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Two-part season finale time! Let’s see to where all of this Angelus stuff has been building, shall we?

We start off in the 1700’s, and we see a very human Angel and his mate getting bollocksed in a pub. I’m not… I’m not from where they are from. Did I use any of those words right? A drunk Angel happens upon Darla, who is not dual-wielding pistols here. She turns him into a vampire.

Back in the modern day, we see Angelus stalkling Buffy and JESUS CHRIST do I use the words “stalking” and “skulking” a lot in this series. I need to his a thesaurus for both of those because it is all these characters know how to do.

Anyway, she kills some vamps and tells Xander it’s time to take the fight to Angelus. Which is weird, because it’s also Finals time. This is unnecessary conflict, show. I feel like Buffy could wait a week.

Giles goes to… some place. And some other folks have excavated a giant block from the ground with archaic writing on it. Giles points out the block has a door etched into it, but does not want to open it until he knows what it is.

All the Scoobies are together at lunch talking about Finals and Angel and what not. Principal comes along, and why is he so prevalent now all of sudden? He was gone for, like, ten episodes, and now we can’t get enough of him. He yells at Xander and Cordy for flirting and at Willow for sitting on Oz’ lap. Which, admittedly, is very un-Willow-like behavior.

Also, shouldn’t she be eating lunch with the faculty now? And are teachers allowed to date students? What IS her role here?

Flashback to the 1860’s now, and we see a human Drusilla entering a church. Angelus has killed the priest and is sitting in the confessional. So wait, vampires can go to open churches? I DO feel like we have seen them in churches before, but maybe only old, closed ones. Though why that would matter, I am not sure. Holy ground and what-have-you.

Just seems weird.

I guess there’s no running water surrounding this church.

Dru confesses her visions make her feel unholy, and Angel tells her to go be Satan’s slave or whatever. She is like “I don’t wanna”, so he tells her to do some prayers and he forgives her. Gripping stuff.

It segues into modern day Dru having a vision about the big block Giles visited. Angelus agrees they should go get it, and really? Not a damn one of Dru’s visions have actually worked out for you idiots, but you’re STILL following them? Damn, these idiots are hopeless.

I can’t wait for Drusilla to die here. Low-key, she’s almost as bad as Mom and Xander, but at least I’m not SUPPOSED to like her.

At school, Willow is helping Buffy get ready for Finals, and Buffy drops her pencil. She reaches down to where the fallen floppy disk is… and just grabs her pencil without realizing the disk is there. THEN: Willow essentially says “Hey, you should do that again”, so Buffy lets her pencil roll away again… and then they find the disk.

That… was needlessly complicated in its execution, writers. Or did Sarah Michelle Gellar fuck up and Allyson Hannigan made her do another take? And they just… didn’t edit that out?

Why not just have Buffy find the disk on the first try? It would be really convenient as a plot device, but the whole thing with Willow telling her to let her pencil roll away again was asinine.

Flashback to 1898, and we see the gypsies give Angel his soul back. He has a little cry over being told what he has done for the past hundred-plus years.

Willow, having read the disk and figured out what it is, thinks she can do the ritual based on her studying of Ms. Calendar’s files. Xander gets all pissy and bitchy about this because he wants Angel DEAD, not BACK. Dude, you have a girlfriend now, and Angel saved your life, like, SO MANY TIMES. Quit being an asshole already, god.

At the, let’s say… museum, Dru and her minions kill the guards and the guy studying the block and steal it. Here we go again.

Kendra returns, presumably so this episode can kill someone we allegedly care about, though all I can think is “This show gives us ONE black character, and she is about to eat it. Fantastic”. She sides with Xander in that Angel needs to die, not be restored. Giles just fucking has an Orb of Thessela lying about, and FUCK YOU, SHOW.

A) I’m actually getting too tired of this show’s laziness to make fun of this.

B) If Ms. Calendar got that from him, she wouldn’t have gone to the gypsy supply store, so Dru and Angel would not have killed her. So everything that happened there was manufactured drama.

It turns out the block is the ancient prison of Acathla, and I had to look that up because I had no idea what the characters were saying. Again, I apologize for making fun of vampires named Bob or whatever way back in season one! Acathla is an ancient evil being that was, OF COURSE, from and buried in Southern California, home of all centuries old mysteries, I guess. Acathla has the ability to absorb the entire universe into the demon realm. Which, if my D&D knowledge doesn’t fail me, is called Dis! I know things!

Angel performs the ritual for reviving Acathla, which is as nothing as eating a dude, getting the guy’s blood on him, and saying some words. But maybe NOT that easy because he still can’t pull out the sword that binds the demon. Whoops!

We cut to Manhattan in 1996, and a homeless Angel struggles to catch a rat to feast upon. Whistler, a supposedly “good” demon (or good-ish, I guess) shows up and knows who he is. I smell a long con! “Good” demon, my ass. He takes Angel to LA to watch Buffy from afar before she finds out she is a slayer, and Angel is instantly smitten. This is Buffy at least one year prior to season one, so remember… SHE IS 14 OR 15 HERE, PEOPLE.

How How How How HOW did any writer get away with this?

During one of her finals, a vampire sneaks into Buffy’s class, removes her protective robe, and calls out a confrontation time and place as she burns to death in the sunlight. I mean… that’s a waste of a minion. Can vampires not send postcards? Make phone calls? Such unnecessary TV-based drama with no basis for rationality.

The gang stays behind to work on Willow’s spell. Kendra gives Buffy a gnarled stake she calls “Mr. Pointy”.

Angel and Buffy start their fight, but they are both just toying with each other. Buffy, because she is waiting to see if the gang can restore his soul; Angelus, because fighting her is a trap. Vampires attack the gang! Willow is buried and knocked out by a book shelf. Xander’s arm is broken. Drusilla squares off with Kendra and pretty easily kills her with her lethal Pokémon combination of Hypnosis and Slash attacks. Damn, Kendra served NO purpose other than to die like a nothingburger. That’s really shitty. I guess it serves her right for daring to be a minority on a network TV show in the 1990’s.

The vamps abduct Giles, and just… leave Xander and Willow defeated. Cordelia ran for the hills. Buffy returns too late, but… just in time for the cops to see her at the scene of the crime!

Episode 22

The cops on the scene begin trying to arrest Buffy, and she is, at first, somewhat compliant. Then the principal shows up and starts blaming her for everything, so she gets pissy and fights them off and runs away.

She sneaks into the hospital to check on her friends, and Xander is up and about because of course HE would be. Willow is unconscious, though, and in a touch-and-go condition. Cordelia shows up, and when Giles isn’t with her, they realize he is MIA.

As good a time as any to check in on ol’ Rupert, right? So the episode cuts to him and Angelus. The latter wants the librarian to tell him how to wake up Acaltha, and he is super excited to get to torture Giles for the info. Here is where I have a question, and the more I think about it, it may or may not be a plot hole. But I think it is…

Why doesn’t Angelus just turn Giles into a vampire if he wants the info? Why risk deception or the fact that Giles will simply refuse to talk at all? If you turn him, he’ll be evil, and happy to tell you what you want.

Here are the points I’m stuck on, though: I’m not 100% sure a vampirized person has all the knowledge of their human life because…

…when Angel regained his soul, he had no idea what he had done for over a hundred years as Angelus.

BUT! Angelus knew all about Buffy’s relationships (including his with her) when he returned.

But maybe that was because Angel was already a vampire?

But then, when Angel turned the classmate of Buffy’s back on the werewolf episode, the classmate rose from the dead and said “Angel sends his love”, which he had to have told her to say when she was still human.

So… it’s ambiguous. But there SEEMS to be more proof that vamps do retain their human life knowledge than not, so…

Why wouldn’t Angelus just turn Giles? I return to that!

(I mean: the answer is “plot armor”, I get it, but still…)

The cops are at the Buffy abode, questioning mom at Buffy’s whereabouts, so Buffy heads to Giles’ pad where she runs into Whistler. He claims he brought Angel back to STOP Acaltha, not bring him back. Sure you did, guy. I SEE THROUGH YOU.

The cops show up at Giles’, but before they can take Buffy down, Spike of all people comes around and beats them down. He wants to team up with Buffy! It turns out he LIKES Earth and doesn’t want it to get absorbed into hell. The deal: He helps Buffy stop Angelus, and he and Dru get to go free. Buffy REALLY has a hard-on to MDK Drusilla… but reluctantly agrees.

At Willow’s hospital bed, Xander fucking tells her he loves her. Jesus Christ, this guy. He loves Willow. He loves Buffy. He loves Cordelia. He’s such a fucking punk. You are just horny, loser. Willow starts to stir and murmurs Oz’ name. GOOD FOR YOU, WILLOW.

At home, mom sees Buffy and Spike get attacked by a vampire. Right in front of her, they kill it and it dusts. “Mom, I’m a vampire slayer”. I mean, yeah, you’ve told her several times. They just all got explained away. Except the time she did it under Amy’s mom’s curse. They never hand-waved that one away. Huh. Mom remembers Spike as the guy she hit with an axe earlier this season.

Buffy tells Spike that Dru killed Kendra, and Spike is proud of her for killing a slayer. It was really easy, you know, because she has mind powers. Mom is all twittipated about what is going on, actually saying “Have you tried not being a slayer”, reminding me of Bobby Drake’s parents in X2:X-Men United, which I would rather watch than Buffy any day. I know this episode predates that, but… that movie is better.

With mom being needy and incompetent, Buffy basically calls her an idiot and a bad parent for not realizing all of this until now. I mean… yeah. The school attack should have been the end of this charade. Mom pulls the “If you leave this house, never return” bluff, and Buffy accepts the offer.

Living with ANYONE except Xander would be a better option, kiddo.

At the hospital, Willow is determined to try the spell to restore Angel’s soul again, so Oz and Cordy run off to get her supplies. Frustratingly, Oz says “I’ll drive”. NO YOU WON’T, YOU DON’T HAVE AN ENTIRE PLOTLINE DEDICATED TO IT. It’s almost like the show WASN’T intentionally building a “Cordelia Is The Wheelman” subplot and that I’ve just been making that up in my head.

The Principal catches Buffy sneaking around the school and expels her. She walks past him to intimidate him, and then he calls the mayor’s office to say he has good news.

In the hospital, Willow is working on her spell, but she’s clearly very weak and concussed. She doesn’t seem like she will be able to get it done… and then she just gets possessed by some force and starts powering through the ritual!

Angels has been torturing Giles to no avail. Spike approaches and offers Drusilla’s services. Dru hypnotizes Giles and makes him picture her as Ms. Calendar to get him to tell her how the Acathla ritual works. Idiot Angel has to use his OWN blood. So it’s just blood and words? He didn’t even have to kill the guy? This is a very easy ritual!

ALSO… Spike promised to save Giles for Buffy, but he also VERY MUCH did not want the ritual to happen… so why would he help Angel figure it out? That’s counter to everything he is trying to accomplish here.

Angel tries the ritual again, and even though Buffy and Spike intervene to attack him, he pulls it off. Er… out. He pulls it of by pulling it out. “It” is the sword. Again, why does Spike let this happen? Drusilla pounces to attack him, but he manages to subdue her pretty easily.

Angel has a sword, and so does Buffy–Kendra brought her a blessed sword–so we finally get a SWORD FIGHT! That’s what this show needed!

Spike floors Dru with a fucking rear naked choke, and instead of making sure Buffy came out on top, he just… drives off. His motivation this episode is bizarre.

(Wait, if vampires don’t need to breathe, and hence, their brains don’t need oxygen, how did Spike choke-out Dru?)

Willow’s spell kicks in a bit too late, and Buffy and Angel have a tearful reunion. It’s short-lived, though, as Acaltha starts absorbing Earth… which Buffy stops by stabbing Angel into him? Killing them both? Couldn’t get out a “Hey, step aside” or anything there? Or… or what?

With Acaltha defeated (how else? Effortlessly^TM! He was a bigger let down than Judge! And The Three. And The Order Of Teraka or whatever. And The Anointed. And…), we move onto the epilogues: Mom finds Buffy’s room empty; Buffy takes a bus out of town after watching her friends going back to school.

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And that is season two of Buffy The Vampire Slayer! This show is still incredibly goofy, and seeing one “big” threat after another going down with minimal problems is disappointing. The amount of threats that are thwarted either off-screen or far more easily than they should is absurd.

The overall show quality was a huge step up from season one, however, so… that was nice.

Storyline-wise, what really surprised me is that Drusilla made it out alive. I thought for sure she would bite it in the finale. I was not aware of this character when I started watching, so I figured she was a one-season wonder. But nope! So I wonder if she goes down quick in S3?

We’ll find out!