Discussion of 8.15 "Wolves at the Gate Part 4" - Released 04/06/08 (Dark Horse)

"Having traveled from her base in Scotland, Buffy ventures to the heart of Japan in order to reclaim her stolen scythe, in Drew Goddard's conclusion to Wolves at the Gate. Along the way, Buffy and the legion of Slayers join forces with the irresistible Dracula to defeat a tight-nit group of nefarious vampires, in which the Slayers suffer a massive hit."

Dark Horse Comics > Profile > Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8: #15 Wolves at the Gate (Variant Cover)

It was really great, actually, though I didn't love everything :
- I expected more from the big Willow/Japanesevampwitch fight. It was over pretty soon, though Buffy diving in the air was just so cool.
- I thought it was a bit easy how they removed the special powers of the vamps... Oh, well. I think it was cool from Drac to let Willow perform the spell even though it would affect him as well.
- I'm not a big fan of Batsu, actually. It's good that Satsu decides to stay in Japan... I can sooo relate to her, the whole loving someone who hasn't your sexual preference thing, but well, I kinda hate how Buffy's just plainly bi now. It's a little too out of character for me, imo.

BUT it was still great.
I loved the Xander scenes. The death of Renee was just heartbreaking... And when he collapses in Buffy's arms, it's just so plainly beautiful. I loved it. Even though I'm a bit irritated by Renee's death, because it's just too much after Anya. If with all that he doesn't become gay after all... =D I also liked him standing up to Drac, that was brilliant.
I LOOOOOOOOOVED the goddessy part with the Restless/BuffyVSDracula quote !!! What you are, what's to come...
I loved how Dracula finally regains confidence, it was pretty good, really.
The giant Dawnbot was a bit too extravagant and non credible (they're in the middle of a city, for God's sake!) but Andrew made me laugh (!! rare !), I liked to see Dawn fight, but it was all over a bit too easily.
The whole fight was just really empowering. And I'm glad the spell didn't work out at all, I was afraid that many Slayers would be touched...

Now, the scene that's gonna make everyone discuss is inevitably the Willow/Buffy one. It made me a bit uncomfortable. (Not the gay thing, obviously.) Just, Buffy seems to be totally thinking about other women now, it was not just the one night (obviously now there are two lol). That's totally out of character. Buffy's too much into men. I would have liked it better if they just explained it as she's tired of men after all she's been through... But even though, it's just too much now. Willow's reaction was awkward... It was kinda funny because totally BtVS-like, but still...

A really good issue.

Don't you just love it when something is so good, you even instantly forgive the silly bits.

Mecha-Dawn shows up, and I'm like "Oh c'mon now...seriously...", then I'm like "Well yeah, but to be fair, you are laughing your ass off. Turn the page let's see what happens next".

Great issue. Everything came together, and locked as a story, all the while totally rocking. So many great, little bits.

And this Batsu thing... I want to dislike the whole Buffy, lesbian, romance thing, because that was my first reaction, but I have to admit, it was sort of growing on me. And that last frame of them is hot.

Time to launch a Bring Back Drac campaign.

I have to admit that my first reation on finishing the comic was along the lines of "well, thank god that's over". it was easily my least enjoyed arc of the comic to date. Mainly because i was never was jiggy with the whole Dracula thing, Mech Dawn was, forgive me, utterly ridiculous - though I will conceed that Andrew's lines were funny. Though, for me that's not enough to make up for a giant Dawnziller.

I did like Willow and Buffy's conversation regarding their 'lists' - that was classic Buffy

I have to admit that my favourite bit of the whole arc was from the letter page where Allie replies to a readers query "We plan to bring in some of the characters that started in Buffy, then went to Angel, but it'll be down the way a bit." Surely that means we'll get one (or both) of our vampires.

Bring on July 3 and the next story!

Okay, this issue totally nuked the fridge in my opinion. We have all this silliness, Dracula pulling out a magical sword and a mecha-dawn, ugh. And then in the end, after Satsu says that she is in love with Buffy and therefore has to stay away from her, they sleep together. WTF? WTF? How irresponsible can Buffy be? How stupid can Satsu be? If I didn't know that a Fray-centered arc was coming I might be done with season 8.

Although the issue had a very high entertainment value, I wouldn't really call it very good. The first Renee page is very good, but by the end of the issue, I'd kind of entirely forgotten about her. And Satsu staying behind in Japan is really a pity. The only two new characters of any importance this season are gone already. The mecha-Dawn thing was funny, but it's too over-the-top in my opinion.

I did like the character moments of Buffy, Satsu, Xander, Renee, Dracula, and Willow though; they were really good.

I'm on board with the Batsu hating. I don't dislike Satsu, I just don't like the idea of them together. I don't like the idea of Buffy with a woman. I mean, this is Buffy, not The L Word. What is going on here?

For the first half of the issue, I kept thinking, GO GET RENEE! SHE MIGHT NOT BE DEAD YET! It feels like they let her go way too easily. It would have taken Willow a half second to heal her, really, but then they got all sidetracked with the falling and the lesbian conversation and the fixing the vampires.

Anyone else ready for Dawn to be human-sized again?

Overall, I enjoyed this arc (not as much as NFFY, though), but the ending seemed very let-downy to me. Talk about a roller-coaster of emotions throughout the arc, though. I don't think Joss has pissed me off this badly since he killed Wash, and yet there were a lot of funny and happy and sad and overall enjoyable moments in there, too.

Without having read the issue yet, I gather from here that Renee is really, finally (at least for the moment) dead, and Satsu is going to stay in Japan to run the Slayer operations there. Is this going to be the way the series goes from now on? Introduce a couple of characters, develop their personalities, then either kill them off or write them out of the script altogether? I know Joss likes to kill off his principal characters, Jesse was just the tip of his hit list, but this is getting rediculous!

I liked this issue (as always) but I think the most interesting bit for me was the bit with Willow and the snake-woman. I wonder what's going on there?

Oh yeah. What's up with the snake woman, if anything...

This one was over-the-top, no doubt.

I personally loved the surprise of Mecha-Dawn and the inane Buffybottish banter of Mecha-Dawn. The tail of Mecha-Dawn, lol. Inexplicable and pointless, but I like a good Godzilla tribute. "Roar?" is still my fave Dawn quote 🙂 And Buffy dive bombing off the building was cool.

Buffy/Satsu still feels clunky, strange to me, with the way it's (sort of) resolved. Maybe if this had unfolded with actors on TV, over several eps, it could be made to feel "˜real' somehow. I don't feel like I completely know the Buffy character anymore (at this point).

I like Goddard's Buffy banter and his daring, in general. But this arc did kinda border on Simpsons-like parody at times. Even the original Xander/Drac short story...I dunno.

Must be tough to strike that balance between the absurd and the heartfelt.

Oh yeah. What's up with the snake woman, if anything...

Click to expand...

Best guess, something having to do with Kennedy.

Angel commented that Willow had left South America and went to the Himalayas.

Isn't the snake woman Saga Visuki, the teacher of both Willow and Kumiko?

I hope I didn't get that wrong, because I'm stating it as fact elsewhere. Straighten me out if I'm incorrect, will you?

Isn't the snake woman Saga Visuki, the teacher of both Willow and Kumiko?
I hope I didn't get that wrong, because I'm stating it as fact elsewhere. Straighten me out if I'm incorrect, will you?

Click to expand...

I think your assumption is correct and safe.

In fact, I think Saga Visuki is a corrupted term for Naga (Visuki) - a Naga is snake like god-being in eastern philosophies.
This would tie in nicely with traveling to the Himalayas that I mentioned earlier.

This was my least favourite of all the issues so far, reasons being

1. Seems like there was a big build up to a not very impressive battle.
2. The giant Dawn robot is just silly and unrealistic even for the Buffy comic.
3. I also don't like the idea of Buffy and Satsu together. I agree with goldenboy, in that it feels like you don't know the Buffy character anymore at this point.

I thought it was a good issue. Had to laugh at Mecha Dawn showing up after my intial WTF? moment.

I was a little dissapointed in the end for both the outcome of the battle and the ofcourse Batsu. But atleast its over.

I was really hoping we would get some depowered slayers since it did say this would change things drastically or something along those lines. But I guess thats something a bit to big for the beginning of a 40+ issue arc.

But now I am ready for some Fruffy to start.

I have quite enjoyed this arc.

I am really sad about Renee it seems so cruel for xander but then it shows the realities of war.

I am liking the whole Dracula / Xander relationship I like that he has a bond with someone outside the scooby group even if it is as a manservant to drac!

Would like of to of seen more of Kumiko/Willow fight as Five mentioned and just see more of Kumiko in general as she seemed pretty cool

as for Buffy & Satsu , I like Satsu reckon she could be one tough Slayer but not keen on whole lesbian thing with them as it just isnt Buffy. And I am fed up with Buffy sleeping with people willy nilly!

Also I feel it is a little unfair to the Willow story , the lesbian thing was important to her journey and feel that this could ( if continued further) taint it!

Renee's death was awful, both from her perspective and Xander's. Xander collapsing in Buffy's arms was so sad. I admit, I cried when I saw that.

Mecha-Dawn made me laugh. Yes, it was stupid, but that was what made me like it. Dawn leading the Slayers was awesome, I thought. "Ladies, we are taking that building." I also liked how she stepped up to Leah. Season 7 Dawn would never really have spoken to a Potential like that, except Rona, so she's grown emtionally as well as literally, lol.

LOVED Andrew's scene. 'Bout time that little geek got to use all that knowledge.

I hated seeing Xander looking the way he did at the end. Xander's lost way too many women he loved. Couldn't Joss just make him happy?

I'm not sure how I feel about Satsu staying in Japan. On the one hand, I hate her relationship with Buffy, it's just not in Buffy's character and I ahte that Joss chose to go down that road with her. But on the other, I like her as a character, I thought she was interesting and I would have liked to have seen her character developed more as she tried to put Buffy behind her. Hopefully she can make a return somewhere down the line.

When this arc started, I hated that they were bringing Dracula back, but now I really like him, and I wanna see him back.

I loved Andrew's scene, too! It made me laugh and then read it out loud to my hubby, who is also a total geek.

I just got this issue. It wasn't that bad, but I do agree that some of it was a little ridiculous...especially Mecha Dawn was pretty ridiculous (although her Dawn impression and Andrew's reaction were hilarious.) But am I ready for Dawn to be human-sized again? Heck no! I love Giant Dawn!

Overall, I don't like Buffy's sudden sexuality switch; it just seems out of character, since she's never demonstrated any bisexual tendencies before. But I admit, Buffy and Willow's talk after they landed in the water was really funny. And when Tohru says something along the lines of "I bet you taste especially sweet" and Satsu says something like "You have no idea...Wow, did I say that out loud?" I had to laugh.

And poor Xander. Everyone he loves winds up dying; Cordelia, Anya, and now Renee. Maybe they're setting things up to start Bander...at least I hope that's what they're doing, since I love the idea of Buffy and Xander together.

I, too, want to know what the dealio is with Willow and the snake lady. But I've got a theory about her! What if she somehow gives Willow access to Tara's spirit, or maybe she actually is a different incarnate of Tara? I know, it's probably wishful thinking, but in Anywhere But Here, they did show the two of them...uh...together. And it might also be another reason why Willow's relationship with Kennedy is strained.

But again, didn't they already tell us what's up with the snake woman? At least the preliminaries.

Didn't they tell us Saga Visuki (the snake woman) was Willow's teacher? They also told us, she was also Kumiko's teacher, she kept the relationship secret from Buffy, and Visuki is not finished with Willow yet.

Within that context how can Saga Visuki be Tara?

Is Willow's relationship with Kennedy strained? I was under the impression that was just a thing Willow was telling Buffy, because she didn't want to tell Buffy the truth. The truth being Willow didn't want Kennedy having any connection to Buffy, because she thought it would be dangerous.