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Buffy 6x16 (Extended) - Hell's Bells (Patreon)

Published:
2023-07-14 18:00:05
Edited:
2024-07-16 23:32:22
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

Content

reaction link: click here. 

love is DEAD. i hate my life.

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Comments

Brendan O'Connor

That caption just about sums it up. This season is Rough

Girl4Music

Domi, I understand your anger and your hatred of Xander but you have to understand that Xander has never known a healthy happy married couple. Not until last episode with Riley and Sam. He had grew up in an abusive household his whole life and he has learned to run away from relationship conflict because of it. He doesn’t do what Willow does (mostly because he doesn’t have the power to) in that he erases the fights. But he still doesn’t deal with them in a healthy way either. But he has a justified excuse for it in that he has known nothing else. Has never had a positive father figure. His reaction and response is understandable. It’s not nice to see. Not at all. But it is understandable.

Joshua

Might actually be my least favorite episode on the series, breaking them up is still the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen and I really don’t understand why they did it other then “no one can be happy”

Captain Hammer

Well said. The timing is really unfortunate but it seemed to be that Xander ended things because he was worried about becoming an abusive drunk. If that's what he fears then not getting married is in Anya's best interest as well. If they got married and he turned out that way I dont think anyone would say that getting married was the right choice.

rattusprat

Love the shirt. At least you got your vows...

Girl4Music

I don’t think it was the right choice to marry Anya at all considering he had all those worries or concerns. It wouldn’t be right. The only thing that I feel he did wrong was that he didn’t communicate all this to her beforehand. I don’t think he was wrong for calling it off. After all, he didn’t want to split up with her. Just stop the wedding. He wasn’t ready and I guess he just didn’t let himself process his own emotions about it due to his instinctive reaction to run away not just from the reality of conflict, but also the mentality of it. It’s something he has subconsciously trained himself to do his whole life every time his parents fought around him - he would disappear. He took that behaviour pattern into his own relationships. You really can’t blame the guy despite how awful it is that Anya was left at the altar. Fear has always been his theme. And here - his fear was too hard to face. I have a whole BUFFY REWATCH recap explaining all this but it contains spoilers to future episodes so I can’t post it here. The thing about BTVS is that none of the main protagonists really do anything wrong other than don’t communicate what’s wrong. How they think and feel. Well… except Willow. She does many things wrong precisely in effort to avoid communicating. But that’s a whole other analysis for another day. But Buffy, Xander and Giles. It’s just lack of communication. They don’t do anything in selfish or manipulative ways. It’s mainly just out of fear which if you think it through enough, is actually something to admire about them because they don’t want to put their loved ones in harms way. Oz as well. Again - doesn’t communicate what’s wrong - his actions of infidelity - and leaves Willow out of fear he will harm her or someone else due to not being in control of his werewolf condition. This isn’t something to hate a character for. You can be angry but these reactions and responses are very understandable - very human. And like I said - there’s only really Willow that exhibits behaviour that is actually morally wrong. With her it’s questionable and shouldn’t be forgiven and forgotten so easily. But with everyone else, it’s understandable. So there’s nothing to forgive exactly. But there is much to acknowledge and address. Xander isn’t a bad person. He is just a tortured soul. And I can’t hate him for what he does here because I know I’d do the same. And I wish more people that watched BTVS looked at it this way. Put themselves in the character’s shoes. Understood that’s it’s only human nature what happens. I know it’s awful for Anya. It’s absolutely devastating what she has to go through. But least she’s safe. At least she’s alive. That’s the way Xander was looking at it. He was protecting her from future him. He didn’t want to turn into a bitter, angry old man and lash out at her violently. And even though that may not be true, again - because he chronically fears it will be - he can’t be blamed for it. This is his mindset and he made his decision based on it. The only thing he did wrong was he made it too late. He should have spoke up earlier. That’s it. But that’s very understandable.

Ron Fehr

Xander sure has a knack for jinxing himself. "As long as nothing bad happens. " ( I forget the title of the episode) "Nothing on Earth can stop this wedding now."

Girl4Music

They did it to address Xander’s backstory. How his life has been like behind the camera. Without that context, people would continue to misunderstood his character. At least now they know the reason why he is the way he is. You merely only get subtext on it until now. Now you see what his parents are really like and it isn’t just his perception of them. This is something very serious that the show should have made us aware on earlier so that people could sympathise with Xander and understand his situation. If you had been brought up in an abusive household your whole life, wouldn’t you react and respond this way too? I would.

Ron Fehr

Well, you wondered what Anya would be like as a vengeance demon. Looks like you may get your chance. Xander, you need to focus on now, not a possible future. Realizing these fears and telling Anya should help you prevent these things from happening. Take one day at a time.

Steve Quast

I hate this episode. It could have been a bright spot in what is an otherwise bleak season. Instead they had to pull this bullshit. It's true that it's unrealistic to have every relationship end like a fairytale, and that would get boring after a while. But it's also boring to have every relationship end in disaster. Yawn.

Dee Aitch

You said as long as it had vows and wasn't "The Body" you were going to be good with it, so I guess you're good with it. Spike actually being "The Doctor" is one of the weirdest bits of the season. In my head-canon he was just an unwitting dupe of the doctor, as he doesn't feel like an international superspy. But yeah, still an evil dupe. Your English is sooo good, I only get reminded that it's not your first language only occasionally. "Old Xander" said he was tortured in a hell dimension or something like that. Also, just so we're clear, we're not allowed to murder people that leave people at the altar, okay?

Dee Aitch

Also, I never realized the "not a crier" was a meme. It sounded like you meant it seriously in one of your earlier episodes. Was it serious early and just turned into a meme?

Thom Purdy

Once again, Xander does the right thing in the worst way. If he had so many deep seeded doubts, they definitely shouldn't get married. He does hate himself, and his family is a reason.

Girl4Music

A few thoughts about Xander and his Season 6 arc. Just wanted to make it clear what my view of the choice he makes in it is. That I don’t think it was the wrong one given the situation and circumstances.  You know it is actually remarkable how decent of a man Xander turned out to be given he had basically NO ONE to look up to from an adult perspective. Buffy was his hero. And he says as much at the start of Season 4. It was no wonder why he felt so useless in Season 6. Buffy was out of sorts with going through her depression post-resurrection. His first and longest best friend was careering off a cliff of emotional addiction and dealing with a painful break-up. The only male figure he had in his life abandoned and failed him along with his friends. In fact I think the person Giles failed the most was Xander. But then he never really liked Xander to begin with. Constantly insulting him and picking on him as if he was a child himself. So I guess that makes sense. Xander could have made a great Watcher with some actual serious and intentional guidance from Giles.  I’m just saying... Considering his circumstances, Xander turned out pretty damn good for all the flack the fandom loves to throw at him for leaving Anya at the altar but conveniently leaves out the information that he was afraid of what he would become if he married her when he realized that he wasn’t ready to at the last moment. You can’t fault him for believing that toxic masculinity and violent tendencies run in the family and for him thinking he would only be perpetuating the cycle when the only example of a marriage life he had was his own parents’ destructive marriage. What else was he supposed to go on? The fears and insecurities he already had prior to ‘Hell’s Bells’ only doubled up on him when he saw a fake depiction of what his marriage life with Anya could have been like. Was he irrational for believing that would be the outcome?  Yes. I fully believe so. His nightmare version of reality wouldn’t necessarily become the reality.  Was he wrong for ending it incase it could be the outcome?  No. I don’t believe so. ‘Cause I would have done the same thing if I was that fearful about where my reality, my marriage, might end up.  I think a mistake he does make, however, is not communicating this to anyone. But then I think that’s the whole curse of Season 6. No one communicates. Everyone is so mentally fucked in this season that no one expresses anything that they’re thinking or feeling or worrying about in the “right” or “best” way. And you’d think given Xanya are the most communicative couple in the show at this point that they’d bypass the curse of Season 6. But nah, it swallows them whole too because human psychology is complicated and messy and corruptible and that’s exactly why I think it’s one of the best seasons of the whole show. It represents the realism of being flawed. But back to me trashing Giles - why the fuck did he not come to the wedding? Don’t give me out-of-show answers. Obviously, I understand why from that point of view. I want logical in-show answers why the character didn’t show up to Xanya’s wedding.

Ron Fehr

Love your last comment. At the very least, Giles's absence should have been addressed somehow, even if just in passing.

Ray D

I’m probably in the minority but this episode doesn’t make me like Xander any less. In fact, I feel just as bad for him as I do Anya. His major flaw has always been his insecurities in general, mostly brought on by his crappy family and parents. The reason that he walks away in the end is to spare Anya future pain that he thinks is coming based on his insecurities of what married life will be. He’s scared that he will become his father. If he was more secure in who he was then he would know that it doesn’t have to be that way but he let his fear win. It’s just sad in general and I feel bad for all parties involved.

Ron Fehr

In addition, we've gotten to know him for almost six seasons, so it's even harder to dislike him. Had this been a season one episode (and he was alreadybout of high school), our feelings would likely be different.

Ron Fehr

We only really saw Xander within the group these six seasons, and those moments were the best for any healthy growth. But apparently his home life was what drove him to his actions. We only heard, and never got to see, until now, how bad things were for him when not with the others. We could never fully understand the thoughts going through his head.

The Chosen One

Well he clearly says (on a few occasions) he does still love her so if he would have just said I think marriage is too soon, lets wait etc. or something along those lines, sure. But just walking away does make him an ass. With reasons for doing so but still.

Girl4Music

He does say that… after he leaves her at the altar. It was just too late.

Claire Eyles

I think one of the biggest mistakes the show made was to treat Xander's home life as some sort of throw away running joke for the majority of the time, "Xander lives in his parents basement, and they don't get along, hey check it out he's sleeping outside in the snow at Christmas time rather than spend time with those people, LOL". In this episode we finally get to see that Xander's family are truly horrendous, and he is scarred from that, but it's too much of a turn by this point. They really needed to address the abuse Xander's dealt with before this episode, and not just keep playing it off for laughs,

Khanach

Yep, still hurts. And it’s mainly because, as angry and devastated as I was, it still made sense to me. Xander is my favourite character, because it keeps the show grounded, makes every character relatable because he’s just a flawed, normal guy. We all know that he usually has a very low opinion of himself (and this episode explains a lot), but he’ll do anything for the people he cares about, including sentencing himself to a miserable life, as long as he doesn’t bring others down with him. Of course, by trying to avoid causing pain in the long run, he caused it right then (I said he is my favourite character, not the brightest). The visions were not just visions (“feel what I felt”), and were directed right towards his deepest fear, so couldn’t bear it. Ok, let’s continue with the fun parade! :D Ps: love the shirt, 80% accurate 😋

Alex Wright

Yeah, it's not like seemingly Giles can't afford to cross the Atlantic at a moment's notice every other time he needs to.

X-man

That's like 99% of how all of the storylines in this season work. Just doing things for the sake of the "no one can be happy" schtick. This season destroyed so many character arcs for drama and plot convenience.