Buffy: The Slouch Continues, Or How I Learned To Stop Bothering and Learned To Love The Devolution

Precious time is slippin' away
You know you're only king for a day
It doesn't matter to which God you pray
Precious time is slippin' away
--- Van Morrison

Ah yes, the penultimate episode ("End of Days") aired tonight, and though it was at least better than the moronic, manipulative game of sexual musical chairs we were treated to last week, it succeeded in further convincing me that the show has trapped itself in a corner and cannot get itself out without trite conventions and patently silly situations. Season 7 set itself up to deal with a lot of issues and a lot of characters (part of the problem: *way* too many characters), and with only 60 minutes remaining in the entire series, it now seems impossible-- barring some kind of miracle-- that there will be any sort of satisfying resolutions. Some general remarks:

Buffy: What ever happened to dealing with the reason for the First Evil's sudden desire to destroy the slayer line? After so much emphasis was put on the fact that the Slayer herself was the problem, we've not had it addressed in a LONNNNG time, and this penultimate episode didn't make a single gesture toward realizing it. And if the spoilers I've heard about the final episode prove true, all of that will have been a giant time-wasting Macguffin and I will be mighty pissed. Worse, the emphasis with Buffy herself has been on her romantic relationships (blech! enough already, or at least take it past the Dawson's Creek level of self-agonizing banality) and on her role as a general (okay, but even the other characters were tiring of her preachiness). There's one remaining possibility, which would go contrary to the spoilers I've heard, which is that Buffy herself becomes connected to the First Evil. Dramaturgically, this seems to me where it should have gone, but it seems like the Mutant Enemy team lost their nerve at the last. So we have a Buffy who's now less interesting than she was in Season One.

Angel: Blah. So trite, so hackneyed. A crappy entrance, and obviously there only for unity and to appease the legions of teenie-boppers still praying for a Buffy-Angel reunion. Also, his appearance is yet another deus ex machina gesture to get the show out of a nasty situation. But this use of the 'god out of the machine' rang hollow, utterly hollow; for a better version of this, see Giles' magnificent return at the end of Season Six with the classic line, "I'd like to test that theory."

Xander, Willow: They've been about as relevant as a tampon is to me. Xander gets to make a speech now and again, Willow gets to feel all tingly again and keep threatening us that she could go bad at any moment. But all of this is to no avail, and the characters are as paper thin as the walls in a Virginia Woolf novel.

Caleb: "Gee, aren't I menacing?" Well, no; the irony is that Buffy already faced a much more difficult challenge in Glory. "But we can give him all these crazy, wacky David Koresh aspects that will send chills down everyone's spines." No, it's stereotypical writing, and the show has never reconciled his supposed religiousity with his conscious embrace of evil. Next week, he'll get back up from the floor-- you know he's not dead yet.... Yawn.....

Faith: Nice to see her back, but what was the fucking point? It hasn't added anything to the story, and only succeeded really in serving as a satiation of those of us who wanted to see her again. She's been thrown to the crowd like a bone, and her whole sub-plot with leading the Slayerettes was little more than exercise in demonstrating how heavy the world weighs on poor Buffy's shoulders and that's why she's such a great heroine. *rolls eyes* Have the Mutant Enemy team forgotten that Faith is more than just a hottie? (Whew-- indeed, a hawt hawt hawt hawt hawttie, but I digress.)

Slayerettes: Pointless, time-wasting characters, mostly cannon fodder and bitch-bitch-bitchers-- except, of course, for Kennedy who's there to be a snot and to give teenage boys their fantasies of lesbians going at it. At least Chao-Ahn provides a few moments of comic relief.

Andrew: Yes, he's been developed, and he's become quite funny. But did keeping him around really add anything?

Dawn: Has there been a point at all to having her around?

Anya: How could they make such horribly little use of Anya, who has proven very often over her development to be either the much-needed splash of cold water for the others (as in "The Body") or the sorely-needed Falstaff to prick through the pretentious rhetoric of some of the characters, especially Buffy? Looks like she's meat to the dogs next week; after the corny conversation between she and Andrew tonight (wherein he anticipates his own death and her survival), you know who's going to die (probably saving the other). Cornball. It's been criminal what they've done to Anya this season.

Wood: Except to make yet another triangle of romance and revenge, has he really served any purpose? Oh, he had to supply the shadow device-- which ultimately proved useless. Really, he was put in here so the writers could feed more into the history of Spike.

Spike: Overdose, overdose, overdose. James Marsters has done what he could, but did we need to have him essentially be the bad-boy British version of Angel? Look for him to make the ultimate sacrifice next week. *Weep weep weep* *Puke puke puke* This is unfortunate because they could have done much more-- and much better-- with him in these final episodes.

The First Evil: This started as a great 'character'-- and in some episodes (like "Lessons" and "Conversations with Dead People") its polymorphous nature, oracular ambiguity, and subtle menace were terrific. (The last few moments of "Lessons" at the beginning of the season were brilliant.) But over the past several episodes the First Evil has been about as threatening as Mr. Snuffleupagus. The FE can see and know everything and exists everywhere, but doesn't know if the Bringers sweat? The FE has its centre everywhere and its circumference nowhere, and yet cannot keep tabs on the plans and machinations of the Scoobies? Bah. This should have been played out much more adeptly; the FE could have been the Biggest of the Big Bads. Instead it's become a caricature.

And my nominee for most wasted character of the season:

Giles: A great character, utterly wasted. The whole is he evil, is he not evil question was a total waste of time, and since then he's been little more than a cipher. Unless there's a hell of a surprise coming next week, there really was no point in bringing him back, even if it's always nice to see Anthony Stewart Head back on the show.

And think of all the red-herrings we've had teased before us but which so far have proven irrelevant: Beljoxa's Eye, Joyce's warnings, the Shadow Men, the slaughter of the Watcher's Council, the question of the First Slayer, the threat from D'Hoffryn, Willow's magic use, the uncertainty surrounding Giles' life and death, the demonic connections of being the Slayer, the declaration from the FE that this was "about power," the ramifications of the existence of two Slayers and two souled vampires, they've all been underdeveloped, handled fliply, or played as tricks of plot. And then tonight we have two new tricks out of the bag brought out as easy answers to the series' crises. Unless Joss Whedon has one helluva trick up his sleeve for next week (which IS possible, but highly unlikely), most of this season is gearing up to look like a giant waste of potential, and indeed a phenomenal waste of time. Maybe the Buffy crew needs to remember the words of Shakespeare's Richard II, "I wasted time, and now time doth waste me."

And, by the way, my title lied: I haven't learned to love the devolution. So much for the saying making things true. Joss, it's all up to you. Precious time is slipping away.... But a pair of warnings. If you put all of this is Buffy's mind from inside a mental institution, I'll hunt you down and gut you. This show deserves more than a Dallas-type ending. If it goes all "Spike sacrifices himself to save the world because of his truly eternal love for Buffy," I will hunt you down, tie all six of your extant appendages to Andalusian horses, and then I'll set the beasts asunder before dancing an Irish jig on the cankerous chunks of carcass that remain.

I kid, of course.

I can't do an Irish jig.