Buffy S8 Review and a bit on writing...
Nov. 5th, 2009 10:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatPicked up the Buffy comic today and distracted self with it, along with General Hospital - which I'm adoring right now, it's a great story, with wonderful music and operatic overtones, makeing me think that I should see more Opera, something tells me that I have an affinity for it. The Buffy comic...was a bit on the disappointing side, but it has been for quite some time now so am sort of getting used to it. I think I've figured out where Whedon is going with it and why. And over all, I still love and identify with his themes and major two female characters, Buffy and Willow, even if the others have sort of fallen by the wayside.
When I picked up the comic, the store owner asked if it was written by one of the tv show writers. I responded - yes, Jane Espenson wrote for the tv show, she also wrote for BSG, and Star Trek or rather one of the Star Trek's and the fact that I know all of that..yeah, I'm not a geek. Sigh. Definitely a geek.;-) I added that this, meaning the comic, was unfortunately not Jane's best work.
The most interesting thing about the comic though was the letters page - there's a rather fascinating discourse between a fan and Scott Allie that made me sort of respect Allie's pov for a change or at least understand it. The fan was discussing how important it was for fans of a story to know that it was pre-planned, that the plot and world were built and outlined in advance, not completely but enough that things made sense, and something wouldn't pop out of nowhere or cause the world to fall into chaos.
The fan said this: I do think fans tend to prefer things to be specified ahead of time. There could be a number of reasons why this is so, but I think the main one is that a fan finds a world (and its characters, plots, and relationships) more satisfying when they "make sense"/"feel real". In order to make sense and feel real, it's important that each new piece of information that is revealed about the world is consistent with what we already know. That is, each new thing we learn should make the world make more sense, not threaten to throw it into unpredictable chaos. That doesn't mean there can't be any surprises - it's more that surprises should (usually) make sense iin retrospect (think of the Xisth Sense - if the twist ending had been tacked on without incorporating it into the earlier story, it would have been horrible; people liked it because it suddenly made everything make sense). People general prefer to have the "damn, I should have realize!" feeling than the "where the heck did they pull that one from ?" feeling.
So the problem with leaving things to be decided later is that, since you didn't know what had happeneded when writing about the intervening time, there wouldn't have been any clues about it. Even if you didn't intend to leave any clues as such, simply knowing what happened in the back of your mind would have likely subtly shaped how you told the rest of the story, since even small events tend to get tangled up with the rest of reality you're trying to create. Therefore, when making delayed decisions, the reveal, if and when it occurs, may seem to have come out of nowhere, leaving the world making less sense and being less satsifying.
Also the other aspect is simply that sometimes it's rather transparent (at least in appearance) that something is being deliberately treated in the "hey we'll figure it out later" way ....This can be irritating because it can create the feeling rightly or wrongly, that the writer thinks they are smarter than the audience and that they can get away with making things up as they go along rather than carefully planning.
Allie's response: I don't think I've ever really approached stories from this fan point of view, so I thind this all real interesting. I disagree with some of what Ryan says - that you need to have these things worked out, carved in stone, in order to convince the reader. In Hellboy, there is a lot of stuff we leave vague so we can change or work it out later. ...Too much careful planning can kill a story dead [God, don't I know it!], and in my experience, the one thing that careful long-term planning really guarantees is that the plans will change....[I'm leaving out spoilers on the comics]
Being flexible on this sort of thing keeps the story alive. Writers will often tell you that they don't work from outlines because if the story isn't able to surprise them, they know it won't surprise the reader. [That and it is tedious as hell to write from an outline. Too much like work if you ask me.] Every writer and sometimes every story has a different balance between planning and improv, and we all want the feeling of solving a mystery.
I find myself, oddly enough, agreeing with Allie. Except with one caveat - the problem with writing a comic or serial tv series is you cannot go back and change the first chapter, like you can in a novel. I can write like Allie states above - as long as no one sees each chapter until it's done and I've rewritten, revised, and fixed the inconsistencies. There are always a couple. But if I were writing it as a TV series? I'd have to be certain that I kept track.
Now unlike most fans, who I'm guessing agree with the letter writer, or Ryan, I'm a bit more tolerant of the chaos not completely, I like it to make sense, but more tolerant than some. See I disagree with Ryan the fan on one particular bit - planned stories are NOT real. Life cannot be planned. We are thrown curve balls that screw up our plans every day of the week. We don't know what is going to happen next. We don't know what happened to the person halfway around the globe. We can't see all the variables or all the people or all the things that can screw us up. I think the reason fans like Ryan and even myself want a plan, want it to make sense is because it comforts us. Our lives feel so chaotic, so out of our control, so random, as if there is some joker upstairs pulling strings and throwing stuff at us out of nowhere, that we yearn for meaning, for planning, for order in stories. We want our stories to make sense at least in part. Because reality painfully does not.
I think the reason soap operas and tv shows like Buffy often feel more real to me than say a well planned affair such as Law & Order or CSI, is because the writer is to a degree making it up as he goes along. The characters much like we all are, are at the writer's whim. They are Pirandello's six characters in search of an author, in search of a plot, of something that makes sense. There's something oddly comforting to me to see characters at the whim of a capricious writer...but at the same time, I do, admittedly yearn for the order.
Allie states in his response to Ryan the fan - that most of the story is planned. The plot arc is. The reveal on Twilight is. The romantic relationships in the tale were. It was smaller bits that were not. And that I think to a degree is true of most tv shows and serials, except of course the ones that change writers so many times, the new ones have no clue what the old ones did.
In the Buffy Retreat Part 5 Comic - we end up with a super-buffy, or a buffy who can fly, who I'm guessing got all the goddesses' powers, although that is not clear in the final frame - just from the reviews I've read on it. The story itself is about a battle going badly for both sides - yet another allegory on why war does not work for anyone involved. I still think JRR Tolkien did this best in The Hobbit - as I was telling someone at work today, who is re-reading the Lord of the Rings, the Hobbit in a way does what the LOTR tries, far better and in less pages - it discusses why war does not work. Why war destroys. Buffy is more or less making the same point. Neither Twilight nor Buffy really win here. Although it appears Twilight has...but that's the thing about victories in war, they all to a degree are false ones.
The issue is also about power - the giving it up, and the regaining of it. Buffy has a lot of power. She gave it up. Now she has it all back but to what end?
I'm not sure what Riley's role is here. He's supposed to be spying for Buffy, but he didn't appear to give her any useful information - including who Twilight is. Sort of liked his interaction with Buffy and his comment regarding Buffy - which echoed past comments. Not quite sure what his purpose was or why the writer bothered to include him. (shrugs). But had more or less figured out he was supposed to be Buffy's spy, what I haven't figured out is if he is also Twilight's spy? I'm guessing if Riley survived, there may be another twist in the works?
The Dawn/Xander romance is leaving me cold. Which is surprising, because I was sort of shipping them in Season 7 and a good portion of S8. Now that they are together? They are irritating me, particularly Dawn. Not sure why. It may be how they are being written?
But I do adore the Willow-Buffy story.
So who died? Anyone important? Or just random red shirts that we don't care all that much about? I hate it when shows and comics do this...they have huge wars, and convienently the only people who die are the ones we didn't know that well or otherwise known to Trekkies the "red shirt" syndrom or "random good guy syndrom". That's not how real life works.
Other than that? I liked the issue and adore the cover. On the art front? Am still having troubles telling characters apart. OZ looked like Andrew. Giles looked like Andrew. Riley looks like Andrew. Kennedy looked like Satsu. And Dawn looked like a random slayer. I think they felt the need to get rid of all of the random slayers, so we'd be less confused as to who was who. Going with that thematic they should also kill off Andrew - that would simplify things a bit. But also piss off fans. Andrew is admittedly growing on me. So maybe kill off Riley and Oz - they aren't doing all that much. Either that or put name tages or dialogue tags on them.
When I picked up the comic, the store owner asked if it was written by one of the tv show writers. I responded - yes, Jane Espenson wrote for the tv show, she also wrote for BSG, and Star Trek or rather one of the Star Trek's and the fact that I know all of that..yeah, I'm not a geek. Sigh. Definitely a geek.;-) I added that this, meaning the comic, was unfortunately not Jane's best work.
The most interesting thing about the comic though was the letters page - there's a rather fascinating discourse between a fan and Scott Allie that made me sort of respect Allie's pov for a change or at least understand it. The fan was discussing how important it was for fans of a story to know that it was pre-planned, that the plot and world were built and outlined in advance, not completely but enough that things made sense, and something wouldn't pop out of nowhere or cause the world to fall into chaos.
The fan said this: I do think fans tend to prefer things to be specified ahead of time. There could be a number of reasons why this is so, but I think the main one is that a fan finds a world (and its characters, plots, and relationships) more satisfying when they "make sense"/"feel real". In order to make sense and feel real, it's important that each new piece of information that is revealed about the world is consistent with what we already know. That is, each new thing we learn should make the world make more sense, not threaten to throw it into unpredictable chaos. That doesn't mean there can't be any surprises - it's more that surprises should (usually) make sense iin retrospect (think of the Xisth Sense - if the twist ending had been tacked on without incorporating it into the earlier story, it would have been horrible; people liked it because it suddenly made everything make sense). People general prefer to have the "damn, I should have realize!" feeling than the "where the heck did they pull that one from ?" feeling.
So the problem with leaving things to be decided later is that, since you didn't know what had happeneded when writing about the intervening time, there wouldn't have been any clues about it. Even if you didn't intend to leave any clues as such, simply knowing what happened in the back of your mind would have likely subtly shaped how you told the rest of the story, since even small events tend to get tangled up with the rest of reality you're trying to create. Therefore, when making delayed decisions, the reveal, if and when it occurs, may seem to have come out of nowhere, leaving the world making less sense and being less satsifying.
Also the other aspect is simply that sometimes it's rather transparent (at least in appearance) that something is being deliberately treated in the "hey we'll figure it out later" way ....This can be irritating because it can create the feeling rightly or wrongly, that the writer thinks they are smarter than the audience and that they can get away with making things up as they go along rather than carefully planning.
Allie's response: I don't think I've ever really approached stories from this fan point of view, so I thind this all real interesting. I disagree with some of what Ryan says - that you need to have these things worked out, carved in stone, in order to convince the reader. In Hellboy, there is a lot of stuff we leave vague so we can change or work it out later. ...Too much careful planning can kill a story dead [God, don't I know it!], and in my experience, the one thing that careful long-term planning really guarantees is that the plans will change....[I'm leaving out spoilers on the comics]
Being flexible on this sort of thing keeps the story alive. Writers will often tell you that they don't work from outlines because if the story isn't able to surprise them, they know it won't surprise the reader. [That and it is tedious as hell to write from an outline. Too much like work if you ask me.] Every writer and sometimes every story has a different balance between planning and improv, and we all want the feeling of solving a mystery.
I find myself, oddly enough, agreeing with Allie. Except with one caveat - the problem with writing a comic or serial tv series is you cannot go back and change the first chapter, like you can in a novel. I can write like Allie states above - as long as no one sees each chapter until it's done and I've rewritten, revised, and fixed the inconsistencies. There are always a couple. But if I were writing it as a TV series? I'd have to be certain that I kept track.
Now unlike most fans, who I'm guessing agree with the letter writer, or Ryan, I'm a bit more tolerant of the chaos not completely, I like it to make sense, but more tolerant than some. See I disagree with Ryan the fan on one particular bit - planned stories are NOT real. Life cannot be planned. We are thrown curve balls that screw up our plans every day of the week. We don't know what is going to happen next. We don't know what happened to the person halfway around the globe. We can't see all the variables or all the people or all the things that can screw us up. I think the reason fans like Ryan and even myself want a plan, want it to make sense is because it comforts us. Our lives feel so chaotic, so out of our control, so random, as if there is some joker upstairs pulling strings and throwing stuff at us out of nowhere, that we yearn for meaning, for planning, for order in stories. We want our stories to make sense at least in part. Because reality painfully does not.
I think the reason soap operas and tv shows like Buffy often feel more real to me than say a well planned affair such as Law & Order or CSI, is because the writer is to a degree making it up as he goes along. The characters much like we all are, are at the writer's whim. They are Pirandello's six characters in search of an author, in search of a plot, of something that makes sense. There's something oddly comforting to me to see characters at the whim of a capricious writer...but at the same time, I do, admittedly yearn for the order.
Allie states in his response to Ryan the fan - that most of the story is planned. The plot arc is. The reveal on Twilight is. The romantic relationships in the tale were. It was smaller bits that were not. And that I think to a degree is true of most tv shows and serials, except of course the ones that change writers so many times, the new ones have no clue what the old ones did.
In the Buffy Retreat Part 5 Comic - we end up with a super-buffy, or a buffy who can fly, who I'm guessing got all the goddesses' powers, although that is not clear in the final frame - just from the reviews I've read on it. The story itself is about a battle going badly for both sides - yet another allegory on why war does not work for anyone involved. I still think JRR Tolkien did this best in The Hobbit - as I was telling someone at work today, who is re-reading the Lord of the Rings, the Hobbit in a way does what the LOTR tries, far better and in less pages - it discusses why war does not work. Why war destroys. Buffy is more or less making the same point. Neither Twilight nor Buffy really win here. Although it appears Twilight has...but that's the thing about victories in war, they all to a degree are false ones.
The issue is also about power - the giving it up, and the regaining of it. Buffy has a lot of power. She gave it up. Now she has it all back but to what end?
I'm not sure what Riley's role is here. He's supposed to be spying for Buffy, but he didn't appear to give her any useful information - including who Twilight is. Sort of liked his interaction with Buffy and his comment regarding Buffy - which echoed past comments. Not quite sure what his purpose was or why the writer bothered to include him. (shrugs). But had more or less figured out he was supposed to be Buffy's spy, what I haven't figured out is if he is also Twilight's spy? I'm guessing if Riley survived, there may be another twist in the works?
The Dawn/Xander romance is leaving me cold. Which is surprising, because I was sort of shipping them in Season 7 and a good portion of S8. Now that they are together? They are irritating me, particularly Dawn. Not sure why. It may be how they are being written?
But I do adore the Willow-Buffy story.
So who died? Anyone important? Or just random red shirts that we don't care all that much about? I hate it when shows and comics do this...they have huge wars, and convienently the only people who die are the ones we didn't know that well or otherwise known to Trekkies the "red shirt" syndrom or "random good guy syndrom". That's not how real life works.
Other than that? I liked the issue and adore the cover. On the art front? Am still having troubles telling characters apart. OZ looked like Andrew. Giles looked like Andrew. Riley looks like Andrew. Kennedy looked like Satsu. And Dawn looked like a random slayer. I think they felt the need to get rid of all of the random slayers, so we'd be less confused as to who was who. Going with that thematic they should also kill off Andrew - that would simplify things a bit. But also piss off fans. Andrew is admittedly growing on me. So maybe kill off Riley and Oz - they aren't doing all that much. Either that or put name tages or dialogue tags on them.
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no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 06:03 am (UTC)"Who is that? I can't tell. Ah, shoot, just kill them so I don't have to worry about it!"
:D
no subject
Date: 2009-11-07 01:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 10:21 am (UTC)I get both the fan's point and Allie's point, but what I took from the exchange was more the way Allie talked about 'we' when he was talking about how the story was developed. Seems like he might have more input into things than is thought.
Also, his saying they realised there were far too many characters batting around made me smile. Could have told him that a couple of years ago, especially as so many of them remain completely undeveloped.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-07 02:01 am (UTC)I don't know how to read the "we" bit. He's an editor and the frontman for the comic - in that he answers the fan mail, no one else does, and speaks for Joss. But if memory serves, Joss is a ghost writer and editor himself and notorious for wanting sole control. So I can't really see him giving Allie that much input, outside of maybe continuity points, which is Allie's job. But I don't know. Everyone deals with editors differently.
Some people let their betas dictate plot points, others just want copyeditors. I'm guessing Allie has input, that he does help plot it, but I'm not sure by how much. It's not clear.
I worry that he is, because that means I'm not going to get what I ultimately want from these comics and should probably just give up now. ;-) (I'm a character girl and I'm guessing Allie is an action plot guy) But I'm trying to stay positive, even if it is an exercise in futility. (We're talking years of reading X-men comics - and hanging in there during the dark period, where they had more characters than I could keep track of and five different books which kept crossing over willy nilly. I did give up on them eventually, and if the Buffy comics continue in the direction they are going, I may well give up on them yet...but at the moment I have hope. It sort of depends on who Twilight turns out to be. And what they do with it.)
Had much the same reaction regarding his realization that there were too many characters...you'd have thought Whedon would have figured this out during S7, I mean Fury figured out that that was a huge problem, where was Whedon???
no subject
Date: 2009-11-08 06:50 pm (UTC)So, you're a former X-Men reader too? I followed the books for years but in the end I just couldn't take it any more and gave up. I'd occasionally dip back in when one of the writers did something I liked with my favourite character (Magneto, rather predictably, in case you were wondering), but I've even given that up now.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-08 07:53 pm (UTC)Then, ironically, Whedon did the Astonishing X-men run after Buffy and Angel ended, and a friend got me a six month subscription for my birthday - so I collected only Whedon's run of the comics. Then Lynch and Whedon started their Spike and Buffy series respectively, which got me back into the whole comic bit once again.
If I get bored, as I did with X-men, I'll stop again.
I'm on the fence about it right now.
Agreed big huge ensemble casts don't play to Whedon's strengths - he's a character guy not an action guy. Espenson is much the same way - this story arc did not play to her strengths. She's better at smaller character moments.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-09 03:50 pm (UTC)Very much so, which is why the best moments were all intimate character ones, like Willow talking to Oz and Buffy re-bonding with Xander.
Weird. Your trajectory from the X-Men to BtVS is so similar to mine, apart from Joss's run on X-Men which I have to say I didn't like much.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-09 05:59 pm (UTC)apart from Joss's run on X-Men which I have to say I didn't like much.
I wasn't in love with it. Ambivalent. My flist liked it more than I did. Stopped for a bit, actually, then picked up again when I read that he'd done an interesting head-trip on Wolverine, Beast, and Scott.
(That and the fact, that I have a weakness for those three characters. I also clearly like Kitty Pryde, hence the lj name).
But, I had problems with it. He had no clue what to do with Wolverine and I was more a Pete Wisdom fan than a Colossus fan...so there was that. Also, it drug in places not as much as the Buffy comics are... The whole DangerRoom arc was deeply stupid and didn't make a lot of sense. Although I did like the fact that Lockheed was a spy and an intelligent lifeform and not just a cute dragon. ;-)
I'm not sure how long I'll stick with Buffy...possibly up until the Twilight reveal, maybe past that - depends on what the Twilight reveal turns out to be, I guess.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-10 01:01 pm (UTC)As is typical with these things, just when I decide I'm so bored with it I can't be bothered to review any more, they've managed to make no 31 (Joss's January issue) look quite interesting. Mind you, that's happened before and the promise wasn't fulfilled.
With you on preferring Pete Wisdom to Colossus. Also, I too felt that Joss didn't have a clue what to do with Wolverine. Wolverine, imo, just isn't the sort of character that appeals to him. A bit like Spike and Angel, in fact.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-10 06:07 pm (UTC)Really? All I heard was that Twilight would be revealed in Brad Metzler's run - which probably means 32.
But you are right...we've been promised stuff before.
(the problem may be similar to season 7 - our expectations are higher than the story can deliver. I'm starting to set my expectations much much lower.)
Also, I too felt that Joss didn't have a clue what to do with Wolverine. Wolverine, imo, just isn't the sort of character that appeals to him. A bit like Spike and Angel, in fact.
I thought that at first, but when I consider the interviews and Whedon's work - I think it's more a case of not having anything more to add or say regarding a specific character.
Wolverine as Whedon correctly pointed out - has been overwritten - or over-exposed. There's very little that hasn't been said about the character. I think he liked the character (enough that he coincidentally gave Spike and Angel respectively attributes), but he felt there was nothing new he could say about him. The only thing he could think of - he did. (I get that, it is very hard to write about a character that has been over-written). Also there was a point in which Marvel was putting Wolvie in every single comic regardless of whether or not it made sense.
On Spike and Angel - I actually think Whedon adored Spike. He gave him some of the best lines and the best arc. Created the William persona in Fool for Love (that portion Whedon wrote - from interviews and commentary, Petrie did mostly the Riley scenes and some of the fight sequences/present sequences, Whedon did the flashbacks, and Marti the porch scene), created
the speeches in Hole in the World and Beneath You, as well as Chosen. Also wrote the scene between Spike and Buffy in Hell's Bells. And he begged Marsters to join Angel. (That wasn't just WB, Whedon pitched it). As for Angel? He pitched the Angel series with Greenwalt.
His difficulty with Angel - was that he'd written the character as a straight up noir hero - which again has been to an extent over-written. Malcolm Reynolds - he struggled with as well, for similar reasons. They were characters he'd grown tired of. I think in some respects he enjoyed Spike more - because Spike was a trickster character that defined himself as Whedon wrote him - he wasn't pre-planned.
I think the reason he's reluctant to revisit the characters isn't that they don't appeal, they obviously do on some level - or he wouldn't have picked up and read Lynch's Spike comics. I think it's more that they don't fit the story he's telling yet or
that he doesn't have anything to say about them at the moment. That may or may not change. (shrugs). I know I have similar issues with stories that I've written.
I have a novel that desperately needs selling to publishers and I'm bored with it, read it too many times. And it would probably be more sellable if I could write a sequel...but the characters just aren't speaking to me for some reason. I think Whedon may or may not be in a similar place with Spike and Angel, they aren't speaking to him, while Buffy and Willow still are.
That said? I have a hunch Spike and/or Angel will pop up in Whedon's comics before the season is over. Probably closer to issue 40 - which at this rate, unfortunately, may not be until 2011.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-11 08:12 pm (UTC)I'm not one of these people who thinks Joss doesn't like Spike (or Angel), incidentally. I just think - as you say - that he's said all he has to say about them. Just my tough luck, I suppose, because I don't find the scoobies that interesting (except Buffy herself) and without the input of such characters - or at least some other ambiguous character with edge, like Dracula - I am just bored with the story.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-13 03:42 am (UTC)No, I agree I think Whedon doesn't have much more to say about them. He likes how he ended their tale in Not Fade Away.
Just my tough luck, I suppose, because I don't find the scoobies that interesting (except Buffy herself)...
I admittedly have a similar problem. The character I found the most interesting at the end of both series and I wanted more information on was Spike. I also wanted more information and a resolution to Spike's past and present relationships with Angel, Drusilla, and Buffy. I felt those three relationships were unresolved and left sort of hanging. It's why the only fanfic I tend to read is regarding Spuffy or Spangle. I felt there was more story there.
I am still curious about Buffy.
And you are right - they need someone like Cordelia, Anya, Faith, Spike in the mix - someone with edge. Faith seems to be watered down. There's no tension - outside of the love triangle, which is aggravating to me.
So I struggle with it. I honestly don't know if Whedon will resolve it or not. I don't want much - just one panel in one issue - short and sweet. The fact that he isn't giving me that - leads me to believe that he doesn't want to resolve it yet. Although it is more than possible that he thinks it doesn't need to be resolved and would rather leave it to the fans imagination.
I am also struggling with a specific and somewhat aggravating faction of fandom - have for a while. I am worried that the reason I won't ever get those resolutions is because of that annoying vocal faction - which I wish sometimes would just put a stick in and go away. ;-) But they don't. So all I can do is ignore them and hope the writer does too, because they are in the minority.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-16 09:38 am (UTC)I know JM tends to get a bit bitter sometimes (whereas at others, he'll explain what he thinks - and I agree - was Joss's view of the character in perfectly reasonable terms, though they don't tally with Joss's, as expressed on that Write Environment CD), but I had no idea DB did too. Actors! Such drama queens! Heh!
But they don't. So all I can do is ignore them and hope the writer does too, because they are in the minority.
Now I'm intrigued to know who this minority is, of course. I can guess, but maybe I'm wrong. If I'm right, I can see Joss being affected by that argument, but I would also like to believe he would be fair to his own character, who was not conceived in that way and people read far too much into what Joss (unfortunately, as it happens) didn't think twice about.
Unless it's that other minority.
Anyway, even if it's the first minority, I would be surprised if Joss had picked up on that argument, in view of the fact that most of the things he's had to say about Spike post-show have been more positive than not.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-16 05:39 pm (UTC)Oh there was extensive whining from Vincent K. and Sarah Michelle Gellar as well. Gellar was still put out about how they treated her during the auditions, and did not like where they were taking her character in S6 and was quite vocal about it. VK was upset that he had no say on his character and couldn't evolve the character.
Whedon stated at one point that his mistake - was becoming buddy-buddy with the actors in the early seasons and forgetting that he's their boss and they need to respect him and do what he tells them.
Actors, unless they are producing the show, have relatively little control over what happens on the set or on-screen. Imagine going to work each day and being told to make out with a co-worker, on-camera, half-nude, who you don't particularly like and annoys you?
Or one that you like but wouldn't particularly want to be nude around? It's hard to feel too sorry for them - because they did pick this profession knowing full well what it required and they get paid a lot of money to do it.
Remember a producer/director telling me once - hardest thing is directing actors. I'd buy that - I tried doing it at the high school level and hated it.;-)
Now I'm intrigued to know who this minority is, of course. I can guess, but maybe I'm wrong.
I'm trying really really hard to not to piss people off who may or may not be reading this and be diplomatic, because mileage varies. The minority is the folks who felt rightly or wrongly that the tv series was sending a negative moral message to impressionable minds. And were outraged that Whedon would put Buffy with Spike after Spike attempted to rape her in Seeing Red in any romantic capacity whatsoever, because according to their experiences and worldview doing such a thing promoted violence against women and promoted a message that men can rape women and get away with it. Also that it was obviously impossible in their worldview and to anyone with half a brain that a man who attempted to rape a woman would ever in a million years feel remorse for this or be trustworthy or try to atone, nor should he ever be allowed back in her life. They felt that her forgiving him in any way or letting herself love him or kissing him - was obviously an endorsement of rape, and anyone who thought otherwise was an apologist or hopeless romantic. Also they felt rightly or wrongly that obviously Spike could not be redeemed nor was redeemed because he still wore Nikki's jacket and dissed her memory to her son, the righteous Robin Wood. (shrugs)
And they do not listen or see any argument or view different from theirs as legitmate or unoffensive, were completely unaware that they were being offensive to anyone else, because you know they are right, you are wrong, and they are in the beleagured minority - and if you try to, you get shot down and well, called all sorts of nasty names.
Sigh. Aren't you glad you asked? ;-)
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Date: 2009-11-17 07:02 pm (UTC)Well, at least I know which minority you were talking about now. It was the first I mentioned, not the second. I stay far, far away from them.
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Date: 2009-11-18 02:38 am (UTC)Sigh. Wise move. If only I were able to. One of them I happen to be related to. ;-) (Brothers...sigh)
And..I've made friends with people like this. So try to be diplomatic. But it is a pet peeve and nothing gets me angrier than that type of reasoning.
Hence the ranty above.
I have nicknamed the faction in my head the holier-than-thous, which I know, I know, is hardly diplomatic.
But I can't help it! LOL!
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Date: 2009-11-20 12:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 10:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 05:55 pm (UTC)But it looks like Joss has completely forgotten about it.
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Date: 2009-11-06 06:18 pm (UTC)fantasized about it (small wonder - there are no other male characters outside of Giles and Andrew) but I don't think Xander is still there...he has a million slayers/women to fantasize about and had a relationship with Renee. He got past Buffy ages ago.
No, if they had had sex - I think Whedon would have made that a lot clearer. Great Muppity Odin while a Xanderism, doesn't mean she slept with him. Just that she's been hanging out with him for 8 years. ;-)
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Date: 2009-11-06 06:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-07 02:12 am (UTC)I think what Whedon was trying to convey was the start of or Buffy's feelings building gradually for Xander. As well as her sexual frustration - she's a straight woman, who likes and to a degree prefers men, who is stuck with over 1000 women. Note, her confidants in previous seasons were male vampires, Giles, Xander, and to a degree Riley - until she shut him out.
I think Xander on the other hand is no longer sexually attracted to Buffy - as Whedon expresses quite clearly in A Long Way Home arc - Xander asks Amy if it has to be a true love or lover kissing Buffy, or if it can just be a really good friend. Also, Xander's dream sequence in Restless - sets up how Xander will see and feel about Buffy later on. Just as Willow eventually grew out of her crush on Xander, I think Xander has moved past his romantic/lust for Buffy. They love each other, just not in the sexual sense of the word. At least that's my take on Xander.
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Date: 2009-11-06 08:27 pm (UTC)I'm really interested to know how this whole Buffy-Xander thing is gonna play out. Knowing Joss, it's not gonna have a happy ending, but it's great he decided to explore it. I just wish Dawn wasn't in the picture.
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Date: 2009-11-06 12:38 pm (UTC)I agree with your reaction to the comics straight down the line. I think the fact that massive numbers of red shirts died particularly bothered me. The blurb for #31 said friends and foes are left dead on the field and I sure thought that meant there'd be at least one or two real deaths. Joss is a bit of a coward on this. If nothing else he could offer up a Leah or a Rowena so there'd be at least an illusion of something being at stake here.
On the Ryan/Allie thing -- I don't mind writers leaving open how things will go. It bugs me when they write without knowing what has happened. If, for example, Allie is right and nobody at DH, Joss included, cares about (and therefore hasn't pinned down) how Buffy came to be in a castle financed by bank robbing, I don't see how they could possibly know who it is they are writing about. And it doesn't strike me as a good writing process to not know who your central character is or how she came to be where she is. (Of course, Allie could be completely wrong or completely misleading about it -- but he's said many times that we neither know nor need to know how we got from The Chosen to LWH.) But I'm with you in not caring that they didn't know what a Thricewise was.
Where Whedon's going
Date: 2009-11-06 05:50 pm (UTC)Nothing groundshattering, more a gut feeling than anything else.
I think he's focusing on ...how to explain this? It's about how Buffy handles the responsibility of being powerful and how that responsibility separates and connects her to what is around her.
The relationship between her power and what is around her, and the arc is about her not rejecting that power, not allowing it to rule her, but choosing to control and be it's master. The power isn't mastering her, she is mastering it. Everyone around her is also struggling for power or control, to be important - and they are letting their desire for power control them, so are powerless. I think that's the overarching theme - and how it differs from S7 is it isn't about sharing power or not fearing your power - so much as it is about how we relate to those with power, how they relate to it, and the degree to which we allow ourselves to be slaves to power or if you will forgive the vernacular - power's bitch.
Up until this point - they've all more or less been "power's bitch" - which is why Twilight is sort of winning. The Goddesses are symbolic of what happens when you let power take over. Buffy and Bay and OZ thought the only way not to be power's bitch was to set the power free - give it to the goddesses and let them take on the responsibility. But they reacted much the same way DarkWillow does, power took over, they were power. Buffy needs to learn how to control the power not to let it control her.
TBC - because stupid lj won't let me be verbose.
Ryan/Allie thing
Date: 2009-11-06 05:51 pm (UTC)I actually agree with you on this point. I think Allie may be misunderstanding the fans, we don't care that what is up ahead is unplanned, so much that we care that they seem to have no idea what happened in the year between Scotland and Sunnydale.
Also, sigh, I admit, I think the story regarding how Buffy (of all people - I mean this is the gal who was protecting a bank from a Robbery in S6) would authorize one, let alone participate and how they got to Scotland and how Willow got involved with a snake goddess - far more interesting than the story I'm getting.
There's a huge difference between a gap in story-telling between episodes like Dead Things and Older and Far Away, or between Grave and Lessons, than a gap between Chosen and Long Way Home. At least in Lessons and Older/Far Away they attempted to close a few loops, here they are almost like - okay this takes place sometime after Chosen (we haven't when yet, will just leave that up to you to figure out, you clever fans), in Scotland (not Italy - all that stuff in Damage and Girl in Question was lies told by Andrew to keep Angel away from Buffy), they are financed by bank robberies which were approved by Buffy (don't worry goes to our whole responsible power theme that's why we did it and it seemed cool), Dawn is a giant, Willow is incredibly powerful, and oh we don't know if Buffy knows Spike is alive or not, because that was...well not important to our overall theme, we may or may not answer it in the future or you clever fans can write fanfic. And Xander grieved for Anya in some comic by Drew Goddard in Tales of the Vampires.
ARRGH!
This makes it a bit hard to believe the writer when he says that the story follows directly from his tv series. Or to care.
What has happened before is vital to what happens now. It's not the same thing as making it up as you go along or not knowing what a Thricewise looked like (although that speaks to it a bit) or where a character will end up. If you don't know where the character was before you started the story, you aren't going to know where they are when you end it and your audience will notice. Also bad form to tease about what happened prior, you tease about what is about to happen - what happened prior is how we figure out what will happen. There's some things you can tease about - a la Spike's background or Angel's or what a Thricewise is...but others, not so much.
I've seen too many serials do this and the story unravels as a result...much like an unstable house of cards. Foundation is vitally important, particularly small details.
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Date: 2009-11-06 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 05:57 pm (UTC)The trick is making your writing and worldbuilding deep and rich enough that when you do resolve something, you can go back to Chapter One and pick out things that will support that resolution and look like deliberate foreshadowing, even though at the time you wrote them, they were nothing of the sort. There are many examples of this on the show, like Spike's "What rhymes with 'lungs?'" line, when Angelus is talking about the lack of poetry in something. I'm positive that in S2 they had no conception of Spike having been a poet in life, but that line supports the idea that he was perfectly
As I was telling 2maggie2 above - there's a huge difference between say filling in the blanks of Spike's background by using bits and pieces you've written, and leaving unanswered gaps in your story, huge unanswered gaps. We need to know when this tale is taking place - how long after the events of Not Fade Away or Chosen. It's not clear. It shouldn't be something we guess at. We need to know what lead to the bank robbery. We need to know if Buffy knows Spike is alive or not. Not knowing these things...makes it hard to care or see the story as a continuation of the series. It feels a bit like it is floating off somewhere, disconnected in space. Telling us these things, grounds it. And it isn't hard to do so, a few bits of dialogue here or there, would do wonders.
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Date: 2009-11-07 12:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-07 02:21 am (UTC)The show frustrated me in somewhat the same way, while I enjoyed the ending, it did leave me a tad bit unsatisfied, just as the ending of Angel did. I craved something...that never quite got delivered. And I'm admittedly reading the comics in part, because I'm hoping they will deliver it. But right now? I'm not so sure.
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Date: 2009-11-06 05:56 pm (UTC)So, Riley is a real Piley, not a Rileybot? And the absence of the scar he had in season 6 - it doesn't mean anything? Heh.
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Date: 2009-11-06 06:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-06 06:53 pm (UTC)It's hard to speculate without seeing the actual comic pages, but when I read about Buffy flying in BOOTS I started to wonder if Twilight if Future!Buffy.
I vaguely remember Joss saying that they ionitially planned a scene in season 7 in which Buffy fights the First!Buffy's - but decided that it would be confusing and dropped the idea.
Who knows - maybe Joss is still fascinated with the idea of a protagonist fighting him(her)self - literally?
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Date: 2009-11-07 05:52 am (UTC)However, I'm now assuming that she died and came back with greater powers than before, likely from the fact that the power may not lie in the goddesses, but in the Earth. Whether the goddess who dropped her intended for the power transfer to happen or it just did because it was convenient for the plot, I have no idea.
BTW, I am assuming that Buffy did die one way or the other here, because she had no powers when she was dropped, and a fall of that height would surely have killed a normal human. Also, the art reinforces the idea, with the snow over her eyes looking very much like coins on the eyes of the dead.
Another idea that just now occurs to me-- this development is the result of a deal that Willow made with the serpent woman? Willow, knowing the future, knows that Buffy will die in this battle. Willow trades her life (when she is killed in the future) for Buffy to be resurrected yet again.
Hummm...
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Date: 2009-11-07 04:39 pm (UTC)There's a rather good review of all of this in
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Date: 2009-11-07 09:53 pm (UTC)The time thing can always be easily misused to "fix" almost any story-telling problem, and I'm hoping such isn't the case here (used badly, that is-- we already know time-travel is part and parcel of this season's story).
My short (sorta) explanation would be along these lines: We are now in an alternate time path, with Buffy's death after the goddess dropped her the locus or pivot point.
In the original time stream, Buffy died in this battle and stayed dead. Willow (who didn't die in the battle) plots a way to reverse things, and meets the serpent woman. In the first time stream, this was their first meeting. The serpent woman provides (directly or more likely indirectly) a means to this end, but to keep the cosmic balance (for lack of a better term) someone else with great power must die to bring Buffy back. Willow volunteers, and eventually, in the far future, gives her life.
The time stream gets reset, and only Willow and the serpent woman remember the old one, so now what we have been watching in Season 8 is the new stream. Willow continues to interact with SW, and things get nudged along further in the new, desired direction. This time the battle in Tibet ends with Buffy dying but being reborn/resurrected. Perhaps the goddess was in on the deal. No matter-- we are now in the new timestream, and all future events will radiate out from this new locus.
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Date: 2009-11-07 10:12 pm (UTC)BTW, I had to go look up this issue for the specific dialog, but I remembered some possible foreshadowing of this back in the Fray arc. From earlier on in issue #19--
Fray: You've been spinning us all.
Willow: Yes, well, I'm dark that way.
Fray: To what end?
Willow: Death, of course.
Fray: Whose?
Willow: (doesn't answer Fray's question) You see what I've seen, you come and go as I have... you realize the most important thing about death isn't who dies... it's who kills them.
( - continued - )
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Date: 2009-11-07 10:14 pm (UTC)Buffy: I'm sorry.
Willow: About what... failing?
Buffy: You know I'll go through you.
Willow: And you know you'll have to.
Buffy: Why?
Willow: Maybe I think the 20th century can soldier along without you.
Buffy: I'm not stupid, Will. You dragged me here and then told me exactly how to get out. Everything, every lie, to get us here. Why? What happened? Why does it have to be me?
Willow: (looks down, very sadly) It's a long story.
See, now reading those lines again gives me this little chill that it didn't the first time around. Things are starting to fall into place. And of course, I could be wrong, but, hey. Would be cool (for me anyway) if I was even close.
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Date: 2009-11-07 10:54 pm (UTC)I think it goes back to aycheb's repeat of the line: "you think you know what you are, what's to come, you've barely even begun" and to a point I was trying to make to 2maggie2, although aycheb may have made it better - up until now Buffy has let the power control her life, make her decisions, as well others. She's playing Twilight's game, much as she was playing the First's and Caleb's game up until Touched/Chosen, when she finally realized she wasn't doing it alone.
Both Willow and Buffy are catering to the power - letting it tell them what to do, or throwing it away. All or nothing.
In Fray - DarkWillow realizes that throwing the magic away did not solve the problem. That deciding power was evil, lets throw it out, more or less was akin to throwing the baby out with the bathwater. What led to the Fray verse - was Buffy pushing the demons into another dimension and closing the door, with Willow's help after herself. Willow sufferred the backlash, and went insane, but was cursed to live forever somehow. (At least that was what I got from reading the comic Fray and Time of Your Life simultaneously). What Buffy and Willow did that lead to Fray is not all that different than what they try here - to get rid of the magic, thinking that will make everything okay.
What Whedon, I think is trying to say is power in of itself is not bad, we shoulding throw it out. It's similar to Superman, who tries to become human, and discards his role as Superman, but realizes that if he does so, he can't save lives.
Here - what happened is the earth gave Buffy back her power. I don't think Willow was directly involved, so much as indirectly. Willow took her power from the earth - she grabbed at it and tugged. Buffy was given hers. Willow does have a natural affinity for it, it does fit her, but she wanted it - she kept grabbing for more, sucking at it. While Buffy didn't want it, and kept rejecting it. Now they've both thrown their power back at the earth - and the goddesses got it all, then got called. And the goddesses represent raw power, uncontrolled, unchained, the slayer in its purest, rawest form.
The hands without spirit, or mind, or heart.
I think Willow's arc is parallel to Buffy's, her power is often contrasted to Buffy.
I don't know. And my mind is a big fogged with other things.
I do think that the Willow one shot in December may shed some light on what's going on with Willow here. I also think that the comics are Willow and Buffy's story - they appear to be the central focus, which may be why I still enjoy them to some extent, because I am at heart a Willow and Buffy shipper.
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Date: 2009-11-07 10:36 pm (UTC)Here's what happened before the comic books began or in the intervening time frame between Chosen and Long Way Home:
1. Dawn meet Kenny, cheated on Kenny, enacted a spell similar to the one Amy cursed Willow with in The Killer in Me, and got turned into a Giant (or Giant Slut as Dawn likes to call it) - each of her configurations fits terms like that - a "filly", a "doll".
2. Willow was on an astral plan learning majicks from the snake goddess whose name I can't remember.
3. Buffy was busy recruiting and training slayers, along with Xander, Wood, Faith, Giles, and Andrew (as far as we know)
4. Buffy to finance her operation, without input from anyone else (as far as we know) okayed the infilitration and robbery of a Swiss Bank. Her slayers, run by the rogue one, were caught on tape.
That happened before everything else.
So that time line was in effect before Time of Your Life. When Buffy kills Willow in the future, Willow is not shown that future, she doesn't know about it. It is not until Buffy tells her about it two issues ago that she knows a thing.
So the new time line can't happen until after Buffy told Willow. Doesn't make sense. And requires way too much explaining.
Also, I remain unconvinced that Whedon plans on changing the timeline that leads to Fray - rather I think this story is to show us how Fray occurred or the events that lead to the Fray universe being created. So no, I don't think the timeline has been changed by anyone as of yet.
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Date: 2009-11-11 09:34 pm (UTC)This issue wasn't what I was hoping for (I guess I was hoping for something more interesting from the goddesses produced than just destruction, although destruction does fit Kali so I'm not really seeing that as a huge fault, I just wanted something more mystical/spiritual in the mix)....
I was interested to see that Riley was working for Buffy (relieved to hear it actually)
and I'm finding myself very interested to find out what is happening w/Buffy, and what Joss will do in the Willow centric stand-alone issue coming up.
I also agreed w/Allie's response to the fan: when writers get too specific, locking things down in their meanings or whatever, then I think they limit the poetry which should exist within the prose. The reader should (IMO) be able to read their own POV and experiences into the story. People should be able to connect with the story on a lot of different levels. If a story is told in such a limited and explicit way that it only can be read from one POV, then I don't think that readers will find any way to connect, won't find anything to love, and it will be flat and dull.
Frankly I think that that was one of the mistakes JKR made in her 7th HP novel: she wanted to put a stop to fan fic, but instead she damaged her own story. Just my own personal opinion of course.
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Date: 2009-11-13 04:11 am (UTC)A lot of people want to be told everything - a la Stephen King, Ann Rice, and JKR (who have a tendency to overwrite).
That said, there is I think a balance and I think we all want and need different things told to us from a story. I, for example, didn't need much on the goddesses - I knew who they were and what they represented metaphorically in the last issue. I knew they'd be destructive forces of nature and represented nature. Both life affirming and life devouring.
I've never been that interested in the Buffy mythology - mostly because I think it is pretty obvious and would rather Whedon not go into depth on it. I like that part to be fill in the blank. I don't care about the world. It's hard to explain, because most fans seem to be obsessed with the "verse" but not the character. I'm obsessed with the character and could care less about the verse. Or, another way to put it, I care about why Buffy robbed the bank, how she felt about it, what motivated her to do it, not what the meaning of thricewise or the names of the goddesses and their mythical context. I care about how Buffy feels about having super-powers and what she does with them, not how she got them or why.
Likewise, I care about how Buffy feels towards Spike, how she felt about his death, how she'd feel about him still being alive, and what she has decided to do about it. I don't care about how she feels towards Xander (I already know how she feels towards Xander - they've told me over and over again. It's obvious. And I don't care how she feels towards Angel, I already know that. And I don't care how she feels about being a slayer, because I've been told.)
The problem I'm having with the story is they are telling me things I already know. But not telling me things I am curious about. I want to know who Twilight is and why he is gunning for Buffy specifically. I want to know why Amy and Warren are back and with Twilight. Why Riley volunteered to spy on Twilight and where Sam is, and why Riley and Buffy are talking.
I want to know more about Giles. Less about Andrew. I want to know how Angel and Spike feel about Harmony's reality series and vampires being cool. I want to know why humans are suddenly thinking vamps cool, humans not. I want to know what Wood thinks about all of this.
So I'm admittedly frustrated. The writer has given me a lot of things to be curious about, but isn't delivering on any of it. There's only so long I'm willing to teased. ;-)
If he continues in this viene he will continue to lose readers - he's already lost a lot of them - because the story is being told in a limited way, it's focusing too much on things we already know and too little on things we don't. Many readers aren't connecting to it as a result.