Buffy Conquers the Academy : Conference Papers from the 2009/2010 Popular Culture/American Culture Associations [1 ed.] 9781443864787, 9781443848312

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Buffy Conquers the Academy

Buffy Conquers the Academy: Conference Papers from the 2009/2010 Popular Culture/American Culture Associations

Edited by

U. Melissa Anyiwo and Karoline Szatek-Tudor

Buffy Conquers the Academy: Conference Papers from the 2009/2010 Popular Culture/American Culture Associations, Edited by U. Melissa Anyiwo and Karoline Szatek-Tudor This book first published 2013 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2013 by U. Melissa Anyiwo and Karoline Szatek-Tudor and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-4831-X, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-4831-2

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ................................................................................. viii Foreword ................................................................................................... ix Why Does Buffy Matter? Amanda Hobson Introduction ................................................................................................ 1 U. Melissa Anyiwo Part I: “The part that gets me, though, is where Buffy is the Vampire Slayer. She’s so little.” The Power of Perception Chapter One ................................................................................................ 6 Buffy, Angel, and the Complications of the Soul: A Collaborative Perspective on the Origin Episodes Dev Kumar Bose and Esther Liberman-Cuenca Chapter Two ............................................................................................. 19 Patriarchy Strikes Back: Power and Perception in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Nadine Farghaly Chapter Three ........................................................................................... 32 A Layered Message of Resistance: Buffy, Violence, and the Double Bind Mona Rocha Chapter Four ............................................................................................. 48 What’s at Stake? The Use of Simulacra to (Re)Construct Identity in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Cassie Hemstrom

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Part II: “Come on, we fight monsters, this is what we do. They show up, they scare us, I beat them up, and they go away.” Re-examining the Meanings of Monstrous Chapter Five ............................................................................................. 60 Brain vs. Brawn: An Examination of the Use of Intelligence and Violence by the Villains in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Heather M. Porter Chapter Six ............................................................................................... 76 The Rage of Willow: Malefic Witchcraft Fantasy in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Lisa M. Vetere Chapter Seven........................................................................................... 89 “We’re Your Arch-Nemesises … ses” – Buffy and “The Trio”: The Americanization of a Mythological Motif Birte W. Horn Chapter Eight .......................................................................................... 105 Caleb, the First Evil, and “That Most Precious Invention of All Mankind: the Notion of Goodness” Bonnie Jett Adams Part III: “And I slayed. My work here is done!” The Continuing Allure of All Things Buffy Chapter Nine........................................................................................... 120 I Date Dead People: Buffy, Bella, Sookie, and the Lure of the Dead Boyfriend Ruth Caillouet Chapter Ten ............................................................................................ 136 My First Time: Theological Diversity, The Rhetoric of Conversion, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer Michael Aaron Perry Chapter Eleven ....................................................................................... 149 More Than Just a Spin-Off: The Enduring Allure of Angel U. Melissa Anyiwo

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Contributor Biographies ......................................................................... 162 Additional Readings ............................................................................... 166

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This volume would not have been possible without the close reading by Brian M. Peters of Champlain College and Rhonda Nicol of Illinois State University. Their knowledge and expertise in the field of Buffy Studies ensure that all the papers in this volume represented excellent examples in the discipline. We would also like to thank all of the contributors to this volume for their hard work, endless patience, and vital contributions to this ever expanding discipline. Melissa would personally like to thank Patricia Leavy and Rebecca Allen Paynich for sharing their love of the show. It was their enthusiasm and support, including Rebecca’s Buffy party and gift of a life-size Spike, which kept the project alive even when it seemed insurmountable. I’d also like to thank my family. Firstly, my amazing mother Mrs. Agatha Anyiwo whose unconditional love expressed through the phrase “of course you can” has fueled me since the moment I was born. Perhaps with this book she can finally be assured that my love of vampires will not make me unemployable. Finally, to my brother Steve and his three perfect little girls, Maeve, Freya, and Mya, a new generation of Buffy fans, whether he wants them to be or not. Karoline greatly appreciates Melissa’s asking her to co-edit this volume with her. “I’faith!” a person from sixteenth-century England would say. Never would I have thought I’d be working on a scholarly edition about Buffy, The Vampire Slayer, an endeavor quite out of the realm of my expertise. But, the experience has been quite enjoyable, and I may even be a convert! My first thanks goes to Dr. Anyiwo. My husband, Matt Tudor – who may very well be a descendent from the Tudor clan – has been very supportive by allowing me the time to spend on this collection, as well as my mother Pearl, whose undaunted spirit and encouragement throughout my career have provided me with strength and courage.

FOREWORD WHY DOES BUFFY MATTER? AMANDA HOBSON

On Monday, March 10, 1997, I sat riveted in front of my television. From the opening cue to the first breathless moment, I was mesmerized, watching a channel I barely knew existed. I had heard that Joss Whedon was going to make his own version of his story, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Never would I have guessed that not only would this endeavor be good, but that it would create a cult that would impact television for a generation. I had been reading and watching everything that I could about vampires for as long as I could remember, beginning with the tried and true Interview with the Vampire. I have been fascinated with vampires for their ability to mirror our fears and desires and embody that which we are most terrified and drawn to in ourselves. Having seen Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the movie theatre when it debuted in 1992, I was trepidatious sitting down to watch the television premiere. I had found the film campy and amusing but just wasn’t sure that it was sustainable as a television show, and to be frank, it seemed that any show I actually liked was doomed to an early demise—a sad trend that has continued. Much to my delight “Welcome to the Hellmouth” and “The Harvest” were intriguing and witty, and I was hooked. I was able to enjoy seven seasons on television, a spin-off, and various graphic novel incarnations of the Slayers. Its longevity is a testament to keen dialogue, character-driven plots, and a commitment to pushing the envelope. For me, Buffy reinvigorated my love of vampire and paranormal fiction, folklore, and films. A key to Buffy’s success stems from the writers’ keen weaving of popular culture references, witty dialogue, character driven-plots, and emotional depth. From “Does anyone else feel like they’ve been Kaiser Söze-ed”1 to 1 Dean Batali and Rob Des Hotel, “The Puppet Show,” Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 1, May 5, 1997.

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“The girl [Faith] makes Godot look punctual,”2 Buffy’s dialogue and cultural references run the gamut from timely pop cultural references, such as the 1995 film Usual Suspects, to obscure literary references, such as the allusion to Samuel Becket’s wonderful 1953 play Waiting for Godot. These references and the myriad other cultural evocations allowed the writers to infuse Buffy with the characteristics of multiple genres. The writers successfully blended heart-wrenching (melo)drama with rollicking humor. The cultural critique and relevance that Buffy offered every week made it important not only during its run on television but also has allowed it to stay pertinent as a text for scholars of popular culture. By addressing a wide-variety of poignant and germane topics, Buffy demonstrated an ability to offer an examination of socially constructed norms, such as race, gender, and sexuality. Buffy stayed relevant throughout the course of its television run in a way that many shows simply cannot do. The writers understood the pulse of the nation and of the American teenager. In 1999, Buffy demonstrated just how eerily in-tune it was. On April 20, 1999, two young men walked into their high school and open fired, killing classmates and faculty. Strangely enough, Buffy was set to air its season three episode “Earshot,” in which a student—Jonathan—brings a gun to school in order to kill himself on April 27. “Earshot” and that season’s finale, “Graduation Day, Part 2,” in which the school is destroyed and many students and faculty killed, were postponed. It was this inherent understanding of the material, cultural issues, and their characters that allowed the writers to tap into the fears and desires of not only teenagers but all of their audience. What better public service announcement is there that exists than the central message of Buffy that “life doesn’t always work out the way we want it to”? It is the emotional, character-driven, and witty underpinnings that simultaneously uphold and deconstruct cultural norms that allow for academics to be drawn like moths to the flame that is Buffy. Margaret Weigel argued, “It’s official: It is now safe for smart people to watch TV. For years, academics eschewed the ‘boob tube’ and its lowbrow programming both personally and professionally.”3 This statement is evident in the multiplicity of magazine articles, books, and conference sessions afforded to Buffy Studies, including a dedicated online journal, Slayage, and its own collection of fanzines such as Plans by Meredith Martini. James South wrote in his introduction to Buffy the Vampire Slayer 2

Douglas Petrie, “Enemies,” Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 3, March 16, 1999. Margaret Weigel, “The Expanding Buffyverse,” The Women’s Review of Books, (Vol. XXI, No. 1, October 2003), 18. 3

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and Philosophy that Buffy was “something worth my thinking about,” which demonstrated further the manner in which Buffy gave academics a rich text to analyze in conjunction with studies of popular culture simply because of its cultural relevance.4 While some people scoffed at the show’s academic or critical worth, it has held our imaginations since its debut in 1997. It has had a lasting place in television, including being number 10 in a list entitled, “The New Classics: TV 1983-2008” by Entertainment Weekly,5 and in 2010, Ken Tucker named Buffy one of the five shows that changed television.6 Buffy is so deeply embedded within our cultural landscape at this point that it has found itself at the heart of many cultural allusions, including spoofs on MadTV and Saturday Night Live and making appearances in some way in television shows, such as The Simpsons, Friends, Charmed, and movies, such as Nightwatch. For example, Nora Roberts, queen of the romance genre, mentions Buffy in her Circle Trilogy, featuring murderous vampires. When introducing a new character, Blair, a vampire hunter, a character asks, “What, like Buffy?” to which Blair responds, “No. First, I’m not the only, just the best.”7 Any reader would know immediately who the character is referring to. Buffy, a central part of our cultural language, has become shorthand for a vampire slayer. Moreover, this cultural fascination with Buffy persists, and the impact remains prominent. Recently, Alyx Dellamonica began a blog in celebration of the upcoming fifteenth anniversary of the Buffy premiere for Publishing House Tor’s website.8 As well, there have been many innovations on television since Buffy aired; for instance, the Emmy awarding winning episode “Once More with Feeling” (BtVS 6.7) appeared to have inspired other shows, such as the Grey’s Anatomy musical episode “Song Beneath The Song” (7.18). The audacity of “Once More with Feeling” (BtVS 6.7) also arguably inspired the birth of the all-musical all the time fan favorite Glee.9 4

James South, “And was there a lesson in all this?” Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale, (Chicago: Open Court, 2003), 2. 5 “The New Classics: TV 1983-2008.” Entertainment Weekly, Issue #999-1000, June 27, 2008. 6 Ken Tucker, “5 Shows That Changed TV,” Entertainment Weekly, Issue #11201121, September 17, 2010. 7 Nora Roberts, Morrigan’s Cross, (New York: Jove Books, 2006), 278. 8 Alyx Dellamonica, “In Every Generation, There is a Chosen One,” Tor.com, January 23, 2012, retrieved from http://www.tor.com/blogs/2012/01/in-everygeneration-there-is-a-chosen-one?WT.mc_id=undefined. 9 Glee premiered on Fox on 19 May 2009.

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For my own scholarship, the most lasting impression Buffy may have made is on the image of the vampire. Could there be an Edward Cullen had there not been an Angel? While there had been many vampires up to Angel who questioned his humanity and his soul, Angel is one of our most tortured souls, who helped shift the vampire into the romantic lead that the vampire has become in recent years. In many ways before Buffy, the vampire genre had been marketed successfully to young men, as a great deal of the vampire fiction and film representations were heavily entrenched in the horror and science-fiction/fantasy genres. While there is a large female audience for horror and science-fiction/fantasy, Buffy pushed the vampire to transgress genres and, therefore, widened the audience. Who was watching the WB and Buffy aside from academics and critics? The answer to that question is that the audience was largely female and generally under 25. The WB was targeted at the high-school and college aged crowd, who grew up with Buffy and the Scoobies. This target audience began to seek out vampires, paranormal tales, and modern fairy tales, finding it in various romance novels, films, and television, such as Underworld and Charmed. So could there have been Edward Cullen without Angel? They are in some ways a generation removed from each other, but it is the use of the tragic love story of Buffy and Angel that allowed for the sort-of-happily-ever-after tale that is Twilight. Buffy and Angel truly perfected the “my-ancient-boyfriend-may-kill-me” angst that would become the story of Bella and Edward. Vampires have become mainstream in the days since Buffy with so many novels, video games, graphic novels, films, and television shows. This trend owes itself to Buffy at least in small part because Buffy allowed the vampire and the slayer as ideas to grow, shift, and evolve in a way that had not occurred since the Victorian era of Polidori and Stoker.

INTRODUCTION

The Associations of Popular Culture and American Culture (PCA/ACA) have a tradition of encouraging growth in intellectual inquiry, and the acceptance of Buffy Studies as a subgenre of the Vampire area in 2008 reflected the belief that this globally recognized discipline belonged at the PCA/ACA. This volume celebrates the continuing existence of Buffy Studies as an endlessly fruitful academic discipline that is truly global and interdisciplinary. The fact that the Buffy Area exists at all is a testament to the astonishing growth and acceptance of popular culture over the last 30 years. Unlike so many artful and clever shows that garnered moments of scholarship, such as the X-Files or the reboot of Battlestar Galactica, Buffy continues to offer unending depths for fan-scholars, teachers, and anyone interested in exploring a show that offers multiple avenues of expression from gender and sexuality, to science fiction and fantasy, to the psychology of violence, and witchcraft. Indeed, as this short selection of essays shows, the areas of exploration are endless. This volume celebrates the best of scholarship from the 2009/10 Popular Culture/American Culture conference, which set a high bar for the types of scholarship still appearing from fan scholars around the world. These are first and foremost conference papers, which enable the reader to really experience the multiple modalities of this unending area of scholarship. Conference papers often rise or fall based on the style of the presentation, and each of these papers was chosen because their authors were so dynamic and convincing in person. While it is the case that conference papers do not always translate well to the written format, these pieces illustrate that a robust argument and a strong voice can allow a creative piece to transform into something more traditional. In short, there is something for everyone here, whatever their interest or academic discipline. The richness of BtVS offers a fathomless sea of intellectual inquiry and debate; and multiple venues engage fellow fan scholars, including those who attend the annual International Buffy Slayage conference and who contribute to the Slayage Journal. Few other television shows still generate such depth of inquiry or offer such rich detail for teaching and learning. Popular Culture Associations across the world feature either Buffy Sections or Whedonverse Areas, both of which are gaining new and emerging scholars with each passing year.

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Introduction

Now living in that Nirvana known as syndication, Buffy continues to bring in new fans just as enchanted by Whedon’s world as those who experienced the show its first time around. Running continuously on the Oxygen and Teen Nick networks in the United States, on Sky 1 in the United Kingdom, and a range of channels throughout the world, the continued relevance of BtVS is spearheaded by its overarching themes and brilliant writing, providing connections for those not even born when the show first aired. It’s wonderful to meet new fans, which, as a professor happens to me all the time. Recently in my US History class, of all things, a student approached me to relate her newfound passion for Buffy. Her entrance to the show had been the failed Sarah Michelle Gellar project The Ringer (2011). But she was no less engaged in the show’s themes and as passionate about wanting to convert all of her friends as anyone from the 1990s. I am constantly hearing anecdotes about the conversion experience that cross the boundaries of class, race, age, and gender. A good friend and fellow professor, Patricia Leavy, converted her now 12-year-old daughter through long mother and daughter bonding evenings, helping mold her character through the values and struggles of the Scoobies. Lately, she has also converted her husband in those hours between dinner and settling down for the night. Another friend, Rebecca Paynich, Chair of Criminal Justice at Curry College, introduced her son while she was still pregnant with him, so that Buffy is truly a part of his DNA. Buffy is like football to him, perfectly ordinary and perfectly a part of his cultural position. Even the coeditor of this volume, Karoline Szatek-Tudor, a Shakespeare professor, now appreciates the intellectual depths of the series. We all have stories like this, of introducing someone else to the show, wondering where to start based on what you know of their interests, values, or personality. Michael Perry reminds us in this volume of what it was like to first fall in love with Buffy and its characters, likening the experience to a religious conversion. In “My First Time: Theological Diversity, the Rhetoric of Conversion, and Buffy, The Vampire Slayer,” Perry examines the multiple, yet similar, experiences of fans “brought” to Buffy, forever changed and forever split between private worship and the desire to proselytize. Feminist ideas permeate the Buffyverse, and these are reflected in the three chapters that debate Whedon’s problematized uses of gender. Mona Rocha, a bright new voice in the Buffyverse, argues in “A Layered Message of Resistance: Buffy, Violence, and the Double Bind,” that Whedon successfully inverts gender norms through his positioning of Buffy as a primary actor in her world. Yet Nadine Farghaly in “Patriarchy Strikes Back: Power And Perception In Buffy, The Vampire Slayer,”

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argues quite the opposite, claiming that Whedon reinforces patriarchy while seeming to dismantle it. From a completely different perspective, Ruth Caillouet in “I Date Dead People: Buffy, Bella, Sookie, and the Lure of the Dead Boyfriend,” thoughtfully compares Buffy with Bella Swan and other women from literature tempted by the love of an (un)dead boyfriend. One wonders whether the commonalities these women share offer any lessons about the place of womanhood in the modern world. The International allure of the show is reflected by the inclusion of non-American authors. From Germany, Birte Horn provides a keen analysis of the myths that pervade the show in "We're Your ArchNemesises … Ses" –Buffy and "The Trio": The Americanization of a Mythological Motif.” Her discussion illustrates Whedon’s core use of classical myth to create new and particularly American archetypes, specifically in the guise of the "The Trio" – who declare they are the "archnemesises" of the Slayer. In addition, American Dev Kumar Bose and German Esther Liberman-Cuenca joined together across the ocean to debate interpretations of the soul and its meanings in the Buffyverse in “Buffy, Angel, and the Complications of the Soul: A Collaborative Perspective on the Origin Episodes.” The inversion of myths through the imagination of Whedon offers rich material for scholars. In her essay Lisa Vetere explores the use of witchcraft as a core element of BtVS in “The Rage of Willow: Malefic Witchcraft Fantasy in Buffy, The Vampire Slayer.” She debates whether Whedon reinforces or re-claims the stereotypes of the good/bad witch for new generations, and Bonnie Jet Adams explores the inversion of religious stereotypes through an examination of the misogynist religious zealot Caleb in Season 7 in her chapter, “Caleb, the First Evil, and “That Most Precious Invention of all Mankind: the Notion of Goodness.” In “Brain vs. Brawn: An Examination of the Use of Intelligence and Violence by the Villains in Buffy, Tthe Vampire Slayer,” Heather Porter attempts a thoroughly innovative psychological analysis of the use of violence and intelligence by the Big Bads of the Buffyverse; she demonstrates new myths about the connections between brawn and intelligence. Finally, in “What’s at Stake? The Use of Simulacra to (Re)Construct Identity in Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” Cassie Hemstrom explores Whedon’s visionary concept of what it means to be real when reality is constructed. Closing this volume, is U. Melissa Anyiwo who breaks with the rest of the pack with “More Than Just A Spin-Off: The Enduring Allure Of Angel” to make the astonishingly convincing argument that Angel is as good as, if not better than, its mother show, and Anyiwo highlights the

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Introduction

spirited roundtable discussion that illustrated its participants are not alone in their, arguably, superior taste. We would like to thank everyone who participated in this project; their contributions illustrate the boundless joys and intellectual depths of Buffy’s world where there remain layers upon layers of meaning to uncover.

PART I:

͆THE PART THAT GETS ME, THOUGH, IS WHERE BUFFY IS THE VAMPIRE SLAYER. SHE'S SO LITTLE.͇ THE POWER OF PERCEPTION

Dev Kumar Bose and Esther Liberman-Cuenca come from different cultures and different rhetorical traditions, yet found common ground in their analysis of Buffy. Examining various presentations of the soul in the Buffyverse, including the spin-off show Angel, Bose and Liberman-Cuenca posit that the soul offers the core presentations of marginalization and redemption to provide a touchstone around which all characters in this universe revolve. The soul, and its complications, becomes the lens through which Whedon offers a variety of arguments regarding humanity, morality, and choice in an ever more complicated world.

CHAPTER ONE BUFFY, ANGEL, AND THE COMPLICATIONS OF THE SOUL: A COLLABORATIVE PERSPECTIVE ON THE ORIGIN EPISODES DEV KUMAR BOSE AND ESTHER LIBERMAN-CUENCA

While brainstorming ideas for our presentation for the 2009 PCA/ACA conference, it was inevitable that each of us would draw from our respective academic fields, rhetoric and history. The result of this brainstorming was a joint interpretation of the soul and its meanings in the Buffyverse—that is, the universe inhabited by the characters of the television programs Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) and its spin-off Angel (1999-2004), both of which were created by Joss Whedon. In this paper, we draw specific examples from origin episodes to argue that the soul carries significant implications on how key characters developed and were represented in the Buffyverse. The first part of this essay demonstrates that the soul in the Buffyverse is a crucial, literary component of the themes prevalent throughout the series: marginalization and redemption. The second part of this essay extends this argument by demonstrating how the soul, as a literary device, carries with it specific

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gendered implications that touch on the Buffyverse’s continual commentary on individual agency. Origin episodes are crucial to both shows’ mythos. By origin episodes, we refer to episodes that contain flashbacks to specific moments in a character’s history, usually taking place well before the beginning of the series. Origin episodes, however, are not stand-alone episodes; they often neatly tie into the main theme of an episode’s primary storyline. They appeared more frequently as both series progressed and became more popular with audiences and critics. Origin episodes are also significant because they reveal popular understandings of history. It is through these origin episodes that the audience is able to place Angel, Darla, Spike, and Drusilla within their specific historical contexts in order to get a better sense of their personal development. Looking at these episodes from an academic perspective, we have realized that history in the Buffyverse lends depth, and even realism, to the broader, philosophical issues with which the series grapples, particularly those having to do with the nature of evil and the imbalances of power inherent to various types of social relationships.

1. The Soul and Identity The soul is a redemptive mystical tool, but one used as a weapon against vampires. Whedon (1998) suggests this interpretation in his twopart episode, “Becoming,” in which the evil Angelus transforms into his redemptive alter ego, Angel, after murdering a gypsy. In the midst of griefridden revenge, the gypsy’s family curses the vampire with a soul in order to inflict eternal guilt for murdering humans. Thus, the soul is utilized to torture vampires. But the soul goes beyond being simply a tool for revenge. Vampires who have been “ensouled” differ from their soulless counterparts in key ways. Angel Investigations – the crime-fighting detective agency in Los Angeles that Angel establishes after leaving Sunnydale – is a business steeped in vigilante exploits blended with a (seemingly paradoxical) capitalistic agenda. The purpose of Angel Investigations may be to fight supernatural crime, but it still operates as legitimate business in the human world. Its very existence asserts a rift between the natural and the supernatural: That is to say, human society considers the agency an extralegal entity, while non-human society treats it as an obstacle to evil. Therefore, Angel Investigations always seems to be under some form of attack. The agency’s tagline, “We help the helpless,” epitomizes the complexity of the soul: Just as Buffy struggles in her love affairs with

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individuals who transcend any traditional definition of “boyfriend,” so the presence of the vampire’s soul complicates perceptions of good and evil. A number of events tie into the theme of the soul complicating the relationship between vampires and humans. From the beginning of the series, Buffy’s character is driven by a purpose instilled in other slayers long before she was born: To destroy evil for the “greater good.” This mission is complicated by the presence of Angel’s soul: Can they carry on a relationship because his soul has possibly purified him? Their attempt to develop a relationship takes a tragic turn for the worse. After a passionate night of lovemaking, the vampire turns evil once again. In “Becoming Part 2” (1998), Buffy is forced to stab her lover in order to close a portal and save the world. The decision to stab Angel is difficult for Buffy, since Angel is not technically at fault for being evil – his current soulless state is. In later episodes, the series returns to the question of whether having a soul truly makes its carrier a good person. After all, villains can have souls but are still capable of committing horrible acts (such as the human Warren, the nerdish creator of the Buffybot in Season Five, who murders Tara, Willow’s lover, in cold blood in Season Six). Most importantly, audiences are not provided with the significance of Angel being ensouled because we do not know what his personal history was with the Romani, the gypsies responsible for ensouling him, until “Becoming” (1998). This very crucial part of the series’ mythology – Angel’s ensoulment – is based on an event that happened long before Buffy and the timeline of the series itself. While the “greater good” is the driving force behind Buffy’s own pain in having to kill her vampire lover, character backgrounds are crucial in understanding how the soul defines humanity, alienates vampires, and complicates the classic struggle between good and evil. Indeed, a central tenet in the Buffyverse was that vampires are (or should be) alienated from human society. Humans and vampires, were they to attempt long-lasting relationships with one another, may be doomed to failure because of their fundamentally different natures. Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer are series that explain the nature of alienation through romantic, friendly, and antagonistic relationships. Vampires with souls are even more alienated in their relationships because they suffer from identity crises. Identity, in this case, refers to the way the characters’ perceive their natures to be. And just as a character develops, so does his or her identity within the Buffyverse. What is the nature of a vampire? A blood-sucking immortal, attractive lover, and a lone hunter, all wrapped up in one guilt-free existence. What is the nature of the vampire with a soul? Essentially, all of the above, but without the guilt-free existence. Vampires with souls live with the guilt of

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their past histories, specifically with all the people they murdered when they did not have a soul. Ensouled vampires are still thirsty for blood, but the soul keeps this thirst in check. Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex (1949) is a useful text to understand the complexities of the soul and how the soul creates a sense of guilt for the vampire in the Buffyverse. Beauvoir argued that oppression of women was the result of patriarchal structures. She demonstrated how women struggled to share the transcendental aim of equality, but have been placed in a position of immanence in which they struggle within male-dominated confines. In this regard, Angel’s identity crisis centers on his thirst for human blood and desire to remain pure, thereby demonstrating the immanence of his existence. Were Angel to satiate his thirst by feeding on humans, he might reach transcendence, yet consider himself tainted for doing so. In contrast to Angel’s “immanent do-goodedness,” Spike’s identity requires a different theoretical explanation – cyborg theory. That is to say, an analysis of Spike’s ensoulment reveals that his character is a cyborg. How did we reach this conclusion? Emerging from a technological perspective, Donna Haraway argued that all individuals (in any given society) are cyborgs. We are political and social hybrids, or constructs, embedded within a web of communicative networks. In The Cyborg Manifesto (1990), Haraway, a third-wave feminist, argued that secondwave feminism encouraged dualistic thinking. She countered de Beauvoir’s transcendentalism/immanence binary model by arguing that such thinking encouraged dualisms. We see evidence of cyborg theory in Season Four of Buffy, in which the “Big Bad,” or the season’s chief villain, is a cyborg named Adam. Adam’s makers – a covert military operation known as The Initiative – capture Spike and install a computer chip in his head. As an electric leash meant to control Spike’s actions, the chip also happens to possess the qualities of an “artificial” soul: Spike is forced to endure excruciating amounts of pain whenever he attempts to satiate his thirst for human blood. The chip prevents the vampire from hurting or feeding off beings with souls (the chip does not prevent him from hurting unsouled beings, which makes him, later on in the series, Buffy’s invaluable ally). Adam and Spike serve as unlikely foils to one another: Adam is a man-made creation whose purpose is to destroy unnatural beings (vampires), while Spike is a vampire who is enslaved by humans because he is considered to be unnatural. Furthermore, Adam controls vampire populations, while Spike is held prisoner as a lab rat. Haraway’s cyborg theory supports the interpretation that, while Adam may be a

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cyborg in the very literal sense of the term, Spike is a true cyborg. A piece of technology artificially transforms Spike’s identity. Human and vampire relationships reflect and extend past the structures of these theories. On the one hand, the existence of vampires is transcendental – vampire life is immortal, the vampire diet is simple, and the vampire lifestyle requires no physical need to live within human society other than to feed. These rules would seemingly make the vampire’s existence perfect. The identity of Angel’s alter ego, Angelus, hinges upon his physicality, hunger for power, and thirst for human blood. But the soul transcends the image of supernatural perfection. It serves as a painful reminder that the ensouled vampire is in a limbo between two unattainable states of being: humanity and “vampirity.” The soul, in the Buffyverse, forces vampires to the margins of both human and vampire societies, and relegates the ensouled vampire to live uncomfortably between both realms. Until Angel is given a mission to watch Buffy he lives like a nomad for about a century, as revealed in his first origin episode in Season Two. In both worlds, Angel is considered an outsider torn between his need for blood and human community. For Angel, the presence of a soul doubly hybridizes his vampire existence. Later in the episode “Becoming Part 1” (BtVS 2:21), the year 1996 shows a very different Angel from the Angelus of the previous century. The pain and remorse of killing humans for sadistic delight follow Angel as he staggers along, rather than stalks, the streets of Manhattan. Living under a life of homeless drudgery, Angel has been reduced to the scum of the earth. This is not the same Angel who will head a private detective agency fighting for the power of good in the years to come. Nevertheless, a moment of epiphany emerges when Whistler, a demon, takes the vampire to Los Angeles where Angel sees Buffy, the Chosen One, for the first time. Angel’s origin episode “Becoming Part 1” (BtVS 2:21) also exemplifies how having a soul gives vampires the pain of human existence. This episode is important because it showcases the transition from the evil Angelus to the good Angel. In London of 1860, the mortal Drusilla feels guilty because she has visions, which she attributes to a demonic source. Confessing her sins to Angelus (sitting in the confessional in the guise of the priest) he tells her that good and evil are social constructs. Vampire souls contribute to the character development that we see in the series, but as supernatural gifts how do souls compare to visions? Visions play an important role for the women who have supernatural powers in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. While Drusilla is scared of her visions, she is also marginalized because of them. Cordelia, a character

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from Buffy, who later appears in Angel as an employee of Angel Investigations, also has them. But Cordelia is able to survive her visions, which are excruciatingly painful because she has the necessary support system within Angel Investigations to foster her visions, which are powers important to Angel’s business (and his bottom line). Cordelia’s visions can be said to demonstrate the transcendental nature of her character (de Beauvoir, 1989). The fact that her character later evolves into a goddess adds to this argument. Drusilla, however, seems to have none of the support that Cordelia has. As a mortal in nineteenth-century London, the visions haunting Drusilla marginalize her as strange, undesirable, and mentally unstable. As an immortal, Drusilla is further alienated from society. Identity is important in both Cordelia and Drusilla’s stories because identity in the Buffyverse could depend on how one uses their supernatural gifts, regardless of their nature. Angel may be in love with the slayer in Buffy, but in Angel he is his own man. Ensouled and alienated, Angel strives for independence in his newfound, post-Sunnydale existence. The path to Angel’s redemption is through the Shanshu (the promise of one day obtaining human-hood). Spike’s redemption, however, is more complex. Unlike his L.A. counterpart, Spike’s path to redemption is to fight alongside the Scoobies. We are made aware of Spike’s inner suffering during the penultimate season of Buffy, in which Spike demonstrates his loyalty and love for Buffy by traveling to the margins — the African wilderness — and making the ultimate sacrifice a vampire could make for a slayer: Voluntary ensoulment. The significance of his descent into a dark cave indicates that the vampire is going to be, in a sense, reborn. Aside from rebirth through ensoulment, Spike’s identity changes through his relationships with other characters. In an episode from the last season of Buffy, “Lies My Parents Told Me” (BtVS 7:17), we are taken back to Victorian London and Spike’s mortal self, William, and the (literal) undying devotion he carries for his mother. It is in this episode that Spike comes to terms with staking his mother, whom he had sired in an attempt to have an immortal companion. His mother’s eventual betrayal leads to matricide. Visions of Spike’s human past provide the backdrop for Principal Robin Wood’s coming to terms with the murder of his own mother, Nikki, a New York City slayer whom Spike had killed in 1977. Principal Wood vows to avenge her death. “Lies My Parents Told Me” is a crucial episode for Spike’s redemptive post-soul arc because Spike’s recollection of his mother’s death triggers guilt and the possibility of empathy towards Robin Wood. The connection between Spike and Robin Wood is also complicated by their competition over Buffy. Robin Wood, at least in the beginning, held

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the advantage over Spike because Buffy had some difficulty coming to terms with a newly ensouled Spike, whose struggle with his own self is dramatized through flashbacks (to both human and unsouled Spike) and flash-forwards (to ensouled, remorseful Spike). Spike’s mother serves as the basis for most of the revelations about Spike’s character. His mother’s tormenting sneer of “You’ll always be a limp, sentimental fool,” is intercut with scenes of Robin Wood saying, “I don’t want to kill you, Spike; I want to kill the monster that took my mother away from me.” Not only do these overlapping scenes show the parallel dialogue between past and present, they also encapsulate the complications and contradictions of an ensouled vampire’s social integration. Wood’s attitude towards Spike is crystal clear at this moment: Despite working together as a team, there will always be a rift between humans and vampires, despite the existence of a vampire soul. While vampires are alienated by their existence as peripheral beings, vampires with souls are even more alienated because of their awareness of human suffering and the extent to which their soul entitles them to these human feelings. Darla understands this sense of alienation quite well in her eponymous origin episode “Darla” (Angel 2:7), in which Angel’s sire and on-again/off-again lover is raised from the dead into the world of the living. Following a noble kidnapping from her captors at Wolfram and Hart, Darla implores her “dear boy” Angel to turn her into a vampire to “return the favor.” When Angel refuses, countering that humanity is not a curse, Darla flees the scene. Clearly, the two erstwhile lovers now have different perspectives on immortality: While Darla craves the power of eternal life, Angel interprets immortality as infinite unhappiness. “Darla” is an important origin episode that further clarifies the idea of “souled morality” in the Buffyverse because Angel’s soul interferes with his desire to simulate the same murderous life he had once led with Spike, Drusilla, and Darla. Angel even goes so far as to protect a missionary family from being killed by the evil (unsoiled) trio during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. Darla sees through Angel’s motives in this flashback. The soul plays a crucial part in remorse and redemption, as it is only until Darla becomes human that she feels remorse for her murderous past, while Angel feels remorse and seeks redemption as a mortal and an immortal. Darla’s redemptive arc is also complicated by motherhood. When she becomes pregnant with Angel’s son Connor, it is her unborn son’s soul that imbues her body with remorse before she commits suicide by stake in order to save his life. The male leads in Buffy and Angel demonstrate how the ensoulment process has the tendency to alienate vampires from humans but also, paradoxically, recover the bonds with them as well. By showcasing the

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soul as a plot device for the development of these vampire characters, the definitions of good and evil become more complicated as the relationship between humans and vampires mature.

2. The Soul in History The Buffyverse is initially introduced as one possessing archetypal and binary qualities of good and evil, human and monster, slayer and vampire, and souled and unsouled. Halfway through the Season One episode “Angel” (BtVS 1:7), Whedon challenges this binary system by revealing to the audience (and Buffy herself) the paradox of the souled vampire. We find out that Angel is a vampire with a soul. The first season establishes an important rule in the Buffyverse: Vampires, by their very natures, cannot possess souls and also commit acts of evil. But Whedon is never entirely clear on the concept of a vampire soul, and whether it differed in any respect from a human soul. In the Buffyverse, the vampire soul was tantamount to a good conscience. Used in the beginning of the series as a plot device to develop the relationship between Buffy and the brooding, redemption-seeking Angel, the soul allowed the love story to progress without having to immediately explain in any significant detail why Angel differed from his own kind and thus worthy of the slayer’s love. But as both series matured, so did their characters. At the same time the Buffy characters transitioned from high school to college and to the drudgery and complexities of adult life, Whedon began to explore his vampire characters further and add depth to his (rather flimsy) concept of the vampire soul in the origin episodes. Indeed, it is in the series’ first origin episode – a two-part finale that closed out the show’s second season – that audiences first learned how soulless Angelus became the souled and redemption-seeking Angel (“Becoming” Parts I & II BtVS 2:21, 2:22). It is in the Buffy origin episodes that we see the beginnings of the Fanged Four (Darla, Angelus, Drusilla and Spike né William) and their various adventures and misadventures in periods long predating the birth of the eponymous vampire slayer. These origin episodes reveal, in particular, the malleability of colonial and gender identities in pre-Buffy history. Whedon uses specific historical contexts to develop the vampire characters’ personal histories and show (rather than tell) their journeys to their present state of mind. He also reveals how their origins inform and complicate power dynamics and individual agency. In fact, the origin episodes themselves – as vehicles of historical characterization within the show – are curious additions to a television series that primarily centers on a group of contemporary California teenagers and their lives at the turn of

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the twenty-first century. It is through Whedon’s vision of pre-Buffy history that we can appreciate how he problematizes the earlier episodes of the series, especially in the way they dealt with souled morality and unsouled depravity, with later episodes—origin episodes— that questioned these very paradigms. The various historical representations of both masculine performance and peripheral societies (as depicted in the origin episodes) color, and inevitably influence, how the audience should react to vampire behavior and morality. In the context of the origin episodes, the soul is multivalent, symbolizing at various points, for Angel and Spike, marginal/mainstream and emasculation/virility. The colonial context is fertile ground for the representation of two polarities in the Buffyverse: The marginal and mainstream (or, the center and periphery). Marginalization and belongingness are prevalent, mutually constitutive themes that quite flexibly apply to storylines involving teenage alienation, vigilante justice, and subversive behavior. The marginal-mainstream dichotomy is thrown into sharp relief in Whedon’s conceptualization of the human-vampire relationship because the vampire inhabits an (usually seedy) underground world of graveyards, darkness, and death. The vampire represents the marginalized “Other,” a fearsome counterpoint to those aboveground and living in the light. Their predatory natures and their physical inability to occupy human spaces permanently relegate the vampire to the margins. Thus, there is both a social and physical dimension to the marginal and mainstream worlds of Buffy’s fictional town of Sunnydale, California. These social and physical divisions are vividly illustrated in the show’s vampire “history,” especially in the episodes dealing with Darla and Angel’s origins. In the early seasons of Buffy, when vampires were primarily the main villains with whom Buffy and the Scooby Gang had to contend, we learn that there are distinct vampire “families,” led by a sort of fearsome paterfamilias, a master vampire, who had turned all or the most important vampires in a clan. Early in the third season, Buffy and another slayer, Faith, slay a vampire master himself, Kakistos, whose protégé, Mr. Trick, begins serving The Mayor (the “Big Bad”), after Kakistos’ demise. The most prominent vampire family in the series, however, is that of The Master, who had bitten and (briefly) killed Buffy at the end of the first season, and who was the leader of the Order of Aurelius, a semi-religious cult of vampires founded in the twelfth century, according to the show’s mythology. In the Angel origin episode “Darla” (Angel 2:7), The Master turns up in Virginia Colony in 1609 dressed in priestly garb, ready to give the dying Darla, a self-professed “whore,” her last rites. We are to assume that from the moment The Master turns Darla into a vampire the two are

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an inseparable duo within the Order of Aurelius, until Darla subverts The Master’s authority and unceremoniously dumps him in order to be with Angelus, her progeny, taking the chance to become matriarch in her own family of vampires. In Angel’s human life he had been known as Liam, a seemingly immoral and dissolute drunk whom Darla had stalked and then turned into a vampire in an alleyway in Galway, Ireland, in the mideighteenth century. Both Darla and Liam were originally from British colonies, and both were marginalized in their societies in different respects. Darla was an independent woman of property; her human death occurred in a bedroom of a rather sprawling estate filled with household servants. That she was a propertied woman casts some doubt on whether she was really a common prostitute, as she confessed. She was most likely a woman of “easy virtue” who died of venereal disease from having many lovers rather than paying customers. Liam was an Irish-Catholic lout in a country whose laws and politics favored Anglo-Protestants, and whose morality, like Darla’s, made him a marginal figure in polite society. It is only when they became vampires that they seemingly acquired all of the wealth, mobility, and freedom to break out of from the colonial peripheries and travel the world. When Darla and Angel decide to extricate themselves from the paterfamilias, it is their desire specifically to leave the darkness and obscurity of an underground world, in which The Master and his minions plotted and schemed to destroy the earth, and to ascend aboveground, where the promise of the human world was much more, as Angel describes it, “fun.” And fun was had for several decades, until the Romani, or Gypsies, cursed Angel with a soul. Thus began the process of disassembling the Fanged Four as a vampire family. The implications of a marginalized group such as the Romani Gypsies being responsible for Angel’s soul perhaps points to Whedon’s fascination with blending magic and sorcery with the exotic, and with attributing magic-like powers to those living on the periphery and beyond mainstream society, as the Gypsies had done for centuries. Indeed, slayer superpowers, witchcraft, and curses all seem to exist in a hidden world of which most ordinary humans in the series (i.e., all of Sunnydale) are ignorant. The result of having a soul ultimately condemns Angel to the peripheries of human and vampire society for almost a hundred years until he meets Whistler in New York City and is given a redemptive purpose. The soul “defangs” Angel and gives him a type of impotency that prevents him from exercising his powers as a vampire (to feed on blood) and as a man (to have sex with Buffy). The soul, in this sense, strips Angel of his own agency and always makes him subject to the needs of his soul. First,

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he is in Buffy’s service, then he is in constant search of Shanshu prophecy, which will turn him human once again. His vampire urges are continually suppressed by the weight of his soul and, perhaps, a dose of good oldfashioned Catholic guilt. Angel’s redemptive journey is punctuated by a few episodes in which he is uncursed, thus losing his soul and regaining his vampiric potency in the form of his evil alter ego, Angelus. However, Angel’s desire to rejoin Darla two years after he was cursed with a soul should not go unnoticed, as it illustrates the way in which colonial themes intersect with broader issues involving gender roles in both of the series. Darla, suspicious of Angel’s inability to act as a proper vampire after begging her to take him back, demanded that he drink from the infant of a white missionary family in China during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. Angel cannot bring himself to do it, thus failing a test that would have proved his sincerity and vampiric virility. He flees, and the soul remains a constant reminder of his moral failings, his conscience, and his permanent exile from both his vampire family and human society. How shall we interpret the use of the Boxer Rebellion as the backdrop of climactic scenes involving struggles for power among the Fanged Four? The Boxer Rebellion was a violent uprising against western missionaries, capitalist expansion, and imperial influences. As a metaphor for encroaching western imperialism and its subsequent suppression of native cultures and religions, the scene in which Spike defeats the Chinese slayer is notable for taking place in a Buddhist temple, the very type of institution the Chinese were fighting to preserve against Christian missions. Spike’s reply to the Chinese slayer’s final request— to tell her mother that she loved her— says it all: “[I don’t] speak Chinese.” This response effectively silences her, the subaltern, and sacrifices her identity to serve his personal narrative, filled with stories of slayer slayings and assorted mayhem (as we see in the crossover episode “Fool for Love” [BtVS 5:7]). At the end of the fight, Spike and Drusilla feast on the blood of the fallen slayer and consummate their relationship among the ruins of the temple. Where Angel had failed Darla as a companion by showing mercy, Spike proved his vampiric worth tenfold with the ultimate kill. In the next scene, Angel declares that Spike “is one of us now”; that is, worthy of being part of the Fanged Four. To Darla’s chagrin, she later compares Angel’s simpering soul-searching unfavorably to Spike’s newfound vampiric powers. The contrast between the two vampires is thrown into sharp relief by two very different scenes: The first depicting Spike’s victory over the Chinese slayer (as well as his sexual victory) and the second depicting Angel’s deliverance of the white missionary family

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from his bloodthirsty vampire cohorts. The subaltern is suppressed in the former, while the white status quo is preserved in the latter. Interestingly enough, consummating his relationship with his sire, Drusilla, in the place where the Chinese slayer met her end, reaffirmed Spike’s newly acquired Big Bad status and masculine potency. Later his notoriety grows when he kills his second slayer, Nikki Wood, in a New York City subway train in 1977—a scene that is intercut by Spike’s monologue that imagines a future in which he would conquer Buffy in much the same way. The scene plays with the idea that Buffy giving herself over in death or over to sex are essentially one and the same. Spike’s reign of terror effectively ends when The Initiative places the chip in his head (BtVS 4:7). This action renders him useless as a vampire and as a lover to Drusilla, who had left him earlier in South America (in a rather comical scene) for the affections of a monster with dripping, phallic-like antlers. Drusilla’s abandonment of Spike results from his obsession with Buffy, and as such, his obsessions have rendered him weak and useless as a lover. It is Spike’s shocking attempted rape of Buffy that spurs his journey to Africa to seek redemption and a soul (BtVS 6:19). His killing of the two previous slayers had obvious sexual undertones, as their deaths were like an “aphrodisiac” to him, but Buffy’s attempted rape was a desperate act fueled by Spike’s frustration with Buffy’s rejection and his powerlessness around her. Since the chip had made him powerless as a vampire, and his perceived moral degeneracy had made him worthless as a lover to Buffy, Spike concludes that a soul would solve both problems. Fighting to win a soul in an African cave, he is reborn with all of the moral weight it carries. The soul is, in Spike’s case, not a curse, but the prize. The origin episodes reveal themes about both emotional and social marginalization in a colonial context. In doing so, origin episodes effectively deliver glimpses into the characters’ personal histories by focusing on their historical journeys. Furthermore, the soul works as a dramatic device, illustrating the fundamental struggle to define identity and power relations within the Buffyverse. The soul defines humanity, alienates vampires from themselves and their societies, and complicates the classic struggle between good and evil. As such, the soul is the driving force behind tragedy, identity, and character development in both series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. The soul can bring the disparate worlds of the natural and supernatural together but can also be the agent that tears these worlds asunder.

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Works Cited De Beauvoir, Simone. The Second Sex. 1949. New York: Vintage, 1989. Print. Haraway, Donna J. “The Cyborg Manifesto.” Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1990. Print. Whedon, Joss. "Angel.” Angel. Fox, Los Angeles. 1997. Television. —. “Becoming: Part 1.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, Los Angeles, 1998. Television. —. “Becoming: Part 2.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, Los Angeles, 1998. Television. —. “Darla.” Angel. Fox, Los Angeles, 2000. Television. —. “Fool for Love.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, Los Angeles, 2000. Television. —. “Lies My Parents Told Me.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. Television.

Nadine Farghaly takes an age-old Buffy argument concerning its feminist underpinnings and turns it on its head. While some may have argued that BtVS has all the ingredients for a truly matriarchal show, in reality Farghaly argues that patriarchy is just too strong a model to dismantle. Not only does Whedon fail to create a female character liberated from patriarchal influences, he creates a character that is more hero than heroine, defeating her enemies by working within, rather than overcoming, male dominance. Farghaly illustrates the ways that patriarchal institutions and their members assert power over the female body in BtVS by synthesizing examples from both the television series and the graphic novel series with the critical cultural theories of Michel Foucault, Max Weber, and John Bowlby.

CHAPTER TWO PATRIARCHY STRIKES BACK: POWER AND PERCEPTION IN BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER NADINE FARGHALY “Did we not put the ‘Grr’ in girl?” Willow (BtVS “Living Conditions” 4.02) While fauna presents us with multiple examples for a matriarchal society, bees and whales to name but a few, the human realm is dominated by patriarchal structures. Although matriarchal societies are not to be found in the western world, it is noteworthy that there are many examples of such a society in the fictional world. Buffy the Vampire Slayer (referred to in this work as BtVS) is one such example and proposes all the ingredients for a truly matriarchal show, offering a glimpse at what a matriarchal society could look like. Since the series’ heroine, Buffy Summers, can be observed as she transitions from a young, naive teenager to a powerful warrior who not only has to fight her own battles but also commands her very own “slayer army,” she would have been the perfect medium to propose a world without any patriarchal influences. The

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Buffyverse would have created an opportunity to explore the possibilities of an utopian society in which men and women can live equally. Unfortunately, the series’ creator, Joss Whedon, fails to create a female character liberated of patriarchal influences. He not only reintroduces patriarchal figures and apparatuses again and again, but he also constrains his heroine to adapt the same power structures his male characters employ. Whedon’s failure to create a heroine who does not depend on patriarchy is explored by Mary Magoulick in her work “Frustrating Female Heroism: Mixed Messages in Xena, Nikita, and Buffy.” Magoulick illustrates that “these female heroes, conceived of and written mostly in a still male-dominated world, represent male fantasies and project a status quo more than they fulfill feminists [sic] hopes” (729). But Magoulick is not the only scholar who states the need for a gender equal characterization of women in film. In “The Image of Women in Film: Some Suggestions for Future Research,” Sharon Smith comments on how women would like to be seen: “women just want a chance to be heroes; a chance to be shown as humanly (not just femininely) frail; and a chance to see men in some of the ungainly situations in which women have so commonly been shown” (18). Smith also comments on the need for gender equality. She states that women want to be heroes as well, and while Whedon supports this claim, he also falls into the trap many men cannot avoid. Smith identifies this trope as follows: “films express the fantasies and subconscious needs of their (mostly male) creators” (15). These ideas highlight the fact that female heroes are still sexualized and that their producers are still trying to cater to a male audience. Therefore, it should be remembered that although BtVS offers strong female characters, all of these women were shaped by Joss Whedon. Like Smith before her and also very much like Matthew Henry in “’Don’t ask me, I’m just a Girl’: Feminism, Female Identity, and the Simpsons,” Margoulick agrees that it is hard for male writers, producers, directors, and creators of popular TV shows to go against their subconscious. Henry contends, “this point is offered not as a critique of the possible limitations these individuals might have by virtue of their sex, but instead as a reminder of the ability … to transcend essential notions of authorship and to produce a mainstream television show that contains an overt feminist sensibility” (29). These indications do not mean that Whedon failed in his creation of a strong female character, but the fact that he made his heroine dependent on patriarchy weakens his idea of equality. Despite the fact that BtVS depicts both male and female characters, the majority of Buffy’s relationships are connected to patriarchy. In light of the series’ supposed theme of woman’s power, the patriarchal relationships

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contradict Whedon’s message. He creates a heroine who focuses mostly on her relationships with patriarchs instead of establishing her own authority. Willow Rosenberg, who plays a constant and important role in the series, is Buffy’s only female friend. Other female characters in the TV show, and in the graphic novel as well, are interchangeable. Throughout the show, the audience has to part with Miss Calendar, Joyce Summers, Cordelia, and Tara to name but a few of the female characters who got erased from the script. In contrast to this, the male characters in the show are rarely dismissed so easily; for example, even though Angel (Buffy’s first vampire love interest) left the show at the end of Season Three, he continued to stay involved in the series. Therefore, it is a fact that Buffy’s main relationships are with males; among them are The Watchers’ Council (an ancient group of men who command, train, and punish the Slayers as necessary); her Watcher, Rupert Giles, and Spike and Angel, two vampires who become Buffy’s friends, warriors in arms, lovers, and confidants. Whedon’s tradition of reestablishing patriarchal characters not only exemplifies patriarchies’ all-pervading influence, but it also exposes that it is undesirable to live successfully without patriarchal authority. But what exactly is patriarchy? “Patriarchy” is a loaded term that can incorporate many different aspects. Nonetheless, despite the many misconceptions and the controversies around this term, the phenomenon itself seems to be universal. Allan G. Johnson’s definition of a patriarchal apparatus defines “[a] society [that] is … male-dominated, male-identified, and male-centered. It also involves as one of its key aspects the oppression of women” (3). These ideas concur with Lois Tyson’s definition of patriarchy as “any society in which men hold all or most of the power” (86). This notion is supported by Kauppinen and Aaltio who quote Kanter in their article, “Leadership, Power, and Gender.” Kanter helps to shape this concept even more; he discusses “metaphorical male ‘homosocial reproduction’—[that display] how men attempt to reproduce their dominant power relations by only uniting with and sharing the same occupational space and privilege with those males they deem similar in image and behavior, cloning themselves in their own image, and forming so-called old-boy networks” (102). This idea emphasizes how patriarchy reproduces itself and how it perpetually creates its own tradition. It also highlights how the patriarchal apparatus is able to survive without modernization. The term “patriarchy” not only refers to the act of female oppression by males, but also to male oppression of other males. Don Sabo illustrates in his essay, “Pigskin, Patriarchy, and Pain,” the “system of

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intermale dominance in which a minority of men dominates the masses of men” (379). He explains how he sees himself as “one more man among many men who get swallowed by a social system predicated on male domination” (379). These claims are in harmony with Kanter who describes “homosocial reproduction,” which states that men duplicate existing power formation (Kauppinnen and Alto 102). These attributes highlight once more how the patriarchal society grants more power to dominant and aggressive men and groups. In Discipline and Punish, Foucault, who coins the term “microphysics of power,” takes the manifestations of patriarchy one step further by describing how an entity of power continues to assert power even if it is not physically present (178). Patriarchal power is so ingrained in society, and therefore in the subconscious of males and females, that it is almost impossible to resist the urge to obey. This idea also demonstrates how patriarchy and its members have built their base of power over millennia. Furthermore, Foucault explains how power was reorganized and how the improvement of diverse bodies of knowledge support and cooperate with that power. Foucault claims that power and knowledge go hand-in-hand and that one cannot exist without the other. He also declares that the body is an object that needs to be acted upon. It is an instrument that needs to be “manipulated, shaped, [and] trained,” as well as an entity “which obeys, responds, becomes skillful and increases its forces” (Foucault 136). Max Weber proposes several hypotheses that are valuable to understand power relations in BtVS. Weber’s traditional authority bases its power on the belief that patriarchy has been present since “time immemorial” (135). Patriarchy is considered to be a pure form of rule (pure in this case means natural), and its traditional norms must be followed even by the patriarchs themselves; Weber argues that patriarchs are substantively bound by tradition (136). Here, positions of leadership are not necessarily attributed because of competence but because of favoritism. The personal loyalty of the faithful servant is one aspect that demonstrates how the interrelationship of administrative staff is controlled. These characteristics, among others, explain how the power structures in BtVS are created. One of Foucault’s central ideas about power is that power needs to be subverted; he suggests that power needs to allow its subjects the illusion that they can challenge the power structures under which the subjects function. The patriarchs in BtVS allow the female bodies to believe that they are able to undermine power when in reality these female bodies can only subvert it as much as these patriarchal institutions allow. In an

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interview with members of Quel Corps, Foucault shares his opinions about these aspects of power: “suddenly, what had made power strong becomes used to attack it. Power, after investing itself in the body, finds itself exposed to a counterattack in the same body. … But the impression that power weakens and vacillates here is in fact mistaken; power can retreat here, re-organize its forces, invest itself elsewhere … and so the battle continues” (Power/Knowledge 56). It is only natural that the same body that was exposed to power will at one point attack the same power that subverted it. Therefore, the Watchers’ Council arguably knew that Buffy was trying to switch the power roles by asserting power over the Council, and it welcomes these attempts since it reaffirms the Council’s status as a powerful entity; this notion can be observed throughout the series until the destruction of the Council in Season Seven. By allowing Buffy to believe that she succeeded, the Council actually strengthens its base of power. The power of the Council and its members “can retreat …, re-organize its forces, invest itself elsewhere” (Power/Knowledge 56). The fluidity of power makes it possible for these patriarchs not only to survive, but also to keep their status as authority figures, regardless of the fact that they may have to adjust their traditions. Notwithstanding their obvious flaws, Whedon constantly reintroduces patriarchs, thus keeping alive not only their power, but also the myth of their influence. Neither the Council nor its members needs to be present to assert power. When applying Foucault’s term, “microphysics of power,” one can easily understand how patriarchal power structures work and why they are so ingrained in society that they not only became “natural,” but also necessary (Foucault Discipline and Punish 178). Notably, the patriarchs in BtVS do not randomly appear; they are overtly present during predicaments. Giles asserts power over evil Willow, and Angel, who appears towards the end of Season Seven to hand Buffy a magical amulet, ultimately saves the world. Thus, the patriarchs reaffirm that the female body is unable to cope with difficult situations alone. This theme of dependence is continued in the graphic novels as it marks the return of Dracula; Buffy inquires after him because she needs Dracula`s help; howeverShe is unable to solve the new crisis alone, and therefore, she sends Xander to ask Dracula for help(Goddard Wolves at the Gate II). Nevertheless, Buffy is not the only Slayer who discovers that she is incapable of functioning without said authority figures. Although in Season Two Faith, an additional slayer, severs the last remaining bonds between the Council and herself, and therefore frees herself from patriarchal rule, she soon associates with a different patriarch,

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the Mayor, who becomes the new patriarchal figure in Faith’s life. The Mayor clothes her, feeds her, provides shelter for her, but more importantly, he trusts Faith, and he believes in her. Not only did he “rescue” Faith from a life of despair, but he also “rescued” her from herself. Faith’s inability to cope independently with her failure demonstrates both her inability to entirely exist without this patriarchal influence, and it also illustrates Whedon’s reluctance to part with patriarchal figures. Considering that Faith is portrayed as even a tougher warrior than Buffy, having Faith rely on patriarchal structures not only weakens Whedon’s overall claim for equality but it also reinforces the most prominent weakness of this TV series, its reliance on strong patriarchal figures and its reluctance to part with them. The fact that Faith, one of the most independent, strong, and emancipated female characters in this television series falls so willingly under patriarchal care is most disturbing. This willingness permits the reading that Faith was not strong and independent because she wanted to be strong and independent, but because she had no other choice; an idea that greatly diminishes her agency and leads to the need of completely reevaluating her character. Suddenly, this strong and independent female character appears much weaker, but Faith is not the only one who is rescued by a patriarch. Although Giles is absent from the show for the majority of Season 6, the moment of his return marks the beginning of a new crisis. Towards the end of Season Six, Willow turns evil and endeavors to destroy the world. Since no one in Sunnydale has the magical abilities to stop her, a British Wiccan coven equips Giles with all their power so that he can rescue not only Willow but also the world. Very much like a father who scolds a child, Giles demands that Willow gives up magic and heed his ruling. Willow very accurately comments on the patriarch’s return by saying: “Daddy’s home. I’m in wicked trouble now” (BtVS “Grave” 6.22). As can be seen in the above mentioned examples, the patriarchs, not Buffy, rescue the world. These incidents demonstrate that the patriarchy’s power is still a force to be reckoned with. Their actions mark a return to “normal” structures. Incidents like these keep the patriarchal myth and its haunting presence alive and indispensable. While these incidents occur in the TV show, the graphic novel, referred to as Season Eight, continues this trope. As the only male character on Buffy’s side in the graphic novel, Xander not only redefines his place among the patriarchs, but his presence also serves as a constant reminder of patriarchy. Xander not only develops into a valuable ally for Buffy, but he functions as an authority figure for other Slayers as well. The fact that he, not one of the other Slayers, becomes Buffy’s second in command demonstrates that the patriarchy’s

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power cannot be completely discarded and must find ways to adapt. Although these new patriarchs do not appear as strong and as “masculine” as before, they are not only present but also still in power. Xander’s character demonstrates both how power can shift and how it is redefined in order to emerge on a different level. His transformation becomes apparent, if one remembers the TV show, Xander was often ridiculed and acknowledges this state by exclaiming, "I’m sick of being the guy who eats insects and gets the funny syphilis. As of this moment, it’s over. I’m finished being everybody’s butt-monkey!" (BtVS “Buffy vs. Dracula” 5.01). The new Xander, however, is the only male companion at Buffy's side; he is organizing the attacks of the other Slayers and is generally a person who demands much respect. His ability to adjust, despite the tradition, signifies the need for these apparatuses and their power structures. Although Whedon demonstrates that the Council contains major flaws, he continuously reintroduces new Council members. During Season Seven, the First Evil kills all Watchers, except Giles, an ancient being that endeavored to destroy the Slayer lineage. The assassination of all Watchers could have presented the end of this particular patriarchal influence in the TV show since it demonstrates the Council’s insufficiency to survive. Instead, this incident highlights that, although it is far from being perfect, the Council not only survives, but also manages to adjust to new situations, just like the patriarchy itself. It can be argued that this near destruction forced the sole survivor of patriarchy to reevaluate and reform the Council’s tradition, an act that eventually undermines the Council’s power base. This aspect highlights the necessity to create a distinction between First and Second Wave Watchers. The term “First Wave Watchers” embraces all Watchers who were called before the assassinations by the First Evil, while the term “Second Wave Watchers” describes the Watchers who were called after these assassinations. First Wave Watchers function under the old regime. They are not only descendants of the Shadow Men, the creators of the first Slayer, but they are also chosen by destiny and family tradition. Thus, First Wave Watchers embody the very attributes that define patriarchy. As Kanter indicates, “metaphorical male ‘homosocial reproduction’—[display] how men attempt to reproduce their dominant power relations by only uniting with and sharing the same occupational space and privilege with those males they deem similar in image and behavior, cloning themselves in their own image, and forming so-called old-boy networks” (102). First Wave Watchers ensured that only men with the right morals, upbringing, and sense of “tradition” would be able to teach the Council’s values to the Slayers. They were born out of the necessity to bring the old order back

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and because an authority figure needed to oversee the new Slayers. As the last survivor of the Watcher’s Council, and therefore, the only Watcher that is still alive at the end of the TV show, Giles is the only one who fits both categories, while Andrew, the Scoobies` former ‘guestage’, is just a Second Wave Watcher. Season Eight's Second Wave Watchers are chosen by coincidence and accessibility, not because of tradition; thus, they dismantle the patriarchy’s position of tradition in the series. The Second Wave Watchers lack training, and more importantly, they are not called to duty as are the First Wave Watchers, a fact that attacks the Council’s self-invented traditions. During one of the earlier episodes, Giles confesses that he did not want to become a Watcher, but that it was his destiny, just as it was Buffy’s to become a Slayer. Unlike Buffy, however, Giles was not chosen by random but because of his family’s tradition of being Watchers. This selection process adds to the unequal power relations in BtVS since it illustrates that the Council places more emphasis on choosing its Watchers than it does in selecting the Slayers. Thus, the Council is accentuating the Watchers’ importance while undermining that of the Slayers, demonstrating that although the physical power passes on through the Slayer lineage, patriarchy still asserts control over the female body. One ritual especially created and enforced by the Council highlights this imbalance. Tento di Cruciamentum refers to a ritual which “is not easy for Slayer or Watcher. But it’s been done this way for a dozen centuries whenever a Slayer turns eighteen. It’s a time honored rite of passage” (BtVS “Helpless” 3.12). In the week prior to a Slayer’s eighteenth birthday, her Watcher drugs her to take her supernatural powers away so that she can fight a vampire as a “normal” and “weak” female. This ritual is not only another tradition that was created by the Council but it also serves as a device to keep the Slayer aware of her own “powerlessness.” The ritual does not serve as a rite of passage, but mainly as a method to keep Slayers as young as possible. A Slayer is usually called to her duty around the age of 15. And more importantly, most slayers know beforehand that they are potential Slayers. With the exception of Buffy and Faith, Slayers seem to be discovered when they are young and still corruptible. The ritual offers the Council a possibility to start with new Slayers, without having to deal with “mature” women in their own right who have completed their development and thus perhaps become too powerful and independent to control. The Council applied this method for centuries, preventing its Slayers from developing beyond the Council’s control.

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The influence and power of the Watchers is very visible in the Second Wave Watchers who occupy an important role in the graphic novels since they represent the primary change patriarchy that endures throughout the series. While in the TV show there was one Watcher for every Slayer; in the graphic novel there is now one Watcher for hundreds of Slayers, thus shifting the power structures even further to the patriarchy’s side. These new Watchers are able to influence and shape more bodies than ever before. Here, Whedon manages to reemphasize the Watchers’ authority and importance and allows the patriarchy to control more female bodies. Naturally, due to the new empowerment of all the potential Slayers as well as the death of almost all Council members at the end of Season 7, one would assume that the graphic novels would offer a perfect platform for the Slayers to leave patriarchy behind, and to establish their own power structures, but unfortunately, the opposite occurs. While it appeared as if the patriarchs were relegated to second place after the assassinations by the First Evil, they just reorganized their structures and recreated themselves in the process, emerging stronger and more efficient. Instead of seizing the moment and reshaping their own destinies, the Slayers, once more, return to the patriarchy. Moreover, it is impossible for Buffy to subvert patriarchy’s power structures and to use/mold them without adapting and incorporating them for herself. Her sexuality plays an important role in this power struggle. In the graphic novel, Buffy entertains a homosexual relationship with Satsu, another Slayer. Interestingly enough, Buffy chooses a partner who could be her equal in battle, and who is also able to understand her completely since they share the same powers, beliefs, goals and ultimately the same fate. Despite her attachment to Satsu, Buffy does not hesitate to assert power over her lover; thus, she mimics the patriarchy’s domination over the female body. Although this domination does not seem to be such an abnormal occurrence for a relationship, it signals a change in Buffy’s approach to relationships. During former relationships, it is evident that Buffy tries to please her partners; with Riley she pretended not to be as strong as she really was and with Angel she forgave him his many misgivings out of fear of losing him. Since Satsu is not a member of a patriarchal apparatus, and Buffy, therefore, does not seek her approval, Buffy completely dismisses Satsu’s input. When Satsu tries to question one of Buffy’s commands, Buffy brusquely interrupts her, reaffirming her status as sole leader by making it clear that “this isn't up for discussion, Satsu...[.] I gave you an order. Get moving.” (Goddard Wolfs at the Gate II).

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Willow reminds Satsu about her position and Buffy’s role in their operation: “Here’s the thing. She’s alone. She’s vulnerable. And she has the weight of the world on her slender shoulders. … She’s not like us. She’s the General. We’re her army. And that’s never gonna change” (Goddard Wolfs at the Gate II). Buffy, like the Council and other patriarchs, expects obedience; she adapts these patriarchal power structures, and thus becomes a member of the patriarchal apparatus as well. Buffy starts out with the best intentions, but she cannot escape falling into the same trap as the patriarchs before her. The fact that Buffy rarely takes other ideas into consideration demonstrates how she is aligning with patriarchal structures. She, like others before her, is not only forcing herself on the female body, but she is also disconnected from her fellow Slayers: Buffy: Why can’t I feel it [the bond all the other Slayers share]? Xander: Maybe you don’t get to. Maybe the girl who brings it all together, is the one that has to give that up. Buffy: Yeah. Yay me. (Whedon A Beautiful Sunset)

This scene not only highlights that Xander still thinks of Buffy as a “girl,” not a woman in her own right, but it also illustrates that Buffy cannot be one of the other Slayers. Buffy is not able to share her position of power with the other Slayers since she is unwilling to relinquish her monopoly; therefore, she cannot be an equal part of the group. Buffy assumes the position of the patriarch instead. Like the Council, Buffy inhabits an outside position; she commands the new Slayers in the same manner as she was commanded; she sends them on missions, and she also transforms them into the body that needs to be acted upon. Both Buffy and the Watchers look upon the body as something that needs to be “manipulated, shaped, trained, which obeys, responds becomes skillful and increases its forces” (136). As Foucault declares, power never leaves; it is always around, even though it may change its appearance. As a result of the empowerment of all potential Slayers, Buffy transforms from the power that was formed to one of the bodies in charge. However, Buffy does not grant the Slayers the same freedom for which she fought; she expects them to obey her commands and to follow her beliefs. This work does not aim to discredit Whedon’s attempt to create strong female heroines, but it offers a non-mainstream reading that demonstrates shortcomings in his work. “Why are you writing strong women characters?” is the question Joss Whedon is asked the most. In an address given at the Equality Now Tribute he answers this question thoroughly:

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Because equality is not a concept, it’s not something we should be striving for. It’s a necessity. Equality is like gravity, we need it to stand on this earth as men and women, and the misogyny that is in every culture is not a true part of the human condition. It is life out of balance and that imbalance is sucking something out of the soul of every man and woman who’s confronted with it. We need equality, kinda now. (Whedon Equality Now)

Whedon clearly states that gender equality is still a concept people struggle with, and he also clarifies one still needs to fight for it. At first glance Whedon’s female heroines, such as Buffy, Anya, Willow and others, may even help him to achieve this goal; nonetheless, while he had the opportunity to create a heroine who could craft a world without patriarchal structures, a world where its individuals are equal to each other, he opts for a return to her “roots,” the patriarchal system. As Kanter and Weber declare, patriarchy not only created itself, but it also creates and shapes its own traditions. Since Buffy now inhabits a completely new position, General of the Slayer army, she creates her own traditions according to the structures she is used to. Although Buffy replaces the traditional patriarch as provider, protector, and decision maker, she is not able to flee its presence. Although the members of the patriarchy allow their subjects the illusion of a possible dismantling, the patriarchs’ power structures allow for a constant reshaping and reforming, making their destruction impossible. Buffy and her Scoobies changed the fate of the world. No longer can it be said that, “into every generation, a Slayer is born. One girl, in all the world, a Chosen One. One born with the strength and skill to hunt the vampires” (BtVS “Welcome to the Hellmouth” 1.01). Since the end of Season Seven, the number of Slayers increased every year. Although a new generation of women was brought into the fictional world, it is a generation that follows the traditional patriarchal models instead of embracing their own embodiments of power. Foucault states, “Power is not an institution, and not a structure; neither is it a certain strength we are endowed with; it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategic situation in a particular society” (History 92-93). Both Buffy and the patriarchy work with these ideas of power. They reshape and reuse them according to their needs. While these ideas propose the notion of an equal access to and use of power; in reality, they illustrate that the haunting presence of the patriarchs cannot be circumvented. Nonetheless, the female bodies started their first steps on their journey towards equality. Sunnydale’s first Slayer changed the Slayer’s lineage forever; she laid the ground for a world where females try

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not only to dismantle male authority figures and power structures but also adopt those structures as their own. It is clear that more research needs to be done to explore this dynamic new world since Buffy’s adventures and that of the other Slayers are not yet completed. It will be very interesting to observe Buffy’s further development in the graphic novel seasons, and I hope that there are many more papers to come that analyze how the notion of patriarchy, power structures, as well as power perceptions, are influencing not only the Buffyverse, but also the world.

Works Cited Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York: Vintage, 1995. Print. —. The History of Sexuality An Introduction. New York: Vintage, 1990. Print. —. Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 19721977. Ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon, 1980. Print. Henry, Matthew. “’Don't Ask me, I'm Just a Girl’: Feminism, Female Identity, and The Simpsons.” Journal of Popular Culture 40.2 (2007): 272-303. Print. Johnson, Allan. Gender Knot Unraveling Our Patriarchal Legacy. New York: Temple UP, 2005. Print. Kauppinen, Kaisa, and Iliris Altio. "Leadership, Power, and Gender." Encyclopedia of Sex and Gender: Men and Women in the World's Cultures Topics and Cultures. 2 vols. New York: Springer, 2003. Print. Magoulick, Mary. "Frustrating Female Heroism: Mixed Messages in Xena, Nikita, and Buffy." Journal of Popular Culture 39.5 (2006): 729-755. Print. Sabo, Don. "Pigskin, Patriarchy, and Pain." Race, Class and Gender in the United States: An Integrated Study. Ed. Paula S. Rothenberg. New York: Worth, 2003. 377-80. Print. Smith, Sharon. “The Image of Women in Film: Some Suggestions for Future Research.” Feminist Film Theory, a Reader. Ed. Sue Thornham. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 1999. 14-19. Print. Tyson, Lois. Learning for a Diverse World Using Critical Theory to Read and Write About Literature. New York: Routledge, 2001. Print. Weber, Max. “Structures of Power and Stratification.” Essential Weber: A Reader. Ed. Sam Whimster. New York: Routledge, 2003. 117-200. Print.

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Whedon, Joss. “A Beautiful Sunset.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. 2008. DVD. —. “Buffy vs. Dracula.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, 2006. DVD. —. “Grave.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, 2006. DVD. —. “Helpless.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, 2006. DVD. —. “Living Conditions.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, 2006. DVD. —. Speech. “Equality Now.” Equality Now Tribute Address. 2006. 22 Web. Apr. 2008 . —. “Welcome to the Hellmouth.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fox, 2006. DVD. —. “Wolves at the Gate #1.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. 2008. —. “Wolves at the Gate #2.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer. 2008.

Mona Rocha, a bright new voice in Buffyverse, takes the opposite view of Nadine Farghaly and argues that the show does in fact manage to subvert patriarchy by attacking sexist assumptions and generalizations. Whedon is able to do this by allowing Buffy to co-opt traditionally male violence, demonstrating that women (Buffy) can excel at physical activities, such as fighting. Yet nothing is ever so simple in the world of Whedon. While Buffy defeats the bad guys through the use of violence, Whedon also suggests that violence is a destructive, corrupting force that, if misused, can cause more harm than the evil the Scoobies try to defeat. Finally, Rocha argues that Whedon successfully highlights the problems of the “double bind,” the desire to both conform to acceptable modes of feminine behavior while simultaneously subverting it. Through an exploration of two episodes from Season One, “Never Kill a Boy on the First Date” and “The Pack,” Rocha asks, can Buffy truly be both a superhero and a girl?

CHAPTER THREE A LAYERED MESSAGE OF RESISTANCE: BUFFY, VIOLENCE, AND THE DOUBLE BIND MONA ROCHA 1. Introduction Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a feminist show that subverts patriarchy by attacking sexist assumptions and generalizations. Buffy in part accomplishes this task by co-opting violence, which is normally the domain of males, whom society celebrates for excelling at physicality. In addition to co-opting violence and showing that a woman (Buffy) can excel at physical activities, such as fighting, the show also presents the idea that violence is a corrupting force that must be stopped. Though women can be good at this activity, the show advises against the celebration of violence. The norm of embracing masculine violence is shown to be problematic in two somewhat conflicting ways. First, the show makes explicit that the ability to master the skills of violence is not exclusive to males. Second, the show points out that while women can master violence, violence is in itself problematic. This potential conflict

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creates a bit of an impasse, but Buffy the Vampire Slayer walks this intricate tightrope, showing that women, too, can be superheroes – but without becoming lost in the violence they seek to prevent. At the same time, Buffy the Vampire Slayer also illustrates another problem, namely the conflicting pressures on identity development, also known as “the double bind.” The double bind occurs when people, especially young girls, are pressured to fit society’s stereotypes while also trying to form their own, unique identities. Identity development is hard in itself, but especially problematic when a person is forced to conform to molds that are imposed on her, such as molds based on male/female gender binaries. Buffy illustrates how conflicting forces can be mediated and how a person’s unique personality can be developed in spite of limiting prescriptive roles, such as that of “the Slayer” or “the Chosen One.” While the Buffy canon is rich in examples of episodes that fit the two themes developed above, this paper will focus on only two episodes, both from Season One. “Never Kill a Boy on the First Date” (BtVS 1.5) is illustrative of how violence is something that can be used by Buffy, while at the same time showing how Buffy rejects violence for its own sake. “The Pack” (BtVS 1.6) goes further in showing violence as a corrupting force. Both episodes illustrate how Buffy negotiates the demand imposed on her to save the world, along with her wish to develop her own life. Both episodes expound on the dangers imposed by the double bind, while at the same time, offer solutions.

2. Buffy, Violence, the Double Bind In today’s society, the dominant conception of masculinity is that men are naturally active, competitive, and aggressive. Being male is closely associated with being violent. In Robert Jensen’s words, “being a ‘real man’ is therefore marked by the struggle for control, conquest, and domination. A man looks at the world, sees what he wants, and takes it.”1 Men use violence to shape the world into what they want it to be; this aggression is sanctioned under the guise of masculinity. Masculine aggression is physical, but can also be emotional or symbolic: men use weapons in combat, compete for hierarchical dominance in sports or in the office, and boast of their sexual conquests of women. Generally, men on TV are shown as coming into their own through violence. Entire genres of 1 Robert Jensen, Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity (Cambridge: South End Press, 2007), 26.

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films, such as Westerns or Heist Films, are built on the close connection between masculinity and violence. Through the use of violence males become ultra-masculine.2 Violent men are the heroes or good guys that TV shows and movies revolve around. At the other end of the spectrum, the ideal conception of femininity is associated with being passive, nurturing, and communicative; women are seen as being interested in maintaining and developing relationships.3 Helping, caring, listening – not actively pursuing goals – are the feminine gender norms most often recreated for television. As such, women are seen as separated from violence: they are the peaceful nurturers. Television programs routinely emphasize these gender norms. Violent men are heroes, employing weapons to save mankind from various problems, defending their womenfolk, and being hailed as heroes for their violent behavior. Studies show that on television, women “are far less likely to be depicted as aggressive or to use violence than males.”4 Instead, women are depicted in accordance to feminine gender roles: as emotionally dependent and interested in nurturing, and interestingly, as victims.5 If they do use violence, women are portrayed in a completely binary way: either as good and pure (such as the innocent woman saving either her virtue or her family, and who was driven to violence as the last resort), or as corrupt, immoral, and insane (often as a femme fatale who causes her own destruction and that of the people around her).6 The violent woman violates gender norms, and so lacks traditional femininity.7 Buffy the Vampire Slayer challenged these traditional representations of male and female. Buffy, and to a lesser extent her group of friends (from here on, “The Scooby Gang” or “the Scoobies”), use violence without falling 2

Hilary Neroni, The Violent Woman: Femininity, Narrative, and Violence in Contemporary American Cinema (Albany: State U of New York P, 2005), 76. 3 Cheryl B. Travis, “Risks to Healthy Development: The Somber Planes of Life,” 20; Judith Worell, “Pathways to Healthy Development: Sources of Strength and Empowerment,” 25-32; Mary Brabeck and Kalina Brabeck, “Women and Relationships,” 209-210. All in Handbook of Girls’ and Women’s Psychological Health, Judith Worell and Carol D. Goodheart, editors (Oxford: Oxord U P, 2006), 4 Barrie Gunter, Jackie Harrison, and Maggie Wykes, Violence on Television: Distribution, Form, Context, and Themes (New Jersey: Lawrence Erlblaum, 2003), 121. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid. 120. In fact, the term “mean woman” has been coined to refer to this phenomenon of negatively portraying aggressive/violent women in film/TV. See Martha McCaughey and Neal King, eds., Reel Knockouts: Violent Women in the Movies (Austin: U of Texas P, 2001), 1-4. 7 Neroni, 76.

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prey to the usual, and often gendered, negative attributes of violence. In using violence, Buffy is not protecting herself from an abusive lover or a rapist; there is no motif of a woman resorting to violence to save herself or her virtue at play here. Neither is Buffy working to save her family, nor is she using violence to hurt others. Buffy is saving humanity, taking on the large-scale operation that is usually associated with male heroes. Buffy appropriates violence and uses it for good – to prevent demons and vampires from taking over the world – and becomes a female heroine, challenging the TV paradigm. Even though she uses violence, Buffy is distrustful of it and sees violence as something that needs to be controlled or minimized. A heroine who is aided by her friends, Buffy often chooses collective knowledge and a supportive network as tools to supersede violence. Unlike Vin Diesel, The Rock, or Daniel Craig,8 all of whom play characters that wholly embrace violence and operate alone, Buffy operates collaboratively. These male heroes are quick to use violence, often times preemptively. They save the world because they wield violence well. Buffy saves the world, but is reluctant to embrace violence. Buffy’s distrust and discomfort with power and aggression exhibits her uneasiness with her role as the Chosen One. Throughout the series, Buffy expresses the wish simply to have a regular life, released from the responsibilities of saving the world. Instead, she must take on a nearly insurmountable task. These conflicting pressures – of being a normal girl and being a savior – are akin/parallel to – albeit on a grander scale – to the same pressures that girls experience when trying to come into their own with their unique personalities. It is during this time of self-discovery that we see the occurrence of the “double bind,” which refers to a deep conflict in personality development, as present in Buffy’s own search for self in the TV series. Laura Choate defines the “double bind” (also referred to as “crossroads”) as the conflict experienced by women who try to fit gender-role expectations while at the same time trying to develop their own sense of autonomy, which requires some separation from gender norms in general and the family unit in particular.9 The crossroads are hard to navigate: “If she does 8

Vin Diesel, The Rock and Daniel Craig are all typical examples of actors who depict the violent male as single hero paradigm. Consider XXX, The Scorpion King, or Fast Five as illustrative of the concept for Diesel and The Rock, respectively. The 007 Bond franchise, with which Daniel Craig is recently identified, falls within the same paradigm. 9 Laura Choate, Girls and Women’s Wellness: Contemporary Counseling Issues and Intervention (Alexandria: American Counseling Association, 2008), 1, 4.

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what is best for her, she risks being criticized or abandoned by others she cares about. If she hides her true feelings, acquiescing to the opinions and needs of others, she maintains her relationships while failing to develop her identity.”10 Buffy is always trying to mediate these same tensions: if she gives in to her desires to be just another teenager, she fails in her responsibilities as Slayer. If she submits to violence and embraces typically masculine traits of aggressiveness (basically following the prescriptive regime of slayer training as laid out by the Council), or if she unquestioningly obeys Giles, her watcher and link to this Council, then Buffy risks losing herself. She would become a tool for these men who see violence as the only solution to the mystic powers of the Hellmouth, such as vampires and demons, in the process losing her chance to experience a more typical teenage girlhood. Luckily, Buffy successfully navigates these treacherous crossroads, offering a model for self-expression and empowerment for girls. It is interesting to note that in the context of the double bind, tension results in aggression from girls who are competing with one another for male approval, popularity, or acceptance. Relational aggression (or RA) is often characterized by physical or emotional violence between girls.11 Usually, the top girl, or “queen bee,” ostracizes her friends for not fitting in or not giving in to the queen bee’s desires; the queen bee disparages and tries to manipulate the relationships of her friends. Buffy’s interactions with Cordelia often allude to this phenomenon, especially in earlier episodes, such as “Never Kill a Boy on the First Date.” Buffy’s handling of a potentially vicious situation shows once again that violence (in this case, of the more emotional variety) is not to be embraced and is something that needs to be mediated through genuine friendship and personal assertiveness (without being combative). In other words, Buffy models a solution to girls that may suffer from similar RA experiences. The following analyzes these themes – violence, the double bind, feminine tension – closely.

3. Never Kill a Boy on the First Date The themes of the double bind and of resistance to a prescriptive program of violence are present from the first moments of the “Never Kill

10 11

Ibid., 4. Ibid., 63, 67.

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a Boy on the First Date.”12 As usual, Buffy is found on patrol in a graveyard, fighting a vampire. As she is fighting him, Buffy is also addressing him in an easygoing, typically humorous style: “We haven’t been properly introduced. I’m Buffy and you’re history!”13 Buffy has a way of personalizing her calling; she makes the slaying process her own. As soon as the vampire turns to dust, though, Giles literally rises from behind a headstone and admonishes Buffy: “Poor technique. Prioritizing: subpar. Execution was adequate but a bit too bloody for my taste.”14 Buffy spiritedly defends herself and responds sarcastically; “Giles, don’t mention it. It was my pleasure to make the world safe for humanity again.”15 Yet, Giles continues on: “I’m not saying your methods are without merit. You’re simply spending too much time and energy. It should simply be plunge and move on. Plunge and …”16 Giles, as Buffy’s watcher and instructor into “Slayerology,” tries to make Buffy fit a certain mold of fighting: one that uses efficient, pure violence as rote and automatic (just a “plunge and move on” style). I am by no means arguing that Giles is the bad guy here, just that he is the character chosen to illustrate the gender norm that Whedon is interested in breaking down in this scene: males as givers of knowledge, who act as influences that shape the identity and way of being of young women. Buffy does not accept Giles’ criticism, and she does not fall prey to the tensions of having to fit the mold Giles advocates. Her sarcastic responses to Giles are meant to illustrate that she is unafraid to assert her opinions. She does not give into the double bind, but fights it every step of the way by asserting her own subjectivity. Another scene in this episode supplements Whedon’s support for the recognition of women’s subjectivities and strengths. This complex scene is located in the Sunnydale High School library: Giles’ lair of knowledge, where the Scooby gang hangs out. In this scene, though, two points are of importance: first, Giles is baffled by a ring he picked up at the cemetery the night before, and, second, Owen, another Sunnydale student, enters the library in search of an Emily Dickinson poetry book. Each of these instances is important in the breaking down of gendered binaries. Buffy unravels the mystery of the ring’s design:

12

Episode 5, Season 1. Never Kill a Boy on the First Date, Season 1. 14 Ibid. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 13

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38 Buffy: Giles: Buffy: Giles: Buffy:

“What about this? There’s a sun and three stars. Haven’t we seen that somewhere?” “Let me see. I don’t think it represents any …” “Yeah. It’s right here (picking up a book and pointing to it) … check these guys. I told you they look familiar.” “Oh, the order of Aurelius.” “Two points for the slayer, while the watcher has yet to score.”17

In this scene, Buffy is placed in a position to help and direct the scholarly Giles, who is stumped by what the ring could represent. When he does not believe her at first, Buffy insists on her point until her contribution is recognized. Here we have a rational male aided in making meaning and in understanding the world by a female – one who is interested in clothes and other feminine pursuits, but is not defined by them, and one who celebrates her accomplishment with a witty remark. This scene turns on its head the gendered norm of males as intelligent and women as superficial, non-intelligent creatures. The scene brings attention to a problematic binary that is alive and well in our society. The idea that males are generally seen as the ones who have knowledge is satirized again in the following scene, where Owen and Buffy interact for the first time. Although this perception is only shown to be problematic towards the end of the episode, it is important to keep it in mind at this point. Owen, a fellow student Buffy is interested in, is in the library in search of the Dickinson book when the following conversation occurs: Owen to Buffy: “I didn’t think I’d find you here.” Buffy: “Why not?” Owen: “I didn’t mean … (he mumbles) I think you can read.”18

Here, Owen discounts Buffy’s intelligence: he is not able to imagine her visiting the library. Clearly, he has formed a negative opinion about her intelligence even though he does not know her well – he only knows Buffy’s public persona, the “dumb cheerleader” façade that Buffy is unable to shed (in part due to pressures that make up the double bind). From the previous scene, the audience knows that Buffy is capable of great insight, if there was any doubt. But Owen just stereotypes Buffy as an empty-headed cheerleader type. Owen’s character represents the (sadly) prevalent attitudes of men toward women, but at the end of the episode, it 17 18

Ibid. Ibid.

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becomes apparent that this hierarchical attitude is wrong. For now, though, let it suffice that Owen asks Buffy out and she agrees. The date with Owen proves highly problematic on two interrelated fronts to the themes of double bind and violence. Buffy’s date has to be rescheduled for another night so that she can patrol the cemetery to save the world from the Order of Aurelius. Giles insists on the rescheduling. He is certain his calculations are correct in indicating that the Order is planning on resurrecting an awesome vampire, The Anointed One, precisely that same night. Ironically, Giles is proven wrong as the entire night is wasted and no spooky happenings occur. Clearly, the idea that males are the repositories of infallible knowledge is not followed in the Whedon universe. Also, it seems that in spite of all of his supposed wisdom, Giles is unable to recognize that Buffy needs to be a normal girl and is not merely the Slayer. The pressures brought to bear on Buffy – revolving around her inability to keep a regularly scheduled date or to behave as a carefree teenager – are akin to the double bind. While girls in the real world experience pressure to conform to certain behaviors because they are influenced to do so by friends or parents or by traditional norms, Buffy is pressured to patrol in the cemetery as a soldier against vampires. Buffy’s desire to be a regular person and develop as a carefree individual comes at odds with her responsibility as a slayer. This tension is Buffy’s symbolic double bind in the world of Sunnydale. Even when the date is finally rescheduled and about to commence, with Owen walking up to Buffy’s door, about to pick her up, Giles bursts in and insists that the date be cancelled a second time. Developing a personal life and slaying vampires are unavoidably conflicting. However, Buffy handles the intrusion assertively: she offers to be on call while on her date. With this compromise in place – and without being stymied by the pressures of the double bind – Buffy is free to enjoy her date with Owen. One particular scene stands out from their date: Buffy and Owen are slow dancing, and Owen asks Buffy if she is having a good time. Replying in the affirmative, Buffy adds, “Yeah, I almost feel like a girl.” Buffy’s uttering this sentiment drives home the point that the double bind theme is real and cannot be overlooked. Buffy yearns to just be a girl, and she struggles with finding her identity when so much is required of her. She’s constantly walking between two worlds, trying to balance them. Interestingly, in true double bind fashion, the date contains a measure of relational aggression. Who should show up at the Bronze but Cordelia, the queen bee of Sunnydale High. Truly a model of real life hierarchical

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relations based on popularity and prodigious adherence to fashion, Cordelia attempts to interrupt Buffy’s date several times. Flirting with Owen and speaking derogatorily about Buffy, Cordelia is hostile and aggressive. Assertively standing up to her bully and explaining in no uncertain terms that she will focus on her date, Buffy handles the situation. This response is actually one of the ones prescribed by counselors to victims of relational aggression.19 Buffy shows girls how to handle confrontations and develop their own identities in the face of double bind pressures or RA. Just as things are progressing normally, Buffy is paged and is forced to rescue Giles from vampires at the mortuary, where he’s gone to investigate the deaths of people who could be related to the doings of the Order of Aurelius. Buffy is effectively interrupting her date to rescue a fully grown man. Besides this little ironic twist, it’s important to note her words when she leaves Owen. Explaining that she is like two people, Buffy says, “One of them has to go, but the other one is having a really, really good time and will come back. I promise.” This separation of the self is indicative of the loss of identity and personhood that girls in the double bind experience. At the mortuary, Buffy finds Giles hidden in the freezer drawer made for housing corpses. Giles explains: “Two more of the brethren (vampires in the Order of Aurelius) came for me. But I was more than a match for them.” Buffy: “Meaning what?” Giles: “I hid.”20

The master of Slayerology, the very person who was advising Buffy how to fight and how to be an efficient killing machine, hid. Of course, we know that Giles is not a fighter, but it remains ironic that a man is entrusted to teach the Slayer how to fight, but he himself is unable to apply the principles he espouses. This is in sharp contrast to typical fictional fighting teachers, such as Yoda, Mr. Miyagi, Gandalf, or Dumbledore – all of whom are not only well versed in the ways of violence, but also excellent fighters themselves. Unbeknownst to Buffy, Owen has followed her (and the rest of the Scooby gang) to the mortuary. In an attempt to shield him from the violence of the vampires, Buffy sequesters him, along with Willow and Xander in a viewing room, assuming this spot will keep him out of harm’s way, and also keep him in the dark as to Buffy’s involvement. Sadly, the 19 20

Choate, 76. Never Kill a Boy on the First Date, Season 1.

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ruse does not work since The Anointed One21 comes alive at that very moment; Owen, Willow, and Xander are forced to flee for their lives. Buffy, fighting vampires right and left in front of Owen, cannot keep her alternate identity secret. This bind is another sort of tension indicative of the manifold pressures to develop a unified identity: she cannot share this side of her (and attain closeness) without losing normalcy (which may be necessary to initiate a relationship). Heroically, Owen tries to help her, but ends up being knocked out by the Anointed One. Screaming in anger, “You killed my date!” Buffy launches a series of kicks and punches against the Anointed, eventually pushing him into the oven used to cremate the dead. As Owen comes to, he calls their date to an end. Significantly, this scene not only illustrates the struggle with identity mentioned above, but it also shows a Buffy who actively tries to manipulate and minimize violence. She tries to keep violence and its effects to a minimum by keeping Owen and the Scoobies out of harm’s way. She fights hard when she believes Owen is dead, but she does not enjoy one moment of her power and strength. She does not rejoice in the unleashed power of the fights, like the usual male heroes. Rather, Buffy views it all as a burden, and as a great responsibility that in the end is what is keeping her from being normal. Buffy uses violence reluctantly. She does not revel in it for its own sake, but rather sees it as problematic and dangerous. This attitude becomes clear at the end of the episode. Owen comes up to Buffy the day after their date to explain what a great time he had because of the violence: Owen: Buffy: Owen: Buffy: Owen:

I think you’re the coolest. Last night was incredible. I never thought that nearly getting killed would make me feel so alive. So that’s why you want to be with me. Oh, absolutely. When can we do something like that again? Something like? Like walk downtown at 3 o’clock in the morning and pick a fight in a bar – how about tonight?22

Owen embraces the rush of aggression and violence. He enjoys the hostility and fighting that come along with it. He does not understand that violence is negative and inherently dangerous – he is mesmerized by it. And, of course, therein lies the inherent danger of violence. The darkest danger is not the danger of getting hurt, but the danger of becoming a 21

At the end of the episode, we learn that the Anointed One is actually a little boy, and not this vampire Buffy is fighting. 22 Ibid.

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person who embraces violence (the way the male gender norms recommend and even require of young boys who are labeled as gay or girllike if they are not sufficiently violent). The danger is becoming someone who engages in violence because it is enjoyable without the overriding concern that embracing violence entails hurting others. Buffy, though, knows these truths inherent in the embracing and glorying of violence. She has the superior knowledge; she doesn’t buy into the masculine normative ideal of being aggressive as the ultimate form of coolness. This superior wisdom harkens back to the scene in the library: Buffy has this knowledge and Owen lacks it. This realization is important and is exhibitive of a type of practical knowledge that perhaps is even more important than “book knowledge.” Even though Buffy is familiar with book-based knowledge, Buffy’s instinctual and empirical understanding that violence is wrong is also relevant. Buffy rejects Owen and his love of violence. She gives up a possibly exciting romantic relationship based on her deep understanding of the dangers associated with violence; she could never be with a person who valued violence when it is something she herself finds problematic.23 Buffy rejects violence because she understands it is not strength. She knows violence is something that is inherently dangerous and corrupting; she wields it to defend and does so only reluctantly, and with the help and cooperation of others. Buffy also views violence as something that is impeding her own self-development because it limits her life choices and because, due both to vampires (who are violent against her and the world) and to the fact that she is the chosen one (born into violence), it effectively prescribes her existence. Thus, in her attempt to negotiate both conflicting sides of her existence, she once more exemplifies the struggles encountered in the double bind process.

4. The Pack Violence is shown as a corruptive, dangerous influence in “The Pack,”24 as well. In this episode, Buffy and Xander become victims of it, albeit in different ways. And, through the mediating influence of

23

Later in the series, Buffy falls in love with two vampires, whom one could characterize as inherently violent. It is important to note that her relationships with Angel and Spike become deeper and more meaningful as both Angel and Spike develop a conscience and learn to curb their violent impulses, or, at least, orient them toward the greater good. 24 Episode 6, Season 1.

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cooperation and friendship, Buffy is able to defeat violence and aggression in the end. The episode opens with the Scooby gang on a field trip at the Sunnydale Zoo. As Willow, Xander, and Buffy discuss the benefits of not being cooped up in class, they notice that a group of mean kids are teasing and tormenting another student, Lance. After some interruption from Principal Flutie, the pack of mean kids takes Lance into the closed-off hyena exhibit. Xander runs after them to rescue Lance. Since Sunnydale is the home to all things otherworldly, what happens next should surprise no one: the hyenas’ unruly aggression, hostility and hunger for violence are somehow transmuted into all those present, except for Lance. The effects of the transmutation happen slowly, but are all the more clearly corruptive since they affect everyone involved. Goofy, kindhearted Xander gradually becomes a different person. At the Bronze later the same night, he starts walking in an aggressive swagger, displaying an uncharacteristic self-possession and dominant attitude toward others. Before this encounter, Xander once exclaimed, “I laugh in the face of danger – then I hide until it goes away!”25 This Xander becomes an alpha male. He openly checks out women and through the sheer intensity of his gaze, intimidates them. But being an alpha male is shown to be negative by Whedon, since Xander’s alpha behavior is associated with hurtful actions: while at the Bronze, Xander eats Buffy’s meal uninvited; he intimidates and coerces people away from their tables; he even joins the pack of mean kids, exhibiting increasingly spiteful behavior towards everyone. Xander’s personality has been corrupted: while he revels in the new found dominance, he is becoming a meaner and more violent person. Xander’s change is further illustrated in a gym scene. Since it is raining, the kids at Sunnydale High are forced to play dodge ball inside the gymnasium. Xander and his pack are on one side, Buffy and Willow and other kids are on the other. The game turns brutal, with Xander and the pack throwing harder at their targets. Each throw becomes increasingly more powerful and violent, a precise and vicious strike against fellow classmates. Even Willow gets hit and a dominant gleam of satisfaction illuminates Xander’s and his pals’ faces. They revel in their violence and in the beating into submission of the rest of the students. With Buffy being the single remaining player on the opposing side, Xander and his pack turn on the only student left, one on their own side: Lance. They pound him with well aimed hits until Buffy steps in and, through her own intimidating gaze, stops them from further torment. 25

The Witch, Season 1.

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This moment is significant: it becomes clear that Buffy has also played the game well, but she’s played it as a game, with no outward violence for its own sake. At the same time, the pack recognizes Buffy as an equal and does not attack her. They recognize her as a skilled rival, another alpha; they instead turn on poor, weak Lance. But Buffy’s power as an alpha leader comes from her intrinsic goodness and valor in standing up for the weak: by extending her hand to Lance, her act of physically helping him to his feet symbolically represents her status as a nurturing hero (the antithesis of the regular macho hero). Buffy is the buffer between innocents and violence.26 Buffy develops her own style of leadership and does not give in to any “alpha script.” The violence in Xander and the pack keeps on escalating. It is shown as completely erasing any human or humane instincts Xander and the others might possess. They devour Harold, a baby pig and the Sunnydale High mascot. Ripping the unfortunate Harold limb from limb and ingesting raw meat effectively marks Xander as an aggressive animal. Through violence, Xander has devolved. The corruptive power of violence is clearly shown throughout this episode as the individuals, once touched by violence, become less human as time progresses. In addition to causing irresponsible, immoral behavior and the loss of any rational or humanistic impulses, violence turns friend against friend. Xander stops Willow in the hallway of the school and publicly humiliates her: “I’ve decided to drop geometry. Which means I won’t be needing your help anymore. Which means I won’t have to look at your pasty face again.”27 His cruelty is all the more humiliating since it happens in a public place, and Xander follows it up by laughing uncontrollably at Willow’s stricken expression in the wake of his declaration. All of this is made more poignant by the fact that the audience knows Willow has a crush on Xander. The hyena’s violence has also caused Xander to become emotionally abusive, which leads him to damage previously cherished friendships. This aggressive Xander does not go unnoticed by Buffy. While Willow does not rationally think about Xander’s increasingly mean behavior as anything else but a personal attack, Buffy finds it suspicious. She alerts Giles that something is amiss with Xander and is initially told by Giles that Xander is just a sixteen-year-old boy, acting out due to hormones. But, 26

Even though this word play is not something that was originally intended by Whedon, it works well in this context of Buffy as defender. On naming Buffy, see IGN: An Interview with Joss Whedon http://uk.movies.ign.com/articles/425/ 425492p6.html (accessed 19 November 2010). 27 “The Pack,” Season 1.6

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in characteristic fashion and once again functioning as the imparter of knowledge, Buffy insists that there is something more to the change in behavior. She posits that perhaps Xander has become possessed somehow and links the change in behavior to Xander’s visit to the hyena compound. Eventually, Giles gives in and admits that something otherworldly might be at work. Once Willow announces that the pack has eaten Principal Flutie, Giles recognizes Buffy’s wisdom. This scene is important since, once again, it serves to point out that women can be the bearers of knowledge and insight; women can act as instigators of knowledge while men might be oblivious and resistant to women’s voices. In this case, the knowledge and insight is based on Buffy’s empirical observations of Xander’s behavior and on her feelings that something is wrong: thus, the scene shows that knowledge can be based in reason and emotion; Whedon works to demolish the old binary. Buffy, aided by Willow and Giles, flies into action to rescue Xander. Xander becomes even more ruthless. He corners Buffy in a classroom and begins sexually taunting her. He continues by becoming increasingly violent with her and ends up physically restraining her. Not one to take kindly to being manhandled, Buffy fights back and Xander lands on his back with Buffy on top, pinning him down. Xander reacts with a macho, “I’ve been waiting for you to jump my bones.”28 If it was unclear before, it now becomes apparent that Xander is physically aroused. He quickly reverses their positions: he gets on top of Buffy and pins her to the floor, coming close to playing the role of a rapist: Buffy: Xander:

“Get off me! “Is that what you really want? We both know you like your men dangerous.”29

Xander’s rhetoric here is reminiscent of the “no” means “yes” ideology of men who ignore women’s refusals. “No” means “yes” because men supposedly know better than women what women want. Xander, through his increasing dominance and alpha behavior – by now fully corrupted by violence – is completely changed from his former self. Violence has symbolically killed the old Xander. All that is left behind is an aggressive animal. This seemingly hopeless situation is solved through the power of collaboration and teamwork. Giles and Willow research the transmutation problem and come up with some preliminary answers. The Scoobies figure 28 29

Ibid. Ibid.

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out how a reverse transmutation ritual could be enacted and plan to attract the pack back to the zoo to complete the ritual. Buffy’s role in the plan is the most dangerous: she is the bait that Xander and his pack are supposed to follow. Courageously, Buffy tracks the human pack through the town and interrupts their attempt to feed on a helpless family. At night, with the pack on her trail, she guides them to the magic circle where the ritual is about to start. After some unexpected hiccups, the reversal transmutation is complete and Xander becomes human again. The zookeeper, who is revealed as the person to blame for the possession happening in the first place, receives his just reward: he falls into the hyena pit as Buffy tries to rescue Willow away from his clutches. In this way, the desire for violence is shown to lead to a violent end. Violence should be rejected and held as dangerous. Violence, throughout this episode, was shown as highly destructive since it not only corrupted Xander’s sense of self, but it also led to carnage, as illustrated by the death of both the pig and the unfortunate Principal Flutie. Only the positive power of friendship and caring were able to cure the violent curse afflicting Xander and the pack: the Scoobies worked together to research the problem and figure out the prescription necessary to save them. Buffy, the most physically fit Scooby, used violence only in a limited and restrained manner: she incapacitated Xander when he was about to rape her, but did not permanently disable him. She fought to save Willow from the clutches of the wizard-zookeeper, who had captured Willow and held her at knifepoint. While the zookeeper died, Buffy did not directly kill him since he fell into the hyena cage. Throughout, Buffy acted as a hero operating through friendship, not in all out, violent action. In other words, Buffy’s nature as a caring individual and her reluctance to embrace violence for violence’s sake saved the community from the wizard, Xander and the pack; most importantly, it saved Xander from himself.

5. Conclusion Buffy operates as a new kind of hero: a feminist heroine. Even though she uses violence to solve problems, her employment of violence is limited, as she is constantly reluctant to fully embrace it. She rightly views violence as something troubling and inherently dangerous. She uses it only as a limited means to protect others when situations force her to intervene. Furthermore, Buffy’s power is shown as deriving from her strong network of support: her friendship with the Scoobies. She and the Scoobies combine knowledge, discuss problems, and construct solutions in a

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collaborative manner, allowing her to save the world over and over again. This method of solving conflicts, dubbed “epistemic negotiation,”30 defines the feminist heroine figure. The feminist heroine negotiates traditional male and female roles and creates a “third space hybridity”31 that combines the traits of both. Intrinsically, that is what Buffy does: she is not a stereotypically girlie hero mowing down vampires with the power of her hair bows or the sparkle of her lustrous hair, nor is she some sort of She-Hulk who embraces violence for its own sake, at the expense of her femininity. Rather, Buffy defies gendered stereotypes: she is pretty, yet intelligent; slight in stature, yet strong; reluctant to embrace violence, yet proficient in it if needed; in a leader position, yet working within collaborative non-hierarchical networks. She constantly works through the obstacles that hinder the development of her own autonomy, finding ways to conquer the conflicts of the double bind. While she does symbolically represent the pressures a teenage girl experiences when trying to develop her true sense of self, Buffy negotiates these tense crossroads carefully and through continuously asserting herself. Just as she slays vampires, by standing up for herself and by negotiating her private life inclinations with her slayer responsibilities, she continuously slays patriarchy and lives outside the norms imposed on her through Giles. In fact, in future episodes, she comes to change Giles and to create a fully cooperative relationship based in equality with him. Overall, Buffy is representative of the full valorization32 of women: she is a character that finally shows women in a positive light, as fully capable, knowledgeable, and complex beings. She’s the feminist superhero we’ve all been waiting for.

30

Sherrie A. Inness, ed. Action Chicks: New Images of Tough Women in Popular Culture (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2004), 232-233. For more on friendships and heroes, also see Rhonda Wilcox, Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (London: I. B. Tauris, 2005), 75-76. 31 Karin Beeler, Seers, Witches and Psychics on Screen: An Analysis of Women’s Visionary Characters in Recent Television and Film (Jefferson: McFarland, 2008), 17. 32 Roz Kaveney, Reading the Vampire Slayer: The New, Updated, Unofficial Guide to Buffy and Angel (New York: Tauris Parke, 2007), 179.

Jean Baudrillard’s theories of simulation and Jacques Lacan’s mirror stage have provided visionary ways of understanding how humans navigate the world. While authors have examined the existence of simulacra in popular culture (most notably The Matrix), Hemstrom argues that television, especially BtVS, provides the best illustration of how identity is central to the role of mirroring in creating a simulation. Joss Whedon excels at playing with concepts of reality through simulations within his storylines, by taking standard stereotypes and explicitly subverting them to create characters and situations that appear (either obviously or covertly) to be other than what they are. From the existence of vampires to the creation of Dawn, Whedon takes reality and subverts it, inventing characters that become real through the process of mirroring reality. The concept of what it means to be real is perfectly illustrated when Buffy and Faith trade bodies in Season Four. Through an examination of Faith’s intentional simulation of Buffy, we watch how Faith becomes a simulacrum, embodying the deepest aspects of Buffy’s personality as well as, if not better than, Buffy herself. What does it mean to be real? Are all identities mere constructions? Hemstrom explores Whedon’s intriguing and disturbing answers to those questions.

CHAPTER FOUR WHAT’S AT STAKE? THE USE OF SIMULACRA TO (RE)CONSTRUCT IDENTITY IN BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER CASSIE HEMSTROM

Critics have linked Jean Baudrillard’s theories of simulation and Jacques Lacan’s mirror stage largely focusing on the actions and states of Marxist production, as in Baudrillard’s “The Mirror of Production.” The discussion of production is one of many examples, such as Baudrillard’s Disneyland or the holograms in Philip K. Dick’s Simulacra, of the ways that people and systems attempt to simulate reality to such an extent that the difference between reality and simulation disappears. Baudrillard and

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other critics conclude that simulacra systems result in a collapse of the separation between representation and reality which is, according to critic Rex Butler, “literally catastrophic” (35). However, few critics have explored the process of simulation, preferring instead to demonstrate the existence of myriad simulacra. As a result, the role of mirroring in creating a simulation has been overlooked. In order to fully explore the simulation process, I turn to the arena in which it is most clearly demonstrated: television. Increasingly, scholars have turned to television and film to gain new perspectives on philosophy and literary theories. Television actors simulate characters and situations through which they are more readily recognized than through their real persons. Writers and directors also generate a world populated with simulated characters and situations that reflect and enhance real world circumstance. Television provides potential for the examination of simulations in myriad settings. For example, John T. Caldwell discussed simulations in visual media technology. In “Televisuality as a Semiotic Machine: Emerging Paradigms in Low Theory,” Caldwell explains the attempt to create more intelligent and personality-simulating technology in cinema: Industry rhetoric now commonly presupposes an emoting and ‘creating individual’ within the design of its technology [.] … Colorgraphic Systems touts their machine's ability to provide a ‘programmable personality[.]’ … By its design and self-definition, the machine asks to be engaged and embraced by users as a surrogate personality. (40)

Simulations are not therefore limited to Baudrillard’s Disneyland, but are also a pervasive goal of industries, including cinema and even engineering. As Caldwell points out, the technology employed in creating cinematic effects is both hidden in the simulation and programmed to act as a simulation. Cinematic productions are consequently simulations within simulations. Simulations also exist in the minds of viewers who engage in cinematic productions and suspend disbelief of material they know to be, at best, a model of reality. Critic Patricia Mellencamp, in “Seeing is Believing: Baudrillard and Blau,” asserts that Cinema has been placed on the side of the imaginary: an apparatus of power, driven by desire, predicated on vision; love at first sight, ensnaring both actor and audience in the circuitry of paradoxical pleasure; sight as initiatory, desire as motivating, and belief as deathly, imaginary action. This is the stance of contemporary film theory predicated on an enshrined circuitry of looks capturing the spectator and thus demanding textural deconstruction for visual salvation. Seeing (imaginary, illusory

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Critics thus contend that simulation occurs in every aspect of cinema and television, from the acting and writing, to the special effects and the machines and programs that produce them, and ultimately to the willingness of the audience to watch and to believe the representation. Writer/Director Joss Whedon often plays with concepts of reality through simulations within his storylines, by taking standard stereotypes and explicitly subverting them. He then creates characters and situations which appear (either obviously or covertly) to be other than what they are. His exploration of simulations can be seen in his series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS), through robots, alternate worlds, and, as scholar Tracy Little explains, in metaphors that morph into reality, like “high school is hell.” As with many of Whedon’s stories, overt simulations in Buffy allow Whedon to reveal and explore common fears and anxieties through a safe, fantasy venue. Whedon’s longest-running simulation can be found in the vampires at the heart of the series. Vampires, the undead, are defined by their very inability to truly be the humans they so closely resemble. Giles explains, in episode seven of Season One, “A vampire isn't a person at all. It may have the movements, the memories, even the personality of the person that it took over, but it's still a demon at the core, there is no halfway” (BtVS “Angel” 2.1.). Vampires are unsettling simulations of life because they indicate the difference between a simulation and a simulacrum: simulacra become as real as, or more real than, the things they imitate; while simulations, like vampires, are reflections of a reality they can never achieve independently. However, they also reveal the fear that true monsters may look just like humans, and may, in fact, be human, or at least begin as a human. Whedon is particularly interested in interrogating questions about what, and who, is “real.” In BtVS, a clear example of this interest is Dawn’s origin, and the continuing question throughout the fifth season of the show: if Dawn was made, rather than born, and if all of her memories and experiences, as well as others’ memories of her, are manufactured, is she real? Buffy’s decision to save Dawn and sacrifice herself in the Season Five finale, “The Gift,” reveals that in BtVS what is “real” is subjective and is always a negotiation of internal and external forces. A thing or person’s state of “reality” is dependent upon both how real something believes or portrays itself to be, and how real others feel and believe it to be. Giles suggests that Buffy should not protect Dawn at her own risk because “She’s not your sister”; Buffy vehemently disagrees, insisting that

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“No. She's not. She's more than that. She's me. The monks made her out of me. I hold her … and I feel closer to her than … (looks down, sighs) It's not just the memories they built. It's physical. Dawn … is a part of me” (BtVS “The Gift” 1.1). Dawn is real because Buffy has decided she is real as a result of the conjunction of Dawn’s physical existence, their shared memories, and Buffy’s sense of identification with Dawn. Two earlier episodes also explore what it means to be real through the use of a simulacrum; in the fourth season episodes – “This Year’s Girl” and “Who Are You?” – Buffy and a rogue slayer, Faith, trade bodies. While Buffy fights to be recognized as herself and allowed to return to her own body and life, Faith pretends to be Buffy. Through Faith’s intentional simulation of Buffy, she becomes a simulacrum, embodying the deepest aspects of Buffy’s personality as well as, if not better than, Buffy herself. These episodes ask, as a corollary to the question, “What does it mean to be real?”; “Is anyone real?” By showing the progression of Faith into a simulacrum of Buffy, Whedon demonstrates the process of simulation and reveals that simulations are intriguing and disturbing because they expose the constructed nature of identities. In essence, simulacra hold a mirror up to us and show us that we do not know our true selves, and that, in fact, we may not have a “true” self. The simulation of Faith as Buffy lies within the domain described by Jean Baudrillard in Simulations and Simulacra. Baudrillard differentiates between simulation and its end result, a simulacrum. For Baudrillard, a simulation “threatens the difference between the ‘true’ and the ‘false,’ the ‘real’ and the ‘imaginary’” because it reveals, by so closely emulating what we believe to be real, that, in fact, “real” and “reality” may potentially be constructed as well (3). To simulate, in Baudrillard’s terms, is to “feign what one doesn’t have,” as opposed to dissimulating, in which one pretends “not to have what one has” (3). Simulation is dangerous in ways dissimulation is not, then, because simulation is always predicated on absence, whereas dissimulation infers presence. Founded upon absence, simulation raises questions about what actually does exist and hints that the answer is always nothing, except what is constructed. This concept is destabilizing when a simulacrum so closely simulates the real that it, in effect, replaces and disables the real. A simulacrum reveals that the real is not essential and unique, but is rather a system of processes imposed upon matter, which can be duplicated to achieve the same end result. Baudrillard explains that when the simulacrum is completed, there is “no more mirror of being and appearances, of the real, and its concept … the real is produced from miniaturized cells, matrices, and memory banks, models of control – and it can be reproduced an indefinite number of times from

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these. It no longer needs to be rational, because it no longer measures itself against either an ideal or negative instance. It is no longer anything but operational” (2). Jacques Lacan’s discussion of the mirror-stage illuminates crucial components of the simulation process. According to Lacan, “Through that which becomes embodied only by being the trace of a nothingness, and whose support cannot thereafter be impaired, the concept … engenders the thing” (65). Lacan argues that the mirroring of a concept creates the concept; and his contention parallels Baudrillard’s theory, particularly as it depends on a pre-existing absence or nothingness. A mirror is not a simulacrum, as demonstrated by Baudrillard in his interpretation of Borges’ story of the map that covers a whole country, but is inherent in moving an image into a simulacrum. In fact, the mirror must exist at every stage to facilitate the interiority of the simulacrum. Just as the television viewer must participate in the simulation by suspending disbelief, a simulacrum must believe the simulation it is to become is a true simulation. Baudrillard quotes Littré to assert the difference between faking an illness and simulating an illness, “Whoever fakes an illness can simply stay in bed and make everyone believe he is ill. Whoever simulates an illness produces in himself some of the symptoms” (3). A simple mirror, then, is an image that reflects the real, whereas a simulacrum is a simulation that plays at being real. According to Lacan, mirroring is a way of determining identity by allowing an individual to see one’s own enactment of identity and prompting an internalization of that identity. Thus, while a mirror produces an image of reality, a simulacrum internalizes the mirrored identity of the real within itself. Simulations of people represent a significant threat because they can lead to the production of a simulacrum, the end result of a simulation, which is not merely someone pretending to be someone else, but someone who has become so invested in the simulation that they become as real as, if not even more so than, the person they simulate. The threat lies in the breaking down of barriers between self and other, reality and simulation, essential beings and beings created by processes. In the face of these collapsing barriers, the stability of being is questioned by those involved in the simulation, and by those who observe it. Whedon’s story reveals the fear that perhaps none of us is unique, and that we may not, in fact, have an essential character, but rather that individuals are made up of thought and action processes generated by the forces imposed upon our bodies. While Faith has always served as a foil to Buffy, a reminder of who Buffy may have been without the strong support system of her mother, her

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friends, and her watcher,1 through the use of simulation to create a simulacrum, these episodes highlight the connected representations of these two women to demonstrate how individuals are shaped by their experiences, by the expectations others have of them, and by the responses they garner from society, and to rehearse and reveal fears about the inherent instability of the self. Baudrillard claims that an image or representation passes through four stages of simulation to become a simulacrum, the end product of the act of simulating. Thus, whereas the vampires can simulate humanity, by reflecting a human image when it suits them, they never believe that they are human, and therefore their act of simulation does not end in the successful creation of a simulacrum. We can see each of these four stages clearly demonstrated in Faith’s transformation into a Buffy-simulacrum. According to Baudrillard, “Such would be the successive phases of the image: it is the reflection of a profound reality; it masks and denatures a profound reality; it masks the absence of a profound reality; it has no relation to any reality whatsoever: it is its own perfect simulacrum” (6). Faith’s simulation of Buffy encompasses each of the four stages, and her experience of each stage clearly demonstrates the role of mirroring in the production of a simulation. By examining each step in Faith’s simulation, we will be able to understand how a simulacrum is produced and how crucial the role of mirroring is in such an endeavor. Faith’s simulation begins as a mirror of a simple image, the most basic simulation possible. According to Baudrillard, this phase “is the reflection of a profound [or basic] reality” (6). For Faith, this phase of the simulation begins with the transfer of personalities and bodies, during which Faith simply wears Buffy’s body, but makes no effort to emulate Buffy’s personality, trusting in the appearance for her protection against discovery. During this phase, Faith turns in response when Buffy’s mother, Joyce, says Faith’s name, and makes a crude joke. She is a purely physical reflection of Buffy at this point. The mirror functions in multiple ways in this stage of Faith’s simulation. Faith embodies the mirror, as she is the physical mirror image of Buffy, and Joyce, Buffy’s mother, enacts a traditional representation of the identity-forming mirror through the face of the mother.

1

This connection is made clear in the episode, “The Wish,” (3.9) in which Cordelia’s wish that Buffy had never come to Sunnydale results in an alternate universe in which Buffy, who does not know Giles and has never been friends with Xander or Willow, is a hardened, ruthless slayer, who acts and dresses much like Faith.

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The second phase of simulation is the perversion of the real. According to Baudrillard, during this stage, the simulation “masks and denatures a profound [or basic] reality” (6). Faith realizes that simply looking like Buffy will not conceal the exchange. She begins to emulate, poorly, her perceptions of Buffy’s mannerisms and likely responses. This emulation leads directly into Faith’s perversion of Buffy; Faith perverts both Buffy’s physical appearance and the most fundamental aspect of Buffy’s identity, her ethical conviction. Faith examines Buffy’s face in a mirror and mockingly coins a phrase that she believes represents Buffy’s credo: “You can’t do that: it’s wrong” (“Who Are You” 1.2). She repeats various mocking versions of this credo to the mirror, and thus to herself. Through her identification of this credo, Faith demonstrates that she understands Buffy as well as Buffy herself does, if not better. This understanding, as Faith’s perversion of the credo shows, is a disassociated understanding. Faith knows Buffy, but does not empathize or identify with her. This mocking repetition is an act of distancing herself from Buffy and from her understanding of Buffy, which signals that the simulacrum is not complete. Faith knows she looks like Buffy, and she pretends (poorly) to be Buffy, but she still believes herself to be Faith and is guided by her own personality. Gazing into the mirror and deriding Buffy allows her to reinforce her separation from the ethical conviction that defines Buffy. The mirror that reflects the perversion of both Buffy’s physical self and her ethics is an actual mirror in this phase. Faith is compelled to mock Buffy in the mirror and performing the action into a mirror allows Faith to see the perversion that she creates. However, it also demonstrates for her the perverse nature of her own character and forces her to begin to internalize Buffy’s identity as her own. According to Lacan, the action of looking into a mirror allows an individual to recognize the movements made in the mirror and the effect of those movements in the reflected environment. Mirroring therefore creates the connection of oneself and ones’ physical body that Lacan refers to as “identification … namely, the transformation that takes place in the subject when he assumes an image” (1). The function of this mirroring is to “establish a relation between the organism and its reality” (4). Thus, by seeing herself as Buffy in the mirror, even as she mocks Buffy, Faith actually begins to associate her experience of being with the image of Buffy, which leads her into phase three of the simulation. It is at this second stage of simulation that the vampire simulation of humanity sticks – vampires reflect the real when they wear human faces, and they mask and pervert reality when they transition to “vamp face,” revealing themselves as demonic. This revelation

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is a perverse image as it shows the demon hiding in human guise. However, vampires can go no further in their simulation because they will eventually revert to a human face in order to lure human victims, or to operate in human company, only to again repeat the aborted process when they next “vamp out.” Additionally, vampires cannot see themselves in a mirror, so they have no opportunity to associate their experience of being, as Faith did, with the image of that which they simulate. Faith, on the other hand, through the association of herself with the physical image of Buffy’s body, moves on to the next stage of simulation. The third phase of simulation “masks the absence of a profound [or basic] reality” (Baudrillard 6). It is in this stage that the borders between self and other truly begin to collapse, and the simulation “plays at being an appearance,” in the Derridian sense, of “play,” and therefore begins to enact being what it reflects, rather than just carrying the image (6). For Faith, this stage is both the longest phase and the phase that generates the most transformation. First, Faith is obligated, in order to conceal her deception from Buffy’s friends, to slay a vampire and protect a teenage girl. This is the first time that Faith acted on her own to protect someone by slaying a vampire. Her actions begin to reveal the “absence” that Faith is masking throughout her entire simulation of Buffy; the absence of Buffy’s character in Buffy’s body, and, increasingly, the absence of Faith as she was before she began her simulation. The slaying of the vampire itself is not a dramatic event for Faith, but the sincere gratitude she receives from the girl whose life she has saved unsettles her and reveals a disruption in Faith’s personality (“Who Are You?” 2.5). Faith is startled and unsettled by the evidence of gratitude from the girl and is uncertain of how to respond. The next scene compounds her turmoil and further reveals the absence that Faith seeks to mask through her simulation of Buffy. Faith visits Buffy’s boyfriend, Riley, and invites him to engage in sexual fantasies that she thinks Buffy would not offer. Riley refuses, preferring instead to treat Faith with the same affection that he always shows to Buffy. Faith at first reacts angrily and then succumbs to his affection. Her discomfort at being treated kindly by Riley and by the girl she saved shows that she lacks the emotional connections and support that bolsters Buffy. According to the writers of the show, Faith was originally conceptualized as a reflection of what Buffy could have become without her support system of friends and family (BtVS “Special Features: Season 3 Overview”). As Joyce says, Faith was driven to commit hateful, criminal acts not because she enjoyed them, but because “She’s horribly unhappy” (“Who Are You?” 1.1). Acting as Buffy, simulating what she thinks Buffy would do, Faith is brought face

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to face with this lack and is forced both to understand and internalize the emotional connection that drives Buffy’s ethical convictions, as well as to understand the lack of that connection that she had herself previously experienced. The mirror in this third phase is encapsulated in other people and their actions towards Faith. She experiences the affection and positive emotions that people show to Buffy, learns what she lacks, and understands what drives Buffy. The acknowledgement of the lack she suffers drives her to understand, appreciate and, finally, to internalize the emotional connection and ethical conviction that motivate Buffy. It is this internalization that moves Faith into the fourth and final phase of simulation. In the fourth phase, the act of simulating produces a perfect simulacrum, which, as Baudrillard says, “has no relation to any reality whatsoever; it is its own pure simulacrum” (6). Faith’s transition into a pure simulacrum occurs as she is waiting with a ticket at an airport and sees a news report about a vampire attack at a local church. At this point she could easily escape and live the rest of her life in Buffy’s body completely free. This is certainly the option that the Faith from the beginning of the episode would have chosen. Now, however, she has internalized Buffy’s humanity. She abandons her clean get-away and goes to the church. She meets Riley at the church and, to his protest that she should not go in, responds, “I’m Buffy. I have to do this” (“Who Are You?” 4.3). This simple declaration demonstrates the success of the simulation, and Faith’s internalization of Buffy’s identity. Faith no longer simply reflects or simulates Buffy, she is Buffy. Accordingly, since Buffy would protect the people in the church by fighting the vampires, Faith will protect the people as well, for, since Buffy has been abducted by the Watcher’s Council, who believe her to be Faith, Faith must do what Buffy would do. The culmination of Faith’s simulation removes her entirely not only from her simple representation of Buffy, but also from her own reality. She is no longer Faith, nor is she an image of Buffy. She has identified completely with the fundamental aspects of Buffy’s character, and, through her simulation, has rebuilt her own identity around them. She is pure simulacrum. As she confronts the vampires that hold the innocent church-goers captive, Faith demonstrates beyond question the success of the simulation, as she tells the vampire that she won’t let him kill the captives, “Because it's wrong” (“Who Are You?” 4.4). Buffy’s credo, which Faith mocked throughout the episode, has now become her own. Mirroring has taught her that hurting others and failing to care about them was wrong. She is no

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longer the “horribly unhappy” Faith, but nor is she the Buffy who goes about her life, blithely slaying vampires and protecting innocents. She is more Buffy than Buffy, as she understands exactly what it is that drives Buffy, rather than just acting in accordance with that drive. When the vampire says, horrified, “You’re the slayer,” she replies, truthfully, “the one and only” (4.4). The mirror plays a role in this stage as well by demonstrating to Faith the absoluteness of her simulation. As the vampire dissolves into dust, Faith is left gazing at Buffy inside her own body. Seeing this mirror image, Buffy’s personality in Faith’s body, demonstrates the result of her own transformation to Faith. Having lost her own identity, and rebuilt herself around Buffy’s reality, Faith violently rejects her former self. Since she has incorporated Buffy’s ethical convictions into herself, Faith now is able to recognize her former unhappiness and lack of ethical code. This dual insight makes the reality of her former self intolerable. She attacks her own body, and Buffy only incidentally, screaming, “You’re nothing! You’re disgusting! Murderous bitch! You’re nothing! You’re disgusting” (4.6). Faith is unable to unite her new perspective with her old existence. She is also confronted with the essential instability of her own reality, and these realizations lead to “the catastrophic effect of the loss of that distance proper to representation” (Butler 35). Buffy, who has escaped from the Watcher’s Council and obtained an Orb from Giles that will allow her to reverse the transformation, switches their bodies back and ends the mirror image which Faith is attacking. But as Baudrillard asserts, in the fourth phase, the representation is “no longer of the order of appearances, but of simulation” (6). Though she no longer looks like Buffy, Faith is still a simulacrum of Buffy’s innermost convictions and thus must find a way to reconcile the realities of her life with the identity she has created for herself through her simulation. Faith’s creation of a successful simulacrum has simultaneously demonstrated the process creating it, as outlined by Baudrillard, and has shown the importance of mirroring in the process. By considering this demonstration, we can see how the use of mirroring is the catalyst for the simulation to proceed from one phase into the next. The ability to be observed as “real” by others, to see oneself as the “real,” and to see oneself as loved by others for being “real,” are the components that allow a simulation to progress from each phase into the next. Mirroring is thus a necessary component in every phase of the creation of a simulation. And finally, it is the ability of the simulacrum in the fourth phase to see the difference between itself as simulacrum and itself as “real” that transforms the simulacrum into the “hyperreal,” the real that is more real than that

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which it simulates and which creates the potentially catastrophic loss of distance between real and representation.

Works Cited Baudrillard, Jean. The Mirror of Production. Trans. Mark Poster. New York: Telos P, 1975. Print. —. Simulation and Simulacra. Trans. Sheila Faria Glaser. Ann Arbor, Michigan: The U of Michigan P, 2004. Print. Butler, Rex. “Jean Baudrillard.” Key Contemporary Social Theorists. Eds. Anthony Elliot, and Larry Ray. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. Print. Caldwell, John T. “Televisuality as a Semiotic Machine: Emerging Paradigms in Low Theory.” Cinema Journal 32.4 (1993): 24-48. Print. Lacan, Jacques. Ecrits: A Selection. Trans. Alan Sheridan. New York: W.W. Norton, 1977. Print. Little, Tracy. “High School is Hell.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale. Ed. James B. South. Chicago: Open Court, 2003. 282-293. Print. Mellencamp, Patricia. “Seeing Is Believing: Baudrillard and Blau.” Theatre Journal 37.2 (1985): 141-154. Print. Rubenstein, Diane. “The Mirror of Reproduction: Baudrillard and Reagan's America.” Political Theory 17.4 (1989): 582-606. Print. Stuart Boulter, Jonathan. “Partial Glimpses of the Infinite: Borges and the Simulacrum.” Hispanic Review 69 (Summer 2001): 355-377. Print. Whedon, Joss. “Angel.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. 14 April 1997. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD. —. “Empty Places.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. 29 April 2003. Fox, Los Angeles, 2004. DVD. —. “Special Features: Season 3 Overview.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD. —. “Special Features: Season 7 Overview – Buffy: Full Circle.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Seventh Season. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD. —. “This Year’s Girl.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Fourth Season. 22 February 2000. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD. —. “The Wish.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. 18 December 1998. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD. —. “Who Are You?” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Fourth Season. 29 February 2000. Fox, Los Angeles, 2003. DVD.

PART II: “COME ON, WE FIGHT MONSTERS, THIS IS WHAT WE DO. THEY SHOW UP, THEY SCARE US, I BEAT THEM UP, AND THEY GO AWAY.” RE-EXAMINING THE MEANINGS OF MONSTROUS

In the fourth season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Spike complains, “This is the crack team that foils my every plan? I am deeply shamed.” From The Master to the Mayor, from Adam to the First Evil, Buffy faced many “Big Bads’’ over seven seasons, all convinced they could defeat the Slayer, and conquer or destroy the world. But what if there was some way to statistically figure out the best way to beat the Slayer or at least figure out if it is smarts or brawn that wins the day? With a thoroughly innovative and original psychological analysis of the use of violence and intelligence of the villains in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Heather Porter may just have found a way.

CHAPTER FIVE BRAIN VS. BRAWN: AN EXAMINATION OF THE USE OF INTELLIGENCE AND VIOLENCE BY THE VILLAINS IN BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER HEATHER M. PORTER

Television is often criticized for its sexual and violent content; in fact, these are the two most researched areas of television content. The works of Joss Whedon, including his show Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Buffy), are not immune to such criticism. The Parents Television Council (PTC) often included Buffy in its top ten list of worst shows on television, citing sexual and violent content as the reason that the show should be avoided. Depictions of violence in a series called Buffy the Vampire Slayer are not surprising. A television show that focuses on a teenage girl fighting vampires and the forces of darkness in order to save the world would inevitably contain violence. This inevitability of violence is exemplified by a moment in the pilot episode, as Buffy cautions a vampire she is about to fight about this type of content, “Now, this is not gonna be pretty. We're talking violence, strong language, adult content…” (“Welcome to the Hellmouth” 1.1). The show’s main characters include Buffy Summers;

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Willow Rosenberg, computer geek and witch; Rupert Giles, Buffy’s watcher and mentor; and Xander Harris, hapless sidekick. This team spends a great deal of time strategizing ways to defeat these forces of evil and thereby keeping the world safe. The majority of these plans take the form of violence, as this is the form of attack many of Buffy’s enemies use. In the Season Two episode “Killed by Death” (2.18), our hero demonstrates this type of planning while trying to stop a demon from killing sick children in a hospital. When Xander asks her how she plans to defeat this demon, Buffy responds, “I thought I might try violence”. Over seven seasons, Buffy faced many villains, from The Master to The Mayor to Adam to The First Evil. These villains believed themselves to hold the plan to defeat Buffy and either conquer or destroy the world. Some villains devised plans based on strategy. Others relied on brute force. In the Season Six episode “Seeing Red” (6.19), while Buffy is fighting Warren Mears, the leader of The Trio, he taunted, “You know who I am Slayer? … I’m the guy that beat you. And, it’s not the muscles, baby. It’s the brains.” Warren is eventually defeated, but he brought up an interesting concept regarding the methods that the villains incorporated into their plans. This paper seeks to examine this muscles verse mental approach to defeating The Slayer by implementing a quantitative approach and comparing the use of violence and intelligence by the villains in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Buffy faces a lot of bad guys, monsters, demons, and vampires in the seven seasons that the series was on the air. Each season of Buffy had one main villain, often referred to as the “Big Bad,” who in attempt to either end or rule the world, becomes the nemesis for Buffy for that season. For the purpose of this examination, these Big Bads will be defined as the villains Buffy faces and eventually defeats each of the seven televised seasons: The Master (Season One), Angelus (Season Two), The Mayor (Season Three), Adam (Season Four), Glory (Season Five), and The First Evil (Season Seven). Season Six has potentially two Big Bads: The Triomade up of Warren Mears, Jonathan Levinson, and Andrew Wells - whom Buffy faces through the entire season, and Dark Willow, who rises at the end of the season after the death of her lover, Tara McClay, at the hands of Warren’s stray bullet. Dark Willow attempts to destroy the world to end its suffering and her own. So in lieu of debating the rationale for choosing one over the other, both will be examined. Many scholars have examined the relationships and themes pertaining to the villains in Buffy. These villains are often used in juxtaposition to our hero. In his book Televised Morality, while discussing the nature of good and evil, Gregory Stevenson writes:

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Chapter Five Nevertheless, Buffy’s worldview is absolute in its conception of good and evil and in the sense that both are categories that exist unequivocally. That true evil and true goodness exist is never doubted. Villains like The Master, the Judge, Adam and the Mayor are absolutely evil. The Mayor is distinctly called “a Black Hat” (3.15). Giles describes the first as “Absolute Evil” (3.10) … Willow … describes it as “undiluted evil” so pure she could taste it. (73)

The relationship between the Big Bads and their threat to the greater good is used to examine Buffy’s moral compass. She is good in her desire to save the world, and these villains are bad in their desire to destroy it. The Mayor is evil, but his goal to turn into a demon is not as evil compared to The First’s attempted destruction of the Slayer line and then the world. No matter the degree of evil, it is the destructive intentions of the villains that justify Buffy’s use of violence against them. In “Bodies and Narrative in Crisis” Erickson and Lemberg direct their attention to the changing environment of the sixth and seventh seasons of the series after the move to UPN. They notice a shift in the clarity of good and evil, especially how the distinction between right and wrong blurred and became more ambiguous. They note that the Big Bad of Season Six could have easily been Willow instead of The Trio. Likewise, Buffy could have been the Big Bad of Season Seven as easily as The First (22). This shift from good to evil and back to good in one person flows well into the later season arch of the pain of growing up and the uncertainty of becoming an adult. As Buffy’s life becomes unclear, so do the villains. She faces what used to be clearly “black hats” and “white hats” to find that they are now all shades of gray. In the chapter “She Saved the World a Lot” in Reading the Vampire Slayer, Roz Kaveney examines the emotional traumas of each season, and how they are reflected in the Big Bads of the corresponding season. In Season Two, Angelus is used to develop the main emotional theme: the conflict between love and duty. Season Four focuses on estrangement and alienation while Buffy faces Adam, a human/demon cyborg who did not fit in anywhere. Buffy must find her place in this world and find a way to connect with her friends to defeat him. Throughout Season Six, when the gang struggles to enter adulthood and accept the responsibilities of growing up, they face off with The Trio, a group of “man-boys” relishing their childhood desires. It is these reflections in life that make the villains of Buffy feel more real and all the more dangerous. These are just a few examples of previous examinations of the villains of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Some studies have examined the themes represented by these villains and their relationship to Buffy. Others have

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closely examined particular villains, especially Dark Willow. However, few have examined the methods the villains used in their attempts to foil Buffy. This current study seeks to examine these methods and the uses of intelligence and violence by each Big Bad and, by comparing them, discover which villain is the most intelligent and which villain is the most violent.

Methodology To study both the incidents of intelligences and the incidents of violence used by the villains in Buffy, two sets of study parameters were used.

Intelligence There are many different ways to measure intelligence. Intelligence is often measured through the administration of IQ tests such as the Standford-Binet IQ test. These tests are not useful in studying a character depicted on a television series, as the characters on the series can only be observed. To study a television character, a method of determining intelligence through observation or a set of behaviors must be used. Sternberg’s theory of Successful Intelligence, as outlined in his book Successful Intelligence: How Practical and Creative Intelligence Determine Success and Life, allows for such observation of intelligence through actions and examples of observable behavior. Sternberg states that there are three types of intelligence: Analytical, Practical, and Creative. The proper and balanced use of these three types of intelligence is what he calls “Successful Intelligence” (128). Analytical intelligence “involves conscious direction of our mental process to find a thoughtful solution to a problem” (Sternberg 155). This is the type of intelligence that is usually referred to as “book smarts.” It is the intelligence that IQ tests are designed to measure. This type of intelligence is typically used in an academic setting and determines how well a person can recall and use learned information. Problem solving is a large part of analytical intelligence. Analytical intelligence would be observed as a person stating knowledge that they gained from an academic setting or creating and executing a plan. For example, in the Buffy episode “Enemies,” The Mayor has a plan to acquire the books of accession and explains the plan to Faith: “Now, first load up on calcium. Then, find the demon. Kill the heck out of him and bring the books to me” (3.17). This is an observable example of a character displaying analytical intelligence.

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Practical intelligence is the ability to work well and effectively in social interactions and real-world situations. It is sometimes referred to as social intelligence. Practical intelligence includes the ability to effectively communicate in and understand non-verbal cues. It is street smarts. This intelligence gives a person the ability to access and navigate real-world problems (Sternberg, 144). Practical intelligence would be observed in a person knowing how to fight or understand the feelings of someone around them. For example, in the episode “Villains,” while Dark Willow tortures Warren she notices his body language when she confronts him on Tara’s death and she says, “She wasn’t your first…Tara, she wasn’t the first girl you killed” (2.20). Then using a truth spell, Dark Willow confirms her observation and discovers Warren has previously killed his ex-girlfriend Trina. Creative intelligence is the bridge between practical and analytical intelligence. This is the ability to use the knowledge gained from practical and analytical intelligence and fashion an imaginative solution to a situation. It includes seeing things that others do not, generating ideas that are rejected by the public at large, and transferring knowledge into action. Creative intelligence is exemplified by characters’ displaying out-of-thebox thinking. For example, in the episode “Innocence,” Angelus tells Willow that he has a message for Buffy. When Buffy arrives and asks what the message is, he tells her, “Well, it’s not really the kind of message you ‘tell’. It sort of involves finding the bodies of all your friends” (2.14). Sternberg defines successful intelligence as the combination of these three types of intelligence. He states: Successful intelligence is most effective when it balances all three of its analytical, creative and practical aspects. It is more important to know when and how to use these aspects of successful intelligence then just to have them. Successfully intelligent people don’t just have abilities, they reflect on when and how to use these abilities effectively. (127)

Successful intelligence is displayed when someone uses all three types of intelligence, together effectively. For example, in the episode “Prophesy Girl,” The Master’s plan to kill The Slayer and escape his prison comes to fruition. Buffy goes to The Master’s lair, knowing that there is a prophesy stating that she will face The Master and die. When she confronts The Master, he tells her, “You tried. It was noble of you. You heard the prophecy that I was about to break free and you came to stop me. But prophesies are tricky creatures. They don’t tell you everything. You’re the one who sets me free! If you hadn’t come, I couldn’t go” (1.12). This example depicts The Master’s displaying analytical intelligence in his

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knowledge of an understanding of the prophesy, practical intelligence in his understanding of Buffy’s character and how she will react to the news that he will be freed, and creative intelligence in using the prophesy to trick The Slayer. The combination of all of the elements shows The Master using successful intelligence. Using these definitions of intelligence, an occurrence which displays any of the four types of intelligence within the show was coded as an incident of intelligence. A scene can have numerous incidents of intelligence either displayed by the same character or by multiple characters in the same scene.

Violence Numerous studies have examined violent content in television programs and its effects on the viewers, especially children. In 2006, the Parent Television Council (PTC) released their report, Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing: A Content Analysis of Children’s Television. This study examined incidents of violence, verbal aggression, offensive language, problematic behaviors and attitudes, sexual content, offensive /excretory content (mostly bodily functions), and social institutions. In their study, the PTC breaks down violence into subcategories to better define television violence in cartoons. These categories include: fantasy violence, physical violence, martial arts, use of weapons, implied violence, fire, violence involving objects (such as bombs) and graphic depictions of violence. The report showed what the PTC called “staggering results” with 3488 instances of violence in 443.5 hours of children’s cartoons, which was an average of 7.86 incidents her hour (1). The PTC are strong advocates against violence on television and Buffy the Vampire Slayer has frequently come under fire from them for its violent content. A set of parameters was created to examine the violent content in Buffy, using the PTC study as a foundation for the methodology. These parameters were expanded not only to count the mere incidents but also to consider the incident’s contextual characteristics. An incident of violence occurs when a violent act is either shown or implied during an uninterrupted scene of programming. If an incident occurs in a scene and the scene cuts to a commercial or another scene and then returns to the same scene, this is counted as a separate incident, as a causal viewer may see only one of these scenes and not the other. Each incident was coded and included the recording of the characters involved; their gender and category (human, demon, and vampire); the aggressor of the incident; verbal aggression; threats; weapons, including type; deaths (including who

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died, who killed them, and the category of each participant), as well as the number of kicks, punches and threats by each character. For example, in the Season Two episode “Innocence” (2.14), Angel loses his soul and turns back into Angelus. His first action as Angelus is to kill a prostitute in the alley. When analyzed for its violent content, this one incident is broken down into the following: One incident of violence involving the characters Angelus and the prostitute. Angelus is the aggressor, a male categorized as a vampire. The scene depicted on screen is an example of fantasy violence because Angelus’ face is in his vampiric form. There are no threats, punches, kicks or weapons. One death occurs. Angelus (male/vampire) kills the prostitute (female/human) by biting her. So, in this study, Angelus would have: 1 incident of violence, 1 incidence as aggressor, 0 punches and kicks, 0 threats and 1 kill. All incidents were coded and the results were tallied. Since each villain appeared in a different number of episodes, for the purpose of comparison, the total number of incidents of violence or intelligence that each villain displayed was divided by the number of episodes that the villain appeared in.

Results Each of the tables below shows the total intelligence and violence for each villain alongside the average incidents for each per episode. The highest mean in each category is starred and the second highest is in italics. Scenes that depicted our villains in flashbacks or alternate universes were not included in these results as they do not reflect their attempt to defeat The Slayer.

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Table 1 The Master – 13 episodes total (“Welcome to the Hellmouth” (1.1) – “Prophecy Girl” (1.13)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

10

0.77

Incidents

19

1.58

Practical

8

0.62

Aggressor

16

1.33

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

4

0.33

Successful

4

0.31

Threats

10

0.83

Total

22

1.69

Kills

3

0.25

The Master is a vampire so old that he is devolving into having bat-like features. The Master ranks the lowest among all villains in intelligence and in violence. In a previous attempt to open the Hellmouth, he got himself trapped in an underground church unable to break through a mystical barrier. The plan that he tries to carry out, after being resurrected by his followers, involves using the prophecies that foretell of his killing The Slayer and escaping his prison, thereby opening the Hellmouth. Buffy thwarts his plan by not allowing her death to stop her from killing him. The fact that The Master is trapped away from the action in a sunken church for the majority of his episodes is the most likely result of his low scores all around. This also explains why, of his three kills, all but one were vampires in his own court. Table 2 Angelus – 9 episodes total (“Innocence” (2.14) – “Becoming Part 2” (2.22)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

7

0.63

Incidents

28

2.89

Practical

12

1.09

Aggressor

20

2.22

Creative

3

0.27

Punches & Kicks

32

3.56

Successful

7

0.64

Threats

16

1.78

Total

29

2.64

Kills

4

0.44

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Angelus is a two hundred and forty-one year old vampire, cursed by gypsies who restored his soul to leave him in torment for his actions. Angel, as he is called when ensouled, is an ally to Buffy, and the two fall in love. After one night together in Season Two, Angel loses his soul and reverts to Angelus. Angelus spends his time devising ways to hurt Buffy and to fight her without actually killing her. In the episode “Lie to Me,” Angel gives Buffy a defining example of the evil acts he committed as Angelus: “I did a lot of unconscionable things when I became a vampire. Drusilla was the worst[.] … She was pure, and sweet and chaste[.] … First I drove her insane. Killed everyone she loved, visited every mental torture on her I could devise. She eventually fled to a convent, and the day she took her holy orders, I turned her into a demon” (2.7). Angelus is more about the torture than the kill, and this is reflected in his uses of both intelligence and violence. Angelus uses a lot more violence than most of the villains. He is second in violent incidents, incidents as aggressor, punches and kicks. Angelus is involved in twenty-eight incidents of violence, but only goes for the kill four times. Knowing how to emotionally hurt someone is practical intelligence, and this is the intelligence that Angelus uses most. It should be noted that Angelus is one of only two villains given credit for using creative intelligence. This is not because the other villains failed to use creative intelligence; instead their use of creative intelligence is used in collaboration with practical and analytical intelligence and thus coded as a demonstration of successful intelligence. Table 3 Mayor Richard Wilkins – 18 episodes total (“Homecoming” (3.5) – “Graduation Day Part 2” (3.22)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

8

0.44

Incidents

10

0.56

Practical

25

1.38

Aggressor

4

0.22

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

0

0

Successful

13

0.72

Threats

6

0.33

Total

46

2.56

Kills

3

0.17

Mayor Richard Wilkins III, as mayor of Sunnydale for over a hundred years, built the town as a place for demons to feed in hopes of ascending into pure demon form. The Mayor is considerably less violent than the

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other Big Bads of the series. This may be a direct result of his intentions. For all intents and purposes, Mayor Wilkins is a pretty good guy. He is afraid of germs and he cares about the youth in his town. In his speech to the vampires on the night of his ascension, he tells them to help him feed on students, so he can maintain his new form but to make sure to watch their language (”Graduation Day Part 2” 3.22). The Mayor’s flaw and defining evil characteristic is his desire to become a full-fledged demon, which will result in the death of everyone around him. This result is a byproduct of the process of becoming a pure demon rather than his intent. Buffy comments, when she finds out that The Mayor is evil, that she had not really gotten that vibe from him (“Consequences” 3.15). Even in comparison to The Master, the three kills that the Mayor commits all happen once he ascends and is transformed into a giant demon snake. Table 4 Adam – 9 episodes total (“The I in Team” (4.13) – “Primeval” (4.21)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

16

1.78

Incidents

10

2.22

Practical

10

1.11

Aggressor

15

1.67

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

19

2.11

Successful

10

1.11

Threats

7

0.78

Total

36

4

Kills

7

0.78

Adam is the Frankenstein-like creation of Maggie Walsh, a scientist and the commander of an underground government agency, called The Initiative, that collects and studies demons. Adam is part robot, part human and parts of many demons. He was created to be the ultimate soldier. Adam marks an increase in the level of intelligence for the Big Bads in the series, especially in his uses of analytical and successful intelligence. This is not surprising for a creature built with vast amounts of knowledge and planning skills to be the ultimate soldier. Adam also has the second highest number of kills among the villains and is involved in numerous violent incidents in which he is the aggressor 75% of the time.

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Table 5 Glory – 18 episodes total (“No Place Like Home” (5.5) – “The Gift” (5.22)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

9

0.50

Incidents

40

2.22

Practical

23

1.28

Aggressor

32

1.18

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

49

2.72

Successful

10

0.56

Threats

60

3.33

Total

42

2.33

Kills

7+

0.39+

Glory is a god from an alternate dimension, cast out of her kingdom, trying to find a key to open a portal to get home. Similar to The Mayor, Glory is evil because of her egoistic intentions. She is selfish and does not care that using the Key, made manifest as the teenage girl Dawn Summers, will destroy it and tear both worlds apart at their seams in the process. The only thing that matters to Glory is returning home. It should be noted that the number of kills that can be attributed to Glory is difficult to determine. Off screen, it is implied that she kills an entire army of medieval soldiers, but their number could not be counted. Thus, her kill average is much lower than it should be. Considering her character, it is not surprising that Glory ranks higher in violence than she does in intelligence. She is mentally unstable and keeps the little sanity she has by ripping it out of the minds of others. She kills anyone who gets in her way. As a god, she has no respect of the lives of those below her. On average, she is involved in the same number of violent incidents as Adam. Table 6 The Trio– 16 episodes total ( “Flooded” (6.4) – “Two to Go” (6.21)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

37

2.37

Incidents

33

2.06

Practical

24

1.50

Aggressor

21

1.31

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

47

2.94

Successful

20

1.25

Threats

27

1.625

Total

81

5.06

Kills

3

0.19

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The Trio is made up of three geeks (Warren, Andrew, and Jonathan) who team up with the intention of taking over Sunnydale. This is the first time that Buffy and her team faced real human enemies; in previous episodes, Buffy may have faced what appeared to be humans but turned out to be something else, such as the robots Ted and April or The Mayor who for most of Season Three is believed to be human. Warren is the leader of this group and, by far, more aggressive than Andrew and Jonathan. The Trio’s numbers above include all three members combined. It should be noted that Warren is the aggressor most of the time. He commits most of the violence done by The Trio (38 out of 47 punches and kicks) and all of the kills. The violence committed by Andrew and Jonathan is almost always committed against each other. Also, of the 24 threats, Warren makes 20 of them. Andrew and Jonathan are responsible for the majority of the incidents of intelligence for The Trio: 29 incidents of Analytical (78%), 16 incidents of Practical (66%), and 14 incidents of Successful (70%). Table 7 Dark Willow – 3 episodes total (“Villains” (6.19) – “Grave” (6.22)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

11

3.67*

Incidents

35

11.67*

Practical

14

4.67*

Aggressor

35

11.67*

Creative

4

1.33*

Punches & Kicks

58

19.33*

Successful

13

4.33*

Threats

52

17.33*

Total

42

14*

Kills

3

1*

Dark Willow manifests from Scobbie gang member Willow in her grief over the death of her lover, Tara, from Warren’s stray bullet. Willow tries unsuccessfully to resurrect Tara and then sets off on a course of revenge against those she sees as responsible. Her ultimate goal becomes to destroy the world in an attempt to end everyone’s suffering, especially her own. Dark Willow is only in three episodes and yet rakes in large numbers in all categories. She never averages less than one incident per episode in any intelligence or violence category and has double digit averages in all but one category of violence. Her use of intelligence is in no way surprising because she is Willow, one of the most intelligent characters on the series. Turning dark did not change who Willow is or what she knows. Dark Willow was involved in more total incidents of violence than the Mayor

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and Adam combined. It should also be noted that she is the aggressor in every incident she is involved in. Table 8 The First – 22 episodes total (“Amends” (3.10), “Lessons” (7.1) – “Chosen” (7.22)) Total Mean Total Mean Intelligence Violence Analytical

6

0.27

Incidents

50

2.27

Practical

42

1.90

Aggressor

16/14

0.72/0.64

Creative

0

0

Punches & Kicks

0/62

0/2.82

Successful

14

0.64

Threats

56/3

2.55/0.14

Total

62

2.82

Kills

0/5

0/0.23

The First Evil is a manifestation of original evil. In the episode “Amends,” The First tells Buffy, "I'm not a demon, little girl. I am something that you can't even conceive. The First Evil. Beyond sin, beyond death. I am the thing the darkness fears.” (3.10). The First is not corporeal, which leads to Buffy, in the episode “Chosen” (7.22) to refer to The First as “The Taunter.” Though The First cannot touch anything, uses the Bringers as its instrument. As shown in the interrogation of a Bringer, the Bringers work for The First as one collective mind (“Touched” 7.20). Thus, all of the acts of violence committed by the Bringers were counted as acts committed by The First. However, the ubervamps and Caleb act on their own, so their violent acts were not counted. Even with the inclusion of the Bringers’ violent acts, The First’s violence is mainly in the form of threats. These threats incorporate a lot of practical intelligence, which is The First’s main form of attack. These overall results show that Dark Willow has the highest intelligence in all categories when averaged by episode and, when looking at the total number of incidents, she is fourth overall while appearing in only three episodes. The Trio is the second most intelligent villain of the series. They have the most total incidents of analytical and successful intelligence. The First has the second highest average of use of practical intelligence. Angelus is the only villain, other than Dark Willow, to use creative intelligence that was not coded as successful intelligence. Dark Willow is the most violent villain in every category. Angelus records the second highest average of violence in every category except threats. In

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regards to threats, Glory comes in second while The First follows close behind at third. Adam scores the second highest kill average.

Discussion Dark Willow is the most violent and intelligent villain of the series, while being in the least number of episodes. This could be attributed to all the power she absorbed. Or, it could be a testament to just how much Willow’s intelligence had developed up to that point. The Trio are the most intelligent of the villains after Dark Willow. However, it took three people to achieve that level of intelligence. Angelus lives up to his violent reputation, ranking second or third in every violence category examined. Angelus, Dark Willow and The Trio together hold the rankings for the highest and second highest incidents in almost every category of violence and intelligence. The other characteristic that these characters share is a human side now turned evil. Dark Willow is a grieving Willow. Angelus is Angel without a soul. The Trio are three geeky boys trying to be evil men. All of these villains also have a connection to Buffy in their human form. Willow is Buffy’s best friend. Angel is Buffy’s boyfriend. In high school, Jonathan, from The Trio, was saved from suicide by Buffy. This connection to Buffy accounts for part of what makes these villains true adversaries. This is particularly true in the case of Dark Willow and Angelus. It is interesting to note that Buffy found Jonathan annoying in high school and finds The Trio more annoying than threatening. Dark Willow is a veiny, terrifying villain. Warren may, on the surface feel like a very violent character, but Willow surpasses the violence of the entire Trio. Dark Willow kills with no hesitation, something that cannot be said for Warren whose two kills were merely accidents. Warren’s level of violence cannot compete with the violence of Dark Willow, as she skins him alive for his accidents. Ironically, while Warren may brag that it will be his brains that would finally defeat Buffy, he is not the brains of his operation. But, even the combined intelligence of The Trio cannot complete with the intelligence of Dark Willow. In the end, it is her connection to humanity and her rejection of it that makes Dark Willow so smart and so violent. Like her predecessor Angelus, Willow loves Buffy, and that is why Dark Willow almost kills her. In the episode “Innocence,” Angelus alludes to the correlation between having a connection with The Slayer and defeating her when he tells Spike, “To kill this girl, you have to love her” (2.14). This betrayal is most prominent in Dark Willow because, unlike Angel when he becomes Angelus, Willow does not lose her soul. In Season Two, when Buffy is

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forced to fight her lover to the death, there is a small amount of comfort in knowing that, at that time, Angel is lost and all that remains is the demon inside. In Season Six, when Buffy is fighting Willow, this is not the case. Dark Willow tells us, “Willow doesn’t live here anymore” (“Two to Go” 6.21), but that is not true. She only wishes that it was. The grief and rage that Willow allows herself to succumb to only takes her away from her pain for a moment, as she inflicts pain and suffering on her friends. The regret and remorse that she feels in Season Seven affirms that it was indeed Willow who caused those levels of pain. Like Angel after he is reensouled, Willow is forgiven for what she did, even though like Angelus, she almost caused the end of the world. In fact both Angelus and Dark Willow came very close to ending the world, and it was the love of their friends that saved them and the world. Willow casts the spell to save Angel because Buffy loved him. Xander saves Willow by telling her that he loves her. These connections fuel the fires of both love and hate, making the villains with connections to our hero more intelligent, violent, dangerous and terrifying.

Works Cited Erickson, Gregory, and Jennifer Lemberg. “Bodies and Narrative in Crisis: Figures of Rupture and Choas in Seasons Six and Seven.” Buffy Goes Dark: Essays on the Final Two Seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Television. Eds. Lynne Y. Edwards, Elizabeth L. Rambo, and James B. South. North Carolina: McFarland, 2009. 114-129. Print. Kaveney, Roz. "'She Saved the World. A Lot': An Introduction to the Themes and Structures of Buffy and Angel." Reading the Vampire Slayer: An Unofficial Critical Companion to Buffy and Angel. Ed. Roz Kaveney. 2nd Edition. New York: Tauris Parke, 2004. 1-82. Print. Sternberg, Robert J. Successful Intelligence: How Practical and Creative Intelligence Determine Success in Life. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997. Print. Stevenson, Gregory. Televised Morality: The Case of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Oxford: Hamilton, 2003. Print. Whedon, Joss. “Amends.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. Fox, 2003. DVD. —. “Chosen.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Seventh Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Enemies.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. Fox, 2003. DVD.

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—. “Graduation Day, Part 2.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Third Season. Fox, 2003. DVD. —. “Innocence.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Second Season. Fox, 2002. DVD. —. “Killed by Death.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Second Season Fox, 2002. DVD. —. “Lie to Me.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Second Season. Fox, 2002. DVD. —. “No Place Like Home.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Fifth Season. Fox, 2003. DVD. —. “Primevil.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Fourth Season. Fox, 2003. DVD. —. “Prophesy Girl.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete First Season. Fox, 2002. DVD. —. “Seeing Red.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Sixth Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Smashed.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Sixth Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Something Blue.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Fourth Season. Fox, 2003. DVD. —. “Storyteller.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Seventh Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Touched.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Seventh Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Two to Go.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Sixth Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Villains.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete Sixth Season. Fox, 2004. DVD. —. “Welcome to the Hellmouth.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Complete First Season. Fox, 2002. DVD.

Witches and vampires, it seems, go hand in hand in popular culture. Yet unlike with vampires, Lisa Vetere argues that most see Whedon as never able to move beyond the stereotypical visions of the good-witch/bad-witch dichotomy that has so troubled modern day practitioners. Instead she claims that, as with so many other stereotypes, Whedon presents a pluralistic panorama of witchcraft identities in Buffy that perhaps demonstrate the multiplicity of womanhood rather than the over simplified good/bad dichotomy so prevalent in modern television. By exploring the historical demonizing of witchcraft, Vetere demonstrates that Whedon once more offers both an acceptance and a critique of what we have always known to be true, and in this way offers a far more complex vision of those who practice Wicca.

CHAPTER SIX THE RAGE OF WILLOW: MALEFIC WITCHCRAFT FANTASY IN BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER LISA M. VETERE

“What's your story, Willow, I mean, witchcraft? Wow, that sounds newagey” —Kennedy “No, it's safe to say that what I practice is definitely old-agey” —Willow (“Showtime” 7:11)

Within the magical realms of popular culture, it seems that wherever vampires roam, so too do witches, whether it’s in the novels of Anne Rice or in recent television series such as True Blood and Vampire Diaries. Thus, one of the most arguably important characters in the highly popular and critically-regarded television series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (19972003), is Willow Rosenberg, a witch. Considering that its creator, Joss Whedon, declared Buffy’s mission to be celebrating “the joy of female power: having it, using it, sharing it” (qtd. in Miller 35), this focus on witchcraft is no surprise. As historian Diane Purkiss claims, the “figure of

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the witch … mirrors – albeit sometimes in distorted form—the many images and self-images of feminism itself” (10). Popular culture of the late 1990s and early 2000s reinforced this connection between witchcraft and independent female power. In fact, it seemed to embark on a mission to redeem the “wicked witch.” Rather than “wicked,” these works insist, this figure is really just a misunderstood “good witch.” Magical but not malevolent, this “bad-witch with a heart of gold” stock character registers a larger cultural imperative to avoid labeling or stereotyping all witches as evil. True, good witches such as Glinda from The Wizard of Oz floated through popular culture over fifty years ago, but a slew of her descendants pervaded all genres in the late twentieth century: Gregory Maguire’s bestseller, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (1995), and its hugely popular adaptation on Broadway; popular television shows, such as Sabrina, the Teen Age Witch (1996-2003) and Charmed (1998-2006); films, such as Practical Magic (1998); popular spell books and teen witch novels, like Cate Teirnan’s “Sweep” series (2001-03), Isobel Bird’s “Circle of Three” series (2001-01), and, of course, the global sensation, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series (1997-2007), both the books and the blockbuster films. Unlike all those other “new agey” teen witches of the era, however, Buffy’s Willow Rosenberg explores witchcraft both benign and malevolent, practices both white and black magic, and for purposes both productive and destructive. One of the main characters of the heroic “Scooby Gang,” Willow often does real harm with her magic, a representation of witchcraft from which Whedon does not generally shy away. In its very first season, for instance, Buffy casts a witch as a villain. Its third episode, “The Witch,” features an archetypal wicked witch: a malevolent mother who uses a potent spell to switch bodies with her daughter in order to relive the glory days of her high-school cheerleading successes. As critics of the series such as Winslade and Wilson note, this episode represents witchcraft as dark and malignant, “a particular early modern type of magic” (Winslade 8) with its accompanying cauldron, black cat, voodoo dolls, and vengeful, malevolent witch. Some claim that such malefic and consequently “negative” images of women, whether of mothers or of witches, conflict with Buffy’s general message of female empowerment—or, in other words, that they are at odds with a feminist agenda. P. Williams, for example, writes that “even as it proclaims allegiance to ideals of female power, Buffy presents few positive female models for its teenage protagonists” (61). Consequently, Williams finds it “difficult to label Buffy a feminist text” (71). Similarly, although Moseley observes that the series “is engaged in renegotiating what ‘being

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a girl’ means now, carving out a new space” (420), she nonetheless sees Buffy as a “post-feminist” text, mainly because of its representation of teen witches as too invested in conventionally feminine attributes such as glamour. Other critics of these “negative” representations of witches include modern “witches” themselves, whether Wiccans or adherents of the closely related goddess/“feminist spirituality” movement. Whedon attests to existence of such objections in his commentary on “The Witch,” by acknowledging, “We get a lot of flak from witches and people claiming to be witches.” While other critics contend that Buffy complicates these “negative” images by juxtaposing them with alternatives, they do so by retaining the good witch/bad witch binary and simply insist that Buffy showcases a multiplicity of witches: the Wicca witch, the folkloric/ fairytale witch, the New Age witch, the Halloween-costumed witch, and the herbalist-healer witch, Tara. I would instead suggest that Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s representation of malefic witchcraft does much more than merely add to its pluralistic panorama of witchcraft identities. Not only do the different images of witches interrelate and interrogate each other, but the presence of “negative” images of women as malefic witches in Buffy is quite the opposite of “post-feminist.” In fact, it is precisely through what second-wave feminists might view as “negative representations” of witches that Buffy the Vampire Slayer fearlessly confronts the uglier side and complicated consequences of the emergence of female power. While such an engagement with the timehonored genre conventions of witchcraft narratives and fantasies may be critiqued as promoting misogynist “stereotypes” and are therefore “postfeminist,” I will nonetheless argue quite the contrary: Buffy the Vampire Slayer deploys malefic witchcraft fantasies throughout its seven seasons as discursive articulations of women’s emotions and therefore aligns itself with feminist art and politics. Furthermore, through the character arc centered on Willow Rosenberg, the series demonstrates the pernicious and ultimately oppressive silencing effect of the attempt to censor such malefic narratives and to police the boundaries of gender and genre. Recent feminist scholars of the witchcraft trials, such as Lyndal Roper, Diane Purkiss, and Deborah Willis, have begun to recognize such a silencing effect. Their work on witchcraft appeared in the late 1990s and was the first to take seriously—and find historical value in—the malefic witchcraft “fantasies” of early modern women. Enlightenment historians scorned such talk as idle gossip and superstitious nonsense. Later in the twentieth century, even feminist historians of the witch trials dismissed these women as tools of the patriarchy, mouthpieces for misogynist institutions and leaders. While these women’s stories did become fodder

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for the state and church authorities’ persecuting witches in witch trials of the early modern era, scholars like Roper analyze how they nonetheless also often registered the desires, fears, and anxieties of those early modern women who provided the testimony. According to Roper, German women’s witchcraft confessions reveal much about women’s concerns about childbirth, sexuality, and motherhood. Such witchcraft stories consisted precisely of accounts of a witch’s maleficium: her destruction and interruption on domestic affairs, whether bewitching a cow, spoiling the milk, hurling the pots and pans, and making other women’s children sick. Because such witchcraft stories revolved around domestic matters (though pre-modern conceptions of the public and private may be considered as much more fluid than they later became), village women were in fact quite often the ones voicing these complaints. To insist upon “positive images” of witches is to forbid and therefore erase the history of the expression of such emotion and to force women once again into the “good girl” role that ultimately limits their real power and wholeness—and erases them from the history books. Unfortunately, as Purkiss notes, when contemporary discourses of radical feminism, Wiccan mythologies, and the feminist spirituality movement protest such images of the witch figure, they perpetuate the silencing. Constructing the figure of the malefic as a “secular martyr” (Purkiss 22), a benign victim of the patriarchy, the prolific and well-published contemporary witch Starhawk reinforces the notion that women must sacrifice themselves for others. The roles of the herbalist-midwife-witch are traditional feminine roles: nursing, healing, caring for women and children” (Purkiss 22). While this central figure of the “myth of the burning times” is “in all essentials … not true, or only partly true, as a history of what happened to the women called witches in the early modern period” (Purkiss 7), the myth also has served, Purkiss admits, as “a key part of many feminists’ identities” ( 26). In 1998 (Buffy’s second season), historian Katherine Hodgkin agreed that it was precisely witchcraft’s “central place in a larger feminist mythology” (274) that discouraged even scholars of “women’s history” from interrogating the role of gender in the witch trials. She writes, “The debates over gender and feminist history raging across the profession steered well clear of witchcraft, while gender remained a no-go area for witchcraft researchers,” despite “popular perceptions of witchcraft in history” having “’feminist’ interpretations at their core” (273). Hodgkin adds that historians of women’s history felt “embarrassed” by these popular accounts, and thus they “lost any position from which to explore gender (274). Purkiss adds that

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“Gingerbread,” an episode from the third season of Buffy, parallels women’s historical use of malefic witchcraft fantasies as articulations of domestic dissatisfactions. It begins with a mother-daughter conflict between Buffy and her mother, who has just found out about Buffy’s secret identity as the Slayer. Seeking to bond with her daughter, Joyce Summers accompanies Buffy on a vampire-hunting expedition. She insists that slaying is “such a big part of your life, and I'd like to understand it. It's, um, you know, something we could share.” Once the mother-daughter pair stumble upon two slaughtered children, however, it becomes glaringly apparent that Buffy’s role as slayer is threatening to Joyce’s maternal identity. Buffy’s strength and experience in such dark matters force a reversal of roles between mother and daughter, as Buffy must be the one to hold and comfort Joyce in her despair and to assuage her fears. Continuing with the reversal, Joyce sobs in Buffy’s arms, as Buffy promises that she’ll make everything all right and “take care of everything.” In fact, she directly articulates her own sense of powerlessness, exclaiming, “I have to help.” But Joyce does not have the special powers of her Slayer daughter; therefore, all that she can do is mount a campaign against those “witches” whom she believes perpetrated the horrendous crime. MOO, “mothers opposed to the occult,” thus springs up in Sunnydale. Joyce, in fact, openly and publicly points to her horror of Sunnydale’s upside down power relations between adults and children by declaring, “I say it's time for the grownups to take Sunnydale back. I say we start by finding the people who did this and making them pay.” The fact that she includes the Slayer in her list of dangerous forces in town reveals that it’s her own daughter, not just witches, whom Joyce finds threatening. In establishing this organization, MOO, Joyce seems to be engaging in a rivalry with her daughter, attempting to restore what she perceives as the proper hierarchy in Sunnydale between mothers and daughters. In “Gingerbread,” Willow is only just learning her magical skills. As most critics of the series contend, her mastery of magic and witchcraft

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becomes one of the main ways in which Willow develops self-confidence, pleasure in her intellect, and a sense that she meaningfully contributes to the efforts of the Scooby gang. Yet her mother, Sheila Rosenberg, explicitly marked as an academic feminist in this episode, denies the reality of Willow’s skills and the potency of her magic, rationalizing that such “identification with mythical icons [is] perfectly typical of your age group. It's a classic adolescent response to the pressures of incipient adulthood.” Her mother’s denial of Willow’s real malefic witchcraft clearly gets coded in this scene of conflict between mother and daughter as maternal neglect and dismissal. In response to her mother’s refusal to take her seriously, therefore, Willow increasingly asserts the maleficia of her witchcraft: she starts by claiming that “I can do stuff. Nothing bad or dangerous, but I can do spells,” but in the face of her mother’s continual denial of her daughter’s agency, Willow appeals more and more to the malevolence of her magic: First, “Mom, I'm not acting out. I'm a witch! I-I can make pencils float. And I can summon the four elements,” and then, “I worship Beelzebub. I do his biddings. Do you see any goats around? No, because I sacrificed them.” Finally, as her mother leaves her room, “All bow before Satan!” and “Prince of Night, I summon you. Come fill me with your black, naughty evil.” In other words, Willow strategically employs the discourse of malefic witchcraft to manage her own sense of helplessness against her mother’s power and to assert those sides of herself to which her mother might be oblivious. Unlike her feminist mother, Willow is free to explore her malefic art in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Further, the series dramatizes how the social insistence to be a “good witch” reinscribes conventional gender boundaries, forcing the women to perform role of “good girl.” From its first season, Buffy the Vampire Slayer clearly positions the witch Willow as the good girl of the series. This high standard actually forces her to perform a very traditional role within her “Scooby” surrogate family—the reliable, nurturing, and supportive “sidekick” to the more active and dominant Buffy. One might almost say that Willow performs as the mother figure of the Scooby gang. As Faith Mendlesohn observes: “Because it is apparently unsexual, Willow’s support is often presented as unconditional, an appearance enhanced by Willow’s little-girl presentation until midway through the fourth season” (48). Before Buffy arrives in Sunnydale, Willow had been playing this non-sexual, almost maternal, support role for her best friend, Xander. Willow and Xander often speak of their longstanding love and care for each other: spending time in each other’s bedrooms in their pajamas, visiting each other for holidays, supporting each other as the outcasts of Sunnydale High. As the conscientious

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academically-superior partner, Willow assists Xander in his schoolwork, while Xander, as the warm, witty nitwit, provides Willow with affection and amusement. While Willow’s feelings are clearly more romantically inclined towards Xander, she nonetheless has obviously found a great deal of solace and comfort in their relationship. As they both have neglectful parents, the two function as surrogate family members for each other, although neither perhaps imagine that familial relationship in precisely the same way: brother/sister; husband/wife; mother/son even. However, the cozy dyadic nature of this relationship gets radically interrupted when the sensational Buffy arrives in town. Beautiful, strong, assertive, intelligent, funny, and sassy, Buffy embodies the “girl power” movement of the late 90s, a manifestation of third-wave feminism that sought to reclaim the agency in femininity. Resentful at Buffy’s intrusion and jealous at the sexual attention that Xander explicitly lavishes on Buffy, Willow cannot express such feelings: first, because she loves Buffy herself; and, second, because she is so constrained by her position as the Scooby family’s “good girl,” or perhaps “supportive mom.” Willow mildly articulates this frustration in an early episode of the series, “I Robot, You Jane” (1.8), an episode driven by Willow’s envy of Buffy’s sexual appeal, especially for Xander. It begins with Willow’s seeking Xander’s company and with Xander’s literally running after Buffy. Left alone in the library, Willow becomes vulnerable to a demon, Moloch, “a very deadly and seductive demon,” who “draws people to him with promises of love, power, knowledge.” Thus Moloch, who disguises himself to Willow as an on-line crush named Malcolm, offers Willow the very thing that she lost when Buffy arrived in Sunnydale: the exclusive attention of a love object. Willow thus becomes especially sensitive when Buffy warns her about “Malcolm,” evincing a jealousy towards Buffy that she can barely acknowledge. The whole episode, in fact, explores such tensions between Buffy and Willow. In each conversation with Buffy, Willow reveals some level of hostility and resentment: “Oh, see, I knew you'd react like this,” she complains to Buffy, and “I don't understand why you don't want me to have this. I mean, boys don't chase me around all the time. I thought you'd be happy for me.” Such comments reveal Willow’s having had prior notions of Buffy as an obstacle to Willow’s romantic success; she imagines Buffy as the jealous one, an obvious projection of a not entirely disguised hostility. When Buffy declares to Willow, “This just isn't like you,” Willow, for instance, responds, “Not like me to have a boyfriend?” “I Robot,” therefore, depicts Willow’s conjuring of the demon Moloch first as a compensation for her loneliness, and then as a discursive opening for a passive aggressive retaliation against her Scooby family—a

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foreshadowing of the sort of black magic Willow practices later in the series. Perhaps, then, it is no coincidence that “I Robot” is the first episode in which viewers are introduced to the “techno pagan,” Jenny Calendar, a very important character for Willow, as she is her mentor in magical spells and the woman who introduces Willow to witchcraft, which becomes the key way in which Willow achieves some parity, if not superiority, to Buffy. In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Whedon most explicitly shows viewers the pernicious effects of the repression of the “bad witch” in Willow through the emergence of her doppelganger, “Dark Willow,” a figure, the series repeatedly emphasizes, that endows Willow with the power to express the very feelings that ordinary Willow cannot: resentment of Buffy’s power at the Scooby’s denial of her power in the form of efficacy of her spells, and their insistence that she curb her dangerous black magic. Episodes, such as “Halloween” (2.6), “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” (2.16), “The Wish” (3.9), and “Doppelgangland” (3.16), demonstrate that Willow achieves undeniably positive effects—strength and confidence, honesty with her friends—when she is “bad.” Yet her best friends and comrades repeatedly insist that Willow curb her dark magic; they often inaccurately deny its efficacy and demand its repression. In Season Four’s “Fear Itself” (4.4), for example, both Buffy and Oz warn Willow against her experimentation in magic, her levitation, charms, “glamours,” and try to curb what she states as her ambitions to go further into “transmutation, conjuring, bringing forth something from nothing,” her desire to get “pretty close to the primal forces.” Later in that same episode, Buffy scornfully derides Willow’s magical abilities, claiming that her “basic spells are usually only fifty-fifty.” Unlike in earlier seasons, however, this more confident Willow shoots back at Buffy that “I’m not your sidekick!” and later observes to Oz that Buffy “thinks I’m not ready to be a full blown witch! I can handle the dark forces as good as anyone else.” The show parallels this insistence on Willow’s suppression of malefic witchcraft with contemporary notions of Wicca by having Willow reject Wicca precisely for the same reason that she resists her friends’ admonitions: she has found malefic witchcraft empowering, able to make her Buffy’s equal rather than her sidekick. While these earlier seasons show Willow responding rather mildly to her “family’s” playful and sometimes even loving refusal of her dark side, by Season Six, Willow has had enough. A savage “Dark Willow” emerges in Season Six who is, one might argue, a response to this foreclosure of negativity, of the “bad girl” in good Willow. For the Willow Rosenberg of this season is no longer the passive good girl; she has become a most formidable active magical force. With the death of Buffy at the hands of

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Glory at the end of Season Five, Willow has become the leader of the Scoobies, supervising their slaying and literally standing over all of them on top of one of the cemetery’s mausoleums. Her power here has reached extraordinary levels as she is able to insert her thoughts and orders into the very minds of her friends. Perhaps the assumption of new leadership is on the mind of Buffy’s creators, as Marti Noxon has taken over Joss Whedon’s responsibilities as executive producer in Season Six. As with the series as a whole, Season Six explicitly showcases and explores the dark powers of a young woman. Willow’s witchcraft has strengthened to the extent that she has power over life and death, as she is the one who casts the spell that brings Buffy back from the dead. It is significant that a key part of that spell is the sacrifice of a sweet, gentle fawn. Willow cuts its throat, a violent part of the ritual that Willow hides from her friends, as black magic is incongruous with her good girl image. The Scoobies find it difficult to accept the dark and powerful side of Willow. Their intolerance of Willow’s malefic witchcraft and their insistence on its repression consequently fuels the plot of Season Six. Once Giles returns to Sunnydale after Buffy’s resurrection, for example, one of his first acts is to scold Willow for magical overachieving. Although Willow was successful, Giles is angry at Willow because he didn’t expect such power from her: “Willow,” he laments, “you were the one I trusted most to respect the forces of nature.” Once again, the Scooby gang holds higher standards for Willow than for the others, leading her loved ones to respond all the more intensely when this good girl defies her role and performs something that might be considered “bad.” In Season Six, however, viewers see Willow responding more aggressively to her friends’ judgment of her badness. In response to Giles’ scolding, for example, Willow— perhaps for the first time ever—expresses anger: “Giles,” Willow insists, “I did what I had to do. I did what nobody else could do. . . I wasn't lucky. I was amazing. And how would you know? You weren't even there.” After he calls her a “rank amateur,” she responds, “The magicks I used are very powerful. I'm very powerful. And maybe it's not such a good idea for you to piss me off.” In this episode featuring Giles’ coming to Buffy’s rescue, returning to watch over and guide the Scoobies, resuming his fatherly role by lending Buffy the money to make repairs to the house, Willow is chastised for assuming power. Yet Willow’s dark witchcraft does not really seem any more malevolent than the powers embodied in many of Buffy’s other characters. Willow’s magic, on the contrary, has done much good over the years. She has, for instance, used her magic to reverse the invitation for Angel to come into Buffy’s house (“Passions,” 2:17); to cast a binding spell to

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exorcise the ghost of a murdered teacher from Sunnydale HS (“I Only Have Eyes For You,” 2:19); to restore Angel’s soul (“Becoming, Part 1 and 2,” 21 and 22); to help Anya conjure the alternative “Doppelgangland”; to slay a vampire in the Mayor’s office with pencil and discover the Books of Ascendance (“Choices,” 3.19); to successfully cast a spell to have her will be done (“Something Blue, 4:9); to play a key role in the group spell that defeated Adam (“Primeval,” 4.21); to magically enter into Buffy’s catatonic mind (“The Weight of the World,” 5.21); and finally, to resurrect Buffy from the dead (“Bargaining, Part One,” 6.1). With only this incomplete list of the power and efficacy of Willow’s spells, both malevolent and benign, her friends’ fear and prohibitions seem unreasonable, if not irrational. This prohibition against black magic reaches its peak when Willow’s girlfriend, Tara, demands that Willow go “cold turkey” on black magic. Tara, not coincidentally just the sort of gentle Wiccan figure whom historian Diane Purkiss warns has literally shut down the historical and scholarly study of witchcraft narratives, disciplines Willow excessively— forcing Willow to choose between the most powerful love of her life and the most empowering force of her life: Willow cannot, that is, have both power and love, the Wiccan witch insists. One can argue that the emergence of a more dangerous and reckless Willow results from her having to make this choice, a choice enforced almost cruelly by all of her friends and family. As loyal viewers of Buffy know, Willow consequently spirals into an addiction and pain that culminates in Tara’s accidental murder at the hands of Warren in “Seeing Red” (6.19). What makes this loss especially painful for Willow is that Tara had just forgiven Willow for her darkness, for not having been a “good witch.” Avenging the loss of Tara, Willow brutally murders Warren, speaks all sorts of painful truths to her friends, and even physically fights Buffy for the first time—a scene upon which the episode lingers. Ultimately, Willow the Dark Witch threatens to destroy the world and is only prevented from doing so by Xander’s intervention: a recovery of the original loss that Willow experienced upon Buffy’s arrival in Sunnydale. Xander offers Willow unconditional love and acceptance; he is able to convince her that she can be whole—both a good and a bad witch. She is no longer forced to choose between wholeness and acceptance. Without her descent into malefic witchcraft, Willow would never have felt the power and sense of security provided by Xander’s confession of unconditional love. As Battis explains, “All of her rage, grief, and desire for vengeance cannot withstand his [Xander’s] brilliant, calm declaration of unconditional love” (34). According to both Klein and psychoanalyst

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D.W. Winnicott, the kind of destructive fantasy enacted in this sixth season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer can be extremely important in psychological development, especially for the kind of psychic challenges that critics such as Battis and Ruddell see in the split and disembodied character of Willow. Children need to feel license enough to imagine such destruction of loved ones. Winnicott writes that “It is destruction … that enables the subject to go beyond relating to the object through identification, projection, and other intrapsychic processes pertaining to the subjectively conceived object. Destruction makes possible the transition from relating (intrapsychic) to using the object, to carrying on a relationship with another who is objectively perceived as existing outside the self, an entity in her own right. That is, in the mental act of negating or obliterating the object, which may be expressed in the real effort to attack the other, we find out whether the real other survives. If she survives without retaliating or withdrawing under the attack, then we know her to exist outside ourselves, not just as our mental product.” (qtd. in Jessica Benjamin 39)

To crush the “good object” in fantasy, to have violent and retaliatory fantasies of murdering their loved ones, results in a more integrated and secure subject. Bruno Bettelheim makes a similar point in The Uses of Enchantment, specifically about children’s need for fairy tales as malevolent fantasies—focusing in particular on the figure of the wicked witch in such narratives. To prohibit the representation of malefic witchcraft is to prohibit emotional development, say these psychoanalysts. Fantasies of violence against a loved object can foster a deep sense of object permanence; the child can comprehend and believe in the power of love to survive wrath. This allows her ultimately to feel gratitude and safety in her environment and life, a comfort in community and self. For Willow at her darkest, Xander’s confession of unconditional love for both “yellow chalky Willow” and dark Willow finally allows her to work through her the resentment, envy, and rage that she had repressed for so long, and which almost forced her to act out in the most destructive and malevolent of acts. Because Joss Whedon refuses to succumb to cultural imperatives to redeem the wicked witch, viewers feel the pleasure of watching this happen.

Works Cited Battis, Jes. “’She’s Not All Grown Yet’: Willow as Hybrid/Hero in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 2.4. [8] March 2003. Web. slayageonline.com.

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Benjamin, Jessica. Bonds of Love: Psychoanalysis, Feminism, & the Problem of Domination. New York: Pantheon, 1988. Print. Bettelheim, Bruno. The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales. New York: Vintage Books, 1977. Print. Hodgkin, Katharine. “Historians and Witches.” History Workshop Journal 45 (1998): 271-277. Print. Kristeva, Julia. Black Sun: Depression and Melancholia. Trans. Leon S. Roudiez. New York: Columbia UP, 1989. Print. —. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. Trans. Leon S. Roudiez. New York: Columbia UP, 1982. Print. Krzywinska, Tanya. “Hubble-Bubble, Herbs, and Grimoires: Magic, Manicheans, and Witchcraft in Buffy.” Fighting the Forces: What’s at Stake in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Eds. Rhonda Wilcox and David Lavery. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2002: 178-194. Print. Klein, Melanie. The Selected Melanie Klein. Ed. Juliet Mitchell. New York: The Free P, 1986. Print. Moseley, Rachel. “Glamorous Witchcraft: Gender and Magic in Teen Film and Television.” Screen 43.4 (2002): 403-22. Print. Pateman, Matthew. “’That Was Nifty’: Willow Rosenberg Saves the World in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 25.4 (2007): 64-77. Print. Purkiss, Diane. The Witch in History: Early Modern and TwentiethCentury Representations. New York: Routledge, 1996. Print. Roper, Lyndal. Oedipus and the Devil: Witchcraft, Sexuality, and Religion in Early Modern Europe. New York: Routledge, 1994. Print. Ruddell, Caroline. “‘I am the Law’ ‘I am the Magics’: Speech, Power, and the Split Identity of Willow in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 5.4. (2006). Web. slayageonline.com. South, James B. “‘My God, It’s Like a Greek Tragedy’: Willow Rosenberg and Human Irrationality.” Buffy the Vampire and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale. Ed. James B. South. Chicago: Open Court, 2003. Print. Williams, J.P. “Choosing Your Own Mother: Mother-Daughter Conflicts in Buffy.” Fighting the Forces: What’s at Stake in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Eds. Rhonda Wilcox and David Lavery. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2002: 61-72. Print. Wilson, Dominique. “Willow and Which Craft? The Portrayal of Witchcraft in Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” The Buddha of Suburbia: Proceedings of the Eighth Australian and International Religion, Literature, and the Arts Conference, 2004: 146-158. Print.

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Winnicott, D.W. Playing and Reality. 1971. New York: Routledge, 1989. Print. Winslade, J. Lawton. “Teen Witches, Wiccans, and ‘Wanna-Blessed-Be’s’: Pop Culture Magic in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 1.1. (2001). Web. slayageonline.com.

Birte Horn suggests that one of the reasons Buffy has been so popular with audiences and academics for the past decade is its unique use of mythology. The "Buffyverse" contains a wide range of elements from a variety of mythological texts, symbols, motifs and archetypes which are adapted from their original contexts and put into a contemporary framework of American popular culture. The introduction of a team of three nerdy teenagers – "The Trio" – who declare themselves to be the "arch-nemesises" of the Slayer, crystalizes the concept of the Big Bad into the historical Greek myth of the nemesis. While The Trio would be more likely to claim their origins in comic books and science fiction, Horn argues that Whedon adapts the goddess of just punishment or retribution, for a new age of viewers, creating characters who are neither all good, nor all evil, but thoroughly human and just a little bit nerdy.

CHAPTER SEVEN “WE’RE YOUR ARCH-NEMESISES … SES” – BUFFY AND “THE TRIO”: THE AMERICANIZATION OF A MYTHOLOGICAL MOTIF BIRTE W. HORN Introduction There can be no doubt that one of the reasons why Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS) has been so very popular with audiences and academics, and continues to be so, even after the series ended in 2003, 1 is the unique mythology which has been constructed in and around this creative television show. Joss Whedon’s "Buffyverse" contains a multitude of elements from different mythological texts, such as legends, symbols, motifs and archetypal figures. In order to integrate these elements more 1

After the television series ended, new seasons of the show were added in the form of graphic novels. These books produced by Joss Whedon and published by Dark Horse Comics have been issued since 2007.

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easily into the narrative of the show, the creators of the series adapt them to a contemporary framework of American popular culture. One such mythological motif, which is a central theme of BtVS narratives, is that of the “nemesis figure.” Every season one key enemy with features of a nemesis is set against the Slayer.2 In Buffy’s sixth season, this key enemy is personified by a team of three nerdy teenagers3 – “The Trio” – who declare themselves to be the “arch-nemeses” of the Slayer. This conscious appropriation, coupled with the fact that the boys are thoroughly human, make The Trio unique antagonists. The Trio takes the mythological motif of nemesis and enthusiastically make it their own. Drawing their inspiration from villains (and a few heroes), whom they find in American popular culture, they reinvent and brand the mythical figure of nemesis with determined Americanness, in behavior as much as in language. While The Trio insists on being Buffy’s worst enemies, they paradoxically shape Buffy into their own nemesis figure. Because the boys are neither supernatural, nor entirely evil creatures, they pose an additional challenge to Buffy Summers and her responsibilities as a Slayer to protect the world and deliver justice to criminals. Consequently, in this paper I am going to show how the idea of nemesis is adapted and Americanized throughout the sixth season of BtVS, and how The Trio appropriate the function of nemesis for themselves and fill it with meaning within a contemporary cultural framework. Subsequently, I will discuss the Slayer’s confrontation with this unusual challenge, including the negotiation of concepts of justice and law, inherent in this conflict.

1. Mythological and Contemporary Notions of Nemesis The origins of nemesis can be found in Greek mythology. Here, the goddess Nemesis was responsible for just punishment or retribution, with an eye on balance and equality. Nemesis means “she who distributes or deals out” (Theoi), and the Goddess Nemesis is often depicted as a winged woman holding a sword, scales, a balance, or a measuring rod. She has 2

In the first season, for example, Buffy encounters an ancient vampire, The Master, whom she needs to overcome. Other seasons feature such challenging enemies as Sunnydale’s Mayor Wilkins who transforms into a giant demon snake in Season Three. There is Season Four’s cyborg-demon Adam, and the Goddess Glory whom Buffy and her friends fight in Season Five. 3 Even though the three young men, who make up the Trio, are (following the narrative of the series) all around 20 years of age, their appearance and attitude make them seem younger.

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also been attributed with an apple-branch and reigns or a lash (Hornum 1137, Greene 27 ff.). What is important to remember, though, is that Nemesis's primary function was to make sure that everyone was treated equally: “Happiness and unhappiness were measured out by her, care being taken that happiness was not too frequent or too excessive” (Theoi). An abstraction of the function of this particular goddess can already be seen in the works of Plato and Aristotle, whose interpretation of Nemesis has become more of an abstract concept which is relatively close to our contemporary idea of this figure: “Nemesis, seen in this context, is not so much an embodiment of indignation at moral wrongs, or a restraint on human impropriety, but rather a frightful being who can snatch away any success or good fortune a human being has obtained” (Hornum 9). Since the ancient Greeks and the Roman cult of Nemesis, the meaning of the term has changed quite drastically. The name of the Greek Goddess has transitioned into a secular noun which, in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, has become an expression used in a wide variety of contexts. It can be found as much in scholarly articles concerned with literature, medicine, and psychoanalysis, as well as in fiction and popular culture.4 The understanding of nemesis, however, does not vary very much. The Merriam Webster Online Dictionary defines “nemesis” as either “a) one that inflicts retribution or vengeance,” or “b) a formidable and usually victorious rival or opponent.” This second meaning of nemesis is the one that we find most references to, especially in literary and medical texts. However, there are other components that have manifested themselves, especially when it comes to the world of popular culture. Here, a nemesis is often not simply a formidable rival, but is usually very familiar and very closely connected to the hero, and at times, even intimately so. One example of such a nemesis character can be found in Smallville's Lex Luthor. Luthor is portrayed as an ambiguous character with great potential to be good or evil. As the heroes of postmodernity are a lot more troubled and complex than those of 50 years ago, so the notion of nemesis is also multifaceted. The series explores the friendship between Luthor and Kent, and the audience gets to know both men on a very intimate level. And even though Lex Luthor and Clark Kent eventually become sworn enemies, they are always influenced by the friendship they used to share. The changed perception of hero figures correlates directly to the modern construction of a hero's nemesis, which is typically complex and open to interpretation and negotiation. With regard to such contemporary concepts 4

A quick search in an academic article database JADE procured up to 300 entries with the term "nemesis" in the title alone (search conducted on 24. Jan, 2009).

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of heroes and villains, The Trio is perhaps the most multifaceted and interesting nemesis figure in BtVS.

2. Americanizing Nemesis: Buffy and The Trio The Trio is made up of Warren Mears, Jonathan Levinson and Andrew Wells. All three characters have been part of previous BtVS episodes; however, they have never before appeared together. We can only speculate about how they know each other and how they came to spend time together. Warren, Jonathan and Andrew, as well as Buffy and her friends, went to Sunnydale High, the local high school. Warren and Jonathan previously interacted with Buffy on several occasions (cf. “I Was Made To Love You” 5.15, “Go Fish” 2.20, “Earshot” 3.18; “The Prom” 3.20, “Superstar” 4.20), whereas Andrew and Buffy have a connection via Andrew’s older brother Tucker (cf. “The Prom” 3.20). All three members of The Trio have a history of being bullied (cf. “Go Fish” 2.20), of being highly insecure (cf. “I Was Made to Love You” 5.15; “Earshot” 3.18), and of having very peculiar interests. Warren is a genius when it comes to computers, technology and robotics, Jonathan has dabbled in sorcery, and Andrew has learned something about summoning demons from his brother. Combined with their obvious interest in science-fiction, fantasy, comic books, etc., the boys are presented as typical high-school nerds who would be ostracized for being different, and who, in our reality, would probably be avid fans of BtVS. Whether Warren, Jonathan and Andrew know each other from school and have started to hang out together because they were the odd kids out is not clear. It is, however, rather obvious that they are not good friends, as they continually turn against each other if it serves their own purpose. The boys seem to have gotten together because there was simply nobody else who would be interested in their company. The Trio is born mainly because Warren, Jonathan and Andrew are bored. One afternoon the boys sit in the basement of Warren’s house, surrounded by appliances, gardening tools, and storage space. They play a board game, which does not seem to be very exciting. Rather out of the blue Warren suggests a new, more stimulating, game:5 Warren:

5

So … you guys wanna team up and take over Sunnydale?

Even though the audience is not informed about whether Warren has thought about "taking over Sunnydale," it seems probable, since Warren is known to develop his plans meticulously and in great detail (cf. “I Was Made to Love You” 5.15).

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(Jonathan and Andrew, look at each other, then look back at Warren) Jonathan and Andrew: (indifferently) Ok. (“Flooded” 6.04)

This “super cool mission statement,” as Jonathan refers to Warren’s suggestion later on, gives us a very distinct impression of what the three boys think teaming up and taking over Sunnydale means: it is only another game. After this decision, Warren, Jonathan and Andrew start calling themselves “The Trio.” This is not only meant to be a catchy name which is easy to remember, but it is the first step towards imagining themselves as nemesis figures: to have a name is to have significance. In the world of The Trio, which is filled with characters and narratives from sciencefiction, or fantasy films, television shows, and literature, every named hero has a named antagonist: Superman and Lex Luthor, Batman and the Joker, Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader, and so on. So when The Trio declare themselves to be Buffy's arch-nemeses,6 it is not surprising that they do not think so much of the Greek goddess of just punishment but more of themselves as team of Lex Luthor's to Buffy's Superman. Establishing themselves as nemesis figures follows a logical rationale. In order to take over Sunnydale and to develop their capacities, Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew need money. Money will not only help them to acquire the necessary tools, e.g. weapons, etc., but to create a lair, a safe haven to work on their “evil” schemes. Consequently, they hire a mercenary demon to perform the rather mundane task of helping them to rob a bank. In the interaction with this demon the complexity of The Trio’s world, mixed up of dreams and fantasy, with only the slightest touch of reality, becomes apparent: Demon: Warren: Andrew: Jonathan: All three:

You hired me to create chaos and carnage for you. Told me you were powerful men, commanding machines, magicks, the demon realms below. We are. Yuh-huh. We're like, Super Villains. Mwahahaha ("Flooded" 6.04)

The boys’ wish to be supervillains is not surprising. Throughout highschool, fellow students who were considered socially successful tormented Warren, Jonathan and Andrew. As villains, especially as a team, they feel powerful enough to get back at this society that they think has mistreated them. It is only logical that they assume the role of the villain because it 6

“Gone” 6.11. This scene will be discussed in more detailed in the next section.

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seems more real and attainable than becoming heroes.7 Of course, another point for being a supervillain might simply be that The Trio perceives this as being more fun, as they do not have to conform to societal norms and can pretty much do what they want. The Trio shapes their supervillains in styles they have learned from popular culture. Having given themselves a name, the boys now need a lair. If we look at key enemies in popular culture, for example Blofeld, from the James Bond movies, or Lex Luthor, we realize that they all have a special place from which they set out to take over the world. Consequently, after gaining a huge amount of money from the bank robbery, the boys begin to create a lair for themselves. This lair is a testament to The Trio’s nerdiness and their playfulness. Instead of relocating to a larger space, such as a house or mansion, The Trio’s lair is still situated in the basement of the house where Warren lives with his mom. This is as much a matter of safety as of convenience. In the basement they have always been safe from people who would bully or humiliate them. It is the place where they were free to dream and to fantasize in the past, and as they are continually dreaming up their lives as supervillains, this is their ideal environment.8 It is probably also the place where they would get soda and sandwiches from Warren’s mom, so they simply stay put. Where the basement used to be filled with gardening tools and appliances, The Trio now transforms this space into a room in which their fantasies can come true. They put soft carpets on the cold concrete and exchange their old beanbags with office leather chairs. The windows have colorful curtains (which are closed), and there are several shelves and glass cases filled with cds and action figures. Where the gardening tools used to be, we can now see three brand new bicycles, even though it is doubtful that those will ever be used by The Trio. Computers and other mechanical gadgets are blinking away, and empty action figure boxes still litter the floor. In the middle of the room the boys have somehow managed to install an old Russian periscope which allows them to watch the garden 7

Jonathan actually tried to be a “Superstar” (4.20) once. Using a magic spell, he changed reality so that everyone admired Jonathan as a James Bond-like hero figure. However, this attempt at being a hero ended with Buffy and her friends having to save him and the rest of the world from a demon Jonathan had inadvertently summoned by way of his initial spell. At the end of the episode, Jonathan is humiliated and lonely as before. 8 Later Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew also obtain a van in which they set up all sorts of surveillance equipment. This vehicle becomes an extension of the Trio’s lair.

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upstairs. The image they receive on a huge flat-screen TV set in their lair thus shows Warren’s mom weeding the tulips and later stretching out on a garden lounger sunbathing. For supervillains this lair is strangely lacking any sign of weapons, except for a big flamethrower, which apparently belongs to Warren. Instead, we simply see three nerds acquiring status symbols, such as games, action figures, television sets with huge speakers, and creating a comfortable environment for themselves. Their immediate goals to start them off on their criminal career seem also far from wicked. A white board in their lair lists The Trio’s steps – presumably – to “take over Sunnydale”: “Control the Weather, Miniaturize Fort Knox, Conjure Fake I.D.s, Shrink Ray, Girls, Girls, The Gorilla Thing” (“Flooded” 6.04). Aside from the rather ambitious plans to control the weather and miniaturize Fort Knox, the proposal to obtain fake I.D.s and to meet girls, sounds more like Warren’s, Jonathan’s and Andrew’s attempt to make up for what they did not have the opportunity, and/or courage, to do before. They want to be the “cool” kids for once and do what their schoolmates probably did since eighth grade. What this “strategy” also shows is the arbitrariness of The Trio’s plans, along with an acute lack of true malice. How much The Trio styles their understanding of nemesis on a frame of American popular culture is not only evident in their behavior, but also in the language they use. To Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew being a supervillain means using a particular supervillain lingo. There are several linguistic cues, which The Trio use to style themselves as villains, for example, using a “typical” supervillain laugh, e.g. “mwahahaha,” or fashioning a “lair” for themselves. But also in conversation do we find confirmation of the influence of popular culture, which the boys have appropriated for themselves. When the demon The Trio has summoned to help them rob the bank demands the Slayer’s head as payment for services rendered, Andrew and Jonathan refuse to kill Buffy.9 The Trio take a vote on this topic, by raising their hands in the traditional Vulcan gesture of greeting known from Star Trek. However, in order to get rid of the demon, Warren gives him Buffy’s address and whispers, “You wanna kill her? Make it so” (“Flooded” 604.) Jonathan and Andrew who could not overhear the previous conversation express their amazement at the events:

9

In this situation it is very obvious that Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew are not friends. When the demon threatens to kill the leader of the three boys, Warren and Andrew quickly point at Jonathan and giggle when the demon physically attacks him. It is only when the demon declares that Jonathan will be the first of the three to die, does Warren stop the demon. However, his aim is not so much to help Jonathan, but to save his own life.

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96 Jonathan: (amazed): Andrew: Warren: (casually):

How’d you make him do that? What are you? Some kind of Jedi? The Force can sometimes have great power on the weak-minded. (Andrew and Jonathan nod and go “hmm” in awe).

The Trio’s language is full of references to shows and films like Star Trek and Star Wars, which emphasizes not only that they use these texts to successfully communicate with each other, but it also demonstrates how much their behavior and language is styled after those fictional worlds, and the deep meaning they invest in those texts of popular culture. It is interesting to note that the boys themselves do not seem to realize how casually they integrate fictional narratives and language into their own lives. A little later in the episode, Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew have the following conversation: Andrew: Warren: Andrew: Warren: Andrew: Jonathan:

Andrew:

Is this the life or what? (agreeing) Mm. I mean, here we got all the stuff we ever wanted. And we didn’t even have to – Earn it? (smiling) Exatamundo. It’s true my friends. The way I see it … life is like an interstellar journey. Some people go into hypersleep and travel at sub-light speeds … (Warren and Jonathan nod in agreement) … only to get where they're going after years of struggle, toil and hard, hard work. We, on the other hand … Blast through the space-time continuum in a wormhole?

(They all nod and smile happily) Jonathan: Andrew:

Gentlemen … crime is our wormhole. (hesitantly) But everyone knows if the width of a wormhole cavity is a whole number of wavelengths, plus a fraction of that wavelength, the coinciding particle activity collapses the infrastructure.

(Warren, wearing a virtual-reality headset that covers the top half of his face turns to Andrew.) Warren:

Dude. Don't be a geek.

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This example shows that rationality, as warped as it may sound, has no place in the world that The Trio create for themselves. It also is a playful nod of the creators to the large number of viewers who actually understand every word Warren, Jonathan and Andrew are saying. The simplicity to identify with one or all of the boys, to the average viewer, is higher than with any other nemesis figure previously seen on BtVS. Once The Trio has established a name, a lair and a certain amount of confidence, they know that being a criminal (and using magic) in Sunnydale will invariably lead to an encounter with the Slayer. Warren, Jonathan and Andrew welcome this threat as a confirmation for their own significance. Their own importance as supervillains will only be fully reached when the local superhero, Buffy, takes note of them as a threat: Jonathan: Andrew: Warren: Andrew:

What are we gonna do about Buffy? You know sooner or later, the Slayer's gotta come after us. Bring her on. We could, uh, we could hypnotize her. Make her our willing sex bunny. (They laugh in a dorky way). (“Flooded” 6.04)

At this stage the Slayer is imagined as a non-threatening, easy-to-dealwith factor in The Trio's plans, which is yet another sign of the game-like and highly unrealistic nature of the picture they have of themselves. However, the further the season progresses, the more obsessed the boys, and especially Warren who functions as The Trio’s leader,10 become with the Slayer, interpreting their own fear of Buffy as a growing threat issued by the Slayer. Eventually, in the episode “Gone” (6.11), The Trio identify themselves as Buffy's worst enemy and nemesis: Buffy: Warren:

Jonathan:

So you three have, what, banded together to be pains in my ass? We're your arch-nemesises … ses. (Buffy and Willow look confused) You may have beaten us this time, Slayer, but next time … um … uh, next time … Maybe not!

This is the point where The Trio meets reality and do not recognize it. Warren, Jonathan, and Andrew have a completely distorted view of their 10

Warren becomes the leader of the Trio not necessarily because he is the oldest, but he is the most ruthless of the three and the only one to have a relatively clear notion of what being a criminal mastermind means.

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own significance and effectiveness as “supervillains,” whereas Buffy has no idea what they want. To Buffy, The Trio are just three guys she vaguely remembers from high school, who have, as usual, played with some gadget11 that turned out to be dangerous. For The Trio, the Slayer clearly is their nemesis. And even though they continue to invent themselves as master criminals and the most challenging adversary to the Slayer, they never reach this desired aim. A nemesis figure becomes truly interesting only when it is a recurring character and provides excitement in the continuing narrative.12 Therefore, as we have seen above, The Trio is not disheartened by having to accept that the Slayer has beaten them in one particular challenge: they will always try again. In this context it is also important that The Trio is not thoroughly invested in getting rid of their nemesis. As already seen in the episode “Flooded” 6.04, when yet another opportunity to kill the Slayer arises, Jonathan and Andrew are so determined to save Buffy that they even convince a reluctant Warren to help their former schoolmate: Warren:

Andrew: Warren: Jonathan: Warren: Jonathan: Andrew: Warren: Andrew:

The Slayer got slammed with a big-ass dose of radiation when the gun overloaded. Her cells are mutating at an accelerated rate. Eventually her molecular makeup will start losing its integrity and then … pfft. (Makes a "pfft" gesture) But, wouldn't that kill her? Well, lemme think. (Sarcastic) Yeah! Wait a minute! We're not killing anybody. Especially not Buffy! (sighs) You guys are so immature! (Angrily) We're villains! When are you gonna get that through your thick skulls? We're not killers, we're crimelords! Yeah! Like, like Lex Luthor. (Gesturing with a comic book) He's always trying to take over Metropolis, but he doesn't kill Superman! Because it's Superman's book, you moron! But Lex doesn't kill him, does he?!

Warren rolls his eyes in exasperation. Jonathan looks determined. 11

In this case it was an “Invisible Ray” built by Warren that would have actually killed Buffy eventually. 12 Examples for the recurring and obsessive arch-enemy character opposing a heroic figure are easy to find in American popular culture, e.g., Lex Luthor or the Joker from the DC comics, Blofeld from the James Bond movies, or Kahn Noonien Singh from the Star Trek universe.

“We’re Your Arch-Nemesises … ses” – Buffy and “The Trio” Jonathan:

Jonathan: Warren:

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Listen, Warren … (points forcefully at the gun) you get that ray working and the first thing we're gonna do is find Buffy and re-visible her before it's too late! You got me?! Fine. (“Gone” 6.11)

This insistence of wanting to be supervillains and crime lords on the one hand but not killing their most feared adversary, illustrates the varying degrees of potential evil within the three boys as well as the seriousness each member of the team bestows to this game of The Trio vs. Buffy. Whereas Jonathan and Andrew are quite happy to rob banks, build and use invisibility rays to spy on girls, etc., Warren does not have any qualms about killing people who stand between him and his plans to become increasingly powerful. While Jonathan and Andrew are more interested in playing the takeover of Sunnydale, Warren is the only member of The Trio to truly develop into a villain. Consequently, the Slayer uses different strategies to deal with the various levels of good and evil that are existent in The Trio.

3. Negotiations of Justice Being a superhero in a world of vampires, demons and other evil creatures is a demanding, but at the same time, pretty straightforward job. A Slayer kills vampires; when something supernatural and evil comes around, Buffy eliminates it. Her destiny is to protect humans and to deal out a particular kind of justice, which could not be handled by a regular “human” person without the powers that come with being a Slayer. In the world of vampires and demons, the Slayer is the law. However, even in the non-magical part of the world where there are human muggers and murderers, Buffy takes responsibility for the protection of innocents, and at the same time subjects herself to the laws governing society.13 Thus, being a Slayer comes actually very close to the classic meaning of nemesis, that is, a figure dealing out just punishment or retribution.

13 For example, in episode “Smashed” (6.09), Buffy disrupts a mugging in progress, helps the victims and goes after the criminals. When in the episode “Dead Things” (6.13), Warren tricks Buffy into believing that she has killed the young woman Katrina, the Slayer is determined to give herself up to the police and face the consequences of the legal system.

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The thoroughly human Trio is initially more a nuisance than a serious threat to Buffy.14 This attitude changes, however, when Warren kills his ex-girlfriend Katrina and tries to blame her death on Buffy (cf. “Dead Things” 6.13). Now, Buffy is determined to bring a murderer, and his helpers, to justice. After the first battle of Warren vs. the Slayer, Warren escapes, but not without a vow to eliminate Buffy; "I swear to god I'm gonna take you down. You piece of … " ("Seeing Red" 6.19). Meanwhile, Jonathan and Andrew are arrested and incarcerated. Jonathan, who has rebelled against Warren, accepts prison as just punishment. In contrast, Andrew adamantly believes that Warren will get them out of this rather inconvenient situation. At the same time, Warren, angry at himself for once again having been beaten by the Slayer, blames Buffy for his failures and seeks revenge. Driven by embarrassment, vengeance, fury and hate, he procures a gun and shoots at Buffy. Warren severely wounds Buffy and accidentally kills Tara, Willow’s girlfriend. The powerful witch Willow is consumed by rage and demands revenge, that is, the death of The Trio, whereas Buffy insists on bringing Warren before the authorities. In this situation Willow and Buffy represent two very different, but also two very American notions of justice. Buffy believes in the efficiency of the established legal system as an integral part of American society. Willow, however, is much more primal in her desire for revenge. From her point of view, putting the murderer and his helpers in prison does not even come close to just payment for the pain they have inflicted on certain individuals and the community in general. The biblical concept of "an-eyefor-an-eye" that Willow propagates stands in the tradition of vigilante justice. American popular culture knows a number of heroes who might be called "vigilantes." Batman, for example, is most certainly not a member of the established law enforcement. As a matter of fact, the police are most often interested in catching this mysterious figure. However, nobody

14

In the already mentioned episode “Gone” (6.11), Buffy is not terribly shocked to be faced with those unknown people who have been observing her and interfering with her life during the previous weeks, but she says: "Oh. You. So what annoying thing are you gonna do to me now?" And after the invisible nerds have been revealed to be former high-school fellows of Buffy's, her determination to bring them down is not very pronounced: “Willow: (surprised) Oh my God, Buffy! – Buffy: (pouting) I know, they're gone. I guess we should chase them. - Willow: No, your hair! (smiles) It is adorable.” This dialogue puts an end to the hunt for The Trio for that episode so that the protagonists can return to the discussion of something much more important: Buffy's new haircut.

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would deny that Batman is commonly seen as a powerful force of justice and a superhero. Superheroes like Buffy, and in this case Willow, can be put into this category as well, and have often been used in American popular culture to discuss notions of law and justice: Superheroes reflect perceptions of failed or deficient law. They are therefore another vehicle for thinking discursively about law because of what they can say about society and its perceptions of the effectiveness of law, in the context of their manifesting a pre-modern, sacralised, view of embodied justice as opposed to modern constructs of law (Bainbridge 455).

As much as the dichotomies of good and evil have become distorted, the lines between hero and villain blurred, so have ideas of what is right or wrong: The black and white distinction between heroes and villains is eroded, the genre throws into question ideas of law and justice, differences between morality and law and evil and illegality (where actions can be good but illegal and legal but evil). (Bainbridge 460)

It is important to observe which solution the creators of the show present to the audience. They could choose to put Warren into prison, in accordance to the law. However, this solution might not seem satisfactory to Willow (and some members of the audience). The other option would be to take Warren’s life as a punishment for his crimes. Consequently, the last three episodes of BtVS are devoted to discussing questions of justice, law, and vigilantism. The audience is offered different positions and ideas through the dialogues of the principal characters. In the episode “Villains” (6.20), Xander, Buffy, and her little sister Dawn are sitting in the livingroom of the Summer's house, after the lifeless body of Tara has just been taken away by the coroner. The mood of the characters is subdued, and in this situation they each voice emotions and opinions: Buffy: Xander: Dawn: Buffy: Dawn: 15

(sighing) We need to find Willow. Yeah, she's off the wagon big-time. Warren's a dead man if she finds him.15 (bitterly) Good. Dawn, don't say that. Why not? (The others look at her) I'd do it myself if I could.

Previously in Season Six, Willow had become addicted to using magic. After getting “clean” Tara’s death has made Willow use magic more fiercely than ever before.

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102 Buffy: Dawn: Xander: Buffy: Xander: Buffy: Dawn: Buffy:

Because you don't really feel that way. Yes I do. And you should too. He killed Tara, and he nearly killed you. He needs to pay. Out of the mouths of babes. Xander. I'm just saying he's … he's just as bad as any vampire you've sent to dustville. Being a Slayer doesn't give me a license to kill. Warren's human. (scoffs) So? So the human world has its own rules for dealing with people like him.

Whereas some viewers will undoubtedly be supportive of Buffy and her decision to deliver Warren to the legal system, others may be slightly disappointed and feel more compassion for Dawn and Xander who would not mind seeing Willow ridding the world of Warren once and for all, and exacting revenge for Buffy and Tara. As mentioned above, this episode is used to negotiate divergent ideas of law and justice. However, law and justice, especially in popular culture, are not necessarily one and the same: “justice and law differ in kind; justice is transcendent or (quasi-transcendent) and is not deconstructible, while law is imminent and deconstructible” (Litowitz 97). If we contend that films and television shows are always closely connected with the times they are produced in, which means they represent values and ideals which are acknowledged in dominant culture, the resolution to the problem discussed above echoes the problematic relationship of law and justice in modern American society. Willow eventually catches up with Warren and kills him in a rather gruesome manner. One interpretation of this scene would be that Warren, who has remorselessly killed two young women, and proved himself to be evil, has deserved to die. Whether this death had to be quite as drastic may be arguable. Nevertheless, Warren was recognized as evil and thus his own death is an inevitable consequence. Jonathan and Andrew, on the other hand, have not displayed true wickedness and should therefore be dealt with by the legal system of the community. Buffy and her friends emphasize consistently that they do not protect Jonathan and Andrew from Willow’s wrath because they like the boys so much, but because they do not want Willow to cross a line, after which she might be irrevocably lost: “The only reason it happens to be your lucky day? Is because Willow kills you, she crosses a line, I lose a friend. And I hate losing” (Buffy in “Two To Go” 6.21). Apparently, the act of taking revenge on an evil murderer can be condoned (even though a universe in which superheroes battle supernatural creatures might make it

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easier to follow through with such a drastic resolution), whereas the killing of Warren’s helpers, Jonathan and Andrew, would go too far. The audience is thus faced with a complex web of logic, determining the oftenminute differences between law and justice in which the writers and creators of the show present us with possible, but never final, answers that invite continuous discussion and negotiation.

4. Conclusion For The Trio the idea of “nemesis” is firmly entrenched in American popular culture. It is an amalgamation of all the images of supervillains that Warren, Jonathan and Andrew have encountered in films, television, comic books, and video games. These fictional characters are an essential part of their cultural repertoire and set the frame of reference in their daily lives. The Trio establish their nemesis figures by imitating models from fictional narratives. They are so immersed in these worlds that they even use the language from these fictional universes to communicate with each other. For all their attempts in styling themselves as nemeses, they only succeed in making the Slayer into their own nemesis, but never the other way around. In the end, the Slayer is the one who attempts to deal out just punishment – at least to Jonathan and Andrew, and she is definitely triumphant as a strong opponent who cannot be overcome. Dealing with The Trio seems simple enough when Buffy insists on bringing the three nerds to justice, that is, into prison. However, using the television show to negotiate notions of justice, the writers and creators of BtVS place the audience before the difficult task of deciding for themselves if and how justice should be served, and if justice and law might in fact be two different concepts that require active interpretation. Seeing how Buffy is almost entirely unsuccessful in her desire to bring The Trio to justice – Warren having been killed by Willow, Andrew and Jonathan escaping to Mexico – the show does not provide the audiences with comfortable and classic solutions to a problem, but encourages them to critically analyze social norms and values and eventually make up their own minds.

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Works Cited Atsma, Aaron J. Theoi Greek Mythology. Exploring Mythology in Classical Literature and Art. 2001-2011. Web. 2 March 2011. Bainbridge, Jason. “This is the Authority. This Planet is Under Our Protection: An Exegesis of Superheroes’ Interrogation of Law.” Law, Culture and the Humanities 3 (2007): 455-476. Print. Russel, Howard and Valyssia, eds. BuffyWorld. Web. 2 March 2011. Gray, Barbara. “In Theory. Negotiating With Your Nemesis.” Negotiation Journal. 19.4 (2003): 299-310. Print. Greene, David M. “The Identity of the Emblematic Nemesis.” Studies in the Renaissance. 10 (1963): 25-43. Print. Litowitz, Douglas. Postmodern Philosophy and Law. Lawrence: UP of Kansas, 1997. Print. Whedon, Joss. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Seasons 1-7. Fox, Los Angeles. 1997-2003. DVD.

Of all the Big Bads that Buffy defeats, Caleb is, according to Bonnie Jett Adams, the most troubling, humorous, and complex. While some might see Caleb - with his priest’s collar, misogynist declarations, and religious zealotry - as a too obvious representation of Whedon’s feminist sensibilities, Adams sees far more. By presenting the most conspicuous of stereotypes, Whedon is able to cleverly subvert them and thus challenge the audience to face our own internalized prejudices about sexuality, gender, and the nature of evil. In this way, through the use of Caleb’s (unintentional) humor, we learn the importance of self-reflection as an antidote to complacency.

CHAPTER EIGHT CALEB, THE FIRST EVIL, AND “THAT MOST PRECIOUS INVENTION OF ALL MANKIND: THE NOTION OF GOODNESS” BONNIE JETT ADAMS

Joss Whedon has always been outspoken about the fact that in Buffy Summers he wanted to present a new feminist hero; with Buffy, Whedon sought to subvert the horror film trope of the pretty blonde girl as near instant victim, offering instead that same potential damsel in distress as the force that defeats a succession of worthy adversaries.1 While an undeniably feminist ethos pervades the first six seasons of the series, many of Buffy’s battles are on the surface more connected with the broader issues of identity, responsibility, and the need for self-reflection as a means to redemptive action – less so on explicitly feminist themes. The fact that 1

Whedon has often spoken of his inspiration for creating Buffy: “[The character] basically came through my love of horror movies and [ … ] seeing the trend of the blonde girl who always got killed [. . . .] I thought, I want to see the movie where she walks into a dark alley, a monster attacks her, and she just wails on him.” (qtd.in Longworth 52-3) As Buffy herself notes in the series finale, “You know me – not much with the damseling” (“Chosen,” 7.22).

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these issues appear camouflaged in guises of recognizable monsters has been a consistent source of critical praise, as they enable Whedon to promote his feminist agenda without putting too fine a point on it. Yet some viewers complain that with Season Seven’s introduction of Caleb – an ex-preacher whose very vocal and visceral hatred of women echoes the worst of the early Church fathers – Whedon takes a too obvious route.2 Certainly there is no denying that Caleb – with his priest’s collar and all-too-familiar misogynist declarations – appears an over-the-top, obvious representation of the previously subtle gender inequalities against which Buffy fought for the better part of seven seasons. Yet some elements of Caleb’s characterization save him from the label of stock villain – primarily that even as he is aligned with the series’ Biggest Bad, the First Evil, he also provides unexpected comic relief. As those familiar with Whedon’s work are well aware, he has seemingly mastered the art of subverting the most recognizable archetypes, turning them into something altogether unexpected, and Caleb is no exception. While it’s not surprising that his utter depravity and religious zealotry are the essence of why he is so horrifying, the fact that they are also fodder for comedy is a departure from the norm. Whedon further deviates from the expected in subtly coloring Caleb in shades of the sexualized female; Caleb’s characterization as such satirizes the traditional misogynist agenda that would make women passive sexual objects in an effort to mask what Whedon himself has labeled the root of much of the misogyny pervading a number of cultures: the fear of female reproductive power and the inherent strength that comes with it.3 While I 2

Such critics note Caleb’s absence of layers; a misogynist ex-clergyman whose sole purpose is to hurt women, his motivation no more complex than a clearly irrational hatred of them that hardly represents the kind of subtlety for which the series had been recognized and praised. Indeed, K. Dale Koontz acknowledges that for much of Buffy’s audience, Caleb seems a “false note”: “Buffy re-imagined so many of the standard tropes of network television that to many viewers, Caleb appeared to be a step backward rather than a step forward[. …] After all, as an expreacher with a pathological hatred of women, Caleb was not only undemonic, but seemed at first blush to be a delivery from the Stock Villains warehouse” (164). Patricia Pender echoes this sentiment, noting that “Season seven eschews to a certain extent the metaphorical slipperiness and pop-cultural play that is typical of its evocation of postmodern demons and instead presents a monster that is, quite literally, ‘an enemy of women’” (453). 3 In a now widely-circulated post on whedonesque.com entitled, “Let’s All Watch A Woman Get Beaten to Death,” Whedon struggles to get to the root of why misogyny is so pervasive across cultures; his central thesis is that “Womb Envy” is to blame: “Biology: women are generally smaller and weaker. But they’re also

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agree with Whedon’s argument, I would posit that this fear manifests itself in Buffy less as specific to female reproductive power and more as a general fear of Buffy’s innate strength. His mythology of the slayer as female disrupts the traditional patriarchal structure. Likewise, Whedon also cleverly draws subtle parallels between Caleb and the mother of all “dirty girls,” Eve, and it is through these comic echoes that he makes some of his more powerful statements regarding the dangers of blind obedience and absolutism. Yet it is Caleb’s role as the physical embodiment of the First Evil that enables Whedon to truly bring the series full circle and to a satisfying conclusion: Caleb’s willingness to blindly follow the First Evil (whose agenda clearly involves convincing individuals that they are beyond redemption and should therefore embrace evil), coupled with his inherent misogyny, further underscores the series’ most fundamental concern: the importance of self-reflection as an antidote to complacency and a catalyst for positive change – in many cases, the ongoing quest for redemption. While at first glance Caleb may appear a tad too sinister to fit the stereotype of the comic buffoon, Whedon makes him the butt of the joke on more than one occasion, primarily through attributing to the character stereotypical elements of what Caleb so despises, the sexualized female.4 As such, Whedon symbolically castrates Caleb (a pre-cursor to his literal castration), simultaneously placing him in the role to which misogyny relegates women: object. In the episode “End of Days,” (7.21) as Caleb begins to lose patience with Buffy’s ability to hold her own in a fight, The First (in the guise of Buffy, the form in which it most often appears to Caleb), purrs seductively, “Your strength is waning. It has been quite some time since we’ve … merged.” Sarah Michelle Gellar’s delivery of the line makes its sexual subtext abundantly clear, and the remaining dialogue further cements the metaphor of intercourse: When Caleb quickly responds, “Maybe you’re right. Okay, let’s do it,” the First-as-Buffy teases, “Boy, you sure do know how to romance a girl. No flowers, no dinner, no tour of the rectory. Just, ‘Okay, I’m ready. Let’s do it.’ Help me; my knees are weak.” Caleb, however, is not amused, admonishing in tones much tougher. Put simply, men are strong enough to overpower a woman and propagate. Women are tough enough to have and nurture children, with or without the aid of a man.” 4 As has traditionally been the foundation of misogyny, particularly within the Church, Caleb’s irrational revulsion toward women clearly stems from fear of their sexual power; he employs the standard derogatory misogynist vocabulary, referring to various female characters as alternately “bitch,” “whore,” “dirty,” and “splits” (7.22, 7.18).

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reminiscent of the stereotypical overly sentimental female,5 “Watch what you say now. … This is a sacred experience for me.” In an effort to no doubt placate Caleb (much like a teenage boy might attempt to persuade a reluctant girl), the First tells him, “When this is all over … and our will sweeps the world, I will be able to enter every man, woman, and child on this earth, just as I enter you.” The barely veiled allusion here to sex (with Caleb again in the role of female object) serves as a prelude to the final comic instance in which Caleb’s pointed feminization effectively subverts his misogyny: He responds quite seriously, “Are you trying to make me jealous?” (7.21). As the First Evil’s only weakness is its inability to achieve corporeality, it relies on Caleb to be its physical manifestation and, as such, carry out its desires. The fact that bodiliness – traditionally associated with the female, in contrast to masculine reason – is literally the connection between Caleb and the First is certainly not an unintentional irony, nor is the resulting feminization of Caleb as vessel. For centuries, Church Fathers have perpetuated binary thinking that aligns men with reason and intellect (virtuous attributes that may lead to enlightenment), while associating the female with the flesh (long considered an impediment to spiritual ascension). Such binary thinking in turn promotes an obvious gendered hierarchy, with men as paragons of reason in positions of authority over their irrational, appetite-driven female counterparts. In the case of Caleb as bodily-vehicle for the First, the vehement misogynist here assumes the traditionally inferior female role, that of the flesh. Likewise, when Caleb allows the First to achieve corporeality through him, he becomes both literal and symbolic vessel. In a scene confirming the First as the source of Caleb’s supernatural abilities, instead of placing the emphasis on Caleb’s remarkable strength, the dialogue is marked by language that places him not just in the role of the female, but even better (and funnier), yet again in the position of the sexualized female. He tells the First, “And you’re in me,” in response to which the First reminds Caleb that he is “the only man strong enough to be my vessel” (emphasis mine). The fact that Caleb responds to the First’s declaration with a somber, “Amen” – oblivious to the sexual implications of his position as vessel for the First – is yet another rich source of comic and dramatic irony. One need not be a Freudian scholar to immediately recognize the associations between the empty vessel and female genitalia, but this connection comically escapes 5

This is not the only instance in which Caleb unconsciously channels the stereotypical female; in explaining why he still wears “the outfit” (priest’s collar), he answers, “Man can’t turn his back on what he come from. Besides, black is slimming; everyone knows that” (7.18)

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Caleb’s notice. Yet Caleb as the necessary vessel through which the First can sustain life, at least inasmuch as it feeds off of Caleb’s body in order to gain strength, serves yet another important function: it parallels Caleb with the expectant mother whose womb is quite literally a vessel necessary to sustain the life growing inside of her. This parallel, then, relates to Whedon’s theory of “Womb Envy,” with Caleb in the role of pregnant female. The fact that Caleb himself might suffer from a bit of subconscious Womb Envy is borne out in his preferred method of slaughtering women: slashing them across the lower abdomen in a move that literally and symbolically destabilizes their reproductive power. Whedon’s death scene for Caleb is his most wickedly comic swipe, for Buffy deals the final blow not by staking him (which, with all its phallic implications, might have been poetic justice but wouldn’t have worked within the framework of the story as Caleb isn’t a vampire). Instead, she literally castrates him, splitting him up the middle with her own weapon, a sharp scythe steeped in a feminine history echoed by its curve.6 Buffy’s castration of Caleb is particularly resonant given his final words: He snarls, “Stupid girl (emphasis mine). You’ll never stop me.” She cuts him short with a blade to the crotch, just as he begins, “You don’t have the ba-” His reference to Buffy as a “girl” isn’t his first reference to her as such (nor is it his worst moniker for a female), yet he clearly attempts here to seize the superior position through infantilizing her, a longstanding favorite misogynist strategy with which he’s obviously familiar – and fond of.7 Similarly, the implication of what would’ve been his final statement – “You don’t have the balls” – again represents a last ditch effort to claim the masculine authority that he believes is his: by sole virtue of the fact that she’s female, she can’t possibly defeat him. Buffy’s casual, “Who does nowadays?” represents a symbolic rhetorical silencing of the misogynist agenda for which Caleb stands. Yet Whedon isn’t content simply to leave it at that. Angel regains consciousness and demands, “Where is he?” Buffy snickers, gesturing to Caleb’s lifeless body as she quips, “Oh, he had to split” (7.22). The joke works on two levels: First, it .

6

In “End of Days” the female Guardian explains the origins of the scythe to Buffy, noting that it was forged centuries before by “women who want to help and protect you” (7.21). 7 In “Empty Places,” upon seeing Buffy in tears at her desk, Caleb remarks, “Things don’t go your way, so here come the waterworks. Ain’t that just like a woman?” Shortly thereafter, he refers to her as “little girl,” then “sweet pea,” admonishing her to “Mind your manners.” As he leaves, he says, “See you soon, little lady.” He will later refer to her again in “Touched” as “little girl,” in “End of Days” as “girlie girl” (7.19, 7.20, 7.21).

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serves as the proverbial salt in the wound, clarifying on the off chance that the viewer might’ve missed it that yes, she actually castrated him. Second, and most pointedly, it serves as a callback to Caleb’s earlier reference to women as “splits” (7.18). Once again, Caleb is symbolically aligned with the female in the most corporeal way; his misogynist slur for female genitalia now serves as perhaps the most apropos term to describe him. Caleb not only reflects bodily aspects of the female; further aligning him with the fairer sex is his blissful obliviousness to the fact that, in his insatiable desire for knowledge (the forbidden kind, of course), he mirrors the mother of all evil (according to his own belief system) – Eve. Just as Eve sinned so as “to add what wants in female sex” (Milton, Paradise Lost 9.823-24), Caleb does the First’s bidding so that he, too, might obtain the knowledge that would elevate him to the level of a deity – well above the men and women he claims disgust him with their “urges” (7.18). The closest he comes to addressing why he ultimately left the Church is to claim in “Dirty Girls” that “There was a reason I never spent too long in one parish. Just looking for answers. … Then you [the First] showed me the light.” In a moment of further remarkable (and comic) lack of selfawareness, Caleb then waxes rhapsodic about Eve, stating, “There once was a woman, but she was foul, like all women, for Adam’s rib was dirty – just like Adam himself – for what was he, but human? But this woman, she was filled with darkness, despair, and why? Because she did not know; she could not see” (emphasis mine). The fact that he has just admitted that he himself was driven to leave the Church in his own search for knowledge – just as Eve precipitated the Fall of man in her quest for that same knowledge – seems not to occur to him at all. Caleb’s inability to recognize the flaws in his logic cements his symbolic representation of the otherwise abstract concepts of blind obedience and zealotry (beginning with the meanings associated with his name).8 His preoccupation with seeing goes beyond his rant about Eve; Caleb in fact holds the dubious distinction of being the only “Big Bad” to permanently wound a member of the Scooby gang. In a particularly gruesome scene, he plunges his thumb through Xander’s eye, effectively blinding him. Interestingly, just before he does so, he says, “You’re the one who sees everything, aren’t you? Well, let’s see what we can’t do about that” (7.18). Read symbolically, this scene underscores Caleb as representative of the kind of zealotry that would discourage – or worse yet, prevent – others from 8

See Koontz’s discussion of the name “Caleb” as associated with loyalty and faithfulness, indicative of the fact that Caleb is a follower “faithful unto death to the First” (167).

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seeing the possibility for enlightenment, an agenda that falls in line with that of the First. Indeed, just as he rests conveniently on scripture to justify his misogyny, Caleb’s logic is tenuous at best; he clings blindly to his belief system (as represented by the First), unable to see the error of his own ways. Actor Nathan Fillion notes that Caleb “believed he was right. That was [something Whedon] taught me: Villains never think they’re the bad guy” (Entertainment Weekly March 25, 2011). Caleb’s failure to recognize himself as “the bad guy” stems in large part from his inability to acknowledge (much less do penance for) his own sins. As Koontz notes, “To Whedon, doubt is a strength,” and Caleb represents “the negative aspects of dead-certain belief” (10). Caleb’s beliefs aren’t just doubt free; they are not even subject to a hint of questioning on his part. This is, however, yet another source of the character’s comic value. When it comes to his belief system, Caleb reveals himself to be, not surprisingly, a fan of the easy answer. At one point, he claims that he “never was much for the good book” (in spite of his aforementioned penchant for occasionally quoting scripture), adding, "I find it a tad complicated. I like to keep things simple: Good folk, bad folk, clean folk, dirty folk” (7.18). One can safely assume that Caleb’s disdain for the more “complicated” parts of the Bible stems from his lack of interest in genuinely searching for whatever truths it may harbor; instead, he clearly prefers sticking with the parts that suit his agenda. Besides, as we all know, “scripture (canonical or not) can be used to support just about any position, whether equality or slavery, the blessings of saving grace or the heavy boot of the punishing law” (Koontz 179). Like so many figures who are dark marks in history for committing atrocities in the name of scripture, in Caleb’s mind there is no room for true questioning or the kind of doubt that might lead to self-reflection. For example, Caleb often frames his most violent actions toward women in the all-too-familiar rhetoric of purification. As he burns Shannon with the imprint of his ring, he exclaims maniacally, “That’s it! That’s a cleansing fire! Hallelujah!” He echoes this language when he tells Buffy, “I need you fit for when I purify you” (7.18). Caleb clearly doesn’t give much thought to his whole plan of purification; after all, he doesn’t attempt to cleanse the women he encounters so much as he seeks to eradicate them. It’s obvious from his various rants that he doesn’t even believe women are capable of purification or redemption; they are, after all (according to his espoused beliefs) born dirty and without souls. Yet again, it is this blind certainty that renders him simultaneously horrific and comical. From his earliest moments on screen, it is obvious that despite his fondness for preaching,

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Caleb clearly doesn’t heed his own words, oftentimes blatantly and comically contradicting himself. For example, in the opening scene of the aptly named “Dirty Girls,” just after he unexpectedly calls Shannon a whore, he immediately adds, “Now I know what you’re thinkin’: Crazy preacher man spoutin’ off at the mouth about the whore of Babylon or some-such. That ain’t me.” Shannon’s bewildered expression mirrors our reaction: Really? He goes on to reassure her that “I ain’t here to lecture you,” then proceeds to do exactly that, informing her that his words “would just curdle in your ears. Wouldn’t take in a thing. Head’s filled with so much filth that ain’t no room for words of truth. Well, you know what you are, Shannon? Dirty.” Shortly after this speech he burns Shannon, proclaiming the act a “cleansing fire.” Caleb often accuses Buffy and her fellow potentials of “just burning with righteousness” – another moment of comic and dramatic irony, as this is an apt description of Caleb himself. It is this very comic lack of self-awareness that surfaces again and again in small moments, often breaking the sustained tension that hangs heavily across the final several episodes of the series. After Caleb asks the First to show him visions of girls he’d previously killed, the First observes, “Most people don’t like visits from their dead, you know.” Oblivious to the First’s implication that Caleb is more depraved than the average killer, Caleb mutters in complete seriousness, “Heathens. No appreciation for life’s pleasures” (7.18). But Caleb doesn’t stray away from all philosophical musing; it is, in fact, the two instances in which he indulges in a little thinking out loud that make for perhaps his funniest moments. For example, after a pivotal confrontation with Buffy in which he proves himself superior in strength, Caleb returns to the First, and rather than relishing the fact that he has shaken the indomitable Slayer, he instead muses thoughtfully, “You know what I figured out tonight? Every high school in this country, from one end to the other, smells exactly alike. Now, why do you suppose that is?” (“Empty Places” 7.19). This philosophical gem is trumped only by the brief moment when we see him truly contemplating a Biblical parable: In hoisting a glass of red wine, he intones, “Drink of this, for it is my blood.” You know, I always loved the story of the Last Supper. … The body and blood of Christ becoming rich, red wine. I recall as a boy, though, I couldn’t help but think: what would happen if you were at the Last Supper, and you ordered the white? A nice oaky Chardonnay or White Zin … I mean, would he make that out of his lymph or some-all? (7.18).

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This clearly comical and irreverent line is one of Caleb’s moments that resulted in denouncements of the show as immoral and blasphemous.9 The criticism was nothing new; the series was frequently a target of Fundamentalist Christian groups, who were quick to seize on the obvious “distractions” – the presence of demons and vampires, the fact that the teenaged characters engaged in premarital sex – while oftentimes missing the much more prevalent, overarching themes that defined the series (primarily those of redemption and salvation). The Parents Television Council’s (PTC) denouncement of Caleb as a “bigoted slap in the face to Christians everywhere” (qtd. in Koontz 167) – without regard for the fact that he is clearly not affiliated with the church – echoes Caleb’s own absolute declarations of women as dirty: Both reactions are clearly kneejerk, and neither sentiment rests on clear logic or solid reasoning. The irony in this is, of course, that in making such accusations (and indeed, in reacting so strongly), such groups as the PTC and Dove Foundation only further illustrate Whedon’s point regarding the dangers inherent in zealotry and the potential pitfalls of blinding oneself by taking things only at face value – never delving beneath the surface to divine the truths in the subtext. Stevenson echoes this sentiment, noting, “Christian scholars [ … ] counter that it is by engaging works that confront the reality of evil, the depth of human failings, and the complexity of moral choices within a framework that also embraces redemption, forgiveness, and mercy that we gain greater understanding of ourselves and the world in which we live” (19). Indeed, Caleb’s zealotry and lack of self-awareness not only serve as comic relief, but they also effectively illustrate the series’ longstanding emphasis on self-reflection and the resulting desire to – put simply – do and be better as a means to redemption. In fact, the concepts of sin and redemption factor heavily into Whedon’s work, and they permeate throughout the seven seasons of Buffy. The crux of Angel’s characterization hinges on the fact that he is a vampire cursed with a soul – and the conscience to go along with it. His punishment is the acute awareness of all the atrocious acts he committed over the centuries. As he tells Buffy in Season One’s pivotal “Angel” episode, “You have no idea what it’s like to have done the things I’ve done … and to care” (1.7). Thus 9

In Televised Morality: The Case of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Gregory Stevenson mentions Caleb’s mocking comments “on the act of communion,” noting that this scene “in particular raised the ire of the Parents Television Council and the Dove Foundation (another Christian media watchdog organization), leading them to decry Buffy as anti-Christian bigotry and evidence of Hollywood’s moral decline” (15).

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the primary catalyst for most of Angel’s actions is, in fact, his search for redemption. Although Spike’s re-ensoulment is the result of his quest to reclaim his soul, he, like Angel, is driven by his awareness of the wrongs he has committed, the most heinous among them being his attempted rape of Buffy. As Rhonda Wilcox notes, “Spike’s attack on Buffy represents his attacks on all his earlier victims: the horror is brought home. … The breaking of trust in the attempted rape scene is so shattering that it propels Spike to earn his soul” (36, 89). Indeed, while initially a bona fide villain, Spike emerges in Season Seven as a fully redeemed “champion.”10 Clearly, Whedon places value on self-reflection, and in the world of Buffy, self-awareness is often the first step toward taking corrective action and achieving redemption. While the series is littered with “Big Bads,” none works counter to this ethos more than the First Evil. Initially introduced in the Season Three episode “Amends,” the First describes itself to Buffy (referring to her in tones reminiscent of Caleb: “little girl”)11 as “Beyond sin, beyond death. I am the thing the darkness fears. You’ll never see me, but I am everywhere. Every being, every thought, every drop of hate” (3.10). The character itself (if indeed the First can be referred to as such) at first glance might seem to symbolize all that is wrong in the world, an embodiment of all the injustices and crimes against which Buffy has fought and the earliest manifestation of such wrongs – hence the title “the First” as referring to the ordinal number one. But if we consider the title not as indicative of chronology, but as a precursor (i.e. something that comes before), the notion of the First as metaphor becomes more concrete. (And after all, in Whedon’s work, monsters are nothing if not metaphors with horns and fangs.) Thus, if the series prioritizes self-reflection as the precursor to good deeds and oftentimes redemption, then the antithesis of that would be self-imposed moral blindness – indifference, if you will. Working under this assumption, one might argue that as a non-corporeal entity, the First represents the unrealized potential for moral blindness – the precursor to complacency. It exists in all of us, as the First tells Buffy, yet it cannot achieve corporeality (or manifest itself) without a willing vessel. Caleb, 10

In the series’ final episode, Buffy tells Spike that the amulet Angel had previously given to her is “meant to be worn by a champion” before carefully placing it in his (Spike’s) hand. He chuckles, then remarks, “Been called a lot of things in my time ” (7.22). The scene is pivotal in its implication that Spike has fully redeemed himself for his past transgressions. 11 The First bears traditional hallmarks of misogyny, particularly in its effort to reduce Buffy to the level of sexual object, telling Angel, “She wants you to touch her,” and later urging him to “Take her” (3.10).

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then, represents a metaphor for embracing that potential, as he is the embodiment of blind belief (zealotry) without reflection. Caleb may be the First’s chosen vessel, but he is not its only accomplice; the Harbingers (or bringers) serve as the high priests of the First. The fact that they have no eyes again signifies the willful blindness that the First itself symbolizes (also foreshadowing Caleb’s blind zealotry and his subsequent literal blinding of Xander). Yet their blindness also serves as an apt metaphor for the source of their power, which involves attempting to demoralize individuals so that they become blind to the possibility for redemption. As Giles explains in “Amends,” “They can conjure spirit manifestations and set them on people, influence them, haunt them.” Indeed, the bringers do an effective job of haunting Angel with images of people he has tortured and killed. Yet they aren’t driven solely by the desire to make Angel feel guilty for his past misdeeds (the specter of Jenny Calendar tells him, “I don’t want to make you feel bad”); instead, they prey on his self-loathing, emphasizing to him that he is a monster incapable of change. As Jenny’s image morphs into that of Daniel, the young man Angel killed in 1838, he finishes her statement: “I just want to show you who you are.” Jenny will repeat this sentiment in a later scene, with the minor alteration, “This is what you are” (emphasis mine). In both cases, the use of the word “are” denotes permanence, the implication that evil is not merely a facet of Angel’s being; rather, it is his being, and as such, is inescapable. This notion continues in a later scene when Jenny tells him, “Cruelty’s the only thing you ever had a true talent for. … You mistake it for a curse, Angel, but it’s not; it’s your destiny.” Again, the concept of “destiny” connotes a foregone conclusion and runs counter to the possibility for free will – the same free will that has for decades driven Angel to good deeds (resisting the urge to feed on humans, helping Buffy slay vampires who do embrace their dark side), all in an effort to seek redemption for his past misdeeds. The fact that the Bringers who are responsible for Angel’s visions of Jenny and Daniel are themselves blind further underscores the First’s agenda of blinding individuals (in this case Angel) to the possibility of correcting past misdeeds and acting for good. It is evident in the episode’s climactic confrontation between Buffy and Angel that he has internalized the words of the ghosts in his visions and has been successfully blinded to even the notion of redeeming himself. He tells Buffy that the First Evil “was showing me … what I am.” His response to Buffy’s vehement, “were” signifies that the First appears to have triumphed, as he finishes, “And ever shall be.” His statement reflects the resignation and hopelessness against which the series as a whole works; likewise, Buffy’s impassioned response reiterates what Whedon

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has illustrated across the show’s seven seasons: “You’re weak. Everybody is. Everybody fails. … You have the power to do real good. … Strong is fighting! It’s hard, and it’s painful, and it’s every day. It’s what we have to do.” The fact that Buffy’s speech is interrupted by lightly falling snow appearing as if out of nowhere (and on Christmas, deepening the suggestion of Divine intervention) puts the issue of the First to rest for a while. It is – however temporarily – defeated by hope, and Angel goes on to continue resisting his darkest impulses, instead choosing to fight for good. As he will say in “Epiphany,” the sixteenth episode of Angel’s second season, “If nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we do.” And therein lies the spirit of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: We all face demons as varied as the monsters scattered throughout the series’ seven seasons. Yet none is perhaps more powerful than those represented by the First Evil: giving in to the easy thing, resisting the need for the oftentimes difficult soul-searching that is such a vital part of growth and surrendering instead to the resignation and complacency that enable one to wave away injustice as inevitable. Caleb tells Buffy, “[You’re] the most aflame with that most precious invention of all mankind – the notion of goodness” (“Dirty Girls”). Indeed, he serves as an apt final villain in a series that concerns itself with the need for constant vigilance, particularly in the face of gender inequality. After all, misogyny extends far beyond the realm of just our country or even Christianity itself, and its justifications are seemingly impenetrable – at least through the lens of logic. Yet as Caleb illustrates, blind following leads to catastrophe, and behind most misogyny lies a fear that is as palpable as it is insidious. If one were to take on the daunting task of attempting to synthesize the “moral” of a series as rich and complex as Buffy, one need look no further than Whedon’s own words: “All I ask is this: Do something. Try something. … Nudge yourself past the brink of tacit support to action. … I have never had any faith in humanity. But I will give us props on this: if we can evolve, invent and theorize our way into the technologically magical, culturally diverse and artistically magnificent race we are and still get people to buy the idiotic idea that half of us are inferior, we’re pretty amazing. Let our next sleight of hand be to make that myth disappear” (“Let’s All Watch A Girl Get Beaten To Death”).

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Works Cited Jensen, Jeff. “The Fillion Files.” Entertainment Weekly 25 March 2011: 44. Print. Koontz, K. Dale. Faith and Choice in the Works of Joss Whedon. Jefferson: McFarland, 2008. Print. Longworth, James. “Joss Whedon, Feminist.” Joss Whedon Conversations. Eds. David Lavery and Cynthia Burkhead. Jackson: UP of Mississippi, 2011. 42-63. Print. Milton, John. Paradise Lost. 1667. The Broadview Anthology of British Literature. Eds. Joseph Black, Leonard Conolly, and Kate Flint, et. al. Concise ed. Vol. A. Toronto: Broadview P, 2007. 998-1058. Print. Pender, Patricia. “‘Kicking Ass is Comfort Food’: Buffy as Third Wave Feminist Icon.” The World is a Text: Writing, Reading, and Thinking About Visual and Popular Culture. Eds. Jonathan Silverman and Dean Rader. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2009. 449-458. Print. Stevenson, Gregory. Televised Morality: The Case of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Dallas: Hamilton, 2003. Print. Whedon, Joss, “Let’s All Watch A Woman Get Beaten To Death.” Web. 20 May 2007. Wilcox, Rhonda. Why Buffy Matters. London: I.B. Tauris, 2005. Print.

PART III: “AND I SLAYED. MY WORK HERE IS DONE!” THE CONTINUING ALLURE OF ALL THINGS BUFFY

According to Ruth Caillouet, dating a dead boyfriend has many advantages that have been well documented by the plethora of narratives featuring brooding angst ridden vampires, ghosts, and other (un)dead boys/men perpetually frozen at the peak of their masculine perfection. Caillouet’s examination of three popular relationships reveals some surprising parallels in their life-and-death love stories and some intriguing discoveries about popular culture and visions of romance that go far beyond the simple notion that dead men make far more pliable lovers than the guy next door.

CHAPTER NINE I DATE DEAD PEOPLE: BUFFY, BELLA, SOOKIE, AND THE LURE OF THE DEAD BOYFRIEND RUTH CAILLOUET

Dating a dead boyfriend has its advantages—at least according to Buffy Summers, Bella Swan, Sookie Stackhouse, and their countless female fans. While Joss Whedon’s vampire-slaying superhero from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer film, television show, and comic books, and Stephenie Meyer’s clumsy damsel-in-distress from the Twilight book and film series may seem to have little in common, both young adults struggle with the same teenage angst in their day-to-day lives, including single parent homes and troubles with fitting in with the crowd. Buffy Summers’ attraction to Angel, and later Spike, and Bella’s hopeless devotion to Edward Cullen put them in a small club of young women in love with cold, breathless “good” vampires. But Buffy and Bella are not the only young women infatuated with (un)dead people. Another popular smittenand-bitten young woman, Sookie Stackhouse, of Charlaine Harris’s Southern Vampire Mystery books and True Blood television show, finds herself hopelessly entwined with vampires, leaving the audience uncertain as to whether vampire Bill Compton or Eric Northman will be her final choice. The most logical connection among the stories of these young

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women—Buffy, Bella, and Sookie—is, of course, that they all happen to love dead people, but closer examination reveals some surprising parallels in their life-and-death love stories and some intriguing discoveries about popular culture and visions of romance. Lovers of ghosts, monsters, and others have been a part of mythology and popular culture for centuries. Monstrous figures, and the objects of their affection, have continued to unfold through legend, fairytale, and film, and for years, Saturday matinees and late-night television movies featured the love stories of King Kong, Frankenstein, hunchbacks, and phantoms. Stage productions depicted many of these same characters, including beauties and beasts in various forms. Demon and fairy lovers have lured mortals astray in countless early legends including the tales of King Arthur and Odysseus. Mysterious islands and castles whose inhabitants--often old women in beauty’s disguise--use magical spells to entrap unsuspecting travelers--often strong but naïve men--hold a magical place in many ancient tales. These monsters, creatures, and witches, however, are distinctly different from the recent trend in popular culture in that they are all mostly alive and often non or super human. Many of the early traditions of love between monster and mortal were also one sided, with the mortal sometimes not even aware of the affection or often ensnared in a magical web. The fear and screaming by the maiden in King Kong’s grasp illustrates the lack of mutual affection. Myths and legends of vampires date back to the earliest civilizations but became more prevalent in European folklore in the 18th century. The storyline of a sophisticated and charismatic vampire became a popular trend as early as 1819 with John Polidori’s novella The Vampyre. Lord Byron’s story in the same year inspired a portrait by Phillip Burne-Jones called The Vampire in 1897, the same year as Bram Stoker’s novel, Dracula. Twenty-five years before Dracula was written, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu wrote Carmilla, the story of a female vampire, which inspired an entire lesbian vampire tradition. Depictions of the vampire in film began in 1922 when the silent film, Nosferatu, first brought the image of the Dracula-figure to the silver screen and into the romantic vision of popular culture. Count Orlok’s attraction to another man’s wife ultimately brings about his death as his final moment of ecstasy, drinking her blood while in a tight embrace, transpires just before his realization that the sun has risen. Orlok bursts into flame as he steps into the light, perhaps never realizing that the object of his affection had purposelessly lured him to his demise. This early film and Stoker’s 1897 novel, like many ancient legends of monsters and demons, show a one-sided attraction and some mesmerizing powers on the part of the vampire. While romantic attraction exists, there

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is not a mutual love, as the vampire often relies on control over his or her victim rather than the pursuit of mutual desire. In more recent years, television shows and films such as King Kong, Frankenstein, Star Trek, Bewitched, Flipper, and Lassie are filled with different forms of human/non-human love—love between giant gorillas and fair maidens, love between monster and creator, boy and dog, between witches and mere mortals, even between a dolphin and two children. Love’s power to transcend space, time, race, and even species has become a symbolic part of popular culture allowing writers to use plot lines to make statements about acceptance in multiple forms. Star Trek, for instance, featured the first televised interracial kiss (Star Trek “Plato’s Stepchildren” 1968). These romances, however, were always depictions of living creatures, albeit sometimes in unusual form, loving one another. Loving the undead carries with it quite different connotations than interspecies dating. Mutual love, and shared attraction between the living and the dead, holds some unique characteristics and obstacles for protagonists. In 1947, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir portrayed the story of a widow infatuated with her resident ghost, a debonair gentleman who becomes her confidante and close friend. In the television production, which aired from 1968 to 1970, the tensions of life and death grow between the two figures as their relationship develops. As Mrs. Muir meets likely “living” men, she continually chooses her ghostly companion, illustrating a woman’s choice to fill her life with a “spiritual” lover rather than a solid, warm, living human being. Legends of ghost and demon lovers weave through the histories and heritage of many cultures. Ghost stories from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Macbeth to Toni Morrison’s Beloved all carry with them tales of love and relationships that tie spirits to the living. This ghost lover storyline has also recently been revisited by primetime television shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Ghost Whisperer on major networks. Dead lovers are thus very much “alive” in modern narratives. The question is “why?” Why do tales of demon lovers remain so popular generation after generation despite their resulting in fraught, unfulfilled relationships? This study explores recent fictions in which young women find themselves hopelessly devoted to lifeless lovers—particularly vampires. It also examines what dead boyfriends can possibly offer to any woman’s quality of love life. More importantly, this research determines what these stories say about our society and a young woman’s desires and explores whether it really takes a centuries-old vampire or ghost to be a good boyfriend. A quick scan of the young adult shelves of any bookstore

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reveals countless collections of vampire stories, most of which contain stories of young adult female humans in love with male vampires, rarely the opposite. Why do many young women seem to find these stories so appealing? To answer these questions and develop theories about the phenomenon, the stories of Buffy, Bella, and Sookie provide a good starting point in this analysis of the lure of the dead boyfriend.

Love, Death, and Romance: Theories of Dead Boyfriends “I have a theory. We should work this out.” —Buffy: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, (“Once More With Feeling” 6.7)

While loving dead boyfriends has become a popular young adult phenomenon, many Buffyverse critics have theorized about the storyline since the television show’s inception, and most of the theories easily apply to other dead lover narratives, even those written before Buffy’s inception. In a 2005 article, “Necrophilia and SM: The Deviant Side of Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” Terry L. Spaise argues that Buffy’s sleeping with Angel is akin to “making love with a corpse” (744), casting a dark light on their relationship. Necrophilia, by its very nature, requires a rather one-sided experience with certainly no real romantic spark or lasting mutual relationship. Spaise’s implication portrays Buffy as a somewhat twisted individual who feeds on death, not the fairly ordinary young woman who happens to be in love with the undead. Angel is certainly more than an unfeeling corpse—as are Spike, Edward, Bill, and Eric. Each of these dead lovers cares about the young woman in his life, disabusing Spaise’s notion. Spaise analyzes the specific type of necrophilia that Buffy experiences with Angel as the desire for “a reunion with a romantic partner” (747), but this assumption cannot work in this circumstance, since clearly Buffy did not know Angel before his death. She did fall for him before she knew he was a vampire, but there is no “reunion.” All of the other characters are well aware of their loved one’s true nature before committing to a relationship, and all of the young women are virgins, so they could not be imagining a sexual reunion. Perhaps each young woman is longing for a past romantic notion of love. Spaise also claims that Buffy tends toward SM in her relationship with Spike, suggesting another negative view of Buffy’s sexual needs as strictly physical rather than real affection. While Buffy and Spike do literally bring down walls during their sexual exploits, they also care very much for one another. Buffy is at first drawn to Spike because he is the only one who understands what it is like to come back from death, but she also has genuine affection for him. Spaise’s theory, however, that women who love vampires may be drawn to violence does

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bring a new possibility to the analysis of these stories, but Buffy, Bella, and Sookie seem drawn more to love—not violence. Unfortunately, violence comes as the by-product of their loves. Rhonda Wilcox, another important critic of the Buffyverse, explores many of the relationships in the series in Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She writes about the “monstrous” behavior of Angel after making love with Buffy as a type of metaphor for modern relationships in which men treat women badly after their first sexual encounter. According to Wilcox, Whedon “shows us that innocence is only fully realized after it is lost” (112). Unlike Buffy, Sookie does not seem to regret her first sexual encounter with Bill, but of course Bill does not transform into a demon in the same way that Angel does. Sookie and Bella both very much enjoy their “first time,” and Sookie, at least, does not really suffer consequences for her decision. Yet, there is the same loss of innocence for both characters and certainly irrevocable changes in their lives. Wilcox also writes of the relationship between Buffy and Spike and the complexities of Buffy’s lure toward Spike’s darkness, but Wilcox sees their relationship as a series of moments in which the two “save” each other. “Her belief in him saves him when he is tormented by the First Evil. His belief in her saves her when she has cut herself off from all others; her connection with him allows her to find herself, to be whole again” (89). Saving one another is a common theme in most of these stories. Bella truly sees Edward as the person who completes her, and Edward comes close to suicide when he realizes that they must part. Sookie looks first to Bill and later to Eric as her connection to life despite the fact that they are both dead. Like Buffy, Sookie, although no superhero slayer, physically saves each of the vampires in her life, as much as they save her both physically and emotionally. In “Frustrating Female Heroism,” Mary Magoulick analyzes the brutality and bloody fight scenes that are so much a part of Buffy’s life and every other heroic woman’s story. She sees the many battles and fights in Buffy’s story as anti-feminist, pointing to the transformation of Angel to Angelus, just after their love scene, as particularly cruel and vicious. Magoulick illustrates her point through examples from Xena: Warrior Princess, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and La Femme Nikita and emphasizes the repeated storyline of the female hero having to fight her lover--a pattern that Magoulick claims is not part of the male hero’s story (742). But Magoulick also argues that “each superheroic woman’s ‘success’ is never entirely her own because she is so dominated by the men who make and train her or control her destiny, that she owes success, to some extent,

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to these men” (742). This completely ignores the fact that, despite existing in a patriarchal universe, much of Xena’s training came from a woman, a Chinese warrior named Lao Ma, who taught the warrior how to control her inner strength. And Xena certainly owes more of her dedication to Gabrielle rather than Hercules. While Buffy may have been trained and guided by Giles, we repeatedly see that her ability is a natural instinct passed down to her by the original slayer, a woman. Even if men may have caused the origin of the First Slayer, we cannot help viewing the final episode as a feminist calling for women to stand up and fight back and a tribute to the overwhelming power of united women standing together against oppression. As to her view on how “violence and sex are often paired successfully in Western culture” (743), Magoulick claims that male heroes rarely meet their worst opponent in the woman they love while this is quite common in female heroic-verse. We may see glimpses of this in Buffy’s battle with Angelus, but it’s not Angel who kills her. Glory, another woman—or goddess, and one of Buffy’s most formidable opponents—is the villain to bring about Buffy’s death. Sookie and Bella may have disagreements with the men in their lives, but their primary opponents come from other sources, not their lovers, and none of them have the same battles against a demonic lover that Buffy faces. Magoulick also claims that “none of these women’s relationships with men is conventional, yet each woman remains incapable of full independence” (743). But Buffy and certainly Sookie are fiercely independent women who work at bars and burger joints to support themselves and their families. Even Bella who, of all of these characters, most clearly fits the traditional societal expectations for women, rebels against the many men who try to rule over her with varying amounts of success. These theories help to decipher some of the complexities of the vampire and ghost lovers’ stories, and while each young woman’s background contains a unique set of circumstances, the connections between their stories are significant to our understanding of popular romance. Allison McCracken sees Buffy’s story as a reminder of the “rewards and the risks of loving beyond social boundaries” (129). That phrase easily describes each young woman’s position since each character is often tormented by society and its pressures because of differences that set her apart. This social pressure is often evidenced through attention to physical constructs including body image, clothing choices, and beauty standards. Magoulick and Mitra Emad both critique female heroic figures for the over-sexualized body image portrayed in characters like Wonder Woman. Magoulick describes the costume worn by Xena as “ridiculously impractical,” while Emad in “Reading Wonder Woman’s Body: Mythology of Gender and

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Nation” emphasizes the cleavage of the female superhero (743). Although each of the three young women, Sookie, Buffy, and Bella is considered beautiful by those around them, Sookie is the only one whose large breasts are continually referenced—by Sookie herself. Sookie enjoys nice clothes, but Buffy’s wardrobe always seems a bit more than she should have been able to afford. Both Bella and Sookie possess a smell particularly attractive to vampires. The physical beauty of each character and the attention to clothes and body image implies some connection between physical presence and “the lure” that connects the characters to their readers also battling with unattainable beauty standards. Even though the attraction of these women to their dead boyfriends has much more to do with inner strength and spirit than to clothes or even breasts, each character entices the objects of her desire in traditional ways. Yet the “hypersexualized” body image described by Magoulick and Mitra Emad could also be interpreted as a woman wielding her best weapons (Emad 975) just as Buffy might wield a stake to defeat an opponent. The theories above help to demonstrate the parallels between the lives of these young women, revealing much about love and social constructs in today’s popular culture. But loving dead people is just one of the similarities in the lives of these young women. The Summers, Swan, and Stackhouse worlds contain many cross-references other than last names beginning with S and extreme popularity at the box office, the bookstore, and television screens. All three characters, Buffy, Bella, and Sookie come from non-traditional homes and are the children of divorced or dead parents. Each has a special ability that sets her apart from friends and other community members and creates feelings of isolation. All three become sexually active, and two of the three suffer immediate issues resulting from their first sexual encounters. All three put themselves in danger in order to help others, and two of those work toward saving individuals that they do not even know. Above all else, all three wish that they could just be “normal” young adults. By analyzing these parallels—relationships in family and community, significance of special abilities, difficulties of romance and sex, and the lure of a dead boyfriend—we can both begin to develop theories about the phenomenon of loving dead people, and analyze the significance of these trends in popular romance.

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Moms, Teachers, and the Scooby Gang: Influence of Family, Friends, and Community “You're the Slayer and we’re, like, the Slayerettes.” —Willow (“Witch” 1.3)

The tradition of parentless superheroes has long been a part of our cultural narratives, dating back to the most ancient stories such as the tales of King Arthur and Robin Hood. The young hero is often faced with a parent’s tragic death, many times at the hand of some great evil. The plot line gives the hero a motive for his or her endeavors, but it also serves to remove adult supervision—allowing for more freedom in the hero’s life. In keeping with this tradition, each of our heroines has lost one or both parents. Buffy and Bella’s parents are divorced, the modern equivalence for death of a parent in adolescent stories. Both of Sookie’s parents are dead, and Buffy ultimately loses her single mother just as Sookie loses her grandmother. The loss of parents torments each young woman and creates a sense of loneliness, but that absence of parental guidance also allows each the freedom to determine her own path. Choosing her path includes the choice of a boyfriend, and while Buffy and Bella’s single parents express some concerns over that choice when they finally learn about their daughters dating “older” men, Sookie’s grandmother could not have been more pleased with the gracious gentleman friend, Vampire Bill. All three characters also find support outside the family through friends who offer the encouragement that family may not always provide. But they also find rejection as each character’s secret life leads to tremendous preoccupation and some difficult moments. Both Buffy and Bella hide their boyfriends from friends and family, and although Sookie is quite open about her relationship, she is often ridiculed for her love of the undead. Teachers or mentors are often a part of the mythic hero’s life, but Buffy is the only one of the three with a Giles, a true guide on her mythic journey. Both Sookie and Bella can only turn to their vampire loves for any guidance. But even though Buffy trusts Giles with so many decisions about her training, the demons she must face, and even how to raise Dawn, in the end, she cannot tell him about the return of Angel to her life. Family and friends may offer some support, but these individuals need a different kind of love to help them feel more complete, and romantic love is as much a part of their desire as it might be for anyone else. For each of these characters, discovering love with someone who knows her complete purpose and special abilities outweighs the need for that

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someone to be alive. Each is also willing to hide their relationship or face the ridicule and torment that may result from their love for a vampire.

Slaying and Telepathy: Significance of Special Abilities “What is your childhood trauma?” —Cordelia (“Welcome to the Hellmouth” 1.1)

Every superhero must have a super power, something that sets her apart from the average citizen, and while heroism and super powers might not be required of an individual who loves dead people, it often seems to be part of the package. Sookie is a mind reader and Buffy, a vampire slayer. Even Bella’s special ability is being unaffected by the super powers of most of the vampires around her. Because of these super powers, the girls find themselves isolated from the world around them. How each young woman becomes “special” varies tremendously. Most of them have no choice in the matter. Buffy is “the Chosen One” who is born the slayer. She has no control over the matter and cannot quit the position regardless of how many times she tries. Sookie’s special talent— which she calls her disability—is her ability to read minds, an ability that is also a curse since she cannot develop relationships without hearing every thought of her lover. Sookie’s grandmother’s choice to sleep with a half-fairy results in Sookie’s part-fairy blood and special abilities. Bella is the only one of the three young women to have a choice in life. Although her ability to be unaffected by vampires’ special powers is important to the storyline, she would never have known of this ability without becoming involved with vampires in the first place. The powers and special abilities experienced by Sookie are revealed at a very young age. Sookie’s ability sets in when she is just a child, but she cannot hide her mental telepathy. Because of that, she is sent to a psychiatrist at a very young age and undergoes many invasive medical procedures. Even while sending Sookie for counseling, however, her father asks her to read the mind of a man in order to gain insight on a future business deal; her parents therefore utilize her skill while also treating it as though it is a mental illness. In Bella’s case, she does not discover her talent until she meets Edward, and the trait to be unaffected by a vampire’s powers is only useful against vampires. Buffy’s abilities become clear when she reaches puberty, and she is told by her first watcher, and later Giles, that her role as the slayer must remain a secret. A common factor in these stories is that two of these young women—Buffy and Sookie—are sent for psychological counseling by their parents, so

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their abilities become a source of shame or at least something to remain hidden. That isolation of each of these three characters leads each to choose someone who can understand her life and unique gifts. The choice of a dead boyfriend for these characters is due to the need to find someone who knows the whole story, someone who appreciates the young woman’s special abilities along with her unique personality. While Giles may know about Buffy’s duties and skills as a slayer, he often forgets her needs as a young woman. And even though many people know of Sookie’s telepathy, and some may even love her in spite of the gift, few truly accept her for it. Bella is the only one of the three whose secret life starts with her love for Edward, but she also must hide too much of herself for anyone else to ever understand her completely. So, in many ways, the secret lives that each character lives, along with the isolation imposed by such secrets, are part of the lure of their dead boyfriends.

Romance, Sex, and Birth Control: Some Advantages of Dead Boyfriends “Clark Kent has a job. I just want to go on a date." —Buffy (“Never Kill a Boy on the First Date” 1.5)

The advantage of dating a dead boyfriend includes long, passionate sex without fear of pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases—at least in theory. Vampires, supposedly, cannot reproduce. The phenomenon and great popularity of dead boyfriends seems to be a strange way to emphasize safe sex among young girls. What is interesting about the early romances of at least two of these characters, however, is the lack of sex. Each young lady initially has a strict moral code that keeps her out of bed with her dead boyfriend even without the fear of pregnancy. That does not mean that there is a lack of attraction between the vampire and his true love. Each relationship depicts the pull of desire, but each young woman resists the temptation. The romantic lure of the vampire has existed since the legends began or at least as early as Dracula’s mesmerizing hold on helpless women unable to resist his genteel charm and sophisticated mannerisms. Bill, Edward, and Angel are all terribly handsome, and each certainly possesses the charm and sophistication of Dracula. They actually have the experience and ability to take advantage of their loved ones, but each behaves as a gentleman, resisting temptation and protecting the honor of his girlfriend. Perhaps the most important similarity in these stories, in fact, is the age of the

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boyfriends. Their stories bring whole new meaning to the idea of dating an older man, but the tales primarily point to the advantages of dating a man from another time. The writers of all three relationships imply that gentlemen of the past treated women with more respect than modern young men. These gentlemen stand up when a woman enters the room. They are protective and drape their jackets across her shoulders if she is cold. They often fight the urge to either bite or make love or both when in the presence of their chosen woman. Each of the dead boyfriends is also from a much different time period than his love, so they force themselves to wait with patience for the right moment. Even with Bella’s constant begging, Edward refuses pre-marital sex. Bill opens the door for Sookie and speaks to her grandmother with the manners of a gentleman. The writers of these narratives seem to imply that it takes hundreds of years for a man to gain the maturity and wisdom needed to make a woman happy. But eventually, sex does come for all three of the young women. These stories illustrate the dangers of sex and the changes that a physical love brings to a relationship. With Buffy’s first sexual encounter, Angel becomes a demon. She is left blaming herself and questioning her abilities in bed while Angel, because of a curse placed on him by gypsies, returns to his evil self. The loss of virginity for Buffy brings pain and confusion that changes her relationship with Angel forever. Her torment is only worsened by the fact that Angelus, the evil Angel, kills innocent people, including Buffy’s teacher, the girlfriend of Giles. Buffy’s guilt over sleeping with Angel is magnified by the pain caused to others and the knowledge that she must kill her true love. And most scholars view Buffy’s sexual relationship with Spike as her need to punish herself. In “Buffy in the Buff,” Milavec and Kaye claim that Spike is “irresistible to Buffy because he is a monster” (178), and they point out that Buffy cannot bear telling her friends about the relationship because of her shame. While this may have been the reason the relationship began, Buffy and Spike remain close in the end because they share a similar past, and in his own way, Spike does indeed love Buffy. In the Twilight series, Bella begs Edward to make love to her throughout the series, but Edward’s honor and moral code will not allow this to happen until the two are married. When their love is finally consummated, Bella becomes pregnant almost within hours of the act. The baby inside her grows and eats like a demon, so Edward worries over his lover’s safety. In the end the only way to save baby and mother is by allowing Bella to die and be converted to a vampire. The pregnancy and childbirth scenes are filled with violence and foreboding rather than with warmth and compassion, so Bella’s story also points to the evils of sex.

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Sookie is the only young woman allowed the pleasures of sex without dark prophecies and evil doom. She enjoys her first experience with Bill and later shares intimacies with Eric and Quinn, the weretiger, all without destruction or demonic twists. It is interesting, however, that Sookie sleeps with Bill for the first time on the night after her grandmother’s brutal murder, and soon after the act she tells Bill about the uncle who molested her when she was a child. Even though the act itself is filled with love and compassion (and a little blood), the moment is framed by the troubles and violence of Sookie’s life. These women may have initially been comforted by the idea that they can have safe sex with their lovers. Both Buffy and Bella laugh to themselves when their parents try to talk to them about condoms and birth control. As it turns out, however, there is no such thing as “safe sex” in a world of demons and vampires. Both young women are changed forever. And even though Sookie is grateful for finally being able to love someone without hearing his every thought, her life becomes filled with violence and pain because of her relationships with vampires. While the writers of the Summers/Swan narratives seem to be warning young women of the evils that will result from sex, the Stackhouse story simply implies that a woman should not have to hide from her lover’s thoughts.

Angels and Vampires: Morals, Life Choices, and the Dead Boyfriend “Seize the moment, 'cause tomorrow you might be dead.” —Buffy (“Welcome to the Hellmouth” 1.1)

Each of these parallels—family and friends, special abilities, romance and sex—helps to explain why these three young women choose a dead boyfriend. Buffy’s line from Season One, “Seize the moment, ‘cause tomorrow you might be dead,” is a real philosophy in the life of a slayer (BtVS 1.1). Buffy has the knowledge that most slayers do not live to make choices in life. Even if she could select an occupation, it would always be complicated by her destiny as the slayer. Sookie has no visions of life outside of Bon Temps and working at Merlotte’s Bar. Even when she discovers the use of her talent for rescuing bodies from rubble after an explosion, she sneaks away from the disaster site so as not to be traced to her home. Unlike Buffy, Sookie has no desire to save the world. She is not a selfish woman, since she often risks her life to help others, but she does not imagine a life outside of her small town in Louisiana. Bella is less philosophical but does plan to attend college and see where life takes her.

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However, Bella’s plans change drastically in the last book when she becomes a vampire and gives birth to her own demon baby. What is very apparent for all three young women is that selecting a dead boyfriend has tremendous impact on life choices. For Bella and Sookie there are obvious advantages to selecting dead boyfriends. The powerful, super-human strength of a boyfriend vampire comes in handy when fighting against evil demons and other vampires who prey on both young women. Buffy, however, does not usually need protection, but she certainly makes use of the extra help when the battle is stacked against her. Bella, like the traditional women of horror and romance films that Whedon wanted to escape, is always in need of rescue—at least up until the last book when she becomes a vampire herself. While all three young women have boyfriends who help them escape danger, there is also an irony in the added violence and a certain menace brought to them because of their association with vampire boyfriends. Both Bella and Sookie suffer from repeated injuries due to their encounters with countless villains, and in Dead to the World, Sookie’s most fervent wish and only New Year’s resolution is to not get beaten up. Unfortunately, none of this really explains why these young women choose their dead lovers instead of the living alternatives. Why would attractive, intelligent, talented individuals such as these choose cold, lifeless boyfriends? What exactly are the advantages of dating a dead boyfriend? Denny, of Grey’s Anatomy, claims that one advantage is that at least there is no need to meet the parents. And a web site from Karen Chance gives the top reasons for dating a vampire that includes “superhuman strength” and “personal protection” but primarily emphasizes their “centuries of practice.” An examination of motives for these young women reveals a variety of reasons that go beyond simple convenience. For some, there is a clear connection, a link between souls that draws the individuals together with maybe even the possibility of fate’s hand. A certain amount of fate puts the individuals in the same town, but something stronger draws the two together. There is a certain amount of chance that puts the two individuals together, and this is a clear case of love transcending spiritual realms. Bella also moves to her father’s hometown and finds herself attracted to her classmate, Edward, while he is instantly drawn to her physical presence. Buffy and Bella both have other admirers, but they each have a “soul mate” kind of love for their dead boyfriends that will not let them choose anyone else. Buffy and Sookie have several partners, but both young women choose vampires even when human alternatives exist.

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While Buffy and Sookie may be drawn to soul mates, they also have special abilities that make their vampire lovers the perfect choice. Because Buffy leads the secret life of a slayer, there are few individuals that can be allowed into her confidence. There is also a hint of Buffy’s own pull toward evil or at least darkness. Riley is her only long lasting relationship with a live boyfriend, but even though he becomes fully aware of her abilities and is a demon fighter himself, their relationship fails. He claims that she does not allow him to be close to her, that she hides many of her true feelings. Because she is the slayer, Buffy often finds herself battling alone, and the burden of responsibility for saving the world “a lot,” according to her headstone, keeps her from being able to lead a normal life. Her pull towards Angel seems much more like the “soul mate” kind of love represented by the Bella story, while her relationship with Spike reflects her need for a physical connection when the world is crumbling beneath her. Spike is also the only one who can understand Buffy’s return from the dead after her fight with Glory—a tie that gives them a shared experience and past. Sookie has a very different reason for her choice of lovers. Since she cannot read vampire minds, she finds these relationships to be the closest thing to a normal life that she can experience. She has many other suitors including a werewolf, like Bella, but vampires are the only individuals who can give her the freedom of hearing only with her ears. Her relationships with Bill and Eric, however, bring violence and destruction into her life, and even though she enjoys the benefits of such physical lovers, she also desperately wishes for some kind of normality in her life. A big part of the choice in boyfriends is connected to each young woman’s path in life. Buffy needs a powerful mate, someone who can help her through her many battles as well as someone who understands her secrets. And while the slayer in love with a vampire creates a quandary, her need for love, strength, and acceptance overpowers the decision. By the end of the show, however, Buffy stands alone. With Spike dead and Angel trapped in his own struggles, Buffy is free to choose anyone as her partner. In the continuing Buffyverse in graphic novels, also written by Joss Whedon, Buffy is very much the loner with only occasional love interests. While Bella may have had choices before the last book, by the end of the series she and Edward are surely mates for life—and death. She is drawn to Edward as her soul mate before her transformation into a vampire, and after the change she is a different being who will be eternally linked to him. Sookie’s life remains complicated since Bill continues to claim undying love for her while she and Eric have a blood tie that keeps

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them enmeshed in each other’s lives. For the most part, however, like Buffy, Sookie stands on her own. The ultimate choice of a dead boyfriend is controlled by many factors. Some of these young women need power, some need silence, but all need understanding and love. According to Terry Spaise, Buffy’s relationship with Spike was “therapeutic” and a “necessary element of Buffy’s emotional restoration and ability to re-embrace life” (761). Bella, Sookie, and Buffy need to share their secrets and not be shunned for their abilities. They need to feel that they are part of the human race. The real tragedy is that these young women often have to search for acceptance among the dead. Since each feels herself to be a bit of a freak, life among vampires and ghosts makes them each feel more normal and able to live among the living.

Works Cited Chance, Karen. “Ten Reasons to Date a Vampire.” Penguin/blog. 4 April 2008. Web. Emad, Mitra C. “Reading Wonder Woman’s Body: Mythologies of Gender and Nation.” The Journal of Popular Culture 39.6 (2006): 954-984. Print. Magoulick, Mary. “Frustrating Female Heroism: Mixed Messages in Xena, Nikita, and Buffy.” The Journal of Popular Culture 39.5 (2006): 729-755. Print. McCracken, Allison. “At Stake: Angel’s Body, Fantasy Masculinity, and Queer Desire in Teen Television.” Undead TV: Essays on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Eds. Elana Levine and Lisa Parks. Durham: Duke UP, 2007. 116-167. Print. Milavec, Melissa M. and Sharon M. Kaye. “Buffy in the Buff: A Slayer’s Solution to Aristotle’s Love Paradox.” Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale. Ed. James B. South. Chicago: Open Court, 2003. 173-184. Print. Nosferatu. Dir. F. W. Murnau. Perf. Max Schreck, Greta Schroder, and Ruth Landshoff. Jofa-Atelier Berlin-Johannisthal, 1922. Film. “Plato’s Stepchildren.” Star Trek. Paramount Studios. 22 Nov. 1968. Television. Riess, Jana. What Would Buffy Do? The Vampire Slayer as Spiritual Guide. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2004. Print. Spaise, Terry L. “Necrophilia and SM: The Deviant Side of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” The Journal of Popular Culture 38.4 (2005): 744762. Print.

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Wilcox, Rhonda. Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. London: I. B. Tauris, 2005. Print.

We all remember our first time; that moment when we fell in love with one of the most innovative and transformative shows of all time. It is one of the reasons that, so long after Buffy ended that we are still writing, debating, and celebrating the world of the Scoobies. With each year that passes, more new fans are converted, transformed, and addicted. Michael Aaron Perry likens such conversion to a religious experience, one that features the same elements of testifying and proselytizing. With an exploration of the BtVS chat rooms, Perry explores the concepts of theological diversity and the rhetoric of conversion that have made BtVS such a transcendent show. How did you come to Buffy? Perry infiltrated BtVS forums to find a multiplicity of answers to that question.

CHAPTER TEN MY FIRST TIME: THEOLOGICAL DIVERSITY, THE RHETORIC OF CONVERSION, AND BUFFY, THE VAMPIRE SLAYER MICHAEL AARON PERRY

In recent years at panel discussions “celebrating” Joss Whedon’s Buffy, the Vampire Slayer (Buffy), I observed (and participated) as countless attendees spoke of how they “came to know” what many refer to as the Whedonverse.1 The passion in the room appeared to transcend both standard academic and traditional fan responses. What I heard again and again was how people “came” to Buffy. It was as if we (yes, I too describe it that way) were testifying. And indeed, such testifying encourages audible response, not polite nods. The rustling in the seats, the abundance of raised hands, and the tangible energy in the room proved as much.

1 From this point in the paper, I will refer to the show simply as Buffy. When I write Buffy without italics, I refer to the character.

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Prior to examining the particulars of this phenomenon, I decided to revisit Buffy. I hadn’t visited her since the show ended. The DVDs rested faithfully in my case – Seasons Five and seven still wrapped. I had watched the final three seasons while they aired. Season Six was only open because I intermittently watch the musical with my older son. (Yes, we sing along. And yes, I am sure he does not share this with his friends.) Upon revisiting the series, the final arcs of Seasons Five, Six, and Seven struck me in particular because of how they deal with the ramifications of death. At first, it appears so simple. When human, death is final. When supernatural, the finality of death is not so very final. Indeed, Warren’s resurrection in Season Eight shows that even being flayed alive does not necessarily spell the end.2 However, Tara’s death, by gun, at the hands of the aforementioned individual during the final arc of Season Six, means there is no coming back. One could say the same for Buffy’s mother, who dies of seemingly natural causes in the Season Five episode, “The Body.” Willow, early in Season Six, applies similar logic (denoting the difference between natural and supernatural death) to rationalize the risk involved in bringing Buffy back from a supposed hell dimension. Of course, dying is nothing new for Buffy, as she sings in the musical episode: “hey I died twice.” Moreover, Whedon challenges such binaries as we discover Buffy was in heaven. In this manner, Whedon takes the comforting (and seemingly black/white) concept of the difference between natural and supernatural death and problematizes it. Willow (or increasingly Dark Willow) acts on what she believes represents the best interests of Buffy; she wants to save Buffy from a hell dimension. Concurrently, Willow refuses to consider the implications upon both herself and those around her of resurrecting the dead. The resurrection of Buffy at the outset of Season Six represents love, selfishness, arrogance, and determination. The Scooby Gang refuses to accept the death of Buffy. She cannot die. She is the chosen one (and UPN picked up the show). It was right to save her, because she was suffering in hell. And it is here that Whedon calls into question the extent to which we can fully rationalize/explain any course of action. We all have trouble letting go, and given the power, who wouldn’t bring back one’s beloved? Ironically (and realistically?), The Scooby Gang’s faith and simultaneous lack of faith both save and condemn Buffy. She is ripped from heaven, but given a second chance—a reversal of sorts on the typical re-birth story, 2

Season Eight refers to the comic books by Dark Horse comics. While there is debate among fans as its place within the canon, Whedon considers it so.

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where someone who has lost her way is saved from the bondage of sin, of hell, and given a second chance at life. As such, might one consider Buffy pro-pagan? Pro Wicca? Certainly, such charges have been made against not only Buffy, but also a wide range of texts that address the occult, including the bestselling Harry Potter series. One might consider Xander’s song: “they could be Witches, evil witches,” as Whedon nodding to the ridiculous notion of treating any one group with a singular, totalizing notion. Indeed, Buffy can also be seen as pro-religious. Or Atheist. Christian. Indeed, Buffy presents a fictional world wherein the supernatural need not negate theological diversity but actually uphold it. Upholding, however, need not be confused with endorsement. Rather, the fictional text (art) offers a forum in which to explore ideas rather than a prescriptive tool that seeks to teach. Embracing such paradox is not, as John Frow would warn, “an acceptance of a happy kind of relativism: a model (which we might call ‘postmodern’) of the world as being irreducibly plural and informed by no principle of totalization” (297). Rather, encouraging exploration of paradox is simply an invitation to challenge binary, didactic views of society. Throughout Buffy, Whedon presents us with a world wherein such dichotomies become irrelevant while, paradoxically, remaining very relevant. He presents us with a world where demons and Angel are real, physical beings, both otherworldly and all too human. In fact, he presents us with a world wherein the human and the supernatural not only interact, but also become one-another allowing mortals to talk to gods and gods to become mortal. However, limiting Buffy to allegory unnecessarily limits interpretive possibilities; solely comparing high school to hell limits the potential embedded in Whedon’s narrative. As such, I choose to consider Buffy through a framework of theological diversity. And the term, theological diversity, is not, to paraphrase Spike, a place to get our “kumbayayas” out (sic). But rather a space wherein supernatural and natural worlds not only coexist, but also constitute a variety of communities, many whom actively engage in acts of negotiation in order to live on their own terms, provided their terms recognize the other’s right to exist. While it may be argued that some religions move so far away from the supernatural that even the possibility of it becomes blasphemous – as seen in some of the more indignant responses to the show – it may simply be the term, "supernatural," that gives many pause. When death and rebirth are cast within a supernatural context, the resultant discussions differ in tone from the same questions within religious contexts. What are we to make of Buffy’s clawing her way out of the grave—certainly not bathed in

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light? Or Spike’s ultimate sacrifice, only to be remade in a law firm? Consider the term sacrifice: maybe sacrifice (martyrdom) is a death worthy of resurrection – not fighting to the death – but putting one’s stake down and accepting death that allows for it not to be final. In other words, rather than uphold the binary, Buffy upends and questions normative ideas surrounding birth and death, heaven and hell. Such questioning encourages theological diversity and establishes the groundwork in which viewers engage in the rhetorical act of conversion. To continue, and in order to avoid any misconceptions, I do not set up this pairing to deify Buffy or Buffy. Rather, the complicated representations of good and evil, of faith and fate, of right and wrong, all mark Buffy as a text that despite (and because of) its cult status, creates within that “cult” an extremely varied and diverse group who have as their common ground, to use a rhetorical term, the experience of conversion. Indeed, embedded within the show’s nuanced mixture of the natural and supernatural itself is a template for theological diversity that draws upon an emphasis on narratological diversity within a text that not only allows for but also demands acknowledgment of myriad identities and traditions. It is a place for atheists, Christians, Muslims, Wiccans, Jews, Hindus, and agnostics. On the other hand, it is a place for none of them. It is entertainment and art. It represents yet another text to help us explore the impulse to understand ourselves, and thus, to understand life.

The New Medium: Social media in purple While exploring the rhetorical implications of social media upon culture, my students and I examine the profound implications it has upon communication, consumerism, and entertainment. One of our areas of focus is what James Herrick refers to as rhetoric’s ability to redistribute power (19).3 It is no mere coincidence that Buffy has acted as a sort of pioneer in the world of social media – early on representing some of the largest, most active sites, from fan-fic, to message boards, to meetings, to direct contact with the creator of the show. Indeed, the vocal nature of Whedon’s fans resurrected Firefly, a dead show, for a movie.4 The movie, however, did not translate to box-office success; not necessarily because of the text itself (it received favorable reviews and good press), but possibly 3

Herrick’s text offers an introduction to the history of rhetoric in general, not in specific connection to social media. 4 Upon cancellation of Firefly, a vocal web community formed a grassroots movement that essentially resurrected the show and enabled Whedon to produce a movie, titled Serenity.

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because of a misunderstanding of the industry to fully grasp just what a vocal internet campaign translates to in the real world; for the level of one’s voice does not always translate into real numbers, real representation. Alongside this observation, I began to investigate the connection between Buffy’s appropriation of the rhetoric of conversion not only in connection to the rhetoric of religious conversion, but also with the tactics of the extreme elements of the religious right in regards to politics. Midway into the Clinton administration, and continuing well into present day, “vocal” parts of the far right “conservative” movement, the decibel of their claims misrepresenting their actual number, claimed (many argue) Christianity as their own. Moreover, they not only claim it, but also often take on the role of defining it by claiming to know good and evil, to know right and wrong – to see the world within an either/or framework. This small but vocal group was (and is) heard. But does this fit with the text to which they adhere? Consider the book of Genesis, where, one could argue, the first original sin is the sin of claiming to know good and evil: “You may freely eat of every tree in the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die” (Genesis 2: 16-17). Possible interpretations of this passage include the fact that the speaker (in this case, God) appears to be telling the first human that he should not claim to know what is good and what is evil – that is not for him to decide. Furthermore, one could argue, that the statement itself is paradoxical, as the speaker at once says eat from any tree, but also do not eat from any tree. And we have not even approached the final part of the statement. Regardless, approaching the text in a manner that allows for contradiction and paradox in fact opens up its possibilities and, one could argue, has the potential to enrich one’s understanding. Pulling all of this together, I began to see connections, however tenuous: we have two “vocal” communities whose voice belies their actual numbers; who both engage in a rhetoric of conversion. One who deals in black and white, good and evil, right and wrong – the other who is increasingly inured with a text that rather than define good/evil, right/wrong, presents a world where the division is paradoxically both obvious and impossible to locate. Of course, even my description above sets up a dichotomy that is, upon close observation, false. Both communities are full of contradiction, diversity, and varying levels of engagement with their texts. And they even overlap. My concern is more with what the comparison can tell us about Buffy. It was never a commercial hit, and its devotees are limited in number but passionate in

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their convictions. And, I posit, it may be possible that one of the reasons (just one, not THE) for its peculiar success and cult status (rather conscious or no) is its ability to stand in contrast to a movement that often seeks to split and narrow theological definitions rather than explore its myriad potentials. It may be possible that while popular media gives voice to a movement that would create the perception of a broad society beginning to split (red/blue), Buffy embraced the color purple. In fact, www.BuffyBoards.com displays this “purpleness.”5 Rather than point to specifics, allow me to summarize: I read over discussions on the 2008 election (both McCain and Obama Supporters), on Prop 8 (the majority upset over its passing, but still a variety of views—indeed, one poster who outright stated his/her support for the proposition was commended for his/her honesty, even if it was vehemently refuted), and abortion (most interesting was a conservative McCain supporter who was against abortion, pro-choice, and strongly opposed to Prop 8). Just this brief glimpse displays a rich variety of people who comprise a single message board. A diversity partly encouraged, no doubt, by the nature of the text itself – a text that allows for Tradition and Change not as contradictions but as a natural occurrence; a text that explores good and evil, right and wrong, but does not grab the apple in an attempt to know and judge.

Conversion: When there is a choice Consider the power embedded in the term conversion. To be converted means having changed – having the ability to significantly change one’s worldview and to adapt/adopt a new set of beliefs. Conversion need not be static, however, as it often implies continued action as described by Peter A. Dorsey, in Sacred Estrangement: The Rhetoric of Conversion in Modern American Autobiography: [C]onversion, in its sacred and secular manifestations, is an almost inescapable construct in the cultures we call Western. As a trope for selfdefinition, conversion was widely available at different times and under different circumstances to conservatives and radicals, traditionalists and innovators, and those in between.… [C]onversion has carried a privileged 5

While there are countless websites dedicated to Buffy, I have chosen to use this particular site for the purposes of this article. Much of the material accessed was done so in the spring of 2009. Some of it is no longer available or buried in the archives. I have decided to keep the posters anonymous when quoting or paraphrasing.

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Note how the concept, or construct, of conversion is not limited to a particular type, a particular community. Indeed, conversion is employed not only in a religious sense but also in connection to diets, sports, entertainment, and exercise. We all come to a crossroads and find ourselves converted. But is conversion final? Based on a single event? And how does one go about converting? In order to explore these concepts within the Buffy forums, I registered myself a username, entered the message boards, and asked a question – prefaced with the fact that I was writing an academic paper. It was not the right question, and certainly too direct to receive much response, other than a mixture of sarcasm and defensiveness, including: “*raises hand* … I didn’t ‘come’ to it;” “I didn’t experience a conversion either;” “Yes, but not ‘found’ in a religious sense. Not like ‘found God.’ Buffy is not my Christ.” For a moment it seemed as if I was entirely off track and had overestimated what I had previously observed. However, what I came to learn was that I walked into a site wherein I did not understand and/or appreciate the rhetorical situation. The sarcastic and defensive responses, the resistance and skepticism that arose, illustrated the mistake I made of talking about an intimate experience in purely academic terms. I should have, instead, talked about how I came to Buffy – about my own conversion. I should have talked about how it was immediate and gradual; how it actually happened in a converted Army barrack when I thought Buffy knew magic and my newborn slept in a crib in the kitchen. That my first introduction to Cordelia was the Angel Cordelia, which certainly changed my latter viewing of the early seasons of Buffy (which I watched while watching Season Five during its initial airing). I should have written about that morning in the Himalayan Mountains, waking up before sunrise, standing on top of a world as the sun rose, snow all around, clouds below; how later that day, surrounded by tall trees (very Tolkienesque), it all seemed to come together, and I simply Knew. For me, both experiences were gradual, subtle, yet entirely and utterly specific. They were paradox experienced. Just as Dorsey notes: “Rather than being structured around a single decisive event, conversion narratives often contain a cyclic pattern of conversion and reconversion, as if the converted are predisposed to repeat and reinforce this fundamental experience over and over” (3). Neither conversion (if I dare even name them as such) was situated around a single event, yet they both were. It is all rather nonlinear.

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Indeed, recurring moments abound: I recall the Buffy episode, “The Body,” and how it forever connects itself to an experience I had in college when losing a friend and finding out via a cryptic note on the bathroom mirror. I recall the realization of the existence of Heaven, of being ripped out, and the implications of the Scooby Gang’s refusing to accept the death of their friend and what that meant for them. Both recollections imply the continual theme of circular redemption and pain. I even recall a sermon where one Sunday morning the pastor mentioned that, like Buffy who fights demons, who engages with angels, we too ought to (on some level – not literal but literal) engage with and believe in the supernatural. Again, understanding the process of conversion, whether connected to religion or becoming inured with a television show, requires both acknowledgement of and dismissal of a single, decisive event – it is conversion and re-conversion – it is cyclical. It is a process – a process that invites discovery, contemplation, consideration, revision. Conversion, as I understand it, must be a conversion on one’s own terms, must be a conversion of choice – a conscious conversion of the conscience.

Tactics and Strategies: This is what “I” would do Once I stopped interfering in the boards, took a step back, and just started listening, I found a wealth of threads that dealt explicitly with conversion in a language more tenable to the message board and imbued with the rhetoric of conversion. Many members talked about tactics they used to “hook” potential viewers. The manner in which they described their actions recalls Michel de Certeau, who describes strategies as available to those with power: “the calculation (or manipulation) of power relationships that become possible as soon as a subject with will and power (a business, an army, a city, a scientific institution) can be isolated” (1252). In other words, a well-planned and visible strategy is a tool of the powerful. But the tactic, which is “an art of the weak … must vigilantly make use of the cracks that particular conjunctions open in the surveillance of the proprietary powers. … It operates in isolated actions, blow by blow” (1253). Recalling the two communities and their desire to convert others, I started to wonder which technique was being used. I began by reading other people’s stories: One member explicitly connected the experience of coming to Buffy as a religious experience: “It’s like I’m a born-again Christian.” This member then follows with a question that garners a wide range of response: “So what’s the best way to convert someone to the show?” The nature of the question immediately speaks to a vital aspect of conversion in that it is not enough to simply

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watch the show, but one must give oneself to the show and allow it to change them. As the member noted, it was not enough to watch, but s/he wants to “convert people to this lovely series.” One of the first responses to this prompt comes from an individual who notes a particular text that acts as “great converter” – Whedon’s web series, Dr. Horrible. The practical nature of the selection makes sense – the text is all of 45 minutes long with a beginning, middle, and end. And the show itself is fairly representative of the breadth and depth of the Buffy series. In other words, here is the Whedonverse in a nutshell. The individual continues by noting that “OMWF” is a good option as well, which refers to the musical episode, “Once More with Feeling.” The flash and fun of that particular episode certainly could grab viewers, but taken out of context, the emotional weight of the revelations certainly would be lost on the uninitiated. The third option references Firefly, which could be used in order to recruit “dudes that are sci-fi nerds.” What is so fascinating about the response is the attention to a variety of potential viewing communities and subsequent attempts to speak to each of them with their own language, which the three examples certainly do. Dr. Horrible displays Whedon’s use of the anti-hero, his ability to infuse humor and social commentary in quick dialogue, and his willingness to kill his characters in emotionally resonate yet random ways. The musical episode speaks to a more popular aesthetic with the singing and dancing and humor. And Firefly certainly (at least stereotypical and in so many incorrect ways) may initially appeal to an uninitiated male audience skeptical of a female centric fantasy show. The strength of each selection, however, is also its weakness. Each one highlights only one aspect, which can create a false impression of the larger picture. Moreover, conversion is never that simple. One member notes that s/he “got exactly. … 1 person to ‘convert’ during my Buffy lifetime … seriously, over the past semester I’ve decided that I’m giving up.” Indeed, the process of conversion is a tireless task – one that can be frustrating from the point of view of the “converter.” One may learn the language of one’s audience, painstakingly plan one’s strategies, only to be denied. The key may rest in the use of the term strategy, which de Certeau points out is a tool of the powerful. Remember, changing the hearts and minds of others is never an easy task. And it is made more difficult by a show that refuses, upon close examination, to fit fully into any one box. Another member offers the following advice: “When I convert people to the show, I very rarely have them watch Season One because it's very campy.” This advice speaks to the hesitation of many, who hear a description of a cute blond in high school battling vampires and think this

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must be written solely for fourteen-year-old boys. In addition, this advice more befits a tactic, in the sense that the member notes a particular downside to the text, and rather than choose a straightforward approach, decides to employ, on some level, dishonesty and trickery. By any means necessary, one could assert. In a way, this member also addresses the inherent skepticism many have against the genre itself. But I need to be careful not to appear as though I am simply trying to defend or even promote the actual show. Nor am I attempting to figure out the best way to convert others (I have struggled with this myself – even my wife will not watch). Rather, what strikes me as instructive and fruitful is the examination of the phenomenon itself; how it is not enough just to say, hey, watch this show. It is good. Rather, consider the following responses from other members: “Hey there welcome to the boards I was a late comer to this grand old religion we follow. I am only 13 and started watching last October.” “I find it weird that I try to convert people. Does anyone else do this and find it weird? Like, I love you internet people and all … but sometimes, I just wanna have a nice Buffy discussion with, say, my Dad. … I feel vaguely like a Jehovah's Witness, going around knocking on my real life folks' doors (okay, calling them on the telephone) and attempting to get them to see the light.” “I have this strange need to share Buffy (as if it is mine to share!) with the people in my life because I genuinely feel anyone who doesn't watch it is missing out.”

All three responses evoke explicitly religious connections and borrow from conventional rhetoric surrounding the concept of conversion. Within each viewer's self is “something” that propels them not only to promote the show, but also to share it in an attempt to change people. All of this can, of course, be overwhelming and off-putting to many who view such explicit conversion techniques (those, I would argue, connected more with strategy than tactic) with a wary eye. Whatever happened to subtlety? In fact, there was one particular post that embraces subtlety and appears so simple, almost tongue-in-cheek, but may offer the most effective way to encourage someone to make a conversion of choice. This member recognizes the position s/he has in the power relation and chooses a tactic that seeks to find space in the “cracks” and never let the converted know what is happening:

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Convert them quietly and then they will stay. Let them make the choice. This, of course, is no guarantee either. But no conversion is.

Common Ground: Where we go from here Consider the sermons of Jonathon Edwards; in particular, recall sinners who are at the mercy of a very angry god. In Delightful Conviction: Jonathan Edwards and the Rhetoric of Conversion, Stephen R. Yarbrough and John C. Adams note, “Saints did not simply disagree with sinners: they saw differently, they felt differently, they thought differently. In short, they lived in a different world altogether” (xiv). In a manner of speaking, the converted indeed lived in a different world entirely from the uninitiated. As such, by feeling, seeing, and thinking differently, the common ground the converted community implicitly shares with one another is lost on those outside the community. The difficulty arises in the intentions of the converters: Edwards never intended for his sermons to persuade their audiences, if persuasion means the process, described since antiquity, by which rhetors seek common ground with their audiences and then work from that base toward mutually affirmable goals, ideas, attitudes. Edwards’ primary assumption—that an absolute difference separated the regenerate from the unregenerate—prevented his seeking to persuade in this sense. Instead, he sought to prepare sinners for accepting Christ by undermining or dismantling the belief structures supporting their sense of themselves as independent, self-determined individuals (xiv-xv).

Herein lies the reason so many members remain frustrated in their attempts to convert people to Buffy, to show them the light, as it were. Too often the rhetoric of conversion forgets the simple concept of common ground – a concept that makes the community itself flourish – a concept that allows such a diverse group of members to come together in a virtual community and share a common task. Tactics can be successful, but they are even more so if they represent a precursor to establishing common ground. The common ground within the Buffy community is, of course, the show. Without that, no common ground is established. Unless one goes

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with the strategy of Edwards, who uses his power and chooses to dismantle “the belief structures” of his audience. Consider one last response: “On my way home from work, I decided that I'm gonna try [to] 'convert' my best friend. Now I've already seen some good suggestions on where to start, but there's an additional problem: She is delusional. She thinks Charmed [sic] is better than BtVS [sic].” Imagine what lies beneath this comment: How can you watch Charmed? It is entirely second tier. You just don’t get the layers, the references, the humor that Buffy has compared to such an inferior show. Your belief structures are irrelevant and plain wrong. Rather, you must simply accept my assertion that Buffy is like an onion (to steal from Shrek). However, as donkey notes, there is always another way to interpret. Onions make you cry. But it may be a false cry – a dishonest cry – a cry not rooted in sadness but biology. Onions also add spice, texture, and even a psychological boost (yeah veggies!). And they have layers. But what does it mean that we throw the outside layer away? The outright dismissal of Charmed simply negates other interpretations to the onion and replaces it with an imperative: if the prospective convertees are told they have to be smart, patient, and willing to get the brilliance that is this show, then they will never watch tv the same way. Speaking at, rather than with an audience, will more often than not fail to achieve a conversion of choice. Telling someone how to act, how to think, and how they should conduct their lives is coercion not conversion. It works, like Edwards’ sermons, by drawing upon fear. But Whedon’s text functions in a different way – in a sense, Whedon employs throughout his oeuvre, tactics – for “the space of the tactic is the space of the other” (de Certeau 1253). In Buffy, while apocalypse reigns down, while vampires roam the streets and demons engulf the ground beneath their feet, the Scooby gang lives by their own convictions, strive to do what they think is the best possible (not necessarily right) course of action. Along the way, additional faces come and go. Cordy. Oz. Clem. Spike. A principal or two (or three, I lose count). No mom, then mom, then no mom. A sister out of the ether. Even demons no longer demons yet still demons. But the Scooby Gang does not head out to convert the masses. They do not head out to say, look, we have it all figured out, and you ought to see not only what, but how, we see. Rather, conversion comes naturally; it is a continual process of revision, of negotiation, of understanding and re-understanding. And there is a moment and there is not a moment. The heavens part, the wind blows, and in the background the musical plays quietly, until that moment when a curious individual asks. And you respond, “Oh, from a musical I like.

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Nothing more.” The key is to convert them quietly, without their ever knowing. Sneaky like. Evil really. A good evil, that is not evil, but goodly evil, which is maybe okay, but more than okay and less than good which is kind of bad. And it is this complex nature of Buffy, of the entire Whedonverse, combined with the simultaneous rise of web-enhanced communities giving a loud voice to small numbers, I assert, that enabled a television show about a young girl slaying vampires to emerge not only as a cult hit but also as a site of cultural resistance rooted in a theology of diversity. A site of resistance, that, to this day, continues to respond to the increasing cultural divide in American culture not by choosing a side, but by attempting to render the divide obsolete.

Works Cited Anonymous. “Message Boards.” Buffy-Boards. Web. De Certeau, Michel. “The Practice of Everyday Life.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. 2nd ed. Eds. Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. 1247-1257. Print. Dorsey, Peter A. Sacred Estrangement: The Rhetoric of Conversion in Modern American Autobiography. U Park: The Pennsylvania State UP, 1993. Print. Frow, John. “Economies of Value.” Reception Study: From Literary Theory to Cultural Studies. Eds. James L. Machor and Phillip Goldstein. New York: Routledge, 2001. 294-317. Print. Herrick, James A. The History and Theory of Rhetoric: An Introduction. Boston: Pearson, 2005. Print. The Holy Bible: Revised Standard Version. Red Letter Ed. Cleveland: World Bible, 1952. Print. Whedon, Joss. “Once More, with Feeling.” Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. WB, 2006. DVD. Yarbrough, Stephen R. and John C. Adams. Delightful Conviction: Jonathan Edwards and the Rhetoric of Conversion. Westport: Greenwood P, 1993. Print.

As someone who thrives on the mysterious and the supernatural because they relieve her of her daily work as a history professor, U. Melissa Anyiwo is rightly positioned to discuss the sequel to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel. The complexity of the Angel character and the events in which he finds himself during the sequel’s episodes, thoroughly intrigues Anyiwo. She loves unraveling intellectual puzzles, and so clarifies for her audience in this essay the angst, anguish, and adaptations Angel experiences as he fights the curse foisted on him before arriving in Sunnydale and attempts to realize redemption. Ultimately, Anyiwo argues that whereas Buffy focused on the world of teenagers, Angel takes on the ever-thorny adult world. The series themes, therefore, require much more development that takes place in a much darker setting, leaving her readers to understand the fine line between the obscure and the clear.

CHAPTER ELEVEN MORE THAN JUST A SPIN-OFF: THE ENDURING ALLURE OF ANGEL U. MELISSA ANYIWO

“It’s not all about fighting and gadgets and stuff. It’s about reaching out to people, showing them that there’s love and hope still left in the world” —Doyle (City Of, “Angel” 1:1)

The television series Angel, created by Joss Whedon and David Greenwalt, ran on the WB Network from 1999 to 2004, and during its five-year run averaged as many viewers as its “parent” series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS). Yet despite its cult popularity, it has not yet managed to garner the type of scholarship accredited to its mother-series, Buffy, as this volume demonstrates. With only four complete monographs on the show, one might wonder if there is less to talk about in a show about a male romantic hero seeking redemption, than a slayer out to save the world. The roundtable held at the 2009 session of the PCA/ACA entitled, “Why We Love Angel,” certainly demonstrated that such a notion is incorrect, with the conversation plumbing the great depths of the show

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to reveal its dark layers. Focusing on its allure as a stand-alone universe and its connections to the Buffyverse, our conversation brought together a group of dedicated fan-scholars all eager to move beyond the discussions of Buffy to discuss the central question: Is the TV series Angel merely a spin-off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or does it stand alone in its own right? There were a wealth of themes in the show, expressed individually by the roundtable participants. Yet the most consistent area of discussion was the move from the emerging adult themes of BtVS to the more adult world of Angel, from the central concept of saving the world to the ambiguity of redemption, for those elements made this show such a compelling one to watch, and Angel such an easy protagonist to fall for.

From the Hellmouth to The City of Angels We wanted a much darker show, darker in tone. It's set in Los Angeles because there are a lot of demons in L.A. and a wealth of stories to be told. We also wanted to take the show a little older and have the characters deal with demons in a much different way. Buffy is always the underdog trying to save the world, but Angel is looking for redemption. It's those two things that creatively make the shows different. —Candace Havens. Joss Whedon: The Genius Behind Buffy 101-102

When I first heard about the birth of a spin-off featuring Buffy’s boyfriend, I was, at the very least, rather disinterested. My experience with spin-offs suggested that they tended to be weaker versions of popular shows, sad attempts to cash in on the success of their parents. So I ignored it and continued watching Buffy. In the United Kingdom where I lived, BtVS was on BBC2, while the new show, Angel, ran late nights on Channel 4, which contributed to making it easy to ignore. But then came “Pangs” (BtVS 4.8) the first crossover episode. Angel secretly returns to Sunnydale, the first time we had seen him since his heartbreaking exit in “Graduation Day Part II” (BtVs 3.22). This episode connected with the Angel episode, “I Will Remember You” (Angel 1.8), which to my mind is one of the best episodes in Angel’s entire run. Thus Buffy, or more correctly the presentation of their forbidden love, drew me into my first complete episode, and I was hooked—and broken hearted. My story is not that dissimilar to many of those who attended the roundtable in 2009. The room was superficially divided between those who had jumped directly onto the Angel bandwagon from the first episode and still bemoaned the loss of Doyle, and those like me who needed a little prodding to get on board. It was clear from my first introduction to the show that Angel, in the same vein as the Canadian show Forever Knight

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(1992-1996), fulfilled far more of my desires for dark, angst-ridden vampiric television. It seems I, and millions of others, are drawn to the vampire detective trying to protect humans from evil demons, and in the process, demonstrating their greater humanity. Angel was the perfectly dark companion to my soul. Buffy was not forgotten, but on different channels on different nights, it was a little hard to keep the two straight and so, until I moved to the US during Buffy’s final season, Angel became my favorite Friday night show. The overall dark tone of the show—and its far more adult themes— offered something that I had never before seen on television. While a vampire as both the protagonist and the vampire detective seeking redemption were not new, this show appeared entirely fresh and indefinable. What drove the popularity of the show, and conversely limited its appeal, centers on the very elements that separate it from BtVS. Angel is arguably, in its initial rendering, a far darker show, in content and visual tone. Angel is a vampire, no matter how hard he tries not to be. His show has to take place primarily in darkness, making the visual tone of the show very different. The characters have deep-seated pathologies that bring them together and add to the overall tone. But it was also about a vampire rather than about a slayer. Such a distinction mattered to those of us drawn to the show at the roundtable. A love of vampires seemed to be a far stronger prerequisite than BtVS in which vampires, with notable exceptions, were on the periphery. The first season introduced us to the strange concept of the “Powers that Be” as a reason to force Angel to return to his search for redemption (not that he really needed it once he had the pragmatic practicality of Cordelia Chase to make him work). The Powers introduced us to a recurring theme throughout the show’s run, that of good and bad being intertwined. The moral ambiguity inherent in the show matched Angel’s murky ambivalence and the insecurities of adulthood that many of us who had grown up on Buffy were now beginning to experience in our own lives. In this sense, BtVS became the show of my youth; Angel, the show of my transitional (or emerging) adulthood. The fact that the show was shot mostly at night became the metaphor for the show itself, an endlessly dark show watched by the few of us awake, while the rest of the world seemingly slept, safe in their acceptance of a status quo that hid a malevolent underbelly, and in Angel’s case the underbelly of Los Angeles. In the world of Buffy, bad guys most often looked and behaved like bad guys. Demons were evil; humans largely good. Whedon blows away those ideas, which appeared complex on BtVS, and instead gave us the

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ambiguity inherent in adult life. The cyberpunk author Don DeBrandt taps into the heart of the Whedon’s intent when he argues, Good fiction always asks good questions, and Angel is no exception. Beneath the obvious ones that drive the plot, it asks much harder ones: What is the nature of heroism? Is evil a necessary part of the human condition? Is committing an evil act for a good cause right or wrong? And perhaps most importantly: Is redemption possible?” (10)

Whedon never offers the audience easy answers to these questions and that helped keep the show endlessly surprising, odd, uncomfortable, moving, and even shocking. The Angel we met on his own show was immediately different from the Angel of BtVS where he had served as the perfect mix of Byronic hero and teenage love interest. There, he filled the role of romantic hero, providing the subplot of forbidden love that torments and incites deep longing in Buffy. Typical of teen romance, Buffy longs for what she can’t have – a vampire boyfriend – and this push and pull provides a world of dramatic tension in the series. Important to the development of the romance is not only Buffy’s longing for the forbidden, but the very real reality that, at the series’ beginning, she is a sixteen-year-old girl. Teenage Buffy does not navigate the world of romantic relationships in the same way an adult would. Thus, the development of Angel as a character in the BtVS series hinged on the necessity of creating not just a romantic hero for Buffy, but one appropriate for a sixteen-year-old.

Enter Angel’s curse More than a hundred years before the series’ timeline, the evil vampire Angelus made the “mistake” of feeding on the wrong human, a gypsy princess. In retribution, the gypsies cursed Angel with the return of his soul. Although on the surface this might appear to be a good thing, the gypsies built in a sub-clause: should Angel ever experience one moment of true happiness, he would lose his soul and revert to being the evil Angelus once more. The gypsies wanted Angel to experience all the pain and suffering of bearing a soul with none of the benefits. Thus, the Angel we meet “found himself viewing 150 years of Angelus’s unspeakable brutality through the eyes of an individual capable of feeling horrified by, guilty about and ashamed of such acts. Rather than merely killing Angel, the gypsies chose to inflict an eternity of emotional anguish on him” (Resnick, 16). Could there be any punishment worse than that?

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In addition to providing a reason for a “bad” vampire to turn “good,” the gypsy curse also turns the dark, evil, foreboding vampire into a boyfriend a sixteen-year-old might just be able to bring home for dinner. However much Angel might like to consummate their sexual relationship, he is forbidden from doing so lest he unwittingly becomes an evil monster who will undoubtedly harm his teenage love. Indeed, during the second season of BtVS, when Angel and Buffy finally consummate their relationship, Angel does revert to Angelus, and Buffy is ultimately forced to kill him. When Angel returns in Season Three, both characters know this is something they can never do again. The pain of being near each other is too great, however, and so Angel leaves Sunnydale and travels to L.A. His departure is the one action that will allow him to finally develop beyond the boundaries of his vampirism and the curse’s stunting of his emotional life. One ramification of his move to L.A. is that he is able begin his transition into his own entity on multiple levels, including acting as an agent of his own power. The first episode of Angel, “City Of,” (1.1) begins with Angel’s informing a fellow bar patron that “it was all because of a girl.” But right from the beginning, this is a different Angel than the one on BtVS. Rather than a mysterious, distant, teen heartthrob, this Angel is a darkly brooding superhero. Through the use of his vampire superpowers and several batman-like gadgets, Angel quickly dispatches the bad guys in the show’s opener, alerting the audience to his new status as series’ protagonist. This new Angel is nobody’s sidekick. Indeed as Laura Resnick writes in “That Angel Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” “If you knew this guy was climbing into a sixteen-year-old’s bedroom window regularly, as Angel did on Buffy, wouldn’t you call the cops” (19)? Aside from his obvious new role as lead, however, there are other distinct differences between Angel and BtVS. The most important is the context for the new series. Whereas BtVS dealt clearly with teen themes, Angel’s context is much more adult. Rather than focus on coming-of-age stories, wherein Buffy must learn how to grow into an adult, Angel is already grown-up. Resnick argues: Angel’s finances are portrayed in a pre-adult manner on Buffy, which is to say that they’re never contemplated at all. By contrast, Angel’s financial problems are often addressed on Angel. He works for a living, and, like most adults, he worries often about money. Angel’s Angel frets about restaurant prices, client fees, paying his employees, cutting costs, generating new business and keeping up with business expenses. (18)

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Angel’s task, therefore, becomes one of learning how to navigate adult situations in an adult world, and how to fully embrace the competing sides of his nature – fallen human and cursed vampire. He becomes a real adult for a more adult audience, reflected in the timing of the show at the 9pm watershed in the United Kingdom, while BtVS aired in the teenager friendly 6pm slot.1 Thus, as the problems of Buffy had been the problems of her audience, Angel’s problems, and those of his constructed family, reflect the harsh realities of life beyond young adulthood: the fears of not being able to pay the bills, of not achieving your childhood dreams, of not being a useful member of society. All of these themes resonated with the audience at the roundtable, and by extension the more general audience. Those of us who had grown up with Buffy now moved into the darker, more ambivalent world of Angel, or as Scott MacLaren writes, “a fictive universe where moral ambiguity is wrestled within an authentically nuanced environment tinged with grey” (7). In Buffy there was the Hellmouth to deal with, and evil comes from external sources that can ultimately be defeated. In Angel as the lead character discovers at the end of Season Two, the world is Hell and evil comes from within all of us. The nature of Angel is also very different from BtVS because of the adult situations encountered with the adult context. Each season of BtVS was marked by the rise and ultimate defeat of villains who are very typical “bad guys,” most often individual authority figures that Buffy must struggle to overcome. The term “Big Bad” has become yet one more Buffyism now a part of our cultural lexicon. While Angel did encounter various “Big Bads” (The Beast and Jasmine of Season Three, for example), his major adversaries are far bigger and more insidious, not defeatable individuals, but a corporation. Thus, Angel of Angel struggles less with clear-cut villains per se, than he does with the “system.” His task is to take down the evil represented by corporate might that wears the face of Wolfram and Hart, a corporate law firm and its charming, perfectly evil Senior Partners (demons originally called the Wolf, the Ram, and the Heart). His struggle to navigate the systems of law and of corporate power ultimately characterizes Angel as a markedly different series than BtVS. Whereas Buffy deals rather definitely with clear-cut good vs. evil situations, Angel deals much more significantly with shades of gray in which he is not always the “good” guy. 1

The “watershed” refers to the dividing line between general and adult programming in the United Kingdom and Australia. Once 9pm hits, children should be in bed, thus almost anything goes including graphic themes of violence and sex, allowing American (and other) shows and movies to be aired without editing for content.

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Examining the median is a theme that is dealt with many times in the course of the series, but most significantly in the fifth and final season when the Angel team goes to work for Wolfram and Hart, a firm described by Roxanne Longstreet Conrad as one “committed to facilitating efforts that will enhance the death and destruction of the forces of good” (34). This is a firm in which termination enrolls you in the “Afterlife Program, [where] you will enjoy all of the benefits of being dead without any of the tedious decomposition” (Conrad 41). Initially, the team is seduced into running the evil law firm because they believe they can do enormous amounts of good with all the resources of the world’s most successful corporate law firm at their disposal. This theme reminded one roundtable participant of the concept of the good man goes to Washington but, in this case, a good man goes to hell. Such clichés as “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” highlight the complicated path Angel is placed on. As the good people of Angel Investigations become ever more mired in the corporate system, they discover that their ability to do good is whittled away little-by-little by the corporate bottom line – profit. Each action they take to “help the helpless” increasingly drives them further into the debt of the very evil they are trying to defeat and forces them to make decisions that seem to be for the common good, at the expense of their souls. Angel Investigations’ involvement with Wolfram and Hart is certainly a situation that belongs unquestionably at the heart of the adult world, as adults find themselves in their own unique situations wherein they realize that their childhood hopes, dreams, and enthusiasm must succumb to the realities of earning a living. This awakening to adult reality might mean psychologically compromising oneself in a work situation, discovering one’s dreams aren’t all they expected, or finding they have to leave their “childhood” dreams behind altogether in favor of doing something that “pays.” These concerns are not a worry that occupied Buffy’s attention until after the death of her mother, for while Joyce was still alive, it was mom’s responsibility to worry about how the bills would get paid. However, it is certainly something of primary importance to the adult world. Selling one’s principals to do good is a fascinating thematic construction that gets at the heart of the ambivalence of the modern world. In Buffy’s world there was a general sense that evil is something easily definable and thus defeatable. On Angel, perhaps because Angel is a vampire, there are no such easy answers, and it is this that provided such an endless draw for me. Angel is the evil that Buffy would have defeated had he not been cursed with a soul, and thus a conscience. As with other televised vampires, such as Nick Knight (Forever Knight) or William Compton (True Blood), to be the hero the vampire must be more like us

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than like the soulless demons they defeat. To be truly heroic, they must battle daily with their intrinsic natures, arguably becoming more human than those they defend. Thus as Sarah Pierce writes in Redeeming the Vampire, Angel feels guilty not merely because he possesses a soul, and not even because he chooses to be guilty, but because he is a hero. It is Angel’s nature as a hero, living in the shadow of that paradigm, that gives rise to his feelings of guilt. He must feel terrible about what Angelus has done, because if he does not feel bad about it, we, the viewing audience, would have a difficult time seeing his character as being heroic. (11)

There is a purpose to his endless ennui, his absorption with redemption, and it has to do with so much more than the existence of his curse. Indeed, Peter Beagle argues, “Angel is one of those heroes who flourish on frustration, who thrive on never achieving their heart’s desire. . . . He needs the curse to do his job—or to fulfill his penance” (120). What makes him so compelling a character in ways that he was not as a loveinterest on BtVS, is that he illustrates that goodness is not an intrinsic quality. We are not good because we are human, anymore than vampires are evil because they are undead. Instead, our actions define our morality. Thus, it is not enough for Angel to merely do no harm. Instead, he must actively seek to do good. Whedon doesn’t make it easy for him anymore than he made it easy for Buffy. Indeed, as with Buffy’s dark road in Seasons Six and Seven, Angel’s path to redemption is ugly and sometimes so difficult that he willingly abandons it in ways that are believable and moving, creating what reviewer Filip Vukcevic described as “one of the darkest and most existential stories on television” (IGN). In Season Two, for example, Angel’s search for redemption sends him down dark hole of plot twists typified by deception, loss, and disaster. As Vukcevic continues, “Where most television shows would bring their hero to the edge and then pull back, this show pushes its hero right over and we see him fall. He all but becomes a villain, dismissing the help of his friends and ignoring what is left of his conscience” (IGN). His existential crisis was neither easy to watch nor easy to solve. His journey seemed to be a constant reminder that “immortal as he is, Angel understands that there is no way for him ever to atone for his crimes. All he can do is devote his eternity to trying” (Beagle 117). I suppose we viewers hoped to spend an eternity watching those attempts. While Buffy saves the world, Angel tries to guide the redemption of a number of characters as part of his path to atonement. In this way, he seems to act as psycho pomp for the series. Because he himself has some

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experience with atoning for the wrongs of the past, he aids others in finding a similar place of psychological wholeness. When the masterminds at Wolfram and Hart torment him with his ex-girlfriend/vampire sire, Darla, by raising her from the dead complete with a human soul, Angel attempts to show Darla the way to redemption. His relationship with Darla is so complex, alternating from hate to lust to compassion, that Angel’s curse is wildly beside the point. For this Angel, who is navigating far more complex romantic situations, “a moment of happiness” seems a very far removed thing indeed. In this show, “Angel’s Angel is a more complicated and ambivalent lover, one whose obsessions can be as strong as his loves and whose loyalties and desires can be in conflict even when his love is sincere” (Resnick 19). Angel’s relationship with Darla leads to another significant thematic difference between BtVS and Angel, and that lies in the Angel series’ focus on redemption. On BtVS, redemption seems to hold no place, as that series’ lead character is a hero who has no dark past to account for. Angel, however, struggles daily to come to grips with all the evil done by his soulless alter-ego, Angelus. Each member of Angel’s team, and some others besides, struggles at some point during the series with some element of the past they attempt to atone for. Many of these issues of the “past” are “mistakes” the characters make during the course of the series and later attempt to rectify. Both team Angel members, Wesley and Gunn, are prime examples of this. More notably, Angel also serves this role for Faith, the rogue slayer who filled the role of villain on BtVS. After waking from a coma and setting about terrorizing Sunnydale, seemingly to enact revenge on Buffy, Faith shows up on Angel (“Five by Five” 1.18). She tortures Wesley and attacks Angel. They fight until Angel comes to realize that this is Faith’s attempt at committing suicide; she wants Angel to kill her. Once Angel acknowledges this, he stops fighting and brings her back to his home where he attempts to heal her wounded psyche. Little-by-little, Faith finds her way back to the “light,” something that would not have been possible for her on BtVS. Indeed, when Buffy appears on Angel and discovers Faith with him, she is beyond upset and cuts Faith off before she can even begin an apology. For Buffy, she and Faith are long past apologies, and this is certainly an appropriate response for the relationship that played out on BtVS. Angel, however, is a different kind of show, and thus, Faith is able to find the redemption there that she would not have been able to find on BtVS, culminating in her eventual return to BtVS as a fellow hero. But it is Cordelia Chase who provides the glue that holds these themes together … Cordelia wasn’t important to Angel because she was a warrior,

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Cordelia’s journey from the very first episode provides Angel with grounding that Buffy could never have given him. His rising ability to trust and ultimately love her mirrors his path to atonement as the two of them slowly but surely create a loving family together, without the drama inherent in his relationship with Buffy. “She grounds Angel the way her character grounds the series Angel, by saving them both from strangling on his darkness and nobility” (Resnick 190).

Awakening What became clear through our ninety-minute discussion was that in order to understand the allure of this show, to explore its themes, the best entrance would be Season Four, episode 10, “The Awakening.” This episode marries all the strongest thematic elements of Angel as well as offer the best example as to why the show is far more than an adjunct to BtVS. It also turned out to be the most mentioned episode at the roundtable. “Awakening” comes during the pursuit of the season’s Big Bad, The Beast, a hellish demon bent on turning the world into endless night. It seems that the Beast had made a pact with Angelus, Angel’s alter-ego, but one that Angel cannot remember. In order to remember, Angel must become Angelus, who remains one of my favorite characters on television. In Angel, such a path is devastatingly heartbreaking, for this Angel (unlike the one in Buffy) sorrow is the true path to redemption. In order to become Angelus, Angel must experience one true moment of happiness. This process is now far more complicated than in BtVS, for Angel requires far more than a great orgasm to experience true joy, as he discovers in the Season Two arc when in the absolute depths of his despair he sleeps with Darla. The sex was a reflection of his despair and self-loathing, not an expression of love, thus (to Angel’s disappointment) no Angelus. In “Awakening,” through a process initiated by a Shaman, Whedon and Greenwalt are able to play with those elements that additionally distinguish Angel from its mother show. Science fiction author, Laura Anne Gilman, describes the episode as “one of the most perfect Gotchas

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I’ve ever seen, the kind that earns my highest praise: “Why can’t I write like that?” (194). An overarching theme of the series and of “Awakenings” is the failure of family. By Season Four Angel has learned over and over that in his world “people don’t come together in a crisis—they break apart. Bonds fail” (Lorrah 62). All too often in this show, his “Scoobies” betray or dissemble, albeit for what they believe to be the right reasons; nonetheless, each season contains some great deception not easily forgiven. But “Awakening” offers a chance for Angel to reconcile with his constructed family, especially his son Connor, and the chance to love Cordelia in ways that had been seemingly impossible before because of his nature. Laura Resnick sums up his character as one who “is a deeply troubled loner carrying a ton of emotional baggage. He has trouble relating to people. He resists intimacy. He’s often uncomfortable with (and in denial about) his own emotions. He has dark moods, predatory instincts and is prone to violence” (Resnick 20). Such a complex character finds it impossible to meet the needs of those who need him. Indeed, in the same episode, his estranged son Connor yells at him: “Everything's going to hell because of you. You're the reason that the sun is gone, that I don't have a home to go back to. You're the reason that she— It's you. You're the reason my life sucks” (4.10). Angel’s response, “Get over it,” exemplifies his inability to deal with the emotional damage done to his son and to address his emotional needs (4.10). Yet in “Awakening,” he is given the opportunity at least to try and become the patriarch of this dysfunctional family, not just their reluctant dissociative leader. The dream given him by the Shaman represented the perfect plot of an action film. Angel even gives the perfect rousing speech of a leader about to do battle: I have to do this. You made a difference. Each of you—not just to me, but to the world. We've been pushed to the edge so many times, done things we're sure can never be forgiven, but we're always there for each other when it counts. We've never let the darkness win. And it's not because of the Powers That Be, or the super-strength, or the magical weapons. It's because we believed in each other. Not just as friends or lovers, but as champions. All of us. Together. (Angel, “Awakening” 4.10)

The audience was swept up in this story – finally Angel was being allowed the happiness he had been denied for so long. In this episode he, and the audience, finally get everything they had wanted, loose ends are tied up, bad guys are defeated, bonds are reformed, and Angel finally understands the true meaning of redemption.

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But it’s all a lie As Whedon shows us, in real life nothing is that easy; Angel can only dream of such redemption. One of the most heartbreaking moments in the entire series comes not for Angel but for the viewer when we realize that it was all just the Shaman’s spell and Angel’s dream. There can be no happily ever after for Angel or his team. One important final aspect to consider is Angel’s gloomier finale. BtVS’s finale ended on a moment of hope for Buffy by using the strength of the slayer to give powers to all potential slayers everywhere through Willow’s magical gifts. For the members of Angel’s team, not only does little hope remain for their survival but also concerns about the on-going existence of the world at large are foregrounded. Angel’s darker and more adult tones allowed fans and scholars alike to explore both the manner in which growth and development can be arrested through both internal and external forces and how those obstacles can be removed. But it was not a happy or satisfying moment for either Whedon or the fans, stripped suddenly of their favorite cast of characters. As Whedon wrote: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the road less traveled by and they CANCELLED MY FRIKKIN' SHOW. I totally shoulda took the road that had all those people on it. Damn. (Breaking News: Angel to End After 5 Seasons)

We’re certainly glad he didn’t take that road with more people on it, but damn, if only the network had been brave enough to let us continue down Angel’s dark and windy one.

Works Cited Abbott, Stacey. Angel. Kindle ed. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2009. Beagle, Peter S. “The Good Vampire: Angel and Spike.” Yeffeth 115-124. Print. Conrad, Roxanne Longstreet. “Welcome to Wolfram & Heart: The SemiComplete Guide to Evil.” Yeffeth 33-47. Print. Cruisee, Jennifer. “The Assasination of Cordelia Chase.” Yeffeth 187-197. Print. DeBrandt, Don. “Angelus Populi.” Yeffeth 1-13. Print. Havens, Candace. Joss Whedon: The Genius Behind Buffy. Dallas, Tex: BenBella Books, 2003. Print.

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Krause, Marguerite. “It’s a Stupid Curse.” Yeffeth 103-113. Print. Lorrah, Jean. “A World Without Love: The Failure of Family in Angel.” Yeffeth 57-63. Print. McLaren, Scott. “The Evolution of Joss Whedon’s Vampire Mythology and the Ontology of the Soul.” Slayage: The Online International Journal of Whedon Studies 5.2 (2005). Web. Nov. 2012. slayageonline.com. Vukcevic, Filip “Angel becomes angry, depressed, and hopeless. Then Things Get Dark.” IGN Entertainment. July 13, 2004. Web. 19 Jan. 2011. Whedon, Joss. “Awakening.” Angel: The Chosen Collection. Fox, 2007. DVD. —. “Breaking News: Angel to End After 5 Seasons UPDATED. Whedon Talks about Cancellation.” KJB. 13 Feb. 2004. Web. 23 Jan. 2012. —. “City Of.” Angel: The Chosen Collection. Season 1; Episode 1. Fox, 2007. DVD. Yeffeth, Glenn. Five Seasons of Angel: Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors Discuss Their Favorite Vampire. Dallas: BenBella, 2004.

CONTRIBUTOR BIOGRAPHIES Editors U. Melissa Anyiwo is a transplanted British citizen with an obsession with the Gothic. Despite the spurious claims of former students regarding her nocturnal habits, Melissa is not a vampire; she just teaches a course about them. As an African Americanist by trade, Melissa has astoundingly managed to connect concepts of race and blood to the vampire image, allowing all the students she encounters to experience her passions and general awesomeness. She is currently the coordinator of African American Studies at Curry College in Milton, Massachusetts, having earned her Ph.D. from the University of Wales Swansea, where she wrote her dissertation on the dominant stereotypical images of African American women—“Mammy” and “Jezebel”—from the sixteenth century to the present. Melissa has been the Area Chair of Buffy Studies at the PCA/ACA since 2009, quietly reviving the Buffy sing-a-long and diligently managing to convince almost no one she meets that Angel is indeed the superior show. In addition to editing this work, she has published a number of book chapters on using vampires to teach diversity including, “That’s Not What I Signed Up For”: Teaching Millennials about Difference through FirstYear Learning Communities and Outside/In: Using Vampires to Explore Diversity and Alienation in a College Classroom. Karoline Szatek-Tudor is a Shakespeare/Early Modern specialist who likes to dabble outside her field from time to time. For Szatek, working on Buffy has increased her awareness of the unflappable interest in the occult by both scholars and the general public. The fit between Buffy and early modern studies lies in these areas’ contributions to and from folklore. In “Bird Folklore in Shakespeare and Hungary,” a recent paper soon to be published by Cambridge Scholars Press, Szatek discusses the connection between bats and vampires and argues that Hungarians refute the common notion that they originated the bat/vampire link. Professor of English at Curry College in Milton, MA, Szatek has chaired sessions, presented papers, and participated in seminars at numerous

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national and international conferences, including the Modern Language Association annual convention, the biannual Blackfriars Conference, Shakespeare Society of America, and International Shakespeare Association. Her most recent publications include co-editing “What Country’s This? And Whither are We Gone?”: Papers Presented at the Twelfth International Conference on the Literature of Region and Nation, co-editing From Around the Globe: Secular Authors and Biblical Perspectives; and co-writing with Andrew Gurr, “Women and Crowds at the Theatre.” As Contributing Editor of The Shakespeare Newsletter, Szatek writes the Table of Contents column, which provides reviews of recent studies on Shakespeare and his theatre.

Contributors Bonnie Jett Adams is a Lecturer in English at the University of West Georgia who excels at missing incredible television shows during their original runs, and Buffy was no exception. She is, therefore, delighted by the fact that Buffy scholarship continues to thrive so many years after the series ended. (Adams may or may not also be one of those people who feels unjustifiably guilty about not discovering Firefly until after its cancellation.) While much of her work focuses on literature by women and gender studies, from time to time she dabbles on the dark side, writing about Buffy and teaching the occasional Monstrous and Grotesque interdisciplinary course. Ruth Caillouet is a Professor of English Education at Clayton State University in Morrow, Georgia, and Chair of the Department of Teacher Education. She received her Ph.D. in English from Louisiana State University. While she possesses no fairy blood, slayer’s strength, or demon lovers, she has discovered super powers through studying the novels of Toni Morrison, through teaching for twenty years in Louisiana public schools, and through her obsession with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Nadine Farghaly, M.A. is a PhD student at the University of Salzburg. She received her M.A. in English Literature from Bowling Green State University in Ohio and her diploma in English and American Studies at the University of Salzburg. While her research interests embrace various themes like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Harry Potter, she mainly focuses on gender representations within popular culture. Nadine’s current project is her PhD-thesis with the working-title, Unleashing the Beast and Claiming the Human: An Analysis of the 21th century Alpha Male and his

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Contributor Biographies

Female Love Interests. In addition, her own edited collection Examining Lois Lane: The Scoop on Superman's Sweetheart will be published in September 2013. Amanda Hobson is an administrator at Ohio University in the Department of Residential Housing. She received a Master's of Education focused on feminist pedagogy and is a doctoral student in Interdisciplinary Arts at Ohio University. Her research focuses upon the construction and portrayal of gender and sexuality in transnational socio-cultural history, mainly using the vampire and the paranormal as a cultural lens. Her dissertation will focus on a philosophical reading of the vampire phenomenon in art and culture. Cassie Hemstrom is completing her doctorate in English with emphases on contemporary literature by ethnic American minority authors and theories of gender, race and identity at the University of Nevada, Reno. Her dissertation focuses on relationships between individuals and local, national, transnational and global communities in contemporary literature by Ethnic American authors. She earned her MA in Literature at Boise State University and her Bachelor's at St. John's College, Santa Fe, where her abiding interest in The X-Files lead to great disappointment as four years in New Mexico did not result in a single close encounter with anything stranger than college students. Birte Horn is a lecturer for American Studies at the University of Duisburg-Essen. She received a Master’s degree in History and English from the University of Bielefeld and is currently working on her Ph.D. thesis. The thesis is concerned with the function of mythology in selected American television shows, such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Xena: Warrior Princess. Birte Horn’s research interests are American history, American popular culture, especially television and film studies, gender and queer studies. Dev Kumar Bose is a Lecturer in the department of English at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa. In 2011, he completed his Ph.D. in Rhetorics, Communication and Information Design at Clemson University. His areas of research are professional communication and disability studies. He is especially interested in mental illness and its influence on communication. Esther Liberman-Cuenca is a PhD candidate at Fordham University, New York. She is working on a dissertation that explores the intersection

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among law, gender, and urbanization in medieval and early modern Britain. She has been a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan since Season Two and fancies herself a bit of a pop culture critic in her spare time. Michael Perry is an Assistant Professor of English at Rockford University, in Rockford, Illinois. He completed his PhD at Arizona State University where he studied the Blues, African American literature, and popular culture studies. A regular presenter at the annual PCA/ACA conference, Michael has presented in many areas including Black Music and Culture, Sports, Buffy, Stephen King, and Rhetoric. Michael has found ways to include Buffy in both his Rhetoric Courses and his literary theory courses while teaching at Rockford University. Heather M. Porter is an accomplished line producer and coordinating producer in reality television. A member of the Producers Guild and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, she has worked on five seasons of Hell’s Kitchen and recently finished her third season of RuPaul’s Drag Race. A Whedon scholar, Porter has presented at all five Slayage Conferences. Her research interests are in quantitative analysis of images of violence, intelligence and sex in the science fiction and fantasy genres. Mona Rocha is an avid Whedonverse fan. When she is not teaching or working on completing her PhD in Women’s History and Gender and Women Studies at Louisiana State University, she can be found in front of the TV watching Buffy, Angel, Dollhouse, and Firefly. Lisa M. Vetere is an Associate Professor of English at Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey, and a latecomer to Buffy Studies, having focused her dissertation and scholarly work on witchcraft narratives in early nineteenth-century America, publishing two recent articles on such in the journals Clio: A Journal of Literature, History, and the Philosophy of History and JNT: The Journal of Narrative Theory. But in the last three years, she has managed to watch all seven seasons of the series in their entirety at least three times, and is even directing an M.A. thesis on the series next year. She integrates such research into her teaching at all levels by offering courses on the gothic, vampires, witchcraft, and other magical narratives.



ADDITIONAL READINGS The following represent core texts in Whedon Studies referenced by the contributors.

Abbott, Stacey. Angel. Kindle ed. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2009. Anonymous. “Message Boards.” Buffy-Boards. Web. Battis, Jes. “’She’s Not All Grown Yet’: Willow as Hybrid/Hero in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 2.4. (2003). Web. slayageonline.com. Chance, Karen. “Ten Reasons to Date a Vampire.” Penguin/blog. 4 April 2008. Web. Dial-Driver, Emily. The Truth of Buffy: Essays on Fiction Illuminating Reality. Jefferson, N.C: McFarland, 2008. Print. Edwards, Lynne Y, Elizabeth L. Rambo, and James B. South. Buffy Goes Dark: Essays on the Final Two Seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Television. Jefferson, N.C: McFarland, 2009. Print. Emad, Mitra C. “Reading Wonder Woman’s Body: Mythologies of Gender and Nation.” The Journal of Popular Culture 39.6 (2006): 954-984. Print. Haraway, Donna J. “The Cyborg Manifesto.” Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1990. Print. Havens, Candace. Joss Whedon: The Genius Behind Buffy. Dallas: BenBella, 2003. Print. Jensen, Jeff. “The Fillion Files.” Entertainment Weekly 25 March 2011: 44. Print. Kaveney, Roz. Reading the Vampire Slayer: An Unofficial Critical Companion to Buffy and Angel. London: Tauris Park, 2001. Print. Koontz, K. Dale. Faith and Choice in the Works of Joss Whedon. Jefferson: McFarland, 2008. Print. Lavery, David and Cynthia Burkhead, eds. Joss Whedon Conversations. Jackson: UP of Mississippi, 2011. Print. Levine, Elana, and Lisa Parks. Undead TV: Essays on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Durham: Duke UP, 2007. Print. Magoulick, Mary. “Frustrating Female Heroism: Mixed Messages in Xena, Nikita, and Buffy.” The Journal of Popular Culture 39.5 (2006): 729-755. Print.



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McLaren, Scott. “The Evolution of Joss Whedon’s Vampire Mythology and the Ontology of the Soul.” Slayage: The Online International Journal of Whedon Studies 5.2 (2005). Web. Nov. 2012. slayageonline.com. Moseley, Rachel. “Glamorous Witchcraft: Gender and Magic in Teen Film and Television.” Screen 43.4 (2002): 403-22. Print. Nosferatu. Dir. F. W. Murnau. Perf. Max Schreck, Greta Schroder, and Ruth Landshoff. Jofa-Atelier Berlin-Johannisthal, 1922. Film. Pateman, Matthew. “‘That Was Nifty’: Willow Rosenberg Saves the World in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 25.4 (2007): 64-77. Print. Pender, Patricia. “‘Kicking Ass is Comfort Food’: Buffy as Third Wave Feminist Icon.” The World is a Text: Writing, Reading, and Thinking About Visual and Popular Culture. Eds. Jonathan Silverman and Dean Rader. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2009. 449-458. Print. Purkiss, Diane. The Witch in History: Early Modern and TwentiethCentury Representations. New York: Routledge, 1996. Print. Riess, Jana. What Would Buffy Do? The Vampire Slayer as Spiritual Guide. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2004. Print. Ruddell, Caroline. “‘I am the Law’ ‘I am the Magics’: Speech, Power, and the Split Identity of Willow in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 5.4. (2006). Web. slayageonline.com. Russel, Howard and Valyssia, eds. BuffyWorld. Web. 2 March 2011. Smith, Sharon. “The Image of Women in Film: Some Suggestions for Future Research.” Feminist Film Theory, a Reader. Ed. Sue Thornham. 14-19. Print. South, James B. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling in Sunnydale. Chicago: Open Court, 2003. Print. Spaise, Terry L. “Necrophilia and SM: The Deviant Side of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” The Journal of Popular Culture 38.4 (2005): 744762. Print. Stevenson, Gregory. Televised Morality: The Case of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Oxford: Hamilton, 2003. Print. Vukcevic, Filip “Angel becomes angry, depressed, and hopeless. Then Things Get Dark.” IGN Entertainment. July 13, 2004. Web. 19 Jan. 2011. Whedon, Joss. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Seasons 1-7. Fox, Los Angeles. 1997-2003. DVD. —. Angel Seasons 1-5. Fox, Los Angeles. 1999-2004. DVD.



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Additional Readings

—. “Breaking News: Angel to End After 5 Seasons UPDATED. Whedon Talks about Cancellation.” KJB. 13 Feb. 2004. Web. 23 Jan. 2012. —. “Let’s All Watch A Woman Get Beaten To Death.” Web. 20 May 2007. —. Speech. “Equality Now.” Equality Now Tribute Address. June 2006. 22 Web. Apr. 2008 http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/joss whedonequalitynow.htm. Wilcox, Rhonda. Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. London: I. B. Tauris, 2005. Print. Wilcox, Rhonda and David Lavery, eds. Fighting the Forces: What’s at Stake in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2002: 61-72. Print. Winslade, J. Lawton. “Teen Witches, Wiccans, and ‘Wanna-Blessed-Be’s’: Pop Culture Magic in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Slayage: The Journal of the Whedon Studies Association 1.1. (2001). Web. slayageonline.com. Wilson, Dominique. “Willow and Which Craft? The Portrayal of Witchcraft in Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” The Buddha of Suburbia: Proceedings of the Eighth Australian and International Religion, Literature, and the Arts Conference, 2004: 146-158. Print. Yeffeth, Glenn. Five Seasons of Angel: Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors Discuss Their Favorite Vampire. Dallas: BenBella, 2004.