Buffy/Angel fans

I just saw some Angel and Buffy seasons at my Walmart for $15. But I shouldn't really complain, I only paid $20 for mine...

oh wow, guess i missed a lot.. sorry ladies, had to sleep, stupid time difference!

fluff... you're absolutely right! spike is furious as he leaves sunnydale and actually looking for the power he needs to kill buffy, right? the fact that the demon gives him a soul is not something he planned.

still, here's what i have to say about spike in general, their relationship and actually all the characters on buffy.. (brace yourselves, haha)

spike is not a good guy by any means. but he's not completely evil either. his weak spot is love, always has been. he would have done anything for drusilla, and he'd do anything for buffy. i don't think he ever actually would have harmed her after falling in love with her over the course of season 5. from the point where he is willing to fight glory for her, i think that becomes clear.

i think to understand the buffy/spike relationship you have to look at the bigger picture.. the one big recurring theme of the show (imo) is people being torn between good and evil:
most obviously angel of course, who has two personas, one completely good, one completely evil.. then there's willow who is normally good but in season 6 goes on rampage, flays a guy and almost destroys the world!.. faith kills a guy even though she's not actually a bad person.. oz turns into a werewolf.. anya is a former demon who has killed god knows how many people.. even giles has done his share of bad things.
and then there's buffy herself.. she's supposed to be the personification of good, but she's always attracted to the "dark side". she falls in love with angel, a vampire she's supposed to hate.. she is tempted to abuse the powers she has whenever she is with faith.. as with every character on the show it's her friends and family who keep her grounded. and when she feels distanced from them after they've raised her from her grave, she loses touch to the good side. that's why she starts the affair with spike, because it's dangerous and forbidden and tempting. maybe that's why she's always so rough with him, too. to keep him at a distance. (i don't see that as a problem either. she's super-strong, she's not being abused in any way. consenting adults can do what they want, i don't care as long as no one is harmed.)

so okay.. where was i.. if you condemn spike you have to condemn a lot of characters on the show. he is torn between good and evil like they all are. willow is just as volatile and probably a lot more dangerous, but her friends never give up on her. they still love her and accept her back. whether that's a good message or not, i don't know. but it's the message that's brought across over the entire course of the show. i don't see spike as an exception.


what we totally agree on is the "ar" scene.. that was absolutely not necessary, and just totally wrong.. i hated seeing buffy that weak and helpless.. and it didn't even make sense to me either. when has she ever been weakened like that by a fight? she should have been able to throw spike across the room in a second. she's supposed to be the heroine, not the victim.

Fluffernutter wrote:

lena152 wrote:oh, riley. totally forgot him. you can skip seasons 4 and 5!

Oh oh wait! Watch The Body cause it's really really heartbreakingly good, and Forever cause it's got a little taste of B/A!!
But 4 you can skip entirely. I did...except for one scene with Buffy and Angel in The Yoko Factor (sensing a pattern here?)

oh no you have to watch "hush" from season 4!! that's an incredible episode. and i remember some of the first few epis of season 4 being absolutely hilarious. after the initiative and adam show up you can skip the rest though...

season 5 idk.. i found glory incredibly annoying, and i never liked dawn.. too much of those two. so watching "the body" and "forever" should do it, i agree.

lena152 wrote:

Fluffernutter wrote:

lena152 wrote:oh, riley. totally forgot him. you can skip seasons 4 and 5!

Oh oh wait! Watch The Body cause it's really really heartbreakingly good, and Forever cause it's got a little taste of B/A!!
But 4 you can skip entirely. I did...except for one scene with Buffy and Angel in The Yoko Factor (sensing a pattern here?)

oh no you have to watch "hush" from season 4!! that's an incredible episode. and i remember some of the first few epis of season 4 being absolutely hilarious. after the initiative and adam show up you can skip the rest though...

season 5 idk.. i found glory incredibly annoying, and i never liked dawn.. too much of those two. so watching "the body" and "forever" should do it, i agree.

Sorry...I did watch Hush. Loved the Giles scene!!

lena152 wrote:oh wow, guess i missed a lot.. sorry ladies, had to sleep, stupid time difference!

fluff... you're absolutely right! spike is furious as he leaves sunnydale and actually looking for the power he needs to kill buffy, right? the fact that the demon gives him a soul is not something he planned.

still, here's what i have to say about spike in general, their relationship and actually all the characters on buffy.. (brace yourselves, haha)

spike is not a good guy by any means. but he's not completely evil either. his weak spot is love, always has been. he would have done anything for drusilla, and he'd do anything for buffy. i don't think he ever actually would have harmed her after falling in love with her over the course of season 5. from the point where he is willing to fight glory for her, i think that becomes clear.

i think to understand the buffy/spike relationship you have to look at the bigger picture.. the one big recurring theme of the show (imo) is people being torn between good and evil:
most obviously angel of course, who has two personas, one completely good, one completely evil.. then there's willow who is normally good but in season 6 goes on rampage, flays a guy and almost destroys the world!.. faith kills a guy even though she's not actually a bad person.. oz turns into a werewolf.. anya is a former demon who has killed god knows how many people.. even giles has done his share of bad things.
and then there's buffy herself.. she's supposed to be the personification of good, but she's always attracted to the "dark side". she falls in love with angel, a vampire she's supposed to hate.. she is tempted to abuse the powers she has whenever she is with faith.. as with every character on the show it's her friends and family who keep her grounded. and when she feels distanced from them after they've raised her from her grave, she loses touch to the good side. that's why she starts the affair with spike, because it's dangerous and forbidden and tempting. maybe that's why she's always so rough with him, too. to keep him at a distance. (i don't see that as a problem either. she's super-strong, she's not being abused in any way. consenting adults can do what they want, i don't care as long as no one is harmed.)

so okay.. where was i.. if you condemn spike you have to condemn a lot of characters on the show. he is torn between good and evil like they all are. willow is just as volatile and probably a lot more dangerous, but her friends never give up on her. they still love her and accept her back. whether that's a good message or not, i don't know. but it's the message that's brought across over the entire course of the show. i don't see spike as an exception.


what we totally agree on is the "ar" scene.. that was absolutely not necessary, and just totally wrong.. i hated seeing buffy that weak and helpless.. and it didn't even make sense to me either. when has she ever been weakened like that by a fight? she should have been able to throw spike across the room in a second. she's supposed to be the heroine, not the victim.

I don't think that it's fair to say that soulless Spike is the same as anyone else from the Buffyverse. Because...well, he doesn't have a soul. I don't think he can be expected to be held to the same standards, but he also shouldn't be seen as the same. True, he did help them, but I believe that if he had the chance, he wouldn't wait a second to get rid of the chip and start snacking on the people he used to save.
That said, I don't think they did a good job with post soul Spike. He regretted hurting Buffy (as he should) but he was never haunted by any of the victims he killed, even when he was being haunted by the First. In Amends, Angel is completely horrified by the memories that the First brings up about the people he hurt/killed who were alive hundreds of years before Buffy was even born. Granted, I'm sure they didn't want to make Spike Angel #2 (they already failed at that, IMO), he had support, he knew he wasn't alone, Spike wasn't as completely all out evil as Angelus (although there is that whole 'shoving railroad spikes through people's heads' thing...) etc. But there were no signs of remorse for the aprox. 120 years of murder pre-chip AT ALL! And he bounced back mighty quickly... The blame for these mistakes I lay with the writers. I lost my faith in them towards the end.

On a completely separate note, who do you guys see Fred with? I prefer Fred/Wesley myself, but Fred/Gunn doesn't want to make me gouge out my own eyes or anything.

Fluffernutter wrote:On a completely separate note, who do you guys see Fred with? I prefer Fred/Wesley myself, but Fred/Gunn doesn't want to make me gouge out my own eyes or anything.

Fred/Wes, definitely...

yes, definitely fred and wes! i never cared much for fred, but in season 5 i really got to like her. especially when she turned into illyria! before, i never thought amy acker was much of an actress, but as illyria she really impressed me. she was so different, with that deep voice, that was amazing.

I was kinda meh about Illyria. I always felt:
a. cheated out of the Wes/Fred party.
b. like the plot twist came too late.
The first time I was REALLY impressed by Amy Acker was this tiny moment in season 4, I think. When Angel and Cordelia are missing and Fred and Gunn are trying to keep everything together. There's just this tiny line where she's like "I'm so damn tired of keeping my chin up!" I don't know why, that just broke me.

Just wanted to share this with my Buffy buds: I've been getting a buttload of emails and letters from different colleges and I've been trying to decide which to keep and which to toss. The decision was easy, though when it came to one. I immediately eliminated Fordham University on the grounds of "I can't support anything that shares a name with a Buffy villain".
Which just cements my place in the wacko hall of fame.

Haha...silly fluff...I just watched that ep yesterday, too...lol

Of course, I find jealous Angel ridiculously adorable in an annoying kind of way, and I love his speech about honing his brooding skills, but in that scene with Angel and Willow in her bedroom (this is not going where you think it is) all I can think of is how weird DB's makeup is, or the lighting or something. Do you know what I mean?

Fluffernutter wrote:Of course, I find jealous Angel ridiculously adorable in an annoying kind of way, and I love his speech about honing his brooding skills, but in that scene with Angel and Willow in her bedroom (this is not going where you think it is) all I can think of is how weird DB's makeup is, or the lighting or something. Do you know what I mean?

Haha! I never really noticed...I just think it's sweet. He and Willow bonding. And Willow is so cute..."I'm not supposed to have boys in my room." "Angel, if I tell you something you don't wanna hear, do you promise not to bite me?" lol!

flyersfan35 wrote:

Fluffernutter wrote:Of course, I find jealous Angel ridiculously adorable in an annoying kind of way, and I love his speech about honing his brooding skills, but in that scene with Angel and Willow in her bedroom (this is not going where you think it is) all I can think of is how weird DB's makeup is, or the lighting or something. Do you know what I mean?

Haha! I never really noticed...I just think it's sweet. He and Willow bonding. And Willow is so cute..."I'm not supposed to have boys in my room." "Angel, if I tell you something you don't wanna hear, do you promise not to bite me?" lol!

My favorite is his adorable little smile when he goes "I promise to behave myself". But I can't stop seeing how weird and white his face looks and how lipsticky his lips look. Cause, you know, I love to stare at David/Angel/Booth/All of the above.

Way back then on Buffy they did try to really make him look pale sometimes. I've noticed it a few times, then other times he's just regular.

One of the first Angel episodes when Oz shows up with the ring that makes him invincible, at the end when they're at the beach, Oz keeps saying how really pale he is over and over, and all I can think is - no he's not - he even has a slight tan! Where was makeup that day??