Willow Rosenberg chants softly at the edge of a quiet brook. She wears pink and white. Sunlight sparkles in the water. Grasshoppers chirp. Nearby, a faun walks beside a tree. It approaches her confidently. She smiles and pets the young deer. Then Willow grabs the knife beside her and pushes it deep into the animal's hide. It struggles briefly and stops. She finishes reciting her spell. She looks around nervously. Welcome to the sixth season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Things are about to get painful.
This makes sense, in a way. If Buffy the Vampire Slayer is both a long-form story and a week-to-week monster-fest, this season should serve as the natural "low point" before the final act. The extended sequence in which life (and supernatural antagonists) hit the characters hardest. Funnily, this was also the time when the series moved from the WB to UPN. Bringing Buffy back to life at the beginning of the season, after her death at the end of Season Five, should seem like a cause for excitement and hope among both viewers and her friends, but the mood is uncertain on-screen. To paraphrase Ed Wood, Buffy's clan might be tampering in Gods' domain.
That they rescue her from the afterlife is no surprise. We still have two seasons left with the Scooby Gang. What is surprising is that Buffy, adapting to life-after-violent-death, mistakes Earth for Hell. By the end of the season, the show seems to share her perspective. The relationship between Xander and Anya suffers from mutual insecurities. Willow's magical strength grows beyond her control. The leadership of Giles is missing. Even in "Once More With Feeling," the spirited musical episode that stands as a season highlight, most of the songs focus on the characters' fears and suspicions.
Focusing on the darker side of Buffy, which has always maintained a balance between real-world emotion and cheery pulp absurdities, is a bold decision, but the effect creates an overall sensation of imbalance. Maybe the problem is that, since the show naturally exaggerates its angst, the constant anxieties feel too outsized. Maybe the problem is that, with long-form television, such a sustained downward spiral inevitably grows more wearying than affecting. I can't imagine what viewers must've felt at the time, turning in week after week to watch beloved characters circle the drain of their worst impulses, as when Spike nearly rapes Buffy, and when Willow erases her girlfriend's memories of an argument.
Even episode titles feel grim. "Smashed." "Wrecked." "Dead Things." "Gone." "Entropy." "Villains." "Grave." The re-structured creative staff (Whedon left to pursue Firefly) tries to ease some of the discomfort by making the "Big Bad" of the season a clumsy trio of nerds. Their efforts to take over Sunnydale stem from boredom and lead to endless Stooge-inspired mishappery. Even these characters, however, aren't above corruption. Warren (Adam Busch), deserves special mention for looking under the rock of his alpha dork status and finding a viper's nest of misogyny and hatred. In a universe of larger-than-life antagonists, this is a normal person driven to emotional extremes. Forget inter-dimensional gods. A bitter man with a gun is terrifying enough.
Inside the darkness of this season, certain truths emerge. The undeniable skill of the actors, for one. They commit to the story turns and invest them with convincing emotion, even when what's happening feels entirely unnatural (Buffy and Spike making harsh love, for example). Upgraded supporters Emma Caulfield and Amber Benson more than hold their own against series veterans. For another, the show's mature handling of potentially exploitative material. Namely, the lesbian relationship between Willow and Tara (Amber Benson). Their interactions are more about connection than kink, and the emotions run surprisingly (terrifyingly) deep.
Also, while this show (and, for that matter, Angel) displays an overabundance of demons, gods, dimensions and heavens and hells and spells and enchantments and talismans...there's a fundamental ignorance of the religious side of things. Or, at least, the more religious concepts (like the existence of Heaven and Hell) never provoke any spiritual insight. For all the magic, there's no sense of an all-powerful divinity guiding the heroes, no holy righteousness guiding their crusade. One of the images in Angel's credits is Angel cradling a crying woman in the rain. At the end of this season, the most haunting image is a mirror of that. One main character crying, another holding her, both kneeling on the ground. In spite of all the hidden spheres and higher beings, these people are on their own.
See, the risk with producing a fantasy show is falling too far into supernatural hierarchy, which ends up diluting the real-world stakes. Just ask Damon Lindelof or Ron Moore, whose series suffered after introducing too many God-like beings and powers that stood outside the scope of character (and viewer) understanding. Buffy isn't completely above such things (that "chosen one" stuff would feel hoary in any genre context), but what may look like a problem - the focus on human miseries this season - reminds me of the fundamental strength of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It is always, truly, about the characters. If things are a little too blunt this go around, it doesn't matter. I love chirpy, sly Buffy, and I love dark, obvious Buffy.
Because let's face it. Buffy's always been about growing up, and the slayer's out of college now, and being an adult isn't like being a child. The usual binaries don't work. The people we dismiss early in life become diverse, impossible to classify and reduce. The structures of order crack against the ever-increasing variables around us. Life is messy, and the world is enormous and unforgiving. Sometimes, we can fight it on our feet, back-to-back, us and the people we love keeping the darkness at bay. Other times, we can lose, and we can lose horribly. Then life is about how we help each other pick up and move on. Some days, it's unbearable. Some days, it's like Hell.
RATING: B+
Former Buffyverse Reviews:
Buffy, Season Five: A / Angel, Season Two: B-
Buffy, Season Four: B / Angel, Season One: B-
Buffy, Season Five: A / Angel, Season Two: B-
Buffy, Season Four: B / Angel, Season One: B-
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