For the Master being there: Maybe Dracula’s powers of being able to be whole again from being dust was somehow transferred to the Master? Maybe the Powers That Be put him back together.
Why Angel didn’t seem to care that Connor would have died if the world was destroyed: The Season 8 ‘audience’ may not even know about Connor, the last issues and 8.36 were fast-paced enough and maybe it was too much to devote room to explaining Connor, and, perhaps Angel now prefers Buffy to Connor.
Buffy ’s done this before with Cordelia and did it again in 8.36. Over on
Angel Angel had professed throughout season 4 that Cordy was his true love or whatever yet in “Chosen” (7.22) Angel acts as if he’s been waiting for Buffy the entire time.
After the Fall made it more clear and solid that Cordy was the love of Angel’s life yet in 8.36 Angel acts as if Cordy never happened.
Hellbound Hyperion And I guess Joss generally likes Brian’s work.
Moon Eyes I tend to side with anything written by a Buffyverse person that actually could be canon is canon. Meaning the first two
Spike and Dru: Paint the Town Red and
Spike and Dru: Queen of Hearts , what Douglas Petrie wrote, nothing that Jane Espenson wrote outside of
Tales and Season 8, and Juliet Landau’s Dru’s issues for
After the Fall . Brian’s more iffy since Joss only plotted out some of the stuff Brian did. But nothing that Brian wrote ‘couldn’t’ be canon, so I like to think of them as canon as well. And that sentiment for Brian has more weight since Joss apparently is going to make
Spike canon and at least partly
After the Fall #39 – end of it and the
Illyria series as stuff will be in all of them that ties to Season 8.
I decided to simply post more thoughts on the issue having read threads from various sites. This will save a ton of time not having to copy and paste entire discussions into Word and reply to each post. And it seems similar stuff is discussed again and again on threads.
To start:
Buffy/Angel sex and lovey-dovey stuff from Buffy to Angel reminds me of “Something Blue” (4.09). Imagine what the reaction would be if in “Something Blue” Buffy was actually having sex with Spike and assume that most the audience believes that Spike wanted Buffy at this point. It seems that they simply wanted an excuse to show ‘Bangel’ sex and love speeches. But in “Something Blue” (4.09) even though it was a spell, everything that happened in it – besides Buffy and Spike actually being that couply and lovey-dovy – came true. I can’t see Buffy actually doing Angel and spewing such words of love to a guy who’s acting pretty much exactly like Angelus. And nothing else can really be told about this other than – hey, Buffy would rather have sex with Angel than no one and Buffy still loves Angel. We already knew both. And did Buffy feel ‘raped’ or ‘molested’ in “Something Blue” though? Apparently not. She already seems to be feeling guilty by the end of 8.36. I pretty much equate what Angel did to if Xander took advantage of Buffy in “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” (2.18). Maybe a tiny part of Buffy was attracted to Xander but she wouldn’t have had sex with him if she wasn’t under a spell. The same – I hope – applied for Buffy when she had sex with Angel.
Back to 8.36 and the Buffy/Angel interaction: it reminds of “Chosen” (7.22) as well except this time Angel should be simply happy that Buffy didn’t call Willow over to turn Angel into something that Buffy could torture for information.
I will say though, that we need to remember and acknowledge that Buffy was pretty miserable before Angel showed up. She had been extremely lonely for years – which makes ridiculous her not bothering to contact Spike if she actually knew he was alive and how to contact him – and had just been rejected by Xander – XANDER!! – for favor of her ‘fake’ sister. Then Angel comes by telling her he loves her, that their powers are their reward, she has sex with a guy for the first time since Spike, and she goes to a happy place and gets more loving remarks from Angel.
So, perhaps if she had a boyfriend, wasn’t on the run for her life for a long time, 100s of Slayers didn’t die, etc. etc. etc., she wouldn’t have bought into Angel’s ‘nonsense’. At least as easily, influence or not. Perhaps Buffy needed to be that defeated and depressed and sexually needy in order for her to decide to have sex with Angel. Otherwise, why wouldn’t the ‘powers’ simply immediately give superpowers to Buffy as well as Angel. They thought Buffy wouldn’t have sex with Angel in that circumstance? Or was it so that Buffy would be more likely to stay in Twilight the world being so bad for her? But then her friends and sister were still alive. The whole thing is confusing and unnecessarily complicated, like all that needed to happen for Jasmine to be borne.
Back to Buffy professing her love to Angel and Willow turning Angel into a frog! I’d have liked to have had Willow turn Buffy into a toad and somehow restrain Angel and torture him until he gives up why he did what he did. They were still in a ship that they know can kill the demons. There was no real need to be so lenient with Angel or Buffy. Spike could have given his information to Willow, Faith, or Giles. Why does he have to give it to the clearly compromised Buffy?
Just now I realized this also showed both’s self-centeredness and egos. They both seem to think that Spike would even want Buffy after she had sex with Angel. I guess since Angel didn’t seem to mind too much that Buffy seemed like Spike when he kissed her in “Chosen” (7.22) that it wouldn’t be a dealbreaker for Spike that Buffy stinks of Angel?
Joss certainly doesn’t put Angel and Buffy in a good light in 8.36. The obvious hero of the piece is Spike and Willow got a little gleeful moment when she turned Angel into a frog. And Faith called Angel a man-bi)ch and didn’t seem too happy with Buffy. And Spike, Willow, and Faith are all very popular characters who all obviously have a future in the Buffyverse.
To step back a bit though: All of Buffy’s badness so far stems from her having sex with Angel and loving Angel even after all that she knows Angel did and the fact that Angel wanted her to stay with him in Twilight while the world was destroyed. If she is simply under some spell or influence and isn’t really in control of her emotions regarding Angel, then she’s still good.
Angel has a far steeper hill to climb.
Angel’s purposes for being Twilight were selfish. He’s sold on being Twilight with: You get superpowers; you get to be a leader and super important; you get to make Buffy have superpowers but first you get to be ‘Angelus’ and toy with her, mess with her mind, kill her ‘family’; and after all that fun you get to be with her in a better world.
As for the Slayers, the only reason why anyone is against them is because of Angel.
Harmony: Just let her go after “Not Fade Away” (A 5.22). And is possibly responsible for her getting people to be against Slayers and for vampires.
Some in the US Military and US Government: Angels’ man Voll got them to believe that Buffy nuked Sunnydale and is a terrorist.
His people are the ones that killed the Slayers. And, really, why was the Swarm necessary or Warren blowing up Buffy’s Scottish headquarters?
Angel’s responsible for over 10% of the Slayers dying. Angel’s the only reason that the soldiers were against Buffy and Co. in the first place. And Angel made the Slayers’ lives far more dangerous because vampires could freely kill them and people would cheer. But if caught killing a vampire, people will be all for killing that Slayer.
Who was going to take the Slayers out? The US Military is having a hard time enough with the Taliban and al Quaida. These are superpowered people with resources.
We already saw on
Angel that even souled Angel can still be a huge dou_che and do evil things.
By this point, an appropriate reaction by Angel would be to dust himself. Angel pretty much has three modes: Do nothing to help the world and try not to hurt it too much, be evil to the point that you want the world destroyed so that you can be in a place you’d like more, or help a few people and save a few lives every year. For those using numbers games to try to justify what Angel did as Twilight, objectively they’d have to conclude that Angel should dust himself. His saving dozens or hundreds throughout his time of being ‘good’ doesn’t outweigh that if not for Buffy, Angel would have destroyed the entire world (twice: “Becoming Part II” (2.22) and in 8.35).
I’ll point also out here that the ‘powers’ made a situation which Angel and Buffy staying in Twilight would destroy the world and either leaving Twilight would destroy the world. So Joss makes certain that Angel wanting to go to Twilight is wrong in the first place.
The Buffy/Spike interaction:
Their confrontation reminded of “Beneath You” (7.02) when Spike showed up at Buffy’s house. They even are talking away from the others. But this time, Buffy’s the one who’s done the bad things and Spike’s doesn’t exactly seem to want to be around her. He’s completely all-business and she’s completely all-business while in “Beneath You” she seems hurt that Spike’s calling her “Slayer” and acting as if they never had a relationship while in 8.36 Buffy’s the one acting as if they never had a relationship.
Not only did the guy die in “Chosen” (7.22) after killing all the UbverVamps and somehow his death or whatever resulted in the Hellmouth being closed forever, but here he swoops in and saves the Slayers, and the humans and now they have a safe place to be in. Buffy’s gratitude seems to be being miffed that Angel had to leave because Spike showed up and has information that she may want.
Spike may have somehow snapped Buffy out of her ‘influence’ for the time being; obviously being near Angel causes her to lose her senses.
The other stuff:
Was the plane real or something the ‘powers’ materialized: I simply thought that the whole plane thing was ‘materialized’ by the Powers or whoever.
If the Shanshu is from W&H… anyway both are simply manipulating Angel if it’s the PTB that made Angel Twilight. Or whoever did knows how to get to Angel: Dangle a shiny reward in front of Angel and he’ll reach and grab for it.
That “cheerleader” has always been used in the Buffyverse: Kendra, Darla, Drusilla in her
After the Fall issues, and now the PTB. Wonder why no one uses drunken whoring lout with Angel?
Who’s going to betray Buffy? Who is the closest and unexpected now?
Willow has shown she doesn’t like what Buffy was doing with Angel and neither does Faith. Giles had been keeping information all this time. Buffy tells Angel that Spike has an agenda yet when confronting Spike she seems to believe he’s genuine. Xander or Dawn can’t exactly be too happy with her, so I’d say for now it makes sense that either Angel or Spike – or herself – is it. However in an actual fight, only Willow it seems could possibly take Buffy. If she could use magic on Angel she may be able to on Buffy. Willow could simply turn Buffy into something not threatening. We could have another fight like in “Grave” (6.22) except this time Willow simply needs to turn Buffy into something.
Shane For the Angel/Cordy stuff: Angel simply acts as if that never happened. At least that’s my take. He did the same in “Chosen”.
I don’t know what “ad libitum” means. I was saying not that Buffy was getting the powers from Slayers being killed, but that she had to suffer a ton of horror and grief to get her powers while Angel was simply given them.
The Initiative knew Buffy was good. And General Voll was the one causing the stir and trying to make the US Military be against Buffy.
It’d take a panel or a few panels at most. Andrew managed to tell the Fang Gang what happened in “Chosen” (7.22) in one speech. Faith and Spike managed to explain what Faith had been doing since “Who Are You” (4.16) in one little scene. I’m sure that they could tell us about when Buffy knew.
Huh? Angel’s more of a villain already. We already know that Angel was still interested in Buffy. All they could do for him in this instance is say that he was under some glow influence as well and that he wouldn’t have had sex with her if he wasn’t. And that he was under the influence since jumping through that portal and he’s pretty much like EvilCordelia in
Angel s4.
Buffy they could easily say that she was under the influence very soon after initially fighting with Angel in 8.34 (?) and has been since. She would have been raped, but that’s unavoidable. That’s the better option than Buffy not caring what Angel did.