Bargaining and season 6

[chani]

I had forgotten how terrific that beginning of season was. ME was usually great at starting seasons, better than at ending them(the Grand Restless being THE exception IMO). I feel that Joss has a hard time with closures...

The opening scene is just great. I love the interaction between Tara/Spike/Giles. And Spike was so sexy and  beautiful then. The "cuppa tea, cuppa tea, almost got shagged, cuppa tea" is a classic of course and tending of the scene with the Buffybot's dadaïsm is also so Joss-like. From fun to deep emotion in a heart beat. I so loved that show!

The episode has great moments of comedy like Anya and Giles fighting in the Magic Box or moving ones like the Spike/Dawn scene after the parents-teachers day and even creepy moments. Willow was scary, she didn't even bat an eyelid when killing bambi!

ASH is wonderful during the airport/farewell scene. I liked how he saved Willow for the last hug. There's always been a special connection between those two, and it's obvious in that scene (yeah I could have shipped Giles/Willow). I guess the writers needed to recall it before Flooded and of course before the end of the season! Sometimes people criticize Joss for lack of consistency. I so disagree. That Willow/Giles arc has run through the 7 seasons with a few highlights like Something Blue, Restless (the way she speaks to Giles in his dream, calling him Ruppert!)...and later Lessons.

I must say that I prefer Part 1, even though I loved the Dawn/Spike scenes in Part 2. They showed so many things about Spike within few minutes. That he loves his little bit and wants to do the right thing for her, that he still has a dark side but is struggling between what his demon craves (violence, destruction "looked like fun") and his feelings, that he's brave and daring (the western-like scene when he faces the demon on  a bike).

At the end of the day, Bargaining foreshadowed  lot of things in season 6 including the theme of rape that appears here through the Razor demon's threats  and will be carried on with  Rack/Willow, Warren/Katrina and Spuffy. Also Buffy isn't only traumatized for being resurrected/pulled out off peaceful rest, she's traumatized because of her rude awakening in her coffin, which says that she will be metaphorically experimentating what vampires go through. Becoming a vampire was supposed to be her biggest fear in early seasons ! Of course she doesn't crave blood during season 6, but she craves life nonetheless (and blood is life), a life she no longer feels inside of her (she goes through the motion but she wants to feel) and this craving is represented by her desire for Spike, for his flesh (and what a delicious flesh!), which is very ironical of course since he has a dead body! During most of the season actually Buffy behaves as a predator, refusing to acknowledge Spike's love and her own feelings because basically he has to be just a thing as humans have to be just food (Happy Meal on Legs) for vampires. The roles are reversed...until Buffy becomes normal again! And in Hell's Bells, NA, Entropy, SR, Buffy is mostly portrayed as a girl who's got feelings again and can be hurt literally (by Spike, by Warren, by Willow) and figuratively (she tells Spike it hurts in HB, she doesn't take well seeing him with Anya, she tells she feels something for him before the AR), not as a superhero fighting Big Bads.

I now get why Buffy didn't beat Darth Willow nor save the day at the end of season 6. The return of the Slayer occured in season 7 only.

Oh and Smudge did a great job as Buffybot!

ETA: After Life kinda reinforced my point. Not only the title itself, but what Spike said (comparing Buffy's experience to his) and also the fact they kept saying the word "normal" about Buffy. She obvioulsy wasn't normal...yet. You know this what I like about BTVS titles, they are so significant and with multi-meanings! Normal Again for instance suits the Buffy-is-crazy-episode but also the whole arc of the season according to my reading.

Comments

[jerusha]

I have this love/hate relationship with S6. Part of me adores that season, for all the reasons you listed, plus the whole idea that our inner demons can be even more destructive than the monsters outside of us. I think it's fantastic. I also love the fact that S6 is the season that often sparks so much fantastic fic. I know it was the season that made me want to write.

On the other hand, I hate the fact that the writers went to so much trouble to declare Spike "an evil thing." You see glimpses of the something more he could be (as you said), but I think they largely were against the whole redemption arc, at least without a soul. Dead Things especially just irks me. I've written almost 600 pages trying to work out my issues. :)

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

well what I saw on screen wasn't an evil thing, and it isn't because of James' acting. The lines they gave him plus the actor directing showed that Spike was a complex character, so I am not sure that the writers were against the redemption arc...

I think that Dead Things is a terrific episode, quite painful for sure but very daring and well directed. The door crypt scene is one of my favourite Spuffy scene ever.