Smashed (Buffy episode)

Infobox Television episode
Title=Smashed


Series=Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Season=6
Episode=9
Airdate=November 20 2001
Production=6ABB09
Writer=Drew Z. Greenberg
Director=Turi Meyer
Guests=Danny Strong
(Jonathan)
Adam Busch
(Warren)
Tom Lenk
(Andrew)
Amber Benson
(Tara)
Elizabeth Anne Allen
(Amy)
Episode list=List of Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes
Prev=Tabula Rasa
Next=Wrecked

"Smashed" is the 9th episode of season 6 of the television series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer".

Plot synopsis

Summary

Willow, sad and lonely without Tara, figures out a way to turn the metamorphosed Amy from a rat back into human. Feeling newly liberated, they decide to go out and have some fun. In the meantime, Spike discovers that the chip in his head gives him no pain when he punches Buffy. After verifying that the chip appears undamaged and still causes him agony when he harms humans, Spike tells Buffy she is no longer quite human, that she "came back wrong."

Willow and Amy go over to The Bronze where a couple of guys try to intimidate them. They perform a spell on the boys to make fun of them, but soon they begin to perform more and more complex spells and the Bronze fills with weird things, strangely dressed people, mutations and so on. Willow is beginning to have a taste of her real power and she likes it.

Spike assaults Buffy and they battle until Buffy unleashes her desire and kisses him, initiating such violent sex that the abandoned house in which they were fighting collapses around them.

Acting

tarring

* Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers
* Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris
* Emma Caulfield as Anya Jenkins
* Michelle Trachtenberg as Dawn Summers
* James Marsters as Spike
* Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg

Guest starring

*Amber Benson as Tara Maclay
*Tom Lenk as Andrew Wells
*Danny Strong as Jonathan Levinson
*Adam Busch as Warren Mears
*Elizabeth Anne Allen as Amy Madison

Co-starring

*Patrice Walters as Woman
*John Patrick Clerkin as Man
*Jack Jozefson as Rusty
*Rick Garcia as Reporter
*Kelly Smith as Innocent Girl
*Jordan Belfi as Ryan
*Adam Weiner as Simon
*Melanie Sirmons as Brie
*Lauren Nissi as Girlfriend

Production details

Steve Tartalia, James Marsters' stunt double, says he knocked himself out during the last scene, in which Buffy and Spike fall through the ceiling. "On that fall," he says, "our legs got tangled in the breakaway ceiling, and it caused us to tilt at an angle so that my head would be the first thing to hit the ground. And it did, and it knocked me out. Basically, I came to with some flashlights and smelling salts."Citation |first= Maria |last=G |date=18 July 2007|url=http://www.whedonopolis.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=126&Itemid=38
title=The Job - This Month's Victim: Steve Tartalia (James Marsters' Stunt Double)|accessdate=2007-10-20 ] Stunt coordinator John Medlen also hurt himself during this episode, while demonstrating how Spike should swing from the chandelier. The chandelier broke, he fell 7 feet, and the chandelier landed on his face, breaking his nose.

A longer, more intense lovemaking scene was originally filmed for the finale of the episode, but cut out. The clip still makes the rounds occasionally in Whedonverse fan circles.

Music

* Halo Friendlies - "Run Away"
* Roxy Music - "Avalon"
* Virgil - "Here"
* Virgil - "Parachute"
* Virgil - "Vermillion Borders"

Translations

* Italian title: "Il diamante ghiacciato" ("The Frozen Diamond")
* German title: "Alte Feinde, neue Freunde?" ("Old Enemies, New Friends?")
* French title: "Écarts de conduite" ("Misdemeanours")

Writing

In his DVD commentary, writer Drew Z. Greenberg says that in his original conception of Willow's confrontation with the homophobic men at The Bronze, he intended for Willow to cast a spell on the men so that they couldn't stop kissing each other. Joss Whedon vetoed the idea because he did not want to portray people's sexuality as changing in an instant and he did not want to portray same-sex kissing as a punishment.

Euphemisms

Three consecutive episode titles in the sixth season are euphemisms for drunkenness or being under the influence of narcotics in American English: "Smashed", "Wrecked", and "Gone". Willow's descent into her addiction to magic becomes dizzying and frightening.

Cultural references

* Spike's comment, "You can play Holodeck another time..." is a reference to Star Trek.

* Xander is looking at a Dungeons & Dragons manual.

* The geeks talk about "Red Dwarf" and "Doctor Who". However, Andrew couldn't have seen every episode of "Doctor Who" on DVD, as only about a quarter have been released and some serials don't even exist anymore.

* The boys calling Willow "Ellen" was a reference to Ellen DeGeneres who, like Willow, is a lesbian.

Quotes and trivia

Continuity

Arc significance

* This episode marks the beginning of Spike and Buffy's sexual relationship.

* Amy is returned to being human after being a rat since the middle of the third season.

* Spike learns that he can hit Buffy without his chip activating.

* It also marks Willow's conscious slide into using magic casually and dangerously. Because she is lonely after losing Tara, using magic becomes a comfort and a way for her to feel powerful and in control of her world. Transfiguring Amy from rat to woman gives her a friend who won't monitor her overusing and abusing magic and thus, Willow freely gives into her darkest impulses. As Anya says, "Responsible people are so concerned with being good all the time that when they finally get a taste of being bad, they can't get enough." Willow, who has been the most dependable of the Scoobies up to this point, can't get enough, which leads her to irresponsibility and addiction as the season progresses.

* Both Buffy and Willow are out of control -- their fears about themselves become what leads Buffy and Willow into a destructive relationships, one sexually, one magically. Unlike other seasons, where Buffy and Willow are shown having long conversations, there are few times in season 6 when Buffy and Willow actually confide in each other and speak honestly. Buffy approaches Willow to have a serious conversation in this episode, but Amy's presence throws her off and she leaves without having voiced anything real. Thus, this episode typifies the season-long theme that self-involvement often leads to self-destruction.

Timing

* Stories that take place around the same time in the Buffyverse:

References

External links

*
*