Buffy the Vampire Slayer || 7x19 || Discussion

I'm fully, fully, fully Team Buffy in this whole argument. No point in going into it a month after this was posted, but yeah, I know Buffy's not perfect, but this was just out of control and rude af.

indaeo

don't listen to a guy who just wants to make Caleb's misogyny seem less important cuz "he hates everyone" pls 😭😭 his character is VERY MUCH about misogyny and its very relevant with what's happening.

angelcakes

very interesting point! im gonna keep it in mind watching the next few eps

Alley Box

also side note: but I love how Robin and Faith both supported Buffy testing the potentials but completely pretend like they weren’t during the last scene xD. I’m a huge Faith fan but… what aholes!

Cotubug

Interesting so many people find the last scene badly written. It’s very annoying to me as a Buffy stan, but I find it quite plausible that everyone would be acting in tense and more extreme ways given the serious post-traumatic stress all the characters are experiencing about this apocalypse. It really add to the sense that this battle is different and can’t be won (which is where all the characters are mentally with it)

Cotubug

Not for the first time Buffy's so called friends turn on her . I seriously hoped that everybody except Buffy & Spike were killed .

Jim Greer

The ending of this episode is SUCH b/s! Gah!! How DARE they! Buffys “lucky”?! She hasnt “earned it”?! Errrm were you here the last however many years?? “Nobody said you deserve…” errrm, she was CHOSEN!!! How dare they. Buffy DIED for dawn, was ripped out of heaven by willow, xander, anya, (tara) and then had to just suck it up and get a job and start slaying again while they all swanned about… these girls are in HER house, UNIVITED and all they do is complain and push back… gah! Who are you robin? You been here 5mins, how about you back off with your vendetta, huh?! Howwww daaaare theyyyyy! Whether buffy is being reckless or not is irrelevant to me during that whole thing. Everytime i see this episode i an furious

Holi117

Also, for the first time ever, I noticed that one of those cops is Billy lol. ALSO your nephew is adorable, hope you all are getting some sleep!!

Mary Kate

While I hate the ending of this episode with a passion because I think it's executed poorly, thematically I don't have a problem with it. The truth is that Buffy's been treating the potentials--and her friends--like an army that must follow orders, not a group of equals who deserve to make their own calls. In a show that's all about choice, the idea of that army committing mutiny is meaningful and important to a discussion of how power should be used. Buffy's letting herself disconnect from the others and treating them almost like cannon fodder, and that's not good for them or her. She hasn't even learned some people's names (and before people are like, she doesn't have time, she's spread too thin, that's the point. If she was surrounding herself with equals who could share the emotional load, she would have more energy to do the important stuff like engage with the potentials). As much as Anya's delivery of her lines in this ep drives me up the wall, she's not wrong that Buffy's leadership throughout the show isn't because she's the slayer. She's a good leader because she values others and tries to empower them, not control them. The slayer thing is incidental, but she's been resting on it through much of the season as reason for why what she says goes. The vineyard is a bad plan, but that's just the match that catches fire to the gasoline that's been brewing all season. This season is "about power" and the show is trying to show that power should never be used to dominate, even with the best of intentions or when it's expedient. I love Buffy, but she had a lesson to learn. I just wish the writers had done it more evenly and clearly, and without throwing the other characters under the bus, because the way they do it makes the message get mostly lost. It's such a vicious scene that people ignore whether the scoobies have a good point (which they do) and focus on defending Buffy from what feels like a betrayal instead of a needed confrontation.

Mitch M

I also disagree that Caleb is ALL about Misogyny. Not defending him but he does say that Eve is unclean because she came from Adam who was also unclean for what was he but human. He is a misogynist for sure but I also just think he is a misanthrope with a hatred leaning towards women. I genuinely think he just hates everyone even if not equally.

TheEvilSmurf42

I agree that running back to the vineyard is a bad plan. These girls are not ready. But it's absurd that everyone pushes back so hard that they KICK HER OUT OF HER OWN HOUSE. I don't believe Dawn would do that and I don't believe Willow, Xander, and Giles would go along with it. That's just a contrivance to set up for the next episode, which means it's bad writing. And it pisses me off that we're getting poorly written episodes THIS CLOSE To the end of the series. I have been mad about this for YEARS

Mary Kate

Yes indeed ... good point! One thing that runs through pretty much all of Joss' work ... Buffy, Angel, and Firefly at least ... is a libertarian streak. He really seems to distrust any movement for "Good" beyond lone warriors or very small teams of human individuals making small-scale efforts. I wonder if that's one of the problems with Buffy's expanded team of the Scoobies + Potentials. It's to BIG and ORGANIZATION-like.

Andrew Pulrang

about the democracy vs dictatorship bit... kinda makes me think of Jasmine over on Angel. that's a great connection im not sure i had made before.

angelcakes

I love Buffy but I definitely have to side with everyone else, she was reckless and Giles was right about no on being on the same page. Whereas she doesn't feel like she can trust or no one has her back while they do and have been going through with all her plans but it makes them feel belittled to think she doesn't trust them while they have risked their lives to fight alongside her for seven years. How about the potentials? These girls are young and came for protection and now preparing for battle, that is a lot to ask of them.

I don't hate this turn in the plot. But it does feel like Joss and the writers wanted to cram a bunch of intense and quite appropriate but so far under-explored ideas inherent to the Buffy story. Mostly it's, "Is Buffy fallible, and if so, what are the Scoobies, individually and collectively, supposed to do about that?" Also, intentionally or not, it kind of raises one of the deeper themes of "superhero" storytelling ... Are these teams fighting for the Good democratic and egalitarian? Or are they benign dictatorships and aristocracies? Plus, it gives Faith another chance to demonstrate whether her differences with Buffy are just "attitude," or does she have another, possibly perfectly valid approach to the Slayer role? I'm not saying it tackles these questions very well, but I think it's what they are trying to do here. That, and some other things which may emerge later.

Andrew Pulrang

the amount of times Xander makes jokes about losing an eye is interesting after this and the last episode. I know of at least three times

kelly mc

Just as a side note: when a character says something, or does something that you don't think that character would do & there is no justification for in the text, get mad at the writer not the characters. It's not Giles fault the writers didn't have a clue what they wanted him to be anymore.

John Alexander