Hot Topic: Is the Buffyverse better or worse off because of magic?

I agree the magic as drugs metaphor in season 6 was just awful. Had they just kept it at, magic was changing Willow, causing her to alienate her friends, was dangerous and forcing her to repair her relationship with them afterwards, that would have been fine. But Rack was PSA awful. I sometimes wonder if they would have kept Amy around as a semi-regular witch, friendly, but not friends, half competent and making sure magic stays at arm's length.
 
EarthLogic said:
Definitely in later seasons when witches are shown to be able to do almost anything with a flick of finger. That's why early-seasons magic made more sense; it was shown to be difficult and dangerous to perform a spell so being a slayer still had importance when it came to fighting demons.
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I disagree slightly with this. When Willow and Tara made Glory re-locate, although they only threw glitter at her, the spell was shown to take a lot out of Willow, she was drained and had to rest between spells. I think later seasons showed magic to be far more difficult and had far more of an impact on the witch. When Willow restored Angels soul in S2, she was in hospital and in pain, but that spell seemed to take nothing out of her and seemed pretty simple.
 
RachM said:
Until Season 6, magic had been shown to be a good thing, a weapon to be utilized when the Slayer needed.
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Accept if you're Amy or Amy's mum, or Willow doing a 'thy will be done' spell, or your a zoo keeper trying to instil the spirit of an hyena in yourself, or your a demon living inside a book that's scanned into a computer . . . there are so many times when magic isn't shown to be a 'good thing' in the early seasons. I don't understand why anyone would think that magic only turned into a 'bad thing' in season 6
 
Antho said:
I think Willow was possessed by a spirit of one of Jenny's clan when she did that spell
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Exactly. She didn't seem to suffer any after effects of that at all, unlike in later seasons were the after effects were all too obvious
 
Priceless said:
She didn't seem to suffer any after effects of that at all, unlike in later seasons were the after effects were all too obvious
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But maybe she didn't suffer because it wasn't really her who was casting this spell.. she was possessed, so maybe it wasn't really HER magic.

@Fool for Buffy I think they created the spell just for punish Angel but I think you can use it on all the vampires. The spell is about putting a human soul in a vampire, whathever who is the vampire.
 
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Fool for Buffy
Fool for Buffy
Okay. That makes sense, I just liked to think it made Angel more special. Feels like they could have cleared it up tho
Antho said:
But maybe she didn't suffer because it wasn't really her who was casting this spell.. she was possessed, so maybe it wasn't really HER magic.
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But she must have called the spirit forward so it could possess her, but she had not ill affects from that. No one appeared to in the early seasons. Amy did a major love spell that affected every female in Sunnydale, yet she didn't seem to suffer any ill effects.

The consequence of magic in the early seasons were all about who the magic was performed on, not who was performing it and I think that's the biggest difference between the early and later seasons. In later seasons we see that those performing the magic suffered consequences too.
 
Antho said:
But we can also see that in the early seasons with Amy's mom and Amy herself : One has locked her soul in a statue, the other has turned into a rat !
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But that's only from magic being done on them, not the after effects of doing magic. They suffered from the spell itself, not from any physical or mental pain or suffering from actually performing magic.
 
Priceless said:
But that's only from magic being done on them, not the after effects of doing magic. They suffered from the spell itself, not from any physical or mental pain or suffering from actually performing magic.
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Okay but even in the later seasons there isn't many examples of what you are saying. The only one I can think is the one you have already said :

Priceless said:
When Willow and Tara made Glory re-locate, although they only threw glitter at her, the spell was shown to take a lot out of Willow, she was drained and had to rest between spells.
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Antho said:
Okay but even in the later seasons there isn't many examples of what you are saying. The only one I can think is the one you have already said :
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Sorry to invade, but doesn't all of season 6 fall under that realm?
 
Antho said:
Season 6 was about addiction and not being Ill because you did a spell..
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Addiction is an illness. And the addiction came from doing spells.
 
Antho
Antho
It's possible I have misunderstood Priceless :) anyway, don't feel sorry to invade, a conversation with you is always a pleasure :)
Fool for Buffy said:
Addiction is an illness. And the addiction came from doing spells.
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Okay you're right. But I think there is a difference between having pain because you didn't cast a spell and you want to (that's addiction) and having pain because of a spell you casted (that's what @Priceless are saying I think)
 
Fool for Buffy
Fool for Buffy
Aight. Makes sense
Fool for Buffy said:
Btw could Willow really "restore the soul of any vampire?" Isn't the spell Angel specific? I thought the gypsies created the curse for Angel, and it was the spell for his soul only.
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I've always thought it was a specific spell for a specific vampire, Angel in this case, and that's why they don't/can't use it on other vampires.

/SK
 
Priceless said:
I disagree slightly with this. When Willow and Tara made Glory re-locate, although they only threw glitter at her, the spell was shown to take a lot out of Willow, she was drained and had to rest between spells. I think later seasons showed magic to be far more difficult and had far more of an impact on the witch. When Willow restored Angels soul in S2, she was in hospital and in pain, but that spell seemed to take nothing out of her and seemed pretty simple.
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Yeah there are still moments in the later seasons where they take care to show its difficulty. The resurrection spell in 'Bargaining' is a good example- it's a dangerous and complex spell which takes a lot out of Willow and requires specific ingredients. But when they started bringing in the 'magic is drugs' metaphor then this sort of got watered down: Willow decorates a room just by saying one word; she and Amy transform people's clothes, and move them around with just a flick and twinkly lights. So yes they did show magic to be more difficult where it's impact on the spell-caster was concerned, but not in terms of the physical process of doing it. at least, not consistenly.

Antho said:
@Fool for Buffy I think they created the spell just for punish Angel but I think you can use it on all the vampires. The spell is about putting a human soul in a vampire, whathever who is the vampire.
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sk73 said:
I've always thought it was a specific spell for a specific vampire, Angel in this case, and that's why they don't/can't use it on other vampires.
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I think the spell is specific to Angel. It's clear what we're shown of it isn't the whole thing because we know there's a happiness clause somewhere in there. So it's reasonable to assume that there is a part of the spell that also connects it to Angel exclusively.
 
EarthLogic said:
Yeah there are still moments in the later seasons where they take care to show its difficulty. The resurrection spell in 'Bargaining' is a good example- it's a dangerous and complex spell which takes a lot out of Willow and requires specific ingredients. But when they started bringing in the 'magic is drugs' metaphor then this sort of got watered down: Willow decorates a room just by saying one word; she and Amy transform people's clothes, and move them around with just a flick and twinkly lights. So yes they did show magic to be more difficult where it's impact on the spell-caster was concerned, but not in terms of the physical process of doing it. at least, not consistenly.
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I see what you mean, but I do feel that Willow and Amy both suffer consequences from their use of magic in the later seasons that they didn't in the earlier seasons. As has already been said, it was all part of the power/addiction story for Willow. I agree there was no consistency where magic was concerned. I also think the 'hand waving' form of magic was only there to show how proficient Willow and Amy were at magic.
 
I know a lot of people look down their nose at the entirety of s6 and the drug metaphor in particular. I think it worked perfectly well.

Some people claim there was no precedence. Well, Giles, Ethan, Willow and Tara used magic to enhance sexual experiences. Doesn't that sound like drugs? That goes all the way back to season 2.

Magic is presented as dangerous from the start. It s a tempting and easy solution that almost invariably ends up making things worse.

I agree that magic is cheapened in the comics by making Will and Giles way too powerful to the point that they challenge Buffy's position as the main fighter. I hate that. However, in the show, Willow can only do the Harry Potter when she is seriously overclocking. They should have toned down the Bronze scene with Amy, because it got way too silly, but that power level was not meant to be seen as sustainable.

In s7, when Willow uses her hippy earth magic, she is a lot less powerful.
Fool for Buffy said:
some of the best episodes of the series are "spell gone wrong" episodes
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Definitely!
RachM said:
There is never a point where illicit drugs are "good" or "helpful".
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Yes, there certainly is. Illicit drugs can have all sorts of beneficial effects. Also, there is no clear distinction between legal and illegal drugs.

This is not an endorsement, by the way 😛
 
It was never really made clear, regarding the Ritual of Restoration. I mean, I'm guessing Jenny did the heavy lifting of adapting the ritual for Angelus, and Willow just did the recitation. I mean, I assume Gypsy magic requires divination to work, and the knowledge to permform such a ritual had to be paid for.
 
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