rusty_halo

I think that one of my biggest problems with this season isn't even directly tied to Spike. It's just the whole "morality should be black and white" theme in general.

Like, I don't get what's wrong with Angel taking over Wolfram and Hart. If he hadn't, really seriously evil people would've taken it over, and used it to do many horrible evil awful things. By being there and preventing even 1/10th of those things, Angel is doing more good than he'd ever manage to do in his tiny, broke little detective organization.

And now, when he wants to do something good, he has immense resources to do it. He can accomplish so much more from this position than he ever could have before.

Should he have lied and erased his friends' memories to get them there? Of course not. But the actual being there, trying to change the system instead of just striking against it ... that's the right thing to do. That's the adult thing to do. Morality is not black and white; it's all shades of grey. Trying to change something is going to be a lot more successful than trying to tear it down. (This isn't to say there isn't a place for those who do fight the injustices of the "system," but it's not inherently wrong to try to change the system from inside, either.)

Now this doesn't mean that it's not dangerous. Yes, Angel and his friends are running the risk of becoming corrupted. But this is their own fault; Gunn, apparently, has given in to the evil that surrounds them, and perhaps others are leaning in this direction too. This is because of their own decisions; it's not the inevitable outcome of working at Wolfram and Hart (though apparently we're supposed to think it is?)

Last week we saw Angel longing for black and white, and Spike, of all people, arguing for it. (Which is probably the largest reason this Spike makes absolutely no sense to me.) To me, this is a weakness in both of them, a longing for childish simplicity instead of a decision to live in the real world, where things are complicated and easy answers aren't always just spelled out for you.

But apparently, we're just supposed to be longing for the black and white along with Angel? I just completely don't get it.

( more bitching about Spike specifically (and the end of grey-area Spike) )

Well, these are supposed to be unpopular opinions, right? So I'm going all out and I'm not going to sugarcoat and qualify. Something here is liable to offend, well, probably everyone, so don't get upset if you, y'know, get upset.

( 10 unpopular opinions about fan behavior )

( 10 unpopular opinions about the actual show(s) )

The Cruxshadows were great last night, as expected. I got there around 8:45 and they didn't go on until around 11:30, which meant I stood around bored for a long time. Also, it was really hot; what's with this weather? The club was packed, but I did get to be in the very front, so that was cool. I always enjoy concerts much more when I can see the expressions on the lead singer's face. I'm very verbally oriented, so the lyrics and the emotion behind them are what matters most to me.

The whole thing was centered on Greek mythology; Rogue introduced most of the songs by telling a few lines about Troy, or Hector and Achilles, or Odysseus, or whatever, tying the story to the theme of the song. It was neat. He's got such a great voice for that kind of thing.

I love that Rogue is so interactive with the audience. He sang at least half the show offstage. He's got a microphone attached to a headset, so his hands are free. He just comes down and walks through the crowd singing to people. Downtime has a cool layout, too, with a balcony with stairs open to the audience. So he climbed up to the top of the stairs and sang a lot from up there, and from the balcony. During Go Away, he went to the bar and got a stool, then carried it into the middle of the crowd and stood on top, singing to the people around him, rotating so he'd get everyone. Then at one point he got annoyed that the people on the balcony weren't dancing, so he climbed up there and hung on the outside of the balcony, over the crowd, and sang directly to them. Then he turned around and hung over the main audience, singing to us.

I also love their dancers. jaydk seemed offended by them at DragonCon, but I think they're awesome. They're not shaking their booty, bodies sexualized kind of dancers. They're very beautiful modern dancers, all of their movements choreographed to match the music and lyrics. There's nothing exploitative about it, it's just really cool and adds another artistic element to the mix.

I also love their violin player, Rachel. How cool is it to have a violin as the central musical element in a rock show? And I love that half the band is female.

They played a few songs from their new album Ethernaut, but most were older songs that I knew. They didn't play Resist/R, though, which was disappointing. But they played almost everything else I would've wanted to hear-Tears, Binary, Go Away, Return (Coming Home), Deception, The Seraphs, Winter Born. The new songs all sounded good; I bought the new record and am listening to it now. They closed with Marilyn, My Bitterness, which kind of annoyed me, actually. I know it's their biggest hit and all, but they've been playing it, like, forever. But it's a good encore since everyone knows it and gets all excited. Unfortunately, since I was in the front, I got pulled up onstage at the end when Rogue was pulling people from the crowd to dance onstage. I hate that. I don't dance. I know no one's looking at me anyway, but I really hate being on a stage in front of hundreds of people. So I hid behind this big guy, and jumped off as soon as it was over. Afterwards I got Rogue to sign my CD; he's so cute. *girly sigh*

Now I'm horribly depressed. I guess it's post-concert letdown. I've been looking forward to this show for the past two weeks--it got me through all the paper-writing and midterms and work stress--and now it's over. I hate being in this frame of mind ... it's like my defenses are down. Everything's upsetting me more than I want it to. Like, I went alone to the concert, and felt so ugly and boring compared to everyone else, and so lonely looking at all the couples. (Even though I don't want to date anyway). Now I'm trying to catch up with my friends list, and all these little things that normally wouldn't bother me are upsetting me greatly. And also, devilpiglet left LJ, and I miss her.

I haven't read LJ since Tuesday; I feel so behind. I'm trying to catch up. Since I haven't posted, here's a quick run-down of what I would have posted about if I'd had time.

( AtS 5x05, Kill Bill, Halloween, etc )

Here's the thing. Spike fans are defending themselves with "I love AtS too!" And AtS fans are qualifying, "Well, the Spike fans who like AtS too are okay." The issue seems to be with those Spike fans who have the audacity to care only about Spike, not the rest of the show. Those are the people we all have to quality that we are not, so that everyone knows we care about the other characters too, and we watched the show before Spike showed up, and we think Wesley/Angel/Lorne/whoever is cool, etc.

But my question is: what's so wrong with just liking Spike? I addressed this indirectly in my earlier posts, but I still found myself qualifying that I've watched AtS since the beginning. Why do I have to qualify? Why can't it just be "I watch for Spike, the rest is irrelevant, and I'm not going to apologize for it"?

I posted this somewhere private, but I'm reposting it here because it clarifies what I mean:

It's like the Angel fans are deigning to lecture the Spike fans on how to behave, and letting the "good" ones in, the ones who pass "not rabid Spike fen" muster. The ones who don't claim their Spike fandom too intensely, and are sure to make all the proper bows to the authority of the AtS fans. It's incredibly condescending, and it's based on this assumption that Angel fans are somehow superior to Spike fans and have the right to dictate who is acceptable and who is too "rabid."

The thing is, Spike fans have been around a long time, too. And while every character has their own particular fan following, many Spike fans have always felt separate. One reason is that Spike never really fit into the narrative, so aside from Spike/Buffy fans, Spike fans didn't really have that many connections to the rest of the show and characters. You could be a Spike fan and skip everything in season six after "Seeing Red," minus 3 minutes in each following episode, and have that be it. Spike's story was rarely tied very closely into the story that incorporated all the other characters (which I think is very unfortunate, but that's another issue). Another thing is that Spike fans got to be such a *huge* group--ad campaigns and mobbing at conventions and letter writing and their own separate, distinct places in fandom almost completely apart from the rest of BtVS and AtS fandom. Plus, many Spike fans abandoned general boards, like TWOP or the newsgroup, because they got sick of the rampant Spike-bashing. So they retreated to private Spike-centric communities where discussion of other characters and events tended to occur only in relation to Spike.

So now Spike fans are interacting with AtS fans, and the AtS fans think that they get to tell the Spike fans what to do because the Spike fans are joining "their" show. They see the Spike fans as less, underlings that they can lecture and decide which "count" as the acceptable ones. But it doesn't work that way--Spike fans have been around as a group longer than AtS has existed, we have our own deeply rooted ways of behaving and watching and thinking about the character.

I don't mean that Spike fans are better--my point is that neither group is "better." I seriously don't think the AtS fans would appreciate the more prominent members of Spike fandom coming over and lecturing them on how to watch the show, and the same holds true with Spike fans; we don't need prominent members of AtS fandom telling us what to do. If we want to watch the Spike scenes and skip the rest because it bores us, that's our right--just like the AtS fans can (and many prominently are) dismissing the Spike parts, forming groups were no one can talk about Spike, etc.

I'm not saying that's ideal--it would be nice if we could all appreciate everything, Spike fans loving AtS and AtS fans loving Spike. But realistically, that's not going to happen. It's a matter of taste; some Spike fans aren't going to be interested in AtS, and vice versa. That doesn't make either group "better fans," and it certainly doesn't give one group the right to lecture and order around the other.

So if you're a Spike fan and you agree with this, I suggest that we all make sure not to apologize, not to feel the need to qualify and explain and justify our existence. Even if you have been watching from the beginning and you love Angel to pieces--it would be okay if you didn't. The fact that you love Spike is enough, it has value and meaning on its own. And if the AtS fans don't want to accept that, well, too bad. They don't get to define us. They can call us rabid all they want, but we don't have to listen and we don't have to let it define who we are.

I'm a Spike fan. Not an Angel fan. Not a Buffy fan. A Spike fan. Spike is the character that I find interesting and intriguing and fun to watch. I would not be watching either show if he wasn't on it. If he ceased to be on it, I would stop watching.

I find most of the other characters at best only mildly interesting, and at worst, tiresome and irritating. I think that some of the plots are interesting, and a lot of them aren't. The ME brand of "feminism" makes me violently ill and I'd never watch another of their shows again if I didn't want to see Spike. Spike is actually the only fictional character I care about enough to watch TV for; without him I'd probably get rid of my television and not miss it.

So what if my character's not in the title? I'm not going to rearrange my preferences and pretend to be interested in characters that I don't care about just because they're the supposed "real" central characters.

You think this makes me a bad fan? Fuck off. I don't need your approval, and there is nothing wrong with watching for one character.

( AtS 5x02 )

Watching it was very fun. jaydk, queenofthorns, chenanceou and Jerry (who needs to get a LJ!) all came over and watched it at my place. We had snacks and drinks and ordered Indian food, and talked and laughed and hung out and such. I love my Buffy/Angel fandom friends. :)

My reaction to episode 5x02. Warning: I'm half asleep and kind of incoherent right now, so my thoughts are very scattered. Unfortunately I couldn't sleep until I wrote this down.

( AtS 5x02 spoilers )