DarklyDreamingDrusilla
Scooby
Okay so I am not much of a writer but I thought I would post this up here anyways. This is my paper for philosophy where I had to take something pop culturey and relate it to one of the theroies that we have studied in philosophy. I decided to do Buffy (of course!) I did the episode Normal again and related to Plato's Allegory of the Cave. So yeah if you actually want to read it I thought I would put it up.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Joss Whedon is a fantasy television series that was on from 1997 until 2003. The show centers around a core group of people called the Scooby Gang. This gang consists of Buffy Summers who is the vampire slayer. She is the chosen one who must battle vampires, demons and other nasty creatures to keep Sunnydale, CA safe. Then there is Giles who is sent to be Buffy's watcher. A watcher is someone sent to train the slayer to fight and teach her all about the magical world. Then there is Willow and Xander who have been Buffy's best friends since she started high school at Sunnydale High School. Willow later began to study the art of witchcraft and is now a full fledged witch. There are a few other characters that appear later in the series such as Spike, a vampire who cannot kill anymore because he has had a governmental chip placed in his head. This chip acts like an electric dog collar and stops him before he can hurt humans. He has now fallen in love with Buffy and follows her around everywhere. Finally, there is Dawn and Tara who are minor characters who do still play a role in the plot of the series. Dawn is Buffy's sister, she was technically not always human as she was made by monks and sent to Buffy as a teenage girl. Tara is Willow's girlfriend for a few seasons.
I have decided to specifically center on one episode entitled Normal Again. In this episode Buffy is attacked by a demon and it stabs her with one of its pokers injecting her with a hallucinogen which causes her to drift out of her reality into another one in which vampires, demons, etc. are not real. She has been in a mental institution for the past six years where she has been imagining her real life. This episode in many ways mimics the ideas of Plato's allegory of the Cave. This episode questions what is real in this world. What is reality? We find Buffy wanting to believe in the nonrealistic world because it helps her to escape her current situation in which she is not happy.
She finds that in her alternate reality her mother is still alive and still married to her father. Her mother tries to convince her that she is sick and that she needs to get rid of her delusions. While this is happening Buffy's friends Xander and Willow are working on an antidote to make Buffy better and trying to keep her grounded in the real world. This is beginning to get more and more difficult as Buffy is getting more comfortable in her alternate reality. Her mother tries to convince her that even her sister is a made up person making it harder for Buffy to connect with anyone in the real world. We find that similarly to the allegory of the cave Buffy begins to detach herself from the darkness and reaches out towards the desired enjoyable world where she is with her family. This question of reality falls under the area of metaphysics, it questions what is real?
Throughout the episode we find that Buffy is being absorbed by her alternate reality as she finds it more appealing. It is easier for her to escape her existing life because at the moment in the show she seems to be in a state of depression because she was pulled out of heaven back down to earth. As a result of this depression she is hurting her self physically and mentally by starting a relationship with Spike, who she hates. She then even turns to eliminating her friends and her sister so that she can completely purge her mind of that reality. This shows us another relation to the allegory of the cave because like Buffy the men strapped in the cave want to get rid of the people threatening their reality. They succeed in killing this man unlike Buffy who comes to a realization. Although we see that Buffy finds that she cannot kill the people she loves, we do not ever truly find out which world is truly the reality. At the end of the episode we find Buffy in the hospital again and the doctors pronounced that they have lost her once again which leaves us with the question if she truly was in a mental hospital. Fans of the show obviously lean towards the world full of demons and vampires as the real world because that is more enjoyable. The answer to this question does not seem truly important towards the end of the episode because Buffy chooses her reality so the viewers come to accept her decision.
The philosophy in this episode does resonate in my mind because it brings forth one of the biggest questions of all time. Although I do not have a specific life event that I can relate to this episode I can find myself from time to time questioning what is truly real. This question can revolve around so many things such as ethics, God, or your feelings. This can slowly begin to frustrate me as it frustrates the men in the cave and Buffy because someone is questioning their reality. Whether this questioner is ourselves or another person it brings up questions that are not easily answered. We find that when answering these questions it is easy to get defensive and take immediate action because we have a need to protect what we believe in no matter what it is.
It is obvious that throughout this episode there are some definite philosophical ideas. This is true for almost everything that Joss has worked on. We find that in Normal Again there are definite themes relating to Plato's allegory of the Cave and we find that it questions reality and what is truly real.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Joss Whedon is a fantasy television series that was on from 1997 until 2003. The show centers around a core group of people called the Scooby Gang. This gang consists of Buffy Summers who is the vampire slayer. She is the chosen one who must battle vampires, demons and other nasty creatures to keep Sunnydale, CA safe. Then there is Giles who is sent to be Buffy's watcher. A watcher is someone sent to train the slayer to fight and teach her all about the magical world. Then there is Willow and Xander who have been Buffy's best friends since she started high school at Sunnydale High School. Willow later began to study the art of witchcraft and is now a full fledged witch. There are a few other characters that appear later in the series such as Spike, a vampire who cannot kill anymore because he has had a governmental chip placed in his head. This chip acts like an electric dog collar and stops him before he can hurt humans. He has now fallen in love with Buffy and follows her around everywhere. Finally, there is Dawn and Tara who are minor characters who do still play a role in the plot of the series. Dawn is Buffy's sister, she was technically not always human as she was made by monks and sent to Buffy as a teenage girl. Tara is Willow's girlfriend for a few seasons.
I have decided to specifically center on one episode entitled Normal Again. In this episode Buffy is attacked by a demon and it stabs her with one of its pokers injecting her with a hallucinogen which causes her to drift out of her reality into another one in which vampires, demons, etc. are not real. She has been in a mental institution for the past six years where she has been imagining her real life. This episode in many ways mimics the ideas of Plato's allegory of the Cave. This episode questions what is real in this world. What is reality? We find Buffy wanting to believe in the nonrealistic world because it helps her to escape her current situation in which she is not happy.
She finds that in her alternate reality her mother is still alive and still married to her father. Her mother tries to convince her that she is sick and that she needs to get rid of her delusions. While this is happening Buffy's friends Xander and Willow are working on an antidote to make Buffy better and trying to keep her grounded in the real world. This is beginning to get more and more difficult as Buffy is getting more comfortable in her alternate reality. Her mother tries to convince her that even her sister is a made up person making it harder for Buffy to connect with anyone in the real world. We find that similarly to the allegory of the cave Buffy begins to detach herself from the darkness and reaches out towards the desired enjoyable world where she is with her family. This question of reality falls under the area of metaphysics, it questions what is real?
Throughout the episode we find that Buffy is being absorbed by her alternate reality as she finds it more appealing. It is easier for her to escape her existing life because at the moment in the show she seems to be in a state of depression because she was pulled out of heaven back down to earth. As a result of this depression she is hurting her self physically and mentally by starting a relationship with Spike, who she hates. She then even turns to eliminating her friends and her sister so that she can completely purge her mind of that reality. This shows us another relation to the allegory of the cave because like Buffy the men strapped in the cave want to get rid of the people threatening their reality. They succeed in killing this man unlike Buffy who comes to a realization. Although we see that Buffy finds that she cannot kill the people she loves, we do not ever truly find out which world is truly the reality. At the end of the episode we find Buffy in the hospital again and the doctors pronounced that they have lost her once again which leaves us with the question if she truly was in a mental hospital. Fans of the show obviously lean towards the world full of demons and vampires as the real world because that is more enjoyable. The answer to this question does not seem truly important towards the end of the episode because Buffy chooses her reality so the viewers come to accept her decision.
The philosophy in this episode does resonate in my mind because it brings forth one of the biggest questions of all time. Although I do not have a specific life event that I can relate to this episode I can find myself from time to time questioning what is truly real. This question can revolve around so many things such as ethics, God, or your feelings. This can slowly begin to frustrate me as it frustrates the men in the cave and Buffy because someone is questioning their reality. Whether this questioner is ourselves or another person it brings up questions that are not easily answered. We find that when answering these questions it is easy to get defensive and take immediate action because we have a need to protect what we believe in no matter what it is.
It is obvious that throughout this episode there are some definite philosophical ideas. This is true for almost everything that Joss has worked on. We find that in Normal Again there are definite themes relating to Plato's allegory of the Cave and we find that it questions reality and what is truly real.
B
Blondie Bear
Would you like my writing-tutoriness applied to this? Cause I can help edit it and PM you if you want.
