What does Buffy mean by the "so much easier to talk to when he wanted to kill me" line?
Oh I love this line. This speaks volumes to me. I think this is one of the first verbal indications we get that Buffy is feeling something for Spike--certainly physically and perhaps emotionally as well. The line "he was so much easier to talk to when he wanted to kill me" can be applied to their entire Season 6 relationship. She's drawn to him. She wants to be with him. But she doesn't know what those feelings mean; she doesn't even like having them. She doesn't want to be romantically attached to a soulless creature but she finds herself in a situation where said character has made his feelings known to her, and she can't help but feel something as well. The turmoil she's experiencing is significant. Hence, he was much easier to talk to, be around,
deal with in general when he wanted to kill her. Back then, she wanted to kill him too. Slayer. Vampire. The rolls were clear and there was no grey area.
Q2. The curtains close on a kiss God knows"¦ What happened next?
I feel pretty confident that Buffy realized she was kissing Spike, tore herself away from him and acted disgusted--just as she had after the first time they slept together. Then she ran away, "virtue fluttering."
Spike went to bed with a grin on his face, knowing he had been right all along!
Q3. At the end of Tabula Rasa Buffy, sitting at the bar, turns away from Spike and Spike seemingly leaves. Yet when we see them next, Buffy and Spike are kissing... How'd that happen?
I imagine that she changes her mind and walks over to him as he's leaving.
Q4. Do you think that Buffy ever really considered a more conventional relationship with Spike?
I honestly believe it had entered her head for sure by Potential; it's the first time she starts to show genuine caring and sympathy for him without the circumstances surrounding Beneath You for example, in which she is pitying him as well. Does that make any sense?
In Season 6, she cared for him, sure. But there were feelings of guilt, anxiety, and superiority tied in as well--in other words, she didn't think of them as equals so she couldn't consider a conventional relationship.
In Season 7, when he comes back ensouled, she feels sympathy for him but more than anything she pities him. Again, they are not on equal footing. If anything, their relationship is more like nurse and patient. This starts to change in Potential. He has a soul, and he's back in the game, helping her out. She can now start to think of him as an equal; as another hero who has her back. The way she shows concern when he is hurt in the early graveyard scene demonstrates this nicely, as does the scene in the bar when they share a knowing grin. Equals. There's relationship
potential. (Ooh, maybe that's an intentional second meaning for the title?)
Certainly by "The Killer in Me" when she decides to have his chip removed in order to save his life--she is truly treating him as she would have treated, (and did treat) Angel and Riley. She absolutely acts if she is in a relationship based on trust and respect in this episode.
Is she conscious of all this? I think so. If anything, she probably is by "End of Days."
Q5 Season Six Spike's propensity for wearing gold chains "“ cool or creepy?
Oh so very cool. They look great on him. But I always thought of all the silver jewelry (there's a lot of that too) as a nod to all the traditional folklore in which Vampires are said to be harmed by it. It's sort of Spike's way of saying, "Vampire, wearing sliver. Who's bad? Eff off." And in reality, the silver had no effect on him. Sort of like when a teenager gets a tattoo just to look "bad" or "carefree" when really we all know that tattoos aren't the most dangerous things in the world, lol.
