atheneum - all the way

We open with a big Halloween sale at the Magic Box. Anya skates around in a Charlie's Angels outfit (actually, it looks more like something from Boogie Nights), while Giles mans the register and Xander - dressed as a pirate - talks to a bunch of kids. Dawn comes in with no costume, and say that Halloween is lame. Toward the front door, Willow's angrily telling a woman decked out in a witch costume that she should re-think the stereotype. Dawn comes up and Willow bitches about "idiots who think witches are all about hairy moles and rotten teeth", but then melts when she sees a little girl dressed up as a witch. Willow takes the little girl off and Dawn is left alone. She sees a golden coin with a dragon on it on the table, and surreptitiously pockets it.

Buffy walks by carrying a box, and Anya sends her to the basement for some more items. Buffy goes downstairs and runs into Spike, who's picking up some fibrous rooty thing to mix in with his blood. They kinda joke around a bit, and Spike finds the mandrake root for her that she was sent down to get. He then asks her if she wants to go for some "rough and tumble". Buffy obviously thinks he's talking about sex, and kinda freaks, until he clarifies that he meant patrol. Still a bit off balance, she says no, she's gotta stay and help out. Spike leaves to go watch "The Great Pumpkin".

Back upstairs, Giles asks Buffy for help in bagging, and she says maybe she should go patrol with Spike. Giles says Halloween's usually devoid of any demonic activity. Buffy reminds him of costumes that take over your body ("Halloween", s2), and little fear demons ("Fear Itself", s4). Giles basically says no-go, and makes her help him bag. We cut to an older man walking down the street with a grocery bag. He enters his house, humming "Pop goes the weasel", and looks out his window at some early trick or treaters. Still humming, he pulls out a big knife, saying he's going to do something special for them this year.

That night, the entire gang closes up the shop and lays around, beat after the hectic day of selling. Anya exhibits over-done sentimentality that everyone helped her make so much money. Giles gets up to start cleaning, as Anya and Dawn do the dance of "capitalist superiority" behind the cash register. Xander seems oddly fixated on Anya, and almost in a trance-like voice he says he's "going to marry that girl". Buffy is startled, and Xander gets up and announces the engagement to everyone. Everyone's stunned, 'cause no one had any idea. Buffy tells Giles they "have to do something", and we cut to the Summers house later, where everyone's having an impromptu engagement party. Buffy apologizes for the lack of decorations, but Willow uses her magic to spruce up the room. Tara and Giles share a look at Willow's use of magic for everything.

In the kitchen, Tara asks Willow why she had to use magic to do the decorations, when they could have just gone to the grocery store. Willow says it was easier this way. They get into a little argument over how Willow thinks Tara's always coming down on her for using magic, until Dawn accidentally interrupts by coming into the kitchen. Back out the in living room, Buffy congratulates Xander. She can't believe that Xander is getting married. Dawn starts to breeze by to go spend the night at a friend's house, but Buffy stops her. Dawn reminds Buffy she already said she could, and Buffy looks to Giles for guidance. Giles says it's up to Buffy, and she reluctantly lets her go after Dawn promises that it's only 4 blocks over, and it's not like she'll be roaming the streets.

Outside, we see Dawn walking along the sidewalk. She stops, smiles, and then we see her walking down an alley. She runs into her friend Jan, and they both laugh over the fact that their families really fell for the "I'll be sleeping over at my friend's house" line. They go to the park to meet up with some other people, including Jan's boyfriend (Zack) and another guy (Justin) who's making eyes at Dawn. Dawn tells him she's seen him "around at a couple of parties". He says he's seen her too. Obviously, this is not the first time Dawn's snuck out like this. The rest of the people take off, leaving just Dawn and her friend with the two guys.

Cut to the fearsome foursome egging a house. Dawn talks to Justin a bit as he lets the air out of the van in the drive way, and then they all take off to continue their reign of juvenile destruction. The guys walk in front talking about whether or not they're going to go "all the way" with the girls, and behind them Dawn tells Jan she really likes Justin. Jan gets bored and wants to go do something else, but Zack looks at the house of the older man from the beginning and says "just one more."

Back at the Summers house, Xander's jovial mood seems to be slowly deflating. He's sitting alone on the steps looking pensive when Giles comes up to him and offers his congratulations. He asks if Anya's moving in with him, and Xander doesn't really have an answer. Giles goes on to talk about when they'll be getting a house and their combined finances and stuff, and Xander starts to look worried. Back at the old guy's house, the four teenagers stand around trying to work up the nerve to go smash the pumpkins on his front porch. Dawn says she heard the guy that lived there was batty. Zack dares Jan to go smash the pumpkins, but she declines. Dawn, trying to look cool, goes up to the front porch and hefts a pumpkin. Before she can smash it, though, the old man comes out and scares her. He invites them all inside, saying he's got something special for them.

Inside, Zack admires a bunch of old toys littering the man's living room. The old man says he used to design them back in '58, until he was fired over "one little mistake". He comes across as slightly looney, and asks Dawn to go help him in the kitchen with their treat. Justin goes in her place, and when they get to the kitchen the old man starts to pick up the knife, but turns around to find that Justin is a vampire! Justin chomps him, and the man knocks a pan off the stove as he falls, revealing some rice krispie treats with pumpkin faces on them that he was about to cut up for them. Out in the living room, the others hear the pan clatter to the floor and jump to their feet. Justin comes running out saying he snagged the man's wallet when he wasn't looking, and they all take off. Outside, Justin confides to Zack that the old man was "rank". Zack says a "spritz of Dawnie" would fix that, and asks if they're gonna just snack on the girls or go all the way and turn them?

Back at casa de Summers, Anya rambles on and on about the wedding, and how many plans have to be made, and houses and cars and babies, and Xander stands next to her looking decidedly not well, now. In fact he looks a bit overwhelmed and punchy. Anya goes on to say that she's the luckiest person in the world to have found exactly who she was meant to be with, and everything is working out perfectly for them. How often does that happen? Buffy's face kinda falls as she listens to this, perhaps thinking of her own single status. Outside, Buffy and Xander come out and sit on the porch. Xander admits to being overwhelmed, but Buffy tells him that Anya's right. This is how life is supposed to work. It's love, and celebration, and moving forward. Xander seems buoyed by this, and goes back inside when Buffy goes off to "take Spike up on his offer to patrol".

Later Justin and Dawn make small talk as he gives her a share of the money from the old man's wallet, saying it's her share of the "spoils of war". He says something about this being the beginning of her life of crime, and she says she steals all the time. She shivers, and he takes his jacket off and gives it to her. Just then Jan comes up and asks where Zack is, and Justin says he went to get the car. Quick cut to Zack after he's fed off of someone. He drops the body and takes off in the car of the victim.

Buffy walks along a sidewalk amidst some trick or treaters, and she looks lost in thought. She sees a couple walking along together, and looks kinda sad. Then she sees an ambulance pass her by, and follows it. It leads her to the victim that Zack just fed off of, and she makes her "Ooh, some bad vampire did this and I'm going to go take my frustration out on him" face. Back at the Summers house, Giles answers the phone; it's Jan's mother, looking for Jan. Giles goes out into the living room and tells them that Dawn and Jan are both missing, after having lied to all of them. Giles orders Xander and Anya to stay there, Willow and Tara to check downtown, and he will go to Spike's and try to catch Buffy.

Out in the woods, Jan and Zack get out of the back seat of the car laughing and kissing, and run off into the woods, leaving Dawn and Justin alone in the front seat. Justin starts to put the moves on Dawn, and she's a little nervous at first but they end up kissing. She's wowed by the kiss, and Justin realizes it was her first. She is really insecure and rambles a bit until Justin kisses her again.

Cut to the Bronze, where Willow and Tara have come to look for Dawn. There's a big Halloween party going on, and they can barely hear each other talking over the music and din around them. They start to go up to the catwalk to get a better vantage point. On the way up Willow makes a snide remark about her own "geek-infested roots", and clearly seems to distance her present self from the person she used to be. Up on the catwalk, Tara suggests that they ask security to help them find Dawn, but Willow says that will take too long. She initiates a spell, and when Tara asks what she's doing Willow explains that she's going to shift everyone who isn't a fifteen year old girl into an alternate dimension for a fraction of a second so they can see if Dawn's there. She doesn't understand when Tara reacts with horror and says she can't. In frustration, Willow says something that blocks out all of the sound from the rest of the club, so she and Tara can have it out. She asks if she's been talking to Giles, and if she's on her side now. Tara says this isn't about sides, but Willow is using too much magic. She asks if she's just supposed to sit back and keep her mouth shut. Willow says that would be a good start, and Tara says she would if she didn't love Willow so much. She runs off.

Back in the car, Justin and Dawn are still making out when Justin bites Dawn's lip a bit too sharply. Dawn pulls back, but Justin kisses her again. He suddenly goes into vamp face. Cut to Spike's crypt. Buffy comes in to recruit Spike's help in finding whoever attacked the owner of the car, but he tells her that Giles was by earlier looking for her, saying that Dawn's out running around on her own.

Giles is walking through the misty cemetery with a flashlight when he hears a girl screaming. He goes running off and finds a vampire feeding on a girl. Thinking it's Dawn, he knocks the vamp off of the girl to find it's Janice. The vamp gets back up and he and Giles fight. Giles uses a Buffy kick-type move on him and the vamp backs into a tree, staking himself on a protruding branch. Giles asks where Dawn is, but Jan is still kinda out of it and doesn't know. Cut back to the car. Dawn jumps out and Justin follows her. He stops her, saying he thought they could "hang out or something". He says she's different from other girls, and he just wants to be close to her. He starts to lean down to bite her, and Dawn closes her eyes. Giles walks into the clearing and starts to say "we can do this the easy way or we can do it the hard way...", but just then several cars in the clearing turn their headlights on, bathing Giles in light. Numerous vamps slink out of the woods, looking all menacing.

Just then Spike and Buffy show up, and Dawn's obviously more scared of Buffy than she is of the vamps, because she pulls away from Justin then. "Were you parking?! With a vamp?!" Buffy shrieks. Dawn claims she didn't know he was a vamp; she'd just met him. "Oh! So you were parking in the woods with a boy you'd just met!" Heh. Ain't no way Dawn can win this one. Everyone starts fighting. Spike takes on a vamp, and Buffy stakes one. Dawn runs away from Justin. Two vamps attack Giles, and Buffy throws him her stake. He dusts them both. Spike berates the vamp he's fighting for "breaking the rules" and feeding on Halloween (see Flaws, below), and then shoots him with a crossbow. He re-loads it, but misfires when another vamp attacks him. Buffy beheads another vamp by slamming a car door on him. Justin catches up with Dawn again, and tackles her. "I thought you really liked me?" she says. "I do," he responds, "and you like me too." He leans in to bite her, and Dawn stakes him with Spike's misfired arrow (bolt?).

Back at the Summers house, Xander and Anya take off, and Tara says she's glad Dawn is okay. Then she goes upstairs to go to bed, still clearly upset by the fight she and Willow had. Willow looks sorry, and follows after her, calling her name. Giles is holding an icepack to his face, but he's none the worse for the wear. Buffy remarks that Dawn (who's sitting in the dining room) is taking it pretty hard. Giles agrees, but says they can't let her get away with this kind of behaviour or it'll spin out of control. Buffy says he's right and then says that she's glad he's "here to take care of it", and leaves. Giles looks startled; clearly he hadn't intended to be left with the responsibility. Nevertheless, he goes in to Dawn and chastises her.

Upstairs, Willow says she's sorry, but Tara says it's not that easy. Willow says "Okay, I'm sorry, let's just forget this ever happened." As she talks, she picks up a small yellow plant and says "Forget" again, and it shimmers. She gets into bed with it and suddenly Tara's fine. When Willow ask her if she's still mad, Tara says "About what?"

FLAWS: Heh...not really a flaw. It's just wrong. Dawn tells Justin that she's a freshman; "Way down there at the bottom of the rung." Um...the bottom of the what? I thinks she meant "bottom of the ladder", or "bottom rung on the ladder". Who the hell wrote that line, or did she flub it?

You remember the messed up time sequence in "Inca Mummy Girl", when Giles drives Buffy to the Bronze, and then we see Giles piecing together the seal at the museum, and then Buffy runs in to the Bronze to find Xander all out of it from his kiss with the IMG? They do the same thing in this ep. Buffy leaves her house, heading toward Spike's so they can go patrol. On the way, she finds Zack's victim. Then Giles gets the phone call from Jan's mother and he takes off to try and catch Buffy at Spike's. Theoretically, they should have arrived at the crypt together, or else Buffy should have gotten there first. After all, she was already half way to the crypt when she found the body, and she went right to Spike's afterward. No way should Giles have gotten there first and told Spike that Dawn was missing.

There are a lot of references to how cold it is...Dawn shivers numerous times, and Justin gives her his jacket. Then, later, while wearing his jacket and sitting in the car, Dawn's still cold. How freaking cold can it be, man? This is southern California, we're talking about, in October. Contrivance!

Also...Spike tells one vampire that "It's Halloween, you nit. We take the night off. Those are the rules." Um.....what? Excuse me, but who was it four years ago on this very night who tried to kill Buffy? (answer: Spike, in "Halloween"). Spike has never played by the rules. Never. Right from the very beginning. In "School Hard" he was supposed to wait until Saturday night to kill Buffy, but he "got bored" and attacked her at school during the parent / teacher conferences. This whole thing where Spike is suddenly following the rules I feel is pure contrivance, to make the viewers go "look, he's being a good guy, he's got morals, he's got ethics." Bah!

Also, during Spike's fight scene with the vamp in the woods, his hair is neat and slicked back one moment, then messy the next when we change angles to the stunt double. Then it's neat again.

THOUGHTS ON THE EPISODE: Eh. This episode was mostly about Dawn being a rebellious teenager, and it doesn't do much for me. It does set us up for some Xander / Anya uncertainty though, when he finally announces to the gang that they're engaged. It indirectly sets up some of the stuff that happens in the next episode, and the Buffy / Spike scene in the beginning was pretty funny. Other than that, I can't say too much for this ep.

BEST LINE:

Spike: "Feel like a bit of the rough and tumble?"

Buffy (completely deer-in-headlights) "What?!"

Spike: "Me.....you....."

Buffy: (more deer-in-headlights look)

Spike: "Patrolling? Hello?"

"All the Way"