My memory about the details of all of this is terrible, so bear with me.
Unlike David Fury, SdK, or Drew Goddard, the writing team of Craft and Fain had never worked on BtVS and, in fact, only arrived in the latter seasons of AtS. Their characterization of Spike in "Unleashed" was so...well...terrible that there was a bit of an online backlash (your standard fandom kerfuffle) that blew up into, I believe, a letter writing campaign to the pair. I don't remember whether this also coincided with their interview admission to having never watched the latter seasons of BtVS or whether that admission was part of their mea culpa interview. At any rate, at some point in some interview, the two admitted to having watched little or none of the latter seasons of BtVS, resulting in a bunch of fans writing angry letters and spelling out that the damn well should watch it because the Spike characterization in their episodes was downright shitty. In the mea culpa interview they said that after the letters (with lists of episodes they should watch) they did indeed go back and watch the latter season BtVS episodes and Spike and that they hoped that their episode(s?) that came after having watched the BtVS stuff would be more acceptable to fans (I vaguely seem to remember that their episode post mea culpa interview was better, but I can't even say that for sure. The only episode that sticks out in my memory as their episode was "Unleashed.")
Anyway, that covers Craft and Fain. Not sure what excuses some of SdK's and Goddards more odd choices as both of them wrote latter season (and even Spike pivotal) epsidoes of BtVS.
Bell (another who hadn't written for BtVS but did seem more familiar with the latter seasons of BtVS than either Craft or Fain) seemed stuck on the concept of Spike as Angel's little brother who constantly envied everything Angel had... and I think he got a few angry responses to that interview. I don't know whether he ever ammeliorated that view, however.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2009-12-17 06:24 pm (UTC)Unlike David Fury, SdK, or Drew Goddard, the writing team of Craft and Fain had never worked on BtVS and, in fact, only arrived in the latter seasons of AtS. Their characterization of Spike in "Unleashed" was so...well...terrible that there was a bit of an online backlash (your standard fandom kerfuffle) that blew up into, I believe, a letter writing campaign to the pair. I don't remember whether this also coincided with their interview admission to having never watched the latter seasons of BtVS or whether that admission was part of their mea culpa interview. At any rate, at some point in some interview, the two admitted to having watched little or none of the latter seasons of BtVS, resulting in a bunch of fans writing angry letters and spelling out that the damn well should watch it because the Spike characterization in their episodes was downright shitty. In the mea culpa interview they said that after the letters (with lists of episodes they should watch) they did indeed go back and watch the latter season BtVS episodes and Spike and that they hoped that their episode(s?) that came after having watched the BtVS stuff would be more acceptable to fans (I vaguely seem to remember that their episode post mea culpa interview was better, but I can't even say that for sure. The only episode that sticks out in my memory as their episode was "Unleashed.")
Anyway, that covers Craft and Fain. Not sure what excuses some of SdK's and Goddards more odd choices as both of them wrote latter season (and even Spike pivotal) epsidoes of BtVS.
Bell (another who hadn't written for BtVS but did seem more familiar with the latter seasons of BtVS than either Craft or Fain) seemed stuck on the concept of Spike as Angel's little brother who constantly envied everything Angel had... and I think he got a few angry responses to that interview. I don't know whether he ever ammeliorated that view, however.