The Chain. Wow. I don't even know where to begin with this story because it's one of Joss's best in any medium. And almost every word is important, so it's hard not to repeat them all. I also thought I might do it chronologically, to get the history of this girl in order, but the intercuts are so moving, it's hard to rearrange them. I guess I'll just go in story order, and we'll see what happens.
We start with a horned demon named Yamanh, the head of a demon army that's headed to the surface from deep underground. Where underground we don't know. He's holding a girl above his head and saying that Buffy Summers is dead. He raises her high above his head for all his minions to see, and here we get the first example of one of the themes of the piece as he tells them to scream the name of the one who killed the Slayer, let it be known, etc. Yamanh (Yah Mon the Jamaican demon?) is a name that all should remember. There's power in his name.
The Girl: The funny part about all this? I never even met her.
Then a quick cut to a jock looking down and asking, "Who the hell are you?"
So we're obviously seeing a story about the slayer who is one of Buffy's lookalikes, the one who is literally underground, who Buffy mentioned in her first voiceover this season. And we know the name of Buffy, we know the name of Yamanh, but we don't know her name. She doesn't tell us that.
Cut over to a flashback to just before the battle. The girl is talking to a pixie girl who's urging her to leave. She refuses because she's been sent to stop Yamanh from rising to the surface. She might die, but she's staying. Pixie girl says she didn't lay her faerie eggs in the girl's ear canal just to watch her die. Ew. But it's not fatal so whatever I guess. Never trust the sidhe. And the pixie has a touching farewell with the girl, "I love you, Buffy," without ever knowing her name.
The Girl: Here's how it works. You don't get a choice.
Then we're back to a time just before the jock's question, where 3 private school girls are bitching about the fascist regime at the school, gossiping about whose panties were in the utility closet. The depantier himself approaches them, looking for the pantiless one, when suddenly the brunette girl seizes and collapses to the ground as her potential is unleashed.
Cut to Giles saying, "And now I will tell you about the chain."
But first, a beautiful panel of the girl experiencing being a slayer for the first time, flashes of demons haunting the slayer dreams, an upside down chain of girls going back into the mists of time with the scythe floating there too, the girl giving a voiceover about how it felt, how it was different for everyone, but it hit her like a ton of Mike Tysons.
The Girl: The power, the shared memories, the...truth. The unbelievable truth.
Cut to Rona saying that there is no truth.
Then we get a fun commercial with Andrew and Vi (I bet he wrote & shot it). The housewife keeps breaking vases because she can't control her superstrength. Are you having this problem? And strange dreams of girls in the past? (Very much the movie mythology there, since it never really came up a lot in the series. We had prophetic dreams, but not so much other Slayer dreams.) There's a pamphlet you can get about this new condition. Call 1-800-CHOSEN-1. This should have been my first indication that the world of the comics was different from the world of the show in the amount of supernatural knowledge the lay people had, but I kind of glossed over it the first time. But this will tie into the whole Harmony story as well.
Flashing back again to her first days of training, where the Rona and Giles shots are coming from. First she thinks it's a cult, but she can't ignore how it feels to be a slayer now.
The Girl: And truth is, it's not cheesy like the commercial. It's actually amazing.
She continues to v.o., mentioning Giles' visit and what he taught them about their lineage, while at the same time reminiscing about the other Buffy lookalike in Rome, partying it up with the Immortal.
The Girl: You know ironically I'm probably even less famous [than Giles w/his association to Buffy] because of the name.
Then we're back to before the battle. A minion has found the girl. She sends him back to Yamanh with the message: Buffy Summers is coming for him. Using the power of Buffy's name to intimidate the demons.
The Girl: The name. What power. Not the greatest power though.
And we see another shot of her lying on the ground after the spell hit her. Then we're with Giles again, and he and the girl talk about the chain, the connection the slayers have with one another, going back to the beginning. She doesn't give him much space to talk, saying we've heard it and it isn't bullshit, but the words aren't what matters, it's the feeling.
Cut to a mission with 6 slayers and at least 6 vamps. I thought I had spotted Simone in some of the training shots, and it's true, she's on this mission, and as charming as ever. "Just stay out of my way, amateurs." Then there's this cool set piece of the fight, and we see our girl fighting, then a less confident redhead cornered by a vamp. As our girl says we have to focus and adapt and work together (the anti-Simone), she saves Red and takes a vamp bite. Then pulls the vamp off her and throws him onto Red's stake. The cool thing is immediately after 2 of the other slayers are gushing about how awesome it is, but they're talking about Simone, who took out the vamp with a sword and took the sword.
It's a foreshadowing of what we already know is to come, our girl will be fighting the good fight in the shadows, unseen by the others who will attract more attention and acclaim, but being the one who gets exactly why she's fighting and what she's fighting for. As opposed to Simone and those who end up gathering to her, who take sisterhood and turn it into a gang of thugs, using their power however they choose. Our girl is the perfect double for Buffy, the girl who never sought to have her name be the power source it is today, who just fought continually to save the world when very few people knew it.
Anyway, back to the book. Our girl mentions she got a souvenir too, not a sword but a vamp scar. And Red tells her that Buffy's got one too. Then we cut to Rona assigning her the mission. "No one up here can know you're her, no one down there can know you're not." The stakes are high and they're hoping the power of Buffy's name will help keep him distracted from rising all the way to the surface.
Why was she chosen? For this mission, for being a Slayer? Because she's strong enough to handle it? Or expendable enough to be tossed away? I think what we're told is summed up as: the strength of her belief in the rightness of her cause, in the bond they share, in the willingness to sacrifice herself for it if need be. Simone would have declared her true name, unwilling to (as she would see it) "hide" behind Buffy's name, needing to claim power in her own name as Yamanh does. This girl has gone beyond that.
The Girl: The truth? There is no truth. There's just what you believe.
The girl descends into the underworld and is slimed by a giant slug as pixies look on. The slug kills any who don't pass his test. I think his sliming was actually an info transfer. She comes out of it knowing what's up with the faeries and the slimefolk. And apparently they don't get along real well. Our girl, speaking from her own truth, tells them they need to work together to survive the demon uprising. "This is how we live. Together. With each other. For each other." Or she doesn't recognize them as people worthy of her help.
Pixie girl exults that they have the Chosen One on their side, that Yamanh knows enough to fear THE NAME Buffy Summers. Sluggo asks if she will face the blackness and not run to the light, and we flash back to that moment of becoming. And we see our girl snap out of her stupor when she hears screeching brakes. Without a thought, she's pushing her friends and the depantying jock out of the path of an out-of-control semi and taking the hit herself. She didn't need training or lessons, she was a slayer from the second she was awakened. And again we see the jock looking down at this girl who survived and saying, "Who the hell ARE you?"
The final fight. We see her taking on Yamanh as the slugs and pixies and Ravenclan and leafblowers fight demons at her side, together. We see the slayer backup team finally arrive too late. And we see her dead body again on the ground.
The Girl: But that's [who you are is] not the point. There's always a name. Lincoln. Hitler. Gandhi. The name can inspire terror, awe...sometimes great things. But there's millions of people go into making a name. People facing things they couldn't imagine they would. In the moments that matter, even our own names are just sounds people make to tell us apart. What we are isn't that. The real questions run deeper. Can I fight? Did I help? Did I do for my sisters? My comrades, children, slimy slug-clan...
There is a chain. Between each and every one of us. And like the man said, you either feel its tug or you ignore it. I tried to feel it. I tried to face the darkness like a woman and I don't need any more than that. You don't have to remember me. You don't even know who I am. But I do.
Gah! I can't read that without crying for this girl we just met and hardly knew. It's such a beautiful statement of what we should aspire to in life, of recognizing what's important and what really defines us. How many of us will reach the end of our lives and be content with our choices rather than full of regrets?
I don't think this story is hugely about the major arc of the season. It's more of an epilogue or musing on the themes of season 7, some of which were a bit sidelined by the whole fight with the First and everything that led up to it. It's a commentary on the spell cast at the end of the season and its metaphorical meaning.
I know there's people out there who feel the spell was a huge betrayal by Buffy, a girl who would never have chosen to be chosen forcing that choice upon all the other potentials in the world. I understand that reading a bit, although I maintain she never forced anyone to use those powers as a slayer, to fight evil or join the ranks. She merely unlocked the door to the potential already within them; they can use their powers as they wish. They can be superheroes or they can be construction workers or stunt women or whatever they want. The point to me is the metaphor of sharing power, and the idea that, however the power was instilled in the line of slayers at the beginning, it is part of the potentials now, and no shadow men have the right to lock away any part of their potential from them. Just as men never had the right to define womanhood (or manhood for that matter) according to what characteristics or what rights were acceptable for them to have, to show, to choose from.
Here is the fuller explanation of that intended meaning. The rest of the season will explore this idea, so even though it's not a part of the Twilight arc directly, it's peripheral and important. And Faith's story explores some of this as well. The slayers choose to come together to fight evil, to walk their own paths, to use or be used, or to not choose at all. By the end, they choose whether to be alone, to band together in smaller groups, to fight vampires or to try and punish Buffy. The chain seems to be broken. Maybe humans just can't sustain that tug on the chain, that feeling of connectedness to one another, for long. Maybe it is too much of a threat to the status quo if we all act as though we're in this together. And there is still always a them for us to side against.
Another thing I think about in relation to this story is Anne, the third season opener. There the thrust of Buffy's character arc was to reclaim her name and all that it implied, at a time when she was doing her best to hide from it. Again, the power of the name. In that case, not accepting her name for herself was an act that came from pain, from not being able to accept the name of the person who had to do the things she had done and would continue to have to do. She simply didn't want to be that person anymore. In that case, ignoring her name, trying not to give it power (while at the same time giving it total power over her choices) was a sign of weakness, of refusing to know herself. In this story, for our not-really Buffy Summers, ignoring her name, stating the unimportance of her name, was a sign of strength. She was not negating herself by refusing to claim her name, even for posterity. She was accepting that ultimately, she was herself entirely, and whatever sounds people made to identify her were irrelevant to that knowledge she had of herself that was unnameable, the concrete reality of her existence that needed no man-made symbol to signify it.
When we go beyond the need for symbols and signifiers to what is real, that's when we know the truth.
To quote Spike: This is just...neat.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #4 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
We start with Warren flashing back to the infamous "Bored now" line of Willow's as she flays him alive. We get the exposition of how he's still around as he taunts her with a scalpel near her eye. Mentions that she was spiraling (referencing the title of a season 5 episode where things are also sort of in a whirl).
We learn that Amy had continued to keep an eye on Willow through the end of season 6, I imagine already resenting her for tossing her aside when Will tried to get clean of magic. Warren said she began to watch over him. I don't know if she became enamored of him because he was the enemy of the Scoobies, and Buffy and Willow in particular, or just figured, hey, if Willow wants him dead, I want him alive, but at any rate she was able to swoop in and save him before Willow tried to burn him away to nothing. And now her magic is his skin. I ask you, why can't her magic be opaque, but whatever.
They together came up with the spell in Killer in Me to punish Willow, and I think that works really well. I could understand before why Amy didn't like Willow and would go to the trouble to try and hurt her, but the method she used, the specifics of the spell seemed kind of weird. I mean, yeah, it was a nice hot button issue with Willow, but it would also be poetic justice to Warren, so it fits together nicely.
The scene ends with Warren asking Willow, "Are you bored now?"
Dawn's upset and hitting walls, but Buffy points out she's not proportionally as strong as she is large, so she could really hurt herself. Dawn feels useless to help Willow and tells Buffy that "Will is like a mom to me." Xander has either the mystics or the Wiccans or somebody figuring out how to use the portal echo to reopen it long enough to send in an extraction team or one or two people only. There's a nice moment where Xander tells Buffy she needs to pick a fighter to go with her, that he wouldn't be as useful there as here, even though you can tell he's worried about his oldest friend. Ah, Xander's all grown up now. And all Buffy starts to say is "Xander" so we don't know if she was going to ask him to come or try to find a way to say he couldn't. I like that ambiguity.
We intercut a lot in this episode, between Willow getting tortured by Warren, Buffy and Xander getting ready to go in, the military waiting for the Slayer, and a dreamspace/otherworldly plane that Willow visits in her mind to escape the pain her body is experiencing.
Pretty sure Warren pokes out Willow's eye before he starts to lobotomize her, but thankfully it's all suggested and talked about and not shown. Buffy chooses Satsu to accompany her into the portal (she's embarrassed to be singled out but the others just tell her to do them proud), and a chance sharing of lip gloss leads to Buffy realizing that Satsu is the one who kissed her to wake her up, meaning Satsu truly is in love with her. This isn't stated until later. We just hear Buffy commenting on the cinnamon lip gloss and have to remember she mentioned cinnamon buns when she awoke.
Willow calls on five goddesses(?) who we will see later -- is it in the Willow one-shot? Need to look it up. She asks entrance to their plane and they grant it. One looks like a tree person, maybe a dryad, another could be a naiad, a water or mist sprite, another looks pretty much like a wookie. Then there's a woman shaped piece of paper with math symbols on it who could be a representation of logic or mind maybe. And the fifth is a slightly diffuse looking woman who is blue on one side of her face and yellow on the other, at least in the shots we see. No clue. I don't think they're defined when we see them later either. I seem to recall them being possible mentors to Willow, but then she chooses snake lady instead. We'll see them again, that's all I remember for sure.
Suit guy and General Voll (I'm assuming guy in charge is always Voll because he's the character we've been introduced to. I don't have a good enough picture in my mind of his appearance to know that, but I'm going with it.) are asking Amy what the screaming is about. She tells them to just be ready for the portal to reopen, that Buffy will definitely come after Willow (bitter much), but that Willow belongs to Warren. I like that we continually see both sides in this being smart. The Twilight folk know the portal will reopen, it's part of the plan, and they're ready for it. Buffy and Xander know that it will be another trap, that they'll be ready for them, and they plan for that. None of it is talked about specifically, we just see it play out.
The goddesses keep Willow company. The naiad-like one talks to her the most. They show her a picture of her agony that looks like fire, with shadow people who represent pieces of what Willow could be. Ending. Brrr. This other plane of the goddesses is a lot like Buffy and Amy's dreamspace, and both seem to foreshadow or at least refer to the empty space that Buffy and Angel create. I'm not sure how it all ties together, and maybe it doesn't neatly tie together, but I think these mental spaces and thought planes are important to the season. I don't think they're just there because they can be drawn easily enough in the comic medium. But we'll have to see. For now, I'm just trying to notice when they appear.
Buffy calls Xander a Watcher again and he says he'll "Watcher your butt." Hee. The portal opens, the military fire, and the (what do I call Buffy's organization? They're not all slayers, they're not watchers. Anyway) Buffy's forces use a giant mirror to reflect the ray gun back upon itself, blowing it up as Buffy and Satsu go through the portal. Xander says, "Magic, it's all done with mirrors." I'm putting a mark by that comment to see if it means more later.
Buffy and Satsu take down all the military dudes, hurting some of them to the point where they could die. Buffy tells Voll that Willow can heal them so he better tell her where Will is. Xander gets their location -- 2 miles south of Sunnydale. Amy is waiting in front of the door.
The naiad says Willow is close to natural death, one she can't come back from, but Willow is no longer concerned She mentions her best friend, then there's a cut to Buffy who says what Willow was saying, that she's a part of me, even when she's gone, a part of her is with me. Then Buffy goes all black eyes and starts flinging Willow magic at Amy. This confuses me a bit. Well, a lot. Is Willow speaking through Buffy, or is Buffy answering something Amy said to her that we don't hear. And when did this magical exchange happen? Was it something Will set up long ago for dire occasions? Or is it just that they have a connection, and when Buffy was close enough, Willow was able to access it and give her the power? It seems to be part of a plan, but I'm not sure. Did Willow enter Buffy's dreamspace at that point? Very confused as to how it actually works. But I like the result.
Buffy mentions having seen Amy's dreamspace and conjures up an image of her mom, Catherine the Great. It distracts Amy long enough for Satsu to grenade her ass. Buffy breaks through the door and sees uggo boy, but Amy recovers and magics them both away, him still spouting off about how it's not over. He'll be played as a pretty over-the-top villain in this season, which is fair enough. He's completely nuts at this point after all. And he was always pretty close to it.
We don't see what Willow looks like as Buffy breaks through her magical bonds, but then we do see her and she looks untouched. I'm assuming she healed herself at that moment. Again, thanks for not showing that. Everyone rejoices, and Dawn causes a small earthquake with her jumping up and down.
The three women head out to heal the soldiers and leave, but Buffy sees a door with the number 30 and remembers her dream talk with Ethan, seeing him imprisoned in three Xs. So she breaks in to free him, but General Voll has beat her to it and shot him dead. RIP Ethan Rayne. Voll didn't want him to be able to help Buffy. Buffy sees his mark and finally gets the name for it from him. "Twilight is coming...it all ends very soon.
We get to hear his perspective and motivation, and it will shape the rest of the season. "You've upset the balance," creating a master race, if you win your war with the demons, "you'll decide the world still isn't the way you want it and the demon in you will just say one thing. 'Slay.'" He also knows about the spell and the fight against the First and the fact that Slayer powers come from a demonic source. He knows a lot for someone we've never met. I take it Angel filled him in on just enough.
Buffy accuses him of misogyny, just not being able to stand all the women with power. He says it's more than men that want to bring them down and stresses the fact that Slayers aren't human. It's a mishmash of things. He's afraid of them because of their demonic origins. I read it as he's afraid that means that humans are done for and the demons, whether trying to do something "good" or "evil" will fight each other and human race will be collateral damage. How much of that is mixed with bigotry for not pure humans is debatable, but interesting he would throw the master race charge against Buffy, when he seems to be the one obsessed with purity of human blood.
Ultimately, it's fallout from the spell, how the rest of the people in the know think of the spell, and how much of it is based on Twilight recruiting versus natural uneasiness and fear of the unknown, we'll never know. Also, how much of it is misogyny, I don't think, is ever clearly shown. He finishes by saying that Buffy and her forces are now at war with the human race. She takes it in and says okay, but his words will weigh upon her for the rest of the season.
This theme of them against humans will continue to play out in a lot of variations through the season, I think, and I'll watch for it. And not just in continuing the argument between Faith and Buffy in season 3 about whether Slayers are superior and not bound by any human laws or mores (something that takes on a lot more weight when there's 1800 of them). Off the top of my head, the werewolf stuff of giving their magic to the Earth and staying human, the end result of magic sucked from the world, even the coming out of real vampires to the mainstream human world exemplified by Harmony, all of that touches on this back and forth, can we all live together, magic-yes or magic-no tension. Buffy not only upset the balance of good and evil with her spell, but possibly the balance of human and demon, Wizard and Muggle. Not sure how or if it relates to the creating a new world, ascending to a new level story. Something to keep an eye on.
We learn that Amy had continued to keep an eye on Willow through the end of season 6, I imagine already resenting her for tossing her aside when Will tried to get clean of magic. Warren said she began to watch over him. I don't know if she became enamored of him because he was the enemy of the Scoobies, and Buffy and Willow in particular, or just figured, hey, if Willow wants him dead, I want him alive, but at any rate she was able to swoop in and save him before Willow tried to burn him away to nothing. And now her magic is his skin. I ask you, why can't her magic be opaque, but whatever.
They together came up with the spell in Killer in Me to punish Willow, and I think that works really well. I could understand before why Amy didn't like Willow and would go to the trouble to try and hurt her, but the method she used, the specifics of the spell seemed kind of weird. I mean, yeah, it was a nice hot button issue with Willow, but it would also be poetic justice to Warren, so it fits together nicely.
The scene ends with Warren asking Willow, "Are you bored now?"
Dawn's upset and hitting walls, but Buffy points out she's not proportionally as strong as she is large, so she could really hurt herself. Dawn feels useless to help Willow and tells Buffy that "Will is like a mom to me." Xander has either the mystics or the Wiccans or somebody figuring out how to use the portal echo to reopen it long enough to send in an extraction team or one or two people only. There's a nice moment where Xander tells Buffy she needs to pick a fighter to go with her, that he wouldn't be as useful there as here, even though you can tell he's worried about his oldest friend. Ah, Xander's all grown up now. And all Buffy starts to say is "Xander" so we don't know if she was going to ask him to come or try to find a way to say he couldn't. I like that ambiguity.
We intercut a lot in this episode, between Willow getting tortured by Warren, Buffy and Xander getting ready to go in, the military waiting for the Slayer, and a dreamspace/otherworldly plane that Willow visits in her mind to escape the pain her body is experiencing.
Pretty sure Warren pokes out Willow's eye before he starts to lobotomize her, but thankfully it's all suggested and talked about and not shown. Buffy chooses Satsu to accompany her into the portal (she's embarrassed to be singled out but the others just tell her to do them proud), and a chance sharing of lip gloss leads to Buffy realizing that Satsu is the one who kissed her to wake her up, meaning Satsu truly is in love with her. This isn't stated until later. We just hear Buffy commenting on the cinnamon lip gloss and have to remember she mentioned cinnamon buns when she awoke.
Willow calls on five goddesses(?) who we will see later -- is it in the Willow one-shot? Need to look it up. She asks entrance to their plane and they grant it. One looks like a tree person, maybe a dryad, another could be a naiad, a water or mist sprite, another looks pretty much like a wookie. Then there's a woman shaped piece of paper with math symbols on it who could be a representation of logic or mind maybe. And the fifth is a slightly diffuse looking woman who is blue on one side of her face and yellow on the other, at least in the shots we see. No clue. I don't think they're defined when we see them later either. I seem to recall them being possible mentors to Willow, but then she chooses snake lady instead. We'll see them again, that's all I remember for sure.
Suit guy and General Voll (I'm assuming guy in charge is always Voll because he's the character we've been introduced to. I don't have a good enough picture in my mind of his appearance to know that, but I'm going with it.) are asking Amy what the screaming is about. She tells them to just be ready for the portal to reopen, that Buffy will definitely come after Willow (bitter much), but that Willow belongs to Warren. I like that we continually see both sides in this being smart. The Twilight folk know the portal will reopen, it's part of the plan, and they're ready for it. Buffy and Xander know that it will be another trap, that they'll be ready for them, and they plan for that. None of it is talked about specifically, we just see it play out.
The goddesses keep Willow company. The naiad-like one talks to her the most. They show her a picture of her agony that looks like fire, with shadow people who represent pieces of what Willow could be. Ending. Brrr. This other plane of the goddesses is a lot like Buffy and Amy's dreamspace, and both seem to foreshadow or at least refer to the empty space that Buffy and Angel create. I'm not sure how it all ties together, and maybe it doesn't neatly tie together, but I think these mental spaces and thought planes are important to the season. I don't think they're just there because they can be drawn easily enough in the comic medium. But we'll have to see. For now, I'm just trying to notice when they appear.
Buffy calls Xander a Watcher again and he says he'll "Watcher your butt." Hee. The portal opens, the military fire, and the (what do I call Buffy's organization? They're not all slayers, they're not watchers. Anyway) Buffy's forces use a giant mirror to reflect the ray gun back upon itself, blowing it up as Buffy and Satsu go through the portal. Xander says, "Magic, it's all done with mirrors." I'm putting a mark by that comment to see if it means more later.
Buffy and Satsu take down all the military dudes, hurting some of them to the point where they could die. Buffy tells Voll that Willow can heal them so he better tell her where Will is. Xander gets their location -- 2 miles south of Sunnydale. Amy is waiting in front of the door.
The naiad says Willow is close to natural death, one she can't come back from, but Willow is no longer concerned She mentions her best friend, then there's a cut to Buffy who says what Willow was saying, that she's a part of me, even when she's gone, a part of her is with me. Then Buffy goes all black eyes and starts flinging Willow magic at Amy. This confuses me a bit. Well, a lot. Is Willow speaking through Buffy, or is Buffy answering something Amy said to her that we don't hear. And when did this magical exchange happen? Was it something Will set up long ago for dire occasions? Or is it just that they have a connection, and when Buffy was close enough, Willow was able to access it and give her the power? It seems to be part of a plan, but I'm not sure. Did Willow enter Buffy's dreamspace at that point? Very confused as to how it actually works. But I like the result.
Buffy mentions having seen Amy's dreamspace and conjures up an image of her mom, Catherine the Great. It distracts Amy long enough for Satsu to grenade her ass. Buffy breaks through the door and sees uggo boy, but Amy recovers and magics them both away, him still spouting off about how it's not over. He'll be played as a pretty over-the-top villain in this season, which is fair enough. He's completely nuts at this point after all. And he was always pretty close to it.
We don't see what Willow looks like as Buffy breaks through her magical bonds, but then we do see her and she looks untouched. I'm assuming she healed herself at that moment. Again, thanks for not showing that. Everyone rejoices, and Dawn causes a small earthquake with her jumping up and down.
The three women head out to heal the soldiers and leave, but Buffy sees a door with the number 30 and remembers her dream talk with Ethan, seeing him imprisoned in three Xs. So she breaks in to free him, but General Voll has beat her to it and shot him dead. RIP Ethan Rayne. Voll didn't want him to be able to help Buffy. Buffy sees his mark and finally gets the name for it from him. "Twilight is coming...it all ends very soon.
We get to hear his perspective and motivation, and it will shape the rest of the season. "You've upset the balance," creating a master race, if you win your war with the demons, "you'll decide the world still isn't the way you want it and the demon in you will just say one thing. 'Slay.'" He also knows about the spell and the fight against the First and the fact that Slayer powers come from a demonic source. He knows a lot for someone we've never met. I take it Angel filled him in on just enough.
Buffy accuses him of misogyny, just not being able to stand all the women with power. He says it's more than men that want to bring them down and stresses the fact that Slayers aren't human. It's a mishmash of things. He's afraid of them because of their demonic origins. I read it as he's afraid that means that humans are done for and the demons, whether trying to do something "good" or "evil" will fight each other and human race will be collateral damage. How much of that is mixed with bigotry for not pure humans is debatable, but interesting he would throw the master race charge against Buffy, when he seems to be the one obsessed with purity of human blood.
Ultimately, it's fallout from the spell, how the rest of the people in the know think of the spell, and how much of it is based on Twilight recruiting versus natural uneasiness and fear of the unknown, we'll never know. Also, how much of it is misogyny, I don't think, is ever clearly shown. He finishes by saying that Buffy and her forces are now at war with the human race. She takes it in and says okay, but his words will weigh upon her for the rest of the season.
This theme of them against humans will continue to play out in a lot of variations through the season, I think, and I'll watch for it. And not just in continuing the argument between Faith and Buffy in season 3 about whether Slayers are superior and not bound by any human laws or mores (something that takes on a lot more weight when there's 1800 of them). Off the top of my head, the werewolf stuff of giving their magic to the Earth and staying human, the end result of magic sucked from the world, even the coming out of real vampires to the mainstream human world exemplified by Harmony, all of that touches on this back and forth, can we all live together, magic-yes or magic-no tension. Buffy not only upset the balance of good and evil with her spell, but possibly the balance of human and demon, Wizard and Muggle. Not sure how or if it relates to the creating a new world, ascending to a new level story. Something to keep an eye on.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #3 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
We begin this with the cliffhanger from Buffy's dream, who is that man? Ethan Rayne! He tells Buffy "my love" is just an expression, but she still wants to hurl. He somehow hitched a ride into her dreamspace via Amy. Dreamspace is different than a dream, it's a place comprised of all the dreams you could dream all the time. Does this place relate in any way to the new world Buffy and Angel will create? Is it the dreamspace of a world or of the Seed?
Anyway, this dreamspace of Buffy's has my eternal gratitude for the next image we see. Buffy, dressed as a sexy nurse, chained between naked Angel and naked Spike, watched by (they better not be Viking!) cherubs, with Georgia O'Keefe flowers and an erupting volcano and trains heading straight towards a tunnel and each other. Ahem...I'm back.
Ethan says Buffy's trapped in here and needs to get out. I'm not sure I'd ever leave, but whatever, Ethan.
In the real world, Willow and Amy are fighting high in the air above the castle battle. Amy taunts Willow about her unimpressive magicks, but Will is just tasting Amy's power so she can disrupt it. She tampers with the spell and the zombies stop trying to kill everyone and start asking the slayers to dance instead. Xander applauds but then Amy hits Willow hard.
In dreamspace, Ethan leads Buffy towards what he wants her to see. On the way, they tumble past a ton of snippets of Buffy dreams that come from her memories of the past. I can pick out pictures of Faith, Dawn, Angel, Caleb, Joss Whedon!!!, dead on the couch Joyce, and a grad pic. We see her walking the halls with Xander and Willow, talking about French, a necessary ingredient to all Whedon dreamscapes. Also a scene of Buffy reading the book Vampyr with Giles looking on. That comes back at the very end of the season when that book, part of their first conversation together in the pilot, is Giles' legacy to Buffy. I think I see Riley in there, possibly the Master, and a scrawled: Buffy & Angel 4ever. I can't remember if that's from the show specifically, like the Prom ep or something, or just a general sentiment. It's also another bit of foreshadowing of the events that happen towards the end. Not only because it comes back to that relationship, but also the 4ever part is implied in their created paradise.
Willow is pixelating from Amy's blow, and she goes all veiny and hits her back hard, knocking her to the ground. Xander calls in his final weapon with a fe fi fo that Dawn finishes with f%$#ing fum! And then stomps Amy like she's Gachnar. Nice. She also asks Willow if she's evil again. I love that most of the characters on the show have to ask each other that whenever they've been apart for too long. Because you really never know.
Ethan and Buffy reach a giant rat cage that Buffy recognizes as Amy's, so she knows who attacked her now. Ethan says he didn't know her, couldn't see outside of himself, but he managed to connect with Amy and therefore was able to get to Buffy. Amy's dreamspace has the rat cage, seems to be in a cavern that is fleshy and red and gooey, kind of like Warren, or the inside of the not-an-asteroid from Empire Strikes Back. There's some dead, orc-looking creature there too. And Ethan is framed by a three-sided construction of X's, leaving Buffy to wonder if it's all about sex. Ethan tells her, "Remember what you see here. Twilight is falling. You're going to need all the help you can get."
Willow is assessing Buffy's condition while Xander and many slayers look on, and Dawn stares in the window, asking about the undead playing Pride and Prejudice around her ankles. Will makes an offhand remark that when the ball is over, they'll go away. Hee. We get a first indication of some sort of time when Xander tells Willow it's been a long year. We don't know if that's since the Hellmouth collapsed or since they got settled in Scotland or started organizing or what, but it's something.
Amongst the slayers in the room are Rowena, Leah and Satsu. Willow says there is someone in the room who is truly in love with Buffy and can break the spell. We're left to wonder if it's Xander or Willow or one of the slayers, presumably one whose name we know already or it's no fun, because Willow has everyone close their eyes so the one person can kiss Buffy in private. Buffy wakes saying, "Cinnamon buns!"
Giles is parlaying with a demon. Apparently it was members of this demon's brood that were slain in the church in the first episode. Twilight's people sent two of their own as bait to lure the demons out and force a confrontation with the slayers. Whether this was just their standard practice, to make their enemies fight one another, or it was part of a bigger plan, we don't know. Amy found Buffy by magic after that, but maybe Twilight used that tactic to find her himself. I don't remember if we find out all the details of that. But Giles tries to convince the demon it was in both their interests to fight each other on their own terms, not someone else's, so they should try to figure out what the symbol means and share information.
Xander is talking to Andrew on the phone about the symbol as well, and warning him about the latest attack. Andrew says it's boring where he is, and he couldn't find out anything about the symbol, despite now having parchment fingers. There's a good sight gag of Andrew talking about how bored Xander would be if he were there, while slayers are playing strip poker in the background. Also, one of the other women in the scene is reading a book called Fray. This is another instance of comics being a different medium than TV. If that was on air, people would be debating whether that reference was too meta, or whether that meant that Fray was a fictional character in the Buffyverse and how could that be, etc. But you see sight gags like that, and like the picture of Joss in Buffy's dreamspace, in comics and they're meant to only be meta allusions. At least, that's how I read it.
Xander is dealing with the wounded. Oh, Renee was impaled on a broadsword in the fight last issue, and I totally forgot to mention it. She survived, but blames herself for letting the undead army breach the walls. Xander tough talks her down, saying she did good raising the alarm and has nothing to feel guilty about. They're cute. Uh-oh.
Buffy and Willow look over a magically shackled Amy. Willow says her spell reeked of tech so she is probably working with someone. She's trying to trace her teleportation origin. Apparently, as we guessed before from Xander's comment, Willow's been gone a while. Buffy wonders where. She doesn't get an answer. We will fill in this gap later at various points. From what I remember, she spent most of the time with the snake lady goddess, seeking mentorship or something. We'll get there.
Buffy asks about Kennedy and is told she died (don't cheer yet, people) -- but it was a mystical thing and only lasted a month. Get some good Willow language that you can really hear Alyson Hannigan say in your head. Xander walks in to find them laughing at the end of a Buffy story. "And I was covered in it!" I know I'm curious.
Xander calls Willow Elphaba, which is fun, and Buffy starts to remember her dream and the kiss that awoke her, then Willow starts getting an image from Amy. It's high tech military guys, and someone mentions the Initiative. Buffy senses a cavern. Is that from Amy's dreamspace or is that the Hellmouth crater? I guess they're the same thing ultimately. Or it could be the cavern of the shadow men that Buffy is reminded of because a portal activates. It pulls Willow through and closes. Xander calls for the mystics. Okay. Are their mystics different from their witches and their psychics? I'm positive we never get that sorted out, but I'm fascinated by all the non-slayer parts of their organization, so I'd like to know.
Willow is strapped to a table in a lab with Amy gloating again over her. They were contracted to bring in the Slayer, but she'll be here, etc. We? BaDum! Warren is Amy's boyfriend, and he's still skinless, and he's megapissed at Willow. End.
It was shocking to see him the first time through. Never would have predicted that. We'll get the story of how he survived in the next issue. What a couple he and Amy are. I'm interested in watching their relationship again as I reread. They start out as major threats and end up being played almost for laughs before Warren turns back to goo. But I'm sure I missed a lot of their thing the first time through. He's just so gross to look at.
This issue was pretty much all action, balanced a bit by Buffy's dream journey that we haven't fully interpreted at this point. I think that happens soon though too; we'll get back to Ethan Rayne. But there's not a lot here thematically that echoes down to the end, unless you count the idea of dreamspace which does tie in a bit to the new world space I think. But we're moving right along.
Anyway, this dreamspace of Buffy's has my eternal gratitude for the next image we see. Buffy, dressed as a sexy nurse, chained between naked Angel and naked Spike, watched by (they better not be Viking!) cherubs, with Georgia O'Keefe flowers and an erupting volcano and trains heading straight towards a tunnel and each other. Ahem...I'm back.
Ethan says Buffy's trapped in here and needs to get out. I'm not sure I'd ever leave, but whatever, Ethan.
In the real world, Willow and Amy are fighting high in the air above the castle battle. Amy taunts Willow about her unimpressive magicks, but Will is just tasting Amy's power so she can disrupt it. She tampers with the spell and the zombies stop trying to kill everyone and start asking the slayers to dance instead. Xander applauds but then Amy hits Willow hard.
In dreamspace, Ethan leads Buffy towards what he wants her to see. On the way, they tumble past a ton of snippets of Buffy dreams that come from her memories of the past. I can pick out pictures of Faith, Dawn, Angel, Caleb, Joss Whedon!!!, dead on the couch Joyce, and a grad pic. We see her walking the halls with Xander and Willow, talking about French, a necessary ingredient to all Whedon dreamscapes. Also a scene of Buffy reading the book Vampyr with Giles looking on. That comes back at the very end of the season when that book, part of their first conversation together in the pilot, is Giles' legacy to Buffy. I think I see Riley in there, possibly the Master, and a scrawled: Buffy & Angel 4ever. I can't remember if that's from the show specifically, like the Prom ep or something, or just a general sentiment. It's also another bit of foreshadowing of the events that happen towards the end. Not only because it comes back to that relationship, but also the 4ever part is implied in their created paradise.
Willow is pixelating from Amy's blow, and she goes all veiny and hits her back hard, knocking her to the ground. Xander calls in his final weapon with a fe fi fo that Dawn finishes with f%$#ing fum! And then stomps Amy like she's Gachnar. Nice. She also asks Willow if she's evil again. I love that most of the characters on the show have to ask each other that whenever they've been apart for too long. Because you really never know.
Ethan and Buffy reach a giant rat cage that Buffy recognizes as Amy's, so she knows who attacked her now. Ethan says he didn't know her, couldn't see outside of himself, but he managed to connect with Amy and therefore was able to get to Buffy. Amy's dreamspace has the rat cage, seems to be in a cavern that is fleshy and red and gooey, kind of like Warren, or the inside of the not-an-asteroid from Empire Strikes Back. There's some dead, orc-looking creature there too. And Ethan is framed by a three-sided construction of X's, leaving Buffy to wonder if it's all about sex. Ethan tells her, "Remember what you see here. Twilight is falling. You're going to need all the help you can get."
Willow is assessing Buffy's condition while Xander and many slayers look on, and Dawn stares in the window, asking about the undead playing Pride and Prejudice around her ankles. Will makes an offhand remark that when the ball is over, they'll go away. Hee. We get a first indication of some sort of time when Xander tells Willow it's been a long year. We don't know if that's since the Hellmouth collapsed or since they got settled in Scotland or started organizing or what, but it's something.
Amongst the slayers in the room are Rowena, Leah and Satsu. Willow says there is someone in the room who is truly in love with Buffy and can break the spell. We're left to wonder if it's Xander or Willow or one of the slayers, presumably one whose name we know already or it's no fun, because Willow has everyone close their eyes so the one person can kiss Buffy in private. Buffy wakes saying, "Cinnamon buns!"
Giles is parlaying with a demon. Apparently it was members of this demon's brood that were slain in the church in the first episode. Twilight's people sent two of their own as bait to lure the demons out and force a confrontation with the slayers. Whether this was just their standard practice, to make their enemies fight one another, or it was part of a bigger plan, we don't know. Amy found Buffy by magic after that, but maybe Twilight used that tactic to find her himself. I don't remember if we find out all the details of that. But Giles tries to convince the demon it was in both their interests to fight each other on their own terms, not someone else's, so they should try to figure out what the symbol means and share information.
Xander is talking to Andrew on the phone about the symbol as well, and warning him about the latest attack. Andrew says it's boring where he is, and he couldn't find out anything about the symbol, despite now having parchment fingers. There's a good sight gag of Andrew talking about how bored Xander would be if he were there, while slayers are playing strip poker in the background. Also, one of the other women in the scene is reading a book called Fray. This is another instance of comics being a different medium than TV. If that was on air, people would be debating whether that reference was too meta, or whether that meant that Fray was a fictional character in the Buffyverse and how could that be, etc. But you see sight gags like that, and like the picture of Joss in Buffy's dreamspace, in comics and they're meant to only be meta allusions. At least, that's how I read it.
Xander is dealing with the wounded. Oh, Renee was impaled on a broadsword in the fight last issue, and I totally forgot to mention it. She survived, but blames herself for letting the undead army breach the walls. Xander tough talks her down, saying she did good raising the alarm and has nothing to feel guilty about. They're cute. Uh-oh.
Buffy and Willow look over a magically shackled Amy. Willow says her spell reeked of tech so she is probably working with someone. She's trying to trace her teleportation origin. Apparently, as we guessed before from Xander's comment, Willow's been gone a while. Buffy wonders where. She doesn't get an answer. We will fill in this gap later at various points. From what I remember, she spent most of the time with the snake lady goddess, seeking mentorship or something. We'll get there.
Buffy asks about Kennedy and is told she died (don't cheer yet, people) -- but it was a mystical thing and only lasted a month. Get some good Willow language that you can really hear Alyson Hannigan say in your head. Xander walks in to find them laughing at the end of a Buffy story. "And I was covered in it!" I know I'm curious.
Xander calls Willow Elphaba, which is fun, and Buffy starts to remember her dream and the kiss that awoke her, then Willow starts getting an image from Amy. It's high tech military guys, and someone mentions the Initiative. Buffy senses a cavern. Is that from Amy's dreamspace or is that the Hellmouth crater? I guess they're the same thing ultimately. Or it could be the cavern of the shadow men that Buffy is reminded of because a portal activates. It pulls Willow through and closes. Xander calls for the mystics. Okay. Are their mystics different from their witches and their psychics? I'm positive we never get that sorted out, but I'm fascinated by all the non-slayer parts of their organization, so I'd like to know.
Willow is strapped to a table in a lab with Amy gloating again over her. They were contracted to bring in the Slayer, but she'll be here, etc. We? BaDum! Warren is Amy's boyfriend, and he's still skinless, and he's megapissed at Willow. End.
It was shocking to see him the first time through. Never would have predicted that. We'll get the story of how he survived in the next issue. What a couple he and Amy are. I'm interested in watching their relationship again as I reread. They start out as major threats and end up being played almost for laughs before Warren turns back to goo. But I'm sure I missed a lot of their thing the first time through. He's just so gross to look at.
This issue was pretty much all action, balanced a bit by Buffy's dream journey that we haven't fully interpreted at this point. I think that happens soon though too; we'll get back to Ethan Rayne. But there's not a lot here thematically that echoes down to the end, unless you count the idea of dreamspace which does tie in a bit to the new world space I think. But we're moving right along.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #2 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Issue #2 begins with Giles' voiceover as he watches and critiques a group of slayers sparring. There's a large group of women there. Not sure where it is. There's a big cathedral looking thing in the background. Do we hear where Giles is before he finds Faith? Will watch for that.
He's reflecting on how there used to be one slayer and hundreds of watchers, and now that's all changed. The world is different. He scolds the slayers for fighting well but alone, telling them they're not working together, not using their most valuable asset...
Cut to Buffy, talking to her Scotland-based slayers and finishing his thought: ...each other. She asks the three slayers who jumped out of the helicopter with her at the start of the season to attack her now. They are Satsu, who we will get to know better later, Rowena, a German-accented blonde, and Leah, a redhead whose name we didn't hear last time. Buffy cleans their clocks because they don't fight as a team. This theme introduced by Giles and Buffy is important to later developments as some of the slayers do start to fracture off and doing their own thing rather than work together outside of battle as well. And by the end, they're all over the place in small groups or alone.
One more "training" scene relates to that as well. Andrew is having a campfire outing with about 32 women and regaling them with his theories as to why Return of the Jedi sucked. And it's not about the Ewoks. He is interrupted by the punker slayer we later learn is named Simone. She's wanting to know why they don't use modern weapons instead of medieval stuff. Andrew's answer is unhelpful and possibly the final impetus to her and her allies to leave Buffy's camp and go out on their own, stealing weapons and villages and running things her way. He tells her, "No slayer carries a gun. Ever, end of story." And I'm sure she sees this a proof that Buffy is out of touch and not worthy of following.
Next we visit with Dawn, who's having a bath in the lake while Xander, looking the other way, talks with her. She's bitching about Buffy not wanting her there, Buffy's got her own slayer sisters and doesn't need Dawn, blah blah same-cakes. I like Dawn, but it's sad to see her still stuck on this riff, when it seemed she had come to terms with things in season 7. But she has had a rough time of it and was alone in college with no family there to help her through things. Xander suggests that maybe the giant thing is a cry for attention and gets splashed by half the lake.
Cut to Drextalcorp Recycling Technologies, a front for General Voll's operation. He and sweaty suit guy enter and go down an elevator into a huge armory, then make their way to the general's quarters. They're talking about how their op has been inserted, which we'll soon see means that Amy's gotten to Buffy. The general is a Twilight true believer who wants to just nuke Buffy's base, but suit guy doesn't want to be indicted and hung, so suggests they not do that. So I guess that means they aren't official military regulars, but another off-the-books black ops group. Or just military members recruited over to Twilight. I don't know if we ever find out.
They decide to use magic to fight magic for now, and the general goes into his quarters thinking about how the suit doesn't get the stakes. That's when we see his Twilight symbol. So is the suit Twilight or just doing his job? Probably doesn't matter, but I want to look at everything happening, even if the military stuff is Initiative-level boring so far. They also tease Amy's monstrosity of a boyfriend again, who we haven't seen yet but I think is revealed next issue.
We enter into a dream sequence that starts off as what seems to be a replay of a conversation Xander and Buffy actually had offpage. That's my take anyway. It looks real to us but will be seen to be a dream soon. He's telling her his giant Dawn theory and thinking that Kenny, the thricewise, cursed Dawn but her own issues could be shaping the curse. Buffy then asks Xander if he's coming to bed. I remember reading that the first time and going WHA?! Then wondering if it was Xander's dream. She says she won't be so rough this time but then kisses him and pops his head clean off. Definitely a dream then. What's awesome is she then swears like Spike, "Oh, balls."
Xander's head is tasting Scottish lint on the floor when the window blows out and Buffy says she can't go outside because she's afraid of the dark. Xander: "Buffy, you are the dark." Buffy: "That's what I meant." Makes me think of "how do you like my darkness now." But it foreshadows also, because darkness follows twilight.
She is pulled out the window and falls onto the hand of a giant gargoyle-like demon whose claws impale her hands and feet, crucifying her face up over its palm. Buffy says, "I know you" and it says, "Yes. Scream." And spits fire down upon her.
Then we cut to the real world and see Amy poised over Buffy, who is tied hand and foot in that same position on the bed, holding a dagger aimed at her heart, saying how she wants it to hurt. Xander and four slayers burst in to stop her, but she stabs at Buffy before they can shoot her with a crossbow and tackle her. But the dagger is broken and not in Buffy because she has mystical protections on her when she sleeps. Unfortunately, she's still stuck in nightmareland because of Amy's spell, and she can't be awoken without the kiss of true love. Makes the image of the talons through her hands even more evocative, resembling the piercing brambles surrounding Sleeping Beauty's castle.
Quick cutaway to Renee and another slayer on guard on the ramparts. Renee is getting teased about how closely her latest interests seem to mirror Xander's. But then they see an army of zombies climbing the wall.
Amy is bound by their security spells. Xander sends the slayers with him to the walls, telling Renee to get their witches working on unspelling Buffy. This is the first mention that they have witches as well as psychics on their team.
Another shot of the zombie fight transitions into Buffy's dream. She's crumpling under the pain Amy's injected into her dream when a stranger offers her a hand, saying not to give up, and calling her "my love." That was also enigmatic the first time. Seemed like it would be Spike, but that's too easy, right? We'll find out soon enough who it is.
Meantime the battle is not going well for the castle, and Amy is starting to gloat about how all she did while trapped in the Sunnydale crater was practice and get stronger, and how a hundred slayers can't best her, no one can, blah blah gloat-cakes. Then we get a call-back to Giles' terrific entrance at the end of season 6 as Willow finally joins the comic. "I'd like to test that theory."
So we got right into the action in this issue. We're still adding back in characters and seeing where they're at, but the season-long fight between Buffy and Twilight and their factions is revving up, and the differing opinions and positions of the good guys are starting to be hinted at. And soon the casualties will start rolling in.
He's reflecting on how there used to be one slayer and hundreds of watchers, and now that's all changed. The world is different. He scolds the slayers for fighting well but alone, telling them they're not working together, not using their most valuable asset...
Cut to Buffy, talking to her Scotland-based slayers and finishing his thought: ...each other. She asks the three slayers who jumped out of the helicopter with her at the start of the season to attack her now. They are Satsu, who we will get to know better later, Rowena, a German-accented blonde, and Leah, a redhead whose name we didn't hear last time. Buffy cleans their clocks because they don't fight as a team. This theme introduced by Giles and Buffy is important to later developments as some of the slayers do start to fracture off and doing their own thing rather than work together outside of battle as well. And by the end, they're all over the place in small groups or alone.
One more "training" scene relates to that as well. Andrew is having a campfire outing with about 32 women and regaling them with his theories as to why Return of the Jedi sucked. And it's not about the Ewoks. He is interrupted by the punker slayer we later learn is named Simone. She's wanting to know why they don't use modern weapons instead of medieval stuff. Andrew's answer is unhelpful and possibly the final impetus to her and her allies to leave Buffy's camp and go out on their own, stealing weapons and villages and running things her way. He tells her, "No slayer carries a gun. Ever, end of story." And I'm sure she sees this a proof that Buffy is out of touch and not worthy of following.
Next we visit with Dawn, who's having a bath in the lake while Xander, looking the other way, talks with her. She's bitching about Buffy not wanting her there, Buffy's got her own slayer sisters and doesn't need Dawn, blah blah same-cakes. I like Dawn, but it's sad to see her still stuck on this riff, when it seemed she had come to terms with things in season 7. But she has had a rough time of it and was alone in college with no family there to help her through things. Xander suggests that maybe the giant thing is a cry for attention and gets splashed by half the lake.
Cut to Drextalcorp Recycling Technologies, a front for General Voll's operation. He and sweaty suit guy enter and go down an elevator into a huge armory, then make their way to the general's quarters. They're talking about how their op has been inserted, which we'll soon see means that Amy's gotten to Buffy. The general is a Twilight true believer who wants to just nuke Buffy's base, but suit guy doesn't want to be indicted and hung, so suggests they not do that. So I guess that means they aren't official military regulars, but another off-the-books black ops group. Or just military members recruited over to Twilight. I don't know if we ever find out.
They decide to use magic to fight magic for now, and the general goes into his quarters thinking about how the suit doesn't get the stakes. That's when we see his Twilight symbol. So is the suit Twilight or just doing his job? Probably doesn't matter, but I want to look at everything happening, even if the military stuff is Initiative-level boring so far. They also tease Amy's monstrosity of a boyfriend again, who we haven't seen yet but I think is revealed next issue.
We enter into a dream sequence that starts off as what seems to be a replay of a conversation Xander and Buffy actually had offpage. That's my take anyway. It looks real to us but will be seen to be a dream soon. He's telling her his giant Dawn theory and thinking that Kenny, the thricewise, cursed Dawn but her own issues could be shaping the curse. Buffy then asks Xander if he's coming to bed. I remember reading that the first time and going WHA?! Then wondering if it was Xander's dream. She says she won't be so rough this time but then kisses him and pops his head clean off. Definitely a dream then. What's awesome is she then swears like Spike, "Oh, balls."
Xander's head is tasting Scottish lint on the floor when the window blows out and Buffy says she can't go outside because she's afraid of the dark. Xander: "Buffy, you are the dark." Buffy: "That's what I meant." Makes me think of "how do you like my darkness now." But it foreshadows also, because darkness follows twilight.
She is pulled out the window and falls onto the hand of a giant gargoyle-like demon whose claws impale her hands and feet, crucifying her face up over its palm. Buffy says, "I know you" and it says, "Yes. Scream." And spits fire down upon her.
Then we cut to the real world and see Amy poised over Buffy, who is tied hand and foot in that same position on the bed, holding a dagger aimed at her heart, saying how she wants it to hurt. Xander and four slayers burst in to stop her, but she stabs at Buffy before they can shoot her with a crossbow and tackle her. But the dagger is broken and not in Buffy because she has mystical protections on her when she sleeps. Unfortunately, she's still stuck in nightmareland because of Amy's spell, and she can't be awoken without the kiss of true love. Makes the image of the talons through her hands even more evocative, resembling the piercing brambles surrounding Sleeping Beauty's castle.
Quick cutaway to Renee and another slayer on guard on the ramparts. Renee is getting teased about how closely her latest interests seem to mirror Xander's. But then they see an army of zombies climbing the wall.
Amy is bound by their security spells. Xander sends the slayers with him to the walls, telling Renee to get their witches working on unspelling Buffy. This is the first mention that they have witches as well as psychics on their team.
Another shot of the zombie fight transitions into Buffy's dream. She's crumpling under the pain Amy's injected into her dream when a stranger offers her a hand, saying not to give up, and calling her "my love." That was also enigmatic the first time. Seemed like it would be Spike, but that's too easy, right? We'll find out soon enough who it is.
Meantime the battle is not going well for the castle, and Amy is starting to gloat about how all she did while trapped in the Sunnydale crater was practice and get stronger, and how a hundred slayers can't best her, no one can, blah blah gloat-cakes. Then we get a call-back to Giles' terrific entrance at the end of season 6 as Willow finally joins the comic. "I'd like to test that theory."
So we got right into the action in this issue. We're still adding back in characters and seeing where they're at, but the season-long fight between Buffy and Twilight and their factions is revving up, and the differing opinions and positions of the good guys are starting to be hinted at. And soon the casualties will start rolling in.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #1 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
"Thing about changing the world...Once you do it, the world's all different."
That's how season 8 starts, in part what it is about, and that thought will be reprised at the very end of the season. I also now realize it's a meta commentary as well. This comic world that Buffy has transitioned into is all different. You've got tons of complicated stunts, huge and gnarly demons, and the entire globe and possibly beyond as a canvas. No limitations of budget, only of imagination, plot sense, and character. So it will be a wild ride.
We start on Buffy, and we find out right away that the promise indicated in her beginnings of a smile at the end of Chosen has passed her by. Her life is different now, but it's even farther from normal than it was on the Hellmouth. She's leading an army of about 500 slayers. There's around 1800 slayers in the world, and it's not clear at the start where the others are. There's two slayers pretending to be Buffy to make it harder for her to be targeted. One is in Rome with the Immortal. Hilarius tie-in to Angel 5x20 The Girl in Question, and another retcon meta joke in that the fans always knew the girl in Rome was not SMG. The other Buffy we will meet and whose fate we will learn of in the Chain, one of the best issues of season 8.
Buffy and Xander are in a castle in Scotland. They have a lot of sophisticated equipment, psychics, and (we learn later) Wiccans working with the slayers. We'll learn how all this was funded in a later issue as well, and it's all part of the fallout from the scythe spell in Chosen, as is the rest of the season. I am convinced that before I get too far into this, I need to rewatch the show. Listening to an old episode of Watcher Cast, their intro includes the quote from Giles that reprised the pilot episodes of Buffy, "The Earth is definitely doomed," I realized that that has foreshadowing too, reflecting forward as well as back. Season 8 seems to showing a world that is about to end, a world in its twilight. With that spell, was the Earth doomed?
More slayer stats come to light and we learn that there's a squad in Barcelona led by Donna. (Note to self, look up names given for all the surviving Potentials so I know when characters are new versus callbacks.) And Andrew has a squad in southern Italy. There's a slayer named Renee in Scotland who will become Xander's new love interest -- for a little while. Of the slayers in on the church mission with Buffy, one we will learn is Satsu and one is Rowena. Don't remember who the other three are, although they show up again I'm certain.
Buffy introduces us to Xander as her Watcher, a post he denies a couple of times. He doesn't want to be called a Watcher. He also seems to miss his old life and job, but feels duty-bound to stay and help Buffy. So nothing new there. At the end of the season he seems to be settling into a normal life, but I'm sure that will only go so far.
We first see the Twilight symbol on the men killed by demons in the church, and it's clear they were there fighting the demons, not ordinary, innocent victims. Xander and Buffy try to figure out the symbol. Buffy's idea, which is more foreshadowing, is that it's a beautiful sunset. Certainly was for her...I'm back.
Then we're with the military, one of the Initiative's offshoots or compatriots or maybe not. Since the world is so different, since the slayers are en masse and Twilight is trying to gather her enemies together, maybe it's the entire U.S. military that's in on the demon fighting now. I think later we get some indications that there's a hell of a lot of demons out there these days, and was that because of the spell? Or at least my mind goes there. I think back to Beljoxa's Eye in season 7, saying that the First was able to rise so high with such power because of Willow and crew calling the Slayer back into the world, a balancing of power, thaumogenesis type deal. Are there more demons because there's more slayers?
We meet General Voll and a sweaty man in a suit. The general considers the slayers to be a new form of terrorist, against American interests, which is what will happen to you if you try to change, and especially if you succeed in changing, the status quo. They're flying to the crater that was once Sunnydale. Again, bringing it back to where Chosen left off. By the way, in this issue we're not given any info as to how long ago that happened. Since Twilight it already up and running, I assume it's been some time. I guess Angel's disembodied friend could have started the whole thing without him, or his stint in hell might not have taken any real world time (that's probably it -- haven't finished the Angel comics yet, but LA is maybe popped back without any time having passed in real time? We'll see when I get there. I'm behind on the Angel comics.) Still, Buffy and friends needed some time to get things set up the way they are now. And the events here take place either at the same time or after the end of Angel season 5, which should be a year after Chosen, given the fake Buffy/Immortal thing. I'll watch for time indicators.
We flip back to Scotland and Buffy trying to connect with Dawn. Dawn is a giant. Awesome. She was going to Berkeley before this happened to her, and she wants to go back. So she was able to get a GED and get into school in whatever time has passed. She had a boyfriend that was a thricewise, whatever that is, and Buffy thinks she slept with him and it went bad so he cursed her. We find out the true story later. But Buffy and Dawn aren't getting along, and Dawn only wants to talk to Willow about it, not Buffy.
So Xander isn't all that excited to be here, missing a more normal life, but handling it pretty well, being Buffy's right hand and confidante. Dawn doesn't want to be there because of her own misery and condition mostly. And Buffy isn't happy in this new world either, feeling even less connected with everything than before, the exact opposite of what she wanted when she shared her power. I seem to remember later on that Faith or Willow says something to her that maybe because she started the power share/activation spell, she wasn't supposed to feel the connection the other girls do. I don't think Faith feels it either. The original Slayers already had the power; the potential slayers are the ones who were activated together and share a bond from it. Buffy tells herself to suck it up.
Then we're back with the military scientists at the Hellmouth. They've found something alive down there, two somethings actually, and no other bodies. And we get the first surprise return of an old friend/enemy in the comic: Amy! She tells them: I'm going to help you kill her. The end.
So we will find out more about Amy and her friend living in the ruins of Sunnydale soon, and the rest of the Scoobies and allies will start showing up soon. It's been a while since I've read The Long Way Home, so I'm looking forward to experiencing it again.
And I worship at the altar of Jo Chen.
That's how season 8 starts, in part what it is about, and that thought will be reprised at the very end of the season. I also now realize it's a meta commentary as well. This comic world that Buffy has transitioned into is all different. You've got tons of complicated stunts, huge and gnarly demons, and the entire globe and possibly beyond as a canvas. No limitations of budget, only of imagination, plot sense, and character. So it will be a wild ride.
We start on Buffy, and we find out right away that the promise indicated in her beginnings of a smile at the end of Chosen has passed her by. Her life is different now, but it's even farther from normal than it was on the Hellmouth. She's leading an army of about 500 slayers. There's around 1800 slayers in the world, and it's not clear at the start where the others are. There's two slayers pretending to be Buffy to make it harder for her to be targeted. One is in Rome with the Immortal. Hilarius tie-in to Angel 5x20 The Girl in Question, and another retcon meta joke in that the fans always knew the girl in Rome was not SMG. The other Buffy we will meet and whose fate we will learn of in the Chain, one of the best issues of season 8.
Buffy and Xander are in a castle in Scotland. They have a lot of sophisticated equipment, psychics, and (we learn later) Wiccans working with the slayers. We'll learn how all this was funded in a later issue as well, and it's all part of the fallout from the scythe spell in Chosen, as is the rest of the season. I am convinced that before I get too far into this, I need to rewatch the show. Listening to an old episode of Watcher Cast, their intro includes the quote from Giles that reprised the pilot episodes of Buffy, "The Earth is definitely doomed," I realized that that has foreshadowing too, reflecting forward as well as back. Season 8 seems to showing a world that is about to end, a world in its twilight. With that spell, was the Earth doomed?
More slayer stats come to light and we learn that there's a squad in Barcelona led by Donna. (Note to self, look up names given for all the surviving Potentials so I know when characters are new versus callbacks.) And Andrew has a squad in southern Italy. There's a slayer named Renee in Scotland who will become Xander's new love interest -- for a little while. Of the slayers in on the church mission with Buffy, one we will learn is Satsu and one is Rowena. Don't remember who the other three are, although they show up again I'm certain.
Buffy introduces us to Xander as her Watcher, a post he denies a couple of times. He doesn't want to be called a Watcher. He also seems to miss his old life and job, but feels duty-bound to stay and help Buffy. So nothing new there. At the end of the season he seems to be settling into a normal life, but I'm sure that will only go so far.
We first see the Twilight symbol on the men killed by demons in the church, and it's clear they were there fighting the demons, not ordinary, innocent victims. Xander and Buffy try to figure out the symbol. Buffy's idea, which is more foreshadowing, is that it's a beautiful sunset. Certainly was for her...I'm back.
Then we're with the military, one of the Initiative's offshoots or compatriots or maybe not. Since the world is so different, since the slayers are en masse and Twilight is trying to gather her enemies together, maybe it's the entire U.S. military that's in on the demon fighting now. I think later we get some indications that there's a hell of a lot of demons out there these days, and was that because of the spell? Or at least my mind goes there. I think back to Beljoxa's Eye in season 7, saying that the First was able to rise so high with such power because of Willow and crew calling the Slayer back into the world, a balancing of power, thaumogenesis type deal. Are there more demons because there's more slayers?
We meet General Voll and a sweaty man in a suit. The general considers the slayers to be a new form of terrorist, against American interests, which is what will happen to you if you try to change, and especially if you succeed in changing, the status quo. They're flying to the crater that was once Sunnydale. Again, bringing it back to where Chosen left off. By the way, in this issue we're not given any info as to how long ago that happened. Since Twilight it already up and running, I assume it's been some time. I guess Angel's disembodied friend could have started the whole thing without him, or his stint in hell might not have taken any real world time (that's probably it -- haven't finished the Angel comics yet, but LA is maybe popped back without any time having passed in real time? We'll see when I get there. I'm behind on the Angel comics.) Still, Buffy and friends needed some time to get things set up the way they are now. And the events here take place either at the same time or after the end of Angel season 5, which should be a year after Chosen, given the fake Buffy/Immortal thing. I'll watch for time indicators.
We flip back to Scotland and Buffy trying to connect with Dawn. Dawn is a giant. Awesome. She was going to Berkeley before this happened to her, and she wants to go back. So she was able to get a GED and get into school in whatever time has passed. She had a boyfriend that was a thricewise, whatever that is, and Buffy thinks she slept with him and it went bad so he cursed her. We find out the true story later. But Buffy and Dawn aren't getting along, and Dawn only wants to talk to Willow about it, not Buffy.
So Xander isn't all that excited to be here, missing a more normal life, but handling it pretty well, being Buffy's right hand and confidante. Dawn doesn't want to be there because of her own misery and condition mostly. And Buffy isn't happy in this new world either, feeling even less connected with everything than before, the exact opposite of what she wanted when she shared her power. I seem to remember later on that Faith or Willow says something to her that maybe because she started the power share/activation spell, she wasn't supposed to feel the connection the other girls do. I don't think Faith feels it either. The original Slayers already had the power; the potential slayers are the ones who were activated together and share a bond from it. Buffy tells herself to suck it up.
Then we're back with the military scientists at the Hellmouth. They've found something alive down there, two somethings actually, and no other bodies. And we get the first surprise return of an old friend/enemy in the comic: Amy! She tells them: I'm going to help you kill her. The end.
So we will find out more about Amy and her friend living in the ruins of Sunnydale soon, and the rest of the Scoobies and allies will start showing up soon. It's been a while since I've read The Long Way Home, so I'm looking forward to experiencing it again.
And I worship at the altar of Jo Chen.
Friday, January 28, 2011
All Clear (and Blackout) by Connie Willis, a rambling review
Thursday morning I stayed in bed reading All Clear until I was done. I'm still unsure what I feel about it. Definitely had a decent ending, but there were few surprises throughout. I kind of guessed Mary before the reveal, definitely guessed Ernest before, and I kind of think I had an idea about him earlier, but I might be making that up, it's been a while. I knew they hadn't lost the war and that the continuum wasn't necessarily trying to kill them and everyone they know. I felt like Polly's epiphany was very close to Ned's at the end of To Say Nothing of the Dog. Really, the whole thing felt a bit like a rehash of old ground. The pacing, with all the running around and getting blocked and finding another way and all that did have a plot reason, but it didn't seem to have a thematic one. Maybe it didn't in TSNOTD either, but it was an effective way to do the comedy, the farce, of that book. It perfectly suited the character's confusion and the tangled mess of Victorian manners and English mysteries and all of it. And that kind of deal done for tragedy worked incredibly well for Passage, where it did tie directly into the theme and the imagery at work in that book. So much so that it's stuck with me for years in a very profound way.
I don't want to feel that that profundity has been dented by her using the same device again to a lesser purpose. It makes it feel as if she's just good at writing that kind of plot and so will continue to do so, even when the reasons for it are not as well thought out or something. I mean, it was part of figuring out the mystery, but it was basically the same conclusion that Ned had with the same reasoning of the same type of coincidences and near misses. Just this time the historians were there to take action whereas before they were there to stay out of the way -- that's not even true. In TSNOTD, they were put in places to do what needed to be done to make history stay on course, they just sat out the last bit to let everything fall into place. So Polly's big moment of understanding that turned around their attitudes felt like old news, so the fact that Dunworthy was so convinced he had ruined the world seemed like a false issue. Of course, IDK if this happened before the events of that book, maybe that's why it wasn't mentioned at all, so maybe he hadn't had the experience of learning that. That would make me feel better about the whole thing, actually.
The Blitz part was great; I learned a ton. And I liked the characters, I liked Eileen staying, although I wasn't surprised. I accepted Colin and Polly and was impressed with Michael actually dying, and quite sad. I think it did go on too long. And there were just too many issues with the trying to do something, being thwarted, trying to go around, blocked again, rinse, repeat. It didn't even match the feelings of the Blitz, which was more of a seige, getting by, doing your part kind of message, not a message of trying to do this, being thwarted, going around etc. kind of thing. And the characters seemed servants to the plot too often, not communicating things for really stupid reasons, needless deceptions, and an overall lack of professionalism. I mean, for time traveling historians, they don't seem to have a great grasp of what they're doing. It's as if Oxford is allowing them to go through the net, but not teaching them about how it works. Like they're truly just historical experts of certain time periods -- they have that knowledge -- but they're not historical scientists, they have no idea how the whole system they're utilizing works. That just seems a bad idea to me. I mean, maybe part of the point is that the historians as a whole don't really know what they're doing. After all, Dunworthy himself is ready to throw away all his old opinions on how it works to believe they've destroyed the world.
I guess the chaos theory part worked for me in the other book, but not this as much. IDK. And I probably need to refer to Doomsday Book again to see how it was handled there, since I never remember that as well. Maybe the idea of this self-correcting continuum just works better in a comedy and ill fits a darker story. I mean, Polly ends up calling it a comedy and not a tragedy, but the book itself was pretty dark. Even the end victory didn't seem that triumphant once you got there.
Still, I liked the idea that the historians from the future had always been a part of winning World War II. It's hard to wrap your head around, but it gives you a nice koan-type thing to ponder, so that was good. I think I'll just have to reread them both sometime and see if it settles in nicer the second time through. Still well worth the read, just not the masterpiece I kind of wanted it to be. But having one author be the creator of two of my favorite books of all time is really good enough I should think.
I don't want to feel that that profundity has been dented by her using the same device again to a lesser purpose. It makes it feel as if she's just good at writing that kind of plot and so will continue to do so, even when the reasons for it are not as well thought out or something. I mean, it was part of figuring out the mystery, but it was basically the same conclusion that Ned had with the same reasoning of the same type of coincidences and near misses. Just this time the historians were there to take action whereas before they were there to stay out of the way -- that's not even true. In TSNOTD, they were put in places to do what needed to be done to make history stay on course, they just sat out the last bit to let everything fall into place. So Polly's big moment of understanding that turned around their attitudes felt like old news, so the fact that Dunworthy was so convinced he had ruined the world seemed like a false issue. Of course, IDK if this happened before the events of that book, maybe that's why it wasn't mentioned at all, so maybe he hadn't had the experience of learning that. That would make me feel better about the whole thing, actually.
The Blitz part was great; I learned a ton. And I liked the characters, I liked Eileen staying, although I wasn't surprised. I accepted Colin and Polly and was impressed with Michael actually dying, and quite sad. I think it did go on too long. And there were just too many issues with the trying to do something, being thwarted, trying to go around, blocked again, rinse, repeat. It didn't even match the feelings of the Blitz, which was more of a seige, getting by, doing your part kind of message, not a message of trying to do this, being thwarted, going around etc. kind of thing. And the characters seemed servants to the plot too often, not communicating things for really stupid reasons, needless deceptions, and an overall lack of professionalism. I mean, for time traveling historians, they don't seem to have a great grasp of what they're doing. It's as if Oxford is allowing them to go through the net, but not teaching them about how it works. Like they're truly just historical experts of certain time periods -- they have that knowledge -- but they're not historical scientists, they have no idea how the whole system they're utilizing works. That just seems a bad idea to me. I mean, maybe part of the point is that the historians as a whole don't really know what they're doing. After all, Dunworthy himself is ready to throw away all his old opinions on how it works to believe they've destroyed the world.
I guess the chaos theory part worked for me in the other book, but not this as much. IDK. And I probably need to refer to Doomsday Book again to see how it was handled there, since I never remember that as well. Maybe the idea of this self-correcting continuum just works better in a comedy and ill fits a darker story. I mean, Polly ends up calling it a comedy and not a tragedy, but the book itself was pretty dark. Even the end victory didn't seem that triumphant once you got there.
Still, I liked the idea that the historians from the future had always been a part of winning World War II. It's hard to wrap your head around, but it gives you a nice koan-type thing to ponder, so that was good. I think I'll just have to reread them both sometime and see if it settles in nicer the second time through. Still well worth the read, just not the masterpiece I kind of wanted it to be. But having one author be the creator of two of my favorite books of all time is really good enough I should think.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Buffy Season 8 - Intro
So my latest project idea, hopefully one I will finish, is to, now that I've read all of Buffy season 8, to reread it and take note of what I notice this time through in light of how it ends. Mostly I'm doing this to try and make sense of the story to myself. I have read it, but I'm not certain I understand it, so I want to revisit the whole thing and try to form a coherent picture. And blog it as I do it.
My experience with the Buffy comics has been on and off again. I started the new series by subscribing to it through TFAW, and I would receive each issue as it came out. And at first I read it as I got it. Then I fell behind. Then I realized I couldn't afford to buy it every month and stopped subscribing and reading. I started picking up the trades when they came out. And I read up to Fray's issue. Then I stopped, thinking I should reread Fray first. And I never got back to it. And then came Buffy's 30th birthday and the release of the last issue. And I, having been spoiled on 2 major events already, decided I'd better catch up. So I read everything up through #36 before Wednesday, January 19th, then picked up the last 4 issues the following weekend.
I had a long gap in between. I reread the first couple of trades in the midst of it, and I ended up reading the majority of the work in the last couple of weeks. So it's fresh in my mind, but I also read through it really quickly, so I need the reread. And I really am not sure I understand it fully. I get the chronology, and the basic plot, but I'm having trouble feeling the thematic points and, for lack of a better word, the moral of the story.
Part of the problem is that it took me most of the way into the story to realize that it was a superhero comic. It was strange for me to realize how different the world was in comic form. It's not just about being able to fight hordes of demons and do awesome stunts, there's a whole new attitude that comes from the change of medium. I'm not that accustomed to comics, and I loved it so as a television show, so it really did take me some time to make the transition. On this reread, I'll go into it knowing that already. I think it will help.
Anyway, that's the "plan." I decided I should not only reread, but I should blog about it. Mostly for the exercise of writing, but also just to flesh out my thoughts a little more concretely than would occur if I was just thinking to myself or occasionally tweeting something as I thought it. Also, it's going to be spoilery, so I should keep anything major off twitter. I will be comparing things from the very first issue to things that happen at the very end and all the way through.
Onward, ho! (Wow, that sounded different in my head.)
My experience with the Buffy comics has been on and off again. I started the new series by subscribing to it through TFAW, and I would receive each issue as it came out. And at first I read it as I got it. Then I fell behind. Then I realized I couldn't afford to buy it every month and stopped subscribing and reading. I started picking up the trades when they came out. And I read up to Fray's issue. Then I stopped, thinking I should reread Fray first. And I never got back to it. And then came Buffy's 30th birthday and the release of the last issue. And I, having been spoiled on 2 major events already, decided I'd better catch up. So I read everything up through #36 before Wednesday, January 19th, then picked up the last 4 issues the following weekend.
I had a long gap in between. I reread the first couple of trades in the midst of it, and I ended up reading the majority of the work in the last couple of weeks. So it's fresh in my mind, but I also read through it really quickly, so I need the reread. And I really am not sure I understand it fully. I get the chronology, and the basic plot, but I'm having trouble feeling the thematic points and, for lack of a better word, the moral of the story.
Part of the problem is that it took me most of the way into the story to realize that it was a superhero comic. It was strange for me to realize how different the world was in comic form. It's not just about being able to fight hordes of demons and do awesome stunts, there's a whole new attitude that comes from the change of medium. I'm not that accustomed to comics, and I loved it so as a television show, so it really did take me some time to make the transition. On this reread, I'll go into it knowing that already. I think it will help.
Anyway, that's the "plan." I decided I should not only reread, but I should blog about it. Mostly for the exercise of writing, but also just to flesh out my thoughts a little more concretely than would occur if I was just thinking to myself or occasionally tweeting something as I thought it. Also, it's going to be spoilery, so I should keep anything major off twitter. I will be comparing things from the very first issue to things that happen at the very end and all the way through.
Onward, ho! (Wow, that sounded different in my head.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)