Spoiler Slayer

Before I go into my thoughts on the Willow spoilage, I'll pass along a few other fun tidbits.

The promo clips for the musical (seen during this weeks episode) are from an in-house documentary that David Fury is working on. With any luck, it will appear on the DVD for Season Six. The episode will also be in letterboxed format (and I'm wondering how long before the show is shown solely in that format) and a soundtrack CD will be available. Since the episode will be only about half as long as a CD, perhaps we will see some other fun things, such as ASH's performances in Season Four or even some Angel bits as well (one can wish). He also confirmed the episode's title, so I updated the Spoiler page accordingly.

Now, let's talk Willow.

It's interesting that the spoiler surfaced today, as I was originally going to discuss my speculation for the future of Tara. I was seriously beginning to think that she might not be on the show past mid-season. In fact, if there was a breakup between Willow and Tara in episode eight, I had a feeling that she might go to England with Giles. This is not based on anything I've heard, just that it would make sense. Just as Cordy went with Angel to Los Angeles, it would be nice to have another semi-regular character from the show to be on the Gile's spin-off. Besides, much like Cordelia, it would be awkward to have Tara around after a break-up. In the past, I would have figured they would have gotten together after a short period of time, but after seeing 'Flooded' I have to say that it won't be in the cards. Willow is in way over her head, if she's even in her head right now.

I promised a while back to share my speculation on what might happen with Willow. I said that there was a good chance that Buffy wasn't the only one brought back from beyond, and I felt that this could be our 'big bad' for the season. I was hoping that someone would pick up the same hints that I had, and come to the same conclusion. That didn't happen, but I'll share the speculation I had anyway. Especially since I don't feel that it's even remotely possible that it would happen.

My original thought was that Buffy would come back, as well as another character from the past who is buried in Sunnydale. That wouldn't be the Master (his bones were destroyed), couldn't be the Mayor or Doctor Walsh or even Kendra. However, there is an extremely powerful witch buried in Sunnydale. One who Willow has strong ties to, one who the writers have outright said that Willow would be more like this season. That would be Jenny Calendar. As much as I hate it, because the Jenny Calendar rumors crop up every season, it seemed that it could be a logical conclusion. Especially when one thinks all the way back to the end of Season Two, when Willow cast the curse on Angel. Which was echoed strongly in 'After Life' and the implication that Willow is hiding something ('Restless').

There you have it, that's what I was thinking. What am I thinking now?

The only thing I know for sure, is that Willow is hiding several things from the gang. In some ways, she might even be hiding things from herself. The power that she is tapping into, is changing her. But will Joss actually kill her? My take is that it could very well happen, for the reasons that I've mentioned. She has the capability to become the 'Big Bad' for the season. She's made some very poor choices, and she's obviously doing things for selfish reasons. It wasn't just a throwaway scene when we learned that the gang made Willow the leader. She is not the same Willow that she was back in High School. Rather than address the reasons why it could happen, lets look at the arguments that the spoiler is false.

The two things that I've heard brought up the most, are the comments made on the Season Two DVD set and at a convention. Both comments revolve around the death of Jenny, which was Joss's way of saying nobody was safe. Except for Willow, he said he would never kill off Willow. He said that one the DVD. At the convention, Joss talked about killing off characters, and Alyson (who was in the audience) said something along the lines of 'Even Willow?'. Joss again said he would never do that. People point to the fact that Joss said this a long time before Season Six began, so he must be telling the truth.

Which is incorrect. It's obvious that as far back as Season Three, that Joss knew what would happen at the end of Season Five. He's also said that he's already got Season Seven pretty much plotted out already. Joss could be passing some disinformation along about killing Willow, but there is the possibility that those statements are the disinformation as well. I just find it interesting that he's said that he won't kill off Willow not once, but twice. We can't trust Joss, after all, he killed the title character last season (and nobody really believed it would happen).

The other argument I've heard is that this is how Joss is going to smoke out the leak. Obviously the spoilers have been highly accurate this season. The writers have commented about how they're not happy about this. The only problem I have is that I just don't believe the writers have ever have passed along false spoilers. In fact, most of the sites who post false spoilers, love to discuss how they were fooled by Joss. How their sources gave them bad information. In fact, I don't think I've ever heard one of the writers say that they deliberately put out false spoilage. More often than not, it's a way for a spoiler source to cover their butt. The source of this spoiler isn't someone new, it isn't someone who's track record is iffy, the source is from someone who has nailed every episode this season. In addition, knowing how the leaks are getting out, this isn't the way to do it. You would track the leak by putting out altered script pages. The one that gets out to the net is the source of your leak. Dropping a bombshell like this doesn't prove anything, since it's been speculated on for months already, since Herc originally dropped the news that a major character would die.

I'm not saying that it will or won't happen, I just think that the opportunity and the possibilities are there. I can't rule it out either way at this point, and I think we would be very wrong to jump to any conclusions. As I've always said, this is going to be one heck of an interesting season. I know that I've said in the past that 'Willow as the Big Bad' is too darn obvious. However, Glory as the 'Big Bad' was also pretty darn obvious last season. I wasn't the only one who thought that she wouldn't last through mid-season. The writers produce a fantastic show, though it often pales in comparison to the speculation that goes on with the fans. Sometimes, the obvious is what happens. Yes, Angel turning into Angelus was a shock. But was anyone really surprised when Faith or Dr. Walsh went bad? The same could hold true with Willow. There is one other thing that bothers me. If Willow is completely safe, then why is she now in the credits as 'Alyson Hannigan as Willow'.