Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Dead Things
UPN Episode Air Date 02/05/02

This episode touches on some important issues, one such being the development of incredible inventions from sheer desperation. The super villains create a neural dampener for the purpose of getting chicks - there has to be a better use for neural dampeners. This is from the same group that created female robots, used spells to brainwash classmates, and created an invisible gun to get into women's locker rooms.

Warren uses this dampener on his ex, Katrina. If he can't make her love him at least he can make her serve him. But the effects don't last as long as expected and things get a little messy. As a result, Warren accidentally kills Katrina. Jonathan, Andrew and Warren didn't sign on to be murderers, just arch-nemeses for Buffy. So they have to find a way to get rid of the girl.

The super geeks were cute and funny as the Jokers to Buffy's Batman, but this latest violent turn is rather hard to take. It does make sense that their adventures would get more and more risky, but Katrina's death was a little sudden. It'll be hard to go back to invisible ray guns and ways to make women love them now that the boys think they can get away with murder. We should be seeing Jonathan come out as the one with the conscience if this plot line continues.

Meanwhile, Buffy and Spike share another romantic evening. (Romantic in the nudge-nudge-wink-wink kind of way, not the dinner and candles way.) In a heart-to-heart conversation Buffy tells Spike that she only sometimes even likes him, and never trusts him. As much as an audience likes to relate to the unrequited love angle, there comes a point where you have to wonder why Spike puts up with her using him.

In an effort to determine what is wrong with herself, Buffy asks Tara to investigate the spell that brought Buffy back. Buffy's theory is that her attraction to Spike and the fact that Spike can hit her without the chip in his head going off are evidence that she came back from the dead "wrong."

It's hard to say if her growing isolation from Dawn and the gang has increased her feelings of self-hatred, or if it was the other way around. Regardless, Spike has to decide if it's better to simply love and hope Buffy will return the love, or shamefully manipulate Buffy into being with him by convincing her that her friends could never accept her with Spike.

It was nice have Tara back in the role of the wise one. Her encounter with Willow after 32 days magic-free was appropriately awkward with just enough pure caring. One can't help but wonder if they stand a chance getting back together. There are plenty of other ways to have fun with the two characters, but maybe Tara should give Willow one more chance.

Buffy will have to come to terms with this wonderfully complex emotional issue of her self-hatred for loving Spike. It's fascinating how she can't see the soul in Spike, but would rather see her own lack of a soul. Hopefully the writers will give this a fair amount of time. We'd hate to see this complicated storyline made all better in a single episode. Though a short break from such serious matters is warranted.

Get out the pretty party dress and go buy some presents because next week is Buffy's birthday. Yeah! That's always good for some chaos.

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Sharon Goodson