“We do do not joke about eating people in this house” – Buffy
Remember that fun little sub-plot regarding a sticky fingered Dawn stealing items from the Magic Box? Well if you were expecting it to lead to Dawn dabbling in magic prepare to be disappointed as everything comes to ahead this week as Dawn feeling that no one wants to spend time with her, unwittingly makes a wish in front of vengeance demon which soon see’s her and the other Scoobies trapped in the Summers house with a demon on the loose.
Entering into this season I knew that this was going to be the start of the rocky period for the show, but this week really highlights how far the show has wandered from those golden years as we get an episode more focused on the fractured relationships of the group and the still grating relationship between Buffy and Spike which the group still don’t know about.
As to be expected this is far from the strongest episode with the group faced with the fact that they aren’t can’t leave the Summers house but we also get a throwaway threat in a demon who can disappear into the walls at will. The fact that the writers couldn’t be bothered to come up with a name for said demon really highlights how much importance they were putting on this creation and its relevence to the story.
Speaking of disposable elements this episode does introduce two new in Sophie, a girl who Buffy works with at the Doublemeat Palace and Richard who Xander works with and who Anya has plans on setting up with Buffy, completely unaware that she is seeing Spike. Of course don’t get too attached to either of them as they are destined to be as quickly forgotten as this episode. Richard’s inclusion however seems to be solely for two reasons with the first being someone for Spike to make fun of continually and the second so the writers could include a “Star Trek” red shirt joke.
Still for how much they want us to buy into the Buffy / Spike relationship for some reason Spike has over the course of the season only become more of a douche and here it continues in this episode to the point were it just become grating and when your also having to deal with Willow still moping about its only the harder to really care how they are going to get out of their current situation. Now I know there are those fans who will defend this pairing to the death, but it still feels like the writers trying to push an unlikely pairing than these characters sharing any kind of real connection even rewatching the show now.
As I stated before this is a forgettable filler episode, which doesn’t add anything really to the show and what it does are treated as disposable items than anything which could help the show to grow which is kind of a shame as right now the show feels like it needs something fresh which with the disadvantage of foresight is something that the season sorely never gets.
Next Episode: As You Were
Channel: Superhero 