7.19 Empty Places

[Clare]

7.19 Empty Places - Episode #141
Following their vineyard defeat, the potentials rally around Faith and throw Buffy out of her own house.

Review (also post a score out of 10) and discuss this episode.

[partcynic]

7x19 “Empty Places”

Episode Rating = 0

Oh dear. I wasn’t looking forward to watching “Empty Places” again, as it’s always been one of my least favourite episodes, and goes beyond bad “Buffy” into bad television. To be honest, it’s hard to believe that this is considered an official, canon story – as this wasn't remotely connected to "Buffy"; just being an embarrassing mess. Seasons six and seven had really evidenced the writers’ lack of focus and attention to detail, as well as Sarah Michelle Gellar's increasing unhappiness with where the series had gone (though the other actors are all routinely falling below former standards now). This ep basically served as the icing on the stale cake, and its total disregard of plot and characterisation hints that the show-wide burnout had become so pronounced that this stuff was just churned out to fulfil contractual obligations.

What I Liked about "Empty Places":

- Willow and Xander’s moment at the hospital was nice. It wasn’t particularly emotional or insightful, but the characters behaved like lifelong friends might.

- Faith‘s fine in her first scene (when Kennedy and Amanda duck out of Anya’s briefing). Her asking Kennedy for soap and cigarettes in exchange for crisps was kind of amusing, as was her statement that she’d shut Anya’s sex talk down by reminding her that she was with Xander first.

What I Disliked about “Empty Places”:

- This episode has zero plot. With no real structure in place, we instead received a series of plodding scenes that contained little development for either the characters or the story. While many of the players took the time to emote and vent their anger/frustration at what was happening, the emoting didn’t actually tell us anything about them, and contained nothing that was actually constructive (e.g. “Buffy, I don’t agree with your plan. I think we should consider doing x/y/z”). The net effect was that this felt like a waste of an episode, and like “Bring on the Night”/”Showtime”, it could probably have been condensed into a ten-minute sub-plot with no negative ramifications.

- The opening made no sense. Why have the townsfolk suddenly decided to up and leave Sunnydale? We’ve heard lots of talk about how bad things are, but we’ve never been shown what the First’s been doing to terrify the populous. Granted, In “Storyteller” we witnessed some bizarre goings-on at the High School, but it wasn’t too far beyond what Buffy dealt with in S1-3, and it was stated to be due to the Seal’s influence (and thus localised). If people didn’t flee when a giant portal opened in the sky, released dragons and fired lightning everywhere (“The Gift”); or when a demon motorcycle gang invaded and torched the city (“Bargaining”), why are they choosing to leave now?

- The conversation with Buffy and Clem was long, dull, contained no new information, and had a bunch of repetitive, unfunny jokes. In addition, are we now supposed to believe that everyone’s fine with demons in public? No one bats an eyelid at Clem driving along (where’d he get his car? Is there a local demon garage?)

- Sarah Michelle Gellar was obviously unwell for parts of the filming, so it would have been good to reference it briefly in the script. Her sickness isn’t an issue for the Buffy character, but it becomes strange when she’s portraying the First, which shouldn’t be able to catch a cold. Couldn’t the staff have pushed back those scenes a bit and let SMG recover?

- Anya and Andrew’s scene in the basement was pointless. The comedy was either bad to start with (Andrew writing on the board) or reliant on tired character tropes (Anya being socially clueless and saying the worst thing at the worst time), and the Turok-han discussion didn’t add anything to our current knowledge. With this in mind, why was this sequence even written in the first place?

- Why didn’t we get any reaction from Anya regarding Xander’s injury? She’s with him when he comes back from hospital, but the writers dropped the ball elsewhere. Instead of wasting Emma Caulfield on the basement stuff, they could have used her time for a meaningful Xander/Anya scene.

- Speaking of Xander, what was going on at the hospital? Shouldn’t a doctor have been filling him in on his treatment instead of Buffy? Where are his parents? Do they know what’s happened? Is he even on speaking terms with them after he called off the wedding they paid for in “Hell’s Bells”?

- Buffy dodging the subject of Xander was an amateurish way of showing her upset, and the basic idea could have been expressed without resorting to a juvenile cliché.

- The section with Buffy at the school was strange. Her looking longingly at the photo of she, Willow and Xander was a cute touch (though it loses emotional impact every time the writers have her do it – remember the identical moments in “Dead Man’s Party” and “The Yoko Factor”?), but Caleb’s arrival made no sense. Why was he at the school? Had he been following Buffy around? Why did he choose to throw her through a window, and then just leave her (a la the Turok-han – it seems like failing to capitalise on your upper hand runs in the First’s ranks)? Wouldn’t killing her have been smarter? And how did this figure into Caleb’s supposed plan? Does he have such an intimate psychological knowledge of Buffy that he knew almost killing her would provoke her into making another full-out attack on the vineyard?

- It’s convenient that everyone has fled town except for the people who run and work at the Bronze. The stuff with the potentials was okay, but Faith’s concern about Amanda’s underage drinking was way out of character. Even a reformed, moral Faith wouldn’t be fussed about that.

- The fight scene with the police was poorly choreographed. When the act break happens, Faith’s got four guns pointed at her, but when the story resumes, they’ve vanished. Sure, she actively disarms a couple of the men, but it’s silly that they 1) don’t try and pick them up and 2) go at her one-by-one for a hand-to-hand battle instead of simply shooting her.

- The setup for abbey scenes didn’t make sense. For some reason, Spike (who was nearly killed by a scheming Giles not that long ago) has minimal resistance to heading out on a road trip at Giles’ behest, and was willing to take Andrew with him (why?) The moment later on with the two of them discussing the onion thing was okay, but it substituted a continuity reference for real humour.

- When Spike and Andrew reach the abbey, why did the monk attack them? What was he even doing there when all of his brethren were murdered? Does he randomly leap at everyone who comes in? Where was this guy when the journalists/reporters/police etc were taking pictures of the murder scenes? And he managed to escape from Caleb by hiding? Something tells me that shouldn’t work against the all-knowing source of all evil. On top of that, we had Spike now being a lingual scholar (are he and Dawn taking the same ‘learn ancient languages in half a day’ course?), and the very linear path to the end of the season being laid out with the reference to the scythe.

- How does Wood know Faith? They’ve never met before. And while Wood says that Buffy told him about her, I can’t see Buffy doing that, since it might have led to questions that would bring up painful memories.

- There’s too much sitting around and griping about the First/Caleb. When your seasonal arc features both the heroes and the villain not doing anything, you’re in trouble, and the Scoobs’ anxiety doesn’t ring true. Just think back to prior seasons - the Mayor was invincible up until he ascended (and even then it took a schoolful of explosives to kill him); Adam was only taken down thanks to dangerous magic, and Glory beat Buffy every time they met. The gang’s sudden change in approach has also led to them forgetting about all of the resources they know are available. If Caleb is especially frightening, why not consider performing an enjoining spell (it beat Adam – and though it had bad effects, wouldn’t the risk be worth it?) Perhaps they could contact Riley again and get some military assistance (guns might help against the Bringers); use the rocket launcher or the troll hammer; or have Willow actually use her super-powerful magic. Or if she was concerned about tapping into the dark stuff, why not contact the coven and get them to imbue Buffy with their strength, as they did with Giles in “Two To Go/Grave”? It seems that all of the characters have forgotten everything that’s ever happened to them, and that’s terrible development.

- The ‘let’s throw Buffy out of her own home’ scene is the worst bit of writing in the entire series. While you may be watching the same actors from S1, their characters are nowhere to be found, and there’s brutal assassination across the board. I’ll now go through the problems in separate points.

- Buffy’s plan to storm was vineyard was merely stupid in “Dirty Girls”, but her insistence that they go back in again is completely out of character. It’s not like she hasn’t made risky plans before, but even a stressed Buffy should know that her idea was not the best direction to go in, and that it might be good to listen to and heed others’ perspectives instead of just dismissing them. The character has become a stone-hearted bag over the course of the season, and I’m left wondering where the compassionate, thoughtful woman of the early seasons has gone.

- For some reason, the writers randomly decided to destroy Giles (and the crucial Buffy/Giles relationship) in “Lies My Parents Told Me”, but if you could at least twist it so that Giles was still Buffy’s father figure – just an unbelievably stern one with no connection to his prior self. However, this episode killed even that interpretation. After almost seven years of bonding and mutual growth, one argument and set of bad decisions render Giles okay with having his ‘daughter’ tossed out onto the street – meaning that all of that development was for nothing.

- It would be nice if Dawn had even a little bit of gratitude for what her sister has done for her. Of course, she’s entitled to disagree with Buffy’s plan (any reasonable person would and should have serious qualms with her current leadership skills). But saying “this is my home too” and joining the ‘kick Buffy out’ gang? Since when was Dawn paying the mortgage and the bills? I bet Buffy wishes she’d let her jump to her death in “The Gift” now – it would have spared both she and us quite a bit of misery.

- Willow and Xander have really atrophied as the show has gone on, and they’ve lost most of their former depth, as well as all of their loyalty. If they disagree with Buffy, that’s fine, but they should express their disagreement like old friends might. They should know Buffy, and that she doesn’t fare well with confrontations. If either of them had been having reservations, why not take her to one side at some point and just talk, instead of neglecting to say anything and then suddenly turning on her?

- Giles, Dawn, Xander and Willow are all fine with Faith being appointed the new leader? Did this ep’s writer actually know about Faith’s past, and that these characters have multiple reasons not to like or trust her?

- Anya’s barb at Buffy didn’t work, and showed basic ignorance of Slayerhood. Buffy wasn’t born with special advantages – she was just a regular human being until she got called. And given that Anya should know how much pain and suffering being the Slayer has brought her (what with countless monsters, multiple deaths and being torn out of Heaven), I’d be hard pressed to see how anyone could consider Buffy ‘lucky’.

Do I like this episode more or less than the last time I watched it?

I still strongly dislike this episode, and I think that the endless list of negatives speaks for itself. Overall “Empty Places” is easily the worst episode of the series, and can’t even provide the unintended laughs that disasters like “Wrecked” offer. It’s one of the few “Buffy” editions that I would actively try and avoid seeing, as the ignorance of history and extreme damage to the core characters is almost unforgivable – though considering how bad Drew Z. Greenberg’s other episodes have been, it can’t say this is surprising. As such, I’ve kept this ep at its previous, well-deserved grade of zero.