I don't know about everybody else but Spike is the best partner for Buffy yet.

[DayDreamer27]

Because there's a difference between 'this is me in an extreme emotional state' and 'this is my default mode'.
One is an understandable (or not) reaction because its due to circumstance, the other is intrinsic to that person's character. You see the difference? One is far more sympathetic than the other.



I guess its entirely subjective to the viewer but generally hitting somebody who is a) good and b) not hurting you is in the general realm of being a crappy person. This is true for all characters. But Spike does it more than any other character when he has a soul.
There's also a complete lack of consequence for him doing it most of the time. Her punches Faith for no reason, goes to tell Buffy about it and basically gets an attaboy and a hug.
Spike, as a character, often gets to act or do what he wants without suffering much in the way of consequences. Hence its up to us viewers who notice this pattern to call him out for his crap. The crap he often inflicts on other, better, characters.

Agreed! Then you have some characters like Angel who regret everything & never seem to get a break.

To quote Angel

I spent years trying to come to terms with infinite remorse. You spent two weeks moaning in a basement & then you were fine. What's fair about that?

So in general, Spike is a character that seems to be gifted a lot of passes.

 

[DaniRose20]

I'm not arguing. 😛 Spike was obsessed, not in love. And no, Buffy didn't love him. That's just fact. I don't read comics. Not into them.

Love is a process? Are you an expert on that? 😅

Fact or you interpretation? There's a big difference. It's called attraction, not love. Any smart person knows that. So it's ignorance then? That makes you say she never loved him? She says it countless times in the comics.

 

[Anyanka Bunny Slayer]

Fact or you interpretation? There's a big difference. It's called attraction, not love. Any smart person knows that. So it's ignorance then? That makes you say she never loved him? She says it countless times in the comics.

Now, now. Don't make it personal, sweetie. I was trying to be nice. We're talking about a fictional show, with fictional people. It's really not that dire. Chillax. 😂

 

[Antho]

Love at first sight can exist ! Just because it doesn’t happen to you, it isn’t your experience, does not mean that it doesn’t exist. Can people have an open-mind please ? I will tell you a story : my sister is in a relationship with my brother-in-law since 17 years. She is 33 years old now. Do the maths, she was 16 years old when she met him. They fell in love immediately when they have seen each other. So according to what some of you have said theirs relationship was dumb since the beginning just because « love at first sigh doesn’t exists , smart people know that ».. Well sorry , 17 years later, they are still together, have child, not being married because both of them are against that and Love is still there between them. And I believe there are others stories like theirs in the world. Yes, it’s rare but again that does not mean it doesn’t exist ! So I want to say that fortunately for them they were both enough stupid to believe in their relationship ! The key for a love that lasts is the communication ! If you have that then it’s going to work for a while. Âge doesn’t matters, and there is no Perfect recipe to have a perfect love. Love has many forms, it isn’t rational and everyone feel it in a particularly way! Just want to say that !

And hello guys by the same occasion.. I see you still have a lot of fun here haha..

 

[white avenger]

I just don't like the idea of someone having to change themselves so someone else will love them.

And can you really change yourself? Or is the person in love with a lie?

QUOTE="Buffy Summers, post: 1376561, member: 1"]
Though he didn't become Angel so that Buffy would love him.
[/QUOTE]

It could be argued that Angel did, in fact, change because of his feelings for Buffy. When Whistler first recruited him, he was a derelict living on rats in an alley. Even before that point in his existence, he was shown in other flashbacks to be reclusive, never interacting with others unless forced to. When he first became ensouled, he still killed humans to feed, even if they were. only the ones who, according to Darla, "needed killing," like murders and rapists. We don't know when that changed, but it apparently wasn't until Whistler told him about buying blood from butcher shops that that idea occurred to him. Maybe, before that, he fed on stray animals. That Angel ceased to exist as soon as he "fell in love with (Buffy) the first moment that he laid eyes on her. Maybe he wasn't consciously trying to change in order for her to love him, but it was that changed man who Buffy came to love. I seriously doubt that she would ever have fallen love with rat eating derelict Angel.

Add in the fact that the audience were shown that giving a vampire a soul is a punishment, and it makes the situation even worse.

The audience was shown that giving a soul to a specific vampire, Angelus, was a curse. It was also shown, and confirmed by Joss, that Spike's soul was given to him as a reward, with no conditions, stipulations, or limitations attached. It is also established, and again confirmed by Joss, that the presence of a soul makes the recipient a totally different character from his soulless former self. He may feel the guilt for what he did previously, bue he, himself, whether or not he chooses to change his name, is not, in fact, the person/monster who actually did those things.

 

[thetopher]

It could be argued that Angel did, in fact, change because of his feelings for Buffy. When Whistler first recruited him, he was a derelict living on rats in an alley.

There is changing your circumstance and fundamentally changing yourself.
Angel's changes came pretty slowly after he got a soul (although he was already completely altered from his 'demonic self'- Angelus). He tried to kill an innocent woman and live up to his nature as 'a monster', wasn't able to so he returned to Darla. He killed 'evil people' but couldn't kill innocents- instead protecting them from the excesses of the Whirlwind during the Boxer rebellion. That lasted a mere few days to a week before he fled, baby in tow.

Next was moving to America and shunning his own kind. He ate rats- its confirmed he did that in 'Orpheus'- and gradually began to hang around the fringes of society. He did drink human blood obtained from blood banks/medical suppliers (as we saw in HYNOHYEB).
Then in the 70's he fed off a recently dead man and ended up becoming destitute, in his own eyes he'd returned to being a loathsome monster again.

Whistler was the first person who told Angel he could be anything other than a monster, but really Angel S1 is not a million miles away from the Angel we saw in the 50's, willling to help if he saw somebody in need.
So no, he didn't change for Buffy, its more he became the best version of himself for her.

It is also established, and again confirmed by Joss, that the presence of a soul makes the recipient a totally different character from his soulless former self.

So therefore Spike DID change himself, everything about himself, by getting a soul.
In fact he stopped being the same character entirely, even though many still like to credit pre-soul Spike with things he did without a soul, like taking care of Dawn...

 

[WillowFromBuffy]

With the way the soul works, vampire who gets ensouled really gets to have it both ways. They cannot be blamed for what they did before they had a conscience and free will, but they do retain any positive qualities they may have had (as well as their bad ones. The soul do not erase them, it just allows the vampire to suppress them).

Having a soul can allow the vampire to mature into a person that is totally unrecognisable (as with Angel) but not everyone may fully get there (as with Spike and Darla).

Angel and Darla and Spike and Angel still have history, even if much has changed. The soul does not erase the good or the bad memories, but it means that the future may be different, because the souled being can choose to be better.

 

[WillowFromBuffy]

Spike and Angel

This was supposed to say Spike and Buffy, but Spike and Angel are also a relevant pair. Angel continues to see Spike as the cocky brat. Spike continues to see Angel as the tyrannical patriarch.

 

[spikenbuffy]

What I love and am truly proud of Spike ensouled is when in ATS he will go with Angel to fight evil at W&H in the Shells. And it isn't to impress Buffy. It's to fight evil.

 

[Foxy]

* sits in the back and eats popcorn while reading this thread *

 

[Anyanka Bunny Slayer]

* throws cookies at @Foxy *

 

[Btvs fan]

What I love and am truly proud of Spike ensouled is when in ATS he will go with Angel to fight evil at W&H in the Shells. And it isn't to impress Buffy. It's to fight evil.

Even better in the Bryan Lynch Spike in Vegas comics where he specifically tells Willow not to tell Buffy after she offers to big him up to her 🙂

Off topic but I thought he as a Comic book writer actually got Spike the best out of all the writers IMO 🤓

 

[white avenger]

In fact he stopped being the same character entirely, even though many still like to credit pre-soul Spike with things he did without a soul, like taking care of Dawn...

I have never liked the idea that the mere presence of a soul makes the character, whether Angel or Spike. a totally new chracter. The only reason for such an idea, as far as I can see, is to somehow give Season 3 Angel a pass for what he did in Season 2. However, within that context, Season 7 Spike i neither a stalker nor an attempted rapist.

As for giving ensouled Spike credit for any benevolent acts that he might have performed in his soulless state, I have no problem whatsoever in affording the same courtesy to Angelus/Angel, if we ever see any evidence that he actually did perform a benevolent act.

 

[DeadlyDuo]

I have never liked the idea that the mere presence of a soul makes the character, whether Angel or Spike. a totally new chracter. The only reason for such an idea, as far as I can see, is to somehow give Season 3 Angel a pass for what he did in Season 2. However, within that context, Season 7 Spike i neither a stalker nor an attempted rapist.

The problem still stands in regards to vampires and souls. The audience are told one thing (that a soul is a punishment for a vampire) then told something else at a later date because it suited the writers to change it, regardless of the unfortunate connotations it throws up. As far as I see it, Spike goes to commit an act of self-harm in order to be "acceptable" to Buffy and is rewarded for doing so. I don't put much stock in what Whedon says, this is the same guy that SHOWS us that Sunnydale has docks in Season 2 and 3 yet by Season 7 decides that Sunnydale is completely landlocked because he wants the town to be destroyed and fall into a giant crater. Whedon chops and changes the story as and when it suits him.

As for giving ensouled Spike credit for any benevolent acts that he might have performed in his soulless state, I have no problem whatsoever in affording the same courtesy to Angelus/Angel, if we ever see any evidence that he actually did perform a benevolent act.

He helped Joyce pick up her shopping when she dropped it? 🤔

 

[WillowFromBuffy]

The problem still stands in regards to vampires and souls. The audience are told one thing (that a soul is a punishment for a vampire) then told something else at a later date because it suited the writers to change it, regardless of the unfortunate connotations it throws up. As far as I see it, Spike goes to commit an act of self-harm in order to be "acceptable" to Buffy and is rewarded for doing so.

Most people can take in two apparent contradictions without their heads exploding.

Angel comes to see his soul as something other than a curse—a chance to be something better. This is the Angel we meet at the start of the show. It is only later that we learn about the long years between Angel getting his soul and meeting Whistler, so we were retroactively able to understand how much of a punishment the soul is.

Spike goes to get his soul without knowing much about what it entails. Getting the soul is a shock. The biggest irony is that when he achieves the very thing he wanted—when Buffy tells him she loves him—he is no longer able to believe her. Then he ends up in L.A. with the rest of the cast offs, too ashamed to tell Buffy he is alive.

And getting the soul is not really a mutilation. It is the vampire who is mutilated. Getting the soul back goes some way to restoring the being that was—or rather, restoring the full potential that existed within the person the vampire used to be.

 

[DeadlyDuo]

Most people can take in two apparent contradictions without their heads exploding.

Angel comes to see his soul as something other than a curse—a chance to be something better. This is the Angel we meet at the start of the show. It is only later that we learn about the long years between Angel getting his soul and meeting Whistler, so we were retroactively able to understand how much of a punishment the soul is.

Spike goes to get his soul without knowing much about what it entails. Getting the soul is a shock. The biggest irony is that when he achieves the very thing he wanted—when Buffy tells him she loves him—he is no longer able to believe her. Then he ends up in L.A. with the rest of the cast offs, too ashamed to tell Buffy he is alive.

The point still stands though. The audience is told one thing (souls and vampires shouldn't mix and the reason Angel has a soul is because he was cursed with one by gypsies as an act of vengeance because it was the worst punishment they could think of), yet Spike should go and get one so that he's more "acceptable" to Buffy and it's sooooo romantic that he did that for her.

Angel made the best of what was essentially a bad situation he had no control over. That doesn't mean someone else should willingly put themselves in that bad situation just to be "acceptable" to somebody because it didn't turn out too badly for Angel. Giving Drusilla a soul would be an absolute cruelty to her, regardless of whether she was cursed with it or earned it because of everything she's suffered at the hands of Angelus and done as a vampire. The whole shtick about Angel and his soul is that he was so evil, that was the absolute worst punishment he could be given. The reasons vampires lose their souls upon turning is because they're not meant to have them, it's counterproductive to their survival.

Angel was unique because out of all the vampires in the world, he was the only one with a soul which just so happened to be the one Buffy fell in love with. As Giles said, there's a poetry there. The Angelus arc works so well because it shows what Angel would be like without a soul, if he was like other vampires, and Buffy has to reconcile with the fact that without a soul, Angel is just another vampire that she has to kill. He's not her Angel anymore. Giving a second vampire a soul ruins that.

 

[WillowFromBuffy]

the reason Angel has a soul is because he was cursed with one by gypsies as an act of vengeance because it was the worst punishment they could think of)

And Angel shows them by turning their punishment into a gift.

Willow and Jenny both try to give Angel his soul back. They don't do that to punish him. They do it because a good person would want to have his soul. It is not bigotry towards evil people.

Spike should go and get one so that he's more "acceptable" to Buffy and it's sooooo romantic that he did that for her.

If you think so.

Spike is evil. Getting the soul was an act of selfishness, but it turned him into a person with the capacity for selflessness. Nobody told him to get a soul, nor does things turn out the way he expected them to.

Giving Drusilla a soul would be an absolute cruelty to her, regardless of whether she was cursed with it or earned it because of everything she's suffered at the hands of Angelus and done as a vampire.

It would be better than allowing her to keep killing. However, it might be kinder to dust her.

 

[DeadlyDuo]

And Angel shows them by turning their punishment into a gift.

Like I said, Angel made the most out of a bad situation.

Willow and Jenny both try to give Angel his soul back. They don't do that to punish him. They do it because a good person would want to have his soul. It is not bigotry towards evil people.

At that point, Angel has accepted the soul as part of his identity and would rather have it than not have it. He's made peace with it. In the early days, he would've given anything to get rid of it.

 

[WillowFromBuffy]

At that point, Angel has accepted the soul as part of his identity and would rather have it than not have it.

I though the soul was a punishment and that was all it could be and to have it be anything at all else than that would be double communication.

 

[DeadlyDuo]

I though the soul was a punishment and that was all it could be and to have it be anything at all else than that would be double communication.

The soul was given to Angelus as a punishment. He did not choose to have it and would not have chosen to have it if he had the choice. Now stuck with a soul and with no idea how to get rid of it, Angel makes the best of the situation, he learns to live with the soul that he had no choice in having. It takes him a long while but he gets there. Angel would rather have his soul than not have it because he has adapted to it and he recognises all the wrong he did as Angelus.

The soul itself is an awful punishment for a vampire. Angel, having no idea that he could lose his soul and believing he was stuck with it for the rest of eternity now that he had it, tries to do good in order to make up for the past evil he committed. He never would've chosen to have a soul in the first place, and arguably Angelus would not choose to have it back once he was rid of it, hence why he has to be re-cursed with it. Souled Angel wants his soul because the soul guilts him about what he could do without it. Angelus lacks a soul and thus doesn't have that guilt about not having one.