Buffy is a Culture Hero

[andrew r]

Originally Posted by Keri

Tushkoo made it Andrew, you might remember her form the Eliza board. She's good at editing videos like that, you can see her others at her YouTube channel if you like.

Yes I do! Shame she's not here anymore Thanks for the link too.

And I agree with Pat too!

[ohiofan]

Wilywiccan - Check out the wallies thread as I just left you another Avatar there!

[wilywiccan]

Thanks for the avatar, Ohiofan.

And I love the wallies.

[andrew r]

I like that new avatar of yours wilywiccan.

[wilywiccan]

It is courtesy of OhioFan, who makes the best wallies/avatars.

Well, I'm going to be having a BTVS marathon. The first half of season seven.

Lessons--Showtime

I have been reading some awful things some fans wrote about Buffy Summers in that year. They completely misinterpreted her character that season. I'm gonna try to write an essay or analysis of her motivations, feelings, etc, that year. She was not being a bitca. And she was not acting all superior.

[ohiofan]

I'm honored you're using my Avatar, Wilywiccan. It doesn't seem to be coming through on my computer very well. Did you use the address for where I have it stored when you changed it? If not here it is: http://lynchmob.freeyellow.com/0-AVATAR-99.jpg
If you use this it should come in much clearer.

I'm looking forward to your essay and I agree about your conclusion concerning Buffy's behavior in Season Seven. Enjoy your marathon!

[andrew r]

I loved Buffy being a counsellor to the students. I thought it was funny when she was settling in.

[wilywiccan]

I thought I'd bring over a few posts--I kind of fused them into one long ramble--from another site. Sorry for the length.

I was on a few Bangel (Buffy/Angel) threads on BTVS websites and it seems like everyone is picking on Buffy for Spuffy (Buffy/Spike) but not picking on Angel? He was half of the horridly puke worthy Cangel (Cordelia/Angel). I’ll probably explain in a different post why I was against that pairing, and it wasn’t just because I still have Bangel tendencies. I mean, it doesn’t stop me from loving Spuffy.

Anyways, Angel was the one that ended the relationship. Albeit, for noble reasons. She never stopped loving Angel and it was obvious how much he still affected her. But she didn't have him. He chose to live without her and even had a happy little family of his own that didn't include her. I think that a part of Buffy was still waiting for Angel to come to his senses and say that he still wanted to be with her. But instead he was too busy making me sick by going all puppy eyed over Cordelia. And Darla. And Nina.

Angel: I can stay in town as long as you want me.
Buffy: How's forever? Does forever work for you?

Did you see the look on Buffy's face in All The Way when Anya was talking about how lucky she was to meet the one person she was meant to be with and to have everything work out? It was obvious Buffy was thinking of Angel.

Or what she said in I Was Made To Love You? When she was talking to Xander about the AprilBot it was obvious she was comparing it to herself and how she felt about not having Angel. You know it wasn't about Riley since she admitted that he was a rebound relationship and that she wasn't there for him like she was for Angel.

Buffy: She spent all of this time trying to make this one person happy and then with him gone it was like there wasn't a reason to exist anymore.

After loving Angel with all her heart, when he left, she was afraid to love again. It hurt her so much to have him walk away.

Buffy: I feel like there's a pattern here. Open your heart to someone and he bails on you. Maybe it's easier to just not let anyone in.

Buffy: Seeing Angel again, even for five minutes, and it was Hello to the Pain.

Buffy: I killed Angel to save the world even though I loved him so much. But I knew it was the right thing to do. I don't have that anymore. I don't know how to live in a world where these are the choices. If everything just gets stripped away, what's the point?

Buffy: I killed Angel! God, do you remember that? I would have given up everything I had to be with--I loved him more than I will ever love anything in this life.

Buffy may have been with Parker and Riley, but she didn't love them. She jumped into a relationship with Parker, trying to get over Angel. There is a piece of dialogue omitted from HLOD where Buffy tells Willow that the whole time she was with Parker she kept thinking "Look how this isn't about Angel. When it was really all about him" or something like that. Riley had to convince Buffy to go out with him and even went to Willow to get dirt on Buffy (She likes cheese, ice skating, has a stuffed piggy named Mr. Gordo, etc). At the beginning of that relationship Buffy had to fake enthusiasm. In one conversation with Willow she is talking about how great Riley is and Willow calls her on the fact that it sounds like she is trying to find something to like about him. That Buffy was forcing herself to like him. Buffy knew that she would never love Riley, not like she loved Angel. That was the point. After the pain and heartbreak with Angel she didn't want to go there again. She tried to have a safe, passionless relationship.

Notice that after Buffy left LA (Sanctuary-The Yoko Factor) she didn't go to see Riley. Instead she lies on her bed, morose, thinking about Angel. It wasn't until the next day that she sees Riley because he comes to her dorm, saying something like "I got tired of waiting".

Out Of My Mind
Riley: Best case scenario they turn me into Joe Normal
Buffy: And that's not good enough for you?
Riley: It's not good enough for you...your last boyfriend wasn't exactly a civilian.

At the end of that episode Riley tells Xander that he knows Buffy doesn't love him.

Into the Woods
Riley: I wanted to know why Angel…has so much power over you.

Xander: You got burned with Angel. And then Riley shows up.
Buffy: I know the story Xander.
Xander: But you're missing the point. You shut down, Buffy. You've been treating Riley like rebound guy.

And it's not like she had many other options in S6. Spike was the only person she had to turn to. Dawn would take anything she told her personally. Her friends were the reason she was suffering from depression. They were the ones that ripped her out of Heaven. Willow was addicted to black magic. Xander was dealing with the fear of turning into his abusive, alcoholic father. Giles moved out of the country. Buffy wasn't that close to Anya and Tara. Although telling Tara about Spike started a good friendship between them.

On ATS (Angel the series) the AI Team (Angel Investigations) was pushing Angel towards Cordelia, making him feel like he should be in love with her. Probably because Gunn, Fred, and Lorne weren't around when Angel was with Buffy and have never met her. Fred didn't know that Angel used to do Tae Chi with Buffy. She didn't know a lot about the relationship. Cordelia and Wesley--who really weren't up front and center during the Bangel romance--made it almost seem like a joke with the kiss me/bite me impersonation. It might have been funny coming from Xander/Willow.

They didn't tell the gang that Angel decided to give up living guilt ridden in the streets eating rats because he was inspired by Buffy. Do they even know that Buffy offered Angel her life to save him? Or that she kissed him in vamp face? Or was able to enter his dreams? That he was going to kill himself because he didn't ever want to hurt Buffy again? They didn't know that he gave up his humanity for Buffy. They didn't know about the Claddaugh ring and its marital importance. They don't know that Buffy never healed from Angel's bite, even though all her other injuries have healed.

I hated that the ATS writers tried to make Cordelia into something she wasn't in season three. I mean short blond hair, calling her a "warrior" "champion", etc. She was barely learning how to fight that year.

Angel can be easily influenced. I mean, look at how he fell for that whole "I'm a champion" thing. He started as a humble fighter trying to make amends for his past. What happened to that?

I think what made him listen to Mayor Wilkins and Joyce Summers so easily was that he already felt like he was hurting Buffy by being with her. When he first met her all he wanted to do was help her. He never meant for her to get repeatedly attacked by members of his old vampire family; Darla (bit her mom & shot at her with guns), Luke, The Master (actually killed her), Spike (nearly killed her on several occasions & sent the Order of Taraka after her to distract her from rescuing Angel), Drusilla. He never meant for her to get emotionally and psychologically tortured for four months by Angelus after having trusted and loved him enough to give herself to him. He never meant for her to have to send him to Hell, which I believe in the long run traumatized her more than it did him. He never meant for her friends to get on her case for being with him. He never meant for her to have to nurse him back to health after the ritual in WML and being returned to Earth in HF&T.

Angel: I'll never hurt her.
FE/Jenny: You were born to hurt her. Have you learned nothing?

Buffy: And I hate it. I hate that its so hard. And that you can hurt me so much.

The final thing that made him decide to leave would have to be the dream sequence in Prom. He dreamt of marrying her, and in a cathedral during the day no less. And it ends with her bursting into flames. He woke up clunching his heart, an obvious sign of how much it affected him to see her die. He couldn't let her get hurt anymore. I think that it also showed him what she must have felt when she had to kill him. How absolutely painful it must have been for her.

He saw how much pain he was putting her through and that it might just get worse in the future. He didn't realize how much it would hurt her to just walk away after everything they had been through and the fact that she wouldn't be able to easily move on since he was her first everything; boyfriend, love, lover.

I really think that not being able to make love to her was a huge factor, just not the biggest. Angel had always been a sexual person. As both Liam and Angelus. After being celibate for nearly a century, his sex drive was reactivated when he started dating Buffy. It was very hard for them to keep their hands off of each other after he was brought back. They couldn't go from being passionate lovers to being friends. Almost everything they did had that underlying sexual tone to it. Going to the movies (it ends up being an Adult Film), sparring, doing Tae Chi, Buffy helping him sit when he was still weak, they kept going into the forbidden zone.

Angel: It told me to lose my soul in you and become a monster again.
Buffy: I know what It told you. Why does it matter?
Angel: Because I wanted to! Because I want you so badly. I want to take comfort in you and I know it will cost me my soul and a part of me doesn't care. I'm weak. I've never been anything else. It's not the demon in me that needs killing, Buffy. It's the man.

Angelus traveled all over the world. I wonder why he didn't know about places like that cave in Africa where Spike got a soul, without any loop holes or triggers.

[sarahbrazilianfan]

Ive read it all and I do agree with you at almost all the major points...just not the one about Buffy turning to spike for sex being right....Not that Cangel was right either...for me Spuffy and Cangel have always been and will always be just......wrong.
BTW , sometimes wilywiccan you do sound like a Bangel !

[ohiofan]

Very interesting points, Wilywiccan. It's amazing that Joss, Sarah and the rest of the crew were able to instill such a sense of passion in all of us. One that lives on in our hearts and minds and always will.

[andrew r]

It also shows what a well written show it was. If it was underrated by its peers at award times.

[ohiofan]

It certainly was!

Wilywiccan - Check the wallies thread as there's another Avatar there you might like!

[andrew r]

I'll hae to go and see. Willywiccan, I was wondering are there any loopholes in the show that you've wanted an answer too? Mine's the dusting of vamps. In particular one vamp who was killed when they tried to raise the Master again. It just that you see the stake go throught the centre of the vamp before they turn to dust. I always thought it had to be through the heart to kill them via a stake or pointy instrument.

[wilywiccan]

It does have to be through the heart. Are you talking about When She Was Bad? I'll rewatch the fighting scenes and check it out.

I have unanswered questions too. I'll have to make a list later.

[ohiofan]

If it's WSWB, I think I know which scene Andy's talking about. I guess one could argue that it all depends on the angle of entry from the back (sorry - that's the in me!). I always wondered how certain items would survive the dusting such as the ring on the one vamp?

[andrew r]

It was WSWB. As for the angle, it's pretty straight as you can see Buffy holding the stake after the vamps dusted. As for the ring, yeah I've wondered that too.

[ohiofan]

I'll look again, Andy, as I seem to remember her hands being in fists. I'll check it out this afternoon. It gives me another excuse to watch Buff's sexy dance with Xander!

[andrew r]

Oooh yeah! That was hot! The dance I mean.

[ohiofan]

Wilywiccan - Check the Avatars again - One there I think you'll like!