Thank YOU very much, Second Law of Thermodynamics!

S05E13

Previously on Buffy: a monk expired, Glory pouted, a knight looked cuter lying down, Spike smoldered, and Glory turned out to be a god.

Der Zauber Kasten. Scooby conference. Willow and Tara encourage Buffy, who's wearing a pretty red top and skanky Pointer Sisters eighties-throwback metallic scarf, to have a party in celebration of her twentieth birthday. Buffy is reluctant, however, since she's anxious about facing down Glory. As Giles begins with the exposition, it becomes apparent that the Quentin Travers and his Cow-kids have already returned to England. Pooh. I wish he'd left behind a few of the Cow-kids for us to play with. It might have been fun. Not as concerned with plummy accented sexy librarian types as I am, Giles sets up the following: "Glory and two of her fellow hellgods ruled over one of the more seriously unpleasant demon dimensions." With this show, I'm never sure whether to capitalize "hell." Tara is surprised to hear about alternate dimensions, which gives Anya a chance to act smug and knowledgeable. Apparently, all these demon dimensions are looking for a way into ours, but what with professional wrestling, global warming, and the popularity of NASCAR, I really don't know why they bother. It seems that the CoW doesn't know why the demons bother either, because they could find no information as to what Glory is doing in our dimension. Buffy recaps the fact that we've seen super-strength from Glory but no super-powers, and Giles suggests that "being in human form must be severely limiting her powers." However, she's still "immortal, invulnerable and insane." As Giles prepares a nice cup of tea, he further tells that which we already know, namely that Glory is maintaining her sanity by tapping energy from human brains. "S-she's a brain sucker?" stutters Tara, looking quite disturbed. Yes, I fear it is so, and thank goodness we're all having to sit through the Scoobies extremely steep learning curve and waste valuable time reiterating things we've been shown multiple times.

Buffy hops up from the table, and I envy her cute red top with the bell sleeves (why are bell sleeves always too short on me?) as she obviouses that they need to find a way to defeat Glory. Doy, Buffy. Hey, Giles just handed her a cup of tea, but no one else got one! Watcher's pet. Willow offers to help with spells, and Anya pipes up, "I can do some research. I know way more about demon dimensions than Giles does. [at Giles's glare] Well, I do!" Because he doesn't have special skills to contribute, Xander -- his arm still in a cast -- asks about the key that Glory is obsessed with finding. Buffy looks contemplative and tries to brush off the question, but Willow and Xander push the point and Buffy admits that she and Giles know the location of the key. This news surprises Xander and causes Willow to look very hurt. Buffy tries to explain that she was protecting the gang, but continued hurt looks from Willow cause her to decide to spill the beans. Giles gently asks if she's sure, and Buffy says, "There's something that you need to know -- about Dawn."

Hoo, knights! At night! In the forest. A bunch of the Knights of Borezantium are standing around a fire, toasting marshmallows on their long, manly swords. Hee, not really. Instead, they're chanting, "The Key is the link. The link must be severed. Such is the will of god." Again, I'm unsure about the capitalization for "god" -- but wait, this Key is a key, it's a portal, and now it's a link? I think Dawn really is the cosmic VCR that JHeaton suggested. As the Knights enjoy their little Boy-Scout outing, they're set upon by a crowd of Glory's scrofulous minions. They fight. The Knights win, and just as their leader ("Orlando," or so sayeth the closed captioning) is about to off Jinx, Glory happens upon the scene. Guess she was keeping her superior strength in reserve 'cause she didn't want to mess up her manicure or her strappy shoes. Glory makes short work of the Knights and leaves only Orlando alive. I'm not sure, but I don't think Orlando is the Knight who looked cuter lying down from last week. I could be wrong, though.

After the credits and a really pretentious, off-putting black-and-white ad for Visa and the Tony awards, we're outside Der Zauber Kasten during the day. Willow and Tara are carefully spilling colored sand on the ground, and poor Tara is dressed in a skirt made out of an entire beige bed-sheet. Dawn twinkles up, all dressed in pastels, which makes an interesting (or noxious, you be the judge) contrast to the earth tones on Tara and the bright solids Willow is wearing. Dawn asks what's up, and Willow explains that she and Tara are doing a spell that will warn the gang if a hellgod approaches the store; they've already done a similar spell around the Summers home. Tara stutteringly adds that the spell will help hide the Key. Dawn wants to help, but the witches get all weird and reject her offer. Feeling left out, Dawn huffs into the store. Damn, I don't care how old she is, nobody should be wearing skin-tight pink jeans. I'm just sayin'. The Paul Frank monkey backpack is cute, though. The witches reflect on what they've learned about Dawn and finish their protection spell.

Inside the store, Dawn greets Anya and Xander; Xander does his best to act normally by tickling Dawn, which leads her to ask in a tone of mock severity, "Did you get into the sugar again?" Suddenly, Anya turns to her and stiffly exclaims, "You make a very pretty little girl!" Okay, heh. As Dawn looks annoyed, Xander hustles Anya away. Giles and Buffy exit the training room, and Giles, jotting in his Watcher's diary, suggests Buffy's training sessions should be harder. Buffy isn't too pleased with this suggestion and teases, "Maybe time I patrol I should carry a load of bricks and use a stake made of butter." For some reason, SMG chooses to end that line with a big ol' hair toss. Tone it down, girl; this ain't one of your Maybelline commercials. They approach the counter and make chit-chat with Dawn about school, which she describes as "a big square building filled with boredom and despair." Hey, Murray Junior High in St. Paul, Minnesota, I'm thinking of you. Hey, maybe Glory is a god from a dimension where it's all junior high, all the time. I would describe that as a very "seriously unpleasant" demon dimension, wouldn't you? ["Actually, it sounds like my first job out of college." -- Sars] And it would explain Glory's whiny all-about-me attitude and unstable temperament. She's the personification of thirteen-year-old hell. But uh, I was writing a recap here, I think. Buffy asks Dawn if she has homework, and as Dawn replies in the affirmative, she notes that Giles has hidden away his diary. Buffy then says she can't help with the homework because she has things to do. Dawn wants to know if the things have to do with Glory, but Buffy lies and says no. They banter, and Dawn amuses me by snotting that Buffy is just pissed because Glory is prettier than she is. Hee. The sibling banter continues, and the scene ends.

Glory's apartment. Glory has Orlando tied with his arms above his head in the middle of the room. Let's play master and servant. I hear it's a lot like life. I wonder if the place came with the bondage fixtures or if Glory had them installed for her own amusement? Speaking of amusement, or lack thereof, Glory is outfitted in a gold lamé strapless ensemble with a gold dangly necklace that really does confirm the much dreaded eighties revival. Bad clothing choices aside, Glory wants to know where the Key is, but of course Orlando won't tell her. Blah blah, Glory teases the knight about fearing intimacy and then, hands under his shirt, rubs herself on him like a cat. The dialogue is written like she's going to jump his bones, but of course the "something" she wants from him is his sanity. Why are all these knightly bit players so much more attractive than Ben? I don't understand the Buffy casting department failure in the Ben department, since they made such a good choice with Michelle Trachtenberg. Anyway, Glory sticks her hands in Orlando's head, light shoots out, he screams, she looks happy.

By Ace

Outside Der Zauber Kasten, Spike is picking the lock as Dawn holds the chocolate box. He gets the door open and sneers with a cocky tilt of his head, "Who's bad now?" Uh, it'll take a lot more than that, m'dear. Inside, he's a little disappointed to hear the whole "caper" is only to steal a book, and starts to help himself to knickknacks on the counter as Dawn looks for Giles's Watcher diary. She finds it in a secret drawer under the counter. Sometime later, Spike and Dawn have made themselves cozy on the floor, surrounded by candles. As Dawn reads from the diary, Spike grouses, "Where'd [Giles] learn to write so bloody small? A fruit fly?" Dawn continues to read from the diary about monks and keys, boring Spike as much as she's boring me, I guess, since he starts wandering around the store. "Hey! Troll hammer!" he exclaims and attempts to lift the hammer, which slams back to the ground with a heavy clang. Uh, all I can say is whatever, after the way that hammer seemed to be made of Styrofoam in "Triangle." Oh hey, one of the candles Dawn is reading by is shaped like a unicorn. That cracks me up. I wonder if Giles sells bongs shaped like Gandalf too. According to Giles's diary, the Key is an "energy matrix vibrating at a dimensional frequency beyond any normal human perception." I wonder if the Key is dimensionally transcendental. Is Dawn bigger on the inside than she is on the outside? What? I'm just curious. You know what this show needs? A robot dog! Robot dogs always make things better. As Dawn reads that insane people can perceive the Key, she flashes back to the different crazies she's encountered this season. Spike munches on the chocolates and wonders if the Key is valuable. Dawn reads further that the Key is susceptible to "necromanced animal detection," and flashes back to our old friend Fake the Snake. Hi Fake. Bye Fake. Haven't missed ya. Don't come back. At this point Spike takes the diary from Dawn and reads further, revealing, "They had to be certain the Slayer would protect [the Key] with her life so they sent [it] to her in human form. In the form of her sister." With a flair for the obvious, Spike then tells the shocked Dawn, "Huh. I guess that's you, niblet."

Back at Buffy's house, Willow is sympathizing that someone didn't send a card to Buffy, and I'm thinking they're talking about her dad, but no, they're discussing Riley. So, let's move on. Buffy suggests "birthdays without boyfriends," Willow gets another "hey I'm a lesbian now" line, and suddenly Tara's eyes widen in shock. Dawn has entered the room, her arms held out at her sides. We see she's holding a large knife and has cut her right arm. Stone-faced, she asks, "Is this blood?" Buffy and Joyce rush to her side, and when Buffy demands, "What did you do?" Dawn turns to Joyce, trying to maintain control, and grits out, "This is blood, isn't it? It can't be me. I'm not a key." On the verge of hysteria, she begins to break down and sobs, "Am I real? Am I anything?" Joyce hugs Dawn close, and Buffy's lower lip quivers.

By Ace

Dawn climbs down a trellis in the Summers back yard. She backs away from the house and bumps into Spike. Yay, Spike! He claims to have not been lurking, but rather "standing about," and Dawn takes on a very sarcastic tone as she notes that he's carrying his much-abused box of chocolates. What, he couldn't steal a new, un-battered box? One which he hadn't used to beat the crap out of the Buffyquin? Spike leans in close and tries to intimidate Dawn, but she just giggles and says, "C'mon, I'm badder than you." Hee. Spike asks if Dawn was "sneaking out to braid hair and watch Teletubbies with [her] mates," so Dawn confides that she's actually planning to break into Giles's shop to steal things. You can see the wheels turning in Spike's brain as he realizes that the walk to the shop could be dangerous, and that Buffy would be unhappy if anything happened to Dawn. "You want to come steal some stuff?" invites Dawn, and Spike actually looks interested as he replies, "Yeah, all right."

The hospital. Neanderthal-browed Ben enters the psych ward and makes a dumb joke about the medications he's carrying. I think these poor crazy people have enough problems without you mocking them, Monkey Face. Orlando, the Knight of Borezantium, is strapped to one of the beds and draws Ben's attention with his ranting. Suddenly, crusty minion Jinx appears out of nowhere and starts flapping his crusty jaws, saying the KoB are "like ants. First you see one, then two, then the picnic's ruined." Anyway, Jinx finally gets to the point and tells Ben that his fate is "directly linked" to Glory's, and that Glory is tired of Ben's defiance. Ben basically says, "Neener, neener. I am rubber and you are glue, what you say bounces off me and sticks to you." That, and "Glory can't lay a finger" on him. He threatens to beat Jinx up some more. Nobody cares!

Dawn is up in her room, going through her diaries and getting more and more distraught, while downstairs Joyce and Buffy are in the living room discussing the situation. Joyce doesn't want to leave Dawn alone, but because Buffy is an emotionally insecure freak who flees when presented with a traumatic situation, she insists that Dawn needs her space. Joyce informs Buffy of Dawn's suspension for yelling at a teacher. Wow. Have the school systems cracked down lately or what? In my day the teachers yelled at you, you yelled at the teachers, and at the end of the day everyone went home with a sore throat and that was called "learning."

Dawn creeps to the top of the stairs just in time to hear Buffy say, "She probably feels like she can say or do anything right now." Imitating Dawn's train of thought, she continues, "She's not real. We're not her family. We don't even know what she is." Dawn is stricken by this news, and am I going to hell here for noticing that one of her breasts is distinctly higher than the other? Puberty is a real bitch even when you're not some sort of mystical energy force. Anyway, she runs into her room and goes on a rampage, tearing down posters, pulling things off of shelves, and ripping pages out of her diaries. Downstairs Buffy and Joyce remain oblivious to the noise, despite the fact that Dawn was able to hear them speaking in normal tones from upstairs.

Joyce and Buffy's heated conversation continues with Buffy asserting that Dawn needs "real answers." "What she needs, Buffy," retorts Joyce, "is her sister. Not the Slayer." They're interrupted by a loud alarm, and both jump up. Rushing upstairs, Buffy assumes that it's Willow's spell, but when they enter Dawn's room they see that a trashcan ablaze with Dawn's diaries has set off the fire alarm. Buffy starts to yell for Dawn, upset that she might have burned the house down, but Joyce stops her with a sober, "Buffy. She's gone," all the while staring at the flapping curtains in the breeze. Poor Joyce. All her daughters high-tail it out of there at some point.

By Ace

scene, predictably, features Buffy storming into Spike's crypt. The vampire in question is sitting on top of a stone coffin painting his nails when Buffy yanks the top out from under him and dumps him inside. Spike pops up, telling her to watch his nail polish, and she slams the coffin lid into him, shoving it back and pinning him while she rants about the manner in which Dawn found out she was the Key. Spike protests that he didn't know, had no way of knowing, and bitches, "Something goes wrong in your life -- blame Spike." He suddenly stands and flings aside the coffin lid, startling Buffy and causing shortness of breath in admirers across the nation. He continues to read Buffy the riot act, saying that Dawn would have snuck out anyway, and he was just trying to keep an eye on her. Buffy insists, "She shouldn't have found out like that," and Spike heads for the final smack-down: "Maybe if you had been more honest with her in the first place, you wouldn't be trying to make yourself feel better with a round of 'Kick the Spike.'" Buffy flounces out, and Spike shakes his head as if to say, "I just can't win with this woman."

Dawn is lying in her bed, still wearing her clothes from the night before. There's a light tap on the door, and Joyce enters. She quietly tells Dawn she'll be late for school, but Dawn sulks that she's not going. Joyce then sits and offers to make soup, and I get a little teary at her attempts to deal, because not much in her life has probably prepared her to handle this, but Dawn rejects the offer, practically shouting that she's not sick. Yay, we get a classic fourteen-year-old line: "Don't tell me what to do. You're not my mother!" Poor Joyce looks so sad. Dawn then hops off the bed and says she'd rather be at school. She storms out, leaving Joyce sitting in the bed. Even in my most distraught teenage moments (and there were plenty of them) I never, ever would have gone to school in the clothes I had worn the day before.

Buffy and Spike stalk across the playground, Buffy calling for Dawn all the while. Spike rightly suggests that Buffy might want to be a bit more stealthy, since Dawn isn't all that keen on being found. "You were right," sighs Buffy. "This is my fault. I should have told her." Eh. The only thing I can see that was a gross error of judgment was putting on that coat. Spike rolls his eyes and reassures Buffy that she probably would have run away in any case, as "she's not just a ball of energy, she's also a fourteen-year-old hormone bomb. Which ones screwing her up more right now? Spin the bloody wheel." As sirens wail in the background, Spike levels a gaze at Buffy and steadfastly assures Buffy that she'll find Dawn. What's that? Oh, don't mind me. I'm just mourning the death of Spike over here.

Dawn wanders into the hospital, down a corridor, and then just walks right into the mental ward and past a -- snack machine? To quote Sep, "What the fucking fuck?" Who the hell straps poor lunatics to beds within clear view of yummy snacks they will never, ever get a chance to purchase and eat? That really is cruel and unusual punishment. Anyway, all the patients start trembling and muttering the instant Dawn walks into the room. She approaches a patient and begs him to tell her what she is, but he shakes and mumbles, "Can't hear it, can't hear it, can't hear it," over and over. "What am I?" demands Dawn. "The Key!" exclaims the Knight of Insanium. Dawn rushes over to his bed and asks him to explain the facts of her life to her, but suddenly he reaches out towards her, exclaiming, "Destroy her!" Dawn freaks and runs out the door, right into Greasy Monkey Ben.

Hospital locker room. Greaseball brings Dawn a cup of hot chocolate and wonders why she's there. He offers to call "her sister." "I don't have a sister," grits out Dawn. Greasy Intern Ben tries to bond with Dawn a bit, telling her that he understands how much of a pain sisters can be, as he has one as well. Dawn cuts him off, saying, "It's me. I'm the one that doesn't exist." Ben tries to reassure her, but Dawn blathers on, "I'm nothing. I'm just a thing the monks made so Glory couldn't find me. I'm not real." At this, GIB visibly recoils and emphatically tells Dawn to leave. Dawn stands there like a lump. Agitated, Ben looks around and implores her to run, right away. Looking around the room wildly, Ben flaps his hands and shouts, "Oh god no. She's coming. I can feel it you've got to get out!" Dawn stands there like a lump some more. Ben grabs her by the shoulders, screaming, "Oh no. She's here!" and then…morphs into Glory, who shakes her head and says to Dawn, "Hey, don't I know you?"

Glory quickly changes out of Ben's scrubs into some red satin thing that Ben had in his locker. Here's a joke. What has the body of a dress but the back of a bra and is red all over? Glory's outfit! Yeah, I know that's pretty lame, but then so's her outfit. Do you think the other interns tease Ben for keeping ladies' clothing in his locker? In the corner, Dawn sputters that Glory is Ben. "It's an eensy bit more complicated than that. Family always is, isn't it?" explains Glory. Dawn gets the urge to flee, but Glory, back still to her, warns her that she'd "rip out [her] spine before [she] got half a step." Glory wants to know what Dawn was "doing here with Gentle Ben." Good to see that Glory's been catching up on American TV in between those exhausting bouts of pouting and shopping. Dawn seems surprised that Glory doesn't remember, but Glory expositions that Dawn was talking to Ben, not her. They're interrupted by a security guard, whose neck is quickly snapped by Glory for daring to interrupt. Then the Magnificent Snorificus takes a grip on Dawn's shirt and hauls her off to somewhere quieter.

The gang meets at the cemetery, and Buffy decides that they should probably check the hospital just to move the plot along, since this episode has really been dragging.

Back at which, in some sort of X-ray viewing room (hey, I'm not a doctor), Glory starts pumping Dawn for Key-related info. Dawn decides to play along, asking Glory what the Key looks like. Glory describes it as a bright green swirl, but then amends that it could look like anything at the moment. "Maybe," says Dawn deliberately, "if you told me more about it, I'd know if I've seen it." Glory leans into Dawn, backing her up against the counter, and Dawn thinks that the jig just might be up, but all Glory does is say, "Okay."

In the waiting room, Buffy tells the gang that Dawn hasn't been admitted, but they're interrupted by a couple of guys who walk right through the gang, talking in decidedly NOT inside voices about the guy in the break room who's had his head twisted off. Even the Scoobies aren't stupid enough to not pick up on that kind of a clue.

Back in the X-ray room, Dawn is trying to get more information about the Key from Glory. We learn that the Key has been around almost forever. Dawn asks if it's evil, and seems disconcerted when Glory animatedly replies, "Totally!" But she recovers when Snorificus corrects herself that the Key isn't really evil, "just depends on your point-of-view." Yawn. From my point of view, the key looks like 54 minutes of prime-time boredom on a box. Dawn overplays her hand when she asks Glory what the Key opens. Glory becomes agitated and approaches Dawn saying, "I'm thinking…that maybe…you…don't have any idea where my key is." I know we're supposed to be worried here that Glory is going to find out that Dawn is the Key and squirrel her away to do some sort of evil, but I know it's not going to happen on a show that has taken twelve episodes just to get this far in the whole story. I've seen lines at IKEA move faster than this plot.

Glory starts having one of her attacks and gets ready to do her brain sucking thing to Dawn, but the gang bursts in just then, Buffy warning Glory to "get away from [her] sister." I won't even ask how they knew where to find Glory and Dawn, since they are certainly NOT in the break room. That's how bored I am with this whole episode. Buffy takes a few swings at Glory and Spike, coming in through a side door, grabs her from behind so Buffy can punch her some more. Spike quips, "I thought you said this skank was tough." Glory can't let this pass and roughs Spike up a bit. Glory: "He wakes up, tell your boyfriend to watch his mouth." Okay. You know what's coming. All together now: "He is NOT my boyfriend." You know it's a bad Buffy episode when you can predict the dialogue. In the background, Willow and Tara start chanting. Giles lets fly a cross-bow bolt that hits Glory and harmlessly thunks to the floor while Xander creeps up from behind and takes a swing with a…crow bar…that was just…lying around…in the X-ray room, where they so often have need of crowbars while X-raying things. Huh. That doesn't faze Glory either, and she pulls Xander around to face her, saying, "Hey! Watch the hair!" before sending him flying. Wow. That's the most intelligent thing she's ever said. Xander really does need to watch his hair. In a mirror. Maybe then he can see how utterly repulsive it is. If he's not careful, the weasel on Buffy's jacket is going to try and mate with it. Glory throws the crowbar like a javelin at Dawn, but Buffy dives in front of Dawn and takes it in the chest. "Is that the best you little crap gnats could muster?" snarks Glory. "Crap gnats"? Further proof that Glory hails from the evil Junior High dimension. At this point Willow and Tara throw glitter on Glory, and Willow claps her hands and says something in a language I don't know ["I assume she says 'Discede,' a Latin command meaning 'go' or 'leave'" -- Sars], and Glory dematerializes into a bunch of little bits. And I guess Willow inhaled some glitter or something, because she's thrown to the ground with a bloody nose. Okay. Time for hugs all around. Except for Willow and Tara, who can't even be shown in the same freakin' frame together. Buffy asks what Willow did to Glory, and Willow breathlessly replies that it was a "teleportation spell. Still working out the kinks." Buffy: "Where'd you send her?" Willow: "That's one of the kinks."

By Ace

there's a stupid scene in which Xander gets off on the fact that a thousands-of-years-old "super power in a raw form" is "digging the Xand-man." Xander manages to totally ignore the fact that he's deriving sexual satisfaction from the admiration of a fourteen-year-old girl. Giles is as disgusted as I am and stalks off. However, he doesn't point out, even though he really, really should, that when you look back on the crushes you had in your early teens, you're usually terribly, terribly embarrassed and that, like Dawn, Xander's haircut is about a thousand years out of place, having last been seen on a chap known as Dorkus Maximus.

By Ace

The gang meets at the cemetery, and Buffy decides that they should probably check the hospital just to move the plot along, since this episode has really been dragging.

By Ace

Somewhere high above Sunnydale, Glory rematerializes, and then the camera pans back to show her streaking meteorite-like to the earth.

Buffy asks if Dawn is okay, and Dawn sulks, "What do you care?" "Because I love you. You're my sister," replies Buffy. Dawn disputes this. Buffy tells her that there's "Summers blood" in her veins, just the same as Buffy's, and then wets her palm with her own blood before grasping it over Dawn's, which, at the very least, makes them blood sisters, which is just as good as the real thing. Ask any eight-year-old. Buffy passionately tells Dawn that "it doesn't matter where you came from or how you got here. You are my sister." They share a hug, and through the power of love Dawnocchio is finally turned into a real little girl. Bah. No time for this crap. Buffy gathers her up and they start to leave for home, but Dawn remembers that Ben was trying to help her; she can't quite recall if he left before Glory came. The Scoobies are left picking glitter out of their hair or something.

The preview for "Crush." Words cannot adequately express my disgust, so I'll be over in the corner making retching noises.