Gingerbread

"Gingerbread" is episode 11 of season 3 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Summary
While on the nightly patrol, Buffy not only encounters a vampire, but her mother looking for some quality time and a chance to "share" in the slaying experience. As Buffy kills the vampire, Joyce discovers the bodies of two children, dead in the park. The police arrive and after some questioning Buffy and Joyce are free to leave. Joyce is really disturbed by this.

At school the next day, Buffy confronts Giles about the situation, explaining that the situation is not one that should go unpunished. She draws him a symbol which was found on the hands of the two children. He says it's probably occult related and Buffy is dismissive, not quite believing that a human being could do this. Willow and Amy sit with Xander and Oz--who exchange a few awkward words--at lunch. Buffy joins them and fills them in on the murders. Joyce shows up at school and informs Buffy that she has spread the word about the murders to all her friends and that there will be a vigil at City Hall that night.

Many concerned parents attend the vigil, including Willow's mother, and the Mayor who says a few words before handing the mic over to Mrs. Summers. She gives a speech about how Sunnydale has got to take back their city from the monsters, and witches, and Slayers. Later, Michael, Amy and Willow--three witches--are shown performing a spell in a circle that surrounds the symbol Buffy found on the children's hands. Michael is shoved up against his locker the next day by another student who threatens both him and Amy. Buffy then makes a brief appearance next to Amy, and the big tough guys go running off. Cordelia, having witnessed the whole incident, remarks to Buffy about involving oneself with losers. Buffy goes to Willow, who has a book Giles needs for researching the symbol.

However, when she finds the book, Buffy also finds the witch symbol in one of Willow's notebooks. Before Willow can explain, a search of all the school lockers begins in order to find any material that may be witch-related. Willow then tells Buffy that the symbol is harmless and that she was not doing anything wrong, just making a protection spell for Buffy's upcoming birthday. Amy and Willow are taken to Principal Snyder's office for questioning. Also, all of Giles' books are confiscated by the police which leaves the Slayer and Watcher without their resources.

Buffy goes home where she finds out her mom, the new founder of a group MOO--Mothers Opposed to the Occult--does not want Buffy to see Willow anymore and is the one responsible for the locker searches. The two argue and then Buffy leaves for a pointless patrol, insulted by her mother who claims her Slaying is not doing Sunnydale any good. The ghosts of the two children appear to Joyce and tell her she has to hurt the "bad girls." Willow goes home where her mother calmly tells her she's grounded. Willow flips out, unable to control her anger towards the fact that her mother does not believe that she's a witch.

Buffy meets up with Angel at the park and they talk. He convinces her to keep fighting and to not give up. He also unintentionally gives her the idea that they do not know anything about the two kids. Buffy heads back to the library to find Giles yelling at a computer while Xander and Oz were unable to retrieve any books from City Hall. After hooking up with Willow over the net, the Scooby Gang find out that the two children died hundreds of years ago. A demon returns disguised as them every fifty years to persuade a town to kill what they call "bad girls" (witches). They are an example that fairy tales are true: Hansel and Gretel.

Then Amy, Willow and Buffy are taken by force to City Hall where they are tied to wooden posts like a medieval witch-burning. Just when Buffy wakes up, her mother lights books on fire, sentencing the three girls to death by burning at the stake. Amy, however manages to cast her famous "rat" spell and scurries away, avoiding death. Cordelia finds Giles unconscious at the Summer's home, wakes him and they go in search of saving everyone. Xander and Oz find Willow's room in shambles.

Giles practices an incantation while Cordelia prepares a concoction to allow the demon to show its real self. Oz and Xander climb through the air vents in the hope of saving their friends. Giles and Cordelia break into the room which is now partially on fire with parents watching, and Cordelia uses a fire hose to put the fire out. As the demon--now in its true, ugly form--goes for Buffy, she breaks the stake she was tied to and stakes the creature. Everyone is safe, and the demon is dead.

The next day, none of the parents remember much of anything regarding the recent events. Buffy and Willow are performing a spell in Willow's room to restore Amy, but it does not work and Buffy says, "Maybe we should get her one of those wheel thingys."

Starring

 * Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers
 * Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris
 * Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg
 * Charisma Carpenter as Cordelia Chase
 * David Boreanaz as Angel
 * Seth Green as Oz
 * Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles

Guest Starring

 * Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers
 * Elizabeth Anne Allen as Amy Madison
 * Harry Groener as Mayor Richard Wilkins
 * Jordan Baker as Sheila Rosenberg
 * Armin Shimerman as Principal Snyder

Co Starring

 * Lindsay Taylor as Little Girl
 * Shawn Pyfrom as Little Boy
 * Blake Swendson as Michael Czajak
 * Grant Garrison as Roy Dukeshire
 * Roger Morrissey as Gingerbread Demon

Trivia

 * The opening credits on this episode finished a half-second earlier than usual, slightly trimming the end of the theme's final note. Presumably this was done for reasons of time.


 * This episode carries with it a moral warning against the dangers of mob mentality, as well as the prejudice held in some small communities (despite Sunnydale's ever-expanding borders) towards alternative lifestyles and belief systems. In the same vein, it explores the easy excitability of people living in Sunnydale (and by extension, over the Hellmouth), especially when 'civilians', such as Joyce Summers, are exposed firsthand to the aftermath of supernatural violence or danger.


 * Amy and Willow has something in common in this exchange cut due to length:

Amy: "Oh, God, and Mr. Nyman that thing he does with his face..."

Willow: "The thing with the face! When he makes a point, the - I always think he's going to sneeze!"

Amy: "I thought I was the only one who saw it."

Quotes
Joyce - "This is not a good town. How many of us have lost someone who just...disappeared or got skinned or suffered 'neck rupture'?! And how many of us have been afraid to speak out? I was supposed to lead us in a moment of silence. But silence is this town's disease.  For too long it's been plagued by unnatural evils. It's not our town anymore. It belongs to the monsters, to the witches and Slayers."

Continuity

 * Buffy asks Angel, "Is Sunnydale any better than when I first came here?" No one remembers the events of "The Wish" a couple weeks previously, where the Master rose unchallenged and Sunnydale became a town under siege, because of the nature of the eponymous wish. The place may not be better than when the Slayer first got there, but it is certainly far, far better than it might have been. This, along with Joyce's belittling of Buffy's responsibilities, strengthens the season's theme of whether or not the characters are making the changes they want to.


 * Joyce and Giles are awkward around each other, this apparently being their first contact since they slept together during "Band Candy".


 * Amy is turned into a rat and remains a rat for 3 years.


 * Magic will get Willow into trouble again in "Doppelgangland" and then rather often in the years to come.


 * Cordelia tells Giles that one day he might "wake up in a coma" which she actually does in "You're Welcome".


 * Cordelia asks Giles rhetorically, "How many times have you been knocked out, anyway?!" This is a reference to Giles being rendered unconcious as a plot device on a regular basis, its regularity becoming an in-joke with many fans. Although the device is given a send-up here, it is far from the last time Giles will be knocked out.


 * A Slayer being burned at a stake under accusation of witchcraft previously occurred in "Buffyverse" continuity, the Righteous Slayer as appearing in the canonical Tales of the Slayers, published 2002.