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| Warning: this page contains info about episodes up through season 3 BtVS/season 2 AtS. If you're in danger of being spoiled, proceed with caution. |
The dead guys are basically the animated human corpses. Unlike Daryl and his would-be bride in SAR, they have not been brought back to life in the biological sense. And unlike zombies (DMP), they still have free will. It is not clear if, like vampires, they would retain what looks they have indefinitely, or continue to rot (see also Provider).
The ritual to raise the dead: On a night when the stars have aligned (one assumes this means planets, since stars don't move relative to each other from the Earthly perspective), Jack crouches over the grave of Bob and the others, cuts his hand with a knife, and drips blood on the grave, saying:
He calls forth the spirit of Uurthu, the restless. No one shall speak. He shall arise! Hear me... the blood of the earth shall restore him... He shall arise! He shall arise!
Jack's grandfather's did the same for him three weeks earlier.
Willow casts the Clouding Spell with an incantation in Latin:
Obscurate nos non diutius.
Translation: Enshadow us no longer
and blows out a candle.
This momentarily confuses the Jhe-demon, allowing Buffy to overpower
her, and Faith to stab her with a sword.
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The Sisterhood of Jhe: These ugly gray pointed-eared female warrior demons have one purpose--to bring the demons back to Earth. They have fought for this cause before, evidenced by records of their post-battle habits (they celebrate victory by eating their foes). Now, they have come to Sunnydale to open the Hellmouth. It is unclear exactly how they intend to do this, but we were never told how the Master did it, nor how it was closed in Prophecy Girl. |
When Giles no longer has the resources of the Watcher's Council, he goes to Restfield cemetery and holds a cross up to a sepulcher to gain information from the Spirit Guides. A floating flame comes out of the sepulcher, and a voice says, "These secrets belong to time and the dark regions. To reveal them would bring chaos down upon the living earth." This is not very helpful, but that doesn't make the Spirit Guides evil; it is possible that if they tell Giles the future, he may do something to change the successful outcome that in fact occurred.
Theories on the Buffyverse Spirit Guides:
(1) The Spirit Guides are ghosts of the dead. They exist outside of time (Star Trek aficionados: like Bajoran Prophets/Wormhole aliens). Think of time as a river we human beings are forced to constantly sail downstream in; we know where we've been, and where we are, but we can't see very far downstream at what is to come. The spirit guides, however, stand on a cliff above the river, and are able to look at the whole river simultaneously. They hence have knowledge of the future.
(2) ...It is only human arrogance that dictates that spirits are of the [human] dead. There are many, many forces out there that have never been human, and many more that have never lived physically. Much like we interact with the dream world, they interact with us. It's like a diver swiming in the ocean. ...the diver is interacting with the suroundings, but the diver is not their in a natural state, but rather a forced one. The spirits can work in the same way, but the task is most strenuous for them, and it's gennerally not worth the effort.... (Zoshi the Malevolent, 20 Jul 1999)
The Spell to bind the Hellmouth: Giles and Willow set up a sacred circle on the area where the Hellmouth opened the last time. They put candles along its edge. Giles reads a Latin incantation from the Hebron's almanac:
Terra, vente, ignis et pluvia. Cunctate quattuor numina, vos obsecro. Defendete nos a recente malo resoluto. Omnia... vasa... veritatis!
Translation: Earth, wind, fire, rains, linger, O four divinities, I pray you. Defend us from the new freed evil, all [you] vessels of truth.
Good
and Evil in "The Zeppo"
The dead guys: Jack O'Toole and his buddies represent both the
evil of arrogance and evil-as-chaos.
Basically, they find fun in destruction--of property and human
egos.
Xander:
Zeppo was in relation to the Marx Brothers.... "Zeppo" Marx was the youngest brother to Groucho and Chico and was always in the background, in their shadows and sort of acted as a sort of tool for their comedy antics....so The Zeppo was sort of a parallel made to Xander!!....which he proved to be anything but (scram, Mar 10 18:22:10 2000)
"It must be really hard when all your friends have, like, superpowers -- Slayer, werewolf, witches, vampires -- and you're, like, this little nothing," Cordelia taunts Xander. And he actually seems to believe it. But Xander has an irrepressible font of courage, if he only digs deep enough to find it.
The scene where he out-waited O'Toole in the boiler room and the final scene where he walks away without taking credit for (or even mentioning) his part in the adventures of the night before (Jade, Jan 29 21:49 1999) Who has less fear?
Xander may be "the Zeppo" of the group (something Cordelia is not fated to claim for herself), but in more ways than this, it makes him the most human as well.
The Sisterhood of Jhe: Because they have one purpose, to bring about Armageddon--the return of the demons to this reality--these demons are good examples of evil-as-corruption.
Moral Ambiguity in "The Zeppo"
The moral ambiguity of Oz-wolf
Willy the bartender
The Metaphysics of "Bad Girls"
El Eliminati are a vampire cult
which formed during the 15th century, a time when dueling and
swordsmanship were popular among humans. They continue to carry
the long and short swords of that era even though the hey-day
of the cult is past. Their numbers dwindled due to anti-vampire
activity and their penchant for getting beheaded in sword
fights. They eventually put themselves into the service of the
demon Balthazar, who brought them to Sunnydale.
Around 1899, they were all driven out of the Hellmouth, and now
are back.
Balthazar is a demon whose power
is tied to an amulet that was stolen
from him around 1899. Since he lost the amulet, Balthazar has
gained a considerable amount of weight and sits nearly immobile
in a tub of water. He also needs to have his body lubricated with
water, although the reason why is unclear. Balthazar is back in
Sunnydale to retrieve his amulet, which will restore his strength.
What little power he possesses involves the ability to move vampires
telekinetically (if he had the ability
to move other things, he would have been able to draw Giles and
Wesley close to him and might have been able to prevent Buffy
from killing him). He drew one vamp minion towards his large belly
and appeared to snap his neck. Vampires should not be able to
die from a broken neck, so he
may have paralyzed him, temporarily incapacitated him, or removed
his head completely, killing him.
The purpose of the Dedication ceremony seems to be to bestow invulnerability on a human seeking "Ascension". The Mayor kneels, hands out at his sides, inside a pentagram circumscribed by a circle, and recitees an incantation:
Potestatem matris nostrae in tenebris invoco. Maledictum filium tuum ab omne periculo custodias nunc et in saecula!
Translation: I invoke the power of our mother in darkness. May you protect your accursed son from all danger now and forever!
The ground shakes. Mr.
Trick sets the vampire Vincent upon him. Vincent slices the
Mayor's head in half with a sword, and the two halves come back
together. For the next 100 days leading up to the Ascension, nothing
can harm Mayor Wilkins. The Dedication ceremony is also the point
at which the Mayor stops mentioning his dislike for germs.
Good,
Evil, and Moral Ambiguity in "Bad Girls"
Vamps who have a code
of honor? El Eliminati are warriors
on the side of evil. As such, they are sent on (or they pick)
individual battles to fight. They are thus examples of evil-as-corruption.
When Balthazar sends Vincent to attack the Mayor, he does so "man
to man, as befits a true warrior". In other words, he uses
no cowardly tactics that will give him an advantage, other than
the hiding in the liquor cabinet. Trick captures him.
Balthazar: Despite being a demon, Balthazar seems motivated
by his own individual needs and wants, specifically, his own power.
He is therefore an example of the (usually human) sin of selfishness
and greed for power.
Wesley Wyndam-Pryce is Buffy and Faith's new watcher, assigned by the Council after they fired Giles. "Is he evil?" Buffy asks. Not really; but he is a little bit inexperienced and naive.
Slayers: The last laugh is on the cops when they snicker at the notion of "girl gangs." "The Slayers" break out of the police car while it's on its way to the station.
Philosophies Represented in "Bad Girls"
Philosophies of slaying
Buffy
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"Slaying is what we were built for. If you're not enjoying it, you're doing something wrong." This is similar to Aristotle's functionalistic theory of virtue. Aristotle believed that the point of moral or ethical rules was human happiness. Humans will achieve happiness if they act according to their nature. The real "nature" of anything, Aristotle argued, is determined by the function(s) it was designed to fulfill. The way to happiness for a slayer, then, is to fulfill her function. Faith's attitude rubs off on Buffy, as she describes to Willow and Xander: "It was like I just let go and became this force." The thrill of the hunt is celebrated in Faith and Buffy's post-slayage dance. |
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Faith explains this principle to Buffy when the two break into a sporting goods store to steal weapons for the attack on Balthazar and his minions. Faith's expression of her own power as "the chosen one" turns its back on duty and sees only privilege--"since I am strong, I will take what I want and do as I wish." One can relate this to Fredrich Nietzsche's dual value systems: the master morality and the slave morality. Masters value freedom, self-definition, and self-expression. The master is an individual of action. He or she acts out of their own individual nature, and whatever meets their needs is what is good. Nietzsche calls this self-expression the "will to power". Slaves value whatever is useful or beneficial to the weak--sympathy, kindness, pity, patience, humility, helping. The slave morality is the morality of the conquered, "the herd." It is also resentful and suspicious of any outsider that would threaten the herd.
Wolfram and Hart's Master morality
The First Evil on good and evil
The Beast's Master's master morality
The Metaphysics of "Consequences"
Psychic dream? Buffy is struggling under water, trying to reach the surface, but the murdered Deputy mayor Allan Finch grabs hold of her leg and keeps her under. She manages to get free, but on reaching the surface, Faith is waiting, and pushes her head back under the water. This may foretell Faith's betrayal--when she tells Giles that Buffy killed Allan, and later defects to the Mayor's camp.
The inivitation to vampires
I think the reason Angel was able to enter Faith's motel room is that hotels and motels are public houses, like for example, whether you stay there or not you can use their facilities persae (delf, Feb 17 07:51 1999).
Good
in "Consequences"
Deputy Mayor Allan Finch: From the moment we saw the look on his face in
Homecoming, it has been evident that
Allan was not entirely comfortable working for the
Mayor. We may never know what side he was actually on, but
Buffy concluded, "I don't think he was in that alley by chance.
I think he came looking for us. I'd like to know why."
Evil
and Moral Ambiguity in "Consequences"
Faith didn't kill Allan without remorse, but she quickly
went into denial about the significance
of what she had done. When Buffy wouldn't go along with her denial,
Faith had two choices--accept its significance or reject Buffy
and her friends and their do-gooder attitude.
She chose the latter. Faith already envied
Buffy for having friends, praise, and Giles' attention. She
also resented the gang for leaving her on the outside of things
(even if she contributed to this as much as they did).
So Faith repressed
her initial horror over Allen's death. Then she tried to justify
her actions by telling Buffy that Buffy had a lust for the kill
that could make her take a human life, too, although perhaps not
as easily as Faith could. Buffy adamantly denied this. She also
claimed to want to help Faith, but it was never easy for Faith
to trust people's good intentions, and at that point, she'd lost
any trust she had in Buffy and the gang. Then Angel's confrontation
and the force applied by Wesley and
the watchers made Faith feel the pressure of her denial. At
that point, flirting with evil was a relief, and a way to spite
Buffy and the others.
But more was going on than that, as Angel knew. Murder
has a seduction all its own, and Faith didn't have a sufficient
moral foundation not to give into the pleasure of it--it gave
her a power over others where before she felt powerless--a power
she felt again when she
almost choked Xander to death. Her initial
move towards the Mayor was also
mere flirtation with evil, but he was so gosh darn nice,
it only accelerated her path down the dark side.
Faith = evil. No ifs, ands, or buts. Evil, evil, evil. I said ...if she kept trying to repress any remorse over killing Allan, she'd eventually succeed, and would become someone who can kill in cold blood. Her almost-strangulation of Xander and her willingness to kill the guy in the WC van without a second thought show that this is indeed what she has become. And, her setup of Buffy shows she'll do anything to save her own ass. ...she's gone to [the Mayor] so she can continue to kill, because Angel's right--she has gotten a taste for it (devil, Feb 17 12:26 1999).
"I know the power, the exhilaration. It was like a drug for me"
Angel is trying to relate to Faith in order to help her deal with killing Allan, but he does it by treating his situation like Faith's. Their situations are not entirely analogous. Angelus committed his evil deeds when he was without a human soul and conscience. Faith is embarking on evil with her soul in tact. She cannot find her guilt via a transformative spell; she must find it in herself as she is.
Ethical Quandaries in "Consequences"
Should Allan's death be treated as "Collateral Damage"?
Buffy and Faith disagree about how to react to Allan's death. Buffy adopts the principle that every human life has intrinsic value, and that what happened to Allan cannot simply be ignored.
Faith wants to discount and forget Allan's death. She argues that
Buffy responds that they have reason
to believe (after being in Allan Finch's office and seeing the
Mayor with Mr. Trick) that Allan was a good guy--he may have been
coming to help them.
Faith argues that slayers do not
have to answer to human justice (which demands that those who
cause human deaths be accountable) because they are above it by
design. They have the strength and fighting skills needed to protect
other humans. In Faith's view, these powers give them not only
a duty, but a privilege to mete out their skills as they see fit
(see Faith's Philosophy of Slaying).
Buffy responds that slayers should not be able to do whatever they want; killing humans is the limit to what slayers should be allowed to do (a point she also makes in Ted, and bringing us back to her first point about human life having intrinsic value).
It is arguable that Faith's rationalization for killing Allan isn't what a Utilitarian would prescribe, however, since the greatest good for the greatest number would be making sure no one good dies (the same goes for Doyle's hypothetical rationalization for Angel giving in to temptation in City Of...)
Should buffy be more like Faith, or should Faith be more like Buffy?
Faith argues that Buffy is repressing her natural instincts and is jealous of Faith. Buffy is the "good little girl" doing what she is told; Faith is the self-actualized Slayer doing whatever she wants.
[In] the beliefs of ...Thomas Hobbes... Morality is seen as an external force, while sinfulness is seen as an internal one. A common perception of good is that it's something society imposes on people, that the "establishment" created these rules about how to behave and that they'd been ingrained into us over the years. Doing the wrong thing, however, is often seen as being what people really want to do, but outside influences force people to suppress it. Because of this, a good person is seen as weak willed, caving into society's rules about what to do and what not to do. Meanwhile, a bad person is seen as having a strong will and doing what they really want to do (Finn Mac Cool, 2003-09-01 22:30)
Faith looks at Buffy and thinks she's repressed and boring, and needs to loosen up and act more wild. But Buffy's not simply some reactive stick-in-the-mud. Buffy has a heavily internalized and ingrained sense of duty, she's thought seriously about how she approaches slaying and life, and it's not simple repression. If Buffy's boring, it's not because she's making a serious attempt to live up to an ethical and moral code. ...I come from a religious tradition in which people are considered flawed, but are generally expected to be striving for "good" (dlgood, 2003-09-01 22:45).
Is Faith legally culpable for killing Allan?
Faith did not murder Allan; what happened was a tragic accident. While it is true that Faith has a reckless fighting style, Buffy could have easily made the same mistake. Both were systematically killing vampires who were jumping out at them in the alley, and Faith did not realize Allen was not a vampire until it was too late.
Kantian morality stresses the motive rather than the consequences of an action as an integral part of respecting the autonomy of the individual. Faith's intention was to stake a vampire, the tragic mortal death resulting from her intention says nothing about her character (Vox, Nov 3, 1999).
So what would the law say? For a legal perspective on Faith's actions, see Vox's Website.
Was Wesley justified in locking up Faith?
What if Faith were the ONLY slayer? Do you lock her up and throw away the key (as he seemed intent on doing)? If so, you'll be without a Slayer until her death, which with her under lock and key as opposed to out fighting every night, wouldn't be for a good long while (RTBS (Feb 17 18:08 1999).
He did what he thought was right. Sure he messed it up, and was wrong to boot, but that's beside the point. What else was he to do? Giles was constently undermining his authority, keeping secrets from him and basically giving him a hard time. He just trying to do a real bitch of a job and gets nothing but grief for his trouble... Giles- Made a mistake at keeping Wesley out of the loop. His lack of trust in him led the young Watcher to do what he did. If Giles had told Wesley what the deal was, they could have worked something out. He didn't and wackyness insued. I love Giles, and think he is one of the best character's on the show, but he was wrong to keep the truth from Wesley (Godeater, Feb 16 23:52 1999).
The Metaphysics of "Doppelgängland"
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Creating a temporal fold: The amulet of Anyanka, the 1120-year old demon first seen in The Wish, was lost in a history that no longer exists. The mortal Anya goes to see D'Hoffryn to request his help in getting it back. She asks him to "fold the fabric of time"--essentially, to use magic to reestablish the alternative history. Restoring the moment in time before the amulet was destroyed would allow her retrieve it. It would also, of course, restore the alternative bizarro-history and erase the normal history of the Buffyverse; the only reason the normal Buffyverse history exists is because bizarro-Giles had a chance to destroy the amulet. When D'Hoffryn is not sympathetic to Anya's request, she approaches Willow. |
The metaphysics of Anya
The spell to restore the
amulet: Anya sets down a plate with
a drawing of her amulet on it. Willow has provided candles, bones,
chicken's feet and other spell ingredients.
They first offer a supplication to Eryishon, the endless one (some
sort of demon with power over time?),
putting their hands out, palms up, fingertips touching:
Anya:
Eryishon k'shala meh-uhn.
Willow: Diprecht, Doh-tehenlo Nu-Eryishon.
Both put their hands on a bottle of sacred sand, preparing to pour it onto the plate.
Anya (picks up the bottle of sand): The child to the mother.
Willow (touching the bottle of sand): The River to the sea.
Anya:
Eryishon, hear my prayer.
This cracks open a fold in time. Light flashes
and mystic energy comes forth. As
it does, Willow sees images of the events that happened in the
timeline that had been undone. She begins to realize that this
power is darker than she was lead to believe. Instead of helping
Anya pour the sand onto the plate, she hesitates and holds the
sand back. Anya persists, and as the sand falls, it hits Willow's
hand before it hits the plate. When Anya's amulet doesn't appear,
she inadvertently triggers the spell by breaking the plate in
anger.
The appearance of
VampWillow: The spell does what
it was intended to do in this respect--it restores the evil time-line.
The spell does not effect the amulet, though. Hence, it does not
prevent bizarro-Giles across town from crushing the amulet and
restoring the normal time-line again, with one difference--VampWillow has not been erased. She appears
in the restored normal timeline version of the factory.
The
spell to send VampWillow back: This
spell basically restores the evil
time-line. VampWillow is put back in the time and place she was
taken from, right before she was killed. Since VampWillow's reappearance
does not effect the rest of the alternate history, Giles' smashing
of the necklace happens again, and the normal history is once
again restored. As a result of Anya's behavior and the spell,
however, the gang now knows that Anya
is a baddie stripped of her powers.
Evil
and Moral Ambiguity in "Doppelgängland"
| Corruption and temptation: When VampWillow emerges in a very human Sunnydale, she is dismayed. She wants her evil timeline back. The Mayor's ex-minions have no trouble calling VampWillow "the boss" after she twists their arms (or was that breaking their fingers?) Anya sees this vampire version of Willow with her lackeys in the Bronze (feeding on Sandy and musing about treating humans like ponies) and realizes that the spell worked, just not in the way she intended. She tells VampWillow that the evil timeline can be restored with the help of human Willow. Before engaging her help, though, VampWillow takes the time to cuddle up to her human counterpart and tempt her to "be bad". |  |
Are vamps like their human predecessors? Joss confuses the issue more when Buffy reassures human Willow that "a vampire's personality has nothing to do with the person it was," and Angel briefly comments, "Well, actually... yeah, good point." VampWillow is not merely the human + some blood lust. She takes what she wants, is not afraid to tell others what to do, and seems to live for pleasures of all sorts, especially of the ouchy variety. In what ways is that similar to the more reticent, kind human Willow? Well, human Willow can take charge in situations that demand it, as we saw in Halloween. (Does VampWillow shed light on Willow's sexuality?)
The evil and moral ambiguity of Anya(nka)
The hermetically insensitive Cordelia
The corrupt Snyder
Ethical Quandaries in "Doppelgängland"
Xander: Hey, wait 'til you have an evil twin, see how you handle it!
Willow: I handled it fine.
Was it wrong not to stake
Vamp-Willow?
VampWillow attacks human Willow in
the Bronze and tries to choke her. When Buffy comes to the rescue,
Willow stops her from staking her evil counterpart. Both agree
they cannot kill this demon with Willow's
face.
Yes
I agree that it was morally wrong to send VampWillow back to her world, where she could torture and kill humans...where she could "have a chance"...what is that? And why would everybody go along with it? Way too sentimental of them.... Hey, if there were a VampTallulahdahling, I'd want to dust her as fast as I could. I wouldn't want her anywhere out there doing evil with my face (Tallulahdahling, Feb 23 19:23 1999).
Only a Consequentialist with precognitive abilities could argue that sending VampWillow back was okay because it changed none of the events in bizarro-world. It is not morally acceptable for a Vampire Slayer to release a vampire merely because the potential harm she may cause will be on nobody you know. This would be far more evident if the question was left hanging, if we never saw what happened back in bizarro-world (Vox, 16 Nov 1999 17:35).
No
At first, I thought sending Vampy Willow back was the wrong thing to do. However, if you figure it this way, they all knew what her world was like (that's proven by Xander knowing he's a vamp in this other world), they know the vampires run things and they know they can't be harmed by it. What's the harm in letting her go? If they'd let her loose in reality Sunnydale, I would have been pissed, but not in this case. It really didn't matter whether they staked her or not (Drugal97, Feb 23 20:24 1999).
Masquerade's note: if Giles understood the metaphyiscs of temporal folds correctly, he knew he was sending VampWillow back to a world that would quickly be erased again. It was six of one, half a dozen of the other.
The ethics of boyfriend stealing: Cordelia doesn't have much to say on this subject, except that the "fact" that she didn't really like Xander all that much (as if) did not give Willow the right to have smoochies with him.
What would it take for Angel to lose his soul again? In Surprise, Angel achieved a moment of true happiness while making love to Buffy, and lost his soul, giving Angelus free reign on the body. After Faith's attempt at seducing the vampire fails, she participates in a ritual to take away his soul. She throws blood on his chest, and then a masked man comes out of the shadows, recites an incantation, and mystical energy fills the room, centering on Angel. The light show is a ruse to fool Faith. Although the Mayor chanted and sacrificed to summon a demon to help him take Angel's soul, the "ritual" could not have been a real ritual (or was done wrong on purpose). Otherwise, Angel would have lost it. His soul, that is. It is therefore unclear if it is possible for Angel to lose his soul through a ritual. But what would it take?
I don't think that sleeping with Faith would be sufficient to give Angel a happy. I am of the opinion that it wasn't the sex that did it in "Suprise", it was the love that came with the sex that did it. Faith can't give that to Angel, in any way, shape or form. She doesn't have it in her, but Buffy did and still does (Cosmic Bob, Mar 17 12:25 1999).
Although the happiness clause has been connected to sex (e.g., in "Revelations" Xander says Angel is safe, "as long as [he and Buffy] don't get pelvic", and in "She", Angel implies dating women is dangerous for him) it has also been connected to other forms of happiness. In Amends, Giles is wary of giving Angel "peace of mind" about why he came back to Earth in FH&T--"...peace of mind? Do you think that's something you should have?" Furthermore, Angel does have sex with a woman he was very close to, and wakes up from it as souled as ever.
Does the gypsy curse still hold?
More on Angel and true happiness
Was the masked man a demon? This is never explicity stated. He has supernatural powers, but he could simply be a human sorcerer of some sort. The Mayor used chanting and sacrifice to summon him, but one does not normally say things such as "Peace be with you" to a demon, nor does it seem as if demons would put themselves into the debt of humans, especially a Watcher.
Is the Mayor human? At the hall of records, Oz finds a scrap book with an old picture labeled "Richard Wilkins." It looks just like the Mayor, Richard Wilkins III. Wesley reasons that "Mayor Wilkins is over 100 years old. He's not human". The Mayor's story about watching his wife grow old while he remained young seems to clinch the age question. But it does not follow that he's not human. His immortality and invulnerability are both be spell-induced without taking away his basic humanness. The Mayor made a deal in which he allowed the demons to have free reign in Sunnydale in return for the power of the Ascension. This could also be the deal that explains his age. In The Prom, Giles says "'The Ascension' refers to a human transforming into a demon,.... And on Graduation Day, our Mayor Wilkins is scheduled to do just that." Ergo, he was (an albeit super-powerful) human--until Graduation Day.
Good
and Evil in "Enemies"
Faith was very defensive about the fatherly attentions
of the Mayor at first. But he played on the
emotionally vulnerable girl's need for love. He gives her
a gift and scolds her for acting "spoiled" (and when
she apologizes, he gives her a cookie). He is clearly in charge,
and the slayer who has problems with authority figures not only
allows it, she enables his evil as surely
as he encourages hers
Demonic and subtle - the Mayor is giving Faith, step by step, inch by inch, what she really wants - a father. And much more subtly than having Old Scratch appear in a puff of flame, saying, "Give me your soul, and in exchange, I'll give you a father." Put like that, Faith might actually have resisted. But the toys, the attention (It's full of calcium!), the fussing, the refusal to take sexual advantage, these are all the things which Faith desperately needs. She is both pathetic and dangerous (BellaDonna, Mar 17 07:06 1999).
When Faith told the Mayor about the demon
with the books of Ascension, he not
only sent her off to kill the demon and retrieve the books, he
also made it clear that he expected Faith to do something about
Buffy. After seeing Angel and Buffy kissing, Faith knew Buffy's
vulnerability. She and the Mayor decided to take Angel's soul
away. Turning Angel back into Angelus would both devastate Buffy
and get another demonic power on their side. After Faith killed
the demon, she went to see Angel with blood on her hands, claiming
to be overwhelmed by what she had done. But in reality, she was
trying to seduce him, playing on his sympathy for her "inner
struggle" with evil.
Later, believing she was allies with Angelus,
Faith made clear that she had become part
of Sunnydale's "Big,
brewing evil." When Buffy asked
why, Faith revealed her jealousy of
Buffy. Faith was supposed to be the chosen one, kicking butt
in Sunnydale, but always had to compete with Buffy, the slayer-who-has-everything:
friends, family, and love. Faith also revealed that the Mayor
allowed demons to run free in Sunnydale, and that his reward was
"the Ascension" which would
occur on Graduation day. "I'll
be sitting at his right hand,"
she said.
It just seemed like Judas kiss to me. A kiss of the final betrayal. The truth was out. But a kiss good bye-to Buffy, to everything she represents to Faith--goodness, humanity. ...she's gone over the line. Her transformation is complete. ...As long as the gang didn't know about her, a small part of her could pretend it wasn't real. ...But she left that hope behind in the mansion (MeeB, Mar 17 10:20 1999).
The
good guy's plan
What the good guys knew:
Based on this evidence, Giles, Buffy, and Angel hatch a plan to find out about the Ascension and Faith's loyalties.
Is Faith
Evil?
Moral Ambiguity
in "Enemies"
Angel
Faith: "What
can I say? I'm the worlds best actor."
Angel: "Second best."
Part of the good guy's plan required Angel to behave like Angelus, a task he performs almost too well. "It's all an act," Buffy reminds herself when it's over, but she doesn't seem completely convinced. Angel's deeds as "Angelus":
But it was Angelus. The demon didn't go away when Angel got his soul back, he's still there, always has been. So when Angel did the Angelus bit, he was letting the demon out just a little. Buffy was seeing that the demon was still there. That has to be disconcerting (Rile, Mar 16 18:47 1999).
Good demons? The unnamed horned Graveyard demon is more interested in his own survival than in killing anyone. Although out for money, he took a risk going to the slayers with his offer sell the Books of the Ascension. "I don't think he falls into the deadly threat to humanity category," Buffy concludes. In addition, the demon seems to live pretty much like a regular person, with an apartment, dishes in the drainer, and a pet fish. While this doesn't prove he is always good, he certainly doesn't seem to be always bad.
Xander, attitude boy
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