Buffy & Faith and their respective roles in Season 3/7

[Iwearthecheese]

(My first thread!)

So in Season 3 Faith comes into Buffy's life. She's slaying focused, a loner with no ties and reckless to the point where she puts her life and the lives of others in danger.
Buffy on the other hand is much more balanced and thoughtful when it comes to the mission, she's intuitive, trusting and reliant on her freinds whilst Faith shuts people out because she can't trust them. This gives her strength and leaves Faith bitter and isolated.

In Season 7:
Buffy is more slayer-focused/mission as the season goes on, and by the time Faith arrives she is viewed by most as being reckless and putting lives in danger. She also shuts people out a lot of the time- for different reasons sure but trust is still an issue.
Faith on the other hand is more balanced and intuitive, realising that there are problems before they arrive and balancing the mission at hand against the people involved.

Anyone see that their roles are switched?

 

[Buffy Summers]

I think that's a very interesting point. I mean, in some ways by Season 7 Buffy had lost the support of the friends that had made her experience different from Faith's.

 

[Skanky Vamp]

Buffy was more impulsive in the latter seasons whereas Faith was more of the big picture. Which again, is pretty much opposite as how they started. Not to mention Buffy totally See, Want, Haved that guys house! That was such a Faith move.

 

[Bluebird]

That's a great observation. I think it's harder to see the contrast since it was done pretty naturally within the show, although Faith's change happened on AtS.

Buffy's resurrection and depression, with the fracturing of the group in S6, all adds up to who she becomes in S7. I can appreciate how she gets there even if she's quite unlikeable at some points.

Angel seems to be quite influential to a Slayer. 😀

 

[Skanky Vamp]

Angel seems to be quite influential to a Slayer. 😀

That's another very interesting point I didn't think about! I wonder if there is a more direct correlation. How the slayer is psychologically shaped and molded by the vampire company they keep. Would explain a lot actually.

 

[Iwearthecheese]

Buffy's resurrection and depression, with the fracturing of the group in S6, all adds up to who she becomes in S7.

Good point. I guess Buffy came to do/understand a lot of the 'dark side' that Faith described.

She'd come to see the 'horny' side of hungry and horny (Faith, such a class act. 🙄) in S4 with Riley and S6 with Spike.
She embraced the joys of being a slayer more in S5- she's very Faith-like in 'Buffy vs, Dracula', all hand-gestures and 'step on up for some overtime'.
She used Spike just like Faith used guys- 'get some get gone'...worse actually since at least Faith didn't abuse her partners, they were simply one-night stands who weren't in love with her.
Buffy had gone through emotional trauma and self-loathing like Faith did, add to that denial of what they had done to themselves and others. It seems like Buffy becoming harder, cynical and more Faith-like was a gradual process over the years.
Makes more sense now.

So...did Faith's murder rehab just mellow her a lot out or was it Angel not giving up on her/his world outlook that gave her a 'big picture'/'some things matter more' standpoint.
Strange that- to me- it seemed like as natural an evolution of her character as Buffy's was. But maybe that was just Eliza's talent; like Faith but 'more-so'?

 

[Skanky Vamp]

So...did Faith's murder rehab just mellow her a lot out or was it Angel not giving up on her/his world outlook that gave her a 'big picture'/'some things matter more' standpoint.

I think a combination of both. The fact that there was someone that never gave up on her and fought for her probably made a big difference on her. Everyone else kinda pushed her aside.

 

[Monkey Pants]

I think Season 3 Buffy had the right idea. She realized that she needed to balance slaying and her own life (as she knew her friends were partially who had helped her get this far), and that she couldn't interfere with human laws.
Faith was alone and felt herself above the law.
By season 7, Buffy's been through death and depression, and, being forced to take care of and train a bunch of girls, was in a more militant frame of mind. This was a huge fight, and she had a lot of responsibility. For the first time, she was 100% the leader. Not Giles or anybody else. She was figuring out how to do that. I think her attitude was temporary, and not a permanent state of being.
Faith has realized she is not above the law, and that she can cooperate with people. She still ends up making the same mistakes as the leader as Buffy had.
While I would say they had switched mind sets a little, I certainly do not think they had traded personalities completely or anything, and I think Buffy was still mostly right. I don't think it's like now Buffy sucks and Faith is awesome haha.

 

[RomanticSoul]

That's another very interesting point I didn't think about! I wonder if there is a more direct correlation. How the slayer is psychologically shaped and molded by the vampire company they keep. Would explain a lot actually.

That is what I talked about in the Bangel/Spuffy teamwork thread. Despite being slayers these girls are also still part human. Faith's issues and downfall came entirely from Faith the person, not the slayer. Same with Buffy. That human side needs as much, if not more, nurturing than the slayer side. Because if the human side fails, then you have a case like Faith (and later Buffy). However in later Seasons being human wasn't seen as an asset anymore (totally opposite from the early Seasons). Humans were actually totally useless, it's all about who has the most power. Despite the fact that 'human' saved the world in S6 (Xander/Dark Willow). Which was different on Angel where totally human Fred, Gunn and Wesley could kick ass just fine until Joss became heavily involved in S5 and it's all about power again.

The problem with Buffy is that she totally neglected her human side, in part because she spend so much time with someone (Spike) who was only interested in the slayer part of her (killing them or screwing them) and who was soulless, therefor less than human. Buffy went through a lot of crap in S5-6 that mostly effected her human side and that's where all her problems came from. In earlier Seasons there would have been an intervention, or turning to friends or Angel but by S7 Buffy was solely defined as slayer by herself and the people around her, hence no dealing with the issues. That's how Faith's downfall happened.

So yeah the roles had changed. Or as Faith would say: Am I the good slayer now? Are you the bad slayer now?

The one concession I make is that it's partly due to Faith that this happened. Faith was the one who took the time out in prison, leaving Buffy as the only active slayer. So unlike Faith Buffy was never able to catch a break or take some downtime because there was no one else to do the job. And when you have so much crap happen to you for years it eventually breaks you. However Buffy wouldn't have ever needed to fall so far because unlike Faith she had a giant support system. A watcher who was basically her father, a mother (until she died) and loyal friends. That used to be enough to keep Buffy perfectly balanced. Until the showrunners decided to torpedo the friendships into oblivion (for Dawn and crappy 'romance') and kill off or ship off the parents for more drama. And that was the downfall.