Buffy Came Back Wrong: Dead Things and Older and Far Away
No clue what this is? Read the first post in the series.
"Depression is a prison where you are both the suffering prisoner and the cruel jailer."
- Dorothy Rowe
Yep, it's been a while since I've tackled this. With good reason, too. We're now approaching Dead Things, one of the central episodes of Buffy's depression arc. It's something that ( Read more... )
"Depression is a prison where you are both the suffering prisoner and the cruel jailer."
- Dorothy Rowe
Yep, it's been a while since I've tackled this. With good reason, too. We're now approaching Dead Things, one of the central episodes of Buffy's depression arc. It's something that ( Read more... )
Reading your analysis...and taking it in context with what's going on in the comics, how Joss is being all Bangel-shippy...I wonder if Joss ever even meant the Spuffy thing as more than metaphor. Spike is still soulless at this point; any other soulless vampire would, at the very least, be beaten up and driven away (and that's if they were as harmless and scrubby as a vampire can get). That's Buffy's job. By kicking Spike's--and metaphorically Death's--ass, Buffy is in fact behaving in accordance with her calling as the Slayer. Vampires=death. It's Buffy's job to "slay" Death, at least in the sense that it doesn't get its victims this time. By turning on Spike, Buffy is doubly-fulfilling the metaphor--rejecting Death coming for her, and returning to her "life" of driving Death away from others. That Spike also happens to be a person...I'm not sure Joss even considered it at the time. After all, according to the text, it ain't true--vampires are "not people". That would certainly explain Tara's non-reaction to Buffy beating her boyfriend within an inch of his unlife. On the other hand, it kind of undercuts the subtextual self-reference of Buffy's words while she's hitting him. Not sure what to think.
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Hmmm...well, this meta is looking at one episode from one very narrow focus. There's a shippier interpretation of the episode, as well. And the events of S7, obviously, have a shippy interpretation, as well. So I don't know that I'd take this one subtextual interpretation of the episode as Joss' sole intention.
While the metaphor is played very heavily in DT, the characters are still...characters. With independent motivations and desires. This meta doesn't at all look at Spike's side of the story, which is significantly more than "being death" for Buffy's story. He's going through his own arc.
That Spike also happens to be a person...I'm not sure Joss even considered it at the time. After all, according to the text, it ain't true--vampires are "not people". That would certainly explain Tara's non-reaction to Buffy beating her boyfriend within an inch of his unlife.
Well, the Katrina-Spike parallels in this episode (and in As You Were) are very explicit. So I'd say it's not even subtext that Buffy owns up to the fact that she's using Spike (which isn't portrayed as a good thing). Whether you want to call Spike a "person" or a "being" or whatnot (feels like a semantic distinction to me), I don't think the show would condone using a being with feelings for sex.
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Yeah, you're probably right. I'm sleepy, and it's been a long time since I saw any of the episodes at all. Once I've gotten some rest, that'll all no doubt sound seriously wonky in the morning.
Whether you want to call Spike a "person" or a "being" or whatnot (feels like a semantic distinction to me), I don't think the show would condone using a being with feelings for sex.
Sometimes I wonder....
But I suppose at this point the show has come a long way from Giles' casual comments about the nature of vampires in the first season.
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