I always think that it was more than sex - but that the relationship happened before Angelus got cursed. TGIQ shows an Angelus and WtB who are unquestionably close - and since they are vampires, I can't see that they would have any problems enjoying themselves in all sorts of ways.
Spike is clear when he tells Blue that he and Angel have only been intimate 'that one time". The two questions are - what does he mean by intimate, and does he differentiate between souled and unsouled versions.
I love the relationship we see between Spike and Angel in season 5. It's clear that Spike sees them as part of a long term relationship (not in the human together and sexual way). He's not going to allow Angel to ignore him or push him aside - and he scopes out the circumstances in minutes (some bargain with the devil...etc.) They know each other.
Angel is 100 years away from knowing Spike - last time they saw each other Spike had hired someone to skewer him. He still sees Spike as part of the period of time that he wants to forget - or beat himself bloody over. I'm pretty sure that sex isn't really on the table (in canon) - but in the context of their long term relationship I can see it.
Which is pretty much what I guess I needed to see to figure out what was going on.
I don't know that "more than sex" is completely correct, at least from my view. I'm starting to think that it's more of an "other than sex" situation. In that the sex is totally seperate from their relationship, whatever it is.
Completely regardless of how the intimacy comment is interpreted, they have had sex at least once. I think I always kept waiting for that to be really important, or just to impact their relationship in some way, but I'm finally getting that it really just doesn't.
"You're not friends. You'll never be friends. You'll be in love till it kills you both. You'll fight, you'll shag, you'll hate each other till it makes you quiver, but you'll never be friends. Real love isn't brains, children, it's blood, it's blood screaming inside you to work its will. I may be love's bitch, but at least I'm man enough to admit it."
"Trust is for old marrieds, Buffy. Great love is wild and passionate and dangerous. It burns and consumes."
These are the things that Spike has said about love. One thing he and Angel obviously share is passion. I don't think they are friends - in fact I would say that the first quote is more about Angel and Spike than Angel and Buffy or Spike and Dru. I don't see either of the het relationships including fighting and hating each other till it makes them quiver.
Nor do I see much trust in the relationship Spike and Angel have. I doubt Spike would call his 20 years with Angelus a 'great love' but I suspect it was wild and passionate, and it burned.
Spike and Angel are demons, even when they are finally souled. I don't see them as fuck buddies at any point in their relationship. And I do think Spike was referring to Angel, as opposed to Angelus, when he says they were intimate once. According to Joss - Spike and Angelus were intimate far more than once.
Watch Lover's Walk and you can see that Angel puts himself between Spike and Buffy more than once. And that Spike expects Angel to do that. When Spike and Dru first showed in season 2, Angel made only one attempt to get them to leave, and that was to talk to Dru and tell her to take Spike and leave. He made no attempt to harm them - only to make sure that big Blue was not a problem. Then he changed to Angelus - and even then, when Spike was vulnerable, Angel was content with some emotional torment.
Angel dusted Darla, killed Penn, set Darla and Dru on fire. But while he claims to dislike Spike, he never makes any effort to hurt him - even when Spike drove him insane.
Watch 'Why We Fight' - Angel spends the whole time putting himself between Spike and danger - then sends Spike off with his newly turned "brother".
I see them as having a complex relationship that does not include flowers and chocolate - but it does have passion, fighting, hate (the other side of love). Angel comments in season 2 about how it's nice to have Spike watching his back again. And in ssn 5 AtS, Spike also has Angel's back - first by telling him what an idiot he's being, and then by staying in LA.
What they do - their snark - is called antagonistic flirting. In part it's habit, and jostling for position, but it's also a game they clearly enjoy in some ways.
When two people can yell for 40 minutes about whether cavemen can defeat astronauts, they definitely have a great deal of passion. They are definitely not friends. I think you're looking for a human sort of love - trust, compassion, communication, caring. From their actions I can see all of those but I suspect neither one would admit to them.
I agree with pretty much everything you just said.
Mostly, what was throwing me for so long was that I kept waiting and waiting for their sexual history to have impact on the rest of their relationship.
But it doesn't.
I think I figured that since it wasn't coming up, there was a reason it wasn't coming up. But there wasn't, it's just completely irrelevant to their relationship and to everything going on around them.
I'm going to disagree with you on the trust aspect, however. I do think that, while there isn't much compassion or communication going on, there's definitely some trust there. Not for the little stuff, no. But at the end of the day, I always felt that they both knew the other hand their back.
Oh yeah - when they truly needed help of some sort both of them would give their lives for the other. And snark about it the entire way!
Maybe it's me but I'm always content to think that part happens off screen - and that's really Doylist. From what I hear, the relationship between Spike and Angel was going to be a main point in season 6. :(
Just curious but what kind of action and reaction would you be looking for?
I know. I was disappointed that we didn't get to explore that some more. It came up a bit in the After the Fall series, but nothing really happened at the end of the day.
I don't know that I was looking for anything in particular. I think I just sort of expected some level of angst or something to come out of their sexual past. Mostly because Spike tends toward codependency and seems to think that having sex with Buffy will eventually make her love him, I guess I just figured that he would have similar expectations from Angel as well.
I suspect he did have those expectation around 100+ years ago. And maybe 100+ years ago they worked - which would be why he kept them (or part of why).
One thing that really fascinates me about Spike is that he actually seems to think in archetypes. The "goody good guys" will help because that's what they do. "This is a mystic creature - a kill or be killed creature". His mindset is geared toward certain expectations of certain types. Buffy and Dru were females who needed him.
I suspect that William, being a well dressed, well educated ponce bounced to the opposite extreme and became a working class mate (and Dru who was cockney was probably part of this)
Angel is not Angelus - so he has moved from one archetype to another. But both share the love of luxury, the notion that they are always in charge - looking down on, well everyone. They have both taken opposite archetypes, and neither will change. Whatever relationship they have fits in those parameters.
Thanks - this has just been a wonderful chance to think some things through.
Spike is clear when he tells Blue that he and Angel have only been intimate 'that one time". The two questions are - what does he mean by intimate, and does he differentiate between souled and unsouled versions.
I love the relationship we see between Spike and Angel in season 5. It's clear that Spike sees them as part of a long term relationship (not in the human together and sexual way). He's not going to allow Angel to ignore him or push him aside - and he scopes out the circumstances in minutes (some bargain with the devil...etc.) They know each other.
Angel is 100 years away from knowing Spike - last time they saw each other Spike had hired someone to skewer him. He still sees Spike as part of the period of time that he wants to forget - or beat himself bloody over. I'm pretty sure that sex isn't really on the table (in canon) - but in the context of their long term relationship I can see it.
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Which is pretty much what I guess I needed to see to figure out what was going on.
I don't know that "more than sex" is completely correct, at least from my view. I'm starting to think that it's more of an "other than sex" situation. In that the sex is totally seperate from their relationship, whatever it is.
Completely regardless of how the intimacy comment is interpreted, they have had sex at least once. I think I always kept waiting for that to be really important, or just to impact their relationship in some way, but I'm finally getting that it really just doesn't.
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friends. You'll be in love till it
kills you both. You'll fight, you'll
shag, you'll hate each other till it
makes you quiver, but you'll never be
friends. Real love isn't brains,
children, it's blood, it's blood
screaming inside you to work its
will. I may be love's bitch, but at
least I'm man enough to admit it."
"Trust is for old marrieds, Buffy.
Great love is wild and passionate and
dangerous. It burns and consumes."
These are the things that Spike has said about love. One thing he and Angel obviously share is passion. I don't think they are friends - in fact I would say that the first quote is more about Angel and Spike than Angel and Buffy or Spike and Dru. I don't see either of the het relationships including fighting and hating each other till it makes them quiver.
Nor do I see much trust in the relationship Spike and Angel have. I doubt Spike would call his 20 years with Angelus a 'great love' but I suspect it was wild and passionate, and it burned.
Spike and Angel are demons, even when they are finally souled. I don't see them as fuck buddies at any point in their relationship. And I do think Spike was referring to Angel, as opposed to Angelus, when he says they were intimate once. According to Joss - Spike and Angelus were intimate far more than once.
Watch Lover's Walk and you can see that Angel puts himself between Spike and Buffy more than once. And that Spike expects Angel to do that. When Spike and Dru first showed in season 2, Angel made only one attempt to get them to leave, and that was to talk to Dru and tell her to take Spike and leave. He made no attempt to harm them - only to make sure that big Blue was not a problem. Then he changed to Angelus - and even then, when Spike was vulnerable, Angel was content with some emotional torment.
Angel dusted Darla, killed Penn, set Darla and Dru on fire. But while he claims to dislike Spike, he never makes any effort to hurt him - even when Spike drove him insane.
Watch 'Why We Fight' - Angel spends the whole time putting himself between Spike and danger - then sends Spike off with his newly turned "brother".
I see them as having a complex relationship that does not include flowers and chocolate - but it does have passion, fighting, hate (the other side of love). Angel comments in season 2 about how it's nice to have Spike watching his back again. And in ssn 5 AtS, Spike also has Angel's back - first by telling him what an idiot he's being, and then by staying in LA.
What they do - their snark - is called antagonistic flirting. In part it's habit, and jostling for position, but it's also a game they clearly enjoy in some ways.
When two people can yell for 40 minutes about whether cavemen can defeat astronauts, they definitely have a great deal of passion. They are definitely not friends. I think you're looking for a human sort of love - trust, compassion, communication, caring. From their actions I can see all of those but I suspect neither one would admit to them.
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Mostly, what was throwing me for so long was that I kept waiting and waiting for their sexual history to have impact on the rest of their relationship.
But it doesn't.
I think I figured that since it wasn't coming up, there was a reason it wasn't coming up. But there wasn't, it's just completely irrelevant to their relationship and to everything going on around them.
I'm going to disagree with you on the trust aspect, however. I do think that, while there isn't much compassion or communication going on, there's definitely some trust there. Not for the little stuff, no. But at the end of the day, I always felt that they both knew the other hand their back.
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Maybe it's me but I'm always content to think that part happens off screen - and that's really Doylist. From what I hear, the relationship between Spike and Angel was going to be a main point in season 6. :(
Just curious but what kind of action and reaction would you be looking for?
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I don't know that I was looking for anything in particular. I think I just sort of expected some level of angst or something to come out of their sexual past. Mostly because Spike tends toward codependency and seems to think that having sex with Buffy will eventually make her love him, I guess I just figured that he would have similar expectations from Angel as well.
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One thing that really fascinates me about Spike is that he actually seems to think in archetypes. The "goody good guys" will help because that's what they do. "This is a mystic creature - a kill or be killed creature". His mindset is geared toward certain expectations of certain types. Buffy and Dru were females who needed him.
I suspect that William, being a well dressed, well educated ponce bounced to the opposite extreme and became a working class mate (and Dru who was cockney was probably part of this)
Angel is not Angelus - so he has moved from one archetype to another. But both share the love of luxury, the notion that they are always in charge - looking down on, well everyone. They have both taken opposite archetypes, and neither will change. Whatever relationship they have fits in those parameters.
Thanks - this has just been a wonderful chance to think some things through.
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