Season 3 is an epic when it comes to love stories. You have Buffy/Angel, Xander/Cordy, Xander/Willow, Oz/Willow, Willow/Vamp!Willow, Giles/Joyce, Wesley/Cordy, and above all else, Buffy/Faith. Okay, I kid, but only a little.
Case in point, "Revelations," 3.07. The episode begins with the Scoobies speculating on whether Buffy's seeing someone. The Slayer herself walks up, her arm around Faith...
"Really, we're just good friends."
No, that's Buffy's actual line.
Why, no, there's no subtext here. It's not like Joyce's reaction to finding out her daughter was a Slayer was to ask "have you tried not being a Slayer?" or anything... No, Buffy and Faith are just really good friends who share a secret that makes them special but could also lead to them being persecuted (cf. 3.11 "Gingerbread"), and they hang out at night together. A lot. With phallic objects (cf. 4.10, "Hush").
Unfortunately, their lifestyle is interrupted by a meddling adult. Gwen Post is Faith's new Watcher (her old one is dead) and she manages to be even more of a killjoy that Giles is. Faith comments that her authority figures tend to end up dead (and she's not kidding; across this show and Angel, every authority figure she accepts does indeed die... although I admit I'm stretching it, because two of those figures die before Faith accepts them). There's a demon in town named Lagos who's looking for the Glove of Mynaghon (yup, that's probably not the official spelling). It's hidden in a crypt somewhere in Sunnydale, just like every plot-centric item ever (hey, Buff, save yourself a lot of trouble and some really mediocre episodes by searching every basement in Sunnydale until you find the Scythe. We'll all be happier for it, promise). So the gang splits up to go looking for the Glove, because there are so very many graveyards.
Buffy shows up at Angel's creepy mansion and tells him that Lagos is in town. I'd like to point out that Angel knows a lot more about local demons now than he will on his own show.
Xander and Willow are in the library, continuing to do their "yup, we have feelings for each other" routine. Giles may or may not have caught on; the scene comes across as somewhat ambiguous.
Faith talks with Buffy about the losers she's slept with and says "now it's just get some, get gone." We learn that Faith knows Buffy has "boinked the undead." Buffy really doesn't want to talk about it. Faith gets the hint and backs off. Her next line is "we're 0 for six tonight," regarding the number of cemeteries they've checked, but it's very easy to mishear as "oversexed." They decide to call it a night, though Faith is going to check out one more cemetery on her way back.
Faith runs across Lagos, but decides to go right for the fisticuffs rather than grab the giant axe off his back because hey, why not? She promised Buffy she'd call out if she was "having fun," but of course she doesn't. This goes about as well as you'd predict; Lagos runs off.
Xander wanders through another cemetery and discovers Angel, who's gone and gotten the magic mitten thingy. He tracks him back to the creepy mansion (and here I thought vampires had heightened senses) and spies him making out with Buffy. He goes and tells Giles, and they - importantly - don't tell Gwen Post.
The Scoobies stage an intervention (Angelvention? I'll show myself out) the next day. Buffy tries to explain that Angel is better now, but they're not buying it. Especially Xander, who's hated Angel from day one. Willow tries to be gentle (because she's, y'know, dating a werewolf). But she also thinks that Buffy can't see straight when it comes to Angel. Se... she doesn't think Buffy has the self-control required to keep her knees together? Giles tells Buffy that obviously she knows that hiding Angel's return was wrong because she hid it. Circular logic? Also, Giles uses the fact that "Angel" tortured him for hours for fun as a big old bat of guilt to beat Buffy over the head with. So Giles is not on Team Distinction Between Angel And Angelus. And again, Oz, who gets a free pass for whatever he does three nights a month, is sitting right there. (Although Oz's free pass will expire the moment Seth Green decides to jump ship; cf. 4.06, "Wild at Heart.")
Gwen drops by Faith's motel and tells her Spartans used to live in quarters much like Faith's completely barren room "because a true fighter needs nothing else." When Gwen starts ragging on Giles, Faith starts defending him... but stops when Gwen mentions that he's been holding secret meetings with Buffy and her friends, to which Faith says "I guess that doesn't mean me."
So for all intents and purposes, this is the start of Faith's turn. Trying to assign blame is a little bit difficult. On the one hand, Buffy is pretty territorial when it comes to her friends, and that didn't exactly help in "Faith, Hope & Trick." But over the course of the next two episodes, it looked like Faith was starting to integrate (so long as she didn't pester Buffy about her love life, and I'm not going to hold it against Buffy that she put up walls there).
Here is Faith's justification for her turn in "Enemies," 3.17 (emphasis added):
You know, I come to Sunnydale. I'm the Slayer. I do my job kicking ass better than anyone. What do I hear about everywhere I go? Buffy. So I slay, I behave, I do the good little girl routine. And who's everybody thank? Buffy. You get the Watcher. You get the mom. You get the little Scooby gang. What do I get? Jack squat. This is supposed to be my town!Faith herself isn't exactly blameless as far as the entirety of that quote goes, but at this point, as far as the Scoobies go, I sympathize. She had no way of knowing (because Buffy was tight-lipped about the whole Angel thing - which, again, is understandable) that they felt justified in keeping her in the dark because she wasn't part of events the first time around with Angelus. (It's still kind of stupid, though. If there is a vampire you're not supposed to kill, it might be a good idea to mention that to one of the only people on the planet theoretically* capable of beating him in a fight.)
*Note that, outside of this episode, where he's still recovering from both spending time in a hell dimension and a bonk on the head, every time Faith and Angel(us) throw down, he wins. (Okay, their fight in "Enemies" is more or less a draw, but Angel(us) is toying with her.)
One thing I can say for certain: Gwen is definitely manipulating Faith to her own ends (because spoiler alert: she's evil).
Buffy decides to go off and kill Lagos as a peace offering to Giles. Meanwhile Faith meets up with Xander in the Bronze. It's not clear whether Gwen put her up to this, or if she's acting on her own initiative. She's nursing a grudge that the Scoobies didn't include her in their little pow-wow, but when she says they were probably talking about the Glove, Xander corrects her and tells her about Angel. Faith has pretty much the exact reaction that I'm assuming Buffy feared she did. She decides that she can't trust Buffy's opinion of Angel and goes off to slay him. Xander asks if he can come (along), but I think he just did.
Gwen shows up in Giles's office. After he tells her where the Glove is, Gwen knocks him out. You mean a guest star turned out to be evil? Drink!
Willow is this close to confessing to Buffy that she smooched Xander right before Homecoming, but chickens out at the last minute. Lagos attacks. Buffy does what Faith should have done and dispatches him with his own axe.
When Xander and Faith go back to the library for weapons, Xander comes across Giles, unconscious. Xander finally comes to his senses and realizes that Angel probably didn't do it, but Faith is hell-bent on getting her slaying in. Buffy and Willow turn up as the paramedics are wheeling him away, and they learn a) to use Living Flame to destroy the Glove, and b) that Faith is going after Angel.
Angel is showing off a Latin accent that's marginally better than his Oirish one, when Gwen shows up and tells him she's here to help. She whacks him over the head with a shovel the instant his back is turned. He vamps, Faith arrives, Gwen encourages Faith to jump to an entirely reasonable conclusion, and Faith does. But before she can finish him, Buffy interferes. What follows is an altercation between two young women that involves plenty of grunting- oh, wait, never mind, I already got in my Major Lesbian Subtext moment back up at the top. They fight.
Willow and Xander arrive and are also deceived by Gwen. Xander tries to stop the fight and gets hit for his trouble. Willow gets knocked out when Gwen retrieves the Glove. Then Gwen starts summoning blasts of lightning. That gets Faith's attention. She runs interference for Buffy...
And let's establish this right now, for the record. Buffy severs Gwen's arm, causing lightning to hit and incinerate her. For those of us keeping score, that is three humans Buffy has indirectly killed so far this season. Just something to keep in mind when "Bad Girls" rolls around. I'm not saying the writers are guilty of Xander-like levels of hypocrisy, but the writers are guilty of Xander-like levels of hypocrisy.
Afterwards, Xander admits that so long as Buffy and Angel "don't get pelvic," everything will be fine. So it looks like things are cool and the Scooby gang is intact. Oh, and it turns out that Gwen only "used to be" a Watcher, and Giles swears there was a memo about it. Nice going.
Buffy goes to Faith's for some "damage control." Pretty much the first thing Faith says is that her place, mirroring Gwen's words earlier, "is real Spartan." She says she's five by five. Buffy tells Faith that she can trust her, but Faith insists that "I'm on my side, and that's enough." (Actually, it's hard to look at "Bad Girls" and "Enemies" without coming to the conclusion that it's most definitely not.) She has a moment of regret as Buffy's on her way out, but doesn't offer any sort of olive branch.
Now this is where I get to start playing the "What If" game. To me the major pivot of this story comes when Faith runs across Xander, the member of the Scoobies who just happens to hate Angel the most. Basically everything that happens from that point on is a reaction to that scene. So what if Xander had been a bit less biased in his explanation to Faith? Or if Faith had run into, say, Willow? Faith seemed to think, in the "you boinked the undead" scene, that it was more interesting than anything else. She doesn't judge Buffy for jumping into bed with Angel; she seemed to think the idea was pretty neat (and see "Enemies" for oh so much more). But all it takes is for Xander to say that he's back, and even with the caveat that Buffy says he's clean, that's enough for Faith. Well, she's got some vampire issues above and beyond being a Slayer, what with the whole Watcher-killed-by-one thing. So I don't really think that the circumstances changing would change the end result: Faith launches off after Angel like a loose cannon.
Still, being overzealous doesn't directly translate to being straight-up evil. That's where the two-parter "Bad Girls" and "Consequences" comes in...
7 out of 10.
Administrative note: I'm rejiggering the schedule. Thursday is Halloween and I'm going to stay up late and do "The Wish." Friday I hope to do both the Game of Thrones chapters I said I'd do on Thursday and a brief summary of important events in "Amends," "Helpless," and "The Zeppo." (I've already done a full review of "Gingerbread" and you can read it here. I almost feel like doing a full review of "Helpless," but not in conjunction with my Faith project right now.)
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