Buffy and Love in Bargaining and After Life

[butterfly]

So, I'm rewatching Season Six of Buffy, which I adore.

Something that really struck me about After Life is how it really shows (as opposing to telling) just how much Buffy loves her friends. In her point of view, they have ripped her out of heaven and placed her into a hell, and yet she still wants to protect them, to make them happy. Dawn tells her that "all they want is to see you happy", so she goes and tells them how happy she is so that they'll be content. All throughout this episode, she gets told how important it is that she's there, how much they need her, so she tries to bury her anger and pain.

It's not healthy and I am so happy that the truth came out, but wow. They all love each other so much, but the Scoobies' love is so clouded by their need that they can't see past that to Buffy. They need to be right about Buffy being in a hell because they need Buffy back so badly that it has to be true -- so she lets it be true.

Spike wants Buffy back even if she's wrong (in fact, as we see later in the season, her being wrong is almost a good thing for him -- yes, he wants the 'really real' Buffy, but he also wants to touch her, which complicates things because he already knows Buffy's stated opinion on that). Dawn won't even let Willow and the others talk about sending Buffy back, no matter what the consequences.

Willow convinces herself that Buffy was in a hell so that she doesn't have to feel guilty about needing Buffy so very much. Xander buries his doubt (and it's stressed in both Bargaining and After Life that he is doubtful) because "it's Buffy". Tara and Anya are pulled along by the strength of their lovers' needs to have Buffy back in their lives. Tara does think that it's wrong and Anya thinks that it's a bad idea, but they go along because they can see how incredibly important it is to Willow and Xander.

"When you were gone... it was bad." That's what Dawn says. We see it, in uncomfortable kitchen talks and a bloody hole that hasn't closed despite the time passing.

Because they couldn't have closed it, not with the BuffyBot there to make the pain pulse and beat anew each time she acted more like a robot than their friend. Giles has to leave, Dawn sleeps near the robot and forgets and calls it 'Buffy'. Willow's been working up a fantasy where she can be the one to save her hero. And Xander may appear to be the best adjusted of those four, but he and Spike are the ones who are always aware, every moment, that the BuffyBot will never be Buffy, can never be Buffy.

"Don't tell me that wasn't the happiest moment of your existence."

Spike loved Buffy so much that he dreamed over and over that he saved her -- he fought for her every night, never letting her memory dim. Giles loved her so much that he trained with the robot, fell into the illusion that it was really Buffy.

Willow and Xander loved Buffy so much that they couldn't let her stay buried. Think of Angel and the question that the Oracles posed about Angel wanting Doyle back -- "To what end? To nullify his noble death?"

"It's Buffy."

Those were the words that made Xander acknowledge that they've already made their choice. They aren't ready to live without Buffy -- it's a selfish, hurtful love, but it's such a strong love, filled with such need and hope, that it works. They will bring her back and they will live with the consequences.

"Here lies the Warrior of the People -- let her cross over!"

And cross she does. Not a fallen angel, but a bird that has had its wings clipped. Forcibly grounded and trapped in a place that she used to know. She loves them so much that she tries to pretend that her pain has vanished, instead of being inflicted by her friends. Buffy's love here is admirable and selfless, but still broken and unhealthy, because she did not make the choice to return. She has been forced back into a slavery of a kind -- a life of pain and danger and so much need.

In Season Six, Buffy is in hell, until she once again chooses to live, to see her life as filled with gifts rather than burdens, opportunities instead of obligations. Then, her world will open up again, and she will make it a heaven once more.

Comments

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I have to add an unspiring "me too". Because yes, this episode showcases how much Buffy loves her friends, and how much they need her. I thought Normal Again was the counterpoint to After Life, because there, under the influence of the drug and in her hallicunations, Buffy allowed herself to finally act on the anger she felt with all of them for being forced to live. But the love ultimately is stronger than the anger, and she comes back to them, and life with them, and saving their life, a second time, by her own choice now.

[toronto-gal.livejournal.com]

Ooh - wonderful analysis, as per usual. I probably ought to step out of the shadows and say it more often, but I love having you on my friends-list - because you come up with all these really lovely and interesting thoughts on the Buffyverse. It's been a pleasure reading your perspective on various elements of the show =)

And yeah - I very much agree that Buffy in Afterlife hits a rather beautiful and selflessly tragic note. Her friends need her so much, and need to hear that she's happy... and due to her love for them, she tells them what they need to hear.

What I love, though, is the level of poignant irony and double-meaning in the speech she gives her friends, when she tells them how grateful she is for being brought back.

Specifically, when she says the following - "You guys gave me the world... I can't tell you what it means to me."

That one line encapsulates so much of her plight. Because from the perspective of the Scoobies, she seems to be saying that she got back the world, and that she can't put into words how grateful she is...

But in terms of a double-meaning, what she's quietly saying is that they gave her back the world... and that she quite *literally* can't tell her friends what that means to her. Because the world now feels cold, and hollow, and like Hell. And out of her love for her friends, the poor girl can't reveal any of that. And thus when Buffy says - "I can't tell you what it means to me", there's a very tragic, and very literal sense to that line.

It ties into what she tells Spike a few moments later - "they can never know... never".

So yeah - definately some really good and really poignant stuff going on in Afterlife =)

[viggorlijah.livejournal.com]

Kiss kiss! Heart heart!

[luminosity]

An insightful essay. I think the moment that broke my heart ... the loudest in all of Buffy was when she told Spike that she had been in heaven and that the others must never know. She was so lost, in so much pain, and truly in a hard, bright hell. I think, too, that it was genius of Joss to have shot that scene in the sunlight--or as close to the sunlight as Spike could get. The brightness of that scene underscored (to me) the darkness and anguish in her soul. It made me cry, and not in the "Chosen" way.

I miss Buffy.

[lasultrix.livejournal.com]

I think you and I have spoken about this before, but - I always feel that the fact that the world needs its damn Slayer back is very much overlooked, both in discussion about the show and in later episodes of the show. The chaos that was overtaking Sunnydale was, I feel, an essential part of the Season Six opener, and something that played a significant part in both the Scoobies' decision to bring Buffy back and Buffy's acquiescence in being back.

Even leaving that aside, I think you slightly overestimate the altruism implicit in Buffy's "They can never know". Given the manner of her death, it was perfectly plausible that Buffy would have been in a hell-dimension. And given the hazy nature of the Scoobies' religious convictions, it was also perfectly plausible that she went straight to oblivion. It would have been highly irrational of Buffy to (on a conscious level) be angry with them for bringing her back, and in that case, the natural thing to do would be not to tell them the truth.

[avrelia.livejournal.com]

Lovely essay, and I agree pretty much with everyhting here.