Why I’m looking forward to S6.

[elisi]

Now this isn’t really about the fact that S8 appears to be crack!fic, what with the ridiculous ret-cons, or that it’ll be Bryan Lynch (yay!) penning S6. OK, so it’s a bit of that, I admit I am shallow. (I’m also currently praying that Franco Urro will do the artwork. Because I really, really like his style!)

But - I’ve been thinking about endings. I’ll never accept the comics as canon, but pre-comics I think that if I could have chosen the ending to mess with, I’d have gone with ‘Chosen’. Because NFA is just so utterly, utterly perfect. But having to face Joss messing with *both*, I’ve been forced to re-examine my feelings, and I’m more upset about S8 - and more excited about S6. There are several reasons for this:

1) Finished vs cancelled.

There were never going to be more than 7 seasons of Buffy. They knew right from the start of S7 that it was the last one (the parade of Big Bads in ‘Lessons’ is a good indicator). It went out on a high, and Joss admitted to being totally out of ideas.

There *was* going to be a S6! They planned for it right from the beginning and had to scramble to tie up all the lose ends when the show was cancelled. And I’m curious to see what we might have got... [cries for lost show and curses the WB]

2) Ret-cons.

I’m sorry, but the ones in s8 (or at least that particular one) just make my head implode. It says ‘f*ck continuity’ and undermines a brilliant moment. (And no, I don’t think it’s worth it!)

Now s6... the obvious one would be to bring back Wes. I doubt this could be done without undermining his death - but! He was only killed because the show was cancelled - he was sacrificed on the altar of ‘make the audience bawl its eyes out’. In a world where the show wasn’t cancelled he would have survived - they had stuff planned out for him in S6. So if they ret-con him... I’ll understand why.

3) The endings.

I know I’ve gone on about this at length, but what I love about the end of ‘Chosen’ is that Buffy is *free*! In theory she can do whatever she wants, and - I’ve come to realise - this is something infinitely precious. That moment at the edge of the Hellmouth is where canon stops. The trails fanning out from there head off in so many directions that to choose just one narrative is a huge, *vast* reduction in scope. As I said above, I’ve realised that the ending of ‘Chosen’ is more important to me than NFA - because Buffy is human, and because she - for the first time since she was called - has her whole life in front of her. I don’t want that messing with. (Especially not for the sake of sending her to a Scottish castle with Giant!Dawn, Suave!Xander, Super!Willow etc...)

Now the *point* of ‘Not Fade Away’ is that it is Angel’s destiny to fight:

The point of Angel was always that the fight never ends. He'll always fight. It's an eternity of fighting. You can't ever win but the fight is worth fighting.
David Fury

His path from the alley only leads to more battles. So the fact that we’ll get another story about Angel fighting pleases me. (Oh and given the writer, I sincerely doubt that Spike will be 'following Angel around like a puppy dog'. Bryan Lynch's Spike is a BDH and *very* independent!)

4) Shipping.

A lot of people aren’t interested in s6, because it’ll just (needlessly they think) delay Spike going to Buffy. (Or of course they’re just not interested in AtS full stop, which I can’t help them with, sadly). Now personally I think he made his choice in ‘Harm’s Way’ (for whatever reasons), and unless a reason comes along for him to seek Buffy out - or they accidentally cross paths - he’s not thinking in terms of ‘once this is over I’ll go to Buffy’. Anyway, what I’ve come to realise (and I feel like such a traitor) is that I love the characters above the ships. I adore Spuffy with all my heart, but if Spike stayed with Angel and never found his way back to Buffy, and she settled down with someone new and lived a happy life I’d be OK with that. Or if Spike and Angel split up and he went off on his own adventures I’d love that too (thank you Spike:Asylum!). I’m easy - as long as the stories are good, I’m happy to go almost everywhere, ships or no ships. For me that’s one of the joys of the open-endedness of the way the shows finished. Does that make me weird?

Actually re. Spike and being on his own - I don’t see Spike not going to Buffy as him ‘moving on’ per se. He will always love her and that’ll never change, even if he thinks he hasn’t got a shot at a proper future with her. But what he *does* do, I think, is adopt her outlook, her MO: ‘The mission is what matters.’

And that’s as many thoughts as I have room for today...

Comments

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

What after all my scintillating arguments and dodgy puns you still don’t believe Warren’s back? I got nothing. And yet keep typing.

Chosen was both an ending and a new beginning. I’d be happy to leave Buffy there on the cusp of a smile but for one thing. In fact lots of things lots of times namely fanfic. Like it or not that clear view of crater has been coloured in too many times now and always the same colours. The thing is with fanfic I already know what it’s going to say, “I’m in UR journalz reading UR posts” and I know that the Immortal is going to turn out to be the very incarnation of evol, I know the disembodied voice/yellow eyed familiar/talking hamburger in her dream is going to be Spike/Angel/Giles, I know Dawn is going to discover big unlocky powers. I just wish for once someone would read their thesaurus all the way through and make her a boat park.

Joss soon the other hand doesn’t keep a blog and is also crazy and mean. He may have thought it was all over back in 2001 but even without reading recent interviews the sheer exuberance of the S8 comics tell me that this is the genius who invented the plot twist having fun. Too much fun on occasion but that’s not a bad fault to begin with.

AtS S6 I’m less sure about. Admittedly because I was never a great Angel fan, every so often it turned up a Smile Time a Home or a Guise will be Guise but it was a boys show when all was said and done and I am no boy. There’s also (to me) something a little offputting about Brian Lynch’s interviews on the subject, he’s a funny guy but so much the Spike fan boy I fear he’ll be writing him as yet another EveryHan (Solo) more than the screw-up I knew and loved. It’s there in the art (based on the Asylum previews) Spike is pretty and action-packing but his face looks weirdly airbrushed, never a wrinkle out of place.

[diachrony.livejournal.com]

I know Dawn is going to discover big unlocky powers. I just wish for once someone would read their thesaurus all the way through and make her a boat park.

::DIES::

I know a couple writers who might well take that challenge!

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

And there could be PotC crossovers...

[stormwreath.livejournal.com]

Aargh. Please tell me that somewhere on the show (and not just in scripts) they showed the word 'Key' written down, and they weren't actually saying 'Quay' all along...

;-)

[owenthurman.livejournal.com]

There is that moment where Andrew is filming the keychain while he narrates the story of Dawn. It comes just before he admires the fine woodwork Xander did on the window.

[elisi]

Spike was reading Giles' notes to Dawn in 'Blood Ties' - I'm pretty sure he'd have said something if she'd been a quay...

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

I think the colonials spell them both the same but Spike was supposed to be reading Giles's notes so it depends where he got the name from and where they learnt English. Or possibly they're two different words in Ancient Sumerian.

[elisi]

What after all my scintillating arguments and dodgy puns you still don’t believe Warren’s back?
Sorry.

In fact lots of things lots of times namely fanfic.
Clearly we read different stuff... OK, so I know a lot of the clichés you mention, but...

I know that the Immortal is going to turn out to be the very incarnation of evol
I presume you've not read shapinglight's Vampire Winter. (B/S, B/A, S/A implied and Buffy/Immortal in the background. Her Immortal is probably the best I've ever read. There is also the one in treacle_a's 'Mortal Wounds', who *is* evil, but might not necessarily think of himself that way. Oh and the one in Three Deep who's *fascinating* and quite possible the Big Bad.)

I know the disembodied voice/yellow eyed familiar/talking hamburger in her dream is going to be Spike/Angel/Giles
Hmmm... struggling to remember any particular ones with that feature.

I know Dawn is going to discover big unlocky powers.
I think people just wish that there had been more done with her on the show. And although I'll grant that the giant thing is new and inventive, the fact that she's apparently regressed to her S6 persona is not nice. Most fics I come across she's simply human and she and Buffy are actually bonding.

I just wish for once someone would read their thesaurus all the way through and make her a boat park.
S2C made her into a *walrus*, what more do you want?

Actually speaking of clichés, then training slayers is (obviously) way up there. And I sort of blinked when Buffy did her little 'if you fight together you are formidable' because I've had Giles say pretty much exactly the same.

the sheer exuberance of the S8 comics tell me that this is the genius who invented the plot twist having fun.
That is rather obvious. :) But then George Lucas had fun doing the prequels... I dunno, he's just not impressed me so far. I don't think it's necessary to make people's heads implode for the sake of plot-twists. It's ballsy, sure, but it's not elegant.

it was a boys show when all was said and done and I am no boy.
A boys show? I'm no boy and I *adore* AtS. Sometimes more than Buffy. There is a darkness and a hopelesness that I love. And - as the_royal_anna once said (in her review of 'Power Play'):

Should we end on the shallow? I think we should. Watching that last scene, where they’re all stood together in a circle with their hands raised, you know what it struck me I’m really going to miss? The experience of watching a TV show and more often than not, wanting to sleep with every single character on screen.

Concurrently. ;)

but so much the Spike fan boy I fear he’ll be writing him as yet another EveryHan (Solo) more than the screw-up I knew and loved.
Have you seen the Drew Goddard quote on my sidebar? I think most of the writers were Spike fanboys. And having pretty much inhaled 'Spike: Asylum' I can say that his Spike is spot-on. Full of all the flaws we know and love. The artwork is *gorgeous*, but then so is Spike - and his vampface is plenty nasty. Actually that is one of my main problems with S8 - it's not pretty enough. My shows were always *beautiful*.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

The point I was trying to make about fanfic compared to the comics was that fanfic inevitably reflects fannish preoccupations hence the vast number of fics that attempt to ‘fix’ their originals or recapture favourite developments in amber. Ship issues dictate that the Immortal be evil whether he sees himself as such (ie is well-written) or not. Dawn being the key fixes what many fans see as a neglect of her storyline in S6/S7, which I think ignores the more interesting ‘becoming ordinary’ arc she had. Dawn reconciling with Spike is another fic standard that I think exists to recapture their S5 relationship and again these stories seem to ignore how the two characters developed subsequently.

Fanfic, almost by definition, doesn’t aim for originality, it’s (generally) about people wanting to play with, re-live, wallow in the characters on a TV show as they were perceived while on the show. That perception thing is probably at the root of why we’re never going to agree on Spike: Asylum (even if someone were so kind as to put some of it online because I couldn’t find it in the comic shop this morning). My perception of Spike and what was interesting about him is probably quite different from yours or Brian Lynch’s. I see the whole hero thing as somewhat of a regression to his death and glory days. I might find a story interesting that problematised his journey to herodom but on AtS and so far in the Lynch comics it seems to have been played entirely straight.

[elisi]

that fanfic inevitably reflects fannish preoccupations
Well I'm not sure you can write off Joss as having no fannish preoccupations. They might be *different*, since as the creator of the 'verse he got to tell *his* story, and thus does not need to 'fix' anything in the same way others do... but he's still a fan with kinks and foibles.

Dawn reconciling with Spike is another fic standard that I think exists to recapture their S5 relationship and again these stories seem to ignore how the two characters developed subsequently.
Considering the way Joss has re-written the Dawn/Willow relationship, I'd say this isn't much of a problem.

Fanfic, almost by definition, doesn’t aim for originality [...] That perception thing is probably at the root of why we’re never going to agree on Spike: Asylum
Oh you *must* get it! The joy of that story is that it really is very, very original. New place, new challenges, and actual real character development:

I see the whole hero thing as somewhat of a regression to his death and glory days.
Do not be too sure of what we mean when we use the word 'hero'. Mostly I think it just refers to the fact that he's the central character, and not the sidekick. See Buffy is noble, and Spike wants to be like her. Angel strives to be noble and Spike simultaneously mocks that and wants to be better at it. This we have seen on screen. Take these two *away* and let Spike try to work things out for himself... how heroic is he? How noble? He has inbuilt 'What Would Buffy Do?' and 'What Would Angel Do?' reflexes. But when it comes down to it, he's neither - and when the chips are down 'What Would Spike Do?' is a *fascinating* concept to delve into.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

Oh Joss has kinks and foibles up the wazoo but we get to see then transferred direct to the page rather than filtered through someone else’s creation and that one less remove makes a difference. He’s not writing Dawn and Willow reconciled because he wants them to make up. In fact he hasn’t written them at all in the sense of them having actual scenes with each other (OK there was that one), more their make up has been implied in order to contrast with Dawn's relationship with Buffy. I keep thinking of this weird analogy with memories of wave-particle duality from O level physics. I think Joss sees characters more as waves, all interacting parts of the fabric of a story. Whereas for fanfic writers they’re more like particles to be separated out discretely, rattled around and rolled into new settings quite independent of one another. It’s been a long day.

The thing with Spike, I’m not interested in him being noble, he’s done there been that. I also think he’s a character that works better as a foil than a protagonist, by aiming to be his own man he becomes just another teflon anti-hero. If he were to have an arc though I’d rather see him learn self-reflection, doubt, kindness. To accept it as well as to give it. There were the beginnings of that in S7 and in Damage but still a long way to go.

[elisi]

we get to see then transferred direct to the page rather than filtered through someone else’s creation and that one less remove makes a difference.
I'd say more than one move, but yes.

I think Joss sees characters more as waves, all interacting parts of the fabric of a story. Whereas for fanfic writers they’re more like particles to be separated out discretely, rattled around and rolled into new settings quite independent of one another.
That makes sense. For me it was always about the characters - they were the reason I watched (even though of course I love all the crunchy meta!). It is the same with fic - I can appreciate a good plot, but I don't need it as long as the characters are good.

If he were to have an arc though I’d rather see him learn self-reflection, doubt, kindness. To accept it as well as to give it.
I really, truly think you'd like 'Spike: Asylum'. For a start there's group therapy...

SPIKE: Come on, hero. Tell me more. Teach me what it means. And I'll tell you why you can't stand the bloody sight of me.

ANGEL: Tell it to your therapist.

What if he had one?