And those triggers are fascinating, because they can be subtle, invisible to others, or they can be glaringly obvious. And they aren't rational -- or, rather, they are usually not entirely explicable by logic. Maybe if we know the full history of the trigger, and the brain chemistry and neurobiology of what goes on when we process the information. But that's a lot of information, and it still is an imperfect representation of an intense subjective response.
What's interesting is trying to navigate conversations with fans about why one character is sympathetic and another isn't, to that fan. There usually are reasons that are clearly expressed -- but a lot of the time, dig deep enough and there are big contradictions. Just as outside fandom, which transgressions from friends or family are forgivable and which aren't varies strongly from person to person, and tend to be inconsistent. Looking seriously at myself, can I really say that I've treated others fairly -- applying the same standards to people I'm close to? No.
Both Willow and Spike seek out substitute mothers in their lovers...Tara for Willow, Dru and Buffy for Spike. Just as Buffy and to a degree Angel seek out the substitute fathers....Giles/Angel/Riley/Wood/Spike for Buffy and Giles/Master/PTB/Wes for Angel. Buffy also has mother issues, but they are less pronounced.
It's interesting that Tara, like Joyce and William's mother, dies in a way that Willow can't fix. While Joyce and William's mother's illnesses were longer, more drawn out affairs, Tara had her own period of insanity (post Glory mindsucking), which matches with Joyce's madness in season five and with Dru. I think I remember you mentioning at some point in one of those essays how Willow/Tara and Spike/Dru are similar -- both even having a scene where they stare at the stars and talk about naming them. And I think that it's interesting how a certain kind of insanity seems "passed down" from mother (or substitute-mother) to child (or substitute-daughter) -- whether immediately or with a long delay, Buffy, Willow and Spike have periods of insanity, mental instability. For Spike it's after getting his soul back, for Willow it's after Tara's death (and to a lesser extent after Tara left her earlier in the season), for Buffy it's in Normal Again where she is reunited with her mother in the mental hospital frame -- which highlights how much Joyce is *absent* in her current life.
For Spike and Dawn, and I think Willow and Xander too, Buffy is a mother figure about whom they are ambivalent, because she bring both love and rejection. With Dawn, Buffy reenacts some of the same issues she had with Joyce, from the other side. Like Joyce in Gingerbread, Buffy goes to kill Dawn (and Willow and Xander) in an effort to rid her life of the supernatural, while under external influence. Willow, similarly, plays a weird kind of mother role to Buffy and Dawn, and is a particular kind of "dark mother" at the end of the season -- when she tells Dawn that she is not a real girl, "we'll all be happier without listening to the constant whining," and when she tells Buffy that she knows she hurt Buffy by giving her life, she is also being a particular kind of scary mother figure, the angry mother who at last can speak her mind and express her ambivalence about her children's very *existence*.
While this represents Whedon's issues, there are other writers to consider. I listened to a podcast once where Marti Noxon talked about a play that she did early on in her career, which very baldly depicted a "crazy mother" figure -- bipolar, menacing, inconstant, terrifying. It was, Noxon thought, very obviously based on her own experiences with her mother. So when Noxon's mother went to see it, Noxon thought -- uh-oh. What is she going to say? How will she deal with me casting her as the villain out on stage for all to see? And afterwards Noxon's mother went up to her and said, "How did you know so much about my mother?" [Marti's grandmother] The generational elements, the way patterns repeat unconsciously, emotional instability -- a lot of what's interesting about BtVS and AtS is in this anecdote.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2016-02-23 12:31 am (UTC)What's interesting is trying to navigate conversations with fans about why one character is sympathetic and another isn't, to that fan. There usually are reasons that are clearly expressed -- but a lot of the time, dig deep enough and there are big contradictions. Just as outside fandom, which transgressions from friends or family are forgivable and which aren't varies strongly from person to person, and tend to be inconsistent. Looking seriously at myself, can I really say that I've treated others fairly -- applying the same standards to people I'm close to? No.
Both Willow and Spike seek out substitute mothers in their lovers...Tara for Willow, Dru and Buffy for Spike.
Just as Buffy and to a degree Angel seek out the substitute fathers....Giles/Angel/Riley/Wood/Spike for Buffy and Giles/Master/PTB/Wes for Angel. Buffy also has mother issues, but they are less pronounced.
It's interesting that Tara, like Joyce and William's mother, dies in a way that Willow can't fix. While Joyce and William's mother's illnesses were longer, more drawn out affairs, Tara had her own period of insanity (post Glory mindsucking), which matches with Joyce's madness in season five and with Dru. I think I remember you mentioning at some point in one of those essays how Willow/Tara and Spike/Dru are similar -- both even having a scene where they stare at the stars and talk about naming them. And I think that it's interesting how a certain kind of insanity seems "passed down" from mother (or substitute-mother) to child (or substitute-daughter) -- whether immediately or with a long delay, Buffy, Willow and Spike have periods of insanity, mental instability. For Spike it's after getting his soul back, for Willow it's after Tara's death (and to a lesser extent after Tara left her earlier in the season), for Buffy it's in Normal Again where she is reunited with her mother in the mental hospital frame -- which highlights how much Joyce is *absent* in her current life.
For Spike and Dawn, and I think Willow and Xander too, Buffy is a mother figure about whom they are ambivalent, because she bring both love and rejection. With Dawn, Buffy reenacts some of the same issues she had with Joyce, from the other side. Like Joyce in Gingerbread, Buffy goes to kill Dawn (and Willow and Xander) in an effort to rid her life of the supernatural, while under external influence. Willow, similarly, plays a weird kind of mother role to Buffy and Dawn, and is a particular kind of "dark mother" at the end of the season -- when she tells Dawn that she is not a real girl, "we'll all be happier without listening to the constant whining," and when she tells Buffy that she knows she hurt Buffy by giving her life, she is also being a particular kind of scary mother figure, the angry mother who at last can speak her mind and express her ambivalence about her children's very *existence*.
While this represents Whedon's issues, there are other writers to consider. I listened to a podcast once where Marti Noxon talked about a play that she did early on in her career, which very baldly depicted a "crazy mother" figure -- bipolar, menacing, inconstant, terrifying. It was, Noxon thought, very obviously based on her own experiences with her mother. So when Noxon's mother went to see it, Noxon thought -- uh-oh. What is she going to say? How will she deal with me casting her as the villain out on stage for all to see? And afterwards Noxon's mother went up to her and said, "How did you know so much about my mother?" [Marti's grandmother] The generational elements, the way patterns repeat unconsciously, emotional instability -- a lot of what's interesting about BtVS and AtS is in this anecdote.