November 2001 posts
Willow and her magic
"addiction" -- purplegrrl, 15:27:16 11/27/01 Tue
Willow should remember her own words to Anya in "Doppelgangland"
that the excessive use of magic is a bad thing (or words to that
effect).
Granted this incident was before Willow was heavily into the black
side of the magickal arts, but why was it bad for Anya the ex-demon
to do black magick (without really telling Willow) for her own
use and it's okay for Willow the good witch to use black magick
just because she usually uses it to help fight bigger evil or
to aid her friends. Willow has gotten to the point where she is
unable to get dressed on time without falling back on her magical
powers. Not to mention stealing her friends' memories and altering
her immediate universe to suit her.
And Amy is a seriously bad influence on Willow. When last we saw
Amy as a witch rather than a rat (in "Gingerbread")
she was unwilling to use her talents/gift in the destructive manner
that her mother did. So why now that she is human again is she
Little Miss Tricky with the spells? Witchcraft is not supposed
to be about fun, revenge, or personal gain (or at least that's
how I understand it).
Maybe tonight's episode will show Willow that her dependence on
magic is a bad thing. We can only hope.
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[> a teensy wittle thing... -- pocky, 23:00:42 11/27/01 Tue
"Witchcraft is not supposed to be about fun, revenge, or
personal gain (or at least that's how I understand it)."
The "personal gain" part is false information being
fed into people by shows like Charmed. Actually, that's the only
show I could think of that has the whole "magick is not for
personal gain" crap.
Magick may be used for everything--it's a matter of whether or
not harm is brought upon ANYone. Harm being of the bad.
~nathan~
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[> [> Re: a teensy wittle thing... -- purplegrrl, 13:05:03
11/29/01 Thu
Okay. Thanks for the clarification.
But if you consistently did witchcraft for personal gain (such
as Willow has been doing) -- even if it's just to get dressed
on time -- you could be doing harm to someone. Could be something
as small as Tara being disappointed that Willow couldn't go even
a week without magic or as big as nearly getting Dawn killed because
you've got to have your "magic fix."
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[> 'nother wittle thing -- anom, 19:56:41 11/28/01 Wed
"Willow has gotten to the point where she is unable to get
dressed on time without falling back on her magical powers."
I read that differently--as Willow using not being ready as an
excuse to stay behind & do the spell instead of leaving w/Tara
& Dawn. I'm not even sure if the towel or that strange black top
she wore was the result of magic--i.e., did she use magic to just
make it look like she wasn't ready, or was she really wearing
the towel & changed her clothes by magic?
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What is the real difference between
white and black magic? -- zombie, 15:52:59 11/27/01 Tue
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[> really, it's all gray. but if you want to get technical...
-- pocky, 16:48:07 11/27/01 Tue
If you need a color to associate the "goodness" of magick
with (black for evil, white for good) gray would be the color.
It's really up to the magick-user whether to use magick for good
or evil. In magickal purposes, the color black is usually used
for banishing and protective workings. White is usually the if-you-don't-have-anything-else
color to use, especially in candle magick.
Now, black, as in Black Magick is the type of magick commonly
used in ceremonial magick. It involves conjurations of spirits
and demons, and lots of drawings of seals, and lots of talking
and lots of threats to demons/spirits who refuse to appear.
I hope that made sense...though I really doubt it did.
~nathan~
PS: no offense to ceremonial magicians out there. ^_^'
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[> [> They way I look at it. -- Wolfhowl3, 16:58:12 11/27/01
Tue
There is no Black or White Magic, it's all just Magic. (and in
my mind, Magic is Green)
You can use a match to light your stove to cook supper, or you
could use the same match to burn down someone's house. That doesn't
make one kind of fire white, and the other black. It's just fire.
Where the distinction lies is the moral choice behind the use
of the tool. To promote life and health, or destroy and hurt.
Wolfhowl
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[> [> [> bless your glibness! -- pocky, 17:00:32 11/27/01
Tue
that was what i was trying to get at! good job, Wolfhowl. i wish
i weren't so verbose!
~nathan~
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[> [> [> [> Thank My Wife, they were her words. (no
Text) -- Wolfhowl3, 20:09:43 11/27/01 Tue
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[> [> [> [> [> Spouses come up with the best stuff...nice
of you to give her credit. -- Rufus, 23:11:20 11/27/01 Tue
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[> [> [> Re: They way I look at it. -- Malandanza, 07:59:40
11/28/01 Wed
"You can use a match to light your stove to cook supper,
or you could use the same match to burn down someone's house.
That doesn't make one kind of fire white, and the other black.
It's just fire. Where the distinction lies is the moral choice
behind the use of the tool. To promote life and health, or destroy
and hurt."
I think there's more to magic than simply being a tool. Where
does the power come from and why do beings that control the power
give it away so freely when evil is being done?
To continue with your match analogy -- what if it took 20 matches
to light your stove, and even then, the fire burned out periodically
and the stove never stayed hot enough long enough to boil water?
And what if a single spark was enough to turn your neighbor's
house into a conflagration? Wouldn't you start to wonder about
fire? (or at least the company that made your matches :)
I think that magic in the Buffyverse follows the same pattern.
Dark, destructive magic is relatively easy to use and easily accessible.
Spells meant to have a beneficial effect have so many drawbacks
or are so complicated that you might as well just do things by
hand. Maybe magic isn't light or dark, but the magic providers
tend towards evil.
I think Willow's attitude has been that magic is neither good
nor evil -- she has learned otherwise. Her recent dabbling into
black magic have left an indelible mark on her strawberry-flavored
soul.
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What do you think Joss will do
after Buffy/Angel end? -- Crichton, 16:43:38 11/27/01 Tue
That day is going to be very far in the future of course, but
eventually all things must end (geez, what are we gonna talk about
then?). When it comes, what do you think Joss will do? Develop
another tv series? Go into films? Speaking of which, has he only
done sci fi stuff, or has he done other things?
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[> There's always... -- RH, 07:15:24 11/29/01 Thu
..."Ripper", or "Dawn the Vampire Slayer",
or he could create a new character (an immortal of some sort)
and chronicle their story from the time they are turned, through
history - that would be neat! We'd get to see them interact in
all sorts of historical events - the viking invasions, the dark
ages, the Inquisition, world wars, Woodstock...! They could even
introduce this character on BtVS or AtS so we'd get to see what
they've become...
The possibilities for a creative mind like Joss' are endless!
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[> Re: What do you think Joss will do after Buffy/Angel end?
-- Skeve, 12:16:34 11/29/01 Thu
Sunnydale Law.
The legal system finally finds its way to Sunnydale. First up:
the insurance claim on Sunnydale High.
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[> [> claim on Sunnydale High? -- zargon, 20:04:23 11/29/01
Thu
I'm surprised W&H haven't shown up yet and made a claim for one
of their demon clients...with all the correct legal paperwork
in hand, of course....
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Tiny comments on "Wrecked"
from 11/27 (SPOILERY!! DO NOT READ UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN THE EPISODE!!!)
-- Earl Allison, 18:08:51 11/27/01 Tue
Maybe I'm expecting too much, but was this handled a bit TOO quickly
and easily, or what?
Willow simply swears off magic entirely -- which I'm not real
sure is a good thing -- she handled it well until Season Five.
Suddenly, things are okay again? At least, they seem to be better
-- Buffy's revelation that she was dragged from HEAVEN doesn't
do it, but Dawn being hurt does?
What did Rack offer, and what was he getting in exchange? He seemed
to be giving them a magical high, but what was HE getting? Was
he feeding off the fear? The wild magic?
And I'm all for metaphors, like the sex metaphor from "Graduation
Day Part II," where Angel bites Buffy, but was this a tad
heavy-handed, or again, am I an idiot (entirely possible)?
Now, from all this it sounds like I hated the episode, I didn't.
I loved it, actually, but things just seemed way too quick, concise,
and easily packaged.
Now, let the bloodletting commence.
Take it and run.
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[> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" (SPOILERY!! DO
NOT READ UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN THE EPISODE!!!) -- Mari_Star_99,
18:18:40 11/27/01 Tue
I agree Earl. That was way too fast to get over magic. I sense
there will be some backsliding on Willow's part. Franky, I hope
JW has not painted himself into a corner here. Can you really
imagine Willow NEVER useing magic again? I'm not sure I liked
this episode. I feel like Willow and Buffy are stalled in character
development. Dawn seems to be the only one to grow in this eppy.
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[> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27 (SPOILERY!!)
-- Herself, 18:30:29 11/27/01 Tue
Please, people--Willow is SO not done. She's been on a wild binge,
she's gotten people and herself into trouble, she's wildly remorseful,
she's sworn off. If anybody has ever read Alcoholics Anonymous
they know what's going to happen next. A few jittery "dry"
days, and then WHOMP. Back into it.
Which is exactly, I'm sure, how it'll go with Buffy too. A few
jittery days away from Spike, and then--whomp.
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[> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27 (SPOILERY!!)
-- Keyser Soze., 18:30:40 11/27/01 Tue
Hey. Just discovered this board yesterday, seems like a great
discussion board (Most of my friends refuse to admit that Buffy
is a more intelligent show than say, Dawson's Creek).
Anyway, I seriously did not like how the events of this episode
turned out.
About the Willow story - I felt like I was watching Requiem for
a Dream. I agree, the story did seem rushed. One day, Willow and
Amy are both out just looking to have a good time (and Amy was
rat just the day before!) and two days later they're sniveling
addicts, crashing cars and stealing for a fix. "Rack's place"
felt just a little too contrived - could they make the "Magic
= Drugs" allegory any more heavy-handed?
Then there's Spike and Buffy. After watching "Smashed"
I had a hope that perhaps that Buffy and Spike had a cathartic
experience - that they had hit rock bottom, and there was nowhere
to go but up. Well, I was wrong. It just made their relationship
more twisted; in fact I think they've regressed back to their
dynamic post-"Crush".
And their characters seemed to regress in every way. One thing
that seemed hopeful for Spike's character was that he was able
to care for someone else besides his love interests - namely,
the fact that he wanted to protect Dawn. But now it seems he's
lost even that; in response to Buffy's worry he only responds
with a sarcastic quip, and it seems he's only going with Buffy
because of obligation/ulterior motives. I still don't know what
to make of this; are we to believe that as soon as the restraints
on his mind are relaxed just a little, his selfishness overrides
any selfless feelings he had in the past?
Although, perhaps his actions are a result of Buffy's response
to their experience. Still, his demeanor and actions are still
uncalled for. I don't really believe that Spike loves Buffy -
doing that would actually require him to care about her emotions.
And how Buffy was at the end of the episode - that doesn't seem
the result of love. More of selfish desire.
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[> [> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27
(SPOILERY!!) -- maddog, 19:31:02 11/27/01 Tue
I don't understand why people seem so appalled at the magic=drugs
concept...drug use is a very serious problem and I can't see a
better metaphor for it than Willow overusing magic...and I don't
see it coming out of nowhere...she's been steadily using more
magic and more powerful magic...you could trace this kinda thing
back to last season if not before. Heavy handed, yes, but rightfully
so.
Yup, Buffy and Spike are twisted, but again, are you shocked?
Spike's had that stupid chip in his head so long he acts more
human that vampire every day....and Buffy, she's been ripped out
of heaven...she's not exactly thinking clearly. So twisted, sure,
but well deserved.
You do realize you just said a vampire did something "uncalled
for"....no kidding...they're evil by nature. :)
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[> [> [> Why the metaphor was a problem ... -- Earl Allison,
15:05:25 11/28/01 Wed
The problem as I see it is, magic has never equalled drugs before,
not in the way it was presented last night.
Did we see Ethan Rayne reveling in his power in such a fashion?
Amy? Anyone? No, it just seemed like a massively changed premise
for the sake of the story -- now I grant you, it didn't go down
that path until Rack came into the picture (and don't get me started
on Amy knowing him and apparently going before she was changed
...), and maybe that's an important plot point, but it came out
of the blue.
Will Willow struggle with this? Maybe, maybe not, but it just
struck me as WRONG. One minute Willow is raising the dead, the
next she's drunkenly staggering down an alley -- just seemed like
it was out of left field, again, for the sake of the story, rather
than logical progression.
Still, I may be pleasantly surprised.
Take it and run.
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[> [> [> [> Re: Why the metaphor was a problem ...
-- Humanitas, 07:00:05 11/29/01 Thu
Magic has been used as a metaphor for drugs. In "The Dark
Age," Giles describes being possessed by Eyghon as "an
incredible high." Also, many of his cautions to Willow have
been very similar to cautions against trying drugs. So the idea
has been there from at least that far back.
I did feel that the metaphor was a bit heavy-handed in this case
though. One of the things I've always enjoyed about this show
was it's subtlety, and there was nothing subtle about this one.
We got hit over the head with it.
I was also a bit surprised that we got to this point so early
in the season. I know the arc isn't finished yet, and there will
be the inevitable backslide-y angst, but still, it seems early
to have reached this point. Maybe it's because the arc isn't really
contained in this season, but is a continuation of things from
last season, I'm not sure. It seems like they usually tease us
more with a character having a problem before they plunge us into
hell, though.
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[> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27 (SPOILERY)
-- robert, 18:37:15 11/27/01 Tue
"Maybe I'm expecting too much, but was this handled a bit
TOO quickly and easily, or what?"
You are not expecting too much. You are merely jumping the gun.
Swearing off all magic doesn't change a thing. She MAY have admitted
to having a problem. I think she is still lying to herself about
her ability to go cold turkey however. ME portrayed gruesome physical
withdrawal symptoms in Amy and Willow didn't look so good in the
last scene. I do not believe that she is anywhere near hitting
rock bottom.
I don't think that either Buffy or Willow can resolve their individual
difficulties without the help of the entire gang. Now may be the
time for a real intervention.
Is there a 12-step program for magic addiction?
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[> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27 (SPOILERY!!
) -- maddog, 18:38:26 11/27/01 Tue
I thought that very same thing til that last scene...and then
it hit me, no matter how upset Willow is now it's like a drug...and
you don't just quit cold turkey without having serious withdrawal...which
means one of two things. Either we're going to have multiple weeks
of Willow going through MAJOR withdrawal...or she's gonna run
right back because of the addiction.
I'm not exactly sure what Rack gets but we see how he gets it
with that hand over the chest drawing something out of Willow
thing when she and Amy first got there.
They're in the business of metaphores...all these storylines are
"let's take a problem that any person could have(in this
case drug use) and let's put a supernatural twist on it to make
it work for the show". I think this one has gotten quite
serious and for good reason...addiction isn't a good thing whether
it's drugs or alcohol or whatever.
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[> [> Re: Tiny comments on "Wrecked" from 11/27
(SPOILERY!! ) -- DEN, 19:30:37 11/27/01 Tue
Right, maddog! Whether or not the drug/magic analogy was a bit
heavy, watching Willow twisting in pain on the bed in that last
scene brought back memories I don't like. Her comeback will be
a LONG process, almost as hard for those who love her. And Buffy,
hiding behind garlic and a cross to protect herself from her own
desires, is in no better shape.
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[> Re: What Rack got from "Wrecked" 11/27 (SPOILERY!!
DO NOT READ UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN THE EPISODE!!!) -- cat, 20:38:02
11/27/01 Tue
What did Rack offer, and what was he getting in exchange?
I was thinking he got the chance for Willow's soul, or at least
a chance to corrupt it. This is what demons do best: corruption.
It takes more time than outright killing, which eliminates a player
from the good side; but instead of killing an enemy, corruption
turns an enemy into an ally.
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[> [> I noticed something..... -- Rufus, 00:57:03 11/28/01
Wed
When they were going to Racks, Willow asked Amy if he was a Warlock
and Amy says "I quess"..........comeon here she didn't
take the time to find out exactly "who or what" this
guy is? Rack also says you gotta give a little to get a little.......so,
a little what?.......Willow is going to have a nice sleep feel
a bit better then she will relapse because going "cold turkey"
may be harder than she expected. The scene at the end....Willow
is sweating, fists clenched..suffering.....Buffy is sitting alone
with her half acre of garlic and a cross.....she may be thinking
but she isn't suffering like Willow is. Thinking that if Willow
just takes the Yaks cheese out of her bra is going to make the
addiction to the high Rack can supply, is just plain naive.
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[> [> [> Hit the post button too soon -- Rufus, 00:59:46
11/28/01 Wed
Thinking that if Willow just takes the Yaks cheese out of her
bra is going to make the addiction, to the high Rack can supply,
disappear.....is just plain naive.
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Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers
for "Wrecked") -- Rob, 18:32:54 11/27/01
I know that we don't usually use foul language on this board,
and I apologize for what I am about to type, but it just has to
be said:
HOLY FUCKING SHIT...
This episode was absolutely incredible. It was dark and gutwrenching.
The betrayed look on Dawn's face and then the hard slap she gave
Willow across the face. Willow's face racked with pain and unbearable
sadness. These are images that are going to stay with me for a
long time.
Of course, as usual, there were a few lighter moments: Anya's
hilarious and brilliant Martha Stewart comment comes to mind;
Dawn's peanut butter quesadillas. But the majority of this episode
was dark as hell, and I loved it. It will be hard to watch again,
but it is so worthwhile.
I applaud Joss and particularly Marti Noxon, the author of this
script, for this amazing hour of television, and, further, for
completely turning the audience's expectations on its head. Now
we know that Willow is not becoming evil, even though all signs
pointed towards that. She was in the throes of a very powerful
addiction. Allyson's breakdown at the end was among the best-acted
scenes we have seen in the show's history.
It was also very gratifying to see Buffy and Willow having a real
conversation. The entire gang has been very avoidy with each other
this season, due to all the emotional baggage associated with
ressurrecting Buffy, Willow's addiction, Xander and Anya's impending
marriage, Gile's leaving, etc. and I was worried that the episode
would end with Buffy angry at Willow and Willow descending farther
into magic. Now I think that Willow's recovery will be the thing
that brings Willow and Buffy back together and strengthens the
gang again. I hope that they will be a family again soon, and
that scene with Buffy and Willow really gave me hope.
I also found the last scene very poignant, with Buffy holding
her cross, examining it. There has been a lot of talk on this
board about the symbolism of Buffy having been wearing a horseshoe
good luck charm around her neck instead of the cross this year,
possibly symbolizing the fact that she does not have her heart
in the slaying as she used to, and a possible new reliance on
luck rather than the faith she used to have in the strength of
herself and her support group. I cannot wait now to find out whether
this clasping the cross is a reaffirmation of her trying to come
back into the world, or it is her continuing to wish she could
stop "going through the motions." That may not have
come out clearly. What I meant to ask was, does this mean Buffy
is now "complete" again, or is it another sign that
she still wishes she was?
Another comment I have is that I hope Xander and Anya return to
the forefront of the story when the season returns in January,
since they weren't given much time for the past two weeks.
What else?
I loved the great continuity, as usual: the story continues the
next morning from where we left off; Tara asks if Dawn wants normal
shaped pancakes or funny shapes, as she did earlier this year
(in either "Bargaining" or "After Life," I
believe--anyone remember which one?). It was also interesting
to see that Amy had been dabbling in the Very Dark Powers before
being turned into a rat. When we first saw Amy using magic in
BBB and then in Gingerbread, I thought she was using darker magic
than anyone else on the show seemed to believe, especially when
her eyes turned black before turning herself into a rat--she seemed
full of fury, as she did before turning Buffy into a rat in BBB.
And now we know just how dark the powers she was playing with
really were.
My only problem with the whole episode was--Amy said her father
was expecting her. When did she call him--while Willow and her
were out partying all night?!? But, you know what, I loved the
episode so much, I'll completely let that little nitpick go. She
called while they were out, or maybe before they left. Yeah.
Anyway--very strong episode that I'm sure will have a lasting
effect on the characters. I'm dying to know how Dawn and Willow's
relationship will heal, as well as Tara and Willow's. Now I'm
starting to feel more than ever that Amber Benson is not in the
credits just to cast doubt in the audience members' eyes about
where the story is going.
But Willow seems serious about staying on the straight and narrow
from now on (well, hopefully not completely straight...I know,
bad pun!), and I think she means it this time.
Oh, I just need to make another comment about Buffy and Willow's
conversation. I was amazed just how perfectly it echoed so many
thoughts that we had here at ATPoBtVS...The idea that Willow didn't
feel special, and then she was "Super-Willow" and the
possibility that she felt jealous of Buffy and her superpowers.
It's very interesting that Willow says she felt she wasn't special,
especially since Xander has had similar doubts in the past of
his importance to the group.
Now I'm ready for all the healing to begin!
Rob
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[> Re: Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- Herself, 18:40:58 11/27/01 Tue
I think Buffy's cradling of that cross in the end had more to
do with why she'd hung garlic over all her windows--to keep Spike
from wandering in and ravishing her in her bed. Clearly she's
afraid of what she wants to do with him. For me both her swearing
off of Spike and Willow's swearing off of magic were of a piece--big
brave talk that they're not going to be able to hold to.
By the way, this is my second post here--found this yesterday.
Am enthralled. Just wish this board wasn't so wonky; it seemed
to be unavailable a good deal of the afternoon today. I'm super
impressed with the thoughtfulness and quality of the posts.
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[> [> Welcome! (and today was a particulary bad board day)...
-- Wisewoman, 18:49:18 11/27/01 Tue
It's frustrating as hell for all of us when it's like it was today,
but fortunately it doesn't happen often.
You might wanna bookmark the chat (link above) separately, and
check in there when the Board isn't working. We usually turn up
to compare notes.
;o)
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[> [> Re: Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- pagangodess, 18:53:51 11/27/01 Tue
'Wrecked' left me feeling 'deflated'. Loved it and hated it. I'm
deeply disturbed by Willows actions and could relate to what Dawn
went through that night.
Wow, again. I'm sure this is exactly what Joss and Marti wanted
us to feel. Amazed and disturbed. This one was dark, you're right
Rob.
I took the ending differently. I think Buffy was hoping Spike
would come. Why else would she go through the trouble of hanging
garlic in her room? All she needs is a stake.
Still can't think clearly, too much emotion was brought out in
me through 'Wrecked'.
pagangodess
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[> [> [> ending of "Wrecked" (Spoilers for
"Wrecked") -- cortney, 19:54:10 11/27/01 Tue
*I think Buffy was hoping Spike would come. Why else would she
go through the trouble of hanging garlic in her room? All she
needs is a stake.*
I thought she looked more vulnerable than anything else. The cross
and garlic are passive defenses - maybe if Buffy had that stake,
I could see her as planning or hoping for a fight. But as it was,
it seemed like she was just warding off something - Spike himself,
or her attraction to him?
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[> [> [> [> Re: ending of "Wrecked" (Spoilers
for "Wrecked") -- Arya Stark, 00:22:22 11/28/01 Wed
I too thought she was hoping Spike would come. She was hoping
that he would see that she was trying to keep him out.
I've done similar things before-- setting up a scene (no lights,
dark depressing music) in hopes that the person I was mad at would
come and find out that I was mad at them!
But I can also see what someone else mentioned-- She wasn't trying
to keep Spike out, but trying to keep herself in.
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[> [> [> [> [> Welcome! (Love George RR Martin,
btw) ;o) -- Wisewoman, 19:36:49 11/28/01 Wed
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[> [> [> [> [> [> Are you the same wisewoman
from the ASOIAF board ? NT -- Stranger, 23:15:41 11/28/01 Wed
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Don't think so, 'cause
I don't know what it is! ;o) -- WW, 08:11:07 11/29/01 Thu
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Oh! Song of Ice
& Fire! D'oh...nope, that's not me. -- WW, 08:14:28 11/29/01 Thu
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[> Don't worry, I'll just cover my blushing eyes...........;)
-- Rufus, 18:51:57 11/27/01 Tue
Loved tonights episode....it is setting us up for a great Feb.
sweeps. Buffy with the cross and the garlic had me laughing as
we all know that she is stronger than Spike, so what is she trying
to repel?
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[> [> Don't forget how dangerous Spike is -- Crichton, 19:23:38
11/27/01 Tue
Buffy may be stronger, but remember, Spike took out two Slayers,
one on one, with only his skill and strengh to back him up. Now
that he can fight her again, and if he ever does turn evil, he
can really give her a run for her money.
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[> [> [> My take on the cross and garlic.... -- Nina,
20:04:20 11/27/01 Tue
I found that last scene very touching and I really didn't laugh
at it. If Buffy would fear something as a Slayer she would have
asked Tara to put a deinvite spell again. She would sleep with
a stake under her pillow. But that's not the issue here. They
fought and she knows that if she wants to she can kill him. The
problem is that she probably doesn't want to and that disturbs
her.
The cross and garlic are what normal people defend themselves
against vampires. It's not the Slayer who is afraid, it's the
girl. She's hugging the cross as she would hug Mr. Gordo. She
looks like she's trying to get herself to feel better about the
whole situation, but she deals with it as a human being, not a
Slayer. And it's all good to me as it is really the Buffy part
of herself who is afraid.
The way I see it, Buffy is freaked out. And it's undertandable.
I don't see what she seeks in Spike as being an addiction. She
believes it though and she makes all those parallels with Willow
because she wants to convince herself that it isn't right, that
it's wrong (like Faith in Buffy said in "Who are you")
Willow's journey is to accept who she is. She isn't a superhero.
Like we saw in "Restless" she has to stop stepping on
everyone's cue and take off her costume.
Buffy's journey is also accepting who she is, but she has to accept
that she is a superhero, like Joan did in TR. She has to accept
that some of her pre-conceptions are false. She has to let herself
go and risk the pain... otherwise she will lose her humanity (like
the guide said in "Intervention").
If Willow is addicted to power, Buffy is addicted to her black
and white world where she is the good girl and where vampires
are bad unless they have a soul. Buffy is not completely human
anymore, that belief got smashed last week. And from what we saw
in TR she can find a proper balance if that B&W world isn't in
her head!
I'm quite psyched for the rest of the season. I personally feel
that we have seen the peak of the Bad and dark Willow arc (thank
god, the methaphor with drugs was just way too obvious to me -
but I accepted it as character development) If anything it really
helped Buffy and Willow bond again after all that happened since
Buffy's return. I also believe we will still see Denial Buffy,
but Spike said it two times in the episode :"Things have
changed", so we won't see the same kind of dynamic.
Really loved to hear positive thoughts on that episode Rob.....
I was at BAPS before (to read the CC) and I just had to leave
as so many people didn't seem to get the episode... or if they
got it they really didn't like it.
It's so depressing reading many bad comments when you actually
like an episode! So thanks for chimming in!!!! :)
PS. The pancake reference comes from Bargaining part 1, beginning
of act 1! :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> I'm with you Nina. -- Cactus Watcher,
20:12:52 11/27/01 Tue
You pretty much said what I had to say and a lot more. :o)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Totally Agree Nina .Couldn't have
said it bettter -- Artemis, 20:38:12 11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: My take on the cross and garlic....
-- maddog, 20:44:34 11/27/01 Tue
While I enjoyed all of your comments, I can't see this as being
the end of Willow's downward spiral...addictions don't die that
quickly.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> You may be right about Willow, but
-- CW, 20:54:33 11/27/01 Tue
Seeing her drive off Tara and nearly get Dawn killed two different
ways, was plenty for me. I'd like to see some hope for her now.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Willow going downhill... -- Nina,
14:00:56 11/28/01 Wed
"I can't see this as being the end of Willow's downward spiral...addictions
don't die that quickly."
Not the end.... or maybe I don't remember what I wrote! I thought
I said we saw the highest peak... now it will go downhill.....
doesn't mean it's over... just that we saw the worst of it. Maybe
it's just wishful thinking on my part! :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Seeing Spike as an addiction is easier
than seeing him..... -- Rufus, 23:05:20 11/27/01 Tue
As a person. Buffy is supposed to slay the bad vampires, she and
they have a place and her sex with and continued attraction to
Spike screws up her world view. I laughed at the last scene because
is was so absurd. Spike wasn't going to be scraping at her windows
begging to be allowed in....he's already in..Buffy just hasn't
accepted that fact yet. As tender as Spike is capable of being
he can also be crass. Buffy didn't need to be compared to the
slayers that Spike had killed....it brought her back to why she
shouldn't be having sex with the "enemy". It also makes
how she see's all demons a bit more complicated than she'd like.
The only consistant thing is that she always ends up looking to
Spike for help....and not just to find her panties either.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> What is BAPS and where is it? -- Traveler,
23:06:18 11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> BAPS... -- Nina, 14:21:48 11/28/01
Wed
The message board is here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Bloody_Awful/messages/
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> And here I thought... -- WillowFan, 00:28:00
11/28/01 Wed
...Buffy was planning to cook a ton of Italian food. And maybe
pray a little bit.
Maybe she came back from the grave...Catholic!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> LOL.......I thought....gee Italian
night at Buffy's.........:):):) -- Rufus, 00:38:54 11/28/01 Wed
Next thought what all night 7-11 has that much garlic?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Actually, I was thinking...
-- WillowFan, 00:44:25 11/28/01 Wed
...that Buffy must have gone to CostCo or Price Club or some other
wholesaler to buy such a mess of garlic all at once.
It seemed like a lot of effort just to "ward off" Spike.
I mean, even after Giles's generous gift, doesn't Buffy still
have to pay all the bills?
On the other hand, perhaps Sunnydale has a discount garlic source,
because, you know, the vampires and all.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> LOL.......stoooop it........Costco...........:):):)
-- Rufus, 00:48:59 11/28/01 Wed
Explain the 100 pounds of garlic to the cashier Buffy.;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> This is Trish
Burkle -- Kimberly, 08:03:05 11/28/01 Wed
OK guys, stop it and behave yourselves! ;-) I'm going to get into
trouble if I start snickering at work.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Hey, it'a
all her.....fault.......serious academic here........;) -- Rufus,
19:35:26 11/28/01 Wed
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Exactly, Rufus! -- WW, 19:25:04 11/27/01 Tue
I just picture her sitting there, wide awake and vigilant all
night, and he doesn't show up!
She'd be so ticked, she'd have to go and find him a give him a
good dressing-down.
;o)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> WW, do you mean undressing? -- Slayrunt, 21:09:06
11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Archaic and deliberately suggestive terminology..
-- WW, 19:41:12 11/28/01 Wed
...for giving him a good talking to!
;o)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Careful, or liq will threaten to kick you out -- vampire
hunter D, 19:30:15 11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- maddog, 20:26:17 11/27/01 Tue
oh, I totally agree. Best part of the episode was Dawn's hurt
look of betrayal and then the slap...true feeling...very well
acted. THe Martha Stewart comment was hilarious. I've always wondered
about her. :)
I have to disagree that Willow's storyline is over...it's far
from that...admitting you have a problem...and stopping...especially
cold turkey....are two TOTALLY different things. What I'll admit
was that I was surprised they came to this portion of the storyline
so fast. I expected a few more episodes of magic overuse.
The Buffy/Willow conversation was nice...you're right...not enough
of that going on lately...even the conversation between Xander
and Buffy about Willow's magic overuse seemed rushed. The storylines
tend to be continuous but this one was much more so because the
last two episodes seemed like a part1/part2 concept. I thought
Amy called her father during the last episode...maybe not.
It'll take a while for Dawn and Willow to patch things up. A big
trust was broken...Willow was like a mother figure to her. A strong
bond there. Amber's never been in the credits cause she was never
meant to be an everyday player...not yet at least.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- Lupe, 21:49:03 11/27/01 Tue
Here goes my first post here:
I, too, enjoyed this episode, though it was hard to watch (as
many eps are this season). I don't think Willow's addiction is
anywhere close to over, but hey, admitting you need help IS the
first step. The problem is, Buffy's still not willing to admit
SHE needs help. In addiction, secrecy is a big NO NO, and Buffy
is keeping her secrets (yes - shame, but also it lets her continue
to act out).
Willow's admitting she has the problem with magic could actually
create a real block between her and Buffy, because Buffy may be
that much more hesitant to tell her or other scoobies that she
may not have come back "right," - which let's face it,
needs to be dealt with. (Hey, Will - know you're hitting rock
bottom and all with the magic, but by the way, you brought me
back wrong).
I liked the idea of the girl Buffy being afraid of Spike as opposed
to the Slayer. I have to admit, I don't totally get the B/S attraction.
I've heard the theories for it, but nothing has completely satisfied
me, because my reaction is the same as Buffy's: "that was
the most disgusting, perverse thing I've ever done." Although
the writers could have built up a nice relationship (of sorts)
between the two of them (a la the nice back porch scenes we had),
they instead have taken a different route where Buffy's relationship
with Spike is more about her own darkness and demons (as perhaps
well it should be). In other words "Smashed" and "Wrecked"
are not synonyms for "hugs" and "puppies."
Okay, I'm rambling off on a tangent now. Maybe I should have considered
doing a nice outline for my first post.
Anyhow: I'm loving this season, although it is very dark - a lot
more drama, I think, than any season we've had so far. And a really
major and slow moving arc. I'm very impatient with it and am going
to go bonkers waiting for a new episode!
Anyhoo: my favorite quote in the episode: Amy: It's not what you
think - it's sage. Buffy: That is what I thought.
He he! Only in the Summers house!
(PS - been an admirer and lurker of this site and board for awhile!
Hope I can contribute!)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Sage the multiple use spice........ -- Rufus, 23:09:42
11/27/01 Tue
Welcome and you just contributed with your first post. You are
right....Buffy isn't afraid of vampires just herself...the garlic
and cross just showed that even Buffy doesn't have the solution
to a vampire that has managed to get to close to her heart...notice
she didn't have any stakes...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Anyone mind if I swear? (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- change, 04:05:24 11/28/01 Wed
I don't think this was a bad episode, but I think it was a little
too blunt. I think it's better when an episode doesn't hit you
over the head repeatedly with its message. The metaphores for
magic use as a drug addition, and paying Rack off with sex could
have been a little less obvious and a little more metaphorical.
I think Willow and Amy's decent into addiction was handled too
quickly. One day Amy seems to be normal, AND HAS NOT USED MAGIC
IN 3 YEARS. The next day, she's going to a sleazy magic den to
get a high from some half demon, and later on is stealing to support
her new habit. There was a little more back story with Willow,
but she seemed to fall into Rack's grasp a little too quickly
as well.
The show also compared Willow's addiction to magic to Buffy's
addiction to sex with Spike. However, I don't see how you can
consider yourself addicted to sex after a single one night stand.
Although perhaps the intent of ME is for Buffy to explain her
feelings towards Spike as an addition, rather than facing up to
the idea that she may really be attracted to him.
Obviously, both Willow and Buffy have a long way to go. Willow
is obviously not going to make it going cold turkey, and the use
of garlic on the windows symbolizes the futility of Buffy's rejection
of Spike. When was the last time Spike came into a house by turning
himself into a bat and flying through a bedroom window? For that
matter, when was the last time garlic was used to repell a vampire
on BtVS?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: I agree, and also.... (Spoilers for "Wrecked")
-- mundusmundi, 04:57:34 11/28/01 Wed
As I bemoaned in chat last night, why is the sex issue taking
precedence over Buffy's teensy little identity problem? Seems
if I were raised from the grave, and I now had reason to suspect
I might not've come back entirely intact, that I just might want
to do some investigating as to why. I'm sure it will be argued
that this was the point -- that Buffy's in denial, that we must
first unquestioningly BELIEVE the show's genius before we can
RECEIVE it, blah blah -- but I just didn't like the way it was
handled. The three episodes leading up to this one were so good,
that it seemed even more annoying.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Not Liking Buffy so much -- Mari_Star_99,
19:29:42 11/27/01 Tue
I am dissapointed with Wreacked. Earl Allison pointed out that
it seemed TOO easy/fast for Willow. Although, I can see why a
car wreack and a demon had a more of an effect on Willow. She
she got to see it for herself, and it doesn't look like Buffy
didn't talk much about her experiance in Heaven. That said I think
there will be so major backsiding before she can really control
her magicall impulses.
But here is what I really did not like... Buffy
I understand that she is in denial. But it is half way through
the season and the Buffster is not showing any signs of growing.
Rather she has regressed. In Intervention she was able to acknoledge
that Spike did a good thing for her and Dawn. Good. It takes maturity,
to admit someone you normally consider an enemy has done something
good.
We (and Buffy) know that Spike, in addtion enduring torture at
Glory's hands and willingness to give his life up in the Gift,
fought alongside the Scoobs all summer, helped look after Dawn,
gentley comforted Buffyr after she came back, and saved her from
burning to death in OMWF. Yet, we have not heared a single word
of thanks on her part. Or even a matter of fact acknoledgment
of the Good thing Spike has done. I find this unsatisfying as
a veiwer. I said in an earler post that I felt Willow and Buffy
were emotionaly stalled. After thinking about it some more, I
definitly feel Buffy storyline/character development is stalled.
We have established that she is feels frozne emotionally. Instead
of using the passion she shared with Spike to develop and explore
who she is and what she really feels for Captain Peroxide, she
goes into "This is BAD. I must not do BAD thing" mode.
Buffy needs to start the growth part of her story, or I fear it
will feel rushed and fake. Kind of like Willow just "getting"
that the magic was too much in this one episode. I would like
to see Buffy's growth over several episodes, not in a slam bam
"Oh I really do love Spike and can find a way to have a relationship
with him as long as his not sucking anyone blood anymore".
Which BTW I fear is exactly where they are headed with this.
The sight of Buffy in her room with garlic and a cross was probably
meant to be a little funny. It struck me as sad. Spike has not
come to her bedroom since he set her stright on Riley. Not to
mention the physical interludes between then were mostly instigated
by her. I don't understand why she would surround herself with
garlic and a cross. She just not the Slayer I knew and loved.
Overall I think this was the weakest eppisode this season. I really
did like seeing Dawn kick the demon though. At least she is doing
some growing. Go Dawnie! Go Dawine! Go Dawie! Go! Go!
One the upside I think I've got a new favorite qoute...
Buffy: "Last night was the most perverse,degrading experience
of my life." Spike:( smiles) "Yeah me too."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- Herself, 19:42:35 11/27/01
Tue
I agree, I was disappointed in Buffy's behavior, and surprised.
Of course part of me just wanted to see more raunch between the
two of them, but aside from that, I did feel Buffy was stuck.
I expected Spike to exhibit some of his affection for Dawn while
they were out looking for her and for this to touch Buffy and
thaw her out a little. That didn't really happen; Spike's part
in the rescue was so truncated. It's time for Buffy to undergo
a change of attitude. All your points about what Spike's done
for her are well-taken.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- maddog, 19:53:41 11/27/01
Tue
Buffy's in denial...easy as that...what I find confusing is just
because her character is following a path that some don't like,
it's considered bad...characters can't be perfect...they're not
supposed to be. Is it fair to judge the direction a show takes
just because we don't like it? I don't know...just seems like
a lot of people are doing it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- Wynn, 20:43:39 11/27/01
Tue
I don't think that people are beginning to not like the show or
Buffy herself; I think that we are (at least I am) beginning to
be frustrated with Buffy's behavior towards Spike. It seems to
be one step forward, five steps back over and over again. I'm
waiting for the moment that actually makes Buffy acknowledge that
straight black and white/good and evil do not exist (the moment
that makes DenialBuffy disappear) and for her to acknowledge that
there is some sort of a relationship between them.
I'm a bit confused about the extreme lack of interaction between
Spike and Dawn. Spike protected her and looked after her the entire
summer, but their bond/frienship has been non existant this season.
I'm confused that he would rush up the tower in The Gift to protect
Dawn, nearly getting himself killed in the process, then protect
her the entire summer, but have little to no interaction with
her since Buffy's return. Any thoughts?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- sl, 21:28:19
11/27/01 Tue
I know, what is Buffy's problem! And I do wonder about the lack
of interaction between spike and dawn.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- maddog, 21:33:56
11/27/01 Tue
Some have expressed their distaste, which is why I wrote that.
Buffy will have that epiphany eventually...she just needs time
to figure it out. THe only reason I can see for the lack of interaction
is that he doesn't want extra run ins with Buffy because of how
she treats him.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- Deeva, 21:49:03
11/27/01 Tue
"beginning to be frustrated with Buffy's behavior towards
Spike. It seems to be one step forward, five steps back over and
over again."
That's exactly what is starting to kind of gnaw away at me. Just
when you think there's progress, we're yanked right back almost
past the drawing board. I mean I know that this is one of the
many reasons that we tune in every week but I'm pretty close to
"enough" already, although not just yet cause when I
finally do have enough of it that would mean not tuning in anymore
and that's an impossibility for me.
As I gather from what I'm reading here & there, other people are
saying that they hated/didn't like this episode. While this is
not my favorite ep. (aside from Butt Naked!Spike, oh, babyyyyyyyy!)
it is far from being one that I hate.
Spike & Dawn interaction. Yeah I agree that it's a little weird
for the 2 of them to spend a whole summer grieving together, Spike
watching over her (rather smotheringly so as evidenced in Bargaining)
and so on, for them to not have that much screen time. But maybe
that's something that we're also not supposed to be seeing. The
idea that they were, and maybe are still close, has already been
set in our heads. Now it's time for Dawn and Buffy to try and
settle into some sort of routine as they didn't really have that
chance after Joyce died and before Buffy died.
I'm really disappointed in Buffy. There's no other way for me
to say it. Why would she revert back to such a passive defense
against Spike from entering into her house? I understand that
she may be feeling lost and extremely confused at her attraction
to Spike but I don't know about the garlic and cross. She knows
that she is stronger than Spike. Even way before he was chipped,
he wasn't able to kill or best her. I'm not sure what to make
of it.
And Spike, well, for a vamp/romanticist who has his moments this
sure wasn't one of them. Way to keep a girl interested, huh? The
line he says about "killing Slayers are great but...".
What girl is going to stick around after that?! Sigh! Now we face
a whole month of re-runs. I'm already in withdrawl.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- pagangodess,
22:19:32 11/27/01 Tue
I'm with you on this one, Deeva (especially the part about butt
naked Spike, lol). I have mixed feelings about the episode, i.e.
love/hate. My thinking on Spike and Dawn is that it's so like
Spike to step back and let Buffy run the show. Like in 'All the
Way' and in 'Wrecked', when he takes care of Dawn while Buffy
fights the demon. That is why, imo, once Buffy was back in Dawn's
life, Spike took leave and waited for Buffy's call if she needed
him. He sometimes knows his place. Besides, Dawn knows where to
find him. And, I'll have to rewatch the scene, but I thought Buffy
looked close to tears when she told Spike that it could never
happen again (beginning of 'Wrecked'). Spike should have kept
his mouth shut about "killing slayers is great, but.."
Then again, what guy does not like to gloat over stuff like that.
pagan
'Do it, just do it. Kill me! Take me out of the world that has
you in it' Spike in 'Out of My Mind'
I know it doesn't have anything to do with it, but it's my favourite
Spike quote and I couldn't resist putting here.
Though now that I did... Spike's dream is really foretelling of
'Smashed', don't you think. She comes to him, they fight, they
kiss. Was Joss trying to tell us something?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Possible ***Spoilers*** above, sorry
-- pagangodess, 22:20:53 11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Gloating -- Deeva, 23:31:48
11/27/01 Tue
Yeah, guys like to gloat and so do girls, too. But must he gloat
while he's with her? I can just see it nw some where out there
is a guy saying to a girl "Man, your sisters are hot but
you're way hotter!" Ick! save it for when your with your
friends.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Gloating -- DEN,
06:31:51 11/28/01 Wed
Of course running his mouth is bad form. But Spike was in great
form , apparently all night (check the mutual bruises and scratches
and Buffy's careful movements when she returns home). He has never
been able to resist a good one-liner whatever it costs him. It
is perfectly in character that he would make exactly that kind
of comment--even though he had to know what Buffy's reaction would
be. Spike, to sum it up, is no gentleman. I sort of think that's
the idea. ,
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Gloating --
Rufus, 20:24:27 11/28/01 Wed
He's no gentleman but he doesn't have the malicious big mouth
Parker did. He didn't turn evil after sex, cause hey!, he's already
evil. Buffy did say that she would kill him if he ever told anyone
about their night together.....I wonder if Parker is still alive?????;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Gloating --
Traveler, 23:25:40 11/28/01 Wed
I can kind of see where Spike is coming from here. After all,
I think I would have a similar reaction under the circumstances.
I mean, if you were a vampire, wouldn't you be thinking, "dude!
I just had sex with the Slayer! How cool is that?" Just imagine
him going to hang out with all his vampire buddies and saying,
"hey, while all you guys were trying to figure out how to
kill her, guess what I was doing? I was having mind numblingly
good sex with her! Haven't any of you morons noticed that the
Slayer is a hot?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> I agree with you....... -- Rufus, 22:53:32 11/27/01
Tue
To expect Buffy to be perfect is the impossible dream. Buffy was
dragged out of heaven...the spell bringing her back was interrupted
part way through. If Buffy is being a bitch maybe there is good
reason for it. As for Spike, love the character but he is far
from perfect himself as he proved when he made that crude reference
to slayers. Both characters are interesting because of their flaws.
If they had none there would be no story because they would become
dreadfully dull.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Their perfection lies in their flaws. -- Deeva,
23:34:01 11/27/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- Talia, 20:45:15 11/27/01
Tue
This episode was something of a let down from the past few...although
that still leaves Buffy easily the best thing on TV, with the
possible exception of its own reruns. I can't give a specific
reason why it was slightly less brilliant. It just didn't gel
quite as well as previous eps this season.
Buffy's bitchiness was not why I merely liked "Wrecked"
rather than adored it. It's a reasonable story arc for her character
to travel....but it's still annoying as all get out. How any sane
straight woman could have Spike wrapped around her pinky and push
him away I'll never understand. Aside from the drool-factor, he
has shown unbelievable loyalty to her, even loyalty to her friends
and family when she was unable to observe. She had acknowledged
Spike as a person at the end of last season and for the first
few episodes of this one. It seems that bringing her feelings
for Spike from the depths of her subconscious to a purely physical
manifestation in the real world has prompted her to deny that
they exist as anything other than a bodily impulse. Since OMWF,
she's flung words designed to hurt at Spike, trying to drive him
off, trying to defend her moping space, trying to keep her own
feelings under the surface or destroyed. Buffy has been hurt enough
even before her death to resist romance with anyone. Disgust with
Spike is a manifestation of her desire to keep anyone at all from
getting close to her. She wants to feel, but she is afraid. Now
she's using Spike to get what little physical and emotional fulfillment
she can receive without opening herself up to whatever happiness
or misery love throws her way. My hope is that her resolution
to stay away from Spike in this episode can turn into a resolution
to refrain from using and abusing Spike like a drug and instead
treating him as a person. Until then we all have to deal with
the Queen of Denial.
I'm also annoyed at Spike lately. He's not showing much of that
patience we saw in The Gift. Waiting by her door is no longer
enough. Buffy's hot and cold attitude is hard enough to deal with
for those of us not currently in love with her, so I see where
he's coming from. Still, I think he would get fewer cutting remarks
aimed his way if he tried to restrain his own. Or maybe not. Who
can predict the amazing resurrected Denial Girl?
My favorite line: "When did the building fall down?"
Geez, she really is out of it.
Sorry about the rather rambling nature of that post. I think it
said something, just not in an especially organized manner. I
need more sleep.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Not Liking Buffy so much -- maddog, 21:37:43 11/27/01
Tue
When did anyone call Buffy sane? :) She was barely sane before
her death/ressurection. I also think she feels that if she gives
in to Spike then she's somehow betraying her feelings for Angel.
Spike's sick and tired of the way she treats him...I think he's
just finally hit his breaking point...as for your quote...I think
that just shows how focused on the fight/sex she was.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Can I just say... Go Dawn! (Spoilers
for Wrecked) -- Lucifer_Sponge, 21:37:28 11/27/01 Tue
I've decided that I'm greatly impressed my Dawn's actions in Wrecked.
I sort of expected her to just bolt in the opposite direction
of that creature, but instead she fought back. She kicked it,
and shocked the hell out of me AND the monster. I didn't see it
coming (don't think Beastie Boy did either). Then she throws sand
in the thing's eyes and thwaps it to try and beat it back a little.
Must be that ol' Summers blood, huh?
Plus, and also, I kind of enjoyed it when she slapped Willow.
I love the little red-head, I really do, but what she did had
to have some reprecussions other than a sobbing "How could
you?". She deserved it. And Dawn deserved to be able to do
it.
~Sponge
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> She didn't slap very hard..... -- Rufus, 22:58:46 11/27/01
Tue
Dawn may have given that demon a good kick but she couldn't bring
herself to slap Willow very hard. Willow was there when Buffy
died, helped her, was someone she loves. The betrayal of tonight
was too much for Dawn. She doesn't have anyone she can count on
right now. Buffy is inconsistant, Willow is busy trying to free
herself from herself. Dawn was right to wonder if anyone see's
her or cares. The indication from those closest to her is no,
they are too wrapped up in themselves to see that Dawn is feeling
abandoned.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: She didn't slap very hard..... -- Lucifer_Sponge,
23:14:49 11/27/01 Tue
I agree wholeheartedly. She didn't -need- to slap Willow hard.
It was all about the intent. She wanted Willow to know how hurt,
offended, and disgusted she was.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Can I just say... Go Dawn! (Spoilers for Wrecked) --
RH, 08:37:00 11/29/01 Thu
Dawn's been quite a little powehouse since Buffy's return - she's
finally starting to carve her own identity and building some confidence.
She no longer sees herself as just "the key" - this
"thing".
Lately we've been seeing a LOT of evidence of "Summer's blood"
pumping strongly through her veins. We know that Joyce seldom
cowered and even smashed Spike in the head with a fire axe (when
he was first introduced) - so generally Summer's women have more
gumption than fear, which is good! I also suspect that because
she was made from "Buffy", that Slayer traits are going
to be showing up more frequently. Why else would the "key"
have been intentionally sent to Buffy as a 15/16 year old girl?
It could have been a twin sister, it could have been a baby, it
could have been an adult better able to protect itself... why
SPECIFICALLY a girl on the brink of "Slayer" age?!?!
You gotta wonder...
Since the resurrection we have seen Dawn...
-grab a makeshift stake when she heard strange noises in the alley
on Hallowe'en night, (we have - to this point - never seen Dawn
witness a vampire execution - although she did see Buffy behead
the "hitch-hiker demon" - she's heard about dustings
but has always been "protected" from actual interaction
between the SG and the "nasties". Nonetheless, her first
instinct - which used to be to RUN - has changed - instead, she
grabbed the stake and went to investigate).
-resist and dust her first vampire who was also a school friend/first
"boyfriend/first kiss - that takes more than a few cahjones
(sp?)
-throw a makeshift stake to "Alex" even though she didn't
know who she was, or if she was "Joan's" real sister,
and had only seen a vamp dusted once. Sure, she screamed like
a girl and ran when she first saw the vamp in the tunnel, but
when she realized that "Alex" needed help, she didn't
turn all "dear-in-headlights" and was clever and quick
enough to provide the perfect solution. This says to me that on
some level, fighting vamps is instinctual, (even though to this
point, she's only dusted one herself). She also said that the
"fear" felt strangely familiar - it was not necessarily
uncomfortable.
-in "Wrecked" we see her healthy "fear" as
she stays alert and tells Willow that she is going home - already
she senses that things are not right, and that in Willow's state,
she will have to take care of her own safety. When the demon appears
she not only hoofs him solidly in the gut, (where did THAT move
come from?!), but grabs Willow and runs. When Willow tries to
take over and help with the car, this is when Dawn shows true
fear - she is not in a position to control what will happen. After
the car crash, Dawn is once again in control and jumps out of
the car presumably to aid Willow - (notice, she has a large gash
on her head and a fracture and doesn't pass out? Summer's blood?
Quick healing? Higher tolerance?) The demon attacks again and
her instincts lead her to scramble under the car and throw sand
in his eyes, (very inventive weapon! She has imagination in that
area just like Buffy!) Even with her fractured arm, she beats
at the beast and screams for help until Buffy comes to the rescue.
(Funny how she reverts back to "kid-sister" Dawn as
soon as Buffy arrives - she knows she can rest easy now that big
sis is here to take over, and she takes this time to bemoan her
wounds.)
I am very pleased and excited with Dawn's progress on the show!
YOU GO, GIRL! Although I am disappointed that she is being so
heinously neglected - is this some sort of Slayer rite of passage?
Being alone? Buffy's parents went through a divorce and she was
relocated with no friends for support when she "came of age",
and now Dawn is not only abandoned by her mother, Spike and Giles,
but Willow and Buffy as well! (Thank goodness for Tara - I have
a sincere hope that she makes it to the opening credits in the
near future!!!)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> yes...& no...& bonus: spelling! -- anom, 22:22:43
11/29/01 Thu
"grab a makeshift stake when she heard strange noises in
the alley"
Not sure if it was a stake or a club--looked like a big hunk of
wood, but not necessarily pointy.
"we have - to this point - never seen Dawn witness a vampire
execution"
Hmm. You sure? I was thinking of the time Buffy dusted 4 of Harmony's
minions while Dawn was chained up--Buffy did tell her to keep
her eyes closed, but maybe she peeked?
"that takes more than a few cahjones (sp?)"
You need but ask. It's cojones (yes, I can spell in spanish too!).
"More than a few"? Just how many? I know somebody who's
reputed to have a 3rd, although I haven't seen for myself (& don't
particularly want to...). @>) (disadvantage of mutant cyclops
smily: how do you make it wink? \>)?)
"(notice, she has a large gash on her head and a fracture
and doesn't pass out? Summer's blood? Quick healing? Higher tolerance?)"
Adrenalin? Actually, we don't know how long it was before she
got out of the car...maybe she was unconscious for a while.
"her instincts lead her to scramble under the car and throw
sand in his eyes, (very inventive weapon! She has imagination
in that area just like Buffy!)"
Yeah, I liked that too!
"(Funny how she reverts back to "kid-sister" Dawn
as soon as Buffy arrives - she knows she can rest easy now that
big sis is here to take over, and she takes this time to bemoan
her wounds.)"
Some people are like that--someone I used to work with said she's
very good in a crisis if she's the one best qualified to handle
it; if there's someone better to do it, she tends to break down
while they deal w/it.
I definitely agree overall--go Dawn!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wrecked (spoilers) -- Onipo,
22:35:03 11/27/01 Tue
Just finished watching Wrecked for the third time, and what I'm
wondering is, if Willow dragged that demon out of hell, who was
the woman it was carrying when it appeared? I can only see three
possibilities, and I really hope Glory isn't going to make a reappearance.
And I don't think either Joyce or Jenny went to hell.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I'm not very helpful -- Traveler, 22:51:29 11/27/01 Tue
I noticed that too, but I have NO idea who (or what) it could
be.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: I'm not very helpful -- Deeva, 23:36:24 11/27/01
Tue
I'm not much help either. The woman looked like she had blond
(straight) hair, maybe?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Willow's Visions (spoilers; wild speculation on rest of
series) -- Umbriel, 00:07:55 11/28/01 Wed
I think this might be the most important event of the whole episode.
While Willow's magic-induced visions could be mere hallucinations,
this doesn't seem to be how the Buffyverse usually works. Visions
and dreams almost always turn out to have great significance in
the 'Verse (with the possible exception of the Cheese Man from
Restless!). Note that the music that we heard when Buffy went
into the trance and discovered Dawn was a recent addition to her
reality was also playing during Willow's vision, as far as I could
tell (don't have a tape of the older episode for comparison).
As for the meaning of the hallucination, I can only guess. At
least one demon was summoned by Willow, and I'm sure that's not
the end. This demon - perhaps the one we saw crawling through
the green stuff (leaves? poor reception made it hard to tell)
during her hallucination mysteriously collapsed into a shower
of sparks and appears to be gone. But the other appeared to be
carrying a woman through a portal of some kind. This demon and
the mystery woman may be out and about in Sunnydale, and a portal
could even still be open behind them. I wonder if this could be
the "big bad" we've been waiting for? Willow may want
to quit using magic, but I think she has opened a channel she
can't close, and I think dark powers of some ilk will be able
to use her through this channel, against her will. As for what
Rack is taking from her in return for the magical energy he provides,
here's a theory: it's a bit of the fabric of Willow's universe.
Perhaps the source of magic is in another dimension, and for a
little of it to come here, a little of this dimension's essence
must go there. Willow would be giving Rack permission to take
a little bit of this essence from herself and transfer it over
to the other side in return for magical power. (I am inspired
here by Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy and the way
Dust could flow around and could drip out of holes cut between
dimensions, plus the Fray comic which implies that all magic will
be banished from the Buffyverse at some point. There has to be
a good reason magic is gone, and if using it cause bits of the
universe to be leached away or exchanged for bits of a demon-verse,
that would explain why getting rid of magic was necessary. Let's
just hope things don't end like the Pullman books - I would hate
to see Spike and Buffy end up like Will and Lyra).
I'm also wondering about the strange way Willow traveled from
location to location instantaneously during her hallucination.
Looked kind of like teleportation. Very interesting indeed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Wrecked (spoilers)...Followed by thoughts on Willow
-- Caligo, 06:54:55 11/28/01 Wed
Long straight blond hair...hmmm...candidates?
The missing part of Buffy. Willow has wanted to bring Buffy back
fully, and maybe she had unconsciously sent the demon to go get
it.
Joyce? I doubt it, Joyce not only died naturally but she was bound
for heaven.
Glory. Maybe. After all Willow did take Tara's sanity back from
Glory. Willow for all her power is a very sloppy spellcaster,
perhaps she brought out more than Tara and thus a part of Glory
resides in her. The Demon is just bringing it to fore-front. I'm
probably stretching here but Rack did say that Willow tasted like
strawberries which are red. Glory's color of choice? Red.
Darla. I really can't work on this theory too much because I haven't
been watching Angel. From what I understand Darla sacrificed herself
for her and Angel's baby. She does have that whole blond thing
going for her.
Finally, the blonde could be Tara. Willow has been wanting Tara
back and it's been evident all episode (as indicated in the whole
animation of Tara's clothes). Perhaps the demon that Willow summoned
has taken Tara and spirited her off somewhere. The next new episode
might have Tara missing. Willow will have to "find her"
as she "always will" and probably use magik to save
her.
Also, I really don't think that Willow needs to give up all magik,
just the darker stuff. She has the natural power in her but she's
been focusing on dark magiks, taking magiks from something outside
of herself. She doesn't believe the power is in herself, which
is why she fell so quickly into Rack's clutches. Willow doesn't
need to learn how to live without magik, she need to learn how
to use it properly, sanely, safely, naturally. Right now she has
Amy representing what can go wrong with magik. On the otherhand,
Tara shows the proper use. Tara doesn't try to claim more than
she has, she doesn't abuse it. Willow was all worried that Tara
didn't know the real her, but Buffy pointed out that Tara wanted
Willow to stop. Tara met Willow because of magik, yes, but it
was Willow's heart and soul, her willingness to give Tara a place
to belong that Tara fell in love with. Tara doesn't want SuperWillow,
she wants the RealWillow. Willow is convinced that RealWillow
is the awkward girl she was in high school, she fears it (I won't
bore you and post up the Willow "Restless" dream). But
Willow has never given herself a chance to be the RealWillow.
She has always defined herself through other people, particularly
romantic interests. She started off trying to make herself the
perfect girl for Xander, acting geeky and laughing at his jokes.
Noticed how quickly her persona changed when being courted by
"Malcolm." Oz comes into the picture and she's now defined
by her "cool, older, guitar-playing" boyfriend. Oz did
try to be great to her, constantly reassuring her, accepting her
oddities (she did accept his), but notice when Veruca started
coming around, she reverted back to bookish-Willow. When Oz left,
she turned to magik and eventually Tara. Once again she was now
defining herself by her magikally-inclined girlfriend, throwing
herself into magik, realizing the power it has and falling prey
to something bigger than herself. Willow should have learned from
EvilWillow how easily she can fall prey to darkness. This season
Willow is going to learn her limitations and she's going to finally
see herself as herself not Xander-Willow, Evil-Willow, Oz-Willow,
Tara-Willow, or even Buffy-Willow. Ok, so she won't be able to
do the cool things SuperWillow did, but I think she'll find she's
really a lot more powerful than she's ever believed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I was sure she had curly hair...! -- RH, 09:16:39 11/29/01
Thu
I too, was intrigued by the whole "demon coming through the
portal carrying some long, curly-haired blonde" - (I rewound
a few times at the end, and yes, her hair is curly). I was particularly
mindful since Willow's reaction to the scene was so violent, and
Rack's response was so malevolent. I thought the "girl"
in question might have been Buffy, seeing as Willow had brought
her back from the dead, but Buffy has had straight hair for some
time now. I think the curly, blonde hair is definitely significant.
The only "dead" characters I could think of who had
long, curly hair were Joyce, Glory, and (flash-back) Darla. Even
though Joyce's body had been resurrected by Dawn and Spike, I
ruled her out because I'm assuming that she went to "heaven"
- a nice, normal lady like that deserves to! And I'm not sure
that Darla was a reasonable guess because to my mind she seemed
to have worked out her own redemption through her "change
of heart" and sacrifice. I also didn't want to think about
it being Glory because basically - Joss has "been-there-done-that"
and why would he do that again? There is a slight possibility
that it could be one of the other 3 "hell-gods" associated
with Glory, (are they triplets? Who knows...)
My only other thought was that this is a completely new "big
bad". Anyway, my concern is that we saw (in Willow's "trip"),
that the demon was carrying a human body - (it looked like a girl
to me) - through the woods, possibly hiding it. The demon then
appeared for real, (having been summoned). We know that the demon
brought something back with it, (hey, something came back with
Buffy, right?), so there is DEFINITELY someone out there that
Willow and the SG are going to be confronted with in the near
future.
Now, we've heard of demon's "hitch-hiking" through the
dimensions, (that "evil" thing came back with "good"
Buffy). Does this mean that a "good thing" could have
come back with this hell demon? It didn't look like the girl was
hitch-hiking, the demon looked as if he was intentionally bringing
her through, unless... what if Willow had called back the girl,
and the demon hitch-hiked with her? Hmmm... but Willow killed
the demon, and we know that the only way Buffy could get rid of
her hitch-hiker was to kill it herself - if the "summoner"
(Willow) did it, Buffy would have died too, so maybe, by killing
this new demon, Willow also killed the girl and undid the summoning.
Oh wait, summoning is different then a spell isn't it, so the
same laws wouldn't apply... but they could! HA-HA! Yeah RIGHT!
Somehow I doubt it!
You just never know what ME will dish out next!
(Thanks for letting me ramble!)
Closing thought: Was Willow more frightened by the demon, or with
who it brought back with it?!
Stay tuned... MUAH-HA-HAAAAA!!! ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why
I Now Understand Buffy -- Traveler, 22:39:55 11/27/01 Tue
I think I liked this episode better than most people, and not
because it was dark. Rather, I believe that this episode made
a nice coda to this part of the season (right before a long bout
of reruns). Before I explain that, however, let me do some character
analysis.
Ok, first off, we have seen three important sides to Spike.
Strong Spike: stands up to Buffy. Although her comments still
hurt him, he doesn't just lie down and take it.
Seductive Spike: tries to bring Buffy out of her shell, but it
utterly backfires. More on that Later.
Sensitive Spike: helps Buffy even though she is still rejecting
him. He is the one trying to talk sense into her, saying "Would
you would put your little sis in danger just to spite me?"
Also, when the demon attacks, Buffy runs to fight it, but Spike
runs to help the injured Dawn. Also, he seems to be the one who
stops and nods Buffy towards the sobbing Willow.
Of course, Spike has always been sensitive, and we've seen a fair
amount of his seductive side. What's really changed is his sense
of strength. Just where has this newfound strength come from?
The answer is:
SEX
As Spike said before, the rules have changed. He no longer sees
himself as being beneath her. It's not that he has become "good
enough" for her. Rather, she has toppled from her pedastal
to reach his level. As he said, "I may be dirt, but you're
the one who rolls around in it." No longer is she unaproachable
and untouchable. Now when she tries to put him down, he no longer
believes her. Because now he doesn't see her as having the moral
authority to condemn him.
But, WHY IS BUFFY SO AFRAID of Spike?
This question has driven me mad since OMWF. Here's a hint: it's
not because she thinks he is beneath her. It's because she's afraid
he isn't. She desperately wants to be "good." She wants
to fight evil and have a clear conscience. But she isn't just
tempted by Spike; she is tempted by the things he does. She's
afraid that if she likes perverse, degrading sex, maybe there
are other "evil" activities that she would enjoy. To
her, Spike is Darth Vader saying, "join the Dark Side!"
If she gives in to him, she may lose herself and forget eveything
she stands for. She may, in essence, become like Willow, who spoke
of how magic freed her but hurt those she loved. Thus, the more
seductive Spike is, the more Buffy resists, because she links
sex with a total loss of control.
Also, I wonder if she is perhaps remembering Parker? He only wanted
her for sex and broke her heart to get it. Thus, when Spike says
"I knew the only thing better than killing a slayer (would
be to have sex with one)," Buffy freaks. Despite all that
has happened, she questions whether Spike's love is real. CAN
it be real, considering that he is a souless vampire? And of course,
there's Angel, the other vampire. In her mind, her relationship
with Spike must seem like a sad and twisted thing compared to
what she and Angel shared. No wonder she compares her feelings
for Spike to an addiction. What else could it be? She tells herself
she doesn't want Spike, but she can't stop herself from seeing
him anyway. Which is why the scene at the end is so perfect. The
garlic hung around the windows and the cross Buffy fingers so
nervously are not there to keep Spike out. They are there to keep
Buffy in. They are the visual representation of how Buffy is trying
to repress her feelings, and thus makes a prison out of her own
room (more house imagery, anyone?). The contrast between Willow
and Buffy is so perfect. As others have mentioned before, Willow
is making mistakes because she has lost all control. Buffy is
making mistakes (like almost not getting there in time to save
Dawn), because she tries too hard to maintain control. So yes,
Buffy hasn't grown as much as we hoped, but something tells me
that she can't stay in stasis forever. Spike has already shaken
her pretty badly, and I can only see that trend continuing.
One last thought on Willow. She was upset when she found out that
Buffy was in Heaven, but that was not nearly as close and personal
as nearly getting Dawn killed while she was high. That one injury
suddenly pushed all her pasts wrongs into her face, and I think
that her reaction was absolutely in character. However, I will
bet money that this is NOT the last time we see Willow use magic...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why I Now Understand Buffy
-- John Burwood, 23:57:54 11/27/01 Tue
Good thinking, & if Buffy fears losing control could lead her
into darkness, she is right to do so. I read some posts saying
giving into sexual passions is healthy. Which is garbage. It is
dangerous & unhealthy. Faith said Buffy was all about control,
meaning self-control, & she was right. Buffy - as opposed to Faith
- tries to do the right, the moral, the responsible thing - and
morality & responsibility are totally about staying in control
of your feelings. Neither come from passion or instinct - only
from self-control.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why I Now Understand
Buffy -- Tillow, 06:51:12 11/28/01 Wed
Wow. Interesting perspective. I'd offer an alternative. I'm not
so convinced all the tension Buffy is feeling is about the sex
with Spike. I think she was lulled into a safety zone with Angel
because after he went evil and all they couldn't have sex. Maybe
it was OK for her to love a vampire if there was no sex involved.
But with Spike she could have both. Love and sex. And because
of his cocky nature, he won't let her forget her fears about sex.
That's what their relationship has always been about, Spike challenging
her.
I disagree that morality and responsibility are about staying
in control of your feelings. I think living a morally responsible
life is more about being open and honest with your thoughts and
feelings at all cost to yourself. And loving is about knowing
when it's safe to let go with another. Buffy is not doing that.
She not being honest and she can't let go. If she keeps it up,
she will be very lonely for the rest of her possibly short-lived
life. I think that's a high price to pay for "staying in
control" of your feelings. I wouldn't wish that for our heroine.
:(
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why I Now Understand
Buffy -- Malandanza, 07:42:57 11/28/01 Wed
"Good thinking, & if Buffy fears losing control could lead
her into darkness, she is right to do so. I read some posts saying
giving into sexual passions is healthy. Which is garbage. It is
dangerous & unhealthy. Faith said Buffy was all about control,
meaning self-control, & she was right. Buffy - as opposed to Faith
- tries to do the right, the moral, the responsible thing - and
morality & responsibility are totally about staying in control
of your feelings. Neither come from passion or instinct - only
from self-control."
I think I'm the only other person on the board who will entirely
agree with you on this one.
In the past ( Bad Girls and in the first episode of Season 5)
we have seen what happens to Buffy when she allows her control
to slip away. The Slayer begins to take over and the girl fades
into the background. Huntress Buffy from the beginning of Season
5 was Buffy at her most disturbing. So I think the final scene
was more about keeping the Slayer in than in keeping Spike out.
Sexual restraint is part of keeping the Slayer in check. We know
from Faith that slaying makes her "horny and hungry"
(and Faith had sex with Xander only after she failed to get a
kill -- leaving her unfulfilled) -- those words were subtly echoed
this episode when Dawn mentioned that she would leave a note on
the refrigerator for Buffy because that's the first place she
goes after a patrol.
Spike is treading on dangerous ground as he moves Buffy toward
her dark side -- would he even like a dark Buffy? Aren't her insecurities
and inhibitions part of the reason he is drawn to her (besides
the whole Angel inferiority complex -- which he brought up again)?
How would he like a Buffy freed from any sexual inhibitions and
getting off her kills? He could end up like Xander (and the nonexistent
"safety word").
So, leave the "healthy" experimentation with dark passions
to those without demons inside of them -- Buffy needs control
to stay Buffy just like Angel needs control to stay Angel.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why I Now Understand
Buffy -- dsf, 19:14:03 11/28/01 Wed
I agree that some degree of control is vital -- especially for
a Slayer like Buffy who wants and needs to live in the human world.
I'm not sure she needs to have as much control as Angel, who has
an entire, literal demon within him. But even if she did, Angel's
control isn't based on ignorance or denial. He knows who and what
he is, he knows just how dark he can be, and out of that understanding,
even acceptance, comes real control. I think Buffy needs a similar
understanding and acceptance of what she is before she can have
true control.
dsf
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: My Thoughts on Wrecked and Why I Now Understand
Buffy -- Cynthia, 19:17:54 11/28/01 Wed
So, Buffy should never have an orgasm because she might lose self-control
and therefore her morality and goodness.
You can only be a Slayer if you're the equalivant of a nun?
I mean, if sex in of itself is the corruptor. How would sex with
anyone be possible for Buffy?
And I don't understand, how is great, no-holds barred, completely
fulfilling, all-night sex between two people who are giving total
consent to each other perservse and kinky?
I think Spirk is stating a truth when he states that if he's dirt
then she loves rolling in it. If she were to believe that it,
at the least, just a basic life-affirming primal instinct, then
it would be. In short, it could be whatever she wanted it to be:
good, bad or netural.
Does a person have to be "in love" in order for sex
to be "a good thing".
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> I'm with Cynthia -- pagangodess, 21:08:04
11/28/01 Wed
We could get into the whole society's expectations of women and
sex, a whole bunch of feminist issues that were covered here after
"Smashed", but lets not. In this day and age where women
are getting conflicting messages from all around about how they
should feel free to let out their sexual feelings and , otoh,
being real 'ladies' at the same time. I don't see anything wrong
with "great, no-holds barred, completely fulfilling, all-night
sex between two people, who are giving total concent to each other".
Don't tell me some of you did not wish for some of that Buffy/Spike
passion in your own lives. I know I did.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Is it healthy? -- vandalia, 01:00:27
11/29/01 Thu
Faith commented how slaying makes her 'hungry and horny.' Dawn's
noted that Buffy heads straight for the fridge after slaying.
Numerous indications that slaying gets Buffy's motor revving.
To me, there is nothing inherently evil or forboding about this,
it rather makes perfect sense.
Slayers slay. They kill. They destroy. Eating and sex are life-affirming
acts. Its a balancing act, perhaps one way to tie them to life
while still keeping them killing.
Why has noone latched onto the 'hungry' part of slayerness as
opposed to the 'horny' part and told us how sick and wrong it
is that Buffy wants to pig out after slaying and that it could
well make her a bulimic (or anorexic if she denies that urge)
and what kind of attitude is that showing young impressionable
girls already worried about their figures?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Balance -- Humanitas, 07:40:33
11/29/01 Thu
I think it's all about balance.
True, morality is all about self-control. To be good, you have
to be able to exercise control over your passions. Otherwise,
they get in the way of the rest of your life and, if you're the
Slayer, put others in danger.
On the other hand, denying the existance of passion is equally
dangerous. Anya was absolutely correct when she said that the
good ones are the ones who become realy dangerous when their control
finally snaps.
I think this may be where the "Oh, grow up" theme is
going this year. Growing up is about acknowledging who and what
you are, and finding a reasonable balance between passion and
control.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: It's not about the sex... -- Malandanza,
08:03:34 11/29/01 Thu
"So, Buffy should never have an orgasm because she might
lose self-control and therefore her morality and goodness.
You can only be a Slayer if you're the equalivant of a nun?
I mean, if sex in of itself is the corruptor. How would sex with
anyone be possible for Buffy?
And I don't understand, how is great, no-holds barred, completely
fulfilling, all-night sex between two people who are giving total
consent to each other perservse and kinky?"
If you don't think Buffy never had "no-holds barred, completely
fulfilling, all-night sex" with Riley, you should look back
at Season 4 -- there was hardly an episode where we didn't see
Buffy and Riley in bed together. Buffy and Spike may have torn
down a building during the throes of passion, but Riley and Buffy
raised the dead. This isn't about orgasms -- it's about Buffy's
descent into a degrading and abusive sexual relationship.
Spike has treated Bufy badly -- she should not be in a relationship
with him. Of course, others will say Buffy has treated Spike just
as badly (or worse) -- but does that make the relationship a good
one? If both partners are severely dysfunctional somehow the relationship
will work?
Spike's "creepy small talk" is what I dislike more than
the physical abuse. He's always had a gift for knowing where his
enemies are weakest emotionally, and in Smashed he used this talent
unsparingly:
SPIKE: You're a tease, you know that, Slayer? (Buffy rolls her
eyes, continues walking) Get a fellow's motor revving, let the
tension marinate a couple-a days, then bam! Crown yourself the
ice queen.
SPIKE: (yells) It's only a matter of time before you realize I'm
the only one here for you, pet. You got no one else!
SPIKE: (to himself) Nothing wrong with me. Something wrong with
her.
SPIKE: (walks beside her) You shouldn't be so flip, luv. BUFFY:
What are you gonna do, walk behind me to death? SPIKE: I'm just
saying things might be a little different. Spike walks around
in front of her again. They stop walking. SPIKE: You oughta be
careful.
SPIKE: Don't you get it? Don't you see? (sneering) You came back
wrong.
SPIKE: (grins) Came back a little less human than you were.
SPIKE: (grinning) Oh, poor little lost girl.
SPIKE: (drops to the floor) She doesn't fit in anywhere. She's
got no one to love.
SPIKE: I'm supposed to be treading on the dark side. ... SPIKE:
What's your excuse?
SPIKE: I wasn't planning on hurting you. (smirks) Much.
This is the woman he loves?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Why were Buffy & Riley so nauseating?
-- CaptainPugwash, 09:47:14 11/29/01 Thu
I don't think Spike is ideal for Buffy either (he is repulsively
sleazy), but at least the sex seemed good.
I never found Buffy & Riley that convincing as lovers; I don't
know if this was just bad chemistry or studio/television politics,
but their sex life lacked something. You had to *imagine* that
Buffy & Riley were having the kind of hedonistic 'physical' sex
that took place between Buffy & Spike, but there no direct evidence
of such a thing (perhaps to the contrary, what with Buffy sneaking
out to slay after whatever).
I don't know if anyone remembers the scene in "Thelma & Louise"
where Gina Davis & Brad Pitt go for it. Well, that it was happened
inbetween Wrecked & Smashed and Buffy LOVED it (hence all the
trauma).
Maybe Riley & Buffy did that too, but it was too innocent, lacking
in detail (no awkward walking, no scratch marks, no knickers in
pocket...), and left to our imagination.
Now that the rules are relaxed a bit, maybe Buffy won't need to
possessed by Faith to behave a little 'dirty'.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: It's not about the sex... --
vandalia, 13:24:41 11/29/01 Thu
Once again, I'm going to have to disagree with you, Mal.
f you don't think Buffy never had "no-holds barred, completely
fulfilling, all-night sex" with Riley, you should look back
at Season 4 -- there was hardly an episode where we didn't see
Buffy and Riley in bed together.
No holds barred? Nope. Look what happens when Faith approaches
Riley for some 'do whatever you want to me' sex when she's possessing
Buffy's body.
Faith: So. . . how do you want me?
Riley: (sitting on the edge) How do I . . . ?
(Still on hands and knees, she turns around and slithers up to
him, wrapping her arms around his neck.)
Faith: Yeah. What do you wanna do with this body? What nasty little
desire have you been itching to try out? Am I a bad girl? Do you
wanna hurt me?
(Riley is giving her a serious look.)
Riley: What are we playing at here?
(Faith drops her arms and pulls back a little.)
Faith: I'm Buffy.
Riley: Okay. Then I'll be Riley.
Faith: (in a huff) Well, if you don't wanna play--
(She turns away to get off the bed but Riley catches her arm and
pulls her back to him.)
Riley: Right. I don't wanna play.
Riley doesn't know its not Buffy. Riley apparently has some lines
he won't cross in the sack, whether his partner wants to or not.
You can argue whether or not this is good or bad, but you can't
argue its no-holds-barred.
Completely fulfilling? Then why is it after their lovemaking for
almost the entirety of season five (that they're together) she
keeps having to go out and slay something before she can get to
sleep? What else is she looking for that Riley's not giving her?
What else is Riley looking for (in the vampire trollops) that
he's not getting (or refuses to get) from Buffy? There isn't complete
fulfillment going on here on either side. Riley's approach to
Buffylove reminds me of Robert De Niro in _Analyze This_ when
he's discussing why he has to have a mistress. He likes oral sex.
Billy Crystal asks him why he doesn't have his wife do it. De
Niro's character replies, 'Those are the lips that kiss my children!'
in an utterly appalled for even suggesting such a thing way. Riley
appears to be a bit Victorian in his approach to Buffy. Does he
respect her or does he put her up on a pedestal from which he
won't allow her to get down and 'dirty' herself with fulfilling
his 'base desires' and in return refuses to accept that she might
actually want to get a little 'dirty' herself?
As far as the all-night sex, yes we saw that, in the episode both
of them are being forced to keep having sex by the ghosts of sexually
repressed teenagers. In other episodes, we see Buffy calling the
sex 'nice' or 'relaxing' or wanting to have another go while Riley's
laughing in amused disbelief. Even Parker comments on Buffy's
'stamina' (and earns himself a punch in the nose from Riley).
I honestly don't think Riley could keep up with her, through no
fault of his own. Reminds me of the essay 'Men of Steel, Women
of Tissue Paper' written a few years back on the logistics of
Superman's love life (or necessary lack thereof).
Buffy and Spike may have torn down a building during the throes
of passion, but Riley and Buffy raised the dead. This isn't about
orgasms -- it's about Buffy's descent into a degrading and abusive
sexual relationship.
They weren't dead, they were sexually repressed. The crazy religious
woman who ran the shelter for them thought they were dirty and
degrading for having sexual thoughts or vanity and punished them.
(Come to think of it, the vine motif there was rather eerily reminiscent
of the vision Willow was having on her first 'magic carpet ride.')
As for a 'degrading and abusive' relationship, well, I guess it
depends on what you consider degrading and abusive. The Christian
lady thought even thinking about sex was degrading. Obviously
Buffy's not quite that bad. But she does certianly seem to have
a bit of prude in her; witness the reactions to Anya's constant
reminders of the 'kinky' things she does with Xander, (i.e. 'we've
enjoyed spanking'). Spanking is hitting, no? Then why is it Anya
and Xander aren't considered to be in a degrading, abusive relationship?
They even call each other perverts in 'The Gift' when they're
having sex instead of looking for things to help save the world.
Does this mean they're dangerously co-dependent or addicted to
sex? If not, why not? And if they're not, how is it Spike and
Buffy are? I didn't see any abuse there (except maybe verbal).
Of course, they were fighting. Tempers were high. When people,
even people in love, fight, they tend to say hurtful things (that's
where the 'fight' part comes in). It doesn't necessarily mean
they love each other any less. So while you can argue Spike's
words are cruel and hurtful (and they are) you can argue the same
thing about Buffy's. Doesn't make either of them better, or right.
Is it a dysfunctional relationship at best? God yes. Show me one
relationship on this show that hasn't been. Hell, show me one
relationship in real life that hasn't been. Is it abusive? No
(at least not on Spike's part). Is it degrading? Again, depends
on what you consider degrading. Buffy apparently wasn't degraded
enough to stop after the first time. Or the second. Or the...
well, you get the picture. Actions speak louder than words.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Drug-Magic-Madness -- Lucifer_Sponge,
20:21:26 11/28/01
I've got to warn you, I jump around a bit here, so you might just
wind up with a headache from reading this, rather than gleaning
any sort of sense or point. I think I wrapped it up rather nicely
at the tail end, though.
Alright, not that I want to piss anyone off, but for starters,
I'm going to draw a parrallel between magic in BTVS, and magic
in the real world.
Speaking as a "real witch," I can tell you that when
you practice magic, you occasionally get an itch to do a spell,
regardless of whether you really need to do a spell or not. There's
a certain feeling that you get when you practice magic... it's
not exaclty druglike (not in my case, at least), but it is exilerating.
You start to crave it, like one would crave sex of chocolate.
And that's just in the real world. I can only imagine what it
would be like, or feel like, to pull off such amazing supernatural
feats as Willow does. It couldn't possibly be anything other than
intoxicating.
(Ok, you can stop cringing now, I'm done drawing a comparison.
See? It wasn't that bad, was it?
I propose that Willow's addiction is two-fold... she's grown dependent
on both the power she weilds and the feeling she gets from weilding
that power. See, my theory is that Willow's eyes don't go black
because she's simply "using black magic." They go black
because she's channeling raw, primal forces.
Think of it this way... What would it feel like to have God swimming
around inside your head? That's what Willow's feeling. She feels
like God opens up inside her and then does things for her. That's
probably what Tara feels as well. Tara, however, practices her
craft in accordance to a deep, spiritual ethic.
Willow uses her power bluntly, and brutishly. She practices magic
like a science, completely ignoring the spiritual implications
because they don't fit into her paradigm. But what she fails to
realize is that just because she ignores them and discards them
doesn't mean that they're not there. I truly believe that Tara
could reach Willow's level of power, over time, but she'd harness
her talents properly.
Going back to my earlier theory of witches feeling like God climbs
inside them and does favors for them ...(Note: don't take this
too literally... I really do believe their power comes from inside
them, not from sentient, outer sources). Tara's beliefs cause
her to be thankful for the gifts she's granted, and to use them
with caution. Magic is sacred to her. It's still as intoxicating
to her as it is to Willow, but to her that's all the more reason
to use it carefully and sparingly.
Willow, however, has no beliefs. Magic is a tool to her. It lets
her do amazing things, and it makes her feel amazing when she's
doing them. She's not grateful because there's nothing to be grateful
to. It's all her. Therefore, she uses it as often and as much
as she can... no matter how petty or pointless the task.
What I think Rack does is simply open up the ecstatic feeling
that magic creates. Again, think about the God thing. The human
brain isn't capable of making sense of God... Witches are no exception.
They cast a spell, they know the otherworldy power is there, and
they use it to the best of their ability. But Rack doesn't really
get his clients to use the power. He just lets them feel it. Therefore,
they are bathing in something they have no comprehension of. They
just know it feels good. Any magical effects (teleportation, thaumugenisis
revisited, etc) are a result of the accessed ecstasy running rampant
because the witch has lost all conscious thought or awareness
of what's going on. He or she is "in the moment," unaware
of what his or her power is doing, but glad it's doing something
because it feels rrreeeaaallll nice.
Ok, what this all boils down to is this: Drugs make you feel like
a God, but magic quite literally turns you into one. So in this
sense the writers aren't just using magic as an incredibly obvious
metaphor for drugs. They're throwing Willow into something more
exotic, more intense, more dangerous than any drug could ever
be.
So that's my two (hundred) cents.
~Sponge
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Drug-Magic-Madness -- maddog, 20:34:35 11/28/01 Wed
While I can't balk at your comparisons I will say that I've listened
to interviews where the writers talk about doing minimal research
on aspects of the show like demon names and wiccan practices.
So drawing any parallel is counterproductive because they didn't
try to be real to begin with...just believable enough to get people
caught up in the storyline.
I can follow your logic on Willow and it does make sense...however
I don't think Tara wants to be where Willow is in magic...I don't
think she ever wanted to be that far into it (the reasoning possibly
being just what Willow's going through now). I like your explaination
of Rack too. I could definitely see that as what's going on.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Drug-Magic-Madness -- Lucifer_Sponge, 20:54:36
11/28/01 Wed
While I can't balk at your comparisons I will say that I've listened
to interviews where the writers talk about doing minimal research
on aspects of the show like demon names and wiccan practices.
So drawing any parallel is counterproductive because they didn't
try to be real to begin with...just believable enough to get people
caught up in the storyline.
Woops. I didn't mean for it to come out that way. I was making
a comparison not to validate what the writers were doing, but
to give people a better idea of where I was coming from with my
theories. I'm not the type who nitpicks over the "inaccuracies"
and "misconceptions." It's a tv show, for christ's sake.
It's just fun.
I just thought if I drew a comparrison people would understand
why I thought the way I did. I guess that didn't work out right,
but oh well. At least my other points got across.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Drug-Magic-Madness -- Slayrunt, 23:46:12 11/28/01 Wed
I understand and agree with you on general term.
Willow and Tara differ in the believe they hold. IMO you are exactly
correct about it being sacred to Tara and not to Willow.
In TR, when they wake up in the magic shop. Willow is baffled
about the magic "stuff" and books, but Tara states in
an excited and wonderus(sp?) voice;"This is a *real* magic
shop". She internally knows about magic and it's reality
(in the show sense), Willow is clueless.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Yeah, witches are real. Get a life before I turn you into
a rat. -- You Suck, 02:42:02 11/29/01 Thu
ss
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Uh... Riiiight.... I'm going to say this one more
time... -- Lucifer_Sponge, 08:09:26 11/29/01 Thu
I did not draw a comparrison between realverse witches and Buffyverse
witches because I'm some whiny Wiccan upset over the "inaccuracies"
or delighted with the "realistic portrayel." It's just
a show, and I don't look to it for anything of that sort.
I drew the comparrsion only to point out that the writers were
not that far off when they used magic as a metaphor for drugs.
People on this board compare things in BTVS to all kinds of things
in the real world, but for some reason they get a irritated when
it comes to this particular subject. Relax, I'm not out to cry
about the writers and how "wrong they're getting it,"
or rejoice in "they're very accurate, well-researched approach."
I don't see them doing either, really, and I ultimately don't
care anyway.
I wrote what I did to illustrate a point... an idea. I did not
write what I did out of some sort of political - correctness agenda.
So calm down. It's all going to be ok.
~Sponge
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Nature-Magik vs. Science-Magik -- Caligo, 09:40:33 11/29/01
Thu
This is more something to ponder about than anything else...
Notice that when science tries to harness something that is totally
natural, such as a thermonuclear reaction, it is dangerous. Power
plants have different methods of protecting and containing the
energy, but if those methods fail, nuclear meltdown, destruction.
Yet the Sun and other stars like it burn without containment.
(But I also like to point out that the sun will eventual burn
out and go nova)
One could liken Willow to a nuclear power plant. Immense amounts
of energy produced in a short time. Yet at the same time, not
environmentally sounds. There's a breakdown of resources around
both. Willow's fail-safes are breaking. She's in for a meltdown.
And if Willow is a nuclear power plant, Tara would be hydro-electric.
She follows the natural current to put her spells in motion. Sometimes
the current is stronger and so is she, sometimes it weak.
All in her head .... -- source,
22:17:27 11/28/01 Wed
Interesting ideas posted by Harmony at JM.com
I've got a theory...
I mentioned before that I got weirder than weird feelings about
"Smashed" and from what I can see, also about "Wrecked".
Something was strange.
I rewatched Smashed to see if I could work it out, and my theory
is this :
The last two episodes are in Buffy's mind. She's either having
a prophetic dream, or she is imagining it, or the most intriguing
idea that she is in another catatonic state.
End of Tabula Rasa. Buffy is in the Bronze, staring at nothingness.
Spike comes along, and she looks at him, and turns away, with
no hesitation. He leaves. She's blank again. Just like she was
in WOTW.
Here's where I see us entering her mind, be it a dream, or catatonia.
Next time we see her, she's kissing Spike. She didn't look like
she wanted to race after him. That's what she probably wanted
to do. It emphasises the point that she is attracted to him.
Move on to the alleyway, with the mugging. Here's where I pieced
together my theory. For the first time, in a long time, she's
fighting humans. We know from "The Gift" that she has
an issue hurting humans, even if they are bad guys. Why? Because
look where Faith's mistake got her. She's in prison. She became
a broken, mentally unstable person. Buffy had first hand experience,
when they switched bodies. She found out exactly what the council
planned to do with her.
The reason Buffy didn't like Faith, is because she was everything
Buffy could become, and it scared her. The good and bad sides
of the Slayer.
I think she dislikes having to fight humans for fear of making
a mistake, and killing someone. She's objected to being called
Killer in the past.
Skim over the Spike scene. More on that later.
She gets home, and Willow has deratted Amy. Buffy is surprised.
That's BIG magick. Is she scared of Willow's magic? Is she scared
that one of her friends is becoming as dark as the Slayer in her
is?
She sees a news report about Rusty the security guy, being frozen.
I find it interesting that he was frozen. Wasn't Buffy mentioning
just that? "I touch the fire and it freezes me". It
was a diamond that was stolen. Not a scroll, or an ancient key.
It was a diamond, like ice. Also, Diamonds have flaws. A beautiful,
clear, glistening thing...with a flaw. Symbolism anyone?
Then she runs into Spike. I've noticed her scenes with him, in
these episodes, play out like her conscience. Spike, the demon,
sitting on her right shoulder, and Buffy, the angel, on her left.
Everything he says counters her previous statement. That's the
basis for an argument, but work with me here.
"That never ends well does it?" "It did the other
night"
You have Good "No. More. Kissing." Buffy and Bad "But
dammit, remember how good it felt?" Buffy.
Eventually she calls him a thing. That's how her denial is being
justified. He's a thing. Not a man. A demon underneath.
Then she lashes out, because the naughty wicked side of her is
winning the argument. But that bad side just hits back. With no
pain. It scares her that she might give in to her desires, and
that she'll become darker than she wants to.
The trio appear next, and could this be the prophetic bit? (I
mean, sure, we're seeing this in full Whedon humour) It gives
her a clue.
She's at the magic shop, and more discussion about Willow and
magic, that very obviously became about Buffy being seduced by
darkness. It's spelled out. She fears her friends finding out
about her latest chenanigans with yet another vampire. She fears
being seduced by darkness.
Then she meets Spike. A dolled up Spike at that. He's wearing
the face (and clothes) of the man who loves her enough to fall
into the Gap. To wear a lot of jewellery. The man who was tortured
for her. But he's talking like the Spike that got her freaked
out in FFL. The Spike she met in early S2. The killer of two slayers.
It becomes apparent that he can hurt her. Another of her fears/worries
is being realised.
"She always worries what she'd do when you get that chip
out of your head"
Not only is she faced with a chipless Spike, but it's a Spike
that she'd come to rely on, that she'd come to care about. Her
friend and occassional kissing buddy. It's going to be a lot harder
to kill him.
She's facing the prospect of a; being killed, or worse, turned
by him or b; Having to kill him, which means having to live without
him, something that would, I think, send her into a depression
that she'd struggle to come out of. Both scenarios are scary to
her.
Also, he tells her she isn't human anymore. That too is a fear.
Possibly her biggest. She came back wrong. If the fact that she
came back from heaven wasn't bad enough, she now has coming back
from heaven...wrong as a problem.
Then there's sex. That SHE initiated. She gave in. No amount of
denial, and fists is going to get her out of that fact now. Does
she fear giving in? Does she fear entering another relationship
with another vampire? Or another man? Does she see sex as the
end? Is Spike going to leave now?
If this is in her head, she's seeing one of her fears play out.
By now, she must be scared of giving herself so fully to someone,
knowing what that usually entails. Departure. Leaving. Gone.
Next morning, she brushes it off, almost as a one night stand.
Another fear? Becoming like Parker? Using him?
Spike then brings up his killing of Slayers. To me, it's a dumb
thing to say. Too dumb for Spike. The way to a person's heart
is not to brag about killing their kind. But isn't that how Buffy
sees him? Killer of slayers? It's something Buffy would say. She'd
bring it up. She is scared that should Spike get his chip out,
that she'd be number three on his list.
Again, the morning after is almost like a battle of conscience.
She gets engrossed in the kiss, until Spike mentions Slayers.
One point for Buffy's good "I had sex with a demon, oh god,
oh god, oh god" side, and the bad "But wow, he's naked.
Where's the chocolate orange?" side is squashed yet again.
All through "Wrecked", no mention is made of Buffy's
new found not human-ness. She'd want to push that to the back
of her mind, surely. To hide it away. Bottle it up, because she's
so good at that (Well, until Hinton Battle decides to show up
again).
Then to Dawn. Buffy is afraid Dawn will get hurt, due to Buffy
being the Slayer. But the scarier scenario here, is that Dawn
is hurt, by one of her friends. And she is. It plays out in front
of her, and scarier still, she just forgives Willow, and lets
Dawn go off with the demon she is trying to get out of her system.
The end of the show sees Buffy on her bed, holding a cross, with
garlic hanging up. To me, that just seems too ludicrous to be
real. It's the cliched vampire deterrents. The type of thing you
see in cartoons. Sure, a cross'll work, but Garlic? Has that even
been shown to work in the Jossverse? And even a cross is no match
for a master vampire with a desire for Slayer blood. Realistically,
Buffy wouldn't use garlic and crosses. She'd have a few dozen
stakes, a bottle of double blessed holy water, and a crossbow.
If it is a dream/catatonia, I'd think she was playing out her
fears. Seeing, in her head, what she was scared of.
- Becoming like Faith - Her friends descent into magical mischief
(Oooh, I like that) - Her attraction to Spike - Being a creature
of the darkness. She's denied it so long, and Spike wants to bring
it out of her - Having to kill Spike (Or anyone she relies on)
- Being turned, or killed by Spike (Or any vampire, but I think
Spike would be a bigger fear for her) - Being other than human
- Being left by the man she's involved with...again - Using someone,
making someone feel as she felt when Parker used her. - Being
involved with, having feelings for, the slayer of slayers, and
becoming his third - Dawn being hurt - Vampire deterrents that
would actually work (Okay, so that's me being sarcastic)
Even if it isn't a dream or whatever, it's interesting how so
many of her worries and fears happened in two episodes.
Views? Opinions?
Sorry about the extreme length of this thing.
~ Jo
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: All in her head .... -- Slayrunt, 02:21:15 11/29/01
Thu
Interesting idea, but I doubt it. I can't explain why I doubt
it, but I do. I also like it too!.
Just some food for thought. In 1st season ep "nightmares"
when everyones nightmares are becoming reality, Buffy had 2 or
techinally 3 come true. 1) the Master rises. 2) She is buried
alive. 3) She is vamped.
Obviously, the Master rising, being the seasons Big Bad, makes
sense. I find it interesting about the other two. We had to wait
5 years for them to raise their ugly heads again.
Finding oneself alive inside a buried coffin would freak anyone
out, I would think, but imagine if you had nightmares about it
and it came true!
Spike's line about biting Buffy had to freak her out as well,
although she has been bitten by three vamps by my count. The Master
just wanted to kill her, Angel out of necessity, and Dracula was
sampling. Spike, I think wants her alive though.
While I was typing that silly Angelus line kept jumping into my
head. "to kill this girl, you have to love her", still
waiting to see what that means.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A completely "What if"
Scenario to Wrecked! (Spoilers) -- Neaux, 05:04:21 11/29/01 Thu
yeah.. this is kinda lame doing a what if.. but I could not stop
thinking about it...
So what if during this Car wreck with Willow and Dawn.. that instead
of hitting a wall.. Willow didn't look where she was going and
Hit Spike in some manner that.. of course didn't kill him (he
is a vampire) but Possibly Wounded him?? Can Vampires lose their
legs?? or a spinter of metal through the torso or something..
to where it injured Spike enough to Get Buffy Worried..
The idea just seems that it would have been more interesting to
see Buffy's emotions towards Spike come flooding to the surface..
to see if she really did love Spike or not..
I dunno.. i guess i'm just rambling..
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: A completely "What if" Scenario to Wrecked!
(Spoilers) -- Shaglio, 08:46:49 11/29/01 Thu
"Can Vampires lose their legs??"
I don't see why not. For the longest time Spike was in a wheelchair
after that burning church fell on him and Dru. That always bothered
me in that it seems like I've seen Spike and Angel get hit harder
than that and just shake it off. Unless Spike was faking the whole
time (I thought he was just faking the injury towards the end;
concealing the fact that he had healed fully).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: A completely "What if" Scenario to Wrecked!
(Spoilers) -- Neaux, 09:21:13 11/29/01 Thu
ah very true.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Losing legs -- FelipeRijo, 06:59:02 11/30/01
Fri
I've read somewhere else that vampires have extraordinary regenerative
powers, so in theory they can grow back lost limbs given enough
time
------------------------------------------------------------------------
OK, for those of us in the audience
who are me... (Spoilery questions for Wrecked) -- Puzzled Muggle
a.k.a. Trollop #1, 06:36:46 11/29/01 Thu
...can anyone tell a poor person who hasn't seen any of the episodes
(Oh, have I mentioned that before?) some things that are puzzling
her?
1. How does Spike know about the Troika?
2. What does Spike know about the Troika?
3. How does Spike know how to find the Troika?
Only one or two of the posters this week has commented on the
fact that Buffy may not be human. Most have concentrated their
posts on [a] the sex scene, and [b] the Willow/drug addiction
comparisons and use of magic. Which comments lead me to
4. Why do you intelligent people think that Buffy is ignoring
the little fact that Spike was able to hit her with no harm resulting
to him? (At least, that's the impression I'm getting from your
posts - am I wrong?). I would've thought that this would be of
far more concern than some hot and heavy sex with Spike - not
to make light of it, of course, but she can always tell herself
she isn't going to do that again, and think she means it, but
she has to be wondering what she is/has come back as, don't you
think? And how will she find out what she is? Blood tests?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: OK, for those of us in the audience who are me... (Spoilery
questions for Wrecked) -- Cactus Watcher, 06:48:21 11/29/01 Thu
Warren the defacto leader of the Buffoons, built the Buffybot
for Spike last year. Therefore, Spike knows where his house is.
Spike has seen the Trio together in the basement of Warren's house
(I guess its Warren's), when he had Warren check out his chip
in Smashed to see if it was still functioning. Other than that
he does not know much because they are a bunch of geeks, and he
isn't interested in them in the least.
Buffy is undoubtably worried about what she is, but right now
she is in denial about a lot of things. Until the end of Wrecked
she was in denial that Willow was having serious problems. This
was because she was feeling if Willow's problems were actually
minor, then surely Buffy's own problems were really minor as well.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Hmmm.... -- Marie, 08:04:59 11/29/01 Thu
Thanks for the quick answer - I had remembered the Warren/Bot
thing, but didn't know if Spike knew about their latest doings!
Buffy is undoubtably worried about what she is, but right now
she is in denial about a lot of things. Until the end of Wrecked
she was in denial that Willow was having serious problems. This
was because she was feeling if Willow's problems were actually
minor, then surely Buffy's own problems were really minor as well.
I take your point about her being in some denial, but surely she
has to be frantic about this! I mean, even if she ignores it externally,
she has to be thinking - "I've come back from the grave,
but something's wrong - I'm not human? What the **** is going
on here?" And who does she ask? Personally I feel that this
is one thing she would contact Giles about (and ASH is making
further appearances, I understand - he hasn't gone completely)
- Willow is unstable at the moment, she isn't as close to Tara,
and Spike she's, er, avoiding.
M
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Hmmm.... -- Cactus Watcher, 08:21:04 11/29/01
Thu
Your point is well taken. The story just hasn't turned that way
yet (too busy with Willow's problems). Maybe next episode!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Hmmm.... -- Isabel, 21:31:44 12/01/01 Sat
"I take your point about her being in some denial, but surely
she has to be frantic about this! I mean, even if she ignores
it externally, she has to be thinking - "I've come back from
the grave, but something's wrong - I'm not human? What the ****
is going on here?" And who does she ask? Personally I feel
that this is one thing she would contact Giles about (and ASH
is making further appearances, I understand - he hasn't gone completely)
- Willow is unstable at the moment, she isn't as close to Tara,
and Spike she's, er, avoiding."
Remember that it's only been one day. And a rather, um, busy day
at that.
I think the answer to why she hasn't mentioned it to anyone is
related to why she hasn't asked Tara to do a de-invite on Spike.
Buffy'd have to explain how she knows that she's not human. "Spike
can hit me now." would probably unite the Scoobies to get
rid of Spike first, to protect Buffy, before they dealt with her
other than human status. It seems to me that Buffy doesn't want
Spike permanently gone. When she's huddled on her bed surrounded
by garlic, she's clutching a cross not a stake.
Not to mention, Dawn'd probably be annoyed at a de-invite. Spike's
her friend too and he went to take care of her while Buffy killed
that demon. She might just take pleasure in re-inviting Spike
as often as Buffy has the spell done.
Plus, Buffy would probably not want to mention their other activities
of the night before. The wigging of her friends would reach cosmic
proportions.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> implications for dawn (spoilers?) -- anom,
11:51:26 12/02/01 Sun
If Spike can hurt Buffy because she's not exactly human, what
about Dawn? First, is she human? The monk at the factory said
they made the Key human, but does that just mean they gave it
human form, or is Dawn truly human, as has been discussed on this
board before? Second, if the category of who Spike can hit is
defined not by being demonic, as everyone assumed, but by being
not human, is Dawn in that category? Third, would Spike ever want
to hurt her? From everything we've seen so far, no, but Joss is
full of surprises. Yes, Spike has taken good care of Dawn, but
he'd "made a promise to a lady" & was guilt-ridden & grief-stricken.
Now Buffy's back (no need for grief), Dawn's OK & Glory's not
a threat (no need for guilt), & Buffy isn't the same "lady"
he made the promise to. And Spike is feeling pretty ambivalent
about the whole "evil" issue. So I think Question #3
is the crucial one. It may be a stretch, but I wouldn't be too
surprised if that very question comes up sometime before the end
of the season.
Hey, weren't we all saying we'd want to see what happened if the
chip stopped working?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: implications for dawn (spoilers?)
-- Isabel, 16:00:07 12/02/01 Sun
I've wondered about Dawn too. I don't think Spike has ever tested
whether or not he can hit her. He's probably assumed that 'she
looks human, I'd get a headache.' On the other hand, in 'After
Life' he did tell her that he could "rip [her] head off and
drink from [her] brain stem." Maybe he knows and has chosen
not to hurt her.
But, Spike's chip inhibits him from hurting any 'Living Thing.'
(Stated by Riley in "The Initiative.") It shouldn't
care if something is human, only alive. Didn't Harmony comment
that Spike got headaches from picking flowers? (Which Spike hotly
denied, but in a defensive way that always made me think that
yes, he did get some discomfort from picking plants.)
Think about it. If Spike could eat any animal as long as it was
not human, why the heck is he drinking reheated pigs' blood from
cartons? He could go to a farm and get it fresh from the vein.
He could be feeding off of the dogs and cats of Sunnydale. (I
always figured the Kitten Poker was his sorry attempt at a non-Scooby
social life. Plus, he might be able to get someone else to kill
the kittens. (Yuck.))
I think demons are alive in a different way than humans and animals
from our world. Buffy is also alive in a different way, so she
doesn't set off the chip.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: OK, for those of us in the audience who are me... (Spoilery
questions for Wrecked) -- mundusmundi, 08:21:52 11/29/01 Thu
Only one or two of the posters this week has commented on the
fact that Buffy may not be human. Most have concentrated their
posts on [a] the sex scene, and [b] the Willow/drug addiction
comparisons and use of magic....Why do you intelligent people
think that Buffy is ignoring the little fact that Spike was able
to hit her with no harm resulting to him?
Speaking as one of the two, I think Buffy's denial can be attributed
to the writers' deliberately protracting her plot arc for February
sweeps. It certainly didn't make much sense to me. Far from denial,
I'd think she'd actually feel relieved that it's all not in her
head, that there is something wrong with her, and that she just
might want to find out what. Guess we're in wait-and-see mode.
(Let's only hope MN doesn't write the big revelation episode,
or we may be in for a long allegorical sermon on Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome. ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: OK, for those of us in the audience who are me...
(Spoilery questions for Wrecked) -- Rufus, 14:24:21 11/29/01 Thu
Hey you can explain your last line cause I don't get it.."allegorical
sermon on CFS".
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Aw, you know my dumb jokes by now, Rufie.
;) -- mm, 15:08:23 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: OK, for those of us in the audience who are me... (Spoilery
questions for Wrecked) -- Earl Allison, 09:00:00 11/29/01 Thu
1. Spike doesn't know about them per se, he knows Warren, and
saw the others there. I don't know if he heard them scheming (he
SHOULD have, but it'll depend on the writers), but he didn't act
like he did.
2. Not much, aside from their really neat computers, action figures,
and comic books (Tom Servo would insist they were graphic novels,
BTW :) -- oh, and that Warren knows about electronics. That and
whatever they told him or inadvertantly revealed in their clutter
-- again nothing spelled out, though.
3. He went to Warren's to find out about the chip. Since Warren's
mom let him in, no need for an invitation again.
4. I think Buffy's biggest concern was that not being human meant
LESS than human, like a demon or soulless creature. That's why
she was able to give in and sleep with Spike. As others have mentioned,
she lost her moral compass and moral high ground, because she
THINKS she's ... just ... like ... Spike!
Personally, given where she came from, and given what others have
theorized, I think she's MORE than human, and more than "just"
the Slayer -- an Angel, perhaps? At least, she's something better,
something perhaps not entirely human, but "higher" on
the scale, if you will. Unrecognizable to the chip (handy little
bugger, anyone wonder how it "tells" human from non-human?)
perhaps, but nothing to be despairing over, IMHO.
Take it and run.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I admitt to complete ignorance. (SPOILERS - Smashed) --
Traveler, 19:41:08 11/29/01 Thu
I have absolutely no idea why Spike's chip doesn't react to Buffy.
To be honest, we don't really know whether or not Buffy is concerned
about "coming back wrong." All we know is that she hasn't
talked about it with anyone.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
They really blew it with "Wrecked"
-- A.C.S., 08:05:59 11/29/01 Thu
They were building up a very interesting point about the corruption
and compulsion surrounding the use of magic. Instead, they concluded
with too literal an interpretation of addiction. What Willow was
doing with magic was dangerous and unethical in and of itself.
The intrusion of a physical addiction copied wholesale drom drug
addiction totally wiped out the wider issues of ethics in the
use of magic.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: They really blew it with "Wrecked" -- Ryuei,
10:57:57 11/29/01 Thu
Yes, I agree. That was very heavy-handed and turned what should
be a very gray issue into a stark black and white issue.
Same goes for Buffy and Spike. I totally agree that Buffy has
regressed in the way she treats/views Spike. I would have thought
that a trip to heaven would have given Buffy a little more perspective
and compassion, but instead all we are getting in angst and self-rightousness.
I admit that being pulled out of heaven would be traumatic, but
still - to have gained nothing at all from the experience and
to just fall back into her old whiny self. Geez!
I am wondering (hoping actually) if the writers are setting up
another curve ball though. Haven't Joss and Co. worked for the
past six years to move from a stark black and white worldview
to one that is much more gray (if not downright colorful when
you consider the likes of Lorne and his wardrobe)? Why take all
that away? It seems to me that Willow will need to realize that
while the black magick is addictive, she may find herself called
upon to use the more balanced harmonious magick again in order
to save her friends. And what else is she going to do - condemn
Tara for being a witch because "all magick is bad and addictive"
when in fact it was Willow's own abuse of magick which made it
go bad. It's like alcohol. Alcohol is also a disinfectant and
in the past was used as a replacement for anasthetics that hadn't
been invented yet. And most people are perfectly able to drink
responsibly. So should all alcohol be forbidden or condemned because
a few people abused it? I think that should be the real analogy
here. So I hope this storyline isn't going the way of magick =
demons = stark evil, but rather magick = power = need for responsibility
and respect.
And as for Buffy and Spike, I'd hate to see this just become a
case where she needs to resist the temptation to get drawn into
an abusive, dysfunctional relationship with the evil but mostly
impotent vampire. What I was hoping to see was a growing respect
and a mutual attempt to humanize each other and not just a stagnant
love-hate relationship.
So I hope to see Buffy and Willow come to the realization that
Spike and magick respectively should not just be condemned and
turned away from, but rather that each needs to find a more balanced
way of dealing with them - recognizing the dangers but still being
able to relate in a positive way for the greater good. I hope
that makes sense. I am thinking aloud here.
In a sense I was disappointed by Wrecked, but in another sense
I am reserving judgement until I see where they go with this.
If it just becomes a matter of Buffy and Willow resisting temptation
without dealing with the ambiguities and potential complexities
of what is currently dysfunctional but could just as easily by
very functional and even healthy in some ways, then I will feel
very let down.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: They really blew it with "Wrecked" --
Rufus, 13:20:19 11/29/01 Thu
Wrecked is a set up for what will happen next. I do think that
they have been deliberate in showing a situation that seems so
simplistic. It's only ep 10, I think that at this point we can
only wait for them to show why things have appeared to become
so black and white in respect to Willow and Buffy and Spike. Of
course now we have to keep ourselves busy for the next 5 or 6
weeks.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Is Buffy regressing? -- Rufus, 19:27:32 11/29/01 Thu
You spoke of balance in regards to magic and Spike and I agree
and think that they are going to go in that direction. First they
had to establish a black and white sense of the situation to forward
the story. Buffy was yanked out of heaven, she had no choice,
and the spell was not completed, the urn smashed before the spell
was finished. So I'm not surprised that we have a slightly incomplete
Buffy. Buffy no longer has a sense of balance, she has been cast
back into a world that only holds pain for her. The best part
is that the only person she can stand to be around is the "enemy"
Spike. I find that their interaction after sleeping together was
very human.
Spike: I knew. I knew the only thing better than killing a slayer
would be f******.....
Buffy: What!? Is that what this is about? Doing a slayer?
Spike may be smart but sometimes his mouth gets him into trouble.
That insensitive comment ruined the morning and stopped the embrace
they shared. On one level you could say that it reminded Buffy
that they were enemies and the natural order of things was askew,
but I also draw a parallel to Parker. Buffy hasn't had the best
experiences with men and the experience of being a notch on the
bedpost of some frat boy was painful. Spike could have stirred
up that hurt by his comment. We know he loves her, but Buffy isn't
so secure about love when it comes to sexual relationships. Her
question about was all Spike after was to do a Slayer was a fair
one. One thing Buffy seems to remember, and that is being used,
and it hurt.
Spike: I wouldn't throw stones, Pet. You seem to be quite the
groupie yourself.
Buffy: Shut up.
Spike: I'm just saying Vampires get you hot.
Buffy: A vampire got me hot...ONE! But he is gone.....You're just....You're
just convenient.
If Spike is to be drawn back into being human the trip will have
to have a few bumps. Buffy may not always be perfect but she is
still only 20, how many times has Spike been 20? I think that
this is normal. Buffy and Spike have to make a new relationship
out of the rubble of the lives they used to know and be secure
with. Spike did have a revelation of a sort by figuring out that
making love not war was preferable, he just isn't mature enough
to understand the full implications of his thought. He only relates
it to sex or killing and hasn't realized that loving a human may
be the first step to becoming more humane. Both parties need each
other. They understand each other when they shut up long enough
to stop the insults. Spike tried to attack a woman in Smashed
and I think that was there for a reason. Just as Buffy going back
to Spike for help is there for a reason. Both are going to learn
that though life is difficult, it has rewards that are worth learning
to respect not just magic but each other and the value of life.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Is Buffy regressing? -- LoriAnn, 03:28:55
11/30/01 Fri
Very good observations, Rufus. The balance has to be found. As
electric as the big Buffy-and-Spike-finally-do-it scene was, their
being tender and affectionate with each other is something that
needs more exposure. The two do seem to have reverted to the comfortably
antagonistic, attitudes of the past. Spike seemed to be getting
comfortable being nice to Buffy and vice versa until OMwF and
the kiss; since then it's been almost all passion and vitriol
from both of them. However, the scene in which they are walking
around looking for Rack's place had some real conversation, perhaps
even communication. Spike told Buffy he loved her without her
negatively characterizing either him or his love. The two of them
seem to make breakthroughs when they are being HONEST with each
other. For example, the scene when Buffy is on the stairs at home
in The Gift was very honest, and the love making scene actually
was too. All the name calling and macho posturing is doing nothing
but putting distance between them. I just thought of something
in a similar vein. Everyone has commented that Spike's remark
about sex with a slayer being better than killing one is crude
and insensitive. I have no argument with either characterization;
however, I think Spike may have been, heavy-handedly, trying to
compliment Buffy. Think of the implications of the statement:
there is something Spike finds preferable to drinking the blood
of the one who is the greatest threat to him, at the time, in
the world. He has found something that makes the demand his nature
puts on him to drink blood moot. That seems earth-shaking to me;
except for blooming onions, what else could vampires possibly
want more than to drink blood. They're driven to it. But Spike
has found love--play with the definition as you will--better.
Maybe there is some redeeming significance, plot-wise, in the,
admittedly, crude and insensitive remark.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Is Buffy regressing? -- RH, 10:46:56
11/30/01 Fri
"I think Spike may have been, heavy-handedly, trying to compliment
Buffy... Maybe there is some redeeming significance, plot-wise,
in the, admittedly, crude and insensitive remark."
Agreed! (But it certainly doesn't hold a candle to his "effulgent"
poem about Cecily!)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Buffy in Hell -- Cactus Watcher,
08:13:59 11/29/01 Thu
Wrecked seems to have polarized opinions. Some people thought
it was good, a lot of people disliked it. I liked it, but I don't
feel strongly about it one way or the other. Whatever, life goes
on and so will the show, in time.
So, ignoring how we got here, I would like to propose that the
current situation is just a deeping of torment that Buffy has
felt since the moment she was brought back. The key words she
used to describe her heaven were that there was no worry or doubt.
Now all she has in her life is worry and doubt, about herself
and the others.
When Buffy was about to die, Willow seemed the rock that would
steady the future of the gang. Now Willow's life is a ruin, and
she has proved she can be a serious danger to the future of the
gang.
When she was about to die, Buffy felt she had done all she could
do for Dawn. But, now she has begun to see that Dawn needs much
more. And we, the audience, see that Dawn has needs that no one
has begun to notice.
When she was about to die, Buffy's relationship to Spike was turning
poetic and almost sweet. Now it has become overripe and decadent.
Perhaps one of the weaknesses of the story line this year, is
that Buffy hasn't been allowed to talk about her growing attraction
to Spike with anyone, but Spike. And we know she isn't admitting
the whole truth to him. We don't really know what she is feeling
(as evidenced by the diversity of the comments here on what she
is feeling). She needed to talk to Willow about this and couldn't
for her own reasons, and now Willow is in no shape to help anyone,
perhaps even herself.
We haven't seen overwhelming problems from the Xander/Anya line,
but that may come after the season break.
There is a vague threat to Sunnydale (from the Trio) that no one
seems to be able to put a finger on. The gang even learned about
the Initiative more quickly. And frankly, with the personal problems
so bad, Sunnydale doesn't seem worth worrying about.
This is not the worst hell imaginable. But, for Buffy it certainly
is hell.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Oh, Grow Up and Post-Traumatic Stress -- Wisewoman, 08:58:19
11/29/01 Thu
Y'know those stress scales that you see now and then, where they
rate the different life events in terms of how much stress they
cause and how likely you are to burn out? Well, I figure Buffy
is scoring right off the scale. Loss of relationship (Riley).
Death of family member (Joyce). Loss of mentor (Giles). Illness
of close friend (Willow's addiction). Serious illness scores pretty
high, so I'm assuming actual death would be a doozey. Plus having
to be constantly battle-ready against demons and vampires, and
now coping with the annoying presence of the unknown Nerd Troika.
(Exploding lint has gotta make you question your sanity.) Put
them all together, they spell "breakdown."
I don't know if Buffy can grow up any more than she is right now,
but I sure hope we at least get to see her enjoy herself and hear
her laugh before the end of the season!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Amen, WW! -- CW, 09:01:44 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Oh, Grow Up and Post-Traumatic Stress -- DEN,
17:14:29 11/29/01 Thu
A few eps back I made a similar observation regarding Willow,
saying she reminded me of a soldier who has spent to much time
on the line,or a pilot who has flown too many missions. For both
her and Buffy, the stress isn't even POST traumatic. They're still
out there taking the hits. And that in turn may help make sense
of the relative speed of Willow's down spiral. A person's judgment,
their sense of self-preservation, everything holding them together,
can go all at once in that kind of situation.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Well said WW -- Dedalus, 19:29:55 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Forgot a big one! -- robert, 20:18:31 11/29/01 Thu
I'm guessing that being forced to kill one's soulmate (Angel)
would also rank highly.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Angel's curse -- Ayanna, 08:55:52
11/29/01 Thu
I have a theory for the populace in general. WHAT COULD MAKE ANGEL
HAPPIER THAN THE BIRTH OF HIS CHILD? Lets assume Joss Wheadon
will not be so cruel as to wait until "DAD" on 12/10/01.
for Angel to lose his soul. If anything were to induce a moment
of pure happiness, surely it would be birth of a child Angel never
thought he could have - a pure innocent soul born of his unlife.
My point? Angel no longer has the gypsy curse. He simply has his
soul. My theory is this. When Willow performed the spell that
restored Angel's soul, she did only that. Restored Angel's soul.
The gypsy's used the restoration spell to curse Angelus. Basically
they said "Okay, you killed a beloved daughter of our tribe
we will punish you. First, take your soul back - feel what you
have done. (Now this is the curse part) If you expirence one moment
of true happiness this soul will be stripped from you." The
restoration spell was a means to an end, not the curse. Angel
has his soul, and it is his - for keeps. No more curse
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Verrry interesting... -- Cactus Watcher, 09:00:21 11/29/01
Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Not really, because ... (refers to AtS Season One "Eternity")
-- Earl Allison, 09:07:38 11/29/01 Thu
In the Season One episode of Angel the Series, "Eternity,"
Angel is drugged by an actress, with a drug that gives temporary
happiness. That lets Angelus out to play briefly, and he menaces
Wesley and Cordelia for a time, before they subdue him and he
returns to normal as the drug (doxymol?) wears off -- of course,
I always thought it was an all or nothing thing, you lose the
soul, or you don't, but what do I know?
Whatever Willow (and whatever she was channelling) cast, it seemed
to keep the happiness clause intact.
Take it and run.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> I thought of that, too. -- CW, 09:19:25 11/29/01 Thu
But, for the sake of argument, maybe the drug just weakened Angel's
control over the beast, and the talk about happiness at the time
was, let's say, over emphasized. I'm not saying that's true, so
don't ask me to defend it!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Not really, because . . . "Eternity"
event doesn't count -- Crooked Mind, 02:14:08 11/30/01 Fri
The events in "Eternity" don't tell us anything one
way or another with regards to the original issue in question
(Will Angel lose his soul to happiness again).
While the drug was fictitious, the class of drugs it represented
is not. These agents cause disinhibition and loss of judgement;
that's why they are so often implicated in date rape cases.
Keep in mind that Angel is truly a dual being; within him is his
soul (Angel) and his demon (Angelus). They are both there 24/7,
but Angel holds the reins (most of the time, on the Earth plane,
anyway). When Angel was drugged, his consciousness and conscience
were crippled by the drug, which had the effect of "opening
the locks" and letting Angelus come out to play unchecked.
Thus, we had Angelus "reborn" without a moment of true
happiness.
The difference also shows if you compare the two events in question
(loss of soul from happiness vs. drug-induced disinhibition).
If the drug had caused "the moment", then Angel would
have been gone; the curse, as seen in the Buffy storyline, was
permanent in effect (save for Willow's intervention). In "Eternity",
once the drug wore off, Angel was back in ascendance.
Thus, "Eternity" holds no clue as to Angel's current
status (though the whole concept of a mind-altering drug working
on a physiologically dead body bends the mind of this legal drug
dealer). I'm of the opinion that the curse is a done thing (doesn't
make much sense that the Powers would leave such an Achille's
heel in place now that Angel serves The Light in an official capacity),
but it would be an interesting wrinkle if Angel went Angelus again
(though I don't see a good fit for such in the developing story
line . . . but that's just wishful thinking on my part!)
CM
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Angel's curse -- A.C.S., 12:25:17 11/29/01 Thu
But the happiness clause refers to "pure" happiness.
I think it's likely that there are a lot of conflicting emotions
for Angel here. That's one reason why I think the happiness clause
has little to do with sex. Angel could sleep around all he wants
and he's not necessarily increasing the probability of his experiencing
a pure happiness moment.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Angel's curse -- Rufus, 13:01:02 11/29/01 Thu
How can Angel be completely happy. Everyone from W&H and the vampire
community wants this kid for something, and Holtz will probably
settle on killing the child. There isn't time to be happy enough
to forget that Angel's status as a vampire may kill his son.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Just the burden of... (Spoilers for AtS) -- Moose, 21:36:45
12/01/01 Sat
...protecting and worrying about the child is enough to prevent
"pure" happiness. Also, Darla just killed herself! Not
exactly a happy moment even if it redeemed her.
I would think that Angel would only lose his soul if he somehow
felt the burden of the world leave him and I don't think that
is going to happen any time soon.
The child actually adds to his suffering, not happiness. He is
still a vampire and cannot take his child out to play in the sun,
still has to drink blood (can you imagine explaining that one?),
and eventually will have to tell his son about his evil past and
curse.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Everybody, please stop jumping
the gun! (some general season six spoilers) -- Rob, 09:16:25 11/29/01
Thu
I've read just about all the threads about "Wrecked,"
and it seems to be an extremely divisive episode. It seems like
you have to either buy the drug metaphor wholeheartedly or detest
it. I, for one, really enjoyed the episode, although I do think
that the metaphor may have been a little bit too obvious. But
then again, perhaps, for this plot, a bit more literalness (is
that a word?) was needed.
The reason I'm posting, though, is to just remind everybody who
disliked the episode, citing reasons such as the Willow-addiction
thing was finished too quickly and didactly, that the season is,
obviously, not yet over, and we may not see the true merits of
this episode until later in the year (Dawn, anyone?). Countless
times, people have criticized particular plot points on "Buffy,"
only to retract their statements when they saw the bigger picture
later in the season. "Buffy" is very much like a novel
for television, with each week being another chapter in the bigger
story, rather than separate, episodic events. When a "Buffy"
season is over, I rewatch all the episodes in a period of a few
days, and I almost always like the major story arc better than
the first time I saw it. Things come into perspective, and more
clues and hints that were dropped in each episode here and there
make much more sense. At this point, we do not know if Willow's
magic addiction is over. This was only one episode that, unfortunately,
was the last before a long hiatus. We cannot, therefore, have
clarification next week about this. But on "Buffy,"
very little is every wrapped up with a nice, pink bow. There were
repercussions to Buffy's resurrection, and I'm sure there will
be repercussions to this.
I would be willing to bet that, by the end of the season, most
people will either change their opinions about "Wrecked,"
or, at the very least, understand it a little better, in the context
of the entire season.
I must admit that myself that I am not yet sure where the story
arc is going this year. Every other year, we've had some clear
idea of what the year would be about (First Season=Master; Second
Season=Angel; Third Season=Mayor, Ascension; Fourth Season=Initiative;
Fifth Season=Dawn/Glory). There were always major surprises, but
we still had a clearer view of where the show would be going.
This year, I have no idea where the show will be going. Yes, we
have the Evil Troika, but are they really the Big Bad? I doubt
it. We've assumed that Willow would be the Big Bad, but now I'm
not sure about that, either. What will the driving force behind
the rest of the year be? I think it will probably have something
to do with Buffy having come back "wrong." But that's
just speculation. This season, on an episode-by-episode basis,
we've been rolling in puppies. Every episode has been superlative
(with the exception, many argue, of "Wrecked"), which
I believe is unprecedented in any other season. But I do not think
it has as strong an arc as Season 5's, at least up to this point.
But I am also very confident that by the time the season is over,
my opinion will have changed about the year's story arc. After
all, how can you judge something that is still in progress?
All I can say is I hope that "Wrecked" will have a major
impact on the rest of the year, and not have quickly tied up a
major plot from the last three years in one ep. But I will wait
until the end of January (sob, sob) to see.
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Little correction to above post -- Rob, 09:24:15 11/29/01
Thu
The reason I'm posting, though, is to just remind everybody who
disliked the episode, citing reasons such as the Willow-addiction
thing was finished too quickly and didactly, that the season is,
obviously, not yet over, and we may not see the true merits of
this episode until later in the year (Dawn, anyone?). Countless
times, people have criticized particular plot points on "Buffy,"
only to retract their statements when they saw the bigger picture
later in the season.
It should say: "...and we may not see the true merits of
this episode until later in the year. Countless times, people
have criticized particular plot points on "Buffy," only
to retract their statements when they saw the bigger picture later
in the season (Dawn anyone?)."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some general
season six spoilers) -- Earl Allison, 09:27:32 11/29/01 Thu
I've tried to make it clear, I might not be seeing the whole picture
:)
I reserve the right to be totally and completely wrong, too :)
Still, until and unless future episodes clear it up, the analogy
was way too heavy-handed for my tastes.
Take it and run.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some
general season six spoilers) -- maddog, 09:25:12 11/30/01 Fri
But where a lot of teens watch this show isn't a good idea to
be heavy handed...to the point of being blatant at times to get
the point across? This is drugs after all...a very serious topic.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Not quite in season 2... -- Juiette, 10:37:48 11/29/01 Thu
Episode 10 in Season 2 was 'What's My Line?' Part 2. At this point,
Buffy and Angel were hunky dory and no-one had any idea what would
happen a few episodes later. (Apparantly the hiatus came after
ep 11, Ted; I'm Brtish and at the time I couldn't stand BtVS so
I don't know for certain!) Xander and Cordelia's relationship
had only just started and Spike had only just been injured, with
little indcaion that he would be wheelchair bound or end up stiking
a deal with Buffy. So season 6 coud suprise us all by taking a
completely different direction than anything we've seen. While
most seasons' arcs start earlier, there is precedent for whole
new story arc to appear half way through the season.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Not quite in season 2... -- Rob, 11:43:47 11/29/01
Thu
Yeah, you're right about that, although I'd also argue that Spike
and Dru, who were there since very early in the season, were much
stronger villians than the Evil Troika...but that's neither here
nor there, because I do love the Troika. They're just not very
threatening.
And I'm not criticizing the method for Season 6 just yet. Perhaps,
with the move to UPN, they didn't want to start the year off right
away with a complex arc, like in the past three seasons, so that
new viewers would have a bit easier of a time. I, however, do
wish that there would have been some more clue to the major arc
in the last episode before hiatus. So far, we have had story threads
(Buffy in heaven, Giles leaving, Willow and her magic, Evil Troika,
etc) but no huge, driving force like with the other seasons.
As I said before, I believe that the majority of the season's
second half will probably have to do with discovering the truth
about who or what Buffy is now...But I think that there would
have been much greater urgency to the storyline had that been
revealed in the last episode before the hiatus. Or, if that isn't
the major story arc coming, then some clue as to what is. I understand
how the writers may want this year's Big Bad to be an internal
one, among the group, but I personally prefer the mysterious,
external forces shaking up their lives. But, as I said before,
I withstand all judgment till the end of the year.
What I find most amazing about this year is that I have loved
every single episode. And yet I still am not sure about the story
arc...The Evil Troika are great, but I really hope they're not
the Big Bad.
And I do think we've been suffering from a serious Xander/Anya
deficiency in the past few weeks. I hope they're brought back
into the forefront once February sweeps begins.
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> I agree... -- Juliette, 18:19:23 11/29/01 Thu
(Let's make sure I spell my own name right this time...!)
I agree. I'd like a little hint as to where they're going with
all this. Up to Smashed I was loving the season but then, suddenly,
the whole tone changed - they literally smashed and wrecked all
the slowly building stoylines. I don't think either Willow's addiction
to magic or Buffy's attraction to Spike are over but I wasn't
wild about how they both came to such a sudden, violent head.
I love the troika, but I agree, I don't think they have it in
them to be It villain-wise. I'm left thinking "Huh. That
was... interesting. I wonder where they're going now?" which
is good, but I'd have preferred "Wow, I love this story,
I can't wait to see what happens!"
(I still don't like Smashed or Wrecked much though! I think its
the soppy romantic B/S shipper inside wishing it had all been
a bit, well, more romantic!)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Not quite in season 2... -- robert, 20:04:46
11/29/01 Thu
"The Evil Troika are great, but I really hope they're not
the Big Bad."
I agree with this. However, I not only don't believe the Troika
to be the big bad, I don't think they will be the little bad either.
I am speculating that by the end of the season, Buffy will discover
the Toika, kick their collective asses, and then co-opt them into
helping her with whatever evil she is fighting.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Not quite in season 2... -- maddog, 09:42:06
11/30/01 Fri
Has anyone come to the conclusion that this season, with the theme
of growing up, could be not one big bad, but each person dealing
with their own big bad? Buffy with what she is, Willow with her
addiction to magic, Xander and Anya with wedding gitters, Dawn
with a lack of any real parenting(Buffy's done so little thus
far), Spike with the realization that he can't have Buffy the
way he wants her. Those are kinda like their own personal demons.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some general
season six spoilers) -- JM, 12:59:51 11/29/01 Thu
Thanks for defending. I've been feeling very odd, in that I really
thought it was a very good episode, and it seems to be basically
reviled on the other boards. (Couldn't get on this one yesterday
and today again, in order to get the most educated opinions on
the 'Net.)
I'm having a hard time articulating why I liked, just know I did.
My main defense is that the metaphor isn't being used to deliver
a message. I'm pretty convinced that ME doesn't really do message
eps. I mean really, who actually thinks that physical addiction
to a dangerous substance is a good thing. I don't think any part
of the audience needs to be educated on that. When ME uses real
world metaphors, they use them to explore the dramatic potentials.
They want to explore the dramatic potential of addiction, both
emotional and physical. What could make a good person do something
that they know is wrong or dangerous? How can a good person involve
others in their dangerous behavior? How can good, intelligent
people do something that harms themselves?
I think magic is a great vehicle for exploring this side of human
weakness. Willow has a had an exceptionally rough couple of months,
and has been using magic as a way of feeling more able to control
the very big responsibilities she took on. Now she's had a horrific
couple of weeks and is vulnerable and powerless enough to take
the step that moves her from simple emotional depedence to physical
as well. Isn't that how many addictions progress in the real world?
And to all those (not sure if anyone on the board has) who object
that magic has never been shown to create dependency or physical
pleasure, actually it's been presented exactly that way before:
Giles. The details of raising Eyghon in "Dark Age" were
pretty explicitly drug related, as well as the effect, "an
incredible high." In retrospect it seems that this may have
been one of Giles' concerns about Willow's magic use.
Like the place the ep left us too. A ray of hope, that will surely
be dashed (mixed met much?). Willow is now to the point where
she and those around her can no longer deny that there is a problem.
So that means that if and when she falls off the wagon, it will
be a deliberate choice to turn away from the light, not the gradual,
almost accidental progression it has been up to this point.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some
general season six spoilers) -- Rob, 13:11:13 11/29/01 Thu
"A ray of hope, that will surely be dashed (mixed met much?)."
LOL...Reminded me of Buffy's line in "Smashed" to Spike:
"Have any more metaphors you'd like to add to that little
mix?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Metaphor Mixing -- Kimberly, 13:29:16 11/29/01
Thu
How many other shows on TV could make a statement like that and
expect their audience to understand it? (More a statement, BTW,
on the low expectations of TV execs, not TV audiences.)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Metaphor Mixing -- Rob, 17:25:45 11/29/01
Thu
Exactly! That was one of the most intelligent jokes, I think,
in Buffy's history, even, and that's saying a lot, considering
every episode is stuffed to the gills with brilliant jokes.
And if it was one of the best in Buffy's history, I can just imagine
the lost, confused expression on the poor viewers' faces had a
writer tried to put that on a show like "Will and Grace"
or "Friends"!
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some
general season six spoilers) -- LoriAnn, 02:47:40 11/30/01 Fri
"Willow is now to the point where she and those around her
can no longer deny that there is a problem. So that means that
if and when she falls off the wagon, it will be a deliberate choice
to turn away from the light, not the gradual, almost accidental
progression it has been up to this point."
Very good point. In the past, we've seen sweet, nerdy Willow become
pretty scarey even though she was on the side of good. If she
does decide to embrace evil, mightn't she become even scarier.
That sort of turn, as you pointed out, is psychologically very
possible now. Another thing, someone posted--sorry, I can't remember
who--that we were left without a clue. I suspect that we just
haven't recognized the clue(s)yet. Willow still has serious potential
as a big bad. Rack would require some very strong expansion, but
he could puff himself up into a serious menace. If he doesn't
seem of great consequence now, that's the nature of hints. What
else have we seen that might expand into more than it seems: a
lot of things.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Everybody, please stop jumping the gun! (some
general season six spoilers) -- LoriAnn, 02:49:47 11/30/01 Fri
"Willow is now to the point where she and those around her
can no longer deny that there is a problem. So that means that
if and when she falls off the wagon, it will be a deliberate choice
to turn away from the light, not the gradual, almost accidental
progression it has been up to this point."
Very good point. In the past, we've seen sweet, nerdy Willow become
pretty scarey even though she was on the side of good. If she
does decide to embrace evil, mightn't she become even scarier.
That sort of turn, as you pointed out, is psychologically very
possible now. Another thing, someone posted--sorry, I can't remember
who--that we were left without a clue. I suspect that we just
haven't recognized the clue(s)yet. Willow still has serious potential
as a big bad. Rack would require some very strong expansion, but
he could puff himself up into a serious menace. If he doesn't
seem of great consequence now, that's the nature of hints. What
else have we seen that might expand into more than it seems: a
lot of things.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I agree, as said in earlier post that seems to have vanished
-- JLP, 22:07:38 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Magic's Price, ***Spoilers from
Wrecked*** -- fresne, 11:34:57 11/29/01 Thu
Some thoughts. Just what is Wrack getting from Willow (or for
that matter any of his junkies)?
Willow goes to Wrack looking for the ability to do more spells,
more powerful spells (hmm...sudden Tool Time flashbacks, where
more power=trip to the hospital). Willow doesn't want to be tapped
out after a night of spell casting. Doesn't want the nose bleeds
(interesting that they have continued), the head aches (Spike's
headaches condition him not to kill, Willow ignores hers), the
yak cheese in her bra (about which may I say, ick). She just wants
the power.
And she wants it enough not to really question the price. "You've
got to give a little to get a little."
What the holy heck does that mean? Does Willow even bother to
ask. A glance at Amy, who was a freaking rat for three years,
and she lets a stranger lay hands on her.
Wrack puts his hand on Willow's chest; there is a crackle of energy.
Her eyes flutter. She's in an orgasmic state even before the trippin
starts. Wrack leans into Willow's space, whispers sweet nothing
in her ear, "You taste like strawberries." How lover
like. How very disturbing with Willow all unnoticing.
She tastes like strawberries. Sweet. Innocent. Stawberries. Chocolate.
Champagne. Picnics in the sun. I don't think so.
A strawberry (at least at one time) was slang for a person who
trades sexual favors for drugs. We're not even talking vampiric
prostitutes, they get paid money.
For a moment, when Willow was dreaming the garden Edenic, the
vines moved like snakes. The demon moving furtive in the brush,
as Wrack smiled.
And I'd have to agree with the consensus that stopping will not
be easy as 123, stop. Like a shift in drugs. Willow has gone from
a drug with a psychological dependency to one with a physical
dependency. They exist in the real world, why not the Jossverse.
We still know nothing of Wrack's price. Power? A year of her life?
Her soul?
We don't know the meaning of that crackle of energy, that unknowing
summoning of a demon. Second time this season Willow has brought
forth a demon without intending it. Willow who had the potential
to be a Vengeance Demon. Willow radiates energy or so Wrack say,
even though she doesn't mean to.
What if like LSD, Wrack's magic stays in your system? Gives you
trips years later. What if Willow summons a demon in the midst
of a dream? What if going to Wrack changed her, so that even simple
spells don't have the same effect on her system?
What if not doing magic is as easy as not talking about Buffy,
123?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Magic's Price, ***Spoilers from Wrecked*** -- Rufus,
13:15:42 11/29/01 Thu
Hey you should phrase that last bit "What if not doing magic
is as easy as not talking about Spike?"....had to throw that
one in. I did a post on the beatles song "Strawberry Fields
Forever" a bit further down. My age must be showing, but
I thought that maybe one of the writers was a Beatles fan. That
song brings back the hallucenogenic days of LSD and escaping reality
through chemical trips. I fear that this is what Willow is doing.
She is escaping herself by doing something that makes her forget
who or just how much of a loser she thinks she is. Her thinking
is disordered enough to have her sure that noone is interested
in Willow, but Superpower Willow. In Strawberry Fields......"nothing
is real"....at Racks place nothing is real.....you have a
Svengali type that is taking more than he gives, the place isn't
real if you consider it's cloaked from the "real" world.
Living is easy with eyes closed Misunderstanding all you see It's
getting hard to be someone but it all works out It doesn't matter
much to me Strawberry Fields Forever
Willow has her eyes closed to reality. She thinks that she is
still inadequate compared to her friends. She thinks that Tara
was only ever interested in her for her power. The magic is her
escape from reality, she has power only when she does magic, or
so she thinks. Problem is that she is losing her perspective on
the real world. She doesn't have a type of power that is a sure
thing, leaving her more insecure. Eventually Willow is going to
have to make up her mind on living in the real world or retreating
to the unreality of Racks place.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Magic's Price, ***Spoilers from Wrecked*** --
fresne, 14:23:22 11/29/01 Thu
Yes, I noticed your post after I posted. Grr this argh slow upload
speed.
Anyway, I am intrigued by the idea that Rack's place is outside
of reality. It's the liminal place where people spin and float
and wait. Waiting to feel something. To be something. Waiting
for a fix.
Actually much of this episode took place in between.
Space Rack's crip, outside of space. The basement of the house
of falling walls. Willow standing in that shower. A tiny square
of indoor space where water falls indoors. Spike's crypt (the
realm of the dead, where in honor of the recent spate of Marvel
poesy, no one is embracing at present). Tara and Dawn sleeping
on the couch. The constant walking down alleys and past darkened
warehouses (SunnyD must be/had an amazing industrial complex to
generate that many warehouses). Willow's vision of the Edenic
garden or of empty space. Both places of waiting. Gestation. Loved
the image of space being ripped open to give birth to the demon
and the maiden. Very monstrous feminine.
Time Tara waking to find that its morning already, she only closed
her eyes for a minute. Buffy waking to realize that she left Dawn
alone all night. Willow disappearing into Rack's inner sanctum
for hours, but thinking that there's still plenty of time to catch
the movie.
Then there's Xander and Anya waiting to get married, which is
about as liminal as it gets.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Magic's Price, ***Spoilers from Wrecked***-A Glory
question -- Calluna, 19:48:07 12/01/01 Sat
I don't know if anyone else has brought this up, but... Why did
a night of magic high jinxs tap Willow out, yet brain-sucking
a Hell Goddess's (Glory) didn't? Soon after the mind tranference
between Glory, Willow and Tara, Willow was telepathically communicating
with Spike and moving Glory's human minions out of the way like
bowling pins (the last one may have been done with Tara's help,
but still...). Yet, she couldn't even close the drapes after the
magic bender with Amy. One would think that it would take A LOT
of power to do what Willow did to Glory. At least more than the
magic bender.
Also, could Willow's addiction to magic have something to do with
her view of magic as "the Dark arts"? Ever since she
started dabbling in magic, she's called it the black arts or the
dark arts, pretty much connecting it with evil. I have never gotten
the feeling that Tara views magic this way. It's almost as if
Willow doesn't realize that magic can be white or black. This
might be why it doesn't surprise her that Wrack is rather evil
and she takes it as normal. To her magic is a tool of power. To
Tara it's a part of life. Perhaps this has something to do with
the fact that Tara's a natural born witch and Willow's a learned
witch. Though, one would think that with Tara's upbringing that
she would more likely to view magic as evil.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Magic's Price, ***Spoilers from Wrecked*** -- beekeepr,
20:07:35 11/29/01 Thu
You are correct re strawberry being woman who trades sexual favors
for drugs. While the Strawberry Fields reference was excellent,
it was your strawberry ref that disturbed and lingered;I adore
the layers of sinister meaning that ME manages to encompass in
the briefest of passages-such economy of terror. Loved your concept
of the Wrack flashback. Anyone know what the correct spelling
is? There has been the usual speculation re 6 Bads-I am disinclined
to accept Wrack just yet as a Big...Consider, perhaps, the phrase
"Wrack and Ruin"-whence enters Ruin? Okay-Vampire Hunter
D-kindly do my spell check now, as I never do..
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> And you laugh at my spelling Ha -- Slayrunt, 22:21:44
11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: And you laugh at my spelling Ha -- beekeepr,
23:27:13 11/29/01 Thu
begone! diminutive blond female!
and w/might good reason, one might add.....
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> You know you love me ... -- Slayrunt,
00:09:21 11/30/01 Fri
and my little tail which hurts when I sit.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: You know you love me ... --
beekeepr, 01:09:49 11/30/01 Fri
YOU are barking mad, that's what I know....
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> "economy of terror"--great phrase! -- anom,
18:56:41 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Where did that information come
from? -- Skeve, 12:12:37 11/29/01 Thu
Information often seems to come from nowhere in the Buffyverse.
Until recently, there wasn't any mention of any heaven dimension,
but now Buffy could have been in any of a zillion. How does any
of the gang know that there is more than one? Spike's chip seems
to be better at identifying humans than Spike or anyone else.
The chip is supposed to be a technological device. How would it
know better than Spike or the gang whether Tara or Buffy was human?
Why do Spike and the gang expect it to be so precise?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Where did that information come from? -- Rob, 12:39:20
11/29/01 Thu
"Information often seems to come from nowhere in the Buffyverse.
Until recently, there wasn't any mention of any heaven dimension,
but now Buffy could have been in any of a zillion. How does any
of the gang know that there is more than one?"
Not true that the info comes from nowhere. Instead, the gang makes
informed guesses. They do know that there are an infinite number
of dimensions--dimension w/o shrimp, hell dimensions, etc.--so,
when Tara said that Buffy could be in any of millions of heaven
dimensions, she means that there are so many dimensions, that
there must be more than only one heavenly-type dimension.
"Spike's chip seems to be better at identifying humans than
Spike or anyone else. The chip is supposed to be a technological
device. How would it know better than Spike or the gang whether
Tara or Buffy was human? Why do Spike and the gang expect it to
be so precise?
Any science-fiction or fantasy story requires a bit of suspension
of disbelief. Along with that, some ground rules are set up for
the world in which the story takes place. Not being science-fiction,
"Buffy" is not required to explain exactly how the chip
works and how it can tell if something is human or demon. But
the fact remains, and has since the chip was implanted, that it
prevents him from hurting humans, but not demons. You have to
suspend your disbelief that such a thing is possible...which shouldn't
be too hard, since you've already had to suspend your belief that
demons even exist. I'd also point out that technology such as
robots ("Ted," "I Was Made to Love You") does
not exist in the Realverse, at least not robots as amazingly similar
to humans. "Buffy" is not required, as fantasy, to explain
how its science works. It's just required to follow its own rules.
And its own rules state that the chip can tell between a human
and a non-human. So you have to either buy into that or not accept
anything on the show.
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> More about the chip... -- Rob, 12:45:48 11/29/01 Thu
This is an exact quote from Masq's site about the chip. It explains
the "science" behind the chip, so it may help you understand
how it works better:
"Spike's chip:
Spike's chip is Initiative technology, so it doesn't work by magic.
It operates on physical and psychological principles. The chip
works by producing a painful debilitating shock that thwarts the
initiation and completion of aggressive voluntary actions aimed
at non-demon life.
Humans and vamps initiate behavior for a variety of reasons--some
are reflexes, some are purposeful actions, some are demonstrations
or "pretend actions". These causes of behavior are differentiated
by which part of the brain that initiates the behavior. In OOMM,
a doctor performs a craniotomy at the top of Spike's skull, where
the upper frontal lobe and parietal lobe of the cerebral cortex
are located.
The upper frontal lobe contains the The Primary Motor Cortex (PMC),
which controls the initiation of voluntary movement. Spike's chip
only sends a pain signal out when the behavior originates in his
PMC and when it is initiated with a violent purpose in mind.
In order to differentiate demons from non-demons, the chip also
ties into the Sensory Association Area in the parietal lobe and
the Visual Association Area in the occipital lobe. These areas
are responsible for processing sensory information--sensing certain
stimuli and deciding whether they are demon or non-demon.
Spike gets a great deal of sensory information from the beings
he encounters. Humans, flowers, dogs, demons--each has a distinct
profile of smell, appearance, etc. These are subtle cues that
humans and vamps take in but normally don't notice consciously.
They tell us the differences between species, food and non-food,
danger and safety. The Initiative were experts at these differences--they
did extensive research on the chemistry and pheromones of demons
(e.g., Cordelia said Doyle "sometimes smelled funny"),
and on their own human soldiers.
Spike's brain processes this information, the chip collects it,
and if the circuitry determines from all the various criteria
that this is a "non-demon" standing in front of him,
it sends a signal to his motor cortex. If his brain starts to
initiate any violent moves, zap!"
Hope that helped your understanding of it a little better! :-)
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- Rufus, 13:03:15
11/29/01 Thu
A former poster I know is a neurologist and said that if you want
to get picky the chip shouldn't be able to work at all. Something
about no direct pain receptors in the brain itself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- Rob, 13:13:50
11/29/01 Thu
But then, there's also the fact that Spike isn't a human. He's
a vampire. Maybe vampires or demons do have pain receptors in
their brains. We know that vamp physiology can copy human physiology
(exhaling cigarette smoking, having sex) but is not the same.
Maybe that's one of the differences.
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- Rufus,
13:22:09 11/29/01 Thu
See, Rob that's why I have a "magic clause"....what
goes on in this show can't be readily explained by science. So
if I can't put an easy explanation to some of the stuff in the
show I invoke the magic clause....plus I don't think any of these
people are neurologists.....:):):)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> I prefer to think of it as
the "Fiction will do", (with the Jedi Wave of a Hand)
No Text -- Wolfhowl3, 21:08:50 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- maddog,
09:00:54 11/30/01 Fri
I think this is where the whole suspension of disbelief thing
works out. :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- Kimberly,
13:23:16 11/29/01 Thu
Why not? Although there are no actual pain receptors in the brain,
isn't it the brain that interprets the signal from the receptors
to say "Pain!" So couldn't the chip be directly stimulating
the pain center in the brain? That's how I've always assumed it
works.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- Rufus,
14:21:26 11/29/01 Thu
Hey you will have to ask the neurologist that one..it was only
a casual conversation we had about a year ago. I always stick
by the magic clause.....never fails me.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Rufus' Magic Clause --
Rob, 17:23:04 11/29/01 Thu
Works for me, Rufus!
I've never actually put a name to it, but that' s basically the
philosophy I've always had about the show.
When ya can't explain it, just invoke the magic clause!
And there's no possible way to argue against it!
It's resourceful, nifty, and leaves no unsightly rust buildup!
:-)
Rob
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Magic Clause - Funny.
-- VampRiley, 20:49:30 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: More about the chip... -- maddog, 08:57:20
11/30/01 Fri
After his little revelation about Buffy the wording on that non-demon
might need to be changed to human...cause I'm doubting Buffy came
back as a demon.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Where did that information come from? -- Skeve,
09:01:41 11/30/01 Fri
From Rob: Not being science-fiction, "Buffy" is not
required to explain exactly how the chip works and how it can
tell if something is human or demon.
From me: Science-fiction isn't required to explain everything
either, but some things deserve more than an "It's there,
live with it."
From Rob: But the fact remains, and has since the chip was implanted,
that it prevents him from hurting humans, but not demons. You
have to suspend your disbelief that such a thing is possible...which
shouldn't be too hard, since you've already had to suspend your
belief that demons even exist. I'd also point out that technology
such as robots ("Ted," "I Was Made to Love You")
does not exist in the Realverse, at least not robots as amazingly
similar to humans. "Buffy" is not required, as fantasy,
to explain how its science works. It's just required to follow
its own rules. And its own rules state that the chip can tell
between a human and a non-human. So you have to either buy into
that or not accept anything on the show.
From me: Spike's chip is more fantastic than Ted, the Buffybot,
or Adam. Of the mechanisms suggested for it being better than
humans and vampires, smell would seem the most probable, but smell
is iffy at best, especially given Buffy's line of work. Imagine
a money tree that you harvest in August and always gives you just
enough to pay your taxes for that year, regardless of any income
or tax law changes occuring from August though April. Even if
we grant the ability of genome editors to give a tree money for
leaves and a great legal mind, there is still the problem of getting
that great legal mind the information it needs to do the job it
does.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Where did that information come from? --
Rob, 11:01:12 11/30/01 Fri
Read the "More About the Chip" thing I posted right
under my first response. It explains the "science" behind
the chip.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Where did that information come from? --
anom, 19:19:35 12/01/01 Sat
Rob: "And its own rules state that the chip can tell between
a human and a non-human. So you have to either buy into that or
not accept anything on the show."
Skeve: "Spike's chip is more fantastic than Ted, the Buffybot,
or Adam. Of the mechanisms suggested for it being better than
humans and vampires, smell would seem the most probable, but smell
is iffy at best, especially given Buffy's line of work."
What may not be clear enough in the info Rob posted from Masq's
explanation is that the chip picks up info that Spike isn't necessarily
consciously aware of. So even if he assumes Buffy is human after
she comes back, he may have picked up subconscious cues--whether
smell or some subtle kind of "offness"--that tell the
chip not to kick in when he hits her.
And as for the brain not having pain receptors, the chip could
send it signals that mimic those from pain receptors. (Remember
Dru saying the pain wasn't real?)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Where did that information come from? -- maddog, 20:55:55
11/29/01 Thu
When did they mention multiple heavens? Even Buffy sang, "I
must have been in heaven"...that's singular...when they thought
she was in hell is when I remember them talking about multiple
hell dimensions. As for Spike's situation, I'd say the chip could
be acting as a filter...like it's probably taking straight from
Spike's brain whether it's someone he should be hitting...instead
of letting his feelings get mixed in.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Where did that information come from? -- Rob,
20:00:14 12/01/01 Sat
In "Tabula Rasa," at the beginning, when Tara and Willow
are talking with Xander and Anya about what happened to Buffy,
Anya wonders if she had a harp and wore Birkenstocks. Tara said
she could have been in any of thousands of heaven dimensions.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Where did that information come from? -- Rob,
20:01:52 12/01/01 Sat
In "Tabula Rasa," at the beginning, when Tara and Willow
are talking with Xander and Anya about what happened to Buffy,
Anya wonders if she had a harp and wore Birkenstocks. Tara said
she could have been in any of thousands of heaven dimensions.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical
Perspective -- Iago, 15:43:57 11/29/01 Thu
Is Spike being conditioned to abuse Buffy?
Applying theory of operant conditioning, one might believe that
this is the case. For simplicity's sake, the Merriam-Webster Online
definition of operant conditioning is "conditioning in which
the desired behavior or increasingly closer approximations to
it are followed by a rewarding or reinforcing stimulus."
For instance, imagine a creature is placed in a box with a bunch
of levers. One of the levers, when pushed, drops a piece of food
or other desirable object in to the box. If the creature pushes
the levers, eventually, it will learn that pushing the appropriate
lever will provide him with food. Thus, the behavior of pushing
the lever is reinforced by an increase of pleasure for the creature.
Spike's attempts to attract and mate with Buffy can be seen as
analogous to the above situation. Spike has tried different approaches
over the past few months. First, he tried to befriend Buffy, but
his love remained unrequited. Lately, his tactics have changed.
He has seen that simply being "the nice guy" isn't enough
to produce the results he desires. Out of frustration, perhaps,
he lashes out verbally at her. Suddenly, their dynamic changes,
and she responds to him with increased aggression. Spike, of course,
is a being who draws parallels between sex and violence. Eventually,
their mutual verbal violence leads to their first real kisses.
(Note: OMwF's final scene was prefaced by the violence of "Rest
in Peace.") Spike, likely unconsciously, decides that since
taunting and put downs lead to kisses, he will repeat that behavior
(aggression) to receive the stimulus (kiss). Enter "Smashed."
Spike and Buffy escalate their violence, and again, aggression
leads to kisses. Only this time, neither of them stops escalating
the violence. Now physical violence, which Spike had not attempted
because he was conditioned to avoid the pain caused by his chip,
becomes a powerful means for him to gain pleasure.
Ok, let's recap. Spike being nice earns him (a little) respect.
Spike being verbally abusive gets him kissed. Spike being physically
abusive gets him laid.
Of course, this scenario begs the question, is Buffy responsible
for enabling this line of conditioning? I believe the answer is
yes. I do not believe that Buffy truly wants to be attacked, but
it's her levers that Spike is pushing, so to speak, and he's finally
found the one that works for him.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
-- vandalia, 19:57:10 11/29/01 Thu
I've been wanting to say something about the environment in which
Spike is trying to 'reform' and how difficult the rest of the
SG (and Buffy) are making it on him. The negative reinforcement
Spike has endured has been surprising. Every time he tried to
do what he thought was right (not feed off of bleeding disaster
victims, tell Buffy how he feels about her, tell Buffy he's changed)
he got hit, or derided, or otherwise told that he was a monster,
a nothing, something that didn't have feelings and couldn't be
anything but a remorseless killer. This is equivalent to a child
being told constantly they're worthless, they're stupid, they
have no right to feel as they do about things because they're
somehow less than human. What usually happens to children in that
kind of situation? They don't turn out too well. I think its pretty
impressive Spike's done as well as he has, considering the abuse
heaped on him whenever he's tried to claim status as a person.
We've seen that Spike responds well to stimulus. He's not stupid.
When Buffy expects him to act like a hero, he steps up to the
challenge (protecting Dawn and her mother, keeping Buffy's secrets,
being willing to sacrifice his life to keep her safe, taking care
of Dawn after she's asked him to take an oath to do so). When
Buffy verbally abuses him (you're an evil, disgusting thing) he
tries to act like one (in a spiteful 'you want to see evil? I'll
show you evil!' kind of way). We've seen how well he does when
he's actually treated like a person, 'one of the gang' (Spiral,
Weight of the World, The Gift, Bargaining I & II) and we've seen
how poorly he does when he's treated as a pariah or non-person
(Crush, Smashed). I think its going to take something eye-opening
for Buffy (and the rest of the SG) to realize how badly they've
treated him and adjust accordingly.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
-- maddog, 20:38:33 11/29/01 Thu
I think the reason Spike has been able to overcome all the abuse
by the Scoobies is because of the little time Buffy treats him
well along with the hope that she will treat him better...that
sustained him til this last escapade.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
[terminology comment] -- Karen, 22:42:20 11/29/01 Thu
I agree with Vandalia about the hostility of the environment in
which Spike as been trying to change, as well as the very sparse
positive reinforcement he's received for the changes he has made.
But I actually want to seize this opportunity to make a pedantic
(but actually pretty useful) distinction about behavioral terminology;
to wit, "negative reinforcement" does not mean what
the vast majority of people think it means : )
By definition, if something is "reinforcement," positive
or negative, it is *encouraging* that behavior to happen again.
Something that discourages a behavior (touching something that
gave you a shock, for example) is properly called an "aversive."
The difference is helpful to understand, because you can encourage
behavior just as strongly by *removing* a demand or a negative
consequence (which is what "negative reinforcement"
really is) as by rewarding it (positive reinforcement). For example,
if a two-year-old responds to a request to put his puzzle away
by crying and tipping over his chair, and you in turn respond
by saying, "Oh, I guess you can play with that a little longer"
(i.e., you remove the demand), you have negatively reinforced
that behavior. The next time you ask him to put something away,
chances are he will try the crying/tipping again, because it caused
the removal of the demand the last time. Basically, negative reinforcement
means letting someone get away with something.
Sorry for the non-Spike/Buffy digression, but I've found this
to be a really helpful concept (and not just with my 8-year-old
with Aspergers, who was the cause of my learning it). It's been
interesting to see, for example, not only what of Spike's behavior
Buffy is actively rewarding, but also what she is letting him
get away with. She doesn't dispute his comment that the sex they
had was "a bloody revelation," she doesn't have a comeback
when he claims it's "her calling," etc., all of which
confirms his suspicion that he's struck a nerve...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
-- maddog, 20:27:34 11/29/01 Thu
I always thought that abuse insinuated that it was one way...Buffy
can fight back. So in essence they'd be abusing each other.
The problem with your theory is that you're forgetting the rules
of an experiment. The only way Spike's behavior would make a difference
is if he changed it and nothing else was changed...well Buffy's
gone from having a mother, to no mother, to dieing, to ressurection...all
those things changing her along the way at the same time he tried
changing his approach...who's to say that she wouldn't have responded
to the violence back before Joyce died...or who's to say that
the all he needs now is the verbal assault.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
-- Iago, 21:09:44 11/29/01 Thu
Spike is not in an experiment here. There doesn't have to be a
control group. While I can see that there might be other reasons
for Spike to act violently against Buffy, his behavior is nevertheless
being reinforced by her responses to it.
Behavior changes occur every day outside the laboratory environment.
The "rules of an experiment" don't need to apply. If
we wanted to use the scientific method to _test_ Spike's conditioning,
then the rules would be applicable. (The theory of operant conditioning
itself has already been demonstrated true experimentally.)
If I touch an electrified fence, and I get shocked, it's a safe
bet to think that I just learned through negative reinforcement
(the avoidance of pain) that my behavior led to an unwanted stimulus.
Spike's chip works on this principle. Shock him enough times,
he'll learn not to reach for the fence to avoid the shock. So
clearly, Spike responds to operant conditioning outside a laboratory
environment.
Spike's current behavior is being rewarded or positively reinforced.
His actions have led to an increase in pleasure, and he has seen
that repeating his action leads to a repetition of the stimulus
he desires.
As for "The only way Spike's behavior would make a difference
is if he changed it," I think you mean "the only way
Spike's behavior would be different is if he changed it."
This is of course the truth, but it applies to everyone. The only
way anyone's behavior changes is if they change it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> And while we're on the psychology tip... --
res, 00:54:40 11/30/01 Fri
Spike is also receiving a partial reinforcement -- the most effective
kind -- which rewards some, but not all, "correct" behavior.
Sometimes when he's really agressive, he doesn't get a "reward"
from Buffy, and sometimes (most of the time these days) he does,
so in general he should be more likely to be persistant in his
agression because he thinks if he can just do it enough he'll
get what he wants. Kinda like slot machines (now there's oversimplification
fer ya).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: shifting from psychanalysis to demonology
. . . -- Crooked Mind, 02:51:12 11/30/01 Fri
The reinforcement arguement is interesting, but I think there
is some as-yet-unveiled variable at play here.
The fact is, that if Spike is "just a vamp" with a chip
in his head, he should by the implied rules of the Buffyverse
be a very different creature than what we're currently seeing.
Up until the intervention of the Initiative, Spike was pure vamp,
a demon bent on destruction and bloodletting. Thus, Spike under
the influence of the chip should be acting like a viscious dog
wearing a shock collar, avoiding acts that bring direct pain,
but still doing evevything else possible to follow its true and
terrrible nature.
This does not describe the Spike of late . . . he more resembles
a darker shade of Angel than he does any true vampire in terms
of behavior. By rights, he shouldn't be able to feel and take
pleasure in good even with the negative reinforcement of the chip
in his head. Such a deterrent cannot in and of itself cause caring!
So the question is, WHAT THE HECK IS SPIKE??? Why is William still
so strong in him when by definition William should be no part
of him?
I'd like to be able to write it off to poetic license of the writers,
but I can't in consideration of what we've seen lately in the
AtS storyline. Darla for the past few eps has been pure vamp (e.g.
repaying Cordelia's kindness with cold, unrepentant hunger). In
order for events to go as they did, the influences of the baby's
soul were explained to justify Darla's development of heart and
ultimately her sacrifice. So how is Spike feeling what he is?!?
Methinks there is more to Spike than a little conditioning . .
.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Ooops . . . that should be "psychoanalysis",
how Freudian! -- Crooked Mind, 02:55:06 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: shifting from psychanalysis
to demonology . . . -- maddog, 08:00:58 11/30/01 Fri
Maybe by letting the vampire have the feelings and emotions the
writers are trying to tell us something about the people these
vampires represent...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: shifting from psychanalysis
to demonology . . . -- robert, 11:08:23 11/30/01 Fri
"Up until the intervention of the Initiative, Spike was pure
vamp, a demon bent on destruction and bloodletting. Thus, Spike
under the influence of the chip should be acting like a viscious
dog wearing a shock collar, avoiding acts that bring direct pain,
but still doing evevything else possible to follow its true and
terrrible nature."
I don't agree here. Even before William the Bloody was vamped,
he was a hopeless romantic. Spike before the chip was also a hopeless
romantic. He was never bent on destruction, at least not for destruction's
sake. In season 2, Spike betrayed Angelus to stop the destruction
of the world and to get Drusila back.
From what I could see, Spike didn't want to destroy the world,
he just wanted to be loved ... and to have a little fun!
Spike with the chip is the same thing, except that he can't have
fun like he used to. He still wants to be loved. Spike was already
obsessed with Buffy before he was chipped and before Drusila dumped
him. His obsession was hateful, which migrated to love after he
started working with her. Buffy's hate is taking a little longer
to migrate to love.
I am just a physicist/engineer, so I need some help here. What
is the connection between hate and love? Are they two sides of
the same coin? Is there much difference between the extremes of
love and hate?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Re: shifting from psychanalysis
to demonology . . . -- Arya Stark, 12:15:30 11/30/01 Fri
Love and hate are very similar-- they are both very strong emotions.
The opposite of love (and perhaps hate- I haven't thought about
that too much) is indifference.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: shifting from psychanalysis
to demonology . . . -- phoenix, 06:31:10 12/01/01 Sat
Id have to agree with you Love and Hate are the same. There two
extremes of feelings powered by the same raw emotion the only
diffence is the outcome that you are trying to achieve (kill her
or screw her). Could you image Spike loving Buffy as much as he
hated her, it would be earthshattering, in fact, i think "wrecked"
proved that.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: higher purpose -- bible belt,
15:36:48 12/04/01 Tue
Someone has mentioned this I'm sure, but in a recent rerun on
FX from S4 Giles tried too ask Spike if he was aware that maybe
there was a higher purpose for him, and Spike kept cutting Giles
off. It seems like that idea came up in discussion by the SG as
well. I don't know if that's for-shadowing or not, but I too think
Spike's behavior goes beyond what can be explained by just operant
conditioning although I can't claim to know a whole lot about
it. He still seems to enjoy killing, other demons that is.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical
Perspective -- maddog, 07:57:20 11/30/01 Fri
There has to be a control group though...cause otherwise not only
are his actions changing, but so are hers and so are her circumstances...who's
to say that it's what Spike did that made the difference and not
something that had happened to Buffy?
Like in your electric fence theory, so you touch it a few times..enough
to know that it shocks you...but you continue touching it....you
say you like the pain. Now suppose you decide that you've touched
it so much that you can't feel the shock anymore and you go to
touch it again...but this time you don't feel anything...who's
to say that the fence is still charged? is it your immunity to
the charge or has the fence been changed? see that one difference
can change everything.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> "Psychoanalytical" ? Skinner is rolling in his
grave -- Sulis, 09:22:25 11/30/01 Fri
Being a newbie, I'm hesitant to put on the pedant's hat, but being
in the psychology biz, I can't help myself.
I agree largely with Iago's comments about the operant conditioning
that Spike's receiving, particularly from Buffy. However, I have
to point out that this is absolutely NOT a psychoanalytic perspective,
for that, think Freud. The behaviorists (who developed the analyses
of conditioning that Iago was using) and the psychoanalysts are
at opposite poles on the psychological spectrum.
Pedant mode--OFF
And back to the more interesting discussions...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy and Spike: A New Psychoanalytical Perspective
-- Nina, 10:05:50 11/30/01 Fri
"Ok, let's recap. Spike being nice earns him (a little) respect.
Spike being verbally abusive gets him kissed. Spike being physically
abusive gets him laid."
I have to disagree with this.
* "Spike being nice earns him (a little) respect."
Spike being nice to Buffy earned him not only respect but it's
really the reason why Buffy is struggling with her feelings for
Spike. It's been made very clear that she would never accept a
guy that would chain her up to a wall (Crush). Spike got that
when Buffy kissed him in "Intervention". Be nice....
I'll be nice with you. The message was clear. Spike was the only
one to be tender and nice to her when she came back (in Afterlife
and in Flooded). He respected her and listened to her and let
her space and THAT is why Buffy is now attracted to Spike (even
if she won't admit it).
"Spike being verbally abusive gets him kissed."
Not true. He saved her life in OMWF and THAT made Buffy chase
him outside and kiss him. Spike came to talk to her in TR and
because he let her some space she run to kiss him.
"Spike being physically abusive gets him laid."
Well in my post above (Buffy and sexuality) I explain that Buffy
always got off on violence even if she doesn't admit it. I mostly
believe that he wanted her to drop the mask and be true. Once
the anger went away she was only left with what she felt and kissed
him again in "Smashed".
It is true that the chip has an effect on Spike's behavior. He
is not the Big Bad he used to be. Gee he didn't even found out
Rack's lair (and Willow didn't have trouble).
Spike still reacts accordingly to the way he is treated.... he's
treated nicely he acts nicely, he's treated like dirt he acts
like a dirty scoundrel. Between you and me I am not sure how many
human beings with souls would handled the chip as well as he does.
It's easy to say "He should stop acting the way he is treated"
but only time can help someone going through hard times.
Well it's my humble opinion anyway ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> thanks, nina -- anom, 19:46:15 12/01/01 Sat
I went through all the posts to see if anyone else was going to
point that out, & there, all the way at the end, you did. All
that's left for me to do is agree.
To go slightly O/T, there's just 1 thing I'd differ on, about
Buffy "running to kiss him." After Buffy turns away
from Spike at the bar & he leaves, we look in on the other characters
going through their own transitions, then back to the bar...pan
over to the right...Buffy & Spike kissing. We don't know which
one came to the other, but since Spike exited to the left, it's
more likely he came back to Buffy than that she went after him.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Perspective -- WW, 00:12:05 12/02/01 Sun
Hmmm, I thought Spike exited left (from an audience perspective)
and somewhat downstage of the open staircase. The later pan started
right, went upstage, then swung around to the left and ended up
upstage of the staircase, in the shadown of which they were snogging.
Something about the juxtaposition of Spike's exit with the lyric
from Michelle Branch's song (I want you, but I'm not giving in
this time) leads me to believe that Buffy was the one who approached
Spike.
Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality
: a problem of self-confidence -- Nina, 21:40:01 11/29/01 Thu
I am talking sex today... so if you want to cover your blushing
eyes do so right now....:)
1 2 3 GO!
First with the facts!
Sexually speaking, Buffy has had two adults role models in her
life: Joyce and Giles. Both didn't have a very sexual active life
and never really spent anytime with Buffy to talk about sex or
help her deal with her feminity (I don't think that Joyce's safe
sex talk qualifies very much here). Buffy as the Slayer may be
strong, but as a woman she is still lacking a lot of confidence
in herself.
Even though Buffy is 20 going on 21, she still wants to be an
innocent child (or teen) and have Giles care for her. The scary
world of adulthood frightens her and to defend herself against
it she often hides under childish braids pushing away her womanhood.
Her experience with love, relationships and sex has been a catastrophe.
In reaction to the constant pain she was feeling she built a lot
of walls to protect herself against more pain. And since Riley
left she has all but not risked the pain of loving again.
Let's have a look at what she got before Season 6. We all know
the usual suspects: Angel, Parker and Riley.
The foreplay all included violence:
* In "Surprise", Buffy and Angel fought Spike's minions
before making love.
* In "The harsh light of day", Buffy fought with Spike
a little before ending in Parker's bed.
* In "The I in team", Buffy and Riley fought a Polgara
demon before making love.
The Love making
* Angel: It was soft and sweet. Buffy is not very at ease with
herself. She's a virgin and she's very vulnerable. Surely a good
first experience (if you discount how it ended).
* Parker: also sweet and soft but Buffy is clearly lacking confidence
here. She's on the defensive (after what happened the last time,
it's understandable!), clearly letting Parker lead the ride.
* Riley: It's the missionary fest. It's the "Me on top, you
on top... is there any other positions? I don't think so"
kinda deal. The hottest sexual relationship they ever had on screen
was in "Where the wild things are" and they seemed both
exhausted and not really enjoying themselves because of the spell.
Yet, even if it was pretty basic and not enough to satisfy her
(B vs D) their first night together seemed quite passionate (not
the kind where she can get it all out, but still...)
The morning after
* Angel turns evil (God, that one is enough to turn any woman
into a nun!)
* Parker goes out buying donuts and coffee (Gee, she really made
a good impression there! Was he trying to fatten her up?)
* Riley pops some pills on his tongue and flees away because he
has to please the Initiative and not ask questions. (Are the pills
really to give him strenght or are they anti-barfing pills for
the morning after? When you lack confidence you ask yourself questions!)
Buffy's reaction to the morning after
* With Angel and Parker she wakes up alone in bed. While she is
worrying about what happened to Angel, she is ready to flee the
scene in Parker's room, as if she knew that a pattern had appeared
and that she would be rejected again.
* With Riley she wakes up and thinks she's alone but is relieved
to find out that Riley is still there. A first miracle... until
the phone rings and she is in fact left alone once again!
* Buffy tried to talk to Angel but only got shut down. Buffy tried
to talk to Parker: "Maybe we can talk or something later?"
but he had to see his mother. Buffy tried to talk to Riley, but
he said that he was leaving her asking the questions and left
her leaving her question unanswered.
Buffy and nudity
*** Tell me if you can walk around naked and I'll tell you who
you are.***
Well, I made that one up, but it is quite true that the ability
to walk around naked and be comfortable with your own body tells
a lot about who you are and how confident you are with yourself.
Buffy is obviously the kind that is not comfortable with her own
body. She's always covering herself up. Curiously enough she's
always covering herself with red blankets (Innocence, HLoD and
The I in team). Even when she is alone in Parker's room, she drapes
herself with a blanket!
The impact of Spike on Buffy's sexuality
* The Foreplay: Instead of fighting something exterior to herself
she actually fights the one she's going to have sex with. She's
confronted to accepting that she goes off on violence and for
once her lover can take it. She doesn't have to hold back.
* The love making: She qualifies it as being perverse and degrading,
yet she doesn't protest when Spike tells her that she felt something.
It was obviously the best sex she ever had. Maybe it was not the
best lovemaking session, but she really got to feel what it is
like to be desired and wanted and she definitely didn't hold herself
back (as Spike himself said that she gave him a run for his money).
The thing is that because Buffy doesn't allow herself to love
Spike back, she has the possibility to not risk anything and make
some sexual experiences with him. She lets herself totally go
and afterwards she is terrified to find out what she likes. She
had no way to find out before as she wanted to please and be normal
girl. With Spike she had her first woman-like sexual experience.
* The morning after.
For once her lover wants her to stay and still desires her and
still wants her and Buffy's response is to freak out and do a
little pot-pourri of her ex-lovers best lines and attitudes:
- She bolts awake like Angel did. - She starts looking for her
shoe like she did in Parkers room. - She says she has to leave
because of Dawn (Parker and Riley left to see their mothers) -
The "freakshow" remark is coming from Angel's mouth
(The Prom) - The "convenient" remark was really intented
for Riley (or should have) and comes from Angel's blatant talent
for hurting words: "I thought you were a real pro".
Buffy doesn't know how to handle the situation because she is
not into repeat mode anymore. Nothing is the same. Spike is still
there, he's not evil, he still wants her, he obviously was satisfied
with her ("Was I no good" is out of question here).
What can she do with that? She has to leave and fast, before she
succombs to his charms again...
Spike vs Nakedness
The big contrast between Buffy's lack of confidence in her body
and Spike new found confidence is established in the first scene
by showing us Buffy covering herself up with her skirt and Spike
spread naked, on his back, completely at ease with this pose.
Spike used to sleep with his clothes on when he lacked confidence,
now that he got his rocks back he goes around naked as if it were
the most normal thing in the world (which it is!). But the moment
Buffy hurts him with the word "convenient", Spike reaches
for his pants and starts to cover himself too. They both reach
for their clothes for the same reason: to cover their fragility
and their vulnerability. As Spike has been hurt in his pride he
can't continue the rest of the conversation naked. He's been hurt
and he withdraws. The clothes are symbolizing their social masks,
the things they try to hide. And boy doesn Buffy has a lot to
hide!
The scene in the shower shows us a very vulnerable Buffy. She's
at her most fragile point and is completely naked. She's dropping
the mask and cries. Away from her clothes she can finally accept
how she feels.It's the truest she's ever been in a long while.
The moment Buffy will accept who she really is, I guess we'll
see a lot more flesh. Maybe not "see" cause it's prime
time, but we will know at that moment that she is ready to accept
who she really is. As long as she hides under blankets and skirts
Buffy will never achieve adulthood and all its facades.
Well that ended up being a lot longer than I thought...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of self-confidence
-- vandalia, 21:59:53 11/29/01 Thu
Great post, except for one thing: It was Willow in the shower,
not Buffy. Thought the point may still apply, just not to that
character.
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[> [> Blushing with confusion!:O -- Nina, 22:12:31 11/29/01
Thu
My bad.... I only got to see that part through zigzags and I was
sure it was Buffy! See how we can invent whatever we want! Great
reminder not to over analyze everything cause after awhile you
can get anything to fit into your vision! LOL
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of
self-confidence -- Neaux, 06:54:50 11/30/01 Fri
Was willow in 2 shower scenes in the same episode, i cant remember?
If so, what is the significance of them?
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[> [> [> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality -- Herself,
06:59:40 11/30/01 Fri
I loved this analysis. Very astute.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> We;ll never see Buffy naked, SMG has it in her contract.
-- sdsdd, 00:13:14 11/30/01 Fri
ss
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of self-confidence
-- Kimberly, 06:23:21 11/30/01 Fri
I agree with your basic points. I've been noticing the increase
in braids, which I don't remember seeing much of before, and I've
been interpreting them as armor. This season, Buffy has been much
more "armored", both in dress and behavior this season.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Another great post from Nina; can't say I'm surprised --
verdantheart, 07:13:41 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of self-confidence
-- maddog, 07:21:57 11/30/01 Fri
ok, first off, none of Joyce's talks meant anything...all she
did was second guess and scold Buffy...didn't really like her
character. The lack of confidence could be that the only guys
she's ever fallen for were a centuries old vampire with a soul,
a guy who wanted to play the field and "forgot" to mention
that to her, and a guy who's been a lab rat for the government.
The walls also come from her father's abandonment too...most of
the male characters in her life leave her...not a great track
record. YOu mention her 21st birthday coming...makes me wonder
if there's anything special that goes with that age for a slayer(considering
what the council had Giles do on her 18th birthday).
You've done a great job pointing out that her 3 sexual partners
have done enough to cripple a girl's confidence for life. I hate
to discount something...and while I do agree that Buffy does lack
a certain confidence that someone like Faith has, but the lack
of nudity...the reason she's always covered...is probably because
the show's on network tv and can't really do the HBO thing.
Not only did Buffy not know how to handle this new experience,
she decides to use what guys have done to her in the past(as you
pointed out) as a way out. Saying what I did in the previous paragraph,
I do like your explaination as it comes to Spike...I mean, he's
very free in Wrecked(and as a guy, I saw WAY too much of him in
that one scene).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of self-confidence
-- Smash, 09:01:05 11/30/01 Fri
Wow. Great points. And I agree that Buffy's discomfort with nudity
is a reflection of the character's self-confidence moreso than
a reflection of the contract of the actress portraying her. Any
decent director can portray a *character's* nudity without the
*actor* going ass-up on screen. Demonstrating self-confidence
while nude is possible without showing anything more than arms,
legs and shoulders. (Note Spike's relaxed position while naked
upon waking up in "Wrecked;" we only saw him from the
chest up.)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of
self-confidence -- maddog, 09:04:14 11/30/01 Fri
Well either you had a different copy of the episode or you missed
it cause I saw him from the hips up, but he was sideways thank
God so I didn't see anything...I remember being on msn instant
messenger and my friend sending over an "EEEEWWW" message.
I suppose you're right though we don't know if handling something
like that properly is Joss's forte.
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[> [> [> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem
of self-confidence -- Smash, 09:13:41 11/30/01 Fri
Aww. Poor maddog. A little too much Spike for your taste, huh?
Yes, I saw Spike's entire left buttcheek when Buffy woke him in
his crypt.
I should clarify that the nekkid Spikey goodness I referred to
in my previous post was when Buffy and Spike woke up together
in the demolished building. I'm thinking of, like, the second
scene of the episode.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality :
a problem of self-confidence -- maddog, 09:37:08 11/30/01 Fri
All I can say is if they show spike like that it should be fair
for the male viewers to see Buffy naked to that extent... :)
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[> [> [> [> [> Sorry Guys, but that hit a nerve.
-- Isabel, 23:20:01 12/01/01 Sat
Why are you so upset? If Spike were 'Susie', would any of you
minded? Did any of you note that Amy came back buck naked in the
previous ep?
Female nudity, or the 'illusion' of it, is extremely common in
our society. BtVS is one of the only shows on tv I've ever seen
even an illusion of male nudity. JM has just joined the group
of guys on the show who've had to be "naked" or almost
naked for a scene.
Ever since I was a teenager, and able to attend R rated movies,
it has ticked me off that we're able to see 98% of a naked woman
on screen in an R rated movie, but absolutely no frontal nudity
of a man is allowed. In "The Whole Nine Yards," Amanda
Peet is able to blow away hitmen wearing only a pair of stilettos
and a .357 Magnum. Can anyone think of a similar scene in any
movie with a man? The only male nudity I have seen was in foreign
films that were unrated. Maybe I'm not watching the right tv shows
or movies but it has seemed to be very inequitable to me.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Yeppers -- CaptainPugwash,
04:53:34 12/02/01 Sun
Yep, its a double-standard; somehow full-frontal nudity for males
is less acceptable in mainstream films.
A couple of things bug me about these posts:
First, I don't really have any desire to see SMG in a state of
undress. Not sure why; maybe its because her character is intentionally
unsexy. It wouldn't have any narrative relevance anyway.
Second, I don't get why men should have difficulty with naked
JM (or any bloke). What's the problem, guys?
The whole point of that scene was to contrast naked Spike sexual
confidence with little miss denial. JM's 'nudity' had a function
and was therefore justified.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Can I just say... --
Nina, 08:21:07 12/02/01 Sun
That I never said that we would have to watch Buffy naked. It's
all camera work. In the morning after scne, we could have seen
Buffy get up and have only the camera focusing on her face without
having her draping herself in her skirt. The message there would
have been completely different. We would have seen almost the
same thing (but the shot with the skirt!) and Buffy's attitude
towards sexuality and nakedness would have been totally different.
That's all I am saying here. I don't want to see Buffy naked and
even though I enjoy Spike a lot I wouldn't mind if they just kept
him in face shot while we know he's naked... the point here is
that we know if the character is naked or not and that makes all
the difference. Not only for us as viewers, but for the character
and it's evolution!
The fact that JM doesn't mind to be naked in front of cameras
and SMG does allows us to see a lot more naked Spike than some
people want to see, but the reason Spike is naked is not because
JM allows it in the first place, it's because the character needs
it. Then because JM accepts to show his skin a little the director
can decide the kind of camera angles he'll use for the shot. If
Buffy needs to be naked.... the director will find a way to respect
SMG desires and still make us know that she's naked.
Nakedness is not bad.... it's the way we look at it sometimes
that is!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> I was commenting
on the double standard. -- Isabel, 16:24:51 12/02/01 Sun
I agree with you about how the nudity in the scene reflects the
characters' self-confidence and sexuality. I agree that the story
called for it. I'm not arguing about more or less skin in shots,
and the directors can shoot the scenes as they wish. That particular
double standard just makes me a little annoyed.
For all I know, JM might not like doing nude scenes, but he's
an actor and the script called for it. He's a good actor so even
if he was embarrassed as hell, he wouldn't show it. Actors amaze
me sometimes. Can you imagine any of us, in our jobs, having to
put on a presentation in front of twenty people stark naked? We
could quit and sue our bosses for making the suggestion. (In most
cases.) Actors, on the other hand, run the risk of flushing their
careers down to toilet if they do say no.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Sorry Guys, but that hit
a nerve. -- Shaglio, 05:33:20 12/03/01 Mon
"Can anyone think of a similar scene in any movie with a
man?"
Have you seen Any Given Sunday? There is a very disturbing locker
room scene in which you get a glimpse of Lawrence Taylor's little
buddy. I had to stop watching the movie.
The thing is most men and most women don't want to see men's penis',
while most guys and some women do want to see naked women (or
at least don't mind it). If an average guy and an average girl
are in a room together and the guy whipped out his penis, the
girl would freak. But if the girl started undressing, the guy
would start drooling. It's just the way we warped humans are.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Sorry Guys, but
that hit a nerve. -- Isabel, 17:22:38 12/05/01 Wed
I haven't seen 'Any Given Sunday' so I can't comment on that scene.
"If an average guy and an average girl are in a room together
and the guy whipped out his penis, the girl would freak. But if
the girl started undressing, the guy would start drooling. "
I was talking about on screen, not real life. Although, I believe
the reactions in that situation all depends on the context. Strangers
or not, Dating or not, Gay or not....
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Crying in the shower, clothing as a barrier (in reply to
Nina's post) -- Dyna, 10:07:29 11/30/01 Fri
Nina, how interesting! I was actually glad the shower scene was
Willow, not Buffy. "Crying in the shower" has become
television shorthand for "I've been physically violated,"
and putting Buffy there would have been cliched indeed--as well
as belying the far more complex reality of what happened between
her and Spike. Putting Willow in the shower, while still not very
subtle, does add another layer to our understanding of her experience:
While she appeared in an ecstatic state during Rack's "tour,"
Willow came out of it with a sense of having been violated, probably
made worse by the knowledge that she allowed it.
On the related subject of clothing as a barrier between oneself
and others, my friend and I have been discussing this for a while,
but as yet I haven't seen a discussion of it in a forum. Perhaps
one has taken place here in the past? Anyway, I'm sure a dissertation
is possible on the subject of leather clothing and its significance
in the Buffyverse, but until I get a grant to study it, I'll limit
this to just some comments on its recent appearances in Buffy's
wardrobe. Some thoughts:
1. If clothing represents a barrier between oneself and others,
the means by which we attempt concealment, leather clothing is
a particularly strong barrier. Physically, leather is much stronger
than cloth. We also associate leather clothing with certain qualities
in the wearer. While leather seems to have shed its automatic
association with evil in the Buffyverse, it still signifies toughness,
strength, fortitude. There is also the tactile quality of leather--it's
a smooth surface, something your hands slip on, not easy to grip.
Leather is therefore protective in several ways: it seals the
body in, repels attempts to "hold" the wearer, and communicates
impenetrability.
2. Leather in "The Gift": One of the most striking images
in The Gift is the moment when Buffy stands on the stairs, looking
down at Spike as he speaks to her. In this last episode of a season
that saw Buffy's increasing emotional withdrawal (and, perhaps
not coincidentally, a dramatic expansion in her leather-pants
wardrobe), Buffy wears an entire outfit of black leather. Watching
this scene I couldn't help but see her as in armor, as a warrior
whose preparation for battle necessarily required that she withdraw
inward, and present a seamless façade to the world.
Spike attempts to talk to her in this scene, but he seems to recognize
that he can't get through, and stops. Buffy is in her armor, ready
for battle, and there's nothing on the surface he can get hold
of. His words cannot penetrate her defenses, so he respectfully
withdraws.
3. The disappearance and reappearance of leather in Season 6:
From Buffy's resurrection through OMWF, the only leather garments
we see Buffy in are jackets, generally worn open. Her regular
clothing is soft, mostly cotton, drapey and feminine. We see her
in jeans more often than ever before. At the same time, her receptiveness
to Spike seems greatly increased--she seeks him out, appears comfortable
with him, occasionally gets flustered in his presence.
Then, she kisses him at the end of OMWF, and -Hey!- The next time
we see her, the leather pants are back! (Along with a huge white-sweater
combo, possibly intended to both conceal the body and reinforce
"white=good," in opposition to Spike's "darkness.")
I see the reappearance of Buffy's leather pants as an attempt
to reassert the barrier between herself and Spike--specifically
to block sexual access. (This is when my friend and I started
referring to the leather pants as "the leather chastity belt.")
However, by the end of the episode we see this strategy didn't
work, as Buffy kisses Spike again, this time with (it appears)
even greater passion and receptiveness.
Cut to "Smashed," where we find Buffy again in leather,
but this time it's--a skirt!
(I was explaining this to a friend who's not a regular Buffy watcher,
and as soon as I said skirt, she shouted, "She's curious!"
To which I responded, "I know!" All of which got us
dirty looks from the other library patrons. :) )
Buffy's leather skirt to me was a great symbol of her ambivalence--she
wants to resist Spike, to keep him "out" and to reestablish
distance, while at the same time, there is a part of her who wants
to let him in. While the skirt's length and black leather material
recall Buffy's outfit in "The Gift," she is not the
same girl she was then. She is more vulnerable, less able to deploy
her warrior persona to repel feelings she doesn't want to admit.
Later, in the fight scene, Spike's words are able to penetrate
her defenses--she can no longer keep him out. And of course, as
they both discover, a skirt, no matter what it's made of, is no
barrier. It can't keep her sexual desire in, and it can't keep
his out. Buffy's left an opening in her defenses, and presto!
I had no idea this would be so long! Darn the Buffyverse and its
sinister attraction!
Dyna
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Mwa. Shall we baptise it the 'Black Leather Skirt
of Ambivalence' then?!? -- Aquitaine, 10:40:57 11/30/01 Fri
Very interesting posts, Dyna and Nina.
I rewatched Smashed with my cousin last night after watching the
rerun of HLoD. My cousin, a casual S5-S6 fan, had to cover her
eyes during the Parker humiliation scene. She said "Tell
me she isn't going to grovel" and "Why doesn't she just
kick him into next Tuesday?". I too was stunned at how insecure
Buffy was. I hadn't remembered the depth of her repression. Thanks
for recapping her sexual history, Nina.
An addendum re: clothes, my friend tells me the top Buffy wore
in Smashed is decidedly bridal (remember, episode 4.9 was "Something
Blue", "Smashed", 6.9) and an interesting contrast
to the 'Black Leather Skirt of Ambivalence'.
-Aquitaine.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Great post Dyna! -- Nina, 11:17:07 11/30/01
Fri
You are onto something here. I didn't like the explanation of
leather = bad. It was too over simplified. I will watch the episodes
again, bearing that new info in mind. thanks for pointing that
out! :)
Yes, Aquitaine... the top Buffy wore in Smashed looked decidedly
bridal... and it miraculously disappeared in "Wrecked"...
I guess it was just too thin and too delicate.... could it symbolize
the woman hymen? Buffy is not a virgin, but for the first time
she really let herself go with Spike. The top got probably torn
out and she didn't take it back when she left in the morning after
scene! ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Buffy vs nakedness and sexuality : a problem of self-confidence
-- Lilac, 12:03:37 11/30/01 Fri
This is the second time I have tried to respond to this message,
and so I will keep it short in case my original response ever
shows up. Don't want to be redundant.
I really liked what Nina has to say about the signifigance of
nakedness in this episode and what it says about the characters
self-confidence. It has struck me that, since she has returned
from the dead, the only person that Buffy has been emotionally
naked with is Spike. Her friends are so concerned that she be
OK, that what the did for her turn out to be OK, that she has
to walk on egg shells around them. She pretends to feel better,
be better than she is.
With Spike, Buffy feels free to be herself. This isn't always
pretty, and doesn't have to always be nice, because he is too
persistent to be driven off by her bad behavior. He has given
her a much needed release from putting on a good front all of
the time. She is not completely honest with him or herself, because
she denies having any positive feelings towards him, which is
ridiculous given how frequently she seeks him out.
After Wrecked I found myself asking "what were they doing
that she found so perverse and degrading?" I have decided
that (probably) there was no particular act that really should
be categorized as perverse (unless you consider the beginning
battle and house falling down, which I don't think of as out of
line or character for these two), that what disturbs her is that
it was a no holding back experience. In her limited sexual experience
she has had one romantic first encounter with disastorous results,
a one night stand that was humiliating, and a relationship with
a perfectly nice, kind of boring boy with whom she could never
fully let go and be herself. Riley encouraged her not to hold
back on him while they were sparring, but she did anyway knowing
she would hurt him. There is no reason to think that their sexual
encounters would be any less constrained.
Buffy's physical relationship with Spike is all at her initiation.
He puts himself in her way, he bothers her, but she always kisses
first. Imagine her behaving that way with any of her previous
suitors.
Well, there had been more, but that's the gist of it. Very interesting
post on a very interesting board.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Oooooooh, this was really good. Some very good points, Nina!
-- Deeva, 12:05:13 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Well of course she's confused, she's 21! -- Charlemagne20,
10:53:50 12/01/01 Sat
WHile by no means is four guys incredibly a large amount for a
girl her age even in the area I grew up in (Tara's country as
I like to call it). It is a significantly large amount with alot
of emotional investment in each.
Angel: The love of her life who ended up killing a teacher, trying
to kill her, and torturing her father-figure.
Parker: A scumbag who used her for sex.
Riley: A man who wanted to be nice to her but under that skin
beat an extremely flawed human being.
Now Spike...
Spike: Who has tried to kill her on numerous occasions, kidnapped
Angel and tortured him, Brought the judge back which led to the
whole 'angel incident', Kidnapped Willow and Xander, and came
back for the Ring in order to kill her.
Furthermore he tortured Angel in L.A...again.
Spike in her mind has seduced her with his promises of darkness
and it's rightfully disturbing because while redeemed he's still
a monster.
She's killed friends like Ford for much less than he's done
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> not just the shower (long) -- anom, 22:46:16 12/02/01 Sun
You make some good points, Nina, but I think who was in the shower
isn't the only thing you interpreted or filled in to fit your
theory.
"The foreplay all included violence: * In 'The harsh light
of day', Buffy fought with Spike a little before ending in Parker's
bed."
I don't think this falls into the same category as the violence
in the other 2 examples, which immediately preceded the sex. After
fighting Spike, Buffy goes back to Parker at the party. There's
some conversation (partly about history & how people make choices--no
connection w/the earlier fighting) & then he kisses her. She doesn't
seem to be buzzed by the violence at that point.
"The Love making * Parker: also sweet and soft but Buffy
is clearly lacking confidence here. She's on the defensive (after
what happened the last time, it's understandable!), clearly letting
Parker lead the ride."
Not entirely. Yes, Parker kisses her 1st, but then he asks if
it's OK. She says yes & starts kissing him, he breaks off & asks
what she's doing, she says, "Making a choice," & next
we see them in bed. OK, the dialog's contrived, but I'd say she
takes the reins when she makes her choice. And we only see the
beginning of their lovemaking (it is [American] TV, after all),
so why assume it was "sweet & soft" all the way through?
Parker's comments to his frat brothers later seem to imply it
was quite athletic & entirely satisfying to him.
"* Riley: It's the missionary fest. It's the 'Me on top,
you on top... is there any other positions? I don't think so'
kinda deal."
Again, I don't think we really know this. There's only so much
they can show. (Just 'cause Riley goes to church....)
"With Spike she had her first woman-like sexual experience."
"Woman-like sexual experience"? I don't even know what
you mean by this. I hope most women's "woman-like sexual
experiences" aren't like Buffy's. And we saw passion, yes,
but the actual physical action we saw didn't look all that...unusual.
Buffy's jacket never even comes off in the scene we see! BTW,
would you call the sex Buffy had w/Angel in I Will Remember You
"woman-like"? Starting out on the table (couldn't even
go 30 ft to the bed!), Buffy licking ice cream off Angel's chest,
& the general implication (more than in the other pre-Spike examples)
that it was pretty uninhibited. Too bad she doesn't remember it....
As for the nudity, 1st, I'm not sure it's always normal to feel
comfortable naked, depending for 1 thing on what the norm is in
a given society. Some people just are more modest. 2nd, wearing
the blanket is a standard TV convention (hadn't noticed it was
always red! but that's what the set designers chose to furnish
her lovers' beds with). Even Faith had the blanket wrapped around
her when she showed Xander the door (a real false note for her
character if you ask me). And in UPN's Sunday rerun today of,
um, that episode where the 1st Evil torments Angel in his dreams,
he pulls the blanket across his hips when he sits up in bed. The
other instance of Buffy being naked is when Amy (or was it her
mother in her body? hard to keep track) turns her into a rat.
When she turns back, she is, of course, naked. She hides behind
some stuff in the room Oz finds her in & asks for his jacket,
but she doesn't seem all that uncomfortable about it beyond finding
it awkward. Maybe that's because it's not a sexual situation.
"Spike used to sleep with his clothes on when he lacked confidence,
now that he got his rocks back he goes around naked as if it were
the most normal thing in the world (which it is!)."
I don't know if lack of confidence was why Spike slept in his
clothes before. Maybe he just didn't have a reason to take them
off, or maybe it's more comfortable when you sleep on stone. Good
point about his putting his pants on when his pride's hurt. And
it's interesting that when Buffy comes back later he's taken them
off again.
To go a little O/T here (or is it? you decide), I'm trying to
remember if Buffy has ever had sex in her own bed. Angel: his
apt., & his place in LA. Parker: his dorm/frat house room. Riley:
his room, & I don't remember if they ever used her dorm room.
I'm trying to think if there was ever an implication that they
had sex at her house. I have a vague feeling that there was, but
having Mom home can be kind of, um, inhibiting. Of course, plenty
of teenagers manage anyway....
Whew. This subject seems to lend itself to long posts! Done now.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> To answer your question -- Isabel, 17:02:57 12/05/01
Wed
"I'm trying to remember if Buffy has ever had sex in her
own bed. Angel: his apt., & his place in LA. Parker: his dorm/frat
house room. Riley: his room, & I don't remember if they ever used
her dorm room. I'm trying to think if there was ever an implication
that they had sex at her house. I have a vague feeling that there
was, but having Mom home can be kind of, um, inhibiting."
Yes, Buffy and Riley had sex in her bed at home in "Into
the Woods." Mom was recovering from her operation at the
hospital and Dawn was over at Xander & Anya's.
All potential inhibitors were removed from the scene. ;)
I don't think we saw either Willow or Buffy having sex in their
shared dorm room.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Who's That Girl? When is Willow...?
(Spoilers for Wrecked) -- vandalia, 22:24:35 11/29/01 Thu
In Willow's two 'trips' at Rak's place, we see what looks like
the body of a girl being dragged through a viney jungle filled
with things moving under the leaves, then in space being carried
through a rift by the same demon that later attacks Willow and
Dawn. Who is it? People have speculated its Joyce, Glory, Buffy,
Tara, but having watched the second scene repeatedly, I'm of the
opinion its Amy.
Why? The hair, for one. Tara, Joyce and Glory's hair wasn't that
long. The body: the nose was all wrong for Buffy and she looked
to be way too tall to be Buffy and too skinny to be Tara. She
also looked to be a bit... top-heavier than any of the other girls
mentioned. Also, who does Rak already have in his grip? Amy. Notice
how he's manipulating what looks to be a little spinning woman
in his hands as Amy spins? He's using her for his amusement, twirling
her around.
On a related note, in Willow's first trip she's seemingly passed
through space (teleported?) twice before she lands on the floor
of her room at Buffy's house. The first stop I at first thought
was the outer room of Rak's place, then looking at it again I
noticed it seems to be the Bronze -- there's a tall round bar
table and all the people gathered that we don't know would certainly
seem to be a Bronze-y atmosphere. Then she appears in front of
the Magic Box. Its night. She has enough time to look around before
she's waking up on her floor. So my question is, what was up with
this? She obviously travelled through space to get to the various
places. But could she have travelled through time as well? Several
people (at JM.com?) have noted a time discrepancy in referencing
past events -- Willow is trying to talk about Tara's outing with
Dawn and Dawn is unsure of which 'other day' Willow is talking
about. Buffy and Spike argue about 'last night' TWO nights after
what we saw. Buffy's clothing also changes enough times to indicate
that two days have passed since The Morning After. Is there some
kind of time manipulation going on? We've seen the Troika do it
on a small scale with Buffy; is this what the diamond is for?
Controlling time itself? Or is this just the writer's way of showing
Willow's so out of it she only has vague flashes of memory of
what she did after she left Rak's and has no idea how she ended
up home?
Discuss!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Mind hurts... ow... must... rewatch... Wrecked... -- Traveler,
22:41:48 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> lol, that was my exact response. -- res, 01:08:07
11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Who's That Girl? When is Willow...? (Spoilers for Wrecked)
-- Umbriel, 00:53:36 11/30/01 Fri
This is fascinating! I'd noticed the "teleportation"
and was wondering what it meant - but time travel just seemed
so far-fetched, somehow! But now that you mention it, time travel
seems to be kind of a theme this season - and not just on Buffy
- there's a time-traveling demon on Angel as well. This might
even begin to explain a small detail that has been bugging me
since last season - that comment Doc made about having seen Spike
with brown hair playing dominoes. I've never been able to figure
out what that was about - could one of them have traveled in time?
This is probably just my wishful thinking - I'm a redemptionista
- but it has always seemed like such an odd detail to me.
As for the identity of the girl, I'm dying to know that as well!
Amy is an interesting possibility. Whoever the girl is, it looked
to me like she had a red dress on - kind of Glory-ish. The last
time we saw Amy at Rack's she was in a blue dress. Also, it sounded
like the demon said Willow had "raised hell" although
I may have heard incorrectly. So whoever it is may have come from
a Hell dimension.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Who's That Girl? When is Willow...? (Spoilers
for Wrecked) -- maddog, 07:04:31 11/30/01 Fri
Remember, Doc was no ordinary person. He had to have been some
sort of demon...and who knows what type of life spans they have...he
could have been around to see a pre vamped Spike...good ole William
who sucked at writing poetry.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Another thought (spoilers) -- Umbriel, 01:11:08 11/30/01
Fri
It just occurred to me - if time travel is actually going to be
important to this season, the Troika could end up being very useful.
They are ridiculous villians, and I don't think they are the real
"big bad." If the real evil is somehow using time travel
to further its ends, the Troika could provide the Scoobies with
their own way to travel in time. Once Buffy figures out what the
Troika is up to, she could easily force them to help her, either
through guilt or ass-kicking. They will have to "grow up"
by doing something helpful when faced with real evil. Their little
James Bond charade is going to seem awfully pathetic when compared
to the real thing, and I think they will be forced to give it
up.
OK, I've projected way into the future based on next to no evidence
but it was kind of fun; don't mind my ramblin'.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Ach!(Spoilers for Wrecked) -- Marie, 03:24:39 11/30/01 Fri
I posted a theory on this question lower down on the board, and
then I came up the board and read this!
My theory was that the demon was somehow summoned subconsciously
by Willow, who actually wants Buffy to appear, and she does -
only it's HumanBuffy (as opposed to SlayerBuffy, who appears with
Spike). HumanBuffy in a coma-like state because the resurrection
spell of Willow's was never finished? (She could have looked different
because it was actually a stuntwoman!).
Don't shoot me down in flames if this is absolute c**p! (Maybe
when I actually see the ep for myself, I'll be cringing for suggesting
this).
Marie
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Who's That Girl? When is Willow...? (Spoilers for Wrecked)
-- Tillow, 06:27:20 11/30/01 Fri
Very cool idea about the time travel. I'll have to rewatch with
something new to obsess over! If this is, in fact, what's going
on... it could have something to do with "The Future is Now.
I also thought the girl rolling around in the leaves could be
Amy only because the dress looked similar with a slit over the
knees. Not sure about the one in his arms but it would make sense
that it would be the same woman in both shots.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Who's That Girl? When is Willow...? (Spoilers for Wrecked)
-- maddog, 07:01:58 11/30/01 Fri
Why does the demon have to be somebody we know? I was under the
impression that it was just a demon...what clues you in on the
fact that it has to be a character that's already out there?
As for time travel, if Willow were really gone for more than a
day wouldn't the others have noticed? I mean, she doesn't come
home one night and it was a big deal...to follow it up by multiple
days I'd be surprised if it wasn't a huge topic of discussion.
The clothes thing with Buffy could be irrelevent too as I even
know guys that change clothes 2 to 3 times a day...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Who's That Girl? (Spoilers) -- RH, 09:18:48 11/30/01 Fri
*(I had a theory posted lower on the board, I'll just cut-and-paste
it here if y'all don't mind...)
I too, was intrigued by the whole "demon coming through the
portal carrying some long, curly-haired blonde" - (I rewound
a few times at the end, and yes, her hair is curly). I was particularly
mindful since Willow's reaction to the scene was so violent, and
Rack's response was so malevolent. I thought the "girl"
in question might have been Buffy, seeing as Willow had brought
her back from the dead, but Buffy has had straight hair for some
time now. I think the curly, blonde hair is definitely significant.
The only "dead" characters I could think of who had
long, curly hair were Joyce, Glory, and (flash-back) Darla. Even
though Joyce's body had been resurrected by Dawn and Spike, I
ruled her out because I'm assuming that she went to "heaven"
- a nice, normal lady like that deserves to! And I'm not sure
that Darla was a reasonable guess because to my mind she seemed
to have worked out her own redemption through her "change
of heart" and sacrifice. I also didn't want to think about
it being Glory because basically - Joss has "been-there-done-that"
and why would he do that again? There is a slight possibility
that it could be one of the other 3 "hell-gods" associated
with Glory, (are they triplets? Who knows...)
My only other thought was that this is a completely new "big
bad". Anyway, my concern is that we saw (in Willow's "trip"),
that the demon was carrying a human body - (it looked like a girl
to me) - through the woods, possibly hiding it. The demon then
appeared for real, (having been summoned). We know that the demon
brought something back with it, (hey, something came back with
Buffy, right?), so there is DEFINITELY someone out there that
Willow and the SG are going to be confronted with in the near
future.
Now, we've heard of demon's "hitch-hiking" through the
dimensions, (that "evil" thing came back with "good"
Buffy). Does this mean that a "good thing" could have
come back with this hell demon? It didn't look like the girl was
hitch-hiking, the demon looked as if he was intentionally bringing
her through, unless... what if Willow had called back the girl,
and the demon hitch-hiked with her? Hmmm... but Willow killed
the demon, and we know that the only way Buffy could get rid of
her hitch-hiker was to kill it herself - if the "summoner"
(Willow) did it, Buffy would have died too, so maybe, by killing
this new demon, Willow also killed the girl and undid the summoning.
Oh wait, summoning is different then a spell isn't it, so the
same laws wouldn't apply... but they could! HA-HA! Yeah RIGHT!
Somehow I doubt it!
You just never know what ME will dish out next!
(Thanks for letting me ramble!)
Closing thought: Was Willow more frightened by the demon, or with
who it brought back with it?!
Stay tuned... MUAH-HA-HAAAAA!!! ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cleaning up the wreckage -- boy_mercury,
09:09:20 11/30/01 Fri
I really enjoyed "Wrecked." I know many of you pounced
on the episode, claiming it didn't live up to your "Buffy"
ideals or whatever, but I thought it was well done. I think people
are too quick to attack and criticize an episode without ENJOYING
it. I agree that some of the plot was pushed along kind of fast,
but who's to say where it's going? After hiatus, all of this could
take a startling and unexpected turn. I just loved how everything
fell into place last year when people were complaining about Dawn,
and then eventually took back their presumptions when the plot
fully revealed itself. I see the same scenario here. The writers
aren't stupid, and they're well aware of where this plot is going.
Instead of being so negative, perhaps those who complain should
try and see it that way, if anything just for the sake of you
enjoying an episode that you normally wouldn't give a chance to.
Just see it as a single piece of a much bigger puzzle. Willow
only went to Reck in this episode. They're not trying to make
magic into drug use. This was just a scare as to where magic could
take Willow if she's irresponsible. The only reason she's having
withdrawals is because of going to Reck's. Willow has learned
from this mistake, but I doubt the magical mistakes are over.
Magic made her into "super Willow," someone I don't
think Willow is ready to part with just yet. At least that's my
theory, a much better theory than "they destroyed the entire
season thusfar with one episode!! Let's all cry about it!"
The episode didn't abandon the entire plot, or contradict anything.
It set it on a new direction, one I can't wait to see when the
oh-so-irritating reruns end.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Cleaning up the wreckage -- maddog, 09:28:07 11/30/01
Fri
I have to disagree...I think the magic was blatantly used as a
metaphor for drug use, and more importantly the aspects of addiction.
But I agree that sometimes people do get a bit TOO analytical
and should just sit back and watch the show.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Great episode! (slight spoilers) -- RabidHarpy, 09:29:44
11/30/01 Fri
"The episode didn't abandon the entire plot, or contradict
anything. It set it on a new direction, one I can't wait to see
when the oh-so-irritating reruns end."
I really enjoyed this episode too! After each episode I try to
figure out how the next one will progress, but this one had a
LOT of surprises in it that I wasn't expecting - especially Dawn
kicking butt and Buffy's mild "morning after" reaction,
(I was expecting nuclear fall-out! She and Spike dealt almost
civilly with each other - Buffy only dished out one punch! - And
the way they both knew just how far to go verbally and how they
have finally quit playing games with each other... not to mention
that ending - priceless!)
I have no idea what the next episode will contain, (thanks to
those sneaky writers!), but I am definitely looking forward to
it!
By the way, does anyone know approximately when the next new episodes
should be airing? Thanks!
:)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Great episode! (slight spoilers) -- maddog, 09:32:03
11/30/01 Fri
I heard January...sorry, that's vague I know. But that's all I
heard. Let the holidays pass I suppose...people get less busy....more
time to watch tv.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Thanks! :) -- RH, 09:44:24 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Thanks! :) -- Rob, 11:32:54 11/30/01
Fri
Actually, worse than that... The END of January! :-(
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> ITA. Even here in the land of TTM, we should enjoy before
we deconstruct :-) -- Aquitaine, 10:15:45 11/30/01 Fri
Although, deconstructing seemed to work just fine for Spike and
Buffy. ::grin::
-Aquitaine
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I agree, but there are some eps you just can't enjoy. --
sassette, 11:56:33 11/30/01 Fri
There have been episodes I've found really enjoyable that were
full of flaws. It happens.
But, I know that I found "Wrecked" unenjoyable. I found
myself cringing during the first viewing, and that's with my critical
faculties turned off.
Anyway, I do agree with you in general, but, for me, there are
episodes that are just downright unenjoyable. "Wrecked"
was the first BtVS ep that's realy been that for me, which is
why I was so diappointed. This isn't to say that interesting things
won't come from it--I think the S/B developments in particular
have a ton going on--but just that it was an hour of television
I'd prefer not to sit through again.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> It's like books.... -- Nina, 16:27:03 12/01/01 Sat
...Sometimes even if you want to enjoy a book you can't. That
book at this particular moment is not good for you. You don't
have the mental disposition to enjoy what it has to give you.
Maybe you'll never enjoy it or maybe things will happen in your
life and suddenly something in that book will "talk"
to you. Suddenly you will feel the connection you didn't have
before because you are just not the same person.
It must be very painful to love BtVS and feel that you don't get
your fix so I understand what you mean Sassette... (yet I really
loved Wrecked so...) let's just hope that one day that episode
"talks" to you and if not well.... you'll have more
than a hundred other episode to watch again and again. One episode
you don't enjoy is not going to cripple you for a long time! Seems
to me that on other boards the list of un-enjoyable episodes are
more than 10 for some people! My best and I hope you get to enjoy
more new episodes to come! :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Or the episode (er, book) is just plain
bad. ;) -- not me, 20:42:56 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Or the episode (er, book) is just
plain bad. ;) -- Nina, 08:10:12 12/02/01 Sun
Could be...
But in my book when so many people like something and you don't,
it just means that it's not for you. "Bad" is relative.
Even Ed Wood has his fan base so... ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: Majority rules? Haven't the
Scoobies taught us anything? ;) -- not me (nor a troll, BTW),
14:25:28 12/02/01 Sun
------------------------------------------------------------------------
While my guitar gently weeps
(OT) -- Slayrunt, 09:17:04 11/30/01 Fri
I just heard the news. George Harrison has died.
While not my favorite Beatle, he and the others created wonderful
music and memories for a generation and more.
My guitar will weep today for a man who inspired millions with
his musical talent.
Slayrunt
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> The Impact of the Beatles -- rowan, 10:45:51 11/30/01 Fri
I was only 6 years old when the Beatles broke up. That means I
was born in the year when they made their appearance on the Ed
Sullivan Show.
Why is it that I know almost every lyric to every song that was
released as a single? Why is it that as I grow older, their music
seems to continue to have so much to teach me?
I mourned John Lennon as if he were a member of my family and
I feel the same about George Harrison.
'No rack can torture me, My soul's at liberty. Behind this mortal
bone There knits a bolder one.'
Emancipation, Emily Dickinson
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> "I heard the news today, oh boy . . . "
-- Fred the obvious pseudonym, 18:34:42 12/02/01 Sun
I think that you kind of had to be around at the time.
The release of the year's new Beatles album was always an event.
"How are they going to transform popular culture this year?"
I still remember where I was when I heard that the Beatles were
going to break up. Took the wind out of me. No more anticipation,
no more brilliant music.
And for celebrities, they behaved fairly well. George made a good
country gentleman. He was stand-up for real -- that nut who broke
in, George took some knife wounds so his wife could bash the guy
on the head with a skillet. Never took himself too seriously,
either; he was the MC on the Monty Python parody of the Beatles
phenomenon, "Meet the Rutles," or, as I like to think
of it, "All You Need Is Cash."
Too bad. Very much too bad.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: While my guitar gently weeps (OT) -- A8, 13:07:50 12/05/01
Wed
When John Lennon was murdered, I was very angry. Some deranged
"fan" was so filled with jealousy that he had to take
away from the world a voice that had meant so much to so many.
Now that George Harrison has passed away, I am saddened deeply.
The world has lost a great musician and a gentle spirit whose
life has had a great influence on my own. The Beatles are the
reason I picked up the guitar. Their music has been a driving
force in the evolution of music as the centerpiece of my life.
Much of the humor we enjoy on BTVS owes its existence to The Beatles.
The puns, the irony, the surreal imagery were all unheard of before
the movies 'A Hard Day's Night,' 'Help' and 'Yellow Submarine,'
and modern entertainment has not been the same since.
Musicians are the vanguard of the collective consciousness. When
one dies, a ripple travels through the fabric of that consciousness
and we are all touched one way or another whether or not we actually
realize it. George was a brilliant slide guitarist with a unique
style. His understated and underrated song writing talents are
now returned to the cosmos. His gifts like all of our own are
just temporary loans. What is left behind are only echoes of a
life that once shared an existence with our own. And now it's
up to the rest of us to carry the torch until it is our time to
return to the void.
Although his catalog is a bit hard to get a hold of these days,
I would whole-heartedly recommend any of you to take a listen
to the hopeful message of spirituality offered to all who would
have the ears to hear it in such songs as 'Awaiting on You All,'
'Give Me Love,' 'Blow Away,' 'Soft Touch,' 'Crackerbox Palace,'
and 'Dear One.' As his mate Paul stated in the Anthology, if there
is one thing The Beatles could be particularly proud of was the
fact that their songs were essentially about love and hope. George
upheld his part of that legacy in a solo career replete with songs
of love, humor and and human dignity.
Day turned black, sky ripped apart rained for a year 'til it dampened
my heart cracks and leaks, the floorboards caught rot about to
go down, I had almost forgot
All I've got to do is to...to love you All I've got to be is a...be
happy All it's got to take is some warmth to make it Blow Away,
blow away, blow away
Sky cleared up, day turned to bright closing both eyes now my
head filled with light hard to remember the state I was in instant
amnesia, the yang to the yin
All I've got to do is to...to love you All I've got to be is a...be
happy All it's got to take is some warmth to make it Blow Away,
blow away, blow away
Wind blew in, cloud was dispersed rainbows appearing the threshes
were burst breezes-a-singing, now I'm feeling good moment had
passed like I knew that it should
All I've got to do is to...to love you All I've got to be is a...be
happy All it's got to take is some warmth to make it Blow Away,
blow away, blow away
'Blow Away' by G. Harrison
Give me love, give me love Give me peace on Earth Give me life,
give me life Keep me free from birth Give me hope, help me cope
with this heavy load trying to touch and reach you with heart
and soul ....Om
...My lord
Please...take hold of my hand that I might understand you
...Om
'Give Me Love' by G. Harrison
Thank you for the lovely music George. I will miss you.
A8
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Re: Season 4 -- Yellowork, 09:58:35
11/30/01 Fri
I think of the 1999 - 2000 season as a landmark,both obviously
for AtS, and for *Buffy*, too. I think that *Buffy* developed
in a chaotic way until it reached the 'Graduation Day' two-parter,
whereupon it splits down the middle. Part of the cast, part of
the themes, part of the crew and part of the writers stay with
*Buffy* while others leave to form *Angel the Series*. After this,
the *two* new series develop along their own lines. This year
saw *Buffy* playing around with science fiction more than ever
before, while AtS got going with the Horror / Fantasy element
from early *Buffy*. Of course, TV, like cookery, is all about
the 'mix': this was an experiment and, over time, *Buffy* began
to play down the sci-fi and once more set off for pastures new.
And, over the two-odd seasons to now, *Angel* has been both more
and less operatic. I have to say the split was not totally 50
- 50; Angel is a good show on boring old criteria such as Plot,
Characterization, Cast, Chemistry, Sex and Violence. However,
it has a male lead very much in the mould of *Batman* or whoever,
it is patriarchal in that respect, and therefore something of
a reversion after *Buffy* the show and Buffy the character, who
is so absurd in a conventional context that the show she is in
works often in spite of itself. Has Buffy jumped the shark yet?
Yes! She does it five times before breakfast. Its the mainstay
of the show.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Look at 'Smashed', 'Lullaby',
'Wrecked', Eden Myth Spoilers Part One -- Age, 10:08:11 11/30/01
Fri
This posting is a meandering look at elements of 'Smashed' and
'Lullaby' with reference to the Garden of Eden myth and possible
parallels between the two eps. Work has kept me from completing
it until now; so, I've been able to add a little about 'Wrecked'
as well. For those who have read my postings before, this has
my usual diatribe against patriarchy; so, be warned that the following
may have the tone, a bit, in part, of a lecture. Besides that,
it's not too bad. Though it is long. Really long, too long, and
meandering like a river or a big snake...I have divided it into
three parts.
Spoilers for this and previous seasons of 'Buffy' and 'Angel'.
The 'Buffy' scene in the museum where the trio steal the diamond
may be a symbolic re-enactment of the resurrection spell that
brought Buffy back, and thereby an allusion to one major element
of the Eden myth, the exertion of will over the natural world
as symbolized by the snake/devil; it is this revolt against being
simply a child, and its being available to Adam and Eve in the
garden that the spell represents to Buffy: she's not simply an
innocent or an angel doing the bidding of a higher power, ie a
slayer. Willow's act, as symbolized by the snake emerging from
her mouth, is akin to that of the devil in the Eden myth, creating
the opportunity for growth through the fall from innocence. It
is this movement away from the frozen state of sanctuary in both
episodes that we witness: from the museum death state of 'Buffy'
and from the sanctuary of 'Caritas' in Angel.
(As an aside: the museum scene is also a symbolic representation
of the condition of Spike's and Buffy's relationship, as the latter's
been blowing hot and cold(an oppositional pattern to her behaviour),
with Spike's being left out in the cold, frozen out like Rusty;
in effect, Rusty is a portrayal of Spike, ie the harmless old
man. The hot and cold imagery of the scene refers also to the
usual Sunny(mask)/dale(subconscious) denial strategy of dealing
with emotions, blowing cold as emotions are repressed and blowing
hot as those unmanaged, unaccepted emotions emerge and take over.
In the museum scene Spike/Rusty is frozen out: there's an imbalance
of power; yet, to show a progression, the writer has Spike go
to see the trio who have just been admiring the diamond they've
stolen. There is a sense here of Spike moving towards the diamond,
towards the ice queen as he calls her, not frozen out any longer
like his toothless security guard counterpart( ie representing
Spike as night watchman(a vampire without bite) looking out for
Buffy's and Dawn's security.))
If the scene is a symbolic re-enactment of the resurrection spell
with the aerial descent of one of the trio suggesting Buffy's
movement from heaven, the blow torch as a reiteration of the flame,
snake(torch stem) and circle images, and the hard, frozen, dead,
perfect state of the diamond(ice) being kept safe behind glass,
untouchable, suggesting Buffy's attitude of feeling superior(in
heaven above) , and her stint in heaven, her being frozen, as
it were, then it sets the episode for the fall that will come
in knowledge and sexuality with a reminder of what was lost, what
Buffy has lost: her perfect glittering moment of heroism and innocence
where things still could make sense, and suicide still seemed
to be painless(to borrow from MASH) because it was also needed
to save the world. In effect, the movement this season is away
from self sacrifice, away from innocent heroism and towards suicide.
The line has been blurred between the two as Buffy figures in
'OMWF' that if she dies she'll just come back again, no big deal,
life, death, it's all the same, nothing here is real. It is a
movement towards self destruction, a form of depression as Buffy
doesn't really want or know how or is afraid to move forward in
her life; but it's also a figurative destruction in the sense
of deconstruction as a means of reconstructing. The transition
from adolescent to adult, from being someone's child to being
ones own person, requires this, but it's painful. It makes sense
to have Spike as part of this period because back in season two
he represented the pain and danger of romantic relationships as
Buffy began dating and then seeing someone on a regular basis,
as she made the transition from child to adolescent. Spike is
now part of another transition period for her.
I might also add that Spike, the neutered vampire, and Buffy,
the dissociated slayer, may be put together as misfits for another
reason. If this series is about deconstruction of myth, patriarchal
myth, then after a certain time there has to be a period of re-construction
or the process of deconstruction becomes a form of nihilism as
the fourth season's Adam was probably meant to show in his having
detailed knowledge but no sense of what living meant; unlike Buffy
the slayer whose symbolic role as deconstructor was assimilated
into her human personality, Adam's deconstruction was his programming(was
his right arm, so to speak, as the stake arm symbolized and which
he upgraded to the absurd level of annihilation and destruction
in the rocket launcher.)
Perhaps the neutered vampire represents the patriarchal male who,
having been told by society that to mask his own inadequacies
all he needs to do is dominate women because that's what they
are there for(as Spike always seems to do(and does in this ep)),
finds himself now out of place because attitudes towards women
have changed: poor Spike, he can't be a man; he can't be a vampire
but he's still attached to the same strategy for dealing with
his problems, a strategy that doesn't fit in anymore.
And, the disassociated slayer finds that her role as emasculator
has led only to an emptiness: the poor lost girl.(I have to clarify
this; I don't think that Buffy has acted as emasculator in the
past, but the slayer itself is a representation of this and a
deconstruction of the power play between sexual predator and emasculator.
What may be happening this season is the writers are using Buffy's
coldness and her recent behaviour towards Spike to suggest an
emasculator role in order to set up the deconstruction of it,
the end of the role established in a male dominated society. There
is a sense here that Buffy is afraid to embrace aspects of herself
and is falling back on defensive posturing in order to keep herself
from Spike; in doing so Buffy has to make Spike out to be less
a man and more like Rusty or something beneath her. This is not
to suggest that Buffy is moving towards giving up the slayer,
but that her relationship with Spike won't include it. Some of
the posts I have read suggest that Buffy's attempt at defence
at the end of 'Wrecked' with the cross and the garlic is that
of a human not a slayer, and tends to support this idea. There
again I may just simply be trying to forge a symbolic and thematic
meaning to one that has more to do with Buffy herself than with
a criticism of patriarchal structures.)
The vampire and slayer are the basic metaphors, obviously, of
the series: the sexual predator and the emasculator, the latter
as reactionary role to the power struggle in a male dominated
society. Buffy's current state of mind may have come, as others
have suggested, from a pattern of abandonment by others. This
is, in a more abstract way, what happened to women in a male dominated
society: abandonment of them through devaluation and vilification,
not to mention the pressure for them to deny their sexuality,
to become little angels. Women were forced into the dichotomy
of being either a virgin or someone's wife; a girl or someone's
mother; a Madonna or a whore. Buffy is exhibiting this same sort
of opposition in her behaviour this season.
What I'm getting at is both male and female have to re-invent
themselves according to this new society, this new society which
is just coming of age, leaving adolescence behind, just as the
characters are, ie there's a co-ordination of meaning between
the characters growing up and society in general. Possibly Amy's
getting de-ratted is a symbolic representation of this new society
where women no longer have to make themselves subhuman, the vilified
other, the vermin, the Eves, to exist. Or, I may be putting too
much into this, and Amy's presence is simply a symbol of what
happens when you use magic to solve your problems: you get stuck
in it. Amy is also a symbol of high school and adolescence, and
it is telling that she goes back to see her dad, back to a father
figure while the others are attempting or being forced to move
forward in their lives alone. Still, her having been initially
unfrozen, so speak, may point at how much our society has changed.
Another aspect of our changed society may be that in some ways
it hasn't changed that much yet. (What? Do I really know what
the heck I'm talking about? Hopefully.) This is suggested in what
Amy says after she's watched TV(the reference to people being
frozen) and what Holst says about there still being families.
What I'm getting at is while there is a general equality between
the sexes, we are still experiencing the legacy of the patriarchal
way of living through the Sunnydale strategy of denial and the
emphasis on power, say, for instance, Girl Power, and it's being
simply perhaps the mimicking of male power. While women are now
valued; while there's some equality between men and women, this
equality can in part be summed up by stating that women can now
do what previously men were only allowed to do. This may be the
masculinization of the female in the roles they are able to carry
out. Women are now permitted to be men if they want to be: they
can wear trousers or play sports like the guys or join the army
or play with toy trucks. But what about boys being allowed to
do traditionally female activities?
(Note also: the sun in Sunnydale is a masculine symbol; if the
female symbol is the moon which comes out at night, then the darkness
in the dale image presents us with a split between men and women,
and a power imbalance between the sun high in the sky and only
the hint of a female symbol in the devalued dale image.)
I want to hasten to add that I'm not arguing at all against women
embracing their natural aggression; I'm saying that there may
have been a tendency to assimilate women into the men's world
because up until recently, the social arena has been dominated
by the male of the species, with the little woman staying home,
in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, serving hubbies needs as
patriarch/boy. The value of being a human being then for men and
now women is being male with the attending power culture that
has gone with it.
This may be one symbolic meaning behind Willow's and Tara's relationship.
On the one hand their relationship is meant to strike a blow at
homophobia still rampant in North American society under the guise
that it isn't natural, but from a purely symbolic perspective,
the fact that the two are women shows that at least one is playing
the role a male would, ie women are now permitted to be men. Again,
I want to emphasize this is purely symbolic, and doesn't reflect
a more literal view of homosexuality. What I'm getting at is we
don't see two men in a homosexual relationship, with one of them
taking the role that a woman would take in a heterosexual relationship.
This season may be an examination in part of the difference between
true empowerment of the feminine, empowerment of women through
better emotional management strategies, improved self esteem,
and deconstruction of established negative patterns; and simple
giving of power to women through the relaxing of the roles they
are allowed to play. In this way, we have Willow's abuse of magic
as a means of exerting power, rather than as a means of loving.
It is the symbol of the feminine reworked into the power structure
that men have occupied: in fact this power structure, this imbalance
of power is what Willow and Amy(again two women) display in their
hijinks in the Bronze: firstly the two are above the others; Willow
puts the guys in cages, the guys who seem to be interested in
one thing only, ie men still in the role as sexual predators;
in fact the image of these guys doing a go-go in the cages(the
same sexual objectification of the males that they were doing
to the women) conjured up for me what Buffy said about Spike being
a serial killer in prison; in other words, these guys have been
taught one set of values and are attached to them, but as society
has changed, another set is impinging on their freedom to be what
they were taught they should be as men, and like Spike they haven't
really changed, but have been neutered by an external pressure;
there is still a tension, a power structure whereby the unchanged
sexual predator is being kept at bay by an external power, rather
than a change of values coming from the man himself. It is still
all power based.
The imbalance of power imagery in Willow's magic then gets expressed
in the height difference between the two guys; the change from
a boy to a girl band, ie the symbolic presentation of the gals
as really transmuted guys, with the oppositional structure shown
in the bands being either boy or girl and not a complement of
both; and then the transmutation into sheep, herd animals that
are symbols of those being preyed upon in a power structure. This
season may be questioning what Girl Power is really supposed to
be. The first song that is sung in the Bronze points at figuring
out what is wrong by using your head, working through the problem;
while the use of power to change the guys to gals finds its reason
in the lyrics of the second song: not wanting to be alone, ie
not wanting to face the problem.
End of Part One.
Age.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Look at 'Smashed', 'Lullaby', 'Wrecked', Eden Myth Spoilers
Part Two -- Age, 10:23:35 11/30/01 Fri
Part Two
If we take Buffy, the same applies. She has been clearly in a
power position over Spike. The symbolism of being above in heaven
shows this structure. In fact at the beginning of the ep she is
symbolically portrayed as a flawless diamond; but, then revealed
to be something else, something less than perfect by Spike. Perhaps
Buffy has to see the other forms of carbon in herself, and not
just the glittering one. Perhaps the diamond image is a play on
the old idea of diamonds being a girl's best friend, a reference
to women in a male dominated society having to act to secure their
futures through the acquisition of wealth over the pursuit of
a love and respect based relationship because men just want one
thing, and, as the song goes, women all lose their charms in the
end, ie the power that women would hold over men would fade and
they'll just get abandoned as Buffy seems to have been several
times. It is different, however, because Buffy is the diamond,
so to speak, but what if she's treasuring a certain idea about
herself, holding onto that wealth at the expense of something
healthier in her life? Like the slayer, as Spike says, Buffy is
alone, with no one to love. Willow has lost her lover through
the abuse of power; Buffy seems to be distant, unavailable, barely
alive, lost perhaps in her own idea based on hierarchy. If this
is so, the women are doing exactly what 'Buffy' was designed to
deconstruct. But, perhaps that deconstruction occurred at the
end of the episode, the unstructuring of Buffy's idea about herself
as symbolized by the house being destroyed with the attending
movement towards the power structure being demolished between
male and female.
I'm not suggesting that this new society will do away with power
structures; nor am I naive enough to suggest that patriarchy is
just one great big evil thing that if only we got rid of it we'd
enter a state of endless utopia where the grass is always green
and men and women walk hand in hand making googly eyes at one
another while elevator music lulls us to romantic sleep in the
background. What I'm getting at is the undoing of the strategies
in Buffy and Spike, in the men and women in general, those based
on a patriarchal upbringing, on the male as dominant and on the
abandonment of the female in order that men and women do then
find a natural balance in their relationships based on their characters
rather than having to play the role of the Big Bad and the Slayer,
ie not having to just go through the motions, walking through
the part.
There is thus a tendency towards equalization as the patriarchal
roles are deconstructed, an equalization which includes 'darker'
aspects, as Spike points out to Buffy. We are rooted in some darkness.
We are dependent like vampires to some extent. We kill in order
to eat; we have sex in order to keep the species going; we are
creatures of what some have labeled as the darkness; but, we are
also creatures of light too. We limit our killing; we strive to
have peace; we strive to know about our surroundings. We love.
It's as if this year, through Buffy, Whedon is exploring the idea
that Angel got presented with after his trip on the elevator to
the home office of hell, the world: if they, the human beings,
didn't have evil in them, they'd all be angels(the image of the
latter got presented to us of Buffy by her being silhouetted by
the stone angel, but the stone angel in the cemetery also suggests
what her stint in heaven symbolized: a kind of frozen state, being
dead.) If Angel last year accepted the 'monster' within, even
showing it this year to Gunn to make a point; then perhaps it
is time for Buffy to realize that her own feelings aren't the
monster they've been made out to be. She has to manage them, not
repress them.
Going back to Willow for a moment, when she says that she and
Amy have pretty much done everything in the Bronze, the words
that echoed through my mind were of Vamp Willow saying: bored
now. This is an allusion to adolescence as vampires on this series
represent being frozen in that state; it is being frozen, attached
to the adrenalin power(rush) of that time. Not only this, but
the vampire is a sexual predator, dominating its victim. If Willow
is acting like this then it may be a case of doing what she's
been taught to do. As Willow and Buffy have to deal with becoming
adults and the power that entails, and women in general have to
deal with power as our society as a whole changes its values,
then perhaps the two elements have been put together to explore
the idea that women need to learn how to deal with power, and
learn to empower themselves, rather than mask their fears or problems
behind the use of it. Or, perhaps this is a contrast, with Willow
presenting the lesson about the dangers of power as an intoxicant;
while Buffy is moving towards a relationship not based on power.
If girl power is simply the green light to do what the boys do,
then won't girls have the tendency to follow the boys in their
strategy for dealing, or not dealing with emotions? Willow's use
of power as a means of masking her low self esteem(her low Will)
and her fears of rejection is something that Spike has been doing.
It is the disempowering of Willow through the repression of her
authentic self, a disempowering which will make it harder for
her to stop her addiction. This idea of the authentic self being
missing applies to Buffy also as she seems to be sleepwalking
through her life, still attached to her diamond slumbers of heavenly
bliss. What I'm getting at, in my usual roundabout way, is that
while women and men are more equal in our society, there's still
an abandonment of the feminine as women get assimilated into the
world of men and take on not only the power of men, but the same
problems as well.
It seems that this week's 'Wrecked' was meant to show this disempowering
for Willow . We were set up to see Willow's visit to Rack as a
way of gaining more power, more spells in order to take her to
greater levels of magic. But, what we and Willow got, was a headlong
crash(a la car crash) into the disempowering aspect of Willow's
reliance on power: just like in a drug induced state of dissociation,
Willow's power use was blocking out her authentic self which she
fears is not adequate enough. Using the analogy of the drug pusher,
we got a symbol of what Willow's power use was doing to her; like
a pusher it doesn't really give power, but takes it away, as Rack
took from Willow in their first encounter. It's not true power,
as in self esteem, but its opposite. The monster that Willow summons
may be how she views herself, and the car drive using magic is
a symbolic representation of how she's using power to escape it,
and endangering not only others(Dawn) but the chance to be a human
woman, as Dawn in the car symbolizes. She is driving away from
something, and not to something, not moving forward in her life;
and that movement away runs her smack up against the reality of
being at a dead stop. The car crash is yet again the representation
of Willow's being without true power: she has stolen a car, uses
magic to control it, ie borrows the means of power/escape, relying
symbolically on something external to herself, and then having
it taken away from her as the car/addiction gets out of control.
In this way, the ep showed Willow herself that she wasn't in control
of her problem, but inevitably that she is in the driver's seat,
so to speak, in the sense of her responsibility and her way out
of the problem.
(A quick thought: we are seeing with both Buffy and Willow the
process of growing up whereby they have to work things out for
themselves. If it were the opposite, if Giles had stayed or Tara
hadn't left, then both Buffy and Willow may have grown dependent
on them as limiters. Giles would have stayed as father figure
and Tara would have swopped her role as daughter to that of mother
of Willow, instead of leaving the role of daughter, establishing
her own identity separate from the enmeshing abusive mother figure,
and coming back when Willow was ready to have a relationship as
equals. This would have represented the need for a patriarchal
society in which citizens are incapable of managing themselves.
It would have been a fundamental betrayal of human character.
Of course this is a thematic abstraction. There are those who
cannot go it alone so to speak. I think the question being raised
here is how much dependence is taught by inadequate parenting
which then gets recycled into the next generation. )
Okay, let's get back to some of the Eden myth and bring in some
of the Angel ep...
Part of the Eden myth dealt with this movement downwards, the
fall from a perfect state of grace into one of bifurcation, of
being in an unholy(un-whole) state. This was coupled with taking
on the role of creator in sexual reproduction, assuming responsibility
for ones life; and facing the inevitability of death. Like Buffy,
Adam and Eve went from being at one, in Buffy's case, one with
everything, in the case of the mythological two, with God to being
somehow wrong. There is this sense in the choice that was made
that somehow something went wrong. Adam and Eve no longer belonged
in the garden, or deserved to be, depending on how you look at
it, and had to find their own way, their own place on earth. It
is this that Buffy is experiencing. She has come back wrong, unable
to fit in as she did before. But, perhaps the coming back wrong
will allow her to explore aspects of herself that she wouldn't
have had she stayed complete, flawless, like the diamond. Perhaps
the stint in heaven represented what Buffy thought of herself,
but at least her life was incomplete.
The movement in the Eden myth is from a state of unknowing to
knowledge as we see in the end of the Buffy episode where knowledge
and sexuality are paired together, as it is with Adam and Eve.
Adam and Eve begin to separate as individuals. It is only then
that they can grow and assume responsibility for their own lives.
And part of the connection, I believe, between the 'Buffy' and
'Angel' episodes is a reinforcement of the idea of responsibility.
The fall into knowing, into sexual partnership, which the 'Buffy'
episode rendered, is followed in the 'Angel' ep by the results
of that type of knowing: the baby. Not only this but the other
consequence of sexual reproduction, the fall into mortality of
the Eden myth is shown in Darla's self sacrifice, an allusion
perhaps to the suicide/self sacrifice that Buffy made in last
season's finale; I get the feeling here that we were supposed
to be reminded that last year Buffy accepted her fertility as
a woman and the role of mother; yet last year there was her movement
away from the sexual aspect of that process. The parallel(antithesis
really)between Darla and Buffy may be a way of showing the movement
towards sexuality on the part of Buffy with the self sacrifice
of Darla reminding the viewers of the what Buffy has already accepted.
The fall into adulthood is the acknowledgement that we are mortal,
that we do make an ultimate sacrifice as Darla's death is meant
to remind us. Like Buffy last year, Darla is full of love, and
we are perhaps meant to get the idea that both Buffy and Darla
came back wrong, one frozen, the other burning with love. In a
limited sense they reversed identities, with Buffy frozen in her
state; while Darla, usually frozen in her state as vampire/adolescent
is forced to move on through the pregnancy. But, the two are akin
also, and reinforce Buffy's situation, that just as Buffy had
no future through her self sacrifice last year, Darla as vampire
(symbol of perpetual adolescence) had none as well. In other words
Buffy has to grow in order to have a future. She can't just do
what Darla was forced to because of her vampire(perpetual adolescent)
nature; she can't go back to that perfect moment of self sacrifice
through death. She has to move on in her life; after all, both
title characters are now parents: Angel has a son to look after;
and Buffy has Dawn. Who is looking after Dawn?
In some sense also the sexual encounter between Spike and Buffy,
and the death of Darla, the vampire, in mythological terms, mark
the end of adolescence, and the beginning perhaps of a reconstructive
journey for Buffy, and a period of suffering, as in the Eden myth,
for Angel, as he must face the consequences of an adolescence
out of control. The transitional figures, the Trio, that are creating
the trials for Buffy as she moves into adulthood seem to be playing
a similar role as Holtz for Angel. They are both symbols of the
past and adolescence which are attempting to thwart the title
characters as they grow. In a limited sense also Holtz is a play
on the punishing God of Eden(in effect throwing the Angel team
out of the sanctuary, the garden of Caritas) who comes to make
Angel pay for his transgressions of adolescence, and we see this
developed in the idea of Christian crucifixion as Holtz puts Angel
in a restraint that forces his arms out in a cross pose: the suffering
of Angel will be like the suffering of Christ, meant to atone
for the sins of the past. But as Darla and Angel both say, they
can never make up for what they've done.
End of Part Two
Age
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Look at 'Smashed', 'Lullaby', 'Wrecked', Eden
Myth Spoilers Part Three -- Age, 10:48:19 11/30/01 Fri
Part Three
If you can never make up for past transgressions, then what is
the point of punishment?
Is it simply revenge, an eye for an eye, as a result of a cold
rage as Holtz seems to be pursuing? How then can two wrongs make
it right? This of course is brought out in the episode as Angel
points out that Holtz is now working with demons and not men.
Is it simply a means of destroying someone's spirit? There seems
to be an element of this in the episode as Holtz learns that Angel
is re-ensouled with his punishment then gaining greater effect,
perhaps aimed now at breaking Angel in the same way that Holtz
himself has been broken in spirit, except for his cold rage.
Is it a form of behaviour modification, a deterrent? It doesn't
seem that Angel needs such a treatment.
Is punishment a lesson in which the perpetrator is shown the kind
of suffering he has meted out: a lesson therefore in empathy,
seeing it from another's point of view? If this is the case, it
is perhaps Holtz who will benefit from the lesson as he, from
his own descent into the darkside, will come to understand why
it is human beings become vampires in the first place. The movement
then would be away from strict righteousness(the oppositional
pattern) and rule of God's law to understanding, compassion and
redemption. Certainly Darla's anguish and self sacrifice are meant
to give us insight into the potential of human beings, even after
they've been killed off as such.
(Yes, this seems very utopian and romantic in its vision, and
one wonders how Holtz could ever learn such a lesson; or how the
relations of the people on the bus could ever come to terms with
the loss of their loved ones at Darla's hands. It is easy to ignore
suffering in fiction because it is fiction. But, to some degree
or other we are all one in suffering, in mortality. We will all
suffer loss and hardship. While what happened to Holtz is an awful
thing, suffering and death will happen to all of us. But, perhaps
that's the point of there being an endless supply of vampires
and demons on the shows. Dealing with pain, loss and suffering
is hard to do; and is a process in which many can and do get stuck.)
It's intriguing to note that right after Holtz destroys Caritas,
symbolizing the destruction of the sanctuary, Eden, and the destruction
of mercy, Fred stays behind to witness Darla's giving birth in
the guise perhaps of the Virgin Mary, symbolizing mercy. It's
as if we are seeing a portrayal of the two aspects of the Judeo-Christian
God: the punisher and the redeemer, the masculinized God and the
feminized reformation of God in the form of the female intercedent,
with Christ being perhaps the intersection of the two(as offspring
of both) through the re-affirmation of law, but the adoption of
the concepts of mercy, compassion and redemption. What I'm getting
at is the double character of God in reference to the double character
of Angel and Buffy as a symbol of wholeness(holiness.) The sense
of incompleteness associated with Buffy this season is simply
a perception on the character's part. As Giles says to her, Buffy
has everything she needs already. It's just that she is denying
aspects of herself which she's afraid of, which she's labelled
as bad. As with Willow there are probably self esteem issues too.
Incidentally the flame of hell, so prevalent in the Buffy eps
this year, we see in Caritas as it is blown up,(we saw it literally
in the 'Billy' ep;) it is replaced with the feminine image of
water (Darla's water and rain etc.) In some sense there is a dichotomy
between two means of effecting change: through suffering and punishment,
the destructive, as perhaps parallel to the destruction in the
Buffy episode, and the redemptive, through love and reconstruction,
creation of a new identity. This may be why the previous week's
'Buffy' and 'Angel' could have been paired together: in 'Tabula
Rasa' the lack of and then search for identity was the focus;
in the Angel ep the search for identity of the baby was the focus.
This pairing of the destruction of identity and the search for
the identity may be a cross-series theme about deconstruction
and reconstruction of identity in a transitional period from adolescence
to adulthood. This may also be part of the ambiguity in the baby's
role: destructor or saviour.
Perhaps the 'Buffy' 'Smashed' ep is supported and reinforced by
the Angel episode as both have elements of the Eden myth: the
museum scene of being safe is paralleled by the attempt to make
Caritas safe again, erect a barrier there, but it is smashed.
There is this movement away from the safe garden to adulthood,
as uncovering of knowledge about identity paired with sexuality
in 'Buffy' and the results of that sexuality in the birth of Angel's
son are meant to show.
The baby isn't only a figure meant to show responsibility, but
is a hopeful figure in that it represents a beginning, and the
possibility of something new being created from the journey that
Buffy and Spike are about to take(the similarity of Spike's and
Buffy's sexual encounter to that of Darla's and Angel's creates
this meaning. In fact the baby came out of Angel's period of deconstruction
of identity and the epiphany, paired with the conception, of a
new identity forged, one based less on gaining something, and
more on the realization that what he has inside is okay; something
Buffy isn't accepting yet. In effect, the two instruments used
to break the wall in 'Lullaby' point to wholeness and Angel's
animal nature: the Buddha head and the rhino. The roundness of
the head and the phallic symbol of the rhino horn also point to
female and male sexual images, and a possible allusion to the
sexual content of the Eden myth as they make their way out of
Caritas, the sanctuary, the garden.) In this way, the sexual act
of the 'Buffy' episode is followed by the results of that act:
the fall into birth and death which the bed falling through the
floor in 'Smashed' may also symbolize(as well as the foundation
of self being taken away as other postings have put forward),
with the pain of pregancy as one of the elements from the Eden
myth as we see with Darla, and the pain of suffering as another,
but also the promise of redemption through the Christ imagery
of Angel, and the redemption of Darla as she takes the opportunity
afforded by her pregnancy to take some responsibility for her
life and her emotions.
Like Buffy before her, death is her gift. But, this isn't accepting
some outside agent to do her redeeming for her; she does it herself.
In fact she's not looking for redemption at all. That's not the
point. The point is to save her son out of love. She doesn't feel
sorry for the transgressions of the past(although she wants to)
but she can do something about the transgressions of the future,
and she does. It is the mitigating influence of love, traditionally
feminine, that changes the pattern of her thinking..
In both episodes there's a sense of something being smashed, of
reaching a point of no return, with Darla dead(perhaps finally)
and Angel having to look after a child; and Buffy having the knowledge
that she's not quite human. Instead of sitting back and relying
on what she's been in the past, she now has to forge a new identity
for herself. No return in the sense of not being able to go back
to innocence, to a state of unknowing, of being in heaven or being
an adolescent, being in Eden. The destruction of the Caritas is
paralleled by the destruction of the house that Buffy and Spike
have sex in. And the fall into knowledge of Buffy is paralleled
by the fall into knowledge of Darla as she comes to see her situation.
In fact the antithetical parallel between Darla and Buffy is complete:
both have come back wrong: Buffy colder and Darla full of love;
they both fall into knowledge about themselves; however, one is
about being less than human; while the other is about being full
of love, more human. Darla's movement in the Angel episode is
from heat, both in punishment flame and passion, desire sense,
to coolness, and water quenching her great thirst, perhaps somewhere
beneath all the pain and anger for this to end. Her movement onto
the roof is also, like Buffy's back in the season five opener,
a movement upwards. Buffy's is the opposite: hers is a movement
from coolness to the flame of passion and ultimately life. Buffy's
is a downward movement. The final antipathy between the two is
of course that Darla is dead; while Buffy is still alive, in some
sense. Darla's redemption, as it were, is that at the point of
her greatest joy, her greatest love, she has to end it because
she's a vampire.(In some sense really both characters' movement
is also down, in a fall of sorts, as for a vampire becoming more
human is a downward motion; and both fall into knowledge about
themselves.)
There is in this the deconstruction of the simplistic opposition
of good and evil. Here is a woman who grew up in a male dominated
society whose trust in life and love was dashed at an early age.
What does this monster do the moment she feels love? She sacrifices
herself. It's easy to talk about good and evil. It's even reassuring
to split them into absolute opposites. But, that doesn't get at
the root causes of things. It simply puts us in a strait jacket
of thinking where we cannot examine who we are. And it doesn't
begin to get at the real question of why we are what we are. Why
are there Darlas in this world? We can overlay a mythological
map over life, but then all we are left with is myth. As Buffy
said back in season four: we'd be myth-taken.
If we look at Darla's self sacrifice, like Buffy's we see that
it isn't an absolute act of selflessness, a 'good' act. Buffy
did die to save the world, but there was an element of selfishness
there too. It was a suicide of sorts. It's the same with Darla:
she dies out of love for her son; but she also recognizes that
she can't make up for the things she and Angelus did to Holtz.
In this sense she leaves Angel to face again not only the prospect
of bringing up a human baby, but also the punishment of Holtz.
She leaves him, just as Buffy left her friends and family. There
is a complexity of motivation that belies absolute opposition.
We are not just cardboard cut outs. Still, in some sense Angel's
being left to care for a human son is symbolic of the new society
I was mentioning above as the roles have been reversed: the male
is left to raise the child, be the parent. A new society in which
we recognize the ambiguity and depth of the human character as
the baby may symbolize through its undetermined role.
As you can see I've been trying to establish a connection between
the episodes, as if the two were co-ordinated together for meaning.
. For example, Holtz being frozen for two hundred years and then
being brought up to date is paralleled by Amy's being de-ratted.
Holtz also has a parallel to the trio. But then Holtz also parallels
Buffy in the sense that his loss of family has brought him to
the darker side of life with his cold rage. He's been kicked out
of the Eden of innocent righteousness, and then tempted out of
the sanctuary of his dead life, as Buffy is removed from heaven,
to the way of no mercy. The two are both vampire hunters, but
now both fallen angels on their different journeys through the
darkside of life. Buffy's coldness is different, of course, but
there's still a touch of righteousness about it. Then again Holtz
parallels Willow in that both are being controlled, used by an
external power to mask pain that they don't want or cannot face.
What I'm getting at is these may not be deliberate parallels between
the shows, but simply representations of the same processes due
to the same person heading the projects.
That's about all I wanted to say. Sorry this posting isn't as
coherent as I would have liked. It just seems to me, as I've mentioned
in other postings, that the writers may(or not) be availing themselves
of the two series to create more meaning. I would think also that
my usual diatribe against patriarchy is wearing a little thin.
I seem to be stuck in a rut, like a broken record. Perhaps this
is also the point of this season: it's time to grow up, to let
go of the deconstruction element of the series and get on with
something new. I guess we'll have to wait to find out....
Thanks for slogging through this. Hope it helps the discussion.
Age.
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[> [> [> Drat! No time to read this right now! -- verdantheart,
11:02:42 11/30/01 Fri
Your posts are so thought-provoking, I can't wait!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Me, too! But I'll print it out & hope
to find time to read it later. -- Deeva, 09:05:29 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> reference to A:tS season 1? -- purplegrrl, 11:45:33
11/30/01 Fri
Bravo! You're at least an 11 or 12 on the "Thinks Too Much"
scale!
Your part three gave me a thought about the end of season 1 of
Angel where Wesley translates the prophecy that says the vampire
with a soul will "shanshu." What if the prophecy was
not literal, that it did not mean that Angel would become human
again? But that he would be allowed to have a child that was human
that would be his legacy to the world? Perhaps this is a stretch,
but with the Oracles gone, Angel has no sure way of knowing if
or when the Powers That Be will choose to reward him for his deeds
on their behalf. And a child/children is often seen as a way to
continue in the world after death. As a vampire Angel is dead
(okay, technically "un-dead"). But his human child allows
him to come to life again.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: reference to A:tS season 1?Spoilers
both series to Present. -- Age, 19:53:48 12/01/01 Sat
It certainly makes sense as we are reminded by Darla that Angel
died in an alley. The human life that was destroyed is restored
in the next generation. And, this certainly is the connection,
as you pointed out, to life, human life as it continues. This
idea is reinforced by Holtz's disconnection from life as his family
were killed. The connection between Angel and Holtz is this disconnection
from life through Angel's acts as a vampire(disconnected from
life). Perhaps Holtz has been brought back to express the difficulty
Angel will have in holding onto the connection to his son, to
human life? Perhaps the son will have a double function: to be
Angel's son, a character in his own right; and a symbol of Angel's
humanity(the potential for that humanity was expressed in the
unborn child of the second season opener, if my memory is correct.)
Perhaps this then is the dichotomy, the struggle between the two
opposing forces expressed by Holtz(now working with demons) as
he makes Angel, through his son(the human), pay for past transgressions.
This is similar perhaps to Dawn and the Trio in 'Buffy.' The Trio
represent the tendency to stay adolescent, but more than this
they represent the masking of the authentic self with the fictional
world of arch villains. Note that their choice to be villains,
to travel the road of the darkside is a symbolic reflection of
what Buffy and Willow seem to be undergoing. Perhaps Dawn represents
the authentic self(the one that Dawn keeps lamenting no one seems
to notice), or the potential to uncover it. This would add a symbolic
dimension to the neglect that she's been experiencing as both
Buffy and Willow seem to have either lost sight or tried to lose
sight of who they are. It adds symbolic meaning to having Dawn
accompany Willow to Rack's as she is left outside in the waiting
room and is attacked by the demon representing how Willow views
herself. Even when Spike asks Buffy in the scene juxtaposed to
Willow and Dawn's if she's going to put her little sister in danger
just to spite him, one could interpret that symbolically as: are
you going to admit to your feelings or put your self at risk?
Last year Dawn was introduced in the episode 'Real Me', and these
words were echoed('Is this really me?') in the lyrics of Buffy's
first song in 'OMWF.'
What I'm really getting at is there's a symbolic dimension to
some of these characters. The shanshu may indeed be the son and
not Angel; but then the son would also remain(if he does) as an
enduring symbol of Angel's human life.
Age.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Brilliant analysis. Nice read. (nt) -- Keyser
Soze, 13:27:28 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Bluring the lines -- Traveler, 21:04:22 11/30/01
Fri
"Perhaps this is also the point of this season: it's time
to grow up, to let go of the deconstruction element of the series
and get on with something new. I guess we'll have to wait to find
out...."
I find myself very much hoping that this is true. Being an romantic,
I want to see all the characters grow and change for the better.
However, with Spike especially, this would require a paradigm
shift, a sort of deconstruction of the deconstruction that is
BtVS. If that's really what's happening, then we should continue
to see more of the lines that divide the Buffy world blur and
shift, until they are replaced with a new paradigm. I, for one,
am curious to see what that new world would look like.
And now for one idea for such a shift that I really really like.
Have you ever thought about what the provable existance of a soul
would do to abortion laws? You could just take your soul detector
and put it next to a woman's womb. If the creature inside has
a soul, it is human and thus protected by law. Then again, what
if souls just don't suddenly pop into being all at once? Isn't
it possible that souls slowly grow into existance as the fetus
grows? Ok, here's the punch line: what if creatures without a
soul could potentially grow one, just like a fetus? What if Peter
Pan decided to grow up one day?
Enter Spike. We have seen Spike doing a LOT of very unvampire-like
things recently. Indeed, I would argue that he even has a conscience
(e.g., he felt guilt over Buffy's death, and kept his vow to protect
Dawn). Maybe Spike's conscience is not fully formed, but it's
still there, and it's something that no souless creature should
have according to Buffy mythology. So, kiddies... has a new baby
soul been born inside Spike? And if so, will it grow and mature,
allowing him to do the same? Imagine if you will, what such a
fact would do to the entire Buffyverse mythos. All this time,
Buffy has been killing creatures that could have been redeemed.
Maybe she had no other choice, but the "goodness" of
her actions would be a lot less clear. Comments?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Bluring the lines -- Kimberly, 18:22:47
12/01/01 Sat
Very interesting. First Age's post (which I'm going to have to
read several times just to figure it out: I love it!), then this.
There's no question that Spike is changing; the only question
has been how far and how permanently. We don't yet know much about
souls in the Jossverse except: 1. Humans have souls. 2. Creating
a vampire rids the body of the soul. 3. Under very exceptional
circumstances, a vampire can be given a soul. So far, #3 has only
applied to Angel; the thought that it may apply to Spike (as an
infant soul) is fascinating.
I want the new first-run episodes!! This board is evil; it used
to be so much easier waiting!
:-)
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[> [> [> [> Re: More Blurring of the lines Spoilers
Buffy/Spike -- Age, 21:46:31 12/01/01 Sat
But, if we did have proof of the existence of a soul, and therefore
proof of life after physical death, then wouldn't the lines between
life and death be demolished as well: death wouldn't really be
death, but simply another form of being alive? What would that
do to the concept of murder? Thou shalt not kill, but then how
can anyone actually kill if there is no death?
I choose to see the soul in 'Buffy' like all the rest of the supernatural
imagery: as metaphor. For some reason the human being has been
killed off and replaced with a demon. This represents an almost
permanent change in outlook on the part of the human being. There
is a fundamental destruction of faith in oneself as human being
and in human society in general, with the resulting reliance on
the predatory instinct of our animal nature.
I echo your sentiment about Buffy killing off creatures that could
be redeemed. I think Whedon wanted to get away from the idea of
Buffy's killing human beings by emphasizing the demon aspect of
the vampire metaphor. But, I too have been concerned that this
isn't Buffy the Vampire Redeemer. What Buffy is doing is killing
off, finishing off out of necessity the remnants of a human being.
However, if the use of the word 'soul' is meant to imply that
the human being in some limbo state continues on(Angel's soul
restored from somewhere), then Buffy's staking is a form of slaying
of the person's inner demon, ie his or her problem, through the
intervention of the feminine or the deconstruction of patriarchal
myth, and frees that human being to go on in some other form to
continue living. In other words, the slaying is a symbolic representation
of getting to the heart of the problem, and releasing the human
being from the frozen state he or she is in. It is an act of penetration.
But the human being is not restored because you can't go back.
The person isn't the same; he or she isn't that same human being
he or she was before. In some sense the idea of 'soul' may imply
reincarnation which metaphorically implies this new person.
Not only this, but the vampires do also express problems that
the main characters are having. There is this supernatural metaphor
dimension to them.
Perhaps with Spike, Buffy the Vampire Slayer has slain Spike's
inner demon in a different way. She has penetrated his heart with
love. In this way, she herself doesn't have to act like the Slayer,
play the role. Spike will never be William again. He will never
be restored to that human being. Perhaps by transforming the demon
soul into one that is human, Whedon is expressing the change to
a new person that ordinarily would happen after a staking.
But, it's very late where I am, and I'm not exactly sure because
Angel's 'soul' seems to be a conscience. So, I'll leave it at
that.
Thanks for the reply and the questions.
Age.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Dewdrop and Diamond -- Rahael, 04:43:33 12/03/01 Mon
I turn my back on the board for two days and Age goes and posts
another great essay!!
Yet again more thoughtprovoking and complex ideas here. Your expanding
on your thesis beautifully - and it definitely holds up with each
new episode. The frozen man in the museum (the place to store
dead historical artifacts) made me go "oh, Age would love
this!"
Have a lot of thoughts, including on the image of the diamond.
You correlate it implicitly with the 'clear, shiny' moment that
Buffy had in the Gift. That is very convincing. It brought to
mind a Graves poem on called 'Dewdrop and Diamond' which I wish
I could quote from memory, but I can't. So I will have to post
again later from home.
Graves also came to mind because you talk of the link between
the moon, and femininity. Graves of course, in his figure of the
White Goddess uses this imagery time and time again.
Hope you are still around to discuss this.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Dewdrop and Diamond -- Rahael, 14:04:02 12/03/01
Mon
Ok, here it is:
The difference between you and her
(Whom I to you did once prefer)
Is clear enough to settle:
She like a diamond shone, but you
Shine like an early drop of dew
Poised on a red rose-petal.
The dew-drop carries in its eye,
Mountain forest, sea and sky,
With every change of weather;
Contrariwise, a diamond splits
The prospect into idle bits
That none can piece together.
Robert Graves
It seems to me that this poem contrasts the wholeness of 'water'
with the hardness of diamond...the dew-drop may be more fragile,
but it contains so much more. Buffy's clear, shining and fiery
moment of perfection was complete in itself. She now needs, as
you emphasise to 'unfreeze' again.
I have been wondering for a while about the images of water and
fire in Season 6 - I hadn't considered them as gendered images
until now. Thanks for that. And I definitely hadn't considered
the complexity of the diamond imagery either.
The ideas you have brought up require yet more thought from me........
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Dewdrop and Diamond Spoilers Buffy to Present.
-- Age, 19:11:28 12/03/01 Mon
Thanks you for searching out the poem.
The water image(feminity, wholeness, movement) is placed upon
the symbol of love, the rose; but its placement further suggests
movement: it is poised and not solid and stationary like the dead
diamond. There is no life without movement. And the movement is
towards a healthier way of approaching romantic relationships
as the fresh dew drop, an image of morning and therefore awakening
life/love, will nourish the symbol of love, the rose, as it makes
its way down to the roots; unlike the diamond, which, keeping
its form, would simply stay upon the petal until it breaks.
The narrator reinforces the wholeness image and the naturalness
of the person to whom he is addressing his comments by showing
how the roundness(again feminine image) of the dewdrop takes every
natural image in without distorting that image into pieces, without
making it into an illusion of sorts where everything is separate.
I hadn't quite seen this aspect of the diamond image. There is
an emphasis on the natural, as opposed to the man made, the compartmentalized
view of the world from which come the repression and devaluation
of the feminine in the male dominated world. Thanks.
Another aspect of the image I hadn't considered until this poem
is based again on the contrast between the natural and man-made.
In my posting I suggested that Buffy has been made through abandonment
to be frozen like the diamond. However, that idea is implicit
in the diamond image itself because it is a cut diamond. It, like
Buffy, has been made to be what it is by the hands of others.
In other words, piece by piece, bits of Buffy have been sliced
off, pieces taken out of her by the events in her life until like
this perfect shining crystal of death, she takes the opportunity
given to her by Joss Whedon to end it all in one perfect flawless
moment. Then of course he takes it back because life isn't about
perfect swan dives into oblivion, it's messy, and flawed and it's
about growing up and having more joy and suffering and self sacrifice
and an opportunity to live before you really die. That's of course
the real contrast and why Buffy could come back: Joyce's death
was real in the sense of being physical; Buffy's death was also
supernatural and therefore metaphorical: it represented how she
felt.
In passing, the Trio have gathered the first piece of the plan
to, I would imagine, take over Sunnydale. If they have retrieved
a metaphor for Buffy, then it seems likely that at some point
in the future they will gather more items that represent the Scooby
gang and the season will end with a confrontation between them
and the Gang in a symbolic representation of the latter's uncovering
of their own desire to be adolescent(none of the gang is now aware
of the trio's involvement) and then the vanquishing of the trio
through the destruction of the mechanism made up of the items
representing the Scooby gang. It could very well be that Buffy
smashes the diamond, or, more fitting to the imagery of your poem,
changes it to a water image. But, this is only speculation and
not based at all on spoilers.
The idea in your poem of splitting into idle (with the emphasis
on idle,) bits reminds me of the difference between the queen
of diamonds and the queen of hearts in the Eagles song. But, to
be honest with you, the poem you have selected is much better.
Finally, you bring up the idea of fragility. This is a perfect
part of the metaphor to express our emotions and even our life,
but by the same token we are strong and will survive like the
water, not in the same form as before, but we will go on. The
diamond's worth, on the other hand, is lost once it is smashed,
changed to another form. Will Buffy let go of her diamond nature,
or will she be smashed along with it?
Thank you.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> Buffy's Diamond and Willow's Crystal --
Wisewoman, 20:14:06 12/03/01 Mon
Fascinating discussion. I wonder about the representation of Buffy
as cold, hard, man-formed diamond in relation to Willow and the
crystal of the Tabula Rasa spell, blackened and fragile enough
to be crushed under Xander's heel.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: Buffy's Diamond and Willow's
Crystal Spoilers B & A to Present -- Age, 22:58:28 12/03/01 Mon
Good question. And I think your question sums up the reason for
the difference in the two forms of crystal relating to the two
characters. Willow's state of mind is much more fragile than that
of Buffy's. Your observation shows that the writers are using
the image to show the attempt to stop life from progressing. The
basis of 'Buffy' is the constant struggle to work through problems
that seem to reach supernatural proportions because of denial
and repression, and the frozen states as symbolized by the supernatural
metaphor that alot of people in Sunnydale get into: vampires,
demons and, for Willow, being a witch. Tara isn't a witch; she's
a person who uses witchcraft. One could even argue that Buffy,
coming back incomplete, as the cutting short of the spell signifies,
has become simply the slayer, not registering as human on Spike's
chip. But not the primal slayer or the socially engaged slayer
that Buffy has been, but simply the role, going through the motions,
ie she too has become stuck in her supernatural metaphor. What
I'm getting at is her very last act in season five was that of
the slayer. She became attached to that moment, and the results
of it, and now she's gotten stuck, so to speak in the role that
she played out. She has to come back to her human self. It isn't
that the spell 'made' her incomplete; it's that she was incomplete.
Giles says that she has everything inside her already, and she
does, but she's afraid to open to it. She locked herself away
like a precious diamond in a museum, never to be touched, never
to be alive again, never to be a woman because women are not innocent.
Of course they aren't, they are adult human beings. They are persons,
not girls or angels.
I just want to point out that while Buffy's sexuality is being
shown, obviously, as part of her, and not something bad or corrupting,
the pairing of 'Smashed' and 'Lullaby', in my opinion, besides
the obvious symbolic parallel of the journey to human contact
between the series and the deconstruction/reconstruction of identity
in the parallel relationships on the series, was meant to show
the responsibility that comes along with sexuality in the birth
of Angel's baby.
Thanks for the observation.
Age.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> And thanks for the explication...;o)
-- Wisewoman, 08:20:12 12/04/01 Tue
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Fluidity and change -- Rahael, 09:26:24
12/04/01 Tue
Wow, Age, thank you...that was a really thoughtful response...made
the poem seem even more relevant than I thought when I remembered
it.
It seems to me, reading your posts, that fluidity and staticness
is inextricably linked to the 'oh grow up', out of Eden theme.
For to be open to change, to grow up, to understand that self
identity is not an 'ever fixed mark' is to be alive.
Joss Whedon commented that none of the characters could ever stay
static - their lives were full of change...and their lives could
even dissolve. The characters this year are walking the tightrope
between two different facilitators of change - the metamorphosis
that occurs in the heat of fire, and the erosion that water can
cause. People need warmth, they need fire - water is essential
for life. But one can also burn away, or drown. At the same time,
to stay static is impossible.
The Sun of course stands for fire, and the moon is intimately
connected with water. These are again random thoughts rather than
a coherent thesis. But it seems that Buffy and Spike, with the
often puzzling and contrary changes they are undergoing are the
very representation of this change. Moreover, the fact that they
are simultaneously strange and ambiguous - both dead and alive
make them ideal canvases for this story. Buffy and Spike are temporal
and physical oddities. What man has always feared seems to be
the onward march of time, the ravages of time, the inevitablity
of death (Hardy's 'time-torn' man, Shakespeare's 'Here lies one
whose name was writ in water, Marvell's 'time's winged chariot',
Larkins 'and then the only end of age' etc etc) Buffy and Spike
seem to be the exploration of these concerns in the Buffyverse,
a concern which first really kicked off with the 'Body'. It wouldn't
surprise me if the ending of their stories will somehow have a
pleasing diametric, and opposing nature. (And that's as far as
I will ever get to a predicted ending for BtVS!)
hmm...if this is a bit incoherent, forgive me. I got a pay rise
today (yay me!!)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Hey! Congrats, Rahael!! ;o) -- Wisewoman,
15:51:41 12/04/01 Tue
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[> [> [> [> [> Re: Fluidity and change -- Age,
16:05:40 12/04/01 Tue
Congratulations on the pay raise.
I watched a documentary on TV a month or so ago about neanderthals
and homo sapiens. Instead of the former being savage brutes as
they have been characterized, the scientists theorized from evidence
that they lived relatively peaceably alongside homo sapiens with
the two groups exchanging ideas, goods etc. The difference between
the two groups seems to be in the strategy that each adopted for
making a living , so to speak. The neanderthals adopted a stationary
strategy where they had a large home base around which they hunted
and gathered. The homo sapiens on the other hand were nomadic.
Their strategy conformed more to the fundamental condition of
the earth, change, and availed them of the opportunity to develop
their brains and exchange ideas, goods etc. The neanderthals died
out, but we are descended from those people who were able to move
along with the world.
I see your point about Spike and Buffy: they are both in an indeterminate
state, alive and dead, ambiguous, perhaps on the brink of change,
not one thing or another. They are thus not defined or static
in their identities. I think people are afraid not only of death
as the final outcome of change, and attempt to deny it, but they
are afraid that the fluidity of identity entails a complete lack
of identity. This is why in various postings I keep bringing up
buddhism. I'm not a buddhist in the sense of proselytizing a religion
as I don't really know if there's life after physical death or
not, but the ideas of buddhism seem to fit the world. If we say
that we have a definite unchanging identity, then that is incorrect.
If we say that we have no identity, then that is incorrect. What
can we say? A zen buddhist would then hit the ground in response.
The zen buddhists characterize these two options in this way:
the former is being attached to name and form, like Buffy being
the diamond; and the latter is being attached to emptiness, the
fluidity, change in which nothing is then said to exist. We are
not something and we are not nothing. It is the attachment to
oppositional thinking that creates the problem. People want to
make themselves into a definite something out of fear that they
are nothing.
While I hasten to reiterate that I'm not proselytizing buddhism,
it seems that the Buddha figure as central icon in the Magic Box
is meant to allude to the concepts I'm discussing in this posting.
It's not an allusion to buddhism as a religion, but as a way of
looking at the world and ourselves.
It is the same with the water and fire images: to have too much
of one, we drown, to have too much of the other, we burn. It is,
as buddhism suggests, a middle path. But, it's not doing away
with passion, with the zest for life, not doing away with the
highs and lows but being able to manage them. This perhaps more
than anything is what the buddha figure on the counter of the
Magic Box signifies: the importance of managing oneself, as opposed
to the strategy of denial and repression, for buddhism is about
daily practice through meditation and letting go.
Anyway, this discussion is about 'Buffy' and not buddhism; so
I'll leave it at that.
Thank you for your comments. They have given more depth to the
symbolic analysis of my postings.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Fluidity and change --
Kimberly, 06:47:31 12/05/01 Wed
Keep right on with the Buddhism; I've been enjoying learning more
from someone who appears to be a practitioner (as opposed to books).
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[> [> [> [> [> [> Thanks! and some further thoughts
-- Rahael, 07:38:42 12/05/01 Wed
The pleasure of having good news is immeasurably enhanced by being
able to share it with such great people!
(Age, I agree very much on your thoughts on Buddhism. And I like
o/t posts, and know that I am not the only person who does.
The most interesting thing about Buddhism to me is absolutely
its view of self identity, and the way it shows you a different
way of navigating your way through life.
As someone whose mother was a Christian and father was a Buddhist,
I have no difficulty marrying two totally different world views,
which is kind of apropos to what Ryuei was discussing above, regarding
the syncretic nature of much religious practice in the East.)
Last night in chat, some thoughts were discussed about order/chaos
in the Buffyverse. I hope that Cygnus and d'Herblay will post
their theories here (hint hint!). Ethan Rayne worshipped Janus
(who was portrayed as an agent of Chaos). Now it was pointed out
to me that Janus is in fact an agent of order...assigning everything
to its proper place. So why did the writers depict him as the
opposite? and how is order portrayed in the Buffyverse? Is it
because the line between the two is so thin? that there is some
instability right at the heart of order? That the very thing one
is asked to be sure of (myself, my identity, 'I') can be the most
uncertain thing?
These questions seem to be exemplified in the person of Dawn -
'real me'. Uncertain of who she is, the baby of the buffyverse,
she is simultaneously one of the most ancient and powerful forces
there. She had the power to create complete disorder, bring down
all barriers, collapse the walls of existence.
It always seemed to me to be one of the wittiest jokes that the
writers have ever created. Her presence in the series as a character
is exactly mirrored by her existence according to the plot. (i.e,
she is unreal, unexpected, totally made up by a group of people,
and yet we find it hard to imagine Sunnydale without her.) Her
existence highlights the artificiality of the television series
we watch, while also highlighting the problematic nature of 'self
identity' within the Buffyverse itself.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> I am constitutionally
oblivious to hints. -- d'Herblay, 01:22:21 12/06/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Thanks! and some
further thoughts Spoilers Buffy and Angel -- Age, 09:08:46 12/06/01
Thu
I couldn't agree with you more.
Good point about Dawn being a meta-character, in the sense of
reminding us of the fiction of Sunnydale. I'm glad that they have
included such a character for this reason because fiction is an
abstraction from reality. These actors are playing the real suffering
that goes on in life, but it is one thing to write and act a scene,
say, the one on the bus where Darla kills all those people, and
another for that to happen in real life. Or, it's fine to have
someone like Cordelia lose access to her money and have to become
a shop assistant; it's a wonderful lesson for her, a tribute to
her character that she can do it, and an opportunity for Xander
to make amends, but we as an audience don't really feel her suffering.
There's still that barrier between how in real life the character
would feel and the feelings we have as an audience. The same could
be said of all the characters of course.
That is not to say that fiction can't convey feeling, and often
we feel more due to excellent writing and acting, but what I'm
trying to get at is the difference between the real experience
say of that which the poem 'Dulce et Decorum Est' is based upon,
a mustard gas attack in World War I, and the aesthetic experience
of that suffering through the transformation of art. As fiction,
it is all symbol: it refers to another world, but can never be
that world unless the bombs or the mustard gas or the vampires
are real for us. I am so glad you mentioned this aspect about
Dawn in your comments. Of course Joss Whedon's point in doing
the series, his wink at us, is, as your comments point out, the
joke that this fiction can never come close to the real horror
of life.
Wow! I am not only now astounded at how many people enjoy and
treat 'Buffy' with the seriousness it deserves, but I'm beginning
to see that our backgrounds are similar also. Here I am preaching
zen buddhism at you when you probably know more about it than
I do. How fortunate you are to be able to see these two religions
together. And even more fortunate to have that vision from your
parents.
It's also good to see buddhism being talked about as I kept seeing
the buddhist icons popping up in both 'Buffy' and 'Angel' and
thought to myself, wow, this has got to be deliberate. In the
scene where Dawn learns she is the key we are meant to see three
symbolic images: the unicorn(the animal that would rather die
than join the herd, ie symbol of innocence), the troll's hammer
of deconstruction, and the Buddha figure, representing change.
Now the buddha figure is the central icon of the Magic Box. Also,
on 'Angel' the demon protector that Angel kills and must replace(become)
in one of his season openers is a practising buddhist with an
altar. Or, the buddhist demons that Angel must fight in the monastery
representing those people who have become attached to the sanctuary
of the cloister as a way of dealing with loss and have forgotten
the buddhist principle that all is change. Or, even more recently
the Buddha head used to help break the walls of sanctuary down.
Your comments about Janus are interesting. My anti-patriarchal
bent gets into everything: the desire to maintain order through
repression is the very cause of disorder in the first place; it
is a self perpetuating system whereby the ruling classes seek
to keep power by denying the humanity of the majority. This denial,
this repression of human self then creates a rage, a repressed
outrage as it were, which is a destabilizing force. The repressive
regime then uses this tendency to destabilization as an excuse
for repressing even more. This is one of the main themes of season
four with the Initiative. Adam is built to fight the agents of
chaos, the demons, but is simply one himself. Riley becomes labelled
as an anarchist, but his and the Scooby's way of approaching life
brings stability through mutual respect and love. Season four,
in my opinion, is a tribute to 'The Prisoner' series of the sixties
which dealt with these issues.
Thus, the very desire to create the thick walls, the illusory
security that denies change and death leads only to a psychological
disease and a form of spiritual death. It is represented in the
surface dwellers of Sunnydale consumers or in the muggles of 'Harry
Potter.' Do we manage ourselves through a daily practice of some
sort, or do we get stuck in emotional states because we daren't
even think that there may be even a hint of certain 'bad' feelings
which a 'good' person could never have.
Getting back to your comments about Dawn. It has been proposed
that she is a metaphor for the formless form of buddhism as she
was amorphous energy made into flesh. As, I'm sure you already
know, in buddhism form is emptiness(absence of form) and emptiness
is form. The one is the other. In other words the concepts of
form and emptiness apply to the world in a limited capacity. If
you get stuck attached to form, you try to make the world more
stable as if there is no change; if on the other hand you get
attached to the fluidity, to the emptiness, then this is like
a depression where nothing matters, there's no you or me, and
everything is bliss and peace(like Buffy's heaven.) Janus cannot
really be the agent of chaos without being its opposite. The two
are inseparable: form is emptiness; emptiness is form.
Thanks again for your comments.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Dis/Order -- Rahael,
18:15:13 12/06/01 Thu
Thanks Age!
What buddhism I know I get by osmosis, rather than anything I
have learned formally. So, what you say resonates with me, and
is very helpful, cos I can then pin stuff down.
That's a very thoughtful point about how fiction and imagination
simply hold a mirror to life, through which we get a fleeting
picture of 'reality'. It reminds me of the Hans Christian Anderson
story about the Emporer and the Nightingale (is it Anderson? I'm
not sure). The Emperor orders an artificial one to be made, but
it cannot replicate the sweetness of the plain unvarnished truth.
Yeats picked up on this in 'Sailing to Byzantium' - an artificial,
golden nightingale as the poet's role, amusing the court. (Interesting
harking back also to Philip Sidney's 'Defence of Poesy' where
Sidney says that the poet should creat a 'golden' world, better
than reality, nearer to the Platonic ideal than the shadows of
this world.)
But the point you make about the pain only being signposted, not
really felt is so true...pain in art is cathartic, it is there
for our pleasure. I guess Buddhism would say that reality, and
experiencing the world one lives in says more to us than a thousand
words could ever say - the beauty of a flower, of a loved one
far more appreciated in the flesh than through a Shakesperian
sonnet. But we impose an order and coherence to life, pain, beauty
through fiction. We invest meaning into the bewildering pain we
feel through the structure of a narrative whether it be religion,
novel, or poem (picked because those are the narratives I use!)
Isn't it noticeable how Dawn 'writes' her life, in her diaries?
And like all of us, who discover that our self perceptions, our
little vanities are mistaken, she too is shattered when she realises
the truth about herself? As her self identity is taken away from
her, she tears up her diaries, her old narratives about her lives.
Unable to create new ones, she tries to feel more 'real' and cuts
herself.
She fears what we all fear, that without boundaries, without limits,
without order, the entire world will collapse around you - you
will be lost - hell will break lose. What is interesting about
the Gift is that Dawn's fears nearly come about - except for the
supremely *selfless* act that Buffy commits. The Gift shows that
while we might fear emptiness, and lack of boundaries, Buffy's
identification with the whole of the universe at that one great
moment, her ability to see the entire world in the person she
is saving, is what saves Dawn. I think this ties in with your
comments on form and emptiness.
Buffy reaches her understanding instinctively, not thoughtfully,
because sometimes thought can obscure. She radiates compassion
- she *is* love. She immerses herself into existence, she 'dies'
to herself.
Foucault would say that power arises from the naming of things,
of the categorisation of the world, the creation of dichotomies
of order and disorder. You are good, you are evil, this is night,
that is day. It is significant that Adam mimics God's creative
naming of the universe by naming plants and animals. The roots
of patriarchy are indeed well rooted! My earlier question was
mistaken. The issue is not so much about Order and disorder, but
about the very categories, the very question I asked. The narratives
that we impose on life obscure the real world to us.
As you point out, rejecting these categories, deconstructing them
is not only a powerful activity, but also a liberating one. The
world of Sunnydale likes to divide itself into good/bad human/demon
souled/unsouled normal/abnormal. I am interested to see where
Joss takes this, and what kind of Sunnydale we will have by the
end of the series.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: Dis/Order
Spoilers for Buffy to Present. -- Age, 15:27:45 12/07/01 Fri
You make some excellent points about Dawn. I had seen Dawn's story
as our own: she moves along in her life with her ideas about herself,
as you point out using the diaries, and then all of a sudden she
learns that she isn't just a person but a link(when Buffy learns
that Dawn is the key, she's by a link fence) (a tool, the key
to the human race continuing,) in a reproductive chain. Joss pairs
this with the beginning of menstruation(the Little Red Riding
Hood mention by Spike and blood image of the arm and the menstrual
blood image repeated on the tower in 'The Gift',(fertility and
mortality are one.)) In the face of this new knowledge about mortality
being something she cannot fight(as Buffy discovers) because it
is part of her, she has to re-examine what her identity as a human
being means. Is she then just nothing, a key, a provider of DNA
for the next generation? If she, Buffy/Dawn gives into this idea,
then she uses Dawn/herself simply as the key, ie becomes the predatory
Beast, as Glory is called, keeping the species going but without
a human identity; if on the other hand she ignores this aspect
and tries to have a human life without the acknowledgement of
her own role in the reproductive chain, then she becomes like
Ben, attempting to be part of the herd, denying certain aspects
of himself(Glory), trying to fight the idea of death as symbolized
by Ben's being a medical intern. Either way the human race loses
out, either through the race itself ending or its humanity. Again
it is this tension between form and emptiness: if we did not have
a form, then the fluidity would mean nothing; but, if we were
simply form, and therefore lacking movement, we'd be dead.
Your comment about Buffy's seeing the world in one person certainly
reinforces buddhist ideas. I had split Buffy's oneness with the
world from her concern for Dawn. Dawn was for me both the daughter
figure(representing the next generation for which we die to make
way) and Buffy herself, the innocent human that she saves through
her actions. But the idea of the one character for Buffy being
her whole world is another way of expressing oneness.
It's intriguing. Now that I look at last season, this season is
contained in it: Buffy reproduces, but without sexual contact.
There's a kind of virgin birth, so to speak. While she does accept
her role as mother, there's no sexuality to accompany it: she's
only the mother. The role of adult usually comes in this order:
fertility, sex, motherhood and death. But, when Buffy dives off
the tower, she is incomplete, still adolescent.
Also, her movement downwards to the earth is already part of the
fall imagery we've seen this season. Unfortunately her movement
downwards is stopped dead, literally, as the movement in her life
comes to a deadening halt. She then gets stuck in her heavenly,(
the tower platform was in the heavens,) moment of oneness(the
death occurs in the air), or in buddhist terms, emptiness where
everything is one and there's no pain or doubt because there is
nothing. The enlightening experience, this clarity of vision as
like the dew drop in your poem which reflects everything, gets
changed to the cut diamond as she becomes attached to that vision.
It is the child Buffy, Dawn, who is left representing both the
clarity of vision, the seeing things through a child's eye, not
losing that vision to cynicism, and Buffy's not having opened
to her sexuality. To express the latter also, the diamond's association
with ice comes into play in 'Smashed.'
It's as if we have two types of innocence here: the innocence
of vision, the don't know mind of buddhism, seeing things in an
all inclusive way sans category; and pre-sexual innocence.
I think one of the main aspects of zen buddhism is letting go,
non-attachment. You make a good point about creating stories,
giving form to our suffering and our lives. We do use categories
in our thinking. Finding a balance between naming things, making
things into definite forms, and seeing that they are formless
comes in non-attachment. It is using thinking and categories as
the tools they are for representing the world, and not becoming
attached to the symbols. The zen buddhists call this not becoming
attached to the finger pointing at the moon.
It'll certainly be interesting to see where Joss Whedon takes
this.
Thanks.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> A
blatant attempt to keep this thread alive -/ kindermoord -- Rahael,
02:32:48 12/12/01 Wed
Possibly pathetic as well! Nevermind!
I've read in some detail d'Herblay's essay on Apocalypse in Buffy.
The idea which leaps out at me here is where he points out that
the fear of apocalypse, the collapsing of the world, is also a
fear of the breakdown of the mind, and the break down of the man
made dichotomies and barriers that we put up.
I have been wondering about Doc's role in all of this - he wields
the knife which cuts Dawn, and simultaneously tears the universe.
At once, Dawn's body becomes the universe as the shallow cuts
in her body rends Sunnydale.
Age also made an excellent point some time ago about knifes as
the points of arguments. His name 'Doc' should have warned us
long before that he was intended to carry out this terrible surgery.
Who is he? Is he the ultimate personification of death? death
of thought, of body? He is certainly creepy and black clad enough
to qualify. In fact he reminds me of the evil, black clad man
(forgotten actual name) which stalks the children's hospital in
'Killed by Death'. The nightmare of childhood.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
An unanswerable technical question -- d'Herblay, 09:17:43 12/12/01
Wed
Once again, you have astounded me with a beautiful observation:
Doc as the terrible surgeon of the universes. I have to admit
that when I hear the appellation "Doc," I think of the
smartest and only non-adjectival of the Disney Dwarfs; I do not
think "Doc Mengele." And Doc's place in season five
was a beautiful piece of misdirection on Marti's part. In "Forever,"
Doc, clad in a bathrobe, seems the kindly, wise old man, the sort
who would be called "Doc" whether or not he possessed
a graduate degree. (Rob, this is your opportunity to explicate
the connections between "Peter and the Wolf" and the
Season Five arc.) Even at the beginning of his appearance in "The
Weight of the World," he shows a concern for Dawn that seems
sincere; and still he wears the bathrobe. The black-and-white
ensemble worn in "The Gift," on the other hand, is more
associated with Doc Holliday than the kindly country doctor.
My technical question is this: while the credits for "Forever"
clearly state "Joel Grey as Doc," according to the transcript
no one addresses him by this or any other name in that episode
or in "The Weight of the World." It is only on the scaffold,
after he has produced his scalpel, that Spike calls him "Doc."
Could "Doc" be only Spike's typically twisted nickname
for him? Now this falls into the category of unanswerable questions,
so I do not wish to provoke a tedious debate with some people
claiming "It has to be his real name," others saying
"It doesn't have to at all," and one lone nut-case arguing,
"His real name is Connor. Angel named the baby after him."
But if it is possible that Spike is not only the sole person on
the show to call him this, but the sole person in the un-shown
back-story, then the eerie prescience should be noted. And with
this in mind, one must wonder about the macabre foreshadowing
of the cutting in Spike's tendency to call Dawn "little bit."
("Kindestod.")
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> And yet more macabre foreshadowing -- Rahael, 09:33:06 12/12/01
Wed
Thanks (for the compliment! I feel honoured!) and thanks (for
the name of the kindestod) again. I have just realised that 'Kindermoord'
came from the Brueghal painting I saw recently - it means the
murder of the innocents. Just as chilling really. I was reaching
for something there, and that came up first.
And yes, your question is unanswerable by me. But it brings up
interesting thoughts.
And for your point about the foreshadowing implied in Spike's
name for her. And here's another, I realised. Dawn's cutting of
herself, seems to be not only foreshadowing but a chilling realisation
on her part of her eventual purpose, to be cut into little bits.
You might even say its 'ghost guessed' as Gerald Manley Hopkins
put it. The dismemberment of the Buffybot is another echo, as
yet another copy of Buffy is torn apart.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> Re: Connections. Spoilers B and A to Present and Harry
Potter -- Age, 22:44:25 12/12/01 Wed
This idea of being cut is contained, as we have discussed, in
the diamond image.
As I mentioned before I saw the Dawn story mostly in terms of
the reproduction of the human race. Also the Buffybot's destruction
I saw in terms of the deconstruction of the dumb blond stereotype.
Your new discussion adds much more to this.
To sustain the idea of keeping this thread alive and to continue
my idea of connections, here is a tongue-in-cheek or should I
say, scar-on-cheek thought about Angel's baby and Harry Potter.
Well, they both have scars on their faces as babies. They both
may be destined for greatness as the exec at Wolfram and Hart
suggests about Connor: because of Darla's act as a vampire, the
son may be destined to grow up and take them all out. As in Potter,
Connor's mother sacrifices herself fighting Voldemort. I have
to explain this. If my memory is correct, Darla was originally
vamped on her deathbed, as a means of escaping death. Darla's
vampire nature then is her own flight from death, loosely and
literally translated as 'vol de mort.' In sacrificing herself
she protects her son from her own Voldemort. In fact her own flight
from death is ended in this act. Also, both Connor and Harry have
an aspect of the demon in them(perhaps): Harry has been imprinted
with the snake; while Connor has been imprinted with the vampire
as Angel's vamp face soothing of him seems to signify. Both are
male based symbols. The ambiguity of Connor's destiny is paralleled
by the ambiguity in Harry himself as symbolized by the sorting
hat's comments.
More connections: 'Wrecked' and 'Dad': the coincidence of the
wreckage in both eps, and the flight in the car by Willow and
Angel. Of course there is a great irony between these two as Willow
is actually running away from something; while Angel has already
overcome his reticence at leaving his baby with others, and is
simply symbolically putting those fears to rest: bang!
Also, I wonder if the parody of a vampire slayer's being called
in the Justine/Holtz scenes may be connected to this year's 'Buffy'
arc as a commentary on the role of the slayer as Buffy re-invents
herself? Certainly both arcs are examining the pain of sudden
loss and, perhaps, the problems arising from a lack of help reintegrating
into life again. It's possible that the vampire slayer parody
and Holtz may symbolize aspects of Angel's past that he's going
to have to deal with before he can properly move on with his life.
Whatever it may be, the episode 'Dad' certainly made the distinction
between life and mission, last year's reaction on the part of
Angel(vengeance or otherwise.)
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> All threads lead to Harry Potter? -- Traveler,
02:57:48 12/13/01 Thu
This entire thread is amazing, Age. I must say, though; I didn't
expect to get new insight into Harry Potter! Vol de Mort. How
cool is that?
I think we can be glad that Giles wasn't anything like Holtz when
Buffy first encountered him. I shudder to think how THAT would
have turned out.
You know, Angel going vamp face to calm the baby reminded me (strangely)
about Tabula Rasa. Like Spike, Angel remained in game face longer
than normal, and it just didn't fit him somehow. He didn't ACT
like a vampire; the vamp face was little more than a mask.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> Re: And back again... Spoilers for B and
A to 'Dad.' -- Age, 08:26:00 12/13/01 Thu
I got the same impression from Angel's vamp face, but I hadn't
made the connection to Spike's. Thanks. It does seem as if these
characters are growing up; and, having the vamp face as a mask
only is another indication of this.
Holtz is taking up where Angel left off last year. As a character
from Angel's out of control adolescence, he symbolizes not only
that adolescence but Angel's attitude that we saw only last year
at this time. As for Justine, her name is very similar to justice,
and points at the motivation of her mission. While the mission
is really one of vengeance, it brings to mind Angel's own desire
to bring himself to justice by helping others. Again, I think
that Justine may be a figure from Angel's past, the vampire slayer,
used to highlight how much Angel's thinking has changed: it's
not a matter of becoming human or of atoning for past wrongs,
but simply helping others. This is exactly what Holtz and Justine
can't see at the moment, blinded by their pain. This is made abundantly
clear as Justine isn't a vampire slayer, but specifically now
being trained as a Vampire-with-a-soul-who-has-atoned-for-alot-of-what-he's-done-in-the-past-and-now-has-a-baby-that-he-loves-and-wants-to-protect
Slayer. As you said in your posting about the mask, it doesn't
seem like a vampire they are chasing at all. They are chasing
the title character of the episode, 'Dad.'
It's interesting to note the introduction that the exec at Wolfram
made to the baby he was watching on the screen, and to note the
contrast between the human exec and the vampire Angel in that
the former gave up his children for his place in the firm, while
the latter is taking responsibility for the care and protection
of his. I like this situation because its a deconstruction of
the traditional roles of caretaker, and an acknowledgement of
our emerging new society. In my postings above, I asked whether
males could do traditionally female roles as an empowerment of
the feminine. Well, here's my answer. 'Buffy' is examining the
role of the power culture in the way women now deal with their
emotional lives; while on 'Angel' we are seeing this movement
towards the valuation not only of women(anti-misogyny in 'Billy';
Cordy learning to defend herself etc) but of the feminine itself
in having Angel look after his child. In fact when Cordy says
that Angel doesn't have a woman's touch, this was meant to highlight
the idea that it isn't a matter of a woman or a man, but of finding
masculine or feminine aspects in yourself, even deconstructing
the whole idea of what is feminine or masculine and just going
with the person that you are: hence the vamp face.
Getting back to the introduction by the exec, just as Darla's
vamp nature had become, in itself her own punishment, in that
she had to stake herself and leave her only source of love and
joy, Angel's very nature as a vampire will be his on-going punishment
(perhaps Holtz will come to realize this) as he will be left out
of many aspects of his son's life.(This perhaps was also part
of the episode, 'Dad': the reticence to let go of his son was
also tied to the unwillingness to see that there would still be
a gulf between Angel and his son in some respects.) More than
this, perhaps Holtz will come to realize that it isn't a matter
of punishment, but a sense of seeing these characters for who
they are, with the transgressions of the past part of what makes
up their character: their crosses to bear so to speak. But, this
is only speculation. In this way, while Angel will have both the
joy and responsibility of raising a child, he will also have the
pain of not being fully part of his life. The child then will
incorporate the fulfilment of the human aspect of Angel, with
a sense of loss coming from his vampire side. Angel will have
to do a certain amount of mourning for aspects of his fatherhood;
and he will find his vampire aspect to be somewhat of a liability,
with his son being attracted to that side of him, seeing it as
cool and wanting to be one just like his 'Dad.'
Thanks.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> Sunnydale Hospital -- Rahael, 08:47:50 12/13/01 Thu
Wow, this thread has definitely regenerated.
While I go and think some more about Harry and Connor, I thought
I'd put down another thought I had. All through Season 5, we go
back and forth from Sunnydale Hospital. A place, where of course
Life begins, and Life ends. Dawn's life begins near the start
of Season 5. Joyce keeps going to the hospital (for tests, coming
back with baby Dawn in WoTW). And of course, Ben/Glory is associated
with that. Was it Age who earlier pointed out that Ben as an intern/nurse
is associated with the ushering in of death? and does this not
add another irony to Doc's name? We think of doctors as kindly
people who cure us, and bring us into the world. But they are
also the people who look after our cold bodies. And nothing they
can do staves off the inevitability of our death.
I've just been so inspired by Age's potrayal of the scaffold as
a kind of grand play, (i'm tempted to say Passion Play, but the
subject is not entirely appropriate) where life/death/rebirth
is reenacted. Dawn rises over Sunnydale as Buffy jumps off. Hospitals
are the places of birth *and* death because those two are one
and the same are inseperable. Joyce dies because she gave life
to Dawn ...and this eternal tale of sacrifice and reward is echoed
in Angel.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> Re: Sunnydale Hospital Spoilers Season 5 -- Age, 12:14:46
12/13/01 Thu
This series is so inspiring, isn't it. I had almost given up on
television until Joss Whedon's creation renewed the medium, and
put into it the potential it always had. You can't have television
unless it is thoroughly entertaining. You can't throw out the
enjoyment and sit the audience down with literary devices and
dark themes and expect the show to last. Nor can you try to meld
enjoyment, humour to a show that is literary and darkly themed;
the enjoyment and the humour have to come from the characters
and the plot. Joss Whedon pulls it off, just look at 'Tabula Rasa'
or 'Once More With Feeling.' What a romp these two episodes are;
yet how literary and dark as well. Wow!
You make an excellent point about the hospital and Doc. I hadn't
picked up on the relevance of Doc's name, but it fits in nicely:
birth and death are part of the medical profession, and do take
place in the hospital. As I mentioned in another posting, I saw
Ben's profession as symbolic of Buffy's desire to become one of
the herd and deny her fertility and therefore her mortality, and
even more so, run away from it. But, the medical metaphor, including
Doc, is part of the greater meaning of the arc: Doc is the surgeon,
bringing a child(and death therefore) into the world in two ways:
by being the symbolic instrument of menstruation: the knife is
a phallic symbol, hence male and female fertility paired together,
with the shallow cuts on both sides of the body where the ovaries
would be; and by being the doctor performing a symbolic caesarian,
bringing forth the child, chaos, to the world. They are linked
only in that the struggle against the sacrifice of the parent
for the child brings about a kind of chaos in the natural order
and in the person him or herself. There's chaos in the natural
order because the link is severed between the generations; and
there's chaos in the person, as suggested by the apocalypse, because
the dissolution of the person literally through death can never
jibe with the identity of the person as a definite form. In constantly
running from the idea of death, there is a sinking into a form
of depression or even madness because the concept of the definite
identity and the fact of death cannot be reconciled. Buffy has
to restore the two worlds, the world of the human race, and her
own world from chaos, by accepting her mortality and sacrificing
herself.
Thanks, Rahael.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> Where have all the vampires gone? -- Rufus,
20:30:13 12/14/01 Fri
I see the Buffyverse as the playground of the unconscious trying
to navigate life. Demons are real and Buffy slays them, but the
demons have less power over her than mortal life and the associated
problems with living. Demons in the form of vampires are easy
to kill. Buffy made a comment that it would have been easier if
she had just killed Spike right off. But she didn't and now as
her problems with living mount, he seems to be becoming more human....just
wondering if you had a comment on that?
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> Re: Where have all the vampires gone?Spoilers
A and B most seasons to Present. -- Age, 23:36:39 12/19/01 Wed
Sorry I have taken so long to reply.
Joss Whedon has certainly given back to myth its metaphorical
content, a content symbolic like dream imagery. In episodes like
'Faith, Hope and Trick' the movement of supernatural/metaphorical
characters to Sunnydale, and the movement from the dream world
to the world of the awake, from dark scenes to light show the
process of Buffy opening up to her guilt and lessening the hold
that her Trick of making everything appear normal has on her.
There is certainly the subconscious at play so to speak.
Buffy has now had two deaths: the death of her childhood back
in season one; and the death of her adolescence last season. In
season two, the Anointed One, the child, the symbol of the perpetual
child that Buffy could have remained is killed by Spike. This
is a symbolic act as he represents in part the possibility and
the danger of romantic relationships, the type of relationship
that Buffy the adolescent would be increasingly involved in: he
has two aspects to him: love and the sexual predator. These two
aspects are in Angel also, but once Spike is in a wheel chair
and Angel is Angelus, the love aspect is transferred to Xander,
while the predator is obviously Angelus. It is Xander who saves
Buffy from the idea that men are just after one thing in the ep
'Bewitched. Bothered and Bewildered.' Buffy comes though this
brush with the opposite sex with much guilt, but with her faith
in romantic relationships still intact: Angel is restored, and
Spike is back to his full strength.
We meet up with Spike yet again in season three when Buffy and
Angel have to face the fact that they can never just be friends:
Spike is again the symbol in part of romantic relationships: both
the danger of getting hurt and the possibility of love.
When Angel leaves and Buffy tries to have a meaningful relationship
with Parker, Spike returns. Romance is not dead, but it's still
fraught with danger: Spike has returned to kill Buffy. Just as
Buffy has had her Faith/faith in herself and relationships put
in a coma, so to speak, but not yet dead, Spike's love life has
taken a dive. He comes back to kill Buffy as a way of venting
his rage and making him feel all manly, but symbolically this
is the danger/sexual predator aspect of his symbolism becoming
dominant.
Then, Spike gets that aspect of his symbolism neutered by the
chip because there's wholesome Riley, the good, clean, Christ
figure to save Buffy from her pit of despair over romance: in
the fourth season episode 'Doomed' there is a symbolic pairing
of Buffy's end of the world, her apocalypse, as she must deal
with Angel's having left her(hence the trip into the pit of despair
in the symbol of the old romance, the derelict highschool, from
which Riley, the saviour, pulls her out) and Spike's as he tries
to off himself. Not only is this a portrayal of Spike the character
dealing with his new condition, but this is also a symbolic representation
of Buffy's giving up on romance. But, just as Riley saves Buffy,
Willow saves Spike. It is Willow who helped Riley and Buffy get
together; so, saving Spike is a symbolic representation of Willow's
helping to save Buffy's romantic life.
The neutering of Spike is paired with the appearance of the clean
cut Riley: love over sexual predation. Buffy's love life becomes
based on nice clean love and sex and nothing dirty like Faith's
approach or that which the ghost children make them do. Buffy
has made the decision to have a relationship with a person who
is seemingly all white bread because she's no fool. To have a
relationship, no matter how exciting and passionate, with someone
who is ultimately going to kill you, either literally or metaphorically,
doesn't make any sense(we see the dysfunctional potential of such
a relationship between Spike and Buffy in 'Something Blue'.) But,
then having a relationship with a white bread man, no matter how
many vitamins or chemicals get pumped into him by the Initiative,
just as is done to real white bread, amounts to the same thing,
death: you need whole wheat bread: you need the wheat germ, you
need what brings life. It's the same basic theme of the series:
the division of self. Even Riley had a darker side to him. And
it wasn't until too late that real communication was about to
be established between Buffy and Riley.
Then, the chip in Spike's head had to do its work before he became
the whole wheat guy for Buffy. In symbolic terms, if Buffy had
staked Spike long before, this would have meant the end of the
road for Buffy's romantic life. To stake Spike would have been
easy; to give up romance would have been easy.
Now that Buffy has come back different, the chip no longer responds
to her. Spike can be a danger again to her, but he's not. There's
the passion without the danger. In Spike's song he emphasizes
how he died so many years ago. It isn't the vampire aspect that
is emphasized, but the human. Spike didn't die so many years before
because if a demon is possessing the body, then the demon hasn't
died at all. This is a circumventing, in a way, of the vampire
metaphor, though not literally. What I mean is in emphasizing
Spike's death, the human being is talking about his own emotional
death. On the one hand one could say that the demon, unable to
act as such by the chip, has become confused by the emotional
content of the human being it has occupied; on the other hand,
one could say that the demon is simply a metaphor for the fundamental
attitude adopted by the human being. The human has been killed
off, the heart with its symbolic meaning no longer beats. But,
this is not the case for Spike as clearly he feels love.
Still, Spike remains a vampire because he's not the man he used
to be, and never will be again: the vampire gives him both strength
and weakness, and if Joss Whedon wants to make him something different,
he'll change Spike's condition as a vampire. Or, if Spike cannot
serve the role as symbol of romance, he'll kill off Spike and
have him transfer that symbolism into another character.
So, in answer to your questions. There is a symbolic component
to Spike's not having been killed off. I think Buffy's having
trouble getting back into life because she is missing the passion
and love that Spike now has/and/or represents. And, this has to
do with mourning for Joyce's death, and the culture shock of being
thrown into the adult world by her death. The chip no longer works
for Buffy. Spike's no longer the neutered vamp, but more the symbol
of what she's moving towards as she comes back to the wholeness
of life. She has to or else she can't grow up. It isn't as simple
as this, and one wonders how much growing up Spike still has to
do.
The question is: what is the point of living when it's just another
form of being dead. It is one thing to take on the responsibility
of adult life, but without the passion then it's just a grind.
We saw this in the 'Angel' ep, 'Dad.' While the daily routine
of looking after a baby is tiring, one could see the joy and love
that accompanied the responsibility.
One more thing. In one of my replies I referred to the slayer
being called parody on the latest 'Angel' episode. If you notice
in 'Once More With Feeling' Buffy says that she should bow or
have honour; when Holtz recruits Justine, the film 'The Karate
Kid' is mentioned. What I'm getting at here is a small cross series
allusion highlighting the antithesis between the father figure/watcher
Giles' approach to helping Buffy(ie getting out of her way, so
that she can grow up and come back to life) and the father/watcher-like
Holtz's use of Justine as she struggles on the edge of life, not
capable of dealing with her feelings and returning to it. This
antithesis, one that we saw back in season three of 'Buffy' is
part of the theme that runs through both shows: the antithesis
between the nurturing parent who knows he or she has to make way
for the next generation(Joyce's death, while premature, makes
this point) and the self-centred parent who uses, eats, destroys
his/her offspring. Of course one doesn't have to look outside
of the 'Angel' arc itself to see this antithesis: Holtz and Angel
make up the opposites in the structure. Holtz has become the vampire,
hunting down his prey; while Angel, has become the human.
Where have all the vampires gone? Most of them have been slain.
This is a dark commentary on the power of parenting and culture.
How many vampires have survived to regain some semblance of the
humanity they lost? Angel, Spike, Darla...
Hope that answers your query.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> Now I will always think of Wonderbread
when I think of Riley..:) -- Rufus, 01:21:26 12/22/01 Sat
I've always been facinated by the literal demonizing of a character
to make a point that Joss has done with this series. As the characters
have grown older it's become more clear that demons are "more
than meets the eye" they aren't all just Big Bads, some have
always been peaceful. Vampires are a creation of a demon bite,
an infection that seemed to drive the humanity out of the human
shell. In Crush it was made clear that vampires could love. That
seemed to upset Buffy more than just about anything else she had
learned over the years. So if a vampire can love, is that because
of they were once human or in spite of that fact? Plus, Spike
has made reference to himself as the Big Bad numerous times, what
is that all about, specially when he can't even find Rack's place?
Vampires are hybrids that don't fit into the demon world as they
aren't trusted because of their human content, yet their actions
such as killing are criticized as inhuman. If you watch the news,
humanity seems to have perfected killing and we all supposedly
have a soul. We do seem to feel the need to categorize killers
as demons or soulless. So, if with intervention some vampires
can find humanity in themselves was it ever lost in the first
place or just ignored?
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> [> demonization -- anom, 18:25:31
12/23/01 Sun
"We do seem to feel the need to categorize killers as demons
or soulless."
Only if they're not on our side. I think it's more that we need
to categorize those we want to justify killing as "demons
or soulless."
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: demonization --
Rufus, 23:06:24 12/27/01 Thu
I was thinking of a more personal type of killer that may just
live next door. If a killing happens in a neighbourhood I find
it facinating just how fast people try to make the killer inhuman,
soulless, not one of us....where in fact they are, they have just
done something most of us wouldn't give much thought to. On that
larger scale in case of war I agree with what you said. It's easier
in the case of war because there are definate sides in the situation.
For our homegrown killers we have to look a bit closer at ourselves
because the killer is part of our side...:):):)
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Natural Born Killers
-- Brian, 04:46:43 12/28/01 Fri
As I recall the theme of that movie was the concept that all of
us are potential killers. That given the right circumstances we
could kill without hesitation.
Interestingly, last night's CSI tackled the same subject about
a group of ten people on a plane who killed one of the other passengers
out of fear and panic.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Re: demonization
-- anom, 12:34:04 12/28/01 Fri
"If a killing happens in a neighbourhood I find it facinating
just how fast people try to make the killer inhuman, soulless,
not one of us...."
But in a way it's the same thing. How much is it that people dehumanize
a killer because of what s/he did & how much that they dehumanize
the killer to justify becoming killers (of the killer) themselves?
"On that larger scale in case of war I agree with what you
said. It's easier in the case of war because there are definate
sides in the situation. For our homegrown killers we have to look
a bit closer at ourselves because the killer is part of our side..."
Maybe it's to keep from looking closer that we characterize killers--& child
molesters, & people who commit other horrible crimes--as inhuman
or soulless. That way we isolate them, convince ourselves that
no, s/he isn't part of our side. Then it's OK to kill them, because
they aren't really human, not on our side. Problem is, in order
to do this, we have to suppress our own humanity...& it can be
very hard to get back in touch w/it.
Hmm...maybe one of the metaphors of vampirism is that the victims
(& in real life, the survivors) of monsters/violence can become
monstrous/violent themselves. How do we deal w/inhumanity w/out
losing our own humanity? Isn't that what Buffy was worried about
in Intervention? If the monsters can look so much like "us,"
how do we keep from treating our own as monsters?
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> That fine
line Buffy walks........ -- Rufus, 13:48:11 12/28/01 Fri
I remember when Faith killed the Mayor's assistant, Buffy knew
and tried to stop her. Giles surprised Buffy by telling her it
has happened many times before. It's something that is planned
for. It proves just how hard a job Buffy has. The demons that
look like "monsters" are easy enough, well at first
they were til we found out monsters come in all packages. Buffy
has to not only save the world but she has to be damn careful
to make sure she doesn't get sloppy doing it. As she gets more
aware of the extent of the problem does she realize that she only
fights a specific branch of evil. She is a specialist that has
to make sure she only kills in her specialty. Add to that the
fact that humans with a soul have done things that make the monsters
pale in comparrison.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [>
[> [> [> [> [> Thank you -- Rahael, 09:00:13 12/22/01
Sat
That was a great analysis. I shall have to have some more time
to think about it before I can come up with a thoughtful response.
I am thinking more and more that OMWF stands alone in some way.
Yes it advances the plot of the series as a whole, but the metaphors
and themes it tackles seems to be the whole of Season 6 reduced
to its essentials. That last scene where Giles and the Scoobies
stand aside while Spike intervenes to pull Buffy back certainly
comes to mind with your point about Giles letting go, while Buffy
turns away from paternal love and toward Romantic love.
I particularly like the way you point out that Mutant Enemy use
all the characters to signify different things at different points.
There's a fluidity of metaphor here, and no one's place in the
series is fixed just as no ones identity whether in life, or in
the Buffyverse is fixed.
Also, you point to the direct connection between the death of
Joyce and the Gift. I agree. Buffy has been brutally expelled
from 'heaven'. Not for her the slow end of childhood and the beginning
of adulthood, the conflicts and eventual renegotiation of the
relationship between mother and daughter. It had all been taken
from her abruptly, and the paradisal gates have clanged shut.
Spike is teaching her that love can exist after the anguish of
death (her own, her mother's).
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[> [> [> [> [> Good for you....the pay rise that
is..:):):) -- Rufus, 16:38:50 12/04/01 Tue
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[> [> [> [> [> Congrats on the pay raise. All incoherence
(none) is forgiven -- Kimberly, 06:48:55 12/05/01 Wed
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[> [> [> [> joyce's death & buffy's -- anom, 16:49:31
12/09/01 Sun
"That's of course the real contrast and why Buffy could come
back: Joyce's death was real in the sense of being physical; Buffy's
death was also supernatural and therefore metaphorical: it represented
how she felt."
Some Jewish mourning practices are interpreted (& maybe intended)
as representing the feeling a mourner has of having died, or perhaps
wanting to, along with the relative who has really died. Between
the death & the burial, the survivors don't participate in life.
No going to services, no working (if you can afford it), no bathing
(it's only a few days), no changing clothes. The customs of mourning
serve to bring the person back to the community over the next
year for parents, the next month for other close relatives. The
mourner stays home for the 1st week (shiva), sitting on a low
stool (not back on the same level as before, or as the rest of
the world); the community comes to hold services, bring food,
& just sit w/them. For the 1st month, the person doesn't cut the
hair or shave. And after the shiva period, mourners go to services
every day and say the mourners' version of the Kaddish prayer
(for a month or a year--actually 11 months--during which they
don't go to parties or performances). The prayer is also said
at part of certain holiday services & on the anniversary (Hebrew
calendar) of the death.
These customs help channel the feelings any mourner, like Buffy,
is likely to have. In her case, she really did die shortly after
her mother did & is now, after her resurrection, making her way
back to the community of the living. Too bad most of that community
doesn't understand what she's going through, as people are more
likely to do in the case of mourners, & as Buffy's friends in
fact did in The Body. And too bad there are no customs for coming
back from the dead to give her a way to navigate that process.
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[> [> [> [> [> Re: joyce's death & buffy's spoilers
-- Age, 21:09:02 12/12/01 Wed
It does seem, doesn't it, that the theme of growing up has been
complicated and made much darker and difficult with the death
of Joyce. There is the lack of feeling and the desire to return
to the world of the dead on the part of Buffy. Instead of the
movement forward in Buffy's life being prompted by a gentle nudge
from her mother and a vision of stepping into another phase of
life, it has come about in a drastic and unexpected manner. Buffy
does seem to be the walking dead at the moment, sleepwalking through
her life's endeavour. There is certainly this tension between
the pull of death, a backwards movement, and the movement forward
towards feeling alive again.
The rituals you mention provide the opportunity for the mourner
to be brought back to the living community; it's intriguing to
note the difference between the gradual influence of the living
community in the rituals you mention and the abrupt restoration
of Buffy by her community, the Scooby Gang. This difference also
may lie in the motivations of the two communities: one is to bring
the mourner back to the living while acknowledging his or her
feelings; while the other is based on not dealing with the feelings
of the mourners by restoring the dead loved one. The price of
not dealing with these feelings, of not moving on, is that when
the loved one returns her community isn't there to help her because
she can't open up to them and they want her to be something that
she no longer is.
Thank you for your comments. I can't say enough just how wonderful
it has been to see this thread being developed as it has been.
One posting brings out a certain aspect of the discussion and
refines it; then another centres on yet a different facet.
Age.
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[> [> [> [> [> [> Re: joyce's death & buffy's
spoilers -- anom, 19:10:58 12/16/01 Sun
"This difference also may lie in the motivations of the two
communities: one is to bring the mourner back to the living while
acknowledging his or her feelings; while the other is based on
not dealing with the feelings of the mourners by restoring the
dead loved one. The price of not dealing with these feelings,
of not moving on, is that when the loved one returns her community
isn't there to help her because she can't open up to them and
they want her to be something that she no longer is."
You remind me of something I didn't mention above: during the
1st 7 days of mourning (shiva), visitors don't greet the mourner
until s/he addresses them. It's left up to the mourner to engage
them when/if s/he feels ready to, & also to lead the conversation,
letting s/him deal w/things on s/his own terms. Although overall,
people have similar reactions to loss of a parent (or other close
relative), each of us has different individual reactions. Even
those who've already been through it can't really know how someone
else needs to respond to it, so the mourner is allowed to talk
about the relative, about other topics, or not at all.
This is in sharp contrast to the way Buffy's friends crowded around
her at her house, getting in her face, falling over each other
to try to guess what she wanted & how she was--to supply the answers
instead of waiting to hear them from her. And the state of mind
Buffy was in is a perfect example of why "shiva visit etiquette"
is a good idea.
A challenge to both B/S & B/A
shippers -- John Burwood, 10:57:42 11/30/01
Angel left Buffy because, despite how passionately they loved
each other, he knew it could never work & he wanted her to have
a chance to live the life and find the happiness she deserved.
Can anyone come up with anything that Spike could do to make Buffy
happy that Angel could not, apart from sleep with her without
turning into an evil monster - but that is because he already
is an evil monster. Any other offers?
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[> Ummm... -- RabidHarpy, 12:04:38 11/30/01 Fri
Spike is the one "man" in her life who absolutely refuses
to LEAVE!!! He's also showing signs of being able to change for
the better - those are positive points to any relationship, especially
considering Buffy's history!
There are also different levels of being a "demon" -
look at how sweet and helpful the Host (Lorne) is, and how kind
Doyle was - even Whistler had a higher calling... We don't know
the exact extent that the demon controls it's host, so we don't
have any way of determining how much change Spike is actually
capable of.
We have seen varying degrees of vampirism as well - dramatic (Dracula);
vacuous (Harmony); mystical (Drusilla); souled (Angel); powerful/evil
(Master); compassionate (Spike); calculated (Darla); animalistic
(minions) - like humans, there are other factors working on these
creatures, and they too are capable of unique personalities and
complexities.
Buffy's world isn't normal, and it's not going to be normal anytime
soon. Spike is trying to offer them both as much happiness as
they can get for as long as they have time to share it. Remember,
he should be rejecting the feelings he has because, in the end,
he is the one who will have to go on living without her - and
I don't think he would ever "turn" her - not if he truly
loves her as he claims!
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[> [> Just for the sake of speculation... -- GreatRewards,
12:14:04 11/30/01 Fri
I think this B/S arc is going to be a long one. In fact, I predict
that it will last until the end of Season 7, where Spike will
finally "turn" Buffy (at her request), and the Scooby
Gang will be forced to dust them both: End Of Show!
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[> [> [> OH! That is SO MEAN!!! ;) -- RH, 12:33:09 11/30/01
Fri
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[> [> Re: Ummm... -- John Burwood, 13:39:25 11/30/01 Fri
Just because Spike loves Buffy does not mean he could never abuse
or kill her. Willow truly loves Tara, yet she abused her with
the 'forget' spell - and note that she did so to stop Tara arguing.
Is that so very different from a man brought up to violence as
normal losing his temper & thumping his wife to stop her arguing?
I bet you many such men would tell you they loved the same wives
& sincerely believe it, & say it was all the wife's fault & genuinely
believe it. Spike, remember, stabbed a former girlfriend in her
heart in a moment of irritation. Anyone think Buffy is never going
to irritate him or make him angry?
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[> [> [> Re: Ummm... -- John Burwood, 04:56:11 12/01/01
Sat
Expanding on my own theme, does anyone remember Spike's Love's
Bitch speech from Lovers Walk? As he said, love is not about sweetness
& light, but about sheer passion. Love does not turn beasts into
princes except in fary tales. It is a motivator, like fear, hate,
and anger, and always potentially dangerous. The Aprilbot was
only programmedto be in love so, as Buffy said, she was dangerous.
The guy who reacts to serious financial stresses by going berserk
& killing his wife & kids & then himself got that passion from
love. Love is a brute & a devil as Peter Wimsey - I think I have
the quote right - said. Being in love does not make you a different
person, just gives you a new motivation. A kind & considerate
person will be a kind & considerate lover. An insecure & jealous
person will be an insecure & jealouslover, and a violent & aggessive
person will be a violent & aggressive lover.
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[> [> [> In Spike's Defence -- Wolfhowl3, 05:11:48 12/01/01
Sat
Quote: "Spike, remember, stabbed a former girlfriend in her
heart in a moment of irritation."
In Spikes defence at this point, the Former Girlfriend was Harmony,
and she really did deserve it. (Too bad she had the ring on at
the time)
Wolfhowl
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[> Please kill Spike and get Willow & Buffy together, we all
know they would be great together. -- The Truth, 15:36:58
12/01/01 Sat
aa
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[> Spike can stay -- Juliette, 17:16:32 12/02/01 Sun
Angel left so they could both move on. Great. But not really a
testement to enduring love - he ran away from the pain of being
around Buffy without being in a relationship with her or having
sex with her. Spike won't leave. When Buffy's life is in danger
and she's trying to save the world, he'll be helping, not rescuing
Cordelia from a demon dimension with no idea what's going on.
A scene I'm afraid we're all
too likely to see on an upcoming episode of "Buffy."
-- d'Herblay, 11:37:28 11/30/01 Fri
INT. MAGIC BOX - NIGHT
The shop is festooned with streamers and balloons as Anya's bachelorette
party is in full swing. "Swing" may not be the proper
word, since Anya, Buffy, Willow and Dawn just sit around the table,
looking vaguely bored.
DAWN So, is there going to be a stripper?
BUFFY No.
ANYA Since the unfortunate incident with Tara, you're one of my
only three remaining female acquaintances. And since I need bridesmaids,
we decided not to go the gratuitous nudity route, seeing as you're
too young.
WILLOW And I'm too gay.
DAWN So what do we do now? We've given you your presents.
ANYA I've got movies. We could watch movies. I've got Wall Street.
And The Fountainhead. With Gregory Peck.
BUFFY Chick flicks.
ANYA They're classic love stories. They tell the timeless tale
of "boy meets money, boy falls in love with money . . . "
BUFFY Not loving the capitalist tear-jerkers, Anya.
WILLOW Ooh! We could find a demon to fight! (Anya glares at her)
A festive demon, with party hats and hors d'oeuvres.
The front door opens. Xander enters, followed closely by Spike.
Xander is out of breath and both are covered in soot.
XANDER (panting) Dragon. At the Bronze. Eating. Breathing. Fire.
Lots of fire. And smoke. Too much smoke.
BUFFY You went to the Bronze for your bachelor party? Lame much?
SPIKE (walks to Buffy) What the blushing bridegroom here is saying
is that there's a four-headed dragon rampant and bent on destruction.
So I say that the Slayer and I gather ourselves some weapons and
go kill this thing. See if we can salvage some fun out of this
evening.
BUFFY (stands) You're dirty.
SPIKE You like me dirty, pet.
They embrace. Xander gathers himself and starts towards the table.
XANDER It says that it's going to eat everyone in Sunnydale and
then destroy the world and -- (notices Buffy and Spike kissing)
it can't do it soon enough.
ANYA Four-headed?
SPIKE (feels face) Wot? Am I bumpy? (to Buffy) Sometimes I lose
control.
ANYA A four-headed dragon, right? 'Cause that's Teddy.
WILLOW You know a four-headed dragon? Did you invite a four-headed
dragon to your wedding?
ANYA Teddy the tetracephalosaurus. He's good people.
XANDER An, he's eating everyone.
ANYA Well, yes, there's the whole "intent on bringing about
the apocalypse" thing, but he never welshes on a debt. He's
fiscally responsible. That's an important quality in a demon.
Buffy disengages from Spike and picks up a sword.
BUFFY Well, in other dimensions that may make him a good credit
risk, but here he's still Slayer bait.
She and Spike start for the door.
ANYA But the thing about Teddy is that he can only be hurt by
humans. So a vampire and a -- whatever it is you said you are
now -- don't stand a chance.
Buffy and Spike turn back towards the table.
XANDER But he can be killed by any human being, right?
ANYA Not by you, honey. You're too fragile. He is a four-headed
fire-breathing dragon, after all.
DAWN Well, I've been getting pretty good at kicking the demon
butt. Admittedly, that last one was pretty much all butt, but
. . .
WILLOW Don't remind me.
BUFFY No.
DAWN Come on. Please?
BUFFY You are not fighting a dragon, and that's final.
DAWN (pouting) Aww.
SPIKE Now, little lady, you heard your sister. You've got that
essay on "Great Expectations" due on Monday and you
won't get any violence until it's done.
DAWN But Spike . . .
SPIKE I'm putting my foot down.
DAWN I liked you so much better when you were trying to kill my
sister.
She storms off, slamming the door behind her.
XANDER (to Spike) You are still evil, right? 'Cause I'm losing
track.
BUFFY Anyway, this tetris-fellow-saurus --
ANYA Teddy. He prefers it if you call him Teddy.
BUFFY -- this Teddy, he can be killed by humans. But the human
has to be armed, right? With what?
XANDER I vote rocket launcher. No problem a good rocket launcher
can't solve.
WILLOW Can you get us back on the Army Base? Do you still remember
your G.I.Q.?
XANDER Except for that one problem.
ANYA You could use a Glaive of Rhadyxmantril.
WILLOW I think we have one of those. I saw it last week, in housewares
and cutlery.
ANYA (goes to counter) Let me check the inventory. (checks the
computer) Damn! Sold it this morning. Damn my ex-demon work ethic!
SPIKE So, what you're saying is, we're all going to die. In that
case, I think Buffy and I will head downstairs. Fit in some training
before the end.
ANYA There's always magic. Teddy can be killed with magic. Kind
of his Achilles' heel.
BUFFY Well, we're in a magic shop. We've got plenty of magic books.
Let's see what we can whip together.
ANYA No, this can't be your amateur, fifth birthday party, watch
me pull a -- I can't even say it -- sort of magic. It's got to
be high-powered stuff. Only someone who really knows what she's
doing can use the kind of magic that will kill Teddy.
BUFFY So we need someone capable of using the darkest magics.
XANDER Not just any old Sabrina.
SPIKE A real kick-ass little Wicca.
All turn to Willow.
WILLOW I need to make a phone call.
She goes to the phone on the counter and starts to dial. The phone
RINGS as we cut to:
INT. HALLWAY, SUNNYDALE HALFWAY HOUSE - NIGHT
A demonic arm extends the handset of the communal phone to Ethan
Rayne, who idly plays with a 2-year chip from Magiholics Anonymous.
ETHAN Willow. What can I do for you?
INTERCUT
WILLOW It's my friends, Ethan. They really need me to help them
out with some magic.
ETHAN Now, Willow. We talked about codependency. Your friends
are just acting as enablers, forcing you back down into the hole
you've worked so hard to get up out of. Remember, you can't help
your friends if you can't help yourself.
WILLOW But if I don't do some magic, the world's gonna end!
ETHAN (holds hand over mouthpiece and barks at someone or something
off-camera) Moglur! Wait your turn! What do you need the phone
for anyway? You've got telepathy! (back into phone) It always
seems that way. Listen to me, Willow. I'm your sponsor. I'm here
to help you, mostly by providing an example of where magic can
lead. Oh, it seems so necessary at the time. Do a spell, prevent
an apocalypse. But look where that kind of thinking can lead.
Do you really want to be forty-eight years old and sharing a bedroom
with Slimor the Odoriferous?
WILLOW No, I guess not.
ETHAN Then do yourself a favor and don't listen to your friends.
Listen to your higher power. Now I want to hear you say our creed.
INT. MAGIC BOX - NIGHT
WILLOW (by rote) Blind Cadria, grant me the serenity to accept
the things I cannot change without using magic, the strength to
unmagically change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the
difference without magical assistance of any sort.
Electricity CRACKLES as magic energy courses through Willow's
body. Her eyes take on a dark hue and then seem to glaze over.
She hangs up the phone.
SPIKE Well, Red? What's it going to be?
WILLOW (mechanically) One day at a time.
ANYA Are we going to die, or what?
WILLOW One day at a time. One day at a time.
BUFFY Willow?
WILLOW One day --
EXT. THE WORLD - NIGHT
The world ends.
BLACK OUT.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Brilliant! -- Rob, 11:42:23 11/30/01 Fri
Wow...you really could write for the show. You have a perfect
ear for the dialogue.
And it's also, by the way, incredibly funny.
Rob :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Verbs to adverbs -- darrenK, 12:24:28 11/30/01 Fri
Just remember that every episode uses at least 2 adverbs that
used to be verbs e.g.
"Judgey" "Observey"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: A scene I'm afraid we're all too likely to see on an
upcoming episode of "Buffy." -- Kimberly, 11:58:15 11/30/01
Fri
Way too funny. I'll have to read it at home tonight when I can't
get into trouble for loud giggling. (Generally frowned on in my
office.)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> what I would love to see (from earlier thread) -- dream
of the consortium, 12:15:12 11/30/01 Fri
Okay - I said this on a thread way down at the bottom of the page,
but I'm going to repeat it here. I am prepared to like Wrecked,
if the writers take it to the right place. Here's my dream scenario
- Willow become the worst kind of twelve-stepper. She's already
got the language down pat. She never stops talking about her addiction,
makes everyone really uncomfortable by apologizing for long-forgotten
slights, compares everyone's problems to her addiction, even when
it's completely irrelevant, chides Tara for her magic-using, Xander
for drinking beer and so on. Then she is needed to perform some
heavy-duty magic to foil some nasty foe, and, as a result (I'm
imagining a tell-all argument where either Spike or Xander lays
it on the line for her), she has to finally admit that magic isn't
just a drug, and she didn't do it just for the high. That the
whole thing was about control, and her attempts to modify everyone's
behavior in the light of her "addiction" have been just
another way for her to control those around her.
And then she grows up.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> I missed this scenario the first time, but I like
it now. -- d'Herblay, 09:02:16 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> I could just SEE them all... -- GreatRewards, 12:20:39 11/30/01
Fri
that was a fantastic piece of fanfic! Thanks for sharing!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> LOL! Thanks! -- verdantheart, 12:25:38 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Very Funny stuff - Congrats!!! -- Brian, 14:01:00
11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: A scene I'm afraid we're all too likely to see on an
upcoming episode of "Buffy." -- Paradox, 19:59:55 11/30/01
Fri
LOL! That was awesome! Very funny/Great dialogue...so where's
Part 2? I know the "World Ended", but there's always
a reset button somewhere? Have you written fanfic you can link
us to? Great job.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> OMG That's the funniest thing I've read it weeks! Brought
tears to my eyes... ;o) -- Wisewoman, 20:20:44 11/30/01 Fri
We just have to find some unsuspecting Buffyboard and send it
to them as a spoiler from a very reliable anonymous source!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Too perfect ^-^ -- Traveler, 21:13:08 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> LOL!!!! Loved it... -- Monique, 06:39:11 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Most Excellent! -- mundusmundi, 07:08:08 12/01/01 Sat
But The Fountainhead stars Gary Cooper, not Gregory Peck. (Peck
did make Moby Dick, so when it comes to chick flicks, for Anya....)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Referring to my notes . . . -- d'Herblay, 07:25:21
12/01/01 Sat
On the legal pad on which I jotted down some thoughts before writing
the piece, right between the serenity prayer and "Are you
evil now? 'Cause I'm losing track," I had written "Fountainhead
w/ Gary Cooper." So, somewhere between pre-writing and writing,
I became senile.
Of course, I'd like to remind everyone that the Buffyverse is
not our universe, and if there can be a world without shrimp,
then Buffy can inhabit a world where Gregory Peck starred in The
Fountainhead.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Something's up. I was sure Peck was Roark too... --
Aquitaine, 14:51:18 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Hmmm, didn't Atticus Finch destroy a few
buildings? -- mm, 15:02:16 12/01/01 Sat
To Kill a Mockingbird....ah, memories! ;)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Damn! Someone mentioned my favorite
movie. -- bible belt, 15:26:02 12/01/01 Sat
When I was in high school we didn't have any thing like BtVS but
my American Government teacher made us watch To Kill a Mockingbird
in class. Best class I ever took.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: A good place for the World to end, when everyone's happy
on Buffy -- bible belt, 08:59:19 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> This is hysterically funny. You've made my day! -- rowan,
09:01:52 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Excellent! Had me in a fit of giggles! *g* -- Deeva, 09:10:12
12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> "Capitalist Tear Jerkers"! Wiping tears... --
Aquitaine, 09:42:57 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: A scene I'm afraid we're all too likely to see on an
upcoming episode of "Buffy." -- pagangodess, 11:41:13
12/01/01 Sat
I can actually see Willow saying: "Ohhh! We could find a
demon to fight. A festive demon with party hats and hors d'oeuvres."
Thanks for sharing. Funny beyond belief.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Are we all addicts? -- phoen ix, 05:20:38 11/29/01 Thu
There has been a lot of talk about Willow being addicted to magic,
Buffy being addicted to Spike, Spike being addicted to Power of
the Slayer I was contemplating were King Joss was taking us (
the viewers) and it dawned on me that Im an addict too. I mean
every week i can hardly wait to see BtVS or Angel for that matter.
I think about the show all the time even when Im driving to work
or sleeping it seeps into my thoughts. I also felt a kind of low
when Wrecked was over I didnt have that same feeling or Hi that
I felt after OMWF or Smashed. So I ask you can KJ be that great
to actually have the audience feel what the characters are experiencing?
Just a Thought I had while i was sleeping.
side note: the name Rack means to torment or afflict pain is he
one of the little bads?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Are we all addicts? -- zilla, 06:51:35 11/29/01 Thu
I'm an addict too. My husband laughs because he got me hooked
on it and now I know more about it than he does. I can hardly
wait every week to find out where the story line will lead. I
even downloaded the mp-3 files from OMTF and burned a cd and made
a tape for in the car as well. So wherever King Joss takes us
I will follow.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Hello, my name is Wisewoman, and I'm a Buffyholic... --
WW, 07:59:27 11/29/01 Thu
Not just addicted to BtVS and AtS, but addicted to SPOILERS as
well.
I'm a sad, sad case.
;o)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Me, too, WW, but I'm the happiest Trollop you ever
did see! -- Marie, 08:13:46 11/29/01 Thu
Or should that be 'that ever communicated across cyber space'?
And not only a Buffyholic, and Spoilerholic, but an AllThingsPhilosophoholic,
too! Happy smile!
M
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: I've unquestionably got you beat in the Buffy-addiction
category, Wisewoman... -- Lucifer_Sponge, 08:14:34 11/29/01 Thu
I tape EVERY episode. After an episode airs, I watch it again
the SAME night, and then at least once a day, every day, until
a new one comes on.
See?
I'm not a sad case, I'm sick.
~Sponge
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: I've unquestionably got you beat in the
Buffy-addiction category, Wisewoman... -- Kimberly, 08:32:19 11/29/01
Thu
But do you keep them all? And rewatch them? Regularly? Almost
daily? More than one a day?
Yeah, I've become completely hooked on this board. So, what's
the twelve-step program look like? (Twelve episodes of BtVS/AtS
daily?)
;-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: I've unquestionably got you beat in
the Buffy-addiction category, Wisewoman... -- Lucifer_Sponge,
08:36:03 11/29/01 Thu
But do you keep them all? And rewatch them? Regularly? Almost
daily? More than one a day?
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes.
I need help, really.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Re: I've unquestionably got you
beat in the Buffy-addiction category, Wisewoman... -- Kimberly,
08:41:15 11/29/01 Thu
Both of us? All of us. I agree. (And the kid gets to stay up late
on Tuesdays because neither of us will take the time to get him
to bed. Maybe that's why he likes Buffy. Plus going-to-bed sing-a-long
tapes. :-))
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> The shakes are starting...
-- Moose, 20:44:09 11/29/01 Thu
I'm right there with ya. Buffy has been exceptionally addictive
this season. I blame Spike. His character is just too damn interesting.
I'm just trusting that Joss will fulfill what he has been setting
up for so long.
BTW--Just got the first two seasons script books that Joss and
co. put out. I cannot recommend them highly enough for Buffaholics.
;-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> I think I've got you all beat -- pagangodess,
16:41:47 11/29/01 Thu
Here is a list: 1. I tape every show and re-watch it. 2. Those
that I did not tape (season 1, 2, 3) I've downloaded and the episodes
now reside in my hardrive. 3. My PC desktop is covered in BtVS
(sound files included) and I have a Buffy mousepad. 4. I have
a huge mp3 collection on my pc including dialogues and short quotes
from the show. I have included them in my playlist, so every so
often Spike will come up and say "Do it! Just do it! Kill
me. Take me out of the world that has you in it!" among other
oneliners. 5. I have read at least 8 Buffy novels (not the tiny
ones). 6. I read and post at this posting board and it's getting
to the point where I cannot go through the day without getting
my fix of it. 7. I always think about the show. 8. Like Kimberley,
I have downloaded OMWF soundtrack, made a CD (and one for my babysitter)
and made a tape for my driving pleasure. 9. On Tuesday nights,
we put the kids to bed extra early, Joss forbid, we might miss
a minute of it. 10. On Tuesday nights, we do not answer the phone
and our friends know better than to drop by. 11. For xmas I'm
asking for all kinds of Buffy stuff. Travel mug, keychain, set
of videos etc. 12. I told my husband that we HAVE to get a DVD
player only because BtVS Season 1 DVD is coming in January.( Do
you think I'm being unreasonable?)
Please help me! I can't stop!
pagan
Hope this gave you a good laugh, even though it's all true, and
made you think: "Hey, I'm not as sick as pagan here".
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> made you think: "Hey, I'm not as
sick as pagan here"... -- VampRiley, 20:36:21 11/29/01 Thu
I don't think I would go so far as to use the word "sick".
I'd probably go with "obsessed".
As for your list:
1. I tape every show and re-watch it.
Ever sit down all day and watch the entire series in order? And
when you tape the shows, do you make sure that they are taped
in the order of their air date so that you can see the series
unfold in order? I have.
2. Those that I did not tape (season 1, 2, 3) I've downloaded
and the episodes now reside in my hardrive.
I admit it. I'm guilty of the same thing. But since they ran those
eps, I got on tape, I deleted tham from my PC. But the reception
for Season One was not the way it is now. There was a bit of snow.
And sometimes, I got half snow-half picture. soddin' recpetion.
And now, I'm only missing "Phases" ('cause when they
moved the shows to 6 and 7, I didn't know that they were going
to start showing the shows with no repeats. When Phases was being
shown, I thought it was the ep from the day before) and Beauty
and the Beast (I put a "6" instead of a "5"
in the "hour space" when I was programming my VCR.)
3. My PC desktop is covered in BtVS (sound files included) and
I have a Buffy mousepad.
You got me beat with the "covered in BtVS" thing. There's
a Buffy mousepad?
4. I have a huge mp3 collection on my pc including dialogues and
short quotes from the show. I have included them in my playlist,
so every so often Spike will come up and say "Do it! Just
do it! Kill me. Take me out of the world that has you in it!"
among other oneliners.
The only mp3 dialogues I got are one or two from South Park.
5. I have read at least 8 Buffy novels (not the tiny ones).
Never read any of the novels.
6. I read and post at this posting board and it's getting to the
point where I cannot go through the day without getting my fix
of it.
I was like that once. But the desire to eat so that I could live
took over. Then came the realization that to keep eating, I needed
to make more money. Am I wrong in this thinking? If so, someone
please hit me over the head with a canoe paddle, please.
7. I always think about the show.
(looking right into pagangodess' eyes with a quirky smile that
says, I know the feeling.)
8. Like Kimberley, I have downloaded OMWF soundtrack, made a CD
(and one for my babysitter) and made a tape for my driving pleasure.
Only downloaded "I've got a Theory" and "Walk through
the Fire". Never made a CD or a tape of it.
9. On Tuesday nights, we put the kids to bed extra early, Joss
forbid, we might miss a minute of it.
Don't have any kids to worry about. But have to agree with you
about the "Joss forbid, [I] might miss a minute of it."
10. On Tuesday nights, we do not answer the phone and our friends
know better than to drop by.
Always the smart thing to do.
11. For xmas I'm asking for all kinds of Buffy stuff. Travel mug,
keychain, set of videos etc.
Not really asking anything for XMas, like the last couple of years.
12. I told my husband that we HAVE to get a DVD player only because
BtVS Season 1 DVD is coming in January.( Do you think I'm being
unreasonable?)
Don't know anything about having a husband. Not married to a guy.
But I do have a DVD player.
And as I finish this post, I still gotta stick with "obsessed"
rather than "sick".
:oP
VR
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> DVDs -- Kimberly, 11:15:50 11/30/01 Fri
Are the DVDs coming out in the US? Then I just have to convince
my husband to get a DVD player. (Shouldn't be hard; you should
see the electronics warehouse we live in.)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> Never mind; I just checked Amazon.
Cool!! -- Kimberly, 11:23:13 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> [> [> two DVD players coming right
up, does anyone else need one? -- pagangodess, 11:30:49 11/30/01
Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> In a word? Yes. Aquitaine stands behind Wisewoman, waiting
her turn at the podium. -- Aquitaine, 08:09:32 11/29/01 Thu
I couldn't read this board most of yesterday and was getting serious
withdrawal pains.
As I wrote in a previous post, I definitely 'feel' the BtVS characters'
pain these days. Whether Joss sets out to do this, I don't know.
LOL.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> I confess - I am an addict, too. -- Brian, 08:35:46
11/29/01 Thu
I was talking to a fellow buffyholic last night over dinner, and
we expressed our pain and concern for what is happening to our
dear and close friends in Sunnydale.
We worry, we are worried, we will worry, and we fear, we dread,
for we know that there will be no happy ending.
So we take comfort in the ride.
Just shoot another episode in that vein, Joss We need another
fix, right this very minute. Sigh!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Hello, my name is rowan and I'm pathetically addicted. Thus
far, no car accidents, though, LOL! -- rowan, 09:54:29 11/29/01
Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> rowan............. -- Rufus, 15:48:09 11/29/01 Thu
They still let you drive???????
Of course I'm different.....not an addict at all.....no human
flaws here........perfect all the time........just like chocolate
is a food group.......
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Hi, my name is Deeva and I'm a Buffyholic. -- Deeva, 12:23:27
11/29/01 Thu
I used to only partake of my addiction once a week, thinking that
I could control it ans stop anytime. But now I am getting a fix
everyday now. Sometimes for 2-3 hours at a time.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Not to mention an addict to this board, which takes more
of a time toll if yaknowwhati'msayin. -- res, 13:10:44 11/29/01
Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> For me, seasons 4 & 5 were my cocaine. 6 is more like heroine...
-- Traveler, 19:29:03 11/29/01 Thu
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Intentional pun? -- verdantheart, 06:41:57 11/30/01
Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> We'd better all get ready for some withdrawal pains ...
-- verdantheart, 06:40:12 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> 12 Reasons why I'm an addict... -- Sebastian, 11:03:44
11/30/01 Fri
I too admit that I am addict to the show.
1. I am a spoiler Trollop.
2. I tape every episode (both UPN and F/X reruns).
3. I schedule my plans around Tuesday nights.
4. I become openly belligerent on the telephone if anyone even
dares to call at 7pm (CST).
5. I have a 'Buffy' screensaver and wallpaper for my computer
at work.
6. I listen to the OMwF songs excessively at work.
7. I make numerous references to 'Buffy' in conversations with
friends - its now gotten to the point where they flee in terror
when I say "...this is just like that one episode..."
8. I have a 'Buffy' T-shirt that I wear as 'houseshirt'.
9. I've encouraged my brother to pilfer a 'buffy' poster from
the TV station that he is a television reporter at so I can have
it framed for my apartment.
10. I re-read the 'Watcher's Guide: Vol. 1 AND 2'
11. I also re-read an EXTREMEY dog-eared copy of 'entertainment
weekly' in which the entire issue was focused on the show.
And most importantly...
12. I re-read this board several times a day - and I'm positive
its going to get me fired because of my zombie like dedication
to reading these posts. :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: 12 Reasons why I'm an addict... -- sl, 14:25:54
12/01/01 Sat
I'll join your 12 step club!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Are we all addicts? -- bible belt, 15:06:07 12/01/01
Sat
If they show another marathon I may never get out of bed again.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked,
Something Blue, general s4 - s6) -- verdantheart, 11:51:19 11/30/01
Fri
After rewatching "Something Blue," I feel that Willow's
behavior is very consistent. In season 4, her behavior after breaking
up with Oz isn't that different from her behavior in season 6
after breaking up with Tara. She has a tough time dealing with
pain. She "deals" with it by turning to magic or--in
the case of "Something Blue"--alcohol, too. In "Something
Blue," Buffy and Xander note that Willow is dancing and seemingly
bouncing back from her doldrums when they discover that she is
quite tipsy. Willow then goes on to cast the my-will-be-done spell
that backfires so spectacularly.
It's been commented that Willow hasn't thus-far shown the tendency
to misuse magic so spectacularly. I think we can point to "Something
Blue" as a misuse of magic. And S5 has her using Magic Box
supplies without permission and resisting advice about her magical
studies. Further, Willow has become much more powerful after getting
over her break-up with Oz. Now she breaks up with Tara. She doesn't
want to deal with that pain, so she finds a friend (one, by the
way, that she knows has a tendency to misuse magic) and goes out
on a bender. I can understand the criticism that the audience
has been hit over the head with the addiction analogy, but can
we really say that Willow's acting out of character?
Another minor point I was reminded of is that Buffy and Spike
of course clearly remembered their "engagement," smooch-fests
and all (fortunately they didn't have alone-time at that point!).
This event isn't the basis for their attraction, of course, but
it gave them an experience of feeling affection toward each other.
This probably bubbled away in the back of both of their minds,
with Spike (with his more flexible view-point) waking up to his
real attraction way ahead of Buffy. Also note that Spike accepted
his fatal attraction instantly (even when he set out to kill her
when he was deeply wounded, he knew he loved her: FFL), while
Buffy continues to struggle. I was also struck by her comment
in "Pangs": "The thing is, I like my evil like
my men: evil. You know, straight up, black hat, tie you to the
railroad tracks, soon my electro ray will destroy metropolis BAD.
Not all mixed up with guilt and the destruction of an indigenous
culture." Reactions: She likes her evil straight, unmixed
with good (no surprise there); and Did she really say she liked
her men evil? But I'm getting off-track.
I'm also reminded that Ta-hoffren's calling card must still be
around somewhere.
Whew, went on longer than I meant to. Ta ta.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked, Something Blue,
general s4 - s6) -- phoenix, 13:00:14 11/30/01 Fri
Did you notice how Buffy starts her lovetaps with Spike in Something
Blue (theres one line where she says shes in need of a good slay,
more like lay) also she only makes a big fuss when their is someone
around watching the two of them (when she is feeding Spike from
the novelty mug she fuss while Giles is there but later she feeds
him without a wimper. Not saying that she loves him or ever could
but there is a strong sexual awareness between the two of them
beginning in S4.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked, Something Blue,
general s4 - s6) -- DEN, 13:04:34 11/30/01 Fri
Verdantheart, you've hit the key issue about Willow and magic.
Willow ultimately uses magic not for kicks, not to demonstrate
power, but to deal with pain. Willow is ABOUT pain. The series
has demonstrated repeatedly that she feels a lot of pain for a
lot of reasons, and those reasons focus on her self-image. It
was never better presented than in "Doppelgangland,"
when VampWillow pouts "this world's no fun!" Willow
replies softly "so you noticed that too?"
The irony is that the more Willow used magic to deal with her
pain, the more pain she generated. The original anodyne effect
of what we might call "spell magic" on her low self-image
eroded. She couldn't deal by baking cookies and detailing Giles's
car! And that's where a previous posting by Sponge comes in. Sponge
talks about the sense of wanting to do a spell just to do it,
and describes better than I ever could the probable impact of
"mainlining" magic the way Willow was doing at Rack's.
Addiction, yes. Power, yes. But pain underlies them both. And
pain generates anger. In "Something Blue," the first
time we really see Willow's maggic run seriously off the rails,
her power manifested subconsciously, striking the people at whom
she was most angry in their most vulnerable spots. Giles, the
intellectual, is blinded. Xander, the guy who can't connect, becomes
a literal "demon magnet. And Buffy--well,any explanation
would be superfluous. Is Willow's anger any less now?
Far from hurrying the arc, or ending it abruptly, "Wrecked"
seems to me a very solid development of both the story line and
the character.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked, Something
Blue, general s4 - s6) -- DEN, 14:03:11 11/30/01 Fri
A kind of PS to my previous post: On one level, D"Hoffryn's
amulet in "Something Blue" is a put-on. With rumbling
music in the backround, the demon ponderously proffers dark powers.
When the heroine gulps "no," he hands her his card,
and says in a "normal" voice, "call me if you change
your mind." Funny. But I'm involved in contracting and subcontracting.
Often when a deal isn't working, I do the same thing. And it's
surprising how often my phone rings--sometimes even after a year
or two.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> Re: Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked, Something
Blue, general s4 - s6) -- Darby, 10:27:59 12/01/01 Sat
A couple of episodes back (and shown a couple of times in the
"previously" synopses), Dawn picked up a coin at the
Magic Shop that looked suspiciously like that Talisman. Could
it be that D'Hoffryn, like a classic Satan-type demon, had no
trouble taking "no" for an answer because he knew that
the misuse of Willow's growing power was going to bring her back
around anyway? If Willow's next love-interest is of the "Y"
variety and does her wrong...
-Or is Dawn going to get caught up in this more directly?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> [> [> Re: Reflecting back (SPOILERS: Wrecked,
Something Blue, general s4 - s6) -- Slayrunt, 02:39:09 12/02/01
Sun
Darby, I noticed that too. I thought I was the only one that made
that connection, glad to see it was not just me.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Buffy and the Beast"
(Spoilers: Wrecked) -- RabidHarpy, 12:27:13 11/30/01
Everyone seems outraged by Spike's comment about sex with the
Slayer, but if you take a good look at Buffy, she doesn't get
nearly as upset as "we" think she should - she gets
up, acts outraged, wipes her mouth, and... insults him right back!
She didn't beat him, or stake him - she doesn't take enough offence
that she wants to hurt him back physically, although she does
throw the "convenient" barb at him. Both Buffy and Spike
seem to have come to a point in their relationship where they
know just how far they can push the other verbally. The whole
"morning after" scene indicates (subconsciously/non-verbally)
that they both REALLY enjoyed their romp together, and that they
actually LIKE each other's company, (God forbid!) - Buffy does
not refute Spike's "revelation" statement, in fact,
she looks quite resigned (albeit vulnerable). Later Buffy tries
to hide behind her usual righteous indignation when she tells
Spike she wants him out of her life, etc., but, as he states,
they are beyond that - they have already broken that barrier and
laid bare their vulnerabilities to each other - Spike's love for
her, and her mutual desire for him (not "love" - yet!)
I found their verbal sparring to be quite mild - both were very
accepting in a sort of "touche" way. One of Spike's
endearing qualities is his honesty, (crude though it may be) -
Buffy never has to worry about what he's thinking, or that his
feelings are duplicitous, as Parker's were, because he tells her
exactly what he wants and how he feels. He also makes her confront
her own feelings for him - he can tell when she is retreating
emotionally, and when she is hiding behind her self-inflicted
"modesty" and indignation.
Some posters have also found Buffy's constant rebuffs of Spike
to be obnoxious and, (dare I say), bitchy. We have to keep in
mind that Buffy has major abandonment issues - she has lost: her
father, Angel, Parker, Riley, (Xander to Anya - I'm sure his unrequited
adoration was an ego soother), Ben, and now Giles. All the men
she's grown close to have left, so in her mind, MEN=LEAVE. This
is a difficult thing for any girl, and has created serious enough
doubts (even before Xander, Ben and Giles "exited"),
that she felt the need to discuss them with the First Slayer.
Her discussion reveals that she is able to love MUCH (which is
why the losses have touched her so deeply and significantly).
When Buffy found herself growing attracted to Spike, I'm sure
that a part of her - the insecure, unsure part - thought right
away - MEN=LEAVE. Why has she been fighting her attraction to
Spike? Because he has no soul? That is surely part of the reason,
but there is also the doubt that if she did begin a relationship
with him, he would eventually leave - would it be worth the emotional
effort?
What does all of this have to do with Buffy being bitchy? EVERYTHING!
She is not only rebuffing Spike for moral reasons (hero vs. soulless
demon), but to protect herself emotionally (obviously). By repeatedly
insulting and rejecting him she not only beats him to the punch
(she "leaves" emotionally before he can leave physically),
but she is also trying to force/push him to prove that she is
right, and that there isn't enough between them to keep him by
her side. On a subconscious level, her rejections are constant
"tests" which Spike must pass - she tells him to take
a hike/he refuses; she beats him up/he gives as good as he gets;
she insults him/he insults her back. Spike is making Buffy exceedingly
anxious with his refusal to be neatly contained in her "MEN=LEAVE"
box.
On some level, I believe that Spike (being as insightful as he
is) has seen through this ploy - he repeatedly calls Buffy out
and forces her to face the truth. He is consistently honest with
her - about his feelings; the status of their relationship; what
he wants from her, etc. His honesty demands her honesty in return,
and so far, she has been physically honest, (kissing, making out,
coming to him for help and to talk), but she hasn't yet admitted
verbally what she feels, (we were SO close when she went to talk
to Willow - argh!)
I, for one, believe his love for Buffy is sincere - he is desperately
trying to show her that what he feels for her is real, and that
he is constant, (literally!) This is something, to him, that is
worth putting up with her feigned rejection/abuse over; worth
putting up with the SG for; worth giving up his "evil"
past for; worth fighting for.
1) Buffy knows Spike is evil - no surprises there as there were
with Angel/Angelus. Spike regularly reminds her that he is evil,
that he killed 2 Slayers, that he is a vampire, etc. - he doesn't
let her hide from it, and forces her to accept him as he is. He
also forces her to face what he is becoming - that she has inspired
changes for the better in his character.
2) Buffy knows how Spike feels about her - he "wants"
her/he loves her/he supports her - she is not simply one conquest
in a line of many as with Parker. Spike makes it clear that he
wants to offer her friendship, love, laughter, protection, partnership,
etc. He also has a good track record, having been faithful to
Dru for so long - this shows staying power and constancy - something
Buffy is not at all used to.
3) Buffy knows that Spike is her equal - in physical strength/in
emotional intensity - she doesn't have to be "careful"
around him as she was with Riley. Spike is capable of the same
towering heights and plummeting depths as she is and he wants
to share them with her.
Where William would have backed off, Spike diligently presses
forward. Where other men have left her, Spike refuses to go. Already
Spike IS different from all the other men Buffy has known - this
makes him a mystery that demands solving.
We can only hope that the solutions they find are a relationship
and a love that are worth embracing...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Very nicely expressed, R.H.! I can't add a thing! (NT) --
Dyna, 13:53:22 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Very nicely thought out and expressed, R. B. -- LoriAnn,
14:16:59 11/30/01 Fri
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: "Buffy and the Beast" (Spoilers: Wrecked)
-- Spike Lover, 15:21:50 12/01/01 Sat
That is why I like Spike. He is so honest and so terribly brave.
Buffy is an emotional coward (or is acting like one.) She is not
honest with Spike, her friends, her sister, or herself. As the
eloquent line goes in "A Room With a View", "why
should they trust you? You have lied to everyone."
As you will recall, it was Spike who was surprised that Buffy
had never told her mother that she was the slayer. And his prompting
is what made Buffy tell her mother. I have always thought that
Spike was sort of the moral (or maturity) compass for Buffy. (Yes,
I am serious.) Whereas Joyce went to Angel and told him to leave
because the "relationship with Buffy" was not right,
she did not confront Buffy with this info. She did not ask Buffy
to "grow up". Angel too, made the decision that the
relationship was not going to be possible. Buffy did not make
that decision. He did not discuss it. He made the decision and
left town.--
Spike is different. He has always put Buffy in the position to
decide. In one of those eps, after Dawn tells Buff that Spike
likes her, Spike takes Buffy out to hunt for the vamps that killed
the folks on the train (remember?). She asks, "Is this a
date?" His reply was, "Do you want it to be?"
Later in the same ep, he (albeit immaturely) ties up Buf and Dru,
and again gives Buff the choice. Say the word and he will kill
his former love to prove his love for her. Even at the end, he
is confronting her- "We have something, it is not pretty,
but we have something." Buff denies it.
Even in "Wrecked", he again demonstrates the moral compass
by asking Buff, "you would really jeapardize your sister's
safety just to spite me?"
Spike suspects that Buff may feel something but is unwilling to
look bad in front of her friends. He may want Buffy, but I doubt
he will be willing to have a clandestine relationship (if they
end up having one) for long.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Thanks! Couldn't have said it better... -- Nina, 15:47:55
12/01/01 Sat
Buffy's attitude during the morning after scene is quite revealing.
As soon as Spike utters his "I knew..." line, Buffy
is stung and hurt. She backs off but she doesn't punch him. She
doesn't leave! She just stands there and listens to what Spike
has to say after she hurt him too. When he puts his arms around
her neck she doesn't leave either, she doesn't punch him. She
listens. Things have indeed change a great deal!
I too don't believe that the vampire with no soul is the only
reason why Buffy is afraid. It used to be the reason she was disgusted
with him (Crush), but I'd say that it has become an easy way out
now. The easy excuse she can rely on without having to actually
confront what she really feels in front of him. The real reasons
are more profound. Buffy is not using Spike for sex and she's
not only attracted to him sexually. She needs him on a more instinctual
level.
I also believe that Buffy is afraid of what her friends might
think of her. She knows that she will have to hide that relationship
or her friends will do another Intervention showing her how wrong
her choice is.
And as you said... Men leave Buffy. That's possibly the strongest
fear she has. She is reacting as any victim of abandonment would.
She knows it will happen so she shuts herself and makes sure that
no one can come in. Spike doesn't play that game and breaks all
her walls. The more walls she builds, the more walls crumble everytime
she lets Spike come a little closer to her.
It must be terrifying for her to just let go and accept what she
feels. We have to remember that she is not spending her time on
this message board analyzing her life and emotions. Buffy lives
in the action and she learns as fast as she can. It wouldn't be
realistic anyway to have her change her ways too soon. People
who fear abandonment test the new people who are trying to enter
their worlds. And you were right on it RH, Buffy is testing Spike
and sometimes he passes the test, sometimes not... but in the
big picture he is taming her slowly. Like the the Little Prince
tamed the fox. One step each day.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: Thanks! Couldn't have said it better... -- Herself,
18:11:56 12/01/01 Sat
Whoever observed up there that her original disgust at Spike's
love was because he was a soulless thing, but that now her attitude
has changed has it right. I see her frantically trying to convince
herself that she still feels that way, when in fact ALL her fear
around accepting Spike's love has to do with purely human dynamics,
which she doesn't want to face. She's hiding from those behind
the whole vampire thing--which is shown beautifully at the end
of Wrecked when we see her with the garlic & cross in her room.
What she's really afraid of is what everyone has mentioned--that
Spike treats her as an equal, an adult, that he's challenging
her to be honest and make a commitment, shake off her depression
and self-absorption. He wants her to Oh Grow Up, so she can be
with him AND fulfill her Slayer duties. This is so interesting.
I wonder what it'll take for Buffy to make the leap in her own
mind to understanding what she really fears about what he's offering
her.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: "Buffy and the Beast" (Spoilers: Wrecked)
-- Kimberly, 18:02:15 12/01/01 Sat
Nicely thought out and expressed. I see something else that Spike
is offering Buffy: primal emotion.
Even though Buffy is used to action, not to thinking things out,
she does feel like she should live rationally. She investigates
anything new in Sunnydale; she wants to know their histories and
motivation; she spends a great deal of time hitting the books.
She spends very little time, and never really has, with the raw,
primal, messy world of emotions. And that is an area which, as
an adult, she must learn to handle.
Yes, adulthood is about responsibility and duty, paying the bills
and caring for the children, and all those other, tiresome things
that our parents tell us we have to learn about. But, before you
can become a confident adult, who can effectively handle all the
tiresome things, you also have to learn to handle all of the messy
emotional stuff that comes up. Some of it's positive, like holding
your healthy baby for the first time. Some of it's negative, like
telling your husband during labor exactly what you think of his
putting you into this position in the first place. But, before
you can parent that infant, you have to admit and handle all of
the emotions he or she rouses in you: love (like you didn't believe
possible), fear, resentment, pain, etc.
To date, Buffy has avoided her deeper feelings. She keeps them
all neatly boxed up because they're not nice. And she's right,
they're not. But they're there, they're not going away, and they
have to be handled before she can go on.
Sorry this is so repetitive; this season keeps hitting too close
to the bone. And I love it. I need a new episode!! Please!!!!!
:-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: "Buffy and the Beast" (Spoilers: Wrecked)
-- Nina, 19:09:58 12/01/01 Sat
"I think it's right... to give it up. No matter how good
it feels."
That's what Buffy says to Willow at the end of the episode. Buffy
desperately tries to convince herself that she is like Willow,
that Spike is like an addiction. But with that sentence, Buffy
tells us quite frankly that Spike makes her feel good.
The whole addiction parallel Buffy's trying to make is not real.
Even when Spike is telling her that she'll crave him like he craves
blood it is not a real addiction. Blood is food for a vampire.
It's air, it's the nutriment they need to survive. Buffy slowly
is starting to feel that she really craves Spike like food or
air, that it's instinctive.
"Sorry this is so repetitive; this season keeps hitting too
close to the bone."
I totally understand you here. I feel the same way! :)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> [> Re: "Buffy and the Beast" (Spoilers: Wrecked)
-- Humanitas, 16:58:23 12/03/01 Mon
Nicely thought out and expressed. I see something else that Spike
is offering Buffy: primal emotion.
That brings up an interesting point. With both of her "Demon
Lovers," Buffy is accessing a common characteristic: Passion.
In the case of her relationship with Angel, this was the all-too-typical
teenage seeking after something dangerous to supply passion and
drama in their lives.
With Spike, Buffy is again seeking something that she's missing.
In OMwF, she says "I just want to feel." How better
to kick-start a depressed sense of feeling than by sleeping with
someone who is not only dangerous, but who has displayed time
and again that he is a creature of emotion?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> great post! I agree with everything except... -- res, 12:54:54
12/02/01 Sun
"Everyone seems outraged by Spike's comment about sex with
the Slayer, but if you take a good look at Buffy, she doesn't
get nearly as upset as "we" think she should - she gets
up, acts outraged, wipes her mouth, and... insults him right back!
She didn't beat him, or stake him - she doesn't take enough offence
that she wants to hurt him back physically, although she does
throw the "convenient" barb at him. "
I think the fact that she doesn't fight back physically, and that
her convenient barb is rather weak and, er, convenient, actually
shows how much it startled and/or hurt her. I agree with your
comments about Spike's honesty, equality w/ Buffy, and refusal
to leave, and how those contrast all the failed relationships
in her past, but I don't think she's accepted or recognized that
yet. She's still fighting that acceptance and causing herself
a lot of self-loathing and pain in the process.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
OT - 1st Poem for Christmas --
Brian, 21:06:05 11/30/01 Fri
As this is December 1st, I was reflecting on what gift I could
give to all the posters at this board to celebrate the joy I feel
from being a part of this wonderful experience. So, with your
indulgence and perhaps with your forgiveness, I present:
12 Poems at Christmas Time
This first poem was published in some obscure poetry journal in
Oregon back in the 60's. I include it as it has some relevance
to Willow's situation. It's called:
SISTER SALVATION
I
Sister Salvation, she's a pretty gal.
She ain't no alley cat.
She knows how to treat a guy.
In the night, when sweat comes pouring,
And the spines of darkness are
Rippling your mind to scream,
Comes Sister Salvation.
She'll make you feel all right.
Her needle is bright.
Her power is flight.
She takes you from grim city scenes.
She's a pretty gal, fluid and light.
She takes you up and away.
She takes you up and away.
II
Sister Salvation, she's a mother.
She comes to you, and you to her.
She takes you up and away.
But she cannot keep you there.
She's got to bring you down.
And you feel her in your blood,
And you know she's coming now,
And you feel your body dying,
As she comes around again,
And she brings you down again.
Down to those same city scenes,
And your mind begins to scream,
But you hardly even notice,
For she brings you down so quickly,
For she cannot do otherwise.
For she lives on fire and death,
For she cannot do otherwise.
Sister Salvation, she's a mother.
She takes you up and away.
But she cannot keep you there.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> You bring a whole new meaning to the 12 days of Christmas
Brian. Thank you -- A friend, 20:03:00 12/01/01 Sat
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Thank you Brian...looking forward to the other eleven! --
Wisewoman, 00:02:54 12/02/01 Sun
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[> Re: OT - 1st Poem for Christmas -- Nina, 08:06:53 12/02/01
Sun
Thank you Brian! I always love your poetry! Keep them coming I'll
continue reading! :) :) :)
Current board
| December 2001