Why Do Some People Hate Spike?

[Moscow Watcher]

add the Clock Work Orange premise of the whole 'becoming a good guy' arc - and you have me vomiting quietly in the corner.

To me, Whedon's subtle subversion of Kubrick's view of humanity is the most fascinating aspect of Spike's journey - but that's a topic for another thread, apparently.

 

[Icarium]

The grey area of Spike's character also confuses people often.

Oh, please...The "grey" area of a character who has a built in excuse for his actions, an excuse that his fans never tire of pointing out? Grey area my ass.

To be a Spike fan, you have to have an unbelievable capacity for empathy. Some people just don't have that capacity.

Some people have more empathy for Spike's victims than for poor woobie Spike.

They'll never be able to grasp the emotional motivator because emotions are all over the place and with Spike they're never just this or that.

Yeah, right. Spike's archetype was already a beaten to death chicle back the 1840s when the Bronte sisters created Mr. Rochester and Heathcliff, two of the most famous characters of that type. It's entirely possible to understand Spike and still dislike him.

I didn't want to talk about fans and haters but since we already started I will try (and apologize in advance if I might offend someone with my generalizations). Personally I believe Spike's popularity is based on wish-fulfilment. He is the character who is allowed to break all rules and get away with just about anything. He is a rebel bully but he is also a sensitive poet. He is a vampire but can be "good". If one says anything about his crimes the lack of soul excuse immediately comes back, yet his fans also demand we count his "good" actions while soulless as selfless deeds, not seeing the obvious contradiction. He is changed by his love for the heroine but she also changes for him.

He is basically the "heads I win, tails you lose" type of character, the ultimate writer's pet. Because of that other characters suffer since they are never allowed to do what they should have done with him, namely stake him.

 

[Black Eye Guy]

I didn't want to talk about fans and haters but since we already started I will try (and apologize in advance if I might offend someone with my generalizations). Personally I believe Spike's popularity is based on wish-fulfilment. He is the character who is allowed to break all rules and get away with just about anything. He is a rebel bully but he is also a sensitive poet. He is a vampire but can be "good". If one says anything about his crimes the lack of soul excuse immediately comes back, yet his fans also demand we count his "good" actions while soulless as selfless deeds, not seeing the obvious contradiction. He is changed by his love for the heroine but she also changes for him.

He is basically the "heads I win, tails you lose" type of character, the ultimate writer's pet. Because of that other characters suffer since they are never allowed to do what they should have done with him, namely stake him.

This, this, this.

This is exactly what I was trying to say, but much better then I said it and directly to the point!

 

[brinkster130]

[MENTION=6758]white avenger[/MENTION] agrees: Well, he was loyal to Dru for over a century, even though, apparently, she didn't return the favor.

True; but then he tried to kill her once he had moved onto his next object of affection. I certainly can't knock his loyalty to the one he loves, but I do wonder how long that loyalty will last. I guess I wonder how special Buffy really is to him, compared to his other loves, or if she is just another obsession.

It's interesting because this why I love Spike. He doesn't know who he is. He is himself in being what others want him to be... I know that doesn't make much sense... but he's a very other oriented person. And by that I mean he doesn't so much see the world in terms of himself, he sees the world in terms of other people and himself. He's trying to one up Angel so that he can prove he can. He tries to impress the women in his life so they'll take notice and give him meaning. To Spike, an action is meaningless if no one is there to appreciate it. And therefore, his actions are done to win the appreciation of others. Other oriented people are really quite interesting... they may seem spineless at first... but when you really look at them you realize it takes a lot of guts to put yourself on the line like that time and time again. And they wouldn't do it unless they felt they had to... being true to themselves is doing things for the appreciation of others. Interesting phenomenon if you ask me.

Fair enough, I suppose where our opinions differ is how you find his other oriented personality interesting and I find it more of a sign that he is lost. Some times I wonder what the writers intentions were with his character; ones destiny plays such a large role in the verse but from what I've seen Spike seems to be without one, he just sorta goes with the flow with out a clear sense of self purpose.

 

[zobothehobo]

See I don't see this at all, Spike for me doesn't grow at all as a character until Chosen.

When he's introduced he's a selfish guy who has no backbone to stand up to his girlfriend, he does everything for her, and while I think that looks like he's a selfless character, I think it's the reverse, he goes out of his way to be nice so she stays with him.

This is carried forward to Buffy, he does everything for her - but not for her, but to get her to like him, I don't see that as selfless at all, it's purely selfish. Like when everyone turns on Buffy and kick her out, I know everyone has opinions on that, but I think the gang were right, Buffy was correct in her plan, but was doing everything the wrong way, the gang was right to show her she was spinning out of control, but Spike just sides with her and Buffy can do no wrong.

I think it's like this right up till Chosen, when Buffy says I love you to him, he knows shes saying it to be nice, and he says no you don't, because he no longer needs her approval, he actually is proving himself a hero, he isn't just saving the day for Buffy.

that's interesting... I've never heard it said like this.

Now... Here's a secret though. Spike IS selfish for all the reasons you've just stated, but he's also not for those exact same things. As I've already stated... he's other oriented... what this means is doing something for himself is doing something for other people. Doing something so that Buffy or Dru will like him is doing what he wants because he wants to do it. That's what being other-oriented means.

However, in Chosen... Buffy's not just saying it to be nice and he knows it. But he knows what she needs is not for him to have a talk with her. So once again he does something because she NEEDS it. This is the same thing he's been doing... just on a larger scale.

I couldn't disagree more.

This is what I was saying when I said it's fans opinions on Spike that have developed my hate for him. And I don't mean to aim it at you Zobo, this is an opinion I've come across frequently.

But where are you getting this from? Because the show I saw has a Spike who just attempted to rape Buffy, he clearly explains his reason while he is doing it, that he knows she loved him, becasue he felt it when he was with her, so he tried to be with her to make her feel it. Then when he gets back to Clem, to me he pretty much explains that he wants to get his soul back because thats the only thing stopping Buffy from loving him.

He doesn't understand the feels between them, he confuses sex and love and believed Buffy would "love" him when he was having sex with her, when he thinks about it, he then thinks he needs his soul for her to love him.

And again none of this is selfless, he didn't do it for Buffy, he did it to prove to her that she was in love with him, believing that if he came back with his soul she would have to love him.

I understand that allot of what happens is up to interpretation, but in this particular case, if you look at the script, read what Spike Says to Buffy during the scene, what he says to Clem it's so clear his thought process, but then people say he got his soul because he knew he did wrong, which I just dont see at all.

Funny you say it's clear his thought process because I believe you have most of it completely wrong. I've explained my thoughts on this scene countless times on this board, all you have to do is look at one of the threads that Taaroko linked to and you'll see some of it. I would go ahead and elaborate here, but I know if I do, this thread will turn into a Seeing Red thread and I don't think it needs to be one. But basically I think Spike realized what was going on when he was talking to Clem and I think it terrified him that he almost did that... and I think he went and got his soul because he wanted to never do that again. He wanted to be the man Buffy deserved. And that man was righteous. The actions of the previous scene were not actions of a righteous man and Spike knew he couldn't really be righteous unless he had a soul. After getting his soul back he realized he could never really be righteous ever again. Not after everything that had already happened.

I agree with this, I think there is way to much of a grey area around Spike. The writers didn't seperate pre and post soul Spike enough, something that was clearly set out for them.

See to me, the beauty of Spike's story is that pre-soul Spike developed into post-soul Spike making the contrast less noticeable.

Now I know it goes under the heading of Spike being this special vampire, but what I have a problem with is when you are discussing something with his fans, one will say about how wonderful he is, then you bring up Seeing Red, and it's "Oh no he didn't have a soul it's excusable" - To me, I can take that, but I think that means everything pre soul should be excusable, that he couldn't have loved Buffy in season 5 and 6 because it wasn't the same person.

Now here's where you lose me. First of all, there is a difference between someone with no soul doing something extraordinarily good and something extraordinarily bad. Because the soul gives you the pain, guilt, and other suffering type emotions that prevent you from doing bad things. So not having a soul would take away your conscious and therefore whatever prevents you from doing bad. So you're naturally predisposed to do harmful things. So for you to do something good and go against that nature is different from going with it.

But even if that wasn't true... I've never actually spoken to a Spike fan who actually excused bad actions while soulless who gave credit for good ones. Most Spike fans understand bad actions while soulless and give credit for good ones or treat soulless and soulled Spike as different individuals.

Now people will say "I agree, and I think they only loved each other from Season 7 on" - I can get on board with that, but it isn't a general conciousness, it varies fan to fan, whereas with Angel you have a clear divide, you don't hear Angel fans saying he was so in love with Buffy because he tried to kill her when he was Angelus, Angelus and Angel are taken as separate people, as they should be, because thats the way the show sets up the vampire mythology, but then when it comes to Spike, because he's a fan favourite all the rules have to be changed.

But Angelus trying to kill Buffy is proof how how much he loved her. She made him feel the most human emotion of all, love. And that was Angelus' big thing against Buffy was it not?

Hmm, to me it's just the opposite, I used to love spike with all his mistakes, and being nasty and snarky. That was the Spike I loved. the Spike of Season six and seven, not so much. I never hated him I just didn't find him half as interesting anymore. Once Spike lost his 'bite' I found him to be a bit boring even. To me personally I think it was Spuffy that ruined Spike for me as a character.

Spike was rude in seasons six and seven. He was snarky. He had a bite. It was just shifted.

---------- Post added at 07:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:47 PM ----------

Fair enough, I suppose where our opinions differ is how you find his other oriented personality interesting and I find it more of a sign that he is lost. Some times I wonder what the writers intentions were with his character; ones destiny plays such a large role in the verse but from what I've seen Spike seems to be without one, he just sorta goes with the flow with out a clear sense of self purpose.

Perhaps that's his point. The character without the sense of self-purpose. The character who's purpose is the purpose of others.

 

[Gum Gnome33]

Some people have more empathy for Spike's victims than for poor woobie Spike.

If we're not to like any characters on the show who at one point or another had victims of some sort, that leaves very few characters. It's a show about demons, vampires, and slayers. It isn't real life. Part of the fun is growing to like those who used to be bad, or have done some terrible things, and are attempting to do better.

The implication that Spike fans sit around not feeling empathy for his victims and thinking of him as "woobie" and "adowable" made me simultaneously laugh and feel quite angry.

It's entirely possible to understand Spike and still dislike him.

And it's also entirely possible to understand Spike completely differently from how you do. 🙂

If one says anything about his crimes the lack of soul excuse immediately comes back, yet his fans also demand we count his "good" actions while soulless as selfless deeds, not seeing the obvious contradiction.

There's no obvious contradiction if one can be both bad and good while soulless, which is something that Spike fans see very clearly on the screen in front of them. Just because he's the first vampire to prove that the two aren't mutually exclusive, doesn't mean it's not possible because, from our POV, it very clearly happens.

Quite frankly, the fact that human beings do just this, every single day--have souls, have humanity but act both good and bad--and the fact that we can point to someone's good deeds and declare them to be so while also acknowledging any bad things they've done means that this phenomenon is not a contradiction but rather a paradoxical truth about our existence.

 

[brinkster130]

There's no obvious contradiction if one can be both bad and good while soulless, which is something that Spike fans see very clearly on the screen in front of them. Just because he's the first vampire to prove that the two aren't mutually exclusive, doesn't mean it's not possible because, from our POV, it very clearly happens.

I think a lot of people get stuck on the question "why does it happen?". The show seemed to set fairly clear guide lines about what vampires and demons were capable of, it makes no sense that Spike would be different/special. (Harmony too for that matter)

Personally I think the chip was the main cause for his change rather than his own free will or determination; he was essentially conditioned to behave.

 

[ladydorotea]

To me, Whedon's subtle subversion of Kubrick's view of humanity is the most fascinating aspect of Spike's journey - but that's a topic for another thread, apparently.

Honestly, I don't see any subtlety in this journey, however hard I try. Here we have a character who basically turned into a monster because he could not get laid, spent over a 100 years under a skirt of a dominating, cheating girlfriend while occasionally snacking on a young girl or two on the side, then 'turned good' after being rejected by yet another woman and turning sexually violent on her. I can call this a parody or an outright pulling of fans leg, devious Jossean sarcasm, but there is certainly nothing subtle about it. At least Kubrick did not shy away from Alex admitting his flaws and raising a question of free will vs enforcement. Spike's story sweeps the part with embedded chip under the carpet and pretend it did not play the key role in his change.

 

[RipperGilesFan]

Spike was rude in seasons six and seven. He was snarky. He had a bite. It was just shifted.

Fair enough. 😱 Maybe it wasn't just one particular thing about Spike that made me not like him as much any more as I used to, right up to the end of season five. Something about Spike season 6 and 7 just rubbed me the wrong way. And it saddens me, because I used to love the character 🙁

 

[Taaroko]

If we're not to like any characters on the show who at one point or another had victims of some sort, that leaves very few characters.

The difference in Spike's case is that we have to deal with him being cheerfully unrepentant and evil (even when he can't physically do any harm) for five seasons without getting dusted, which strains credulity to the breaking point. I have the same problem with Harmony and a similar problem with Andrew, and I'd probably even have gotten tired of Angelus if he'd been around that long without getting staked, even though he's my favorite villain of anything ever.

And it's also entirely possible to understand Spike completely differently from how you do. 🙂

Yep, it's pretty much all down to how we individually interpret the characters. Spike's fans might think that those of us who dislike him do so because we just don't understand him, while I and many others feel we understand him perfectly well and dislike him *because* of that. I don't see any flaws or logical errors in the way I interpret Spike, because that interpretation fits with everything I saw of him onscreen while not clashing with my understanding of how the Buffyverse works. I do, however, see a glaringly huge error in interpreting Spike as an exception to the rule, a soulless vampire with enough humanity to truly grow and change for the better.

There's no obvious contradiction if one can be both bad and good while soulless, which is something that Spike fans see very clearly on the screen in front of them.

And there's that glaringly huge error I mentioned. Without a soul, a being can only be evil. With a soul, a being can be good, evil, or (far more likely) anywhere in between, because the soul is what gives a being the capacity to understand the difference and to make decisions based on more than self-interest, but they still won't always make the best choices. Spike is stuck at the evil end of the spectrum until he gets his soul. This is what I saw very clearly on the screen in front of me throughout his arc in seasons four through six. Perhaps that's not what the writers wanted me to see, but it fits into the rules they already very clearly established for their universe, so it's their problem if they weren't bothering with internal consistency.

Quite frankly, the fact that human beings do just this, every single day--have souls, have humanity but act both good and bad--and the fact that we can point to someone's good deeds and declare them to be so while also acknowledging any bad things they've done means that this phenomenon is not a contradiction but rather a paradoxical truth about our existence.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're saying that because human beings with souls can be bad, vampires without souls should be able to be good. I can see why you would say this--it does have an appealing sort of symmetry to it, but it doesn't fit. Like I said before, humans can be anywhere from good to bad because they have souls. Souls don't force them to be good, they merely enable them to choose good over evil and have selfless motives behind their actions. When a human character (or someone in real life) chooses good most of the time and tries to do their best and regrets their mistakes and makes amends when they wrong others, it's only natural to consider them good people. Nobody's perfectly good, and thank heavens for that, because perfectly good characters would be boring.

But soulless vampires are different. They have no choice. They're *all* stuck at the evil end of the spectrum (making them perfectly selfish and evil, if you will). But since they still have as different of personalities as they did when they were human, that's going to manifest in wildly different ways from vampire to vampire. You end up with vamps like Harmony who are just too simpleminded to excel at being evil, and vamps like the Master who have grand plans for opening hellmouths and bringing back the ancient demons. Vamps like the Three who are just obedient toadies to other vamps, and vamps like Sunday who can command their fellows with apparent ease. Vamps like Mr. Trick who move and change with the times instead of getting caught up in tradition, and vamps like Penn who relive the same scenarios over and over. Vamps like Lyle Gorch who run when they know they're outmatched, and vamps like Zachary Kralik who decide to keep playing the game even when they could take the opportunity to run. Vamps like Angelus who, along with causing as much pain and suffering as they can, take the time to learn the languages of the places they visit, and vamps like Spike who are bloody awful poets and get a thrill from fighting Slayers to the death. For all that variety, all of these soulless vamps are still evil.

 

[Icarium]

If we're not to like any characters on the show who at one point or another had victims of some sort, that leaves very few characters. It's a show about demons, vampires, and slayers. It isn't real life. Part of the fun is growing to like those who used to be bad, or have done some terrible things, and are attempting to do better.

Too much of this "fun" and you get a show that is basically morally bankrupt. I don't like using that phrase and before anyone asks I will note that I do not want all characters to be paragons of virtue but Whedon's brand of "redemption" tends to make me sick. And not just when it comes to Spike, mind you. It's just as true with Faith, Willow, Angel, Andrew and especially Anya. I tend to think of it this way - if a relative or a friend of one of Spike's victims came around in S5 looking for justice, would the Scoobies have a leg to stand when they tell him that he shouldn't kill Spike? If not, why haven't they done it already? And was the risk of Spike's chip (a device which none of them had the slightest idea of how it was working or how long it was supposed to last) malfunctioning, allowing Spike to kill more people (and probably some of the Scoobies too), acceptable for the reward of...what exactly? Not killing a vampire who is helpless? I know that if I were living in Sunnydale I wouldn't want my protectors to be that lenient.

There's no obvious contradiction if one can be both bad and good while soulless, which is something that Spike fans see very clearly on the screen in front of them. Just because he's the first vampire to prove that the two aren't mutually exclusive, doesn't mean it's not possible because, from our POV, it very clearly happens.

The contradiction isn't about what's possible and what's not. It's about the simple fact that if Spike can defeat his nature while soulless then he (or rather his fans) cannot use the lack of soul as a get out of jail free card for the crimes he committed in that period. I know that you and I have had this discussion too many times, so I'd rather not go that road again as none of us will change their mind.

But even if that wasn't true... I've never actually spoken to a Spike fan who actually excused bad actions while soulless who gave credit for good ones.

Really? Did any of those fans wanted Spike to be staked for those "bad actions"? If not, why not? Did any of them thought Buffy's "He has a soul now" was kind of missing the point then? If not, why not? Would any of them be okay if another character they like, say Xander or Willow or someone else with a soul decided to become a serial killer? If not, why are they okay with Spike's crimes? And no, giving lip service to the idea that he committed crimes isn't really not being okay with that, IMO. If one actually gives a damn about Spike's crimes they wouldn't want Spike anywhere near the rest of the main cast, chip or not chip. And they would want him staked too. Everything else for me is looking at the story from an outsider perspective (i.e. knowing that Spike won't really do any serious damage, unless we count random red shirts) and not really taking Spike's crimes seriously. Which isn't something I can really blame fans for, mind you, since the writers often did the same but let's call things as they are.

 

[Gum Gnome33]

The difference in Spike's case is that we have to deal with him being cheerfully unrepentant and evil (even when he can't physically do any harm) for five seasons without getting dusted,

In the second half of season 5 and all of season 6, Spike is actively helping all of the scoobies, saving their lives repeatedly. Why, again, should they be staking him? And the lack of believability therein is maddening. "Oh Spike is such a monster. He's evil, he's--oh no I'm being attacked! Spike! Save me!" And he does. Is he a saint? No. Is he truly good? No. Reforming? Yes. Just because he has a chip doesn't mean he has to help anyone do anything. Even when Buffy, the object of his so-called obsession, is dead.

I don't see any flaws or logical errors in the way I interpret Spike, because that interpretation fits with everything I saw of him onscreen while not clashing with my understanding of how the Buffyverse works.

And that's exactly how Spike's fans feel.

I do, however, see a glaringly huge error in interpreting Spike as an exception to the rule, a soulless vampire with enough humanity to truly grow and change for the better.

But I genuinely don't understand why it's erroneous to see Spike as an exception to the rule. Why can't he be? It would hardly be the first time in fiction, or in life itself, for someone to come along and change what we'd previously believed to be the truth. Honestly, I keep hearing this as a reason to dismiss Spike's story, and I just can't understand where it's coming from, or the reasoning behind it. To me, that's what makes the story great. That a character can come along and be the exception. That's the kind of thing that makes me keep watching. Granted, it has to be set up well and explained properly. There has to be motivation and reason. In my opinion, this is all covered.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're saying that because human beings with souls can be bad, vampires without souls should be able to be good.

Well I think this can apply too, but I actually just meant that since human beings can be both bad and good--each individual can be both--it's not a stretch to imagine that a fictional character could be, as well.

if a relative or a friend of one of Spike's victims came around in S5 looking for justice, would the Scoobies have a leg to stand when they tell him that he shouldn't kill Spike?

In season 5? No not really, especially not before "Intervention." But a victim is a special circumstance entirely; anyone is allowed to feel as if they can and should seek revenge on a killer at any point in time, even if said killer now "has a soul." That goes for any character in any season, regardless of how much they've changed since they killed.

The contradiction isn't about what's possible and what's not. It's about the simple fact that if Spike can defeat his nature while soulless then he (or rather his fans) cannot use the lack of soul as a get out of jail free card for the crimes he committed in that period. I know that you and I have had this discussion too many times, so I'd rather not go that road again as none of us will change their mind.

But again my point, in case anyone wants to hear it, is that Spike's personality like everyone else's is a living thing that can change and develop. Just because he didn't have the inclination to do something before, (ie defeat his nature), doesn't mean he can't discover that he can, and that he wants to, later. The things that happen to us greatly shape who we become, and for Spike the experience of being chipped, loving Buffy, and being forced to look at things from a new perspective could be enough to encourage such a transformation. As I've said multiple times, it obviously wasn't enough, and that's where the journey to Africa comes in. But the fact that one being can have both negative and positive inclinations--can do good things and slip up and succumb to his evil nature again--is not only something that I feel is not inherently contradictory, but it also makes perfect logical sense to me, given what we see every day.

I certainly don't want to watch characters who can only act a certain way or within a certain set of predetermined parameters throughout an entire story, like robots, never changing perspectives based on their experiences. (Quite frankly, very few characters in the show do that.) Sure, Spike is an extreme example of this. But I don't exactly think that qualifies his story as nonsensical, either!

If one actually gives a damn about Spike's crimes they wouldn't want Spike anywhere near the rest of the main cast, chip or not chip. And they would want him staked too. Everything else for me is looking at the story from an outsider perspective (i.e. knowing that Spike won't really do any serious damage, unless we count random red shirts) and not really taking Spike's crimes seriously.

But honestly you can take out "Spike" in this phrase and replace it with Angel, Willow, Faith, and Anya. Sure we can just expect the other scoobies to eliminate any one of them based on their past, and the horrible things they did, not allowing for any future development or reformation. But I rarely see that suggested.

 

[Once more wNeNe]

I just love spike. A lot.

 

[Icarium]

In season 5? No not really, especially not before "Intervention." But a victim is a special circumstance entirely; anyone is allowed to feel as if they can and should seek revenge on a killer at any point in time, even if said killer now "has a soul." That goes for any character in any season, regardless of how much they've changed since they killed.

Okay, not a victim then. A concerned citizen. Do you think "Well, poor follow is helpless we can't just kill him, never mind he has killed thousands" is going to be accepted? The reason for Spike's survival is so flimsy that the show doesn't even bother with it sometimes. Like after Out of My Mind when neither Spike nor Buffy seem to even remember that Spike's actions in the previous episode almost led to Riley's death, let alone do something about that (like Spike hiding or Buffy trying to kill him). It's perfectly silly, they might as well have had Spike wear a "James has a long term contract, okay?" sign.

The things that happen to us greatly shape who we become, and for Spike the experience of being chipped, loving Buffy, and being forced to look at things from a new perspective could be enough to encourage such a transformation.

That's only if you buy the possibility of a vampire without a soul loving a Slayer and I don't. I don't believe people trying to kill each other can fall in love. I am weird like that. Nor do I believe love would have made Spike go look for a soul rather than the much more obvious solution of making Buffy a vampire.

But the fact that one being can have both negative and positive inclinations--can do good things and slip up and succumb to his evil nature again--is not only something that I feel is not inherently contradictory, but it also makes perfect logical sense to me, given what we see every day.

Again, the problem is that you want to have it both ways. If Spike can change then the question how come it took him more than a century arises. And really, revelling in evil for a millennium with no sign whatsoever that you have any goodness left in you and then out of the blue being changed by love is the kind of drivel I wouldn't enjoy even in fanfiction. Although, at least he changed more quickly than Anya, I will give him that. 🙂

Also, the show never tackles the problem of how come Spike could change while it's perfectly okay to kill all other vampires based on the assumption that they can't. This right here is enough for me to classify his story as half-baked nonsense. There wasn't really any message or point to it, it was just a convenient way to keep a popular character around and satsfy a very vocal shipper faction. Selling out is just not cool.

But honestly you can take out "Spike" in this phrase and replace it with Angel, Willow, Faith, and Anya. Sure we can just expect the other scoobies to eliminate any one of them based on their past, and the horrible things they did, not allowing for any future development or reformation. But I rarely see that suggested.

Well, I suggested it in my previous post. In any event other characters getting away with murder isn't really an excuse for Spike to do so too, is it?

 

[Astral]

Spike is one of my favorites. I don't think I could actually pick between Spike or Angel for favorite vampire. He provides so much comic relief that helps give the show its quirkyness, especially in season 5 of Angel which is my favorite Spike season. I do agree that he does a have a sort of "get-out-jail free"card though and I believe it is even mentioned in the show by Anya and Xander a few times. But how could you not like a vampire who likes watching "Passions" and eating onion blossoms. 🙂

 

[Taaroko]

In the second half of season 5 and all of season 6, Spike is actively helping all of the scoobies, saving their lives repeatedly. Why, again, should they be staking him?

Because, for all they knew, the chip could have stopped working at any moment. They risked innocent lives by not getting rid of him. He rarely contributed any information they couldn't have gotten somewhere else, especially after S4. He might have been helpful, but he repeatedly proved that he was still dangerous. Admittedly, the Scoobies have a tendency to not stake vamps they don't consider a threat. They didn't stake vamp Willow, they didn't stake Harmony, so while it doesn't make sense, it's not necessarily out of character for them not to stake Spike, even though he came much closer to killing all of them than either of the other two ever did.

Just because he has a chip doesn't mean he has to help anyone do anything. Even when Buffy, the object of his so-called obsession, is dead.

He has to help them if he wants them to keep giving him money for blood and not leave him to fend for himself against all the demons who'd be happy to kill him now that he's killed so many of them.

But I genuinely don't understand why it's erroneous to see Spike as an exception to the rule. Why can't he be?

Because this isn't the kind of rule that allows for exceptions, it's a universal law, like gravity. All soulless beings are *always* irredeemably evil at their core. They can make a show of being better than that if it benefits them, and they can play the part so well that they even convince themselves, but they can never make even a tiny amount of genuine progress towards being good under the surface. You're going have to explain to me why Spike *can* be an exception to the rule, because it's much less logical to assume he's an exception than to assume he always has selfish motives driving his actions.

Another example of a universal law in the Buffyverse is that all vampires are soulless. Angel (and later Spike) is an exception because his soul was restored with magic. This is a logical exception with an explanation that makes sense. Spike being able to change for the better because (if I recall right from previous discussions) he has an extra helping of humanity compared to other soulless vampires is *not* an explanation that makes sense. *Why* would he have more humanity than the next vamp? How is that possible? You can't say it's because he was a better person when he was a human than any of the other vamps we saw. Drusilla was practically a saint, Alonna spent her life fighting vampires with Gunn and caring for the other homeless kids, Theresa from "Phases" was just a sweet girl, Jesse was a nice kid, Sarah Holtz and Collin (the Anointed) were just innocent children, etc. What makes Spike so special that he gets to be the only one out of them and all the others who retained a little goodness when his soul flew the coop?

It would hardly be the first time in fiction, or in life itself, for someone to come along and change what we'd previously believed to be the truth.

When writers set up an ironclad rule (soulless vamp=evil) that they keep for *years* with no intention or hint of breaking it, and then more than halfway through the show's run attempt to break it for one character without explaining why that's suddenly possible, it's extremely sloppy storytelling, and I don't feel inclined to put up with it. Besides, nothing I observe in the show makes it absolutely definite that the rule was broken in the first place. I can find selfish motives behind all of soulless Spike's actions quite easily, and so the Buffyverse continues to function properly.

Honestly, I keep hearing this as a reason to dismiss Spike's story, and I just can't understand where it's coming from, or the reasoning behind it. To me, that's what makes the story great. That a character can come along and be the exception. That's the kind of thing that makes me keep watching.

We already have a character who came along and was an exception: Buffy. Buffy is the first Slayer *ever* to have friends and family and go to school while slaying. Her exceptionalness is the point of the show, not Spike's (which is obviously debatable anyway).

Well I think this can apply too, but I actually just meant that since human beings can be both bad and good--each individual can be both--it's not a stretch to imagine that a fictional character could be, as well.

Of course it's not a stretch to imagine that a fictional character can be both bad and good, as long as that character has a soul.

But again my point, in case anyone wants to hear it, is that Spike's personality like everyone else's is a living thing that can change and develop.

Not in a morally good direction, it can't.

But the fact that one being can have both negative and positive inclinations--can do good things and slip up and succumb to his evil nature again--is not only something that I feel is not inherently contradictory, but it also makes perfect logical sense to me, given what we see every day.

Never in the history of the real world has there been any such thing as a soulless being, so there is no real life comparison to make for the behavior of soulless vampires. This is why we have to rely on the rules the Buffyverse gives us. In the Buffyverse, soulless=evil. Therefore, Spike does not and can not have positive inclinations while he has no soul, only negative ones. He can do objectively good things only if they benefit himself.

I certainly don't want to watch characters who can only act a certain way or within a certain set of predetermined parameters throughout an entire story, like robots, never changing perspectives based on their experiences. (Quite frankly, very few characters in the show do that.) Sure, Spike is an extreme example of this. But I don't exactly think that qualifies his story as nonsensical, either!

There have to be parameters and standards and boundaries and rules, otherwise we have no context for any of the characters' behavior, and we're left with utter meaningless chaos. Just because Spike can't become less evil without a soul doesn't mean he can't grow and develop. As I illustrated in my previous comment with my examples of the wide range of personalities we see in soulless vampires, there is a *lot* of wiggle room within the classification of "irredeemably evil". Spike certainly did change perspectives and build up to the point where he went soul questin', but he managed all of that without taking a single step towards being an inherently good person.

But honestly you can take out "Spike" in this phrase and replace it with Angel, Willow, Faith, and Anya. Sure we can just expect the other scoobies to eliminate any one of them based on their past, and the horrible things they did, not allowing for any future development or reformation. But I rarely see that suggested.

Willow and Faith are slightly murkier territory because they've always had souls, but I wouldn't have held it against the other characters if they'd killed either of them in self-defense or in protection of innocent people or something. Angel shouldn't be killed for what Angelus did, and Anya shouldn't be killed for what she did as a demon (though a little remorse from her before S7 would have been nice), but any character would have been perfectly within their rights to take out Angelus or Anyanka.

 

[dexeded]

Damn time zones. I sleep and miss all the action.

He has to help them if he wants them to keep giving him money for blood and not leave him to fend for himself against all the demons who'd be happy to kill him now that he's killed so many of them.

I think there's no way for me to argue with you here, because it's up to your interpretation of the story... but honestly, your interpretation never even occurred to me. I thought it was made explicitly clear that he was helping them because of Buffy.

Because this isn't the kind of rule that allows for exceptions, it's a universal law, like gravity. All soulless beings are *always* irredeemably evil at their core. They can make a show of being better than that if it benefits them, and they can play the part so well that they even convince themselves, but they can never make even a tiny amount of genuine progress towards being good under the surface. You're going have to explain to me why Spike *can* be an exception to the rule, because it's much less logical to assume he's an exception than to assume he always has selfish motives driving his actions.

Oh yes, he always does have selfish motives driving his actions. Killing demons because he couldn't harm humans. Protecting the Scoobies because of Buffy. Saving Buffy's life because he couldn't bear for her to die (in a selfish way. If you know what I mean, which is that he lacked the whole "Touched" speech mentality). But that doesn't mean he can't have genuine character development. People do good things for the wrong reasons all the time, unless you're an absolute paragon of morality. You don't steal because you'd feel guilty. You don't cheat because you might get caught. You feel sad for a friend migrating because you won't get to talk with him/her face-to-face as often. Spike's thoughts and feelings for himself aren't as straightforward as "I want Buffy to live because then I have a chance with her." It's more imagining Buffy dies and feeling terrible about it, but not explicitly thinking that he doesn't want her to die because then he'd be sad. I know that just sounds like not thinking through his true motives, but that's what it's like for regular people everywhere, who think they can't go on without someone, or wonder what they're going to do without that person. And he makes progress because he does more and more good actions and that slowly becomes his moral code, which is essentially what human law does as well.

When writers set up an ironclad rule (soulless vamp=evil) that they keep for *years* with no intention or hint of breaking it, and then more than halfway through the show's run attempt to break it for one character without explaining why that's suddenly possible, it's extremely sloppy storytelling, and I don't feel inclined to put up with it. Besides, nothing I observe in the show makes it absolutely definite that the rule was broken in the first place.

That's called change. That's what makes it facinating. All that talk of black and white, Angel/Angelus... Spike overturns those assumptions. Hell, we even see good demons, in both BtVS and AtS. As Buffy said way back in S2, "Nothing's ever simple anymore. I'm constantly trying to work it out. Who to love or hate. Who to trust. It's just, like, the more I know, the more confused I get." To which Giles replies, "I believe that's called growing up." And fast forward to the later seasons. It gets greyer and greyer as the Scoobies grow up. So to me, it's not an ironclad rule. It's not immutable. Because in the show, they clearly set up Spike/souled Spike as the contrast to the Angel/Angelus dichotomy that had been established. Because now characters can change--not truly change selflessly, but still change--with a different catalyst. The chip and Buffy.

But I also subscribe to the belief that Spike is a special snowflake vampire. Any other vampire would have either staked himself/herself (although Spike did try... and failed) or just killed the Slayer and Scoobies by other means like setting their houses on fire or poisoning their food or something. I mean, we all know Spike has an unusual capacity for love re: his mum and Dru. It's not a difference so great that he is a good vampire and sparkles and repents or whatever, but a marked difference nonetheless. That's what made him so interesting in S2, after all, what with the love for Dru and teaming up with the Slayer--he was different from other vamps we had previously encountered, and continued to be different through the seasons.

I can find selfish motives behind all of soulless Spike's actions quite easily, and so the Buffyverse continues to function properly.

And as I wrote in my first paragraph, I agree that he was selfish... so I guess my previous point is pretty much redundant since we were agreeing anyway... D'oh!

Of course it's not a stretch to imagine that a fictional character can be both bad and good, as long as that character has a soul.

What about a chip?

Weak argument (my previous statement, not your argument), so just sweep that aside. I just wanted a nice one-liner before diving into a dense paragraph.

Bad, good, those are all subjective terms. My stance is: Spike was bad when soulless, even when chipped. But he was good, considering he was soulless. He was both bad and good because he did good things while being selfishly motivated. I count that as grey area good/bad. It's like a character who kills bad guys purely for revenge rather than a moral compass. Considered a white hat. But still for selfish reasons. Not that I even consider soulless Spike a white hat, per se. That was just a loose comparison.

Now, Spike is naturally evil. When he goes against his nature to do good things (not 'killing demons because he can't kill humans' good, but 'saving Buffy from being skewered by a sword in the RV' good), we applaud it. That's why he's both bad and good.

Never in the history of the real world has there been any such thing as a soulless being, so there is no real life comparison to make for the behavior of soulless vampires. This is why we have to rely on the rules the Buffyverse gives us. In the Buffyverse, soulless=evil. Therefore, Spike does not and can not have positive inclinations while he has no soul, only negative ones. He can do objectively good things only if they benefit himself.



There have to be parameters and standards and boundaries and rules, otherwise we have no context for any of the characters' behavior, and we're left with utter meaningless chaos. Just because Spike can't become less evil without a soul doesn't mean he can't grow and develop. As I illustrated in my previous comment with my examples of the wide range of personalities we see in soulless vampires, there is a *lot* of wiggle room within the classification of "irredeemably evil". Spike certainly did change perspectives and build up to the point where he went soul questin', but he managed all of that without taking a single step towards being an inherently good person.

...Well, I agree with absolutely everything you're saying (except for the whole 'Spike helps the Scoobies after Buffy's death because he wants their cash' riff). Now my entire post is redundant, dammit.

Willow and Faith are slightly murkier territory because they've always had souls, but I wouldn't have held it against the other characters if they'd killed either of them in self-defense or in protection of innocent people or something. Angel shouldn't be killed for what Angelus did, and Anya shouldn't be killed for what she did as a demon (though a little remorse from her before S7 would have been nice), but any character would have been perfectly within their rights to take out Angelus or Anyanka.

Yes, I agree with you here, except for Anya. I like Anya. But I like her because of suspension of disbelief. There's nothing about vengeance demons and souls, but as you said, Anya shows no remorse for her killings pre-S7. So why shouldn't they take her out? I understand killing soulless things, since they are inherently evil, but not killing something just because it's a human? (And this is not a Buffy Is The Law, But Humans Should Fall Under Human Law thing, because Anya is an ex-demon.) Honestly, if Anya got her powers back, she'd jump at the chance to wreak havoc once again. There's not much of a difference with Anya/Anyanka, except Anyanka has the power to do what Anya wants. It's like a Spike-chip situation.

---------- Post added at 03:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:26 PM ----------

Okay, not a victim then. A concerned citizen. Do you think "Well, poor follow is helpless we can't just kill him, never mind he has killed thousands" is going to be accepted? The reason for Spike's survival is so flimsy that the show doesn't even bother with it sometimes. Like after Out of My Mind when neither Spike nor Buffy seem to even remember that Spike's actions in the previous episode almost led to Riley's death, let alone do something about that (like Spike hiding or Buffy trying to kill him). It's perfectly silly, they might as well have had Spike wear a "James has a long term contract, okay?" sign.

Lol, I totally agree with you. And I think we've talked about this before in another thread about Anya, but it's just about suspension of disbelief for me. So I can't actually argue with you here.

That's only if you buy the possibility of a vampire without a soul loving a Slayer and I don't. I don't believe people trying to kill each other can fall in love. I am weird like that. Nor do I believe love would have made Spike go look for a soul rather than the much more obvious solution of making Buffy a vampire.

Well, it wasn't--and I don't want to use this maudlin term, but for want of a better word--true love. It wasn't pure. A lot of it was obsession mistermed. Some of it was empathy. Some of it was transferrance. And some of it was love (arguable. That point doesn't matter, for reasons I will state below). It was how vampires love. But honestly, love even in the human world can't be defined. Very rarely is love truly pure and selfless, or so I gather. (Also, they weren't actively trying to kill each other at the time. It was a shaky alliance. Later on, he was actively helping and protecting Buffy.)

But I won't argue with you whether he truly did love her or not--what mattered is that he thought he did. Emotional turmoil drove him to want to be a man. Chip prevented him from being a monster. AR made him realize that he needed to decide. Boom, soul.

Again, the problem is that you want to have it both ways. If Spike can change then the question how come it took him more than a century arises. And really, revelling in evil for a millennium with no sign whatsoever that you have any goodness left in you and then out of the blue being changed by love is the kind of drivel I wouldn't enjoy even in fanfiction. Although, at least he changed more quickly than Anya, I will give him that. 🙂

Basically, chip.

He couldn't engage in the usual debauchary, so the monster side was restrained. He interacted regularly with humans. Then the whole love thing. My previous explanation applies.

Also, the show never tackles the problem of how come Spike could change while it's perfectly okay to kill all other vampires based on the assumption that they can't. This right here is enough for me to classify his story as half-baked nonsense. There wasn't really any message or point to it, it was just a convenient way to keep a popular character around and satsfy a very vocal shipper faction. Selling out is just not cool.

They addressed the vocal shipper faction, sure, with S6. But it was a 'be careful what you wish for' deal, because S6 was the cautionary tale. Shippers turned away from AR, S6 wasn't what they asked for--but the journey didn't end in S6. It was rounded up in S7. (Let me just pretend the comics don't exist, okay?)

And for the bit on killing vampires indisciminately. Spike had a chip, plus special snowflake vampire. I covered this in my reply to Tarako, just above this one, so you can read that, but suffice to say (a) he had another catalyst and was rendered harmless regardless, and (b) not all vampires would have reacted like him. They are inherently evil. Conditioning them to change like Spike would require too much to warrant sparing them.

Well, I suggested it in my previous post. In any event other characters getting away with murder isn't really an excuse for Spike to do so too, is it?

Suspension of disbelief again, with Willow and Anya and Angel and Faith and Spike. It's pretty damn good TV already; they can have a couple slip-ups.

 

[zobothehobo]

I'd just like to point out that almost all of the criticism given of Spike in this thread is about the grey area his character exists in and how that confuses/makes the people criticizing Spike uncomfortable. You can elaborate on that all you want, but at the end of the day... this is the answer to the question posed by this thread. And honestly, it's pointless to try and argue that... because you cannot argue Spike doesn't exist in the grey. And all that's being pointed out is how he exists in the grey and why the person criticizing doesn't like that. We are all entitled to our own opinions and world view.

 

[prophecygrrl]

Spike is one of my favorite characters, but to answer the OP's question, I can understand why some people would hate him. To be honest sometimes my enjoyment of the character is hurt by certain elements outside of the show, like fandom or personal reasons. And maybe I just have terrible luck or something, but for every great Spike fan I see (hey, awesome ones in this thread! 😀), there definitely are those fans who excessively apologize for his mistakes and unfairly shame other characters to build up Spike. Not directed at anyone in particular and not trying to accuse people here of things they say they haven't done, but this is what I've seen of some Spike fans. As a Spike/Spuffy fan who hangs out in, well, Spike/Spuffy corners of BtVS fandom, there's good and bad just like any other fandom. But I understand disliking the character on account of the bad parts because sometimes it bugs me too. Maybe it's because of the extremes the writers made Spike go through in the show, but Spike issues seem to hit harder than with most other characters. Hope I didn't offend anyone, this totally wasn't directed at anyone specifically or even at all Spike fans (I mean, I count myself as one of them 😛), but these are some unpleasant trends that I personally see and why I sometimes don't like him very much some days.

 

[Taaroko]

I'd just like to point out that almost all of the criticism given of Spike in this thread is about the grey area his character exists in and how that confuses/makes the people criticizing Spike uncomfortable. You can elaborate on that all you want, but at the end of the day... this is the answer to the question posed by this thread. And honestly, it's pointless to try and argue that... because you cannot argue Spike doesn't exist in the grey. And all that's being pointed out is how he exists in the grey and why the person criticizing doesn't like that. We are all entitled to our own opinions and world view.

Wow, thanks for dismissing my entire argument and any future arguments as the pointless criticisms of someone who is confused and uncomfortable about the concept of shades of gray. If I actually were uncomfortable with shades of gray, then *none* of the human/soulful characters would make any sense to me and I wouldn't be able to be a fan of these shows. In reality, my favorite season of either show is Angel S2, because Angel's descent into dark, dark gray territory is deeply fascinating to me. And I get strongly invested in some very dark gray characters in other shows too. Guy of Gisborne in BBC's Robin Hood comes to mind. My claim is that only human beings and other creatures with souls can (and do) exist in the gray.

Soulless vampires, on the other hand, are stuck in pitch black as a direct consequence of being soulless. Just because you claim that soulless Spike exists in the gray does not make it fact. Nothing I observed in the show (which I've watched all the way through several times) insists that he must be in the gray. On the contrary, the shows spend a *lot* of time driving home the concept that soulless vampires are always evil. Consequently, no matter what Spike does before he gets his soul (up to and including questing to get it), he cannot have pure motives even when he thinks he does. His actions may be objectively good, but his underlying motivations cannot be.