S05.E05: No Place Like Home

[Joe Hellandback]

The Good; First appearance of Glory and she's a kick in the head, love her exaggerated creeping up on Buffy and her rambling madness, panto style. Also clever the way Dawn is actually a little menacing when remarking to Buffy that Joyce will be home soon, is the tea she offers her mother poisoned we wonder for a moment? But the very last scene is beyond beautiful, Buffy stroking Dawn's hair for the first time, the way the Summer's girls seem to express physical affection for one another. Giles' wizard outfit and Anya's skill as a salesgirl are also great. Like the little Anya/Giles moment when they reminisce about the sorcerer. Spike has a small role but it's fried gold.

The Bad; Not much although it seems to be mighty convenient that the building just collapses on Glory.

Best line; Spike; (explaining why he's outside the Summer's house in five words or less) OUT-FOR-A-WALK....BITCH!

Women good/men bad; Nope, female villain time. In fact couldn't Buffy have made a little more effort to make Riley feel needed? Riley's slow fall is agony to watch. Ben comments that Buffy has some serious muscles for a girl.

Jeez!; Brainsucking for the first time and it's HORRIBLE!

Kinky dinky; Spike starts stalking Buffy. Joyce wonders if a 14 year old Dawn could be pregnant? When Dawn asks what Buffy is doing in her room she replies 'My boyfriend'!!!! Glory thinks the stutter is sexy (look out Tara?)

Captain Subtext; Joyce comments that Buffy is so grown up, we'll she's going to need to be.

Guantanamo Bay; The poor monk tied to the chair and tortured

Scoobies to the ER; No but Buffy goes to get Joyce's medication.

Questions and observations; Glory whines about having to live in our reality. Well if you don't like it you can go to hell baby! (or go back there?). That said I think Clare Kramer does a wonderful job as Glory especially when she's acting insane (apparently she's a great friend of ED although they never have any scenes together much as Marc Blucas was a good friend of Christian Kane) Joyce refers to Dawn as 'little-pumpkin belly'. Buffy never had a pet name (except for Sleepyhead?) and never got piano lessons either (Will can play). Anyone else think that the monk on the run from Glory looks an awful lot like a young Lance Henrikson (Aliens, Terminator)? Dawn seems to have inherited Xander's big mouth. Buffy wears a very demonic looking t-shirt? Glory asks Buffy 'Can you fly?', the same words Angel uses in his pilot (and in Robocop)

Marks out of 10; 8/10

Rumours about season 5;

I heard a load of rumours about plot lines in season 5, more than any other year of the show. In no particular order;

Spoiler

1) Xander would turn out to be Glory or one of the other Hellgods from her dimension, Willow would turn evil and be the one to bleed Dawn

2) Dawn would touch Joyce's corpse at the end of The Body and bring her back to life with her Key powers

3) Faith would be released from jail and end up sacrificing herself to save Buffy in the final battle with Glory

4) Drusilla/Dracula would seduce Buffy who'd then allow herself to be sired. VampBuffy would then be the big bad for the season with Faith leading the Scoobies against her and her undead anti-Scoobies. In the season finale VampBuffy would taste Dawn's blood and be restored to normal by The Key's power.

5) Spike falling in love with Buffy and then siring her because he thinks that's the only way to make her love him. In the end he realises he doesn't love unsouled Buffy so uses magic to turn her back to normal.

6) Buffy and Xander get zapped by some demon and he gets her powers. She has to adapt to being ordinary whilst he revels in being a superhero but starts to lose control which is why the Slayer is always a girl.

7) Xander and Buffy would end up in Caritas singing karoke to get some guidance ('Wind beneath my wings'?)

Angel Investigations would show up for the final battle with Glory in Sunnydale along with Riley and Oz.

Now you can see how some of these ideas worked out. Ben rather than Xander is Glory whilst Willow will go evil and threaten Dawn in season 6. Rather than bring Joyce back to life Dawn gives Buffy the will to live in season 6. Faith will be released from jail to hunt Angelus on Angel season 4, Buffy will be the one who sacrifices herself. The Dru-sires-Buffy scenario sounds like a dark- slasher's fantasy but has elements of Buffy-vs-Dracula and Riley and his vampwhores. Dru actually sires Darla instead, Dawn's blood will play a major role in the season 5 finale and Buffy will turn temporarily against her friends in Normal Again. Faith will defeat Angelus by getting him to taste her blood in season 4 of Angel. Spike will fall in love with Buffy but get's his own soul back rather than take her's away. The Xander gets Buffy's powers idea becomes The Replacement, we find out in season 7 why the Slayer is female whilst Riley will return in season 6.

I heard a load of rumours about plot lines in season 5, more than any other year of the show. In no particular order;

 

[Halting Hex]

Horribly stupid and contrived episode that only exists to dribble out a little crumb of exposition at the end.  Brother Idiot Jeb flies halfway around the world to speak with Buffy (thereby leading "The Beast" straight to the fucking Key he's trying so hard to hide [/eyeroll]) and then doesn't seek her out, and leaves the Mystic Glory-Fighting Weapon (the DagonSphere) lying around in the parking lot, and the only reason Buffy ever gets her hands on the Sphere is because she happens to come along at just the right moment for the security guard to casually hand the Glory-Fighting Weapon to the One Girl in the World who will, in fact, soon be fighting Glory.  Well, that's convenient, isn't it?

Spoiler

Oh, and the cute intern that Buffy flirts with at the hospital?  Just happens to be Glory's alter-ego.  Oh, fuck me.  This episode is such a pile of contrived garbage that it almost makes Same Time, Same Place look logical, by comparison.  Except I don't know if there's anything that can do that.

And then there's the part where Buffy is the one to cast the Cloutier Trance, literally the only time she's done magic so far in the show (she was the focus of the Magnus Tripod spell in IOHEFY, but didn't actually cast it; same for the enjoining spell in Primeval), rather than Giles…or Willow…or Anya…or Tara.  (Amber isn't in the episode, but still.). Why?  Because they want Buffy to be The Only One who knows Dawn's secret…at least for now.

Even when we don't get a contrivance, we get total idiocy.  Hey, remember how Spike double-crossed Buffy and nearly got Riley killed last episode? And how Buffy learned that Spike has been hiding Harmony, who kidnapped and nearly murdered Buffy's precious little "sister" three episodes back?  And how this meant that Buffy was going to definitely hunt Spike down and slay him, once and for all, no fooling??

So what happens?  Spike randomly shows up on Buffy's front porch, gives Buffy lip, and Buffy…ignores him and blows right past him. Gee, I'd be feeling real loved if I were Riley or Dawn right now, you bet.

Easily Doug Petrie's worst script ever.  And that's not counting

Spoiler

the fact that his next script (Fool For Schmoop) will feature Spike preparing to shoot Buffy with a rifle whereas in his previous script (The Yoko Factor) Spike couldn't even point a toy gun at Xander without the chip firing.

, because those are actually good episodes, minor flubs aside.  This is full-on drek, the worst episode of S5.  

Only redeeming moment is Giles opening the store in the wizard robe…and then Buffy wordlessly shaming him into getting out of it…and then Willow being disappointed that Giles isn't wearing it.  And Riley's line that "the hype was out of control"; it's cool to see that Riley "speaks Willow".  (See also his saying that he would sing the "La-la, we're on the way to Xander's" song in The Replacement.)

But that still doesn't come within an ocean of saving this one.  2/10.  

Spoiler

Only because I want to save the "1" ratings for the shit that follows on UPN.  But this crap makes me wish that Joyce's aneurysm would kill me.

[Jack Shaftoe]

I have to agree that this episode is ridiculously full of stupid contrivances. In addition to the already mentioned ones, there is also Dawn acting all creepy for no reason other than to mislead the viewers. Also, Buffy is rightly suspicious of Dawn after the trance... yet blithely leaves her alone in the house because apparently she read the script and knew she would get answers at that factory and had to to right now. The Monks of Bloody Stupid deciding to have Buffy protect Dawn from someone vastly stronger than her is another piece of hack writing.

Quote

And then there's the part where Buffy is the one to cast the Cloutier Trance

Adding insult to injury, it's specifically mentioned that it's a hard spell to cast. It's like they weren't even trying to make sense when writing this horrible episode.

Spoiler

Honestly, the entire season 5 story arc is patently absurd. This is punctuated in The Gift when the protagonists suddenly remember that the Dagon sphere and the troll (god, yeah right) hammer. Joyce's utter non-nonchalance when accepting Dawn as her daughter is also a "favourite"  especially in a supposedly feminist show.

[lembergwatcher]

6 hours ago, Joe Hellandback said:

The Good; First appearance of Glory and she's a kick in the head, love her exaggerated creeping up on Buffy and her rambling madness, panto style.

I for one think Glory was one of the worst and most annoying big bads in the series. Even Adam wasn't that bad with his arrogance. Yes, Clare Kramer is pretty, but her character happened to be cheap drama queen-styled self-centered and very stupid bitch. I find it highly unlikely the gods could be that petty and stupid. And Glory wasn't even remotely scary. Angelus from season 2 meant business and was truly menacing (the moment he snapped Jenny's neck still makes me shiver), Richard Wilkins was menacing because his polite and friendly demeanor could easily mislead the opponent. And Adam acted like dominating personality and was able to terrorize into submission. With Glory's arrival there was talking the talk most of the time. Goddess? Hell no. Some stoned socialite, who went cold turkey nearly all the time, hence all the temper tantrums and hissy fits. 

Spoiler

Sometimes I think Buffy's incessant speeches in season 7 were the direct result of her interactions with talkative hellgoddess. While Caled was probably Glory's son or younger brother (hence equally annpying).

 

6 hours ago, Joe Hellandback said:

Glory whines about having to live in our reality. Well if you don't like it you can go to hell baby!

But she had a chance to live on the Hellmouth with all the advantages. Even her tiny brain could have figured it out.

[Halting Hex]

5 hours ago, nosleepforme said:

and you should maybe put it into a spoiler, as we won't know for quite some time what it is for

From this episode:

Quote

GILES: All we've managed to uncover so far is the Dagon Sphere was created to repel That Which Cannot Be Named.

Quote

BUFFY (to MONK): It was you who planted the Dagon Sphere, right? I got it. Don't worry. I'm stronger than I look.

And then Buffy and Glory fight.  And later the Monk calls Glory (if anything should be spoilered, it's that name [which isn't mentioned until Shadow] but it's only a name and people are using it all over the page, so never mind) "the Abomination", so it's pretty clear this is a weapon against the Clare Kramer-shaped menace, unless there are actually two villains being introduced here, and one stays off-stage the entire episode and Glory attacks when Buffy and Brother Idiot Jeb are talking about this other villain and Brother Idiot Jeb never clears up this (hypothetical) confusion (and I grant you this sort of nonsense would fit right in to this episode, but still…), it can be reasonably assumed that the new villain Buffy fights is the one that her new "ally" brought the Special Weapon to fight against.  His incredible idiocy in "planting" the Special Weapon in the fucking parking lot aside.

4 hours ago, Jack Shaftoe said:

Adding insult to injury, it's specifically mentioned that [The Cloutier Trance] a hard spell to cast.

And why does Buffy cast it, in the first place?  Because she just happens to be in the hospital when the nightwatchman from the teaser is brought in, brainsucked, and he starts raving about how "they" are coming for Buffy (nobody actually is) and how "They come through the family! They get to your family!".  Except that nobody came "through [his] family" and nobody is coming for Buffy's family, either…but we have to get Buffy to do the Trance somehow, right?  Oh, eyeroll.

Quote

BUFFY:  But whatever touched this guy, it made him see through what the rest of us are seeing. He knew someone's hurting my mom and they're trying to get to me.

Nobody's "hurting" Joyce.  It's a natural brain tumor (unless it was caused by the Monks rewiring Joyce's brain to force Dawn in there), nothing to do with Glory.  It's not anybody "trying to get to" you, Little Miss Ego. FFS.

But we need some "reason" to have Buffy (who doesn't do magic) do the spell (which has nothing to do with the actual season plot) or we'll never get Buffy into that abandoned factory to fight Glory…

Edited September 14, 2018 by Halting Hex

[Jack Shaftoe]

You know, it was my recollection that the Idiot Monk had some actual reason for leaving the Dagon Sphere in that abandoned factory but no, now that I checked I saw that apparently it just happened. Off-screen. Then Glory came, brain sucked the nightwatchman but missed the monk somehow, then she found the monk on the next day. So what, the monk was there all along but missed Buffy's fight with the vampire and her taking of the sphere? Or he never noticed that he had, well, dropped the ball, and showed up on the next day to look for it? Why did he decide to inform Buffy about the true nature of Dawn when he and his idiot buddies had gone to extreme lengths to create the fake memories? Who knows, certainly not the writers.

Last but not least, this is an episode where the Scoobies contribution to the main plot is annoyingly minimal (Anya suggests the trance and Giles, miraculously, finds out that a rather nondescript glowing orb is in in fact the Dagon Sphere), another sign of bad things to come. Ultra-capitalist Anya if fun, don't get me wrong but I want to see Xander, Willow and Giles do more than give a suggestion to Buffy from time to time.

Edited September 14, 2018 by Jack Shaftoe

[Joe Hellandback]

On ‎14‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 6:18 AM, Halting Hex said:

Horribly stupid and contrived episode that only exists to dribble out a little crumb of exposition at the end.  Brother Idiot Jeb flies halfway around the world to speak with Buffy (thereby leading "The Beast" straight to the fucking Key he's trying so hard to hide [/eyeroll]) and then doesn't seek her out, and leaves the Mystic Glory-Fighting Weapon (the DagonSphere) lying around in the parking lot, and the only reason Buffy ever gets her hands on the Sphere is because she happens to come along at just the right moment for the security guard to casually hand the Glory-Fighting Weapon to the One Girl in the World who will, in fact, soon be fighting Glory.  Well, that's convenient, isn't it?

  Hide contents

Oh, and the cute intern that Buffy flirts with at the hospital?  Just happens to be Glory's alter-ego.  Oh, fuck me.  This episode is such a pile of contrived garbage that it almost makes Same Time, Same Place look logical, by comparison.  Except I don't know if there's anything that can do that.

And then there's the part where Buffy is the one to cast the Cloutier Trance, literally the only time she's done magic so far in the show (she was the focus of the Magnus Tripod spell in IOHEFY, but didn't actually cast it; same for the enjoining spell in Primeval), rather than Giles…or Willow…or Anya…or Tara.  (Amber isn't in the episode, but still.). Why?  Because they want Buffy to be The Only One who knows Dawn's secret…at least for now.

Even when we don't get a contrivance, we get total idiocy.  Hey, remember how Spike double-crossed Buffy and nearly got Riley killed last episode? And how Buffy learned that Spike has been hiding Harmony, who kidnapped and nearly murdered Buffy's precious little "sister" three episodes back?  And how this meant that Buffy was going to definitely hunt Spike down and slay him, once and for all, no fooling??

So what happens?  Spike randomly shows up on Buffy's front porch, gives Buffy lip, and Buffy…ignores him and blows right past him. Gee, I'd be feeling real loved if I were Riley or Dawn right now, you bet.

Easily Doug Petrie's worst script ever.  And that's not counting

  Hide contents

the fact that his next script (Fool For Schmoop) will feature Spike preparing to shoot Buffy with a rifle whereas in his previous script (The Yoko Factor) Spike couldn't even point a toy gun at Xander without the chip firing.

, because those are actually good episodes, minor flubs aside.  This is full-on drek, the worst episode of S5.  

Only redeeming moment is Giles opening the store in the wizard robe…and then Buffy wordlessly shaming him into getting out of it…and then Willow being disappointed that Giles isn't wearing it.  And Riley's line that "the hype was out of control"; it's cool to see that Riley "speaks Willow".  (See also his saying that he would sing the "La-la, we're on the way to Xander's" song in The Replacement.)

But that still doesn't come within an ocean of saving this one.  2/10.  

  Hide contents

Only because I want to save the "1" ratings for the shit that follows on UPN.  But this crap makes me wish that Joyce's aneurysm would kill me.

It is all a little contrived, I grant you that, if I ever write a series one of the rules is that the heroes will never stumble across anything. We'll talk FFL when we get there 

On ‎14‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 10:28 AM, nosleepforme said:

I really love this episode, because I am just a big fan of the sisterly bond between Buffy and Dawn and the scene at the end where Buffy strokes Dawn's hair, as they both wonder what is wrong with their mother is heartbreaking. So it's also kind of weird that Dawn never mentions that Buffy with her slayer power basically assaulted her. Must have been really scary for Dawn, when Buffy shoved her against, what was it, a closet? I do also love just any scene with all the Summers women in it. I just respond to that family dynamic.

 

Glory's rambling madness is my favorite thing about her and I think Clare Kramer does that extraordinarily well. Generally, I think Glory is not an overly difficult character to play, as she is mostly a Queen Bitch, but I think to do the rambling madness convincingly is a challenge. So kudos to her.

 

I think most of these rumors are to series-altering to actually have been considered. The only rumor that I believe is that

  Reveal hidden contents

Tara was initially set to die and that Willow was already supposed to go evil at the end of season five. 

 

 

Honestly, I kinda doubt the writers already knew what the DagonSphere was supposed to be like at this point in the season (and you should maybe put it into a spoiler, as we won't know for quite some time what it is for). And yes, theoretically they could have had an arc where they find out about the DagonSphere and keep looking for it, but the convenience also works for this episode, because the whole idea is that they do not know what it is. Why it is in the parking lot, we can only speculate. I doubt he just left it there on purpose. 

Absolutely, I love the Buffy/Dawn/Joyce love triangle. And seconded, especially the scene in Tough Love 

Spoiler

when she talks with Tara

[Joe Hellandback]

On ‎14‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 11:09 AM, Jack Shaftoe said:

I have to agree that this episode is ridiculously full of stupid contrivances. In addition to the already mentioned ones, there is also Dawn acting all creepy for no reason other than to mislead the viewers. Also, Buffy is rightly suspicious of Dawn after the trance... yet blithely leaves her alone in the house because apparently she read the script and knew she would get answers at that factory and had to to right now. The Monks of Bloody Stupid deciding to have Buffy protect Dawn from someone vastly stronger than her is another piece of hack writing.

Adding insult to injury, it's specifically mentioned that it's a hard spell to cast. It's like they weren't even trying to make sense when writing this horrible episode.

  Hide contents

Honestly, the entire season 5 story arc is patently absurd. This is punctuated in The Gift when the protagonists suddenly remember that the Dagon sphere and the troll (god, yeah right) hammer. Joyce's utter non-nonchalance when accepting Dawn as her daughter is also a "favourite"  especially in a supposedly feminist show.

Spoiler

Not fair, Dawn is Joyce's daughter, she's essentially Buffy's clone so she does have Summers blood. 

Plus there are no favourites in the Summer's house, they love one another equally. 

On ‎14‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 12:41 PM, lembergwatcher said:

I for one think Glory was one of the worst and most annoying big bads in the series. Even Adam wasn't that bad with his arrogance. Yes, Clare Kramer is pretty, but her character happened to be cheap drama queen-styled self-centered and very stupid bitch. I find it highly unlikely the gods could be that petty and stupid. And Glory wasn't even remotely scary. Angelus from season 2 meant business and was truly menacing (the moment he snapped Jenny's neck still makes me shiver), Richard Wilkins was menacing because his polite and friendly demeanor could easily mislead the opponent. And Adam acted like dominating personality and was able to terrorize into submission. With Glory's arrival there was talking the talk most of the time. Goddess? Hell no. Some stoned socialite, who went cold turkey nearly all the time, hence all the temper tantrums and hissy fits. 

  Hide contents

Sometimes I think Buffy's incessant speeches in season 7 were the direct result of her interactions with talkative hellgoddess. While Caled was probably Glory's son or younger brother (hence equally annpying).

 

But she had a chance to live on the Hellmouth with all the advantages. Even her tiny brain could have figured it out.

No, Glory is extremely entertaining and HOT, they learned their lesson from their mistake with Adam .

On ‎14‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 4:04 PM, Halting Hex said:

From this episode:

And then Buffy and Glory fight.  And later the Monk calls Glory (if anything should be spoilered, it's that name [which isn't mentioned until Shadow] but it's only a name and people are using it all over the page, so never mind) "the Abomination", so it's pretty clear this is a weapon against the Clare Kramer-shaped menace, unless there are actually two villains being introduced here, and one stays off-stage the entire episode and Glory attacks when Buffy and Brother Idiot Jeb are talking about this other villain and Brother Idiot Jeb never clears up this (hypothetical) confusion (and I grant you this sort of nonsense would fit right in to this episode, but still…), it can be reasonably assumed that the new villain Buffy fights is the one that her new "ally" brought the Special Weapon to fight against.  His incredible idiocy in "planting" the Special Weapon in the fucking parking lot aside.

And why does Buffy cast it, in the first place?  Because she just happens to be in the hospital when the nightwatchman from the teaser is brought in, brainsucked, and he starts raving about how "they" are coming for Buffy (nobody actually is) and how "They come through the family! They get to your family!".  Except that nobody came "through [his] family" and nobody is coming for Buffy's family, either…but we have to get Buffy to do the Trance somehow, right?  Oh, eyeroll.

Nobody's "hurting" Joyce.  It's a natural brain tumor (unless it was caused by the Monks rewiring Joyce's brain to force Dawn in there), nothing to do with Glory.  It's not anybody "trying to get to" you, Little Miss Ego. FFS.

But we need some "reason" to have Buffy (who doesn't do magic) do the spell (which has nothing to do with the actual season plot) or we'll never get Buffy into that abandoned factory to fight Glory…

I forgive Buffy for trying to find a supernatural solution to Joyce's illness as Anya comments. 

[Halting Hex]

On 9/14/2018 at 3:09 AM, Jack Shaftoe said:

In addition to the already mentioned [contrivances], there is also Dawn acting all creepy for no reason other than to mislead the viewers. Also, Buffy is rightly suspicious of Dawn after the trance... yet blithely leaves her alone in the house because apparently she read the script and knew she would get answers at that factory and had to to right now.

This is especially noteworthy because the show has already established that Buffy will arrange babysitters for Dawn, regardless of Dawn's own feelings on the matter.  How difficult could it have been to call Xander away from shop duty, exactly?

On 9/14/2018 at 8:56 AM, Jack Shaftoe said:

Glory came, brain sucked the nightwatchman but missed the monk somehow, then she found the monk on the next day. So what, the monk was there all along but missed Buffy's fight with the vampire and her taking of the sphere? Or he never noticed that he had, well, dropped the ball, and showed up on the next day to look for it?

Maybe he went apartment-hunting, and thus missed when "The Beast" came looking for him?  That was a decent crash-pad Glorificus was crashing in…Brother Idiot Jeb might have been all "she's just down the hall, it's too dangerous!  But…I really like this place…"

[lembergwatcher]

Buffy is visibly unhappy with Dawn's presence. It seems like Dawnie's existence alone drives our heroine mad.

Is it just a sibling rivalry or Buffy's Slaydar somehow triggered by the fakeness (i.e. wrongness) of everything related to her so-called "lil' sis"?  

Spoiler

Several episodes later though, Buffy will grow into the role of Dawn's "loving sister" to such an extent as to accept all her friends and the whole world dying a horrible death in order to buy the beloved Key a few extra minutes.

[Halting Hex]

On 9/14/2018 at 1:18 AM, Halting Hex said:

Brother Idiot Jeb flies halfway around the world to speak with Buffy

Hey, don't they have phones in Prague?  I'm pretty sure they have phones.  So Brother Idiot Jeb could have told Buffy all about Dawn without leading Glory right to Dawn.  Sheesh.

I was going to say "then again, maybe he really wanted to see Disneyland", but they do have EuroDisney, after all.

4 hours ago, lembergwatcher said:

Is it just a sibling rivalry or Buffy's Slaydar somehow triggered by the fakeness (i.e. wrongness) of everything related to her so-called "lil' sis"?

Probably the latter; the hero subconsciously rebelling against a "perfect" altered reality is a pretty standard trope.  Buffy herself has even done it, in Superstar.

Buffy's willingness to revert to hair-stroking mode once she finds that Dawn is "an innocent" is a little askew, though.  She should be seeking to restore the status quo ante Monkfuck, you'd think.

[Loandbehold]

2 hours ago, Halting Hex said:

I was going to say "then again, maybe he really wanted to see Disneyland", but they do have EuroDisney, after all.

But the exchange rate b/w the Euro and the dollar is so much better. 

[lembergwatcher]

You should've seen it coming, Willow, my dear. And you had time to do something about it. Should have used all those opportunities to put the bitch in her place long ago.

[Halting Hex]

Somehow, I think Willow is able to distinguish "wrapping skills" from "summit of human achievement" without too much trouble.  Of all the reasons to turn Anya into a toad, this is fairly far down the list, I'm thinking.

[lembergwatcher]

14 hours ago, Halting Hex said:

Of all the reasons to turn Anya into a toad, this is fairly far down the list, I'm thinking.

It doesn't have to be the reason. Just some straw that broke the camel's back

[lembergwatcher]

For someone who supposed to be an experienced demon hunter dealing with cunning, malicious and manipulative forces of darkness Buffy is dangerously gullible.

Why take anything Brother Idiot Jeb has to say at face value? This is as stupid and reckless as believing Spike is 'harmless' just because he says so.

The guy (Jeb) happens to be a part of some mysterious organization Buffy knows nothing about with an agenda Buffy knows nothing about. Yet she almost unequivocally accepts his words regarding Dawn being just an ordinary innocent little sister.

Even if Dawn is all 'innocent' now doesn't mean she cannot become a problem in the future. What if she's some kind of 'Troian horse' set to serve her purpose at some exact time? What if she isn't as 'innocent' as she seems? 

The mere fact that Jeb uncovered the truth about younger Summers despite him and his brothers altering everyone memories to make Dawn's existence plausible should be suspicious enough.

Anyway Buffy is free to believe whatever she wants and whomever she wants, but her poor judgement can put her friends and other people at danger sometimes.

[Halting Hex]

Buffy's willingness to take people at their word is both strange (even journalism requires two sources…or it used to, anyhow) and out of character.

Quote

BUFFY:  We have my word, Mom.  Not proof -Becoming, Part 2

I mean, she was skeptical about even Angel, until Darla verified his story about the curse.  She didn't even believe her own mother about how great Ted was.  She held out against Giles and Willow and Xander in believing that Emily was killed by a demon, not a human, in The Puppet Show.

I grant you that a dying declaration carries more weight (is Idiot Jeb going to go to the great beyond being all "ha-ha, totally fooled that Summers girl!"?  Unlikely), but given that Buffy was practicing magic to find out the truth before, it is a bit odd that she simply lets the matter drop afterwards.