Rules of Engagement: Violence and Hyperreality in the Buffyverse
rebcake recently posted a poll regarding the onset of Buffy and Spike's sexual relationship in the BtVS episode "Smashed." I answered "neither" and began to post a comment to explain, but it started to get long-ish, so I thought I'd just do a long-ish blog post instead. What I wrote turned out to be somewhat off-topic in terms of her poll, and more
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Yes. Abso-fucking-lutely. Though I prefer a "cut to fireworks exploding in mid-air" to "fade to black" OR "gauzy romance shots" on general principles. ;-) I would have been pretty upset if Joss had done the voice-over moaning as he did in Surprise/Innocence, however.
Speaking of which, one reason I would like for the issue to be settled explicitly is that I'd appreciate a little sex positivity for Buffy in her show's, ahem, climax. I know you like the flaming hand orgasm, but I'd be happier with some non-world destroying nookie first. I know I'm dreadfully unpoetic, but there it is.
The lack of poetry in my soul means I just can't see the FTB containing anything new in their relationship without further evidence, much as I'd love to. I'm happy other people can imagine a meaningful love scene, but for me, there's nothing there. I'll put in that retroactive requests for fireworks any day now.
I do care what other people insert in the FTB, partly because of all the endless arguments on the internet about whether she ever forgave him really, truly, etc. forever, amen. Though no doubt those arguments would have been replaced with slut-shaming ones, or ones lamenting her continued victimization, even after he got a soul. *gasp* I suppose I should be satisfied with what we got. But, like Buffy, I'm not.
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Ooh, or how about a rocket blasting off into space? Or maybe something like this:
The lack of poetry in my soul means I just can't see the FTB containing anything new in their relationship without further evidence, much as I'd love to.
But isn't the gentleness new? Isn't the fact that when we see them together earlier, she is lying there, "in (her) dead lover's arms" as The First puts it, a fairly new thing? Even if FTB Spike didn't park his dragon in her dungeon, I don't think these moments between them count as "nothing."
Then again, I have trouble believing they only "slept", based on what Xander says that leads us to this scene:
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AMANDA:
What kind of person could sleep on a night like this?
XANDER:
(looks over at Anya, who's passed out beside him) Only the crazy ones.
---
... and then we see Buffy go to Spike. The implication seemed pretty clear to me that they weren't going to "sleep" either. I thought that was a great bit of writing, actually.
Though no doubt those arguments would have been replaced with slut-shaming ones...
Right, exactly. I guess that was my point to blackfrancine above; the level of explicitness wouldn't have made a difference to internet flame-fests, because the logical arguments are following the emotional responses, not the other way around.
Meanwhile, Joss Whedon is probably the Ultimate "Spuffy", since by the end of the show he was practically clubbing us over the head with their love story. I don't see him leaving the escape hatch slightly ajar for people who weren't totally on-board as a cynical business ploy, like Barb probably does. The show was so big and sprawling, and about many things besides Buffy and Spike's romance. Considering the huge moment he gives them at the end, I think it actually would have been overkill to show them kissing or otherwise canoodling.
Speaking of which, one reason I would like for the issue to be settled explicitly is that I'd appreciate a little sex positivity for Buffy in her show's, ahem, climax.
That's not a bad point, I guess, in a "I want this character to be happy" sort of way. I guess I never saw Buffy as a Happily Ever After sort of hero. It's not that I want to see the character unhappy, just that I like the idea of showing how rare it is for heros to get the things they deserve.
Also -- and maybe there's *too much* poetry in my soul -- I think maybe the greatest thing about fading to black is that the mystery makes for a compelling jumping off point for fanfiction. Their story doesn't necessarily feel complete, particularly since Canon Spike gets resurrected via magical whoositz the power of love evil lawyers Plot Armor. So, combined with their "shirty" conversation in "End of Days", it really makes you wonder what might have happened between them somewhere down the line.
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But isn't the gentleness new?
It's been there for a few episodes, probably since LMPTM, and definitely from Touched onward. And it's great, really. But without something concrete, such as a morning after shot, I can't assume there was more than that in the FTB.
That's not a bad point, I guess, in a "I want this character to be happy" sort of way.
It's sadly true that I want Buffy to be happy, and the probability of that lasting is slim. But I also have a big appetite for female empowerment, which is a separate issue, although related. Unlike some fans, I really like the we're-all-bleeding-together-and-sharing-the-primal-power-source aspect of Chosen. And we see that Buffy is open to and gains power from intimacy, before the end. That's big.
But the last time we see her in a sexual situation, it's Seeing Red, the perfect(ly awful) bookend to her experience in Innocence. As a feminist message, it's a pretty bleak place to leave it, and isn't helped by the comics, thanxfernuthin S8.
I resent having to "do the emotional work/fill in the blanks/use my imagination" about something so key to The Female Hero/Buffy's empowerment as embracing her sexuality. I understand that not everybody feels that sex is important, but we've seen ample evidence that Buffy does. From what we're shown, the simplest conclusion is that Buffy's learned to keep her knees together, even if she can finally open her heart again.
True, the story was unfinished, and maybe that is something she will work on, eventually. Unless and until that happens, I can't help but think that Buffy left her show with a big psychic scar where that elemental part of her lives.
it's almost the most important shot in the show because it really shows the mystery of their relationship.
Mm, yeah, that doesn't really work for me, Joss, because the whole point of their relationship was that it wasn't "mysterious". This shot adds some mystery, I suppose, in the way a smokescreen always does. So I'll call "bullshit", even if Barb didn't.
I'll also add a quarter to the pot, but only if Buffy's consent can't be handwaved away by spells, roofie of mystical or mundane origin, or for any other reason. *waits*
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But the last time we see her in a sexual situation, it's Seeing Red, the perfect(ly awful) bookend to her experience in Innocence. As a feminist message, it's a pretty bleak place to leave it
Well, Joss has said before that the show isn't a polemic. I tend to think that the fact Buffy falls short of an idealized propaganda poster or some sort of feminist version of a Platonic Form is a feature, not a bug. Art-as-propaganda is usually stilted and boring, dragging you towards its meaning on a set of railroad tracks. The Buffyverse never felt like that; it was way more expansive.
I always marvel a little bit whenever I see art critiqued because it "provides bad role models" or "sends the wrong message", as though this was the purpose of art. Ironically, it reminds me a bit of the Hayes Production Code that prompted Hitchcock to be so subtle with his dirty dogginess. This argument seems to me like the other side of the same coin -- this desire for art to be morally instructive about behavior.
From what we're shown, the simplest conclusion is that Buffy's learned to keep her knees together, even if she can finally open her heart again.
I disagree. The simplest conclusion is that Buffy's wounds haven't fully healed yet, making it still very difficult to open herself to another relationship, sexual or otherwise. She says as much as late as "Touched". Your conclusion relies on the notion that Buffy's heroic journey *is* a feminist polemic, meant to perfectly encapsulate that philosophy's ideal woman -- including some apparently unified feminist depiction of what constitutes an embrace of sexuality.
Maybe I just consume art differently. For instance, I've often heard the phrase "Joss is not a feminist" used as a rallying cry against aspects of the show that feminists don't like. Meanwhile, my usual reaction to this cricitism is something along the lines of, "So what?" The Buffy authors' exploration of feminist themes doesn't necessary mean that they intended her to be propaganda tool or recruitment poster, or even that they agree with every tenet of the ideas they are exploring. Moreover, even capital "F" Feminism itself isn't monolithic. There are various feminist sects who would posit that Buffy "learning to keep her knees together" was an empowering message. I don't agree that this was the lesson being learned, but if a feminist wanted to frame it that way it wouldn't be too hard a fit.
Meanwhile, I think what's really going on (and what's been going on for several millenia) is that philosophers/sophists have always coveted the raw power of art, and the way that great art can make lasting, metaphysical connections with people that their bricks of propositional text could never hope to. So, instead of trying to ascend towards art and deal with it on its own, rather messy terms, they try to drag art down to their level, where they dissect it with their claws and try to jam the pieces into the prison of their particular worldview. Whether the character falls short Ultimate Dogmatic Feminist Hero or not seems to be beside the point. Was it a good story? Did it make you feel and think?
If the entire point of the Buffy bildungsroman was to construct the Ultimate Dogmatic Feminist Icon, and all the other themes were merely inserted to service the creation of this graven image, then I think one would have to count the whole effort as a massive failure. The lessons she learned in Sunnydale exceed anything we could glean from a college textbook or sociology thesis. Buffy emerges from the ordeal of the Hellmouth not as an ideal chiseled from marble, but as gloriously flawed and human, scarred but alive and filled with hope for the future.
I'll also add a quarter to the pot, but only if Buffy's consent can't be handwaved away by spells, roofie of mystical or mundane origin, or for any other reason.
Ha! I can't wait to collect my growing fortune! :)
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But in answer to your question would the main themes of the show, or Buffy and Spike's individual arc on it together, have changed markedly for you if their purported sexual relationship at the end had been made more explicit, I still say yes. Buffy making peace with her sexuality would have been a marked change. Not having her last sexual experience on the show be SR would be a marked change. For me.
But that's not what we got. We got a Buffy opening up to intimacy, which I continue to think is huge for her emotional journey, as I'm sure you do. There could have been more, there could have been less. Like much of fandom, I can imagine loads of small adjustments to the finale that would have changed all kinds of things substantially. But that's why we have fanfic.
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