Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Myth, Metaphor & Morality

by Field, Mark

  We could have a big debate even now about the meaning of Spike’s behavior in the last scene. Why didn’t he kill Buffy? I’m holding off on that for a while because it’s nearly impossible to say anything meaningful without spoilers. I will say that I think it’s a key moment in the progression of his feelings about Buffy.

  Trivia notes: (1) Remember that word “effulgent”. It means “glowing”. (2) The taunts William suffers at the party – “They call him William the Bloody because of his bloody awful poetry!”; “I'd rather have a railroad spike through my head than listen to that awful stuff!” – use the words which described Spike when we first saw him in School Hard: “He's known as 'William the Bloody'. Earned his nickname by torturing his victims with railroad spikes.” Puts a whole new light on Spike, doesn’t it? (3) The reference to Spike as a “bloody awful poet” gave rise to a Spike-centric fan club called the Bloody Awful Poet Society (spoilers at link). (4) When William collided with someone on the street after leaving the party in tears, if you look closely it was Angel walking with Darla and Dru. (5) In FFL we see that Drusilla sired Spike. In School Hard, Spike referred to Angel as “my sire”. We can fanwank this – Angel as his “grandsire” – but it’s contradictory. (6) Spike taking the coat was inspired by the Frank Miller comics series Sin City. (7) This is the second episode to use the phrase “here endeth the lesson.” The Master used it in Never Kill A Boy On The First Date, as Spike does here. It will be used once more in S7. It’s the standard closing after a Bible reading in traditional services. (8) Fool For Love was shot at the same time as the AtS episode Darla and many of the flashbacks were used in both episodes, albeit from a different perspective. The different perspectives give a Rashomon quality to the scenes and create still more uncertainty about the “truth” of what we’re shown. (9) The scene with Dru and the chaos demon refers to Lover’s Walk: “I caught her on a park bench, making out with a *chaos* demon! Have you ever seen a chaos demon? They're all slime and antlers.” (10) Note that Spike got a memento from each Slayer he killed: the scar over his left eye courtesy of the first, the duster he wears from the second.

  Shadow

  If you can overlook the poor quality of the snake demon, Shadow is another good episode. Joyce’s illness is the emotional core of the episode for Buffy. I may be reaching, but I see Joyce’s “shadow” as a metaphor for the shadow of uncertainty cast on Buffy’s journey. If I’m right about that, the season’s focus on split personalities makes it natural that Joyce’s illness is in the brain.

  Interestingly, what’s hidden in the “shadow” is Dawn. We get this from Glory’s spell (my emphasis):

  GLORY: (To the snake demon) The power is yours to see what is unseen. To find what is shrouded in shadow. Already, you know what I seek. I have given you form, now find for me the key.

  Shadow opens the morning after Fool For Love and it turns out Spike isn’t the only fool for love. Riley’s inability to keep up with Buffy is really getting to him. Spike successfully preys on the exact point of Riley’s insecurity, and we see that Riley has no real response even if Spike’s claims about Buffy are dubious: “Buffy's got a type, and you're not it. She likes us dangerous, rough, occasionally bumpy in the forehead region. (patronizingly) Not that she doesn't like you ... but sorry Charlie, you're just not dark enough.” Of course, had Riley not spent his morning making the tomb go boom, he might have actually been there for Buffy.

  Riley also criticized Buffy for not taking him along when she went after Glory, but that’s exactly what he did in FFL, as Xander tells him directly. “Riley gets darker and darker throughout this season, and I think [going after the vampires all by himself in FFL] was kind of a turn for him.” (Doug Petrie)

  Going back to Sandy is strong evidence that Riley was, as he admitted to Xander, “just a little crazed”. It certainly was crazy, for more than one reason. While Buffy was waiting all by herself in the hospital and while Dawn could have used some protection in the Magic Shop, Riley was indulging his insecurities with a vampire. Letting Sandy bite him was stupid. Buffy would see it as a betrayal, just as Riley did (with less justification) when she “let” Dracula bite her. I mean, imagine how Edward would react if Bella went out and let herself get bit by someone else, or even just made out with him in a car.

  If getting bit was stupid, staking Sandy, vampire though she was, for doing what he wanted is a new low for Riley. I’ll revisit this point when we get to Into the Woods.

  There’s an irony in all this, one that Dawn’s comment to Riley brings front and center. Buffy was emotionally invested in Angel, though she had sex with him just once and spent most of S3 not even kissing him. We see Buffy much more physically demonstrative with Riley, yet he’s convinced she’s not feeling the emotional connection. “She doesn't get all worked up like that over you.” And that’s the other half of Riley’s problem. It’s the same tension we’ve seen since the dueling attitudes toward love we were given by Mr. Platt in Beauty and the Beasts and Spike’s famous “Love isn’t brains” speech in Lover’s Walk.

  Riley desperately feels left out by Buffy, but can’t recognize that he’s demanding to intrude on both her Slayer duties and her personal trauma. Buffy needs to be strong for Joyce and Dawn. It’s very hard to take on that role while being “weak” so that Riley can be the one to comfort her, which is what he seems to want. Besides, Buffy has always been prone to hold her emotions close and not confide in others. Riley’s demanding something from her that’s contrary to her basic nature.

  Riley’s holding a double-edged sword: he’s upset because she won’t give him the passionate attention he craves, but he’s so focused on his own needs that he isn’t giving her the support she needs. From the viewpoint of an unbiased observer, it’s hard to escape the conclusion that he’s being selfish under the circumstances. As Xander tells him, Buffy can’t fight Joyce’s tumor, so needs to confront something she can fight (note that she actually can’t fight Glory – there’s a metaphor there). Riley is actually ducking the real confrontation because he’s unwilling to face up to his own fears.

  Trivia notes: (1) Since Dawn asked, a CAT scan is, as Buffy said, similar to an x-ray. The letters stand for “computed axial tomography”. (2) The two recent de-invitation spells Spike mentioned were done in BvD (Dracula) and Real Me (Harmony). Spike actually got his invite in Becoming 2 and that has never been revoked even though he was far from harmless for much of the time. (3) Spike’s “sorry Charlie” refers to the commercials for StarKist Tuna. (4) Anya’s strong reaction to Xander’s wish for a cult of bunny worshipers relates to her fear of bunnies which we saw in Fear, Itself. (5) This is the episode where we learn Glory’s name. (6) When the cobra turns into the monster, Dreg shouts “He is arisen.” That phrase is a take-off from Matthew 28:6, which refers to Jesus. (7) Giles didn’t have the Aleister Crowley album the customer wanted. Crowley was a famous occultist and mystic. AFAIK, he never made an album; it’s a joke. (8) Buffy strangling the snake demon reminds me of Princess Leia with Jabba the Hutt in Return of the Jedi.

  Listening to Fear

  The Queller demon in Listening to Fear might very well win a contest for lamest demon in the series. The episode also suffers, I think, from the far too obvious metaphorical vampire whorehouse. I’m not fond of this metaphor. Don’t get me wrong. LtF is not a bad episode like, say, I Robot, You Jane is bad. There are important developments here, both in plot and metaphor. It just suffers a bit from weak execution. That said, I do want to praise the scene of Buffy crying privately as she washes the dishes to the sound of her mother’s deranged ramblings. SMG really sells that scene.

  Riley let the SG down when he failed to show up for their slay date, instead spending his time in the aforementioned “whorehouse”. Aside from the fact that the metaphor’s an anvil, I never really saw Riley as the type to “stray” in this way. Sandy, ok; that can be explained by his obsession about Angel and Dracula. The suck job we see him getting in the teaser is less plausible to me, and I
say that as someone who’s not a big fan of his.

  Riley also lied to everyone about not wanting to do research because he wanted to summon the commandos. As he has before, Graham called him on it:

  GRAHAM: You found a stiff in the woods and called us in? Don't you usually call your girlfriend for this kind of thing?

  He grins. Riley gives him a dirty look.

  We as viewers learn in LtF that Ben has some connection to Glory. He seems like a nice guy, a caring doctor, but think about what Ben has done here: he deliberately caused the murder of half a dozen mental patients. Maybe this is a good thing – after all, now those patients can’t say anything which might reveal Dawn’s nature to, say, Glory. It’s unclear if this is why Ben summoned the Queller, though it’s probably his best reason.

  In my essay on Choices, I discussed the distinction between consequentialist ethics and deontological ethics. The former judges ethical decisions by their impact on others. A consequentialist might very well justify Ben’s action depending on what the consequences would be if Glory were to find Dawn. It’s a conditional approval because we don’t know (yet) what would happen if she did, and we don’t know (yet) if Ben knows. In contrast, a deontologist would argue that those innocent victims (doubly victims, in fact – made crazy by Glory, killed by the demon) have a right to life which can’t be erased simply because others might benefit from it.

  A parallel debate about the proper moral course will be central to the season finale.

  Xander guessed that Glory was responsible for the Queller demon, but it turned out to be Ben instead. Glory is the one creating the epidemic of mental patients, as we (but not Buffy) now learn: The crazy man we see in the hospital who’s later the first victim of the Queller demon was the security guard from No Place Like Home. It’s not expressly stated, but Glory caused his madness by what she did to him in that episode. Moreover, we also learn that those with mental problems can recognize that Dawn doesn’t belong. In effect, Glory is creating her own “key detectors”, parallel to the Geiger counters used by the commandos.

  The basic rule of the show is that the demon tells us something metaphorically about Buffy. What we see in LtF is that Glory is inadvertently, unknowingly, creating the ability to see Dawn’s true nature, i.e., that she is the Key. By summoning the Queller demon, Ben is, in essence, repressing the discovery. Translating this to Buffy, the episode tells us that some part of Buffy is resisting the knowledge of what Dawn represents, even as other parts try to tell her. Consistent with this, Dawn expresses doubts about her own reality, doubts which get to the heart of Buffy’s challenge for the season and fit perfectly with Dawn’s metaphorical role:

  DAWN: (teary) She hates me.

  BUFFY: (kneeling beside the bed) No.

  DAWN: She called me a thing.

  BUFFY: She loves you. Okay? She's not herself. (puts her hand on Dawn's) I told you what the doctor said about the tumor.

  DAWN: (shakes head) No, not just Mom. People. They keep saying weird stuff about me.

  BUFFY: Are you talking about the man in the hospital?

  DAWN: He called me a thing too. And there was another one. Weird guy outside the magic shop. (Buffy looks concerned) He said I didn't belong. He said I wasn't real. (Buffy sighs) Why does everybody keep doing that? What's wrong with me?

  Joyce then tells us directly what we inferred from the previous episode:

  Suddenly Joyce gasps and sits up, staring at Dawn.

  JOYCE: Don't touch me! You - you thing!

  DAWN: (backing up) Mom, please!

  JOYCE: Get away from me! You're nothing, you're, you're a shadow!

  The fact that Joyce recognizes Dawn’s importance is therefore a critical step towards Buffy’s end-of-season revelation:

  JOYCE: No, I guess it isn't. I do know I was ... pretty out of it, and I had ... not-not a dream ... exactly, more like I had this ... knowledge, i-it just came to me like ....truth, you know? (Buffy frowns) Even though it didn't seem...possible, even though I shouldn't even think such things.

  BUFFY: What?

  JOYCE: That Dawn...

  Buffy looks very startled.

  JOYCE: She's not ... mine, is she?

  Buffy stares at her mom, then looks down. She comes to a decision and looks Joyce in the eye.

  BUFFY: No.

  Joyce absorbs this for a moment.

  JOYCE: She's ... she does belong to us, though.

  BUFFY: Yes, she does.

  JOYCE: And she's important. To the world. Precious. (Buffy nods) As precious as you are to me.

  Buffy smiles and nods again. Joyce nods back.

  JOYCE: Then we have to take care of her. Buffy, promise me. If anything happens, if I don't come through this-

  BUFFY: Mom-

  JOYCE: No, listen to me. No matter what she is, she still feels like my daughter. I have to know that you'll take care of her, that you'll keep her safe. That you'll love her like I love you.

  BUFFY: (teary) I promise.

  Trivia notes: (1) When Willow tells Giles she doesn’t want to be the one to find the bodies, she’s probably remembering her experiences in Prophecy Girl, Doomed, and Real Me. (2) Contrary to Willow’s statement, the Tunguska event was in 1908, not 1917. (3) Dreg referred to himself as a “humble postulant”. A postulant is, generally, someone who makes a request or demand. It also has a more specific sense of a candidate for a monastery. The more general sense seems meant here.

  Into the Woods

  The title of Into the Woods is ironic, of course. The success of Joyce’s operation means that she’s now “out of the woods”, but Riley left to join a commando operation in the jungles of Central America. Buffy’s distress at his departure means that she’s not yet out of the woods emotionally.

  I have a take on the events of ItW that’s fairly cynical, particularly with respect to Xander’s dialogues with Buffy and Anya. In order to explain my position on those, I need first to explain how I see Riley and Buffy. Here’s the way I said it 10 years ago and I still see it pretty much the same way:

  “The principal complaint Riley had about Buffy was that he loved her more than (he felt) she loved him. His feelings towards her were more intense than (he felt) hers were towards him. I would emphasize 2 points about this:

  1. By saying this, Riley seems to be adopting the Spike theory of love ("Love isn't brains, children, it's blood boiling...."). [Edit to add: Riley even asks Buffy to hit him, just as Spike did in Fool For Love: “You're the Slayer. Do something about it. Hit me. Come on. One good swing. You know you want to.” h/t Anonymous] I thought there was general agreement that this was an immature notion of love. If this is Riley's standard, he's just as wrong as Spike.

  2. This is a cheap shot by Riley. He can know the intensity of his own feelings, but he has no way to judge the intensity of Buffy's.

  We, the audience, can't see inside either one of them. I personally didn't see Riley show any great passion towards Buffy (as distinct from what he said). In fact, by sleeping with Faith/Buffy he showed a lack of passion -- he engaged with the body rather than the person.

  Nor did I see any diminution of passion in Buffy. What I did see was that she was overloaded with stress brought on by her obligations to Dawn and her mother's illness. To me, Riley's insistence that she engage emotionally with him on these counts was pure selfishness on his part. It gets back to whether his view of love is mature or not -- a mature view allows one's partner to engage emotionally somewhere else when the need arises. The immature Spike view says "me, me, me".

  Riley never could accept his diminished role after the destruction of the Initiative. He kept intruding into Buffy's space in order to satisfy his own ego, then blamed her for shutting him out. He didn't know how to deal with a woman strong enough to handle pressure without his manly support.”

  The one change I’d make in this today is that I now think Riley was right on one point – Buffy doesn’t love him, at least not the way she loved Angel. We could get into long debat
es about whether that intensity of love is good (see Spike in Lover’s Walk) or bad (see Mr. Platt in Beauty and the Beasts). Bottom line is, the passion wasn’t there on Buffy’s side.

  In no way, shape, or form does this mean that I think Buffy is somehow at “fault”. Words like “fault” and “blame” don’t belong in the discussion when it comes to whether or how much you love someone. As Xander put it in Prophecy Girl, “you either feel a thing or you don’t”. As was true then, Buffy doesn’t, at least not in the sense Riley wants/needs.

  Nor is Riley “wrong” to love Buffy more than she loves him, assuming he does. No, he is at fault, but not for that reason. His faults are three: he hasn’t really been able to accept that he’s not Buffy’s equal when it comes to Slaying; he didn’t try to talk to Buffy about his concerns at a time when that might have helped, instead waiting until now to deliver an ultimatum; and he behaved stupidly, recklessly in the meantime. The problem is not that Riley went to the vamp trulls; that’s merely a symptom. The problem is with Riley’s attitudes and expectations, which I’ve been discussing in the posts on the previous episodes. It wasn’t Buffy’s job to find him a new goal in life beyond being the mission’s boyfriend. That was his job, and his failure to do so led ultimately to the break.

  One more point before I get to Xander’s advice to Buffy. As I see it, Xander, no doubt with good intentions, succeeded in making her feel guilty, feel that she had failed by “not being there” for Riley. For the moment it doesn’t matter if he’s right in his claim that she “shut down”. I’m just saying that I interpret what he says and how she reacts as a guilt trip. Consider, in particular, these lines:

  I think you mean convenient. I think you took it for granted that he was gonna show up when you wanted him to, and take off when you didn't.

  You shut down, Buffy. And you've been treating Riley like the rebound guy. When he's the one that comes along once in a lifetime.