In its final season (s7). Buffy the Vampire Slayer
In s7, an evil being called The First is killing all of the girls in the world who are potential slayers. For protection, girls from around the world come to live with Buffy, who must train them in the fight against the First.
In the following scene, Buffy has been cast out as leader, because the other girls think she is too hard on them (there are also tinges of jealousy; after all, she has the power they all ultimately want). Also, she has led them into a disastrous battle against Caleb, the emissary of the First who repeatedly defeats Buffy. Floundering in her role as leader, which is quite different from her role as warrior, Buffy is ready to give up.
Spike, who is a vampire who used to be evil but who is now on the path to redemption, tries to revive Buffy’s lowered morale:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NiIYZz3Z5c]
Buffy’s “always alone” speech has roots in the show’s history of her power, which has always required her to feel like/worry she must stand alone. This is first consolidated at the end of season two
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1H2gZFf0JyE]
Being “chosen” is always synonymous in BtVS with being alone and making sacrifices in relationships–a theme you are also familiar with from the Alias
Continued here…
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I find the ‘she has to be alone’ theme interesting, because it seems like even when she tries to be, she never really can be. For one, she needs her team to back her up (just like Sydney needs hers in order to succeed on her missions): Giles to be the Watcher, Willow to perform the spell that turns Angel back in the second clip, as well as Spike to give her a pep talk in the first clip. She needs these people in order to succeed (just like Sydney needs Vaughn, Dixon, Marshall, etc.), somewhat diminishing her role as the One.
I wonder how much of this is meant to soften her image as a ‘girl power’ figure. In her fight with Angel, she doesn’t defeat Evil Angel with her fighting skills; rather, she deceives him once he’s turned back to normal and literally stabs him in the heart and banishes him to another realm. And that deception lies in her sexuality and their romantic relationship. And then she cries (she also cries in the first clip, in which Spike is very fatherly towards her). I wonder if we would see a male hero ever feel so much angst about emotional attachment to people and cry so much about that angst. Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing (we do want our heroes to be compassionate human beings, after all), but I highly doubt it would happen if Buffy were a boy.
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I disagree, I think that Buffy absolutely defeats Angel with her fighting skills, and that the show is very invested in making that point. The ultimate girl power moment is when she’s crouching in a corner and Angel is taunting her. “No weapons, no friends, no hope. Take all that away and what’s left?” “Me,” she says, and stops his sword with her bare hands and her eyes closed. This is an important idea to the show, that Buffy possesses an essential strength of character; her power comes straight from herself and her belief in herself.
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