I think Buffy and Angel are both maneuvered into Alpha territory by their destiny. They're both told that they're unique and have a vital role to play. With this and they're natural gifts I don't see how they can be anything else. It's reinforced throughout both shows. You'd lose count of how many times Buffy is told she's the chosen one and it's up to her. Angel is told he's a major player in the apocalypse. Then the pair of them get jerked around into creating a universe together. If you're that important you're going to see yourself as the leader.
That's a good point - Buffy and Angel are both constantly thrust into situations where they must be alphas. But I think that there IS a difference between them - Angel wants that role, whereas Buffy tries to run from it.
Buffy constantly wishes she was normal, "just a girl", a child. Her costume in halloween (which represents what she WANTS to be) in season 4 is red riding hood - the innocent child, as opposed to Xander's authority figure (James Bond) and Willow's badass righteous rebel (Joan of Arc). When Buffy learns that she's gonna die in 1x12, she asks her mom to run away from town with her. When her boyfriend turns evil in season 2, Buffy doesn't have it in her do her slayer duty and kill him, and has to spend a lot of time (from episode 14 to 22) building her will to do it. When Faith comes to town in season 3, Buffy sees her as both a threat to her normal teen life (eating her chips, stealing her boyfriends, etc) AND as a possible replacement that will allow Buffy to leave slaying behind her. In season 5, when she finds that she has natural slayer instincts, she's scared and wants to learn to control them. And in 5x22, Buffy sacrifices her own life so she could save Dawn - who represents Buffy's childhood, her innocence, and NOT her dutiful slayer life. Season 6, of course, is all about Buffy trying to avoid her responsibilities and using slaying as nothing but an excuse to not do anything. She fight vampires because it's easy and distracting, but she doesn't
really try to go after the trio. And in season 7, she finally accepts her role, but very reluctantly, and it makes her miserable - she says "I am the law", but she says it in sadness and desperation. She hates it and resents it, but she can't escape it. She spends 7 years trying to run away from her role as the slayer, and she ends the series by empowering EVERYONE, which gives her (and everyone else) the choice of whether to be a slayer or not.
Angel, on the other hand, sees his role as an OPPORTUNITY, not a burden. For him, being a "champion" is an opportunity to redeem his past sins, so he pursues it willingly - he smashes the gem of Amara, which provided him something of an escape into humanity, because his duty is more important to him. He gave up his humanity in 'I wil Remember You', because his duty is more important. He allowed Faith to pummel him in her anger, because his own happiness isn't important, but the opportunity to be Faith's champion IS. In 'To Shanshu in L.A", Angel doesn't even care about his own prophecised death. He only cares about the lives of his friends. The Shanshu prophecy gives Angel the opportunity to see his redemption as something tangible and near, and that makes him abandon his friends and his humanity in season 2. He does so in service of his mission of redemption, symbolized by his war to defeat Wolfram & Hart. When he realizes that he can't defeat them in 2x15, he loses hope in sleeps with Darla, but when that doesn't change anything either, he realizes that he must go back to the day-to-day redemption of fighting the good fight. He rejoins his team. He allows them to punish him for his bad behaviour and allows Wesley to be leader, because Angel's own happines isn't important to him - only the mission is important. This continues throughout the series, with Angel getting closer and closer to his own humanity (getting a son, entering into relationships, building a family of friends around him), but he always chooses the mission over his own happiness. In the final episode, Angel literally signs his own happy ending away, because redemption is more important.
So, Buffy is very reluctant to fulfill her duty as the slayer, whereas Angel is completely devoted it. What does this have to do with alpha-ness? Everything. Because their duties (The Slayer and the "champion". Also, for the record - I really hate the word champion) are the duties of alphas - to be the adult, to be the leader, to decide what's right, to choose, to act. Buffy's reluctance to fulfill her duty makes her NOT an alpha, IMO, whereas Angel's eagerness to fulfill his duty makes him a very alpha-ish character. That's just who they are.
Also - this is probably just me, but... David Boreanaz naturally exudes a certain alpha-ness, don't you think? I mean, the guy is, like, THE men's man of men. Just
look at him:
Oops, wrong gif, my bad. This is what I'm talking about:
The guy looks like a freakin' greek statue. I mean, yes, okay, EVERYONE on these shows is ridiculously beautiful, but I don't think there's another person who's so classically masculine on
either show.
Which, you know, that's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. But it
does kinda make me want to see him fall on his face sometimes, just to remind him that he's human.
