Lola

buffy spends seasons juggling the idea of ever actually staking spike

she says she’s going to kill him so many times in the show that at some point it just stops meaning anything; physically of course she can but mentally? no

nah, she can’t kill that bleached hair annoying face super hot leather covered pale bastard

Me, "You don't have you, it's understandable if you don't. Also Spuffy does the work and they choose to see past it and that's okay too."

The people, "I can't believe you just said it's really good for victims to always forgive their rapists" ←usually will include a death or rape threat.

Do they need a third? Asking for a friend

- buffy's reaction to angel having a son

- spike's reaction to angel having a son

Because Buffy’s birthday can’t have been the first time Buffy and Spike saw each other after she beat him to a pulp in the alley, right? They’re just all cutesy and bantery and pretending like that never happened despite his big black eye? Or maybe it is?

He does crash the party and brings Clem as emotional support, the only slight indication that he is feeling vulnerable (that and the fact that he keeps his coat on at all times and has all of his jewellery on aka various items that make up his armour)

THANK YOU FOR THIS QUESTIONNN!!!

One of the biggest reasons I feel very conflicted about S7 is because of Spike's character arc. How can I ever hate his character arc? In my opinion from my first watch, it couldn't have gone better. I was actually so dejected after the "Seeing Red" episode in s6 and was really confused on how they could redeem a character like him. I know that a lot of people still don't forgive Spike which I would say is valid. I can understand anyone who hates him for what he did because he DID do a really bad thing. But I don't hate him and here's why.

I usually immediately get an ick with a character if they try to sexually assault someone (Hyena Xander doesn't count imo because he was possessed and I choose to believe that Xander wouldn't do something like that.) because I have such great fear when it comes to SA. I have lost interest in so many characters in different movies/tv shows because of this but Spike was the only one who redeemed himself because he had something that the other characters didn't. He had guilt and the urge to make it right. I have not met a SINGLE person nor character who felt bad for what they did and did something to help the victim instead of outright denying it. Spike was the first Vampire, to my knowledge, to have gone and sought his soul just so he could never harm Buffy.

Now that we've gotten why exactly I root for Spike out of the way, We can get to the real question. I really loved the idea of having The First fuck with his head while he's actively recovering from getting his soul back. I've already talked about what the episode Beneath You means to me so I don't want to get too much into it but I loved the detail of Spike not wanting Buffy to know about his soul because he knows that it would lead to her forgiving him which he thought he didn't deserve.

Spike going from the Vamp that Buffy despised the most to the man that she trusted more than her core group of friends was a surprising yet believable plot twist for me. I knew that she would end up trusting him but seeking comfort with him while her friends actively criticise her was a great thing to see. I feel like the writers had the idea of making Spike "the sacrificial lamb" in the last episode while they first started working on the season because it felt like everything that happened this season led to it. I don't know how to explain it properly but it just felt like this storyline was all they were working on and they just built the rest around it, which would honestly explain a lot.

When I watched it for the first time I was not thinking or analysing what it meant for Spike to be the worthy vamp, I was simply excited for him but how was it for people who went in with no knowledge that Spike was going to die? Because I knew that he was going to die but also it was pretty obvious if you look into it. The final battle starts in the morning, sunlight is deathly for Spike but let's just say that he somehow got in....what about getting out? They closed off all the sewer tunnels. How was he to get out in full scorching sun? From Buffy's reaction, we know that the characters had no idea that Spike might be killed in the process of the final fight....Idk what they were thinking but this was plaguing my thoughts forever....Like I know that he's not getting out of it alive but a way for him to get out would be nice...?

1. Nobody knew exactly what the amulet would do. They probably thought Spike would be okay underground under the school until nightfall since a vamp is either dust (through decapitation, fire, sunlight or staking) or able to recover with some (lots of) blood. There was no plan for Spike because nobody thought they'd need one. Like, Giles asked at the end what closed the hellmouth. Nobody knew.

2. Scapegoat and sacraficial lamb. I love the religious history of this, therefore I will tell you about it. Basically in early Judaism/ proto Judaism there was the practice of the Scapegoat, two goats were picked, one was slaughtered to appease god, the other got the sins of the people strapped onto it and then it was chased out into the wilderness. Yes, the story of Abraham references this when Abraham is told to kill one of his sons and the other is chased away. In Christian lore Jesus stopped the practice of the Scapegoat since he became the willing sacrifice, allowing absolution without the need to chase away another being. Jesus is the sacrificial lamb. And this makes a fascinating parallel to Buffy and Spike. Buffy was the sacrificial lamb since season 1, she went and accepted, even anticipated, her own death. It is (in part coincidentally) when Buffy becomes close with Spike that she starts seeing herself as more than an acceptable sacrifice, moves on from her S5 believe of being a living weapon by S7 she becomes the Scapegoat, when her plans go wrong she is chased away. Spike starts his redemption journey (S3-S7) as the Scapegoat. Anything goes wrong? Spike's fault. This comes out stongest in S6 where he lets Buffy harm him (Dead Things) because he believes that that's his place in her world, the one to carry the sins, the one to be excluded and chased away. S7 though? Others may treat him like the Scapegoat but Buffy doesn't and that's what matters most to him (which i hate and adore in equal measure). End of S7 he becomes the willing sacrifice, nobody asks him to wear the amulet. He is the one who asks Buffy for it. If you haven't noticed yet, they have opposing arcs in relation to (self) sacrifice and I love that.

that's what makes her a good character! she's so much more interesting because she has flaws! If she was perfect she would be boring! She is kind of a messed up individual and that's why she's so interesting to me! I want to see her be wrong and messy and human and complex and complicated!

Fiction is not reality.

You can enjoy things in fiction that would be awful in the real world. Like playing a murderhobo in a game! In the real world, being or supporting a murderer-thief would be pretty damn awful, while in the game it's just good fun. Same with anything else you choose to do with the pixels on the screen, like kinks that don't affect anyone real, so they're okay in fiction, but would be pretty damn bad in real life.

No one else is responsible for your online experience. They are required not to harass you, but they are not and never will be obligated to not post about ships, kinks, or tropes you dislike just to avoid you seeing them. It's up to you to blacklist words or phrases, block tags, or even block users as needed to avoid seeing content that upsets you.

No one can force you to read anything against your consent. Any content you don't like seeing can be instantly avoided by closing out of the offending post/fic.

You are not owed an online experience free of discomfort.

Nothing that happens in your imagination can ever make you a bad person. Words you write or read about fictional characters will never make you a bad person.

The claim that media consumption influences real-life behavior is intellectually dishonest and serves only to excuse the behavior of real offenders.

Fiction is a safe way to explore horrifying or confusing concepts. Therapists agree that fiction, even (or especially) about taboo topics is a good coping mechanism, especially, but not exclusively, for trauma survivors. Fiction is to adults what play therapy is to children. This doesn't stop being true if the work in question is of a sexual nature.

Sex isn't an inherently worse or better motivation than anything else. A work written to create feelings of arousal isn't dirty, shameful, or in any way less pure than works written to entertain, provoke moral questions, or for other reasons. And worth noting is that multiple purposes can exist in the same story, especially fanfiction.

Angel defends Faith, who took Buffy’s body and slept with Riley (or offered to sleep with him, claiming he can do whatever he wants to her etc), while Buffy was not ready to forgive Faith and I don’t blame her for that, eventually she does forgive Faith for the sake of saving the world which too bites her in the ass. Angel also stalks teenage Buffy… Then, dates her, mind you he was an adult when turned… Dating a 16 year old (if i remember correctly she’s 16 in s1, but Angel stalks her before that). Then his moment of true happiness is sleeping with Buffy, he loses his soul and no longer loves Buffy, instead his goal is torment her like he did to Drusilla once.