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Episode 4.22: Restless | Episode 5.02: Real Me
Characters:
| Buffy | Xander | Willow |
| Giles | Spike | Riley |
| Anya | Tara | Dawn |
Overall (7/10)
Buffy:
Having Dracula in the S5 opening episode is incredibly appropriate.
Dracula is an iconic figure, immediately bringing up images of vampires, bats, and coffins. There is a cultural connection between Dracula and vampires, such that Dracula is often used as a representative for all vampires.
That's what he stands for in this episode. He is the opposing force of vampires, tempting Buffy over to their side.
Last season ended with Restless, an episode that left Buffy with a lot of questions about her Slayerness. In addition, the very First Slayer called into question Buffy's skills as a Slayer. This has been festering all summer with Buffy going out at night to hunt. Not just patrol. She's taking pleasure in the kill, which Dracula will suggest hints at her darker self.
Dracula and Buffy meet, not just as individuals, but as representatives of their respective forces: Evil and Good.
Buffy: Do you understand what a Slayer is?
Dracula: Do you?
Buffy: Who are you?
Dracula: I apologize. I assumed you knew. I am Dracula.
Dracula enters the scene with the assumption that his identity is known, just as hers is known to him. He tells her that she's "known throughout the world".
Keep in mind what the arc for this season is: Buffy goes up against a god. This episode is showing that she's earned her reputation and is ready to do so.
While doing so, though, she'll explore the nature of being a Slayer.
Dracula: I came to meet the renowned killer.
Buffy: I prefer the term "Slayer". "Killer" just sounds so...
Dracula: Naked?
This is what Buffy fears. She fears that, when you take away the Council and her humanity, she's a demonic killer at the core. Dracula encourages this fear, telling her that her power is rooted in darkness.
It's this fear that makes her vulnerable to Dracula's thrall. She wants to know about who she is, while at the same time, she's afraid that Dracula may be right.
In the end, he is able to prod her into drinking his blood by reciting a variation of the phrase she heard in her Restless dream:
Dracula: You think you know. What you are, what's to come...you haven't even begun.
It's only when Buffy gets a taste of that demonic power that she's able to come out of the thrall in the realization that that's not where her power comes from. This is essential, as this is the same realization Buffy will come to at the end of the season when she sacrifices herself in The Gift. At this time, though, Buffy isn't sure what the root of her power is. She'll finally figure it out by the end, though.
Finally, Buffy kicks a little Dracula butt and asks for Giles to become her Watcher again to help her find out what being a Slayer is all about.
Xander:
Xander starts this season out at the lowest of the lows. He's still in his parent's basement without a steady job. His girlfriend fawns over her old flame, Dracula, for the entire episode. And Xander is left being the butt-monkey while eating bugs.
There's nowhere to go but up, really.
He'll quickly come into his own in The Replacement. For now, though, he's total butt-monkey.
Willow:
Willow's showing off her witchy powers pretty early on in the episode. To be fair to her, the rain was probably the traditional rain that heralds Dracula's arrival in accordance with the myths surrounding him. So we'll not blame her for that incident.
We see her, as always, trying to attain group harmony. When she learns that Giles is leaving, she does what she can to convince him to stay, though her attempts are pretty...lame.
Can anybody really blame this guy for wanting to get away after last season? In Restless, he realized that his place was as a Watcher. However, he feels that Buffy doesn't need a Watcher anymore. As such, he makes plans to go back to England.
It's in the scene where Buffy tells him she does need him as her Watcher again that Giles starts to comprehend what the dream meant: He's still needed to help his Slayer.
Spike gets a short scene in this one. He's still not even a peripheral Scooby member. Instead, he's the local toothless vamp that they can go to for information. Spike's up on Dracula and, of course, thinks Dracula's back in town to see him.
This episode starts up the rivalry between Spike and Riley. Riley makes it clear that he doesn't have a problem staking Spike like Buffy does. Unfortunately for Spike, there's not much he can do about it with the chip. He gets stared down by Riley in the end.
Here we begin to see some cracks in the Buffy/Riley relationship.
Not surprisingly, Riley is immediately threatened when Buffy is bitten by Dracula. However, he is afraid of Dracula having some sort of romantic influence over Buffy like Angel did.
This is part of the isolation of the Slayer that Buffy has to deal with all series. Riley sees Buffy's relationship with various vampires and becomes jealous. He doesn't understand it. He can't be a part of it. Buffy can't talk to him about it. It is, effectively, a part of her life that he doesn't have access to by its very nature.
He's trying to understand the demonic world in human terms and it's no wonder he's reacting poorly to it.
In this episode, his reaction works out for the best. In future episodes, it won't, though, as Riley goes to greater and greater lengths to try to "understand" Buffy.
Riley takes it upon himself to go to Spike for information after his suggestion to load up on stakes and go Dracula-hunting is shot down by Buffy. Later, he and Giles go looking for places Dracula might be. They aren't much use to Buffy, but they don't hurt much, either.
We get a slight bit more of Anya's background here, with her having dated Dracula in the past.
Tara seems to have settled in the the group fairly well, so far, though we'll see later that she still doesn't feel fully integrated with them.
This is Dawn's first appearance! She shows up at the very end of the episode in a sequence meant to confuse and intrigue the viewers. She's a seemingly retconned character, though, of course, we'll learn more about her later.
Her arrival's been foreshadowed throughout the series, and was even foretold in this episode.
Xander: Well, that is intimate. Dracula's gifting these ladies with his own blood. And blood...blood is life!
That is exactly what happens when Dawn manifests: Buffy's blood is used to create her and give her life. This point of blood being life is centrally important to the ending of the season whereas Buffy sacrifices herself in Dawn's place because they share the same blood.
So in the very same episode Dracula offers his blood to Buffy to "give her life", Buffy's blood is taken by the monks to give life to Dawn. Dracula wasn't completely incorrect when he spoke of the similarities between him and Buffy.
Dracula appears in Sunnydale and makes Buffy uncomfortable.
Dracula.
While not an obvious arc episode, excepting the appearance of Dawn at the end, this episode does introduce the thematic arc of the season and the exploration of what a Slayer is.
An underrated episode, if you ask me. The plot is less important than the themes it explores, and it's better taken in relation to its relevance to the larger thematic arc of the season. The best of the season openers.
Special performance award goes to Anthony Stewart Head for his valiant stint in the chick pit.
7 out of 10.
The meeting between Buffy and Dracula in his castle where Buffy drinks, and then rejects, Dracula's blood. It's wonderful foreshadowing for her epiphany at the end of the season.
Episode 4.22: Restless | Episode 5.02: Real Me
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