The Problem of Riley Finn
...or definitive proof that I can multitask in multifandoms.
The first time I saw S4, I had a very hard time getting past how annoying I found Riley. I didn't start watching Buffy until S7, so I had the benefit of some hindsight, of knowing the basic outlines of his story even though I didn't know the details. Still, my visceral dislike was strong even though I had no emotional investment in Buffy/Angel (and can I just say, I am so so so glad I missed out on all that fun when it happened). I found his turn to the dark side in S5 moderately more interesting, and eventually found myself having some sympathy for him, but I never felt like he really worked as a character, and his departure was a relief. In rewatching the show, I've tried to articulate to myself exactly why I feel that his character never gelled.
First, to get the superficial out of the way, when he's introduced, a great point is made about how wholesome he is. I find that kind of genuine wholesomeness irritating and deeply creepy. Perhaps this says more about me than it does about Riley. But, more to the point, Buffy is a sharp and often cynical show where the reward for that sort of Pollyannaishness has in the past included getting eaten by a pack of hyenas or, at the very least, some pretty serious mocking. Asking the audience to suddenly admire this trait without irony is jarring.
I do think, though, that one of the fundamental problems with Riley has less to do with his character per se than it does with the manner in which he is introduced, and this speaks to the issue of insertion of new characters into the show in general. Buffy as a show very much rests on the interpersonal dynamics between the four Scoobies. Almost all new characters are introduced through relationship to one of the core four, be it romantic (Angel, Oz, Anya, Tara) or filial (Dawn). (Spike is an exception to this dynamic, as he is to so many others; I also don't count Cordelia, since she's introduced on day 1 of the show along with the Scoobies.) The audience develops an emotional investment in new characters by getting to know them through the experiences of the Scoobies. The new character can then be fleshed out and provided with backstory and we'll want to see it because we already care.
Riley is, as far as I'm concerned, the exception that proves the rule. Although he's intended as a love interest for Buffy, he's introduced as a character in his own right. Rather than learning about him through Buffy's experience of him, we see him talking with his friends, doing Initiative stuff, etc. long before his romantic relationship with Buffy starts, and in scenes that have little to do with Buffy. What's missing from these scenes is the reason why the audience should care, the showing; instead, unfortunately, we get a lot of telling about how great Riley is. By contrast, we get to know Angel almost exclusively through Buffy's experience of him in Seasons 1 and 2. The first time we see Angel backstory that's about Angel the character rather than Angel-as-Buffy's-lover-or-enemy is in Becoming, almost two years after we've met him, and by that time, he's earned his place on the show. We see a lot of the Buffy/Riley relationship from Riley's POV. This is very different from the treatment of Buffy/Angel, where all the Angel POV on the relationship we saw was actually, indirectly or directly, about Buffy. In fact, looking ahead, two of the Scoobies have serious relationship meltdowns in S6, and even though Anya and Tara are established secondary characters at that point, the audience experiences those meltdowns almost exclusively through the POVs of the Scoobies.
Unfortunately, the problems with Riley's introduction are compounded by the unconvincing depiction of his relationship with Buffy. Before they start dating, in many of their early scenes together, there's no indication that they're the least romantically interested in each other and they don't seem to have anything in common. In fact, Riley seems to click much better with Willow, with whom he actually does have things in common. Riley and Buffy's almost instantaneous switch to romantic interest around "The Initiative" isn't natural, and it doesn't help at all that Marc Blucas and Sarah Michelle Gellar have absolutely no chemistry whatsoever. What follows is a lot more telling instead of showing: since the characters don't have any natural affinity, and the actors don't spark, we're treated to a number of godawful sex scenes. Along the way, we also get plenty of (unintentional) indications of what a poor match Buffy and Riley really are. In "Doomed," when Buffy points out to Riley that despite his involvement with the Initiative he doesn't really understand her world, that it's a job to him but a destiny to her, she's right, and in arguing with her he comes across as pushy and willfully ignorant. We never get any indication of why Buffy backtracks on that line of thought, though; in the next episode, Riley's at the "boyfriend stage" with no explanation. Instead, we get more indications of what a bad match this is from his difficulty in dealing with Buffy's successful demon-killing past and their clash of authority over handling Ethan Rayne and the Initiative.
Indeed, throughout his tenure on the show, Riley is shown having a lot of trouble with Buffy's strength and independence. He is never really able to cede his masculine role, and I think it's impossible for someone like that to be in a relationship with Buffy (Angel and Spike, though they have very little else in common, both know when to stand back and let Buffy take charge). I think the reason I find this trait so hair-pullingly maddening in S4 but sort of interesting in S5 is that the writers make a shift from telling us Riley's the swellest thing ever while showing him engaging in that kind of behavior to acknowledging that it's a problem, though they still absolve him of blame for it. In general, in the Buffy/Riley relationship, there's a real lack of connection between the dynamic that comes across to me from their behavior and the way the writers apportion responsibility. When Riley sleeps with Faith-in-Buffy's-body in "Who Are You?" Buffy is upset and needs time to assimilate. It maddens me, though, that the writers cast the situation as solely Buffy's problem, something she needs to get over, and Riley doesn't have any responsibility beyond sitting back and waiting for her to come to him. That does not speak well of the relationship as a partnership. Buffy's also fine with the fact that Riley doesn't trust her in "The Yoko Factor" despite the fact that she's never given him a reason not to. In Season 5, despite the fact that her mother's very ill, she has to care for a sister, and Glory's hot on their tails, it is also Buffy's responsibility to make sure Riley's fragile male ego is soothed. And despite the fact that Riley has been basically cheating on her, and putting himself and all of them in a very dangerous situation by doing so, it's Buffy's responsibility to suck it up and get over it within the time frame of his ultimatum in "Into the Woods," and if she can't, it's her fault for letting the long haul guy go. To me, the most pernicious aspect of the writers' idealization of Riley--of them telling us how great he is as a shortcut to establishing him on the show in a way that's meaningful to the audience--is that in every case it diminishes Buffy. There are problems on both sides of the Buffy/Riley relationship, but Riley never has to take responsibility for his half of it. That drives me absolutely crazy.
That said, there are some things about Riley that I find genuinely intriguing. He's someone whose moral compass was entirely externally driven--by the Initiative, by Professor Walsh--and throwing him into Buffy's more complicated moral universe has a lot of potential. The problem is that the character is given a huge independent role on the show long before he's earned the right to it, and that role often comes at the expense of the show's main character. We're still getting to know him, and don't yet have the emotional investment in the character that the storyline requires. I can never get aboard the Riley hate train, and I certainly feel sort of bad for Marc Blucas since it's not his fault the character he played came in for such negativity, but I do think the writers got caught up in how cool they thought Riley was and tried to force him on the audience in a way that didn't mesh at all well with the established inter-character dynamics of the show.
I made an enormous pot of gumbo yesterday for my Lost-watching with D., because he specifically requested gumbo. I make it the right way, with a dark-brown roux and okra. I've ordered a lot of gumbo at restaurants out here only to be served some sort of smoky tomato soup with seafood and every time I develop an irrational prejudice against the restaurant for daring to call it gumbo. One of the best smells on earth is the Cajun trinity--bell pepper, onion, and celery--sauteeing in roux. I've been loaning D. S1 of Farscape disc-by-disc over the last few weeks, and last night he grabbed the whole season, so I think I've made a convert, and I have leftover gumbo for lunch. It takes very little to make me happy these days.
The first time I saw S4, I had a very hard time getting past how annoying I found Riley. I didn't start watching Buffy until S7, so I had the benefit of some hindsight, of knowing the basic outlines of his story even though I didn't know the details. Still, my visceral dislike was strong even though I had no emotional investment in Buffy/Angel (and can I just say, I am so so so glad I missed out on all that fun when it happened). I found his turn to the dark side in S5 moderately more interesting, and eventually found myself having some sympathy for him, but I never felt like he really worked as a character, and his departure was a relief. In rewatching the show, I've tried to articulate to myself exactly why I feel that his character never gelled.
First, to get the superficial out of the way, when he's introduced, a great point is made about how wholesome he is. I find that kind of genuine wholesomeness irritating and deeply creepy. Perhaps this says more about me than it does about Riley. But, more to the point, Buffy is a sharp and often cynical show where the reward for that sort of Pollyannaishness has in the past included getting eaten by a pack of hyenas or, at the very least, some pretty serious mocking. Asking the audience to suddenly admire this trait without irony is jarring.
I do think, though, that one of the fundamental problems with Riley has less to do with his character per se than it does with the manner in which he is introduced, and this speaks to the issue of insertion of new characters into the show in general. Buffy as a show very much rests on the interpersonal dynamics between the four Scoobies. Almost all new characters are introduced through relationship to one of the core four, be it romantic (Angel, Oz, Anya, Tara) or filial (Dawn). (Spike is an exception to this dynamic, as he is to so many others; I also don't count Cordelia, since she's introduced on day 1 of the show along with the Scoobies.) The audience develops an emotional investment in new characters by getting to know them through the experiences of the Scoobies. The new character can then be fleshed out and provided with backstory and we'll want to see it because we already care.
Riley is, as far as I'm concerned, the exception that proves the rule. Although he's intended as a love interest for Buffy, he's introduced as a character in his own right. Rather than learning about him through Buffy's experience of him, we see him talking with his friends, doing Initiative stuff, etc. long before his romantic relationship with Buffy starts, and in scenes that have little to do with Buffy. What's missing from these scenes is the reason why the audience should care, the showing; instead, unfortunately, we get a lot of telling about how great Riley is. By contrast, we get to know Angel almost exclusively through Buffy's experience of him in Seasons 1 and 2. The first time we see Angel backstory that's about Angel the character rather than Angel-as-Buffy's-lover-or-enemy is in Becoming, almost two years after we've met him, and by that time, he's earned his place on the show. We see a lot of the Buffy/Riley relationship from Riley's POV. This is very different from the treatment of Buffy/Angel, where all the Angel POV on the relationship we saw was actually, indirectly or directly, about Buffy. In fact, looking ahead, two of the Scoobies have serious relationship meltdowns in S6, and even though Anya and Tara are established secondary characters at that point, the audience experiences those meltdowns almost exclusively through the POVs of the Scoobies.
Unfortunately, the problems with Riley's introduction are compounded by the unconvincing depiction of his relationship with Buffy. Before they start dating, in many of their early scenes together, there's no indication that they're the least romantically interested in each other and they don't seem to have anything in common. In fact, Riley seems to click much better with Willow, with whom he actually does have things in common. Riley and Buffy's almost instantaneous switch to romantic interest around "The Initiative" isn't natural, and it doesn't help at all that Marc Blucas and Sarah Michelle Gellar have absolutely no chemistry whatsoever. What follows is a lot more telling instead of showing: since the characters don't have any natural affinity, and the actors don't spark, we're treated to a number of godawful sex scenes. Along the way, we also get plenty of (unintentional) indications of what a poor match Buffy and Riley really are. In "Doomed," when Buffy points out to Riley that despite his involvement with the Initiative he doesn't really understand her world, that it's a job to him but a destiny to her, she's right, and in arguing with her he comes across as pushy and willfully ignorant. We never get any indication of why Buffy backtracks on that line of thought, though; in the next episode, Riley's at the "boyfriend stage" with no explanation. Instead, we get more indications of what a bad match this is from his difficulty in dealing with Buffy's successful demon-killing past and their clash of authority over handling Ethan Rayne and the Initiative.
Indeed, throughout his tenure on the show, Riley is shown having a lot of trouble with Buffy's strength and independence. He is never really able to cede his masculine role, and I think it's impossible for someone like that to be in a relationship with Buffy (Angel and Spike, though they have very little else in common, both know when to stand back and let Buffy take charge). I think the reason I find this trait so hair-pullingly maddening in S4 but sort of interesting in S5 is that the writers make a shift from telling us Riley's the swellest thing ever while showing him engaging in that kind of behavior to acknowledging that it's a problem, though they still absolve him of blame for it. In general, in the Buffy/Riley relationship, there's a real lack of connection between the dynamic that comes across to me from their behavior and the way the writers apportion responsibility. When Riley sleeps with Faith-in-Buffy's-body in "Who Are You?" Buffy is upset and needs time to assimilate. It maddens me, though, that the writers cast the situation as solely Buffy's problem, something she needs to get over, and Riley doesn't have any responsibility beyond sitting back and waiting for her to come to him. That does not speak well of the relationship as a partnership. Buffy's also fine with the fact that Riley doesn't trust her in "The Yoko Factor" despite the fact that she's never given him a reason not to. In Season 5, despite the fact that her mother's very ill, she has to care for a sister, and Glory's hot on their tails, it is also Buffy's responsibility to make sure Riley's fragile male ego is soothed. And despite the fact that Riley has been basically cheating on her, and putting himself and all of them in a very dangerous situation by doing so, it's Buffy's responsibility to suck it up and get over it within the time frame of his ultimatum in "Into the Woods," and if she can't, it's her fault for letting the long haul guy go. To me, the most pernicious aspect of the writers' idealization of Riley--of them telling us how great he is as a shortcut to establishing him on the show in a way that's meaningful to the audience--is that in every case it diminishes Buffy. There are problems on both sides of the Buffy/Riley relationship, but Riley never has to take responsibility for his half of it. That drives me absolutely crazy.
That said, there are some things about Riley that I find genuinely intriguing. He's someone whose moral compass was entirely externally driven--by the Initiative, by Professor Walsh--and throwing him into Buffy's more complicated moral universe has a lot of potential. The problem is that the character is given a huge independent role on the show long before he's earned the right to it, and that role often comes at the expense of the show's main character. We're still getting to know him, and don't yet have the emotional investment in the character that the storyline requires. I can never get aboard the Riley hate train, and I certainly feel sort of bad for Marc Blucas since it's not his fault the character he played came in for such negativity, but I do think the writers got caught up in how cool they thought Riley was and tried to force him on the audience in a way that didn't mesh at all well with the established inter-character dynamics of the show.
I made an enormous pot of gumbo yesterday for my Lost-watching with D., because he specifically requested gumbo. I make it the right way, with a dark-brown roux and okra. I've ordered a lot of gumbo at restaurants out here only to be served some sort of smoky tomato soup with seafood and every time I develop an irrational prejudice against the restaurant for daring to call it gumbo. One of the best smells on earth is the Cajun trinity--bell pepper, onion, and celery--sauteeing in roux. I've been loaning D. S1 of Farscape disc-by-disc over the last few weeks, and last night he grabbed the whole season, so I think I've made a convert, and I have leftover gumbo for lunch. It takes very little to make me happy these days.