We open to a band about to start a set at the Bronze. While the lead singer sings we have a montage of the characters: Buffy walking through the cemetery, Willow studying at the campus library, Spike drinking at the Bronze and Dawn arriving home. We jump back and forth, watching Dawn read Buffy's note about being home late and Willow getting drowsy and Spike getting morose and Buffy, crouching by a fresh grave. From which an arm pops out.
"And so it begins."
Cut to credits and the song
(Note to the reader. Rather than jump back and forth here are the five convesations with dead people as there was no interaction between the characters at all.)
Dawn's Conversation:
Dawn, being a mature and studious teenager, makes up little ditties to the anchovies, checks out Buffy's blouses, turns the radio up real loud, plays with Buffy's crossbow and battleaxe and performs experiments with marshmellows and microwaves before phoning up her best friend and tying up the phone for hours as they simotaneously watch a movie. The only down side to this is the massive thumping sound that occasionally echoes through the house. Being Buffy's sister this is more annoying than scary. However, it gets scary when she realizes that the TV isn't showing the same movie as her friend's TV. Unplugging it doesn't help. In fact, that just seems to cue the other electronic applicances to go nuts with the stereo turning on and the microwave exploding. The trusty, aforementioned battleaxe cures those little glitches. Then the radio calls Dawn's name. In Joyce's voice.
Needless to say, this is upsetting. It gets moreso. Joyce's body keeps appearing and disappearing on the couch. The thumping gets louder and louder. The front door blows open and a hurricane wind blows in. But Dawn refuses to leave because a) it's her house and b) she thinks her mom is there. She talks to the Thumper and the Thumper thumps back; one for yes, two for no. She is told that the Thumper is her mom, that her mom is not okay, that her mom is not alone. There's a little strobey effect where you can see a guy in a monster suit strangling Joyce's dead body. Getting to the panic stage Dawn does a spell, to cast out the thing hurting her mom and invading the house. The thing fights back, pushing Dawn into a wall, cutting her face, smashing her mouth. But the kid completes the spell like a pro (although the final line "now die you bastard" was likely an ad lib). Joyce appears.
Joyce is all Touched By An Angel with a little wind fan to do the hair thing and glowy white robes. Joyce tells Dawn that she loves her and Buffy. But bad stuff is coming and when it does, Dawn, you got to watch out for yourself because Buffy is going to let you down. Then, poof, she's gone.
Andrew's Conversation:
Jonathan and Andrew return to Sunnydale, haunted by nightmares and the inability to learn Mexicanese. Their plan is to follow their nightmare, find the proof that something is going down, take it to Buffy and have her and the Scoobies a) forgive them and b) let them hang out at her house.
They break into the high school and begin to look for The Place. They, of course, seperate and Warren appears to Andrew, something that he's apparently been doing for awhile now. Andrew is still enamoured with Warren and is helping him move on to Phase Two. (Phase One ending with the dying thing.)
Andrew and Jonathan eventually find the room directly under the principal's office and begin digging. (Apparently Xander saved the board of education a boodle of money on concrete by not putting a slab in that room.) They dig and dig and dig until they unearth what looks like a giant Metallica album cover. The proof that will make Buffy forgive all and make Jonathan the scooby he always wanted to be. Jonathan is hyped. High school, with the immediatcy gone, is looking pretty good and he's remembering the good points and all the people he knew, almost knew and wished he knew then. When Andrew reminds him that no one likes, cares or even remembers Jonathan. Jonathan replies that it doesn't matter, he cares about them. He then notices Warren, standing behind Andrew, but he doesn't notice the knife that Andrew sticks into his stomach. He falls back onto the goat headed pentagram, his blood filling in the hollows. Long time Buffy fans just know that this can't be good.
Buffy's Conversation:
The rest of the vampire climbs out of the grave. They fight until Vamp boy recognizes Buffy. They went to high school together, survived graduation and went off to Dartmouth where he's a psych major. In a really bizarre sequence of events, between trying to kill each other, they have a really productive session where they discuss Buffy's need to enter doomed relationships and her inferiority complex about her superiority complex. They determine that because her father betrayed her mother and his daughters she is likely to initiate relationships which she knows are doomed thereby avoiding the committment and allowing the guy to betray her. They further determine that while she naturally feels superior to everyone what with being the Slayer (and therefore she actually is superior) she doesn't feel she deserves it and therefore feels inferior to all her friends. VampShrink probs some more and finds out that her last relationship was with a vampire and, when he finds out it was Spike, is vastly amused by the irony as Spike is his sire.
Willow's Conversation:
Cassie emerges from the library stacks. Willow recognizes her from her picture and they discuss which is more ironic; Cassie showing up to someone she's never met or Cassie showing up because she's dead. Cassie tells Willow that she is here as a messenger and tells Willow a couple of things that only she and Tara would know. Turns out that Tara can see and hear Willow but can't manifest as Cassie can because Willow killed a bunch of people (hey, one person but you know how these things grow in the telling. First it's a single person and then a couple and then you've slaughtered half of Greece and nearly conquered Rome and... sorry, wrong show.) Tara, through Cassie, tells Willow that she has to stop using magic. Period. Stop. No more. Cold turkey. If she doesn't then everyone will die. Acutally, if she doesn't everyone will be killed by Willow. Willow is doubtful as Giles has told her that stopping cold is just as dangerous as using dark magic. Cassie repeats her warning. Willow repeats that she doesn't think she can do it. Cassie offers an alternative. If she doesn't think she can handle it and if she misses Tara so there's an obvious solution. Which is just like going to sleep.
Willow clues in.
She demands to know who Cassie really is. Cassie admits the suicide was too far but everyone would buy it. What with Willow being as Willow is... just a couple of candles, Indigo Girls on the stereo and a razor to the wrist. Willow figures out that Cassie is the Big Bad. Which the Big Bad admits to just before doing a really disturbing CGI effect and disappearing.
Spike's Conversation:
Spike's talk is silent. He sits at the bar and a woman approaches. She looks like the lead singer. She sets a pack of cigarettes beside his drink and glances at the chair beside him. He nods that she should sit. Later, they walk down the street. They're obviously talking and Spike seems very relaxed, not the strutting big bad vampire but looser. The get to her place, one of those apartments with the stairs on the outside of the building. She guestures towards the stairs, inviting him up. He looks up, as if considering. Then he vamps out, biting and drinking until she falls.
The music from the beginning plays as the dead go home. Fade to black.
RANDOM THOUGHTS
Okay, I have not been so scared by a Buffy episode since Hush.
Obviously at least two of the manifestations were false. But what about Joyce and what about Spike?
I am so very, very glad that Amber Benson's agents and the studio couldn't come to a deal. I am freaking turning mental cartwheels of joy and delight that it wasn't Tara sitting across that table because I honestly don't think I could have watched that.
I liked Vamp Shrink. He had to die but he was fun while he lasted.
Speaking of Hush. On the Hush-o-Meter this episode rates right up there with ... well, not Hush and the Body. But we're getting there. Right up there with Tabula Rasa and Family though.
Before they actually got evil the campy exubrance of geekdom was very funny. Jonathan and Andrew, roaming the halls of Sunnydale High School with equipment better suited to scaling Mt. Logan was hilarious.
Oh, this has been compared to The Yoko Factor in that the Big Bad is using their own doubts and fears against them. It is but it also reminds me of the third season episode where Angel is considering staying up until dawn because Jenny is haunting him.
RANDOM QUOTES
Jonathan: "Of course I'm scared. Last time we were here 33.34% of us were flayed alive."
Andrew: "It eats you. Starting with your bottom."
Cassie: "She asked me to come talk to you. It's kind of important."
Willow: "She?"
Cassie: "Don't worry. I'm not going to hurt you or anything."
Willow: "Who asked you? What are you talking about?"
Cassie: "She says she still sings."
Andrew: (with Alec Guiness accent) "That boy is our last hope."
Warren: (with slight Frank Oz accent) "No. There is another."
Andrew: "Really? Who's our last hope?"
Warren: "No. I was going with it. It was a thing. He is our last hope."
Buffy: "This is insane troll logic."
Cassie: "She says you're not going to be okay. You're going to kill everyone."
Joyce: "When it gets bad, Buffy won't chose you."
Willow: "From beneath you, it devours."
Cassie: "Not it. Me."