Buffy the Vampire Slayer: 7x4 Full Reaction
Added 2025-06-10 01:31:59 +0000 UTC"Help"
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Cassie is one of my favourite guest characters in the Buffyverse. Azura Skye is a really good actor, it's too bad she never hit it big. Also, Sarah Hagan, the girl who had to see Buffy because she beat up a bully at the beginning, played Millie on Freaks and Geeks, which is an amazing show that more people should watch.
Arlo Murphy
2025-07-07 01:45:14 +0000 UTCThe way I always read it, Spike went to the trials because of his inability to not be evil. He really felt a love for Buffy, insofar as he could without a soul. His vision of someone in love would not mesh with his actions in Seeing Red. He realizes at that moment that his lack of soul is what ruins him, not only for Buffy but for the man he thinks he is. Everything in him comes out as obsession, anger and pain; the Spike mask he put on has become his reality but the poet is still in there somewhere and hates who he has become. So he seeks a soul. "Make me what I was". The man he used to be is the poet rejected by Cecily, who dotes on his mother and only wants to think on the beauty of the world. Someone who would never do the things Spike has done. He is asking to be William again.
Keith Jones
2025-06-11 11:21:37 +0000 UTCShe had a fun small role on Bones that I remember.
Mrs. Peacock
2025-06-11 01:30:19 +0000 UTCNormally I always side with Buffy, but Blue Öyster Cult is a ROCKING band! Leaving stones on a gravestone is a Jewish tradition. There's a lot of theories as to what -- EXACTLY -- it means, since it evolved over time and people have come up with a lot of explanations. The most common thought is that stones are used in lieu of flowers because flowers wither, but stones are permanent, so it symbolizes permanent memory of the deceased. It also allows for a constant 'participation' in the burial, making it ongoing instead of something that happened once in the past. Regarding this apparent ongoing debate about Spike and his soul, I think the very strong opinions are because people are actually arguing about different things. They're arguing about what Spike-the-character intended, what the show writers intended, and what the show writers wanted the audience to think they intended. Some of these are up to interpretation, and some aren't, so people are going round-and-round.
JBK405
2025-06-11 00:57:53 +0000 UTCCassie is probably my favorite single-episode character of the whole series. After, I would make a point of watching whenever I saw the actress's name (Azura Skye! What a name!) listed in a show or movie. As in the first 3 episodes of this season, this episode closes with a striking, memorable image. What do you do when you know you can't help? You go to work and help anyway. It's a beautiful answer, very Buffy.
DanielOrme
2025-06-11 00:53:33 +0000 UTCOf course you know the tragedy of Cassandra, priestess of Apollo, who gave her the gift of foresight to predict the future, and then when she would not "yield to him" , cursed his gift so that she would never be believed. She then went mad trying to tell everyone about floods, earthquakes, wars, murders, betrayals, disasters, including the sack of Troy, destroying the kingdom and the death of the royal family, and they always came true but no one would believe her. Some blamed her for causing the disasters, and she came to a horrible fate. Cassie was a little bit of that kind of tragic, no one believing her inevitable predictions. The scene where she tells Buffy about all the things she will never get to do -- Buffy gave a similar speech to Joyce in the season 2 finale about how she wished she could be normal teenager but it just wasn't meant to be. Angel had a speech like that in season 1 of his show as well, where says he will never have love, a family, a place in this world. That's what Buffy is trying to do now, have a family, a place in this world with Dawn.
spikeysnack
2025-06-11 00:29:37 +0000 UTCThe question at the end is answered by the following scene; what do you do when you know that you can't always help ? Well, you still show up.
madfem
2025-06-11 00:23:35 +0000 UTCThe actress really did a great job
Mrs. Peacock
2025-06-11 00:19:01 +0000 UTCBuffy writers went a bit overboard with misdirects sometimes, where what the character says or how they say it doesn’t really make all that much sense once you know what is really happening. One that comes to mind is the way Dawn says/does certain things in “Real Me”.
Mrs. Peacock
2025-06-11 00:18:29 +0000 UTC“To be the kind of man who would nev-“ Never do what he tried to do. That wouldn’t be the case if he just got the chip removed.
Mrs. Peacock
2025-06-11 00:15:31 +0000 UTCThe butcher's knife would also be known as a meat cleaver.
Christine Cox
2025-06-10 21:34:43 +0000 UTCHe went after his soul. He just didn't know what that really meant. He thought he would stay the same, only with a soul.
ThePowerDrome
2025-06-10 19:25:50 +0000 UTCI think that Spike went to seek out the demon to get his chip out and let him be a full on monster again initially, but when he got there and was being punished and tortured, he came to realise that he was there for his soul after all. If you llok at the way he talked before and after then it's a totally different tone of voice.
Dave Cruickshank
2025-06-10 19:02:44 +0000 UTCIn my humble opinion, Spike doesn't want anything. Or rather, he certainly wants the voices to be silenced. As for Buffy -- of course he's in love and he has certain desires, but he's also very aware of his pitiful state when it comes to interacting with Buffy, so he definitely doesn't expect anything from her, and that's perfectly normal. How can you expect anything serious after what he's tried to do? And that's exactly what I think is happening. He said he came back to help, and I don't think he's lying. That's exactly what he's trying to do, and he also feels a certain shame that things are clearly not going the way he saw them in his head.
ThePowerDrome
2025-06-10 18:32:54 +0000 UTCWell Spike definitely isn't gonna go to the demon trials to get his chip out, that really don't make sense.
Morgan Williams
2025-06-10 17:42:28 +0000 UTCI have been waiting for this episode! It is one of my favorites from the series. Cassie is an incredible character, and her reflection of Buffy connected the character's growth from season one to now. Can't wait to watch your reaction!
Autumn Linder
2025-06-10 14:29:25 +0000 UTCSpike did go to get his soul. The whole point of his chip arc was for Spike to re-connect with what it is like to be human and he ended up wanting that. What might be confusing some viewers is the writers' desire to make the trial scene ambiguous to the viewer in the moment. The writers know for sure that Spike wants his soul. Its a bit unfair like in some murder mysteries where the detective may have knowledge that the audience does not and they solve the case in a way an observant reader/viewer can not. In this case it is done for effect, to make us ask “is he going full villain again?”. We feel the hand of the writer for a moment but then they bring us back in. Its not as cheap as the Cordelia is injured, cut to funeral, just kidding that is an unrelated background funeral; but its still a bit cheap.
The Testimony of Mushroom
2025-06-10 13:51:41 +0000 UTCDoogie Howser was one of the best sitcoms of the early 90's.
Steve Quast
2025-06-10 10:15:06 +0000 UTCI like this episode, I like what they did with the precognitive stuff and Cassie is a great character but man alive this one has to have the highest density of cringey early 2000s jokes😬😆 Everyone is entitled to their own opinion of course but "Why does a man do what he mustn't? For her. To be hers." seems very explanatory to me.
Preaching to the Horse's Mouth
2025-06-10 06:35:49 +0000 UTCWhen I saw this, my read on one day she'll tell you was one day she'll forgive him
Neill Shaughness
2025-06-10 03:12:31 +0000 UTCFun fact: When Willow suggests that they google Cassie, it was the first time in popular culture that google was used as a verb.
Douglas Robertson
2025-06-10 03:11:32 +0000 UTCHmm... I am today years old before I gave William/Spike any thought about his participation in the foiled sacrifice at the climax of the episode. I think that this was both a positive development as well as highly dangerous in that he seems to be able to fight through the effects of his chip. Possible that his soul being returned has something to do with having more determination against THAT particular source of pain. I believe that line of thought is worth exploring.
Michael Labs
2025-06-10 02:59:27 +0000 UTCI've been so excited for you to get to this episode and meet yourself lol. I think people are so adamant that it's not a spoiler to say Spike wanted to get a soul after the season 6 finale because it was not at all kept a secret. I think there was even a panel the cast and crew did before season 7 aired where Joss just openly says that Spike did the trials to get a soul when he was asked about it. I prefer it being revealed in the church scene though. Willow placed stones on Tara's gave because it is a Jewish tradition to do so.
Lime Pie
2025-06-10 02:56:42 +0000 UTC'Doogie Howser, M.D.' was a sitcom that ran from the late 80s into the early 90s, it focused on a genius teenager who was able to become a doctor by age 16, the titular Doogie Howser (portrayed by Neil Patrick Harris). Allyson Hannigan would later co-star with Harris in 'How I Met Your Mother'
James Smith
2025-06-10 02:44:55 +0000 UTCI was literally just thinking to myself "I wouldn't be surprised if C uploaded tonight." Good shit.
Preaching to the Horse's Mouth
2025-06-10 02:28:07 +0000 UTCthere's some fans that you'll never convince that their opinion is in fact an opinion. But I agree with you Cass on this one!
Jason Harrelson
2025-06-10 01:48:22 +0000 UTC
