Listening to yet another "was Riley good for Buffy" conversation, this time on Hellmouth Podcast for A New Man, I revisited an old pet peeve of mine. The following is just my rambling way of working through my thoughts on it.
I've always had a little trouble with the idea that Buffy rejected Riley because he was a good guy or boring or not dark enough. To me, the quality that Buffy needs from a partner isn't darkness, and I think it does the character a disservice to phrase it that way. It's not about darkness or evil. That's not what drew her to Angel. I mean sure, he was a mysterious force at the start, cryptic guy, but I never got the sense Buffy thought of him as dark. Just mysterious, which was a draw of course. But she fell in like with him before he was unveiled as a vampire, and then she loved him despite herself. But not because he was evil. If he were evil, she would have staked him, not offered up her neck. And she wasn't drawn to Angelus.
To me, what is similar about Buffy's more intensely passionate relationships isn't just that they were vampires, therefore somewhat evil, dark and dangerous. It's that they're from her world. They operate within it in a way closest to how Buffy operates, which is different from Riley or even Xander, and different from how the other vampires and demons deal with the world.
It's not about evil, it's not about the bad boy in any direct sense. Self-proclaimed nice guys need not feel threatened or depressed that Riley didn't get the girl, nor do they have to find ways to make it her fault that the relationship failed. Like many things in BTVS, it's a metaphor, much like the bad boy in cinema is a symbol more than a reality. So sometimes it is saying some women want the bad boy, the man who will treat them like shit, just as some men seem to want a cruel woman. But often the bad boy is symbolic of difference, of rebellion, or of the feminine. I'm thinking James Dean in Rebel. Bad on the surface, sensitive within. Women who go for that aren't looking to be treated badly or roughly, they're identifying with someone who isn't Captain America or Tim Allen, who isn't a soc or a jock, someone more in tune with traditional feminine qualities like empathy, intuition, sensitivity and openness to the world, not someone more traditionally male who seeks to dominate it through physical strength and force of will. These bad boys also usually have a more nuanced understanding of what the world is like, that it's not made for them, and an understanding of oppression. This is not the symbolic perfect white male ideal who's gone through life without realizing how many breaks he's had, how relatively easy it's been for him, who has never really had to come up against significant barriers so never had to question the world view he was taught. That perfect man works for some women, perhaps because they too have had the privilege not had to question what they've been taught about the world, perhaps because they seek the status that goes with it. But some of us are operating within a different paradigm.
I've gotten far afield from where I wanted to go (so new), but not too far, because now I'm going to talk about Riley. Riley was that guy, the one who continued to view the world pretty simply as a black and white, orderly place, a world where he could make a difference, could impose order when it went awry, a world where he had a pretty high status and was in control. He wasn't arrogant or cruel or particularly misogynistic or chauvinistic, he was a genuine nice guy, but simple. Buffy woke him up to some reality, opened his eyes to a grayer world, and he got pushed off his simple track and began questioning what he had been taught. He even went so far as to declare himself an anarchist, which he never was and never will be. But as much as he learned from Buffy and the Scoobies, he never really developed a more complex world view. The Initiative turned out to be evil, but their overall perspective and strategies were still the way to do things. He still saw the world simply. He lived a very goal-oriented life, planning out his desired future, acting to make his desires come true. Not a bad way to live, nothing wrong with it if it works for you. But that's not Buffy's world anymore, not since she became the Slayer. It can't be.
((Finding out you're the Slayer at puberty coincides with becoming a sexually mature woman for more reasons than one. Becoming the Slayer is a metaphor for becoming a woman, realizing that there's something different about you that makes you not completely human in the eyes of the patriarchal lenses that seem to abide. Having that realization is pretty intense, and definitely the end of childhood. ))
The world Buffy has to navigate is full of incredibly complex situations, not at all clear choices, and obstacles that appear without warning and have to be dealt with regardless. She's had to develop a very nuanced and complex case-by-case based strategy for dealing with her daily life that Riley never had to face. But Angel and Spike to some degree have. They live in the world of demons and myth as Buffy does. They too used to be fully human, living their own unexamined lives, when they were chosen to walk in a far larger, wilder realm. Since they managed to hold on to or reclaim their humanity in tandem with the beast within, they've had to negotiate ways of surviving in that more complicated world. I guess, simply put: They get it; Riley doesn't.
Of course, the wider world, the world full of danger and magic and very complex moral dilemmas doesn't have as much to do with order as it does with chaos and random uncertainty. And anyone who lives in that world develops very different coping mechanisms and strategies than someone living in (or thinking they live in) a world of order. When order is the norm, it's hard enough to deal with the occasional bits of chaos that creep in, but if you survive those, you can find a way to ignore them or to do as Riley did and pick your times to fight them and your times to pull back and regroup. Riley doesn't live in the chaos, he just visits there on occasion and works to keep that world away from his own. Buffy has to live in the chaos, where order is the unusual mode of being. She can't just drop in and out as needed because of who she is. Being the Slayer isn't part of her life she can turn off after 5:00, it affects every aspect of her existence, even when she tries to step away from it.
Buffy doesn't need darkness or evil, she doesn't normally want to be treated badly, even if she did go through a depression that led her to use Spike to punish herself for a while. She needs someone as a partner who acknowledges the same reality, lives in the same world and has developed similar strategies to deal with it.
Maybe that does manifest as darkness in the eye of the beholder, but darkness as a descriptor is too vague and misleading. It's about the feminine really. The long-standing dichotomy we use to discuss these things is male being intellect, power, order, control, light, science; female being emotion, compliance, chaos, the wild, dark, magic. Riley and Buffy were in a sense just as opposed and unlikely lovers as any of her beaus. He's the Initiative; she's the Slayer. They each learn from one another a great deal, and try walking in each other's worlds, but it ultimately doesn't make them more alike because they live in those separate worlds, Buffy out of necessity, Riley maybe out of choice or maybe because he just can't navigate the other and be happy. (The fun part is that I see Buffy as yang to Riley's yin in season 5 at least, which casts a really interesting dissonance on top of the more traditional male/female dichotomy they seem to symbolize. I <3 Joss Whedon.)
Anyway, Buffy lives in the wild places, yes, in the dark. When Riley tries to join her there, he picks that almost perfectly wrong way to do it, focusing on the exterior details of her vampire bites versus the more profound interior differences between the two of them in the ways they live in the world. He didn't get it, it didn't work for him, so he set a new goal, took off, and found something that did work for him, that kept him in his world, doing the work he was fulfilled doing. Buffy didn't try to cross into Riley's world in season 5. She toyed with it in season 4, found it wasn't right for her, and tried to bring Riley back home with her instead. So she didn't meet him halfway, and she owns that. But I think she blames herself too much for not giving him what he needed when to do so would have gotten her killed or changed her into a different person. As a slayer, she can't escape the chaos.
Buffy and Angel almost worked not because he was dark and could be evil. First, they had the Romeo and Juliet first love, star-crossed thing, which was passionate and intense, but their relationship survived the Angelus resurgence because of the maturity they both gained dealing with the adult ramifications of that turn and the choices they both had to make to come out of that alive and whole. The childish first love became Buffy's first adult relationship. It was a dive into the wild, the chaos, that they survived, first separately and then together. They share a history and understanding gained on that journey that can't be replicated. Angel gets it.
Buffy and Spike almost worked not just because he was evil, although that played a part in the beginning of their physical relationship. Spike thrived in the wild, and he had insights into what it was to be the Slayer and what it was to walk in the dark. He knew what it was to die and come back. And Buffy was in a place where she couldn't connect with anyone else. She was self-destructive and Spike stayed by her side through it. But season 6 Spike didn't fully get it either. He was on the opposite end of Riley then, trying to take Buffy to a place of pure chaos, away from even the bits of order the Slayer attempts to coax out of the wild. But season 7 Spike with his full humanity restored finally got it, and eventually understood that Buffy had grown past her own self-hatred, and they got past the crazy to a place where they could fully connect. They too traveled a journey together that no one else fully shared or understood. Spike gets it.
And maybe it's as simple as the fact that Riley and Buffy were together at a less tumultuous emotional time. The history he shares with Buffy doesn't hold as much weight, isn't singular enough to bind them together in a shared understanding. Riley never navigated the wild with Buffy in any meaningful and long-lasting way. Maybe there is some truth to the idea that those romantic dramas will ultimately result in a more intense bond. Most people don't need that, but most people don't live in the wild. That doesn't make Buffy a drama queen, just someone living her perforce intense, brutal existence.
Back to the metaphor, not that we left it. Joss created what I would argue is the greatest female hero ever for that time (or now in my mind). In defining her world, her philosophy, her relations to that world, he managed to combine the chaos of the wild feminine with a hero who takes action. Who gradually finds ways to traverse the chaos and mingle in some order without trying to bend the world to a masculine will or blow it up if it won't comply. She has the most intense connections to the lovers in her life that can do the same, and who can treat her as an equal partner in the endeavor. Buffy's so-called need for darkness is actually her need for a partner who can see the complexity of her circumstances, will attempt to navigate her world with her, and will accept her as an equal. Riley thought he saw the first, but didn't. He attempted the second, but not in any way that showed he understood it, and therefore failed. And he never fully succeeded at the third either. He wasn't a hidebound sexist, but he never gave equal credit to the intuitional, emotional feminine ways of dealing with chaos, never saw those strategies to be equally effective as his attempts at control, and couldn't fully accept that Buffy could be his protector just as he could be hers, in true egalitarian partnership. Open your eyes to the dark, Riley Finn, and then we'll talk.
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I could ramble on forever without streamlining my point, I think. Maybe in future I can come back and try to make this coherent and separate out the different strands of argument. It could happen.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #15 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Wolves at the Gate conclusion
We open with Renee's thoughts as she dies, impaled on the stake end of the scythe. Fog is curling up around the team, Kumiko tackles Willow out the building window, and Xander is coming towards her as the fighting starts. "Xander, I'm not ready." Six Feet Under style whiteout as she dies.
Xander cradles her body and Buffy rallies the others around them to keeps the vamps from Xander. Dracula tells Buffy he can stop the spell, but he needs Willow, so would she please go get her. She doesn't want to leave Xander vulnerable, but Dracula has his back. What did happen with those two? Buffy transfers command to Satsu and dives out after the witches.
Willow and Kumiko are flying and falling, Will's green magic against Kumiko's red. Kumiko tells her they were both students of Saga Vasuki, aka the green snake lady. Did we know her name yet? I can't remember. Anyway, Will reads Kumiko's mind and finds Vasuki there. "Did you think I could not find you? Did you think you could hide from what you are? Or what's to come?" Those words echo from Restless and Buffy vs. Dracula, only then there were for Buffy. Now Willow gets a dose of it, along with a fiery vision of a city in flames, the scythe, and the snake lady curled around it. I think all this is foreshadowing the Fray future arc to come.
Kumiko is on top and Will is stunned from her vision when Buffy lands on Kumiko and sticks a knife into her heart. Hopefully she's dead, but who knows. Buffy and Willow continue to fall towards the battle below.
The slayers aren't having much luck, and Rowena calls for them to fall back, but Dawn is not having it. She stomps on a few more vamps and leads the charge toward the building. But the vampires were prepared for this. Come one, Tokyo, robotics division, you knew it was coming. Mecha Dawn! Toru: "Well, there's something you don't see everyday." Echoing Andrew's words last issue. Dawnzilla vs. Mecha Dawn commences.
Raidon says the slayers are within the radius -- so does that mean the spell is still limited to the city/country and not global? -- but no word from Kumiko. Turo's up for doing the incantation himself, and he starts that now that the lens is powered up. Then Dracula leads the infiltration team onto the roof. He tackles Turo, freeing the scythe. Satsu jumps for it and gets it and continues her arc over the edge of the building. Oops.
On the street, Willow woke up just in time to turn the sidewalk to water for them to land in. They crawl out dripping wet and see Satsu falling through the air. We focus on the two of them talking as they watch Satsu's descent. They discuss whether Satsu is Buffy's girlfriend now, and Willow tells Buffy to be careful with her Sappho sister's heart. And BTW, Willow never wanted Buffy that way, she's not even on the list. So there. Then they decide to catch Satsu.
From the roof, Raidon has the chance to be there when Willow appears with Buffy, Satsu and the scythe. Lucky him. But the vampires are still all full of gypsy tricks and can't be killed. Dracula calls to Willow, gives her his sword. He says -- this is interesting -- it's an ancient relic and bound with demon spirit, like the scythe. (Was there stuff about this in Fray at all? I can't remember.) Dracula tells Willow to do some sort of reversal spell that uses his sword and the lens to take the power from the vampires pretty much the same way they were going to take the power from the slayers using the scythe. Interesting. I guess Dracula's weird magic powers come from the sword somehow. Anyway, Willow casts the spell and the vampires are killable again. The slayers go to work.
Dawnzilla and Mecha Dawn fight while Andrew offers his finally useful expertise. Mecha Dawn says things like, "I like blue jeans and irony," "I cry a lot," and "I often let boys take advantage of my weak emotional states." Dawnzilla has had enough. She rips Mecha Dawn's head off.
In the battle on the roof, Satsu kills Raidon, saving Buffy. Dracula takes on Toru, calling for his sword back. Will tosses it his way and Toru intercepts. But Vlad Dracule is no slouch at combat. He takes back the sword, cuts Toru's hands and feet off, claiming that he has always been unique among vampires and Toru shouldn't be so cocky. Then he hands the sword to Xander. Xander cuts off Toru's head with determination but no joy.
The vampires run for it. Buffy orders her slayers to seal off the streets and let none escape as she walks to Xander to hold him as he collapses and cries.
Aftermath. At the Japanese fort, Dracula takes his leave of Xander. And I guess the manservant label is going the way of the dodo.
Buffy and Satsu talk once more. Satsu can't handle it. "I'm in love with you. And I need not to be." She wants to stay in Japan in Aiko's place, leading this squad. Buffy agrees. They say nice things and make love one last time.
The last page mingles Dracula's words to the captain of the ship carrying him away to quick shots of our Scooby gang:
"We have a cold journey ahead of us." Willow, meditating or communing with her snake lady.
"Find what warmth you can for now." Buffy and Satsu entangled in bed.
"And I'll stand watch alone." Xander scattering Renee's ashes and saying goodbye.
Now that was a particularly fine story arc.
We open with Renee's thoughts as she dies, impaled on the stake end of the scythe. Fog is curling up around the team, Kumiko tackles Willow out the building window, and Xander is coming towards her as the fighting starts. "Xander, I'm not ready." Six Feet Under style whiteout as she dies.
Xander cradles her body and Buffy rallies the others around them to keeps the vamps from Xander. Dracula tells Buffy he can stop the spell, but he needs Willow, so would she please go get her. She doesn't want to leave Xander vulnerable, but Dracula has his back. What did happen with those two? Buffy transfers command to Satsu and dives out after the witches.
Willow and Kumiko are flying and falling, Will's green magic against Kumiko's red. Kumiko tells her they were both students of Saga Vasuki, aka the green snake lady. Did we know her name yet? I can't remember. Anyway, Will reads Kumiko's mind and finds Vasuki there. "Did you think I could not find you? Did you think you could hide from what you are? Or what's to come?" Those words echo from Restless and Buffy vs. Dracula, only then there were for Buffy. Now Willow gets a dose of it, along with a fiery vision of a city in flames, the scythe, and the snake lady curled around it. I think all this is foreshadowing the Fray future arc to come.
Kumiko is on top and Will is stunned from her vision when Buffy lands on Kumiko and sticks a knife into her heart. Hopefully she's dead, but who knows. Buffy and Willow continue to fall towards the battle below.
The slayers aren't having much luck, and Rowena calls for them to fall back, but Dawn is not having it. She stomps on a few more vamps and leads the charge toward the building. But the vampires were prepared for this. Come one, Tokyo, robotics division, you knew it was coming. Mecha Dawn! Toru: "Well, there's something you don't see everyday." Echoing Andrew's words last issue. Dawnzilla vs. Mecha Dawn commences.
Raidon says the slayers are within the radius -- so does that mean the spell is still limited to the city/country and not global? -- but no word from Kumiko. Turo's up for doing the incantation himself, and he starts that now that the lens is powered up. Then Dracula leads the infiltration team onto the roof. He tackles Turo, freeing the scythe. Satsu jumps for it and gets it and continues her arc over the edge of the building. Oops.
On the street, Willow woke up just in time to turn the sidewalk to water for them to land in. They crawl out dripping wet and see Satsu falling through the air. We focus on the two of them talking as they watch Satsu's descent. They discuss whether Satsu is Buffy's girlfriend now, and Willow tells Buffy to be careful with her Sappho sister's heart. And BTW, Willow never wanted Buffy that way, she's not even on the list. So there. Then they decide to catch Satsu.
From the roof, Raidon has the chance to be there when Willow appears with Buffy, Satsu and the scythe. Lucky him. But the vampires are still all full of gypsy tricks and can't be killed. Dracula calls to Willow, gives her his sword. He says -- this is interesting -- it's an ancient relic and bound with demon spirit, like the scythe. (Was there stuff about this in Fray at all? I can't remember.) Dracula tells Willow to do some sort of reversal spell that uses his sword and the lens to take the power from the vampires pretty much the same way they were going to take the power from the slayers using the scythe. Interesting. I guess Dracula's weird magic powers come from the sword somehow. Anyway, Willow casts the spell and the vampires are killable again. The slayers go to work.
Dawnzilla and Mecha Dawn fight while Andrew offers his finally useful expertise. Mecha Dawn says things like, "I like blue jeans and irony," "I cry a lot," and "I often let boys take advantage of my weak emotional states." Dawnzilla has had enough. She rips Mecha Dawn's head off.
In the battle on the roof, Satsu kills Raidon, saving Buffy. Dracula takes on Toru, calling for his sword back. Will tosses it his way and Toru intercepts. But Vlad Dracule is no slouch at combat. He takes back the sword, cuts Toru's hands and feet off, claiming that he has always been unique among vampires and Toru shouldn't be so cocky. Then he hands the sword to Xander. Xander cuts off Toru's head with determination but no joy.
The vampires run for it. Buffy orders her slayers to seal off the streets and let none escape as she walks to Xander to hold him as he collapses and cries.
Aftermath. At the Japanese fort, Dracula takes his leave of Xander. And I guess the manservant label is going the way of the dodo.
Buffy and Satsu talk once more. Satsu can't handle it. "I'm in love with you. And I need not to be." She wants to stay in Japan in Aiko's place, leading this squad. Buffy agrees. They say nice things and make love one last time.
The last page mingles Dracula's words to the captain of the ship carrying him away to quick shots of our Scooby gang:
"We have a cold journey ahead of us." Willow, meditating or communing with her snake lady.
"Find what warmth you can for now." Buffy and Satsu entangled in bed.
"And I'll stand watch alone." Xander scattering Renee's ashes and saying goodbye.
Now that was a particularly fine story arc.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #14 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Wolves at the Gate part 3
Aiko is strung up downtown, her blood spelling out "Welcome to Tokyo." Buffy and her crew cut her down and take her body to the local headquarters, a building that looks kind of like a Shinto shrine out in the country, heavily fortified. Buffy lays Aiko's wrapped body at the feet of Buddha as the girls watch. Then she sits vigil.
Night falls, and Willow comes to see if she's gone catatonic again. They discuss options, not really clear on how to attack these vamps when they can't physically touch them. Enter Dracula with information on a containment spell, being snotty and condescending and laying claim to the master suite, poor Xander running along behind him.
At the top of a Tokyo building, which we later hear is called Ashikaga (which is the name of a city, a clan, and a shogunate), the huge red-tinted circle o' doom is buzzing away. Raidon is talking to a new woman about their plans, mentioning tech support (for the lens mechanism) and robotics division (just wait). They also have an army of vamps to guard them from the slayers while they're getting the lens up to speed. Kumiko hangs around sleeping or meditating like a bat. (Not that bats meditate, although they may, what do I know, I just mean hanging upside down, basically).
Renee is playing schoolgirl damsel in distress, luring a vampire into a Scooby ambush. Will uses the containment spell Dracula taught her, putting up a force-field box around the vamp. They pour gas on him and Buffy questions him about Toru. They find out what we already know, that Kumiko is going to use the scythe to reverse the spell, making all the slayers human again using the super lens on the Ashikaga building. They're just finishing getting the lens ready, which should happen before dawn -- be back before Dawn. (It's also going to happen before, as in in front of, Dawn, so punny foreshadowing).
After he spills, Buffy sets him on fire, and the four of them walk off through the night, a box of fiery light behind them. Cool if dark power shot.
Buffy and Satsu are arguing. Buffy doesn't want to take the local slayers, still reeling from Aiko's death, into battle with her. She wants Satsu to stay behind and watch over them, bury Aiko, stay out of it. Satsu is pissed about being put out of harm's way or out of sight, either one. She refuses to obey the order and storms off. Buffy: "I can't believe I find it sexy when she calls me ma'am." Heh.
Xander and Renee talk while gearing up, an unwilling? Dracula overhearing it off to the side. Xander makes a case for calling today their first date, avoiding all the normal first date awkwardness. Like getting tied up and sacrificed to open the Hellmouth you mean, Xander? Except that is like this. Anyway, Renee is not down with her first date with Xander being all schoolgirl vampbait, roasting vampsmores, and the company of the freaking dark prince...bator. She agrees to bypass the awkward waiting to see if a kiss is in order phase though, by planting one on Xander. They make out for a bit. Tick tock.
There's an army of a thousand vampires around the base of the building. They have plenty of slayers, but still no way to engage the enemy. We get a nice shot of Xander, Renee, Buffy, Dracula, Satsu, Andrew, and Leah ready to infiltrate the building. Buffy's only concern is to get in and get that scythe. To that end, Willow is creating a distraction. Come on, they already have a giant, are in Tokyo, you knew it was coming. Dawnzilla! Andrew: "Well, there's something you don't see everyday."
Dawn starts stomping havoc on the vamps as they run in terror. Buffy's team heads in and up, finding Toru and the scythe. But it's not him, it's a projection of him. Yes, it's a trap. Bye bye Renee. That may be the shortest love affair destroyed in its glory yet. Bong. Poor Xander.
Aiko is strung up downtown, her blood spelling out "Welcome to Tokyo." Buffy and her crew cut her down and take her body to the local headquarters, a building that looks kind of like a Shinto shrine out in the country, heavily fortified. Buffy lays Aiko's wrapped body at the feet of Buddha as the girls watch. Then she sits vigil.
Night falls, and Willow comes to see if she's gone catatonic again. They discuss options, not really clear on how to attack these vamps when they can't physically touch them. Enter Dracula with information on a containment spell, being snotty and condescending and laying claim to the master suite, poor Xander running along behind him.
At the top of a Tokyo building, which we later hear is called Ashikaga (which is the name of a city, a clan, and a shogunate), the huge red-tinted circle o' doom is buzzing away. Raidon is talking to a new woman about their plans, mentioning tech support (for the lens mechanism) and robotics division (just wait). They also have an army of vamps to guard them from the slayers while they're getting the lens up to speed. Kumiko hangs around sleeping or meditating like a bat. (Not that bats meditate, although they may, what do I know, I just mean hanging upside down, basically).
Renee is playing schoolgirl damsel in distress, luring a vampire into a Scooby ambush. Will uses the containment spell Dracula taught her, putting up a force-field box around the vamp. They pour gas on him and Buffy questions him about Toru. They find out what we already know, that Kumiko is going to use the scythe to reverse the spell, making all the slayers human again using the super lens on the Ashikaga building. They're just finishing getting the lens ready, which should happen before dawn -- be back before Dawn. (It's also going to happen before, as in in front of, Dawn, so punny foreshadowing).
After he spills, Buffy sets him on fire, and the four of them walk off through the night, a box of fiery light behind them. Cool if dark power shot.
Buffy and Satsu are arguing. Buffy doesn't want to take the local slayers, still reeling from Aiko's death, into battle with her. She wants Satsu to stay behind and watch over them, bury Aiko, stay out of it. Satsu is pissed about being put out of harm's way or out of sight, either one. She refuses to obey the order and storms off. Buffy: "I can't believe I find it sexy when she calls me ma'am." Heh.
Xander and Renee talk while gearing up, an unwilling? Dracula overhearing it off to the side. Xander makes a case for calling today their first date, avoiding all the normal first date awkwardness. Like getting tied up and sacrificed to open the Hellmouth you mean, Xander? Except that is like this. Anyway, Renee is not down with her first date with Xander being all schoolgirl vampbait, roasting vampsmores, and the company of the freaking dark prince...bator. She agrees to bypass the awkward waiting to see if a kiss is in order phase though, by planting one on Xander. They make out for a bit. Tick tock.
There's an army of a thousand vampires around the base of the building. They have plenty of slayers, but still no way to engage the enemy. We get a nice shot of Xander, Renee, Buffy, Dracula, Satsu, Andrew, and Leah ready to infiltrate the building. Buffy's only concern is to get in and get that scythe. To that end, Willow is creating a distraction. Come on, they already have a giant, are in Tokyo, you knew it was coming. Dawnzilla! Andrew: "Well, there's something you don't see everyday."
Dawn starts stomping havoc on the vamps as they run in terror. Buffy's team heads in and up, finding Toru and the scythe. But it's not him, it's a projection of him. Yes, it's a trap. Bye bye Renee. That may be the shortest love affair destroyed in its glory yet. Bong. Poor Xander.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #13 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Wolves at the Gate part 2
15 minutes before the end of the last issue, Dracula was an old and depressed dude. His servant, Butterfield, tries to entice him into a hunt for an Albanian boy at loose in the hedge maze, but it's no go. Apparently Dracula's been sitting in his own stink for months. But he sees the helicopter approaching and snaps out of it.
Xander says they need his help, while Dracula plays it coy. He insults Renee, calling her a Moor, insinuating she's a slave -- why do they need this douche's help again? Dracula relents and lets them in, saying Xander will want a nice snack of mealworms before he dons his manservant bloomers. Obviously some history there we haven't seen. I'm not sure if I ever want to or not.
Cut to Andrew, dressed as the count, giving a class to the slayers about the dark master...bator. On the chalkboard, Dracula's known powers include: Romantic Undertones (technically not a power). Very reminiscent of season 7.
The girls know about Dracula, they want to know what's up with him and Xandman. Andrew says they stayed in touch after Dracula visited Sunnydale. Whether that's true or not is unclear. After all, this is the man who taught that Faith fought a Vulcan once upon a time. But can't you just see Xander's face when he opens up that letter? Anyway, apparently, for whatever reason, Xander spent time with Dracula after Anya's death. There's a whole story about their weird buddy movie hijinks still to be written I guess. It includes a motorbike, which Andrew adds to the chalkboard as another power.
Meanwhile, real work is being done. The slayers have found out that the vampires are from Tokyo, the leader is Toru. Slayer local field op Aiko found them. She confabs with Buffy from a scene of carnage, having just taken out at least five ugly Kabuki demons. Buffy is impressed, but tells Aiko to surveil, not approach until reinforcements arrive.
We get some awkward drama as Satsu questions Buffy's plan to take every last one of them with her to Japan, and Buffy snaps at her all general-style. I guess the honeymoon is over.
Xander and Renee take tea with Dracula. Renee watches as they make polite talk in an ersatz homosexual marriage kind of way, wondering why she came no doubt. They finally get down to business, explaining the sitch, and Renee gets up in his face about him selling his powers to the highest bidder. Dracula is offended, saying he's the worldly guardian of these ancient magics. Hmmm. Wonder if that's significant at all. Ancient magics. Highlight that. Then Dracula seems to remember something painful. "Oh, balls."
Tokyo. Toru and Raidon discuss how Kumiko wants the kill (of Buffy I thought at first, but now I assume Willow). Toru wants her to concentrate on the spell. Aiko follows them. They notice and know why, decide to give Buffy something to see. Toru pulls out a red-tinted lens and twirls his nonexistent mustache as we...
...cut back to Dracula freaking out and being all racist against East Asians. He apparently got wasted at a Tibetan speakeasy and gambled some knowledge of his powers away in a game of pai gow poker, trying for a Kawasaki Z1000. Andrew knows all. Dracula says he was cheated and mentions a witch with them (Kumiko). He's so pissed off he agrees to join their battle even though he loathes Buffy and her crew and wants to see them all destroyed. Great ally.
While flying the troops in a big transport plane to Japan, Willow talks with Satsu. She gives her the deal on Buffy, how she's the general, has to be separate, that won't change. Oh and BTW, not gay, so don't get your hopes up. Then she wants to dish on Buffy's prowess in bed, but Satsu stays mum, a true gentlelady.
Aiko checks in with Buffy, then finds Toru's lens on the ground and picks it up. She's hit through the lens with a blast of light from the scythe in Kumiko's hand, and her powers are gone. !! Toru taunts her and then eats her. Another one down. And they're planning to do this spell on a larger scale with a big old lens to reverse the spell on all the slayers. Crap.
15 minutes before the end of the last issue, Dracula was an old and depressed dude. His servant, Butterfield, tries to entice him into a hunt for an Albanian boy at loose in the hedge maze, but it's no go. Apparently Dracula's been sitting in his own stink for months. But he sees the helicopter approaching and snaps out of it.
Xander says they need his help, while Dracula plays it coy. He insults Renee, calling her a Moor, insinuating she's a slave -- why do they need this douche's help again? Dracula relents and lets them in, saying Xander will want a nice snack of mealworms before he dons his manservant bloomers. Obviously some history there we haven't seen. I'm not sure if I ever want to or not.
Cut to Andrew, dressed as the count, giving a class to the slayers about the dark master...bator. On the chalkboard, Dracula's known powers include: Romantic Undertones (technically not a power). Very reminiscent of season 7.
The girls know about Dracula, they want to know what's up with him and Xandman. Andrew says they stayed in touch after Dracula visited Sunnydale. Whether that's true or not is unclear. After all, this is the man who taught that Faith fought a Vulcan once upon a time. But can't you just see Xander's face when he opens up that letter? Anyway, apparently, for whatever reason, Xander spent time with Dracula after Anya's death. There's a whole story about their weird buddy movie hijinks still to be written I guess. It includes a motorbike, which Andrew adds to the chalkboard as another power.
Meanwhile, real work is being done. The slayers have found out that the vampires are from Tokyo, the leader is Toru. Slayer local field op Aiko found them. She confabs with Buffy from a scene of carnage, having just taken out at least five ugly Kabuki demons. Buffy is impressed, but tells Aiko to surveil, not approach until reinforcements arrive.
We get some awkward drama as Satsu questions Buffy's plan to take every last one of them with her to Japan, and Buffy snaps at her all general-style. I guess the honeymoon is over.
Xander and Renee take tea with Dracula. Renee watches as they make polite talk in an ersatz homosexual marriage kind of way, wondering why she came no doubt. They finally get down to business, explaining the sitch, and Renee gets up in his face about him selling his powers to the highest bidder. Dracula is offended, saying he's the worldly guardian of these ancient magics. Hmmm. Wonder if that's significant at all. Ancient magics. Highlight that. Then Dracula seems to remember something painful. "Oh, balls."
Tokyo. Toru and Raidon discuss how Kumiko wants the kill (of Buffy I thought at first, but now I assume Willow). Toru wants her to concentrate on the spell. Aiko follows them. They notice and know why, decide to give Buffy something to see. Toru pulls out a red-tinted lens and twirls his nonexistent mustache as we...
...cut back to Dracula freaking out and being all racist against East Asians. He apparently got wasted at a Tibetan speakeasy and gambled some knowledge of his powers away in a game of pai gow poker, trying for a Kawasaki Z1000. Andrew knows all. Dracula says he was cheated and mentions a witch with them (Kumiko). He's so pissed off he agrees to join their battle even though he loathes Buffy and her crew and wants to see them all destroyed. Great ally.
While flying the troops in a big transport plane to Japan, Willow talks with Satsu. She gives her the deal on Buffy, how she's the general, has to be separate, that won't change. Oh and BTW, not gay, so don't get your hopes up. Then she wants to dish on Buffy's prowess in bed, but Satsu stays mum, a true gentlelady.
Aiko checks in with Buffy, then finds Toru's lens on the ground and picks it up. She's hit through the lens with a blast of light from the scythe in Kumiko's hand, and her powers are gone. !! Toru taunts her and then eats her. Another one down. And they're planning to do this spell on a larger scale with a big old lens to reverse the spell on all the slayers. Crap.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #12 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Wolves at the Gate part 1.
Xander and Renee are on guard, seeing a pack of creepy, red-eyed animals coming towards the castle, arguing over whether they're wolves or panthers. Renee thinks Xander is checking up on her since the zombies attacked last time on her watch. He assures her he's there to hang out with her.
Cut to THE panel, the first really controversial shot of season 8, Buffy and Satsu in bed together! I guess loneliness and knowing someone wanted her kind of naturally led Buffy to this action, but hello power imbalance!
Willow is flying Andrew up from Italy, and he's trying to be Lois to her Superman. He enters the castle to sleep off the Dramamine and Will gets grabbed by a Japanese girl who materializes out of a fog. We'll soon learn she's a witch named Kumiko.
Xander finally asks Renee out. Start the death clock. They don't seem overly concerned about the creepy wolves, but that's flirting for you.
Buffy and Satsu talk over la passion. Buffy is happy but not sure it goes further, and suggests they keep it between them. I think she's trying to honestly process where her head is at and be thoughtful towards Satsu and not creepy. Oh, and start the death clock.
Then we get a farcical scene that doesn't work that well for me, not sure why. Basically everyone and their wolf ends up coming into the room and catching them together naked. Ha ha, let's keep it a secret, oops, Xander knows, oops, and Renee. And here comes Andrew with news of wolves in the castle, and Dawn with talk of bees in the barn. Then Will crashes through the roof and the party is complete. Well, at least we don't have to have the dramatic irony secret drag on.
Wolves find the armory and turn into vampires. They go straight for the scythe. Uh-oh. One is named Raidon. We'll find out soon enough the other is Turo. Buffy interrupts them, but Raidon turns into a panther, takes the scythe and runs while Buffy tries to fight Turo, who turns to fog and disappears. No fair! Raidon passes the scythe to Kumiko, and the vamps retreat.
Castle meeting. The slayers say that all the vampires were changing into fog and bees and wolves and panthers, oh my. Xander calls them Japanese vampire goths. Buffy is concerned they got the scythe. It finally occurs to them that they know a vamp who can pull off those tricks. All eyes turn to Xanfield.
Cut to Xander and Renee in a helicopter, headed to Dracula's castle. Yeesh, lot of medieval settings this season. Dracula opens his door. "Hello, manservant." "How's it going, Master?" The end.
Xander and Renee are on guard, seeing a pack of creepy, red-eyed animals coming towards the castle, arguing over whether they're wolves or panthers. Renee thinks Xander is checking up on her since the zombies attacked last time on her watch. He assures her he's there to hang out with her.
Cut to THE panel, the first really controversial shot of season 8, Buffy and Satsu in bed together! I guess loneliness and knowing someone wanted her kind of naturally led Buffy to this action, but hello power imbalance!
Willow is flying Andrew up from Italy, and he's trying to be Lois to her Superman. He enters the castle to sleep off the Dramamine and Will gets grabbed by a Japanese girl who materializes out of a fog. We'll soon learn she's a witch named Kumiko.
Xander finally asks Renee out. Start the death clock. They don't seem overly concerned about the creepy wolves, but that's flirting for you.
Buffy and Satsu talk over la passion. Buffy is happy but not sure it goes further, and suggests they keep it between them. I think she's trying to honestly process where her head is at and be thoughtful towards Satsu and not creepy. Oh, and start the death clock.
Then we get a farcical scene that doesn't work that well for me, not sure why. Basically everyone and their wolf ends up coming into the room and catching them together naked. Ha ha, let's keep it a secret, oops, Xander knows, oops, and Renee. And here comes Andrew with news of wolves in the castle, and Dawn with talk of bees in the barn. Then Will crashes through the roof and the party is complete. Well, at least we don't have to have the dramatic irony secret drag on.
Wolves find the armory and turn into vampires. They go straight for the scythe. Uh-oh. One is named Raidon. We'll find out soon enough the other is Turo. Buffy interrupts them, but Raidon turns into a panther, takes the scythe and runs while Buffy tries to fight Turo, who turns to fog and disappears. No fair! Raidon passes the scythe to Kumiko, and the vamps retreat.
Castle meeting. The slayers say that all the vampires were changing into fog and bees and wolves and panthers, oh my. Xander calls them Japanese vampire goths. Buffy is concerned they got the scythe. It finally occurs to them that they know a vamp who can pull off those tricks. All eyes turn to Xanfield.
Cut to Xander and Renee in a helicopter, headed to Dracula's castle. Yeesh, lot of medieval settings this season. Dracula opens his door. "Hello, manservant." "How's it going, Master?" The end.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #11 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Okay. This is kind of a prequel to the Wolves at the Gate arc, just giving us something to think about as we go forward.
A Beautiful Sunset
Flashback to THE spell at the end of season 7 with a voiceover by Buffy. "Once upon a time I did something good." She goes on to consider how she not only shared her strength with the other potentials, but also meant to give them purpose and meaning. (Of course, purpose and meaning without reflection and a sense of history don't do you much good as we'll soon see.) Oh, and she gave them connection.
"Saving the world means keeping the status quo." (Assuming the status is quo.) "But apocalypses come because the world is trying to change. It has to." This can be read many different ways I think. In some sense it's a repudiation of everything Buffy's worked for, saying trying to stop the apocalypse is trying to disallow change. But while I think that crosses her mind, I think right now she's thinking how she tried to not stop change, but initiate it. Her saving the world by changing the slayer status quo was intended to be a positive redefinition of the ways things were, not an attempt to keep things as they always had been.
This time wasn't just about stopping an invasion, it was Buffy being proactive, riding the change the world wished to enact and guiding it to a better resolution. So casting that spell was not just an act of desperation in the face of overwhelming odds, which is certainly was, but also a game-changing move to make whatever world is left afterwards a better place.
A lot has been out of balance in the Buffyverse since she was brought back. Her returned overbalanced the good side, allowing the First a stronger foothold in reality. Then it upped the ante and Buffy responded, and then some.
But what can you do? Balancing the forces of good and evil in the world isn't like balancing your ratio of exercise to TV viewing, it's a so much larger scale, and so much harder to see in its entirety. All Buffy knows is evil is always out there, and it's always coming back bigger and badder than the last time. She couldn't know her masterstroke would tip the balance so heavily and send the world into chaos. Just as none of us know when a choice we make will have unforeseen consequences. Not all of it is in our control, but we still have to make the choice.
Ahem. Anyway.
All this is behind Buffy's eyes as she watches her monitor screen. The Buffyster is bummed because the less positive results of her choice are playing out on a security feed of a weapons storage facility. The not-so-lovely Simone (Doffler, for what it's worth) is flipping off a camera as she and a few other slayers go rogue in a big way, collecting some major firepower. We hear that she's been a known problem to some extent, having been shipped out of Chicago by Rona -- so Rona is in charge of the Chicago squad -- to Italy to cool her jets away from the big city. That "plan" didn't really do much good apparently.
One of the other girls with her is from Andrew's Italy squad, but the rest are newcomers who didn't come up in the Buffy organization. Xander is concerned about Twilight and others learning about slayers with guns.
Buffy is blaming herself, not just because of the spell, but the robbery she committed initially to fund their endeavors, like we learned about in her side adventure with Willow. Xander asks if that's why Will didn't stick around, but Buffy says it's complicated, not going on to say that Willow doesn't want her loved ones to die anymore because they fight near Buffy.
To change the subject, Xander lets Buffy know he found and was saving a vamp nest for her. She decides to take Satsu with her so they can talk. Then we see there's a big party going on in the castle, even giant Dawn is there, along with tons of slayers and many kegs of beer. Buffy won't be joining in, but she looks on as they enjoy each other's company, connecting.
Xander says Buffy spends too much time alone. Surrounded by slayers, she's still in charge and separate. But she doesn't make speeches anymore, so there's that. (I think) later she'll say she created this connection but she doesn't feel it herself. Some of us are just like that, Buff. No big.
Buffy and Satsu head to a cemetery for a vamp fight slash girl talk scenario. Buffy tells her she's the best fighter and could be a great leader someday, but she needs to remember she's always in danger. The particular danger right now is Buffy figured out from the lip gloss that Satsu is the one who kissed her awake, who is in love with her.
Buffy says knowing someone feels that way about her makes her feel a little bit less lonely, but, fresh from her talk with Will, goes to the Doomed place. Says there's something wrong with her that makes her friends and lovers all die or leave her. Ironically, enter Twilight.
He takes her for a fly, roughs her up a bit, says he came to talk but hates to see her cry. He also gives her some info on his motivations, saying the world can't contain all these slayers and they'll suffer for that. Which he intends as a fact, not a threat I suppose. He says his only gift to her is not killing her now, but she's brought disaster to the world that he has to deal with. If he's trying to get a message to her, I don't see it. "Have you made a difference? Have your slayers helped change anything in this world? Have they helped you?"
VERY SPOILERY PARAGRAPH
He didn't really tell her anything she didn't know, just bummed her out some more. I guess I'm not sure where's he at right now and whether it stays consistent or changes throughout the series. He told his crew he was stripping her of her moral certainty, which is exactly what he did while they were completely alone. Very Angelus kind of talk/fight really. Was he just being cruel to get her to think about the ramifications of her actions? I know ultimately he's trying to help by gathering her enemies together under his banner, and presumably he's still acting as a champion for the greater good, but I still can't see the through-line of his thoughts.
Quick scene with Buffy and Satsu in the infirmary, where she seems to get the message about people near Buffy being targets for pain.
Buffy and Xander talk again in the ramparts, in a bookend scene to the beginning. Buffy asks if they're really doing good. There seems to be ever more demons to fight, and is that their fault? Xander thinks all these girls filled with purpose is pretty rad and says they're just starting out, beginning to make a difference. Maybe they're cleaning up messes now, but they can change the world for the better later. And who's to say he's wrong? I'm not even sure if the season says he's wrong or not conclusively.
Aha! This is where Buffy mentions she doesn't feel the connection. Xander says maybe that's the mystical price of leadership as well. Buffy looks down on the slayers below training together and repeats the words she said in the beginning while watching Simone at her finest. "Yay me." She may have a very different view this time, but she doesn't look any happier as she says it.
A Beautiful Sunset
Flashback to THE spell at the end of season 7 with a voiceover by Buffy. "Once upon a time I did something good." She goes on to consider how she not only shared her strength with the other potentials, but also meant to give them purpose and meaning. (Of course, purpose and meaning without reflection and a sense of history don't do you much good as we'll soon see.) Oh, and she gave them connection.
"Saving the world means keeping the status quo." (Assuming the status is quo.) "But apocalypses come because the world is trying to change. It has to." This can be read many different ways I think. In some sense it's a repudiation of everything Buffy's worked for, saying trying to stop the apocalypse is trying to disallow change. But while I think that crosses her mind, I think right now she's thinking how she tried to not stop change, but initiate it. Her saving the world by changing the slayer status quo was intended to be a positive redefinition of the ways things were, not an attempt to keep things as they always had been.
This time wasn't just about stopping an invasion, it was Buffy being proactive, riding the change the world wished to enact and guiding it to a better resolution. So casting that spell was not just an act of desperation in the face of overwhelming odds, which is certainly was, but also a game-changing move to make whatever world is left afterwards a better place.
A lot has been out of balance in the Buffyverse since she was brought back. Her returned overbalanced the good side, allowing the First a stronger foothold in reality. Then it upped the ante and Buffy responded, and then some.
But what can you do? Balancing the forces of good and evil in the world isn't like balancing your ratio of exercise to TV viewing, it's a so much larger scale, and so much harder to see in its entirety. All Buffy knows is evil is always out there, and it's always coming back bigger and badder than the last time. She couldn't know her masterstroke would tip the balance so heavily and send the world into chaos. Just as none of us know when a choice we make will have unforeseen consequences. Not all of it is in our control, but we still have to make the choice.
Ahem. Anyway.
All this is behind Buffy's eyes as she watches her monitor screen. The Buffyster is bummed because the less positive results of her choice are playing out on a security feed of a weapons storage facility. The not-so-lovely Simone (Doffler, for what it's worth) is flipping off a camera as she and a few other slayers go rogue in a big way, collecting some major firepower. We hear that she's been a known problem to some extent, having been shipped out of Chicago by Rona -- so Rona is in charge of the Chicago squad -- to Italy to cool her jets away from the big city. That "plan" didn't really do much good apparently.
One of the other girls with her is from Andrew's Italy squad, but the rest are newcomers who didn't come up in the Buffy organization. Xander is concerned about Twilight and others learning about slayers with guns.
Buffy is blaming herself, not just because of the spell, but the robbery she committed initially to fund their endeavors, like we learned about in her side adventure with Willow. Xander asks if that's why Will didn't stick around, but Buffy says it's complicated, not going on to say that Willow doesn't want her loved ones to die anymore because they fight near Buffy.
To change the subject, Xander lets Buffy know he found and was saving a vamp nest for her. She decides to take Satsu with her so they can talk. Then we see there's a big party going on in the castle, even giant Dawn is there, along with tons of slayers and many kegs of beer. Buffy won't be joining in, but she looks on as they enjoy each other's company, connecting.
Xander says Buffy spends too much time alone. Surrounded by slayers, she's still in charge and separate. But she doesn't make speeches anymore, so there's that. (I think) later she'll say she created this connection but she doesn't feel it herself. Some of us are just like that, Buff. No big.
Buffy and Satsu head to a cemetery for a vamp fight slash girl talk scenario. Buffy tells her she's the best fighter and could be a great leader someday, but she needs to remember she's always in danger. The particular danger right now is Buffy figured out from the lip gloss that Satsu is the one who kissed her awake, who is in love with her.
Buffy says knowing someone feels that way about her makes her feel a little bit less lonely, but, fresh from her talk with Will, goes to the Doomed place. Says there's something wrong with her that makes her friends and lovers all die or leave her. Ironically, enter Twilight.
He takes her for a fly, roughs her up a bit, says he came to talk but hates to see her cry. He also gives her some info on his motivations, saying the world can't contain all these slayers and they'll suffer for that. Which he intends as a fact, not a threat I suppose. He says his only gift to her is not killing her now, but she's brought disaster to the world that he has to deal with. If he's trying to get a message to her, I don't see it. "Have you made a difference? Have your slayers helped change anything in this world? Have they helped you?"
VERY SPOILERY PARAGRAPH
He didn't really tell her anything she didn't know, just bummed her out some more. I guess I'm not sure where's he at right now and whether it stays consistent or changes throughout the series. He told his crew he was stripping her of her moral certainty, which is exactly what he did while they were completely alone. Very Angelus kind of talk/fight really. Was he just being cruel to get her to think about the ramifications of her actions? I know ultimately he's trying to help by gathering her enemies together under his banner, and presumably he's still acting as a champion for the greater good, but I still can't see the through-line of his thoughts.
Quick scene with Buffy and Satsu in the infirmary, where she seems to get the message about people near Buffy being targets for pain.
Buffy and Xander talk again in the ramparts, in a bookend scene to the beginning. Buffy asks if they're really doing good. There seems to be ever more demons to fight, and is that their fault? Xander thinks all these girls filled with purpose is pretty rad and says they're just starting out, beginning to make a difference. Maybe they're cleaning up messes now, but they can change the world for the better later. And who's to say he's wrong? I'm not even sure if the season says he's wrong or not conclusively.
Aha! This is where Buffy mentions she doesn't feel the connection. Xander says maybe that's the mystical price of leadership as well. Buffy looks down on the slayers below training together and repeats the words she said in the beginning while watching Simone at her finest. "Yay me." She may have a very different view this time, but she doesn't look any happier as she says it.
Buffy Season 8 - Issue #10 SPOILERS FOR BUFFY 1-8 ENTIRE & ANGEL THRU AFTER THE FALL
Anywhere But Here
We've concluded Faith's arc and are back in Buffyland full-time with a little adventure/fact-finding mission of Willow and Buffy's.
We start with a fantasy about being anywhere but here, their old game from high school days. Probably suggested by Willow to get Buffy's mind off of being so far above the ground. She's on a beach with Daniel Craig, in desperate need of sunblock. Willow claims it's a bit generic, but Buffy can't concentrate while riding on Willow's back through the air trying to find something they can't teleport to.
Xander is giving Dawn a gift. The Wiccans bigged up her stuff so she has a change of clothes now. She's so excited she dumps Xander in her giant suitcase with the clothes.
Willow's fantasy is of Tina Fey. They're stuck in a ski lodge and need to stay warm. Buffy asks her again about Kennedy. Willow says it's a fantasy game with no significant others allowed. Buffy talks about not seeing her much or Will for that matter. And they arrive...
...at the Lair of Sephrilian, who walks between worlds. His house is TARDIS-like, he has a female minder to watcher over the unstable reality field he creates. Buffy doesn't know how Willow knows all this stuff. We'll find out later.
The Minder is Robin, who Willow meets later on but doesn't know now or something timey-wimey. They're there to consult I guess. Robin tries not to be gloomy. Tells Buffy the important this is to rescue the prince. Hunh? We also find out Minders are chosen, they don't volunteer to go slowly nuts watching over this thing. Buffy's pretty peppy (or nervous?) enjoying Will's company and making jokes about time loops.
Dawn is enjoying her clean-smelling clothes. Xander is swimming in lacy underthings (foreshadowing) when he finds a picture of Dawn and Kenny.
We're back in the game, and Buffy is enjoying the company of Little Women Christian Bale and Reign of Fire Christian Bale in some gothic ballroom, plotting an escape. Buffy assures Willow she likes Kennedy, thinking Willow is keeping them apart, wondering where they went anyway and what's up with Will generally. She's doing all the talking.
They're interrupted by a giant claw attached to a creepy-looking demon with faces on its tail and lots of teeth that must be Sephrilian. Buffy asks for help, saying he's demon elite or Tichajt, and knows the future. "You know where we are heading. The imbalance between our worlds is going to rain destruction on all our heads." Visions of Beljoxa's Eye swimming in my brain. He prophesies the end "...of the struggle, of the hellmouths...the final triumph of the base humans over the demons. It's your life's goal achieved, Slayer. The death of magic." We'll definitely have to come back here later.
Dawn looks at the picture of Kenny and says it's all her fault. Xander says guys suck. Dawn tells him she didn't sleep with Kenny. She slept with his roommate.
Sephrilian says all human beings can comprehend are the lies they tell to avoid reality, then opens the faces on his tail and show them their secrets. We see a squad of slayers led by Buffy stealing gold and gems from a Swiss bank. That's how she was able to bankroll her organization. Buffy says it's a victimless crime and it's only money. Willow says, "Money changes everything. This is where it all starts, Buffy. What your enemies saw." She calls it the first domino leading to Twilight.
Then we see Willow getting up close and naked with a green snake goddess type woman. Much more on this to come.
Dawn flashes back to her own secret, Nick. She says she cheated and is a skank and deserves what she got from it. She wanted to tell Willow, thought she could, but couldn't. Xander compares Nick to Parker and says all Dawn is guilty of is being a cliche. Then claims he's special because Dawn opened up to him. Too true.
Robin shows up with Buffy and Willow somewhere neither of them recognize. It's a domed stone structure with a cracked red egg. There's fog on the ground and Buffy is lying there, crying and injured. Robin claims what happens here is "betrayal. The closest, the most unexpected." Then Robin leaves because they're about to cause a disruption. Buffy immediately asks Willow if it's her.
Willow says she won't betray her more than she has, and we get the story behind her taking Kennedy and running. Flashback to Kennedy fighting with Willow about why she's keeping her away from Buffy, is she ashamed of her?
We find out Kennedy sort of died once for Willow, and that Will went away for 6-months to presumably learn naughty things from snake goddess. More on that in the Willow one-shot.
Willow says it's not about shame, but when she saw Warren again, she realized it was about Tara. Her and Tara were happy when Buffy died. And so was Buffy. But Willow brought her back anyway, and that led to Tara's death. She's talking both to Kennedy in the flashback and Buffy in reality now. "I chose to put Tara in a bullet's path. I chose you (Buffy) over her." She can't do that again.
Sephrilian pops back up with his faces. He says all of them are there for you to see, but humans hide so many of their own. Buffy and Willow can't look at each other now. Buffy is so not in the mood for Sephrilian to gloat about welcoming the coming war or threatening to expose their weaknesses to other demons. Neither is Willow. Buffy takes the fire Willow gives her and uses it to slay Sephrilian. The place explodes. Robin keeps shielded. She's glad to have some time off, and she doesn't remember what happened there. Apparently it was only a projection of her, so their secrets are safely hidden.
Buffy, looking sad, calls what happened demons playing games. Will looks guilty. They head off separately.
Man, that's rough. I get Willow's point, but poor Buffy. She didn't ask for, well, any of that. Harsh.
We've concluded Faith's arc and are back in Buffyland full-time with a little adventure/fact-finding mission of Willow and Buffy's.
We start with a fantasy about being anywhere but here, their old game from high school days. Probably suggested by Willow to get Buffy's mind off of being so far above the ground. She's on a beach with Daniel Craig, in desperate need of sunblock. Willow claims it's a bit generic, but Buffy can't concentrate while riding on Willow's back through the air trying to find something they can't teleport to.
Xander is giving Dawn a gift. The Wiccans bigged up her stuff so she has a change of clothes now. She's so excited she dumps Xander in her giant suitcase with the clothes.
Willow's fantasy is of Tina Fey. They're stuck in a ski lodge and need to stay warm. Buffy asks her again about Kennedy. Willow says it's a fantasy game with no significant others allowed. Buffy talks about not seeing her much or Will for that matter. And they arrive...
...at the Lair of Sephrilian, who walks between worlds. His house is TARDIS-like, he has a female minder to watcher over the unstable reality field he creates. Buffy doesn't know how Willow knows all this stuff. We'll find out later.
The Minder is Robin, who Willow meets later on but doesn't know now or something timey-wimey. They're there to consult I guess. Robin tries not to be gloomy. Tells Buffy the important this is to rescue the prince. Hunh? We also find out Minders are chosen, they don't volunteer to go slowly nuts watching over this thing. Buffy's pretty peppy (or nervous?) enjoying Will's company and making jokes about time loops.
Dawn is enjoying her clean-smelling clothes. Xander is swimming in lacy underthings (foreshadowing) when he finds a picture of Dawn and Kenny.
We're back in the game, and Buffy is enjoying the company of Little Women Christian Bale and Reign of Fire Christian Bale in some gothic ballroom, plotting an escape. Buffy assures Willow she likes Kennedy, thinking Willow is keeping them apart, wondering where they went anyway and what's up with Will generally. She's doing all the talking.
They're interrupted by a giant claw attached to a creepy-looking demon with faces on its tail and lots of teeth that must be Sephrilian. Buffy asks for help, saying he's demon elite or Tichajt, and knows the future. "You know where we are heading. The imbalance between our worlds is going to rain destruction on all our heads." Visions of Beljoxa's Eye swimming in my brain. He prophesies the end "...of the struggle, of the hellmouths...the final triumph of the base humans over the demons. It's your life's goal achieved, Slayer. The death of magic." We'll definitely have to come back here later.
Dawn looks at the picture of Kenny and says it's all her fault. Xander says guys suck. Dawn tells him she didn't sleep with Kenny. She slept with his roommate.
Sephrilian says all human beings can comprehend are the lies they tell to avoid reality, then opens the faces on his tail and show them their secrets. We see a squad of slayers led by Buffy stealing gold and gems from a Swiss bank. That's how she was able to bankroll her organization. Buffy says it's a victimless crime and it's only money. Willow says, "Money changes everything. This is where it all starts, Buffy. What your enemies saw." She calls it the first domino leading to Twilight.
Then we see Willow getting up close and naked with a green snake goddess type woman. Much more on this to come.
Dawn flashes back to her own secret, Nick. She says she cheated and is a skank and deserves what she got from it. She wanted to tell Willow, thought she could, but couldn't. Xander compares Nick to Parker and says all Dawn is guilty of is being a cliche. Then claims he's special because Dawn opened up to him. Too true.
Robin shows up with Buffy and Willow somewhere neither of them recognize. It's a domed stone structure with a cracked red egg. There's fog on the ground and Buffy is lying there, crying and injured. Robin claims what happens here is "betrayal. The closest, the most unexpected." Then Robin leaves because they're about to cause a disruption. Buffy immediately asks Willow if it's her.
Willow says she won't betray her more than she has, and we get the story behind her taking Kennedy and running. Flashback to Kennedy fighting with Willow about why she's keeping her away from Buffy, is she ashamed of her?
We find out Kennedy sort of died once for Willow, and that Will went away for 6-months to presumably learn naughty things from snake goddess. More on that in the Willow one-shot.
Willow says it's not about shame, but when she saw Warren again, she realized it was about Tara. Her and Tara were happy when Buffy died. And so was Buffy. But Willow brought her back anyway, and that led to Tara's death. She's talking both to Kennedy in the flashback and Buffy in reality now. "I chose to put Tara in a bullet's path. I chose you (Buffy) over her." She can't do that again.
Sephrilian pops back up with his faces. He says all of them are there for you to see, but humans hide so many of their own. Buffy and Willow can't look at each other now. Buffy is so not in the mood for Sephrilian to gloat about welcoming the coming war or threatening to expose their weaknesses to other demons. Neither is Willow. Buffy takes the fire Willow gives her and uses it to slay Sephrilian. The place explodes. Robin keeps shielded. She's glad to have some time off, and she doesn't remember what happened there. Apparently it was only a projection of her, so their secrets are safely hidden.
Buffy, looking sad, calls what happened demons playing games. Will looks guilty. They head off separately.
Man, that's rough. I get Willow's point, but poor Buffy. She didn't ask for, well, any of that. Harsh.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Jacob-inspired musing material
Jacob wisdom from recap of True Blood finale (http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/show/true_blood/and_when_i_die-1.php?page=17):
"...all other things being equal -- if Tara were out of the picture and Sookie had just killed Debbie on her own, let's start there -- then you are looking at a particular story, which is that when you choose to deviate from the norm, when you go it alone, or queer, or however you're going to do it, even just unmarried, that decision cuts both ways. Yes, you get to be free and true to yourself, but also, you have opted out of the game and can't expect validation from the game.
"...all other things being equal -- if Tara were out of the picture and Sookie had just killed Debbie on her own, let's start there -- then you are looking at a particular story, which is that when you choose to deviate from the norm, when you go it alone, or queer, or however you're going to do it, even just unmarried, that decision cuts both ways. Yes, you get to be free and true to yourself, but also, you have opted out of the game and can't expect validation from the game.
As Jessica's learning, you can either be a sex warrior gender revolutionary or a socially validated Good Girl, but you can't have both. And you can't flip back and forth between Sexy Faery You and Nice Christian You, not forever. You have to become something that is both. It is a trade-off. A wonderful, powerful, scary-as-hell trade-off.
"And I think for whatever reason, at this time in our culture, we've fallen into a lazy lull of somehow feeling owed something, in this way. That instead of acknowledging that living by our own lights and being true to ourselves might have a cost, we manage to either conform or do it half-assed and then whine about it later. "All I did was act like a slut and then you called me a slut" is not a well-formed sentence or valid complaint. "All I did was act like a slut, a word with zero meaning or power over me" is a well-formed sentence, and allows at least for the possibility that life is an unfair place for grownups and crybabies alike.
"As I said, it gets twisted by the fact that Tara died in the middle of it, but if you follow just the thread of Mine, His, Hers, it's a pretty complicated idea. "Why can't you both be Mine" is a meaningless question, because "Mine" isn't just about feelings -- it's about facts, and death, and danger. But to rebel against this idea that "You have to be His or you won't be at all," that can't possibly be a bad thing either, right?
"I think this is what it looks like, all this brain matter all over the kitchen. I think if you're willing to risk the danger of the real world, and be a complete person, the first thing that's gotta go is your fear of being the bad guy. Because it's not like Sookie killing a person in self-defense is really all that different from Sookie having one of her boyfriends take care of it for her, which is what you're really saying when you say Mine: Kill those that threaten me, so I don't have to get my hands dirty.
"Our mistake lies in thinking that grace attends any more to purity than to experience. But that's just nostalgia too: Because now is difficult to deal with at any given time, the past was always easier and kinder and clearer and purer. And that is imaginary, and reactionary, and gross, and scary. Especially when you apply it to yourself, which shouldn't be a show for other people anyway. Because the truth is, nobody lives that way.
"Nobody stays clean. We weren't designed for that. When your hands get dirty, all you have to do is wash them."
This is why I read his recaps; I always get things to mull over from his way of saying things that is so different from how I would say them but still meaningful to the things I think about. That dissonance is invigorating and extremely helpful.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Today
She didn’t always stop to take a look around the world. She guessed few people do. After all, we’re all so busy living our lives, thinking through our next mood, worrying about the immediate physical area around us, it’s amazing we see anything of the outer world.
Sometimes she would look up and realize that what she thought was around her actually looked totally different than the mental image she had assumed. Like the background desktop picture, overly simplified and bland, suddenly became uneven and pixelated and full of specifics, not all of which went together. The necessary blur. If we were to spend the time necessary to really see everything around us, we would sit for hours at the base of a tree, enraptured by its patterns.
But today was different, today she wanted to remember everything, to notice everything, and not let the blurriness take over her vision. Today was the first day of the rest of her life.
It wasn’t a special day really. Not her birthday or the day she fell in love. She didn’t get a promotion or win a prize or pass a test. And it wasn’t the worst of times either. No big personal breakup or national tragedy to live in infamy. She didn’t feel any better or worse than usual. And she wasn’t about to die. Nothing at all that dramatic. It was just a day.
It was the day she decided to make important instead, and thinking makes it so. Right?
Okay. So really it was just like any other day, except the desperation was upon her. It hit at different times, but often with no rhyme or reason. Just every once in a while she’d wake up and start to think a little too deeply about life, the universe and everything. If the normal course of affairs was to charge ahead through the day to get to the part where all the necessary tasks were finished and she could just stop doing things, the necessary balancing was this intermittent need to think too much, to ask herself the same philosophical questions again and see if her answers had changed or evolved.
Sometimes it manifested itself as depression and even despair about the lack of fill-in-the-blank of her life. Sometimes it was not so dark, just a yearning for something she suspected was universal and therefore unexceptional. And then there were times when it was an active force, a flowering of creativity and a small rebirth. Those were the good times.
That’s what she felt now, this desire to foster the creative parts of herself that got so little attention. The actual need to act, to emit, to do something besides just taking things in. The feeling that maybe there was something she could put into the world that would be new, for her at least.
Of course, how does she go from wanting to create something to the idea to look closely at stuff? Isn’t that just more letting things affect her?
Never mind that though. It’s not about getting bogged down in the details. In order to act in the world, she has to be open to the world. That’s what it’s about. Yes, she normally feels a bit like a black hole, sucking in knowledge and images and ideas from the world around, synthesizing them inside her, and then integrating them into herself in a new form. But isn’t the problem that that’s the first few steps of art? It’s not that that process is the problem; it’s that she seldom goes beyond that process, to take what was created inside her and find a way to put it out in the world for others to see. She feels more like a rich person fighting the inheritance tax. She made her riches within the economic system, but doesn’t want to put any of it back into the system to keep it alive.
She wonders if an economic analogy is really the place to go to for this idea of artistic expression and the passing on of knowledge, keeping the intellectual and artistic legacy of culture alive. But it’s a recurring thought process, one of the ones that can turn dark sometimes in her thoughts. It goes along with the idea of what is a responsible citizen and what do we owe the future. That those get tangled into a mess of guilt and disappointment and sense of failure is not what she wants to allude to now. This is a more selfish question right now.
By wanting to look around at the world, be open to the world in a dynamic way, she wants to create a dialog. And of course that’s the problem. Talking is not her strong suit at all. She’s much better at listening than speaking. The ideas she forms in her head when listening to others, when reading, when watching entertainment, when viewing a waterfall, those all stay inside. When she wants to articulate what anything means to her, nothing comprehensible comes out. At best, she can explain how she understands something or recognize how something affects her state of mind or emotion, but meaning is not forthcoming.
It’s not about not being able to communicate. She has a good vocabulary and speaks clearly, using words correctly. The problem is inside. If she doesn’t know what something means to her, she can’t say it. She thinks that a copout and not really true though. For with many things she does know what they mean to her, and in her mind, she will discourse at great length many arguments about why something means this or that or affects her this way. It keeps her awake at night, this obsessive thinking through of what something means or why she feels the way she does about it.
But it’s so unstructured. It’s all over the place, repetitive, arguments incomplete and out of order. So is this seeming inability to put even words out into the world, the tools she’s most familiar and versatile with, simply a lack of discipline? Of not wanting to take the time to write it out, organize it, rewrite it, edit it until a cohesive piece is created that makes sense and is even persuasive or interesting? She doesn’t believe that’s it.
What it is is a deep and unrelenting belief that what she has to say does not matter. That’s really it. It’s not even a self-hate kind of deal, it’s simply a realistic view of her place in the world and its meaninglessness. And she can’t seem to make herself find that liberating or unimportant. It’s just words, words, as Hamlet would say, with that same inflection. There’s so many words out there. Everywhere you look, someone is saying something, writing something; it’s an incredible din of blather. How much of it means anything?
When she was young, the block was a feeling of fakeness. Writing about the world, in fact or fiction, was pretending a knowledge she didn’t have yet. It would come with experience, with living. It felt useless to try to write anything that hadn’t been said before and better, by people who knew so much more than she did.
Now it’s different. She realizes this was a lie she told herself out of cowardice. We all know something; we all live in this world. And it can’t be about becoming Charles Dickens or Virginia Woolf. That’s either a pathetic excuse not to write or it’s some sort of arrogance. Like what she would write has so much importance attached to it, so much weight.
Now nothing has weight. Every day on Twitter, 140 characters are posted how many times a second? There’s how many blog posts online? So many of them saying the same things over and over. And even as we decry the end of publishing as we know it, how many books in whatever form are being put out there? And magazines and zines and songs and poems and essays and articles and advertisements and obituaries and sermons and debates and political speeches and laws and parking tickets and bumper stickers and graffiti, how much of that is produced and replicated every single day? Does she want to add to the din? Is it possible to be heard, should she finally decide she wants someone to listen?
But sometimes she almost gets it, almost understands the place her expression could live in between the ideas of what its weight would be and whether that matters and to whom. She feels like she’s almost beyond the pretension and the hopelessness and the false pretention and hidden hopefulness; maybe that’s just wisdom finally putting in its two cents. But shouldn’t wisdom feel more wise? More sure and strong? Shouldn’t wisdom be able to be put into words?
Most days she’s stuck on Angel’s epiphany, “If nothing we do matters, all that matters is what we do.” If nothing we write matters, then all that matters is what we write. She doesn’t know if that makes sense at all. It almost feels right.
Today has moved on an hour now, and she’s not necessarily made it a special day after all. But she opened the file, she put the thoughts in her head on the blank paper facsimile in front of her, and she posted it online, a drop of water in the vast sea of internet babble. And she felt good.
Sometimes she would look up and realize that what she thought was around her actually looked totally different than the mental image she had assumed. Like the background desktop picture, overly simplified and bland, suddenly became uneven and pixelated and full of specifics, not all of which went together. The necessary blur. If we were to spend the time necessary to really see everything around us, we would sit for hours at the base of a tree, enraptured by its patterns.
But today was different, today she wanted to remember everything, to notice everything, and not let the blurriness take over her vision. Today was the first day of the rest of her life.
It wasn’t a special day really. Not her birthday or the day she fell in love. She didn’t get a promotion or win a prize or pass a test. And it wasn’t the worst of times either. No big personal breakup or national tragedy to live in infamy. She didn’t feel any better or worse than usual. And she wasn’t about to die. Nothing at all that dramatic. It was just a day.
It was the day she decided to make important instead, and thinking makes it so. Right?
Okay. So really it was just like any other day, except the desperation was upon her. It hit at different times, but often with no rhyme or reason. Just every once in a while she’d wake up and start to think a little too deeply about life, the universe and everything. If the normal course of affairs was to charge ahead through the day to get to the part where all the necessary tasks were finished and she could just stop doing things, the necessary balancing was this intermittent need to think too much, to ask herself the same philosophical questions again and see if her answers had changed or evolved.
Sometimes it manifested itself as depression and even despair about the lack of fill-in-the-blank of her life. Sometimes it was not so dark, just a yearning for something she suspected was universal and therefore unexceptional. And then there were times when it was an active force, a flowering of creativity and a small rebirth. Those were the good times.
That’s what she felt now, this desire to foster the creative parts of herself that got so little attention. The actual need to act, to emit, to do something besides just taking things in. The feeling that maybe there was something she could put into the world that would be new, for her at least.
Of course, how does she go from wanting to create something to the idea to look closely at stuff? Isn’t that just more letting things affect her?
Never mind that though. It’s not about getting bogged down in the details. In order to act in the world, she has to be open to the world. That’s what it’s about. Yes, she normally feels a bit like a black hole, sucking in knowledge and images and ideas from the world around, synthesizing them inside her, and then integrating them into herself in a new form. But isn’t the problem that that’s the first few steps of art? It’s not that that process is the problem; it’s that she seldom goes beyond that process, to take what was created inside her and find a way to put it out in the world for others to see. She feels more like a rich person fighting the inheritance tax. She made her riches within the economic system, but doesn’t want to put any of it back into the system to keep it alive.
She wonders if an economic analogy is really the place to go to for this idea of artistic expression and the passing on of knowledge, keeping the intellectual and artistic legacy of culture alive. But it’s a recurring thought process, one of the ones that can turn dark sometimes in her thoughts. It goes along with the idea of what is a responsible citizen and what do we owe the future. That those get tangled into a mess of guilt and disappointment and sense of failure is not what she wants to allude to now. This is a more selfish question right now.
By wanting to look around at the world, be open to the world in a dynamic way, she wants to create a dialog. And of course that’s the problem. Talking is not her strong suit at all. She’s much better at listening than speaking. The ideas she forms in her head when listening to others, when reading, when watching entertainment, when viewing a waterfall, those all stay inside. When she wants to articulate what anything means to her, nothing comprehensible comes out. At best, she can explain how she understands something or recognize how something affects her state of mind or emotion, but meaning is not forthcoming.
It’s not about not being able to communicate. She has a good vocabulary and speaks clearly, using words correctly. The problem is inside. If she doesn’t know what something means to her, she can’t say it. She thinks that a copout and not really true though. For with many things she does know what they mean to her, and in her mind, she will discourse at great length many arguments about why something means this or that or affects her this way. It keeps her awake at night, this obsessive thinking through of what something means or why she feels the way she does about it.
But it’s so unstructured. It’s all over the place, repetitive, arguments incomplete and out of order. So is this seeming inability to put even words out into the world, the tools she’s most familiar and versatile with, simply a lack of discipline? Of not wanting to take the time to write it out, organize it, rewrite it, edit it until a cohesive piece is created that makes sense and is even persuasive or interesting? She doesn’t believe that’s it.
What it is is a deep and unrelenting belief that what she has to say does not matter. That’s really it. It’s not even a self-hate kind of deal, it’s simply a realistic view of her place in the world and its meaninglessness. And she can’t seem to make herself find that liberating or unimportant. It’s just words, words, as Hamlet would say, with that same inflection. There’s so many words out there. Everywhere you look, someone is saying something, writing something; it’s an incredible din of blather. How much of it means anything?
When she was young, the block was a feeling of fakeness. Writing about the world, in fact or fiction, was pretending a knowledge she didn’t have yet. It would come with experience, with living. It felt useless to try to write anything that hadn’t been said before and better, by people who knew so much more than she did.
Now it’s different. She realizes this was a lie she told herself out of cowardice. We all know something; we all live in this world. And it can’t be about becoming Charles Dickens or Virginia Woolf. That’s either a pathetic excuse not to write or it’s some sort of arrogance. Like what she would write has so much importance attached to it, so much weight.
Now nothing has weight. Every day on Twitter, 140 characters are posted how many times a second? There’s how many blog posts online? So many of them saying the same things over and over. And even as we decry the end of publishing as we know it, how many books in whatever form are being put out there? And magazines and zines and songs and poems and essays and articles and advertisements and obituaries and sermons and debates and political speeches and laws and parking tickets and bumper stickers and graffiti, how much of that is produced and replicated every single day? Does she want to add to the din? Is it possible to be heard, should she finally decide she wants someone to listen?
But sometimes she almost gets it, almost understands the place her expression could live in between the ideas of what its weight would be and whether that matters and to whom. She feels like she’s almost beyond the pretension and the hopelessness and the false pretention and hidden hopefulness; maybe that’s just wisdom finally putting in its two cents. But shouldn’t wisdom feel more wise? More sure and strong? Shouldn’t wisdom be able to be put into words?
Most days she’s stuck on Angel’s epiphany, “If nothing we do matters, all that matters is what we do.” If nothing we write matters, then all that matters is what we write. She doesn’t know if that makes sense at all. It almost feels right.
Today has moved on an hour now, and she’s not necessarily made it a special day after all. But she opened the file, she put the thoughts in her head on the blank paper facsimile in front of her, and she posted it online, a drop of water in the vast sea of internet babble. And she felt good.
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