shipperx | In Need of Intellectual Discussion

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In Need of Intellectual Discussion

For fanfic purposes, I'm trying to puzzle out a post-apocalyptic BtVS/AtS world.

A few hypothetical discussion questions:

* What would the world look like in 20 years if The First got what it wanted? The First wanted to take over, to make the world... what, exactly? What did The First actually want? Control? Anarchy? Worshippers?  Everyone as its puppets with the sublimation of free will, Sleeper-like zombies, Andrew-like betrayers?  What?  We assume the world would be full of evil and populated with a Hellmouth quotient of Cro-Mag vampires. But what does The First get out of it? With all of its yak-yak-yak, what kind of world would The First be intent on creating 20 years down the road?   The First would probably be more defined by magic/supernatural, I guess. What would the world in the The First's image be?

* Another question. What would the world look like 20 years after Not Fade Away if Wolfram and Hart and the Circle got what they wanted? A world controlled by corrupt lawyers, what would that be? A different sort of apocalypse from most, I would guess. They are corporate evil and a Demon Mafia.   What would that world look like? What would that apocalypse boil down to? I tend to assume that the bad guys really don't want the destruction of the world so much as to take the world over and exploit its resources to... uh... what? (I'd fail at evil overlord school). But what would the world look like in 20 years if Wolfram & Hart had won?

* If both The First and W&H/Circle are at work, would they share similar goals or would the two be at odds with one another (bullies can have personality conflicts with one another, after all). Could these folks work together? Is it a fragile truce, dividing the world into their own provinces, or two enemies united by a common goal? If The First and W&H were at war, what would that mean? Is it chaotic evil vs. ordered evil? If they were in concert, would that mean something else?

* In a First vs. W&H Battle Royale, who would win? Or would they never go against each other? Could they be provoked into going against each other because they have fundamentally different goals, or is it simply We're Evil. Evil Rawks. So... yay?

* What's left of humanity in all of this? What about lower innocuous demon orders such as Lorne and Clem? Vampires (not the ones with souls)?

I guess I'm trying to do a Sims game exercise, mentally building a world, or actually theorize about several, try them on for size and see which is most intriguing. It feels that a post-apocalyptic world should be based on the desires of the villain in question (although it could be augmented by human self-destruction -- global warming, religious wars, etc).

So what would the world be if The First could construct it in its desired image? What about a W&H based world? Any thoughts? Ideas? Theories? ...Wild speculation?

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A world controlled by corrupt lawyers, what would that be?

Uh, you're soaking in it. :)

In the case of the First winning, I see it's first action as being a corruption of all those Slayers it manipulated Buffy into empowering.

The First doesn't really care about physical victories, all it's after is corruption of the good. It doesn't mind killing people, but killing is optional as far as it's concerned. It much prefers to take good souls and pervert them, corrupt them. Turning of the light inside humanity and make them darker.

A world ruled by the First would be filled with selfishness and greed and anger, with people just thinking about themselves.

Wolfram and Hart weren't really after changing the world, they'd already started the process years ago, darkening the world, making deals with demon for more personal power for themselves, with the rest of humanity still living their life as unknowing sheep, unaware that they're all just being made ready to be shorn or butchered.

With the caveat that I don't think Mutant enemy knew in the slightest what either actually wanted, I'd put the First down with sensation and W&H as control.

A world of munchables being munched and fucked with no limits doesn't mesh well with a world controlled by Halliburton on meth. They'd clash. W&H would be most annoyed at not getting their full pound of flesh because people are running from a heap of vampire throwbacks and they'd get the military forces to actually use bunker busters, napalm and cluster bombs and beat the First without breaking a sweat.

I've always thought that W&H was more symbolic of human evil, despite the fact that they used supernatural means. Their goal was to corrupt and suppress what was good about humanity in general and in individuals in particular. It would use a person's strengths against them to enslave or destroy them. And given all the stuff Lindsey said about the Black thorn, i think a W&H apocalypse wouldn't be any big battle. It would just be the world going on as it is. W&H would try to steer it along the worst-case scenario path where possible, and increase the sum total of human greed and misery, and decrease the sum total of hope and charity. Which is why, in the long run, the Annes of the world have a better chance of holding them off than the Angels do, because Anne, too, is about the long haul.

If the First Evil had been done in a subtle way, if it really had used every person's deepest fears against them, then I think it could have worked with W&H. For awhile, anyway. The question would be what the First would want to do once it had won. And that, I honestly don't know. I suppose that the Turok Han army suggests it was after some rather conventional hell on earth scenario, with humanity enslaved or eaten or something. But honestly, it's impossible to tell what the First wanted, which is one reason it lacks something as a villain. Its goals were too vague.

I could actually see a scenario in which W&H allied with the good guys to fight the First, because W&H would consider the First's apocalypse too destructive.

Hmm...

My instinct with the First was always that it wanted a world where evil was present to such an extent that it could manifest itself, but I say 'instinct' because I have absolutely nothing to back it up. It's plan seemed to be to wipe out the Slayer line, which I suppose would reduce the level of good, and then releasing the Turok Han, presumably to create a world of pain and terror where evil naturally grows out of the circumstances. Of course, in such a situation I'd like to have enough faith in humanity to assume a sort of blitz spirit would kick in and evil wouldn't prevail in humans, but I'm not sure the First thinks that much. Maybe it simply wants to destroy humans, so that all that remains are the evil demons, which would still achieve its ends... Then, presumably, it would proceed to other dimensions - if the universe is infinite, then it's working for infinite gain, destroying until it can manifest itself in as many dimensions as possible until the end of time. I mean, if you take the First to be a sort of religiously-neutral version of Satan you get down to Milton's 'only in destroying do I find ease to my relentless thoughts' idea, where it's out to destroy simply for the purpose of destruction. But for some reason I still have the desire to manifest in my head, and I don't know where from.

W&H seemed to want to have an interest in everything, with their goal presumably being to make the most profit for them and to make their lives as easy as possible. I think that the apocalypse that they're always talking about is not the one that Angel induces - despite the number of times 'apocalypse' is used in the show, I think it has a different meaning, somehow, when they use it. If I wanted to wildly speculate, I'd go down some tangent where at the end of its time each world/universe spontaneously turns into either a heavenly or hellish dimension for other souls to be carted into from the middle worlds, and the actual apocalypse isn't something that can be averted, but instead something where either the hell-gods have a new dominion or the good-gods get it (we don't really hear very much about them, but I'm assuming they exist). W&H, therefore, would still be grooming the world for that event, but since the Senior Partners' plans aren't as personal as the First's, if they were left to their own devices they would go about it a lot more subtly, trying to subvert humanity itself as opposed to squishing it. I think W&H would be clever enough to work out that if they tried to actively oppress humanity then it wouldn't work, but if they let them drag themselves into a pit of sin instead it would be much more effective.

[More bollocks to follow...]

I'm too sleepy to be of much intellectual use, but I think you should figure out a way to bring Wesley back somehow. ;-)

Um...

http://www.geocities.com/lapassiondusanguinaire/Plans.html

Hmm...Spike looking like Mad Max with a beard and a pony tail. ohh the pretty.

Interesting post. Don't have time to go into any details, but what The First wanted was to become corporeal. That was it's plan:

First!Buffy: I know why they grab at each other. To feel. I want to feel. I want to wrap my hands around some innocent neck and feel it crack.
Touched

First!Caleb: I will overrun this Earth. And when my army outnumbers the humans on this Earth, the scales will tip and I will be made flesh.
Chosen

So in a way it was very much like Jasmine - except Jasmine wanted to make people *happy* slaves. ::thinks:: Actually that is a pretty neat comparison, since The First would be able to pull of that same sort of mind-meld trick:

First!Buffy: Look, when this is all over, and our armies spring forth, and our will sweeps the world, I will be able to enter every man, woman, and child on this Earth, just as I enter you.
'End of Days'

Does that help?

Regarding The First wanting to become corporeal: remember that 'Amends' established that It was only able to materialise in Sunnydale because a group of Bringers were hiding under the Christmas tree lot chanting. Once Buffy disposed of them, The First showed up one last time, made its Evil speech and then left town, leaving her to pick up the pieces.

In season 7, Sunnydale was overrun by Bringers. Caleb was travelling the world organising them, and the Seal over the Hellmouth was converting more humans into Bringers. All those worshippers gave The First the ability to materialise pretty much at will during that season. (However, I speculate that The First was running a risk by expending so much of Its power in this way: Buffy's resurrection gave It a window of opportunity to affect the world decisively. After all, if It could have created so many Bringers any time it wanted, why wouldn't it? There must have been a downside preventing It doing so years earlier, until the potential (heh) benefits outweighed the risk.)

Unleashing an army of vampires would create even more potential worshippers, giving The First the power to materialise whenever it wanted, as others have said. However, I'll add that the Turok-han probably aren't the true threat. The real danger is that humanity will react to the appearance of the monsters with panic, fear and hatred. They'll take ruthless measures against them, and then against the 'innocent' demons, and against anybody who associates with demons, or uses magic, or has a kitchen full of herbs, or looks different. It's the release of all this negative emotional energy - not a rampage by a bunch of Neanderthal vampires - that will mark The First's true victory. (And this also explains how Buffy finally defeated It - not with an army or a magic amulet, but by refusing to give up hope even at the blackest moment. The moral is to the physical as three is to one, as Napoléon said).

Regarding The First's character, with its playful cruelty and arbitrary whims I actually see it as something like a cat. With us in the role of mice, naturally.

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