March 2003 posts
It's all about the Mission....or would that be Mother? spoilers for Lies my Parents Told Me -- Rufus, 23:53:58 03/25/03 Tue
Lies my Parents Told Me seems to be a simple enough episode until you look a bit closer at what is going on, so I'll start in the beginning......
Nikki: YOU DID A GOOD JOB, BABY BOY. YOU STAYED DOWN JUST LIKE MAMA TOLD YOU.
Robin: CAN WE GO HOME NOW?
Nikki: UH-UH. IT'S NOT SAFE THERE ANYMORE. HOW ABOUT I LEAVE YOU OVER AT CROWLEY'S HOUSE, AND YOU CAN PLAY WITH THOSE SPOOKY DOODADS
THAT YOU LIKE?
Robin: NO, I WANNA STAY WITH YOU.
Nikki: YEAH, I KNOW YOU DO, BABY. BUT REMEMBER, ROBIN, HONEY, WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT...ALWAYS GOTTA WORK THE MISSION. LOOK AT ME. YOU KNOW I LOVE YOU. BUT I GOT A JOB TO DO. THE MISSION IS WHAT MATTERS. RIGHT?
THAT'S MY BOY. COME ON. ROBIN.
This part of the teaser section of the show is important as it shows us that Robin see's the upcoming situation with Spike through the eyes of that child in the rain with the yellow boots. It also is consistant with anyone who has suffered a loss like he has...they can relive moments of their life forever....like Robin who desperately tries to hand onto any memory of his mother that he can....unfortunately Spike is also in that memory. There are many mothers in this episode....Nikki (who we see in flashback), Anne (William/Spikes mother again seen in flashback), Dru (who has a need to be seen as a mother, a creator of unlife), and Buffy....mother figure to Dawn, and to Robin as he see's so much of his mother in Buffy, his actions in this episode a desperate attempt to save his mother by making sure Buffy doesn't share in her fate. And Spike, he had a mother called Anne, Buffy's second name.
I go back briefly to Once More with Feeling and that number that Spike sings about saving Buffy.......
SPIKE: No, I'll save her, then I'll kill her.
Spike as William loved his mother more than anything, even finding a woman to take her place in the household, but when he becomes a vampire he kills her thinking he has saved her. I wonder if that is more tragic foreshadowing for the future?
Anne: WELL, SHE'S LOVELY. YOU SHOULDN'T BE ALONE. YOU NEED A WOMAN IN YOUR LIFE.
I HAVE A WOMAN IN MY LIFE. WELL, YOU NEVER... OH. [CHUCKLES]
William: [CHUCKLES] WELL, DO NOT MISTAKE ME. I STILL HAVE HOPES
THAT ONE DAY THERE WILL BE AN ADDITION TO THIS HOUSEHOLD. BUT I WILL ALWAYS LOOK AFTER YOU, MOTHER. THIS I PROMISE.
In the drawing room of their home we see a glimpse of life that once was.....William was a lousy, a real lousy poet, but, he was a good man. Being a man he also had faults, just as every other human being. He made a promise to a lady and he meant to keep it, soul or no soul. It makes him a very unusual vampire in that he seems to have retained the ability to love in a way that most other vampires don't, including his mom.
Dru enters the scene as both she and William/Spike go back to the home he knew his whole life.....there to keep a promise, too bad Dru didn't understand that as his second mom she would always be in second place.
Dru: OOH, SUCH A PRETTY HOUSE YOU HAVE, SWEET WILLIAM. IT SMELLS OF DAFFODILS...AND VISCERA.
Spike: DON'T GET TOO ATTACHED NOW. WON'T BE HERE FOR LONG, LUV.
Dru: WELL, THEN...SHALL WE GIVE IT A PROPER GOOD-BYE? [GROWLS]
Spike: YOU'RE A SAUCY ONE, AREN'T YOU? AAH! MMM. OH, DRU...
WE'LL BRING THIS WORLD TO ITS KNEES.
Dru: IT'S RIPE AND READY, MY DARLING, WAITIN' FOR US TO DEVOUR ITS FRUIT.
Spike: WE'LL RAVAGE THIS CITY TOGETHER, MY PET. LAY WASTE TO
ALL OF EUROPE. THE THREE OF US WILL TEACH THE SNOBS AND ELITISTS
WITH THEIR FALDERAL JUST WHAT--
Dru: THREE?
Spike: YOU, ME, AND MOTHER. WE'LL OPEN UP THEIR VEINS AND BATHE IN THEIR BLOOD AS THEY SCREAM OUR NAMES ACROSS THE...WHAT?
Dru: YOU. YOU WANNA BRING YOUR MUM WITH US?
Spike: WELL, YEAH. YOU'LL LIKE HER.
Dru: HMM. TO EAT, YOU MEAN?
The look on Dru's face when William/Spike goes from destruction to the info that he is a package deal, mom's coming too. Dru's hysterical giggle was hilarious.....hell is...living with your mother-in-law forever. You'd think Dru would make sure that she found a guy who was his own man before she snatches him from the mortal coil.
The next scene is of Anne coming into her drawing room to find William with a woman she has never seen.
Anne: WHO IS THIS WOMAN?
Dru: I'M THE OTHER THAT GAVE BIRTH TO YOUR SON.
Anne: I BEG YOUR PARDON?
I'm with Anne, she may have wanted a woman in William's life but she never figured he's drop by the nearest lunatic asylum to find one. It's then that William keeps his promise, one made as a mortal, now twisted into a demon's frame of mind. The scene is extra creepy because while William descends upon his mother with promises of health, Dru is rubbing her lower belly.....I guess happy that she is about to become a Grandmama. But what looks good on paper, or in the imagination doesn't always work in life.
Getting back to Robin, Giles, and Buffy.......seems there is a problem with the trigger. Giles thinks it's in place, and he is right. A stone with the power to work on the unconscious memories the trigger uses to control Spike may be the thing to start a process where the trigger can be broken, but it means that Spike has to expose something he has hidden from everyone, himself most of all. The stone seems to have no effect but we know that Spike is taking a tour of his past and a memory he has tried to forget for so long. Not wanting to expose his secret he tells only the name of the song used to trigger him, not why the song is so important. This is when Robin steps in to talk to Giles about doing something about what he considers a danger to the mission, danger to Buffy......
Robin: MR. GILES. YOU GOT A MOMENT?
Giles: WHAT'S ON YOUR MIND?
Robin: SAME THING THAT'S ON YOURS. WE GOT OURSELVES
A PROBLEM.
Giles: SPIKE.
Robin: YEAH. IF THAT TRIGGER'S STILL WORKING, THEN THE FIRST
MUST BE WAITING FOR JUST THE RIGHT TIME TO USE IT AGAINST US.
Robin does have a valid point....Spike is still a real danger to everyone, including Buffy, but he also has his own agenda that Giles picks up on.
Robin: BUFFY WOULD LISTEN TO HER WATCHER, WOULDN'T SHE?
Giles: OH, YES. WELL, YOU DON'T KNOW VERY MUCH ABOUT THE WATCHER-SLAYER DYNAMIC.
Robin: AS A MATTER OF FACT, I WAS RAISED BY A WATCHER.
Giles: YOU WERE?
Robin: BERNARD CROWLEY...TOOK ME IN WHEN I WAS A YOUNG KID,
TRAINED ME.
Giles: CROWLEY. WELL, I REMEMBER THE NAME. NEW YORK BASED WATCHER, ISN'T HE? RESIGNED SHORTLY AFTER HIS SLAYER WAS...YOU'RE NIKKI WOOD'S SON.
Robin: YES.
Giles: SPIKE KILLED YOUR MOTHER.
Robin: YES.
Giles: DOES BUFFY KNOW THIS?
Robin: SHE KNOWS MY MOTHER WAS A SLAYER. SHE DOESN'T KNOW ABOUT SPIKE.
Giles: NOW THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH PERSONAL VENGEANCE.
Robin: DOES IT MATTER? HE'S AN INSTRUMENT OF EVIL. NOW HE'S GONNA PROVE TO BE OUR UNDOING IN THIS FIGHT--BUFFY'S UNDOING--AND SHE WILL NEVER, NEVER SEE IT COMING. NOW I'M TALKING ABOUT WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE. FOR THE GREATER GOOD, GILES...AND YOU KNOW I'M RIGHT.
Giles: WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU PROPOSE?
Robin: I JUST NEED YOU TO KEEP BUFFY AWAY FOR A FEW HOURS.
Robin is smart in that he establishes that he and Giles are on the same team, one that Giles has never considered Spike part of. His voice takes on emotion and urgency that betrays his fears for Buffy, not wanting a vampire to take something, someone else away from him. For Robin, Buffy is his mother, in the same peril, and he is going to save her this time. Giles is an easy sell, on board almost right away, even though he understand that vengeance fuels Robin's motives, but with fears for Buffy all his own he decides that Robin is right and It's time to get rid of a threat.....remove someone from the team....someone he doesn't approve of anymore than he did Angel.
Giles keeps Buffy busy on a training session while Robin lures Spike to his "Sanctuary"....if you need a cross, any type, Robin is the guy to see, cause in his garage there are many types of crosses lining the wall. Spike smells a rat....but doesn't quite know what to do...Robin makes that a bit easier by playing the trigger song.....just to get the monster out to play. Robin doesn't want to kill Spike, not the vampire with a soul, but the monster who killed his mom.....he begins to lay a beating on Spike, but Spike's mind is elsewhere......
Spike: MOTHER?
Anne: HELLO, WILLIAM.
Spike: LOOK AT YOU.
Anne: MMM, YES. ALL BETTER.
Spike: YOU'RE GLOWING.
Anne: AM I?
Spike: YEAH.
Anne: WELL, I SUPPOSE I HAVE YOU TO THANK FOR THAT, DON'T I?
HOWEVER WILL I REPAY YOU?
Spike: SEEING YOU LIKE THIS IS PAYMENT ENOUGH.
Anne: OH, WILLIAM. YOU'RE SO...[CHUCKLES] TENDER.
Spike: WELL, THIS IS AS IT SHOULD BE, MOTHER. YOU AND I TOGETHER. ALL OF LONDON LAID OUT BEFORE US. AH, YES. US, HMM. FIRST, WE'LL FEAST. THEN THE NIGHT IS YOURS. THE THEATER, PERHAPS? DANCING? TELL ME. WHAT'S YOUR PLEASURE?
Anne: PLEASURE? TO TAKE MY LEAVE OF YOU, OF COURSE. "THE LARK HATH SPAKE FROM TWIXT ITS WEE BEAK." YOU HONESTLY THOUGHT I COULD BEAR AN ETERNITY LISTENING TO THAT TWADDLE?
This Anne I agree with.....it was twaddle, but the mortal Anne would never have seen her son in this way, never have made fun of him. She couldn't be that cruel...
Anne: I FEEL EXTRAORDINARY. IT'S AS THOUGH I'VE BEEN GIVEN NEW EYES. I SEE EVERYTHING. UNDERSTAND...EVERYTHING.
Spike: MOTHER.
Anne: I HATE TO BE CRUEL. NO, I DON'T. I USED TO HATE
TO BE CRUEL IN LIFE. NOW I FIND IT RATHER FREEING.
NOTHING LESS WILL PRY YOUR GREEDY LITTLE FINGERS
OFF MY APRON STRINGS, WILL IT...
Spike: STOP, PLEASE.
Anne: EVER SINCE THE DAY YOU FIRST SLITHERED FROM ME LIKE A PARASITE?
Spike: WHAT ARE YOU--
Anne: HAD I KNOWN BETTER, I COULD HAVE SPARED MYSELF A LIFETIME OF TEDIUM, AND JUST...AND JUST...BASHED YOUR BRAINS OUT WHEN I FIRST SAW YOU.
[GROANING]
AAAHHH!
Anne: GOD, I PRAYED YOU'D FIND A WOMAN TO RELEASE ME.
BUT YOU SCARCELY SHOWED AN INTEREST. WHO COULD COMPARE
TO YOUR DODDERING HOUSEBOUND MUM...A CAPTIVE AUDIENCE FOR
YOUR WITLESS PRATTLE?
Spike: AAH. OH. AAH! WHATEVER I WAS, THAT'S NOT
WHO I AM ANYMORE.
Anne: DARLING...THAT'S WHO YOU'LL ALWAYS BE... A LIMP,
SENTIMENTAL FOOL.
Limp.....hmmmm isn't that what Nikki called Spike in the teaser? Seems that words seem to crop up in different characters mouths as reminders of feelings from the past. Anne has been turned into a monster, gone the mother and born a demon with no motherly feelings....
Anne: YOU WANT TO RUN, DON'T YOU? SCAMPER OFF AND CRY TO YOUR NEW LITTLE TROLLOP? DO YOU THINK YOU'LL BE ABLE TO LOVE HER? THINK YOU'LL BE ABLE TO TOUCH HER WITHOUT FEELING ME, HMM? ALL YOU'VE EVER WANTED WAS TO BE BACK INSIDE. YOU FINALLY GOT YOUR WISH, DIDN'T YOU? SANK YOUR TEETH INTO ME, AN ETERNAL KISS.
Spike: NO. I ONLY WANTED TO MAKE YOU WELL.
Anne: YOU WANTED YOUR HANDS ON ME. PERHAPS YOU'D LIKE
A CHANCE TO FINISH OFF WHAT YOU STARTED?
Spike: I LOVED YOU. I DID. NOT LIKE THIS.
Anne: JUST LIKE THIS. THIS IS WHAT YOU'VE ALWAYS WANTED.
WHO'S MY DARK LITTLE PRINCE?
Spike: NO!
Anne: UNH! GET OUT. GET OUT! THERE, THERE, PRECIOUS.
IT WILL ONLY HURT FOR A MOMENT.
Spike: I'M SORRY.
As a mortal mother, Anne saw William as her shining light, as a demon he was a pathetic dissapointment. She makes what can only be called a pass at her own son, and he stakes her...he saved her (he thought) only to kill her. But revisiting this traumatic part of his past, Spike has found the cure, understanding that he was taunted by a demon, his mother only briefly resurfacing as she turns to dust.
Wood: WHAT?
Spike: I'M SORRY. [GASPS] OH! UNH!
Wood: SORRY? YOU THINK "SORRY" IS GONNA MAKE EVERYTHING RIGHT?
Spike: I WASN'T TALKING TO YOU. I DON'T GIVE A PISS ABOUT YOUR MUM. SHE WAS A SLAYER. I WAS A VAMPIRE. THAT'S THE WAY THE GAME IS PLAYED.
Wood: GAME?
Spike: SHE KNEW WHAT SHE WAS SIGNING UP FOR.
Wood: WELL, I DIDN'T SIGN UP FOR IT.
Spike: WELL, THAT'S THE RUB, ISN'T IT? YOU DIDN'T SIGN UP FOR IT, AND SOMEHOW, IT'S MY FAULT.
Wood: YOU TOOK MY CHILDHOOD. YOU TOOK HER AWAY. SHE WAS ALL I HAD. SHE WAS MY WORLD.
Spike: AND YOU WEREN'T HERS. DOESN'T THAT PISS YOU OFF?
Wood: SHUT UP. YOU DIDN'T KNOW HER.
Spike: I KNOW SLAYERS. NO MATTER HOW MANY PEOPLE THEY'VE GOT AROUND THEM, THEY FIGHT ALONE. LIFE OF THE CHOSEN ONE. THE REST OF US BE DAMNED. YOUR MOTHER WAS NO DIFFERENT.
Wood: NO. SHE...SHE LOVED ME.
Spike: BUT NOT ENOUGH TO QUIT NOW WAS IT? NOT ENOUGH TO WALK AWAY...
FOR YOU.
I'LL TELL YOU A STORY ABOUT A MOTHER AND SON. SEE, LIKE YOU,
I LOVED MY MOTHER. SO MUCH SO, I TURNED HER INTO A VAMPIRE.
YEAH. SO WE COULD BE TOGETHER FOREVER. SHE SAID SOME NASTY BITS TO ME AFTER I DID THAT. BEEN WEIGHING ON ME FOR QUITE SOME TIME. BUT YOU HELPED ME FIGURE SOMETHING OUT. YOU SEE, UNLIKE YOU, I HAD A MOTHER WHO LOVED ME BACK. WHEN I SIRED HER, I SET LOOSE A DEMON, AND IT TORE INTO ME. BUT IT WAS A DEMON TALKING, NOT HER. I REALIZE THAT NOW. MY MOTHER LOVED ME...WITH ALL HER HEART. I WAS HER WORLD.
[EARLY ONE MORNING PLAYING]
THAT'S A NICE LITTLE SONG YOU GOT THERE.
[MUSIC STOPS]
THANKS, DOC. YOU CURED ME AFTER ALL. I GOT MY OWN FREE WILL NOW. I'M NOT UNDER THE FIRST OR ANYONE ELSE'S INFLUENCES NOW. I JUST WANTED YOU TO KNOW THAT...BEFORE I KILL YOU.
After all the lies told in this episode, it's the setup meant to kill Spike that helped rid him of the trigger...and then he faced the man who wanted to kill him. Spike says that Nikki didn't love Robin enough to stop the game......the only thing he says that I disagree with. I feel you can't properly compare Anne who never was chosen to fight evil, save the world, with Nikki, who not only had to save the world, but try to keep her son alive at the same time. I wonder if Spike said what he did to be cruel? He did tell the truth about Slayers.....it is about the Mission, but they didn't choose the mission anymore than Robin did, they just ended up in circumstances beyond their control. Buffy runs to save Spike and finds that he has saved himself....she then see's Robin, a very beaten Robin and goes to him, but no words of comfort come from Buffy......she sounds just like his mom.......
Buffy: I LOST MY MOM A COUPLE YEARS AGO. I CAME HOME, AND I FOUND HER DEAD ON THE COUCH.
Wood: I'M SORRY.
Buffy: I UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU TRIED TO DO. BUT SHE'S DEAD.
Wood: BECAUSE HE MURDERED HER.
Buffy: I'M PREPARING TO FIGHT A WAR, AND YOU'RE LOOKING FOR REVENGE ON A MAN THAT DOESN'T EXIST ANYMORE.
Wood: BUFFY, DON'T DELUDE YOURSELF. THAT MAN STILL EXISTS.
Buffy: SPIKE IS THE STRONGEST WARRIOR WE HAVE, AND WE ARE GONNA NEED HIM IF WE'RE GONNA COME OUT OF THIS THING ALIVE. YOU TRY ANYTHING AGAIN, HE'LL KILL YOU. MORE IMPORTANTLY...I'LL LET HIM. I HAVE A MISSION...TO WIN THIS WAR. TO SAVE THE WORLD. I DON'T HAVE TIME
FOR VENDETTAS. THE MISSION IS WHAT MATTERS.
So, who is right and who is wrong? I don't think it will be easy to make that judgement fairly. If you like one character more than the other you may be blind to your favorite characters faults. Robin Wood may have meant to kill Spike, but he is basically a good man, a wounded man. Problem is that he wanted vengeance more than anything and how can you get revenge on someone that no longer exists. By triggering Spike he may have brought out the demon but a mind controlled demon. Killing Spike wouldn't have brought his mother back. He isn't a bad man, he isn't right in what he does....but somehow the sequence of events...lies and all....worked in Spikes favor. So, was anyone wrong? Again.....I don't know. I guess it's all in how things end. We can feel one way about someone when happy or angry, but our feelings change and circumstances change. How we feel now may be very different than how we will feel a short time later. Each character has done things that are hurtful and deceitful but remember what Anya says......
Anya: DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME DOWN THAT ROAD. SPIKE'S GOT SOME SORT OF "GET OUT OF JAIL FREE CARD" THAT DOESN'T APPLY TO THE REST OF US. I MEAN, HE COULD SLAUGHTER 100 FRAT BOYS, AND...FORGIVENESS MAKES US HUMAN. BLAHDIDDY, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH.
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I see Buffy & Spike as both being deluded (spoilers for Orpheus & LMPTM) -- Scroll, 00:32:53 03/26/03 Wed
Specifically, I think Buffy and Spike don't really have a grasp on what the soul (and lack of same) means to a vampire. Both Buffy and Spike seem to separate the souled being (whether human or vamp) from the unsouled being (pure vamp). Spike isn't willing to see that Vamp!Anne's resentment and cruelty came from Anne herself, and not the demon. Of course, Anne with a soul was a kind, gentle woman who would never say any of those things -- but without a soul, she had no constraints. She could be cruel with impunity.
Same with Spike. Just because he has a soul now doesn't mean the killer within is gone. As wrong as his vendetta is, Robin is correct in saying the man who murdered his mother, despite having a shiny new soul, "that man still exists". Like Angelus tells Faith, he's always in Angel. Deep in. Same goes for Spike.
Just an aside, but I really didn't like Spike's attitude about killing Nikki. It's one thing for Spike to say it's just the way the game is played when he was simply another soulless vampire. But now he has a soul -- shouldn't he realise that Nikki's death is, oh I dunno, kinda really his fault? Because it is his fault. It's Spike's fault that Nikki is dead. It's Spike's fault that Robin lost his mother. It's Spike's fault that every person he ever killed is dead. What's not Spike's fault is Robin then developing an obsession over avenging his mother's death. (Though he's still partly responsible because he's the catalyst... er, something.) Huh, just realised that maybe I've defended my own point. Spike the Killer (within Spike the Souled) says to Robin, don't give a damn that I took away your childhood. Tough cookies on you.
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Re: I see Buffy & Spike as both being deluded (spoilers for Orpheus & LMPTM) -- Rufus, 01:00:56 03/26/03 Wed
I kinda see some of what Spike was saying as "My mother loved me more than your's loved you". Wood had just beaten the shit out of Spike and Spike got the last word in the fight. But......look at the situation cause Spike and Wood have more in common than they would like to think.....both loved a slayer, who may or may not have been capable of loving them back.....both wanted to save their mother, that desire getting stronger the closer each got to Buffy.....both men are flawed but both trying in their own way to do the right thing. It's easy to say that Wood was all wrong and Spike all right....but it's not so easy. Spike murdered (and that is the only word that Wood will ever see her death as)Wood's mother, and that started a series of events up that got us to this latest revelation about Spike. So, what else could happen, cause no good deed goes unpunished and no action has no reaction.
The people in the Buffyverse do the wrong and right things all the time and our feelings shift in reaction to what we see, but in the end it doesn't matter how we feel cause what will happen is beyond our control.
BTW....notice the shovel twirl in the teaser reminded me of Beneath You...as did Spike's comment to Wood about "the show" when they wanted to put that stone in his head.
The use of the word mission can be taken a few ways....does each woman really fully mean what they said or does the phrase match what a Watcher teaches them. Buffy mentioned letting Dawn die if it would save the world and at the end of the episode we see her caress Dawn's face. We have to not only listen to what characters say, but also to what they do cause the actions don't always end up matching the words. Nikki and Buffy talked about the Mission being the thing but is there something about those words that just may change before the season ends? "You think you know ... what's to come ... what you are. You haven't even begun."
Remember it's all connected...;)
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Spike and Wood -- HonorH (not sleeping), 02:12:49 03/26/03 Wed
Regarding what Spike said to Wood: he wasn't right. Caveat: he was partially right in what he said, but not in how he said it. He's got grounds for being angry, certainly--Wood had deceived Buffy (and got Giles in on it, as our boy must have figured out) and then deliberately triggered Spike with the intentions of first beating the unholy crap out of him, then killing him. Hence Spike beating the crap out of Wood, then taking a bite, throwing in a little emotional abuse in the bargain. As usual, Spike uses the truth to hurt, but he doesn't use all of the truth. I feel fanfic coming on.
Wood has two parts to him: the 30-year-old man who knows what being a Slayer entails, that Nikki had a Calling and that it had to come before everything else, including him. He knows this. He understands it. But inside him somewhere is the 4-year-old who *doesn't* understand and who's never quite gotten past his mother's death and his interrupted childhood. He was raised by his mother's Watcher, who, if he favors the other Watchers we've seen, isn't big into the emotional side of life. Crowley (was that his name?) raised a warrior, not a son. So we've got these two sides to Wood--the mature man who desires to fight on the side of Good, and the little boy who lashes out at his pain.
Where we end up is this: William's mother loved him, and only him. He was the center of her life, and she was the center of his. Robin Wood, too, had a mother who loved him, but her life had its center elsewhere. William's mother, on some level, resented how central she and William were to each other--how much she depended on him, and how much he depended on her. Wood resented the fact that his mother *wasn't* centered on him. So Spike was right in much of what he said. He was wrong in what it all meant, though, and definitely wrong in how he said it.
I also think this is far from the last we've heard of this. I'd lay odds that Spike's words will come back to haunt him in some way. Could be wrong. Might not be. Should try to sleep again.
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Oh, and about that soul-- -- HonorH (possibly delusional), 02:18:40 03/26/03 Wed
I think Buffy was right in saying that the creature who killed Wood's mother doesn't exist anymore--from a certain point of view. Yes, all the elements of Killer!Spike still reside within him. Yes, he has William's soul. The corporate being, however, is now something different from either Soulless!Spike and William. Just as Angel is different from Angelus or Liam, though he has elements of each. In a very real way, the Spike who killed Nikki ceased to exist when he regained his soul. So Buffy was right, if you take it that way. But Wood was also right, from another pov--what Spike was continues to inform what he's become, and always will.
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Re: Spike and Wood -- lynx, 03:22:02 03/26/03 Wed
>>Robin Wood, too, had a mother who loved him, but her life had its center elsewhere.<<
i'm unsure about this. what kind of love takes a four year old boy out into the pouring rain and shoves him behind a bench knowing that there are vampires about?
sorry, but that bothered me a LOT.
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Read my response below.......who do we forgive. -- Rufus, 03:30:48 03/26/03 Wed
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Love (Spoilers, Lies my parents told me) -- Rahael, 04:19:09 03/26/03 Wed
Holtz left his little daughter safely at home, and he ended up having to watch her burn.
Perhaps Nikki knew that no one could protect Robin like she could.
Also, it's really really difficult to make judgements about how parents show their love. My mother took me back to a warzone and kept me there. We suffered deprivation, lack of schooling, hunger, no electricity, and we escaped death every day. Robin Wood stood there while she killed vampires. I stood there while she stood up to men with guns who were threatening her. I was there when she died too, within hearing distance, if not seeing.
And I treasure every single day I got to spend with her. She had her mission. It was dangerous. It killed her. She couldn't not do it, and I understood. And I was glad to be there with her. What kind of love is that? It's the kind of love that keeps you strong for the rest of your life. It showed me what one single, unarmed woman could do. It showed me what I could be.
I understand that this might not look like love to others, that it might look like neglect or even bad mothering. But I bet Robin Wood, feels exactly the same as I do. I have a very good friend who was sent off to boarding school from the age of 8. I know who has a stronger relationship with their parents, who is the happier, even though her life was immensely privileged and mine, relatively speaking, wasn't.
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Re: Love (Spoilers, Lies my parents told me) -- MaeveRigan, 08:31:05 03/26/03 Wed
Very few people would understand this. I, too, had parents with a mission. Sometimes you don't know who you want to "kill," but if your parents really loved you, you know that, ultimately. And if their work was worthwhile, that may come to mean something to you, too.
Here's the other thing: it's not necessarily good for a child to have the world, including their parents, revolve around them. That may not be the best kind of love. Look at how William/Spike turned out. Sure, he has a soul now--after 100+ years. As he discovered, and as Nikki knew, there are worse things than death.
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Love will lead you to your gift... (Spoilers, Lies my parents told me) -- Rahael, 11:39:00 03/26/03 Wed
Thanks MaeveRigan - this seems to be a difficult subject, and of course, seen through the prism of experience and emotions, which does not make them lesser, but greater.
I think it's also important that the ep title is 'lies *my* parents told *me*,' not 'the lies parents tell'. The parent child relationship is the crucible of love, hate, resentment, pride, acceptance, rejection....
It's interesting that Nikki emphasises the mission, and so does Buffy, by saying that she needs Spike to be around because of what is coming (or that's the impression I get. I haven't read the wildfeed yet). That there's a grand scheme of things that Wood's agenda would have to be subservient to, his personal, emotional attachments.
Our parents lie to us all the time, (remember Buffy asking Giles to 'lie to me'). From the very moment that they tell us that they will always be there for us (because they can't be) from the very first 'happily ever after'. Part of the growing up process for me, anyway, has been learning to see my parents as human beings with complex motivations. Not the saints that outsiders think them, not the undoubting, strong as iron heroes, but a man and woman whose love for me was as passionate as their commitment to the bonds of family, community and friends.
In BtVS and AtS, rarely are the commitments to our fellow men/women set separately from our duty to humanity. They are one and the same. From the love we have for our dearest ones, to the whole world. From the individual to the universal.
The mission is our friends, family and neighbours. Our brothers and sisters and children. There was something incredibly reassuring about the fact that my mother never turned away from those in need, who cried over a student of hers who went missing and raged and pursued after the authorities until she could tell a bereft mother what happened to her child. I find this reaussuring because after she died, I started feeling that I was no longer connected to my family and world - my father was an outsider to the community I was born in. I asked my grandmother, "if I were someone you knew, alone, bereaved and powerless, would you help me, even if I wasn't your daughter's daughter?" And my grandmother said "No. I would only help you because of who you were. Why on earth would I help a complete stranger?" Now that was a truth that stung me for a decade.
I grew up with the knowledge that I was loved by someone who loved me for more reasons than the fact that I was her daughter. That even if she didn't have any kinship with me, she would see it there, because she saw kinship in wider terms. I don't know how to explain why that made me felt more loved, rather than less, it's just the feeling she gifted me with.
The day after she died, she was laid out in a big hall so that people could pay their respects to her. I didn't even know half the people who thanked me for what she had done for them. I remember watching my stern maths teacher break down and cry. A mission need not be impersonal, unloving, and selfish. It can be highly personal and loving.
Love will lead you to your gift...........
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Thanks for that -- Spike Lover, 12:11:27 03/26/03 Wed
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Beautiful Rahael -- Alison, 13:29:53 03/26/03 Wed
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Echoing the thanks and.. -- ponygirl, 14:17:17 03/26/03 Wed
A mission need not be impersonal, unloving, and selfish. It can be highly personal and loving.
Do you think this is the case right now for Buffy? I'd say that she's had this before, in Becoming and The Gift, but now she seems to have lost much of the love that motivated her. Or is she just hiding her love because she fears that those around her will see it as weakness? It seems to me that you've summed up what Buffy is journeying towards this season.
It's interesting that Nikki emphasises the mission, and so does Buffy, by saying that she needs Spike to be around because of what is coming
Buffy sees the potential for good in Spike and spares him, Giles sees the potential for evil and condemns him to death. So much Potential this season, all those girls murdered not for what they were but for what they could become. Manny on AtS representing the limitless potential of man (or something like that). Is this the difference between the FE and any sort of presumed First Good? One looks at a person and sees only their potential for evil, the other only their potential for good?
Great post!
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Buffy, Mother and Child -- Rahael, 14:37:21 03/26/03 Wed
At this point, I have no idea how they are going to resolve this. I am waiting with eager anticipation to see it cohering marvellously together at the end. I was rather troubled a month or so ago, but I think I am starting to get some idea of what they'll end up affirming.
I wrote a lot more but I deleted it because I am getting way too close to spoilers, and I don't even like hinting or teasing at those!
But to answer your question directly, free of spoilery taint, I'd agree with you that Buffy seems to have lost some of it, and I certainly want her to journey back to it.
Buffy certainly plays the part of child to Giles' parent in this ep, and I think that role is very important (and not just in relation to Giles) in the coming eps. But, there is also another role that Buffy plays - the mother. She is the mother figure for Dawn. As Leslie pointed out a while ago, Wood mistakes her for a 'mother'. She fears she has mom hair. She is responsible for the potentials. Spike's mother has her middle name, and she is a slayer, just like Nikki.
So, is Buffy herself the figure in whom the disturbing issues raised in this ep will finally be resolved? Because I see nearly every incident in 'Lies' as ambiguous and unresolved.
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Vague spoilers for 'Lies my parents told me' -- Rahael, 14:49:51 03/26/03 Wed
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The Mission-- Spoilers for Lies/Parents--Unspoiled speculation -- Arethusa, 16:02:38 03/26/03 Wed
I've no idea what will happen, but I think Buffy will have to make some decisions about her slayer lineage. When Joyce told Dawn "She won't choose you," do you suppose she was warning Dawn that when the time comes, Buffy will choose the mission, not Dawn? But I can't help but think that since Buffy disrupted the slayer line, is totally depending on her slayerness, and the WKCS has reappeared, that she will have to give it up in some way.
It's interesting that when Angel put Connor before the mission he was criticized, and when Nikki put the mission before Robin she was criticized.
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Sky, Sea and Earth - Cordy and the Mission (Spoilers, Tomorrow AtS S3) -- Rahael, 16:21:29 03/26/03 Wed
I think there's been one very clear instance where the choosing of the mission has, in retrospect, looked like a big honking mistake.
RIgth after I saw Tomorrow, I thought, so Cordy thinks her mission is above love? above the hopes and desires of Angel and herself? Above the very precious thing we can have on earth? Cordy forgets about meeting Angel, to ascend, and Angel goes to the bottom of the ocean crying out his love for his son, Connor.
Maybe, between the sky and the sea, we can find the median way of the earth. Finding a mission which does not reject or turn away from the very people closes to us, who need us.
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The flame and the spark. Spoilers, Tomorrow AtS S3) -- Arethusa, 20:42:27 03/26/03 Wed
I admire the brave and dedicted. They burn with a fire that illuminates and spreads. I am the banked ember; I can only warm those next to me.
Like you, I've spent my entire life knowing that I'm the child someone who tried to save lives, who (in my mind, at least) was heroic. It made me feel special, which is a wonderful, if costly, inheritance to leave a child.
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OT 'From under ashes into sudden flame' -- Rahael, 02:58:28 03/27/03 Thu
Now there's a poem about an ambiguous hero! Milton's Samson Agonistes reminds us that sometimes stories about heroes don't always show them behaving heroically - its the study of a man moving from slavery to freedom, the moment before the heroic act, from ash to flame.
My mother was the convential woman of the family. She did the right things, followed the attractive career path and wanted eventually to be a good housewife and mother. She was the ember forced into flame, not for the wanting, but for the necessity. She wrote that it was only undertaken as a 'survival task'.
I admire the embers. They contain the fire within. They may never have occasion to show it, and maybe we should be glad of that. I am pretty sure you make your children feel just as special, just as mine did before she did anything outwardly extraordinary. It was in the fierce glance of love. The way she sang Bob Marley songs to me when she walked me to school. The way she baked cakes for me, and tried to please my fussy spoilt ways. The way she made me dance with her when the electricity came back on after months of being out, and we could have lights, and music again.
Whatever she did, my inheritance would have been costly. It would be of a community and way of life destroyed, of pain, and loss and betrayal. But she made sure that it had other things too - hope, and dignity, love, courage and integrity.
I felt the usual anger and resentment that many bereaved people feel. There are painful moments, guilty moments, because I don't know whether she ever knew how much I loved her. But I know she must have been doing something right. I thought my world and I would collapse without her, she the person who was my backbone and my centre. But the fire lives on.
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Re: Still OT 'From under ashes into sudden flame' -- Arethusa, 08:29:43 03/27/03 Thu
I am positive your mother knew how much you love her. I know that even when my daughter begs me to stop singing "Going Through the Motions," or says she can't wait to get away from me when she goes to summer camp she still loves me just as much as when she was a baby. I'm glad to see her want to be independent and express her opinions, and know that our relationship is strong enough to survive painful words.
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Hey Rahael -- Tchaikovsky, 01:58:22 03/27/03 Thu
That symbolism is a brilliant catch- it completely eluded me.
TCH- now worried that the scary Spelling Militia are going to correct elusion/allusion/illusion
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not o/t for the board--maybe for the thread: reflection on cordelia (still spoilers for tomorrow) -- anom, 14:38:51 03/28/03 Fri
Very nice, Rahael. I hope we can all find that middle path--it ain't easy.
It also sent my thoughts spinning off in a different direction. Your reference to Tomorrow reminded me of Cordelia talking to herself in the mirror. Or was it herself? Could that have already been Evil!Cordy in the mirror? Was her convincing Real!Cordelia she loved Angel our 1st glimpse of E!C's manipulatin' ways? Does that imply she was working w/Skip to get R!C up, up, & out of the way? Then all she'd have to do would be stay out of sight till the gang got back from LA. Not sure what that does to the "she was evil but needed Lorne's spell to get R!C's memory" theory--she'd have to have known enough about R!C's life to work the deception on her. So maybe the memory loss/restoration show was a fake? But what for? Hmm...maybe she needed that much time to come through the looking glass (maybe from another dimension) & get "very corporeal," & couldn't take her memory with her, so she did need the spell.
And is R!C still up on high...bored no longer?
--anom, wondering if this should've been a new thread
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Oh yes! -- Rahael, 09:18:27 03/29/03 Sat
That's a moment that's still a bit of a mystery for me - it seemed to ring false. Shiny glowy Cordy seems deeply sinister to me at the moment.
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Re: Buffy, Mother and Child -- Rufus, 16:31:44 03/26/03 Wed
So, is Buffy herself the figure in whom the disturbing issues raised in this ep will finally be resolved? Because I see nearly every incident in 'Lies' as ambiguous and unresolved.
That's the nature of life, some incidents and issues remain abmiguous and unresolved forever. Giving us stuff to discuss...forever....;)
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Re: Buffy, Mother and Child (Lies spoilers and unspoiled spec) -- ponygirl, 16:52:32 03/26/03 Wed
Buffy as the mother figure does raise some disturbing issues. In some way Wood and Spike were asking themselves the same questions throughout - how to save the mother, how to prove the son's love for the mother, how to earn the mother's love. Wood saw himself as trying to save Buffy from Spike, much as he briefly saved Nikki as a child. As Spike killed Anne when he saw what she had become, will Wood also come to see Buffy as tainted?
Spike came to see his mother's words to him as untrue, spoken by the demon in her. Of course this contradicts a lot of what we have seen of his own nature which allowed love to survive relatively unchanged. Nevertheless he was still able to break the hold her words and death had held for him. I wonder though if the regret he felt over his mother's death led in a large part to his statement in Afterlife, that he wouldn't allow Willow to destroy what she had brought back if any part of it was Buffy. Released from this trauma, realizing perhaps for the first time that he had been loved, and with the ability to make his own moral judgements, might his unwavering loyalty to Buffy falter? If he saw her as wrong, as becoming a monster, or failing, a direction I suspect Giles is heading in, what would Spike do? I'm not as sure of the answer as I would have been a week ago.
Went on a bit of a ramble there, but I think you're right about the importance of Buffy's role in this episode. She's both the mother trying to protect her charges, and to help them to grow up, finding the limits of love and sacrifice; and the child who has quite probably moved past the parent. I'm very excited to see what's coming!
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Re: Buffy, Mother and Child (Lies spoilers ) -- Rahael, 03:57:52 03/27/03 Thu
Yes, I see so much ambiguity and layers and irony in this ep. I don't think it's at all cut and dried what the message is, and I think it's pretty important that the title has the word 'lie' in it!
Or at least I'm choosing to see it that way because I share Sol's view about the possible alarming implications. What I don't understand is this - yes Giles betrays Buffy by lying to her. I can understand her anger and her actions towards him. But how can we see a rejection of his view of 'the greater good' when Buffy herself seems to affirm it in her other actions and words? There seems to be a disconnect there. I'm hoping it's the source of further drama and tension, and sitting back for a rousing connection of the faultline.
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Re: Love (Spoilers, Lies my parents told me) -- deeva, 09:38:14 03/26/03 Wed
Rah, I never thought of it in that light. This is a hard subject that is highly subjective. Judging how much one, or another, is loved by a parent is something that really shouldn't come up but it does cause, hey, human here and the brain is always coming up with stuff to think about, appropriate or not. In watching the relationships last night it never occured to me to judge one love versus another as everyone of them has something different that does not make them equal, the fact that these are all different characters.
I won't claim to have such an extraordinary and tragic (so not,the word that I'm looking for but I can't think of what might fit and please don't take this as pity. It's not and it's not meant as an insult in anyway at all.) experience with my own parents but they all do what they feel is necessary for both parties. When I was much younger (6-7) and it would be school break, my mother would take me along to the sweatshop she worked in (I swept up the loose threads and fabric off the floor) or my father would take me along with him to some of his onsite jobs. He was a general contractor. He would occasionally hand me a hammer and I would set to work on removing nails from loose boards. Both situations unsafe for kids? You bet. Was I ever hurt? Nope. Looking back I see it what it is/was. They did what they could and they were very watchful. Always close by. My family is not very big on the verbal/physical loving but we are very attuned to each others actions and their implications. That was how they expressed their concern and love. I think that is why in real life I place so much on an individual's actions and not so much on what is said.
On another note, has it started to warm up a bit in your neck of the woods? I enjoyed London so very much that I intend to return next year. There is still so very much that I didn't see. Hey, ya wanna see the very unexciting pics?
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sigh...my first dropped tag. I'm 'speaking ' in all italics. -- deeva, 09:57:35 03/26/03 Wed
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Re: Love (Spoilers, Lies my parents told me) -- Rahael, 11:49:00 03/26/03 Wed
Thanks Deeva! It's incredibly complex and I think I too judge situations more on those unspoken moments, those attunements you describe so well. It's much the same with my family. As for London, the weather is lovely!! I'd love to see pics - email me! My email account continues to exasperate, bewilder and confuzzle me as to why it deletes the emails I save and why it saves the emails I delete.
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Another beautiful post - thank you. -- Caroline, 12:13:53 03/26/03 Wed
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So, who do we forgive? -- Rufus *sleep what's sleep?*, 03:27:35 03/26/03 Wed
Just cause Spike got a soul back it didn't mean he was going to be the bestest guy out there, a proper prince who was kind to all. Spike as William was flawed and those same flaws are still there today, soul or no soul. But, as a vampire with a soul, the part of him that would have killed Nikki is no longer driving the car, so basically doesn't exist unless his soul is again lost. Robin didn't want to kill Spike, he wanted to work out his rage and fear on the monster. Sometimes all is takes is one moment in time to f*ck someone up forever, forever change how they see everyone and everything. Each character in Lies says stuff that may or may not be true, or they may not be able to do what they say they will.
We are fans who watch a show and because we are all human different things trigger us to either like or despise a character. Some are hated or loved more than others. So, at any given time some of us will want one character dead yet fail to see the failings of one we may prefer...just like in real life. Spike had a mother who loved him over all things, and he used that like a club to hit Wood with, but those words just may bite him in the ass because they are so ironic.....if he knows so damn much about Slayers then why is he still chasing Buffy? Slayers have a mission but the mission chose the girl not the other way around...so some may see Nikki as a bad mother, but I see her as a woman who got a sh*tty break. Robin's mom didn't live in luxury with only her son to dote upon, she had a mission to save the world...I don't think that makes her a bad mom as much as it makes her a tragic figure..she didn't choose, she was chosen. Take that thought onto Robin....he didn't choose the freakin mission either, he just loves and misses the mother he never really got to know. Spike, well Spike, he has spent years after the attention the vulgarians (reference to partygoers in Fool For Love)or the woman he desired didn't give him. His promise to his mother he kept, at the price of creating a monster. Giles, well Giles wants Buffy to survive but at what cost? The list is endless.
Every character has had highs and lows. It's what Anya said about forgiveness that sticks with me....everyone and I mean everyone...Buffy, Giles, Robin, Spike, Anya, Willow, Xander and more should have an equal chance at being forgiven or it all just means....blah diddy blah blah blah.
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Re: So, who do we forgive? -- Arethusa, 07:46:21 03/26/03 Wed
But Spike was right. Nikki chose the mission over her son. (Boring personal stuff follows.)
My father was a fireman and than a policeman (in Sunnyvale!). But my mom said that being a policeman wasn't exciting enough for him, and he wanted very much to fly airplanes. The only way he could afford to do that was join the air force. He chose to join at a time that war was heating up, undoubtedly feeling that the risks were worth the potential reward-life as an airline pilot. He lost the gamble, and I had to face the fact that instead of staying home safely with his rather immature wife and four small children, he wanted to fight. He felt it was his duty to fight evil and protect others.
(End boring personal stuff.)
As Spike said, Nikki could have quit. Faith did, when she couldn't bear being a killer any more. She could have not had the child, or given him up for adoption. Instead she chose to raise her child and fight evil, gambling that she would be able to protect them both. She lost, and Robin was left with that fact for the rest of his life. But it's nearly impossible to both hate and worship the center of your life, your mother. So Spike did everything he could to be the reverse of what VampMum called him, and Robin spent the rest of his life blaming and hunting vampires, for what they did as well as for his mother's choice. Spike finally forgave his mother. Even if Anne did resent him a bit-and what mother doesn't feel at times a little resentment for what she gives up to be a mother?-she loved him with all her heart, and Spike was able to forgive her actions. Robin still hasn't forgiven his mother, and is still a danger to Spike until he does.
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Re: Spike and Wood -- Malandanza, 09:19:59 03/26/03 Wed
"He was raised by his mother's Watcher, who, if he favors the other Watchers we've seen, isn't big into the emotional side of life. Crowley (was that his name?) raised a warrior, not a son."
I'll go a little further -- Crowley raised a tool for vengeance, not a warrior.
Remember in Fool for Love that Buffy cannot find any accounts of why the previous slayers died. Giles explains that the Watchers likely found it too painful to write down the final account of the slayer they had trained, sometimes since birth, and who died by their command. That Crowley was traumatized Nikki's death is clear from his subsequent resignation. My guess is that most of Wood's obsession with killing vampires was built carefully into his personality by a vengeful watcher obsessed with his own failure.
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Interesting -- Spike Lover, 10:55:32 03/26/03 Wed
You have a point.
Also, remember, what else Spike said in Fool for Love.
"She wanted it."
Even if it was subconscious. Nikki was ready for the mission to be over. So what was the betrayal? Not going into early retirement or surrendering?
Sorry, not explaining myself. It seems that after Spike left, N took Robin to the watcher and then WENT BACK OUT TO HUNT SPIKE. (And found him on the subway.) Maybe that is not the intention. But if it was, perhaps that was a betrayal, if she could have simply called it a night. Let Spike go- Regroup. Rest. Plan.
As I recall, Spike had specifically hunted the slayer. He was not behind a diabolical plan to end the world. He was like a young gunfighter who just can't resist calling out Wyatt Earp or whoever. He is after the thrill and rep of killing the slayer, and Nikki is glad to oblige him.
Seems to me, (if I have watched enough Westerns), she would have regrouped, planned, etc. But perhaps she was going thru her 'hunting' phase. The ole 'Get out of bed with Riley to go slaying' thing. Ditch the kid (meant in the gentlest terms) so that mom can "get her some".
Remember, tangling with a slayer is (almost) sexual with Spike. Sex and death and violence go hand in hand. If Nikki is at all like Buffy, she got off on it too.
So there is this element of dualling testosterone between Woods & Spike over Buffy, and a feeling of confronting your mom's last lover (who ended up treating her bad.) However, I do not know that Woods knows that it is sexual between vamps and slayers or Buff & Spike.
By the way, even though the vamped Anne was making all sorts of Oedipal type statements, I think she said it to hurt him so he would either kill her or leave her. I don't think she thought his devotion was a latent sexual desire on his part. (I think she knew just what buttons to push.--Kind of surprising. Would Angelus have turned his freshly vamped mother down?)
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Re: Interesting -- dream, 11:40:32 03/26/03 Wed
Re: Spike's Mom. I thought that too. Wish I had the script, but she does say something about wishing he had found a woman, because he wouldn't cut the apron strings on his own. In the midst of all that nastiness, I saw a hint of tough love. Momma knew all along that William's attachment to her wasn't healthy, but lacked the heart to force the issue. Newly vamped Mom is able to express her resentment and frustration with William, but I still got the impression that she wanted him to get free of her, not just her free of him. Could easily be read the other way, of course.
Also agree with your points about Wood and Nikki.
On an unrelated note, did anyone else find Giles' betrayal of Buffy almost physically painful? Or am I the only one with issues that large?
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Giles & Buff -- Spike Lover, 12:07:59 03/26/03 Wed
Pain? No. Pain for me is when the character does something so offbase I stop watching the ep and wonder what the writers are thinking.
But there was CONFUSION. I thought the conversation between them was not very clear. But if the purpose was distraction, then it might have made more sense. What does it mean when Giles says, 'Don't kill him yet?' For a moment, Buffy was clearly his puppet, which she really never has been.
I suppose he was trying to make her see that Spike could not be trusted, but I think there may be a latent fear of lack of control. Giles has heard the 'he has a soul' argument a lot. (Spike must have been right. Getting a soul was a shoe-in for getting on the right side of Buffy.)Anyway, If you will remember, a few seasons ago, it was Angel & I this and Angel and I that. A & B were a wall of action and a wall of decision making. Giles was not her ally, he was her adviser which she would disregard. Everyone wanted the pair to break up. Xan, Giles, and Joyce in particular. (Ok, maybe for different reasons.) (Ironically, Wesley never said much about it.)
I think Giles can deal with Buffy, and if necessary, he will take her out of the picture if that is what it takes to save the world. He actually would not hesitate to do it, if necessary. I think he thinks if Spike & Buffy bond, Buffy will become even more powerful. What are the chances he could take Buffy out and save the world, if Spike is defending her?
Wars are about alliances. And as Angel and Buffytvs shows reflect each other, remember that there has been lots of talk on Angel about the necessity of killing Angelus and losing Angel altogether if they could not find him or resoul him. You also know that what is messed up on Buffy is the hereditary line of slayers. If you kill Buffy or Faith, or both, it might straighten itself out again.
These are just a few thoughts, but If you read farther down this thread, you will find more commentary on this interaction.
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Re: there's parents, and then there's parents -- leslie, 12:32:00 03/26/03 Wed
"On an unrelated note, did anyone else find Giles' betrayal of Buffy almost physically painful? Or am I the only one with issues that large?"
Nope. In all the overwhelmingness of finally finding out what William's deal with his mother was, and Wood's deal with his mother, I think Buffy and her daddy issues have gotten lost by the wayside. Giles really did betray Buffy, and in a very condescending way. His entire spiel in the graveyard was that Buffy has to stop giving inspirational speeches and actually be a general, yet he is second-guessing her generalship right there. She has decided that she needs Spike, and whatever her feelings for him may be, she is completely right that he is the best warrior they have. Christ, look how long he has managed to survive without getting staked, with all the risks he takes, all the love he has of fighting out in the open--he isn't a vampire who has lurked in the shadows. But General Buffy's decision about who she needs in her army does not jibe with her Watcher's opinion, so he dismisses it as being based purely on love for Spike. If Buffy is the general, sorry, her decision has to be final; she can't have the troops second-guessing her.
I think the final shot of the episode, of Buffy closing her bedroom door in Giles's face, was pretty definitive and parallels, in an odd way, Spike's new understanding that his mother did, indeed, love him. Both have given up their reliance on the opinion and regard of their opposite-sex "parent" and made it clear that, for better or worse, they are independent adults--that they have free will. William goes back to his mother after he is vamped in the belief that he can make his happy childhood last forever now, without the fear that his mother will die. (Tangent--Anne appears to have tuberculosis--that's what the coughing up blood is generally a sign of--and many historical outbreaks of "vampirism" were actually the result of outbreaks of TB, with the first family member to die of the disease coming back to "claim" relatives who, in fact, had merely caught the disease from them. See Michael Bell's Food for the Dead and Paul Barber's Vampires, Burial, and Death. Are we supposed to see Anne's TB as an indication that it is she who is in fact the emotional vampire in this relationship?) Buffy going to the graveyard to train with Giles is, again, a return to the past, a recapitulation of the days when she needed to train with him, when he was her authority figure and trusted "father." But although she goes along, she already knows that this is a nostalgia trip more than real training--she knows that there isn't much else that he can teach her in terms of fighting vampires, and I got a sense that she went with him almost as a break, a chance to rebond with Giles in the midst of all this horror. And instead, he betrays her.
I also think it's interesting that the two who betray her in this episode are Buffy's "superiors." Giles is her Watcher, Wood is, at the end of the day, her boss. Her relationship with Wood has charted an interesting course--originally, he was just her boss, the guy who gave her a job when she really needed one. When he revealed that he was a Slayer's son, they moved to a relationship of equals, comrades-in-arms. Now Buffy is the General, and by the end of the episode, she has made it clear to Wood that she outranks him. There's more than just Wood's desire to avenge his mother going on here--the alliance between Giles and Wood is an alliance of male superiors who feel that their authority over The Girl is threatened by her increasing competence and power. It's also significant, I think, that Wood approaches Giles in his role as Buffy's Watcher. Like Wesley (at least in the beginning), he thinks that when the Watcher says "jump," the Slayer says "how high?" One thing that seems to be happening with Giles is that, whereas before he had been the renegade Watcher, with the demise of the Council, he seems to be taking over their role and their attitudes toward the Slayer. Buffy closing the door on him merely restates her "closing the door" on the Council, as she did at the end of S3, but this time, it is much more of a betrayal on his part.
I really wish that this episode had been shown in what obviously was the correct chronological order, on the night before Orpheus over on Angel. The contrast between Wesley's resumption of his Watcher role with Faith and Giles's with Buffy is very stark. There's also the deliberate parallelism of Angelus biting Faith and Spike biting Wood--neither completes their intention, but they are stopped for different reasons. Angelus is, well, spiked by the drug in Faith's blood, he is stopped while Spike stops himself--not, I think out of any generosity of heart but as an illustration to Wood of his own power and his control of that power--he can decide to kill Wood, and he can decide to change his mind in mid bite. That is a dangerous man, and a powerful warrior, one who is not going to lose his head in battle, one who is not going to go berserk.
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Great post. -- Sophist, 12:48:15 03/26/03 Wed
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Echoing Sophist. -- HonorH, 12:59:53 03/26/03 Wed
Lots of chewy goodness here, and I think you've nailed the Buffy/Giles dynamic in this episode perfectly.
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Great post indeed -- dream, 13:28:27 03/26/03 Wed
Fabulous catch on the TB issue - I understood that that was what Spike's mom was supposed to have, but had forgotten completely the connection with vampirism. I see the Giles and Wood thing exactly as you do, but of course there's no emotional resonance with Wood. It's seeing Giles regressing that hurts so much. I would like that investigated a bit further before the series ends - really, what I would like to see is regret on Giles' part. I do think that some of Giles' attitude is understandable (though not excusable) if you consider that a) he hasn't been around Buffy for a while, b) she wasn't very effective in the last (Willow) apocalypse and c) he is the last Watcher and may feel a greater connection to the Council in his grief and anger than he did when he was the renegade.
There's another element at play here. Giles may be willing to look beyond black and white with demons, now that he has been exposed to Anya, Angel, etc. But his paternal feelings for Buffy may expose his lingering prejudices. How many people do you know who don't seem racist in the slightest - until their children start dating someone of another race? Buffy's older than when she was with Angel; Spike may feel like more of a threat. I thought it was interesting that Giles brought up Angel at all in the graveyard - surely there would be no need to if he only concern were for possibility that Spike might turn dangerous.
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Excellent post. -- deeva, 13:44:03 03/26/03 Wed
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Closing doors -- Dichotomy, 15:18:51 03/26/03 Wed
Great observations! I really can't add much (as usual) but I did see another dimension to the final scene. You said: "Buffy closing the door on him merely restates her "closing the door" on the Council, as she did at the end of S3, but this time, it is much more of a betrayal on his part."
This scene also made me think of the final scene in "Crush," when Buffy shuts the door in Spike's face after he chains her up to try to prove his love and make her admit her love for him. She didn't appreciate this misguided and unwelcome proof of love any more than she appreciated Giles' misguided and unwelcome assistance. Giles essentially tried to force Buffy to accept a decision she wasn't willing to make, as Spike tried to force Buffy to admit her attraction to him.
This is especially interesting because, as we know, Buffy was indeed attracted to Spike in some way (whether we think it was physical, romantic or just her way of "feeling alive") and the consequences of her acting on this attraction were not entirely beneficial.
So will we see her denial of Giles' attempts to do what he thinks is best come back to haunt her or will she come to believe he's right, her denial changing to an opposite action? I'm not sure, but those two scenes seemed so similar to me, that it just couldn't be coincidence, could it?
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Re: Closing doors -- leslie, 16:34:54 03/26/03 Wed
The main difference I see here is that Spike knew he had done something wrong and was trying to talk himself out of it when Buffy closed him out, and Giles still seems to think that he is in the right. Also, Spike literally could not get back in because Willow had recharmed the house, whereas Giles could easily open that door all by himself by admitting he stepped over the bounds. I think it's significant that it was Buffy's bedroom door (wasn't it?), too--William killed his mother because she made sexual advances to him (no matter how much she hurt him verbally, that was what pushed him over the edge), and Buffy closing Giles out of her bedroom also seems to hint at some sense of telling him to get the f*ck out of her sex life as well.
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Re: Closing doors -- Caroline, 20:21:04 03/26/03 Wed
I agree - shutting the door of the house on Spike said get out of my life completely, shutting the door of the bedroom on Giles says stay out of my personal life.
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Disagree -- Darby, 08:02:32 03/27/03 Thu
I thought that the whole point was that Buffy's decision regarding Spike was not personal. Giles just can't let loose of the conviction that it is, and I don't think that the evidence says that he can't be right. It doesn't seem that Buffy has really done a cost-benefit analysis of Spike - she looks at how he can help them, while Giles and Wood look at how he could hurt them.
And without Wood's intervention in the Cavern of Crosses, Spike might just have been the deciding factor in a victory for the First. He may yet still be, as Buffy may be forced into a Giftlike decision after investing so much in sparing him. My personal feeling is that the whole season is building to that sort of decision.
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Well there's the question -- ponygirl, 08:40:18 03/27/03 Thu
It doesn't seem that Buffy has really done a cost-benefit analysis of Spike - she looks at how he can help them, while Giles and Wood look at how he could hurt them.
What is the morality of executing a person not for what he has done (Spike's past crimes are an issue but they don't seem to be the issue) but for what he may do? In a way Spike's trigger was the equivalent to the SITs calling - each of them has the Potential to become a very powerful force for the other side - Giles' consent to remove Spike was not so very different from the FE sending the Bringers after the Potentials. Eliminate the threat before it is a threat - it makes sense strategically, but when the enemy you are fighting is the evil within such actions don't seem like the path to victory.
We've seen Buffy make the hard decisions before, she sacrificed her love for Angel when duty demanded it, faced with a similar choice in the Gift she sacrificed herself. Why does Giles doubt her now? If it comes down to another situation of personal sacrifice for the greater good, is the third time really going to be the charm? Maybe Buffy needs to find another way.
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Re: Disagree -- Caroline, 08:40:43 03/27/03 Thu
That's not what I was saying in my original post but I think you are completely wrong. If you focus on what has happened rather than speculation about the future, you will see that the situation between Spike and Buffy is personal. The mission is important, but Spike is more than the mission to her.
Buffy is in denial about her feelings for Spike, they are still unresolved, and she is using the importance of the mission and Spike's importance to the mission to justify her protection of him. She already told him that she's not ready for him to not be here - something that has nothing to do with the mission. She untied him after the worm incident even when Giles and Wood argued against it, saying that the trigger was still active and even knowing from Andrew that the FE still has plans for Spike. Buffy may say that it's about the mission but her actions belie her words. Just like the situation with Dawn - she says she won't sacrifice herself for Dawn yet at the end of the show, she's in Dawn's bedroom, caressing her face. I doubt Buffy would sacrifice her, no matter what she said to Giles in the cemetery.
By shutting the door in Giles' face, Buffy is telling him that she makes her own decisions, but that he can still be around to fight the fight. I'd be more concerned if she shut the front door on him in the same way she did with Spike in S5.
I think that if Buffy is all about the mission, she will lose. She will become a slayer like Kendra, whereas her emotions have always given her power. They have to be her real, authentic emotions and perspective, not the ones that Giles or anyone else is trying to feed her. In a dream earlier this season, Joyce told Buffy to wake up. Buffy is not yet awake but hopefully she soon will be.
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Viewpoint Needed... (WKCS mentioned) -- imp, 15:44:44 03/27/03 Thu
Hi Caroline! I know next to nothing about psychology and psychoanalysis--its history, philosophies, etc. But I wanted to get your take on something I've been thinking about for some time but am now not able to post to your earlier William/Spike thread.
Since I am a regular lurker on this board I've read a number of posts/essays regarding Buffy and her shadow selves--namely Spike and WKCS. Now, I am about to butcher my post with my ill-formed ideas but here goes: Spike represents certain "masculine" aspects about Buffy's psyche--correct? WKCS represents aspects of Buffy's psyche from the other side of the gender coin--correct?
Many posters have been commenting for a long time that Buffy needs to integrate her shadow self (selves), to accommodate (?) her darker tendencies. What are your thoughts regarding her treatment of Spike this year, particularly from Sleeper onward? One of my takeaways from LMPTM was that Buffy appears to be quite comfortable being around and interacting with Spike. She also takes up for him when Giles wants to proceed with his questioning during the basement scene where Spike had to be restrained.
Psychologically speaking, what do make of the imagery presented in this scene? Do you see Buffy unwilling to have her shadow self contained/chained up? Throughout the episode (and for most of this season to date) do you see her dealing with Spike-as-shadow-self better than ever?
What are your thoughts regarding Buffy's upcoming interactions with WKCS? I personally think there will be an initial period of awkwardness and distancing, but after that, the optimist in me thinks Buffy will be able to forge some kind of reconciliation with WKCS.
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Fantastic Post! You nailed it. Agree completely. -- shadowkat, 20:21:31 03/26/03 Wed
See my post to Caroline above where I shamelessly quote you because I think this post should be up there as well.
This is truly amazing leslie. You nailed it and you did it eloquently.
Here's some metanarration to back you up:
1. Helpless - Giles attempts to control Buffy through drugs, the evil vampire wants to kill her to resolve his mother issues and the Council has set her and Mom up in order to get Buffy to pass their test. Giles betrays her, but his compassion for Buffy redeems him.
2. Angel S1 - Giles believes Buffy should kill Angel. Buffy chooses not to.
3. Revelations S3 - Giles believes Buffy killed Angel and is upset she kept his reappearence from him
4. The Gift S5 - Giles kills Ben, advises Buffy to kill Dawn
5. Spiral S5 - Giles argues with Buffy for including Spike into the mix
Other odd metanarrative points:
Dr. Gull - according to someone on another board stands for Dr. William Gull - physician to Queen Victoria who may have also been Jack The Ripper according to Alan Moore's well know comic From Hell - made into Johnny Depp/Uma Thurman film of same name.
Crowely (Nikki's watcher)- also the surrname of Aliester Crowley, the dark prince of the occult world, mentioned in the movie Ghostbusters and in the comic Promethea.
Wood has been saved ironically enough at least 6 times by Spike: 2 times in Him from Buffy herself, once in First Date sort of from the she demon, once in Get it Done (when the beast attacks), once in Storyteller - in the school from rampaging kids, and once in LMPTM from a vampire.
Wood has NOT saved anyone's life, with possible exception of cutting Xander down. Nor proven himself to be that wonderful in a fight. Interesting choice on part of the writers.
Giles dream in Restless - yes I know Atltr - but, watch the dream again - in it : a) Giles seeing Buffy as a child that he can hypnotize and control and leave at will to do his own thing, b) Giles comment to Spike that he always thought Buffy should have killed him and seeing Spike as nothing more than a black and white villain, c) card-board vampires that Buffy must knock down and his only teaching? You need to stop dropping your elbow. d) When he sees the primal behind Buffy, it flusters him and he doesn't know what to make of it - it, the First Slayer, scalps him.
Giles is a bit like Professor Henry Higgins - all he can do is teach moves, his books, all his knowledge - not helpful.
The student has moved past the teacher. We see it again in
the school - with Giles' rant about the library being filled with computers and no books. Time has moved past him. He wears the same jacket. The same clothes. He has not changed. Yet ironically - he brings the one thing that can shine a light on Spike's problem - but he remains incapable of seeing how it works - he needs to elicit Willow's help to do that spell and unable to find out what's going on with Spike - he makes assumptions and decides to just kill him - the black and white villain.
Some additional points-
1. Wood/giles want to control the girl. They think by killing Spike they can. They also want to protect the poor deluded girl from herself. Over-protective father again.
By shutting the door on Giles and letting Wood know she does not support him - Buffy shoots down that figure, finally.
2. The whole Wood/Spike thing is interesting as well. I find it particularly interesting what Spike tries to convey to Wood: which is NOT that Wood's mother never loved him but that his mother didn't make him the center of her world. Not that she should have. But Wood as both child and man, did not understand that. As he clearly states: "She was my whole world". Why couldn't I be her's?? And he clearly blames Spike the vampire not the man for taking her away from him - not just in death, no that's not it. It's more than that. If it weren't for creatures like Spike, Wood thinks, he would have had his Mother all to himself. Wood competes Oedipally with the vampires for his mother's attention. You can see it in that opening scene with both Nikki then later with Buffy. He even asks his mother to just spend time with him - to play instead of going after the vampires, but Nikki tells him the mission must come first. This is reminiscent of Buffy with Dawn in S6, where Buffy must put slaying first but by S7 does bring Dawn along at times, makes Dawn a solider - of course Dawn is 15/16 while Wood was 4. I think Spike is correct when he points out that Wood's anger towards him is somewhat missplaced anger that he has towards his mother and slayers in general - why couldn't she have put him before the Mission? This is a common complaint of children with working mothers. Because, Spike tells him, she had a mission that was bigger than you - that's bigger than us all - that's how it is being chosen, deal.
It's so ironic, because the whole time Wood is beating up Spike - he is telling Spike that Spike never cared for or loved anyone, that he just careened through life. Truth is - Spike did care for someone - his mother and Drusilla and buffy and Dawn and Joyce. While Wood has really only cared for his mother. The irony is that Wood has had to make Spike into a heartless animal - a disease - in order to justify his vendetta. This is very similar to Holtz in Angel, who can't let go of the monster. Holtz ignores the whole soul thing - he wants the monster to justify his vendetta. And Holtz also holds misplaced anger - in Holtz's case - he loses his family because he chose to hunt vampires and the guilt he feels is projected as an obsession. Most obsessions come from inverted anger that can't be expressed either at ourselves or the loved one that is dead.
Again very good post leslie. Hope I added a little to it. I missed you and have been impatiently waiting to see what you thought of the episode. Your post and Caroline's above made my day.
SK
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Re: Fantastic Post! You nailed it. Agree completely. -- Rufus, 00:04:15 03/27/03 Thu
Dr. Gull - according to someone on another board stands for Dr. William Gull - physician to Queen Victoria who may have also been Jack The Ripper according to Alan Moore's well know comic From Hell - made into Johnny Depp/Uma Thurman film of same name.
I have the movie on DVD and the book....notice the use of Alan Moore in a few occasions now....borrowing from Promethea for the Slayer mythos and the Uber-Slayer in Primevil, now a bit of From Hell in the Victorian backstory for Spike. ....there is also an ongoing Yoko Factor at work through this whole season by the First using everyones fears and desires work to it's advantage. Pretty soon you may think of another movie when it comes to Buffy....;)
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Gads, 'Restless'! -- HonorH, 00:38:02 03/27/03 Thu
"You have to stop thinking . . . This is the way women and men have behaved since the beginning," Giles says as he swings a watch in front of Buffy's face. The Shadowmen, the CoW--it's always been this way, the men controlling the women "since the beginning," doing their thinking for them while the women go out and kick ass. Aah! This show is frugging BRILLIANT!
As usual, you blow my mind, s'kat. You and Leslie just made my day.
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Re: Gads, 'Restless'! -- Dariel, 08:10:47 03/27/03 Thu
Great points, Leslie, s'kat, HonorH. The men controlling the women. Maybe that's why even the term "chosen one" grates so, at least to me. As we saw in (7.16?) the girl is forced, not chosen. The whole "chosen one," "the slayer is alone," bit itself is a patriarchal framework. One that Buffy has always struggled with.
Why can't the CoW get itself a team of 5 big men to do the slaying? Because they couldn't control them, or perhaps because cooperation is a feminine attribute?
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'Cooperation is a feminine attribute'?? -- Darby, 05:27:01 03/28/03 Fri
I was going to start of with, "in lions, maybe!" but even that isn't true.
If it was true, we'd be watching scores of women in Iraq right now. Heck, even vampire males, big horny teen male metaphors that they are, often nest and hunt together.
I agree that male-female control issues are embedded in the metaphor of the Slayer, but the actual backstory, I think, has some other twist to explain "Why teen-age girls?"
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Re: 'Cooperation is a feminine attribute'?? -- auroramama, 20:53:32 03/29/03 Sat
Well, if you're limiting the sphere of action to fighting and killing, men do more cooperating because they do more, period. Traditionally, women have both cooperated and competed within the sphere of activities alloted them, just like men. I don't think cooperation per se is a gendered attribute.
But I agree that "why teenage girls" isn't because they're cooperative. I'm thinking: girls because they seem weaker, more controllable, inferior, to traditional males; teenage girls because that's when men traditionally took an interest in controlling female potential. The first Slayer was forced to marry demonic power by the men who controlled her, and they chained her down to make sure the marriage was consummated, to serve their purposes.
auroramama
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Re: Gads, 'Restless'! -- Gyrus, 20:12:26 03/27/03 Thu
"You have to stop thinking . . . This is the way women and men have behaved since the beginning," Giles says as he swings a watch in front of Buffy's face. The Shadowmen, the CoW--it's always been this way, the men controlling the women "since the beginning," doing their thinking for them while the women go out and kick ass.
Too right. And let's not forget Buffy's response to that statement -- she laughs. The whole situation is artificial and absurd, and she knows it.
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Re: Fantastic Post! You nailed it. Agree completely. -- leslie, 10:31:31 03/27/03 Thu
Ah, work has been a massive bitch and I barely managed to read 1/3 of the avatars thread and never had a chance to weigh in there. You want to know the ironic thing? The first fifteen minutes of the episode I have actually only seen, couldn't hear what was being said, because ... my mother called me just as the show started. (I've got it on tape and with luck will be able to watch it today.)
I think the interesting thing about the way Giles is behaving is just how much he is becoming the Council, despite his awareness of how clueless the actual Council was. And he is really the only one (aside from Wesley, now operating in the alternate WB universe) who truly knows the Council and how it works--he's the one who knows them on their own turf. Buffy and Faith have only known them as distant powers who occasionally drop in and screw things up. Giles is also, arguably, the one who has been most poorly treated by the Council--not just endangered, as Buffy has been, but humiliated (do you think it was purely a coincidence that they chose to send a prig like the original Wesley to replace him as Buffy's Watcher?) and stripped of his income; he was in the classic postition of the man in the field being ignored by the brass back home, which numbers among the most frustrating positions in the world.
And yet, the instant the Council is destroyed, Giles appears to--perhaps almost unconsciously--adopt some of their worst traits, chief among them being the tendency to value their own, abstract opinions over the experiences of the persons actually doing the work. Buffy may be getting carried away in her self-perception as Motivational Speaker to the Stars (or at least SITs), but Giles is equally carried away by, perhaps, the feeling that now he can get it done the way it should be done. Perhaps Giles is subject to some hubris as the guy who managed to deflect Darth Rosenberg when all her little friends couldn't?
The thing is, the relationship between Buffy and Giles has changed, and in a way he does not seem to realize. Why is he bringing all these SITs to Sunnydale? Yes, that's where the Hellmouth is, that's where the problem is going to arise that they need to deal with, that is where the Slayer--at least, the only one who isn't behind bars--is available to train and protect them. But he is not there as Buffy's Watcher. As I pointed out with the changing status relationship between Buffy and Wood--which is easier to see because it has happened in a much shorter time frame--Buffy has gone from being a subordinate to an equal--Giles brings the SITs to her because she is necessary to train them in a way that he cannot, she can protect them in a way that he cannot, the two of them are, initially, co-sponsors of the SITs. Now Buffy is the General, and she outranks him, but he does not seem to realize this; for all his insistence that Buffy needs to stand on her own two feet, now that she is actually doing it, he can't adjust to the change in their relationship; he may not even realize (until this episode) that there has been a change.
This is where I think Buffy's need for Spike really surfaces. The two of them fight extremely well as a team, but he is completely secure with himself in allowing Buffy to be the leader, the planner. Watching Older and Far Away on FX last night really reinforced that--Spike and Buffy are fast approaching the train wreck of their relationship, they are personally squabbling and at odds, but as soon as there's a demon to fight, they're in action together, she's delegating him to look after Dawn, he's the one she relies on to back her up...they are the grown-ups in the bunch (closely followed by Tara).
Maybe Buffy was wrong to stop Spike's "cure" where she did and trust that it would all turn out okay; maybe she should have been willing to push him further when he refused to get into the source of the trigger (maybe she was afraid of what was going to come out of that turgid unconscious of his). On the other hand, maybe she was right to trust that it would come out of its own accord, triggered by something in the environment (whoever ended up playing the song to him) and that he would be able to overcome it. While Spike may have been externally resisting acknowledging the source of the trigger, it was coming to consciousness inside him before Wood brought him to the "sanctuary." As I understand psychotherapy, when the things you've buried in the unconscious are ready to come up, they come up; the mind finds something in the environment to bring it up.
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Giles, Spike. -- Darby, 05:40:18 03/28/03 Fri
I think that, although there have only been glimpses of it, Giles has been, when not on retrieval missions, also involved with training the protos. It would make sense, since he has all of that juicy expositional knowledge that made him such a valuable character for all of those bygone seasons. I do think, from the glimpses, that the writers see him doing this, as being a Dumbledore, an equivalent to Buffy but serving a different role. Giles has a right to expect this to be a strategic collaboration, even if in the field Buffy takes the control and responsibility - that Giles doesn't seem to be up to the task anymore wouldn't necessarily be obvious to him. He feels that, as has long been the case, the actual planning should be done collectively, including the selection or exclusion of players, and he's not wrong, as Buffy should have learned in Prophecy Girl.
On the subject of Spike, one point that no one has brought up is that, once it was obvious that the trigger was still active, they needed Spike chained because at any moment, the First could have appeared just to him, hummed the little ditty and set him off like a hand grenade. There's no way he should have been loose until they were sure the trigger had been neutralized.
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You're not the only one. It made my stomach knot. -- Ixchel, 18:34:59 03/26/03 Wed
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how much difference did the soul make in that scene? (spoilers for LMPTM) -- anom, 12:19:28 03/28/03 Fri
"Same with Spike. Just because he has a soul now doesn't mean the killer within is gone....
Just an aside, but I really didn't like Spike's attitude about killing Nikki. It's one thing for Spike to say it's just the way the game is played when he was simply another soulless vampire. But now he has a soul -- shouldn't he realise that Nikki's death is, oh I dunno, kinda really his fault? Because it is his fault."
Y'know, now that I think about it, it's hard to tell what difference it made that Spike had a soul in much of that scene. Maybe that's what was keeping him from fighting back until he finished resolving his Mommy-demonest (OK, reaching there, trying to pun on Mommy Dearest) issues, but everything he said & did after that sounded like stuff he'd've said & done without the soul. The only difference I can see is that he let Wood live. He told Buffy it was because he'd killed Nikki, but the soul could've given him qualms regardless of that.
Scroll opened with "Specifically, I think Buffy and Spike don't really have a grasp on what the soul (and lack of same) means to a vampire." I think that's right, but there's another side to it (not that it negates the side Scroll's talking about). Where they may be deluding themselves is that they both seem to think Spike, w/the soul, really could kill Wood. Or maybe 1 or both of them want Wood to think Spike might kill him, to keep him in line...or something.
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My new favourite quote (Spoilers, Lies My Parents Told me) -- Rahael, 03:15:54 03/26/03 Wed
"Anya: DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME DOWN THAT ROAD. SPIKE'S GOT SOME SORT OF "GET OUT OF JAIL FREE CARD" THAT DOESN'T APPLY TO THE REST OF US. I MEAN, HE COULD SLAUGHTER 100 FRAT BOYS, AND...FORGIVENESS MAKES US HUMAN. BLAHDIDDY, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH."
Hahahhaha! Did Anya say this? I love it! I love the ep for this alone. Just this part, particularly "forgiveness makes us human. Blahdiddy, blah, blah".
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Yes, it's what she said but it's the outfit she wears that may make you forget it....;) -- Rufus, 03:29:25 03/26/03 Wed
I take notes and use the Closed Caption.
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The hat was cute, the top was cute, just not together! -- ponygirl, 08:45:37 03/26/03 Wed
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Spike and Buffy. Spoilers for Lies my Parents Told Me -- Darby, 06:01:00 03/26/03 Wed
One would have to assume that Spike, with this new history, would never consider siring Buffy. Hell, she's nasty enough to him without a demon helping her find the words.
And a Slayer who takes her child on patrol, where he executes strategic distractions, has a very strange parental thing going on. Did she figure that when she went, she wanted Robin to go with her - like Spike and Mommy? It was just dumb luck that when Spike did kill her, Robin wasn't there as dessert.
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The old saying is still true. -- CW, 06:23:00 03/26/03 Wed
Sometimes you just can't find a sitter when you need one.
Besides there is no reason to assume that Nikki actually took Robin on patrol. Nikki may have been taking him someplace to have him looked after when Spike appeared.
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Re: Spike and Buffy. Spoilers for Lies my Parents Told Me -- Silky, 07:21:36 03/26/03 Wed
I thought, from the dialogue, that Spike had been looking for Nikki. She said to Robin, that they couldn't go home because it wasn't safe anymore - the implication being that Spike knew where they lived. So, I don't think Nikki took Robin along on patrol, but that she was with Robin (for whatever reason) when Spike attacked.
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Re: Spike and Buffy. Spoilers for Lies my Parents Told Me -- Darby, 07:42:48 03/26/03 Wed
Could be, but the kicking over of the trashcan was not accidental - Nikki congratulated Robin on doing some rehearsed strategy. Maybe it was for rare times that they were together and she was attacked, but I like the resonance of the possibility that, on some level, she put him habitually into a situation where they would go together. What's the alternative - leave her baby in a world of demons without her protection? I even wonder if the rain (an involved production issue, so there for a reason) was there specifically to give her a reason to send Robin away when she goes off to her death - without the danger of pneumonia, he would have accompanied her down into the subway.
On a related note, in Fool for Love, Nikki is specifically used as an example of a Slayer with a Deathwish, lacking Buffy's "ties to the world." It was just Spike's perception, but seems to have become canonical. Maybe in her heart Nikki saw the world as unfit for mother or son.
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Could be that Nikki was with Robin often, as a lot of mothers of young children tend to be. -- Finn Mac Cool, 08:57:46 03/26/03 Wed
So, being attacked when he was with her probably wasn't that unusual, if they spent a lot of time together, and the trashcan thing was probably something she taught him for when those situations arose.
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Re: Could be that Nikki was with Robin often, as a lot of mothers of young children tend to be. -- Mystery, 09:33:04 03/26/03 Wed
By her saying that the house wasn't safe anymore, made me think that maybe she was trying to get him to Crowley's where it was safe. I'm thinking that someone might have accidently invited Spike into Nikki and Robin's home. Because otherwise, why wouldn't Robin be safe there?
Yeah, the garbage can thing might have been rehearsed, but I don't see much difference between that and the way Buffy would sometimes command and coach Dawn, or teaching a grade schooler to never take candy from a stranger. Nikki's job as the Slayer made Robin's reality a little harsher than even that of a normal inner city kid. At that age, he could have easily been taken and used as bait, so I actually agree with her for teaching him some tactics. It helps keep him alive and safe. Just like Buffy finally accepted that she needed to teach Dawn to fight. Granted Robin was only 4, but technically, Dawn's 2 or 3. :-) I wonder if Nikki's lesson to Robin were similar to Buffy and Dawn in Lessons?
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She congratulated him for staying down and quiet. -- V, 19:27:28 03/26/03 Wed
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Are these the most reasonable conclusions? (Spoilers for Lies my Parents Told Me) -- Robert, 13:01:55 03/26/03 Wed
>>> And a Slayer who takes her child on patrol, where he executes strategic distractions, has a very strange parental thing going on. Did she figure that when she went, she wanted Robin to go with her - like Spike and Mommy? It was just dumb luck that when Spike did kill her, Robin wasn't there as dessert.
On the basis of one short scene, you appear to conclude;
(1) that Nikki was on patrol,
(2) that Nikki routinely took Robin with her on patrol,
(3) that Nikki trained Robin to fight with her,
(4) that Nikki wanted Robin to die with her.
There is nothing in this scene to dispute such conclusions, but I see such conclusions as extremely cynical. I don't think that we know whether Nikki was on patrol or not. Spike was pretty clear that he sought out Nikki, not the other way. I certainly don't think that we know that Nikki routinely takes Robin on patrol, only that she trained him well on what to do if vampires ever attacked.
It is true that Robin distracted Spike (though I think that tactical would be a better description), but it wasn't the distraction for which Nikki praised Robin. She praised him for hiding, and staying hidden, when the vampire attacked. The distraction may have been inspired, or it may have been a stumble of shock -- we don't know. I don't believe that we can conclude that Nikki specifically trained Robin to perform such maneuvers.
And finally, just how do you conclude that Nikki wanted Robin to die with her? That goes beyond cynical. There are some parents who are truly mentally diseased, who want death for their children. They, thankfully, are few and far between. There is nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, in this scene to suggest that Nikki had a death wish for Robin.
Nikki's only mistake (if such could be said at all) was in keeping the child in the first place. She couldn't completely shield Robin from her mission and its consequential collateral damage, any more than Buffy could shield Dawn. Nikki loved Robin so much that she couldn't bear to give him up, so she attempted to give him the tools to maximize his chances of survival. Some might suggest that Nikki was selfish for not giving up the child. I would suggest that safety is completely relative.
What one person considers an acceptible risk for their child may be considered negligence by the next person. If I were to have a child today, I wouldn't even consider risking the child with the public school system. I detest public schools for the way they treated me, my wife, and my step daughter. And yet, millions of parents see no problem with sending their children. So, what does it mean to keep your child safe? What level of risk constitutes safety? Was Nikki a bad person for attempting to raise a child? If so, who gets to draw the line?
I stand in awe in the diverse reactions people can take from a simple scene such as this. I saw a metaphor for the single mother who was trapped by circumstance, trying to do the best for the child she loved in a world which is giving her no good choices. Spike is a teller of lies of the worst sort, and he always has been (The Yoko Factor for instance). He uses truths to tell his lies. It is true that Nikki didn't give up the mission in favor of Robin, but she understood that she could not give up the mission. There was only one slayer and she was it. In order to call a new slayer to replace her, she would have to die. If she quit, then there would be no slayer to protect the world. Nikki was screwed by circumstance, and yet it appears that Nikki still gets the blame -- compassion be damned.
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Spike, Slayers, and Quitting -- Solitude1056, 15:56:52 03/26/03 Wed
It is true that Nikki didn't give up the mission in favor of Robin, but she understood that she could not give up the mission. There was only one slayer and she was it. In order to call a new slayer to replace her, she would have to die. If she quit, then there would be no slayer to protect the world. Nikki was screwed by circumstance, and yet it appears that Nikki still gets the blame -- compassion be damned.
I knew there was something else I couldn't remember, that bugged me after the show. Spike tells Robin something along the lines of "if your mother truly loved you, she'd give b[being the Slayer] up" or some such. That whole list I posted, and I spaced on that one line - yes. You're right. Spike was twisting things most deliberately - or alternately, the Goddard/Fury combo was ignoring the reality of only death ending the gig. Nikki never had the option of "giving it up" and doing something different.
For Spike to even suggest such a thing would mean that we're supposed to believe one of the following:
1. Spike momentarily forgot there's only one Slayer, and no Slayer gets to holler Pass and let the next girl take over.
2. Spike figured Robin wasn't aware that Slayer's jobs end only when Slayer dies.
3. Spike figured Robin knew, but wanted to torment Robin with a fact that both knew was patently false. (Huh?)
4. The writers were hoping we wouldn't notice, just so we'd get the punch of Slayer Mom = Not Really Loving Mom.
In some ways, Spike's Stay-at-Home mom seemed to get the benefit ("she loves me; it was only the demon saying bad things") while Robin's Working mom got shafted. So to speak. Just what kind of commentary is that? After all, this puts some serious writer-perspective comments down on the side of Buffy-as-Working-Mom. Is the underlying slant that Buffy's stint, as Slayer, somehow means she loves Dawn less now than she would if she were non-working Sister/Mom? Am I the only one reading this as a subtle statement, with Spike as mouthpiece, that:
- Working Moms don't love their children (or, don't love their children enough to be full-time Moms)
- Stay-at-home Moms will always love you unless you vamp them out and then they'll be all mean and sexy on you
Yeeech. Just thinking about the undercurrents gives me hives.
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I think you are reading too much into Spike's statements. -- Robert, 09:14:00 03/27/03 Thu
>>> Is the underlying slant that Buffy's stint, as Slayer, somehow means she loves Dawn less now than she would if she were non-working Sister/Mom?
Not in Buffy's case. Faith was worse than no slayer at all. Buffy could not reasonably turn the slayer duties over to Faith. This may change with Faith's current path to redemption. As far as the working/wage earning part of Buffy's life, that was less metaphorical. If she didn't bring home a paycheck, then she would lose the house and, ultimately, Dawn. Buffy was constrained by circustances as much as (any maybe even more than) Nikki.
>>> Am I the only one reading this as a subtle statement, with Spike as mouthpiece, that:
>>> - Working Moms don't love their children (or, don't love their children enough to be full-time Moms)
>>> - Stay-at-home Moms will always love you unless you vamp them out and then they'll be all mean and sexy on you
Spike was doing what Spike does best -- destroying people's self-respect with lies and half-truths. And, he was not particularly subtle about it. He attempted to hurt Robin in ways far worse than a mere physical beating. Spike however was not the messenger of the writer's moral lessons. Let us not forget, that Spike's prior actions were the source of Robin's pain.
On the other hand, Spike does put into words the feelings some people have. That being "if you love your children, you will find a way to stay home with them." If this is true, then it should apply just as much to fathers as to mothers. Unfortunately, circumstances don't allow most of us to stay at home with our children. Besides, it is all bull shit, and this (I believe) is exactly the point being made in this episode.
If the behavior of grown children has any corrolation with how much the parents loved and cared for their children, then look at the results. Spike goes on a century's long killing spree which included two slayers, apparently just because his mother (whom he sired) was mean and nasty. Robin goes on a decade's long dusting spree to eliminate vampires (the enemy of humankind), because he lost his mother to Spike in a tragic brutal battle for survival. So, who gets the moral highground? Who is more screwed up? William's mother may have loved him more, but she ended up with a son who had about as much emotional backbone as an unbaked loaf of bread.
Sometimes that greater love of your children is to tell them the truth. William's mother may have loved her son so much that she really didn't mind the terrible poetry, maybe even enjoyed it. But, she still knew that it was bad, and how others would react to it. She did William no favor by leading him on. She set him up for tragic failure and heartbreak.
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Yes!!! -- Rahael, 14:13:06 03/27/03 Thu
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I guess it didn't come through that I was being mildly facetious. -- Solitude1056, 20:08:14 03/27/03 Thu
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Re: I guess it didn't come through that I was being mildly facetious. -- Solitude1056, 20:17:25 03/27/03 Thu
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I agree with both of you at the same time -- Rahael, 00:32:19 03/28/03 Fri
I've been a little open-jawed at current interpretations of that scene - you articulated my fears, Robert articulated my hopes. Both of you did so very satisfactorily.
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I am afraid not, though ... -- Robert, 13:16:12 03/28/03 Fri
facetiousness and sarcasm are always risky in small postings such as these. The reason I thought you were serious is that I read one of your previous postings where you indicated that you disliked this episode.
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Going back to season 2 -- Mystery, 08:58:34 03/28/03 Fri
When Spike first came on the scene, he told Buffy the that last Slayer he killed (which was Nikki) begged for her life. It seems to go against the Death Wish he claimed she had in season 5, but you can still have a death wish and beg to live if you have someone you need to live for. Buffy wanted to stay dead most of season 6 but she still fought and in the end she decided she wanted to live, to show Dawn what the world is all about.
Nikki could have wanted to die because it's a way to end the mission, BUT that doesn't mean she wanted to abandon Robin.
I also got the impression that her and Robin's home wasn't safe. It's a residence, why wouldn't it be a sanctuary to them? Perhaps because a deadly vampire got invited in? Nikki might have been running to Crowley's to get Robin to safety...Also, it seems that it's fairly well established that Nikki had a son, family. How many times has Joyce or Dawn or hell, any of the Scoobies been taken hostage as bait for Buffy? If I were in Nikki's shoes, I'd think that Robin would have more of a chance at surviving under my protection then if I tried to hide him.
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Nikki and patrol... -- Rufus, 16:45:46 03/26/03 Wed
Listen to what Spike says....he had been searching out Nikki for a long time...did it ever occur to you that Nikki may not have been on "patrol" at all? Again I go back to the fact that Nikki is on a mission that she never chose but chose her. What does one do when they suddenly know about a segment of life they never to that point knew about? The chosen one is chosen and they are it til they die, there is no passing the septre to someone else. We don't know when Nikki was called and it very well may have been after Robin was born. So, to judge Nikki in a way that makes her the villian for walking outside at night with her son, maybe or maybe not on patrol excuses the actions of Spike who was clearly stalking her.
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Are we being deafened by the anvil chorus? (Speculation towards finale) -- AurraSing, 08:44:47 03/26/03 Wed
Wonderful work,Rufus! Who needs sleep,eh?
Time and time we have had it beaten into us this year that Buffy may well end up facing the FE on her own (whether through decimation of her troops or personal choice),that Spike is a flawed but highly skilled asset that could cause her much grief,that Buffy may need to make some sort of decision about Dawn,that Buffy has to be hard on those around her in order to win this war,yadda,yadd,yadda.
I'm wondering if ME has some particular reason for drumming this series of ideas into us all throughout the season? Are they trying to show us that Buffy will come to one all-consuming,apocalyptic battle in which she does have to face all the fears she has been supressing about Spike's nature,her small army of SIT's,Dawn and whether or not she'll have to make the ultimate sacrifice yet again??
Or is ME playing a mind game on us? Could the constant banging of anvils regarding Spike,Buffy being alone and the possible demise,etc be just a massive smoke-screen designed to obscure a far different resolution;one that we cannot have forseen for the ringing in in our ears??
I can only hope,right?
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Yeah, my head's bashed in from anvils and I'm cranky. (spoilers for LMPTM) -- Solitude1056, 11:56:30 03/26/03 Wed
Figured I'd respond all in one lump here rather than pepper this thread with a bunch of two-line responses. First, man, Rufus, could you please do non-all-caps when quoting the dialogue? I love the fact that you take the time so quickly after an episode to give us the exact phrasing, but even if a young'un like you has good eyes, my eyes are old, and it's actually quite difficult to read a line of all-caps, let alone several in a row. Makes me head ache. Wah.
Okay, now that I've finished my day's minor whine, on to ep responses.
- I didn't automatically assume Nikki had Robin along simply to provide distraction, or that Nikki had trained Robin what to do at a certain point.
The kid's either three or four years old. Ignoring the fact he barely weighed enough to just "bump into" a trashcan and knock it over, there's question in my mind about whether he realized his action had positive results. After watching my friends deal with their kids, it seemed to me that Nikki knew Robin was scared, and the way she made it seem as though his accidental trash-can-bumpage was an important part of her fight was her way of making him feel included, as though he was contributing. That is important to a kid's development, even if their version of planting in the garden means putting rocks in holes and covering them up; parents the world over still praise their children for mimicking adults. In this case, Nikki seemed to be praising Robin for his action and simultaneously staving off any possible fear on his part that he had inadvertantly made the situation worse.
- Who is writing Giles this year? Could we send them copies of the past two or three seasons, along with a big ol' smack upside da head? Since when does Giles come bursting into an office (to which he wasn't invited, and with whose occupant he hasn't been introduced), and ramble on in a panic about computers and books? I mean, really. A line like that might have been funny five seasons ago, but now it's like the comment about taking girls into the desert. Maybe a funny line, but it's not Giles. (Not the least of which, btw, was also because The Real Giles would've delivered the line in a muttering, glasses-cleaning, mildly distracted manner, as though he was continuing to obsess about the situation even after Buffy had changed the topic.)
- Buffy and Giles' conversations, from the very beginning, had a forced, contrived feeling. It just didn't have the refreshing snap of interactions like Buffy's use of the expression "hand over fist," followed by her confused studying of hand gestures while Giles continues to obsess about this week's little bad.
- Given that Giles has backed Buffy up so many times in the past, regardless of his own feelings about the situation - oh, let's see, with Tara and her family, when kicking Spike out of the bookstore, dealing with Wesley, blahdiddy blah blah blah - it just seemed wierd that Giles would pick now, on this topic, to swerve so totally and completely from his Buffy-support to go behind her back to do away with Spike? I mean, please. I was supposed to believe that? Giles has spent the past six years trusting that Buffy has some basic idea of what she's doing, and now he decides, in what appears to be a relatively snap decision, to let someone else dust Spike? This is the same man, in Revelations, who told Buffy:
"I won't remind you that the fate of the world often rests with the Slayer. What would be the point? Nor shall I remind you that you have jeopardized the lives of everyone you know by housing a known murderer. But sadly I must remind you that Angel tortured me. For hours. For pleasure. You should have told me he was alive. You didn't. You have no respect for me, or the job I perform."
It's one of the most brutal (if honest) things Giles ever says to Buffy, but what's also important is that this was the end of the conversation. Giles has stated where he stands, he knows where Buffy stands, and the two of them make a point of respecting each other's positions from then on out. On top of that, we didn't even have an apocalypse (yet) that early in the season, so it wasn't like Buffy could even argue that Angel was crucial to stopping the latest greatest Evil.
So why, this time around, would Giles see fit to argue with Buffy not once but two or three times? Yes, he has valid issues with Spike, and always has; Buffy has equally valid issues for keeping Spike in one piece. But it just felt completely out of character for Giles to not only question Buffy repeatedly, but then to act, without her knowledge, to completely counteract her clear decision.
I kept waiting for Giles to pull off his head and reveal he's the latest version of the First Evil. (But then, mentioning that would get me started on the whole disgustingly stupid and cheap mislead of "Is Giles Another Face Of The First Evil? Stay tuned until next week, when we hear Giles make a completely out of character comment about little girls!")
Sigh.
- I didn't mind Spike through the past two seasons. I've always enjoyed his character's evolution, even if it's somewhat annoying for being what Scroll (I think) called The Thorn, but I think of as The Thorn in Buffyverse Side. Or maybe, The Thorn in Buffy's Canon. TTBC. Hey, more initials. Woo, hoo. Ahem. Where was I.
Oh, yeah. Spike.
Spike's contribution, as a character, has been his unfailingly hysterical way of seeing the world that's honest but funny because if we didn't laugh, we'd be crying at the simple truth. Who here didn't absolutely love (even while we were cringing at the truth of it, perhaps) the complete truth of Spike's mini-speech in Pangs:
"You won! All right? You came in and you killed them and you took their land. That's what conquering nations do! That's what Caesar did, he's not going around saying "I came, I conquered, I felt really bad about it"! The history of the world is not people making friends. You had better weapons, you massacred them, end of story!"
Thing is, Spike's little speech to Wood didn't have that funny-because-otherwise-it'd-hurt style, it lacked that snarkiness. It was taunting. My mother loved me, and yours didn't love you, and that's your problem, not mine.
Maybe the lines were written or directed or even (gasp) acted badly, which is why it comes across more like taunting. Perhaps the original intent might have been to show Spike's resentment at the idea that Buffy will never love him first and foremost. In that case, I would guess it'd be a corrollary: your mother was a Slayer, and put you second, and I know it, because I'm second, too. Instead, it came out as: you were second, but I wasn't. Nyah, nyah.
But the implication, to me, and what really made me grit my teeth, was: "I can not only taunt you with something that isn't the whole truth, but I can also beat your otherwise pretty frail human body, bite you, and leave you to die... and Buffy will still side with me." I don't like that attitude in spoiled only-children, and I like it even less in a character that's supposedly one of our most complex yet strangely loving semi-bad characters.
The whole thing smacked of Fury's renegade treatment back in Crush, when he did his level best to destroy any sympathy for our resident devil. Now, though, it not only undermines sympathy for Spike - since how can I sympathize with someone who clearly lords it over everyone else with the "I'm so valuable, I'm untouchable, and can do what I want because the boss likes me" - but it also makes me just a little repulsed by Buffy, as well. I would've preferred her rebuking all of them - Giles, Wood, and Spike. After Spike's responses over-the-top responses to Wood, I find myself disliking the fact that Giles and Wood got smacked down while Spike - the only non-human in the bunch, the 100+ yrs of blood-drinking, mother-killing demon, mind you - has the whole get-out-of-jail-free card?
[Well, as a human being, I'd sure as hell resent that. I'd so be ready to take Spike down a notch or two, if I could. And when the whole house doesn't want Spike around, and when two of your human fighter-allies don't want him around either, I'd start questioning the wisdom of pushing him into everyone's face.]
- I get that some folks see Spike as the sympathetic character. Oh, his mother was dying of TB, and where every other new vampire we've ever seen immediately wants to go on a crazed killing spree, Spike is only thinking of his mother's happiness. Oh, dear me, I do believe I'm about to have the vapors at the unbelieveable retconning romance of it all. Quick, Fabio, the smelling salts!
I kept waiting for Dru to dust Spike's mom. I kept waiting for Spike to kill his mom. I kept finding myself asking, how did Dru and William get into the house? Did they kill the servants already? (Viscera. Uh, maybe.) I kept waiting for someone to walk in from a corner, smack the daylights out of Spike and holler, "Vampire, you moron! Evil! You're supposed to be eeeevul!"
The flashback bit with Dru, William, and William's mother felt way too much like reading old texts that say, "and we know he was supposed to be a saint because so-and-so came forward after the saint had died, saying, 'the day this person was born, our pigs flew over the barnyard roof and our cow jumped over the Moon, so we always knew our neighbor's child was destined for greatness'." Oh, please.
Hindsight is not always twenty-twenty; sometimes it's so myopic it's ridiculous. Fury's sole contribution, I think, is to push the plot in one direction or another. The problem is he does so by sacrificing the characters' usual actions or motivations or patterns. It is okay to make a plot movement based on Anya's materialism. We know she's materialistic; this is not a surprise. To retcon so Spike was always a loving, caring vamp just as he was a loving, caring son - a loving, caring vamp where 99.9% of all other new-made vamps we've seen are bloodthirsty and vicious - that may give us the plot point of "Wood tries to kill Spike" but it does so by seriously undermining the consistency in Spike's character. If it's moving too slow, get Fury in there - he won't waste precious onscreen time with petty things like character continuity! Continuity is for wimps!
Grrr.
- Then again, maybe (as someone else commented and now I can't remember whom, to give credit), this is setting us up for WKCS' return next week. Even if Robin is willing to set aside his life-long mourning for his mother, and even if Giles understands Buffy's decisions, and even if the SITs understand that Buffy's word is law... just how do you think Robin and the SITs are going to feel when they find out that Buffy isn't even The Slayer? Don't you think there'd be just a little bit of, wait a minute. You were playing us? You told us you were the Slayer. We followed you because you were the Slayer. Look how much we put up with, and you couldn't even be honest that you aren't the Slayer, and when you die, we won't be chosen?
Okay, maybe that's too much to hope for, a conflict like that this late in the game. But I sure would appreciate some mention of it, because in Wood's position, or the SITs' positions, that's what I'd be thinking.
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Re: Yeah, my head's bashed in -- Rahael, 12:03:21 03/26/03 Wed
I expect to enjoy this ep (but, I think, view it very differently from most re the Spike/Mom, Robin/Nikki interactions, it seems like) but gosh, I loved reading this post.
Hey, if people aren't going to like eps (or like them), can we do it with such style?
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It's good to be appreciated. -- Solitude1056, 12:19:25 03/26/03 Wed
But it may take a bit. As Spike Lover mentions in a post higher up in this thread, when you stop watching an episode because you're too busy thinking, "what were the writers smoking?" - that's a bad sign. Okay, that's not exactly what SL said, but that's my paraphrase. And, boy was I ever thinking - about ten seconds into the teaser, actually - who was the writer? Shoot hir. And by the second commercial break I was definitely thinking, Fury. He's behind this. I know it.
So it's good to be appreciated. And I always appreciate ME, but I appreciate some of them more if they stay producers and don't screw up our beloved characters by trying to write anything. *sigh* If Fury heads over to AtS at the end of BtVS, don't be surprised to hear I held ME HQ in Lalaland, keeping security at bay with a pencil and a steak knife while hollering, "No one make any sudden moves! I'm a donkey on the edge! And you, mister Fury, back AWAY from the script!"
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Well, 'Salvage' had its moments -- Masq, 12:45:56 03/26/03 Wed
In fact, I like most of the episode. Except the parts with Angelus in that demon bar. Lame beyond the telling of it, that whole demon bar scene.
Fury writes Faith well--perhaps a little more vulgar than the writers of "Release" and "Orpheus"--but he can't do Angelus.
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Didn't Fury also direct this episode? -- Sarand, 14:48:13 03/26/03 Wed
I read that somewhere today, although I didn't notice when watching last night. If he did, though, he not only monkeyed with Drew Goddard's script to make Spike unsypathetic, he also directed Marsters to play it very unsympathetically.
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Fury was indeed the director. -- acesgirl, 15:23:42 03/26/03 Wed
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Right there with you -- Tchaikovsky, 15:53:29 03/26/03 Wed
I wonder whether we shouldn't gang up and take Fury out, Sol. You know, it's for the good of one of the greatest pieces of narrative art of the 20th Century. I used to like Fury's episodes before he had any power. I liked 'Helpless' and I liked 'Choices', but I now have the feeling that Whedon and Greenwalt were leaning attentively over his shoulder. Since he got the power, he seems to write his own vision. Jane Espenson said in an interview I can't be bothered to find that Fury was the one who had the most individual views on Spike, whereas she was the most likely to go along with Joss' vision. All I can say as, as well as finding Espenson's episodes funnier, more intelligent, and having more connected thematic resonances, I also think the way her scripts fit in to the Season greatly trumps Fury's later efforts.
TCH
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<g>Poor David. -- Rufus, 16:55:52 03/26/03 Wed
I hear the same complaints about scripts that David Fury writes....he's the guy with the anvil....remember in the interview with Jane Espenson she mentions that she is on one side of the spectrum with Joss, and David has very powerful opinions and represents that other side of the spectrum. There are scripts of his I like including "Helpless" and "Real Me".
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Spike = The Thorn in Buffyverse's Side -- Scroll, 18:03:36 03/26/03 Wed
Heh. Funny, but sadly I didn't come up with that. Don't know who did... If I'd had the brains to think of it, I probably would've said it, though. Much as I like Spike, I hate the way he's "so special!" that everybody else's personalities have to be twisted around to accommodate him.
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Oh, I totally agree - thus my particular sense of sarcastic humor at the new acronym. I'm with Anya. -- Solitude1056, saying blah blah blah, forgiveness is human..., 19:29:04 03/26/03 Wed
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Oh great! For whatever reason I'm thinking of Gumby and Pokey.....;) -- Rufus, 23:01:50 03/26/03 Wed
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Agreed with many of the things you stated -- Caroline, 12:33:39 03/26/03 Wed
but I saw Spike's conversation with Wood differently. Spike had the benefit of a mother who did put him front and center. Wood didn't. Both had rather tragic consequences on the psychology of both as children and both ended up feeling rejected. But at least William knew what it was to have his mother's total love and when he could finally resolve some of his psychological issues, he could rest comfortably in that knowledge. Wood will always be questioning the love that his mother had for him but not putting him front and center. Spike managed to find the good enough parent and be happy with that - Wood is going to have a much harder time finding the good enough parent.
But I do agree that the way the lines were written was very ham-handed.
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Re: Yeah, my head's bashed in from anvils and I'm cranky. (spoilers for LMPTM) -- Rob, 12:42:01 03/26/03 Wed
"Thing is, Spike's little speech to Wood didn't have that funny-because-otherwise-it'd-hurt style, it lacked that snarkiness. It was taunting. My mother loved me, and yours didn't love you, and that's your problem, not mine.
Maybe the lines were written or directed or even (gasp) acted badly, which is why it comes across more like taunting. Perhaps the original intent might have been to show Spike's resentment at the idea that Buffy will never love him first and foremost. In that case, I would guess it'd be a corrollary: your mother was a Slayer, and put you second, and I know it, because I'm second, too. Instead, it came out as: you were second, but I wasn't. Nyah, nyah."
See, I didn't see this scene as badly acted or written. I thought it was the most powerful one in the episode. In fact, it is what made me love the episode. I didn't see Spike as taunting Wood. He seemed to be speaking very straightforwardly, as if he was giving Wood a lesson, or stating a fact. Spike has every right, IMO, to lay this all out for Wood like this. After all, under a pretense of friendship, Wood did lure him into a room to kill him. Further, he's been acting unkind to him, from the very beginning, even when Spike had saved his life numerous times. What Wood was planning was premeditated murder, because he believed that he could finally find meaning in his life by having his revenge. Spike, as the almost-victim, IMO, has been back-stabbed and has the right to attack Wood in turn. I think it was a very important assertion that Spike has a soul, Spike is completely acting of his own will, thus making his attack of Wood all the more powerful and threatening. This is a person with free will, teaching a lesson to someone who wronged him. He didn't know at that point that Buffy would forgive him. And I also find it very commendable that Spike found the self-restraint to stop drinking from Wood before he had completely killed him. He didn't have to. Further, if he hadn't shown Wood a true threat to his life as he did here, Wood wouldn't have refrained from, in the future, trying to attack Spike again.
"To retcon so Spike was always a loving, caring vamp just as he was a loving, caring son - a loving, caring vamp where 99.9% of all other new-made vamps we've seen are bloodthirsty and vicious - that may give us the plot point of "Wood tries to kill Spike" but it does so by seriously undermining the consistency in Spike's character. If it's moving too slow, get Fury in there - he won't waste precious onscreen time with petty things like character continuity! Continuity is for wimps!"
Why is this a retcon? I don't agree that every time a new fact is added in from a backstory that that makes it a retcon. How about when Angel first rose? He wasn't EEEEVIL right away. He felt power, he drank from the guy in the cemetary, but I wouldn't qualify him as evil. Further, Darla really had to show him how to be evil. At the start, he seemed to love his family, but the resentment of his father boiled higher than in life, so he acted out his demonic urges. And how about Holden? He didn't seem particularly evil upon rising. Neither did the vamp in this episode. I think the demon affects different vamps different ways. Some rise immediately ready to attack, perhaps based on psychic messages of some sort. Others take a while to find their bearings. Oh, yeah, another example being the first vamp in "Lessons" who politely asks for help out of his grave. Spike was evil enough with Dru to want to massacre all of Europe. But he was still so psychological bonded with his mom, he wanted her to come along. Spike has always been different than other vamps. He's always been able to feel love and other human emotions when others couldn't, soul of a poet, and all that jazz. I don't find it hard to believe that to begin with, Spike was a kinder vampire and it took a traumatic event to set him on the road of true bad-assiness. This episode truly helped me understand Spike's character probably more than any other since "Fool for Love."
In many ways, actually, this episode was an homage to Anne Rice. In "The Vampire Lestat," Lestat does the same thing for his sick, dying mother. And she soon grows bored with him, and abandons him. She isn't as cruel as Spike's mother is, but she does reveal her boredom with him the same way Spike's mother did.
I kind of agree with you on the shakiness in the Buffy/Giles scenes, as well as the writing of Giles in general, but except for that, I loved this episode.
Rob
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Re: Yeah, my head's bashed in from anvils and I'm cranky. (spoilers for LMPTM) -- Arethusa, 15:46:59 03/26/03 Wed
I agree with your take on Spike, Rob. Spike's never been like other vampires, which come in many varities. Some just want to drink and eat popcorn in peace, some want to eat their way across Europe (like American tourists, hee), some want to just get high. It's even more improbable that Spike would want a soul than Spike would want to bring Mum along on his European tour, instead of killing her. Spike loves an audience.
The dynamics between VampMum and Spike reminded me of a twist on the mother and son in The Grifters. The poisonous con mother tries to seduce her son to continue as her partner, instead of leaving with his girlfriend.
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VampWilliam and evil, or: Huh, people? -- HonorH, 16:34:35 03/26/03 Wed
Just have to ask: Was I the only person who was paying attention while VampWilliam was rhaphsodizing to Dru about killing half of London and Europe? And am I the only one who thinks that just might be evil? So he wanted to vamp Mum. Okay. Alonna wanted to vamp her brother. VampLiam slaughtered his family, yeah, but he already had Issues. As Darla said, what they have been informs what they become. It makes sense to me that a newborn vampire with strong family ties would want to bring those into unlife, just as a newborn vamp with big family resentments would want to slaughter the whole lot of them.
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Re: VampWilliam and evil, or: Huh, people? -- Rufus, 17:00:54 03/26/03 Wed
That was one of my favorite scenes..Spike goes from killing Europe to "the Three of Us"....."you me and Mom"...no wonder Dru giggled hysterically cause William/Spike share the same strengths and weaknesses....unfortunately as a vampire any grand gestures of taking care of mom end up twisted in a demonic way.....he thought he was saving her, but ended up killing her. I hardly think Dru was too cut up over the loss of their "third".
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I see your point and raise you one more... -- Solitude1056, 17:32:23 03/26/03 Wed
I get what you mean. Thinking back to the epi (since I never have figured out the new-old VCR), I think what got me the most was the fact that William's mother goes from zero to sixty in nothing flat.
Yes, William's immediate intention to vamp his mother was amusing (although Dru's reaction was probably the high point of the whole episode - the squeak nearly did me in, along with her expression)... but his mother's reaction, after being vamped, didn't give us any time to really adjust. She seemed to go from "oh, wow, I'm glowing" to "don't you want to have sex with me?" just a leetle too fast. I mean, that's a world of jumping. We're not talking point A to point B, for the average set of mothers and sons. Maybe more like point A to point R, with a whole bunch of points in between.
And even assuming that I can easily and happily adjust to the notion of having sex with one's offspring as a result of being vamped, I still fail to see what the purpose was. Spike had already chosen Dru (or been chosen by her), so it's not like we could say that Spike likes falling for mother-types. Mother-as-Invalid, a little different from Girlfriend-as-Psycho. One is physically ill, the other is mentally ill, and I'm not certain I like the idea that we can easily mix the two such that Spike would naturally transfer love/affection for one type to the other type.
Besides, what does all this say about Buffy? I mean, if Spike is who she considers her Big Gun these days, just what does that say about her? It may seem sometimes that ATLtS, but in the end it's ATLtB. How does it change Buffy's metaphor to have a souled-vamp with mother-sex issues lurking in his closet?
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All Threads Lead to Angel, IMO -- Scroll, 18:53:06 03/26/03 Wed
I think a good deal of Buffy's "Spike has a soul, he's good now," and her "he's my Big Gun, I need him," really has to do with her abandonment issues. Spike offered to leave because he was a danger. Buffy conveniently ignores this danger because she can't let go. She has power of Spike, he does what she says. He's not going to leave her like some other souled vampire did -- heck, Spike went out and got a soul for her! For her! Spike has a new mother whose apron strings he can hang on to. (Of course, with his new "revelation" that his mum really did love him, Spike may have cut those strings.)
So now Buffy is defending Spike because she has never accepted that Angel and Angelus really are the same person. Just as she's willing to accept that the Spike who murdered Robin Wood's mother and tried to rape her is someone who doesn't exist anymore.
And to a certain extent, Buffy's right. Souled!Spike is different from Unsouled!Spike. With a soul, he now has free will. He can freely choose to do good or freely choose to do evil. So in that sense, now having that free will, Spike is a whole new vamp. But that killer is still in there, and I think both Spike and Buffy would like to pretend it's not. Because if Buffy can convince herself that the killer isn't there, then she doesn't have to feel sick or guilty for not letting this killer vampire go.
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Re: I see your point and raise you one more... -- Dariel, 19:08:47 03/26/03 Wed
How does it change Buffy's metaphor to have a souled-vamp with mother-sex issues lurking in his closet?
Seems to me, the episode showed that William, even unsouled and demony, was pretty squicked by the idea of sex with mom. I don't call that "mother-sex issues," I call that normal!
I do agree with the idea that the whole sex thing was kind of over the top. Definitely falls under the category of "unnecessary creepyness." I suppose they wanted something awful enough to get William to dust his mom. But, even that wasn't necessary. For her to reject him and then leave would have been a major blow; no need for anything else to get the point across.
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I feel a Simon & Garfunkel song coming on... -- Solitude1056, 19:38:41 03/26/03 Wed
I do agree with the idea that the whole sex thing was kind of over the top. Definitely falls under the category of "unnecessary creepyness." I suppose they wanted something awful enough to get William to dust his mom. But, even that wasn't necessary. For her to reject him and then leave would have been a major blow; no need for anything else to get the point across.
Exactly my point. When all else fails, I always think, what would Buffy do?
Well, actually, I think, what would Faith do?
Not really.
I actually think, would Faith do me?
Oh, wait, I was gonna say something intelligent here. What was it.
Uh.
Faith.
*drool*
Oh, hold on.
Righto.
Anyway, the show's about Buffy, and the rest of the characters, in the final analysis, have paths that follow or reflect Buffy's own development as a person/character. So while I get the notion that Spike has attached himself to Buffy for various monogamous-obsession reasons, and I get that Buffy is liking the whole "won't leave me and can't die" aspect of having a stable, uh, something around... I don't get why we have to have last-minute almost-ran mother-son action, because I don't see how that unbelieveably controversial (and frankly, over-the-top squickness) really adds anything to the metaphor.
I would've expected there to be a helluva lot more power in the scene had Spike's mother dusted herself rather than spend an eternity with Spike. Oh, man, now that would've clearly set him in motion for some major therapy hours later in his unlife. But dusting your own mother because she came on to you? That's enough out of character for the average mom that the line of "it wasn't her, it was the alcohol, err, demon" just might fly, only I'm thinking, "it wasn't her, it was ME, err, Fury."
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I got the feeling. . . -- Finn Mac Cool, 20:07:47 03/26/03 Wed
That Spike's mom was going much closer to rape than come-on. The whole "it will only hurt for a moment" thing, and her change into vamp face gives the impression that she was using force against Spike.
Think about it: the human trait unleashed and magnified by her new state of demon hood was the desire to be rid of William. As a human, her best hope of doing this was for William to marry some woman, which would hopefully get him out of the house (but even that unlikely event probably wouldn't do the trick, as we saw). But William "scarcely showed an interest", he remained almost like a child (note the kneeling beside her, or referring later to the song as something she sang to him "as a baby" (I know he was covering, but I think there's significance in it)). So, she decided to take his virginity forcefully (assuming he and Dru hadn't already done it). This would be a symbolic way of stripping away his childhood, which is what always kept him near her.
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Dear Heaven, I hope you're wrong! -- Arethusa, 20:21:06 03/26/03 Wed
I just thought VampAnne said the worst possible thing that came to her mind, something so terrible that even doting Spike would be appalled. What greater joy could William's saintly mother think of as a vampire than to destroy the love that now revolted her? (Actually, I'm with Sol-if I repeat "Blame Fury" several times very rapidly, the urge to fanwank goes away.)
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Hmm, didn't think of it as fanwanking. That's what I immediatly thought when I saw it. -- Finn Mac Cool, 20:25:54 03/26/03 Wed
That and by raping him, she'd be making everything that he adored tainted and horrid.
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Not accusing you-I'm admitting to it myself. -- Arethusa, 20:59:45 03/26/03 Wed
I chose to believe that making the suggestion was enough to amuse VampAnne, without actually carrying out the act.
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Re: I see your point and raise you one more... -- Malandanza, 16:16:41 03/29/03 Sat
"Spike had already chosen Dru (or been chosen by her), so it's not like we could say that Spike likes falling for mother-types. Mother-as-Invalid, a little different from Girlfriend-as-Psycho. One is physically ill, the other is mentally ill, and I'm not certain I like the idea that we can easily mix the two such that Spike would naturally transfer love/affection for one type to the other type."
But Spike and Dru worked best when Dru was Mother-as-invalid -- after that mob in Prague weakened her to the point that dear little William had to take care of her. Dress, her, bathe her, bring her small children (remember Angel saying that Dru preferred children?) I don't think it's necessary to mix the types -- weakened Dru wasn't much different from TB ridden Anne. And a newly strengthened Dru left Spike just as unhappy as the newly vamped Anne.
As Rufus is fond of quoting: "What we once were informs all that we become" (or words to that effect). William, the doting son taking care of his invalid mother, became Spike, the doting vampire taking care of his invalid sire. Add to that two instances from Season Six where he suggests that he would take care of a damaged Buffy -- the first, when confronted by Xander and he accuses Willow of hiding the fact because she knew Spike would take care of Buffy no matter how damaged she was; the second, where Spike stops Buffy in the alley before the infamous beating, promising he has taken care of everything -- and will continue to do so (although in this case, Buffy is damaged spiritually). It's not that he's transferring his affections for psychotic Dru to his mother, he transfers his obsession with his sick mother to Dru when she becomes injured. Like Ethan Frome's Zena, he is only happy when he has someone to nurture and protect.
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LOL...... -- Rufus, 17:11:44 03/29/03 Sat
I just bet you mumble that line in your sleep now...;)
You can add to it In the end, we all are who we are ... no matter how much we may appear to have changed. Giles in "Lessons".....that line just may have a few surprising meanings later this season.
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Also, Spike was almost the only one who could understand most of what Drusilla said -- Finn Mac Cool, 21:31:17 03/29/03 Sat
He was able to make sense of her riddles and prophetic rumblings. Even Angelus wasn't able to do that all the time. Drusilla was Spike's invalid mother in the sense that, without him, she could barely communicate to the outside world.
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Is it Giles or is it Memorex? (spoilers for LMPTM; unspoiled spec) -- Sophist, 13:22:15 03/26/03 Wed
I just told LB earlier today that I think something's wrong with Giles. The character hasn't been GILES since the scene with Robson. He's been pushing and pushing and pushing and -- well, I'll stop while I can still spell banana -- Buffy to adopt the "everyone's expendable" philosophy. She's allowed him to push her in that direction, at least in her speeches, though not so much in her actions, until last night. I'm having my doubts that what we're seeing is really Giles. Either we have a plot surprise coming, or I agree with you about the writing.
After Spike's responses over-the-top responses to Wood, I find myself disliking the fact that Giles and Wood got smacked down while Spike - the only non-human in the bunch, the 100+ yrs of blood-drinking, mother-killing demon, mind you - has the whole get-out-of-jail-free card?
Buffy didn't know about the "mom didn't love you" aspects of Spike's speech to Wood, so she couldn't "smack him down". I think Rob makes a good case about Spike's options regarding Wood otherwise.
I am not much impressed by Anya's "get out of jail free" argument. Buffy is giving Spike exactly the same chance she is giving Anya (and Willow and Andrew, for that matter), namely to prove that he can act morally when given a fair chance. So far, Spike and Willow are taking that chance, not as completely as I might like, but with halting steps in the right direction. Anya is not moving at all. If there is any double standard here, or excess of patience, it applies to her.
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Most irritating thing about an otherwise pretty great season. Who the hell is Giles? -- Rochefort, 00:45:00 03/30/03 Sun
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Most irritating thing about this pretty great season. I hope it isn't really Giles cause jeez. -- Rochefort, 00:46:30 03/30/03 Sun
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Re: Yeah, my head's bashed in from anvils and I'm cranky. (spoilers for LMPTM) -- Rufus, 16:52:02 03/26/03 Wed
Actually I thought I had made things look all better but when I pasted what I had over here, well you can see the results. I'm a computer illiterate slob doing the best I can. The post looks quite a bit different on the Trollop board.
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An Old Dying Thread - But I had to add -- Dochawk, 13:43:59 03/27/03 Thu
I couldn't agree with you more Sol. You said it much better than I ever could.
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This juror's out on that presumption... (logical speculation S7 ending) -- Briar Rose, 16:24:18 03/28/03 Fri
I am specultating that Faith is going to turn out to NOT be a "true Slayer" now or even part of the direct line that will allow a new Slayer to be called on her death.
Between the fact that Kendra was "chosen" but never displayed all the capabilities of "The True Slayer" (as Buffy always continued to do) since Buffy survived that little brush with death. I also never felt that Faith did either after being "called" after Kendra's death. Faith was never able to get the best of Buffy in a fight or heal as fast as Buffy did.... This was brought to mind yet again in the latest Angel. Sure, she survived the drug, but she sure did it slowly and with a great amount of healing time needed in between the previous bouts with Angel and the Stoney One. See all the blood she lost from the head wound as a way of comparing her and Buffy's healing speed....
And if the death(s) of Buffy not breaking her ability to call on the Slayer's inner powers weren't enough? Buffy just took in a heck of a lot of "First Slayer" power! She may have not accepted the entire thing, but she obviously got enough of that first deamon energy to stoke her up.
It would appear that the First Slayer, the one who holds the essential spark of the Slayer's power, is directly tied to Buffy's psyche. She is STILL right beside her in dreams and visions. Buffy is the only one of the three Slayers to seek her out again and again and to be contacted by her again and again.
I truly think that we're going to find out that Faith was never the "true Slayer" at all OR that Faith was stripped of that "true Slayer" mantle at the choice of the Primordial when she left the Slayer's calling to become a rogue.
It will all depend on how ME decides to carry on the universe. Cause if they want to do movies and spin-offs of BtVS, they have to come up with a viable option to keep Buffy around.
What I see as a viable option is that Faith is NOT the "true Slayer" right now. Buffy is. But since Buffy has a direct line with the Primordial Power, she will (at some point) find a way for Willow to create a little magick and give the mantle back to Faith, or at least share the strength between them. That way Buffy is a viable character and able to walk away from her duty, Faith is there to protect the world and ME has a whole set of profitable options to flesh out their verse at a later date.
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A rant about Spike -- lakrids, 17:52:16 03/26/03 Wed
Sorry about my English
I would like to think about myself as a more or less impartial viewer of the BtVS. I didn't dislike any of the main characters. That would be until the episode LMPTM, then I have become to despise Spike.
Why did Spike complain about becoming chained up, when they knew that trigger was still functionally?. If there had been any logic in the plot should Spike, have been chained to the wall, when first they figured out that Spike could be controlled with a trigger from the FE. And stayed there until he was cured. .
That Spike doesn't want to apologise for his murder on Woods mom, could I have accepted if Spike has said something like " I am sorry about you mom, but I am not the person that did it, because I got a soul now". Instead he says something like, that she knew what she got into when she began hunting vampires, it was part of the game.
It's and was not a game!, Woods mother was more or less drafted into job of the extermination of vampires. I would more compare her to a cop that is going after serial killers. Sure she could have been staying safe in her house and knowing, that every night people died, that she could have saved. I don't think a serial Cop killer would get reduced sentenced if he told the court, that the cops he killed knew the rules of the game.
Why did Spike keep his? Coat, knowingly it belonged to Woods mom?. Could he not just have urinated on Wood when he lay down and kicked him in the balls, same difference.
Giles and Wood where right about, and probably still is, that with the trigger in Spike mind. Was Spike a walking time bomb. That Buffy did nothing to confine. The only problem I have with that conspiracy plot, is that Giles should had self have taken Spike out, with a minimum of fuss, a stake in the back or a little gasoline and match etc, not with some stupid vengeance deal with a dangerous vampire.
Buffy is hero but when it comes to her boyfriends, has she shown (to me) again and again, that she often thinks with her groin/heart and not what it should be done. So I completely understand if Giles doesn't feel that he can count on Buffy to do the right thing when it comes to Spike.
"But personal isn't the same as important" Terry Pritchett: Men at Arms
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Re: A rant about Spike -- Solitude1056, 17:59:48 03/26/03 Wed
Sorry about my English
You might be able to trade that English on eBay for something more useful. I hear Brits can be a hassle, and the upkeep is so expensive!
But seriously, I think you've got some good points here - especially about the ridiculousness of Spike calling it "a game" as if Nikki also was fighting on her side just because it's fun and hey, what else does a single mother do on a saturday evening?
But AtS is almost on, so I have to skedaddle. ;-)
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Re: A rant about Spike - What bothered me.. -- Utopia, 15:25:59 03/27/03 Thu
Was that Spike bit Wood. I could understand beating him up as self defense, and the things he said about Woods mother were hurtful but I again Spike must've been feeling defensive and angry and that doesn't lead to the most sensitive comments. I was disgusted by his speech, but people say things in the heat of the moment, whatever.
But biting him, that was evil. It was unnecessary and won't do much to convince Wood that Spike has changed for the better. Sure he let him live, but he was rubbing the fact that he was a monster in everyones face. I'm surprised that Buffy wasn't more disturbed that the guy who's supposedly a good *man* bit someone under his own free will.
He said that the guy who killed Woods Mom was gone, and then turned around and did something very, very vampirey and underhanded and just...
Somehow I find it extremely disturbing that he didn't think anything of biting a human, even with his precious soul.
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Are we sure he bit Wood? -- dream, 09:26:59 03/28/03 Fri
I genuinely don't know. I couldn't see bite wounds on Wood's neck on the ancient tv I was watching. Does anyone who has it taped (I, tragically, do not) know for certain?
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It's not absolutely clear, but I don't think so. -- Arethusa, 09:54:56 03/28/03 Fri
I just checked, and Spike is not shown actually sinking his teeth into Robin's neck, although that could be because he was just trying to teach Robin a lesson or because Masters didn't want to put his mouth on another guy's neck. From then on, we don't see the right side of Robin's neck, but there's no blood either. He could have just nicked him, or done nothing.
Either way, Spike was warning Wood to never again attack him from behind. Reprehensible, but effective.
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Eh. 'Marsters' -- Arethusa, 09:56:40 03/28/03 Fri
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Guys, it's not like Wood would show that off like it were a hickey from a Slayer....;) -- Rufus, 17:13:43 03/29/03 Sat
Spike lets Wood think that he is about to die to prove the point that at any time Spike could kill him....just not that time.
Copied from 'the other place'- Charisma's baby -- jana372- tansferred TCH, 01:48:50 03/26/03 Wed
The new baby is here!!!
Please welcome to the world Donavan Charles Hardy. Charisma gave birth to a healthy baby boy at 9:50 PM on March 24th at Cedar Sinai hospital in Beverly Hills. He weighed in at 8 pounds 10 ounces and has a marvelous head of hair. Both mother and baby are doing well.
Please join us in congratulating Charisma, Damien and the new baby!
http://www.charisma-carpenter.com
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It's looking a bit sparce -- Celebaelin, 03:29:53 03/26/03 Wed
But I didn't think it was appropriate for me to be the first from ATPo
This
Charismas' Baby Book
Should get you straight there
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Not least of all because I can't spell 'sparse' -- Celebaelin, 03:38:40 03/26/03 Wed
Oh, and I think it was Scroll who was asking about links, it's in the FAQs as well, and lo and behold, it works!
C
Music, Monsters and Modern Times (Lies spoils) -- neaux, 04:33:53 03/26/03 Wed
Ok. I'm sure you already know where I'm going with this. But I'd like to address this as "THE OTHER" message from last night's show.
BTVS has always been about the old and the new. Taking the old and placing it in the new. BTVS has always been about the music too. While in the past, Let's say season's 1-4, The Music was THE modern and the vamps/monsters were considered the old world mythological counterpart.
Well I of course found the Mother of All Macintosh Computers' I-Tunes MP3 to be of more interest than the rest of the story. Why? Because it reflected modern times. BTVS hasn't done this in a while. There was the whole technopagan story line, but that hasnt been played up in a while. The last evidence of a "WE are here in modern Times" story was with the Troika and their computer equipment; specifically their Webcams.
Now back to the MP3. I personally thought, "Hey cool!" And who wouldnt. Principal Wood had a kickass set up and one of those nifty new Mouses. (very very drool) But to me, the use of a computer and an MP3, made me think back to other horror movies of the past that tried to convey this "Monster and Music in Modern Times" idea.
First off. "DEATH BY STEREO." Yes, One of the best vamp movies of all time, "LOST BOYS." Here we have a monster and a monster stereo. We have music, a vamp and electronics. Back in the 80's that was the reflection of modern music and technology.
Let's jump to the 90's with the easily forgotten "HELLRAISER III." I personally remember this movie because it was filmed locally in High Point, NC. But the reason this movie is important is because it took the idea of Modern Music, THE CD and used it as a weapon of one of the cenobytes. Yes, the movie was lame.. and the idea of monsters throwing CD's to decapitate humans is also lame.. but it reflects this little message of mine.
And most recently, Last year's Queen of the Damned showed a Vamp with a Rock Star attitude living in a modern Rock Star world.. with the stage, the pyrotechnics and massive stadium sized crowds.
So last night to see the use of the MP3 and its effect on a Monster/Man/whatever was refreshing. It's what horror movies do best and it was good to see if brought back to the buffyverse.
someone please comment.
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I hate to do this, but trying to avoid this from being eaten -- neaux, 04:35:58 03/26/03 Wed
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I hate to say it, but -- CW, 05:43:01 03/26/03 Wed
When the MP3 started playing, I just burst out laughing. I was thinking "Zowie! Yet another practical use for that modern convenience the PC!" What an advertisement for the utility of downloading from the Internet!
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or maybe -- neaux, 06:10:54 03/26/03 Wed
the download itself was the "big bad" of the week!
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