One More Spuffy Rant...
Sep. 19th, 2003 11:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shipperxOkay, shows me the...er... "enlightenment" of wandering into other boards after having been a resident of BAPS and TabRas for so long. But-- WHAT THE FUCK is with the Spuffies who say that those of us who think that the ending of Spuffy SUCKED just want something sacchrine and sweet?
Excuse me, but this is just so not an accusation usually thrown at me.
I didn't want sacchrine. I didn't want soap opera melodrama. I didn't want Spuffy as B/A redux and can these people please get out of their mindset long enough to see that the poeple pointing out that the way S/B was presented wasn't fulfilling get overthemselves long enough to realize we have a right to complain?!
Jesus, there's a HUGE DIVIDE between sacchrine melodrama and having to read Buffy expressions like a psychic reads tea leaves! Tea leaves are tea leaves, damnit, and a blank faced actress is a blank faced actress! It's not some metaphor for being disconnected, it IS being disconnected! Beating the hell out of someone because of self loathing isn't a metaphor for beating the hell out of someone because of self loathing. It IS what it is. There's now freaking metaphor there!
Don't tell me that I don't understand. I understand just fine. I understand that when Spike says "No, you don't" when she said "I love you" that he mean "No, you don't." I understand that when battering someone saying "there's nothing good or clean inside you" that it's not "okay" because someone is stressed or has a lot of pressure. It's not okay. It's not a metaphor for depression. It is what it is.
Someone go grab a Magritte's painting and explain "The Treachery of Objects" to some of these people.
(er... that's the painting of the pipe saying "Ceci n'est pas une pipe."--"This is not a pipe") It's not a pipe because it's not a pipe. It is what it is -- a painting of a pipe.)
For a metaphor to be a metaphor... there has to be something going on that's metaphorical. Someone who is a bitch to her friends, abusive to her lover, and wallowing in self pity isn't a metaphor for disconnectedness -- it IS disconnectedness. What's so difficult about this concept?
Saying that we wanted something requited as a story, something where Spike wasn't always but always "beneath" Her Precious Pinchface, something where the woman didn't prance around throwing herself at every guy who walks into town because she was ashamed of the one who loved her enough to stick by her bitchy self isn't asking for stupid soap opera. What's stupid is thinking that one can say that a woman who played with a guys heart UNTIL. HE. DIED. is a "great love story." It's a shitty love story.
I didn't need trite B/Aer stuff. I didn't need vaseline coated lenses and googly eyes. But I needed a hell of a lot more than the half-assed crumbs that Spike and Spuffies were dealt. Don't condescend to me and say I wanted something simplistic. I didn't. I just didn't want something abusive, vacuous, and deliberately ugly. I didn't want to spend all my time trying to rationalize why Buffy really wasn't a heinous bitch when 95% of her actions were those of a heartless, heinous bitch.
She used Spike to. his. death. No "flaming hands" is going to excuse for me that Spike died believing he was unloved. No "flaming hands" is going to make me forget how nauseating it was to see her "bask" for PodAngel when he blew into town.
No, damnit, I NOT satisfied with where Spuffy ended up and I don't have to make excuses for that. It was all over the screen why I'm not satisfied.
If anyone is fooling themselves, it's not the ones who came away disappointed and dissatisfied. It's those with their heads stuck in the sand claiming "Yes, but Buffy was just in a bad place." Buffy was in a hell of her own making... and she can freeze there.
Excuse me, but this is just so not an accusation usually thrown at me.
I didn't want sacchrine. I didn't want soap opera melodrama. I didn't want Spuffy as B/A redux and can these people please get out of their mindset long enough to see that the poeple pointing out that the way S/B was presented wasn't fulfilling get overthemselves long enough to realize we have a right to complain?!
Jesus, there's a HUGE DIVIDE between sacchrine melodrama and having to read Buffy expressions like a psychic reads tea leaves! Tea leaves are tea leaves, damnit, and a blank faced actress is a blank faced actress! It's not some metaphor for being disconnected, it IS being disconnected! Beating the hell out of someone because of self loathing isn't a metaphor for beating the hell out of someone because of self loathing. It IS what it is. There's now freaking metaphor there!
Don't tell me that I don't understand. I understand just fine. I understand that when Spike says "No, you don't" when she said "I love you" that he mean "No, you don't." I understand that when battering someone saying "there's nothing good or clean inside you" that it's not "okay" because someone is stressed or has a lot of pressure. It's not okay. It's not a metaphor for depression. It is what it is.
Someone go grab a Magritte's painting and explain "The Treachery of Objects" to some of these people.
(er... that's the painting of the pipe saying "Ceci n'est pas une pipe."--"This is not a pipe") It's not a pipe because it's not a pipe. It is what it is -- a painting of a pipe.)
For a metaphor to be a metaphor... there has to be something going on that's metaphorical. Someone who is a bitch to her friends, abusive to her lover, and wallowing in self pity isn't a metaphor for disconnectedness -- it IS disconnectedness. What's so difficult about this concept?
Saying that we wanted something requited as a story, something where Spike wasn't always but always "beneath" Her Precious Pinchface, something where the woman didn't prance around throwing herself at every guy who walks into town because she was ashamed of the one who loved her enough to stick by her bitchy self isn't asking for stupid soap opera. What's stupid is thinking that one can say that a woman who played with a guys heart UNTIL. HE. DIED. is a "great love story." It's a shitty love story.
I didn't need trite B/Aer stuff. I didn't need vaseline coated lenses and googly eyes. But I needed a hell of a lot more than the half-assed crumbs that Spike and Spuffies were dealt. Don't condescend to me and say I wanted something simplistic. I didn't. I just didn't want something abusive, vacuous, and deliberately ugly. I didn't want to spend all my time trying to rationalize why Buffy really wasn't a heinous bitch when 95% of her actions were those of a heartless, heinous bitch.
She used Spike to. his. death. No "flaming hands" is going to excuse for me that Spike died believing he was unloved. No "flaming hands" is going to make me forget how nauseating it was to see her "bask" for PodAngel when he blew into town.
No, damnit, I NOT satisfied with where Spuffy ended up and I don't have to make excuses for that. It was all over the screen why I'm not satisfied.
If anyone is fooling themselves, it's not the ones who came away disappointed and dissatisfied. It's those with their heads stuck in the sand claiming "Yes, but Buffy was just in a bad place." Buffy was in a hell of her own making... and she can freeze there.
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no subject
Date: 2003-09-20 12:39 am (UTC)I couldn't agree more. I'm sorry, but what we were shown wasn't some complex mythopoetic indication of the yin-yang with ancient Egyptian influences and the archetype of the Trickster, complete with flaming hands symbolic of the Great High Orgasmic Barbecue of Malachi. People can spout off all they want about how I don't "get" the metaphor - sorry, babes, but there wasn't one. Depression is not a metaphor for depression, whether it's set in a fantasy world or not. And abuse is not a metaphor for abuse.
Fact is, the writers delineated Buffy to be an emotionless, cold little bitch, and expected us to stick with her and identify with her all the same. The audience didn't, they embraced Spike. So they made Spike the "bad boyfriend" in order to excuse Buffy's actions. No metaphors here. If there were metaphors, they were abandoned early - like the equating of nakedness with vulnerability and the female sexual role.
We're not stupid because we see Spuffy in the way it was depicted, instead of some high-drama, elitist, "deep" relationship. We're not latent B/A shippers, wanting idealistic romance. We simply don't take shit and try to spin it into gold.
no subject
Date: 2003-09-20 11:10 am (UTC)Exactly! This is the part of the argument that drives me nuts! This is Mutant Enemy we're talking about. The same people who couldn't be bothered to finish writing the script for "Lies My Parents Told Me" until the thing was half filmed! The people whose "story" plan for Spike was "He starts out crazy in the basement... stuff happens... and he dies in the finale so we can have a happy ending." These people can't plan worth shit! They ADMIT that they had no idea what in the hell they were doing throughout large portions of Season 6. They admit that they were constantly changing things and restructuring the story. They can't keep any continuity (magic coat placement in the basement, anyone) yet I'm supposed to believe that these same reckless, unorganized people constructed some metaphorical subtext for the season that is so brilliant that poor little me can't begin to get it?
Look, I was a fine arts major in college. I was really well trained in the bullshit of explaining what I'd done as "And this is to represent the way that man interacts with nature" and I'm telling you, 75% of the time it's bullshit spewed to make sense to someone so you're not stuck saying "I did this because it was what I wanted to do." Yes, there are metaphors. And sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And the point of a television show is to COMMUNICATE with the audience. So if the story sucked on a level that most people are walking away saying "That sucked ass!" then guess what, it did! Because even if I were to buy (which I don't) that Joss actually had some brilliant metaphor that I'm just too damn stupid to get, then he STILL fails because he didn't communicate to the television viewing audience. Actually, I think Joss "communicated" just fine. I just think he had some dumbass, reactionary "girlpower" metaphor that was absolutely was as offensive, trite, and ridiculous as it looked.