A Layer of Soft Light

I’ve seen others criticize the character Anya because her history lacks believability. While I’m all for eliminating flaws where they exist, I don’t see one here. She is character born out of contrast. A demon that becomes a human being and subsequently grapples with what it means to be human.

That she doesn’t understand isn’t a flaw. It’s her struggle to understand that is the entire purpose of her character. She allowed the writers to explore universal human qualities and experiences from an entirely different perspective. Without her we would’ve missed out on some beautifully poignant pieces of writing. Her scene in The Body is often, rightly touted as one of the best of the series.

We all experience that moment during childhood. We lie in some small, dark, familiar place, usually our beds and come to terms with death as best we’re able. What we see from Anya is exactly that. She’s able to express that in a way which touches us.

The thing that makes her perspective so different is that she not only feels grief for the loss of an important figure in her life, but she grieves for something much greater and more personal: the idea that she too is going to die. Her dialog has a childlike quality that further intensifies our recollection.

That scene is in my opinion is one of the finest five minutes of television ever broadcast. In light of that, picking over the character’s history is tantamount to finding the goose who laid the golden egg and complaining that her feathers are brown.

The purpose of Anya’s character is to illustrate a point. She is a couple hundred times older than any of us could ever hope to be. We commonly see wisdom as something that comes with age. Her childish nature raises issue with that notion. It makes a statement. Wisdom is something that we must strive for it. It is earned. And that search is a bloody brutal thing. This point is driven home in the final season. We see Anya come to terms with her humanity. She pays the ultimate price as a result of her understanding.

Back to The Body…

I know I’m probably not going to make any friends by pointing this out, but the first time I watched that episode something struck me. In the final ten minutes we watch Buffy fight a vampire to save her sister. Most of you probably ignored that. Some of you may’ve even liked it. ‘To each his own.’ But to me it felt like Mr. Whedon saw the need to remind us that we were watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I could’ve lived without the reminder.

Imagine for a moment the most beautiful person you’ve ever seen. Hopefully that person will be someone that your hold dear, not just some face from the media. Maybe they’re in the next room? That’d be even better. Now add to that image a pimple on their cheek. It’s one of those juicy things that one application of Proactive will never cure.

That’s how I felt about that scene. It embodied many of the things that skilled authors try to avoid. It was abrupt. It interrupted the flow. And it was unnecessary. Nothing was gained by the addition of the vampire. The points that were key to the overall message could’ve just as easily have been made without him.

Were that scene retooled to remove the vampire, not only would The Body be the only episode without a musical score, it would also be the one example of a show rooted in the supernatural without any of those elements. And it would contrast the next episode Forever which addresses the same topic but is based entirely in the supernatural. The two episodes would create bookended views of how we cope with loss.

It kind of feels to me like Mr. Whedon painted his Mona Lisa and decided for some unfathomable reason that she needed a moustache.

But maybe it was some higher-up at the network that made the call. Would you be surprised to learn that?

I wouldn’t.