Buffy the Vampire Slayer
"Shadow"

Airdate: November 21, 2000

To bring me down from my Spike-induced high from last week's episode, this one focuses almost exclusively on our two latest storylines: the trials being undergone by the Summers women, and the evil efforts of the new villain in town. Unfortunately it is a decidedly sub-par entry in the arc that covers Joyce's illness and Dawn's key-ness, and after the wonder that was "Fool for Love", I just couldn't help but be disappointed by "Shadow".

Xander tries to be a bud in Riley's darkest hour, but Captain Cardboard walks alone.

The episode focuses mainly on our new villain, Glory, and her quest to find The Key, which we all know now is Buffy's not-sister, Dawn. Her new demon servant, Dreg, has found a spell she wants to try out which will conjure up a beast to find The Key, wherever it's hidden. But the spell needs some magical ingredients, and the latest edition of the Yellow Pages -- with its shiny new Magic Box advertisement -- points her straight toward the Scoobies.

Meanwhile, Joyce is undergoing CAT scans to find out what's been causing her illness, and Buffy and Dawn are at the hospital with her. The Scoobies attempt to research Glory, and come to the conclusion that Glory's not only powerful, but old -- so old that she predates the written word, and perhaps spoken language as well. As they research, Glory walks right into their midst, and an unwitting Giles happily sells her the items she needs for her spell.

The results from Joyce's tests are in, and the doctor delivers the bad news to Buffy: her mother has a brain tumor. Buffy puts Dawn in Riley's care and rushes to the magic shop, where her friends sadly inform her that magic can't really help with problems of a medical nature. Instead, Buffy devotes her energies to a bigger problem: stopping Glory from doing whatever it is she's doing.

Glory's spell turns out to be one which turns a regular cobra into a very large man-snake. Glory thoroughly kicks Buffy's ass (but doesn't kill her for completely unknown reasons), the snake slithers off to find The Key and report back, Buffy kills the snake, and Glory's left to wonder where it all went wrong.

This episode did have good to go along with the bad, namely in the form of Glory's new demon servant, Dreg, who is hilariously and creatively effusive in his praise to his master, calling her everything from "most tingly and wonderful Glorificus" to "your most fresh and cleanness". He makes for wonderful comedy relief. Also of the good is Riley finally doing something interesting; he picks up a vampire at Willy's bar and lets her snack on him a little before staking her. Does he have a death wish? Is he discovering new and interesting sexual kinks? We don't know yet, but at least it makes you wonder what Riley will do next, rather than wondering other things like whether or not he has a job. Dawn is also becoming less of a whiny idiot and more of a well-rounded character, which is an incredibly welcome change for the better.

Standing in the gray area between good and lame is Spike's short appearance; Riley catches the vampire in Buffy's house, sniffing her sweater, and kicks Spike out, but not before our boy snags a pair of Buffy's panties. Is this Spikealicious hilarity or a degrading dive into wussiness? You decide.

Unfortunately this episode's cool bits are outweighed by its lame points. Glory is one of them; actress Clare Kramer seems to be trying way too hard with the role, and after seeing more of Glory, I'm ready to hand her the "More Annoying Than Dawn" award. At this point I really wouldn't mind a traditional villain of the incredibly sinister type who'd spend more time doing evil things than wisecracking. Or at least one with fewer temper tantrums.

Taking the cake for one of the stupidest-looking monsters ever featured on Buffy is the snake guy, who was not only terribly done but also approaching plot-device territory. Neither the computer-generated version nor the giant rubber head for close-ups looked anywhere near realistic, and it didn't even possess the kind of cheesy charm that makes favorites of so many old movie monsters. And don't even get me started on the whole "Buffy rides bucking man-snake as she chokes it to death with a chain" scene.

The episode did serve to push along a few of the story arcs, like Joyce's sickness and Riley's downward spiral, but overall was a lackluster contribution to the season which failed to satisfy.

-- Lisa Kincaid

Buffy the Vampire Slayer airs at 8/7c, Tuesdays on the WB.

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