"Potential," written by Rebecca Rand Kirshner. Season seven, episode 134.
"Storyteller," written by Jane Espenson. Season seven, episode 138.
"I see more than anybody realizes, cos no one's watching me...You're not special. You're extraordinary."
Xander, "Potential."
"You've already met Buffy. She's beautiful with a lion's heart and the face of an angel. She's never afraid because she knows her side will always win."
"Honestly, gentle viewers, these motivating speeches of hers get a little long."
Andrew, "Storyteller."
"I knew we'd always do that again. One more time anyway."
"Is that what this was? One more time?"
"Do you think there should be more?"
"I don't know. It was nice. It felt like...like a 'one more time.'"
"I think we're really over. Which—it's good, right? Now we can move on?"
"Sure."
Xander and Anya, "Storyteller."
"Here's the thing. I killed my best friend. There's a big fight coming, and I don't...think I'm going to live through it. That's probably the way it should be."
Andrew, "Storyteller."
In the best of all worlds, this would be a year long course—or at least a semester. I know we skipped an entire season, watched one episode from the next, and now we're six episodes from the end of the series. A lot has happened that we've never even seen: Buffy's other boyfriend, Riley; the death of Tara; the descent into evil by Willow; Xander's becoming a responsible adult with a regular job; Spike and Buffy's tortured love affair; Spike's redemption; Giles' leaving; the reason the potentials have ended up in Sunnydale. Sorry guys. There's always Netflix and Wikipedia to fill in the blanks.
There are those who loved the series and thought it should have ended after the fourth season, where Buffy dies. The original intent of the show, a show about the hell of high school, had long been achieved; and the tone of the show got darker and more serious—no more hell hounds and Inca Mummy Girls and Willow and Cordelia running from some monster, screaming, nor Giles and/or Xandet getting knocked out in three seconds. This is, as we discussed with "The Body", a series about young adults in that netherworld between adolescence and adulthood. Now, seven series in, that's probably done as well. Buffy is the adult, the one making life and death decisions for these scared potential slayers, not to mention her best friends. Giles is gone, "no longer standing in the way" of Buffy's full growth as he sang in "Once More With Feeling." We're a long way from the Buffy who wrote "Buffy—heart—Angel" on her notebook. I don't know if this makes the show less interesting, less dramatic, but it certainly makes it different. Not coincidentally, Dawn is a sophomore in this last season—the age Buffy was when the series began.
"Potential" and "Storyteller" are two unusual episodes in our viewing, though they speak to the adventurousness and willingness to try something different that the later seasons engaged in more and more often. Buffy really is a secondary character in both episodes. And in "Storyteller," Andrew—a minor character elevated to someone major—acknowledges something that some viewers complained about at the time: Buffy, as an adult and leader, was a bit of a bore—her speeches did go on and on. Joss Whdeon clearly made this part of her character. Giles made being The Man seem so easy, and clearly it isn't, not even for Buffy. And Buffy's lessons to the potentials can be confusing: as Molly—or is it Vi (I can't keep track of the potentials)—asks Buffy, are they supposed to make out with a vampire before they kill it? Andrew's hilarious video narrative speaks of Buffy's lack of fear—which should be the heroic narrative, but as we know, isn't here.
Anyhow. All this is a lead up to the final three episodes we'll be watching. So:
1. Your reaction to the two episodes? What particularly struck you in each episode? In fact, since Buffy is, arguably, secondary in both, what is each episode really about?
2. How is Buffy as an adult in these two episodes? Give specific examples from each episode in answering this.
Tomorrow: ""Lies My Parents Told," a Spike centered episode, and "End of Days," the penultimate episode. Giles returns with other slayers and Faith, the bad slayer of season three; and we meet Caleb, the very bad preacher who is in cahoots with The First. See you then.
