A few S4 thoughts.

[elisi]

Main problem with S4: Adam. Secondary problem with S4: Adam & Riley. I'm thinking about 'Goodbye Iowa' specifically, with the big scene where Adam confronts Buffy and Riley, doing his big revealing speech and calls Riley 'brother'. It's supposed to be a big moment - the Big Bad sees himself as akin to Buffy's honey - but it just falls so woefully flat.

*sigh*

I really, truly try to like everything - heck I even found the positive sides to Caleb - but Adam is pretty much hopeless. He's dull and ugly and never does anything interesting. I'm going to attempt to look at him through my meta eyes however, because I think he has something to tell us about Slayers.

But first, Buffy/Riley...

Buffy/Riley
“It’s just doomed! And I can’t do doomed *again* right now. Sorry.”
Now I wrote a long post about these two already, so I'm not going to go over that again. But I think I've pinpointed the moment things begin to go wrong, and why:

BUFFY: I have to tell you some stuff... about my past. And it's not all
stuff that you're gonna like.
RILEY: You can tell me anything.
BUFFY: I think so. I think I can.
'New Moon Rising'

But - she doesn't tell him the whole truth. Xander accidentally fills in the blanks Riley didn't know were there the next day, and then draws his own conclusions when Buffy rushes off to LA.

Which leads to this conversation:

Buffy: Have I ever given you any reason to feel that you can't trust me?
Riley: No.
Buffy: Then why with the crazy?
Riley: Because I'm so in love with you I can't think straight.
'The Yoko Factor'

And right there is the problem: He trusts her - he's left his friends and job because he trusts her. But she doesn't trust him - not on the same level. She didn't tell him the whole truth about Angel which led to Riley jumping to an erroneous conclusion.

More telllingly still is her dream in 'Restless'. Riley's first words to her are:

“Hey there, killer!”

And he's sat with Adam - the two of them looking very much like brothers now - drawing up plans for world domination:

BUFFY: World domination? I-is that a good?
RILEY: Baby, we're the government. It's what we do.

Subconsciously, Buffy never really lets Riley in. A moment later they meet again - and Riley might look different, but he still sounds the same:

RILEY: (offscreen) Thought you were looking for your friends. Okay, killer...
(Shot of Riley wearing regular civilian clothes)
RILEY: ...if that's the way you want it. I guess you're on your own.
(Walks off.)

Buffy was right - they are doomed. It takes a little while before Riley leaves, but the game was already up.

Buffy and Adam
“You could never hope to grasp the source of our power.”
But now I'm going to look at something far more interesting - the parallels between Adam and Buffy:

Adam: Aggression is a natural human tendency. Though you and me come by it another way.
Buffy: We're not demons.
Adam: Is that a fact?

Because the whole Initiative story line is a mirror of Buffy the Slayer - again and again we see the two tackle the same situations, but it's not really ‘Military vs. Slayerhood’ that's the main opposite here. It's Maggie and Adam who parallel the Watchers and Slayers. Maggie Walsh tried to harness the powers of demons, just like the Shadowmen did long ago - but Maggie came at the idea from a scientific/human angle, taking bits and pieces from demons and humans and putting them together like a quilt. This is in stark contrast to the Shadowmen, who decided to fight the demons on their own turf - they used magic to create the Slayer, and took the spirit of the demon to imbue a girl with super strength, leaving her with a mind of her own to make moral judgements, rather than Maggie’s ‘programming’. Of course both Adam and Buffy were supposed to be guided by a 'parent' - but where the Council was always a very strict and distant, seeing emotions as weakness, Maggie deliberately developed a strange, twisted mother/son relationship with Adam and the rest of the soldiers.

Also - in 'Restless' - we see the importance of names:

RILEY: Buffy, we've got important work here. A lot of filing, giving things names.
BUFFY: (looks at Adam) What was yours?
ADAM: Before Adam? Not a man among us can remember.

This goes back to Genesis - Adam (the first man) naming all the creatures of the world, man (human) as the ruler of the world. Which again is a contrast to The Slayer who has no name:

First Slayer: I have no speech. No name. I live in the action of death, the blood cry, the penetrating wound.

The Slayer is more like a weapon, or a force of nature, than a soldier. S4 shows how although a Slayer isn't perfect (and we've seen the prime example of that with Faith), how the Watchers didn't get it quite right, it is the Slayer’s humanity that is important. It is what stops Buffy from being Adam:

Adam: I have a gift no man has. That no demon has ever had. I know why I'm here. I was created to kill. To extinguish life wherever I find it. And I have accepted that responsibility.

The First Slayer is closer to that than Adam thinks:

First Slayer: I am destruction. Absolute ... alone. [...] No ... friends! Just the kill.

Maggie orders Buffy's death because she's 'a liability', because she thinks for herself. It is what sets Buffy apart from her fellow Slayers, and what will in the end change the world:

BUFFY: I talk. I shop, I sneeze. I'm gonna be a fireman when the floods roll back. There's trees in the desert since you moved out. And I don't sleep on a bed of bones. [...] You're really gonna have to get over the whole ... primal power thing. You're *not* the source of me.

Riley uses the word ‘killer’ twice. Dracula will go on to use it - and unsettle Buffy. The darkness and demonic origins of the Slayer will be the major theme for the rest of the show - but Buffy will again and again prove how a Slayer is so much more than a ‘killer’. Her powers are a part of her - but not the source! It's an important distinction, and one that Buffy makes instinctively.

Comments

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

Just to add my two cents very quickly.

I think that Adam being a patchwork of various dead bits is the exact opposite of the Scoobies, Adam is there to make Buffy understand that even though she's The Slayer she needs her team...the team she's neglected because of Riley (cf "A New Man"), a team that Adam and Spike tried to break("The Yoko Factor"). It's only when they do the "union spell" in "Primeval" that the First Slayer is summoned and Super!Buffy can beat Adam. So IMO the parallel works mostly between Adam and Buffy&Co, rather than between Adam and Buffy.

Adam's bits are dead and demonish or artificial. He's a product made out of death (like vampires then !)by others, and he can only bring death. The goal of that patchwork was a destructive power , just like the First Slayer who was made by the Shadowmen and , as you pointed out, who said she's was absolute destruction in "Restless". The First Slayer was created too, she had no choice.

When the Scoobies merge in "Primeval" they seek power, but they are more than that, they remain living individuals connected together by choice and through love.

A choice and a love that will be again echoed in the last episode of the show, "Chosen".

[elisi]

Oh that's all excellent! There's also the fact that Adam is completely self-contained, not even needing food. Which again is in contrast to Buffy who shares her burden - and power - with those around her.

Thank you! :)

[shapinglight]

No profound thoughts about Adam, who I agree is a very boring villain (and Goodbye Iowa is a bad episode). The points you raise about Buffy and Riley are excellent.

[elisi]

Thank you - and poor Buffy and Riley, they really were doomed...

[zanthinegirl.livejournal.com]

Great point! I have to say that I've always found Adam too dull to think about that hard!

You found good points to Caleb? Really? The only good point to Caleb I've found is "Nathan has a paycheck"; but I'm curious!

[elisi]

I've always found Adam too dull to think about that hard!
Well I feel I've done my part for fandom now, and refuse to think about him any more! ;)

You found good points to Caleb? Really?
Ah suah did! Here and here. Enjoy!

OMG

[quietpoet.livejournal.com]

You know what, chicky? You never cease to amaze me. Just when I think you couldn't possibly come out with something more insightful, you write something that makes me go "hmm, I never saw that before!" I never really saw the whole Buffy/Scoobies and Adam parallels (mostly because I usually fast forward the Adam parts in those episodes hehe).

It's stuff like this that makes me wonder what show the people who make fun of the show or write it off are watching. Joss Whedon is so brilliant, and even the little teeny details (like Riley calling Buffy "killer")that don't seem important on the surface are foreshadowing or symbolism or just something important.

Great job, babe. I'm putting this in my memories

Re: OMG

[elisi]

You never cease to amaze me.
Well that's quite a compliment! *blushes*

It's stuff like this that makes me wonder what show the people who make fun of the show or write it off are watching.
Well my husband for one thinks that all the analysing is just sad, and that the show should be judged on entertainment value only... to each their own!

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

It's Maggie and Adam who parallel the Watchers and Slayers. Maggie Walsh tried to harness the powers of demons, just like the Shadowmen did long ago - but Maggie came at the idea from a scientific/human angle, taking bits and pieces from demons and humans and putting them together like a quilt. This is in stark contrast to the Shadowmen, who decided to fight the demons on their own turf - they used magic to create the Slayer, and took the spirit of the demon to imbue a girl with super strength, leaving her with a mind of her own to make moral judgements, rather than Maggie’s ‘programming’. Of course both Adam and Buffy were supposed to be guided by a 'parent' - but where the Council was always a very strict and distant, seeing emotions as weakness, Maggie deliberately developed a strange, twisted mother/son relationship with Adam and the rest of the soldiers.
And because Maggie was the type of parent who simply refused to allow her "boys" to think for themselves, they rebelled and took her power (aka life) away from her. While Giles, the Council representative, is smart enough to know that Buffy simply can't be contained and allows her the freedom to make her own decisions which gives her the power to save the world over and over while Adam and Riley sink into nothingness. I mean Riley goes off to fight demons in Central America but that's hardly save the world material as far as we can tell and frankly do we really know what those demon eggs would have done anyway?

[elisi]

While Giles, the Council representative, is smart enough to know that Buffy simply can't be contained
::nods:: We see it in this conversation particularly:

Riley: All my life that's what I've been groomed to do. They say jump, I ask how high? I get the job done. Just don't know if it's the right job anymore.
Buffy: I know how you feel. Giles used to be a part of this council. And for years all they ever did was give me orders.
Riley: Ever obey them?
Buffy: Sure. The ones I was going to do anyway.

Riley of course doesn't have super powers, and I like the fact that he keeps working the same mission, even if it is in a much smaller way. But he does it for Buffy's reasons, not Adam's.

[lusciousxander.livejournal.com]

He trusts her - he's left his friends and job because he trusts her. But she doesn't trust him - not on the same level.

Poor Riley. :(

I never cared for Adam. I loved S4 for the Core Four arc, them drifting apart then realizing that they need each other to survive, that they're family. That's the stuff I like. That's the main plot for me, the Adam stuff I've always considered subplot to help the main plot.

[elisi]

Poor Riley. :(
Well yes and no. Buffy helps him to see that the world isn't black and white, and he goes on to find a new mission and a pretty wife!

That's the main plot for me, the Adam stuff I've always considered subplot to help the main plot.
Yup, same here!

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

For me, Adam was just a rehash of Frankenstine's monster, which had already been done once in season 2 (the second episode, with the football player and his brother). While that's interesting, I didn't like the finale for much other than the special effects (especially after the really bad special defects of season three's finale). However, I loved Adam in "Who Are You?," when he gets the vampires to obey him by telling them to face their fear (the holy). Very cool. Then, of course, Joss decides to do Restless and leaves poor (David Fury?) to write the season-long arc finale in Primeval. Oh, well. At least we got season five next!

[elisi]

Adam was just a rehash of Frankenstine's monster
I wrote somewhere else (although possibly not on LJ) that Adam is an existential Big Bad, questioning everything - reflecting the Scoobies as they go to college. At least that is what I dearly hope they were aiming for - it doesn't work very well.

leaves poor (David Fury?) to write the season-long arc finale in Primeval.
Yes it was David Fury - and the episode isn't all that bad. Given what he had to work with, I think he did rather well.

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

Oh, I liked it okay. It just wasn't nearly as wrenching as Becoming, Prophecy Girl, The Gift, Grave (the other Fury finale), or Chosen.

[elisi]

Well they've drifted apart and then make up. And nobody dies. Not a lot to tug at the heartstrings...

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

Oh, I remember another reason why I wasn't so thrilled - Spike was all evil. I like Spike when he's grey like Becoming or Lover's Walk. Not when he's just petty and selfish.

[elisi]

Oh I know. Me? I just go - Spike's fighting! And he's wearing The Coat! Mmmmmm....

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

Whoa. Icon. Moving. With Coat. Whoa. Wait a sec. I have to try to imitate the Walk. Whoa.

[elisi]

Heeee!

JM has said that one of the things he misses about playing Spike is the way he walks whilst wearing the duster. :)

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

I remember that quote! I wants a black coat. And a brown coat. I already has a long blue coat like Simon/Angel. And the Walk is so much fun, even if it does get you funny looks and you can't do it without the coat.