Buffy for Beginners 3.11: Gingerbread

By Sabrina Boyer

Everyone knows the story of Hansel and Gretel, right? A father abandons his two little kids in a forest because he does not have the money to feed them; knowing this, the kids leave breadcrumbs behind so they can find their way back to their house. However, the breadcrumbs are eaten by the forest creatures; Hansel and Gretel stumble upon a house made of gingerbread and candy and are invited in by the old woman who lives there so she can fatten them up and eat them. Outsmarting the old woman, the kids end up shoving her in the oven, escaping, and finding their way back home. Now, is it me, or does this sound like any number of creepy slashery scary movies in the last ten years? This is supposed to be a children’s fairy tale? Seriously?

And so, this episode begins in much the same creepy vein as the German fairy tale, with Buffy out patrolling for scary vamps/demons, the usual, when her mother, Joyce, shows up to “spend quality time” with her daughter. While slaying. “Mom, what are you doing here?” “I brought you a snack!” Joyce would like to understand and share the slaying with Buffy. “Good honey! Buffy, he’s over here!” The vamp Buffy fights ends up to be Mr. Sanderson from the bank; As Buff does the bam, stick, boom, Joyce wanders over to the playground only to discover two dead children, one boy, one girl. Let the ridiculous fear and anger begin.

Somehow, in all of Sunnydale, hellmouth extraordinaire, after all the deaths, unexplained phenomena, etc., it’s two little kids who get Sunnydale’s panties in a bundle? Buffy promises Joyce she’ll find whoever did this, and Joyce’s response? “It’s just, you can’t. You can’t make it right.” So, Buffy heads over to Giles of course and tells him there was a symbol that was on their hands;  a triangle with a squiggly line across it. Giles tells Buffy this suggests a ritual murder, a cult. “Someone with a soul did this?” Buffy gets all people bad, demons bad, and wants to go in for the kill. No questions asked, no research done; she just wants to find the culprits. Meanwhile, Oz, Xander, and Willow share an awkward lunch together and Buffy let’s them in on the 411. Joyce shows up during lunch and Buffy tells her about Giles’ ideas about who dun it. Joyce goes on a tirade about witches and cults; “makes me grateful that my mom isn’t concerned about my extra-curricular activities…or my curricular activities,” Willow muses.

Meanwhile, Joyce has called all of her friends in town and there’s a vigil down at city hall. We finally get to meet Willow’s mother, who is absolutely clueless about who Buffy is (she calls her Bunny) and apparently, about who Willow is as well; “you cut your hair, that’s a new look,” Sheila, Will’s mother says. “Yeah, it was a sudden whim I had in August.” More talk about witches being responsible and then, the mayor. Blah blah blah political rhetoric, Sunnydale’s a good town, and then, the quintessential mantra: “never again!” Anytime we see or hear that mantra, you know things have gotten severely black and white. Joyce takes the podium and calls the Mayor out; “How many of us have lost someone who’s gotten skinned, or suffered neck rupture?” Silence is this town’s disease. “This isn’t our town anymore. It belongs to the witches, and the monsters, and the slayers.”

Wait, the what? The slayers? You mean Buffy??? Whoa. Fear and ignorance are a deadly combination. And then, the episode places us in Joyce’s place: cut to a scene of Amy, Willow and some other girl doing witchy witchcraft. Complete with the symbol found on the kid’s hands. And then we have to question what we know. Could Willow really be responsible for this heinous crime?

Of course not. Then we get to see fear manifest itself on those who are different; kids are picking on other kids, and Buffy shows up as the muscle to keep the peace. Buffy finds Willow’s notebook and sees the symbol. What? “A doodle, I doodle, you doodle, you do doodle too!” Things get wicked serious when lockers are searched without warrant or reason; “Aw, man, it’s Nazi Germany and I’ve got Playboys in my locker!” cries Xander. The symbol is a protection image that Willow did for Buffy’s birthday. Amy and Willow are taken away. Books are stolen from the library and Gile’s personal collection. It is Nazi Germany.  Only Snyder’s not responsible for the book censorship and destruction. MOO is. Mothers Opposed to the Occult. A powerful new group founded by Joyce.

Willow tries to become a person to her mother and not just an age group, but is locked away in her room and labeled a delusional teenager. “I’m supposed to mess up; I’m a teenager! Prince of night I summon you! Come fill me with your black naughty evil!” Buffy and Willow are separated and MOO just wants to “weed out the offensive material.” The thing is, who decides what’s offensive and where do we draw the line? That’s the thing about censorship. Once it starts it doesn’t stop. Oh, and Joyce is seeing and talking to the creepy dead children. Uh oh.

Buffy muses on her lack of change; her slaying and her never winning. And they never will. They fight because there are things worth fighting for. And Buffy finally calls out the obvious. Who are these kids? What are their names? We know nothing about them except for their deaths. Through computer research, the Scoobies find out that the same kids have been killed all over the world since 1648. Hansel and Gretel. Oh, and Willow’s mother “lets her go.” Giles surmises that fairy tales are real. That some demons thrive on communities turned savage. And things get officially not funny when kids are being attacked, people are taken out of their homes, and all of a sudden we’re in Salem, Mass during the witch hunts. Joyce chloroforms Buffy and Giles and the ghostly kids tell Joyce to kill ‘em all.

Head down to city hall and Buffy, Willow and Amy are tied to large stakes and are about to be lit on fire. Oz and Xander want to be part of the hate down at city hall; “What’s with the grim?” “Just so we’re clear, you do know you’re crazy right?” Oz asks. He’s a man of few words but they’re all the right ones. Amy gives ‘em a witch and turns herself into a rat; the rest of the Scoobies work to save them; Giles mutters an unveiling spell and the kids turn into the real demon that it is; Cordy puts out the fire and Buffy stakes the big demon responsible with the stake she’s still tied to. “Did I get it? Did I get it?” Yeah, she got it.

Oh, and Willow and Buffy try to turn Amy back to a human. No luck there. She’s still a rat. “Maybe we should get her one of those wheel thingies.” Maybe.

Never miss an update. Subscribe to Pink Raygun by Email or subscribe via RSS

About Sabrina Boyer: As a kid my dad would sneak scary movies past my mom and let me indulge in his horror movie fetish. I grew up watching V, Alien Nation, The Thing, The Fog (all originals) and then, in 1992 when Buffy the movie came out, I became obsessed with vampires, girl power, and all things gothic. I once stayed home from school, faked sick, and watched BTVS: the movie 6 times in a row. I know the beginning cheerleading dance by heart (still). Currently, I’m obsessing over Laurell K. Hamilton novels, and dream about Anita Blake being my best friend.

Related Stuff: