Fear, Itself

In my opinion, Fear, Itself was one of the more interesting Buffy episodes that we have watched thus far because it was in conversation with gothic literature and its intrinsic tropes. The first scene of the episode mocks the constructs of the modern day “goth,” a movement that was inspired by music and literature surrounding the gothic culture. Buffy anthropomorphizes the jack-o-lantern and comments on the fact that it was once happily sitting in the sun until “someone came and ripped its guts out.” The camera pans to a depressed looking Buffy, her hands steeped in the disemboweled pumpkin remains. Whedon is able to turn the usually effervescent and fun-loving blond, into the mold of the “teenage, angsty goth.” A trope that is more harmonious with that of gothic literature is the haunted frat-house. When I a three-year-old at Euro Disney, I was planning on entering the Haunted Mansion until le garcon a dit: “Whomever comes in, never comes out.” Terrifying, right? I think I cried more at that then on the “Snow White’s Scary Adventure” ride and it took me years to muster up the courage to go on the ride (which isn’t that scary, by the way). Anyway, once Buffy and the Scooby gang enter the haunted frat house, they begin to lose their way. The doors and windows seal themselves and they are trapped within the realm of doom, only to be saved by a chainsaw bearing Giles. The sealed portholes are clearly an allusion to previously established gothic norms. Another literary allusion that Whedon makes is to the first gothic text, The Castle of Otranto. Though less obvious than the aforementioned examples, both the episode and the novel have rather anti-climactic endings. There is a huge expectancy for build-up and then resolution at the end of the text, but all that takes place is a marriage between the heart-broken Theodore and the desperate Isabella. As readers, we are expecting something more earthshattering to occur after all of turmoil of the text has been resolved. However, nothing happens. In the episode, Buffy and the gang are sitting around in his living room, binging on Halloween Candy. Suddenly, Giles stands up and says in an anxiety-provoking tone, “Oh no, I should have realized this about [the monster] earlier.” As viewers, we expect that something has gone wrong and that the demon will make a comeback. But, no. All Giles says is “I should have translated the writing under the picture. Actual size.” Right after, the episode ends. It is interesting to consider the intellectual banter between the show and the gothic traditions with which it is constantly engaging.