Why Didn't Wolfram & Hart and TPTB Help Buffy More?

[Buffyverse Fan]

In all honesty, Buffy's plan in Chosen was terrible. If not for Spike wearing Wolfram & Hart's amulet, she would've been the cause of a premature apocalypse.

Considering the fact that if one of the ubervamps managed to kill Spike, the world would have ended, and the First would become more powerful than Wolfram & Hart, why didn't W&H send more than Angel (who didn't even stay for the fight) to fight on Buffy's side, increasing the odds that the amulet would work?

Obviously from a storytelling POV, it would have been an anticlimactic for outside forces to save the world, but from an in-universe perspective, why?

Since W&H saw the First as a big enough threat to help Buffy, why wouldn't they go all-in, and send their heavy hitters in, like Hamilton & Vale?

Same question for TPTB. Joss surprised us by showing that Whistler is in a whole other league of strength above Buffy or Angel, and TPTB send him in when evil is about to overpower good...

 

[Robb Stark]

Yeah, very good point.

Buffy in "Chosen" drives me absolutely off the wall. It's so stupid it's almost to the point of insanity. When you really think about it, W&H, the big bad villain of another show, saves the planet in the final episode of BTVS.

Anyways, I'm not really sure why the Powers didn't do more over the course of the series to help Buffy out. They obviously view Angel as one of the ultimate champions for Earth, and probably figured that with him at Buffy's side for the first three seasons she was already well in hand. Once Angel moves to L.A.? I'm not so sure. Maybe they had their hands full watching over Angel and getting him started?

The only other thing I can think of is that maybe the Powers wanted Angel and Buffy to be away from one another unless the situation was imminent? I mean, they send Doyle a vision that Buffy is in life-threatening danger. That doesn't really explain all the times Buffy was in far worse danger and Angel wasn't sent to help and protect her, but that's the only thing I can really think of.

 

[iShower4free]

I dont think WR&H help Buffy to stop The First but as a tool to get Angel to work for them. At least thats how it seemed to me. They were making Angel an offer to convince him to come work for them.

Where it comes to TPTB and Whistler im thinking him being so powerful wasnt even written in until after Buffy s07 was over and done with so there is no reason to expect him to have been included in the story.

 

[Buffyverse Fan]

Anyways, I'm not really sure why the Powers didn't do more over the course of the series to help Buffy out. They obviously view Angel as one of the ultimate champions for Earth, and probably figured that with him at Buffy's side for the first three seasons she was already well in hand. Once Angel moves to L.A.? I'm not so sure. Maybe they had their hands full watching over Angel and getting him started?

The only other thing I can think of is that maybe the Powers wanted Angel and Buffy to be away from one another unless the situation was imminent? I mean, they send Doyle a vision that Buffy is in life-threatening danger. That doesn't really explain all the times Buffy was in far worse danger and Angel wasn't sent to help and protect her, but that's the only thing I can really think of.

The only explanation I can think of is perhaps TPTB saw that those spirits actually would have killed Buffy without Angel's intervention.

Your keeping Angel/Buffy away from each other is actually a really good point. As Giles said, there was always that prophecy about a slayer & a champion destroying the world. Even though Giles never took it seriously, perhaps TPTB did, and kept their team away from Buffy so as not to trigger it...

I dont think WR&H help Buffy to stop The First but as a tool to get Angel to work for them. At least thats how it seemed to me. They were making Angel an offer to convince him to come work for them.

If Wolfram & Hart hadn't sent Spike's Amulet, the First would have easily defeated the Scoobies.

The First would have then conquered Earth, and kicked Wolfram & Hart out of the dimension. Since Earth was the core of their power, they would have lost everything. So yes, I think they were serving their own interests by fighting it.

W&H doesn't play well with others, we know they directly opposed Jasmine, Illyria, and Twilight.

 

[emptyvessels]

This is actually something pretty interesting to think about. I definitely see W&H's reasoning for throwing some help Buffy's way, but I still don't understand why the PTB weren't more involved? I mean, they constantly threw help Angel's way. Okaaaay, maybe not constantly, but enough times, I think, when he needed it (not always, of course). I just feel like they were more of a dominant player on Angel than they were on Buffy?

Don't get me wrong, I completely agree that from a storytelling perspective, the fact that they weren't so involved had a much larger impact. I mean, would the finale even been so memorable if Buffy and the Scoobies had most of the hard work done for them?

The only thing I could think of that makes any plausible sense is Robb Stark's theory about Angel being the ultimate champion and whatnot.

 

[Ethan Reigns]

Consider the shape Wolfram & Hart was in.

In "Reunion" 2x10, Holland Manners had groomed their top people to be the next generation of movers and shakers in the company. These were the people in the inner sanctum, the go-getters of the company who were in tune with powers and had the ability to conjure up a lot of arcane forces that were not necessarily known oor available to the others in the company. After Darla and Drusilla got at them, only Lilah and Lindsey were left.

Then in "Habeas Corpses" 4x08, the Beast massacres a lot of the W&H staff. I think the remaining W&H lawyers recognized that maybe they had better look after their own interests in any coming apocalypse because the forces they were supporting would be just as likely to snap their necks as reward them for their service. And just a few months later, a new apocalypse was brewing in Sunnydale.

So the company had been hollowed out - its best and brightest killed off followed two years later by a generalized slaughter. At this point, I doubt any company could bring the full weight of their resources to bear on the situation - but they did send what they knew would help. I have seen a lot of this in the real corporate world - companies that have downsized to the point where if a prospective customer came around looking to start a major project, the company would be too anorexic to do the heavy lifting the customer wanted.