Anya has a fear of bunnies, first referenced in Fear, Itself when she wore a bunny costume to a Halloween party, with the simple explanation: “bunnies frighten me”. This fear is shown in Shadow, The Gift, Once More, With Feeling, Tabula Rasa, Smashed, Selfless and in Chosen. In Bargaining (Part 2), Razor asks Willow what she’s going to do, “pull a rabbit out of a hat?” Anya turns to Tara to be reassured that she won’t. Anya’s final words on the show are about bunnies. She thinks of them whilst preparing for the huge battle - “Bunnies. Floppy, hoppy, bunnies.” Anya’s bunny suit in Fear, Itself became so popular that modelmakers Clayburn Moore created a figure of the character.
December 23rd, 2005 at 4:07 pm
Well, speculation on the net says that she got the phobia of bunnies because they reminded her of the pain she went through with Olaf. I guess it makes sense.
January 10th, 2006 at 6:38 am
In season five’s finale, the Gift, Anya finds a stuffed Bunny the basement of the Magic Shop and screams in horror. She is determined that it is a bad omen. Xander tries to comfort her and then proposes. I guess it really is a bad omen on many counts. Buffy dies later in that episode and in season 6, we find that her engagment to Xander is doomed as well.
January 10th, 2006 at 7:24 am
I wish they didn’t break up. I bet they would have been cute as a married couple and that would have added a whole new dynamic (or whatever) to the story too. But I never thought of that, the bunny omen thing, I mean.
May 9th, 2006 at 2:59 am
Anya’s “bunnies” line in Once More, With Feeling is classic.
This fear of bunnies is my favorite character trait of all the Scoobies. It perfectly suits her absurdly skewed, yet somehow empathetic, humanity.
Does Selfless explain the source of her hare-raising (sorry, couldn’t resist) phobia?
July 10th, 2006 at 9:22 am
Selfless doesn’t explain her fear. It only shows that Aud (human Anya back then) and Olaf had bunnies. Anya is holding on when Olaf comes in before they have an argument.
July 10th, 2006 at 4:18 pm
If you read above AnyaRocks put that the speculation was that the bunnies reminded her of Olaf leaving her. This would make sense because she was so angry and upset that she became a demon. Therefore I think Selfless does explain her bunny fear.