Spike tries to change, over and over, but doesn’t succeed. And Riley turns to the vampire junkies, because they need something from him Buffy doesn’t. Angel’s love for her almost costs him his soul. Look at the relationships the romantic leads have with Buffy. He may be fighting an evil vampire one second and making a deal with a demon the next. He wants to be good but he enjoys being a bad boy too much. No one in the gang, not even Buffy, ever trusts him completely, and with good reason. Spike becomes the romantic lead and, arguably, the most important male character in the Buffy world. He never becomes a replacement for Angel, even when David Boreanz (who plays Angel) leaves the show. And a character who is capable of great evil and great good. And his very unexpected truce with the Slayer foreshadows his future, as a semi-regular member of the Gang. Spike’s flash of altruism is explained by his self-interest he doesn’t want the world destroyed. Angel, who has lost his soul with the consummation of his love for Buffy, is trying to raise a demon to destroy everything. As early as 1998, Spike, still an evil force, allies himself with Buffy to save the world. Certainly Spike plays the role of second banana when he is a member of Angel’s vamp group.īut as the show moves forward, Spike evolves into a more complicated character. Spike fills the same role as foil to Angel. In fact, they compete for the title of homecoming queen in the larger high school world. Cordelia serves as the envious, less popular girl, wanting to take Buffy’s place. Buffy is the prom queen and Angel is king. The Buffy world begins in high school and, to some degree, that dynamic continues throughout the show. But for me his appeal is more nuanced than that. Is it because of the appeal of James Marsters and those killer cheekbones? Again, partly. Is he popular because he is the bad boy, the antihero? Partly. Even when he becomes, well, not good exactly, but less evil, and attains his heart’s desire-Buffy-he remains a bad boy. Why is this? Shouldn’t Angel, the brooding vamp who will lose his soul if he experiences true happiness, be the most popular? Spike, after all, is evil. Spike, in fact, became one of the most popular characters on the show and a cult favorite. But he is definitely my favorite and, in my very informal survey, Spike, the vampire who goes from evil to good and back again-and is frequently both at the same time-is by far the more popular. And Spike? Well, “reform” is not a word one thinks of in connection to Spike. Angel, the reformed vampire with a soul, is the hero and romantic lead, a tortured Heathcliffesque character who broods about his evil past. In fact, the names of the two most important male characters would seem to indicate that Spike, whose name sounds like a street tough, is the villain, and Angel, whose name sounds, well, angelic, is the hero.
#Spike from buffy tv#
Thoughts on this? I hope I explained it well enough.I’m sure this title makes no sense to those souls who have never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which aired on TV from 1996 to 2003. This moment doesn't really feel sweet at all and I’m not sure it's intended to. It feels like Buffy dismissing Spike again, not understanding him. It's compartmentalizing him and simplifying him. So I don’t think calling him that really a compliment or comfort to Spike. I don't think William is utterly destroyed, but rather a part of him but not all of him. It seems like a rejection of Spike instead of an acknowledgment of William. By using that name, she's refusing to see the man he really is and has designed himself as and has been trying to explain he is.
It is a rejection and complete misunderstanding of the man who stands in front of Buffy.īuffy never even knew Wiliam: so using that name seems to be putting a degree of separation between her and Spike. Dismissing that name choice is to acknowledge a self of him that is dead or otherwise incorporated into the identity of Spike. His name is a choice, it’s a statement, it’s part of the careful self he’s constructed over the years. I don't necessarily think it was a good thing for Buffy to call him William, even if she intended to humanize him, because he's intentionally rejected that name and chosen a new one in order to take control of himself and how others perceive him.
Why do you think she does this? Moreover, was it a positive or negative thing overall? Spike has a complicated relationship with his own identity, the person he was, is, and becoming, and he especially had a complicated relationship with his name. So when Buffy breaks up with Spike she says "I'm sorry William" instead of calling him Spike.
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