Holy
Seeing the BSG fandom up in the flames?
Oh it brings back so many memories. It's so strange to NOT be the one having my still beating heart ripped out, stomped on and then...thrown out a 10 story building into a giant pile of glass just for good measure.
It's interesting. And kind of glad that I vowed NEVER to get that emotionally involved/invested in a show ever again because....writers fuck you over. They really do. They'll leave breadcrumbs they'll string you along, making you believe that they really loved and cared for a character.
Then we get S6 and S7 Buffy. Then we get...S3/S4 (and to an extent S5 I don't think it was interesting or had much layers to it that could make me hate it, but it wasn't good...) of ATS....what the...?!
I still contend that the INTENT-slash-meaning behind Chosen was way better than NFA.
Angel - let's go on a kamikaze mission not knowing whether it will actually make the world a better place, but I'll be dead so I won't be alive to see it...so who cares! Also let's kill an innocent human being in the process. I kind ofREALLY had a huge problem with Lindsay dying, and I KNOW, we ALL know that humans with *souls* can be every bit as bad as demons can, but the metaphor was in the demons. There was a specific line where our heroes would NEVER cross. EVER. It meant that they had a chance, that they had a chance to redeem themselves, and they wouldn't EVER absolutely EVER have to kill someone unless there was no other choice (I threw that in because of Graduation - Faith/Buffy, because she was painted into a corner, but the writers were *VERY* conscious of the Buffy DOESN'T KILL HUMANS part of the show). It was touched on briefly in Ted but..you get the point. But I digress, he went in...I almost want to say less heroic because he goes in pretty much because he's sick and tired of fighting and the take home message was supposed to be "keep fighting". First off, Joss - LAME. 2) IT WAS SO A CLIFFHANGER!1! *bitchslaps*
I get that ATS was "darker" and I scoff at the "more adult" notion...but...it just rubs me the wrong way. I feel like as much as some people might have hated Buffy in the last two seasons, they tried to redeem her in the last ep. It was epic. There was purpose, there was meaning and her plan MADE SENSE.
I think my point being, and I actually have a little bit of bias and bitterness towards Angel that in a lot of respects he got it easier than Buffy. Buffy gets humiliated by the nerds (in both the last seasons), no, the fact that her nemeses for the season were 3 human losers. Her mother dies, she's left with no money, has a fake sister that isn't a really real to take care of, bills to pay, a fucking gang of people living in her house who DO NOT CONTRIBUTE TO IT AT ALL - except for Xander who fixes stuff and picks Dawn up from school. While Willow boo-hoos her way through the last two seasons and is pretty much useless and also annoying. Buffy has no money, can't get a real job, has to drop out of school while trying to readjust herself from being ripped from heaven. Was the Connor thing bad? Yes but he gets him back, and one of Angel's biggest problems that season was Cordy sleeping with him? GRR. But I think the fact that he didn't have to deal with anything outside of that kind of makes it unfair to say the least, while simultaneously not making him seem like a "real" person (...or vampire). He's a got a hotel, he charges people to work cases, he has a stash of cash hidden in said hotel. With that being said this doesn't mean I don't like Angel, it doesn't. It just means I love Buffy more and maybe she never had to know what it was like to have the blood of thousands of people on her conscious. But she had so much shit piled on her at the same time, and no one gave her the credit she deserved or the benefit of the doubt. How many times has Buffy thought one way, while the others felt another...and turns out Buffy was right all along?
A lot of stuff made me think about it because I mourned my Buffy so much. While Buffy was losing people in her life, Angel was gaining them, with power and money. It's quite the contrast. There is actually a really interesting meta on the feminist aspect of this, and actually carlyinrome wrote a really interesting essay on Buffy and Xander, and talked about the things that Xander (or the men) were allowed to get away with versus what Buffy couldn't. Do I think this was done on purpose on the show? No, but it's the society we live in. Angel is allowed to become colder, more powerful, become a general and is feared and revered while Buffy gets demonized and booted from her house.
(I'm getting off topic here...)
The point is, in my eyes Buffy went down heroically...and no she didn't have to die to do it. Let's count 3 key times where she sacrificed herself to save the world...Chosen was no different. They go in knowing that there is a high chance they might die (but is thus, different than the suicide mission of NFA). They do it because this is THE FIRST EVIL, the evil of all evils and they have NO CHOICE but to go to war. It's this...or the world as we know it implodes. Sidenote: I agreed with Buffy that they had to go back to the vineyard because they were definitely guarding something there. Again, was she not right about it the whole time? I think so.
Cut to NFA - was it *necessary* or was Angel just fed up and didn't care whether he lived or died? What exactly would taking down the Senior Partners accomplish, and knowing well enough that they are in EVERY part of the world. Joss tells us that the message is to keep fighting...but is he? Is he really? I know that it's easy to say they should keep fighting blah blah blippity blah, but I feel like if there's a way to see Angel go...it wouldn't be like this. It would be him fighting tooth and nail, for the world, for the people he loves, for his fallen friends, to save lives (uh..channel Buffy?). When the fucking episode ended I sat there in silence, staring at my tv thinking..."Where's the rest of this goddamn episode? This is it? This is REALLY how they're ending it?". So...Angel goes on a nutso kamikaze mission NOT saving the world, accomplishing..? With an army of...5? Only 3 of them being supernatural beings? Buffy goes in, she prepares she goes in with an army and with a purpose. Now she's going out fighting, she's fighting for the world she lives in even though she knows it's not perfect.
So to me that makes Buffy's ending more epic and heroic. We get closure with enough leeway for more stories. People complain that Joss "forced" these girls to become slayers, but I don't necessarily see it that way. I understand some people are saying it's not fair because only select girls will get the power, but I think the point was not to make them slayers and take their choices away, but to give them that power, that confidence and to chose what they want to do with it. Nothing was taken from them, they were given. And most of all we got hope. We think that Buffy has come to peace with herself, with her destiny, who she is, what she is. We see that there is still a fire between Buffy and Angel, that despite everything that's happened, miles apart, years apart, heaven and hell...it's still there. That impossible love that they both cling to the faintest hope...faint, but still there. "Someday" is everything and I think that's more than enough for us B/Aers to keep telling their story for years to come. Someday means not now, and maybe not in this life, but one day they will find a way back to each other. They might not have children and a white picket fence, hell Angel may never become human...but they'll have each other. They'd have had the good, the bad and everything in between. So I pity the BSG fandom, I feel for the Lee/Kara shippers. It's sad, and yo got royally fucked over from what I hear. Buffy got torn down in the last two seasons, but I, at least believe she came out on top in the end. Kara wasn't even granted that.
This ended up being so much longer than anticipated, I'm so tempted to just skip ahead and watch Chosen. AH...Must. Resist.
I dunno about you despite S6 and S7, I still look back on the show fondly. What could have been for S6, it started out so promising and I think maybe if it weren't for the debacle that was Buffy/Spike gratuitous nakedness, and trying to make Spike into Angel 2.0...the season wouldn't have been half bad. Could Buffy and Spike get close? Could he have become her confidante, absolutely! A lot of it had to do with the fact that Chosen was fairly satisfying - was it great? No...but I think it was enough. Our hero prevails, and she comes out as heroic as ever.
Oh it brings back so many memories. It's so strange to NOT be the one having my still beating heart ripped out, stomped on and then...thrown out a 10 story building into a giant pile of glass just for good measure.
It's interesting. And kind of glad that I vowed NEVER to get that emotionally involved/invested in a show ever again because....writers fuck you over. They really do. They'll leave breadcrumbs they'll string you along, making you believe that they really loved and cared for a character.
Then we get S6 and S7 Buffy. Then we get...S3/S4 (and to an extent S5 I don't think it was interesting or had much layers to it that could make me hate it, but it wasn't good...) of ATS....what the...?!
I still contend that the INTENT-slash-meaning behind Chosen was way better than NFA.
Angel - let's go on a kamikaze mission not knowing whether it will actually make the world a better place, but I'll be dead so I won't be alive to see it...so who cares! Also let's kill an innocent human being in the process. I kind ofREALLY had a huge problem with Lindsay dying, and I KNOW, we ALL know that humans with *souls* can be every bit as bad as demons can, but the metaphor was in the demons. There was a specific line where our heroes would NEVER cross. EVER. It meant that they had a chance, that they had a chance to redeem themselves, and they wouldn't EVER absolutely EVER have to kill someone unless there was no other choice (I threw that in because of Graduation - Faith/Buffy, because she was painted into a corner, but the writers were *VERY* conscious of the Buffy DOESN'T KILL HUMANS part of the show). It was touched on briefly in Ted but..you get the point. But I digress, he went in...I almost want to say less heroic because he goes in pretty much because he's sick and tired of fighting and the take home message was supposed to be "keep fighting". First off, Joss - LAME. 2) IT WAS SO A CLIFFHANGER!1! *bitchslaps*
I get that ATS was "darker" and I scoff at the "more adult" notion...but...it just rubs me the wrong way. I feel like as much as some people might have hated Buffy in the last two seasons, they tried to redeem her in the last ep. It was epic. There was purpose, there was meaning and her plan MADE SENSE.
I think my point being, and I actually have a little bit of bias and bitterness towards Angel that in a lot of respects he got it easier than Buffy. Buffy gets humiliated by the nerds (in both the last seasons), no, the fact that her nemeses for the season were 3 human losers. Her mother dies, she's left with no money, has a fake sister that isn't a really real to take care of, bills to pay, a fucking gang of people living in her house who DO NOT CONTRIBUTE TO IT AT ALL - except for Xander who fixes stuff and picks Dawn up from school. While Willow boo-hoos her way through the last two seasons and is pretty much useless and also annoying. Buffy has no money, can't get a real job, has to drop out of school while trying to readjust herself from being ripped from heaven. Was the Connor thing bad? Yes but he gets him back, and one of Angel's biggest problems that season was Cordy sleeping with him? GRR. But I think the fact that he didn't have to deal with anything outside of that kind of makes it unfair to say the least, while simultaneously not making him seem like a "real" person (...or vampire). He's a got a hotel, he charges people to work cases, he has a stash of cash hidden in said hotel. With that being said this doesn't mean I don't like Angel, it doesn't. It just means I love Buffy more and maybe she never had to know what it was like to have the blood of thousands of people on her conscious. But she had so much shit piled on her at the same time, and no one gave her the credit she deserved or the benefit of the doubt. How many times has Buffy thought one way, while the others felt another...and turns out Buffy was right all along?
A lot of stuff made me think about it because I mourned my Buffy so much. While Buffy was losing people in her life, Angel was gaining them, with power and money. It's quite the contrast. There is actually a really interesting meta on the feminist aspect of this, and actually carlyinrome wrote a really interesting essay on Buffy and Xander, and talked about the things that Xander (or the men) were allowed to get away with versus what Buffy couldn't. Do I think this was done on purpose on the show? No, but it's the society we live in. Angel is allowed to become colder, more powerful, become a general and is feared and revered while Buffy gets demonized and booted from her house.
(I'm getting off topic here...)
The point is, in my eyes Buffy went down heroically...and no she didn't have to die to do it. Let's count 3 key times where she sacrificed herself to save the world...Chosen was no different. They go in knowing that there is a high chance they might die (but is thus, different than the suicide mission of NFA). They do it because this is THE FIRST EVIL, the evil of all evils and they have NO CHOICE but to go to war. It's this...or the world as we know it implodes. Sidenote: I agreed with Buffy that they had to go back to the vineyard because they were definitely guarding something there. Again, was she not right about it the whole time? I think so.
Cut to NFA - was it *necessary* or was Angel just fed up and didn't care whether he lived or died? What exactly would taking down the Senior Partners accomplish, and knowing well enough that they are in EVERY part of the world. Joss tells us that the message is to keep fighting...but is he? Is he really? I know that it's easy to say they should keep fighting blah blah blippity blah, but I feel like if there's a way to see Angel go...it wouldn't be like this. It would be him fighting tooth and nail, for the world, for the people he loves, for his fallen friends, to save lives (uh..channel Buffy?). When the fucking episode ended I sat there in silence, staring at my tv thinking..."Where's the rest of this goddamn episode? This is it? This is REALLY how they're ending it?". So...Angel goes on a nutso kamikaze mission NOT saving the world, accomplishing..? With an army of...5? Only 3 of them being supernatural beings? Buffy goes in, she prepares she goes in with an army and with a purpose. Now she's going out fighting, she's fighting for the world she lives in even though she knows it's not perfect.
So to me that makes Buffy's ending more epic and heroic. We get closure with enough leeway for more stories. People complain that Joss "forced" these girls to become slayers, but I don't necessarily see it that way. I understand some people are saying it's not fair because only select girls will get the power, but I think the point was not to make them slayers and take their choices away, but to give them that power, that confidence and to chose what they want to do with it. Nothing was taken from them, they were given. And most of all we got hope. We think that Buffy has come to peace with herself, with her destiny, who she is, what she is. We see that there is still a fire between Buffy and Angel, that despite everything that's happened, miles apart, years apart, heaven and hell...it's still there. That impossible love that they both cling to the faintest hope...faint, but still there. "Someday" is everything and I think that's more than enough for us B/Aers to keep telling their story for years to come. Someday means not now, and maybe not in this life, but one day they will find a way back to each other. They might not have children and a white picket fence, hell Angel may never become human...but they'll have each other. They'd have had the good, the bad and everything in between. So I pity the BSG fandom, I feel for the Lee/Kara shippers. It's sad, and yo got royally fucked over from what I hear. Buffy got torn down in the last two seasons, but I, at least believe she came out on top in the end. Kara wasn't even granted that.
This ended up being so much longer than anticipated, I'm so tempted to just skip ahead and watch Chosen. AH...Must. Resist.
I dunno about you despite S6 and S7, I still look back on the show fondly. What could have been for S6, it started out so promising and I think maybe if it weren't for the debacle that was Buffy/Spike gratuitous nakedness, and trying to make Spike into Angel 2.0...the season wouldn't have been half bad. Could Buffy and Spike get close? Could he have become her confidante, absolutely! A lot of it had to do with the fact that Chosen was fairly satisfying - was it great? No...but I think it was enough. Our hero prevails, and she comes out as heroic as ever.