I think you are right that a lot of it is about what the characters being redeemed are focused on. And there is the whole metaphorical aspect. And of course the whole protaganist structure makes it difficult, too. Plus, you have to tell an exciting story. Making Robin Wood the son of some random woman is a lot less exciting that making him the son of a slayer.
(I do actually think the AR works better than, say, Spike trying to bite her; while that would code more closely to how Spike treats his usual victims, his problem, w.r.t. Buffy, is that he genuinely thinks that he doesn't *hurt her*, that she is exempt from his trail of destruction, and so it makes sense to me that he hurts her in a way that is consistent with him believing himself to be a good man -- i.e. him trying to convince her to love him again as a 'man'.)
Yeah, I think making it an attempted rape was the perfect choice for Spike, within story, but on the other hand it raised all sorts of real life issues that the writers were obviously not prepared to deal with. And it wouldn't have made any sense for Spike getting a shiny new soul to redeem him for over a century of rampage, but not trying to rape Buffy. So it was definitey a tricky story to write.
(That, and, of course, that Faith and Spike are 'bad' when they do their bad deeds, whereas Buffy is supposed to be the hero.)
But is Faith "bad" when she attacks Xander? At what point did Faith cross the line from being "good" to being "bad"? She's on her way down to being "bad", but if she hadn't gone any farther down than attacking Xander, than would she still have been one of the "bad guys"?
Faith is very heavily focused on Buffy, Angel and Wesley (and Giles, depending on whether you take comics canon or not)
Don't read the comics, but I always thought it was interesting that Faith never does anything to directly hurt Giles (and she even defends him to Gwen Post, back in "Revelations"). I think he is the only person in the gang whom she never hurts or seriously threatens.
I know a lot of people don't buy Willow as having accepted responsibility for Villains - Grave, but I really disagree.
Usually the argument I hear is something along the lines of, "She should have been punished more." That just a summer vacation wasn't enough of a punishment for everything she did. Which begs the question--is punishment really necessary fora redemption story? What kind of punishment? Who decides what punishment is sufficient?
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2012-04-19 06:38 pm (UTC)I think you are right that a lot of it is about what the characters being redeemed are focused on. And there is the whole metaphorical aspect. And of course the whole protaganist structure makes it difficult, too. Plus, you have to tell an exciting story. Making Robin Wood the son of some random woman is a lot less exciting that making him the son of a slayer.
(I do actually think the AR works better than, say, Spike trying to bite her; while that would code more closely to how Spike treats his usual victims, his problem, w.r.t. Buffy, is that he genuinely thinks that he doesn't *hurt her*, that she is exempt from his trail of destruction, and so it makes sense to me that he hurts her in a way that is consistent with him believing himself to be a good man -- i.e. him trying to convince her to love him again as a 'man'.)
Yeah, I think making it an attempted rape was the perfect choice for Spike, within story, but on the other hand it raised all sorts of real life issues that the writers were obviously not prepared to deal with. And it wouldn't have made any sense for Spike getting a shiny new soul to redeem him for over a century of rampage, but not trying to rape Buffy. So it was definitey a tricky story to write.
(That, and, of course, that Faith and Spike are 'bad' when they do their bad deeds, whereas Buffy is supposed to be the hero.)
But is Faith "bad" when she attacks Xander? At what point did Faith cross the line from being "good" to being "bad"? She's on her way down to being "bad", but if she hadn't gone any farther down than attacking Xander, than would she still have been one of the "bad guys"?
Faith is very heavily focused on Buffy, Angel and Wesley (and Giles, depending on whether you take comics canon or not)
Don't read the comics, but I always thought it was interesting that Faith never does anything to directly hurt Giles (and she even defends him to Gwen Post, back in "Revelations"). I think he is the only person in the gang whom she never hurts or seriously threatens.
I know a lot of people don't buy Willow as having accepted responsibility for Villains - Grave, but I really disagree.
Usually the argument I hear is something along the lines of, "She should have been punished more." That just a summer vacation wasn't enough of a punishment for everything she did. Which begs the question--is punishment really necessary fora redemption story? What kind of punishment? Who decides what punishment is sufficient?