Results Of The Shanshu

[white avenger]

It's been established that the Shanshu Prophecy refers to Angel, but what, or rather who, is left after the award is received? In the Buffyverse, "when you die, the demon takes over. It's not you, it's just a demon walking around in your body, with your memories, but you aren't there. It's THE DEMON." So, my question is, who actually gets the award? Is it Liam, the only actual human part of the vampire, or is it the demon who now inhabits Liam's body? It would seem that Liam hasn't done anything to earn it, so does that mean that the demon currently in possession of his body and memories, who would have actually earned the reward, will become human?

Or do we have to cheat and say that Liam and Angel are really the same person?

 

[Xin Rong]

It's been established that the Shanshu Prophecy refers to Angel, but what, or rather who, is left after the award is received? In the Buffyverse, "when you die, the demon takes over. It's not you, it's just a demon walking around in your body, with your memories, but you aren't there. It's THE DEMON." So, my question is, who actually gets the award? Is it Liam, the only actual human part of the vampire, or is it the demon who now inhabits Liam's body? It would seem that Liam hasn't done anything to earn it, so does that mean that the demon currently in possession of his body and memories, who would have actually earned the reward, will become human?

Or do we have to cheat and say that Liam and Angel are really the same person?

Angel, who is a combination of Liam and Angelus, the ego in between the super-ego and Id, gets the reward.

Who was made human by the mohra demon in season 1, Angel, the demon or Liam? I'd say Angel was made human, which means it's definitely Angel who gets the reward.

 

[Black Eye Guy]

Or do we have to cheat and say that Liam and Angel are really the same person?

How is that a cheat?

I've never seen any evidence to suggest Angel and Liam aren't the same person, Angel being Liam with hundreds of years of murder at his hands

 

[white avenger]

How is that a cheat?

I've never seen any evidence to suggest Angel and Liam aren't the same person, Angel being Liam with hundreds of years of murder at his hands

That wasn't a poke at Angel, but he, himself said that all that makes up the persona of the living person is gone at death. What remains behind is a demon occupying an animated corpse (or, a "meat suit," as it's referred to in "Supernatural) Does that living person somehow return once the soul is restored? I've never heard any official answer to that as applies to either Angel or Spike, the only two examples of ensouled vampires that we have in the Buffyverse. The closest that we have ever had to it is Angel claiming to be Liam in "Spin The Bottle," and I'm not really sure that that counts, since Liam's memories would have been the only ones that his host demon would have to draw on at the time. Just because the demon had no other memories to draw from in identifying itself is no more valid than Spike assuming that he was Randy Giles in the "Buffy" episode, "Tabula Rasa." All that it proves is that Angel BELIEVED that he was Liam.

 

[Black Eye Guy]

That wasn't a poke at Angel, but he, himself said that all that makes up the persona of the living person is gone at death. What remains behind is a demon occupying an animated corpse (or, a "meat suit," as it's referred to in "Supernatural) Does that living person somehow return once the soul is restored? I've never heard any official answer to that as applies to either Angel or Spike, the only two examples of ensouled vampires that we have in the Buffyverse. The closest that we have ever had to it is Angel claiming to be Liam in "Spin The Bottle," and I'm not really sure that that counts, since Liam's memories would have been the only ones that his host demon would have to draw on at the time. Just because the demon had no other memories to draw from in identifying itself is no more valid than Spike assuming that he was Randy Giles in the "Buffy" episode, "Tabula Rasa." All that it proves is that Angel BELIEVED that he was Liam.

Oh I didn't think it was a dig.

But Spikes Randy and Liam aren't the same thing, Spikes memories were wiped, Angel was returned to age 16, if it wasn't Liam it wouldn't it be Angelus 16 years in?

Also what soul was returned to Angelus if it wasn't Liams? Same way the demon that gace Spike his soul says he will 'return' his soul, not give him a soul.

 

[white avenger]

But Spikes Randy and Liam aren't the same thing, Spikes memories were wiped, Angel was returned to age 16, if it wasn't Liam it wouldn't it be Angelus 16 years in?

Also what soul was returned to Angelus if it wasn't Liams? Same way the demon that gace Spike his soul says he will 'return' his soul, not give him a soul.

Couldn't it be just as likely that all of Angel's demon's memories were wiped, but Liam's memories remained intact specifically because they weren't part of the demon's memories. They were simply the residual memories that belonged to the body that it occupied. And as for what the cave demon told Spike, that doesn't really affirm that any part of William's personality or actual "self" was also returned. The soul, in the Buffyverse, is basically a conscience, the ability to feel remorse and guilt, and (hopefully) the desire to do what is good and right as opposed to what is evil and wrong. But nowhere is there any affirmation that anything that specifically pertains to the living human host is also restored. Quite the contrary, in fact. If the soul were actually the specific living person, none of the demon's experiences over the last century plus would affect it at all, because the soul wasn't there during that time to experience any of it. If the soul and the personality were connected, then the vampire's personality would revert back to what the human was at the time of death, which we know obviously didn't happen. The vampires who received souls and were forever changed by them were Angel, not Liam, and Spike, not William. Whatever actually went into defining Liam and William had long since gone on to whatever reward or punishment they had earned in life. They didn't come back.

And before anyone points out that that would have any relevance to Willow resurrecting Buffy, remember that Willow preformed a spell and ritual specifically designed to restore Buffy's body to life and reunite it with her soul. Neither Angel nor Spike were restored to life when they received their souls, so the same rules don't apply.

Buffy's soul was restored to a living, breathing person. Angel's and Spike's souls were given to two dead bodies who were animated by demons.

 

[ILLYRIAN]

No doubt someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but here goes anyway.
Liam is the human.
Darla has her wicked way with him and he becomes a vampire.
A vampire whose name is Angelus.
A vampire is a demon.
Gypsy's put curse on Angelus, the curse gives the demon a soul.
Vampire (demon) with a soul is Angel.
Angel is a vampire (still a demon) with a soul.
The demon was never removed, if it was you'd get Liam the human so how could a vampire (demon) and a human be thought of as the same.

And no, there has never been any evidence to show that Angel and Liam aren't the same.
I don't remember anything being said of Liam when he was at home in regard to Liam's drinking of pig's blood, of him being super fast, seeing in the dark.

Then there's the whole curse thingy Angelus (vampire - demon) is given a human soul
the result is a vampire with a soul, not a human.

About the demon giving Spike his soul back, I think the words were I return your soul.
if so, then that demon was an idiot. Spike is a vampire, vampires don't have souls, so he couldn't return the soul. That demon gave Spike Williams soul.
Good thing that Demon didn't have a sense of humour or you'd get Angel with Spikes/Williams soul and Spkie with Liams soul.
Which brings about another question, when Spike Angel put on the 'game face' does that part of the body have a soul in it? If not then you could in theory have Spike with Liams soul.

 

[white avenger]

And no, there has never been any evidence to show that Angel and Liam aren't the same.

For that matter, the only thing ever said, one way or the other, is that a vampire possesses the memories of its human host, but the host is no longer there. There's no definite statement anywhere that I could find (Maybe someone else can find one) as to whether or not the soul that the Gypsies gave him returned Liam to the vampire's body or just gave the vampire a sense of guilt, shame, and regret for what it had done since taking over its host body. In fact, if it weren't Liam's soul, but was in fact the equivalent of a universal or generic soul, one that had never been assigned to a human, that might explain why it isn't permanently attatched, but has the "one moment of true happiness" escape clause

In fact, if Liam had never returned with the soul, it might better explain why Angel would feel guilt for what Angelus had done. Liam wouldn't have any real reason to feel guilty, or need to in any way make restitution, for what Angelus had done, because he (Liam) wasn't the one who did it. Liam isn't Angelus, even though he retains the human memories, so there isn't any real reason why Liam should be Angel.

(Reading back over this, I see that I have, once more, gone way beyond the original question and the subject of this thread, so, out of respect for the other participants here, I'm going to go back over into my corner and mutter to myself for a few hours. Sorry, folks)

 

[Xin Rong]

You are talking about Liam and Angel as separate identities, when in reality Liam is a part of Angel, just as Angelus is a part of Angel.

If there was such a thing as a generic soul then there would have been no issue when Angel's soul was stolen in season 4, surely Willow, uber powerful witch, could emulate something done by some gypsy woman, who seemed to have very little power, considering she and her tribe were eventually killed relatively easily.

This to me suggests that Angel's soul is Liam's soul, but Liam no longer exists because a new identity, Angel, has been created, which incorporates both Liam and Angel.

Also we know that the soul returned to Angel is in fact his human soul, because Doyle, who receives his information direct from the all knowing PTB tells us this in the very first episode:

"Once upon a time there was a vampire. And he was the meanest vampire in all the land. All the other vampires were afraid of him, he was such a - bastard. Then one day he’s cursed – by gypsies. They restore his human soul. And all of a sudden he is mad with guilt. You know: ‘What have I done?’ You know, he’s freaked."

To suggest otherwise is to contradict what the writers tell us directly and indirectly throughout both series

 

[Kairos]

Angel has been living with a demon (colloquially referred to as Angelus) and his original soul (who was once known as Liam) in the same body. Becoming human would remove the demon from that body, leaving him as an ordinary human guy with an ordinary human soul.

"Who gets the Shanshu" isn't much of a question; there's only one possible recipient left.

 

[Black Eye Guy]

"Once upon a time there was a vampire. And he was the meanest vampire in all the land. All the other vampires were afraid of him, he was such a - bastard. Then one day he's cursed "“ by gypsies. They restore his human soul. And all of a sudden he is mad with guilt. You know: "˜What have I done?' You know, he's freaked."

I spent ages looking for that quote yesterday! Knew there was a quote that mentioned his human soul.

Angelus, Liam and Angel are all the same person to me, there is no difference between them other then no conscience.

If Liam had his soul removed but wasn't turned into a vampire, he'd be the same as Angelus. The idea of the vampire being a completely different being is shown to be false as the season progresses, in my opinion.