So Alyson Hannigan recently gave birth to her first child, a little girl. And even though she and husband Alexis Denisof didn't name the baby Willow, I'm excited for them. Hannigan and Denisof are pretty darn adorable.

See? Alexis is all, "Ooh! I'm gonna touch her boobs"! Or he's about to do the safety dance. I'm not sure which.

But Alyson's face in this next picture clearly says, "Neil Patrick Harris is grabbing my ass. It's awkward."

Alyson looks like she might be copping her own feel of NPH's behind and he's not minding too much. I think that Lily and Marshall are adorable, but I love it when Aly and NPH get to work together on How I Met Your Mother. I hope that Lily and Barney get over some of their antagonism so that there can be more episodes like "The World's Best Couple."

But can a robot lady learn to love?

Jane Espenson and I have a complex relationship. On the one hand, she wrote "Band Candy," "Earshot," and "Superstar." On the other hand, there's "Doublemeat Palace."

And "Triangle" joins "Him" on the Just Godawful list. I mean, this episode offends me.

"Triangle" attempts to soften Anya around the edges a little, but in order to make Anya sympathetic, Willow has to act like a callous shrew. Granted, Willow is not at her most likable during the first part of season five, but I find her behavior in this episode wildly uncharacteristic. She has expressed antagonism toward Anya in the past but never to this extent. And stealing ingredients from Giles? First, I have a very hard time believing Willow would do that, and second, I think that Anya would have had ample time to observe whether Giles occasionally lets Willow use inventory for free, so their argument over the ingredients seems contrived.

Emma Caulfield and Alyson Hannigan are — or at least were — good friends, and it’s obvious that they are having a lot of fun working together. And while both of them do some nice comedic acting, Willow and Anya’s bickering wears thin very quickly. But I do actually kind of like the suggested root of Willow and Anya's antagonism toward each other, namely that Willow fears Anya might hurt Xander and Anya feels a little threatened by Xander and Willow's history. That final argument about Xander does drag on a bit, but it feels like more old-school Buffy with a potentially sentimental moment undercut by the fact that Willow and Anya are yelling at each other and just as they reach an understanding a troll breaks down a door. However, if the writers were going to reach back to season three for the Willow/Xander stuff, couldn't they have pulled out some "Doppelgangland" baggage too? I mean, Willow does punch Anya for using her and joining forces with her evil alter ego to try to kill people in that episode.

I also cringe at Olaf's ultimatum to Xander. In an episode when, for the first time ever, Xander feels like he has to choose sides between his best friend and his girlfriend, he's actually asked to pick between the two women? Boring, obvious, and derivative.

While Willow and Anya's quibbling annoys instead of amuses, the episode's failure is only compounded by Buffy's "I have to keep Anya and Xander together because my needy, insecure boyfriend just left me" subplot. Sarah Michelle Gellar is a pretty decent actress most of the time, but she cannot funny cry or fake laugh. Her attempts here to weep humorously are agonizing, killing any entertainment potential that story might have contained. And though I didn’t really take offense at first, subsequent viewings have made me increasingly offended by this subplot's conclusion. Buffy blubbers about seeing Xander and Anya "good and alive and together" while completely ignoring Willow and Tara, who are also good and alive and together and standing right next to them. I know that Buffy has focused on Xander and Anya throughout the episode because she thought that they might be breaking up. But seeing as though their relationship was never in real jeopardy, her not recognizing Willow and Tara’s good, alive togetherness suggests that Buffy (and the show) doesn’t see the same sex couple as a real couple.

Spike trying to prove himself to Buffy is the only consistently amusing piece of this episode that's trying really hard to be a hour-long sitcom. I love his hopeful approach to Buffy when she arrives at The Bronze and his inability to understand why not feeding off accident victims doesn't win him any points with her. "What does it take?" And Anya does get some good lines when she is taunting Olaf. "Your roar is less than full-throated!"

I have trouble laughing at Olaf's dialogue that suggests the devouring of infants and raping of women. I'm just too much of a humorless feminist, I guess. The gratuitous destruction does not enamor me of this episode either. As I said before, excessive wreckage makes me twitchy.

I do like that Tara interacts with members of the group who aren’t Willow on more of an individual basis. She has two whole scenes alone with Buffy, and I always smile when Xander amends his "two favorite girls" comment to include Tara. But Willow and Tara's dynamic frustrates me. Tara's "I said 'quirky'" bit nicely hints at intimacy, but Buffy and Xander get more play from Tara and Willow respectively than the women give each other. Their "reunion" at The Bronze feels particularly awkward. Sure, Willow didn't know that Tara was worried about her, but she barely acknowledges Tara when she arrives with Buffy. So Tara is left staring at her girlfriend as if she wants to say something or to touch her but cannot because she has been inexplicably forbidden. It's ridiculous and uncomfortable and wouldn't have happened if they were a straight couple.

To compensate for Willow and Tara's lack of touching, Espenson includes two "Willow is gay" comments. The "Hello, gay now" statement annoys me because it oversimplifies gay identity, which the show never dealt with very well when Willow first came out. Also I hope that Willow wouldn’t break up Xander and Anya because, you know, she is committed to her relationship with Tara and learned from past experiences. I know that Espenson is going for a joke, but like most of Willow’s remarks in this episode the "gay now" comment comes across as too glib and facile. The second "Willow is gay" comment delivered by Anya puzzles me a bit. I like Alyson Hannigan’s nod and accompanying "Yep, it’s really true because they keep having me say it" look, but I can’t decipher the meaning of Xander’s reaction. He looks almost depressed by her confirmation of her gayness. Maybe it’s just the broken hand.

As a retrospective nitpick, how is it that Xander is hit repeatedly with Olaf's hammer and suffers only the broken hand while Buffy uses the hammer to pummel Glory in "The Gift"? Also, the blond curl sticking out from the nun's veil in the teaser looks absolutely ridiculous. If they really wanted to go for that extremely pointless mislead, the costume department should have used a postulant's wimple (think Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music), which doesn't cover as much of the head as the veil does. And Buffy looks like an idiot when she hastily throws away her stake after killing the vampire in the nunnery. The nun just saw a man turn to dust and explode and Buffy thinks a piece of wood is incriminating?

Unlike "Him" I cannot entirely dismiss this story concept, which could have been entertaining if the bickering had been characterized differently and no one had made SMG try to funny cry. Oh, wait. They made that episode already.

Of course some episodes of Buffy are lackluster. "Beer Bad," "Spiral," and much of season seven are equal parts ridiculous and dull. But few episodes, in my opinion, are as embarrassingly, insultingly awful as "Him." If not for its last nine or so minutes, I would easily call it the worst episode of Buffy ever.

First, the writers are ripping themselves off. "Him" is an obvious retread of season two's delightful "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered" in which Xander accidentally casts a spell on himself that causes all the women in Sunnydale to love him...to DEATH. (I know that sentence sounds like a crib from a Lifetime promo, but I couldn't resist.) Why does "Him" fail where "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered" succeeds? Because the latter is not an exercise in the complete humiliation of every female character on a supposedly feminist show.

In "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered" it becomes clear pretty fast that the females are acting strangely due to Xander's botched spell. Xander acts quickly to reverse its effects, and he doesn't take advantage of any of the girls who throw themselves at him. Giles chastises him for his foolish use of magic, and the women's escalating emotions for Xander threaten his well-being. As for the effects of the spell on the women, it causes them to be sexually assertive toward Xander, but none of their initial come-ons make me feel embarrassed for them. And the later mob scenes are so over-the-top that I know they would never happen without the spell.

In contrast, when watching "Him" I wasn't certain a spell caused Dawn's behavior until Buffy starts to hit on RJ, which doesn't happen until halfway into the episode. Sure, Dawn pushing that guy down a flight of stairs is creepy, but I wouldn't put it past her even when she's spell-free. I experience physical discomfort watching Dawn's attempts to win RJ, humiliating herself in front of him and his friends. The petty backstabbing and catfights between girls competing for him is nauseating, but none of it is behavior I haven't seen before on other shows and in movies as representative of how women might actually behave. Despite the girls' degradation, RJ doesn't suffer any ill effects from wearing the enchanted jacket. Because he doesn't seem to know about the enchantment, he doesn't have to learn a lesson about exploiting young women. Both Buffy and Principal Wood give him small lectures but to little effect, and having his jacket taken away by Spike and Xander hardly seems like much of a punishment.

Another important distinction between the two episodes is that "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered" provides character and story development for two main characters. Xander gets to show he's really a good guy when he refuses Buffy, and he and Cordelia become an official item when Cordy calls her friends out on being sheep and decides that she doesn't care what they think about who she dates. "Him" doesn't further story or reveal anything new about any of the main characters, though it does prove that Dawn really would win Miss Teen Angst Sunnydale.

I wouldn't give this episode a second viewing if it weren't for the nine minutes following Willow and Anya falling under RJ's spell. I love the shot of Willow and Anya reacting to the love spell because of Alyson Hannigan's wistful expression that morphs into confusion tinged with disgust at lusting after a guy. Much of the following dialogue is very quotable and excellently performed by Hannigan, Emma Caulfield, and Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Buffy: "Willow, you're a gay woman."
Willow: (So?)
Buffy: "And he isn't."
Willow: "This isn't about his physical presence. It's about his heart."
Anya: "His physical presence has a penis!"
Willow: "I can work around it!"
...
Anya: "Well, you're gonna have to do better than that—I'd kill for him."
Willow: (scoffs) "You'd kill for a chocolate bar."
Buffy: "No. Yes! Kill for him. I'm the slayer. Slayer means kill. Oh, I'll kill the principal."
Anya: "Ooh, that is hard to top."
Willow: "Yeah, well, I have skills. I can prove my love with magic."
Anya: "Yeah, right. What're you gonna do? Use magic to make him into a girl?"
(Willow's eyes widen with realization and delight.)
Anya: "Damn!"

The wonderful comedic acting continues with the montage and split-screen of the women doing their things to win RJ's heart, with the exception of Dawn who has to spoil the fun by wallowing on the railroad tracks. Willow and Xander have a fun exchange after he stops Willow's spell ("Will, honey, RJ's a guy." "I know. 'S why I'm doing my spell, 'cause, you know, he doesn't have to be."), which leads to some excellent physical comedy by SMG and James Marsters as Spike tries to take the rocket launcher away from Buffy. I also enjoy Dawn's line about Buffy having "sex that's rough," and Spike and Xander wrestling RJ's jacket off of him and running away. The writers hadn't managed to churn out that amount of continuous comedy for a while, and they don't for the rest of the season. (This moment comes earlier in the episode, but I also like Willow commiserating with Xander that "she is right there with him" feeling disturbed at finding Dawn attractive. It's one of the show's more subtle "Willow is gay" moments.)

This episode includes a lot of callbacks to previous episodes. Dawn wears Buffy's cheerleading outfit from "Witch," Buffy tries to use the rocket launcher from "Innocence," and Xander references the events of the above-mentioned ripped-off episode "Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered."

I really like the music in this episode. UPN seems to have made Buffy's music supervisor use songs that people might have actually heard of instead of the California alterna-rock of the first five seasons. I applaud the show for trying to use music from lesser-known, local bands, but sometimes they tended to be indistinguishable from each other. "Him" features a song by The Shins, a song by Coldplay, and a couple from The Breeders, who are playing at the Bronze. The Breeders are one of my favorite bands and I was happy to see them on the show, but their music seems an odd choice for dancing tunes. I also really like the Charlie's Angels-ish music that plays over the split-screen montage. Kudos to Robert Duncan if he composed that score.

Despite this episode's solid comedy and trendy indie music soundtrack, I feel bothered and bewildered (but not bewitched) that the writers thought this story had a place on Buffy. I do not tune in to a show about a young woman with super powers who kills vampires to watch women bicker pettily about a boy and then be saved by two men.

Oh, Neil Patrick Harris.

See, Amber, you claim that you're not looking down Alyson's dress, but if you're not staring at her boobs then what are you looking at?

I wonder if that's Alyson Hannigan's stand-in on the far right there. She's really pretty.

Or perhaps the better question is what was the rationale behind Nick Brendon's striped pants? And why is Alyson Hannigan shoved into the background in almost all of the photos?

All of them are trying for the mysterious, sexy pout that American mags seem to like, but none of them are entirely succeeding.

• Dawn is surprisingly likable in this episode. I love her little walk away from Buffy: "Bye. I know. You never know what's coming. The stake is not the power. To Serve Man is a cookbook. I love you. Go away!"
• Very obviously, this episode attempts to return the show "to the beginning" with the reopening of Sunnydale High. I think thankfully the dialogue is quippier ("Let's just start with dead and pissed," "Dead guys? Resentful dead guys?") than the dialogue of season six and the Evil Of The Week easily defeated. However, it seems like the show is trying too hard to be season one without acknowledging that these characters are not the same people who they were six years ago.
• I like the scenes between Willow and Giles in England. I think that Alyson and Tony do a wonderful job of conveying from where Willow has come on her journey toward recovery. I wish that Willow had stayed in England longer because A) more Giles and B) I love Willow and Giles together.
• How maddening that in the first episode of supposedly Buffy of The New Leaf she hides the fact that she saw Spike in the school basement. Her protection of Spike is never explained even though people keep challenging it throughout the season, and I still don't understand her attachment to her manipulative, would-be-rapist ex-boyfriend.
  
• While the reintroduction of The First isn't particularly creepy, I did find it interesting on the first viewing. I loved seeing The Mayor again — Harry Groener is simply a genius in that role. However, I knew from that last scene that The Big Bad of the season would be The First from "Amends." I'm disappointed that the writers did not attempt to hide that plot point longer.
  

"Villains"

• HATE the Dark Willow storyline. And what a boring start to the mini-arc this episode provides. Thanks a lot, Marti Noxon. I really tend to dislike the episodes that you write. Oh, that's right. I went there.
• I hate the mislead of Buffy's shooting that allows Willow not to tell Xander and Buffy about Tara's death until 20 minutes into the episode. Everyone knows that Buffy won't die -- all the shooting does is prevent someone from sharing significant information with their friends, as all television characters tend to annoyingly do.
• I really like post-"Hell's Bells" Anya, and I love that she shows compassion and tries to dissuade Willow from draining the black arts books.
  
• I hate that Willow shows up at the hospital to heal Buffy and that she changed into more appropriately evil clothing. (She uses her white, blood-spattered shirt later in the episode to find Warren. Why couldn't she change then?) I would find Dark Willow, um, darker and more convincing if she had immediately pursued Warren. She could have saved Buffy when she walks out of the Summers' house as Buffy is being taken to the hospital and then went on her merry, "I'm going to kill Warren" way. But, again, ideally Buffy would not have been shot because, hello! We know that she won't die.
  
• And speaking of inappropriate hair and wardrobe changes, Buffy takes the time to curl her hair when she knows that Willow is trying to find Warren to kill him? I hate how Buffy, Dawn, and Xander sit around and discuss the ethics of murderer killing and where Dawn can hide when, again, Willow is trying to find Warren AND KILL HIM.
• I'm sorry to say it, but I hate Alyson Hannigan's acting choices as Dark Willow, especially in this episode. She was so great as Vamp Willow in season three that viewers expect a lot from an evil Willow. But I think that she did not want to retread Vamp Willow's gleeful, sexy evilness. Because Willow finally relinquishes her dark magic with an outpouring of emotion caused by connecting with her humanity, I suspect that Alyson chose to play Dark Willow as suppressing all emotion. But she comes across as lifeless and boring rather than menacing. I like her portrayal better in "Two to Go," but all the characters keep saying that Willow is running on fury and I think the fury would have been a lot more interesting. We rarely get to see Willow really angry.

"Two to Go"

• I hate that Dark Willow chooses to go after Andrew and Jonathan. They didn't do anything to her, and I really doubt that Willow would care. I know I don't. Well, about Andrew at least.
• I hate the incredibly useless and inept Sunnydale police who wave their guns at a woman tearing bricks from the side of their building and then wave their guns around again when she levitates above their heads. And why didn't Willow just walk up to Jonathan and Andrew's cell? Is she that big on the showmanship?
• I hate the car chase. What exactly was Willow's big plan? Bump them to death?
• I hate that Buffy doesn't let Jonathan help translate the anti-magic spell, especially since he helped her in "Seeing Red." And what motivation would he have to screw himself over?
  
• I like the scene with Dark Willow and Rack. Rack? So creepy. The sexual tension between Rack and Willow is palpable and Rack's repeated line about Willow tasting of strawberries implies that he uses her like a drug dealer uses a "strawberry." That she reverses their roles and "rapes" him ups the creep factor considerably.
• I love the scene in which Dark Willow threatens to turn Dawn back into energy. Alyson Hannigan is at her creepiest and I actually buy Dark Willow as a threat.
• I love the fight between Dark Willow and Buffy, mainly because I am a champion of all things Willow and Buffy gets on my nerves. A lot. And Sarah Michelle Gellar seems like kind of a diva.
• I hate the "get off, super bitch" line. I suppose Doug Petrie is trying to recall Warren calling Buffy "super bitch" in "Seeing Red" to...I don't know. Draw a parallel between murderer and victim? Maybe.
• I hate that Anya is hiding in such plain sight doing the anti-magic spell. The Magic Box has a basement, you know, Anya. You who co-owns the shop.
• Anthony Stewart Head is so sexy.

"Grave"

• I hate that Xander, Dawn, Andrew, and Jonathan's strategy to elude Dark Willow is walking sorta quickly.
• I hate that Xander derides himself for usually being so good at running. What? Xander never runs away to an almost irritating extent. He is idiotically brave.
• Like "You're always saving everyone. It's kinda pesky." Hate the "Fly, my pretty, fly" and "See what I did there?" lines. Who wrote this crap for Dark Willow? Why did the writers make her so chatty? Didn't they learn from Adam and Glory that talky villains just aren't that menacing? Oh, yeah. The First. I guess not.
• Uh, why did Willow's green blobs of whatever energy she fires at the temple have to come out of her boobs?
• Oh, and the yellow crayon speech? Aly and Nick do some good acting, but how trite is that crap? And really, Joss? The evil lesbian has to be stopped by heterosexual man-love?
• And the maudlin continues with Buffy promising to show Dawn the world and the montage under "Prayer for St. Francis." The dulcet sounds of Sarah McLachlan worked at the end of "Becoming, Part Two," but they ain't working here.
• Man. The only two characters who don't annoy me in this episode are Anya and Giles. If only they had made out!

I hope that the following statement is obvious: Joss Whedon & Co. would have taken crap about having lesbian characters on Buffy no matter what. Inevitably when anyone is portraying characters from non-dominant social groups, someone somewhere will complain about the authenticity/fairness of representation/appeal/hairstyle of that character. That said, I have adverse emotions toward the Willow/Tara relationship. Mostly I come down on the side of “Not great, but thanks for trying.”

Willow’s a Lesbian?
As I mentioned in my previous post about Buffy, the character of Willow really drew me to the show. As many people more eloquent than I have commented, despite Willow’s “sidekick” status the average viewer relates to the sweet, awkward outcast with a long unrequited crush on her best friend more readily than the petite, pretty blonde with superpowers. When a love interest for Willow, besides Xander, was finally trotted out, he was burdened with having to be pretty fantastic to be good enough for our Willow. And Oz was, in fact, probably the most perfect boyfriend ever. The chemistry between Alyson Hannigan and Seth Green was not based so much on sexual tension but caring, respect, and genuine affection — a factor not often present in most TV teen romances.

Then came Tara. I know people disagree with me, but I thought that Willow and Tara had chemistry, and more of the sexual tension variety, from the beginning. From their first conversation, I thought that they had a strange energy that I couldn’t quite define. As their implied romantic relationship became more explicit, I realized, “Oh! Homoerotism. That’s what that is.” But when Willow and Tara finally outed themselves in "New Moon Rising," I was initially resistant. I think that I would have resisted Willow being with anyone who wasn't Oz, and perhaps I would have resisted a male love interest more than a female one. I also resisted Tara because the writers failed to give her much of a personality when she first appeared. She was Willow: Reloaded, but lacking most of season-one Willow's quirky charm.

Willow’s transition from heterosexual to homosexual relationships was handled roughly. I enjoyed the scene in which Willow outs herself to Buffy in “New Moon Rising,” saying that her relationship with Tara was not something that she was looking for but that it was powerful. Perhaps due to my own experience, I appreciate the presentation of Willow’s sexuality as fluid — she is attracted to whom she is attracted. In season five though, the writers enter black-and-white territory and Willow describes herself as just “Gay now” in "Triangle," and in "Intervention" Buffybot’s read-out screen says about Willow “Gay (1999-present).”** But season five does offer an interesting scene that explores their relationship with more depth. In the appropriately titled "Tough Love," Willow and Tara argue when Tara implies she worries Willow will decide to date men again. In that argument, Willow essentially says that she is committed to Tara and doesn’t think of their relationship as some experiment. But that conversation feels unfinished to me because Glory sucks Tara’s mind soon after, and we never see them reconciling that particular argument. I wish that we could have seen more scenes like that for the two of them, because I feel like the intricacies of relationships are revealed in disagreements (that do not lead to break-ups) and compromises. In season seven, Willow expresses her sexuality as less of an orientation switch than previously suggested. Much as she articulates to Tara in "Tough Love," Willow specifies to Kennedy in "The Killer in Me" that she didn't realize she was interested in women plural but a woman.

** Side note: Those two incidents also suggest that the show does not take a strictly biological approach to homosexuality, because both imply that there was a time in Willow's life when she was not gay. Maybe those silly jokes even imply that Willow chose to be gay when she started a relationship with Tara. If that assertion has any validity whatsoever then Willow is probably the best television portrayal of someone who is queer by choice. But maybe the jokes are simply evidence of the writers' conflation of gay identity and being in a gay relationship.

I both appreciate that Willow’s change in sexual preference did not cause a fuss and recognize that not making any fuss does a disservice to the characters and their friendships. While Buffy’s initial reaction of surprise and then support was nicely played, I think that it would have been appropriate for some follow-up weirdness or at least some questions. As an audience member, I struggled with what Willow and Tara’s relationship meant in regards to her previous relationship with Oz and her long-held crush on Xander. A scene in which Xander and Willow discuss those very issues, or even an extension of a scene in "Family" with Buffy and Xander talking about Tara, would have served everyone. And I think that they could have had such a conversation without making Willow's friends sound like jerks.

Authenticity
Unfortunately for both Tara and the Willow/Tara relationship, they were created at a time when the show's writing began to deteriorate. Season four featured one-note storylines for both Xander and Giles and the inclusion of a one-note character (Anya) as a cast member. Tara did not fare much better. In fact, Tara really didn't receive much character development until season six when Willow and Tara split up. One of the writers commented to the effect that the break-up really allowed Tara to come into her own as a character. ...Right. Because you want to wait two years to develop a recurring character. (The hell?) Willow and Tara's scenes also seemed to become the repository of clunky dialogue that attempted subtext (e.g. "I've been thinking about that last spell we did all day") and of the treacly sentimentality that suddenly appeared in season five (e.g. the final scene of "Family").

Some people have commented to the effect that they could never buy Willow and Tara as a gay couple, rather they seemed like two straight women just playing at being gay. Again, I think that Alyson and Amber managed to generate some real sexual chemistry at times, but I do think that they struggled to generate sexual tension when (see above) bad writing and treacly sentimentality were involved. Even the greatest actors playing a straight couple would have difficulty generating heat rather than barely concealed eye-rolls with some of the dialogue Willow and Tara were given.

Early in the relationship there also existed a mismatch of sorts between Willow and Tara concerning how much sexual attraction they conveyed. Amber really makes with the smoldering looks in episodes like "Who Are You?" and "Out of My Mind," but Alyson responds with the looks of fondness. I actually find these discrepancies fitting with the characters. Tara always seemed very certain in her attraction for women, while Willow had just ended a serious, two-year relationship with a man. And Alyson never really plays Willow as a very sensual/sexual being. Not to say that Alyson isn't sexy or can't bring the sexy. She very much brings the sexy-sexy in "The Wish" and "Doppelgangland" as Vamp Willow. Willow becomes sexier as the series progresses and she gains confidence, but sex is not an intrinsic part of Willow's character, as it is for characters like Faith and Spike. Scenes in "Restless," like the one in which Willow is painting her "homework" on Tara's back, fully establish Tara's sensuality, despite the wardrobe department's sincerest efforts to hide it with ill-fitting clothing.

Of course, discrepancies exist between the amount of heterosexual sexuality and homosexual sexuality portrayed within the show. Buffy and Riley go at it for an entire episode in season four ("Where the Wild Things Are") while Willow and Tara don't even kiss on-screen. Their first on-screen kiss doesn't happen until almost a year after their relationship begins. While I like that Joss did not want their first kiss to be a romantic-music-swelling, featured-in-promos bit of exploitation — and I consider their kiss in "The Body" to be one of the best same-sex kisses in TV and film — I think that a year was a bit too long to wait. However, I cannot determine how much of these discrepancies are the result of The WB and UPN's Standards & Practices or the result of Joss's choices. What I can determine is the crappy direction of the few sex scenes between Willow and Tara. The two explicit ones that I can recall ("Once More, With Feeling" and "Seeing Red") had a "lie back and think of England" quality to them. Even in the first naked-in-bed scene in "Seeing Red," Tara is all legs-splayed, glowing, and sexed-up while Willow is practically in a fetal position off to the side. Though I must say that none of the sex scenes in season six were particularly convincing, with some seeming anatomically impossible.

Seemingly, because they couldn’t show any actual affection between Willow and Tara — or, you know, show them within three feet of each other — the writers compromised by having Willow say the word “gay” a lot in supposedly humorous contexts. My favorite “Willow is gay” references are much more subtle: a hopped up on magic Willow causing a pencil to become “flaccid” in “Doublemeat Palace”; Willow commiserating with Xander about finding Dawn attractive in “Him”; Willow professing her disinterest in “tool talk” in “Never Leave Me.”

Tara’s Death/Dark Willow
Joss' transformation of the season four and five metaphor of magic as lesbian sex to the season six metaphor of magic as drug addiction also proved troubling for many viewers. First of all, I dislike the magic addiction/Dark Willow subplot in its entirety — the storyline proved a ham-fisted and boring exercise in pointless character assassination. No pun intended. And in this context shifting the meaning of the magic metaphor can easily be interpreted as homophobic. It also causes viewers to scrutinize Willow and Tara's relationship, giving new and possibly more disturbing connotations to previous encounters. For example, in probably what one could describe as their first "sexual" encounter, Willow and Tara link fingers and combine their magic to move a soda machine to block a doorway. In that moment, Willow particularly is excited by the power that she and Tara have when they combine their magic, which could suggest that Tara actually gave Willow her first taste of magic the drug. I thought her recognition of that power in season four seemed more, "Oh, my connection with my partner really empowers me" rather than Willow's "I can use my power to manipulate my partner" attitude in season six, and I want my interpretation to stay that way.

Do I think that Joss & Co. intended to demonize lesbianism in season six? No, but I cannot fault that interpretation. However, I do think that the writers attempted to distinguish the loving, gay sex white magic from the destructive, addictive dark magic, which is often characterized by masculine or heterosexual images. For example, the spell that Willow uses in "Bargaining" to revive Buffy at the beginning of season six definitely sets a disturbing tone for Willow's magic use of the season. That spell involves a couple of very phallic/masculine images, namely the stabbing (dagger = phallus) of the fawn and Willow vomiting up a snake. The snake coupled with the very yonic urn also give the spell a distinct implication of heterosexuality as well.

Dark Willow ultimately attempts to destroy the world by raising a Satanic temple from beneath the ground. Only the steeple of the temple — featuring a statue of Medusa (an “evil” woman who embraces a phallic symbol) no less — emerges from the ground making her tool of destruction distinctly phallic. Simultaneously, Dark Willow traps Buffy in the yonic symbol of the underground cave to prevent Buffy from stopping her. In her most destructive use of magic, Dark Willow both utilizes the phallus and dismisses the yonic, transforming the yonic into a hindrance, a prison.

Willow's use of dark magic also masculinizes her. When Dark Willow attacks Jonathan and Andrew in the Magic Box she says, "I'm just getting a wood for the violence." The Forget spell that causes Tara to break up with Willow is described as "violating" Tara's mind and is characterized by the masculine concept of invasion. Another moment that defines the different types of magic and perhaps foreshadows how magic will divide Willow and Tara occurs in “After Life.” Willow becomes impatient with the spell that she and Tara are performing together and dips into dark magic to perform the spell alone. Instead of embracing the more feminine tendency of cooperation, Willow isolates herself.

The primary figures that enable Willow's "addiction" to dark magic are Amy and Rack, both heterosexuals. Rack, in particular, has a couple of very sexually charged scenes with Willow in which he "takes a tour" of Willow magically and then she drains his magic. Rack even says that she "tastes like strawberries," a reference to the slang term "strawberry" or a person who has sex in exchange for drugs.

Examining the sexual relationships of season six, Willow and Tara's actually emerges as the healthiest, despite its problems. The episode "Entropy" comes to mind as an excellent illustration of the differences between homosexual and heterosexual relationships during that season and, in fact, the series. In that episode, Spike is sulking because of a recent break-up with Buffy, and Anya and Xander are hurting because Xander left Anya at the altar. Spike and Anya sleep together and Buffy and Xander accidentally catch them via a hidden camera. This story ends badly, of course, and the intertwining of those two subplots suggests that heterosexual relationships are ultimately only avenues for sex that will result in alienation and pain. However, the episode ends with Tara and Willow reuniting, with homosexual love enduring, offering caring and support. Indeed, their relationship ends when Warren, a misogynistic man who previously attempted to rape an ex-girlfriend and who exploits Andrew's obvious homosexual attraction to him, shoots Tara.

But really, Joss? You had to embrace both the dead lesbian and evil lesbian clichés?

A.T.
I do think that Tara's memory was tarnished by the events of season seven, and by that I mean that which dare not speak its name. OK, I will speak its name: Kennedy. Why would Willow date such a pushy, charmless brat? And she dates a pushy, charmless brat, like, five minutes after Tara dies. Where is the mourning? Where is the remorse for her Dark Willow actions? Again, five minutes and then nothing. Lots of nothing in general. Did season seven have a plot? Anyway, Willow and Tara's relationship was one of the first lesbian relationships on primetime TV, and good or bad it was an important piece of increasing the presence of LGBT characters on network television.

Though I call myself a Buffy fan, I admit that my viewing habits of the show were spotty. I missed watching seasons one and two on their first TV run. I watched reruns and a friend’s taped episodes of season two before season three, which I did watch regularly. Season three, which in my opinion is the best season of the show, caused me to anticipate season four. I remember watching the season four premiere and thinking, “Well, that was weird.” The show gained some momentum, but after Oz left to find his inner wolf or whatever I remember that my interest slowly began to wane. Re-watching season four for the first time since I viewed the episodes seven years ago has clarified aspects of the season that did not gel for me and has revealed some bits that I really like.

Aspects of the Season That Did Not Gel

• Pacing – I realized what felt so weird when I first viewed the season four premiere was the pacing, in that it slowed dramatically. In comparison, season four feels as though the cast and crew suddenly started drinking tea after three years of nothing but coffee. While the first three seasons absolutely have poignant, dramatic moments, on the whole the show is quick and quippy. Habitually, the show’s tender or heavier moments are undercut with humor so that it addresses serious matters but does not become encumbered by weightiness or sentimentality. I think that Joss Whedon and the writers wanted to mature the show a bit when Buffy went to college, but mature does not mean boring. The writing definitely weakened with several episodes featuring long, rather unfocused scenes during the third and fourth acts when the episode should speed up. Perhaps editing is to blame as well as the writing.
• Riley – Oh my god. Oh. My. God. Speaking of boring, could they have found a love interest for Buffy who was more bland? And could Marc Blucas have any less chemistry with Sarah Michelle Gellar? I mean, Angel isn’t exactly as deep as the Grand Canyon and the chemistry between Sarah and Boreanaz isn’t astounding, but compared to Riley the Buffy/Angel relationship sets rooms on fire. The lack of chemistry is made so painfully apparent when Spike and Buffy smoulder in "Something Blue" and "Who Are You?"
  
• Continuity with Characters – The male characters specifically have rocky character arcs. Giles begins the season as a sexy gentleman of leisure, but soon becomes this comical (though still sexy) middle-aged guy going through a mid-life crisis, which involves his becoming a demon for one episode. (Um, why?) While Giles began as something of a pratfall-inclined, laughable character, the writers created Wesley in season three to make Giles seem edgier, sexier, cooler, and I really liked that more confident Giles. His character backslid a bit in season four and not in an interesting way. At the end of both Buffy and Angel, I was ready to smack Spike, but I initially really liked him. I rank him as the second best Big Bad of the series, after, of course, The Mayor. I like Spike for his honesty, his willingness to say how things are and not sugarcoat them, and for his sense of humor. During season four, the writers started on the slippery slope of making Spike laughable instead of witty. Xander seems simply without direction throughout the season, going from job to job. The writers seem to have kept Xander on the show out of obligation rather than necessity. They liked him enough to keep him around but not enough to give him anything to do?
  
• Heavy-Handed Storytelling – The episodes “Beer Bad” and “Pangs” come to mind when discussing this topic. Whedon & Co. obviously wanted to address issues that college freshmen might face like casual sex and drinking, but come on. Drink a beer, become a Neanderthal? Why must television constantly demonize alcohol and sex? TV shows always seem to portray those behaviors as all or nothing situations – you’re sober or drunk, you’re kissing or you’re having sex. “Pangs” is just confusing. White people should feel very, very badly about what their culture did to Indians, but look how violent and vengeful they are. So don’t feel too badly because violence just makes you kill people. No one’s fault!
• Moping – I hate to mention this matter, but placing Buffy’s ordeal with Parker so close to Oz leaving Willow caused season four to feature a lot of Moping About a Guy. I do not want to dismiss either Buffy or Willow’s feelings, but after a few weeks the moping became tiresome. And poor Willow had the tail end of the moping, so everyone was giving her crap about grieving over Oz and, hello, Parker was a one-night stand while Oz was two years of Most Perfect Guy Ever. I think that Willow had the right to some crankiness.

Bits That I Really Like

• Willow – Willow was always my favorite female character when I watched the show as a teenager, but during recent viewings of early episodes I have found her to be a little grating at times. Everything was always all about Buffy or Xander. While she definitely came into her own over the course of season three, during season four she became her own distinct entity. She becomes a bit more world-weary, but maintains her role as mother/mediator of the Scooby gang. Willow really benefited from that switch from coffee to tea. Oh, and Alyson Hannigan has great chemistry with everyone it seems like. I would have believed a relationship between Willow and Riley more than his relationship with Buffy. Hannigan really seemed to carry the emotional core of the show during season four.
  
• Reappearance/Resurrection of Faith – Faith! OK, yes, I always enjoy watching Eliza Dushku run in leather pants, but that dynamic between her and Buffy is always fascinating and engaging.
• “Hush,” “Fear Itself,” "Who Are You," “Superstar,” “Reckless” – Season four managed to churn out some kick-ass episodes.