I agree that BtVS was always on that knife edge. I disagree that season eight doesn't push it further. But really, it's a matter of degree and not of kind. A lot of people view season eight as pushing way past the boundaries of the show, and so we get world-ending spacefrakking and constant flying and Xacula and Centaur!Dawn instead of soul-loss frakking and Willow hovering in moments of extreme power and Xanya and Key!Dawn. The latter set are still huge, extreme angst but somehow the first set are even more so to me. I guess it's not easy to articulate why.
Angel always was Captain Hammer, I don't need to be told that Buffy is his Penny, that's been clear from the start, I think she knows it too.
Angel was always Captain Hammer, but he also brooded and felt guilty about his massive arrays of sins. This Angel does in the Riley one-shot, yes, but by "Twilight" and "Last Gleaming" he's very blase about having nearly ended the world. Angel in the past would have at least felt the need to do angsty voice-over pushups ala Redefinition. It's not that that isn't itself very silly, but it's still at least a more layered bit of silliness, some indications of at least attempts at introspection, that the current Angel doesn't have. Who knows, maybe we'll get some soon. But again, I see it more as amping up Angel's Hammer-ness until it's impossible to ignore, rather than just reproducing Angel's absolutely normal behaviour.
You might be right about the Jane/Rochester but my Jane Eyre knowledge is fuzzy (read: nonexistent, though I did see I Walked with a Zombie which is supposed to be a quasi-remake, with zombies, prefiguring Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by sixty years).
and that's more interesting because Buffy needing to save people isn't a weakness to get over, it's a strength, it's part of what makes her heroic. There's a genuine dilemma there a very Jossian one about passion. Can't live with it, can't live without it.
I do very much like this point. I don't know if I can see Buffy's actions in Twilight as being primarily motivated by a selfless desire to help Angel by letting him try to save her. But maybe if I tilt my head on a reread it'll come through.
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Angel always was Captain Hammer, I don't need to be told that Buffy is his Penny, that's been clear from the start, I think she knows it too.
Angel was always Captain Hammer, but he also brooded and felt guilty about his massive arrays of sins. This Angel does in the Riley one-shot, yes, but by "Twilight" and "Last Gleaming" he's very blase about having nearly ended the world. Angel in the past would have at least felt the need to do angsty voice-over pushups ala Redefinition. It's not that that isn't itself very silly, but it's still at least a more layered bit of silliness, some indications of at least attempts at introspection, that the current Angel doesn't have. Who knows, maybe we'll get some soon. But again, I see it more as amping up Angel's Hammer-ness until it's impossible to ignore, rather than just reproducing Angel's absolutely normal behaviour.
You might be right about the Jane/Rochester but my Jane Eyre knowledge is fuzzy (read: nonexistent, though I did see I Walked with a Zombie which is supposed to be a quasi-remake, with zombies, prefiguring Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by sixty years).
and that's more interesting because Buffy needing to save people isn't a weakness to get over, it's a strength, it's part of what makes her heroic. There's a genuine dilemma there a very Jossian one about passion. Can't live with it, can't live without it.
I do very much like this point. I don't know if I can see Buffy's actions in Twilight as being primarily motivated by a selfless desire to help Angel by letting him try to save her. But maybe if I tilt my head on a reread it'll come through.