I'm glad they didn't do a 'snap'. This is a very different kind of kill for Spike, this is putting a human out of his misery, at his own request. It has a meaning above just another vampire neck snapping. It has to be handled differently and I thought the 'Ive got you mate' was quite affecting.
Discussion of Buffy 11.10 - Released 8/30/17 (Dark Horse)
- Thread starter Blair
- Start date
TriBel
Scooby
Noooo! Are all cultural stereotypes out of the window?! 😱On the plus side...Prawns on the Barbie was the only thing keeping me away. That's set me up nicely for a visit! 🙂 X
@GoSpuffy - stop putting comments in little boxes - I'm too thick to figure out how to respond! 🙁Alternatively, tell me how to respond and continue putting things in little boxes.🙂 There was a please implied in both those sentences!😀
And the allusion to Cheese Curds went Whoosh (further proof I'm thick)! At the moment, it's on par with Cantona's comments about sardines (I make certain allowances for Eric a) because of his accent (sigh) b) because he's King and c) because he was in a Ken Loach film. He's my ideal man.🙂
Note - for clarification: this Eric🙂
Or this Eric🙂
Not this Eric. Sigh - I'm so fickle! 🙁🙁
GoSpuffy
You hit the karma button and type in the comment box. If aussies are known for shrimp aren Canadians known for poutine aka chips gravy and curds.
I think the established fact that a bite can be made to turn pleasurable means that this was a far kinder way to euthanise the guy than breaking his neck which might have, however momentarily, been horrifically painful. Perhaps it can be too instantaneous for the brain's pain receptors to get the message, but I think I'd rather go on a sure high than risk a final moment of intense pain. Plus, you know, Spikey bite. 😀
GoSpuffy
Vampire Lover, I mean Slayer
white avenger
white avenger
It's been established that being fed on by a vampire can have a euphoric effect on the victim. That is pretty much enforced by the fact that no one ever really struggles, once they are bitten, and further by Riley's own experiences with vampire prostitutes in Season 5. Also, Spike actually told the police agent, who's name I can't recall, the same thing in Season 10.
My objection to Spike killing in that manner wasn't so much the bite itself as the fact that he has been so determined to not go "back on the sauce," as he put it, since becoming one of the good guys, with the exceptions of in Season 7 (which shouldn't really count, since he apparently had no memory of it) and his recent feeding on Buffy as a simple matter of survival.
In the comics we saw people donating blood for the vampires in the safe zone, so I thought Spike had been drinking human blood. Plus he regularly fed from Buffy.
white avenger
white avenger
What human blood Spike has taken in this Season has been, as I said, a matter of survival. Killing this soldier wasn't about survival. I guess that it would be called an act of mercy, Still, except for feeding on Buffy, which might be seen as much an act of intimacy as actual feeding, he has never actually fed directly off of a living human, much less completely draining anyone.
It's apparently no really big thing, I guess, within the story line, just my personal preference would have been for Spike to have chosen a different way to perform his act of mercy.
Yes it is. 🙂 It tends to be visually there (Buffy/Angel in S3, Dru's bite when turning William becoming pleasurable, Spike biting Buffy in the comics was given a 'glow' in the visual), but it was outright stated by Angel to Faith in S9 too after Angel had to bite Willow in Quor'toth. He explains to Faith later that he brought Willow down from her power surge by using the pleasure the bite can give, or some such. The bitehouses in the show also support that it can be made to give the bitten a physical rush. 😀
GoSpuffy
Vampire Lover, I mean Slayer
My prediction is the Season ending with an "I love you" like S7. I just hope Spike doesn't have to die this time.
TriBel
Scooby
I thought the euthanasia by bite was far more effective than the snapping of the neck. The latter is clinical (also - isn't it what the First Evil equated with feeling?). 'Verse aside, ecstasy/euphoria have been associated with a vampire's bite since Stoker (possibly before). Spike himself may have got pleasure from it but, because it breaks his code, it's - in many ways - the "pleasure of the damned". He makes an autonomous choice to do it - it's an ethical and moral decision. He releases Buffy from the responsibility (thus he absorbs her pain and absolves her of any guilt). He may not have WANTED to do it but I'm fairly sure Jesus didn't WANT to die on the cross. (I don't wanna be this good looking and athletic. We all have crosses to bear). It was a very sacrificial act he made. I think he sees it (Angel like) as his duty - but he's doing it out of love - not some abstract notion of duty - not with redemption in mind.
"I've got you mate" is a very profound thing to say when you're releasing a life force.
From Touched. "And the only man strong enough to be my vessel, and I know you feel me, but I know why they grab at each other. To feel. I want to feel. I want to wrap my hands around some innocent neck and feel it crack"
TBH, I thought we were coming full circle. 2 editions left? End of Days and Chosen?
When I was banging on about a pregnancy, it was to do with the coming together of opposites. These creatures are a combination of nature and technology - the merging of a binary opposition - but for perverse reasons. The balance of the universe needs adjusting.
These are notes - I haven't thought it through - I'm procrastinating again.
"I've got you mate" is a very profound thing to say when you're releasing a life force.
From Touched. "And the only man strong enough to be my vessel, and I know you feel me, but I know why they grab at each other. To feel. I want to feel. I want to wrap my hands around some innocent neck and feel it crack"
TBH, I thought we were coming full circle. 2 editions left? End of Days and Chosen?
When I was banging on about a pregnancy, it was to do with the coming together of opposites. These creatures are a combination of nature and technology - the merging of a binary opposition - but for perverse reasons. The balance of the universe needs adjusting.
These are notes - I haven't thought it through - I'm procrastinating again.
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TriBel
Scooby
That's wrong Willow describes them as "normal creatures transformed by magic and altered by science". This still figures a perverse melding of binary forces. A unification of opposites for the purpose of power. I need to see a similar unification from a place of love.
Why is Buffy devastated to the point of distraction? She seems almost catatonic to me. Is it simply because Rudy is part human or is it because she's also a human transformed by magic and was altered by Andrew in S9?
Pandora Institute: Pandora means Gift (Gulp!). She was the first woman created by the Gods (often conflated with Eve). She had another name
- Anesidora, "she who sends up gifts" - the implication that the gift came "From Beneath You".
Pandora/Anesidora takes on aspects of Gaea. Gaea/Gaia - the Earth Mother - relates her to Tara (Terra) McClay. She also connects to Spike (but only if you see him as personifying Eros/Chaos - which I do but possibly no-one else does 🙁)
Pandora allegedly opened a jar and let evil loose on the world - the only thing that remained in the jar that could work to the favour of mankind was Hope. We already have Faith. We need Charity. These are the three Christian virtues - the cross is a symbol of faith, anchor is the symbol of hope and the heart is love/charity. I still anticipate Harmony and Clemency showing up. Has Spike just committed an act of charity/agape by killing Rudy? Or is it murder? They freed the "Safe Zone" "residents" - is this being figured as "letting evil loose on the world" by the media? Spike's just set the Pandora creatures free. Finally, there's a story that Pistis, Elpis, and Agape (Greek for Faith, Hope and Charity) became martyrs, and all three were interred on the Aurelian Way. The Order of Aurelius? The Master? The mother of F,H & C was Sophia (Wisdom*). I think (I'm hazy on this) Sophia is the Gnostic Mary. Mary as the Madonna featured in S7 (also as the Sorrowful mother but that's my "idiosyncratic" reading). Their tomb is a crypt beneath a church that became a place of pilgrimage - Sunnydale? *Giles - Faith's "father".
I didn't realise the baths were real 😳. Interesting fact (I tend to avoid facts in favour of speculation). In 1896 (the year that building opened) , the "St. Augustine Monster, a large carcass later postulated to be the remains of a gigantic octopus, was found washed ashore near St. Augustine, Florida". Neat!
In 1966 - when Institute closed US was experiencing turmoil - Civil Rights Movement and Protests against Vietnam. Xander as VEEP quotes MLK.
That script they're using for Spike's Vampire voice - isn't it less aggressive than usual?
Why are they staying in Windsor QUAY motel? Quay - I get - Windsor? It's a prominent sign on the roof of the motel - it doesn't progress the story so why do we need to see it?
Finished over determining (playing 6 degrees of) now🙂! I managed to get Glory and Illyria (the Blue Fairy) and Cordelia in - you don't want to know how😵. @Priceless - would Aurelius explain why Angel's trying to change history? The Wiki page I had open has just collapsed on me - possibly out of disgust at the liberties I've taken.
In summary - I've no idea what's going on but feasibly they could bring back everybody from the entire series, combine it with the Angel storyline and finish the comics here. Alternatively...someone wakes up in a shower (or hospital) and it's all been a dream.🙂🙁
PS - just found this reference: "Years later, Tansy Fry, a member of the Order who was thrown out because her methods kept drawing unwanted attention, attempted to regroup the Order in L.A, but was thwarted by Spike and Eddie Hope". It's The Devil you Know - not sure if it's canon. Tansy Fry was replaced by Darla.
Could it go further back, to the Initiative, Adam and Riley? And also remind her of the man she beat nearly to death in issue 8? Issue 8 was also the issue that included Riley and Sam, when Sam questions Buffy about why beating a man is any different to beating a monster.
This caught my eye too, but I though I was reading too much into it, especially as Windsor is a town 63 miles from San Francisco, so it might just be a convenient town 🙂
Are you reading the Angel comics? I wish you would, then explain it to me. Angel had a dream about flowers and bugs (beetles) and is now on a hunt through time to track down the meaning of them. We've found some bugs that turn people into zombies . . .
But I did think, early on, that whatever Angel changes will have an effect on Spike and possible everyone, but I'm not sure if the publishers are wanting to combine the two sides of the verse.
I had no memory of Tansy Fry and had to look her up. I could be wrong, but The Devil You Know is canon, though I am sure someone on this board can be more definitive than me.
I absolutely love reading your thoughts TriBel, even though I don't always understand them 😀
TriBel
Scooby
The Initiative - yep - definitely but it seemed to be more traumatic than that. Spike has to pull her out of the way and Faith seemed a bit perplexed. I'd forgotten about the man in 8 - that might explain it. I suppose I was wondering whether she was "a bit hormonal" and thinking back to the decision she had to make when she was a bot in 9. The "invaders" (?) remark seemed apt.
Thanks for that! The only Windsor Quay I could find was Cardiff! I still think it's flagging Dawn's status though.
OMG - read the last one - all I could think was "hmm...that'd look nice on the stairs". Great for choosing paint - useless for anything else. (YES - sorry distracted - MU 2-2 at Stoke. My two teams - nobody loses and Utd. go back to top on goal diff🙂). I think I started the season but missed the middle bit - I'll start again.
. Thanks for that - I thought I'd got all the Spike (AtF; Spike and the Omnibus) - I'll get it for the ipad now (instant gratification) and order hard copy.
That's an opinion shared by many - including me. The scary thing is (LOL - I've got Spike in my head again!) "you've never met the real me" - I make far more sense than I did 15 years ago! All I really knew about Pandora was "Greek - let evil loose in the world". When I started to research her it threw up so many connection I couldn't follow them all (the above was the simplified version). Then I started to think about the implication of what Angel was doing (whatever that is). I definitely think there's a connect with S7 so I've started reading the asides in 11 - the throwaway lines etc. I'm a bit concerned* about Willow saying she's "erased the footage" after what happened with Vikki.
I'm also concerned that a bag of Bombay Mix and a bag of liquorice isn't what my cardiologist means by a varied diet 🙁.
TriBel
Scooby
Ta! I bought it electronically (only the price of a flat white in a decent coffee shop🙂). From what I've read, I don't much care for Spike but quite impressed with Eddie.