After series viewer who has always been a Bangel fan.
I did watch all of Angel before I started watching Buffy so I was probably destined to enjoy Bangel, but I loved it from the start and especially in Season 2 when it went from the classic fairy tale romance through the Angelus arc to the heartbreaking end of Becoming.
I also enjoy all the post Graduation Day contact between Buffy and Angel and how they reflect different stages of their post break up relationship.
I can understand why people may prefer Spuffy. Spike was more integrated into the show whereas Angel was often only there to be Buffys boyfriend and wasnt fully fleshed out until he got his own show. But personally I was never a big fan of Spuffy. Partly as it always seemed a bit toxic, but also I preferred Spike when he was playing off all the other characters like in season 4 rather than just obsessing over Buffy
I watched Angel first - at least i started following Angel seriously first, but I really liked Cangel. I believe that Cordelia was more temperamentally suited to Angel. Angel had a tendency to dark moods. Cordelia was optimistic and no nonsense, and she was able to cut through his BS when there was BS. Buffy did NOT have this capacity. She was too worshipful of Angel (partly due to her age and the fact it WAS a first love). Angel by contrast put her on a pedestal. She was his perfection. His ideal... And he could not 'see' her fully, IMO.
Seeing the friendship with Cordelia -- THEN seeing the relationship with Angel -- the relationship with Cordelia was more adult and I think had the potential to be good for both of them. Cordelia needed someone to ground her and help her to care about important things instead of trivialities. She did a lot of growing in Angel and I think she also brought LIGHT to Angel the person. I so wished they'd met on that bluff that night and decided to seek a solution to the soul -- maybe similar to what Cordelia did when she got the visions protection potion.
Also, since Angel managed to be with Nina Ash, it's possible that he could have been with her without that 'first time I ever felt loved' total joy. Even knowing that he could lose his soul might be enough to keep him from absolute joy.
Anyway, I think that would have been better for the series... but at that point, series weren't doing what they did on Bones (Boreanaz' next series). The whole 'will they/won't they' BS was big on TV then. They ruined Mulder and Scully by making it a hidden thing IMO, but that's a different discussion.
Even after coming to prefer Buffy the series once seeing it all, I never invested deeply in Bangel, though, unlike some spuffy fans, i don't hate the Buffy/Angel relationship, but to me, it always reads as a "first love" with all the limitations of excessive idealization. Then, I feel that after Angel returns from hell that Angel and Buffy have a huge gulf that they cannot bridge. How can he get over her killing him and sending him to hell? How do they get past the curse? And they still aren't shown TALKING. The closest we see them to relating is the really lovely scene where they are doing tai chi. That is absolutely amazing.
So... the question of love? I could
never deny it. Especially, I believe that utter and complete love is
why he loses his soul. For the first time in his entire existence, he feels utterly IN LOVE
AND utterly LOVED. I can't believe he was celibate for 100 years after getting the soul. We see several hints that he had interactions with women (on Angel, flashbacks), and he slept with Darla after the soul until SHE got fed up with his not being able to kill and threw him out of the foursome. If sex was going to make him lose his soul, he'd have lost it after he got it when he went back to Darla.
I believe Buffy gave Angel JOY.
You cannot have perfect happiness just for great sex. It is more than bliss. It was amazing. It WAS real. And that does not take anything from either of them even if they did not end up together.
But they come to an impasse and break up. I don't believe it is IN Angel to fight for them at this point - if it had been, he would not have left. This does not mean they don't care, but it does mean that like a lot of other "first loves" they don't really work in the long term.
To me, part of it is that they never really learned to TALK like an adult relationship needs to. Caring is
not enough when you have huge challenges. (just as later, loving Buffy is NOT enough for Spike to function as a fully moral human being, and to be a true partner for Buffy without his soul) Yet, Buffy and Angel never forget each other. Why should they? Most of us remember our first love and if it doesn't end with huge hostilities, often we can become friends for life.
Even when it ends badly, most of us have a small place in our hearts for that first,
innocent love that is often so very
uncomplicated by adult realities.
Spuffy is something else. It goes through a lot of phases and changes both people... not always for the good... but in my opinion, they come through on the other side -- though it takes years of growing and healing for both of them.
I see the interaction with Buffy begin to challenge Spike's choices from the beginning. Dru sees it too - before Spike - and way before Buffy. Like Angel, Buffy challenges Spike to be his best self - even though she is not aware of it for a long time. Over time, the inner William comes more and more to the surface - and the fact that he never left caring behind (spent a century caring for Dru) makes it easy.
It is not enough for true human judgment, but all through season 5 Spike slowly changes and becomes Buffy's lieutenant. He is unhealthily obsessed. It is one sided. BUT even then, he listens to her.
Then comes Buffy's resurrection INTO hell. She was unmoored from her life and it broke her. That is when he becomes someone she can talk to - something that began before her mum died, but at this point, I think Spike becomes CRITICAL to her surviving her resurrection.
Were they dysfunctional and toxic? Definitely, but maybe it is because i have seen people work through troubled relationships and grow, I can relate to them and I don't OVERLOOK this... but that is what i see them do and to me, they become STRONG because of it. By season seven, they are truly friends, they are partners and they are on the same page about the mission. Spike doesn't try to get in her way. He keeps showing up even though he's struggling with his demons. She saves him because he has become vitally important to her AND her mission. For me, they have come fully into an adult, supportive friendship, and yes, love.
I don't think that either man or either relationship negates the value of the other. I do believe that Buffy and Spike have a chance to grow through their hurt and pain - and I also think that the fact that SOULLESS Spike was willing to get his soul tells me how fully integrated his feelings are into his psyche.
For whatever reason, Angelus cannot love - my guess is because Liam was brutally treated as a child (we see a very dark relationship between him and his father) - and only the shock of the soul returning and the remorse allows him to care - and meeting Buffy helps him finallly step up and become a CHAMPION.
I think that Angelus whenever we see him allows the angry, vindictive side of Liam to the fore. William, by contrast, was
loved as a human - and so soulless Spike is not so bitter. He kills more for the need to eat than anything else. Angelus kills like a sociopath... because he's working out his RAGE.
I am going to break from a lot of Spuffy fans here:...
In my opinion without a soul -- without human conscience of moral judgment, neither man is a good fit for Buffy - but soulless Spike is less of a direct threat than soulless Angel (Angelus) because the rage of Liam that makes him so dangerous is absent from William.
Soulless Spike does have one advantage... he can see he needs his soul - though it takes an appalling act of VAMPIRE thinking for him to ACT.
Angelus is leashed by the soul. Without it, he cannot be anything but a vindictive, sadistic serial killer. That is a TRAGEDY of Angel. I wish they'd come up with an out for Angel to get his soul permanently.
I never hated Angel or Bangel because I was always a fan of Angel the series, and Angel the character (one i liked MUCH BETTER on his series than on Buffy). I did come to feel Spike and Buffy fit much better as an adult relationship and that Spike had the temperament and patience to deal with resurrected Buffy's pain.
