In this episode, the mayor, who is just being introduced as a minor character, has to pay off a debt to a demon who helped get him elected. To do so, he employs a newly arrived vampire (they met in an earlier episode) who subcontracts the job. Candy is produced and distributed, ostensibly to pay for the high school band uniforms. There's a delicious little scene in which Principal Skinner personally hands boxes to Buffy and her friends.
Thus the candy is quickly dumped into the community -- and chaos ensues. It seems there's something in the candy that turns the adults into teenagers--not physically, but attitudinally, hormonally and behaviorally--rather extreme versions of teenagers. In a word, they run amok. This allows a crew of vampires to accomlish their mission--stealing babies to feed to the demon as his payoff.
Naturally, Buffy arrives in time to save the day (not to mention the babies), but when one looks at the story in its bare outlines as I've presented it, well, the political allegory is pretty darn in-your-face, don'tcha think? The melding of the routine workings of power with a corrupt purpose, the use of innocence (candy, a second adolescence) for the destruction of innocence (the babies), the adult authority figures reverting to heedless bundles of id (Principal Skinner in particular was really a hoot, I could just imagine Henry Hyde), it was really so remarkably apt, I just couldn't believe it.
Nightline, by way of contrast, is totally Clueless.
-- Paul Rosenberg Reason and Democracy rad at gte.net
"Let's put the information BACK into the information age!"