“Gingerbread” and “Normal Again” – Terrifying Reality

In both of these episodes, it is reality that is the most frightening, especially to Buffy and her friends. In “Gingerbread” Buffy’s own mother is the catalyst to a force that nearly destroys Buffy’s fragile world in which she is able to operate as the slayer. This force is human fear, mob mentality, and a man with a key. At the end of the episode, the demon that’s part of Buffy’s world is the easiest thing to kill in comparison with the insanity that stemmed from MOO. A quick spell, smashing a potion on the floor, and a great big stake in the neck, and Buffy wins again against the demon world; like she says at the beginning of the episode, bang boom stake (Whedon foreshadows). But there’s no easy fix to the problems that stemmed from the human world as we see at the end of the episode. Willow’s mother blocked out almost everything from those few days when she abducted her own daughter and tried to burn her at the stake. Once again, Whedon shows us how simple the demon world is in comparison to the ambiguous and confusing human world. I think the most representative still from the whole episode is the shot of Buffy’s face when she realizes her mother’s actually going to burn her at the stake – pure horror. That’s what happens when reality gets mixed up with fantasy, Whedon seems to say. But then, how do we reconcile Buffy, she half in and half out of the world of fantasy? The same is shown in “Normal Again” through Willow’s expression when she’s tied up in the basement – horror at Buffy’s becoming mixed up in this supposedly “real” world. But it’s this world that’s so much more frightening than a waxy demon chained up in the basement. I think that what Buffy finds the most frightening is the concept that she really isn’t any of the wonderful things she’s purported to be throughout the series. Instead of a strong, confident, selfless, and courageous woman, she’s less than ordinary, sick and incapable of living in a comparatively simple world where her greatest responsibility would be taking out the trash. I’d prefer the delusion too.

Another thing to mention: as I commented on someone’s post, I think the reason we’re left with the same old Buffy the Vampire Slayer at the end of “Normal Again” is because that’s the Buffy that we take advice from, that we look up to, that we need. Buffy the hero is the food of our imagination, so if Whedon, as I think Janelle mentioned at one point, had returned to that room with the strapped bed and the sick girl, it would entirely dislodge our belief in Buffy. If we had returned to the sick girl, the idea that in another reality Buffy could have been real and just as strong as she proves herself would disintegrate. It’s important to question the show with episodes like “Gingerbread” and “Normal Again,” but it’s also very important to embrace the unreality of the show so that we may also embrace the very real lessons it can teach us.