I Wish Angel Had Stayed Dead

[itsnotmymind]

I re-watched Innocence yesterday. Still a powerful story. It really brings home to me, though, how Angel coming back to life in S3 undermines the story. She kills him, and the very next episode he's in the credits? I know when the show first aired there was a few months in between seasons where viewers thought he might stay dead, but even still - that's not that long a time. We only see a few episodes of Buffy trying to grieve and move on before he's back, for a whole season of pointless on-and-off romance. And while I was never huge fan of Jenny or Kendra, I am bitter that the white male is in the credits the episode after he dies while the women of color die and stay dead.

And think how powerful it would be if Angel had stayed dead, or if he had come back after a few seasons instead of right away. Yeah, I know, we would have missed out on AtS. But for Buffy's story, it would have been a vast improvement. What if Buffy really did have to enter adulthood having killed her great love? Not temporarily, but permanently (or apparently permanently)? It would have rendered his death and the S2 story line so much more meaningful.

Comments

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

So much yes. I liked his character okay up until he's brought back. Afterward, it was as if the Powers That Be would excuse everything he did and that puts him firmly in the entitled white male bubble. It's way too much like real life, where horrible people (mostly white men) get away with everything, and the rest of us are just here to prop them up.

It absolutely undermines Buffy's story. Even more egregious, his arc in BtVS season 3 is boring. Unforgivable. I can't fully enjoy the Angel show, because I resent him so much. I think my resentment is borne out by the fact that he gets pretty much everybody killed by the end.

And his return in the Buffy comics is even worse. Why do people persist in seeing him as a hero? I can see that he thinks it, but when everybody around him also seems to believe it, it's a little like being gaslighted.

I should maybe not be so angry about a fictional world.

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

Using my icon from Gaslight since you mentioned it...

I enjoy AtS off and on. When it was good, it was very good. When it was bad, it was terrible. But yes, Angel's BtVS S3 arc was boring, and it was mostly just re-establishing what we already knew.

You know, I meant to include this in the original post, but one thing that really struck me re-watching S2: Buffy and Angel don't seem to be in love for most of the first half. I mean, they're totally into each other, but it seems more like adolescent passion (and playing at adolescent passion because being with Buffy gives him a chance to pretend to be something he is not) than deep affection. In Surprise they do actually start to read to me as in love...and then he goes evil. I wonder if their relationship would have become such an epic Thing to them - and everyone else - if he had never lost his soul.

I don't read the Buffy comics. I've never gotten the impression that I'm missing a whole lot.

I support your right to be angry about a fictional world, but I am not sure it is good for your health. ;)

[stolenglimpse.livejournal.com]

So nice to find someone that thinks Angel was basically useless when he came back in season 3. And I do agree it would have been a bigger deal that Buffy had to sacrifice him and her love for him to save the world. Especially since she keeps bringing that up as a major event through other seasons... mainly season 7. And the whole ordeal to poison Angel and only a Slayer's blood can cure him... Sheesh... enough about him really. That's why I actually loved that he left after graduation.

I'm a Buffy/Angel shipper up until he dies. I don't see the point of shipping them in season 3. I don't see the point when he comes back for Joyce's funeral... well, not true, I kinda do but he could have stayed in LA. The whole having to meet somewhere in between Sunnydale and LA when Buffy comes back and the whole cookie do part in season 7... it's like, come on... move on already...

I like Angel in season 1 and 2 of Buffy. I'm adjusting to him in season 1 AtS but I really like him though he's not a favorite character of mine. Especially on the "evolution/development side of things".

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I'm rather odd in that I HATED Buffy/Angel in seasons 1-3 and in I Will Remember You, but then warmed up to them as exes. Shipping Buffy/Spike oddly made me appreciate Buffy/Angel more. I still think they have no chemistry, but I think I understand now what each of them saw in the other. Angel's treatment of Buffy is creepy, though. He's an evasive former mass-murderer playing at being high school sweethearts with an underage girl.

I like Angel himself as a character. But it would have been better for the story if he had stayed dead.

[stolenglimpse.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I get what you mean.

With season 3, I just couldn't get back to shipping them. They were just circling around the sex issue and how it was bad that they're together and they can't do more to prove their love or anything and I felt like he was more a weight on Buffy's shoulders and such.

With Spike... I don't know... he gets Buffy more.

Angel, without the gypsy curse, he would never have developed feelings for Buffy the way Spike did. And he would never had gotten his soul back for her either. I felt that, even though it wasn't a sane relationship between Buffy/Spike in season 6, Spike still did more for Buffy than Angel did. Angel kinda hid the dark side of himself while Spike wasn't afraid to admit it.

Anyway... not sure I am making sense... I am tired from my first work day, haha!

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

Makes sense to me :)

I <3 Buffy/Spike and as horrible as their relationship was, it was open, honest, and equal in a way that Buffy/Angel was not, and could not have been.

But sometimes I do wish Buffy would get together with a nice, normal guy. Like Riley, but without Riley's various hang-ups and inability to handle Buffy's slayerness and her complications. I would like Buffy to be with a true civilian.

[stolenglimpse.livejournal.com]

I agree with all of this :D