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Episode 4.21: Primeval | Episode 5.01: Buffy vs. Dracula
Characters:
| Xander | Buffy | Giles |
| Spike | Anya | Willow |
| Tara |
Xander:
"It's all about the journey, isn't it?"
Xander's dream is all about his journey this season. Or rather, the fact that he hasn't gone anywhere. While his friends have been in college, moving forward with their lives, he's been stationary, stuck in his parent's basement. He feels like an outsider among his friends. Notice his exchange at the very beginning.
Xander: Did I miss anything?
Buffy: Bunch of massacring.
Xander's afraid that he's missing out on what's going on. He's missing out on the Slaying. He's starting to feel superfluous after this past year, which hasn't been a very good one for him.
It's no surprise that sex plays a large role in Xander's dream. He's constantly tempted by tantalizing women from his life, and then he can't quite get to them. He's first "offered" Joyce where he labels himself a "comfortador". He's not out for conquest. That's something more accomplished people do. Right now, he's after comfort from his poor home life.
He leaves Joyce as she says "Don't get lost...", an important command in Xander's dream.
Xander quickly finds that all roads lead to his basement. When something starts banging at the door, Xander says that he "didn't order any vampires". However, as he realizes what it actually is, he becomes more frightened. Vampires are less frightening than what's actually behind the door, which is the years of emotional abuse from his parents that's holding him back. Xander even recognizes that that's not the way out.
Throughout the entire dream, Xander will be trying to move forward, while at the same time, being threatened by something behind him. This "something" is vague and undefined. It is his own fear of this thing and his own preoccupation with it that's holding him back.
Xander comes across Buffy, Spike, and Giles in a surreal scene. He notes another path that he didn't go down: being a Watcher. He mentions that he "was into that for a while, but...got other stuff going on."
As often happens in Xander's dream, there's many references to being on the move and going forward, even though he's not actually succeeding in doing so.
Indeed, as Xander moves into the ice cream truck, Anya questions him directly, asking if he knows where he's going. As he and Anya get into an argument, Xander is distracted by a sexified Willow and Tara who ask him to join them.
Unfortunately, as before, he ends up in the basement. This time, though, something begins to chase him. He ends up at school and runs into Giles. Giles seems very surprised to see Xander at school, obviously speaking to Xander's insecurity in not going to college. He does ask Giles for help, though, and he's told that "the others have all gone ahead", of course.
When trying to get more of an explanation, Giles (and Anya) begin speaking in poorly dubbed French, which Xander can't understand. He's separated from his group because of his lack of schooling, and he's unable to save himself as a result.
At this point, instead of continuing the journey on his own, Xander is forced into the next stage as Giles, Anya, and a bunch of students grab him and carry him to the next scene. It is here where Xander has lost control complete and is soon sent back to his high school years to confront...well...Principal Snyder, who questions him as to where he's going and why.
Xander finally has enough of this part of the dream and stands up, running through various rooms only to wind up, a final time, in the basement.
This time, the door bursts open and Xander's father comes down the stairs to yell at him:
Dad: No, you don't understand! Life ends here, with us! You're not gonna change that. You haven't got the heart.
A pretty bad ending for Xander's dream that started with him on an aimless journey and ended up spiralling more and more out of his control.
Buffy:
Buffy plays a couple of roles in Xander's dream. The most signficant scene is, obviously, the one on the playground with Buffy in the sandbox.
Xander: Buffy, are you sure you want to play there? Pretty big sandbox.
Buffy: I'm okay. It's not coming for me yet.
Xander: I just mean...You can't protect yourself from some stuff.
Buffy: I'm way ahead of you, big brother.
Xander: Brother?
Buffy playing in a sandbox, or a desert, is a reference to the home of the First Slayer. Or, in general, a reference to Buffy's Slayerness. Xander is questioning if she really wants to be fighting as a Slayer, showing concern for her. Buffy's response, that it's not coming for her yet, can have a double meaning: the most obvious being the First Slayer that's hunting them. The second one is foreshadowing Glory's arrival in the next season. Xander's response that she can't protect herself from some stuff would then be another foreshadowing of Buffy's death.
The next part of the exchange is equally interesting, though. Buffy, of course, tells Xander that she's ahead of him (As many of the characters do during his dream). She also calls him "big brother", which seems to effect Xander deeply. It's a sign of the sibling relationship that they've established. The very first episode of this season showed that Xander still had something of a crush on Buffy. This episode puts the nail in that coffin as dream!Buffy lets Xander know what he is to her.
As Xander processes that, he literally goes somewhere else (to the ice cream truck with his actual girlfriend).
From that point on in the dream, Buffy is used as a protector. She's one of the few girls that doesn't come on to Xander in his dream. Instead, Xander comes across her, Giles, Anya, and a convulsing Willow while he's running from the First Slayer. He tries to get them to help him, but they're more concerned with helping Willow than with helping Xander (Speaking to Xander's perception of his importance in the group).
Giles:
Giles consistently plays the role of the paternal mentor in Xander's dream. Although, to Xander's confusion, Giles has a paternal relationship with Spike in the dream.
He's also put to use later as a way to almost give Xander the information that he needs.
Spike is swinging in daylight with Giles, wearing a tweedy suit. He's going to be taught how to be a Watcher and is "like a son" to Giles.
In this past season, Spike has, in some ways, taken on a similar relationship to Giles that Xander once had. Xander is obviously feeling threatened by the addition of another male in the group, and how that'll affect his place in the social dynamics.
Ironically enough, Anya's the other female, besides Buffy, that doesn't get sexed up in Xander's dream. And she's his girlfriend.
In his dream, once she finds out that Xander doesn't know where he's going, Anya expresses a wish to get back into vengeance. This, of course, actually happens in S6 after Xander leaves Anya at the altar.
Willow plays the sex vixen with Tara in this dream. She echoes Buffy's earlier statement that she's way ahead of Xander. This time, she's talking about her relationship with women, oddly enough.
Xander hardly knows Tara, so she gets little more than a cameo in his dream.
Episode 4.21: Primeval | Episode 5.01: Buffy vs. Dracula
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