Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Mark Field

Author:Mark Field [Field, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯)
Published: 2013-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Trivia notes: (1) The teaser builds on an incident from Out Of My Mind towards a plot development which will be important at the end of S5 and the centerpiece of S6. (2) Buffy’s reference to Glory as “Miss Congeniality” refers to the movie of that title which came out in 2000. (3) Megan Gray (Sandy) also played the girl bitten in the Bronze by VampWillow in Dopplegangland, suggesting that VampWillow sired her then. (4) Amy Adams played Cousin Beth. It was one of her very first acting jobs.

Fool For Love

Episode 7. We expect something dramatic and important from Episode 7 and we certainly get it from Fool For Love. It’s a fan favorite and in my personal top 20. The whole episode is beautifully constructed, but I have to give special praise to the way Spike’s fight with the NY Slayer intercuts with his present dialogue/fight with Buffy. At the end, the past Spike talks directly to Buffy in the present. Brilliant.

The most important feature of the episode is that it employs the literary device of the unreliable narrator (Spike). Watch the first two transitions between his present dialogue with Buffy and the scenes we see from his past. In each case, Spike’s claim about his past is directly refuted by what we see after the cut. I’ll give you the first example; the second is the same:

“BUFFY

Were you born this big a pain in the ass?

SPIKE

What can I tell you, baby? I've always been bad.

CUT TO:

INT. LONDON (1880)- VICTORIAN PARLOR- NIGHT

Spike, then the human William, is sitting and composing poetry off in the corner of a dinner party. The spirited laughter of the party-goers can be heard in the background. William's hair is long and unruly and he's dressed as a proper gentleman, complete with tie and reading spectacles. He's awkward and bookish- none of the confident swagger we're used to.”

The only thing bad about William was his poetry. Spike was in no way “always” bad. He created his persona after Drusilla sired him. “Was he always tough, was he always bad? It was much more interesting to make him a foppish dandy in the beginning and have him turn into Spike. What you'll notice too, if you're watching carefully is that you'll see James [Marsters] transform from this guy here, having his feelings hurt, being this dandy poet. Piece by piece he will turn into Spike throughout this episode. Here he's got different hair, different clothes, glasses, a different accent even and no scar over his eyebrow. And you will see one by one him acquire all these things. So he literally builds Spike piece by piece.” (Writer Doug Petrie, DVD commentary.)

One way to interpret this process is that we, the viewers, are seeing Spike’s actual memories of what happened. What he told Buffy was likely something quite different, though we have no way to know with certainty. We definitely should doubt that he told her some of the more embarrassing points, such as Cecily’s “You’re beneath me.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.