Fool For Love

Buffy Episode Review

In which we learn about Spike.

What Did I Think?

Previous Buffy/Angel crossovers have merely been the story moving from one location to the other, such as Spike's search for the Ring of Amarna in 'Harsh Light of Day' and 'In the Dark.' The bottom of the rating scale is 'Pangs' and 'I Will Remember You,' which paired a campy comedy with a serious drama, giving the audience emotional whiplash. That was essentially two separate stories, with Angel shoehorned into the first so that they could call it an "Event," but this night finally lived up to the hype.

First of all, the structure: flashback fun as part of character exploration. The past events highlighted present relationships, particularly how the Buffy/Spike dynamic and the Angel/Darla one are so similar, with the whole 'sex and violence' vibe running through them.

It was seriously cool the way that they came at the same events during the Boxer Rebellion from both the Spike and Darla/Angel perspectives. I admit to flaking and not clicking onto the fact that Angel shouldn't have been there the first time through, but any questions were answered during Angel. A simple Rashamon twist used to great effect to tie the two stories together.

Then, the characters. Angel, Darla and Spike all come from a background of rejection. Denied, they took up Faith's "I want, I see, I take" philosophy and ran with it - until something brought them up short and made them look at their actions. With Angel, it was obviously getting his soul back. Spike hits that moment when he looks at Buffy crying on the back stairs and realizes that here is something more important than he is.

Darla hasn't gotten to that point, which is one reason I loved the ending of "Darla," because for her to start spouting off about how she wants to change would have been so fake. She hasn't shown the slightest hint of looking past herself; even her campaign to win back Angelus is more about getting her favorite toy back.

Spike, on the other hand, came to Sunnydale because he wanted to help Drusilla, and left the way he did in order to protect her. Some of what Drusilla may have been "Seeing" was Spike's newfound willingness to put himself on the line for someone else. It's something the Slayer has to do all the time, but to creatures like vampires that are all about sating their hungers, self-sacrifice is an anathema.

I just hope this isn't building to some big 'throw Spike in front of the speeding car to save Buffy' finale, cause that would suck. Spike's journey is almost more interesting than Angel's. The return of Angel's soul really just reasserted his previous personality over the demon; if Spike changes, all of him, demon included, will have grown.