4x05 – SUPERSYMMETRY

“Supersymmetry” is another thematically strong episode with significant plot issues. These are counter-balanced by some compelling development for a couple of characters and a few really stunning dramatic moments, but those too are marred by serious flaws. The episode deals with what connects people in relationships. Somewhat ironically, it works on the assumption that Fred and Gunn already have a well founded relationship when in fact the writers have failed to develop their connection as a couple. What could’ve been a season or even series highlight is instead only slightly memorable due to considerable pacing problems, and a flaw in the episode’s premise.

In dealing with compatibility in relationships and moral justification dually, the episode focuses on Fred. She finds her relationship with Gunn tested when she vows revenge against her old professor, whom she discovers was the one who sent her to Pylea. We learn early in the episode that Fred has been secretly delving back into physics, and that a paper of hers has been published; a paper she’s been invited to present on at a conference (as a side note, it bugs me that her return to this work wasn’t mentioned in any previous episodes, since it was once a huge part of her life).

Being at the center of so much attention creates a fair deal of anxiety for the shy, submissive and reclusive Fred. The episode attributes these traits largely to her time in Pylea, where as a slave she was forced into submission and needed to live unseen in order to survive. When a portal just about swallows her whole, even more old ghosts come forward to haunt her. So what is the flaw here in this episode’s premise? That after being resolved in 3x05: Fredless, Fred’s Pylea issues return out of nowhere after an entire season of going without mention.

It’s not that I don’t think these issues need more attention, because I indicated in my S3 reviews that Fred got sane a little too quickly given what she experienced, it’s that it shows inconsistency to bring the issues up so bluntly here without previous buildup. Didn’t the series previously decide to resolve these issues (even if it did so poorly)? By returning to them at such a random juncture, “Supersymmetry” appears awkward in its attempt to right the wrong of breezing past Fred’s trauma in S3.

I do admit the episode succeeds at trying something interesting with her character. S4 is full of sticky moral dilemmas and this one is no exception to S4’s rule. The writers create a parallel between Fred and Wesley by looking at their relationships. Both Gunn and Lilah show affection for their respective partners, but are ultimately limited by their inability or refusal to be compatible with them about certain things fundamental to who they are. This spurns both Fred and Wesley to turn to each other for what they seek. Fred seeks an affirmation of her moral position on killing Seidel, and Wesley seeks someone who understands him emotionally.

At the outset of the story, Gunn is thrilled for Fred and her successes, but even so finds himself unable to revel in Fred’s joy because he doesn’t understand the first thing about physics. Meanwhile, Lilah is worried enough about damaging her relationship with Wes that she buys him a gift, demonstrating affection, but at the same time a complete lack of understanding about the basis of Wes’ problem with her. Lilah believes that sparing Lorne’s life (Slouching Towards Bethlehem) was decent enough, but Wes’ problem is the fact that if Lorne had not had a history with Wesley, Lilah would’ve had no moral problem killing him. Her mercy was little more than a selfish act performed with the intent of keeping Wesley with her.

Both relationships suffer from considerable gaps created by each partner’s different moral outlooks on life. Lilah was conditioned by a vicious and murderous corporate environment. Fending exclusively for oneself is the natural and necessary way of living to her. Wesley on the other hand was raised by Watchers, who aim to distinguish truth from illusion in the deceptive world of magic, and fight all the evil they see in the world. An honest and altruistic path is fundamental to his way of life (part of the reason why his deception of Angel in S3 left him so guilt-wracked).

In the Fred/Gunn relationship we see how Gunn was conditioned by a life on the streets. His time at Angel Investigations made him more forward-thinking and understanding, especially after Angel disappeared and he was required to keep the group together. Fred was conditioned by the hell of Pylea. That these two have experiences from different worlds is both literally and metaphorically true. When Fred discovers that her former Professor, Seidel, was the one who sent her to Pylea to squelch the competition she represented, she gives us a sense of just how traumatic Pylea was. She doesn’t grieve, break down, throw fits or try to reason it out. Rather she almost instantly arrives at a cold and visceral conclusion: “He’s gonna die.”

The shock of this statement is probably the episode’s single strongest merit. Every major character on AtS has dealt with inner demons, but rarely have they been confronted with so little ambivalence. Fred even admits she knows that such cold-blooded murder is wrong, but she doesn’t care. Seidel has to die. After she’s come to this conclusion, the gap between her and Gunn becomes apparent almost instantly. She won’t accept his attempts to persuade her not to kill Seidel because of the unique burden of her experiences; he couldn’t know what it was like for her in Pylea. How could he possibly say what Seidel deserves? This moral ambiguity gives the episode a gleaming edge of allure at times.

Like Wesley, Fred feels misunderstood by her partner. She believes others see her as shy, submissive and reclusive and that showing mercy towards Seidel would be the weak, shy, and Fred-like thing to do. She violently reacts to those traits because she associates them with her time in Pylea. She hates those things about herself, she hates being seen this way, and all of that goes back to Seidel. The question is: does he deserve to die? If he does, is it his victim’s moral right to kill him? In Western society, we conceive of justice as a legal, contractual process which can only be properly served by impartial professionals lacking emotional investment in particular cases. But in a world where the legal system can’t regulate the use of magic, and the Wolfram and Hart types run the show anyway, individuals are left to make their own justice.

But Fred’s experience in Pylea was so traumatic that her compass veers one way and stays locked there. However, I want to point out my main problem once again: we’re being asked to believe Fred’s experience in Pylea still holds this much influence over her when we haven’t seen any clear effects in a long time. Nonetheless, she believes Seidel deserves to die, and when Angel and Gunn, who have personal experience with inner demons, try to persuade her otherwise, she perceives their hesitation as weakness. She then turns to Wesley, whose characterization in this episode is another dark and fascinating strong point.

He shows no hesitation towards helping Fred plan Seidel’s murder. Knowing that Seidel’s a serial killer and that he tried to kill Fred is more than enough for him to be persuaded. Unlike Angel and Gunn he doesn’t seem to see anything morally wrong with personal vengeance, though he warns Fred that she’ll have to deal with the consequences once she’s got her revenge. This complex attitude towards killing Seidel reveals another aspect of how Wes has changed. Having lost his delusions of heroism and having spent time in pain and self-loathing, the idea of personal vengeance now has appeal to him.

For him it’s especially personal since Fred was nearly killed. But notice that he doesn’t go into the building to help Fred kill Seidel, he only enables her to do it. I don’t think this is him trying to avoid guilt as much as trying to make his actions all about helping Fred. He wants to endear himself to her while also chipping at her opinion of Gunn, going so far as to point out that Gunn isn’t present on the drive to Seidel’s. At Wes’ apartment he and Fred relate through vengeance and physics (and since when did Wes know physics?). Nonetheless, they too have a considerable gap between them, since Fred does think what she’s doing is wrong and admits she loves that Gunn is upright enough not to help her. Of course, Gunn proves her wrong.

The episode’s stunning climax features Gunn killing Seidel to keep Fred from becoming a killer, but by demonstrating that he can coldly murder a human being, he sacrifices something that Fred saw as the basis of her love for him. He didn’t just throw Seidel into the portal, but brutally snapped his neck to be sure that his act was the cause of death. The thematic point of this unnerving conclusion seems to be that Fred and Gunn are incompatible. They might’ve been able to have a relationship in spite of lacking common interests, but they can’t have one when they differ this vastly on a moral dilemma that concerns a human life. When we see them in 4x06: Spin The Bottle , things are tense between them because of Gunn’s actions.

But again, I have to point out that the writers have never explained Fred and Gunn’s relationships in terms of anything deeper than attraction and mutually enjoyable company; it certainly wasn’t explained that they loved each other because of moral admiration. I was content with the lightness of their relationship during 3x14: Couplet and 3x18: Double or Nothing, but only because I naturally expected it to develop further. The tail end of S3 largely ignored these Fred and Gunn, so those episodes were all we ever got. They’re just not sufficient to explain why these two supposedly have such a deep love for each other.

In addition to this major problem, the entire first half of the episode was dedicated to setting up Fred’s past with Seidel and putting her on the warpath towards him. Due to this pokey pace, the first half of the episode was far too slow, while the second half crammed too much compelling material into too small a time frame. The first half lacked a real sense of tension, though I enjoyed the Wes/Lilah scenes, and the writers’ attempt to mislead us into thinking that Lilah may have tried to kill Fred didn’t really work. Finally, the dull sub-plot with Cordelia and Connor only slowed the episode down once the best material with Fred and Wesley got going.

Connor is trying to push his father out of Cordelia’s life while simultaneously attempting to make himself an important figure in it. So far Cordy has been the only person understanding enough to see past the scars of Quor’toth, and she also happens to be a very attractive woman. We get an uncomfortable reminder of just how much a teenager Connor is when he kisses her. For Cordelia, who is trying to re-connect to her old identity through pictures and clothes, this is all very confusing, and she runs back to Angel. None of this material really grabbed me.

Wiping Cordelia’s mind blank was basically a huge plot contrivance (see my review of Slouching Towards Bethlehem) designed to get some major stories rolling later in the season, but doing so cost the show a major character. Watching her try to figure out who she is when we already know isn’t compelling in the least. She seems like the same late-S3 Cordy: determined, self-directed and a little bit vain, but with an extra layer of confusion added by the magical Amnesia now. I’m also growing uninterested in Connor now that his hormones and dislike of Angel are being made out to be the essential traits of his character, where his teenaged turmoil was but one component of a more complex person in late S3.

Unfortunately, Connor stays this stale and two-dimensional for the rest of S4 with only a few exceptions (Inside Out and Home instantly come to mind).

So while the idea of facing inner demons is not new to AtS, presenting that conflict to a character who usually sits on the sidelines of the show’s darkest dilemmas made for some great moments in an overall uneven episode. It has some big ideas, and took a bold step with Fred to make its points about relationships and morality. Perhaps the best part of this story is what it leads to later: turning this screw in the Fred/Gunn relationship makes for some powerful tension in the coming episodes, especially as Gunn begins to contemplate his place in Angel Investigations, making him a more interesting character.

• Gunn’s decision to murder Seidel has long-lasting implications for the Fred-Gunn-Wesley triangle. In Spin The Bottle Gunn discovers that Wesley helped Fred, creating conflict between all three of them. As Angel Investigations battles The Beast and contends with Angelus, Gunn and Wesley’s shared affection for Fred compounds their problems.