30 Days of Buffy Meme Day #12: Least Favourite Episode
Episode 7x19: Empty Places
Ugh, I hate this episode; it starts off quite enjoyable, with Clem's final scene as he is fleeing from Sunnydale, but it just goes downhill from here.
It takes place following a failed attack on the new villain Caleb, who killed three potentials (as I recall) and left some characters in hospital, including Xander, whose eye he has gouged out.
There ares some funny bits near the beginning, mostly a scene with Anya (absent from the previous episode) and Andrew writing "Steak" instead of "Steak".
After this, Faith, who also returned to the show in the previous episode, after appearing in a few episodes of Angel, takes the potentials out clubbing; Buffy doesn't agree, probably because Giles gave her and Xander the "hairdryer treatment" after they both went out on dates, all about becoming distracted, and how they should not be dropping the ball when the world is at stake.
The potentials rebel; they don't like Buffy's leadership, and the fact that her plan in the last episode got three of them killed, but the final scene is the reason why this is my least favourite episode.
Giles sends Spike and Andrew off on a mission, and when Buffy returns home all the other characters confront her, led by (of all people) Dawn and Giles, characters who have previously been supportive of Buffy. They all tell her that they want Faith to act as their "leader", and to make matters worse, Dawn then kicks Buffy out of the house. It says a lot that Spike and Andrew, who started off as bad guys, were seen as the ones who would stand up for Buffy at this point, thus they were got out of the way.
The treatment of Buffy at the end of this episode doesn't get easier to watch, and the only characters in that scene who I didn't find myself angry at were Faith, who didn't really seem to want them to go as far as they did, and Willow, who does at least snap at a potential for her "Ding Ding! The Witch is Dead!"
Yes, truly a nasty episode.