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Author Topic:   What are you? Who are you?
Idiot Jed
Scooby Gang Member

Posts: 96
Registered: Jan 2000

posted 19-05-2000 05:53 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Idiot Jed   Click Here to Email Idiot Jed     Edit/Delete Message     Reply w/Quote
[I am so sorry for inflicting this rambling on you all but it wouldn't go away until I wrote it, and then I thought if I post it I'll get really embarressed and stop thinking about it altogether, so please bare with me....]

One of the season's encompassing themes, how far does knowing what you are answer the question of who you are? There are numerous examples of this:

. Adam is the the one who asks the question (in Goodbye Iowa). He knows what he is and immediately wonders who.

. Wild At Heart develops the werewolf issue. How far does the wolf part of Oz extend?

. Spike is a vampire but he can't kill, does that mean he's fair game for dusting or does it give him some sort of post-Slaying right to live? Plus does the inability to physically threaten mean that he's no longer a threat?

. Riley is a soldier trying to find out if there is anything else underneath that facade.

. Anya was a demon and acted like a demon, but now she's a human and acting like a human. What does this say about the question at large?

. Giles is turned into a demon, but refuses to act like a monstor because he looks like one. Proving that to everyone else however is rather more difficult.

. The Initiative are a group of people intent on fighting the forces of darkness, but does that automatically make them good?

. Then of course we have Faith, stuck in her bad guy persona but living in the body of a Slayer....
The whole nature/nurture debate of Season three is given the usual next season Joss-over, when Faith and Buffy switch bodies. In the previous season we were led to believe that after a certain point its your own nature that decides your basic moral code (in Jossverse language, whether you embrace the darkness or the light) This Years Girl picks up from this point pretty much straight off when Buffy voices her hopes that Faith may well be sorry for what she's done, and alone and scared. All of which are probably in the event true but cowering in a corner is evidently not Faith's way of dealing. When she switches bodies the whole question of nature/nurture is taken to another, and completely more abstract level: that of body and soul. How closely is the body connected with the soul? Is it significant that Faith had her first real 'moment of truth' after killing Alan when she was in Buffy's body?

Even if the answer to the last question is yes, then we still have to ask why? Was it that she was being treated like Buffy (and thus we remain firmly entrenched in the Frankenstein area), or was it because you cannot truly switch bodies without in some sense switching minds? Seeing things out of new eyes, new senses and, if we are to take the whole body transference thing literally, new brain tissue as well?

In season four then, Joss extended the classic theme of nature/nurture even further into the fantasy genre. But where, in the end, was the final vote cast? With the transference from Buffy to Angel Faith's story moves into a different phase. That of forgiveness and of course redemption. The first episode focuses on Faith herself, an area closer to the body and soul question. How does Faith see herself, and how far are her actions merely caused by a self-fulfilling prophecy effect? It is rather poignant that the final question comes full circle to the girl at large. Can Faith redeem herself not only in the eyes of those around her but in the way she sees herself? Sanctuary largely returns to the environmental aspects of changing course (from darkness to light). Where Faith not only has the police and the Watcher's council on her tale, but Wesley, Cordelia and Buffy too. The ending retains the show's staunch grey area mentality by having the two people she hurt the most stand by her just before she decides to go unaided to the police. The basic point in this instance would seem to be that nature is indeed the fundamental of the matter, but nurture is just as vital in the process of making the light of that nature glow.

[I find this whole area endlessly fascinating. Any thoughts on the general theme?]

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ASH
Scooby Gang Member

Posts: 334
Registered: Feb 2000

posted 19-05-2000 06:20 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for ASH   Click Here to Email ASH     Edit/Delete Message  n/a   Reply w/Quote

I guess it depends where you`re coming from personally and whatever ideologies and beliefs you hold about what it is that makes a person, is it genetics or is a person the sum totality of their experiences ?.

Personally I go with the latter, mainly because I refuse to believe one person can be born good, another evil and so on.Enviroment is a major factor in shaping personality in my humble opinion( though not the only one , after all plenty of people raised in good homes do bad things and vice versa)

Like you said, that`s what makes Faith such an interesting character.More than any of the others she asks the awkward questions like can good people do bad things, and can they then find a way to recompense ?.None of us know what hardships Faith endured before we met Buffy but we do now she never had the kind of emotional support group the Buffster had.If she did would she have been a different slayer ?, possibly but another way of looking at it is to ask whether Buffy could have survived living as Faith had without succumbing to the same inner demons.As neitchze would say "Whatever doesn`t kill you will only make you stronger "
So maybe personalities adapt to the enviroment they find themselves in in order to survive.

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Eve
Scooby Gang Member

Posts: 181
Registered: Apr 2000

posted 19-05-2000 06:23 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Eve   Click Here to Email Eve     Edit/Delete Message     Reply w/Quote
My view on the initiative is , no they are not good. The soldiers may think they`re doing good but the base was used to create Adam. They dont understand Demons so they hurt them, not all Demons are bad (Doyle, Whistler) but they find them all a threat so they hurt them.
That probably made no sense but I`m so tired I`m on Buffys level of fire bad, tree pretty!

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sange
Scooby Gang Member

Posts: 157
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 22-05-2000 10:09 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for sange   Click Here to Email sange     Edit/Delete Message  7087688   Reply w/Quote
Ok my opinion on the Initiative they are bad dudes ........
They are no better than The Scourge in Angel....why.....because they are persecuting and experimenting on species that they do not understand,uncomfortable parralels with Ethnic cleansing that still goes on in the world today.They see only black and white and no areas of grey......so I have to go with Buffy on this one.

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julz
Bit Character

Posts: 25
Registered: Feb 2000

posted 25-05-2000 12:08 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for julz   Click Here to Email julz     Edit/Delete Message     Reply w/Quote
The Initiative represent blind government & politics. They set out to do good but are corrupted by Politics. One of the great things about the later series of buffy is Joss has moved away from the one dimensional good guy bad guy thing. (Remember the master? Compare with now, series one begins to look a bit cartoony). Their is only one "good guy" now, the scooby gang, the rest of the world is crazy. Maybe this represents the move from high school to Uni.

You can't condemn the initiative because, there's the exception, Riley. Therefore the entire shebang can't be evil. (and remember Adam was an *accident*, it killed its creator so we can assume he's off the rails).
You can't endorse Slayers because... Faith (hmmm... that used to work better)
You can't condemn the Council because Giles.
Demons: Oz

etc. etc. etc.

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azrael
Scooby Gang Member

Posts: 286
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 25-05-2000 12:39 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for azrael   Click Here to Email azrael     Edit/Delete Message     Reply w/Quote
for the "what makes a person" question look for a film called dark city for all that have seen it look at the way the strangers treat humans.

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