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by Charity aka Taygeta Buffy s3e10 Kindly donated by Jade's BtVS Theories What can I say about the guy? I love him to death . . . he puts up a simpleton front, when in reality he is quite possibly one of the most complex characters on the show. In all respects, Xander's never had life easy. Romantically speaking, he's had his moments of happiness, but situations, feelings . . . monsters :), outweigh the happy of it all to such extremeties that I don't think he actually dwells too much on past happiness. Rather, it's more that he wants to do something that alters present unhappiness into a state where he doesn't feel or he can at least say to himself, "I'm not unhappy." His home life - the little we know of it - has obviously been worded to the extent where we pretty much know that Xander's from a dysfunctional family and with the Amends scene, its safe to say that he's not exactly close to anyone in his family or vice-versa. The only other aspect of his life wherein he seems somewhat happy and content is the life he shared with those he called his friends. Xander depends a lot on friendship to make up for all that he lacks from the other aspects of his life. His friends are his real family - the people who you love and love you and despite whatever you do and whatever you've done are going to be there for you. At least, I think that's what his friends represent to him, and now the idealism has crumbled and the friendships that he's depended on - really depended on - for the past two years have fallen with the remnants of that debris. I actually believe that this "Fall of Friendship" was a long time coming. Quite possibly beginning with the weakening of the Willow/Xander friendship, which I pinpoint somewhere within the mess that is the rejection of the Spring Fling, the aftermath of the near-kiss that involves the pre-sexy dance, and the incidences of Inca Mummy Girl. Such a weakening probably wasn't too evident because Buffy became a factor that created an equilibrium between all relationships. Willow shifted to have Buffy as her main best friend and Xander, later (the aftermath of Surprise/Innocence, in which Xander and Willow were basically a non, Buffy had lost Angel, and Willow was preoccupied with Oz to really do the whole "a shoulder to cry" thing), began to do the same. Although at this time they were all considered (and still are to an extent) best friends. Because Xander and Buffy were so close in the latter half of second season, there was a lot of dependency on both sides; however, I think that Xander made up the most of that dependency, since he basically lost a great aspect of himself when he lost Willow's friendship when she found out about Cordelia. Cordelia never entered the "friends" zone and I think that impended a lot of doom on the side of X/C because that lack of primary basis with the premise of lust did not give X/C a strong enough foundation to stand upon.
We know from Anne that Cordelia was gone the entire summer with very little contact with him and obviously Willow and Oz had a stronger, closer relationship through that summer, which doesn't seem to give much "friend time" for Xander and I doubt that he spent time with Giles other than what was necessary. So, he had no one to talk to about any of this. Giles probably let out a lot when he had to explain everything to Joyce, Willow had Oz, and Cordelia didn't exactly care all that much about Buffy in the first place to actually need to talk to anybody. Therefore, he spent the entire summer harboring his pain. Which didn't make me at all surprise that he let out the way he did in DMP. When she came back, he was with the jokes and everything, but he still had all that contained inside of him. The fight in DMP was like uncorking a pressurized bottle, not only for Xander, but for Buffy, who had also done the repressing thing. The fact that it immediately became a Buffy and Xander argument did not at all surprise me. The sudden romance of Willow and Xander was just that, sudden. There was nothing but the moment to spark it and the fact that we haven't seen anything remotely near W/X prior to that since BB&B, makes me personally think that its the beginning of the sorrily needed resolution to the W/X friendship, so that they make get to a state in their relationship where they are at ease with each other and unfortunately, it's probably going to be a state where they're not a close as they were. Surprisingly enough, Cordelia was perhaps the stablest unstable factor to Xander's life, if that at all makes sense. The reoccurance of the soap-operatic thematic C/X music in their kiss in Anne basically said to the viewers that their relationship was what it was from the beginning...lust. I personally believe that Xander cares for Cordelia, but he was never in love with her, as opposed to her feelings for him and that's probably where the W/X kiss in Homecoming comes in. We later find out that he has a dissatisfaction for his romance with Cordelia; I mean, I would think dissatisfaction would ensue when you're with someone that you're not exactly in love with. What started in DMP between Buffy and Xander kind of settled in Revelations with the "Are we cool?" near the end. So, basically B/X friendship began to do its normal, settling thing, whilst making all of us all the more aware of the the difficulties that is B/A. Lover's Walk is kind of an echoing of those difficulties extended to everyone and so by the end everyone was alone, and with the Spike wordage, Buffy did the "letting go of Angel to live her life and let him live his." The Wish was not to show us Bizzaro Sunnydale or to prove to us the power of Buffy, Xander, and Willow friendship, or at least, not in the mainstream storyline sense. It was to basically show to us that B/X/W friendship was off and going again (Cordy, too, but that has nothing to do with this)- however it was was much like the whole equilibrium thing that it was in the first half of second season. Amends showed us how Willow and Oz got back together, but still the 2 teen main characters of Buffy and Xander are still alone (Cordy's doing the readjusting thing). Which relates to the same kind of predictament in the aftermath of Surprise/Innocence. In epsiode comparison I feel that Revelations/Lovers Walk had some of the same effects as Surprise/Innocence. Anyway, Buffy and Xander friendship had been rekindled and at that moment, Buffy really was the only friend Xander had in the Scooby Gang. The one thing about Xander is that when dealing with Buffy, he would just about do anything for her and now that she's the only one that upholds his friend idealism to any extent, that feeling is probably grown somewhat. I've noted that Xander may feel antagonism for Angel, but in the long run, if it's beneficial to Buffy, that antagonism takes a backseat. So, although I can't say that Xander's motives were purely that, I do believe that that was the basic drive in why he was so apt to help out with the Angel situation. Also note that he laid off the Angel commentary when he realized (or she told him, I don't remember which) that it bugged her. As for the "moment" it's a comparison to the Phases moment and all the other moments sprinkled about the latter half of season 2. Like the Phases mortuary moment, it's a "natural reassurance friend" thing that grew to be something more unintentionally. ... His actions, his reactions, they've been pretty consistent with who he's becoming - growing up - to be. I'm not going to say the guy's perfect nor am I going to say he's a flat tire, but I'll definitely say..he's Xander.
I think a lot of that constitutes his antagonism towards Angel (which I'm not tired of because I've never particularly liked Angel) and his viewpoint of Buffy - of what she held to the world and to his world - didn't help relieve that antagonism, it just made it grow stronger. And such a perception worked...for awhile; but little pieces of his life beyond the Hellmouth mainstream made black and white turn to the reality of what life represents, gray. And just when he was beginning to perceive that with the whole relationship situation with Willow, Angel turns to Angelus and thereby losing that definitive "awakening" if you will. Angel actually represented gray; I think Xander said it best, "Hey, Angel's our friend...except I don't like him," but his disliking of the soul-bound vampire added with the jealousy he obviously contained for the demon that loved the girl he loved, made Xander pretty much avoid Angel when possible. Also, Angel never constituted as an important person in his life and those few important people he held so dear (i.e. Buffy, Willow, Giles, etc.) are the people that make him see. I think a lesson learned for Xander in BB&B is that decisions have consequences and the events thereafter emphasized on decisions and I think that because of that emphasis and the realization that began there, caused that split-second choice in Becoming. So, now we're in third season...black and white is nowhere to be seen. From Homecoming onward, we see Xander and the gang get hit by both of those little realizations in latter half of season 2 - except they're not little anymore. Decisions have consequences - events of Lover's Walk, Revelations, Homecoming, the entire Wish episode was practically devoted to that. There is very little black and white, what remains is gray. Revelations - Angel/Angelus...is there a definitive? There's trust, but not total trust, Lover's Walk - relationships and the funniness of love, Buffy/Angel...love is immortal, but love is also impossible, Amends - The First Evil represented by Jenny who was good, is evil total evil?, etc. And among all of this, Xander truly had no one. He lost his friendship with Willow - or the closeness of, there is no Cordy, but there is Buffy. Yet, his actions in Revelations had consequences and one of them is that it hurt his relationship with Buffy. Redemption - make Amends - for past wrongs was Angel's storyline, but paralleling that was Xander's "sudden" change...his want of redemption for past wrongs that he was now remembering as possible wrongs on his part, but he soon realizes that he can't undo what he's done before. He can only try and sort the now so that the later will be okay. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that we shouldn't dwell too much on the past events for Xander or for any other character on that matter. They're changing, they're evolving from their present state and more rapidly than ever before. Senior year. The year before they enter that "real world." And I think that's the point of this third season. Redemption not for the past, but redemption of the now so that the later will prove them all to be of a "definitely superior" kind. Your opinion Or you can
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