At the same time, the role of 'demonizing' (and letting demons be redeemed) in distinguishing between the act and the actor pushes the metaphor into territory that really should make us rather uncomfortable. Buffy still needs to protect the world. But insofar as the demon metaphor stands in for bad "people", her job not only raises questions regarding Buffy's power over life and death, but also the question of vigilantism. Buffy is the judge, jury, and executioner -- a point which as you note, she makes to Xander. The problem is that one of the main functions of civil society (at least in the modern western sense of the term) is to handle justice so as to avoid the inevitable lapse into vengence-seeking that would happen if people pursued justice on their own behalf (because we never can judge such matters impartially).
Agreed. It hit me in my rewatch. I'd just listened to Whedon's Cultural Humanist speech, then rewatched the two episodes back to back again - and it struck me, wait...what is the writer saying here?
Because in Selfless - numerous characters from Xander to D'Hoffryn point out that Buffy is playing the law. "Lady Hacks Away" or "Justice". And it is notable that in very next couple of episodes...she is struggling with that title.
I don't know if Joss, et.al. mean to raise those particular sets of problems -- but I can't help but bring them to the table when watching the show. It's a big part of the difficulty I have in seeing the show's final metaphor (Buffy shares her power) the way ME presumably wanted to depict it. Buffy doesn't share the power with society at large (which would be to recapitulate the idea that justice belongs in the hands of the state), she shares it with a select few.
Have you listened to the cultural humanist Q&A? Whedon said some interesting things in it, that makes me wonder if he himself is questioning that ending. He seemed to state that what he was going for was the one of many ending, that you aren't shut off, that you have shared your power with the world. But, he's uncertain of the metaphor. I'm guessing and I may well be wrong about this..that S8 is addressing that issue and that's one of the reasons he chose to come back to the story and not end it with Chosen?
I'll be very interested to see how that metaphor fares in the wake of a completed season 8 -- where these issues seem to be front and center. A lot will depend on what sort of villain Twilight turns out to be. If he's a straight-up villain, then the slayer spell was good, and the slayers are just a persecuted (martyred) group of heroic individuals trying to save the world despite itself. That would fold back into our lust for vengence, and I'd be disappointed if that's the road Joss takes. I am hoping that Twilgiht is more interesting than that.
Agreed. It depends a great deal with where they take this. I can't tell at this point. And after listening to Whedon's speech and Q&A, I'm not really sure - during that speech he made a point about how we should demonize the action not the actor. That he was most interested in those who had power and those who did not, and those who abused the power they had. He said for years he felt he had none, then discovered when he had it he was abusing it - and hope he could be redeemed. Dollhouse - he said was to a degree about that and how we objectify each other and project ourselves onto others. That comment makes me wonder what he is doing with Buffy and where he is taking that story. My guess is in the direction we want...because I've read Indentity Crisis (I think that's the name) by Metzler - the co-plotter, which is about the Justice League (Superman etc) and how their abuse of power gets an innocent person killed. How they bend the rules for their own purposes. Whedon picked Metzler to co-plot Buffy S8 based on that comic/graphic novel. Which is an anti-vigilantism novel about the abuse of power.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2009-08-29 08:59 pm (UTC)Agreed. It hit me in my rewatch. I'd just listened to Whedon's Cultural Humanist speech, then rewatched the two episodes back to back again - and it struck me, wait...what is the writer saying here?
Because in Selfless - numerous characters from Xander to D'Hoffryn point out that Buffy is playing the law.
"Lady Hacks Away" or "Justice". And it is notable that in very next couple of episodes...she is struggling with that title.
I don't know if Joss, et.al. mean to raise those particular sets of problems -- but I can't help but bring them to the table when watching the show. It's a big part of the difficulty I have in seeing the show's final metaphor (Buffy shares her power) the way ME presumably wanted to depict it. Buffy doesn't share the power with society at large (which would be to recapitulate the idea that justice belongs in the hands of the state), she shares it with a select few.
Have you listened to the cultural humanist Q&A? Whedon said some interesting things in it, that makes me wonder if he himself is questioning that ending. He seemed to state that what he was going for was the one of many ending, that you aren't shut off, that you have shared your power with the world. But, he's uncertain of the metaphor. I'm guessing and I may well be wrong about this..that S8 is addressing that issue and that's one of the reasons he chose to come back to the story and not end it with Chosen?
I'll be very interested to see how that metaphor fares in the wake of a completed season 8 -- where these issues seem to be front and center. A lot will depend on what sort of villain Twilight turns out to be. If he's a straight-up villain, then the slayer spell was good, and the slayers are just a persecuted (martyred) group of heroic individuals trying to save the world despite itself. That would fold back into our lust for vengence, and I'd be disappointed if that's the road Joss takes. I am hoping that Twilgiht is more interesting than that.
Agreed. It depends a great deal with where they take this. I can't tell at this point. And after listening to Whedon's speech and Q&A, I'm not really sure - during that speech he made a point about how we should demonize the action not the actor. That he was most interested in those who had power and those who did not, and those who abused the power they had. He said for years he felt he had none, then discovered when he had it he was abusing it - and hope he could be redeemed. Dollhouse - he said was to a degree about that and how we objectify each other and project ourselves onto others. That comment makes me wonder what he is doing with Buffy and where he is taking that story. My guess is in the direction we want...because I've read Indentity Crisis (I think that's the name) by Metzler - the co-plotter, which is about the Justice League (Superman etc) and how their abuse of power gets an innocent person killed. How they bend the rules for their own purposes. Whedon picked Metzler to co-plot Buffy S8 based on that comic/graphic novel. Which is an anti-vigilantism novel about the abuse of power.