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thedeadlyhook) wrote2004-03-20 10:16 pm
S7 Ficlet - Question and Answer
I'm writing essays again! After a long hiatus with the whole laptop failure disaster, I'm back on track with my essay-writing, and if all goes well, may even get a major site update done before the Angel hiatus is over, even with all the fic-writing the hubby and I are doing. Not so sure about the redesign, although that's part of the plan too. Time flies. We'll see what I can get done.
But on the fic-writing note... I found this old story kicking around on my hard drive and just for the hell of it, I thought I'd post it here (the fact that the next couple of installments of "Bad Trip" are going to be heavy on stuff I wrote as opposed to the hubby have nothing to do with it... well, sort of). I'd read a couple of stories based on Kantayra's "Practically Perfect" challenge - don't rememeber where, but it was in my notes for the fic - and I'd done a little Buffy/Spike vignette in that vein. It's nothing to do with the original challenge, but the base idea is still there, vaguely - what Buffy would have changed about Spike, if she could (this is set roughly around the time of "Storyteller"). In retrospect, it's funny how comfortable I'd felt in Buffy's head back when I thought they might be going somewhere with her, or the 'ship... I didn't exactly like her, but I somehow felt like I could write where her head was at. I dunno.
..........
"What is this?"
The riotous laughter that had been echoing through the house came to an abrupt stop.
Buffy glared around the sunny living room. The teenage girls who had only a moment ago been giggling like teens at a slumber party had frozen, locked in a guilty tableau. A furiously blushing Vi quickly closed the magazine she held clutched in her hands. The rest redirected their gazes to the floor, the walls... anywhere but at the irritated Slayer, who was giving off every sign of gearing up for a long lecture.
Dawn, draped over an armchair near the edge of the group, rolled her eyes.
"I said," Buffy began evenly, ignoring her sister. "What is this? Daytime pajama party? The end of the world's on the way and you figure there's time for..."
"We were just reading, is all," Vi spoke up. Her face was still bright red, and her eyes were trained on the pages in front her her, but her voice was steady.
"Reading what?"
"Just a magazine, that's all. It had this quiz. Y'know, about guys and, a-and we were... y'know, just... uh, I mean..."
Buffy sighed. "Girls, don't you think you could find something a little more constructive to do in the countdown to the apocalypse than read the Cosmo quiz? I mean, we're..."
"It's not a quiz. It's a chart," Molly spoke up. "A personality match chart. Me mum used to make them, from astrologies. Girls wanting to know if their boyfriends were a good match. She'd tell them if they fit together based on the stars." She shifted uncomfortably for a moment under Buffy's intense glare, looked away.
The hall clock announced the hour, letting out a booming chime. No one flinched.
Buffy let the silence spin for a moment. Honestly. She took a deep breath, listened to the ticking clock, and counted to ten. "Look, girls. I know things are hard right now. I know it's hard to concentrate, and maybe it feels like you just can't handle the pressure anymore, but you've got more important things to think about right now. Like training. Training to take on the forces of evil. I mean seriously, boys or boyfriends, or potential boyfriends should be the last thing on your minds when..." she began.
"Hey Buffy, you never told us. How did your date go? You know, with the principal?" Dawn's voice had that blaring quality of a little sister who knew damn well what kind of trouble she was getting big sis into.
Buffy turned slowly and locked narrowed eyes with her sister. Dead, you are so dead, she found herself thinking. You are SO in for extra chore duty after this. Like, until the end of time.
"It went fine. Completely work-related levels of fine," she gritted.
"Uh-huh."
"Look, can you..." Buffy trailed off, and heaved an exasperated sigh. What was the point? Dawn's little interruption had done its work. The girls were already looking at her with that waiting expression she'd gotten all too familiar with, like she was a comedian who'd forgotten the punch line. Oh, forget it.
"Fine. Whatever," Buffy huffed out. "Don't listen to me. Do what you want! You want to giggle over some teen hottie? Be my guest. I'll be downstairs." She mentally slapped herself even as the words were leaving her mouth. "Working!" she added, with perhaps a little too much emphasis. Stupid!
"We were charting the guys in this house," Kennedy chimed in. Buffy wheeled around to look at the dark-haired girl, slouching in the armchair in a way that Buffy found unconciously irritating. Kennedy reminded her of kids at school who started fights - a little something in the eyes, a little challenge in the voice. Don't let her get to you, she found herself thinking, although she could already feel her reaction - teeth clenching, face getting hot. Think of Willow. She's close to Willow. That's a good thing. Good for Willow.
"It was kinda funny. You know," Kennedy continued, meeting her eyes coolly. "Figuring things out. Matching people up. Like Molly said." She lifted a shouder in a shrug, gave her an appraising look that seemed to last a little too long, then looked away. "It was something to do," she finished. End of story, her voice seemed to silently add. The other girls followed her lead, looking everywhere but at Buffy.
As if that didn't just prove my point! she thought, taking in the girls' distracted manner, their weird discomfort. We've got work to do! Anger rose up in her like a tide. She marched up to Vi and snatched the magazine.
Dawn let out a snort of disgust. "Wow, touchy much?"
"Don't you start," Buffy bit out. "Out of everyone, you should know better," she started to say, but felt the air go out of her argument, because all of a sudden he was there. Even without the familiar prickle at the back of her neck to warn her, the wafting scent of cigarette smoke told her exactly where he was, right at her back. And any second now he was going to open his mouth, and then she could just kiss the last shreds of her authority goodbye. Perfect. All I need. she fumed silently.
"Oh c'mon, pet. Let them have their fun, why don't you. Not like there's all else to do."
Right on schedule.
She turned, slowly. Folded her arms. Glared at him. He smirked back, and took a long drag on his cigarette.
"Did I or didn't I say something about smoking in the house?"
He raised an eyebrow at that.
"Maybe. Don't remember. If you worked it into one of your longer speeches, I might not have noticed." He lifted one shoulder in a dimissive shrug, a little too much like Kennedy's gesture for comfort, took another drag on his cigarette, blew it out, then inclined his head toward the girls. "Ta, ladies," he rumbled, flashed a quick, toothy smile, then swept out, dark coat flicking at his heels.
Trust Spike to make walking through the living room on the way to the kitchen into a big dramatic exit. Showoff, she grumbled to herself. She turned back to the girls with thoughts of finishing her lecture, or whatever she'd meant to say, and abandoned the idea after the first glance. They were giving her that look again. That something's-going-on look.
"No. More. Magazines," she said stiffly, and stalked out of the room.
..........
He'd already left the kitchen by the time she passed through. She hadn't heard the microwave running. Probably already had his daily blood dose then. She checked the sink. Yep, one congealed yuck coffee mug waiting there for her to wash out.
So much for today's emotional weather report, she thought, snapping on the faucet and rinsing out the offending piece of dishware with hard, angry motions.
He was mad at her. Not like she needed an interpreter to explain. And he was making sure she noticed too - all his lousier habits were back in full force. The smoking and the snarking and the disgusting blood guzzling. Just because he knew how much she hated them.
Better than the alternative, she thought grimly. Let him be Mr. Annoying. No more Mr. Nice Guy. Just like I told them. Not the time.
She shut off the water and dropped the cup into the sink drainer. It wasn't the old "Kiss the Librarian" mug from Giles' place, but a new one emblazoned with the Sunnydale high school logo. She didn't bother to dry it. Everyone knew it was his - whether she'd been the one to originally "liberate" it from the teacher's lounge or he had, it hardly mattered. No one else would touch it.
Flinging water from her hands with an impatient motion, she flung the back door wide and left it open, feeling a burst of petty satisfaction as the kitchen flooded with sunlight. At least she would be ensured of privacy from the daylight-challenged for a little while. She stretched out her sore limbs across the porch steps, smiling at the thought.
It was a bright day. There had been light rain the night before, and droplets glittered on the treetops as she looked out over the yard. A cool breeze lifted the leaves as she stretched her face up to meet the sun, enjoying the warmth. She felt a sudden, intense craving for a deep, dark tan. Skin cancer, not really a worry right now, she reminded herself, wiggling her toes in her sandals.
The minutes ticked by. The pleasure of sitting in the sun aside, she was actually kind of bored. She leafed through the purloined magazine with a distracted air, not really all that curious. She'd read magazines like this once. They'd been her guidebooks to life - fashion and beauty and gorgeous clothes. Now she couldn't remember the last time she'd looked at one. The thick, glossy paper felt downright foreign between her fingers.
Next week, all these people could all be gone, she reminded herself, staring at a photo of a model in an outfit she made a mental note of even while she mentally critiqued the whole idea of caring about fashion at a time like this. The fashion models could be dead. The photographers. The people at the printing plant. The editors. All those people who make annoying telemarketing calls. All deader than disco. And it could happen anytime.
"Gonna sit out here sulking all day then?" Spike's voice drifted from behind her.
Startled, she turned to look. Against all expectations, there he was, hovering at the edge of the porch, tucked securely in the one spot of shade the morning light had to offer, a little area protected by the overhang of the house.
Her eyes followed the line of the roof to the awning, and then back to him. He met her gaze coolly, expression just this side of bored, as if he'd just happened to find himself in the same place that she was. Buffy found herself staring over his shoulder, measuring the distance between where he stood and the open door. At least ten feet of strong sunshine. There was a light haze of smoke in the air. She drew a breath, unaware until that moment that she'd been holding it.
"Do you ever not do that?" she heard herself asking. "The whole courting death by sunshine thing?"
He copied her gesture, eyes drifting up to the awning for a minute, then back to her.
"Hadn't really thought about it," he replied mildly.
No, you wouldn't, would you? You just go where you think you need to. She turned away, willing herself not to notice that his voice had been soft this time, the silent invitation to talk. She really shouldn't have chosen the porch for her time-out. It was where they'd always talked before. He'd probably taken it as a sign.
I asked for this, she reminded herself, barely even aware of the subject change in her own mind. I asked for dangerous Spike.
She couldn't have it both ways.
Her eyes fell to the magazine in her hand and she idly began leafing through the pages again. Behind her, she heard the snap of his lighter, the familiar creak of leather. A door slammed somewhere in the house. Buffy sighed, hard.
"Do you ever sleep?" she asked without looking, aware of the irritated edge in her voice, glad for it. Not like she'd asked him to come out here. She turned the pages angrily, snapping the paper in fast, jerky motions.
It wasn't until a minute or so had gone by that she realized he hadn't answered.
She turned to look, brow knitting in frustration. He was still there, but his posture was stiff now, one hand drifting at his side with a cigarette clenched tight in his fingers, eyes narrowed. Their gazes locked for a moment, and she saw his shoulders slump, as if bearing up under a sudden heavy weight, and her stomach answered with an odd little clench.
He looked away first. "Right then. I get the message. Won't bother you," he muttered, dropping his cigarette to the boards and grinding it out with his boot. He stared toward the kitchen door in a long glare, as if gathering his nerve.
Buffy watched these motions with a gathering frown. She didn't really want to see him dash back through the sunlight, and knew on some instinctual level that he'd rather she didn't see it either. There was something embarrassing in it, like the way he'd felt about her telling the principal about his soul. Like the shock in his face when she'd dressed him down in front of the others. It was like... making fun of him somehow. His failed attempts to reach her.
Unbidden, the image popped into her mind of another morning, of him bursting through her kitchen door under a smoking blanket. Slamming the door and rattling the shade. Stamping out the smoke. Then acting all casual, saying he was "just out for a stroll." A bewildered Willow holding a spatula.
A helpless giggle bubbled out of her before she could stop it. She tried to choke it back, failed. His eyes turned to hers, the obvious hurt in them disappearing quickly behind a hard glare.
"Glad you're enjoying yourself," he snarled.
"I'm not," she answered, and felt a smile quirking her lips as she said it. "But... I was just thinking. That I could be. Or I would have, anyway... if you still were who you were then. You know. When we first met. The 'vampire who tried to kill me'? I would have laughed myself sick to see your hair on fire."
She bit her lip then, trying not to smile too widely. The look of startled panic in his eyes had been worth it. At her reminder, he made a nervous, smoothing gesture, sweeping his hands through his hair, then wrinkled his brow and shot her an irritated glance. Her smile got even broader.
"You know, there'll be shade in front of the door in a few minutes," she said calmly, turning back to the magazine and tossing her hair, as if she were still that tanned girl at the beach she'd been once upon a time. Her fingers lingered over the glossy photos, examining each one as if they were transmitting very important signals from The World of the Fashion Gods. There was a moment of quiet.
And the creature behind her let out an exasperated sigh, coat rustling as he settled in to wait.
She let herself relax, and turned to the next page. "Is He Your Perfect Match?" the headline blared. There were pen and pencil scribbles where the girls had filled in the quiz, noting their own personal scores with a scattering of letters and numbers, like a secret code. She was sure that her own name was tucked in there somewhere.
"Whatcha looking at?" he asked, finally. Never could be quiet for long, she remembered.
"Just some quiz," she answered, and let her eyes drift over the questions. Huh. Do you share similiar interests?
"Gotta pen?" she mumbled, and glanced over her shoulder. He stared at her, mouth open, then let out a little snort of laughter.
"Could make a dash for one." He smirked as he said it, but his eyes were soft. She couldn't help smiling back.
Creature of the night, she thought with amused irony, her eyes taking in his shaded face, the sunlit backyard just over his shoulder. One step back, and he'd be in full daylight. Unlife on the edge. Her smile faded a little.
"Nah. I'm good," she said quietly, and turned her gaze back to the page.
[end]
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Yes, weirdly, I couldn't stand her at the time because the whole Willow/Kennedy thing seemed so forced, but I've come to regard her more kindly since we began working on our "Bad Trip" fic... maybe it's because she's so open to interpretation as opposed to the main characters, who are relatively fixed... your guess is as good as mine. But yeah, I see the mini-Faith dynamic there. (Which in a way makes me wonder why we couldn't have seen some more interesting Willow/Faith vibes there...)
Spike wouldn't be trying to show a little bit of machismo for Buffy by courting big-pile-of-dustiness, would he? Heh. And I like the unspoken comparisons, lovesick Spike and S2 Spike. You could say they definitely share similar interests, ha....
I had all sorts of theories about that, at the time. I'd always thought Buffy in "Showtime" was doing her own machismo bit with the "see me pull the head off this UberVamp with no weapons" dealy-bob, and then wrapping up her little demonstration with "here endeth the lesson," just like Spike said to her in "Fool for Love"... and when she starts paging through the magazine the second time in this fic, she's also thinking about herself back in S2, and the sort of person she was then... at least that was my intention. Sort of a then and now for both of them.
But anyway, glad you liked. : )
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Kennedy...a failure in execution, not so much in idea... Whedon said he wanted Willow to wind up happy.
My inclination is to lay it on the actress a bit - not that she was per se bad, just bad casting, I think. Too cutesy, too pretty. I think someone sexier, more out there, could have sold me on the 'ship. As is, it just seemed too artificial. And believe me, I was all for the Willow winding up happy, but did it have to be such a "Willow's so great - here, have the happy relationship prize" sort of thing? Wasn't she supposed to be on something of a redemption trip too? Or was it exactly like Amy said, all is forgiven because she's Willow? Few mixed messages there, huh.
Willow and Faith had a great conversation in the car from LA to Sunnydale at the opening of My S7 Fic
I still wouldn't mind seeing this. Why not? I haven't read anything else like it, and I love the idea of Willow thinking about herself in Faith-like terms of needing to atone (you may have noticed a certain element of this in the hubby and I's current fic).
I'm sorry, but if they were going to have the Uber Urok Han Tai Whatever, he needed to be bigger than four feet tall. I'm just sayin.
(grins) Yes, our household makes much merry fun of the UberVamp. Silly, silly menace in its silly, silly elf costume. Don't you love how it takes Buffy two eps to bag one, and in "Chosen," regular humans like Giles are killing them with swords? Uh...
Yeah, I thought that came through nicely.
Ooh, thank you.
I got awfully sick of Buffy sort of bopping Spike around when she didn't want him and then using him when she did, but I felt more sympathetic to her in this fic. I hadn't realized just how much S6 and S7 had damaged her character for me until I started catching earlier Buffy in reruns and remembered how sweet and quippy she'd been.
I guess this story shows where my head at been at then - I thought they'd been trying to make a point about the extent of Buffy's damage, and how she has a really, really hard time reaching out to people for fear of getting hurt. It seemed like she and Spike equaled "safe" together in an odd way - in S6, because she really didn't care about him (or... I dunno, jury's still out for me on that one), and in S7 because they kind of can't hurt each other any more than they already have. I'd thought they'd set up this interesting platform for talking about expectations and how you can make your own life heaven or hell based on them, and I'd had this theory that the end of S7 was going to be all about Buffy letting out this big emotional bubble about how much her friends mean to her but she really isn't as strong as they think and needs them to give her their strength, blahdiddy blah blah. Instead we got a lot of fake smiles and silly dialogue. Guh. In hindsight, Spike's story was the only one that ended up feeling emotionally real to me - the rest of the characters' stories came off as, "oh, well this is just how we want the characters to be." The End. All of which, I guess, explains why the hubby and I are writing our current fic.... so...
Huh. I guess I really need to finish some more of those S7 essays. I still seem to have a lot to say on the subject.
no subject
Do you think Whedon might've partly been driven by the Dead/Vengeful Lesbian Cliche, especially when he got so much flak over killing Tara?
I think I can confirm that. I sat through a panel at San Diego Comic-Con with Whedon and various writers in which a fan asked about the whole attempted rape thing in "Seeing Red" and the writer in question autopiloted back an answer about Tara and how it was a story decision, not a political one, blahditty blah. I think they were really unprepared for the negative reactions they got on both those topics - which is why just hearing "Seeing Red" would lead them into conflating the two - and also explains why the subsequent treatment of the fallout for both in S7 was so slipshod.
there's about three different versions mashed together and they all suck and they would've been in Maine before the end of the conversation.
I hear you. Bear in mind I'm simplifying things by saying "I've got six different versions of my S7 wrapup essay" or something to that effect, because I probably have more than that in various states of finishedness, but they all come down to something like (wildly condensed): I don't like Buffy in this season. She's behaving like a bitch. Why isn't she getting any better? She's supposed to be the hero. Wow, Spike's really trying here. And actually, he was trying before. I'm started to get cranked off about how people are treating this guy. Why isn't it okay to like him, if he's trying to be a better person? Buffy sure as hell isn't trying. Oh, look - new annoying characters. Plot no make sense. Try to be good person = die, just use any power thrown in your lap + be mega-bitch who spouts cliches = congratulations, you win? Then comes the hatred. Rrrr.
So, basically, it all comes down to editing. Pick the points you want to cover in this conversation, and put off the others for later. (Still want to see this in your fic - I'm gonna keep bugging you about it, I swear.)
Spellcasters Anonymous"? Not very fucking funny to some members of your target demographic, Joss
ME really hasn't been banging the high notes on the sensitivity meter lately, have they? I always wondered about how people who've been in abusive relationships felt about Buffy in "Dead Things."
she and Spike seemed to shrink from physical contact, or dealing with any fallout at all
This too was covered - vaguely - in the Comic-Con panel. Joss asserts he "wanted to express their ambiguity on the subject"... which translates in my book to having no firm opinion worth expressing. Not a great treatment of heavy issues. He also mentioned how he "knew he couldn't bring them back to a physical relationship" because he found stories where a woman falls in love with her rapist "disgusting." (Although he didn't seem to have a problem with presenting S7 with such "ambiguity" that you could view the whole season with the honest impression that's what you were watching!) But anyhoo, I have a lot of issues with wasted opportunities with that 'ship. I would have liked to have seen them both grow rather than come down to an equation of Buffy being superior because she's Woman and Spike just lying down to die for her, because apparently that's what men should do. That helps me deal with the real world, thanks guys.
YEAH, and that would have fit in with the share-your-Slayer-strength too -- I guess we were supposed to've felt that Buffy and the Scoobies had mended their rifts by the end of S7, but it didn't really feel that way -- like the writers thought it had, and wrote accordingly, but the audience hadn't been along that journey and so the emotional resolution wound up feeling fake.
General laziness of the variety I complained about in "A Hole in the World," and which I've got no patience for. As a viewer, my intelligence is insulted.
Wow, this one was really long. Urk. Yeah, uh, back the essays!
no subject
Which was my main complaint - unless you have some point to make... well, what's the point, if none of us are even enjoying ourselves here?
And why was it OK for her to treat Spike like a punching bag because he didn't have a soul?
Yes, the "willing slave" line seemed a lot less funny in that context. The racism parallel got pretty hard to ignore.
It didn't seem ambiguous at all....more like they had a relationship of ex-lovers and THEN you would get these comments thrown in that reminded you the audience of the RAPE (poke, poke) (which were also tossed off in such a joking manner they were impossible to take seriously).
Yep. Not even gonna get started on that one myself. You basically had two readings for that relationship: a) Buffy never felt anything for Spike and just used him like a toy, which had the effect of making her into an amoral bitch or b) she actually did care about him, in which she was a closeted little coward and severely fucked up. And sorry, but neither one of these readings feeds my "girl power" jones.
I know it would be a Big Thing, but do you have any interest about writing a piece re Buffy now that all seven seasons are over? A general wrapup? I'd love to hear your thoughts on it all, is why I'm asking....
Yes, I do plan to do that - I've been working on various versions of exactly that for months, and once I get my website overhaul up and live, hopefully I'll at least have my S7 wrapup ready to go. All this LJ talk has certainly helped me firm up a lot of my thoughts, so it's not looking as daunting a topic as it used to be... especially now that Angel will be ending too, I feel the need for some overall analysis. I'll keep you posted.
no subject
I was always stunned at how ME took two magnetic, attractive young actors who had sizzling chemistry (remember "Rather be fighting you, anyway"?) and reduced the actual sexual relationship to something dull and depressing. (Well, except those first moments in "Smashed," maybe....)
My current A-1 complaint about Seasons 6-7. There just wasn't a lot of stuff in there that was fun to watch (although I agree that "Smashed" was pretty hot). But it's like the staff forgot about the part where the audience is there to be entertained. (This is actually a key topic of one of the essays I'm currently writing.)
Not to be crude, but if the biggest love relationship winds up only holding hands....
Agreed. Infantile and unrealistic. Whedon might as well have made Buffy a nun... actually, he practically did (she fobs off Angel with "It'll be years, if ever" before she gets her head together). And I note that Angel is also mostly celebate except for the occasional meaningless sex fest, so perhaps that's the model we're working with here - real love is not to be sullied with filthy touching. (snorts - not in my house!)
no subject
But then Whedon apparently got really into his "Buffy in pain = Show good" mindset
If Joss Whedon wrote nursery rhymes:
"Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow.
And everywhere that Mary went, her life was filled with pain and suffering."
But-- but what happened to the lamb?!
and you also had the loss of metaphor (high school = hell turned into real life = hell only with bills and crap jobs substituted for vampires and hellmouths).
Which only works if you consider post-school existence to be equally hellish. For me, the best thing about school was that in the end you can get the heck out; if we're working with the premise that everything in life is horrible (as per Wesley's spiel at the end of "Shells") then why not just shoot yourself in the head? Yuck!
Because when he originally lost his soul with Buffy, it didn't look like he went evil because of the orgasm.
Yah, it seems like it's afterwards, when he's lying next to her. I'm kinda reminded of that bit in Clive Barker's "The Great And Secret Show" about the cosmic ocean which you only glimpse the first time you sleep alongside someone you love. So perhaps, if Spike were subject to the same kind of gypsy curse, his "moment of perfect happiness" would come when he's snuggled up next to Buffy in "Touched," which he later describes as "the best night of my life" or something like that. Hm, maybe that's a deliberate parallel.
But later on in Ats, when Angel sleeps with Darla, it's pretty clear he's trying to lose his soul by having "lots of orgasms" with her and although it's "perfect" (and I take Darla's word for her being someone who'd know), which I took to mean Lots of Orgasms were had, he doesn't lose his soul.
Don't forget Angel's party boink-a-thon with skeletal Eve. The Darla thing is particularly interesting because, although at first I thought it was some kind of doofus fake-out, it really does look like something is happening to him - not so much the losing of the soul, as the getting of it back.
Perhaps Angel is just deliberately denying himself. Or perhaps it's just sloppy writing - wouldn't be the first time...
no subject
There was someone on TWOP who kept putting forward the theory that if high school = hell, they could have gone with a college = heaven parallel (which you seemed to see with Willow at first, rejoicing in the library).
I can't really imagine them going with something so angst-less. But I'd have to say I found their efforts to dredge up sources of pain and suffering in post-high school life to be, ahem, less than convincing. I often wonder where a staff of geeky writers, who presumably would have thrived in college and are now making a living doing the kind of thing any geek would give major bodily organs for - and I'm not talking about stuff like kidneys, where you'd still have a spare - get off telling us how much it sucks to be a grownup.
Yeah, they go to sleep, he wakes up and then AAAGH stumble out in to the rain BUFFY blah blah. That also happened with Darla, although it was a major-league fakeout -- and even with Cordelia in the fake life that was set up to bring back Angelus, I think.
I did love all the credulity-straining character-conflict resolution that built up to the perfect-Cordy-moment, though. Kinda reminded me of "Chosen," come to think of it. Now I'm imagining a Season Seven coda where we cut back to Buffy, chained to a table, with a glowy-eyed shaman announcing that he's successfully extracted her soul. :-)
Aww. That seems kinda sweet, for Clive Barker. What is it, filled with blood or something?
Hee!
And sorry about making you stab yourself in the eye. Won't happen again.
I swear continuity isn't a major kink, but I wish to God ME would be able to keep one storyline straight for a while....late Whedonverse reminds me of late Xfiles, where there were too many complications to remember, let alone try to keep straight.
The one that set my head on fire last week was trying to figure out the ground rules for Wolfram & Hart's magic bookshelf. When Sirk first shows Wesley the books at the end of the last season on Angel, the fact that they can only display stuff in the company archives is a frickin' plot point - that's how Wesley figurs out that Sirk stole a bunch of rare tomes from the pre-'splodey Watcher's Council. Then Whedon blunders in and blithely declares "No, it can display any book in the world." I say he's full of it, and the company just happened to have copies of The Little Princess and Fun Facts About The Deeper Well somewhere in the stacks...
Had to join this thread.
As for the Initiative, I can't wank that one so it makes any sense whatsoever.
no subject
Yep. I would have liked Kennedy much better if she had simply been the most visible baby Slayer, who got to sit at the big kids' table by virtue of her smarts and talent, not because she's Willow's girlfriend.
Plus, you had the whole very romantic story of Willow + Tara and its tragic end and then WHOMP a new interest, which is of course psychologically realistic and Whedon said he wanted Willow to wind up happy, but it was rather a terrible jolt.
Well, two things here. First, the very people Joss was trying to placate with a new love interest for Willow were the same people who were the least likely to be happy about that. The hardcore Willow/Tara shippers may have been most attracted to the relationship because it was a positive lesbian relationship, but they also loved it because it was Willow and Tara, not just Willow getting some Hot Girl Action. Second, it is psychologically realistic that Willow would get involved with someone again after losing a great love, but it's not realistic that said relationship would be much more than comfort sex. If Tara had just left town at the end of Season 6 (which I would have preferred, if she had to go), it would have been easier to accept a relationship that was deeper than rebounding, but as it was, Willow/Kennedy never seemed to me to be anything other than Willow drowning her sorrows with the first person to come along.
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Exactly. All girl-on-girl 'ships are not created equal.
it is psychologically realistic that Willow would get involved with someone again after losing a great love, but it's not realistic that said relationship would be much more than comfort sex... as it was, Willow/Kennedy never seemed to me to be anything other than Willow drowning her sorrows with the first person to come along.
Which is why I had such problems with Willow/Kennnedy as presented - you could almost draw a direct parallel between it and S6 Buffy/Spike. I often wondered if we were supposed to be making that connection, about the "kite string" and all, and Buffy wanting Spike to make her "feel," etc. All of which still makes Willow come out looking the better of the two, sad to say, even if she eventually decides later to give Kennedy the old heave-ho... but it doesn't help either Willow or Buffy in terms of making them look like they're capable of making relationship choices that don't just revolve around supplicants coming to them and saying something like "I like you, you're hot, you can use me if you want." Right. Positive role models. Uh-huh.
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She's an extraordinarily powerful person, but she's essentially neutered because if she uses the power she'll tip over into evil and her girlfriend has to kiss her back to life? The hell?
It seems axiomatic to me that, assuming these characters are meant to be heroes, then the power that comes from within them has to be good, and that forsaking it in favor of an external power (say, one embodied in a handy Deus Axe Machina) would thus be bad. I know most major world religions would disagree with me, but I didn't have the impression that this show existed to push the idea of submission to a higher power that Knows What's Best For You. Consider that my mission statement for "Bad Trip." :-)
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Oh lordie, yes. TKiM had SO much potential (a word I use far too much in describing Seasons 6 and 7), and yet... I really, *really* wanted to see fallout from Tara's death in an emotional sense, and while the brief scene at the gravesite in Help (I believe?) was sweet and good, it wasn't quite enough. Le sigh. So much that could have been.
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