Ragnarok

Since we aren't going to have new episodes to discuss, we're going to have weekly episode discussion threads for old episodes. New threads will, of course, appear each Tuesday.

All The Way

As the episode opens, we find the gang hard at work at the Magic Box’s big Halloween sale. Out of nowhere, Xander announces that he and Anya are engaged. Finally! At Buffy's, the gang throws a shindig for the two lovers. Willow and Tara have a short fight after Will uses her magic to fill the room with decorations. Then, Dawn reminds Buffy that she is spending the night at her friend Janice's house. After Dawn gets the thumbs up from the Slayer, we quickly learn that she is spending the night out raising hell with Janice and a group of rowdy older kids. The night was a setup for Janice and Dawn to act on their teenage hormones with two boys named Zack and Justin. Back at the Slayer abode, Giles and Xander share a drink and talk about Xander's future. Xander seems to second-guess his marriage intentions and his future. Giles assures him that everything will be fine, while Buffy leaves to patrol.
Back on the streets, Dawn and friends find themselves in front of old man Kaltenbach's place. After Janice refuses to smash the old kook's pumpkin, Dawn volunteers. Unfortunately, as she lifts the pumpkin, the old man grabs her. Dawn's pals quickly rush to her aid. Strangely, they are invited into the house. As the four hooligans debate leaving, Justin offers to help the old man with his special gift in the kitchen. To our surprise, the old man didn't have any evil intentions at all; he just made them a rice crispy treat. However, Justin vamps out, kills the old man and steals his wallet. We return to Buffy's house: Janice's mom calls. Quickly, Giles figures out that the two girls have pulled a fast one. Giles decides to find Buffy, Anya and Xander mind the house and Tara and Willow head to the Bronze.
Just after we have learned that Zack and Justin are vamps, Zack steals a car by killing the driver. Then, the four teens begin making out. Janice and Zack run away, leaving Dawn and Justin alone in the car. Justin makes his move and delivers Dawn her very first kiss.
At the Bronze, Tara and Willow get into a spat about Willow using her magic to shift everyone who isn't sixteen years old into an alternate dimension to make Dawn easier to find. After Tara calls Willow out, Will freaks and accuses Tara of taking Giles's side.
In Zack's stolen car, Dawn and Justin continue to make out. However, after Justin nibbles her lip a little too hard, he vamps out. Although Dawn is swept away in the moment, she manages to feel his lumpy noggin. Nearby, Buffy arrives at Spike's crypt and learns of Dawn’s deception.
On the edge of the cemetery, Giles races to find Dawn. To his surprise, he stumbles on Zack and Janice (who he assumes is Dawn), just as Zack pulls his teeth out of her neck. After Zack calls Giles "grandpa," the watcher dusts him on the spot and continues to look for Dawn. In the clearing near the cemetery, Giles finds Dawn as Justin attempts to turn her. Right as Giles is about to dust the young Don Juan, a crew of adult vampires, surround them.
Spike and Buffy rush to the rescue as an all-out Halloween battle breaks out. In the battle's conclusion, Dawn dusts her first kiss Justin with a misfired crossbow arrow.
The long day comes to an end with the whole gang back at the house. Buffy decides not to be responsible for Dawn's actions, leaving the punishment to Giles. Shockingly, Willow places a spell on Tara that makes her forget the entire night and their fight.

RtS: #123; beat Where The Wild Things Are in the play-in round; lost to Fool For Love in the first round.

After the previous two episodes, I was ready for a nerd-free week and this episode delivered. The core story was fairly interesting - seeing Dawn interacting with her peers instead of being the tagalong Scooby mascot. MT gave a very good performance. The "side stories" were more interesting to me, though: Xander's huge case of cold feet after his big announcement was a dead giveaway that the wedding was no sure thing; Willow and Tara continued to slide towards disaster, capped by Willow's terrible decision to erase Tara's memory; Buffy's isolation, noticed only by Giles, continues to become worse as she bails out of the engagement party and leaves Giles to discipline Dawn. And okay, call me slow, but the B/S scene in the Magic Box basement was the one that made me realize that B/S was going to happen. And honestly, I wasn't all that happy about it, because it was clearly going to be a disaster.

Please feel free to post your comments, screencaps, favorite scenes and quotes.

Next week: 6x07, Once More, With Feeling.

Scythe

I felt really sorry for that old guy. He was really cute



"Shiver me timbers"



Dawn is a bit stupid to not have noticed that he's a vampire, you would've thought it would be the first thing that she would have checked for.



I was very happy for Xander and Anya. It's a shame that they didn't get married and never will now



I thought it was really cute how Buffy and Spike came to the rescue together



I started really disliking Willow when she started misusing magic She just really annoyed me. I wanted to scream at her "Why can't you just controll yourself! You were warned about this many times!"

Fortyseven

I'm not a big fan of this one. Still, it had some good moments. I felt sorry for the old man too. I usually love Willow, even the magic junkie Willow, but she really pissed me off when she did that spell on Tara. Some great X/A scenes! They were really cute. I don't even wanna think about their bitter end. Dawn's story was ok. Not so exciting but I loved Michelle's performance. I really felt sorry for Dawn when she had to stake her date.

Scythe

Poor old man

da daa da daa da da da daaa Happy Halloweeeen

Stupid Dawn and Vampire ugh!

Jaime Bee

Hey Guys!

Well to me the best part of this episode was the beginning with Spuffy.

Spike: Feel like a rough and tumble?

Buffy totally thought he was talking about sex!

Fortyseven

I love that part. And with Spike, you never know.

Ragnarok

Yes, I also think she did. And that's when I expected her to call him a pig and possibly punch him. When she didn't, I thought "Okay, we're in trouble now."

Jaime Bee

Oh yeah and the part where she says to herself He was so much easier to talk when he wanted to kill me.

Fortyseven

I love that quote

Giles was good in this episode too. We found our why he's always cleaning his glasses!

sum1

Dawn was great in this this ep.

Xander and Anya: That ship makes even B/A look like heaven.

Willow: Grrrr.... :buffy_willow: Never gonna forgive what she did to Tara.

Night Nymph

I always felt that this episode was underappreciated. I enjoyed it quite a bit. My favorite scene not yet mentioned was Buffy trying to lecture Dawn - "Oh, so you were parking with a boy you just met?" I found that entire exchange to be funny - vampires all around and Buffy is worried about Dawn's innocence. Poor, naive Dawn.

And yes - she should've been cautious about the vampire bit - At least she brought a stake.

Scythe

I skipped this comment and was just gonna say that knowing Spike he probably was partly saying it like she thought

Jaime Bee

True but he didn't seem to know why she was acting so strange in the scene. I don't think at that point he realized how much he had gotten under her skin. He seemed to generally be talking to her as a friend in my opinion. He wasn't smirking which usually is a good sign he means something else. lol

Scythe

Ah! That's a really good point! I like that alot!

Ragnarok

Spike was on his best behavior, for the most part, in the early episodes of S6. Obviously, he was happy that Buffy was back, but he also seemed content that she was willing to spend time with him and he probably knew he'd lose that if he pushed it. I didn't like him much in S5, but I really did start to like him in these early episodes. I honestly can't decide if he meant any innuendo in his line, but there's no doubt in my mind that Buffy heard it that way, and I was very surprised that she didn't immediately shoot him down.

I agree, but it's probably because people focus on the main Dawn story line. That was an okay story, but really didn't and couldn't go anywhere. When I rewatch it, it's for the stuff that's going on around the edges - Giles' dismay when Buffy runs off and leaves him to speak to Dawn, the expression on Willow's face when she registers that Xander really does mean to marry Anya, the Buffy/Spike business, and Xander's panic attack when he realizes he really has publicly committed to marrying Anya. And of course, Willow's first step into real evil when she performs the spell on Tara and effectively turns her into a sexbot. That's the real gold in this episode.

I agree with all of you who've commented on the old man. He was a nice piece of misdirection - I definitely thought he was up to no good right up to the moment Justin attacked him. Poor guy.

sum1

While I can't match your disgust, I'm not a huge fan of X/A. Anya was always too much of a doormat for me to ever be completely comfortable with the ship. That's what made X/C work for me - Cordelia was never reluctant to give him a verbal thumping when he got out of line. I don't remember Anya ever doing that until after the breakup. Things might have gone better for them if she'd been able to find that gear early on.