Season 1 Episode 6: The Pack

Babes Watch Buffy

In light of recent events before you listen to this episode we would like to say: Episode 6: The Pack uses mystical possession by predatory ware-hyena spirits to explore the topic of teenage bullying. It's clumsy, poignant, funny, dark, and troubling for both good and bad reasons. Joss Whedon himself notes it as one of his favorite episodes. And this isn't the first or last time the Buffyverse will use mystical forces to alter a character's agency - spells, potions, poisons, hauntings, hypnosis, demonic forces, and a vast array of body snatching, swapping, possessing, and distorting are all employed metaphorically to tell us stories and make us think. All that being said, Gentle Listeners, we need a moment of real talk: Sunnydale is a fictional setting. In the real world actions are actions, not metaphors. If an act of violence is committed it is not a debatable subject about who or what is to blame. It is the fault of the person who takes that action, and no malevolent outside forces like "campus drinking culture and promiscuity" can diminish that action or wipe fault away. In a fictional setting, the Scooby Gang can divorce agency from accountability and consequence depending on what mystical forces are at work. In the real world, we cannot. Or at least, we should not. Respectfully, -Anna & Cate