This Season Wants you to Hate Buffy

[Thursday]

Exhibit A: I agree. In Damage, the Slayers taking away Dana just bugged me. They're not going to do anything for her that Angel and Co. couldn't-- both would probably just get her a room at a private hospital and just get her some help. And, they made it sound like because they're Slayers their better equipped to care for Dana. Yeah, right. Dana will probably never be mentally stable enough to function as a Slayer, and this mentally unstable girl, made even more unstable by having Slayer powers forced on her, is going with the people who did this to her. Although Angel is now the evil head of Wolfram and Hart, he's the lesser of two evils in this situation.

Exhibit C: I don't think TGIQ was to make Buffy look bad. I think the episode was meant to poke fun at the whole "who should be with Buffy? Spike or Angel" argument and to tell Spike and Angel just to grow up and quit squabbling over a girl who's currently moved on. (That's probably why I enjoyed this episode so much).

 

[Icarium]

Yes, one really starts hating Buffy that season indeed...wait, you aren't talking about Buffy S7? Silly me, I read the title of the thread and immediately jumped to conclusions. 😀

Taking over Wolfram & Hart did absolutely nothing to Angel's character until the last 3or 4 episodes of the season.

He was the exact same way he had always been in the series.

Even if we agree with that, Buffy and Giles have no way of being sure of it. To them it must have looked like Angel had compromised his principles. I like the idea of such a rift but the execution was really sloppy and very much hampered by the viewers never seeing Buffy nor Giles on their screens.

Better therapists than the psychologists and magic Angel could provide thanks to Wolfram & Hart?

Yes, because Wesley and to a lesser extent Gunn, Spike and Angel were all such paragons of psychological stability that season...[sarcasm]

Buffy is screwing some random dude for no real reason. She just is.

Not random. More like evil and demonic. Not that Spike and Angel come off much better than Buffy from that episode, mind you.

 

[cordangel]

Ok, I'd like to add my thoughts about Buffy in s5 and s5 as a whole.

First of all, I as someone stated before, I don't like s5. Joss's take on Angel is different than Greenwalt's and the other writers (Minear). And I don't like it. Not at all. And Joss's attitude continues in the comics, Twilight garbage.

As for Buffy in s5...yes, I agree, the writers seem to want Buffy to be hated. But this is not new in AtS. Think about Sanctuary and her attitude with Angel, her asserted love for Riley... such a bitch. I never ever recovered from that (and her attitude in s4 BtVS).

Someone said Andrew was right, Hey, they can't trust Angel anymore. Why? He saved their lives, after all. Without the amulet brought by him (and W&H!) they would have never ever won the war against the First Evil! And, put that aside (if you can put aside this little little thing), couldn't Buffy call Angel and tell him something? But no, they decided to play dirty: 'Come on Angel, go to risk your life in the attempt to stop this poor, mad girl who became a slayer because of US,use all the resources you have and then...job well done, Angel, NOW we say to you we can't trust you anymore! Now, put yourself aside and we take care of her.'..yeah, right, because it was the Council or Buffy who saved Faith, right? Not Angel. (Random note: how much Andrew loves Spike! He was in an ambulance with his hands cut, and Andrew ...well, Andrew nothing, he is so busy to threaten Angel.)

And the lowest point is...Giles and his refusal to save Fred's life because of Angel working with W&H.After that, my disregard for him was complete. This and his leaving Buffy in the darkest time of her life, his attempt to kill Spike...I couldn't love him anymore.

Random thought: Angel helped Buffy in her last war but she didn't help him in his. This speaks volumes for me.

 

[Taake]

Random thought: Angel helped Buffy in her last war but she didn't help him in his. This speaks volumes for me.

Honestly a lot of this to me speaks more of actor involvement rather than character development in the actual shows.

Clearly the writers wanted Buffy to play a part in s5 whereas SMG did not have time for that. Thus Buffy wasn't able to take part in this war. I would hardly penalize the character for something like this... we don't know what Buffy's intended part in it all would have been... (not to mention I wouldn't really
have wanted her there to steal Angel's thunder so to speak)


As for s5 of Ats no it did not make me hate Buffy. It made me a little bit mad at Giles cause I felt his workings behind it more than anything, and yes it made me disappointed that we didn't get to see Buffy in a single epsiode of Angels last season. However regretable this is I think the show did just fine without

 

[LadyLavinia]

Let's examine the evidence.

Exhibit A: "Damage"

A gang of Slayers muscles Angel out of taking care of a horribly traumatized Slayer. They are in no real position to help the girl while Angel actually is.

ANGEL:
You're way outta your league. I'll just clear this with Buffy.
ANDREW
Where do you think my orders came from? News flash—nobody in our camp trusts you anymore. Nobody. You work for Wolfram & Hart. Don't fool yourself... we're not on the same side. Thank you for your help... but, uh...we got it.

Exhibit B: "Shells"

Refusal to help save poor Fred's life as well as uncaring that the greatest threat to the world has just been unleashed.

ANGEL
(to phone) All right, look—
What do you mean she's not on this plane? You just said— Astral projection? Well, is there any way to get her astral over to L.A.? Giles, this is an emergency. No. No, I'm not going— Don't put me on hold.

Yeah, I'm still at Wolfram & Hart . What does that have to do with anything? Yeah. I understand.
(throws phone against the wall; it shatters)
We're on our own.

Exhibit C: "The Girl in Question"

Buffy is screwing some random dude for no real reason. She just is.

Yes the comics retconned this but who cares about the comics. Fact is most people don't even know about them which means they just see this episode and hear Buffy is a whore.

So, Buffy is off the air and all we know about their actions after Season 7 is decidedly negative.

Also their main voice and presence is through Andrew. Oh god why Andrew.


So, yeah. What was the writers of Angel Season 5's problem with Buffy?

Angel had NO BUSINESS taking care of Dana. She was NOT his responsibility. She was Buffy's responsibility. The new Watcher's Council obviously had the money to take care of her. And frankly, the idea of a Slayer in the hands of Wolfram & Hart (regardless of who was running the L.A. branch) did not leave me feeling warm all over. Which is why I had no trouble with Andrew appearing in Los Angeles with a few Slayers to find Dana and bring her back. Having And why should Buffy trust someone who made a deal that left him in charge of the L.A. branch of Wolfram and Hart? Does anyone remember why Angel became head of that particular office in the first place? He used Wolfram & Hart to rob Connor of his choice of what to do with his life at the end of S4. He also allowed W&H to commit the psychic theft of his friends' memories of Connor . . . memories that go back at least a year-and-a-half.

Why on earth should Buffy trust Angel? She probably didn't know about his deal with Wolfram and Hart, when he gave her that amulet in "Chosen". Judging by Andrew's actions in "Damage", she certainly did.

 

[Gotham]

As usual in the Buffyverse, friction is caused by a lack of communication. It's amazing how many times Joss has used this as a plot device.

 

[Hale Caesar]

Really this season had a lot of emphasis on the fact that the Scoobies and Slayers wanted nothing to do with Angel...and let's be honest we can't blame them because Wolfram and Hart is notoriously evil. This is one of the biggest weaknesses of season 5, we only got Andrew to come back and briefly go over what the Scoobies reasoning was. If any of the Core 4 of Buffy had sat down with Angel and said "listen, this is why we don't trust you", we could actually see more than one side of the story. I sympathize with Angel because he did get screwed by Buffy and the others and he never got a full explanation why, except because of his new job