“Needs Must” [Buffyverse drabble]

[aadler]

Needs Must
Copyright December 2024

Setting: Buffy, Season 6
Spoiler(s): “Flooded” (Buffy S6-04)

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At Willow’s words, Giles goes cold:

You’re right. The magicks I used are very powerful. I’m very powerful. And maybe it’s not such a good idea for you to piss me off.

He can only stare, wordless, shocked. The next moment, she’s placating, apologetic … but not because she recognizes how far she’s gone, she just doesn’t want to fight. And she’ll never see, unless somehow forced to it.

He genuinely loves this young woman. She’s always been the brightest light —

Now, however, he very calmly begins thinking on how to kill her if need be.

Because that need …

… may come.


– end –
 

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And there you are. Don’t hesitate to offer commentary.

Comments

[texanfan.livejournal.com]

You so caught exactly what I saw in Giles' expression in that moment.

[aadler]

His face changed. It was as if he was seeing her for the first time, or perhaps for the first time recognizing what she was still in the process of becoming.

My own first serious reservations about Willow started in the “Fear Itself” frat house in Season 4, when someone who had always been emphatic about being Jewish ignored that “thou shalt have no other gods before me” requirement and called on ‘Aradia, goddess of the lost’ to provide her a nightlight. And, oh, they carried it so much farther; Season 6 was about Willow’s descent into darkness intertwined with Buffy’s traumatic return to life, but the writers started it long before and built it up skillfully.

At the end, the real surprise was that it was possible to stop Dark Willow without killing her.

[texanfan.livejournal.com]

I think it started with the ensoulment of Angel. Willow pushed boundaries she shouldn't have and it's reasonable to me that she opened a door she never should have. I got so frustrated with the drug addict storyline in season 6. I think it kind of cheapened the real issue which was Willow's need to control everything and everyone around her. By any means necessary.

[aadler]

Within the show, her re-souling of Angel could be seen as the beginning. (In fact, it was clearly designed to literally show ‘something new’ coming into her.) From an external view, however, nothing was done with that — except that Willow gradually began attempting magic on her own — and it was never referenced again.

I also saw it less as a need to control everything, than as an increasing pleasure in being able to control things, but I can recognize that’s a matter of personal interpretation.

And, oh yes, I’ve never heard anyone opine that the ‘magic addiction’ theme WASN’T stupid and heavy-handed, there’s just occasional variance in how much it was hated by this or that viewer/fan.