arms around her revived sister, but a close-up of Buffy's face shows a troubled, blank stare. Again, quite creepy.

Other emotional moments?

1. Dawn climbing into bed with the Buffy-bot (even though it was shut off and being recharged).

2. Dawn looking heartbroken when she finds the remains of the shattered Buffy-bot.

3. Spike doing his best to protect Dawn and trying to cover up his guilt over Buffy's death.

4. Willow losing it when she thinks her spell didn't work and that Buffy is gone forever.

So old Joss Whedon and his crew have already got more than enough sombre material to fill up this season. There's Willow's possible turn to the dark side, Buffy's emotional problems, and the absence of Giles, as well as Spike's continuing, unrequited love for the slayer. But that doesn't mean they've completely forgotten about the funny side.

Just for kicks, Joss threw in Anya's (Emma Caulfield) obsession with announcing her engagement to Xander (Nicholas Brendon), a hilarious sequence involving the Buffy-bot at Dawn's parent-teacher conference, and a healthy dose of Buffy-isms, such as "You've got your sombre on, Willow". Funny stuff.

The episode earned about 3 out of five stakes, losing points for excessive length and lame villains with bad make-up jobs. Although there were no crazy surprises, the writers have started to hint at so many potential problems and deliciously dark story-lines that the sheer anticipation for more episodes makes the premiere worth watching.