Discussion of 7.04 "Help" - Aired 10/15/02 (UPN-US)

[TriBel]

fate still remains more powerful than her, than everyone. Fate is the one that rules in the end, taking out Cassie even though Buffy and the others strived to save her till the very end.

I don't think it's as abstract as fate. What kills Cassie is a genetic flaw - her physical make-up. Could it have been avoided? Possibly - had someone made the connection between mind and body. Re-establishing these connections is, IMO, S7's priority. Had Cassie's parents not - with the best of intentions - kept her history from her perhaps she would have made the connections for herself? If so, would she have sought help in time? Is the text making a parallel between Cassie and Buffy? Did Giles (or more likely the council) keep the demon origins of the Slayer from her in order to have her on the side of "light"? In fact, isn't it true that Buffy really "belongs in the shadows" as Spike insisted she did? In fact - and this has just occurred to me - perhaps Buffy was "born wrong" the first time she was born but the nurture she received from Joyce (and Hank) made her more "human" then she was. Joyce wasn't there in her third "re-birth" to ease her through it. This would tie in nicely with the questions raised in Tabula Rasa.

Thanks for this - it's given me a new perspective on the episode.

 

[spikenbuffy]

Buffy in this episode : I failed her (about Cassie)
I think it has a tie with how Buffy will be in this season with dealing the deaths of the potentials.
The final scene with Buffy accepting Cassie's death and saying that sometimes you can't do something to help looks like and reminds me the scene with Buffy & Woods in Get It Done. The potentials that will die, Buffy will say that she failed them, that some will die and that she can do nothing about it.