Reviewed by Sanguine

Thanatos--In Freudian theory, the death drive. Sometimes opposed, sometimes linked to Eros, the desire for life (sometimes love).

"On occasions, Freud asserted, the mind acts as though it could altogether eliminate tension, as though, in other words, it could reduce itself to a state of extinction. The compulsion to repeat is symptomatic of this kind of mind-set. Freud arrived at the view that this compulsion to repeat is a kind of discharge and this compulsion to repeat can be seen as the effort to restore a state that is both historically primitive and also marked by the total draining of energy, i.e., death". (Richard Wollheim, Sigmund Freud, 211-212)

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You regain consciousness. You feel the flesh reform on your bones. Your eyes widen. You look up. Satin. Closed all around. Womb-like.

Your hands reach out. Clawing. Scraping. Bleeding. Air? There is none.

Escape.

Dirt everywhere. Choking. Thrust from the ground. Gasping for air. Reborn.

In an episode that played like a bad Freudian nightmare, Buffy the Vampire Slayer returned for a sixth season. And boy, will Buffy need some psychoanalysis after what she’s been through. After all, coming back from the dead can be murder on your hair.

Ahem.

Bargaining (Pt. 1 by Marti Noxon and Pt. 2 by David Fury) was not designed to win new viewers to the Buffyverse. Its exceedingly grim subject matter coupled with some of the most excessive violence I have ever seen on BTVS might have turned off even the most devoted viewer. (I’m thinking of Willow’s knife dance with Bambi, the drawing and quartering of the Buffybot, and the demon bikers’ fondness for beating Buffy with lead pipes). The pace of this two-parter dragged; Noxon and Fury simply did not have enough story to fill out the full two hours. UPN’s solution? More commercials! They are paying a pretty penny for Buffy and the increased commercial interruptions were a most unwelcome guest.

Furthermore, the writers seemed to have difficulty incorporating Dawn and Spike, two characters that played such essential roles last season. Last season Dawn was the major motivating factor for the big bad and her ‘bleeding’ caused the tragic denouement: Buffy’s spectacular leap into the great beyond. Quite simply, Dawn was Buffy’s emotional core last season.

Spike’s character underwent a radical change last season. He went from evil vampire to semi-evil vampire. We learned that vampires can love (a point that the opening episode of Angel rearticulated) and that he genuinely cares about Buffy and Dawn.

In Bargaining, Spike obviously has not fallen headlong back into a bit ol’ vat of evil. He’s helping the Scoobies (albeit reluctantly) and protecting Dawn. His snarkiness is alive and well. That’s a good thing (except when he’s leering in delight while a screaming woman is being victimized by demon bikers. That was really quite distasteful, Mr. Fury, and Spike completely lost my sympathies at that moment. We get the picture. He’s still a demon. He still craves destruction. ‘Nuff said). But as with Dawn, Spike’s exclusion from the resurrection ritual, while logical, seemed wrong on an emotional level. It also pointed up how much the series had relied last season on these two characters. I suspect Season 6 will give better storylines to Willow and Xander. My response: it’s about damn time.

While the shift of focus away from Dawn’s keyness and Spike’s moral progress seemed a bit jarring, it was nice to see Willow and Xander have something really substantial to do. Willow’s supernatural powers continue to grow, but unfortunately her moral compass isn’t keeping pace with her increasing abilities. At several points in Bargaining she made questionable decisions. Obviously the magic she was invoking to raise Buffy from the dead was some heavy stuff (incidentally, if you read Anita Blake some of the ritual was eerily familiar). Bambi blood (maybe the heart?), supernatural wrist slashings, expelling snakes from your mouth. Doesn’t sound like a good time to me. For Willow, the ends justified the gruesome means. That makes Willow dangerous. She has become the ultimate pragmatist.

But why is Willow so obsessed with bringing Buffy back? She is obviously worried that Buffy is stuck in a hell dimension, a la Angel. She is also concerned about the fate of Sunnydale. But most importantly, Willow was not able to accept Buffy’s death. She decided to ‘fix’ it with magic. We saw evidence last season that Willow didn’t cope with death very well when Joyce Summers passed away. With a magical wave of her finger, Willow facilitated Dawn’s attempt to raise Joyce from the dead. She saw the repercussions of that action. That’s why it was rather puzzling that she and Tara, who was the voice of morality in last season’s Forever, would decide that bringing back someone from the dead was OK after all. The mystical energy escape clause didn’t work for me. It felt like the writers were desperately trying to paint themselves out of a rather tight corner. Nevertheless, in spite of these plot-based reservations, I loved the direction that Willow’s character is taking and I look forward to seeing the moral chaos that will undoubtedly ensue. Yummy.

Now I’ve carped about what I didn’t like in this episode, let’s move on to what I did like. And there was much goodness.

Three words: I loved Xander. He was the voice of reason. He was the one asking the hard moral questions. His best moment was when he realised what had happened to Buffy. She awoke "Right where we left her. In her coffin." Nicholas Brendon’s performance was absolutely heartrending as he sees Buffy, reverted to an almost primitive state, cowering in the corner with dirt-stained clothing and bleeding hands and puts 2 and 2 together. Best of all, Nick Brendon cut his hair. Let the rejoicing begin!

Giles’s farewell was also poignant. Especially effective was his scene with the Buffybot. He tries to tell her about the concept of "chi," an idea that would certainly be beyond the grasp of the "descendant of a toaster oven." After Anya points out the futility of imparting Eastern philosophy to an automaton, Giles decides it’s time to go, to get a life. The scene in the airport was genuinely emotional, and served as a fitting send-off for Anthony Stewart Head (who will only return on a recurring basis).

BTVS’s triumphant return to the horror genre made me fondly recall those days in Seasons 1 and 2 when I would watch and be genuinely scared. Buffy’s escape from the coffin was terrifying. The raising ritual was suitably horrible. The slaughter of Bambi was nightmare inducing. But beyond the gruesome visuals, the psychological elements of Bargaining were even more harrowing.

People forget their birth because it is simply too traumatic. Buffy now remembers her escape from the womb-like coffin with excruciating clarity. She then arises to find Sunnydale on fire, complete with demons. Through still blurry eyes, she witnesses the graphic death of her simulacrum, her representation. She lives her death again and a single word escapes from her throat. "No!"

Running, always running but never escaping, she finds her friends, but cannot connect. She seeks aggression, beating up demons (and aggression in Freudian terms is part of that pesky death drive). She seeks that sweet elimination of all tension, all anxiety that death affords. She seeks peace.

So she returns to the place that gave her death. Seeing Dawn (another part of herself) she asks her first question. "Is this hell?"

The evidence would suggest it is.

She reveals her reason for jumping at the end of last season: "It was so clear on this spot." In death all the choices, all the indecision fell away. There was only pure light. Perfect clarity. Peace.

Now Buffy has no peace. She demonstrates a "compulsion to repeat" to repeat her own death by leaping from the tower. But then Dawn calls out. She is in danger. Buffy’s role as a protector, as a sister, and her desire to save that "best part of herself" overwhelms her death drive. For Buffy at that moment, her desire to live overcame her desire for death.

"You’re home," Dawn tells Buffy. The final shot of the show belies those words. Buffy’s haunted eyes stare into nothingness. She is not the same. She will never be the same.

And thus, Season 6 begins.