Buffy for Beginners 4.9: Something Blue

By Sabrina Boyer

Poor Willow. She’s still blue about Oz leaving. As a viewer, I’m blue too about Oz’s rapid exit. But after the bad show of Angel and Buffy’s relationship, we oughta know that love doesn’t end well in Sunnydale. As Will looks on in Oz’s room, sniffing his pillow, Buffy happens upon Riley hanging a “Lesbian Alliance” sign from the archway of one of the main buildings. Buffy smiles at his handsome good ‘ole boy charm. “Is there something you want to tell me?” she asks. “Yes, I am a lesbian,” Riley responds, good naturedly. He asks her out on a picnic. He lets it slip that he does “prep work” before their conversations. She’s a mystery, that there’s a lot about her that needs puzzling out. “I lose you somewhere?” he asks. “Right around beautiful,” she says.

On patrol that night, Buffy and Will discuss the very ordinariness of Riley. She likes him. Likes being around him. He cares about her. But she feels like something is missing: he’s not making her miserable. “Riley seems so solid. Like he wouldn’t cause me heartache. I have to get away from that bad boy thing. There’s no good there.” But Buffy is wondering if a nice, safe relationship can be that intense and passioney. For some reason, she’s gotten it into her head that real love and passion goes hand in hand with pain and suffering. I wonder where she gets that from?

Meanwhile, Spike is chained up in Giles’ tub, and Buffy gives him the third degree about the Commandos. Spike wants the tele on, and Giles brings Spike his warm blood in his “kiss the librarian” mug. Giles reassures Spike that they have no intention of killing a flaccid, impotent vamp. Buffy teases Spike with her poor, exposed neck. They’re like grade-school kids teasing each other on the playground. Will comes up with the idea of a truth spell for Spike. Giles asks Buffy about Will and how she’s dealing with the pain. “What?” Spike says. “She’s hanging on by a thread. Any ninny can see that.” We realize he’s right when Will goes by Oz’s pad and all of his stuff is gone. It probably means he plans on settling down somewhere else, not here. That night, Buffy tries to comfort Will as she realizes that Oz is really…gone.

“Come on now! It’s tele time!” Spike screams from his tub the next morning. “Passions is on! Timmy’s down the bloody well! If you make me miss it, I”ll….” Spike screams, “What?” Giles asks. “You’ll lick me to death?” As Giles and Spike spend quality time together, Buffy and Riley discuss her lack of driving ability; she’s a full on pedestrian. Will comes by and brings the sad to the picnic, pointing out their apples are turning brown, the way they do. Yeah. She really needs to find the fun.

And she does, that night at The Bronze as she dances and guzzles the beer. The gang doesn’t love her drowning…or wading…of her sorrows. She can’t stand the pain, and insults Xander in the process. Buffy tells her she has to go through the pain, that that’s the only way there is. Will wants to make it go poof. I gotta say that there’s nothing really that bad about easing the pain with a little liquid painkiller, as long as it’s not every night, and not the chosen path of dealing. But Will can’t stand the pain either way, so that night in the girl’s dorm bathroom, she makes a circle of candles and does some kind of spell, that her “will” be done. Literally.  She wants her heart to be healed. But it doesn’t work. Only, it works in the way she doesn’t expect. Her will begins to affect her friends.

Like when Giles comes by the dorm to ask her about their missed appointment in dealing with Spike, she yells at him about his “lack” of seeing anything dealing with her pain. And then, poof! He can’t seem to see. Like, out of his eyes. He can’t see so much that Spike’s able to escape that night. As Will complains to Buffy, she’s able to turn Amy back to a normal girl only to turn her back to a rat, without noticing it at all. One of the many references back to season there’s Gingerbread that we get. Hilarious. Then Will tells Buffy that she’ll probably be able to find Spike in like two seconds, and she does. It’s Will’s….well, will. Back at Giles’ Buffy’s up for a good slay, and as Xander explains that Buffy needs Spike to find the Commandos, Will says “fine, why don’t they just marry each other.” And then Giles comes out to find Buffy and Spike engaged. And kissing. Giles squints on, not believing what he’s seeing. Yeah, can’t say I blame him.

As Will laments even more about doomed love, she tells Xander that he’s nothing but a demon magnet. And in bizarro world over at Giles’, Buffy and Spike are sickening. I mean, seriously. As she pouts about him not taking their wedding seriously (it’s all a big joke to him!), he says “Look at that lip. Gonna get it. Gonna. Get. It.” Ew. And surprisingly hilarious and kinda cute. But still disgusting. They also fight over the exes Angel and Dru while talking about making sweet love on their wedding night. And then Giles goes completely blind, and Spike helps Giles cause he’s like family and all. While Buffy is out getting supplies for a reversal spell to help out Giles, she sees a wedding dress in a store window and tells Riley she’s getting married. To Spike. And in a weird foreshadowing event, she ponders why they fought for so many years, probably because they couldn’t admit how they really felt about each other. And that comes close to the truth later on in season six.

Meanwhile, Xander gets attacked by demons, because, you know, he’s a demon magnet. Giles is blind until tomorrow while Buffy and Spike talk weddings. Xander shows up at Giles’ and hilarity ensues. As Xander points his fingers at Giles to test his blindness, Giles replies, “stop, whatever you’re doing, you smell like fruit roll-ups.”

“This is the crack team that foils my every plan?” Spike asks. Yeah. Xander realizes that all of this sounds familiar. They figure out that Willow did a spell to have her will be done, and they head out to find her. D’Hofferyn, Anya’s ex-demon boss makes a visit to Will, telling her “vengeance” and her “pain” is like a scream that pierces dimensional walls. She’s perfect for being a vengeance demon. She declines, and the gang heads to the cemetery to try and open a portal to get her back. Of course, demons attack, they fight, Will gets told that what she did to her friends was inspiring, and she’s teleported back to the real world. She breaks her spell, just as Spike and Buffy are kissing. “Spike lips! Lips of Spike!”

Later the next day, Willow makes cookies and has agreed to detail Giles’ car. She also wears a shirt that says “speak no evil.” “Don’t I get a cookie?” Spike asks. He still has Buffy taste in his mouth. Oh, and Buffy wanted “Wind beneath my wings” as the first dance. And then she realizes that she told Riley she was getting married. Oh crap. Just another little piece of the Buffy puzzle.

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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.

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