BtVS 5.12 Checkpoint
P@rick
Oh my god! Glory is one. Actually a goddess. Or are deities asexual by
default? She is pretty sexual in my opinion, but in an entirely
different meaning. Too bad the Slayer isn't a man, or gay, so Glory
could seduce him and bang the key out of him.
I wonder how strong her minions are. Strong enough to kidnap a not so
tiny postman against his will without cuffing or sedating him. But weak
enough to get beaten up by Ben. Then again, if Glory is a god then maybe
Ben is some sort of god as well. Or maybe the minions carry weapons to
threaten helpless postmen with.
So, Glory is a god. Of course, being a god, she could locate The Key
just by snapping her fingers. But apparently it's not that simple. She'd
sooner be snapping necks to get to her Key. She practically knows that
Buffy is protecting it. Now it's just a matter of finding out how many
of her friends and family Buffy is willing to sacrifice in order to
protect the Key. The season is going to be very short when Glory starts
with Dawn.
Or when the Knights of Byzantium (better known as the Knights Who Say
Key) get to her first. They are an ancient order, and so are their
methods and weapons. Good thing they come in large numbers (well, next
time anyway). They know that Buffy protects the Key (must have looked it
up on the internet) but do they don't appear to know who the Key is. So
Glory wants the Key (and she is on a time schedule) and the Knights want
to destroy it. And Buffy is right in the middle of all that.
And then there are the Council Goons. Who take the first opportunity to
bribe their way into the Slayer's life again. Buffy is their instrument?
Well if they wanted control of their instrument back, they'd simply kill
her and wait for the next one to appear. Or kill Faith if she's the only
trigger to the new Slayer. But they wouldn't go through all the hassle
of sending a delegation to the US if Buffy wasn't important to them. And
if Buffy is that important to them, why didn't they try to get her back
on their team sooner. Glory probably isn't a threat to mankind, not that
they know of anyway, or they wouldn't have played hardball with Buffy.
Sadly Buffy realises all this only at the end of the episode. So the
rest of the episode her uncertainty towards the CoW is pretty
cringeworthy. Of course the stakes were high, but with all the training
and development Buffy's gone through lately, or so the writers told us,
she shouldn't be too worried about a physical test (where was Trevor
when Buffy demonstrated her skills on the Knights?). Buffy landing that
axe in the dummy was just too contrived. But hey, all ended well with
Trevor acknowledging all of Buffy's demands (a bit too sappy for my
taste). Giles is her official Watcher again and has access to all of the
CoW resources I assume.
Luckily the appearance of the CoW lead to some great scenes as well. I
loved the interrogation part with Willow/Tara/Xander/Anya. "We're
lesbian, gay-type lovers". You tell 'em Willow!
The Spike scene was great as well, except for the part where the Council
members, they who fight evil (but apparently don't kill it) fail to
spike Spike. Maybe he isn't perceived as being evil (nonsense) or maybe
they happily leave the dirty work to their 'instrument' (although the
mere fact that Spike is interviewable proves that the Slayer is unfit to
kill him). No matter how hard I try I can't come up with a logical
reason why they let Spike live. Now I'm even willing to believe that
Spike can hypnotise people into not killing him. Spike taunting Buffy
("Oh, it's the Slayer. For a second there I was worried.") was both
accurate and sad.
Although I have very mixed feelings about the CoW part of this episode,
and especially Buffy's reaction towards them, I did enjoyed this
episode. Even more on my second watch. Things are being set up and they
are rather promising. Glory is a god who swears to kill Buffy's friends
and family if she doesn't hand over the Key. The Knights have made it
their business to destroy the Key, and Buffy if she stands in their way.
And I think we can expect some more info on Glory and perhaps The Key
from the CoW. Yeah, this could get very good :)
Bye, Patrick
--
Keeper of the Willowism, "And I'm eating this banana. Lunchtime be
damned!"
Keeper of the Wily Willow Charms
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