How Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Most Hated Season Became Its Most Important 

Danny Strong, Adam Busch and Tom Lenk in season 6 of

From 20th Century Fox Film Corp./Everett Collection.

When it first aired back in 2001, Season 6 of

earned a pair of colorful nicknames from its famously devoted fans. The evocative “Season Sex” referred to the frequent, toxic, and often violent sexual clashes between the titular vampire slayer (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and her enemy turned lover Spike (James Marsters). Meanwhile, some called it “Season Sucks”—which, alas, was not a vampire pun. This was a dark, unpopular chapter in the show’s seven-year run. But with its 20th anniversary upon us and everyone in a nostalgic mood for the demon-infested Sunnydale, it’s impossible to ignore that two decades on, the show’s sixth season—once its most hated—has become its most important.

When I was trying to figure out how to celebrate the anniversary of the most personally important show in my life, I thought I should go big or go home. But as I approached my self-imposed assignment of ranking every single Buffy villain ever, I made a surprising discovery. The No. 1 slot didn’t really belong to either of Buffy’s boyfriends—Angelus or Spike—or even to my personal first-watch favorite, the Mayor. Looking back down the decades, it’s the unlikely trio of angry frustrated nerds—Jonathan, Andrew, and Warren—who still loom the largest.

There’s been a recent, fashionable reevaluation of Joss Whedon as “feminist” storyteller. Other audiences—thirsty for more female-centric stories told

women—have decided to re-cast him as a well-meaning but “problematic” father of fighters like Buffy Summers, River Tam, and Echo. (See, for example, the drubbing he got for the Black Widow story line in

, which inspired Whedon to take a long break from Twitter.) But even those who insist on not giving Whedon full marks for feminism can’t deny him credit for being well ahead of his time when it came to the frustrated, angry young men of the social-media age. And it’s that examination of both the Trio and their impact on the women warriors of

that make Season 6 shine, even its darkest moments.

’s rockiest season. The slayer had died dramatically at the end of Season 5, and—long before resurrections were all the rage in genre TV—some viewers thought maybe she should have stayed in the ground. Thanks to contract disputes, the show—cozily ensconced on the teen-friendly WB for its first five years—moved over to the less coherently branded UPN. For sticky legal reasons,

could no longer play in the same pool as its spin-off series,

, either—and the lack of cross-over potential watered down the vampire saga. The slayer

, and came back to life . . . and David Boreanaz’s Angel—allegedly her soul mate—had to largely deal with it

But the biggest handicap working against Buffy was that Whedon’s guiding voice had been spread thin over a number of projects. At that point, he was running both

and, in December 2001, he had just sold and started work on another show: the embattled-yet-beloved

Whedon (that show is wall-to-wall memorable quips), while

made due with the grim leftovers. The rest of *Buffy’*s talented writing and producing staff stepped up to the plate, but as those writers themselves have admitted, it was always Whedon who had in the past come in to punch up every script and give

Whedon’s right-hand woman, Marti Noxon, became the show’s executive producer for Season 6, and in retrospect her influence is clear. At the time, though, Whedon adamantly insisted to disgruntled fans that he was still in control of the narrative, and that he hadn’t abandoned

Say not that I’m not into it, Marti’s not getting it done, anything of that sort. . . . Fact is, I’m in this show up to my neck always. Same With

too . . . Marti (She of the great brain and great beauty) and I shaped this year very carefully, and while we made mistakes (as we do every year), we made our show. We explored what we wanted to, said what we meant. You don’t have to like it, but don't think it comes from neglect.

Season 6 themes of female anger, sexual aggression, self-destruction, and frustrated masculinity have cropped up again and again in Noxon’s recent work: the deliciously dark first season of

They are largely absent from Whedon’s Noxon-less projects.

Whomever we have to thank—both of them, I’d expect—for Season 6’s Trio, that once-mocked story line has become one of the clearest mirrors of our current clash of the sexes.

’s earliest seasons translated the issues that bedevil every teenager into literal gods and monsters haunting our heroine. It was an enormously relatable show, and, being the same age as Buffy when the show premiered, I perhaps over-identified with her outsider status and issues with authority. That supernatural fight as metaphor for ordinary struggle is, of course, the show’s cleverest conceit.

But as an adult looking back, it’s astonishing to see the prescience of Andrew, Warren, and Jonathan—the show’s first human Big Bads. Their original gripe with Buffy is essentially a scarier version of the old “we would have gotten away with it if it hadn’t been for you meddling kids” revenge tale. Having had their various evil schemes (or their brother’s scheme) thwarted by the slayer, these frustrated young men want to make her pay. (This is particularly tragic in the case of Jonathan, who was a sometime-ally of

kind of angry young man in the show’s controversial school shooter episode.) What ensues (and eventually dovetails into the weaker Dark-Willow-hooked-on-magic conclusion) is a frightening look into the entitled, misogynist rhetoric that rose to the surface during the Gamergate culture wars of 2014, and has seemingly infiltrated everything since—the 2016 presidential election included.

Like Gamergate itself, this campaign to take down Buffy started with a jilted man. Taunting Warren with visions of Katrina—the girl he killed after she accuses him of rape—Willow gets right to the heart of the matter near the end of the season:

] Because you deserved it, bitch! [finally turns to look, but Katrina is gone] Willow: Because you liked it.

Willow: You never felt you had the power with her, not until you killed her.

] Women. You know, you're just like the rest of them. Mind games.

Willow: You get off on it. That's why you had a mad-on for the Slayer. She was your big O, wasn't she, Warren?

] Are you done yet? Or can we talk some more about our feelings?

Buffy—grappling with her own depression after getting ripped out of heaven—is operating not at her best. Her strongest guiding light, Giles (Anthony Head), has abandoned her for vague reasons. In Season 6, Buffy, as ever, is also grappling with everyday concerns. There are episodes dedicated to both a haircut and a terrible minimum-wage job. But in the end, the darkness Buffy is dealing with (tormented as she is by constant harassment from the Trio) spreads to the other women on the series, who start to internalize the abuse. Warren’s most violent act results in the tragic death of one half of the show’s lesbian couple—it’s the Whedon death that

It may lack some of the trademark zip of the show in its prime, and critics of the Dark Willow story line in particular are not wrong in their concerns. But with the luxury of historical context, Season 6 of

carries more powerful resonance than any other moment in the show's history. (And, don’t forget, it has the musical episode!) There are so many ways that the revolutionary edges of Buffy’s earlier seasons have been dulled by the passage of time. The proliferation of other on-screen “kick-ass” female characters like Wonder Woman and Furiosa may make Buffy’s revolutionary fight seem par for the course. In other words, Buffy has largely won the fight for representation in genre fare. But when it comes to abusive, frustrated young men—that’s a battle women are still waging every day.

Joanna RobinsonJoanna Robinson is a Hollywood writer covering TV and film for VanityFair.com.

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