Week 2: Innocence

Experiencing rejection at the hands of someone you love (and thought loved you) is the perfect vehicle for Whedon to demonstrate Buffy's hitherto untapped reserves of mental, emotional, and physical strength. Which is not to say she never looks distraught or unruffled, since she does, like when Giles asks about what happened the previous night and when she sobs herself to sleep or when she finds out about Jenny Calender or when Angel wounds her verbally.

Instead of retreating from the world or refusing to participate in her life and the consequences of her choices, Buffy puts aside her understandable emotional turmoil and pushes forward with determination. Her lines "I know what I have to do...kill him" are spoken with calm resolution, despite the horror they imply. She can't quite bring herself to do it at the end of the episode, though, but when Angel sneers at her that she wouldn't, can't kill him she says as she turns away: "Give me time." She is well aware of what she has to do. After that night she'll have to come to grips with what has happened and its far-reaching affects on the close community she has developed with Giles and the Scoobies, which won't be easy. But after her stunning portrayal in this episode, I--and hopefully other viewers--am convinced that she is capable of much more than she is given credit for in "Surprise." It's as if her character has undergone an almost total transformation in one episode's time.

Someone in another blog mentioned that it's easy to forget that Buffy is only supposed to be seventeen, and indeed, at the end of the episode when Buffy and her mom are together (one of my favorite moments in the episode) and her mom mentions her age, I felt shocked at the reminder. To be the same, and yet not the same is something I've mulled over. Everyone asks how you feel after your birthday, and I usually respond "the same" while also realizing that I'm not, can never be who I was even one year ago. Moreover, to be viewed one way--"I think you look the same," her mother says--and yet know that there is so much more to the self than is presented to others is something every person faces, especially when one is in high school, but a dilemma that even extends to college and beyond.

So..."let it burn."