Buffy 03/25/03 - Lies my parents told me (spoilers)

Cafe Society
21

I can’t help but agree with the assessment that most of this season has felt like filler, like the writers are just wasting time until they can get to the good stuff.

Once upon a time, this show had plenty of excellent stand-alone episodes that maybe had a line or two to connect them to the overall season arc, as opposed to these blocks of boring exposition with occasional fight scenes we keep getting in season 7. It’s just as well there isn’t going to be a season 8, because I wouldn’t be tuning in anyway. It’s all I can do to keep watching Buffy now hoping it will get better.

22

Well, good ep, but there’s still a few continuity things that I don’t see getting cleared up before the series finale.

  1. Buffy showed the determination to sacrifice ones she loves to save the world back in Season two’s “Becoming” when she sent Angel (not Angelus) to hell. She didn’t kill Dawn because there was another option. Ok, she didn’t realize that until after all Hell broke loose, but between those two extremes, maybe she’s trying to balance things a little.

  2. I think Buffy is a little too hung up on Soul = Good. Spike was a very human monster, how far off would it be that he could be a monstrous human?

  3. I was really hoping to see the Sunnydale side of Angelus’s phone call (and what if anything Dawn told everyone), but with the little time the series has left, maybe that’s for the best.

  4. The Slayer isn’t meant to be a general, she’s the front line. Aren’t there any non-blowed-up Watchers wandering the world that could pitch in?

  5. File this under snowball’s chance in hell, but I can’t help speculating on whether Cordy is incubating a corporeal form for the First.

Finally, is there a new ep next week? The “next on Buffy” looked like they’re re-running “Sleeper”. I checked the listings on tvguide, and it looks like the local UPN station is choosing to run the Rockies opening-day baseball game. :frowning: So is it “eight weeks left” by the calender, or eight episodes?

23

Wow, I thought that this was a damn good episode. The intense action, both physical and emotional, kept me on the edge of my seat. I liked how they expanded both Spike and Woods past. I also liked the fact that no one was, in my opinion totally in the right…. However, with the end of the series approaching the characters had better get unified soon…
Hopefully I will have more time to post my thoughts soon…

24

pepperlandgirl

Project much? I say with confidence that the vast majority of Buffyverse fans adore Faith.

25

pepperlandgirl

Project much? I say with confidence that the vast majority of Buffyverse fans adore Faith.

26

Well, Fiver, I do spend the bulk of my time on 6 different message boards, Buffy chat, and have a good idea of what’s going on the MBs I’m not a part of. I’d say I have a pretty good feel of what’s going on with most of Internet fandom, and they are not happy. They are especially not happy now that their Spec of Faith’s return is falling by the wayside. shrug But I don’ tknow every fan.

In other news, Otto I don’t think we’ve received any indication that a vamp can’t return to their own home. Unless you can think of a specific point of cannon that they disregarded? It’s Joss’s rules, he can do whatever he wants, and now he wants vampires to have access to their own homes.

“Adams” was definitely a fanfic convention. Just like the millions of last names and occupations assigned to William. (Mmmmmmmm William. Does anybody just want to cuddle him and stroke his hair and whisper words of bad poetry? Or is that just me?)

Exactly. I think, hope, that this time we find a 3rd option where nobody has to die.

God, I love Spike. ANd I’m so, so, so happy he finally told Buffy something without begging for her opinion or approval. “He so much looks at me funny, I’m going to kill him.” You tell her Spike! The Shooting script was marginly better—in it, Giles admitted that he killed Ben for the Greater Good and that’s how she figures out what Wood is up to. Also, Wood’s like “Until he murdered her” used to be “She got herself killed.” ANd they cut my favorite line! William says Dru wants to give him a nickname and she says “Like Bill or Willy or Lucien, Prince of Lies.” I was really looking forward to that line.
I was marginally distracted throughout the episode because all I could think other than “Wood needs to die” and “Spike Pretty” was “OH MY GOD I’M GOING TO MEET THAT MAN IN FIVE DAYS!!!” :smiley: :wink:

27

Faith- um, wasn’t she the other boring character-who-was-really-a-plot-device? The Slayer who was strictly a one-note bad girl, meant to represent Buffy’s dark side without Buffy having to do any real self-examination?

I was kind of hoping that Spike would end up giving Wood the duster, as a gesture of respect to Nikki, but after tonight’s ep, he can keep it. He looks real good in it anyway.

I’ve been wondering about Cordy’s fetus being the incarnation of the First, too. Since it can’t touch anyone, being all go-throughable, taking on physical form so it can do it’s own fighting instead of having to work through fallible minions might be a good move on its part.

Also, there’s something I’ve been wondering about concerning Spike. I’ve been saying for months that he seems to have come through the process of being vamped with more of his humanity intact than your average vampire. Seeing him turn his mother is partial confirmation of my theory. I’ve been hoping that it would be revealed that, chip and falling in love with Buffy aside, there was something in Spike’s psychic make-up that led him to seek his soul. Sure, his love for Buffy might have been the spur that sent him off to go do it, but I’ve often wondered if the demon in him was somehow never quite fully formed.

28

pepperlandgirl:

Sure we have. In the Angel episode that featured the flashback to Angelus’s munching of (Liam of Galway)'s father, we see Angelus in his father’s house.

His father asks how he got in, since he has to be invited, and Angelus says he was invited, and gestures to the dead body of the family’s maid.

29

Well, I don’t watch Angel because I hate Angel and I don’t care. If Joss is really concerned about cannon, he’d make sure it was established in both shows. I can’t be held responsible for cannon points on a show I would never willingly watch.

30

Beside, the Bastard probably needed an invite becaues it was his father happened. Since William’s mother was probably a widower, he probably owned the house. He may not have needed an invite to the house that he owns.

31

That last post didn’t even make sense. :rolleyes: That first line should read “because it was his father’s house…”

32

I was thinking the same thing! My sister and I got to watch an episode together in the same room instead of over the phone. It wasn’t pretty. The room was so quiet.
But I am going from seeing older episodes every day to the new ones on Tuesdays and I’m a bit lost on some of it.
I watch because of Spike and Sis watches because of Angel.
I got to see seasons two and three on DVD.
I’m so into the daily older episodes the newer ones don’t seem right.
And Pepper, I am so jelous of you. You must take pictures! Or at least get me a signed one! Let me know if you could do either please!!!

33

Kricket, I totally would but the convention doesn’t allow outside cameras, and you have to buy tickets for autographs and photos in advance. I’m paying 85 for the priviledge of an autograph, and later, a posed picture of him.
However, you might be interested in this week’s Variety magazine, the Oscar Edition. There is a full page ad thanking James Marsters for everything he’s done for the show and for his fans.
You can view the ad at www.savespike.com If you don’t get Variety, it’s also going to appear in the Hollywood Reporter at some undisclosed future time.

34

Ok ep, but it underscores the problem I’ve had with this season. I think people were too hard on season 6, but season 7 has felt like a quagmire. I think I may start a thread on my thoughts…

Spike’s utterly lack of remorse seems odd, considering Angels weepy regrets, which were implied as being a necessary consequence of a soul. Spikes weepy regrets came in the aspect of insanity, and then pretty much disappeared altogether with his craziness. I also felt that Spikes “I’ll kill you” was too much of an obvious commerical break shocker, and the later bits trying to justify this were over the top. Spike has no right to kill a human even as Buffy doesn’t, no matter how bad they are. Human laws, remember? And if that’s all changed, it would have been nice to see it happen, other than “ok, now I’d kill Dawn” out of the blue. What has been so life-changing about the FE? It’s been a lame failure all season long, and as far as Buffy knows, she’s shut down the seal that potentially allowed all the Turok Han into Sunnydale.

35

Near as I can figure, William’s mother was a widow, which would mean that William was the legal owner of the house- up until the twentieth century, a woman couldn’t own property unless she didn’t have any male heirs. Anything she owned was the property of her husband, and when he died, it would become the property of her son. So, if the house was William’s, he wouldn’t need an invitaion.

Also, did anyone catch Anya’s complaining about Spike getting a pass, and showing no remorse about the killings she committed? Apparently the undoing of the spider-demon spell at the end of “Selfless” was the result of momentary regret, not true, deep-felt remorse, opening teaser aside. So much for any potential Anya redemption arc. Not that it’s too late in the season for that or anything. Hell, there’s five more whole episodes left…

Also, I think the reason that the “cure” didn’t work at the beginning of the episode was that Giles allowed the thing to be a public event. Wood was there, and Spike doesn’t trust Wood at all. And, even though Xander is starting to warm to Spike, there’s still a lot of tension there, too. And Giles’s own relationship with Spike has always been strained. Did he really expect that Spike would be able to do the necessary self-examination for the de-triggering surrounded by people he doesn’t trust? He should have just explained what the bit of rubble was for, then cleared the room, except for Willow and Buffy, gotten the hell out himself, and let the spell do its work.

The whole situation left me with the sense that Giles went and scoured the globe for the bit of rubble as a show to hide his true intentions toward Spike. With the chip gone, Giles obviously doesn’t think the soul is enough to restrain Spike from hurting people.

Also, I think the whole song and dance about a general having to make hard choices was blowing smoke up Buffy’s ass. He obviously didn’t intend to let her make the “hard decision” when it came to Spike. Instead, he went behind her back, then told her in a round-about way when he thought enough time had lapsed that the deed would be done before she could do anything to stop it.

36

I don’t know if you noticed, but Spike and Angel are completely different characters, foils even. Spike is not going to react to the soul like ANgel did, because Angel’s personality is so different. It was established (so I heard…) that Angelus is literally trapped in Angel…but tonight it established that Spike has pretty much always been William, except with issues. Other than being vampires with souls who love a Slayer, they have absolutely nothing in common, personality wise, or even “demon” wise. Just becaues it’s in character for Angel to be weepy and broody doesn’t mean it would be in character for Spike to do the asme thing, especially since the writers have stated more than once that Spike’s story is not Angel part Deux.
I’d personally be very disappointed if Spike turned into Angel just because he got a soul. Disappointed and kind of disgusted…there’s a reason, after all, I don’t watch the other show.

37

Sorry, was someone expecting you to be?

Anyway, after Harmony’s goon kidnapped Dawn in S5 it was clearly established on BtVS that the invitation to enter had to be extended by someone who lived in the home. Since William was dead he no longer lived in the home and so even if he could enter he could not have invited Dru. A servant who lived in the home could have invited William and Dru in (as established on AtS) but since we didn’t see either a servant or a servant’s body it is IMHO a continuity error.

As far as it’s being his house, I am not aware that it was impossible for a woman with a male heir to own property in 19th Century England. If that was the case, then upon William’s death the house would become his mother’s and again William would be unable to enter without her invitation.

38

You know what I had a flashback of last night - the final couple of eps of Seinfeld. Or the end of MASH. Where they essentially said, to hell with writing good new eps, instead, let’s just toss in “greatest hits” vignettes from favorite past eps.

Did we even see X last night? The desire to get screen time for Anya, Andrew, and the slayerettes takes away from the Scoobies we have gotten to know over the past several years.

Heck, I love Faith. But tossing her in will just further gum up the mix.

At this point, I’d almost prefer that they nor “resolve” the various threads hanging. Just have the best next eps they can. Maybe even end the whole series with a cliffhanger.

39

No. No, no, no.

All “Real Me” said was that neither Riley, Anya, or Xander could have invited Harmony in, because they didn’t live there. That dialog doesn’t exclude the possibility that ownership also conveys the “right to invite”. In other words, perhaps the rule is that ownership or residence allows a person to extend an invitation.

Moreover, it’s quite a jump to say that because we don’t see a dead or living servant, there was a continuity error. Persons of the class of William and his mother almost always had servants; it’s not a remote leap at all to assume that one invited William in at his request or demand. We didn’t see him enter the house at all – why do you assume that it’s a continuity error?

We are never shown Giles getting a work visa or a green card when he loses his library job, yet we accept without question that those administrative details were taken care of. We don’t whine about how unrealistic it is that he can enter and leave the country without a valid visa.

Finally, you can’t take every single statement a character makes as accurate. Osiris refuses to raise Tara from the dead because she was “killed by natural means.” That’s good evidence that it can’t be done, but not definitive. Perhaps it’s that Osiris can’t do it, but another power/god/spell could. Perhaps Osiris could, but was feeling cantankerous that day.

I’ve said this before – when we’re spoon-fed rules as they arise during narrative, it’s only natural to take them as laws of nature. But only through rigorous experimentation can these things be truly known. I kinda wish the Initiative had stayed around; they would have been a great resource in codifying what the rules for these sorts of things are.

Final thought: Angel is able to enter Kate’s apartment in AtS to save her without an invitation. It’s clearly NOT a continuity error; Kate comments on it. So we clearly have at least one more exception to the invite rule.

  • Rick
40

First, I thought Willow had a father they never showed, much like Buffy(only heir’s make an appearance). Actually, I think Willow’s mother is only in the one episode(where Amy becomes a rat).

Secondly, I agree with the idea that Spike should feel worse for the evil he did. I thought he was a pretty good guy as a human and now he has that soul back, he should start to regret what he did.

Finally, I too was under the impression that Faith was immensely popular with the Buffy fans.