Buffy Season 8 Recap - Living Doll

We start on a box full of tools “not the knife” a voice begs. “not again” it begs as we see an old wrinkly hand pick up a thin knife, “yes, again” the apparent torturer tells them. We see an old man surrounded by china dolls and puppets, “how long are you going to keep doing this to me” the voice asks. The man looks at the doll in front of him as he lowers the knife to her face “until you’re safe” he tells her as it is revealed that the doll is Dawn.










Buffy and Xander walk through the corrdiors of the castle, Buffy explains that while Dawn annoys her and begins to list the reasons why, including the fact that she never returns Buffy’s DVDs, Xander stops her and tells her that Dawn is probably fine. Buffy tells him that Dawn not being around is worrying and she wants to know where she is before she can relax. Xander tells Buffy the plan he has set in motion to find and cure Dawn of her ‘curse’, first of all, is his ‘inside man’.
Andrew arrives at a dorm room door, and asks if the guy is named Kenny (Dawn’s ex boyfriend), he is and Andrew tells him that he is his new room mate. We return to Dawn who is now trying to escape, as she gets down from her shelf the other dolls ask her why she is trying to escape, the man keeps them safe they tell her. They grab her and tell her that she cannot leave. The man enters and apologies for the other dolls behaviour, they do not have souls like she does. Dawn begs to be let go, telling him that he knows she has a soul, shes different. The man agrees that she is different and that is exactly why she should stay, he soul is held within her new porcelain body and it is much more fragile than a human body, any fall or break and her soul will be destroyed. He puts her back on the shelf and tells her that she is safe here.

As Buffy and Xander go looking for Dawn in the woods they discuss Buffy’s concerns for her sister, she tells Xander that she didn’t want Dawn in situations like this, she wanted her kept away from the Slayer organisation so she could have a normal life. Suddenly they stop and find Dawn’s hoof prints, as they follow them they realise that her feet transmogrified into smaller feet, Dawn has gone into phase three of her ‘curse’. As they begin to follow the new tracks Buffy asks Xander how dangerous Kenny is, Xander tells Buffy that he is a thricewise which are not usually magically gifted, his power was exemplified because he was so hurt over Dawn cheating on him. Buffy stops in shock as Xander realises he wasn’t meant to tell anyone, Buffy is shocked at herself for not knowing this. Buffy tells Xander to get the thricewise to Scotland immediately.

Andrew places three totems around the dorm room, on the third one Kenny outrightly asks Andrew why he is placing magical objects around the room but before Andrew can finish his unconvincing lie Willow utters a spell which transports all the items within the three totems to the Scotland base. Kenny gets up and morphs from his human image into his thricewise image. He smashes through the wall and runs towards the woods. Buffy and Xander find a cabin in the woods and as they get closer one of the dolls hiding in the trees hits Xander with a tranquiliser. Buffy now has no back up but Kenny arrives, telling Buffy that he never meant things to go this far. Buffy and Kenny enter the cabin and Buffy tells the man to put down the Dawn doll, Dawn looks up at sees Kenny, Kenny upon seeing Dawn utters her name lovingly, Dawn looks him the eyes and apologies which instantly morphes her back into a human, the curse has been lifted. As Buffy begins to threaten the old man, the other dolls beg for her to leave him alone, he looks after them and keeps them safe. Buffy lets go and tells the others that they can go home.
Kenny and Dawn walk hand in hand across one of the fields outside the castle, Kenny apologies to dawn for doing the spell in the first place and then Dawn apologies once more for sleeping with his room mate. She explains that she wasn’t ready for sex with Kenny and in a moment of weakness his roommate seduced her, she is not making excuses but is simply accepting responsibility for what she did. Kenny understands that they have both hurt each other too much for any relationship to be able to continue, he changes into his human form and says goodbye to Dawn and she walks back alone to the castle.

As Buffy walks through the darker part of the castle (presumably the cellar) she finds Dawn sitting alone, Dawn begins to talk to Buffy but she interrupts, she tells Dawn that she knows shes been a bad sister and she is going to make it up to her, and she is sure it will feel better to tell her, but she is reassuring Dawn that she already knows. Dawn tells her to shut up, and that’s not what she was going to say. She tells Buffy that she cant keep her safe, she is an adult now and she doesn’t expect Buffy to be able to save her like she did when she was younger. Buffy has an army to run and Dawn feels she was being selfish trying to get some of Buffy’s attention. Buffy smiles at her and tells her that while she has an army to run, she only has one sister, one that she will love until death. Buffy will always try to protect Dawn even if Dawn has created the danger herself, “want to watch TV?” Buffy asks, and Dawn gets excited for some time with her sister. Dawn then uses this moment to inform Buffy that she might have scratched one of her DVDs to which Buffy then threatens to kill her herself.