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inconsistentlywrittensoul · 2 months

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What's My Line part 1 thoughts:

MR GORDO! And Angel can't help playing with him. Someone should really get that guy some plushies of his own - you know he'd love cuddling with them.

Angel: "It's career week." Buffy: "How did you know?" Angel: "I lurk." Angel:

God, he's such an awkward, pathetic disaster [affectionate]. And he knows he is! When he's with Buffy, he's just fumbling around, trying to sound vaguely person-like. But because he's big and quiet and vampiric, everyone interprets his awkwardness as badass brooding.

Buffy says ACAB. Honestly, this subplot is just reminding me how how pre-9/11, the view of cops as corrupt, lazy and/or violent was pretty standard across pop-culture. (I'm currently playing Miles Morales: Spider-Man and it's so weird the way these games treat the NYPD as unambiguous allies, compared to how most Spider-man media has always treated them.)

Buffy and Giles' interactions feel like a regression after the last four eps developing their relationship. To be fair, Buffy is regressing a little due to having feelings about her life (never a good idea, always suppress those), but it still feels odd.

Looking at Spike's obsession with Buffy here, you can really see the origins of his feelings for her, on both a Watsonian and Doylist level.

Snyder, to Xander: "Whatever comes out of your mouth is a meaningless waste of breath. An airborn toxic event." Huh, is Principal Snyder part of the Buffy fandom? He really sounds like the Buffy fandom here.

Feel like Willow and Oz's big computer company opportunity isn't quite as exclusive as they're making it seem, if two students from a small town are being offered it.

Wonder how you comission the Order of Whatever. Is there a ritual, or do you just call them? Do you pay in money? Magical relics? Virgin sacrifices?

The ice-skating is really pretty. That's it, don't have any critical thoughts, it's just super pretty.

The piano soundtrack here isn't the iconic Buffy/Angel theme, but it sounds a little similar? But more innocent. Is this like an earlier variation? I guess it makes sense - this feels like their first real date beyond coffee at the Bronze; the first time they feel like they're in an actual relationship together. Which is kinda weird when they've already confessed their love, but idk, I guess teenagers and vampires are like that.

"Kill as many of these assassins as you want, it won't make any difference. They won't stop. Unless you kill three of them, then they'll stop and never come back. But otherwise? They're completely unstoppable."

Has Buffy been to Angel's place before? It looks significantly nicer than where he was staying in 'Angel'. Fits with the sense that he's gradually learning to be a person. I do wonder how she knows where he lives, though. Like, that can happen off screen, but first time at his place seems like a significant step?

And now Xander has named the Scooby Gang the Scooby Gang! If you don't like the name, blame him. (The writing of Cordelia in this scene feels very Season One though. Not great.)

And Kendra's finally here! Man, these episodes are really paying tribute to Chris Claremont with this accent.

#i think this show might be a bad influence on me #my quips are sounding increasingly xander-ish #xanderesque #xanderogynous #btvs #Buffy the Vampire Slayer #btvs rewatch #What's My Line #What't My Line part 1

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nvrbeenkissed · 3 months

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NINE PEOPLE I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW BETTER.

LAST SONG :: Feed the Wolf by Breaking Benjamin.

FAVORITE COLOR :: Purple, but I've been on a Pink kick lately. I also own a lot of black t-shirts, if that says anything about me.

CURRENTLY WATCHING :: Grey's Anatomy, NCIS, old Scooby-Doo Cartoons, && I started re-watching season 6 of Criminal Minds. I also started watching Naruto && Legacies a while back, and never finished them. I plan to revisit them later, as I got distracted with other shows. I also need to finish Angel the series, but it's not on any apps I have at the moment.

SPICY / SAVORY / SWEET :: I love the taste of sweet things. As well as the taste of coke-a-cola, anything cheesy, and the taste of pizza.

RELATIONSHIP STATUS :: I'm single and I'm in the never been kissed club with Lenny. We're the co-captains. XD

CURRENT OBSESSION :: Listening to rock / alternative / metal music - especially Breaking Benjamin & Flyleaf, watching ChilledChaos streams on twitch, watching Minecraft streams, painting, hoarding books, and coming up with original character ideas.

TAGGED BY :: @devildukem!! Thank you friend!! :)

TAGGING :: @diverse-hearts-ocs, @tximidity, @eternalxloyalxspirits, @snnydcys, @hcpemikaelscn, @righteouslysin, @rivalsunraveled, @kneel-to-seto-kaiba, @storieswoven, && anyone else who wants to do this can say I tagged them.

#— ✿ ooc.#— ✿ out of character.#— ✿ dash memes.

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tuiyla · 1 year

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Thoughts on Faith in BtVS S4/AtS S1, Tara and Anya?

Oh good timing! I was just thinking about how I'm yet to note how much I enjoy Anya's character. So let's start with her. I don't have a ton to say apart form really enjoying her bluntness and the refreshing presence she brings to scenes. It felt a little strange when they started humanizing her and making her part of the group but she's charming, and though I don't think the Xander relationships bodes well for her I want good things for Anya. I vaguely remembered references to her as one of the Scoobies but then she appeared and I was like, surely this isn't the same character? It's an interesting route but I can see why they kept her on. Anya really is a delightful presence and I'm glad she's a series main now and in the opening credits.

Then, Tara. I don't think enough has happened with her so far for me to really have much to say. I like her and look forward to whatever reveal is coming about her backstory, based on the deliberate sabotage of a spell earlier on and whatnot. She might be a tiiiiny bit too bland so far but Oz wasn't the most exciting ch either. I can take or leave shy characters, now that Willow is more assertive than her high school self the balance works out. I do wish she had, just, more, but hopefully we'll get to see more of her before, well, you know. Because it would feel especially cheap if they just buried her without properly flashing her out first. I know she's a fan favourite and I understand, I just hope she gets more in the series, possibly outside of Willow. Her scene with Dawn in s5ep2 was sweet, maybe more of that.

And Faith, oh Faith. The bodyswap episode was great but I have a bit of the same problem with Faith's heel-face turn as I did with her face-heel turn. As in, the spiral there felt a little too fast and too intense with no going back, and here she descends into darkness once again when appearing on Angel before coming right back up. And look, her scene with Angel is great, the breakdown is effective, the following ep good at showing how it's gonna be a process. I do think her, sigh, sexual assault of both Riley and Buffy, coupled with her previous aggression towards Xander is very unfortunate, to say the least. I still like her and want to see her fight on the side of the good guys but it was impossible to support women's wrongs there. Still, she was hot as always and had some great scenes in Buffy s4, and finally peaked and turned back in Angel s1. I guess my main gripe is now she barely has any eps left, as IMDb might have told me, and this is just when we'd need her on Angel. The scene with her and Angel at the end of s2ep1 was very, VERY sweet and it's cruel that they're giving me that only for, what? For Faith not to return until season 4, is it? Or Buffy s7? That's just cruel.

Sigh, okay, I have more thoughts and feelings on Faith than what could be expressed here but I'll try in subsequent posts. Everyone knows I went into Buffy wanting to be obsessed with Faith and I am, I'm just also a little frustrated with how her ch was handled at times. And now that we're at the real juicy bits where she could become who she was meant to be, she'll barely have a few episodes to do so. We need a full season of Angel where Faith is an on and off presence, being sponsored by Angel and all. Goddamn. I guess I'll just have to read the comics.

#i'm frustrated with faith because i love her #and want better for her #bothersome when she'd decentered in what is ostensibly her story or at least substory #buffy asks #btvs #anon #faith lehane #the hell are the other two's surnames i was thinking about this today #anya jenkins #tara maclay #thanks tv tropes

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coraniaid · 1 year

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Giles/Jenny for the ship ask game!

Yeah, I like this ship. Not to the extent that I’m obsessed about it (or even think about it all that much), but it’s good.

1) What made you ship it?

Hmm. Honestly I think it's partly just the fact that Jenny Calendar shows up in the second half of S1, exactly when the show starts to find its feet. So when I rewatch, I'm sort of primed to associate Jenny's arrival with good things. (But it's not just that, of course, because you could say the very same thing about Principal Snyder.)

Giles and Jenny starting to date just feels like part of the show really starting to work, I think: like Spike and Drusilla arriving at around the same time (Spike and Dru being, as it happens, my other favorite ship from the first two seasons).

Also, while I'm not really sure it was ever consciously planned by the writers, I like the fandom reading that losing Jenny just has this quietly devastating impact on Giles that he doesn't ever really recover from. I think it retroactively gives their relationship an importance and depth that I don't think it was always intended to have. But it works, and it makes the fact nobody really takes about Jenny after S3 seem intentional and deliberate in a way that nobody talking about (say) Kendra really doesn’t.

2) What are your favorite things about this ship?

My favorite version of the ship is definitely the early S2 phase, before The Dark Age and before all the retcons about what Jenny's doing in Sunnydale. Honestly I just think they're kind of cute together.

(I'm not really sure what would have happened to this ship in some alternate universe where Jenny didn't get killed off. It's hard not to think that the writers were already struggling for ideas, because by the time of Passion we'd already been treated to two different iterations of "they've broken up because one of them turned out to be lying about their past and Bad Things happened -- will they get back together?" and I don't think that sort of dynamic is sustainable in the long run.

Maybe there's some other reality where they break up for good mid-season 3 (after Jenny finds out about Giles's role in the Cruciamentum, say), and it's Jenny, not Wesley, who ends up following Angel into his show in LA. That’d be kind of fun.)

3) Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

There's a pretty popular fandom take that basically casts Giles as the Dad and Jenny as the Mom, with Giles apparently seeing the Scoobies as adults and Jenny seeing them as children. I really don't get this reading at all.

Not only do I not think there's much in canon to ground this on (beyond that one scene of Jenny saying "not in front of the kids"), I think it's pretty much the reverse of how they actually relate to the rest of the Scoobies. After all, it's Jenny, not Giles, who blows off teaching her classes on the grounds that her friend Willow can cover for her, isn’t it? And it's Giles, not Jenny, who is explicitly cast as a parental figure to Buffy, who dismisses Xander's odd behavior in The Pack as him just being a teenage boy, and who as late as S3's The Prom is referring to Buffy and her classmates as "children" whose maturity surprises him.

In short, it's Giles who treats the Scooby Gang as kids; Jenny (mostly) doesn't.

And that makes sense, I think, because -- after all -- Jenny Calendar is much closer in age to the other Scoobies than Giles is! (The show never establishes her exact age, but since Robia LaMorte is only seven years older than SMG I assume she's meant to be in her late twenties at most?)

#btvs #ask games #thanks for the ask!

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beatriceeverytuesday-old · 1 year

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ok hi three ships! buffy + angel tara + willow and giles + jenny!!

Buffy + Angel

Why don't you ship it?

I'm really nervous to answer this because I don't want to make people mad haha so if you're a Bangel fan, scroll past, this isn't for you. Personally I don't like when people argue in fandom I think people are entitled to their own shipping opinions but I'm always worried I'm gonna start a fight so I don't say much against loved characters but since you asked haha... I have multiple reasons but to name a couple: I'm not a huge Angel fan, I don't like the start of Angel's redemption arc being tied to a (very young) Buffy that he fell in love with at first sight, I feel that Angel is the one with age and experience and knows them being together is a bad idea and still lets it happen, and I feel that Angel treats Buffy like a child and is always making decisions for her rather than with her.

What would have made you like it?

If they weren't trying to get together randomly throughout season 3 when they knew it couldn't work, Angel's one moment of true happiness not being tied to sex with Buffy (personally I think she deserves better than someone who is only ever truly happy with her when they're sleeping together), if they could interact in later seasons without arguing or kissing even though they know it's a bad choice and they're involved/in love with other people, and honestly just...I'm not the biggest Angel fan so changing parts of his character haha??

Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it?

So whenever I do a rewatch, in seasons 1-2 I do enjoy the Buffy/Angel plot line and I wish it could have worked for them, but beyond that I don't ship them. What I really want is for Buffy to be happy and if she could manage that with Angel, that's good enough for me. I think they're a sweet first love story but beyond that, they're not my favorite. No hate to anyone who likes them it's just not my thing!

Tara + Willow

What made you ship it?

So I started watching Buffy for stage combat class, got hooked on the plot, and happened upon Tillow completely by accident. As a closeted genderfluid lesbian who had been raised by religious parents who sent me to Catholic school for 13 years, this was the first time I stumbled across something queer without having to actively seek it out in secret. I'd seen other sapphic couples in media before, but I'd had to look for them. I wasn't expecting to discover it being treated as normal in a 90's show about vampires. I was so pleasantly surprised and very quickly became obsessed.

What are your favorite things about the ship?

I love the way the show handles the relationship in seasons 4-5 (ignoring season 6 haha...) I love that despite a slight learning curve when Willow comes out, she's met with pretty solid support from the rest of the Scoobies. And I love that their first onscreen kiss was placed in The Body, so it wasn't the focus of the episode or treated like a crazy big deal. They got to be as natural and normal as the straight couples :)

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

So when I first watched the show, Willow was one of my favorite characters. Recently, however, on my latest rewatch I'm having trouble stomaching her treatment of Tara through her magic addiction with the memory wipe spells. I really wish more time had been taken onscreen for Willow to actually have to own up to the harm she had inflicted on Tara, and I wish they hadn't gotten back together so quickly. So I guess my opinion is that I wish they had spent longer apart, so Willow could get over that magic addiction plot line, Tara had time to heal, and so Tara weren't in the house in Seeing Red and could've survived. Not sure if that's unpopular but I haven't seen it said much before haha. My other unpopular opinion I guess is while I was obsessed with them when I first watched the show, they're no longer one of my favorite ships. I still love them, but I rarely seek out Tillow content anymore.

Giles + Jenny

What made you ship it?

Basically the first time they interacted I was into it. I love them both!

What are your favorite things about the ship?

I haven't spent a ton of time thinking about this ship so pls don't hate me if this is an incorrect read but to me they're a straight couple that flips gender roles on its head. Jenny very much wears the pants in the relationship so to speak and I love that. I also love how easily and joyfully she messes with Giles, and how flustered he gets. They're so smitten with each other!

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

I don't think so!

#thank you for the ask!!#anti bangel #ask game

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the-sparkling-diamond-satine · 1 year

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3, 11, 12, 16, 28, 51 for buffy/anya!!!!!

Hi, thank you so much for asking about them I love them so much!!! Buffy/Anya are simply so :)))

3. Do they wear the other’s clothes? (sweatshirt, bandana, necklace, etc.)

I think yes, definitely! Though Anya borrows more things than Buffy does. Anya really struggles with feeling like she belongs anywhere and she tends to cling to labels and things that give her a sense of belonging (she works in the Magic Box, she's someone's girlfriend, she's an American, etc). Borrowing something of Buffy's is an outward symbol that Anya probably feels shows the rest of the world that she belongs to someone. She's obsessed with this concept. And we learned from Buffy wearing Angel's jacket that she likes wearing her partner's clothes as well :) In 5x13 Blood Ties when Buffy opens her birthday presents Anya says something about how much she loves it and wishes it were hers. I'm sure at some point Buffy gets a new article of clothing, shows it to Anya who says something similar, and Buffy says she's welcome to borrow it. Two girlfriends = twice the wardrobe, and they'd both take advantage of this. They have differing styles though I think Anya would wear Anything That's Buffy’s, Pretty, And Looks Good On Her whereas Buffy probably borrows less from Anya's wardrobe since she has very specific opinions about fashion and values the way others perceive her and a big part of the image she wants to portray is shown through her clothing. But Anya simply gets So Delighted when Buffy wants to wear something of hers so Buffy starts doing it more and more because she loves making Anya happy :) Also they would be That Couple who wear matching Christmas pajamas. It would happen.

11. Do either try to hide their emotions if upset? Can the other still tell?

I think they both do. Buffy moreso than Anya. Buffy is the queen of repression and not admitting how she feels. I think Anya would be able to tell. Whether or not she's able to get Buffy to open up depends on whatever is upsetting her, but she can tell. Anya may be bad at social cues but she is hyperaware of how other people respond to her. Even if she doesn't understand what she's said "wrong" she can tell when the other Scoobies are making fun of her. So I think she'd be hyperaware of a shift in Buffy's mood. And over time she learns Buffy's tells for when she's upset. Anya only tries to hide her emotions if she's upset at Buffy or if it's something she really doesn't wanna talk about. Except even when Anya says it's something she doesn't wanna talk about, she always seems to drop gigantic hints for what it is and not move on from the subject. So it's really easy for Buffy to tell when she's upset. I think this is part of what makes them such a good pairing. Anya can give Buffy space if she needs to but she will repeatedly bring it back up in the future until Buffy talks about whatever is upsetting her. This pisses Buffy off sometimes but at least they're actually talking things out. I think a piece of why Buffy and Riley failed is because Riley was unhappy in the relationship and kept that mostly to himself. And Buffy was dealing with so much at the time that she just assumed Riley was fine because he wasn't saying otherwise, and was always racing off to deal with things that were Obviously Not Fine. It was Riley's job to express the way he was feeling to Buffy, and I think Buffy could really thrive with a partner who does just that. This is basic healthy communication, but there's not much of that among the characters in this show haha

12. Do they have many heated arguments? How do they smooth things over?

Not many, but sometimes. I think a lot of their arguments stop before they really get going because Anya says what they're actually arguing about rather than them arguing around things. Sometimes this backfires because she's so blunt it hurts Buffy's feelings. They definitely have makeup sex to smooth things over midway through actually talking it out (or angry sex before they've even started resolving the issue), and then they have the important conversation afterwards. It's a really effective system for them.

16. Can they stay up all night just talking?

Yeah :) Honestly I think they do this a lot. Anya probably accompanies Buffy on patrol and they talk a lot between slayings. Buffy is a night owl and while I could see Anya naturally being a morning person, she likes to be awake when her person is awake (and to cuddle with Buffy when she's sleeping) so I think she tries to adjust. She only tries to sleep without Buffy a couple of times when she's opening the Magic Box the next day, but it doesn't work and she's still awake when Buffy gets home. She's so tired at work (and won't stop complaining about how this is impacting her ability to do her job well and how her current schedule is ruining her ability to have morning sex with her girlfriend) that Giles gets so tired of hearing this and eventually lets her switch to a later shift so she can stay up and then sleep in with Buffy.

28. What are there thoughts on pet names? Do they have any?

I think they mostly stick to the basics like 'baby' and 'babe.' At least, at first. Then Anya decides she wants a more special nickname just for her but when Buffy insists on letting one happen naturally, Anya starts creating ones for herself that only get more and more absurd. Sex poodle is, of course, on the list. One time Anya starts calling herself a 'bad girl' because she wants to try spanking. Buffy is So Not Into This, or so she says... ;) Anya learns from watching TV that many pet names are food-adjacent (sweetie, honeybun, cutie pie) and Buffy Loves Food she’s always hungry!!! So Anya starts trying with food nicknames but she doesn't get The Vibe and therefore starts calling herself whatever Buffy's eating currently. Pizza. Ravioli. Cheese. Eggplant. Buffy joins in thinking it'll help Anya realize how ridiculous this sounds but her plan backfires and instead Anya Loves It and now Buffy has a girlfriend who expects to be called 'peach' and 'peanut' and 'jellybean.' Help. (The search for a nickname that makes Anya happy and Buffy doesn't feel ridiculous using is still ongoing.)

51. What’s a non verbal way they say I love you?

Answered here :)

#buffy x anya #buffy summers #anya jenkins #thank you for the ask!!#ask game #i simply love them so so so much #i probably wrote too much but i was having the best time #i love thinking about THEM :)

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firemanwhenthefloodsrollback · 3 years

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side character deaths in buffy

I've been thinking a lot recently about death in buffy, mainly inspired by Help and everything that has to say to us about avoiding, accepting and understanding death

obviously the main characters' deaths are heartbreaking, because they're written to be heartbreaking and break our relationships with characters we love and know well. buffy (twice), angel, spike, joyce, tara, anya, and all the many alternate universe and dream vision deaths that kill the main characters rip my heart out of my chest for obvious reasons. but today I've been thinking more about the deaths of people we didn't know that well and whose deaths we watch without knowing them well. so I'm gonna talk about some of those cause it's my blog and you can't stop me.

(for the purposes of this post I'm counting main characters as anyone who was in the credits, with the addition of joyce because come on)

Deputy Mayor Allan Finch/Warren in Bad Girls and Villains

These two deaths both make you gasp for the same reason - they're sudden, physically icky (warren has the edge here with the flaying but the dark blood and death rattle for allan is also horrible to watch) and while we don't have a lot of positive feelings for the victim, we gasp because of what it means for the murderers and how we suddenly realised this season is going to get darker than we thought. faith and willow both spend the rest of their time on the show dealing with the consequences of these deaths and the audience knows in the moment they happen what it has to mean for the main characters. we want to save faith and willow from the consequences of having done this. just like faith, we're confused in the dark when a figure comes towards the slayers and we don't realise what's happening immediately, and with willow we've been watching her friends approach through the forest the whole time she's giving her evil speech thinking they have to be in time to stop her because no way would the writers let willow torture a man to death on screen. If warren or the deputy mayor had died because of a demon or accident we probably wouldn't have noticed (in the deputy mayor's case) or we'd have actively applauded (I rly wanted to watch warren die).

Jesse in The Harvest

I'm guilty of forgetting about Jesse (and so is the buffy writers room when they fail to mention him for seven years) but killing off a character who looked all set to become a scooby in the pilot and then making his best friend dust him as a vampire was both shocking and showed us a lot of the issues the show would go on to consider in miniature, right at the start. we've had campy vampires running around and wisecracking, we've had vampires being cool and edgy, the master being a total ham, but then we suddenly have to watch xander grapple with the idea that vampires are more than strangers in graveyards, they're the people you knew with yellow eyes and no soul, they can talk to you with all their childhood memories of you intact. season one might do a lot of floppy cardboard monsters but Jesse's death tells us they fully intend to Go There with the horrifying psychological implications of what vampires can do to you.

Jenny Calendar and Kendra Young in Passion and Becoming

I think of these deaths together because they were both characters that we half-knew and thought we'd get to know more. they were both characters who we felt could have gone on to be in the credits, have their own plots, and had a lot left to explore on the show. having two slayers in town could have been interesting (and would go on to be interesting in season three) and as well as her love story with Giles, we'd just had the veil pulled back about Jenny's heritage and reason for coming to Sunnydale - so both of these deaths were in the horrible sweet spot of having got to know the characters more than someone like Jesse, but not feeling 'done' with them yet. they were both killed by vampires who didn't even feed on them, by neck injuries that weren't bites by 'big bad' vampires who were really after someone else. after their deaths they both set more in motion and had long thematic afterlives - we think about Kendra when faith is called, and when we meet the potentials, and Jenny gives us the soul curse and gets willow started casting spells. Kendra definitely deserved more remembering than she got, and in a world where Joss Whedon had more time for Black characters I like to think we'd have got more of her and Mr Pointy.

the normal teens buffy couldn't save

before I started writing this post, I knew this was where we were going to end up.

(Jonathan maybe doesn't totally count here but I did because his final lines made me so sad)

characters who chose to join a battle between good and evil and died as part of that fight break my heart, but at least with Jenny and Kendra they knew at least partly what they were signing up for. Larry and Harmony we knew enough to have compassion for, and even when they were mean they were mean in regular school kid ways rather than big bad evil ways. I went to school with all of these people and probably so did everyone else.

Larry and Harmony died on graduation day when they were meant to be becoming adults under posters that said 'the future is ours' - Larry was newly out as gay and Harmony was about to get out from under the popular girls and maybe become a person who could stand on her own two feet, and Buffy could have helped them if there'd been less murder and death going on everywhere around them. harmony as a screaming blonde teen was exactly the type of victim buffy saves ten times an episode in alleys outside the bronze. Jonathan had more of an arc but at the end, back in high school after making an optimistic, bittersweet speech about coming to terms with high school and being optimistic about the rest of his life, leaving behind Andrew and Warren's bitter obsessive revenge of the nerds fantasies.

and Cassie, my heartbreaking queen, the one that gets me more than anyone that I wrote about a lot yesterday, knew what was coming and that no one could save her, and all the things she listed that she knew she'd miss were teenage coming of age things. she wanted to go backpacking, attend college, go to a dance with a boy, and fall in love one day. the whole of Help, she's considering the rites of passage she won't get to do, and in her therapy sessions Buffy tries to inspire her to want to go to college or join the french foreign legion. for buffy, saving Cassie means giving her a future. we haven't met the potentials or heard the word potential yet in Help but this episode is all about potential, and Buffy's attempts to save a life meaning safeguarding someone's potential and right to grow up.

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ettadunham · 5 years

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A Buffy rewatch 2x05 Reptile Boy

aka adulting and frat boys

Welcome to this dailyish text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and point out / hyperfocus on one detail in it in 10-3k words. Mostly. The rules are arbitrary.

And today’s episode managed to heighten the show’s ever present metaphor of Buffy fighting toxic masculinity and rape culture by adding some super disturbing and way too real moments to its supernatural spin. There’s also the question of adulthood vs. maturity, Willow’s totally not jealous, and Angel is starting to be aware of some... stuff.

Let’s start with our ‘gay watch’ which may or may not become a regular segment on these posts, and appreciate this exchange:

Buffy: I'm not going with Angel. I'm going with... Ye gods. Cordelia. Willow: Cordelia?! Did I sound a little jealous just then, 'cause I'm not really... Cordelia?!

Now, that being said, during my previous experiences with the show, I definitely noticed a pattern of Willow being jealous / hostile towards other prominent people in the Scoobies’ lives - specifically towards other female characters. It happens with all of Xander’s love interests, sure, but also with Faith (so basically... Buffy’s love interest), and it appears to point to a fear of being replaced / abandoned more than anything. Probably more on that later.

The Buffy/Cordelia train has definitely left the station at this point though. Like who is Cordy kidding (other than herself) - she just wants to hang out with Buffy. And maybe her friends...

Speaking of said friends, I had to include the above screencap, especially after I saw someone once pointing out the way Xander makes a fabulous braid on his end and Buffy is just fumbling and looking confused at Willow’s hair. I really love these little bits and exchanges on the show, it often builds character and establishes dynamics in unexpected ways. Right now for instance we can clearly see that Buffy never had a little sister whose hair she’d braid as a kid.

...Also more on that later.

But I also want to fold this onto my talk about maturity and adulthood. because of the context of this scene. Apparently the Scoobies are all out of money and don’t really have anywhere to go out as a result - so they’re staying at home, watching a Bollywood movie together instead.

Later on the episode this will be juxtaposed with the whole aspirational idea of going to a frat party, and doing ‘adult’ things like drinking and hooking up with your (slightly older young adult) date; as well as the dull repetitiveness and responsibility of having an obligation that other people rely on you to do. And yet, that scene at the beginning - staying at home watching movies because you’re too broke to do anything else - is actually the most adult experience I could think of.

And I guess that’s sort of the point. Adulthood is much more mundane than what we imagine in high school it to be; while college can be this weird Twilight Zone where you can not only suddenly do all the ‘adult’ things, but potentially have the freedom to do so as well. Especially if you live in a country where higher education is easily affordable and not in some dystopian landscape where apparently only the richest can focus on their studies and not their part-time jobs .

Speaking of dystopian societies that the American culture appears to be to me - what’s it with these fraternity clubs? And why are they so weirdly gender-specific? And why are Americans so obsessed with the idea of ‘legacy’ students? ‘My father and grandfather attended this same college and were part of this same fraternity club’ who the fuck cares, Chris, it’s college, not a cigar club.

You guys are weird. Like we have hazing rituals for freshmen and all these weird parties going down in dorms, but the whole structure of fraternities just seem to give way too much space to up the notch on the worst aspects of college life. Of course my exposure to it is admittedly only through pop culture, but it really does look like a cult from here, ngl.

Anyway, the point is that college is the part of your life where you can be legally an adult, but you don’t need to have the level of maturity that that entails quite yet. Which is basically the polar opposite of where Buffy is at this point - someone who hasn’t yet entered the age of adulthood, but has all these obligations and responsibilities that demand a certain level of maturity from her that goes well beyond her years.

There are two particularly insidious scenes in this episode, one where Obnoxious Frat Guy offers a drink to Buffy that she refuses to which he says: “It’s okay, I wasn’t into adult things at your age either.” And then on the other end of the spectrum, we’ll have Nice Frat Guy talk about how “mature” he thinks Buffy is. So when he offers a drink she finally ends up accepting, because she’s tired of being ‘mature’.

In both cases, these guys are being manipulative and predatory (especially given how the drinks are spiked... I know, this episode gets way too real). Obnoxious Frat Guy is trying to be condescending, and reaffirm the high schooler idea of conflating adulthood with doing ‘adult things’. Nice Frat Guy however is being more subtle in his approach and appeals to Buffy’s sense of being burdened by her responsibilities - if she’s already so mature and has to deal with so many adult themes, she might as well do some of the ‘adult things’, right? She’s earned the right to loosen up in the ‘adult way’ a bit... right?

And then she gets drugged and chained up in a basement because no girl can ever let her guard down in this society. As Buffy says, she went to one frat party and had one drink, and this is what happened. I do kinda wish that Giles’ reaction to that wasn’t just that “let that be a lesson” line, and instead offered a reassurance that this wasn’t on her. But he also promises to put less pressure on her in the future, and he’ll have a great line to Buffy later in the season that makes me want to cry even now, and that evens those scales for me.

Given how the show often deals in caricatures when portraying characters like these frat guys, I also kinda appreciate that Nice Frat Guy actually seemed like... well, a nice guy (but also, a Nice Guy). I mean, as the audience it was easy to see through his manipulative bullshit act but I could also understand why Buffy liked him and was able to trust him somewhat. (This will happen in s4 again, although with much less rapeyness and much more general doucheness.)

This episode also seemed to have heard my 2x02 rant and it kind of addresses my concerns of Angel seeing Buffy as a “kid”. Their conversations here basically leave out the whole vampire pretense, and skip right into what’s this really about... sex. As the older one in their relationship, Angel seems to have come to the understanding, that it’s his responsibility to put an end to things before they get too far. Apart from the obvious age difference thing as well as Buffy being underaged that I touched upon previously, there’s also just the idea that Buffy may not be ready yet. And I do kinda respect Angel for finally acknowledging that.

Again - there’s this idea of adulthood vs. maturity. And how the latter is often recognizing the difference between being able or wanting to do something vs. whether or not you should do it. Being in the moment vs. considering the consequences of your actions.

When I previously talked about their relationship, I mentioned how I saw Buffy being the slayer tilt the power dynamic between them toward her, and making me more prone to get on board with them together. This episode however starts bringing the older guy / high school girl aspect closer to the surface. Even if we look at vampires as beings in some sort of arrested development, Angel was still in his early 20s when he was initially turned - which is just enough to make this a little murky.

I guess no wonder that them eventually going down that road will lead to disaster... But more on that later.

Or not. It’s a lot to sort out and maybe I’ll just want to talk about something nice and cozy like Oz instead.

Let someone else deal with all the heavy stuff.

#buffy rewatch 2k19 #btvs talk #btvs

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