Lessons

"Lessons" is the first episode of seventh season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and is the hundred and twenty-fourth episode altogether. It was written by Douglas Petrie and directed by Nick Marck. It originally broadcast on October 1, 2002.

Synopsis
Dawn finds vengeful spirits in the new Sunnydale High School. Giles helps with Willow's rehabilitation in England.

Summary
In Istanbul, a dark-haired girl is running, looking over her shoulder in fear. She's being chasedby two men in hooded cloaks. After trying various alleys looking for an escape route, she finds herself trapped in a dead-end. She sees a drain pipe next to her and decides to use it to scale the building. The people chasing her grab her foot, but she manages to escape their grip and easily climbs up to the roof. There, another hooded figure is waiting and pushes her off the building. She screams, but she lands on the ground alive, on her back. Two hooded figures hold her down, and she fights back with all her might. A third figure raises an arched, shiny, silver dagger and stabs her...

Buffy is in Sunnydale training her sister on how to fight vampires. She instructs Dawn that fighting (and slaying) are about power. They discuss the fact that Sunnydale High has just reopened. Meanwhile, Willow is studying with Giles in Westbury, England. She studies magic and meditation with a coven of wiccans that Giles knows. She is learning control, but feels frightened and distraught because she "killed people" ("Villains").

Xander is working construction at the new high school which Dawn is to attend. He shows Buffy his discovery that the Principal's office is right over the Hellmouth (where the library used to sit). Buffy follows Dawn into the school where she meets Principal Wood. She wanders into a bathroom, where she finds a mysterious talisman. Upon seeing the talisman, she sees a dead girl who threatens her. She says Buffy was unable to protect her, and that she will not be able to protect Dawn either.

Anya is still in the vengeance business, and is drinking coffee with her fellow vengeance demon Halfrek. "Hallie" tells Anya that the other demons are noticing a lack of quality in her work, and that "something big is coming".

Buffy tries to warn Dawn, but winds up only embarrassing her. Dawn then sees a similar dead student. She hurries to the bathroom where she meets Kit Holbum, who has also been seeing things. They are about to leave the bathroom when the floor caves in and they wind up in the high school basement. Willow, back in England, has had a vision. She saw "the earth's teeth" -- the Hellmouth. She tells Giles, who has taught her that everything is connected, that not everything that is connected to the earth is good.

Dawn and Kit run into another student in the basement, Carlos Trejo, who says he saw a dead janitor. They are soon confronted by the three dead people. The dead people tell them that everyone dies at Sunnydale, and they will be no different. Dawn calls Buffy on her new cell phone. Buffy descends into the basement to help Dawn, but cannot find her. Instead, she finds a deranged Spike holed up in a small room.

He has scratches around his heart which he explains as attempts to "cut it out". He is rambling incoherently, but tells Buffy that the dead students are not zombies or ghosts, but "manifest spirits" raised by a talisman. Buffy calls Xander, telling him to find and destroy the talisman. She then hears Dawn screaming, and runs to her rescue. She fights the spirits off as Xander wrestles with one to destroy the talisman. Xander breaks the talisman and the spirits disappear.

Buffy then sends Dawn, Kit, and Carlos off to class. Principal Wood is impressed that Buffy was able to convince Kit and Carlos to socialize and go to class (Saying that they are the only two students with school records as large as Buffy's had been). He offers her a job working as a counselor at the school, and she gladly accepts. She wants to be able to keep an eye on her sister, the school, the Hellmouth, and the new principal.

Spike is now huddled in a corner in his basement room. He says that he had a speech to Buffy prepared, but she would not understand. Warren Mears is seen pacing around him. He begins to give a speech about how great he is. He turns into Glory, then Adam, followed by Mayor Wilkins, Drusilla, and then The Master, each of whom continues the speech, but each in their own particular voice. The Master says, "It's not about right. It's not about wrong." He then transforms into Buffy and tells Spike, "It's about power", the same thing Buffy had said to Dawn at the beginning.

Quotes and Trivia

 * Dawn: "He might not know those fancy martial art skills they inevitably seem to pick up." Dawn comments on the supernatural strength that vampires inherit.


 * Giles: "Synchronized swimming. Complete mystery to me." Giles admits the one thing he doesn't know anything about.


 * Buffy: "Ah, you put the box near the milk. I saw it on the food channel." Buffy teaches Xander how to make cereal.


 * Buffy: "You know, you could still drop out. Only nerds finish high school." Buffy gets cold feet about leaving Dawn at Sunnydale High.


 * Xander: "Whoa. Contracty goodness." ''Xander sees big bucks when coming across the bathroom floor caved in.


 * The First Evil as Warren (re: Buffy): "She's a girl! With sugar, and spice, and everything... useless, unless you're baking." Buffy will use a similar metaphor in the series finale.


 * Kali Rocha was performing in the play Noises Off when Season Seven was shooting. She was flown in for one day and filmed all herSeason Seven scenes ("Lessons" and this episode) on that one day. She filmed her "death scene" before a green screen for later super-imposition into the scene.


 * The scenes that are marked as taking place in Westbury were actually shot at Anthony Stewart Head's house in Somerset, England. He owns the horse seen in the episode, and it is named "Otto".


 * This episode marks Dawn's first day at Sunnydale High. The First remarks to Spike, "We're going back to the beginning."  The first episode of Buffy depicted Buffy's first day at the old Sunnydale High.  (This is just one of many references to the old days of Sunnydale High.)


 * Willow's mentor in England, Ms. Harkness, is named after the Marvel Comics character, Agatha Harkness, who is also a witch.


 * This show marks the first time Buffy is seen using a cell phone.


 * This is the only episode in the entire series where you can briefly see one of Sarah's real life tattoos. In the first act when Buffy & Xander are discussing the Sunnydale High you can the Chinese symbol for hope or luck on her left hip. But not later in the episode.


 * This is the only episode where Spike and The Master (as The First) are seen together.


 * At the end of the episode, except for Buffy, all of the First's appearances are the Big Bads from previous seasons, in reverse chronological order: Warren Mears (Season 6), Glory (Season 5), Adam (Season 4), Mayor Wilkins (Season 3), Drusilla (Season 2), and The Master (season 1).


 * Willow remarks how confused she is that Giles rehabilitates her with magic, comparing him to the fictional wizard character Dumbledore, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the school Harry Potter attends, in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series of books and movies.


 * Buffy refers to the three spirits as the "Resentful Dead", a reference to The Grateful Dead.


 * Dawn assures Buffy that she knows To Serve Man is a cookbook, a reference to the classic The Twilight Zone episode.


 * In her "intervention" over Anya's lackluster vengeance, Halfrek suggests that it's best they don't talk about "Mr. Czolgosz." This is exceptionally obscure in-joke directed at Jane Espenson, who wrote a joke in Season Six about Anyanka making a male victim fall in love with President McKinley ("Superstar"). Leon Czolgosz assassinated President McKinley. The joke was a little too obscure; Espenson didn't catch it.