Fandom Snowflake Challenge, Day 6

[aadler]

 
Continuing the meme/challenge begun and tracked here.

Fandom Snowflake Challenge, Day 6

In your own space, create a fanwork. A drabble, a ficlet, a podfic, or an icon, art or meta or a rec list. A picspam. Something. Leave a comment in this [the assignment] post saying you did it.

* * *

Meta: “Seeing Red” and Spike

There are a couple of things that I’ve seen more than once in various fandom-related posts, and they both seem to go back to the same central issue. I’ll name them, then go into my own opinions on the subject.

The first was actually about some stories of my own. I did “Shock to the System” in 2013, and “Rough Trade” late last year, both Spike-centered stories, and in each case, recs of the story elsewhere contained the qualifier … Spike is still evil at this point …

The second had to do with various observations regarding problems different people were having with the bathroom scene (yes, attempted rape) in the BtVS episode 6-19 “Seeing Red”; the most recent one I saw even included some observation as to how that scene utterly obliterated that viewer’s ability to see Spike as any kind of romantic hero.

Well … yeah.

Spike was evil. Did we ever forget that? He liked being evil, he got a huge kick out of it, he got offended whenever anyone forgot that was what he was. He enjoyed being evil, and never apologized for it, and even seemed to draw some satisfaction from rubbing people’s faces in it. Spike spent five Buffy seasons being evil (okay, just the single appearance in Season 3, but he was still what he was), and then one being not-evil (followed by his presence in Angel’s final season). So, okay, six seasons as a frequent or regular character, and evil for the first four of them.

Spike and Dru were supposed to be there-and-gone villains on Buffy. They stayed because they were so popular. Spike became a breakout star, rather to my own annoyance: I wanted to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer, not the Spike and Buffy Show. But he became popular because of what he was, and what he was came down to four things:

1. handsome
2. snarky
3. vampire
4. EVIL.

He was evil. No getting around it, and the show writers never actually tried. He killed people and enjoyed killing them. He hurt people and enjoyed hurting them (though always as an appetizer to, rather than a substitute for, killing them). He killed two Slayers, but most of the people he killed were helpless, and he did it because it was fun.

Did the show writers put the chip into Spike so they could keep him around as a regular character without him remaining the evil adversary that Buffy just somehow never managed to kill? or were they already planning the long arc that would take him to where he eventually arrived? Either way, the chipping part came about long after there had been many, many, MANY fanfics ’shipping Spike and Buffy. And, however the ficcers may have rationalized it in the individual stories, I couldn’t escape the sense that it kept coming down to Spike & Buffy totes belong 2gethr bekoz he’s just so GORGEOUS.

Uh-huh. She’s a defender of humanity, protecting the helpless against the evil, demonic creatures that prey on them. And he’s one of those evil, demonic creatures — humans are “Happy Meals with legs” to him — and the only thing he likes better than killing people is terrorizing and torturing them before killing them. But he’s really pretty, so the two of them definitely belong together.

Yeah. Got it.

When Spike and Buffy actually did begin together as a couple, in canon, it was almost a textbook example of the flip line, Figure out what the fans want, and then give it to them hard. The Spike-and-Buffy relationship was horrible and horrifying. He hit her at her lowest ebb, he took advantage of a trauma victim, he found someone who was (from her own perspective) in Hell and explicitly tried to drag her — he put it that way himself — deeper into the darkness. On her side of it, she was screwing something she was supposed to hate, purely because she hated herself, she was committing slow-motion suicide because her own life was killing her (or, at least, that was how she felt). There was nothing romantic about it, and the moment it stopped being a death-spiral was the same moment she found the strength to break away from it.

Spike was evil. I keep stressing that. He was evil. That was the point.

And that was why his character journey was so extraordinary. The attempted rape in “Seeing Red” wasn’t a bump on that journey, but the most crucial part of it.

Spike was always more than just another vampire. He was unusual even among his own kind for his unstoppable determination, his utter ferocity, the zest he took in ‘living’, and — tied up in all that — his devotion to Drusilla. The Judge (BtVS ep. 2-13) disapprovingly found that affection to reek of humanity. When it unexpectedly transferred to Buffy … well, talk about a train-wreck! Spike wanted Buffy, hated her, hated wanting her, hated himself for wanting her … In “Fool for Love” (BtVS ep. 5-07), he made his best play for her, was rejected, came back to kill her with a shotgun (could he have pulled the trigger before the chip paralyzed him? he was at least willing to try), and then had his determination undercut by finding her in pain and wanting to help.

His ability to love didn’t make him any less evil. It did, however, begin to pit one part of his nature against the rest.

What he accomplished from there on was magnificent. He willingly underwent torture rather than betray, not Buffy, but someone Buffy cared for (BtVS ep. 5-19). There seems little doubt that he would have willingly given his life to save Buffy at the end of Season 5. At the beginning of Season 6, he was still there in the fight even though all his reason was gone: protecting Dawn because he’d promised Buffy he would, helping the Scoobies because … well, because she’d have liked that.

Perversely, his regression began once Buffy was brought back from the dead. Except it wasn’t exactly regression: he continued to grow, but the growth was dark. When she had been unattainable, he had done his best to be worthy of what he could never have, or at least to properly worship it; on her return, it seemed possible that she might be attainable after all. And that … oh, that didn’t go well.

He used her while she was vulnerable. When she finally began to recover, he resisted that part of the recovery that had her ending the destructive sexual relationship (and any relationship that went beyond partners in battle). And then the bathroom scene …

That was the crux. That was when everything changed. That was when it was made clear to him, in terms that he couldn’t deny or ignore or mistake for anything else, that what he wanted was made impossible by what he was. He had come far, had achieved much, had gone beyond his essential nature to an extent that should have been impossible. He had loved, fully and genuinely, as no other vampire ever had or ever could. (The milk-and-water soppiness James and Elizabeth showed for each other — A:tS ep. 3-01 — didn’t even begin to compare.) But he had already done as much as he could; he was up against the dead-end of his own nature. In an unexpected paradox, he had got as close as he possibly could, only to discover he was farther away than ever. He could do no more, he had been doomed to failure before he began, because he was evil.

So he set out to change his own nature.

That was breathtaking. That was stunning. Angel had become a champion because of his efforts, once a soul was reattached to the demon, to atone for the things Angelus had done. Spike, though, set himself to chain the demon while he still was the demon.

Okay, so — at least from my perspective — Spike became enormously less interesting once he had a soul. (Maybe that was a different aspect of a problem script writers have been dealing with for decades: after all that time spent with UST, what do you do with your couple once they’re finally together?) It doesn’t change the fact that what he did, why he did it, the insurmountable obstacle he faced and the way he surmounted it, was astounding character development, a mini-epic in a show that had more than its share of those.

So, no, “Seeing Red” isn’t a barrier to being able to accept Spike as a romantic hero. The events in that episode, and his response to them, were what finally made him one.
 

Comments

[velvetwhip.livejournal.com]

This is a fascinating and well-thought out take on Spike's arc. I am going to be pondering this for a long time.


Gabrielle

[aadler]

It wasn’t hard to do, I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. I really DID resent the crazy fan adulation for Spike and the resulting (in my opinion) over-focus on Spike; I was entirely in agreement with one article writer who said that Spike was Fonzie, a slick-haired leather-wearing punk who messed up a good show by being too popular. All the same, the BtVS writers put serious effort and attention into the character, and it shows.

I still believe Buffy would have been better if Spike had never returned after his attempt (on A:tS) to recover the Gem of Amarra. That doesn’t change the fact that the character arc was fantastic.

[slaymesoftly.livejournal.com]

Excellent meta. The fact that you're a straight male and not blinded by abs and cheekbones makes it all the more worthwhile. A very balanced look at the character, IMHO.

[aadler]

Straight male, oh yeah. Not just exclusively but enthusiastically heterosexual. Wouldn’t dream of kicking Clare Kramer or Juliet Landau out of bed … but that doesn’t mean I’d ever believe — or try to convince anyone else — that Glory or Drusilla was just the perfect match for Xander.

All the same, Spike’s character journey was unbelievably well done. Only Willow’s (from stammering nerd to world-threatening Big Bad) can even be offered up for comparison. (And now I have to recommend brutti_ma_buoni’s “A Half-Formed Thing” as a peek into that journey.)

[slaymesoftly.livejournal.com]

Everything Brutti does is amazing. She's so prolific, I can't keep up!

[teragramm.livejournal.com]

This was very interesting meta! Interesting because Spike being evil wasn't something we didn't all know, it was something a lot of us chose to forget. I didn't forget Spike was evil but I had a tendency to ignore the fact. For me, it wasn't because Spike was gorgeous, it was more because I could see that he was trying to be a "better man". The episodes "Intervention", "Forever", "Tough Love" (just to name a few) are prime examples of Spike going against his evil nature. Also, the fact that JM played Spike with great charisma and charm also helped me to ignore the fact that Spike was evil. ~_^

[aadler]

He did indeed get his teeth into the role, didn’t he? And the people doing the show demonstrated real skill and effectiveness in making us see, not just his own journey, but the difference it began to make. Memorable moments:

• “I know you’ll never love me. I know that I’m a monster. But you treat me like a man. And that’s …” (ep. 5-22)
• When Buffy, pretending to be the ’Bot, kissed Spike and then he realized this was the original woman. (ep. 5-19)
• When she called him William, even in the process of leaving him. (ep. 6-15)

I never liked the thought of Spike and Buffy as a couple, and still don’t feel that I was wrong. The show convinced me that there was a relationship there, though, and made it poignant and striking. That’s an achievement.

[teragramm.livejournal.com]

I never liked the thought of Spike and Buffy as a couple, and still don’t feel that I was wrong. The show convinced me that there was a relationship there, though, and made it poignant and striking.
I, on the other hand LOVED Buffy and Spike from the very beginning, "School Hard" (Spike watching Buffy dance and "Do we need weapons for this") to the very end "Chosen" (where Buffy tells Spike she loves him.) To me, the whole thing from enemies, to reluctant allies, to willing allies, to lovers, to friends who love each other, was totally spellbinding.

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

Our mileage most likely varies wildly on Spike the character — and on the Fonz, too — but I find myself agreeing with much of what you say about him here.

I do have some philosophical questions about the Jossverse, such what constitutes capital "E" Evil there, and if vampires — particularly Spike and Harmony — are really the best or most interesting expressions of that. I wouldn't ask you to answer those questions, though, as they are hugely debatable but largely unanswerable.

However, I do take exception to this statement:

the chipping part came about long after there had been many, many, MANY fanfics ’shipping Spike and Buffy. And, however the ficcers may have rationalized it in the individual stories, it always came down to Spike & Buffy totes belong 2gethr bekoz he’s just so GORGEOUS.

Admittedly, I haven't read ALL the early Spuffy fics, but those that I remember were more concerned with how interesting these two were as a couple, precisely because they were not an easy fit, than with how pretty the vampire might be.

And let's not forget that Spike was introduced, right from the start, as an Ideal Romantic Lover. For Drusilla. He had the devotion, the care taking, the intensity, the interest — but not insistence — on The Sex, making him oddly PG, as befits a show aimed at teens. So it shouldn't surprise anybody that the ficcers would take the Lover character away from the Beloved (who didn't appreciate him anyway) and throw him together with the Heroine.

To state that the only possible motivation for writers (and let's face it, usually female writers) to explore that pairing pre-chip is that they are blinded by the pretty is fairly insulting. It's sort of like saying that men are only interested in one thing. Yeah, the One Thing rates pretty high with many, many men, but I've been around long enough to know that guys have plenty of other interests. Sports ball, for instance. ;-)

Facetiousness aside, sweeping generalizations, like vague disclaimers, aren't anybody's friend. If you'd said that pre-chip Spuffy was OFTEN motivated by the gorgeousness of the vampire, rather than ALWAYS, I wouldn't be nitpicking.

Very interesting meta.

[aadler]

Either we were reading very different stories then, or (quite possibly) we were reading from substantially different perspectives. I was reporting the impression I got at the time, and that very definitely was the way it came across to me. I have, however, slightly modified that section to make it more a statement of opinion than a decree of THIS IS WHAT IT IS.

I wouldn’t have been so irritated by such stories if that wasn’t what I was seeing, and I simply stopped reading Spuffy because it annoyed me so much. Perhaps this self-defense boycott meant I missed the stories you describe. If so, I don’t feel that I missed that much, because Spuffy — or any pairing-based stories, for that matter — simply aren’t my thing.

And, however true may be your observation about people being intrigued by the linking of such striking personalities, I still don’t believe for a moment that they’d have been so interested if Spike hadn’t been so physically striking as well.

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

I'm a relative late-comer to the fandom (2006, y'all!), so I'm sure there's a bunch of that early fic that I never saw, and sometimes I think I'm better off for it, though I'm equally sure that I've missed the sine qua non of fanfic, somehow. There's a lot of Spuffy fic that is NOT memorable, to be sure.

I'm sure you're right about beauty being a big part of the equation for a lot of writers. Humans like pretty things. However, I can think of many people more beautiful than Spike that do not inspire nearly the sheer tonnage of creative outpouring. I still think his establishment as iconic Perfect Lover (again, for Drusilla) was catnip for fans. His atrocious treatment of Harmony no doubt changed that for some, as well it should. But, as you say:

Spike was always more than just another vampire.

[red-satin-doll.livejournal.com]

Here on velvetwhip's rec - I have nothing to add except wildly enthusiastic applause.

[aadler]

Just articulating something that seemed pretty obvious to me, out of surprise that it wasn’t equally obvious elsewhere. If that pleased you, bonus.

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

Very interesting meta!

[aadler]

And I thank you.

[spikesjojo.livejournal.com]

I started out as a Spuffy fan, mainly because I was very mama bear about Spike. So of course Spike should get what he wants. Now, years later, I really think that they would be disasters for each other - as would Buffy and Angel, IMO.

I really like what you wrote here - and yes, what intrigued me most of all was that demons can love, but it sure as hell isn't the same as hum,an love. That Spike truly wanted and believed he could be someone he wasn't. And he found out that he really could not when he did the one thing he swore he would never do. It was hard wired inside him.

One thing that intrigues me is that Spike's demon actually chose to get a soul. Think about that for a moment. We say Spike did it - and I think well, quasi-human and weakened demon and....but that's not it. The whole point of needing the soul is to restrain the demon....and it was the demon that chose to fight for....what is a soul for a demon when it is not a curse?

[aadler]

That was indeed what impressed me most. Angelus never for a moment in his existence desired a soul, even when he was fresh off the memory of having one. Spike sought one out and fought for it, because it was the only way to get something he wanted more than he wanted to remain what he was.

Granted, souled-Spike was never as interesting as the Spike who had been on the journey to wanting a soul … but that was Season 7, and Season 7 seemed to have a number of problems, so I don’t necessarily put that down to deficiencies in the character (or the possibilities to be found in that character).

[double_dutchess]

Here via Gillo's Snowflake post. Thank you for referencing this one from there, it was a great read.

So he set out to change his own nature. Yes! That sums up why I love soulless Spike so much.

[aadler]

When a character I don’t particularly like does something that major, I take notice.

Happy that my observations seemed to resonate with you. Thanks.

[gillo]

"what he wanted was made impossible by what he was. He had come far, had achieved much, had gone beyond his essential nature to an extent that should have been impossible. He had loved, fully and genuinely, as no other vampire ever had or ever could."

Yes. At the core that is what makes him special. He constantly tries to change himself to become the being he believes the individual he loves or admires wants him to be. But with Buffy he literally cannot become what she needs without a soul. We see how much Angelus hates what a soul did to him. Spike sees it. But he still went to do the only thing he felt could make it safe for him to be with her. She deserved a partner with a soul. So he got the soul, at whatever risk to himself that involved.

[aadler]

It was impressive, yes. Hence my being so impressed by it.