Barbelith Underground > Film, TV & Theatre > Reassessing Buffy Season Six

One of the revolutionary ideas Joss Whedon had was to use the revolutionary idea that JMS had, that you can actually use continuity in sci-fi fantasy and the audience will go with it. It wasn't just for your Dawson Creeks or your soaps. In parts of season 4, season 5, and season 6 they forget this. The clearest example I can give is Giles and Xander in season 4. They spend the entire season wondering how they can still be a useful part of Buffy's life when they aren't college types. This leads to things like Xander being a barman in 'Beer Bad', and is the basis of the storyline in 'A New Man'. That ends with Buffy telling Giles she does need him, but then next episode it's back to worrying Giles, because of the position he needs to be in in 'The Yoko Factor' where they all split up.

I don't think that Giles example is neccessarily a problem. The events of a 'A New Man' did convince him that he had a place in Buffy's life, but then we go through the Initiative arc, where Buffy fights for them. These episodes place Buffy in a place where she's backed up by more force than Giles could ever provide. It puts him in a situation where he questions his purpose. Even though Buffy clearly still loves him, as shown in 'A New Man,' he still isn't really needed in her life in season four. The arc is resolved in season five, when Buffy reintensifies her training, thus validating his position as watcher.

In season six, Buffy spends the entire season depressed because she's not in Heaven any more. This would be okay if we didn't have the climax of 'Once More With Feeling' where she would have committed suicide if not for Spike. The secrets are out. Everything is different, except it isn't. Buffy's left to be miserable until the last episode, when suddenly she decides she's going to be happy from now on.

So, you're saying that just telling her friends she was in heaven should instantly make things better? I think it makes perfect sense that she'd be further alienated from her friends. How do they react to the news that they pulled her from heaven? Willow withdraws into magic, Xander and Anya focus on their own problems, leaving Buffy essentially alone, until she goes with Spike. The first step to recovery might be admitting you have a problem, but admitting alone shouldn't make her better. Keep in mind the way OMWF ends, Buffy leaves her friends, who she trouble relating to, goes out to Spike and sings, "I know this isn't real, but I just want to feel."

Buffy is weak when character continuity gets ignored in favour of tying storylines to the structure of a season. With the exception of the Dark Willow episodes you can largely watch most of season six in almost any order.

I think that's just not true. Obviously, the Willow/Tara stuff changes, and so do Xander and Anya, but there really is an evolution of Buffy over the season. At first, she's numb, completely overwhelmed by being back, she gets drawn to Spike, and engages in that relationship just to feel. Once she's finished with Spike, she's a good way out of the depression, but the Xander/Anya breakup into the next episode plunges her down a bit. Without the Spike relationship, she was clinging to Xander and Anya as the light at the end of the tunnel that show a relationship can work. The chain of events that that sets up would obviously lead to depression. I think it makes sense that Buffy would come out of the depression at the end becuase she has a renewed sense of purpose, saving Willow, and, in talking to Giles, I think she steps back and sees things from a new perspective. She talks jokingly about the events of the season, and this helps her to get back on the right track.

I'll admit there's some shoddy continuity around Gone, like she breaks off the relationship with Spike in Wrecked, then is instantly back to it in Gone, but it all holds together fairly well. Now, I could understand the idea that Xander and Anya don't really go anywhere until Hell's Bells, and Dawn does very little over the course of the season, but Xander very rarely does anything, at least in the later years of the show, and I think they never really figured out a role for Dawn after she stopped being the key.

Somewhere, probably towards the end of season four, someone in the crew gets the idea that Buffy is a hero. This is admittedly Flyboy's idea, so I might ask him to expand on this, but from this point on Buffy is right because she's the hero, which is a really bad idea. Buffy isn't a hero, she's a rich brat that is only better than Harmony because she makes friends with people like Willow and Andrew. She's a weapon, to be aimed by people like the Watchers and let go. The nadir of this is season seven, when we have her lambasting the spirits of the people that made the Slayer, because they were men that dared to create something that could fight evil, and her leading the Potentials for no other reason than her being Buffy.

I heartily agree with this. One of the reasons I love season six so much is becuase Buffy isn't a hero, she's more of a person. By season seven, all the humanity is stripped away and she becomes an almost mythical figure.

Giles leaving. Well, it was always going to be difficult, what with five previous seasons emphasising Giles' role being at Buffy's side. Writing a script about Giles realising he's got to step aside because he's stopping Buffy develop as a Slayer when we have the climax of 'OMWF' is the height of stupidity.

I agree with you, the ending of OMWF does contradict what comes later, but, I think you can clearly see Giles is uncomfortable playing the father for Buffy and Dawn. Once he gets a taste of independence, I think it's tough to be plunged into a situation where he basically has to clean up the huge mess that Buffy has. As much as he loves her, I think it just overwhelms him. He sees Buffy using him as a crutch and thinks that maybe she does have to make it on her own, she's never going to do that if he holds her hand, so he throws her in the deep end, and she can't really swim. It's a judgment call, he figured Buffy needed to learn how to do things on her own, clearly it was the wrong judgment, and I think he realizes that at the end of the season.

One of my favorite scenes from that last episode is after Giles complimenting Buffy's hair, Anya says she changed hers too, like a younger sibling trying to get the attention of her dad. That end of season six is the last time that the Buffy gang really feels like family, in seven they become sort of a military unit, and the loss of that sense of famly really hurts the show.