Buffy Season 8 Recap - Retreat - Part 3

Apologies for the delay, between Christmas, surgeries and general life, posting these fell to the side. The next 10 issues are already written out so these recaps should become more often again. For those who want to re read the first two parts to this story:
Retreat Part 1
Retreat Part 2
Other than that, quick reminder. The big bad this season is a flying masked figure called Twilight. Through his manipulation vampires are now considered victims by the general population and Slayers are now the enemies who hunt them. Twilight is apparently teaming with the American government who also consider Buffy and her Slayers "terrorists" after the destruction of Sunnydale. Buffy and her army of Slayers have realised that Twilight kept finding them because he was tracking their magic. Buffy has taken her army to Oz in Tibet, here they are learning to suppress their magic whilst taking the Slayers out of the public eye to avoid more bad press.

Andrew runs through the halls in the dead of night, he arrives at a door and knocks frantically. Giles clearly having been woken opens the door and demands what the problem is. Andrew tells Giles that there is a spy amongst them, Warren was able to find Andrew deep in the catacombs of Rome so someone must have told Twilight. Giles tells Andrew that extra suspiscion amongst them is not going to be helpful, he believes Andrew is being paranoid but he is welcome to look into the matter as long as he doesn’t tell the others. Andrew leaves but he is not disheartened, he decides to document their time in Tibet with a video camera and he can look over the footage to determine who might be the spy.

Andrew asks Bay to explain to the camera more about the suppression of magic but Bay reminds him that they are simply redirecting their power back into the earth, it is not being suppressed within. Andrew compares it to decomposing much to Bay’s horror and denial. Andrew takes us round the Slayers doing different chores, he explains that physical exertion makes them focus more on their mortal side rather than their Slayer side. We see Bay teaching the Slayers other ways to fight, ways that do not focus on their Slayer strength.

Andrew tells the camera and “the gentle viewer” that Faith is another prime suspect of being the spy as she has always been an outsider, a rogue. He climbs a tree and films Buffy and Faith secretly. Buffy and Faith are moving a boulder using strategically placed pieces of wood as they discuss being a Slayer. Buffy asks Faith if she misses her Slayer power but Faith tells her that being a Slayer meant a lot of responsibilities and she was never that strong to wield such power, “good riddance”. Buffy places her hand on Faith’s shoulder and tells her that she no longer feels the responibilites of A Slayer and feels she has lost her way, she needs this reconnection with her mortal side. They finally get the boulder into the position using teamwork and slump to the floor with exhaustion. Faith places her arm around Buffy’s shoulder. Andrew faces the camera and tells his audience that Faith is very clearly not the spy and he must move onto someone new, perhaps someone who seems more loyal, like Dawn or Xander.

Xander and Dawn are looking at some of the weapons they took from the submarine and Dawn asks what the Chinese sign on the bottom of a landmine says. He tells her that it says that this is the explosive side, she asks how he knows that and he tells her that humans always point to the danger and never point towards the safe side. Dawn looks Xander in the eyes and tells him that maybe they should point to the safe more often, Xander tells her that that’s perhaps what they are doing. Dawn agrees, maybe its time for Xander to go for what he wants, the safer option. Andrew interrupts and tells the viewer that Xander’s vague comments could be an indication he is working for Twilight, Andrew sets out to investigate further.

Andrew is now secretly filming Buffy and Xander as they talk. .He asks her if she has told Willow her big secret, Buffy looks stunned and asks him what big secret. He explains that he overheard her on the submarine talking to Giles, he knows that she killed Willow in the future. “What if telling Willow makes her become the person I saw in the future” Buffy worries, “What if not telling her is the thing that causes it” Xander responds. Buffy begins sucking her thumb due to a splinter “why does it hurt so much? Its so little” she asks, Xander explains that it must be part of the effect of giving up her Slayer power. Buffy smiles gladly, because she is giving up her Slayer power she gets to feel more. She looks Xander in the eyes and asks rhetorically “I need to tell her, don’t I?”. Xander places his hand on hers and tells her that when she does tell Willow, she should come find him and he’ll be there for her.

Andrew confronts Giles and asks why he hasn’t done anything with the Willow situation, its very possible that Willow has already turned dark and is spying for Twilight. They need to keep watching her and if there is anything suspiscious it needs to be dealt with. Giles takes his glasses off in frustration and takes a moment to think, he looks up at Andrew and tells him that he is completely correct. He tells Andrew to keep watch and to report back when he has any information. Andrew sneaks in and records a private conversation between Willow and Oz, it becomes clear that Willow feels like she will be nothing without her power. She tells Oz that shes jealous that he left sunnydale and began a family, he did something to make sure he could never be pulled back into fighting demons as a life choice. Willow doesn’t have that choice, Oz puts his hand out to comfort Willow put she pulls away in anger, she tells him that she can’t begin a family because she is too important she has her mind on what she needs to do for the greater good. Oz puts Kenden down and embraces Willow, he tells her that she can still return to a normal life, all she has to do is allow the poison to leave her body and enter the earth. She denies that its that easy and begins to storm out, Oz shouts back at her that it is that easy and asks if she would like to look after Kenden. She turns around with tears in her eyes, “You’d trust me?”.


Andrew then skips the video forward to another important moment, Buffy has found Willow. Willow is alone with Kenden playing pattycake. As Buffy begins to talk Willow tells her how amazed she is with Oz’s child and it has her thinking, they may all have families one day, she tells Buffy that they may have normal lives some day in the future. Buffy stares at her in shock, then finally blurts out “I killed you in the future”. Buffy sits down and quickly tells Willow that in the future, Willow was evil and Buffy killed her. Willow walks over and lowers herself to Buffy’s level, she smiles and tells Buffy that it wasn’t HER, she still has plenty of time to change the events of the future and will try harder to give up her magic. She hugs Buffy and tells her to stop worrying about it. Buffy gets up excidedly, “so were okay?” “were okay” Willow confirms, Buffy tells Willow that she needs to go tell Xander that they’ve had ‘the talk’. Buffy walks along the corridor and demands that Andrew stops following her with the camera, Buffy opens the door to Xander’s room and looks into the room absolutely shocked. “What has she seen?” Andrew asks his audience, Andrew arrives at the door and peers the camera inside, inside Dawn and Xander are kissing. .Andrew turns the camera towards Buffy’s face which is still in shock, he holds there filming Buffy’s reaction until Buffy again tells Andrew to go away. Andrew ends the video discussing the fact that many secrets have been revealed but there is still one secret left, the identity of the spy, Andrew calls a meeting and informs the group that there is a spy amongst them, he apologises for thinking it was Willow and says that he knows who it is. As he says it a cat one of the Slayers laps disappears and he faces the surprised Slayer. The cat that had been seen in the background for most of the issue was a magically powered spy which was sending information back to Amy and Twilight. Buffy tells the group to calm down, she tells them that Twilight now knows where they are, she asks Xander to prepare their defences because Twilight is on his way and they’re about to get hit.