#i appreciate and understand the character of Buffy so much more as an adult than i did when watching as a teen

[girl4music]

Honestly, I’m not a Bangel shipper or really an Angel fan… but I have to say that the intimate moment they share in ‘Forever’ has got to be one of the greatest character interactions with another character there is. It details so much about Buffy and Angel and why they actually would have worked so much better as a couple when Buffy was not a minor. When they were both consenting adults and not obsessed with the “love conquers all” passion and urgency of true love. It’s by far my favourite Bangel moment - although I do have to say that, for me, a lot of Bangel moments are not comfortable for me to watch or even think about. They’re on a level playing field. Buffy now knows so much about herself as a person and as a Slayer. Angel has come to the understanding that while Buffy will always be his true love,… he doesn’t need to have her constantly in his life for him to be either a person and hero in his own right. Both of them are not in the best place either emotionally or mentally, - but they’re also not dependent on each other for their sense of happiness (or fulfilment I guess in Angel’s case since he isn’t allowed to feel happy or his soul goes bye-bye) They’re needy but they’re not desperate. It’s not a “oh the sky will fall if I can’t be with you” scenario. They’ve accepted their unfortunate circumstances to the point where it would actually be healthy for them to be together (sans the loss of a soul situation) rather than destructive. And they can now be there for each other in a way that actually feels necessary for them. It’s a wonderful little scene that makes you see the amazing growth in maturity for the both of them. And I can always appreciate that in a romantic relationship even if I’m not necessarily a supporter of it being one.

It’s kind of ironic that I love, appreciate and support Buffy and Angel being friends and confidants more than lovers when it’s that very thing that actually makes me see how their love can benefit them rather than be a detriment to and destroy them. But then I’ve always been a believer that true love is friendship on fire rather than a naive obsessive romance where the individuals in it can’t grow from and through it.

This moment right here is absolutely glorious. This is the beauty of love when it’s based in mutual trust and respect and understanding. When it’s fully matured.

[we-pay-for-everything]

Buffy and Angel ask anon here! Thank you so much for your response! I really enjoyed reading it and appreciate you taking the time to write out your thoughts :)

I love the way you explained Angel’s love for Cordelia. It always seemed that he was more in love with the idea of her than her as a person. And by the time he goes to Sunnydale at the end of the season, he had already spent almost an entire year where Cordelia wasn’t even herself. Angel definitely wasn’t sitting there waiting for Cordelia to wake up from her coma so that he can enter into a romantic relationship with her either (not to say he didn’t want her to wake up but I don’t think his priority was for her to wake so that he could profess his love for her and make her his girlfriend - he just wanted his friend to be okay). I feel that people conflate his feelings for Cordelia and their non existent romantic relationship to a really extreme degree. Like you said, Angel was chasing a fantasy in S4, it’s made clear by his hallucinations in “Deep Down” and his inability to put his son first when he thought he was losing Cordelia to him. It all came crashing down on him and he had to stop lying to himself because the fantasy he was chasing was one he could never have (just like he couldn’t have Buffy)

I agree that the way Angel was acting happy and light was maybe unrealistic because of Connor but I don’t find it completely out of character considering his last scene in “Home” was seeing Connor with his new family, happy and alive, and Angel smiling at being able to give his son that at least. I think Angel was at peace with the decision he made and I think just seeing Buffy after so long automatically put him in a happier mood.

I’d love to hear why you don’t like Buffy and Angel talking about the future? Is it because you feel like the obstacles keeping them apart are still very present and them getting back together would hold the same problems or because you don’t think they would realistically WANT to get back together?

Yes, I agree with everything, including your interpretation of Angel's happiness, though I believe it was a bit extreme. Tbh, Angel was the same way after Epiphany, just acted super goofy all of a sudden. It's just how DB is, sadly. I can't connect with Angel when he's like that.

I just think the way Buffy and Angel discussed their future was inorganic. It was clearly a set up for the cookie dough speech and to maybe throw shippers a bone. I don't think Angel would be so blasé about this topic. Maybe he was actually asking Buffy if she still had feelings for him, or if, in a perfect world, she saw a future with him, but I just don't see why he'd ask her so casually. Buffy and Angel are always very cautious when they discuss their feelings or the reasons they can't be together... I guess the only way I can understand Angel's words is if he was genuinely curious about Buffy's life and who she loved, or if he wanted her to know he'd be with her if he could.

My biggest issue is that the tone of their interaction is way off. She was serious and almost cold, while he was playful, relaxed. It made it seem like Angel had forgotten why he can't be with Buffy. Even her response, so adult-like and realistic, made Angel sound juvenile. That wasn't the intention, maybe that was Angel's way of telling Buffy he still loved her, but it still painted Angel in a bad light in comparison to Buffy imo, and kind of erased everything he went through.

Buffy might be cookie dough, but Angel also had his own shit going on. Their whole conversation felt awkward and forced to me because they were on a completely different wavelength. Buffy was acting like she was about to be in the biggest fight of her life (which she was), while Angel was acting jealous and reminiscing about the good old days. It was tone deaf, honestly. I don't know how to explain it better.

I don't like the cookie dough speech itself, so there's that. I just think it was a one-sided conversation. It was all about Buffy, and Angel's characterization or feelings were irrelevant. It could've been okay if Angel had been played and written differently. I just didn't like his entire attitude, or Buffy's...

I don't think I explained myself well, but I'm not sure how else to put it and I'm sleepy too... Let me know if you got what I was saying.

Thanks for the ask!

[filmmakerdreamst]

Xena: Warrior Princess Review

During Pride Month 2020, I finally got around to watch ‘Xena’. A show that had been in my to-watch list for years, but never got around to start. And when I finally did, I was pleasantly surprised. It was not what I expected and it was everything I think my 11 year old self would have loved.

The one thing that surprised me about the show, was the lack of packaging. Even though it was a fantasy, it also played with different kinds of genres too. I’ve talked about this before in my other review - ‘Xena’ was made at a time when TV had very few rules/rarely had a set audience, since there were parts of the show that were clearly for kids and there were other parts that were clearly for adults (therefore had much more flexibility). I admired how they weren’t afraid to break barriers and touch on deep themes such as religion, morality, redemption, spirituality, motherhood, forgiveness etc - even more than shows of today are able. I also loved how they played into the idea of ‘murder’ and how much it can damage a person - not just the person who commits the act, but the many people affected afterwards. I wasn’t expecting it to be that extreme. It made me think that this must of been the inspiration for ‘Game of Thrones’. 

I see a lot of comments here and there, saying how ‘cheesy and terrible’ it was but to just accept it because its part of the fun. And while like any show it does suffer from the occasional spell of bad writing (the whole of season 5) but it was also shown to be very aware of that fact and never took itself too seriously - unlike some shows I could mention. 

And regarding the ‘cheese’ factor (what 90s show wasn’t) It definitely can be, but I would call it ‘camp’ and ‘experimental’ more than anything else. (Don’t diss the poor use of CGI - I’m personally sympathetic to what was avaliable to them at the time) The style of humour reminded me of Taika Waititi’s filmmaking. If you’ve watched any of his films such as ‘Hunt for The Wilderpeople’ or ‘Jojo Rabbit’, then you know what I’m talking about. I liked how little they cared about being accurate or logical, which added to the ‘bonkers’ element in the show - which you can see in all of Taika Waititi’s films.

In all seriousness, a show centered around two women in their late twenties, who are realistic sizes (not trying to play teenagers). One of whom is a reformed mass murderer, who has lived a life experience, trying to do good in the world for the first time, picking the other one up who has no life experience prior (after they bugged them until they said ‘ok fine’) in their path to redemption. Just two women who become friends travelling the world together, fighting crime, having a laff, learning from one another without any toxicity - when suddenly when the stakes are raised - they realise ‘oh I'm actually falling in love with this person’ I have watched a lot of badly written shows in my childhood enough to know that, that’s not ‘cheesy’. I’ve never seen a story like that in my entire life. I’m not at all surprised that Russel T Davis was inspired by it while writing the Doctor and Rose’s relationship in ‘Doctor Who’ since he’s gay himself.

What’s more amazing about their love story is how they’re both develop as separate people as well. There was this video essay explaining ‘Why you should watch Angel’ the spin off series to Buffy; how ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer ‘was all about growing up and ‘Angel’ was all about being an adult. With Xena: Warrior Princess, you have both of those stories at the same time. 

Xena’s character was such a multifaceted experience to watch. And I can’t imagine anyone else who could play her as well as Lucy Lawless. What planet did they get that actress from? She's flawless! The amount of skill she has to put herself into a very physical role is astonishing. I personally had a love/hate relationship with her character all series long. Not in the way that I hated her, just that I couldn’t trust if she was all good or bad, which I know was intentional on the writers part. I haven’t seen a character quite like her before. She felt very much like a fallen angel; almost like the villain of her own story. Some of my favourite episodes come from fleshing out her character and dark past (‘Locked up and Tied Down’ is one of them) which reminds the audience that's she's not the stereotypical hero everyone expects. I loved her transformation from being this incredibly stoic warrior to being content and happy with who she is in season six, all because of a woman she fell in love with along the way. 

I’ve always thought of Gabrielle as the real hero and narrator of ‘Xena’. She’s the prime example of ‘a normal person becoming extrodinary’. Gabrielle’s coming of age story starting out as an innocent girl from a poor village dreaming of adventure, and ending as this vicious warrior who realises the ‘adventure’ wasn’t how she made it out to be is honestly the best character arc that I’ve ever seen. I loved how travelling with Xena made her realise her passion for writing (which was never going to happen in her home town, given the ‘sexist’ and ‘heteronormative’ ideas) and that she became a amazon princess like Xena. In regards to her sexuality, which is more up for debate than Xena’s (which I think we can all agree is bisexual) I personally interpret her as gay, just in terms of how she was written. Theres this moment in season 4 where she's being held up her hair, and Xena “symbolically” cuts it off ‘freeing her’. And she never really gets with a man afterwards, unless she’s being ‘possessed. It reminded me of a moment in one of Hayao Miyasaki’s films ‘Laputa, Castle in the Sky’ where the bad guy Moska shoots Sheeta’s ‘princess hair off’ which symbolises her transition from child to adult.

The cinematography was breathtaking. There was some great utilisation of New Zealand as the scenery. So was the soundtrack. You could tell it was made by experienced filmmakers. One of my favourite things about the show was the domestic elements - moments in the show where time seemed to stop - which made the world around the characters seem very real and magical. Even though it was a show that featured a lot of action/adventure, there was also this gentleness to it as well. For example, you could feel the wetness of the rain, the warmth of the sun and the clashing of the waves. This technique is used in Hayao Miayasaki’s work a lot .

The technique is referred to as ‘MA’ 空虚 meaning emptiness in Japanese. ‘Miyasaki describes this as the time between a clap’

“If you just have non stop action, with no breathing space at all, its just busyness. But if you take a moment, then the tension building in the film can grow into a wider dimension” - Hayao Miyasaki

The episode ‘A Day in the Life’ in season two is a really good example of this technique being used.

To my understanding, they used a lot of the local actors in New Zealand, which according to Lucy Lawless, consisted of ‘African immigrants and other different ethnicites’. It was so refreshing to see such a diverse show (despite some slip ups) especially in the 90s. I appreciated the idea that if the actors or extras couldn’t do an ‘american accent’ people could just talk in their natural speech which was also very refreshing. 

The LGBT representation was surprisingly amazing. I never expected so many queer characters in one show - especially under the censors. There was this one episode where they had a trans woman - played by an actual trans actress - win a beauty contest. It made me cry. Not to mention the actress was an aids activist. It was actually Lucy Lawless’ idea to kiss her which was incredibly controversial at that time considering how everyone thought you could catch aids just by kissing. I can definitey see how it validated people back in the 90s.

When people told me that Xena: Warrior Princess was one of the greatest love stories, I thought they were exaggerating a little. But no, watching the show in context, I found out that it really is. Despite its obvious restrictions, It made me realise (regarding token gay couples today) how often television writers rely on physicality and drama to convey a ‘love story’ and how much of it is actually pandering the audience. One of the reasons why Xena and Gabrielle’s relationship felt so genuine is because it was built on mutual respect/compassion and they were also best friends. I felt like I was witnessing something very real and private. It didn’t need kissing scenes or drama to make it interesting. 

It really helped that most of the writers were queer also. There’s this opening scene in season 4, panning over to Gabrielle giving Xena a massage (metaphor for sex - because they weren’t able to show that on screen) which I consider to be one of the most iconic scenes in media - considering how I wanted to sick up my supper when I watched the 10 minute ‘empty’ explicit sex scene in ‘Blue in the Warmest Colour’. The difference when something is written by a queer women vs a straight man.

Because the creators weren’t allowed to write their love story in the normal way, due to the studio forbidding them to, they found creative ways to showcase that love on screen - which made for a very magical/sensual experience. And I can safely say, if anyone has doubts about watching ‘Xena’, whenever I expected to be queer baited at a few points in the show, I was proved wrong time and time again. It’s the most romantical show I’ve ever seen in my life!

[inawickedlittletown]

The Dresden Files - an overall review

(There are very very minor spoilers, but I mostly wanted to write something non-spoilery about the series as a whole.)

-

The Dresden Files. I knew a few things about this series before I went into reading it in part because I had watched Daniel Greene’s YouTube video about why people should read it and I won’t lie and say that I didn’t go on Goodreads, look at how long the series is and then question if I actually wanted to read it and wanted to spend months and months going through the books. But, I had nothing else that was pressing on my TBR list and my library had Storm Front on ebook available. So, I gave it a chance. I am so glad I did. I think I finished that first book in two days and I rolled right into reading Fool Moon pretty much as soon as I finished Storm Front. 

I didn’t expect to like it as much as I ended up liking it. I didn’t expect to read the series as quickly as I did. But here we are. The thing about Dresden Files is that it’s the type of story that starts off small and then evolves into something much bigger. After all, the first few books can almost be read as standalones because while there is consistency of character, largely the events of each really remain within the scopes of each book aside from a few minor details. This is why at first glance Dresden to me seemed like a procedural leaning towards a pulp-fiction style of storytelling which I was okay with even though from the aforementioned YouTube video, I was aware that that would change as the series went on. 

Back when I was a kid, one of my favorite shows was Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And Dresden has been one of the few things that reminds me of BTVS, although I’d wager that Dresden more closely resembles the BTVS spin-off Angel more. I think it’s this resemblance that made me eager to keep reading. That and knowing that the books weren’t as simple as first presented. 

The things I love about it:

I love how simple and yet complicated it is all at once. It’s simple because the concept can be summed up in two words: wizard detective. You really don’t need a whole lot more to describe it. And yet as the books go on the world is expanded and suddenly things are more connected than you once thought and there are different levels of power at play as well as factions and magical creatures and politics in the middle of all of it. This just makes the world so much richer and interesting and fantastical while still keeping the roots of the human world. 

I love the characters. There is no character in this series that isn’t complex and flawed. They are very very human even when they’re not actually human and it is very easy to relate to one or more of them. Not every character is likable, but many — even the villains — are. And to go off of that, it is the relationships between the characters and the growth of that over the course of the books that makes this series worth reading. 

The mythology that is weaved into the story is great too. There is so much that comes right out of myth and adapted to fit into the world of Dresden and I am just in awe of how well Butcher manages to fit all the different things into one world from characters to artifacts and story and then also weave it into his own additions and his own changes to fit with his story. I’m aware that Fool Moon has a lot of criticism, but one cannot ignore the work that went into depicting all the different werewolf myths in one book. Then you also have the three courts of Vampires, the Sidhe, and characters like Odin, as well as archangels, and so much more. 

The writing is also good. I think one of the best parts about it is that Butcher has gotten better and better with every book. His descriptions are vivid and he does so well when it comes to magical battles and action. And it’s very easy to read and get just sucked into the world in part because the books are written in first person POV. 

As far as representation goes, it isn’t amazing, but there is some and specifically, there are a lot of women in positions of power which is always enjoyable to read. 

All of this does not mean the books aren’t without their flaws. No one thing can be perfect (except Black Sails…), there is always some problematic aspect to a work or something that doesn’t appeal to everyone. Some might say that Dresden Files has a lot of problematic things going on. 

The number one glaring thing is the way that Harry talks about women. It’s not that he doesn’t respect women or think that women can be strong and capable — I mean, he literally has Murphy there to remind him — it’s that the male gaze is so very very prevalent throughout the entire series. It’s like Butcher and Harry through him, cannot help but notice how beautiful or sensual or sexy any woman that crosses his path is. It’s understandable because we are reading the first person POV of an adult man, and even more so when we realize that sex is a big part of the supernatural world. I mean, we literally have vampires that are essentially succubi and get their “food” from sexual energy rather than drinking blood. The Sidhe all seem to be attractive and in multiple instances we see these fairies use their bodies and sensuality and like weapons to entice and seduce and overpower Harry and others. 

And yet, there is a clear choice that Butcher has made here to have Harry notice every woman and describe them nipples first and then describe them again on a next encounter in the same way. Even Murphy who does get described by her stubbornness and her strength and her accomplishments and her prowess also has the attached description of how short and how cute she is and Harry does also sexualize her in his head. Susan gets similar treatment and in the first book we even get to see her throwing herself at Harry due to the imbibing of a mis-intended potion. 

So, yes, this is very much the male fantasy/male gaze in action. Harry has women — mostly supernatural women — throwing themselves at him and in-book context there are reasons for this, but we’re supposed to praise Harry for how much his male libido is telling him “yes” and how he manages to somehow rise above that and not take the temptation — there’s even a scene where he literally pours ice water down his pants. And to be honest, I see the problems, but I also think it fits his character and Butcher describes the series as “Dirty Harry Potter” so what can you do. 

The moment that it became truly a big problem for me was when Molly came into the picture. The first time that Harry has a scene with Molly she’s fourteen and I can’t quite remember the exact words used but I’m sure that he manages to notice her body.

Molly doesn’t return for a few more books, but when she does she’s seventeen and Harry definitely notices Molly then and while it is one thing to take notice once, he constantly goes back to noticing Molly throughout the book. Molly’s feelings during all of this is one thing in part because Molly is young and impressionable and I think most young women have crushes on older men they admire and look up to, but to continually make a point of having Harry notice Molly and be attracted to Molly is icky. It doesn’t even matter that Harry doesn’t intend to act on it and that he actively puts a stop to it when Molly tries to turn things in that direction, mostly because in books following this one Harry still always takes a moment to appreciate Molly’s appearance and not just him but other male characters. 

So, yes, the sexulization aspect of the books is not the best, but I did appreciate that at least earlier on Harry is a bit demure when he is with women. His sexual acts are not described in detail. I was a bit surprised, then, when we did get slightly more graphic descriptions when it came to Harry and Murphy. It’s nothing like what you’ll find in fanfic, but it was a surprise. 

And the thing that also gets me about this is how easily Harry being this way could be explained because of his past and because of how Harry relates to sex, but instead Butcher explains it by saying that Harry is repressed because he isn’t getting any so that’s why he notices every woman that comes into his life. 

I will also point out that there aren’t just women supernatural beings, and that aside from Thomas who is described as the perfect man — strong and attractive and young, a lot of the male characters are a bit rougher and older and monstrous. 

Now, I’m not the best person to speak on this, but religion is a bit strange in Dresden. Mostly because while we have characters like Odin and Hades show up we also have fallen angels and archangels and characters that believe in God and have faith. But we have Christian artifacts in play so I do feel like there is a bias towards Christianity. 

Overall, I did enjoy these books. I think it’s a really good immersive story and that the world is interesting and ever expanding and that as a fantasy series — in particular an urban fantasy series — it is one of the best out there and I can’t wait to see where the rest of the series takes us. So I do recommend it with the caveat that it isn’t perfect and that some books are better than others but that as a whole it is an enjoyable read. 

--

Other Meta/Reviews 

[laufire]

i’ve seen people compare dean to buffy (and dean/sam to buffy/dawn), and i do not have the energy to articulate how deeply fundamentaly WRONG that is. NO. he’s elena. (i do however see agree that there are dean/angel parallels.)

Oof.

I could imagine there were such comparisons, but I’m very, very glad I’ve never had encountered them personally xD.

There’s a lot to unpack alone in the Dean-Buffy comparisons that I’d feel more comfortable doing when I’ve watched more of Dean’s journey, but it goes without saying I agree with you: Buffy and Dean aren’t similar people, at all. The comparison bugs me, ngl, but, and this goes beyond parallels. I’m going to take comfort in the fact that Buffy would be disgusted by Dean xDD (and god, can you imagine how shitty Dean would be to her. Putting aside what a misogynistic creep he can be -I’m not forgetting that scene with Jess any time soon-, I can just picture the kind of shit Dean “rape joke” Winchester would say to her about her relationships with Angel or Spike and it sickens me). Not that I actually think Dean and Elena would get along either, similarities or not xDD

But boy, the Buffy-Dawn vs. Dean-Sam comparison. That one is a kick to the stomach. Even worse than the one with Wynonna and Waverly -Wynonna Earp takes clear inspiration from SPN, but it really only works on the surface level; so, if that’s how you watch the show, I could potentially understand those comparisons, fine. But Buffy and Dawn?? Are you kidding me???

Buffy cherishes Dawn, she encourages her growth and her relationships and bonds with others. She doesn’t restore to violence when Dawn says something that makes her angry. She apologizes to her and strives to make amends and acknowledges when she’s wrong. She’s forgiving and understanding and compasionate of Dawn’s mistakes. When she finds out Dawn is not human (that she’s not even her sister at all), she embraces it and never shames her for it.

If you think any of the above applies to Dean, you have completely bought into his POV, disregarded Sam’s, and have a blind spot in the narrative the size of every state they’ve been in s1 alone combined.

Now, Elena sending Damon to erase Jeremy’s memories when he becomes to difficult to control? That sounds right up Dean’s alley and, according to s9 (I think? The one where he tricks Sam into getting possessed by an angel without his knowledge. Good times I’m sure) wikia summaries, maybe even a little tame for him xD. Jeremy had to lie to Elena about what he was planning to leave town and her clutches, and that was by the time Elena’s influence was minimal. At least he seems to have a life separated from her doing what he wants.

Also, I’m never, ever going to forget something Dean said to Sam back in s4 that froze me where I stood: that threatening “If I didn’t know you, I would want to hunt you”. Try to put that phrase in Buffy’s mouth, *especially* in relation to Dawn, and tell me how that sounds.

I do concede there are similarities between Dean and Angel lmfao. For one, Doylist-wise I see them fitting into the same pattern: SPN seems to have started with the idea of being about BOTH brothers, but Dean’s POV (partially for his character type, partially for Ackles presence and charisma) dominates and redirects the plot from practically the first second. Angel wasn’t initially supposed to have as much weight on BTVS, but try to stop Boreanaz xD (he has the IT factor. How I wish he was cast as Bruce Wayne in a show lmao). His scenes on the pilot awakened memories of both Angel and Chuck Bass lmfao, in terms of how disruptive and all-encompasing his presence was.

I can see some similarities beyond that, too. I’ll never deny that Angel could be a terrifying mean cold mofo, soul or no soul. Hell, some of my favourite moments in the Buffyverse are whenever Angel acts like a cold mofo (Forgiving, anybody???). And I could see very unflattering yet not entirely unfair comparisons been made, although I’d probably have a good argument for those! Like with Buffy, I see key differences that to *me* matter in terms of how I react to each character, although I’d probably could say a lot more after I finish SPN.

For now, I’ll say that one of them is that Angel has proven himself capable of relinquishing control and make amends (see s2 of ATS), something that at this point I doubt Dean has in him in any meaningful way. And also... this is more abstract but Dean is so full of this self-righteous, poisonous hate in him for anything other. It’s one of the things I find so utterly frightening about him. And I don’t see that in Angel, at all. Because Angel is the other and he never, ever forgets that (in that one way, actually, Sam is closer to him. Dean could’ve never done what Angel did with Faith, or with Darla in s2. Sam could, and has done close enough things for comparison).

I must also say that a good romance softens audience reaction to a cold mofo like nothing else lmfao, so Bangel definitely affects how I see Angel. It’s not exactly a mystery why his episode with Cassie is by far the most likeable I’ve found Dean lol (likeable as in likeable, as opposed “fascinating terrifying character” the way I’ve done in other episodes lol). Still count myself lucky she never made a reappearance, with this show’s track record xD

But anyway. Dean is his own thing. And one of the many things he can be is a meaner, scarier version of Elena Gilbert lmao -because he doesn’t have the constraints she has and can be terrifying in areas Elena couldn’t. I get the impression I’m going to have a reversed reaction to their arcs, however. In TVD, I started out loathing Elena (on Caroline’s, and later Bonnie’s, behalf. Even Jeremy’s, to a lesser extent) and only could properly appreciate what an interesting character she was after I’d let go~~ of my hate lol (in her case, because she was no longer as serious a threat to those characters I cared about).

With Dean, as of now I don’t hate him. I mean, I think he’s scary and hateful as a person, but I don’t feel the way I did for Caroline or even Bonnie about anyone around him getting hurt, by him and their vulnerability to him; for now, my interest on him as a character construct trumps that -we’ll talk again when I properly see his dynamic with Castiel lol. Even if it turns out there’s no reason to feel as protective there as with the characters in TVD, the spoilers I’ve read (and contrasted with the wikia, I always do that) about how I know he treated Jack are going to be enough to make me wish the worst for him. His treatment of full grown adults he has complicated relationships with can fit within my “fascinating and terrifying protagonist” description. Driving a kid that, looks or not, has the life experience of a toddler to a suicide attempt to them tell him “no, I’m gonna be the one who kills you” is only going to make me feel nausea, because it already does. At this point, the knowledge that Jack has the power to resurrect him but doesn’t care to only fills me with satisfaction xD

[badgerthegnome]

OKAY so I binged season 5 of She-Ra

and it was ~♡*SO GOOD*♡~

Here is my very spoilery review, from perspective of I, a Glimadora fan, but a Glimadora fan who grew up in the Queer Representation Drought of the 90′s.

OKAY, so, if you’ve kept reading firstly thank you. And may we all dance together and THANK NOELLE.

Admittedly I went into this season not hopeful anyway for Glimadora, after what happened with them last season (and the fact that Catra and Adora’s star signs match the star signs of the Showrunner and her Wife? .....Yeah). 

I still love them, and think the spark of possibility of their romance is and was a gorgeous thing, and will remain one of my favorite parts of the show.

But.

WE GOT DECENT REPRESENTATION, SO very DECENT REPRESENTATION. BETTER THAN ANYTHING I’VE SEEN IN AN ALL-AGES SHOW IN MY LIFE SO FAR. 

And I HAVE to be grateful for that. 

The people behind Korrasami fought so that we could have canonical, actually represented Catradora. The entire Crewniverse, esp. Rebecca Sugar, fought SO HARD so we could have canonical, actually represented Catradora. Hell, Naoko Takeuchi made Uranus and Neptune lovers, and Be-Papas made Utena queer as the day is long, so we could have canonical, actually represented on-screen Catradora. So much has been done to get us here, so I can’t help but be grateful - baseline, gratitude, first and always - that we got this level of representation AT ALL.

And ALL THOSE Netossa and Spinnerella moments. MY GAY HEART. The fact that we got all those kisses, and the actual use of the word WIFE. Priceless.

AND Double Trouble. EXTRA priceless.

AND Kyle/Rogelio.

AND all the moments where everybody was queer with.....well, everybody. 

This show has given us SO much, that even though I didn’t get exactly what I wanted..... I can’t be mad. I’m not. I’m just so touched and pleased.

And honestly - I didn’t know how they were going to get Catradora to where they ended up, after everything. Not having shipped it before, I didn’t have a lot of thought-energy invested there, and since I didn’t have high hopes for a Glimadora-romantic-reconciliation after their fall last season I didn’t really forsee anything Catradora going well. I thought, honestly, that if they were going to push for Catradora endgame after all, it was going to feel forced and we’d only get implications, not THE CONFESSION. AND THE KISS (both kisses!).

And everything that built up to that? SO WELL constructed. I am so impressed. Not only between Catra and Adora directly, but the fact that Catra fits so well into the Best Friend Squad that I can’t picture them without her now that it’s happened. And I never, ever thought that was gonna happen.

(And I’m not even going to start about the Utena parallels in Catra saving Adora from that last vision she was having. You know what I mean.)

NOELLE I WAS SO WRONG TO DOUBT YOU.

On that note, again, I REALLY REALLY REALLY also SO much appreciate the Spinnetossa storyline, that we got to see SO much of them, and SO many kisses, and the threat of Spinnerella having been compromised was taken SO SERIOUSLY. DAMN. I shipped it before (how could you not?) but I ship it so hard now, and HAPPILY take it as consolation about my aforementioned ship woes (which can’t even really be woes. See above).

Here, have some crappily-taken phone camera shots of me pausing and flailing over the kisses as I watched on my tablet:

And as usual, the world building for the whole show - the world itself, the plot, the historical impact of all the backstory, everything - was SO WELL DONE. I have been massively impressed on that level alone since day 1, and now, at the end, I’m still not disappointed.

Also Scorpia. Always, but especially in her friendship with Perfuma this season (love love loved the resolution between her and Catra, too. I may be on board with Catradora now but I may have still cheered a lot when she blasted her, even though she was mind-controlled, and definitely squealed at the hug). 

And all the scenes between Shadow Weaver and Castaspella. The build up to her redemption was handled very, very well, too. Even though I still hate her face.

I do have to say, though, that as a Glimadora fan I’m not sure how to approach Glimbow. I did not see that coming (as much as it wasn’t explicitly shown, and as much as I appreciate that it was left open to interpretation, I do think that the timing of their “I love you” shortly before Catradora’s “I love you” was not an accident). What I DO appreciate about them together, though, is that both characters are still queer af - and in my opinion, their love pushes Bow’s sexuality in a more fluid way than I expected. When I first saw the character designs in season 1, and with how he reacted to Seahawk, I was pretty sure they were going to go ‘stereotypical gay man’ with him - and I don’t say that with any harshness on the need for gay male representation, or any doubts about Noelle or anyone else on the creative team. I say that from the background of someone having grown up in the 90′s, where the best queer representation I saw on any non adult-adult TV was Willow and Tara of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (which and who I LOVE). BUT even with their loveliness, Willow’s bisexuality/pansexuality was ERASED as soon as she became attracted to a woman (like she tripped and was like “Whoops, guess I’m homosexual now!”). So I wasn’t very optimistic about Bow being any of the LGBTQ’s except the G, BUT a) clearly I was wrong, from the start, and yay for that, and b) he reads so strongly as pansexual, in my opinion, and so does Glimmer (I know and respect that many may disagree with me on this, not trying to start any kind of wars here. Especially since we just wrapped one up ;D ). So them together actually only solidifies that representation, I think.

(And I also gotta note that I am SO PLEASED with my girl Glimmer’s character development this season, in general. I was very very glad with how they handled her, especially after how hard - though understandable - how hard her decisions in season 4 were to watch.)

Definitely definitely definitely need a rewatch, now, from the perspective of Catradora AND Glimbow. An open one, trying to see both developing from the beginning, and value and respect all that went into building them.

I wanna end by saying that one of the things I appreciate SO much about this fandom is that we all have SO much LOVE for the show itself, and the representation we’ve been given. So I hope no matter what we shipped, still shipped, whatever we wished for - we can be grateful for the gift that this show is. And hopeful, too, for a spinoff in whatever format they can give us.

(I personally want more comics, but I’m super biased.)

P.S. Shoutout also to Entrapdak, Wrong Hordak and to Keston John for all the amazing work he did with all the clones this season. Damn.

(And that moment with Prime-possessed Hordak and She-ra/Adora at the end was ALSO PERFECT.)

(Okay really shutting up now.)

[impalementation]

what played differently positively and negatively on your buffy rewatch?

putting under a cut because this got long! disclaimer: this is all just my personal opinions and reactions, nothing objective or definitive. also when i talk about how i reacted “as a teenager” i mean from ages 13-16 rather than more mature teenage years. i did revisit the show briefly around 18, but don’t remember what i thought. so i’m comparing how i watched it at ~15 to how i watched it at 27, basically.

negative:

- a lot of trouble connecting to the more high school elements of the show. i just grew out of caring about teenagers, unfortunately. so i got impatient with a lot of seasons one and three, and some parts of two. which was really a shame, since i used to pretty unreservedly adore those seasons.

- in that vein, a lot of trouble connecting to buffy/angel. partly because adult men are no longer as opaque to me as they are to buffy, and so although i respect what the writing was going for by objectifying angel, it was still frustrating to feel like i wasn’t given much to go on as far as understanding his character motivation or why he and buffy were drawn to each other. boreanaz’s acting also got in the way of my enjoyment, unfortunately. i have nothing against the pairing, as a pairing, and i like a lot of the writing around it, but it lost the ability to give me any of the feelings it gave me as a teenager. i was sad about this!

- having seen a lot more movies and tv shows by now, buffy’s often ungainly execution was difficult to ignore. there are a lot of jokes that just strike me as clunky and unfunny, pacing i thought was slow, character writing i thought was dumb, etc.

- all the parts that haven’t aged well from a political perspective (some of which people complained about at the time too, of course). the weird attention given to xander’s self-deprecating possessiveness, terrible jokes like the one about the first slayer’s hair in restless, baffling moments of sexism, an often facile approach to gender politics, etc.

positive:

- i wasn’t a dumb teenager, but i wasn’t sophisticated either. i didn’t have the analytical toolkit that i have now. so the biggest positive change was being hit over the head with the realization of how intricately and elegantly thematic the show could really be. the feeling of “oh shit, they were doing things.” when i got to the end of season six and saw buffy crawling out of that grave a second time i was just on the floor like “fuck you buffy the vampire slayer and the symbolism you rode in on.” overall i gained a lot of respect for it as tv with literary tendencies. as messy as the show could be, and as superficially “pop” as it was (as in, it wasn’t a prestige-y hbo show), it’s one of the few tv shows i’ve seen that is clearly and consistently “about” something, both from season to season and over the course of the whole show. one of the few good comparisons i have is the wire, which is consistently about institutional decay and how systems fail people, and then explores that idea from season to season by looking at different failing systems (crime, labor, reform, education, media, etc). similarly, buffy is (among other things) about the trials of growing up, and growing into a person that has agency and ownership of themselves. and each season explores that subject in new ways by putting buffy into new situations that challenge her to be mature in a way she hasn’t been before. the wire achieves literary coherence in a much more controlled, focused, and overall skillful way. but people know that the wire is Serious Art. buffy fascinates me in that it has similar aspirations while also being goofy, stupid, messy, unabashed genre entertainment. unabashed television, at that.

- in general, i also felt like i had a deeper understanding of a lot of the storylines. i’d always liked seasons six and seven, even when i felt like i wasn’t “supposed” to (and hey that was another nice thing about watching it as an adult. i no longer had a need to care about whether i was supposed to like something or not, because i felt confident in my own ability to assess that.), but i didn’t quite get them on that emotional level. this time though, i felt like i completely understood the experience that the writers were trying to convey. buffy’s struggle with mortality in season five, depression in season six, and isolation in season seven, all hit me unbelievably hard. even the college experience stuff in season four had new, added layers.

- in a weirdly equivalent-but-also-opposite situation to buffy/angel, my life experience colored how i received the whole buffy/spike storyline. on the one hand, i was newly able to properly appreciate that their season six story was a story about a toxic and self-destructive relationship. as a teenager i found it hot and engaging, but also sort of baffling; i couldn’t tell what the writers were going for. because i was so used to a sex = romance paradigm in tv, instead of the sex-as-character-writing that you see in more sophisticated media. similarly, i was finally able to understand the more disturbing sides of spike’s character, instead of just finding him funny and entertaining. yet instead of that understanding making the dynamic, or spike as a character, less interesting to me, it actually finally gave me an emotional “in” with it. it made things compellingly complicated instead of just confusing. i couldn’t be moved by it before, because i didn’t understand the emotional conflicts at play. whereas watching it with life experience that echoed it, a lot of it felt like being suckerpunched, in a good way.

- for whatever reason, i also found myself really enjoying the willow/tara dynamic. i was pretty dismissive of it as a teenager. i thought tara was dull, and resented the feeling from friends that i was supposed to like it just because it was gay. but i found them (and tara) very sweet this time around, in a pleasantly subtle way, and with more understanding of my own queerness, i appreciated things like how implicit their courtship in season four had to be, or their easy domesticity. and it meant that when their relationship fell apart in season six it genuinely made me sad instead of just “well alright.” and i really like it when stories affect me, whether or not the way it’s affecting me is a happy emotion.

- my love for buffy as a character like...quintupled. i’d always loved her but, as i’ve said, my enjoyment of the show was on the superficial side. i think i used to basically take her at face value, and accept everything she goes through as “well, that’s just what happens to protagonists of tv shows.” also, since i’d never related to the sorts of coming of age narratives typical of high school shows (popularity! boyfriends! virginity! cheerleaders! prom!), and i hadn’t experienced any of the things the show explores past season three, it was difficult to feel like buffy as a character was speaking to my own struggles in growing up. but now that i wasn’t expecting to relate to her, it was easier to see her face everything and go “man, you brave, amazing girl.” i felt like i could finally really appreciate her as a character, which made all the times that i did end up relating to her feel richer too.

- all the parts that have aged well. there have been great female protagonists since buffy (and great female protagonists before her), but few great female heroes. and buffy is kind of incredible for being both. i’ve said this before, but one of the great things about her as a character is that on the one hand, she’s able to participate in a hero narrative that is normally only the province of male characters, and be a source of admiration or inspiration that isn’t about gender. but on the other hand, she’s also allowed to be human...sometimes to people’s dismay, especially in the later seasons. and that duality, particularly in a female character, is deeply, deeply rare. buffy summers is just an utterly remarkable character, and consuming more media only made that more obvious to me. aside from buffy, i think many of the show’s more experimental choices have aged quite well, whether the format breaking episodes in season four, or the postmodernism of season six, or buffy’s mourning and depression in seasons five and six. i also really appreciated the show’s themes around forgiveness, atonement, responsibility, and agency, and found myself wishing that more contemporary things had them.

[letterstothemidnightsociety]

THAT’S RIGHT BITCH! It’s October and I am still watching and inexplicably blogging about Supernatural - a dinosaur of a television show that’s been on the air longer than most children I know have been alive. 

I know I’m An Old because I don’t think kids these days understand the struggle it was watching television before streaming. We had to wait for episodes. Hell, I don’t think kids these days even really have to wait for seasons. I mean, Voltron premiered on Netflix in 2016, capped off their seasons at 13 episodes a piece and, oh yeah - aired seasons 5 - 8  all in 2018. Was I mad about that? No of course not. Do I also say phrases like “kids these days? Yes, so who even knows if what I think is relevant anymore. 

Alright, so speaking of seasons, last time I looked at pilots and pilot seasons and how the streaming era is changing everything we know about starting a TV show. But once you’ve got your pilot down, now what? 

Not this kind of pilot. Also, based on the prerequisites for demon possession, we’re all agreed this co-pilot’s like, an alcoholic, right?

There’s a rule in TV (sort of) that the first six episodes (some might argue the first season entirely) should be a kind of rehash of the pilot. The pilot sets up your premise and once you’ve got your pilot down, your job as a TV writer is to re-establish that premise over and over again. You’re building your world, you’re writing it’s rules. You’re setting up a template, a formula for how your episodes are gonna play out. This helps your audience get to know the characters, get familiar with your world, get comfortable spending time with them. Essentially, you’re getting your audience to trust the show that they’re going to be tuning in to for at least the next 20-some-odd episodes. 

I’d also argue that this is important so that later, you can break that format later. I’m not saying you should break the trust your audience puts in you, and that’s probably a real fine line of distinction. But if you break your rules right, it can hit the audience with a big emotional sucker punch. Or, it can stand out as a real breakout, tentpole of an episode - I’m thinking specifically about Ghostfacers! In season 3, or Once More, With Feeling, from Buffy. Those episodes work, really work, because they deviate from the formula, but they only work because we know the formula so well.  And these aren’t big changes to the way episodes are done, they’re just shifted ever so slightly that they felt new again.. 

So what is the premise of the first four episodes Supernatural? What’s the formula they set up for the rest of the series? 

Brothers. I said it in my last post, I’ll say it again, Sam and Dean/Jensen Ackles and Jared Jared Padalecki are what makes this show. Full stop. I think we could have gotten 5 seasons out of a show starring two other dudes. I do not think this show could have gotten 15 seasons with two other dudes. So from the pilot through Phantom Traveler, we learn that Sam and Dean have a sh*tty home life - their mother was killed by some mysterious evil thing and their father raised them to be little demon-hunting child soldiers while they look for the killer. Oh yeah, and Sam’s girlfriend died the exact same way which we will never forget because Sam’s gonna have a dream about it almost every episode from here on out. We set up the tension between the brothers - that Sam got to go to college while Dean stayed with their dad like a good boi. We learn that everybody hates each other probably because they are deeply and unhealthily codependent love each other so damn much. 

Next we get the basic rundown of the season arc: 

Dad’s on a hunting trip and he hasn’t been home in a few days. The Winchester brothers are looking for him and by extension, looking for answers as to what killed their mom/Sam’s girlfriend. We also get the basic rundown of every episode: dad is a mysterious and elusive sonuvuabitch, so every episode they go about, say it with me now:

“The family business.” I would also accept “Killing as many evil sons of bitches as I possibly can,” but why can’t I find a gif for it?!? 

Backtracking on this but you know what else gets hecking established with the Winchesters? Sam is the cute one with the people skills and the puppy dog face, so you’d naturally assume that he’s the soft one. No. Not the case. Dean is the Sofffft Boi. The SOFTest boi. Dean wants Sam to talk about his feelings, Dean wants Sam to not keep things bottled up, Dean is the one who desperately wants to keep a hold of his family and also is just deeply broken and traumatized on the inside and oh no, I told myself I wouldn’t do this but I did it anyway. Sorry not sorry. This watch, I’m really picking up on the fact that Dean is, weirdly, the Mom Friend in this first season. Like, he’s basically a Trailer-Trash-Teen-Pregnancy Mom who’ll give you spaghettios five nights a week and a shot of whiskey so you’ll quit yer bitchin’ and go to sleep faster, but he’s the Mom nonetheless. Later in this season and in other seasons, I think you even see him do his dumb-baby-best filling in as the Mom when John went off the deep end. Anyway, I have a lot of feelings and we don’t have time to unpack all of that so I’ll just move on.

RUDE.

Next we set up our Supernatural Bag of Holding - what’s in it? What are the mystical artifacts they use to kill those evil sons of bitches? First up is The Car. Damn, I am not a cars girl, but that 67 Chevy, it does things to me. 

This car has some weird pavlovian trigger for me, it’s not NATURAL. 

The journal. 

John Winchester, you journal the way I imagine a psycho killer journals and I would just really appreciate it if you could be ANY MORE ORGANIZED THAN THIS.

The Trunk Full of Weapons - I love that in these first few episodes (and possibly the rest of the series???) they give this HELLA conspicuous look every time they open the trunk full of weapons. It’s hilarious EVERY TIME.

No, you’re not being obvious at ALL, guys.

The Fake ID’s - from credit cards to impersonating feds, these boys are not afraid to break the law to save some lives and I feel like that’s...that’s the theme of the show maybe? They’re here to save people and they’ll do what they have to to do that? In a world that clearly establishes a dark vs. light/good vs. evil dichotomy, the Winchester make it their job to live in a world of grey? Basically? 

Next on the checklist for this first season of Supernatural - it’s spoopy. *Spoop mileage may vary.* I said it last time, but I’ll say it again: this first season aired at 9:00pm at night. That means it’s primetime stuff for the 18 - 25 year old crowd, but they don’t want to risk some 13 year old watching it and getting too scared before bed. 9:00pm is X Files time slots, Fringe time slots. 9:00pm says you’re gonna get something a little more gruesome and gory and shocking than at 8pm. 8pm is for Friends. Vampire Diaries aired at 8pm its first season. 9pm is for the real adult content (but not too adult because the audience is still mostly children). 

SPOOP!

But yeah, let’s look at the real horror vibe that you get off of these first four episodes. We talked about La Llorona from the first episode - this is a legit ghost that they fight. The kids at the end that literally drag their mom to hell? Pretty spooky stuff. The Wendigo in episode 2 is a literal monster of the week and so for me personally, it’s not that scary, but it is a cannibal monster that eats human flesh. Dead in the Water has vibes from both Jaws and Friday the 13th. Everything from the lighting to the sound design let’s you know this is a horror show, or as horror as you can get on network television. Listen to the scenes just before somebody dies and you get a nice creepy “Come play with me” whisper coming out of the water. I’m a little spooked just thinking about it now. Yes I know I’m a chicken, and I’m OK WITH THAT. And if we go past my season 1 disc 1 into episode 5, Bloody Mary is STILL terrifying and I STILL watched that episode with half my face covered. That’s where I am these days. It’s 2020 and the world is a nightmare but imagining Bloody Mary creepin’ out in my mirror does not need to be a part of it. 

SHE F*CKIN CLIMBS OUT OF THE MIRROR GUYS! I DIDN’T KNOW SHE COULD DO THAT!!!

Then we get Phantom Traveler and our very first case of black-eyed-demonic possession. Watching this episode now, it’s like watching someone’s home movie of their first steps as a baby. They’ve never even done an exorcism before guys! They have to read the exorcism rite out of the journal! It’s so cute!!! Let’s not think too hard about how they got that full sized bottle of holy water past TSA in a post-9/11 world. And try to ignore how poorly these special effects have aged - the smoke from the demon possession?? OMG! THIS EFFECT! I’m pretty sure I could make that effect with my first ever graphic design software on my, like, 2009 mac book pro. So cute and soooo good! I’m gonna leave that CG plane alone, they’re doing their best. 

SO cute and SOOO good!

You want to know what my favorite established staple of Supernatural season 1 is? The extras. LOOKIT these guys - 

Wendigo you have Cory Monteith who later goes on to star in Glee. 

You have Alden Ehrenreich, Debatable Han Solo, doing a lot of face work with very little dialogue. 

You have Gina Holden who is in SO. MANY. Spooky-type things! My personal favs are Blood Ties and Harper’s Island, but she’s in Fringe, she’s in the SAW franchise, she’s in the Final Destination franchise, she was in some deleted scenes on an episode of Teen Wolf! I LOVE seeing Gina Holden, anywhere she pops up. 

And speaking of Harper’s Island, you’ve also got Callum Keith Rennie who played John Wakefield in Harper’s Island, a show that was A+ Great and I highly recommend if you like Agatha Christie and/or murder mysteries. 

Honestly, Rennie looks like he’s about to murder a bitch in this episode of Supernatural, it is not a stretch to believe he’s a psycho killer.

Dead in the Water you’ve got Amy Acker, a regular in Joss Whedon and Whedon-adjacent type shows.

Good LORD, this wardrobe was SO 2000′s WB and it PAINED me.

And finally in Phantom Traveler, you have Jaime Ray Newman who also shows up in a lot of the shows that I like to watch. She was in Eureka, she was in Midnight Texas, both kind of terrible shows that I love because they are terrible, but she was ALSO in Bates Motel and Veronica Mars, which are generally considered to be more quality, so there’s that. 

This still implies that they actually LIT scenes, which is a SURPRISE TO ME. 

Point is, seeing these actors in Supernatural back in the early 2000’s felt like I was seeing the start of their careers. That may or may not have been the case, but as a viewer it was exciting to see them pop up again in other things.

So what about TV now? Do we still use those first 6 (sometimes more) episodes to re-establish the premise? Well, it certainly hasn’t gone away. Look at any network show that still produces 22 - 24 episodes a season and you’ll still see that the pilot season just keeps re-iterating the premise established in the pilot episode, specifically in anything that’s procedural - that’s you’re monster/problem-of-the-week shows. Think sitcoms like Brooklyn 99 or Superstore or dramedies like Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist. The reason being that these shows play in the traditional model of television - on a network, once a week. They are not releasing episodes all at one time or relying on their audiences to stream a whole season in one sitting. These are shows that still assume that someone out there is going to tune in or stumble across their show one night while they’re surfing channels (lol) and need to be told, no matter what episode they’ve just turned on, what the premise of the show is. They need to be formulaic so that people can pick it up anywhere at any time.

But what about shows that don’t follow this traditional model? I mentioned in my last post that seasons are getting shorter and shorter, so when you’re writing a show that only has (8) episodes instead of 22, how much time do you really want to spend establishing the premise? Because of these short seasons, you’re also dealing with shows that are more serialized and less procedural than their predecessors - meaning, you’re dealing with a show that focuses on a season long story (think Game of Thrones or Stranger Things where each episode is an important chapter that you can’t skip) vs. a procedural (think the shows I mentioned above or any cop drama really) where each episode is it’s own contained story, neatly wrapped up at the end. These are shows where you can skip an episode and still know where you are in the show no matter where you start or stop watching. Supernatural is a little bit of both - procedural with their monsters of the week AND serialized with a season long arc. We’ll talk more on that in a later post. 

Not only are we getting shorter seasons, but we’re also dealing with shows that are not released over long periods of time. A few streaming channels, like Disney+ and HBO Max, make a deliberate point to slow-drip their seasons, but most streaming channels will release entire seasons in one shot. You don’t need to worry about your audience missing an episode because they have 24/7 access to all the episodes all at once. And for the most part, they’re designed to be binged. They start at full speed and they don’t slow down to keep driving you to the finale. 

Do I think the procedural is ever going to go away? No. As much talk as there is about dropping the cop drama from TV all together, I think audiences still love a good mystery series. And you can’t just think of procedurals as cop dramas either - a procedural also covers most if not all sitcoms. New Girl, Letterkenny, Parks and Rec, Superstore - these all have a premise that doesn't change from week to week. They may make tiny shifts away from what they set up in the pilot, but by and large, you know what you’re getting into any time you turn on an episode. I think we as an audience still like that kind of familiarity. We may be seeing a bigger swing towards more serialized content, but that doesn't mean that the procedural is dead and gone. 

So that’s what we’ve got for Supernatural - two dudes, driving around in a car full of spears and hand guns, killing bad guys. Some day, they may even find that father that’s missing. What could possibly go wrong? A lot. Stay tuned. 

[comradesummers]

top 5 moments of xander-provided levity

Wow, this is a really cool question. For as many issues that I have with Xander’s character, one of the main attributes of his that I really connect with (and a reason that I have such a love-hate relationship with him) is his desperation for levity in terrifying circumstances, if only to retain a level of calm and allow himself and others to feel at least somewhat grounded. I think that’s something we can all relate to in these apocalyptic times (like a lot of people on this website, I am currently in quarantine), so I really appreciate this ask. 

5. “Say hi for me.”

This one’s during Innocence, and Willow’s in the library having a phone call with a panicked Buffy who still hasn’t found Angel, leading to this conversation:

Willow: No. Don’t eve say that! Angel is not dead.

Xander: Say hi for me. 

It’s just so random and casual, and for some reason it never fails to make laugh. 

4. “Does the council reimburse for that kind of stuff?”

This is from Enemies, an episode that spends most of its runtime trying to trick the audience into believing that Angel’s turned bad again. In that context, the entire scene of Xander describing how he bribed Willy the Snitch is especially delightful. But I love this part in particular, because with this throwaway line, Xander is officially the only character who ever suggests the Council should maybe provide the Scoobies some funding, which might actually make him the most sensible one out of all of them (it also might be telling that he’s the only one to do so given his working class roots, but maybe I’m reading too much into it).

3. “Just think of me as …  as your …  You know, I’m searching for supportive things, and I’m comin’ up all bras.”We really don’t give season 5 credit for just how depressing it is. Like everyone talks about season 6, but season 6 only exists because season 5 was so traumatic for everyone that they pretty much had to address the aftermath.

So, anyway, Buffy’s just dropped out of college in order to take care of Dawn, and Xander’s offering her his support, which is adorable. He says to Buffy “Welcome to the real world” because out of all of the young characters, he’s the only one with any real, adult career experience (not including Anya because she basically got a job by pestering Giles until he offered her one, which is amazingly on brand, but generally not how it works for people who aren’t Anya). But he doesn’t say it in a mean or superior way. He says that and then immediately tells Buffy that he’ll be there for her no matter what she chooses. He’s offering to help because he knows he can be helpful and it’s really lovely. Plus, it shows some of his own character growth in the confidence he displays about his life and career choices, which is also great to see.

And the line about bras is especially cute because it actually makes Buffy, who is understandably pretty upset at the moment, crack up a little. And you can tell that he says it specifically because he wants to make her laugh, and it’s just really cute and I love it a lot.

2. “If you have to go to the bathroom, it’s to your left. If you don’t have to go to the bathroom, picture what you’re about to face. Better to go now.”This one’s from Chosen and it’s just such a dad thing to say. I love it. It’s also definitely Xander passing on wisdom he’s gained from past experiences which makes it even funnier.

1. Xander proposing to Anya in The Gift

It feels kind of awkward to include this one, much less give it the top spot, since we all know how that entire situation played out. Also, this may not even count, seeing as it’s Xander providing levity in more of a meta way, as opposed to him actively making a joke in order to lighten the mood. But I kind of have to go with this one because of how emotional it made me when I first watched it. Which is funny, because I am by no means a Xander/Anya shipper. Like I don’t hate that ship like a lot of people do, but before Hell’s Bells (an episode that made me so viscerally angry that I’ve never once been able to bring myself to rewatch it), I rarely gave them much thought as a couple. 

But I think this moment hit me so hard during The Gift because it’s an episode that really focuses on just how exhausted the Scoobies are. They’ve stopped so many apocalypses (still not sure if that’s the plural) and yet the world seems determined to end, and they don’t know if they can manage to keep their heads above water anymore.

So in that context, having Xander make that cute, funny proposal to Anya is already such a breath of fresh air. But more than that, Xander’s speech is pretty much the only genuine expression of hope in the entire episode. While he may have fucked it up in the end, I truly believe that he believes, in that moment, that the world won’t end, and that he will live a long and silly life, and that he will have a future with Anya. He believes that happiness is possible for them and he wants to pursue that, even under the circumstances. It just gets me that out of all them, he’s the one that manages to hold onto hope. It really makes me believe that he’s the heart of the Scoobies, and it’s also a message that I think we all need to hear every now and again.

[theboywhocriedbooks]

How to Be Remy Cameron by Julian Winters

[Goodreads]

Everyone on campus knows Remy Cameron. He’s the out-and-gay, super-likable guy that people admire for his confidence. The only person who may not know Remy that well is Remy himself. So when he is assigned to write an essay describing himself, he goes on a journey to reconcile the labels that people have attached to him, and get to know the real Remy Cameron.

Thoughts:

I met Julian Winters in 2019 while I was helping out at YALLWEST. He’s super nice and I was looking forward to checking out his books, mainly because I knew they had queer characters of color at their forefront. I decided to start with this book and I am so happy that I did because it was so damn good! So much of it is about identity, obviously but also the ways identity interacts with things like friendship, love, and school. The characters all felt very fleshed out and were so lovely, and there is a cute dog so that’s always a plus! There were so many important themes/ideas shared throughout this book and some of them were a bit heavy-handed but that’s completely fine. I love heavy-handed things. My view is this: this book is for young adults and many young adults really need to hear these things told to them directly in a way that often isn’t in popular media. That they’re valid, that queerness is okay and comes in many forms, that people of color can be queer, that racial fetishization isn’t okay, etc. ALSO! The main character AND his love interest both are not white and that brings me so much joy (that I’ll go on about later!) The point is, if this sounds a little like it might interest you then you gotta pick it up now! Going to go on about it in SPOILER-Y DETAIL BELOW: _______________________________________ I loved this. Lucy was my favorite friend but I think I could have liked Rio more had she been in it a little more beyond their fight but Lucy was just generally really good. I loved the cast of characters because most of them felt so individual. Well, I would say that there was a set of twins that really fell on the sideline but aside from that everyone was so fleshed out. I loved his family because they were so warm and felt really close, which was important to his character as an adopted kid. The birth sister, Free, was so good too though. She didn’t even have too many scenes but I felt the connection and I loved it when she would talk about their birth mother. It was just such an interesting and complex situation to be in and I thought it was handled honestly and very well. The other best character was obviously Clover.

Ian was so good. I had a playful friend crush on someone named Ian in high school so I did think of him lol. I really liked Ian and Remy’s relationship though. It was a lot less dramatic than relationships I’ve read in YA and I appreciated that. They were friends and connecting so it was nice. I appreciated the honesty in the book generally but especially between these characters. The lack of drama was really in them being pretty honest during certain moments instead of stewing too much. It was just cute. They had lots of little moments, like the cafeteria whisper, the pool, the walking the dog talks, etc and it felt very natural. As I previously mentioned, it feels so good to see an author of color writing two queer characters of color romantically involved. We all know how white the media can be but even when they do give us, say, a gay Black character, they then give him a white boyfriend. So often, that’s what happens. But not here, and I loved it. It really reflects my own experience as a qpoc and that always feels good since it is so rare.

I did say things were heavy-handed but again, I do think things NEED to be heavy-handed at times. Especially since certain ideas aren’t directly addressed too often that when it is addressed, it can feel almost clunky. I thought it was very well done here though. An extension of that, I really appreciated how diverse the cast of characters was. It felt very natural. 

The topic of identity was so big, understandably. I love an introspective narrative and I thought this one was set up well — Black gay guy adopted into a white family, there really are so many identities at play there alone. Then you add his relationships with people (friends, family, birth family) and the pressure of school?! It was intense and I enjoyed watching Remy explore these certain aspects of himself and trying to understand them or how others view them perhaps.

Outside of the heavy-handed comments, I did see a few critiques online for this book. One was the Harry Potter references but I was okay with them despite my current feelings about that franchise but I can understand the annoyance there. He also made Buffy references and I’m obsessed with Buffy so that made up for it to me lol. A lot of more serious critical comments were about the references to the main character getting a boner. It was referenced directly and indirectly a handful of times and it did catch my eye. My response to that, as a person who has a penis, is that boners happen literally all of the time and so that’s life. I just think people are uncomfortable with the writer referencing it because it so rarely is talked about in YA. Like periods or condoms lol. The last big critique I saw was around the outing of a character. After the MC spends the whole book emphasizing he can’t out his love interest, a side character randomly reveals her bother (the school loner) is “demisexual and not straight”. Reviews/thoughts I saw about this question the characters agency over his identity, especially since we never actually see him speak. I did feel like this was a fumble.

Overall, I think it’s a fun and almost perfect book. It made me smile and laugh and I can’t wait for little queer Black boys and queer boys of color to read it. I hope you enjoyed it too!

[dictacontrion]

What tv show influenced you the most?

Hmm, you know anon, my first instinct was to say Buffy, but I think it’s actually Xena: Warrior Princess. 

I started watching Xena as a youngin’ and was so struck by a few things about the show. 

Here was this protagonist who was a woman who took up space, who never questioned the obviousness of walking into a room or sitting down at a table and standing tall, spreading out, taking up whatever room she needed to move comfortably through the world. 

Who had done terrible things and was given the room to change and grow, who was seen as important enough and worthy and valuable enough to be given room to have her own story, her own evolution. And not because she was good or obedient or desirable, but because she was strong and smart and willing to try. 

Who was motivated by changing, by learning, by becoming better - and who was NOT motivated by that because of a love interest, but because it was the right thing to do, and she had been shown mercy and kindness and justice, and aspired to mercy and justice and kindness. 

Who was motivated by her own internal compass, rather than by being liked. 

Who kicked some fucking ass. As a fighter, yes, but also as a strategist and a diplomat. 

And who was still allowed to be funny! And to have fun!

Who was totally at ease dealing with the actual pantheon of Greek deities and warlords. Who was threatened, who people tried to silence, and who did a lot of looking back at them like “Really? You think you can shut me up? You actually think you can accomplish that? Or offer me anything more important than my own voice?” 

Whose relationships with women were the most central parts of her life. Who was just not all that concerned with men. Who had friends and allies who were men, and treated them with respect and friendship and cared about them and was sometimes flirtatious or romantically involved with them, but who didn’t change herself even one little bit to make herself more palatable to them. 

Who had this relationship with another woman that seemed a whole lot like the queer relationships I was seeing IRL - their camaraderie, their intimacy, their ease with one another. Tbh, the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle never read as especially subtextual to me; they just seemed like a queer couple who we were mostly seeing in public spaces and who were as intimate as any other couple I saw on TV, talking drowsily to each other and spooning together. And I felt pretty certain that I was watching a queer storyline on TV and, even beyond that, a queer love story that was about real understanding and depth and adoration and support and passion and desire, that gave the characters room to grow as people, that freed them from the constraints of stereotypical womanhood and helped them become more themselves, that felt just really wonderful in a lot of ways. 

Who was, to my young eyes, allowed to build a life with - to love and to center her life around that love for - another woman, without giving anything up, without becoming less extraordinary or determined or valuable or good. Who was able to build a life with a woman who was her equal, who was also phenomenal, and to have that relationship make both of their lives so much better.

Who traveled the world and learned new things and and slipped up in big ways and kept trying and trying. Who did not ever think she would ever be perfect, but kept trying anyway. 

And! The same was true for Xena’s main love interest, who was a woman! 

And for her arch-nemesis, who was a woman. And they dressed and spoke and moved differently, and they wanted different things, but they all, all of them, were motivated by their own needs and beliefs and histories, they all grew and learned, they all took up space. And it was that capaciousness and complexity, that made them worthy of each other’s attention. That made them worthy of greatness. 

It was this show that didn’t center Christianity, that didn’t center heterosexuality, that didn’t center heteronormative femininity, that showed women who had strength and intelligence and wisdom and perspective and humor and loyalty and foibles and sexuality and sexual agency and friendship and beliefs and conviction and autonomy and agency. That didn’t reward women for forcing themselves to become quieter and smaller - that rewarded women for being braver and bolder and truer to themselves. 

And I think parts of that stuck, and holy fuck am I ever glad that they did. And it’s not that those are things that I learned from the show. Those are very much things I learned from the awesome real women in my real life, and I doubt Xena would’ve stuck in the same way, vs seeming like pure fantasy, if I wasn’t surrounded by women who had real full lives and who did awesome things just because they wanted to and who took up space and some of whom had queer relationships. But the show did help me learn that it wasn’t just the women I knew, and it did help me see that there was a much wider world out there that could appreciate and admire a woman who was all of these things, and it made it something that I could see just sitting at home, that I could take in in a different way. 

It was also the very first show I was a fannish fan of, all sitting on the dial-up looking up Xena/Gabrielle slash on the Pink Rabbit consortium and discovering all these smart stories, and that all these author people around the world saw and valued the same things I did. And also, fandom has generally worked out pretty well for me, as a thing I’m glad I’ve had in my life. 

I’ve tried watching the show again as an adult, and to my older, contemporary eyes, it has a lot of very cringe moments in its OTT kitschy campiness (not that I don’t love a bit of camp; I do, it’s just…very 90s in this certain way?), in its approach to cultural exchange/appropriation, in its whiteness even whilst telling stories set in the Mediterranean and Middle East and North Africa, in its centering of Eurocentric history. It’s an imperfect show. But the ways we consume fiction are complex, and it can simultaneously be a show that was imperfect and that did some really, really wonderful things, and that I’m grateful for. 

So anyway anon: Xena: Warrior Princess.

[ifeveristoday]

we have always sent children into war

Something I’ve appreciated about Jordie’s writing for the Boom!verse is how consistent she’s been with building on characters and themes - when I think she’s dropped a plot point, it asserts itself in the next issue. While there have definitely been threads that are a little too exposition happy, or heavy-handed attempts at Whedonesque dialogue, on the whole - she understands and sees the earnest heartbeat of the show and infuses her own spin on Sunnydale and its inhabitants. Buffy was a show about human fears and anxieties given form as monsters and curses and a hero’s journey paralleled with a coming of age story.

But it was also a story about a war - the Slayer versus the darkness. Over seven years, Buffy and her friends and family fought and tested their own boundaries and capabilities for darkness and the pursuit of power.

In the Boom!verse, the idea of legacy has been stated from issue one - Buffy has her obvious calling, and Giles has his life long training to be a Watcher, and then Buffy’s watcher. Neither of them is automatically good at it and they’re still figuring what their legacies will ultimately be.

In issue 11, legacy comes back in the form of a conversation between Rose, Kendra and Robin.

Rose is a military brat from a military family - her father and her grandfather both chose it as a career. She shrugs off Kendra’s admiration for her family history by saying that it’s all become second nature and there’s really nothing special about it.

Then she asks Kendra about her father - and Kendra dismisses him as a deadbeat that she doesn’t care about because he didn’t care about her. That she’s discovered there are more important things that concern her - namely her calling as a Slayer.

Robin’s sudden interjection that if there are more important things, why are Rose and Kendra chatting away like besties on a date than - getting to the bottom of the fuckery that’s beset Sunnydale?

Rude, Robin. Also sometimes people just want to live and not dwell on the horrors of life, okay?

It’s also clearly projection: Robin has a loving dad who cares deeply about him - but he also has an apparently long-festering resentment over 1) his mom dying because of her Calling and leaving him, 2) despite ‘Slayer blood running through his veins,’ none of his training matters because the Council didn’t choose him to be a Slayer (is that even possible? #releasethelorejordie) and instead he’s...settled into being a Watcher. His legacy isn’t to follow his mother’s path, and his second nature doesn’t make him ‘special’ enough to do so. So to listen to Rose and Kendra being so casual about their own legacies --- well, it triggers his insecurities, which I’m sure is not helped by the evil toxic masculinity Rage Sweats that have been infecting all the men lately.

Is it a super heavy-handed metaphor for how performative/peer pressured ideals of masculinity is damaging to everyone? and to have the Hellmouth emit evil pheromones causing this a gloss over for real societal problems? 

Probably.

But also TVBuffy fought a literal penis headed monster and Xander ate part of his school mascot while under the influence of a wild hyena spirit and also split into two selves trying to figure out which one was the real him and whatever the fuck the episode Billy was, so I’m going to give Jordie a pass here.

When Kendra calls him out on his overreaction, yet still calling him Mr. Wood (acknowledging her more traditional character and respect for the Council), he loses it completely when she tells him to not go off on his own - it’s dark and also it’s Sunnydale where people die in inexplicable evil-adjacent ways.

He retorts that he doesn’t need a mother and that he doesn’t need you -

hello, Parental issues. It wouldn’t be a Whedonverse adjacent property without someone’s parental issues. Robin is wrong of course - he does need Kendra because he’s her Watcher, and he’s (understandably) mad about his mother.

Rose and Kendra puzzle over Robin’s sudden hulk rage, but go back to figuring out what’s rotten in Sunnydale and how much Buffy’s absence is felt - even though they’re auxiliary Scoobies at this point, Buffy is what brought them together. Kendra brings up the general loneliness of a Slayer - she has to keep her identity secret, she doesn’t generally ask for help re: Life things, and the regimented nature of Slayerhood really makes me think about the similarities to a soldier’s life.

And Rose being a soldier’s child would be the perfect person to empathize with. I don’t have personal experience, but I do have friends who have served in different branches - and when I was living overseas, the country I lived in had mandatory army service for the men. 

I’m not going to get in too deep about the whole troubling military complex that America has and how the business of war built this country or how it preys disproportionately on POC and lower-income people, or how when veterans come back, the services in place for them are lacking and how in general soldiers are good people who believed in the ideals of peace and protection while the realities don’t often match up with the propaganda...but you know. 

Slayers are child soldiers who are sworn to protect a world at large that doesn’t know they exist or what they really do. But it also goes along with the real-world tradition of sending children into war - in the US [currently], you can legally join at 18 without a parent’s permission or 17 with a parent’s permission.

Think about back in history, before 18 was considered a legal adult.

So we have always sent children into war - but Jordie really emphasizes that the Scoobies are children fighting something they don’t really understand, and there are no adults around (hello, Show also did this but also because Adults are not actually people in the 90s) to guide them, which adds to the anxiety.

Giles is all Rage Sweated out, Jenny is probably taking well deserved time for grading papers and chilling with her cat (h/t @jenny-calendar) and it’s up to Xander and Willow, as the OG Scoobies to figure out what to do, now that Buffy’s disappeared.

And oh, her disappearance has taken an emotional and physical toll - Xander’s been patrolling every night, with some assistance from Willow - it doesn’t seem like she’s been doing it nightly though. He’s tired and upset, and Willow’s upset she didn’t get to say goodbye to Buffy and they’re both hurting in their own ways and also not talking about what’s really bothering them, which is only tangentially connected to Buffy’s disappearance.

Willow and Xander’s bond has always been a key element to their characterizations and relationships with others - they’ve been ride or die from childhood, and now that they’re sharing a soul has made this closeness even more significant.

Which means when they fight, it’s to the bone. Xander’s previous issues of feeling lonely and ignored by others - and not being listened to manifests itself against Willow’s need to share and vent, but not actually listen - it gets ugly really fast.

Xander accuses Willow of being selfish and the reason she broke up with Rose is that she couldn’t handle the mundane realities of working hard at a relationship when she had the more exciting side-gig of fighting at Buffy’s side - which Willow angrily denies. Xander then rips into Willow’s need to be praised and liked, and suddenly brings up the possibility that she’s doing this to impress Buffy, which is stupid because she’s not here and also, she won’t ever make the gay love with you -

and Willow calls him out on his need for love and validation, that he falls for any girl who’ll give him ‘the least amount of attention.’

And Xander vamps out - if this is what Willow really thinks, that she’s always seen him something pathetic

which snaps both of them out of their fight.

Xander admits he only goes vampface when he’s really angry and he can’t always control it, but when he is - he feels better. Which is really concerning.

Xander goes on to say when he’s human, the anger has been harder to ignore, that there’s something dark calling to him and it makes him want to hurt Willow - and she confesses that she’s been feeling weird all the time as well.

Is their soul tie working against them? 

And the fact that Xander in vampface feels more comfortable than when he’s being human and more prone to Rage Sweats -- that’s gotta be significant.

Kendra interrupts their heart to heart and tackles Xander to the ground, which leads to a few bits of hilarious misunderstandings, but also the bombshell that Buffy is dead.

According to Robin, a new Slayer is only called when the previous one dies - which means Buffy must have died.

There goes my whole ‘they are a slayer theory’ but I was expecting it to go that way. In an earlier post - or possibly just a conversation with @jenny-calendar, I was thinking out loud that because Buffy has passed into the Hellmouth, she is no longer of the living plane, so she’s considered ‘dead’ aboveground. Obviously, she is not dead no matter what the misleading summaries future comics say, but she is not among the living.

Semantics aside, everyone is fucked up from hearing this - Willow and Xander turn on Robin, insisting he’s wrong and that it’s a sick joke, which causes Robin’s final form: teary-eyed Rage Hulk Hellmouth McGuffin. He says he didn’t ask for any of this, that he’s already lost so much - his mother, Buffy (which seems rather strange considering he was blanking her the whole time after he infiltrated her friend group and there didn’t seem to be any more flirting/sparkage in the lead up to Hellmouth) and more importantly - his chance to be a Slayer.

He’s railing against the fact he’s stuck with a Slayer that doesn’t know what a real vampire is, that there’s nothing special about her - and it’s obvious that even though his words are coming from a dark ugly place, there’s the feeling that Robin feels entitled to his rage and disappointment.

Kendra’s aware something’s gravely wrong with Robin and tells him calmly that she doesn’t want to hurt him but like every villain at the peak of missed-redemption moment, he says he feels perfect. And the last bits of rationality exit his body and he calls on the Evil Bro Squad to surround the Scoobies.

And triggers Xander’s kill switch - apparently the darkness that Xander’s human side was feeling? That’s because his demon soul is tied to the soul that infected all the men of Sunnydale and turned them into misogynistic meat puppets.

Dunn dun dun -- it’s the Hellmother.

Xander pushes back, but he’s disturbed by how strong it feels and what’s keeping him from going completely evil Frat boy?

Kendra tells them they have to fight and they’ll figure out the details later - and they’re doing their last stand in some stunning colored horror-inspired panels and it doesn’t look good for our heroes when....

WHACK.

Anya brains Robin with a croquet mallet like some white-suited queen of hearts and snarks, “Great. Now I have to fight teenagers to save the world again.”

A surprise boss appears - is Anya going to be the final Adult and help the Scoobies out of the mess they’re in?

Did she even really leave? Was that rabbit that was skulking in the grass from earlier issues really her?

Once more, Jordie leaves us on a cliffhanger.

[sophygurl]

Hi! I was just browsing through my activity and noticed that after I responded to your ask about ships a while back, you reblogged and shared your thoughts about Spuffy. I'm so glad you were able to read my opinions and understand them, even if you didn't agree with them. I just wanted to stop by and ask what your thoughts and feelings are on Spuffy? I'd love to hear your perspective :)

Oh wooooow, you have no idea how happy you just made me! I feel like I talk about spuffy quite a lot but without ever really saying much of anything because inside of me it’s just a lot of (!!!!!>?>>?!!?!>fjhghhf?!?!?!?!!?) YKWM? Like feels central exploding all over the place and it’s really difficult for me to put into coherent words. 

But I’ve also been wanting and meaning to write some serious spuffy meta and kinda dissect what it all means to me personally, as a survivor, for some time now. And like. Especially with all of this purity culture stuff coming to a head, it feels like a good time to take the time to try and do it because, yea, shit not only doesn’t have to be pure to be helpful - but sometimes the darker stuff IS the Most helpful. 

And I really did appreciate your perspective about the relationship because you talked about the ways in which it did and didn’t work for you without ever shaming anyone for the way it does work for them? And I wish we could all do that more. 

So thank you so much for sending me this ask, and asking for my perspective because sometimes all it takes for me to finally settle down and write something I wanna write anyways is to be asked by someone else to do it! 

This is absolutely gonna get long so have a read more cut.

For context, let me start by saying that I didn’t watch Buffy when it first aired - it was, mmm, I wanna say about 10-11 years ago when I decided to try it out. And while I was watching it, I was also in the midst of doing some heavy duty therapy work on my PTSD stemming from childhood sexual abuse and then some further traumas in my young adulthood that happened because of poor processing of said abuse. I’m not gonna get into details about my personal traumas except for some specific ways in which they relate to the lens in which I watched and processed the relationship between Buffy and Spike. BUT, due to that lens, there very well may be triggery content in this post. 

My experience watching Buffy, in general, started out with me being really unsure what the draw was in season 1 and then slowly getting more involved in the characters and relationships and mythos as the series developed into a more mature and nuanced show. I was really hooked by season five, and season six is my favorite, with seven a close second. 

I liked Buffy, the character, okay in the beginning but it wasn’t until she started really going through and processing her traumas that I started to personally connect to her. So season six was like, my jam. She was raw and stripped down to the nerve, and cycling between like outright rage to pure numbness and just lashing out trying desperately to feel and to make sense of her experiences and I was like - yea, Buffy, same, Same. And then in season seven she starts really contextualizing her trauma and using the pain of it to give herself more power and then sharing that power with others and it was just … fuck, I can’t even begin to tell you what that meant to me. In that last episode, I felt her handing me back my OWN power - like I FELT it - it really … anyway. We’ll get there.

And then there was Spike, who I loved right away. I love me some snarky villains. I love me the bad boy who has hidden depths inside of him. I love the villain who doesn’t … really fit the mold of the other villains in-verse. I love the villain who doesn’t mind working with the heroes if it fits his agenda. Basically, Spike was fictional catnip for me right out of the gate.

I adored Spike and Drusilla together for a lot of reasons, but for Spike to develop beyond just Big Bad, he had to fall out of her orbit, so I was okay with that ending.

On the other hand, I was never into Buffy and Angel. Watching the series as an adult, it just felt creepy to me how this old vampire basically stalked a very innocent-seeming to me teen Buffy. Their romance reminded me of girls I knew who fell for older guys when I was in high school where the older guy seemed sort of dangerous and mysterious and I get the draw from Her perspective - but not necessarily his? I don’t know, I just personally never really bought them being truly in love - they were sort of practice relationships for one another? Her as a young teenager, and him as someone just starting to re-learn humanity. I never Disliked them together… I just never shipped it. The idea of them being one another’s One True Love’s was just sorta meh to me. 

So when Spike started having his crush on Buffy? I was so ready for that. Because it was so silly at first, right? It was not serious. It was creepy and weird and wrong. But in a way that appealed to me. 

How do I explain? I guess, it had to do with all of the reasons that Spike was Not Like All The Other Villains/Vampires. Angel was always different but ONLY because he was cursed with a soul. It was a thing done TO him and when he reverted back to Angelus he was literally a whole different person and did not have any desire to turn back into Angel. When he was Angel, he was all brooding and guilt-ridden and terrified of his other self. 

But Spike was always different just because he was different. This didn’t mean he had a soul or a capacity for love or the ability to be a Good Guy. It just meant he worked a little differently than the other vampires. I truly think he loved and was devoted to Dru. I don’t think she was capable of returning that love in the same way. 

So, anyway, Spike is back and he’s split with Dru because Dru could just … tell … something was off and Spike was wanting to deny that but then suddenly - crush! Not love, not attraction, not lust, not desire - a freaking schoolboy crush.

But of course it was creepy because hello - soulless vampire who has never had a healthy relationship of any kind in his LIFE. But he starts doing these odd things, like wanting to comfort Buffy when he sees that she’s upset and being willing to take care of Dawn when no one else was available and HE doesn’t get it either, but somehow he’s becoming a slightly more decent person because of this weirdass crush? 

IDK, that’s appealing.

And let me clarify. It’s not appealing to me because I see myself in the Good Girl who can make a Bad Boy into a better person. That is never what’s appealed to be about these types of relationships. 

In large part because of my abuse, I see different layers of myself in each character. 

I went through a large portion of my life pretending very hard to be a Good Girl and then when I finally came out of denial about the abuse realized that was because inside I felt like a very Bad Girl and then as I pursued more recovery realized it’s all a lot more complex than that but really I’ve been more of a Decent Person who felt like a Bad Person trying really hard to be a Good Person. I hope that makes sense.

But the point is. I see myself in both the Good and the Bad characters in these sorts of push-pull love-hate dynamic relationships.

And what I love about spuffy, specifically, is that they’re both … both. Eventually. I’m getting ahead of myself. But yes, Spike suddenly wanting to be decent here and there because of his weird developing feelings for Buffy appealed to me - and especially to part of me that feels Bad. I’m Spike in this scenario, not Buffy. 

But I’m also Buffy, being really grossed by this Bad Person’s interest in me. When Buffy throws her money at Spike and says he’s not good enough for her - that’s me hating myself and saying I’m not good enough. But it’s also, strangely, me taking a stand and saying I’m worth better than the ways in which I was treated.

Gods, this whole abuse recovery dichotomy can be so confusing to explain because like. I never abused anyone. But the ugliness I feel inside of myself has to do with what happened to me, and also with what I know people in my family have done to others. So there’s this idea of Badness there. And the idea of there being forgiveness and redemption for that Badness is very very appealing.

And at the same time? There’s this beauty inside of myself that I always thought I was faking but that it turns out - is fucking real and precious and important. And standing up for that broken beautiful part of myself and saying no to being used and abused again is so powerful.

So in that scene? I’m the ugliness in Spike being hated by Buffy but I’m ALSO the powerful beauty in Buffy standing up for herself.

You can maybe see how this all gets even more tangled up the further we go, yea?

So Spike gets chipped and becomes a part of the team - all the while simultaneously reminding them that he’s still a Bad Guy AND slowly becoming a slightly better person because of his interactions with them and his feelings for Buffy. He’s not even close to redeemed, okay, he’s still a villain. He’s just a more and more intriguing villain, an anti-villain, even, eventually.

And then season six. And Buffy comes back. And she’s broken and raw and needing something that her friends cannot give her. She is needing to connect to the darkness inside of herself, and who is waiting there for her? 

And so yea, okay, hatesex is very appealing to me just inandofitself. It’s like double the passion and it’s animalistic and there’s something so sexy and gratifying about two people just using one another with equal force, yk? 

And Spike and Buffy are physically matched perfectly. She can take all her anger and pain and rage out on him without permanently damaging him. And she’s NEVER been able to let loose like that before. Her first time with Angel was a more tender and sweet moment and then - welp - turns out they can’t do the do. And otherwise she’s been with humans who she’s had to hold back with. There was zero holding back with Spike. 

So from Buffy’s perspective, there’s this amazing relief and release and yea, even, empowerment in being able to just freely let herself go in this way. 

From Spike’s point of view, it was about more. And here is where I feel for him because, at this point he’s still not really capable of love in the way we talk about it as being something from a soul. He’s chipped but not soul’d. He has strong feelings for Buffy that no vampire (besides cursed-soul Angel) should be able to have. But it’s not … quite … love. It’s passion and it’s care and it’s wanting and it’s even becoming something like friendship. But it’s not love, much as he thinks it is.

But he does Think it is. And he’s thinking it’s the same for her, but she just can’t admit it, yet. The hatesex to him … is just  … sex. And he fully believes he’s winning her over. And so her constant rejection of him as a fully human person with a soul and feelings guts him - even as he’s still trying to convince himself that he does love her and she does somehow secretly love him back. 

The fact that she keeps using him physically, and also keeps coming to him for emotional support, supports this belief and keeps him from understanding the reality of the situation.

Now, I think I mentioned than when I was watching this for the first time I was in heavy duty therapy mode yea? Well, there was another even heavier duty therapy mode a good tenish years prior when I had first admitted to the abuse I experienced and got really good and fucked up and made some bad personal decisions and here is where some of that comes to play because I saw myself in this scenario - again from both sides.

I am Buffy learning to enjoy the pleasures of my body and sexuality for the first time but also making really bad decisions about who to share that with because I am still so new to processing my trauma.

I am also Spike - longing for something more and better and being told (by myself) that I was not good enough, that I was bad, that I was not a full human person who deserved good things or good relationships.

(There, there, pastme - it does get better)

Back to first-time-Buffy-watching me. And I am enjoying the HECK out of the spuffy sex and I am feeling for poor pining Spike and feeling for Buffy who is hating herself for what she’s doing and also shipping them like WHOA because there is so much about their dynamic that is just sexy and fun and FEELS everywhere. 

But I knew Seeing Red was coming, because I did have a few things spoiled for me just by existing in the world for years without having watched the show yet myself. I really didn’t wanna watch it, or the rest of season six. So I got into a spiral of just watching the earlier parts of the season over and over - specifically the musical and through the 3 episodes of heavy spuffy sex. I did a LOT of processing during this time and then eventually girded myself to watch what I knew was coming. 

And Seeing Red is awful. Traumatic. Triggering. Terrible. But also, like, gods, did it make sense for where these two characters were at this point in time? I didn’t feel like it was contrived or somehow put in just for the heck of it. It made sense in the narrative. Spike legitimately just did not get it. He did not realize he was attempting rape until … finally … he did. 

And the horror of that, the horror of realizing that he almost did that to the ONE person in the world that he has ever cared that much about? Broke him. Sent him off on a magical quest to get his fucking soul back.

No one did that. Even Angel was Cursed with his soul, right? No vampire ever wanted to get their soul back - even had enough non-ensouled feelings to have the ability to want such a thing. Not to mention going through the trials of actually getting it back.

Season seven Spike is such a different beast. He’s messed up from the soul-thing, but I honestly believe Most of his messed-up-ness came from what The First was doing to/through him. Because … gods, okay.

When Spike goes through the flashbacks and recognizes what his trigger is? (Like the show legit uses PTSD terminology here - it was a Trigger) He processes his Own old traumas and he is able to tell Robin basically - fuck it, I know who I am. I know I did terrible things without my soul, but I can’t and won’t beat myself up for that (for example the way Angel does) because it wasn’t entirely my fault and all I can control now is who I am now and what I do now.

Now THAT spoke to me as a trauma survivor. Stop hanging on to all of this so-called badness inside, forgive yourself, and move on. WOW. Fucking powerful. 

And what he DOES choose to do is to be there for Buffy in any way she will allow him to.

Ensouled Spike is no longer creeping around her or making weird assumptions about her or trying to Get something From her. Ensouled Spike defends her when others attack. Ensouled Spike holds her all night when she needs it and gives her pep talks and asks what he can do to help and accepts when he can’t help and just stands there quietly willing to do battle With her. 

I just … phew… that makes me emotional. 

Because, again, I look back at some of those dysfunctional relationships I got into in my early 20′s and like. None of those fuckers would have done anything like that. 

And my attraction to the Fictional Bad Boy with a Hidden Heart of Gold was never about expecting any of them to. I was with them, unconsciously or even some cases consciously, on purpose to punish myself or to work out past traumas with or just to Feel Something. I never expected or even necessarily wanted deep love from them.

So, here’s the thing. None of those fuckers would have done anything like that for me. Nor I them. 

So Spike slowly gaining his redemption through his willingness to become a better person because of his love of Buffy? Fucking spoke to me.

And Buffy slowly accepting the darker parts of herself through her willingness to let Spike into her orbit because of her feelings for him? Fucking yes. 

And when she hands him the - shit it’s been a long time - that medallion meant for a champion? And he doesn’t think he’s worthy, but she says she knows he is. Fuck!!! That is ME accepting ME, okay? All of myself, the good and the bad, the ugly and the beautiful, the messed up and the slowly healing. All of it. 

And when he sacrifices himself in the end??? When that’s how she’s finally able to defeat The First? All that power sharing with all of the other women was *chefkiss* but it also took Spike. Spike who stormed on the scene in season two with snark and a twisted sense of love and no desire to ever be a hero? That Spike!? Sacrificing himself and STILL NOT BELIEVING BUFFY LOVES HIM. 

Because by then, let’s be clear, she did. Maybe not the same way he loved her, but she did love him. And he doesn’t believe it, can’t believe himself worthy of that love. But he sacrifices himself ANYway?

THAT Spike? Is no longer asking anything in return. He gives all of himself and won’t even accept her statement of love in return. “No, you don’t. But thanks for saying it anyway.” Just AUGJH?!? You know??? 

That was me … redeeming me … for me…. 

So anyway. 

I just want to add that AS I WAS WRITING THIS OUT, I got another ask in my inbox stating “People who like problematic or villainous characters are apologist for shitty people and should rethink their life because they’re shitty people.”

And this is the exact WRONG time to come for me like this because I just poured out my entire traumatized abuse surviving soul into the internet to explain why watching a problematic villain evolve and learn to do better helped ME to contextualize and process my fucking trauma. So fuck you. People who write anonymous hate without knowing the full story are being shitty and should rethink their actions because they’re shitting on actual REAL LIFE COMPLEX INDIVIDUAL PEOPLE. 

The end. 

[anotherbadmovie]

Halloween 2019 Run-Down

Well, Halloween is well and truly over. It’s been a few years since we managed the one-a-day challenge, managing just 17 films this year, with a personal best of 33. The goal was quality over quality - let’s see how that goes...

1. The Invisible Man (1933)

Dir. James Whale

It is unreal how well this film holds up at 86 years old. Me and my girlfriend both enjoyed this film, and it’s down to James Whales undeniable craft and Claude Rain’s endlessly entertaining performance.

2. Friday the 13th (2009)

Dir. Marcus Nispel

I fell in to the same trap as I did with the Conan remake by being convinced, by a documentary on the franchise, that this would be worth my time. It’s not terrible but not nearly good enough to rival the charm the original series has just by virtue of being 80s crap rather than 2000s crap.

3. Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Dir. George A. Romero

I hadn’t realised how long it had been since I watched this. Maybe it was zombie-fatigue, or maybe that I usually throw on Night of the Living Dead this time of year. DotD is just a brilliantly crafted film, and I feel like I fully appreciated the commentary on consumerism this time around, rather than just knowing that was what the film was “about”.

4. Scream 2 (1997)

Dir. Wes Craven

This was not nearly as good as I remember. My entire memory of this was the discussion of sequel tropes, and I think that brief moment of doing the thing Scream did was about all I enjoyed from it. While the original is as solid as ever in my opinon, even Buffy wasn’t enough to save this for me.

5. The Child (1977)

Robert Voskanian

A random purchase, this film was a gem of a find. Its low-budget 70s aesthetic really added to the atmosphere of this oddball movie and made some sequences especially creepy, tappinh into a truly nightmarish vibe so seldom found in cinema. Fans of Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things should make efforts to track this one down.

6. Candyman (1992)

Dir. Bernard Rose

Quickly realising this wasn’t standard slasher fare, the opening had me very excited for this film. However, it went on to do relatively little for me. I won’t deny it had some unsettling moments, I just felt it wasn’t holding together as satisfyingly as I wanted it to. Whilst I feel I should give this another chance, I doubt I will soon.

7. It (1990)

Dir. Tommy Lee Wallace

I’d never seen an It film. I found myself loving the original for its character work - rare in a horror film - and disturbing concept. For some reason the thought of being haunted by something your whole life really creeps me out. Despite its age and budget, the dual storyline and efforts taken to portray the personal impact of the horror in this film go a long way to make this very effective. Very chilling, very good.

8. The People Under the Stairs (1991)

Dir. Wes Craven

There are good things about this film but it suffers from very weak cinematography (like many 90s horror films) and the fact that satire in horror has been much more interesting and sophistacted in years previous to and since the making of this film.

9. Phantasm (1979)

Dir. Don Coscarelli

I was well aware I needed to revisit this often over-looked franchise which I have always championed. Way back when, I began with the sequel, which bowled me over, and then watched the original. My memories was that the 1979 film was a purer horror film with a very singular tone. Watching it again, it wasn’t the perfect nightmare I’d remembered but is still a must-see for its original aesthetic, unique storyline and chilling moments.

10. Hocus Pocus (1993)

Dir. Kenny Ortega

Despite being a recent addition to the roster, it wouldn’t be Halloween without Sarah Jessica Parker’s cleav- I mean... without Hocus Pocus.

11. Halloween (2018)

Dir. David Gordon Green

Originally wowed by this lovingly crafted follow up to the original Halloween I was concerned that a second viewing might bring me down without the benefit of my initial low expectations. Not so! The characters make this film, and the care taken to blend the old and the new is palpable. I still love this film and believe it’s about as a good as a Halloween sequel could be.

12. Phantasm II (1988)

Dir. Don Coscarelli

While Phantasm (1979), if not disappointing, wasn’t all I’d hoped for revisiting it Phantasm II was just as glorious as I remember. Gory, dreamy and mad as a box of frogs, I can’t recommend this enough and I maintain it works well having not seen the original (like my first time) as it only accentuates its nightmare-like rythm, wooziness and insanity.

13. The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942)

Dir. Erle C. Kenton

I knew this wasn’t going to live up the previous three but you can’t be a bit of Frankenstein for October, and Universal Monsters always hit the spot. What this film lacked in directorial tightness - Boris Karloff - it made up for with bombastic set pieces, wacky plot points and the return of a brilliant peformances by Lugosi as Igor.

14. Suspiria (1977)

Dir. Dario Argento

My thoughts on this film have changed a lot over the years. Initially, upon recommendations from people such as Mark Kermode, I adored it on first viewing, yet recent watches have left me thinking it no longer really did it for me. Viewing it on the big screen (for the second time), stepping in on a chance passing by the Prince Charles Cinema, I’ve come full circle to thinking it is (aside from visually beautiful) pretty perfect as a disturbing, hysterical, dream-like (original opinon, I know) fairytale for adults.

16. Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island (1998)

Dir. Jim Strenson

Whilst inevitably not as good as I remembered from my childhood, revisiting this was a perfectly seasonal treat and in spite of some ridiculousness its combination of hijinks and genuinely creepy moments definitely peg this as one of, if not the best of the Scooby Doo feature films.

17. Halloween (1978)

Dir. John Carpenter

I don’t fully understand why, but Halloween is a film I’ve changed my mind on massively over the years. Maybe it’s because I saw it, for the first time, long after all the other John Carpenter films I’d watched and loved, or maybe because so many films borrowed its formula that the impact of the original was diluted but those first few viewings left me lukewarm on the film. Yet over the years I have appreciated this film more and more, now to the point where - after this year’s Blu-Ray viewing - I think it’s pretty fucking perfect, remarkably atmospheric and actually very scary.

[ettadunham]

A Buffy rewatch 6x15 As You Were

aka don’t you want your trash?

Welcome to this dailyish (weekly? bi-weekly?) text post series where I will rewatch an episode of Buffy and go on an impromptu rant about it for an hour. Is it about one hyperspecific thing or twenty observations? 10 or 3k words? You don’t know! I don’t know!!! In this house we don’t know things.

And in today’s episode Riley’s back, which is awkward, but not as awkward as his wife’s characterization.

For an episode that was written by one of the show’s main writers, As You Were is also just generally riddled by some awkward dialogue and story choices. Although there are just as many scenes and elements that I love for that matter.

The episode starts with painting a picture of Buffy’s messy adult life. It’s also just so mundane in its horribleness. For instance, when I came home from work today, I barely had the energy to put on today’s episode to watch. (Going out with friends? In this economy?) I also definitely have tried washing a shirt I like with my hands to wear the next day (and ruined it in the process). And I may or may not have run after a garbage car with my trash at some point in my life.

And while I don’t have a kid sister I’m supposed to provide healthy nutrition to… I have a cat? And most of the time, I’m only able to give her the garbage-type of cat food, cause that’s all that’s available in the nearest store to us. That’s almost the same.

Anyway, the point is that it’s all very relatable… All but the sleeping with a vampire part, but we all have our coping mechanisms. Mine is writing gibberish about Buffy the Vampire Slayer at 10 pm.

But then Riley shows up, and the episode takes a bit of a turn. I get that they were going for a theme juxtaposing Buffy’s mundane sucky life and this heightened James Bond action spy fantasy, but that doesn’t really work when you drop most of those former elements at that point. When Riley arrives, Buffy just leaves work. That’s that. She never returns, and we don’t address that she just left in the middle of her shift without telling anyone.

Which works in a heightened spy fantasy, but ignores the previous context we set up for the episode. That’s kind of what I mean when I say that this theme of contrast isn’t really executed well for me.

Still, if you get through that, there’s a lot to like. Even stuff like Riley being kind of the worst.

Which he is here. He drags Buffy out of work to help him hunting down a demon, even though he has plenty of resources. Including his wife, who he fails to mention while falling into a flirty banter with Buffy. He even screws up by not telling Buffy what their mission is and that they aren’t supposed to kill the demon somehow??

Riley… my dude… my comically tall dude with your new cool face scar… there is no part of this that you haven’t fucked up.

But then his wife shows up and calls him out on his bullshit, and that makes it a whole lot better.

Sam herself becomes kind of an issue for me though. She’s cool, she’s understanding, she says the right thing to all the Scoobies who all instantly bond with her. It somehow manages to turn into an unintentional red-herring, as you wonder if she’s manipulating everyone around her. Maybe she’s this “Doctor”, our mysterious Bond villain! At the very least, she’s definitely up to something!

And then the episode ends, and you realize that no. She really was just written that way. That’s her entire character.

I don’t want to shit on Sam too much though, because she’s obviously supposed to be a subversion of the whole rival jealous other woman trope. And I appreciate that. I appreciate that Buffy came to like her, that Willow’s whole deal of “let me hate that girl for you because friendship” was mostly dropped after a moment of genuine connection, that Xander was inspired by Sam and Riley’s marriage… These are good ideas. I just wish that there was more to Sam’s character than that.

Instead what we get is a lot of awkward dialogue quickly trying to establish those connections, and it doesn’t really work for me. Plus, in the awkward dialogue department we also get other gems like “I got addicted like addicts do”, in case you forgot that Willow has a drug addiction metaphor arc. It’s very important that you remember that, even though the metaphor itself is awkward and only semi applies to her situation.

On a positive note, I’m pretty sure that the sweater Willow is wearing will also be worn by Dawn in s7. Ah yes, the magical moment when you’re old enough to start sharing wardrobe with your cool (lesbian) aunt.

And then there’s the whole Buffy and Spike thing. Which, honestly? This might be my favorite episode of their storyline this season.

I’ve been admittedly avoiding talking about it in too much detail this season, and I’m not sure that I’ll have a longer rant about it at any point. It’s not a healthy relationship at this point for either party, but my focus is obviously on my girl, Buffy. It’s always Buffy.

Buffy’s been using Spike as an escape, and Spike’s been abusing that perceived power over her. Spike’s been Buffy’s punch bag, who in turn manipulated and isolated her even further from her friends and family.

I always felt like the best of their Buffy and Spike’s relationship in any season came from their most honest moments. And in many ways, I don’t feel like they’ve been fully honest with each other recently – mostly because they haven’t been fully honest with themselves.

Here and now however, Buffy’s finally been able to have the strength to face these truths. Not just about Spike and his weird evil ways, but about herself. She admits out loud to Riley that she’s sleeping with Spike, and sure, that happens after Riley has seen them together already, but telling people stuff is an important part of processing them. That’s why therapy is good for you.

This of course already started when Buffy told Tara, but that was a moment of catharsis. This is one of acceptance. She can finally take a step back, and instead of getting caught up in her depression pit, she can begin to process her emotions and understand them.

She’s breaking things off with Spike not just because she realizes that she’s been fueling her own self-hatred through that relationship though, but because she made a choice to change. This is her first act of self-care this season.

And she’s honest to Spike about it. There’s something gentle and incredibly vulnerable about Buffy admitting that this relationship was killing her. That using him only made her feel worse about herself. She even calls him William to convey that same tone, to strip away all these distractions they built up trying to maintain the illusion.

Keep up with that self-care, Buff!! You’ll need it.

Meanwhile Xander and Anya are planning their wedding from hell. Sometimes literally. For now though, they’ve managed to stay positive about the future of their relationship.

For now.

[bluephoenixdruidicprincess]

Opinion about Buffy: The Vampire Slayer: Buffy is my favorite character on the show, her story is really good and I relate a lot with it, specially the early years, even though I'm a guy (but human experience can always be relatable, even if what happened to you is not exactly the same). Also, I love magic and magic wielding characters. I just wish that her sexuality arc was better planned, because she seems to have really felt love and attraction to Oz, so I think they should have made her bi.

I’m pretty sure you meant Willow on this ask and not Buffy, unless I’m forgetting something huge that happened between Oz and Buffy. But I’m sure there are people who did ship Buffy and Oz so maybe you did mean Buffy. But I’m thinking you most likely meant Willow as I know for a fact they were canonically involved.

I totally get you, by the way. Willow is a great character to relate to regardless of whatever you self-identify as. Society is on this really strange kick where, for whatever reason, you’re not allowed to relate to and like characters that aren’t exactly like you; you can only relate to characters that look like you or self-identify like you and this way of thinking has always felt a tad bit ridiculous to me. I understand and totally agree with the importance of more diverse representation but at the end of the day, I never needed a character to represent exactly like me in order to relate to them and like them. And it’s as you said, you can relate to characters even if your experiences are not always exactly the same. Particularly when I was growing up as a pre-teen and teenager, I had more of a propensity for enjoying male characters and that’s simply because at the time these stories were circulating, male characters were getting these storylines I related to more. But I never felt like I was a less of a woman for liking these male characters more than the female ones, they just had character arcs I was more interested in. So yeah, there’s nothing wrong with liking characters that don’t exactly represent you.

As I said, Willow was a great character and I completely understand you. She was super relatable and had this vulnerable quirkiness that was super adorable. She was one of my favorites as well. Interestingly enough, my favorite character was Oz and after Oz left, Anya took that slot. And Oz and Willow were such a cute pairing (they both had such different quirks that meshed really well with each other), I shipped them so much but I also really liked Willow with Tara as well. And I really liked what the show did with Willow’s magic arc. I thought it was super cool and how it eventually lead to this sort of addiction that Willow had to work through (with some really terrible consequences on Willow’s part) and that’s something that I always kind of appreciated with this show. Despite the show being heavily fantasy, the way it dealt with these “real world” problems in their fantasy setting was really fascinating.

It was an interesting move to play around with Willow’s sexuality and it definitely made a difference in a lot of people’s lives particularly when this show was still airing as it was something that wasn’t commonly explored, particularly in these “young adult” shows. I know quite a few people whose lives were saved because of Willow and her sexuality arc. But like you, I do wish it had been better planned. There were a few hints sprinkled a little bit throughout the earlier seasons but it honestly wasn’t really enough for me to be completely down with how quickly the change happened. It also doesn’t really help that it happened right after Oz was written out of the show. Her meeting Tara and having a relationship with Tara really felt like all the makings of a rebound relationship and I wish more of the season had been spent with Willow just kind of exploring herself more and I think that would’ve made her sexuality arc a little bit more impactful.

I also don’t particularly like how Oz was written out of the show. As I said before, he was my favorite character but I understand why he was written out. Around that time, Seth Green was getting more and more popular, he was becoming a more heavily sought after actor, he was also probably becoming more expensive and harder to nail in as a recurring character in the show, so it was probably in the best interests of the show to do what they did. I just feel like what the show did was kind of a crappy way to write him out that didn’t really do any justice to the character. But definitely it feels like that had Seth Green not left the show, Willow’s sexuality probably would never have been explored, I definitely don’t think Willow’s sexuality arc was something that was planned from the beginning but instead a result of having to write off the Oz character. And I do kind of wish, like you, there was more of a bisexual component in Willow’s sexuality. Because I do think that Willow did love Oz and that she was attracted to him. Oz represented so much to Willow. It was through him that she was essentially able to let go of her childhood and move away from Xander and really just become this new person. She might never have been able to attain that if it weren’t for Oz. I’m of course by no means saying that Oz was “the one” for her. Highschool sweethearts very rarely work out, I just wish the show would’ve acknowledged more not just the love she held for Tara but also Oz as well. Both of those relationships were instrumental in forming her as a person. But it is a common YA theme that you can only love one person in a truly romantic sense, I don’t necessarily agree with it, I think no matter how many relationships you had, how many of them you loved, you never truly stop loving any of them, they’re always there just kind of adding on to your current love.