Covering
“Triangle,” in which Kubiak is here to burn your crops and make merry sport
with your more attractive daughters!
The
departure of Riley looms large in everyone’s minds as “Triangle” begins (an
episode that I wager most people forget or think is far too silly, but I adore
for idiosyncratic reasons, many revolving around one scene in particular), much
of that looming is not shock at all that their split happened, though there is
confusion as to why it happened, beyond the vampire strumpets. The season has
been smattered with hints—Buffy’s dark and deepening connection to her Slayer
impulses leaving her more and more disconnected from everything else, a
critical lack of passion, Riley needing a purpose, Buffy possibly preferring
bad boys, Riley’s rapidly growing recklessness, Buffy perhaps taking him for
granted, and even Riley’s rather unappealing paternalism (among many instances
of this, in the last batch, he rather absurdly try to take the gang to task for
“letting” her go after Glory, as if he wouldn’t “let” her and had a prayer of
enforcing that edict)—enough that Buffy, in a bit of transference, worried
about little things becoming big things, leading to break ups. While there’s
some truth to that, really it’s as simple as this—they just weren’t ready to
make their lives together.
Riley, though, goes largely
unexamined, though, because, well, he’s gone—humping through some jungle that
Buffy hopes he finds disagreeable enough to send him back to her. Buffy remains
behind, so she gets to shoulder the examinations, the worry, and the emotional
wreckage. Except there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of emotional wreckage.
Buffy is not necessarily sanguine, but she’s not as wrecked as she
traditionally gets, even if her comical transference does reveal she is hiding
and denying a great deal. Still, Dawn notes how long it was before Buffy took
down all her Riley photos, and while Spike fears he’s going to end up being
blamed, such thinking doesn’t seem to ever enter her mind. The blame she holds
falls on herself, and that blame seems to be not for Riley leaving, but for not
seeing the leaving coming. With her mother’s health troubles, Dawn, Glory, and
Giles departing across the pond to give the Council some very limited
information, she directs her energies elsewhere.
Just in time for Anya’s ex to come
to town.
The title is a little misleading, as
there’s really much more of a quadrangle going on here. Obviously, the central
tension is between Willow and Anya over Xander, but Buffy winds up proving an
important counterpoint to the other end than Willow, as driven by her
transference, and I like to think to apologize for heaping contempt on Xander’s
relationship when he was trying to intervene for the well-being of hers, Buffy
serves as a zealous supporter to Willow’s harsh critic.
“Triangle” is really all about an
aspect of relationships that the show has only fleetingly touched
upon—integrating them with existing friends. Those fleeting times this has been
touched upon generally involve Willow responding to some relationship of
Xander’s—Cordelia, Faith, the Incan Mummy, an almost legendary string of deep,
well-founded relationships that did not end in disaster, humiliation, or near
death. So she’s not exactly unjustified in being skeptical, and she wasn’t
privy to the lovely scene at the end of “Into the Woods.” But then again,
Anya’s pretty justified in being pissed off that Willow seems to be constantly
riding her ass. Willow’s previous angst and anger over Xander’s paramours was
always framed by her long unrequited crush, but as she notes here “Hello, gay
now,” so her contempt seems…well, significantly more petty, even if it has to
be said, Anya’s first real true showcase hinged on her tricking Willow and
sending her vampire self after her. She says Anya is “the fish,” of The Cat in the Hat fame (and Anya
rightly calls her out for yet another reference seemingly designed to exclude
her, however cutely she tries to play it off), but goes on to allude to her
young attempt to play the cat, which cost her fish owning rights, which
undercuts her position that Anya needs to lighten up and let the witches keep
stealing from the store.
Anyway, their feuding produces Olaf
the Troll, once just Olaf the dude until he cheated on Anya and she cursed him.
And Olaf (apparently Abraham Benrubi is best known from ER, but he’s always Kubiak of Parker
Lewis Can’t Lose to me, and I really only remember that show because of
this episode) really makes the episode. Yeah, he’s silly, and stupid, and
absurd, but he’s very funny, someone’s really awful D&D baddie given free
rein to run amok through the show for a while.
Which leads us to The Scene, and
it’s actually not Willow and Anya continuing their argument in Giles’ car while
they pursue Olaf (though Anya being excited about learning something new is
always great). No, I’m of course talking about the extended business at the
Bronze, where Xander takes refuge from the arguing and runs into Spike. Scenes
of Xander talking out dude stuff with other dudes were pretty rare over the
course of the show (and given how absurdly unbalanced shows still are to this
day, it’s not like that was a critical failure), but they were always welcome,
and pretty fun as they sublimate their contempt for each other just enough to
commiserate over their girl troubles (it turns out a lot of people didn’t get
Dru). And then Olaf arrives, drawn by the smell of ale, and, feeling peckish,
hoping to find some succulent babies to eat (“What do you think, the hospital?”
Spike asks Xander for affirmation before being told to shut up), but he is not
swayed by the promise of boars, stags, hearty grog, or even an entire fried
onion (Spike’s affinity for bad bar food is great).
Olaf’s just a hilarious creation,
from “Puny receptacle!” to “It was only one wench! I had a great deal of mead!”
almost everything he says elicits a laugh. Is he silly? Incredibly. Is he
stupid? Quite a bit. Is there a bit much coincidence and contrivance fueling
his episode? Yeah, probably. But he makes me laugh, a lot, which is a worthy
enough reason for it to be my favorite. It’s against the rules, but rules are
stupid.
Good thing it’s so fun, because from
here on out, it’s going to be more slog than sunshine.
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