RE: Re: Entropy character review (SPOILERS)

[danspector@xxxxxxxxx]

Me on the character thread Jason started. Again, Spoilers are only for
"Entropy".

carol

clarke

has

the 

cutest

Spoiler 

Space

I've

ever 

seen

:)


SPIKE: Not only did he clearly spill on purpose just to hurt Buffy and
Xander, and let Anya know how he'd played her, but when, after all that,
he pointedly goes, "I. Wish.--" , it's clear he knew all along what
Anya was hinting at.

He knew what she wanted and chose to seduce her instead, because that
way he'd get to hurt the gang more. Very interesting.

And yes, this is classic badass Spike. It's just weird to have this
juxtaposed with Noble Late Season 5 Spike in the B/S scene, where he
loves her, truly and honestly. It would have been better if he'd been
consumed-by-controlling-passion Spike, as he was in Season 5 up through
"Crush", as he was with Dru. Then the revenge bit would have played
like it did in "Lovers Walk", and it would be completely believable
Spike wants Buffy (as he wanted Dru), but he also wants to hurt her
(remember him furiously beating Dru's doll, as he clearly wanted to beat
her?).

Speaking of "Lovers Walk", I watched it last night, and James carries
that thing by virtue of his energy level. The contrast between the
original Spike and this year's is shocking; JM really seems to have
been affected by the overall lassitude (and plodding scripts, etc.),
because he's nowhere near the commanding presence he once was.

Oh, and obvious plot point, why the frell DIDN'T Spike go "I Wish...the
stupid chip was out" or "I Wish...Buffy really loved me and was proud of
it". Possibly Anya wouldn't have granted such a wish, although I've
always been of the opinion that Vengeance Demons don't get to pick which
ones they grant. But this needed to be addressed.

Which leads to:

>Are Vengeance, er, Justice Demons undergoing a major retcon?

Well, yeah, apparently. But what annoys me is that either Greenberg
didn't get the memo about how this thing works, or Jane Espenson didn't
get the memo about how Greenberg was going to change it. Because in
"Doublemeat Palace", Halfrek is very much an old-fashioned VD (heh).

"Quiver, masculine one! I have been called, and Vengeance shall I
wreak!"

See, Jane's Halfrek 

1) has an anti-male bias
2) is dealing "Vengeance"
3) responds to a summons rather than tuning into psychic pain or
whatever
4) is present to act on her Wish, rather than working from afar, as in
"OAFA"

Far more theatrical than Anyanka was in "The Wish', but still the same
basic M.O. And totally inconsistent with how Greenberg has subsequently
written her.

XANDER: Yeah, "pathetic" seems to fit. It's interesting that here's a
guy who:

a) leaves his girlfriend at the worst possible time because he doesn't
feel mature enough to make a commitment.
b) has said girlfriend publicly humiliate him by cheating on him with a
vampire
c) seems to only be capable of responding with violence, and
d) is really stupid

And yet they seem to be grooming him to be Buffy's boyfriend. As
stated, aside from "Willow would be better" and "what happens to
Willow?" issues, I'm cool with B/X, but I hardly think this is the way
to sell Spuffyites on the new guy

WILLOW: Stayed home with Dawn out of script convenience, absolutely.
Good catch, blinviz. I don't know if we can blame James Contner for
this, any more than we can blame him for characters being where the plot
needs them to be in "The Harsh Light of Day"; it seems like the
writer's fault, not the director's.

(If you want to blame Contner for something in "THLoD", blame him for
having the Buffy/InvincibleSpike fight take place in the shade. What's
that about? The whole point of Gem of Amarra is now he can go out in
the sun, and it's about as sunny as that alley in "After Life". If you
lost your light, move elsewhere and set up again.)

("I can't wait to see if I freckle." Not if you're not ACTUALLY IN THE
SUNLIGHT, Spike. Grr.)

Still, I could buy Willow staying home with Dawn. Although I'd rather
it was addressed:

WILLOW: Buffy, wait! I'm coming with you!
DAWN: Yeah, me too!
BUFFY: No way. You're both staying here.
WILLOW: But...Xander...Spike...
BUFFY (nods): Yep, badness. And you two are staying out of it.
(leaves)

Even so, I'm okay with just the implication that Willow stayed with
Dawn. What I hate, as mentioned in the review, is WILLOW HAPPILY
READING IN BED.

If Willow had been trying to reassure Dawn when Tara came in, that would
have been fine. If she'd been pacing and fretting, that would have been
okay (although, when I stay home to watch Dawn, I watch Dawn, otherwise,
what's the point?). Heck, even if she'd been anxiously plucking at a
book, trying to read, but having to put it aside, I could have dealt.

But to have her calmly, peacefully, sprawled on the bed, reading without
a care in the world, makes me sick.

Buffy fucked Spike? Lalala
Anya fucked Spike? Lalala
Xander's heartbroken? Lalala
Xander's trying to kill Spike and someone might get hurt? Lalala
Dawn's worried and I'm supposed to be watching her? Lalala

Oh, hi, Tara. No, you're not interrupting, nothing's happening here,
it's a very quiet night.

THIS I blame Contner for. (Or, possibly, Aly.) It's the worst bit of
directorial character assassination since James Whitmore Jr. had Xander
deliberately sack out on Oz-watch in "Beauty and the Beasts"
(contradicting Marti's script).

TARA: Absolutely she could have been staying away from Willow because
she didn't want Willow to be tempted by being near a witch.

Although, it doesn't seem like Tara can't go an hour or two without
casting, so she still could have visited.

And if that's the theory, then Willow really shouldn't be attending
Scooby meetings in a Magic Shop.

And none of this excuses hanging up on her phone calls.

But even if you don't feel that Tara wrote herself out of Willow's life
and is now coming back when it's convenient for HER, my problem with the
end is Tara cracking and breaking down and needing Willow badly when
she's been maintaining an almost preternatural calm. If Tara's been
struggling to keep away from Willow, couldn't we have seen a hint of it?

Instead, she's been taking things with an annoying equanimity. I'm
still very upset about the UC-Hellmouth scene. In "Normal Again", Tara
saw Willow run away after she witnessed the kissage, and Tara was upset
to see Willow upset. Yet this week, Tara acts like she was never
concerned she'd hurt Willow; indeed, she seems to be gently chiding
Willow for being so foolish. Not at all the attitude of a girl who
desperately misses her ex- and is fighting to keep away from her (and
gives in at the end of the ep).

There's really only one good explanation for Tara's behavior: the calm,
collected (somewhat condescending, IMO) veneer was all an act; a front
she was keeping up so that Willow wouldn't see how much she wants her
back.

However, again, they needed to SHOW this. Perhaps something like this:

After the coffee date, Willow, feeling giddy, cautiously tries for a
kiss, but Tara pulls away. Willow is apologetic, but as Tara tries to
explain why they can't do this, Willow gets angry at how easily Tara
seems to be handling this and blows up. She accuses Tara of not having
any feelings, and when Tara tries to protest, storms off.

When Tara arrives at the house, Willow is totally contrite about her
earlier outburst, but Tara tells her she knows how Willow feels, she's
just been working really hard to hold it in. She explains about taking
it slow, rebuilding trust, maybe we've changed (with Willow nodding
vigorous agreement, wanting to make up for her temper tantrum), and then
it's "can we just skip it and start kissing now?"

That way would work for me. Indeed, if I were to write W/T fics, I
might very well write that one.

Lastly,

>ME just fretted away [Amber's appearances] and now it's "can we just be
kissing now?"

This is getting to be a problem of bad "Buffy" seasons. In Season 4,
after Adam became the Big Bad in "Goodbye, Iowa", we then had four
consecutive non-Adam eps. Yes, he was mentioned in every one and
appeared in two of them, but the arc wasn't developed at all between its
beginning and end. Compare that to the Season 2 Angelus arc, which also
began with ep 14 ("Innocence") but had two major beats ("Passion" and "I
Only Have Eyes For You") and two minor beats ("Phases" and "Killed By
Death") between the start and the climax. (And although there's no real
Angelus-arc movement in "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered", they still
found a satisfying way to work him and Spike and Dru into the ep. Only
his appearance in "Go Fish" is truly gratuitous.)

Likewise, in Season 6, the show wasted 15 eps worth of potential Xanya
wedding comedy (I could name a dozen scenes off of the top of my head
that they could have done), and then crammed it all into "Hell's Bells",
having to tell about, rather than show, things like the rehearsal
dinner. This would have been excusable if they'd been using Xander and
Anya for other things during the season and couldn't devote time to the
wedding, but that was hardly the case. Instead we got the same old
boring "sit around the Magic Box and talk about the wedding" scene week
after week after week.  

For an arc-based show, nobody here seems to really know how to develop a
storyline. Even Buffy/Spike, my objections to the couple aside, didn't
develop at all. 9 eps of utter stagnation.

Here we go:

"OMWF": Buffy and Spike kiss

"Tabula Rasa": Buffy says it won't happen again, but it does.

"Smashed": Buffy says it won't happen again, then they have sex.

"Wrecked": Spike gloats, Buffy is disgusted

So we've taken 4 eps to get to where it should have been two scenes. I
mean, would we have been so shocked if "Tabula Rasa" started with B/S
waking up together? It seems they were drawing this out to make the
Willow-addiction parallel, but you don't have to synchronize the stories
that exactly.

Continuing:

"Gone": Buffy comes to him once there aren't any consequences, but
Spike doesn't like that.

"Doublemeat Palace": More sex, although it seems to be starting to
pall.

"Dead Things": Buffy realizes that she doesn't want to be with Spike,
and learns that she has no excuse for doing it (not a demon, after all).

"OAFA": Really, not much happens.

"As You Were": More boinking, Riley tells her she's better than this,
Buffy admits she was using Spike, and stops.

Not really a lot of ups and downs there, were there? A lot of in and
out, a lot of screaming on various boards, but not a rocketing,
twisting, story arc. Pretty much filler.  

(As an example, compare this to the Buffy/Riley arc from "Something
Blue" through "Superstar". Not that that was brilliant plotting,
either, but comparatively speaking, it looks Byzantine.)

Remember, "Normal Again" (then called "Killing Chronos") was supposed to
be episode 9, not 17. Seems like Marti realized they didn't have an arc
for the second half of the season, and decided to pad out the B/S thing.

(Actually, all the arc-movement with B/S has seemed to have come
post-breakup. He wants her to tell, she realizes her friends make life
worth living, he sleeps with Anya, he spills the beans. It's still too
slow, but it's faster than before.)

So yeah, Tara wanting Willow back and deciding that her objections don't
matter seemed to come out of nowhere, but that's been par for the course
around here.

Dan