Angel. The Fall
The main complaints against Angel's arc I saw online boil down to two claims: a) Angel is out of character and b) to service Buffy's journey, Angel is destroyed.
Judging by Jeanty's Q&As, Angel's arc in season 8 is over. He won't be in #40. It's time to sum up his story. What the hell has happened to him?
( Angel, Joss way )
Judging by Jeanty's Q&As, Angel's arc in season 8 is over. He won't be in #40. It's time to sum up his story. What the hell has happened to him?
( Angel, Joss way )
This seems to be the biggest disconnect, because as far as I can see, Angel wasn't responsible for that at all. People hated Slayers because a self-selected group of superhuman killers who blow up Californian towns, steal guns from armouries, etc, would make anybody nervous. Humanity came up with reasons to hate and fear Slayers all by itself.
Sure, in the early part of the season Buffy found it easier to blame Twilight for all her problems than to accept that people might have a problem with her Slayer Army themselves. But Angel was trying to keep a lid on the anti-Slayer hysteria by diverting and delaying it - not whipping up the frenzy himself.
The seed had been here all along. Twilight only came into effect because Angel was stupid enough to buy its flimsey excuses.
Perhaps so - but if it hadn't been Angel, it might have been someone else. Like Roden, for example - do you think he would have abandoned his brave new universe to follow Gigi back to Earth to help her friends? From all the exposition we were given, it was clear that this prophecy has been in play for a very long time; and it was looking for suitable candidates to meet its requirements. If not Buffy and Angel, then someone else; if not now this very minute, then pretty soon. The world is cyclical, and it's on a timer that's running down.
So, um... who's showing him this?
Whistler, the emissary of the Powers who dragged Angel out of his filthy, rat-eating back-alley misery and set him on the path to becoming a Champion and earning redemption. The Powers who guided him through Doyle's and Cordelia's visions. Those Powers.
Also, it might be worth remembering that Angel's reaction to the talking dog was to turn his back and walk away. It took a lot more to convince him than that.
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We have no way of knowing that. That's another problem with the execution. We don't have a dependable timeline that actually relates to anything.
We were only shown Angel's decision to become Twilight in flashback and do not know when it was flashing back to. When the comics had started, the Slayers were already at war and there was already a mystery person involved. Which came first the chicken or the egg... we don't actually know.
Whistler, the emissary of the Powers who dragged Angel out of his filthy, rat-eating back-alley misery and set him on the path to becoming a Champion and earning redemption
Or Whistler, the guy who introduced him to the one girl in all the world that would cause him to lose his soul and try to resurrect Acathla. And is it even really Whistler? I've seen speculation that it may well have been Twi-Whistler. So again, we're back to not really knowing who or what to believ. We don't know what timelines Angel was shown or whether he's being told these things by an unreliable narrator. We don't even know whether really real Whistler should be believed, but we don't even know for certain whether it's even really-real Whistler.
So much of Season 8 depends on the readers fanwanking it six ways to Sunday to make it make sense... which is why we have so many and so many disparate interpretations of it.
If not Buffy and Angel, then someone else; if not now this very minute, then pretty soon. The world is cyclical, and it's on a timer that's running down.
"Soon" is rather relative, especially since we're talking a seed which predates earth. Are we talking geological time? Because if the choice is the earth ending now or a million years from now, I'd think most people would choose a million years in the future. Hell, most people areound now would choose a hundred and fifty years from now. Heck, I'd go as far as to say for most people if the choice is between now and next week, they'd choose next week. The fact is only Angel choosing to go along with it made it now. Given the longevity of the seed and the Powers and how long Twilight has been waiting, we could have been talking a thousand years in the future when we're all trogladytes by then. And we might be destroyed by the asteroid Apophis in 2036, but I don't think many people would opt to trigger the apocalypse today because of it.
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We know that because in the very first issue of the very first comic we hear the all too human General Voll getting his rant on about Slayer terrorists not jibing with American interests following a charismatic leader who reduced her home town into a crater. He's being listened to respectfully (ie as if he's talking sense) by people who are not part of the Twilight organisation. We know it because the same representative of humanity explains how Slayers are possessed by a demonic force that will ultimately lead to them wanting to remake the world in their image. We also know it because Willow points out to Buffy that the bank job will have made her enemies amongst the rich and powerful who see her as a threat to their possessions. In that context when Angel confirms it to be the case in #33 the least fanwanky interpretation is to accept that he's telling the truth about the government's role in all this.
The issue with Twilight is... the world was in no immediate danger.
As far as Angel knew it was. In #36, wherever he's come from he expects (at the very least) LA to be in darkness and ruins. Whatever the talking animals are really up to, something delivered on giving him a second chance to prevent whatever put out the lights of his city from happening.
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And is it even really Whistler?
Seriously, does it matter at this point? Angel thought it was Whistler. Whether Whistler was the emissary of the Powers That Be or of Twilight, he was still a supernatural force here to persuade Angel to follow his plan in order to save the world (or make it into a better one.) The big contrast of S8 is the supernatural versus humanity.
Hell, most people around now would choose a hundred and fifty years from now.
Most people probably would, yes. Buffy, for instance. However, as I remarked above, Angel is immortal. He's not getting any older. Why should we expect him to see these things the exact same way as us?
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I don't read aycheb's posts any longer. I told her as much last week when I decided that was the course that I would follow, and I told her why in the confersation that convinced me to do that. But that was in someone else's journal and I have no reason to bring it to Moscow's.
As to the comics, I get that you guys like them and in the many interpretations of stuff that have come out of the comics, you guys have one that work for you and that satisfies you. I'm glad someone enjoys the comics. Someone should.
I, however, note the fact that I can go around LJ and a few forums like Buffy Forums and find a whole host of other theories and interpretations with people who sincerely believe that they have them figured out also (while noting that almost everyone's theories have a tendency to morph from one issue to the next with entirely different fanwanks given the month, the state of the comics, and, at times, I suspect the phase of the moon). All of these people believe their interpretation just as much as you guys [and I can read the Q&A's with Allie and Jeanty contradicting one another and contradicting themselves on any number of points from one Q&A to the next]. All of this indicates that, while there may be an interpretation that works for you guys, there are a lot of interpretations, most of which don't align with one another and many of which depend on entirely different readings of the exact same text. This indicates to me that there's enough wiggle room and gaps to allow for all manner of things. That's the issue. It clearly says very, very little. The fact is most of the theories floating around the fandom do not jive with one another and are primarily constructed around the need to protect someone's sacred ox from being gored. So "Whedon is God" folks come up with fanwanks that make this good writing no matter what is going on. 'Buffy is my girl' folks come up with how somehow she's not been written very poorly throughout this mess. Bangels wank how this actually isn't hideously ugly for their ship. Some 'Buffy is my girl' folks find themselves wanking Angel by extension in order to protect their girl. Spuffies try to find a way to salvage that ship out of the negative space and subtext. Xander fans are bitching about how it 'clearly' set him up for something BIG and macho while Bander's insist that the space-boink didn't destroy their ship because she didn't somehow flip from being 'in love' with Xander to the throwing herself into Angel's arms as soon as she glimpsed his face. Few of these many interpretations make a great deal of sense and most cannot in any way jive with one another. So we're dealing with a comic that --given the vast number of interpretations out there-- are clear as mud. [Yes, people can read multiple interpretations into stuff, but when the vast majority of them agree on virtually nothing, something is seriously off in the writing.] So everyone seems to be reading whatever it is that best preserves whatever their point of view happens to be... and they all find support for it in the endless ambiguity of this 'text.'
Personally, I think it's treated characters like mindless caricatures, taken one aspect of characters and then blew them up to near ludicrous levels so as to have them do stuff because the plotting makes it so... even though the plot is clunky, meandering, and often illogical. If I examine it very much there are enough contradictions that in order for it to work I have to give it every possible benefit of a doubt, take a whole hell of a lot of stuff that I'm told at face value (even if it makes no sense) and default to the absolute most generous fanwank possible. Every time. Even if these elements don't sync together very well.
To be perfectly honest, I don't see why I should have to work that hard or why I have to give them that much of a benefit of a doubt.
I realize that mileage does vary.
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I don't have a fixed theory about how it all works; untl the season is over, how can I? But it doesn't stop me speculating and theorising, and even changing my mind as new information comes in or other people suggest different readings of things. And I read the comics because I enjoy them, not because someone makes me do it. :-)
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