Grave

by Jerry

See also: Jerry's review of Two to Go

"Grave", the 6th season finale, written by David Fury, picks up where "Two to Go" left off, wraps up most of the season-long storylines, and sets the stage intriguingly for what's to come next year.

In the Magic Box, a serious and formidable-looking Giles has returned to confront Willow. Buffy and Anya, both temporarily stunned from the battle, are surprised and hopeful at his arrival. Willow's in a taunting mood. "Uh oh. Daddy's home. I'm in wicked trouble now." She rises to confront Giles, but he knocks her down with magic. It's "borrowed power", according to Willow, and won't be enough. Giles says he wants to help her, but she doesn't want helping. She taunts that being a Watcher, he's free to watch while she finishes her killing. Buffy says she doesn't want to fight Willow anymore, but Willow prefers to fight Giles anyway. She remembers Giles chewing her out in "Flooded", and definitely holds a grudge. As she tries to conjure something bad against him, Giles traps her in some sort of energy field, neutralizing her for the moment.

With the immediate threat out of the way, Giles is distracted from explaining how he put Willow in stasis by noticing Buffy's new (to him) hairdo. They share an emotional embrace. Anya feels left out of the Giles-love, and points out that her hairdo is new, too (as though that were news). She gets a hug as well. Giles makes an effort to offer condolences to Willow over Tara's death, but Willow just responds with threats.

In the training room, Giles is explaining why he's there. Buffy thinks the Council sent him, but he says no - the Council hasn't got a clue - about anything. A Coven of witches in Devon sensed the rise of a dangerous force in Sunnydale, and a Seer sensed Tara's death. The Coven imbued Giles with their powers and sent him to Sunnydale (I should point out, before we go any further, that if you have a low tolerance for mystical rigmarole, this is not the episode for you). Giles wants to know how all this has happened. Buffy spills her guts about it all - Willow's addiction, Xander's abandonment of Anya, Anya's return to demonhood (We notably get a surprised/concerned reaction from Giles to that), Dawn's stealing, Buffy's own financial woes, and (oh, by the way) that she's been sleeping with Spike. It's obvious that Buffy particularly dreads admitting this to Giles, but he surprises her by bursting out in laughter at the absurdity of it all, eventually allowing Buffy to do the same . Given what we know of Giles' behavior at her age, I guess it's not surprising that he's non-judgmental.

Anya is tidying up the shop (an increasingly futile task, I might add), when Willow reaches out to her telepathically. She's trying to get Anya to release her, but Anya insists that mind control doesn't work on vengeance demons. At this point, I was expecting that Anya would be compelled by her mission to help Willow because she was seeking vengeance. Instead, either Anya is wrong about the mind control thing, or she's not quite as much of a vengeance demon as she thinks.

Giles and Buffy are still laughing, recounting Buffy's delusions from "Normal Again". They finally settle down, and Giles asks if Buffy can ever forgive him for leaving. She suggests that he was right to go - she needed to grow up. Giles agrees with that, but thinks it still would have been more grown up for them all to know when to ask for help. Buffy recounts her problem - the feeling that she left something behind in the grave. She doesn't know why she's back - the world would have and should have gone on without her.

Buffy asks what's to be done with Willow. Giles says the Coven is working on a way to take away her powers, but he can't guarantee that she'll live, or that she'll be the same if she does. As they ponder whether Willow can come back from killing a human, a black-eyed Willow appears in the doorway behind Anya's unconscious body. "Willow doesn't live here anymore", she says.

As Willow discards the unconscious Anya, Buffy charges at her, but Willow blasts her against the wall, knocking her out (Buffy and Anya are both gaining on Giles in the concussion department in this one). Giles tries to encase Willow in magic again, but this time Willow casts it aside. She propels all the weapons hanging on the wall at Giles (rather echoing her 'bag of knives' attack on Glory in "Tough Love"), but he propels the practice dummy in front of himself to catch them. Giles hurls a ball of energy at Willow, propelling her through the wall.

Xander is leading Dawn, Jonathan, and Andrew, down a street out of danger. He has no idea where to take them. Xander is frustrated by his inability to help, or to even run away well, as he catalogues all the bad things he's helpless to prevent - Buffy getting shot, Tara dying, Willow going bad (but no Anya). Dawn wants to go back and fight. She thinks that's what Spike would do. "Sure - if he wasn't too bust trying to rape your sister", Xander adds. Xander is unlikely to ever be called upon to mediate in Northern Ireland or the Middle East, I suspect. Dawn doubts Spike would do that, and Xander rants about the blindness of the Summers women regarding Spike.

In the cave, ugly demon heads are rolling. A battered and bloodied Spike remains determined to face any challenge he has to in order to "get what I need to take care of the Slayer". What he gets is bugs crawling up his nose, which doesn't seem like what he was looking for. But hey, I'm sure bugs up the nose are redemptive.

The Magic Box is now thoroughly trashed (we can just put that on Willow's tab, I guess). Willow is back on her feet, and defiant and mocking towards Giles, who's upright but looking a bit worse for wear. Willow is quite arrogant about her power. Nothing can hurt her, she boasts. It's clear she's insulating herself against more than just physical pain. "I see," says Giles, perhaps calling on his recollection of Jenny's death, "if you lose someone you love, then the other people in your life who care about you become meaningless? I wonder what Tara would say about that." Willow hardens herself emotionally every time Tara is brought up, and this is no exception. "You can ask her yourself," she says, hurling her power at Giles. Buffy knocks Giles out of the way, allowing for more property damage. Willow is annoyed by Buffy's heroism, and not for the first time. She summons a fireball, announcing that it will fly off to kill Jonathan and Andrew, and anyone with them (knowing full well that that is Xander and Dawn). With a very Wicked-Witch-like "Fly, my pretty, fly" she lets it go, and is happy to see Buffy leave to try to stop it. Now she can go to work on Giles uninterrupted.

Willow is lecturing Giles, calling him a hypocrite for using magic to try to get her to stop doing magic. There's a distinction between her magic and his, but she's not interested in seeing it. She's tired of being told to be a good girl (an issue going back at least to "Dopplegangland". She points out that Giles is in no position to tell her what to do now, and we see that he's pinned to the ceiling. Willow drops him to the floor. She says that she used to be in awe of him, but now he's just jealous of her powers. She pins Giles to the ceiling again, and he zaps her with his power, which annoys her. Willow drops him to the floor, and puts her hand to his chest to suck his powers like she did to Rack, leaving a gravely wounded Giles on the floor. This time, the magic affects her differently. We get some very druggie imagery, and a suggestion that from this point forth, Willow isn't really Willow. Giles' magic seems to open up Willow to the world's pain in the same way that Cordelia was in "To Shanshu In L.A." - or perhaps it just forces her to finally feel her own. The difference is that Willow decides the world should die to avoid that pain, and she zaps herself away for parts unknown to get to work on that.

Xander is trying unsuccessfully to break into a crypt to hide in (I'm not sure why they haven't gone to Spike's crypt here). Xander gets preoccupied with trading insults with Andrew, and fails to notice the incoming fireball that's about to kill them until Dawn points it out. Buffy (who can run improbably fast when not trying to catch a helicopter) knocks Jonathan and Andrew out of its path, and the fireball smashes into the ground, creating a large hole. The ground collapses under Dawn, dropping her in, and Buffy (who seems like she could have avoided falling in if it wasn't in the script) soon follows. Xander, meanwhile, is knocked unconscious. Jonathan's and Andrew's swords conveniently find their way into the hole as well. The nerds themselves are okay, and with their captor/protectors out cold or vanished, they decide Mexico isn't such a bad plan after all.

At what's left of the Magic Box, Anya has finally awakened, and comes out of the back room, knocking the door off the hinges in the process. Surveying the ruins of her place of business, she spies the semi-conscious Giles on the floor. She apologizes for helping Willow ("Willow forced me to free her with her brain.") Giles says he's dying, much to Anya's dismay. He says he can see what Willow is doing (more mystical, unexplained rigmarole) - she's going to try to end the world.

The sun has risen, and Buffy is trying to climb out of the Very Big Hole, without much success. Given all the stuff we've seen her do, her failure here screams "plot device", but I'll humor it. Buffy and Dawn yell for Xander, to no avail. Buffy wants to build a big pile of coffins to climb out on. Dawn wants to follow the tunnels to Spike's, which sounds like a viable plan to me. Buffy wants no part of going near Spike's at the moment. Dawn lashes out at Buffy for not telling her about Spike's assault. Buffy (muttering against Xander) says Dawn didn't need to know, which frankly doesn't make much sense given that she was recently going to leave Dawn with him. Dawn chews Buffy out for her over protectiveness. Xander wakes up and calls down to them. As Buffy is urging him to find a rope, Anya teleports in. She brings the news that Willow is about to try to end the world - she's raising a big Satanic temple that was buried in the earthquake of '32 (the one that trapped the Master, I guess).

We cut to a shot of Black Magic Willow raising the Satanic temple. Looks pretty evil to me.

Anya explains that Willow intends to drain the planets lifeforce and funnel it through the effigy of Prosapexa (I can't even make an educated guess on spelling that one), burning the earth to a cinder. Translation - bad stuff will happen, and the details are unimportant. No magic or supernatural force can stop Willow. Buffy senses there's something Anya isn't telling her. Anya sadly admits that Giles is dying, and says she needs to get back to him. She zaps out.

Buffy calls out to Xander for a rope, but Xander is nowhere to be found. Buffy vows to Dawn that she will do what she can to fight Willow. As Willow is chanting on the bluff, she somehow hears Buffy's thoughts. Willow notes (and Giles somehow hears this too - continue to not ask questions) that Buffy won't go out without a fight, so she gives her one. Suddenly some sort of demons made out of roots spring out of the earth to attack Buffy and Dawn. Buffy takes up a sword to attack the demons, hacking a few of them apart, but soon realizes there are too many for her to defeat alone. In a moment that probably should have been more casual if the writers hadn't meant it to be a big symbolic deal, she asks Dawn to help. Dawn takes up the sword, and is surprisingly adept for a beginner.

Willow, her eyes black with evil, and squinting as though she's actually an actress with painful contacts, is chanting and channeling lightning at the effigy of She Who Cannot Be Spelled.

Meanwhile, Anya is giving Giles an emotional pep talk, trying to get him not to die. "Don't die - not yet - there are things I want to tell you." It's clear she feels a strong bond with Giles, although exactly what that bond is (romantic? parental? other?) remains undefined, giving the writers something to play with. Whatever it is, it's fun to watch. Anya thanks Giles for coming, while noting that he did give Willow the power to destroy the world, which might not have been the best idea.

As Willow is doing the apocalyptic thing, Xander suddenly appears in her way. Willow blasts him, but it seems to trouble her. Back at the Magic Box, Giles is relieved, taking Anya by the hand and assuring her it's not over.

Dawn gets in trouble, causing Buffy to yell that she's coming to help. Before she can get there, Dawn rolls free, grabs the sword that had escaped her, and beheads the demon most efficiently. We get a Very Important Power Shot of sword-wielding Dawn. "You think I never watched you?" she asks. The sisters get to hacking away back-to-back as more root-guys attack.

Xander gets up, interrupting Willow's apocalyptic work. "You can't stop this", she tells him. Xander says he gets that, but if the world is ending, where else would he want to be? Well, with Anya would be a possibility, but I digress. Willow mocks Xander's efforts to stop her by telling her he loves her, but that's pretty much what he has in mind. With Tara gone, Xander does have the best inroads into Willow's heart. He tells her about the first day of kindergarten, how he loved her then and still loves her when she's apocalyptically evil (Xander might want to consider making his newfound tolerance a habit). Willow lashes out at him repeatedly, but he keeps advancing, and keeps telling her he loves her. As he gradually reaches her humanity, her powers leach away, and she's reduced to flailing at him like Faith with Angel in "Five by Five", and finally convulsing in tears. The black hair and the veininess bleed away as Xander envelops a sobbing Willow in his arms and the world doesn't end.

At the Magic Box, a disconsolate Anya is stunned to see that Giles isn't dead, embracing him to the point that he has to ask her to stop. Giles explains that the magic Willow took from him did what it was supposed to - it allowed Xander to reach the humanity that remained within her. His magic was "the true essence of magic", while Willow's "came from a place of rage and power" (I was expecting Yoda about now). "And vengeance", Anya adds, indicating that she may be rethinking her line of work. Anya is left to ponder the fact that Xander saved the day, seemingly unsure whether she should be angry or proud.

In the hole, Buffy and Dawn realize that the crisis has passed. Buffy starts to sob convulsively, which leads Dawn to be annoyed that Buffy is disappointed the world didn't end. Buffy insists it's happy crying. She's sorry for all the things that have been wrong, and she wants to make it better - she wants to show Dawn the world, not protect her from it. We know it's the season finale, so this should count- unlike many other Big Weepy Moments, this time Buffy will likely not get de-epiphanied.

As Buffy and Dawn emerge from the grave-like hole in the ground, Sarah MacLachlan chimes in, singing the Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi ("make me an instrument of your peace..."). It seems, largely, that everyone is where they are supposed to be. Buffy is back on good terms with Dawn (the best part of herself, as she described her last year). Xander is consoling Willow, who is most likely finally allowing herself to grieve for Tara, not to mention regretting her actions. Anya is helping Giles out of the ruins of the Magic Box. Jonathan and Andrew are nervously sharing a ride with a too-friendly trucker. As the song reaches it's conclusion, Buffy and Dawn walk in a graveyard far more scenic (and Garden of Eden-like) than we have seen before.

"And it's in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.", the song concludes, as we see a badly beaten Spike lying in the cave. The demon informs him that he has endured the trials. Spike demands what he wants - "make me what I was - so Buffy can get what she deserves". The demon agrees, grasping his chest - "we will return your soul".

It's been a long and trying journey, on a crooked path, but hopefully something worthwhile has occurred. Buffy has, we think, finally fully regained the will to live - this time, it's not just another false start. Dawn may now overcome her understandable self-pity and start to get on with living. Giles should now have a better understanding of his obligation to be a part of Buffy's life, even if he does so from England. Xander is hopefully off his moral high horse - if he can love the woman who's trying to end the world, perhaps he can summon some forgiveness for Anya, or even, God forbid, for Spike. Anya seems to be on the verge of a decision to take her life in a direction that opposes her existence as a Vengeance Demon.

Which leaves the two characters most at the crossroads - Willow and Spike. Spike, while he's been making an effort at goodness, has a long track record of bloody mayhem that he's never really regretted in anything more than a theoretical sense. Now he has, for reasons other than moral conviction, sought out the ability to really, truly feel regret. There's really no telling how that might turn out. And Willow, who has had a soul all along, has done awful things - not just the bloody murder of Warren, or the effort to end the world, but the things she revealed about her inner resentments of Buffy, Giles, and Dawn. She's got a long, bumpy road ahead of her. Where do we go from here ?

-- Jerry

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