The Long Way Home, Part Three

Publication

May 2, 2007

Length

22 pages

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight #3

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The Long Way Home, Part Two	The Long Way Home, Part Four

The Long Way Home, Part Three is the third issue of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight comic book series. Written by Joss Whedon and illustrated by Georges Jeanty, it was originally published on May 2, 2007, by Dark Horse Comics.

Synopsis[]

With Buffy incapacitated, Amy the witch has taken the opportunity to-get this-lay siege with an army of the undead. Willow takes her on in a witches' battle royal as hundreds of Slayers defend their Scottish citadel, but without the kiss of true love, Buffy will be out of commission indefinitely-with an unwelcome familiar face, and an image you won't soon forget.^[1]

Summary[]

Buffy discovers that the figure in the duster and red shirt is Ethan Rayne. He reveals that he and Buffy are trapped within her dreamspace, the conglomeration of all of a person's possible dreams. Ethan urges Buffy to escape so she can help the battle raging outside.

Willow and Amy are locked in a magical duel, with Willow absorbing Amy's magics to decode them. Willow then casts a spell that makes the army of zombies behave as if they are at a ball. Amy retaliates with another spell, which Willow counters — her eyes and hair turning black in the process. While Amy taunts her, the gigantic Dawn crushes Amy beneath her foot.

Meanwhile, Ethan has led Buffy through her dreamspace to Amy's cage from her time as a rat. Ethan says he didn't know her name and can't see outside himself, but he connected with Amy. Buffy then a cage formed by three letter X, and Ethan begins speaking in riddles, saying that "Twilight is falling" and to remember the things she has seen in her dream.

With Amy out of the way, Willow addresses Buffy's condition. She reveals that someone in the room is in love with Buffy, even though that person may not have realized it or will not admit it. Willow then commands all the people in the room to close their eyes and the person in love with Buffy to come forward and kiss her. Buffy, feeling something on her lips, suddenly awakens, yelling: "Cinnamon buns!"

Giles contacts a demon of the same breed as those Buffy had killed, asking for information about the symbol found on the bodies. The demon insists that the demons were led into a trap and the symbol is meaningless to his kind.

Xander contacts Andrew in Italy to see if their station was attacked, and cautions him to be on alert. Xander then visits a wounded but recuperating Renee, reassuring her that she did her best in the battle.

Buffy and Willow examine Amy, now held in a binding spell. Willow thinks Amy isn't alone because her spell reeked of tech. Buffy and Willow attempt to catch up: Willow asks about Dawn's giant condition — asking Buffy if the cause was having sex with a thricewise — and Buffy asks about Kennedy. Willow reveals that Kennedy died, prompting Buffy's shock and sympathy, but Willow quickly explains that it was only a short-lived mystical death, adding she always says that wrong, and that they are currently taking a break. Xander arrives and sees them laughing and hugging.

Suddenly, Willow traces the source of Amy's power. A portal to a military installation opens up and forcibly takes Willow and Amy. Buffy is unable to go after them, and Xander screams at his microphone calling for mystics to the basement.

In a laboratory, Willow is trapped into an operating table. Amy says they had agreed to capture Buffy but figured that Willow would serve as bait. A shadowed figure boasts of being looking forward to killing Buffy, but he adds that he's most excited about revenging himself on Willow. The figure emerges wielding a surgical saw, revealing to be a skinless man: Warren.

Continuity[]

Amy taunts Willow for almost destroying the world in "Grave."
Buffy's dreamspace features past events such as her "Buffy&Angel 4Ever" signing seen in "The Prom," the Scoobies surviving the destruction of Sunnydale in "Chosen," her high school graduation in "Graduation Day, Part Two," and the death of her mother in "The Body."
Buffy recognizes the cage Amy lived in as a rat, which happened from the episode "Gingerbread" until "Smashed."
Ethan helps Buffy to identify the number 30 (or XXX), which is revealed to be the room he's been maintained captive (The Long Way Home, Part Four). Similarly, in his previous appearance ("A New Man"), he warned Giles about the number 314, which revealed to be the room of the 314 Project.
Giles confirms the dead humans Buffy found in The Long Way Home, Part One were sacrificed and the demons lured into a trap.
Buffy will discover the person who kissed her is Satsu (A Beautiful Sunset).
Willow, seeing the military base Amy had been, questions the return of the Initiative, as the organization was defeated and deactivated in "Primeval."
Warren appears skinless, as Willow flayed him in "Villains."

Appearances[]

Individuals[]

Angel (Only in visions)
Caleb (Only in visions)
Chaos (Only mentioned)
Rupert Giles
Alexander Harris
Kennedy (Only mentioned)
Ken (Only mentioned)
Leah
Faith Lehane (Only in visions)
Amy Madison
Catherine Madison (Only mentioned)
Master (Only in visions)
Warren Mears
Ethan Rayne (Only in visions)
Renee
Willow Rosenberg
Rowena
Satsu
Spike (Only in visions)
Buffy Summers
Dawn Summers
Joyce Summers (Only in visions)
Andrew Wells

Organizations and titles[]

Initiative (Only mentioned)
Scooby Gang
Slayer
Slayer Organization
Twilight Group
United States Armed Forces (Only in visions)
Watcher
Witch

Species[]

Human
Demon
- Thricewise (Only mentioned)
- Unidentified demon (The Long Way Home)
Dragon (Only mentioned)
Giant
Vampire (Only in visions)
Zombie

Locations[]

Dreamspace
Italy
- Slayer Organization Italy headquarters
Scotland
- Slayer Organization command center
Sunnydale, United States
- 1630 Revello Drive (Only in visions)
- Drextalcorp Recycling Technologies
- Sunnydale High School (Only in visions)

Objects[]

Cross
Mark of Twilight
Stake (Only in visions)
Vampyr (Only in visions)

Rituals and spells[]

Binding spell

Death count[]

Joyce Summers, died of natural causes (in visions).

Behind the scenes[]

Production[]

About his variant cover, Georges Jeanty has stated: "I really like the idea of Willow and Xander helping Buffy get back together, since that's essentially their job. I thought it would be really cool to personify that idea. But I submitted the regular crop of ideas also. I was really pulling for a cover like this; so much so, I actually included a version of it for issue #2."^[2]
Joss Whedon makes a cameo appearance in Buffy's dreamspace.
Another cameo is a Fray comic book, which one of the Slayers in the Italy squad is seen reading.
This issue marks the return of the Slay the Critics fan mail section.
In the panel Dawn stomps over Amy, the onomatopoeia originally covered most of the action, which was changed into transparent letters when first collected in a trade paperback.

Distribution[]

The Long Way Home, Part Three was the twelfth best selling comic issue in its publishing month, with 106,634 sales in May 2007 at comic specialty stores.^[3] It was also among the 300 best selling of June, September, and November 2007.^[4]
As the printings were sold out, there were two additional printings available for this issue.

Collections[]

Goofs[]

Willow has her eyes colored blue, instead of green as they most commonly appear.
Giles has his eyes colored brown, instead of green (as portrayed by Anthony Stewart Head) or blue as they commonly appear.

Pop culture references[]

Buffy associated the three Xs in her dream space with Vin Diesel, due to the XXX movie franchise he starred.
Dawn compares the zombies' dance to the novel Pride and Prejudice (1813).
Xander and Dawn say "Fe Fi Fo Fum" like the giant in the English fairy tale Jack and the Beanstalk.
Xander calls Willow Elphaba, the protagonist of the novel and musical Wicked.
Xander calls himself Action Jackson.

International titles[]

French: Un Long Retour au Bercail, Troisième Partie (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
German: Der Lange Weg Nach Hause, Teil Drei (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
Italian: La Lunga Strada Verso Casa, Parte 3 (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
Portuguese (Brazil): O Longo Caminho de Casa, Episódio 3 (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
Russian: Долгая дорога домой, Часть 3 (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
Spanish: El Largo Camino a Casa, Parte III (The Long Way Home, Part Three)
Turkish: Evden Uzakta, Kısım Üç (Away from Home, Part Three)