#bc spuffy hurts too much

[tubesock86]

matching outfits !!

[atlasshrugd]

just read an absolute BATSHIT CRAZY fic in which spike didn’t die in chosen and him and buffy’s relationship has a beautiful progression. it was perfectly written...EXCEPT IT ENDED WITH SPIKE WAKING UP FROM A DREAM IN ANGEL INVESTIGATIONS. IT WAS ALL HIS FUCKING IDEAL REALITY. FUCK. YOU.

[chasingfictions]

hmm, I love all of your takes so much.....I am trying to think of an opinion we haven't talked about...alright so I've been thinking about how I would have fixed "seeing red" & at least in terms of spike's arc I think I have a decent idea. because I do like the idea that he takes things too far & realizes he needs a soul, like, as a concept. the execution is where they lose me. what if instead spike tried almost successfully to turn buffy into a vampire so they could finally belong together? I think her disgust & horror could've nailed home that he needed to change for him just as well. I've also thought of the idea that he could just successfully kill someone somehow even with the chip & same outcome, but I somewhat do like the idea that for it to be drilled in for him it has to be a specific horrible action against buffy. trying to change her so she can be with him could be the ultimate bad thing he did. idk if that's an opinion so much as an idea for a fic or something lmao but there you have it lol

send me your opinions & I say whether or not I agree

Omg no i truly love this as a fix it???? bc for one thing it Does feel so pointed like, that spike never tries to bite her even once for the whole season when he can hurt her,, like the most he ever says in wrecked is “maybe some day I will bite you” but it’s SO empty as a threat??? like that’s never what he Wants it to be about, and like for all that people (erroneously imo) say s6 spuffy is entirely about spike trying to like, separate buffy from her loved ones and bring her “down to his level” , it’s really not. like he genuinely thinks she would be happier if she acknowledged and embraced her dark side, and ultimately he just wants to see her happy? see- “it’s nice to see you happy, you glow” in hells bells and the way in as you were the second buffy says “and it’s killing me” he stops arguing the breakup or even earlier in life serial “yeah it is [your kind of fun] and your life’s gonna get a lot less confusing when you figure that out”

so to go from entropy onwards where his arc is losing that perspective and becoming so warped in losing her that he decides to try to make her a vampire in a fit of blind desperation? Works with the story intentions for seeing red from a character arc place , doesn’t traumatize actors or audience, AND is kind of gorgeous within his arc of like?????

spike as buffy’s shadow !! spike tries to make buffy a souless vampire and that’s what triggers him to become a souled vampire ???? Bc spike is buffy!!! spikes arc is Buffy’s arc and you have Buffy’s shadow trying to put her back in the grave out of fear and anger??? and then a final episode where Buffy’s shadow goes underground to the cave and buffy is underground in that grave with dawn and they both emerge in this same moment, undead and reborn and re-reborn!!!! Out of the grave!!!! And what does that MEAN??? and sabdkrkfjdb??/?:!:!:

And ALSO fits with the themes that have been circling around since buffy vs dracula??? That buffy vs dracula makes buffys psychosexual longing for vampires explicit and it’s no coincidence that she starts flirting with beating up spike every episode after that episode . Buffy vs Dracula with dracula saying see you want to be like us, you want to be dead, and Buffy rejecting it. Fool for Love with spike saying every slayer has a death wish, you’re just a little bit in love with it, and the way spike IS right, and the subtext of him as a dead man saying that to her is RIFE, but in the end of that episode it’s not death they connect in, but LIFE. Spike shows up to kill her and instead they BREATHE TOGETHER, because of mortal mundane death, because of family, because of empathy. so??? an alternate seeing red could carry out that same throughline that’s been present since season 5 — fuck, since season 1, since nightmares — and once again, it’s a vampire telling buffy you want this you want to be dead. and they’re not wrong , but also they ARE. Buffy wants to be dead but buffy wants to be alive MORE. and her shadow , spike, finally recognizes that in that moment, recognizes that both are true at once, and seeks a soul. Souls as empathy and souls as the complicated stuff of feeling everything to the fullest and this act which lets both truths coexist, that buffy wants to die and buffy wants to live, because spike is dead and will always be dead but he has taken the stuff of life into him with this almost blind faith. (Someone stop me I’m thinking about the fool in the tarot again) ANYWAY. The vampire who sought a soul. The dead man who is so close to life who falls in love with a woman who is so alive and so close to death. spike returning in season 7, still dead, but having sought life, having sought the complication of life and its still working around inside of him. literally once more with feeling, LIFE’s NOT A SONG LIFE ISNT BLISS LIFE IS JUST THIS IT’s LIVING . YOULL GET ALONG. THE PAIN THAT YOU FEEL IT ONLY CAN HEAL BY LIVING. YOU HAVE TO GO ON LIVING, SO ONE OF US IS LIVING.

spike trying to turn buffy into a vampire affirming that!!!! YOU HAVE TO GO ON LIVING. fuck. FUCK. I’m broken rn hi anyway this is CANON and you’re so SMART and I know I already wrote a whole seeing red fix it but I wanna write another one about this or read yours this is so good I’m gonna cry,????? This is canon to me this is so smart HI

[elastijubilee]

Things I personally prefer in the Buffyverse ‘Cuz I feel like it... I’m not bashing anything :)

This was inspired by the fandom being rude AF on twitter today and me staying out of drama but wanting to blow off steam. Bold means I prefer, ok? Ok.

Disclaimer: I love both shows so don’t take it too personally. Just somethings I like a little bit more

Buffy, the Vampire Slayer or Angel: The Series

Buffy or Angel (the characters)

Most important (IMO) character arc on BTVS: Buffy’s 

Fave C-Arc: Willow or Spike or Buffy

Most Important Arc on ATS: Angel and Cordy’s equally (however, everyone (mostly) had a great arc on Angel)

Fave C-Arc: Cordy and Angel’s both (but again all the characters developed well--well, Fred kinda got forgotten, but Faith got to do so much good on ATS it almost feels like she belonged there more but her arc on both shows in vital )

Blonde in Alley doesn’t get eaten for once and fights back: Nice :) fun subversion of trope sometimes happens in specific horror movie (though considering it is called Buffy, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER we kind of can see that happening so it’s not exactly the “masterclass in subverting expectations” as one pretentious twitter user has said. And it WAS NOT THE OPENING SCENE, we saw her in action and figured she wouldn’t die in the first episode of her own show :)) She’s stronger than the vampires which is cool :)

Man saving blonde in alley but turns out to be a vampire that almost wants to eat her himself: Awesome and subverting the big strapping hero trope (bc you were suppose to think “oh, boy just another they save damsels show” and then it subverts into something that could be more sinister) into something darker and considering he was pretending to be drunk and the show uses his bloodlust as an allegory for alcoholism, and drinking from Buffy and caused him to relapse and he cuts himself off from the ones he save. Sets up something interesting about walking a dark line and dualism of personality. Phew...I love redemption and betterment stories over “being chosen” they’re more complex

Spike or Angel (both but maybe Angel a little more right now)

Willow or Fred

Buffy or Cordelia

Buffy or Faith (for different reasons obviously, but I think a great ying/yang dynamic)

Buffy or Dawn

Lorne or Klem

Amy or Kate (I liked Amy more but then her turn was weird)

Kate or Justine

Fave Character in the ‘Verse: Cordelia Chase

City of or Welcome to the Hellmouth

Chosen or Not Fade Away

Life of the Party or Halloween

Illyria or Dark Willow

Wesley or Giles (both equally though I think they both got hurt towards the end)

Doyle or Xander (I like both but I’m going with Doyle)

Gunn or Xander

Anya or Cordelia (love both but Cordy by a long shot)

Dawn or Connor

Connor or Kennedy

Season 6 BTVS or Season 4 ATS

S7 BTVS or S4 ATS (um so first half of s7 is great but the last half is awful, s4 is the worst and probably worse but I find it more interesting)

S7 of BTVS or S5 ATS (I enjoy s5 more but as a final season 7 was more prepped)

Fave seasons of ATS: 2&3 (I enjoy s1 of ATS more than s4 of BTVS, sorry not sorry)

Fave seasons of BTVS: 3&5

Least fave season of ATS: 4

Least fave season of BTVS: a tie between 1 and the second half of 7

Bangel or Cangel

Bangel or Spuffy

Spuffy or Cangel

Spuffy or-- (I prefer Buffy alone and trying to figure herself out rather than obsessing over her romances)

Xanya or Cander (I like Xanya but I feel like we got to see more of Cander’s chemistry)

Tillow or Woz

Frunn or Fresley

Fave Ship in the ‘Verse: Cangel

Best werewolf: Oz, Nina, or Veruca

Mr. Gordo or Fiegenbaum (I didn’t know him that well :()

Cordy’s Blue Teddy Bear or Mr. Gordo (spread that love)

Scoobies or Angel Investigations (Fang Gang forever!)

BTVS theme or Angel (both)

Joss Whedon or David Greenwalt

Marti Noxon or Joss Whedon

Joss Whedon or Phillipa Goslett (this isn’t Buffyverse but fuck him)

Halloween or Fear Itself (both great)

Life of the Party or--(ATS needed more Halloween episodes)

[willowrosenboob]

Def Mood on the whole part about bangel's wedding being played for drama and angst but also, for me one of the main reasons is because even with all of their scenes together, their dynamic still felt underwhelming when you take out all the dramatic angst scenes? Like sure ok I will sit through seasons 1 2 and then 3 while I watch them but I always end up liking their conversation more in season 7 which is ironic, given that it feels kind of thrown in, but it's also just one where it felt like both were more or less on an equal footing to me. Buffy was older and a lot more experienced while being a slayer, she didn't take Angel's crap when he was jealous of Spike, but she was also honest about her feelings in general towards him. I guess part of the reason why I liked it is because it didn't feature Angel having more say in what happens to them, but Buffy does for once, since he was the one that broke them up in season 3 and then in "I Will Remember You", and while I don't think it was necessarily bad, since it did end up being a good choice for him to go his own way, it still felt a bit unbalanced to me bc again, Buffy had no real say in it. And I can never really be into the season 5 scene either (when Joyce dies) mainly because it just feels like Buffy is in mourning, and she's trying to cling onto the one thing she previously knew and felt something intensely for.

I know you just made that post to highlight one reason and that's def valid, so I hope this doesn't come off as me correcting you bc I also agree.

don’t worry, I really appreciate that I get a lot of long opinionated asks. it’s a lot of fun to talk about btvs. it is my favourite show after all. and I’m always honoured when people wanna send their opinions to me 💖

as for what you said about bangel, I don’t really have a big problem with the wedding dream other than my own personal distaste towards most weddings, but I get finding them a bit boring together. in my first watch through I barely thought about them at all. and especially in season 3, their relationship can be downright confusing. I used to always forget when they were dating and when they weren’t, cause they were always flip flopping between two extremes.

honestly I’m really surprised you like the chosen scene. it always bothered me how the kiss came out of nowhere, and joss & co were obviously trying to throw both bangel and spuffy shippers a bone without fully committing to one or the other. but honestly I do love how mature buffy is in that scene. and seeing her be so confident in her identity in a way she’s never been before. I actually liked the forever scene a lot. I liked that buffy could take comfort in something familiar, even if just for a while. also it was the only post s3 angel cameo that I didn’t found completely out of character when I first watched btvs.

honestly I always felt like their relationship was very unequal. it’s certainly not equivalent to what a real life relationship between a teenager and a 20 something would look like, but I always felt like angel had more autonomy and choices in the relationship, and there’s lots of evidence that he still viewed her as a kid (remember when he straight up called her a brat? big ole yikes there). it’s not a coincidence that buffy broke it off with angel twice in s3 and spent a lot of time trying to avoid him, but it’s angel who actually gets the last say. and he did it in such a shitty way too. I think he was in the right to break up with her, since their relationship was clearly doomed, and he actually became his own person once he left sunnydale, but he used such self righteous reasoning, and he made buffy’s struggles all about him (like in s2 when Buffy said she wanted a normal life and angel was like “before me” 🤡🤡). it was good for angel, but it was not good for buffy. he told her he wanted her to have a normal relationship, and you know what she did? she immediately rushed into a relationship with a normal guy and got hurt. buffy was way more vulnerable in their relationship than angel was, and I just can’t find myself to care about angel as much as I care about buffy in their dynamic.

honestly I have so much to say about their power dynamic. it’s not even the age gap, it’s just that angel has so much baggage that he dumps on this teenage girl without caring about the emotional consequences for her. also all the ‘old man angel’ jokes on ats just make me sideeye their relationship even more. and this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I feel like angel traumatized buffy way more than spike did. before s6 spike was pretty much just a nuisance that was rarely taken seriously, and even in s6 buffy was already going through some tough shit. he really only made up a small part of her struggles. compared with the stuff with angelus that made buffy feel like loving her was dangerous and synonymous with death. over the years she felt so much shame for her decisions (that were not her fault at all), and her experience with angel overshadowed her relationships in a way that is not romantic at all (I hate how some people romanticize buffy struggling to tell her love interests she loves them, as if it’s because she’s still in love with angel and not because she’s scared that being vulnerable in that way again will only lead to suffering for both her and everyone around her). and obviously a lot of it isn’t his fault, but it unfolds in a way that makes me really fall on buffy’s side.

so yeah. I have Many Thoughts ™ about this, which is weird cause I honestly don’t dislike bangel half of the time. I think a lot of their scenes are cute, and I sometimes get wrapped up in the dramatic romance too. but they had some major problems, and I just really dislike the idea of them ending up together. they’re just such different people at the end of their respective shows, and maybe if they had a fresh start they could make it work, but buffy had so many of her insecurities tied up in her relationship to angel that I just don’t think they could ever get past that. even if buffy herself gets over it, there’s always gonna be that implication that their relationship only leads to pain, and I don’t want that for buffy. that’s why a lot of my preferred buffy ships involve more internal conflict. it leaves room for them to change and grow together, not forcing them to be apart, and having to deal with the wreckage by themselves

[kittenshift-17]

that whole is ‘i love you’ ‘you don’t but thanks for saying it anyway’ UGH I HATED THAT. GOD it was just so patronizing! like thx for sacrificing urself! could’ve given this to my ex but i chose you! bc ur in love with me and will do anything for me! like that was just a slap in the face. she clearly never saw him as an equal even with a soul. with angel she would’ve given him a million chances even if he killed more people she loved but spike was just a punching bag. (4/multi)

Actually, for my own thinking (which I confess has been wildly influenced by the amount of Spuffy fanfic I’ve devoured) I do think Buffy meant it when she said she loved him. I think that SMG did a really bad job delivering that line, but I do think she loved him. Maybe not like we would hope, but she realised when she was about to lose him that she loved him and liked having him in her life. We see that in the way she says “I’m not ready for your to not be here” and we see it depicted through the eyes of the others, like Giles, “There’s a connection. He relies on you. You rely on him.”

There’s no denying that they do feel something for each other. I think it’s just that Buffy spent so long fighting it - so long being determined to hate him, and to want nothing to do with him even when she lusted after him, that even then - even when he’s about to die after proving once and for all that he IS the good guy, despite a lifetime as the Big Bad - it’s hard for Buffy to accept, and harder for her to admit. The human animal is conditioned to believe that we’re never wrong, and to feel shame and anger when it’s proved that we are, in fact, incorrect about something. Buffy is stubborn and prideful and self-righteous and to have been so wrong about Spike, and to have made him suffer for it - to have made herself suffer for it by resisting him when she could’ve been loving him - had to be a bitter pill to swallow.

Spike’s evil. There is no doubt about that. He’s without conscience for the majority of the series, and he proves time and again that he’s in it for himself first, and everyone else as an afterthought. Even when he admits that’s he’s a Grey Hat, or even part of the Scooby Gang, he is begrudging and childish and immature about it. You spend a century being evil and ruthless and a killer, having been trained in it from when he first rose at Angel’s knee, and it’s a hard habit to break. He plays Kitten Poker, don’t forget. He eats kittens. He eats babies and little children. When he first comes to Sunnydale, he kills a man who he claims is too old, because he prefers lamb to mutton. He’s not going to eat him. He just kills him for kicks. Like... Spike is a bad guy. He’s a Big Bad and he’s proud of it because in the world he’s come to know, that’s the thing to be. The demonic underworld is where the biggest and baddest are the best off and the most popular and Spike covets that and acts in whatever way necessary to be that and maintain that for a long time. He pitted his will against Buffy. Stalked her. Studied her. Learned everything he could about her in an effort to kill her - and he didn’t have any good reason for wanting to kill her, other than to improve his reputation as the Slayer of Slaryers and an extra oomph for his Big Bad image. He didn’t need her blood. He didn’t need her soul. He didn’t need to kill her. He just wanted to. Okay, yes, so did Angel, but at least with Angel it was because he claimed she made him feel human and without his soul, being/feeling human is a despicable weakness. Humans today kill people for that very reason. Spike just wanted to kill her because he thought it would be fun, and because he wanted the thrill of the fight and the rush of tasting her blood. 

So, yeah. I do understand Buffy being a bitch to him all that time, and I understand Buffy hating herself and beating herself up for wanting him even despite knowing what a bad guy he was, had been, is, and could return to being. Don’t forget that when Spike came back to Sunnydale and got chipped in the first place, he came back with the Gem of Amara, intending to kill Buffy. He still tried to kill her and to hurt her friends several times even after he was chipped. He wasn’t all sunshine and puppies. That said, neither was Buffy, and the older and more mature she gets, the more we see of that.

The show did a fabulous job of depicting the hard knocks that come amid the transititon from idealistic teenager into cynnical young adult and I commend all of the writers for the way they portrayed that. Buffy grows steadily more bitter with age, not just after being ripped out of heaven, but right from the beginning. We see the idealism and hope of first love, and the crushing pain when it’s dashed. We see the fear and despair of learning someone we love has betrayed us and wants to hurt us. We see the betrayal of a father figure turning on us for the sake of doing his job, and the misjudgements our parents make. We see the transition from high school into the real world, and the way it can warp and twist friendships we’d relied so heavily upon into something that becomes a chore. We see the way friendships change as we grow apart, and the way the choices our friends make impact not just their lives, but ours too. We see the way it feels to want someone you know is bad for you; someone who is bad, period. We see the trials of losing a parent, and takcling motherhood, and the tribulations of needing to find work to have money, and the wretched disappointment when the good things we were all promised don’t pan out that way. Watching those scenes as an adult, having lived a number of them myself, those things are bang on, man.

There are definitely things about the show that I hate; that “I love you” “No you don’t, but thanks for saying it” scene among them, but there is so much richness there, that how can you not love it? Even in that scene, those words from Spike scream so much. They show that he’s been pushed away one too many times. That he doesn’t trust easily anymore, not even himself, and especially not Buffy. I truly think in those moments, when Buffy says she loves him, she can barely beleive it herself, and she doesn’t want to say it at all, but she says it anyway because she knows this is her last chance to do so - her only chance to do so - and we also see how Spike’s been bitten once too often to beleive her. He wanted so long for her to love him, and she spurned him every time. Never said it. Refused to feel it, even, perhaps, when she did feel it just the same way she felt lust for him. He doesn’t believe her because he’s spent a lifetime, it seems, listening to her tell him what a monster he is and how she could never love something like him. He refuses the words because he thinks she’s only saying them out of pity. And in a way, she kind of is. Were he not about to save the world by sacrificing himself, she likely never would’ve fully, truly beleived it herself that she loved him, and even if she did, she would never say it. She only says it because he is dying, and so he thinks she is only saying it to make him happy in his final moments. But there’s too much pain and too much bad blood and bad feelings and hurt and anger and betrayal there for it to feel like more than a platitiude to Spike. 

As a fangirl, as a viewer, a reader and a writer, the whole scene is a kick in the gut and not the HEA we all so desperately wanted for the two of them. But as an adult, as a person with understanding of everything Joss was trying to portray - everything that is so much bigger than fanciful romance - I do completely understand the purpose and maybe even the necessity of that scene playing out exactly as it was written. No matter how painful and ugly and disappointing. That’s life, after all....