season seven  >  touched

This episode caused me quite a bit of mental anguish, so rather than relive it and then have to spend the effort to sue ME for irreversible mental damage, I'm keeping it short. Truly, at this point, I'm so annoyed I don't even feel like wasting my snark on this crap.

That's right, I said it, CRAP. And I'll say it many times. Probably during this recap.

So, Buffy's been booted and Dawn feels real bad. Considering she's the one who went all Judas kiss on her, I'm refusing to feel her pain. The camera man goes all NYPD Blue on our asses and jerks around quite a bit. This, in case you were wondering, is meant to convey "tenseness"? The SiTs freak out, the one that Xander fantasized about is allowed to speak, and I swear to god they use different extras for the SiTs every single scene. I find that annoying. But whatever. The lights go out. Faith guesses that the power company left town like everybody else, and why that would take all the power in the city down is beyond me. But I don't write this shit. I just complain about it. [The power left town too! -SP]

While Faith tucks the little buggers snug into their sleeping bags, Buffy breaks all dejectedly into a strange man's house, takes his gun and kicks him. She then expresses displeasure about the lack of Tab in his house. Do they still make Tab? Seriously? And people still drink it? [And isn't that a recycled joke from Back to the Future. Like from 1985? And back to breaking into a strange man's house. WTF?]

Andrew and Spike play a game of "I spy" in the monastery of stupidity while waiting for the sun to go down. Which, thankfully, Andrew spells out for us, in case we thought that they were just hanging out for fun. Because I know I like to hang around monasteries, listening to a crazy souled vampire whine about the girl he has a crush on being in danger without his little ass to protect her. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that there is nothing important about this scene. This scene is a waste of time. Much like this paragraph is a waste of space. I'm just trying to convey how much of a waste this scene was.

Faith is down in the basement with the SiTs and some other people I can't be bothered to remember, since the writers don't. After some bitching from Kennedy who seems to think she should be the boss and Willow telling her sweetie that she's being too pushy, Faith lays the smack down and tells the little bitches that she's in charge, so they'd better shut up and listen. She then decides they're going after the Bringers, since they're not big and scary and won't lecture them in a stupid southern accent like Caleb.

I'll get the magazines and start ripping out letters now. Dear The First, if you want your Bringer back -- well, we will be surprised because you have three million other ones...so please disregard this letter. Yours sincerely- -

Somewhere in here, Caleb and the First watched Bringers work on a big rock and ponder that really important question: Do Bringers sweat?

Spike and Andrew finally get back to the Summers' house. The gang acts all dodgy, then Willow steps forward to give him the lowdown on how everyone decided that Buffy needed a nap. Spike calls them all ingrates and then he and Faith start to beat each other up. You know, if there was a point to this, I wouldn't mind. But this show is getting down more and more with the gratuitous violence with less and less of a reason. If I thought this was a set up for a revelation that the longer one is a Slayer the more the beast takes over, much like Joss' original vision for vampires, or that a character would step back one day and go "woah, I need therapy. I solve everything with my fists" then I'd be fine with it. But they've danced around and made jokes about how Buffy solves everything with violence, and they've never gone anywhere with it. I love a good fight scene, but this? Faith and Spike beating on each other? It's pointless. Ooooh, everyone's on edge and hellmouthy. Not really a reason. We realize every single character on this show is dysfunctional, but if you're not going anywhere with it, find a new theme.

Anyway, Spike leaves to go sniff out Buffy and the gang hangs out in the kitchen, looking all sorts of guilty. Spike finds Buffy, who is curled up all dejected on a bed. He tells her she's right, they were wrong, and encourages her to take that power back. Buffy whines she's not sure she deserves it and maybe they were right. Blah blah blah.

Kennedy traipses down an alley and we're supposed to think she's sulking because she got shut down instead of everyone falling on their knees and worshipping her, when really she's the bait. When a Bringer attacks her and fails to kill her, Giles and some SiTs emerge from the shadows and bring that Bringer down like a little doggie. The SiTs kick some ass. And stuff.

The Bringer turns out to have had its tongue cut out, so luckily Dawn comes through with an ancient Turkish spell she found. You know, while randomly studying ancient Turkish. Berlitz has a program for that, right? Willow gets some stuff together and they try to cast the spell. Andrew is in the basement for the fun. One would think this would be pointless, Andrew being anywhere, but it turns out he has to be there because the Bringer's brain waves choose Andrew as their conduit. The Bringer says a lot of useless stuff, like we're really evil and we're not afraid of you and we are the Borg and you will be assimilated and we will dance on your graves. Stuff like that. Giles then slits the guy's throat. Before they get anything useful out of him. Come on, this show is all about the torture and hitting and everything-where's the organized torture to get him to talk? Couldn't Giles put those techniques he learned as Angel's bitch to good use? What the hell is going on here? And why the hell did Giles slit his throat like that? Does it mean anything? Will it? And why do they keep putting him in turtlenecks?

You are getting very sleepy. Very, very sleepy. I do not have a pocket watch but then again, you do not have eyes. Speak to us.

Oh, why do I care?

Oh, and the Bringer did say they were building an arsenal, so Faith decides to take the SiTs into the tunnels at first light to find them. She's all tense and shit, being in charge and stuff when she's used to being told where to go and when to go there for the past three years, so the First decides to show up at this time to shake her shit up some more. Realizing that the Buffy-guise might not be the best one here, he goes for the Mayor. Ah, the Mayor. *sniff* There was a villain I cared about. But, anyway, in response to Faith declaring that she knows what he is and to get out, the Mayor assures Faith that while he may be part of the First, he's actually also the Mayor. He knows everything the Mayor knows and blah blah blah. This feels like it should be important, and one wonders if the First's knowledge ends with the first death-like does his intimate knowledge of the Buffster continue, with her being alive again and everything? And wouldn't that mean that he always knows what's going on inside? And does that have any reason to do with why he shows up as Buff so much? You mean there could be a deeper meaning than just because he likes her silky, shiny hair?

Right. Anyway, he tells Faith to beware Buffy cuz she's dangerous, yo, and then tells her that he'll always be with her, in everything she does. Wood chooses this moment to show up, tells her the First came to him as his mother so he understands, and then they get it on. Please see SP's note on the previous recap about that being all the foreplay we would get.

Hitting things and a whole lotta Jack D dulls it some.

Meanwhile, Kennedy and Willow get it on after some extremely painful dialogue about kite strings. [And could hot girl-on-girl action be any …less hot? Who thought that sentence was even possible.] Then Xander and Anya get it on because, well, why not? I actually feel sorry for the SiTs at this moment. Who knew that could happen? Buffy and Spike, exhausted from their little lover's tiff about how she's good and right and he knows it and loves her and she doesn't want him to love her and I'm sure there was more but I fell asleep, just hold each other and gaze into each other's eyes until Buffy, also bored, falls asleep.

There's... junk, food cartons, sleeping bags not rolled up... everyone's very scared and uh, unkempt...

Spike wakes up alone to a note. Oooh, zing!

Buffy goes back to the vineyard, goes all retro-Buffy on us for one shining moment and traipses around the room, taunting Caleb while he tries to kill her. The First hangs out during the chase, being oddly glib, until Caleb asks her to go because she's confusing his poor, addled brain. He throws stuff at Buffy and she sees a door that was under some barrels. She slides into it and the door shuts after her. She finds Excalibur. Excalibur is a scythe that is supposed to be ancient, I hope you don't mind me jumping ahead here, but in fact looks like it is shiny and new and made last week to be used as a prop on the Battlestar Galactica movie.

This scene, by the way, is intercut with Faith and the girls having an interesting fight-by-flashlight in the sewers. They find a weapon store, get attacked, kill all the Bringers, and then go through a door. They go into another dark room and there's a little moat. Right. In the sewers. A moat. They cross a little bridge set over the moat in the sewers and Faith opens a lockbox. Inside is a bomb. Poor Faith. Poor, poor, about to be blowed up Faith.

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