Buffy Season Eight: Last Gleaming, Part 3

Buffy: "It's not enough to side with our original big bad -- now we're working for him."

Synopsis:

Angel is fighting the Phoenix-like Higher Being Twilight whatever. It complains that Angel abandoned It, and that its mother, Buffy, abandoned It, too. It wants Angel to bring It the Seed, its soul. (Aha, says Billie.) The demons and monsters pouring in are a bit premature; they're anticipating the removal of the Seed.

Meanwhile under the Sunnydale crater, monsters are everywhere and there is much fighting by everyone with everything. Monsters bonk Dawn, who is injured, not dead.

Inset shot of Angel's face, looking pale, with blank spots for eyes.

The Master proposes that he and Buffy ally to protect the Seed. Buffy decides to stake him and Spike is ready to help. Willow stops her and says they must indeed ally with the Master to protect the Seed. Buffy asks Willow what happened when she passed out. Willow lies. The Master attacks Buffy and succeeds in hurting her, because the Seed has made her weaker. Spike attacks but is tossed aside. Willow again insists that everyone work together to protect the Seed.

Back to Angel, who has been unconscious or worse, I think, probably because of the panels of him looking blank. The Phoenix-like Higher Being tells him to fly and he flies.

Back to the sphere ship, where the General (remember the General?) smushes one of the Bugs. The General is injured, shuns Amy's help, and says he's off to find a medic.

Buffy goes off in a corner and talks to Giles. Buffy acknowledges that all this was her fault for empowering the slayers. Giles says he can help, but not here, and Spike can't go out because it's daylight. Buffy needs to get away from the Seed to get her powers back.

Xander brings Dawn to a military medic station and of course, the General is there. and knows who they are. The General has intel that the Seed must be destroyed. He's right. How about that.

Willow chants a protection spell for the Seed, with the Master looking on. Buffy and Spike, further away, fight monsters. One of the monsters bursts apart and it's Angel in disguise. Except that he punches Buffy out. Spike says "Angelus" as Angel punches him out, too. Buffy says, "No." Angel says, "Twilight."

Review:

I'm confused. What is Twilight? It's a place created by Buffy/Angel boinking, it's a Phoenix-like Higher Being spawned by Buffy and Angel, it's Angel's alter ego, it's the Big Bad, it's a book by Stephenie Meyer. I wish they'd make up their minds and stick to it.

I guess it was inevitable that Angel would become evil again. Except what he did earlier in the series was evil, too. Wouldn't it have made more sense if he'd been Angelus all along? Except that Angelus would never have wanted to go to Twilight heaven with Buffy. Hey, couldn't they go back and rewrite season eight and get it to make sense?

This issue had a ton of confusing cartoon battle scenes, which does nothing for me. And did they have to tease us with the cover? They show Xander carrying Dawn's body, and she's not dead. I guess since she didn't wink out of existence in season five when everyone wished she would, Dawn will never get written out. It doesn't seem quite fair.

Bits and pieces:

-- The Seed restored the Master when Twilight "chose Angelus." Angelus, not Angel, huh.

-- The General thought Xander was soldier-like. "Halloween" lives on.

-- The last few have mentioned "The queen is dead" here and there. Like back in the Faith volume, except Gigi was referring to Buffy.

-- Buffy losing her powers as she gets close to the Seed is a lot like that terrible Highlander TV movie that I'm trying to put out of my head forever.

Quotes:

Master: (referring to Angel) "I sort of thought he'd show."
Spike: "Oh, he'll be around later to take credit for everything, don't you fret."

Xander: "I get it. Little too much time around his preciousssssss..."

The Master: "She and Angelus will see you all dead."
Buffy: "Wow, this guy is really challenged by the major plot points."
Dawn: "He's not the only one."
Count me in on that, Dawn.

Buffy: "He's a monster and he killed me."
Willow: "Grudge validated. Move on."

Buffy: (to Willow) "You talked to your snakey demon hottie girlfriend, didn't you?"
Giles: (to himself) "It seems I've missed a great deal."

The Master: "You remain that same little girl I killed. I can still smell the acne scrub."

Two issues to go. But who's counting?

Billie
---
Billie Doux reviewed all of Buffy and Angel, so she knows the plural of apocalypse.

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