by Sanguine

Disclaimer: No offence is meant to reptiles, goddesses, the Mattel Corporation (proud copyright owners of Barbie ™), Jim Morrison (who might be turning in his Parisian grave), anyone named George, or David Fury. Oh, and for the uninitiated, George is the nickname we gave the snake on the Buffy Cross and Stake Board when the episode originally aired.

Ride the snake

To the lake

To the ancient lake baby

The snake he’s long

Seven miles

He’s old and his skin is cold

Jim Morrison (American Poet), from "The End"

Sanguine: Mr. Fury, can I ride the snake too?

DF: No Sanguine, riding the CGI snake would only make you look like a cheesy Barbie-doll action figure.

Sanguine: But, but I really want to ride George. Buffy makes it look like so much fun!! That scene made me forget all about her sick mother in the hospital.

DF: George? Who's George? Look Sanguine, don't mock me. I won't be mocked.

Sanguine: Sorry sir. No offence intended. It's just . . . well I didn't quite understand your episode, Shadow. A sick mother, a sweater-sniffing vampire, an insecure boyfriend, a goddess on a time schedule, a man in a rubber snake suit . . . where were you wanting to go with this episode anyway?

DF: Leave me alone, you freak. [David Fury stomps off in exasperation.]

Sanguine: Geez. Some people are so sensitive! What did I say? Mr. Fury!

Come back! I'm sorry I made fun of your snake! He was kind of cute in a cold-blooded, glowy-eyed, reptilian kinda way . . . Mr. Fury!!!

As you might gather from my imaginary dialogue above (lack of sleep does strange things), I was not impressed with the episode Shadow. I'm sure that David Fury was instructed to write a "pivot" episode (an episode that changes the direction of the story arc), but the result was an unfortunate hodge-podge of disparate elements that never quite gelled.

As frequently occurs on Buffy, the campy (George, the key-seeking snake; Spike, the undie-stealing lovesick vamp; Glory, the Valley Girl-talkin' goddess) was juxtaposed with the serious (a very ill mother, Riley's insecurities and burgeoning vamp-suck addiction). Unfortunately, in this episode the connection between the campy plot threads and the serious ones was so tenuous that even a rigorous reading of the subtext (ala my review of I Was Made to Love You where I argued--for better or worse--that the sexbot April was actually symbolic of both Buffy's and Spike's approaches to romantic relationships) wouldn't yield results. George was simply George.

The episode begins with Joyce taking a CATScan. The camera travels into the tunnel with Joyce, allowing the viewer to experience her isolation and fear. The camera then pans over her prone body as her eyes, wide open, stare upwards. Hindsight is 20/20, and this camera shot seemed to foreshadow the events of The Body. Dawn and Buffy comfort each other in the hospital, and Buffy shows remarkable insight into her "little sister's" emotional state as she refrains from becoming irritated by Dawn's nervous chatter. Again, we see that Buffy is moving from adolescence into adulthood. She will need all the strength and maturity she can muster. During the course of the episode we discover that Joyce has a low-grade glioma that may or may not be operable. The doctor questions Buffy about Joyce's exposure to energy sources: a question that made many Buffy viewers speculate that perhaps Dawn is somehow responsible for Joyce's illness. Ben, the intrepid intern, interrupts at a key moment to "save" the Buffster from having to answer the doctor's insensitively-timed questions. Score a few brownie points for the body-sharing hellgod!

In other serious news, Riley is feeling all neglected and unneeded. He arrives at Buffy's house bright and early in the morning . . . only to find the door open. Hmmm. Riley, being a good soldier and all, cautiously enters the house. He finds an old green blanket on the floor.

The plot thickens. He then hears noise from upstairs. What, pray tell is happening? We then cut to Spike, indulging in a bit of sweater sniffing. David Fury really enjoys humiliating Spike, doesn't he? Or maybe, as James Marsters recently said, they're only bad to those they really love. OK. In any case, Spike's sweater sniffage and panty-stealing activities in this episode added fuel to the argument that Spike is nothing more than an evil, stalking vampire. Pesky demon. Comforting compassionately one episode, stealing undergarments the next. Spike then decides to indulge in one of his favourite activities: playing mind games. And boy, does he have some powerful ammunition this time. Spike tells Riley that he and Buffy spent the evening together, hanging out and drinking at the Bronze. Riley doesn't believe him at first, but then Spike points out that if Buffy hated him so much, why wasn't he de-invited from the house (foreshadowing alert!!! foreshadowing alert!!!). Riley is a bit surprised by that one. Spike presses forward, pointing out that both he and Riley are "harmless" but at least he still has the "dangerous" attitude. "What've you got? A piercing glance? Face it, white bread, Buffy's got a type and you're not it. She likes us dangerous, rough, occasionally bumpy in the forehead region . . . Not that she doesn't like you, but, sorry Charlie--You're just not dark enough." Spike possibly insightful diatribe seems plausible to Riley (OK, before I get flamed for calling Spike insightful, let's look at Buffy's track record: Buffy's one true-love experience was with a guy who turned evil when she shagged him :-) Furious, Riley thrusts the vampire out the door into the sunlight. The interesting thing about this scene (and indeed, subsequent Spike/Riley interactions in Into the Woods) is the establishment of parallels between Spike and Riley. Both men love Buffy. Neither man has been able to secure her affections. Riley's response: he becomes a vamp-addict and then leaves town for a dangerous and possibly self-destructive mission. Spike's response: he watches Buffy obsessively, does some good deeds to get into her good graces, and when rejected chains her up and almost feeds her to his ex-girlfriend. Oh, and then (God, please let it not be true) he has a sexbot built in her image. So neither boy deals with rejection terribly well. Gee, Buffy's luck with men surely does suck (no pun intended). No wonder she's decided to stay single.

Riley's feeling of isolation continues as Buffy is understandably preoccupied with her mother's illness. She simply doesn't have time to coddle her insecure boyfriend. She (as usual) is dealing with life and death. Riley's journey down a dark and shadowy path continues after an innocent little conversation with Dawn in which she makes the huge mistake of comparing him to Angel. Just what he needs to hear. "How shall I cope with my inferiority complex and my awakening death wish? Hmmm. I'll go to Willy's Bar, get smashed, then have Sandy suck on me for a while before I stake her. Sounds like a plan!" I really wish they would have done more with the Riley-goes-dark storyline. It resolved way too quickly, and the possibilities were really rich. But I digress. Let us now move to . . .

In this episode we find out more about Glory. She has a name and a time schedule (although you'd never know it). She also has an obsequious minion, Dreg, who has located a spell to raise a key-seeking . . . man in a rubber snake suit. It's George, one of the worst special effects in BTVS history! According to the shooting script, it was really supposed to be terrifying, but my husband and I found ourselves guffawing. Cheesiness at its finest! Anyway, this "scary" snake thing finds Dawn and then goes back to report to Glory. But luckily Buffy hops in the Giles-mobile and they manage to stop the snake before it reaches the petulant "Perturbed Yet Ultimately Merciful One" (AKA Glory). So once again, another monster has been thwarted. Sunnydale is safe once again! The forces of evil have been . . . temporarily detained!

Perhaps the title Shadow refers to the lightness and darkness present in this episode. For, you see, one cannot have a Shadow without some Light. Thus, the blend of extreme camp with a storyline about a seriously-ill parent was actually a stroke of brilliance . . . Nah! I can't do it. Don't get me wrong, though. Certain elements of this episode were enjoyable and interesting. I particularly liked Giles's ad for the Magic Shop, Giles's appreciative puppy-dog expression as he sold the goods to Glory, Giles's line: "Alister Crowley Sings? No, sadly, I don't carry it . . . But I do have some lovely whale sounds," Anya's growing ability to keep her mouth shut, Riley's dances with vamps, and the great dialogue between Dreg and Glory. But these small pleasures do not alter my final verdict: Hiss!!!