Who Am I?

Who Am I?
Written by and directed by Joss Whedon

Original Airdate: February 29, 2000

Plot: Part 2 of 2 Faith and Buffy have switched bodies, leaving Faith trying to assimilate herself into Buffy's life while Buffy is captured by the Watcher's Council...

Review

Warning: If reading SPOILERS for the latest episode of Buffy, "Who Am I?" will give you a bit of an identity crisis, then I strongly suggest you turn back now. There are major SPOILERS just ahead.....

In short: A satisfying conclusion.

Body-switching stories are nothing new in a science-fiction-like show, like Buffy. The original "Star Trek"'s final episode featured a plot where the bad-guy swapped bodies with Captain Kirk, and the plot has been done to death in endless comedies such as "Freaky Friday," "Eighteen Again," or "Vice Versa." So, I guess it was only a matter of time before Buffy gave us its own twist on this plotline.

Such plotlines are usually dependent on the actors/actresses involved being able to step outside of their usual roles and give a new twist to their characters. It's an ability that takes a bit of talent to pull off and just the right amount of screen prescense.

Thankfully, Buffy is extremely lucky in that area.

"Who Am I?" more than ablely showed off not only the talents of Sarah Michelle Gellar, but also of Eliza Dushku. Both actresses were able to pull off not only the disorienting nature of having their bodies switch but were able to give us enough textual clues so that you knew that Buffy was in Faith's body and vice versa. Indeed, I think of such small things as the way Sarah Michelle Gellar sat and carried herself that was so like Faith and how Eliza Dushku brought the vulnerability to Buffy and also got down the patented pushing the hair out of the face move. Those both really, really worked. And it's nice to see the actresses not only hit the high marks but also find the subtle ones to really make a performance believable.

But having stong performances by Sarah Michelle Gellar and Eliza Dushku would have gone for naught if there hadn't been a strong plotline to support them. And once again, Joss delivered a plotline that really took advantage of the situation and let us learn some new and interesting things about these characters.

The last three episodes have really slowed down the full-speed-ahead pace of the Initiative plotline and really allowed us to have some in-depth, character glimpses. And it's been a really nice change of pace. Certainly, the character work we saw Faith given here was nicely done and stemmed from a lot we learned last year. I like the fact that even though Faith is considered a villain on the show and has fallen from grace, she is still painted in shades of gray.

We picked up some interesting ingsights into her character in this episode. The subtext of the scenes with Riley during the intimate moements was nicely realized. Riley's being able to get under Faith's skin as it were by admitting he loves Buffy was nicely done, as was Faith's reaction. To hear her say that it could only be about something physical or about satisfying certain needs but not others was interesting. I wonder if there's more to it than that--if perhaps Faith had an Angel in her past that she lost and doesn't want to allow anyone to be close to her in that way. It certainly fits the profile of her we've seen--which is to be self-destructive in all her relationships. Build them up to a point and then tear them down if they want to become any deeper or might violate some issues she doesn't want to bring up. Certainly, there's some interesting fodder for future exploration here.

Also, the fact that despite all she's done, Faith is still inherintly wanting to do the right thing. Yes, she sought the mayor out last year for the approval she never got as Slayer from Giles or the Scooby gang, but when push came to shove Faith did what was right. She may not have done it for glory or approval, but she did it to help innocent people. She went back to Sunnydale to stop the vampires in the church when she could have just as easily taken the next plane and been long gone, leaving Buffy to her fate at the hands of the Council.

It still makes me thing that Faith is not beyond redemption. But there is going to have to be a whole lot of redemption coming her way in order to save her.

I've also got to admit that the other plotline that impacted this one really worked well. I enjoyed seeing Adam' interactions with the vampires. He certainly seems to have set himself up as a David Koresh-type figure for the vampires and demons on Sunnydale. A new messiah showing them the new way. It will certainly be interesting to see if and how this develops. I wonder what Sunnydale will be like if the vamps and demons have an organizing figure behind them--one with a military mind that been bred for this purpose as Adam has. It certainly makes the Scooby gang's job of stopping him that much harder.

And it certainly brings up some issues of just what Walsh's goal was in creating Adam.

Finally, I enjoyed the amount of screen time and how that time was utilized we got behind Willow and Tara. Certainly Tara has been one of the more interesting creations from the mind of Joss and company this year and it was certainly nice to see her get some development here. To have Tara be the one who figures out that Buffy isn't Buffy worked pretty well. And it was nice to see she and Willow figure out how to contact Buffy and attempt to put things right. And certainly, there was an incredilby erotic subtext to the scenes when the spell was being performed.

It's also nice to see Willow come out of the closet, as it were, about her new friend to the gang. You've got to wonder how long it will before the Scooby gang finds the same subtexts to the relationship that Faith did.

Overall, there was so much right here on a character level. But on other levels, things didn't click.

For one thing, I really hoped that when we saw Anya, we might see some reaction to her learning of Faiths' return. Instead, we got "I'm the hopelessly horny demon who says this at odd times" that we've got ever since "Fear Itself." Anya has so much more to offer and she could have offered some interesting insight to the plotline here. Instead ,she was once again wasted. I can only hope that with Emma Caulfield going full-time as a cast member that Anya will get some much needed depth and soon!

Next up was Riley. He worked in the intimate scenes with Buffy/Faith, but his whole reason for being at the church fell a bit short. Why haven't we seen any of Riley's faith before now? I think that a hint of dialogue early on might have made this development a bit easier to stomach. As it was, it stuck out like a sore thumb.

Finally, the ending seemed rushed. And by the ending, I mean the way in which the bodies were returned. It seemed as if Joss had painted himself into a corner in that Buffy and Faith had to switch back and, thus, we got the ending we did. It felt rushed for some reason. But yet, I wouldn't want to trade any of the character moments or development for more time for a battle. I wish the ending had just seemed to flow out of the events of the epiosde a bit better is all.

All in all, there was a lot to like, but some things to not like here. This is the first major, during the season, Joss written and directed show that hasn't hit a home run for me. And that's a shame as it was a heck of a batting average.

So, that about wraps it up for now, except a few small things...

--Continuity alert! Two of them in one ep! Reference to Giles being a demon was nice, but the best part was Willow's talk of hyena possession, heralding back to season one's underated, "The Pack." Nicely, nicely done.

--Spike was again wasted. Having James Marster in there simply to have Spike in an episode is a waste. Give him something to do!

--Boy, the Watcher's Council didn't get a good showing here. They seemed a bit hamfisted and idiotic at times. And these are the people who fired Wesley....I shudder to think of it.

--The Watcher's Council surely must have more to say than "Oh Buffy and Giles quit." There needs to be some consequences to these actions...

--I loved the disolve between Buffy's face and Faith's face in the final minutes. That was a thing of beauty.

Well, that's it for now. All in all, "Who Am I?" was a nice wrap-up to a solid month of new episodes. But it did have some flaws that kept it away from the usual Joss offerings...

My rating: 8.0 (out of 10.0)

Next up: A repeat of "Wild at Heart."