Could Willow have still gone evil?

[Chosen Enemy]

Willow turning evil was mostly because of Tara's death. But even before Tara's death we saw some evil-ness (if you wanna call it this way) in her that came from the powers she had inside her (the magic addiction which among other things made her to almost get Dawn killed). Do you think that she could have still gone evil if Tara hadn't died? Say if something else triggered it?

 

[BuffyElevated]

I think she would eventually gone to the dark side even if Tara hadn't died. It might have been a more gradual progression but I think it was there way before Tara died.

 

[dexeded]

No. Tara was her anchor to not losing herself to magic. She was already well on her way to 'recovery'. Giles may have also sent her to the coven in England for training if there were further signs of losing control.

 

[FlowerPower]

I have issues with Tara being Willow's One Trigger. Really, not Xander losing his eye or if Tara was alive but Buffy was dead from Warren's bullet?

Still, the apocalyptic, double homicide, attempt to kill all of her friends Willow of the last three eps of Season 6 literally came out of nowhere for me. Even with Tabula Rasa and Smashed/Wrecked painting Willow in an unprecedented bad light, I never would have guessed that killing Tara would cause Willow to want to kill Buffy/Xander/Giles/Dawn/the entire world.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

I agree with [MENTION=8356]HisMrs[/MENTION], it could have happened some other way. Maybe she lost control over Xander getting hurt or out of fear and sucked power in from somewhere, or a situation arised when they needed power, so Willow, assuming she could handle the evil, sucked in dark energy from the books and then lost control. Or like [MENTION=8356]HisMrs[/MENTION] said, it could be gradually.

I would like to think that after the Dawn thing she learned her lesson, but who knows. She was shown over and over again during the show that magic is bad, and her belief in her abilities to control the magic and herself was overstimated, yet she abused magic over and over again. So having Tara and the others being against magic wouldn't have been enough.

So maybe she would have slipped, and sucked in too much energy, or it was a gradual change.

 

[arabella]

I personally feel that without a catalyst the same magnitude as Tara's death, that Willow wouldn't have crossed the line from addictive, irresponsible behavior to end-of-the-world destructive behavior. Addicts do become involved in destructive behavior, but not for the sake of destruction as Willow did in the end of Season 6. Addicts' destructive behavior (be it to self or others) is simply a by-product of their quest for their drug. So if Willow did relapse without the catalyst of Tara's death or something equal in magnitude, I seriously doubt that it would've been the same sort of evil Willow but rather a junkie on a bender...which is also dark, but different.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

No. Tara was her anchor to not losing herself to magic. She was already well on her way to 'recovery'. Giles may have also sent her to the coven in England for training if there were further signs of losing control.

My rep comment got cut short, ignore it.

 

[white avenger]

I don't think so. It's hard to actually explain why I feel that way, other than to say that Willow knew that Tara wouldn't approve. I can't recall Willow, even at the height of her addiction, ever using magic in a malicious way or to hurt anyone innocent except for that initial period of blind insane grief when she lost Tara.

 

[FaithsFollower]

Even if Tara hadn't died, I believe she would've gone evil eventually. Remember back in Season 3 when Willow was talking about sage and other stuff and then said about how she mixed a virgin's saliva with something... Giles cut her off and warned her that magick was not something to be dallying about with. With that in mind, you could tell that Will was well on her way to a dangerous path. Whether or not Tara was in picture does not really matter. Not with Amy lurking about in the background. 😉

I know it seems ridiculous that Tara's death was the triggeer but look at it this way: it was probably the last straw. Her best friend died...twice and her first real boyfriend left her. I caught part of an episode of S4 not that long ago where Tara was feeling down that Willow hadn't told her friends about her. Willow said that she kind of liked having a secret from her friends, just 'for me'. Even back then, Tara was becoming very special to her. In fact, I daresay that Tara was kind of her 'mentor' when it came to magick and the like.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

I don't think so. It's hard to actually explain why I feel that way, other than to say that Willow knew that Tara wouldn't approve. I can't recall Willow, even at the height of her addiction, ever using magic in a malicious way or to hurt anyone innocent except for that initial period of blind insane grief when she lost Tara.

But what if she lost someone else she loves, in a horrible way? (Or, to match the loss of Tara, two people?). Don't you think Tara's disapproval would have been a non priority then?

 

[arabella]

[MENTION=8557]Skytteflickan88[/MENTION] drug cravings make addicts irrational and cold as a rule...but they don't cause the user to undergo the effort needed to create a catastrophe as that would detract from scoring more of the drug and using. Without a proper catalyst (which, short of dead Tara or dead Xander I don't think we'd get) I don't see a relapse escalating to that level. Addicts do relapse (approximately 7 times on average) before achieving sobriety but I don't think Willow's behavior would have ever escalated from the low she had pre-Tara dying to the same low she had from Tara dying. She wasn't acting as an addict, she was acting as a grieved lover/friend.

 

[Skytteflickan88]

[MENTION=8557]Skytteflickan88[/MENTION] drug cravings make addicts irrational and cold as a rule...but they don't cause the user to undergo the effort needed to create a catastrophe as that would detract from scoring more of the drug and using. Without a proper catalyst (which, short of dead Tara or dead Xander I don't think we'd get) I don't see a relapse escalating to that level. Addicts do relapse (approximately 7 times on average) before achieving sobriety but I don't think Willow's behavior would have ever escalated from the low she had pre-Tara dying to the same low she had from Tara dying. She wasn't acting as an addict, she was acting as a grieved lover/friend.

I don't know much of RL drugs, but from what I know what you say could be true for ordinary drugs, but magic as a drug wasn't just addictive in the Buffyverse, it was corruptive. Magic seemed to have a will of it's own, and dark magic, well, it was simply dark. So while grief helped make Willow dark in season 6, I think Willow simply absorbing enough dark powers would eventually have made her cold and ruthless, like after Tara died. It would just have taken longer.

 

[Ripper666]

I think yes she would. She had the chance to become evil, Tara was just a trigger but not the trigger. I mean that if Xander, Buffy or Dawn etcetera, would have been killed, Dark Willow would still get alive too! I think that she needed to make this experience to show her, where she will end while walking the path of anger! She learned from the experience, that's the point. But without this experience I am sure she would become dark Willow, maybe not immediatly but after some time. Becasue she never saw the aftereffects of what she was doing!

 

[Dagenspear]

It is very possible.