A ramble about Buffy, life, and endings
Jul. 19th, 2003 09:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflySo, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
selenak wrote a love declaration for the later seasons of Buffy.
I couldn't agree more with everything she said.
During a season's run, my favorite episode was always the most recent. Always. Right now, my favorite episode is still Chosen, though I'm guessing this'll change as I rewatch the show and have it all settle in. Then again, it might not. Chosen, I like for many reasons, not the least of which because it's an invitation to continue the story.
Joss is (in)famous for saying that he gives the fans what they need, not what they want. A lot of people have taken exception to this statement, calling it arrogant.
Well, it is. Of course it is. That doesn't make it wrong.
We all watch Buffy through the lens of our experiences and our biases. Some people let outside interviews or opinions affect their viewing of the show, some people just watch and never talk about it online or with friends.
Buffy isn't a show that's about comforting the viewers. It's about challenging perceptions and looking at things differently. It's about taking on the world and not giving up, no matter what the cost or the odds stacked against you.
It's easy to be liked if you never change. In some shows, the characters are static, though the situations change.
Life isn't static. Some people in our lives drop away. We get new friends. We get into new things and stop being as enthused about what we loved as children.
We grow up. We never stop growing. All of us are continually becoming someone new. It never stops. We never become 'who we are meant to be'.
"You think you know... what's to come... what you are... you haven't even begun."
When we leave Buffy, she's finally begun. We don't leave a finished person, because there is no finished person. Finished is dead. Static is dead.
Life is change. If Buffy were still the quippy girl of season one, if she were so unaffected by killing and dying, how realistic would she be?
"The Slayer forges strength from pain."
We all do. Buffy, the Slayer, is a stand-in for all of us. She is us in a fashion far more positive than Connor, who shows the isolated, fearing, and ultimately doomed side of being human. Buffy survives her childhood, wounded but stronger for the wounding. She bends. She falls. She rises again.
The monsters that Buffy faces are the monsters that we all face. As she grows older, those monsters, those fears, become more grounded in reality and humanity. She defeats them, both by skill of weapons (which is, in the end, a metaphor for facing our fears - this is why she is a better fighter when she's emotionally prepared) and by trusting others. Without trust, we are isolated and alone. Each of us is the only Slayer, trapped in the belief that we alone can face the demons that haunt us.
That's not true. That's what Buffy shows us: that by facing our fears and trusting in other people, we can always beat those fears back.
Every day is the first day of the rest of our lives.
And there are no endings, because there is always someone to remember the story and to continue to live it.
selenak wrote a love declaration for the later seasons of Buffy.I couldn't agree more with everything she said.
During a season's run, my favorite episode was always the most recent. Always. Right now, my favorite episode is still Chosen, though I'm guessing this'll change as I rewatch the show and have it all settle in. Then again, it might not. Chosen, I like for many reasons, not the least of which because it's an invitation to continue the story.
Joss is (in)famous for saying that he gives the fans what they need, not what they want. A lot of people have taken exception to this statement, calling it arrogant.
Well, it is. Of course it is. That doesn't make it wrong.
We all watch Buffy through the lens of our experiences and our biases. Some people let outside interviews or opinions affect their viewing of the show, some people just watch and never talk about it online or with friends.
Buffy isn't a show that's about comforting the viewers. It's about challenging perceptions and looking at things differently. It's about taking on the world and not giving up, no matter what the cost or the odds stacked against you.
It's easy to be liked if you never change. In some shows, the characters are static, though the situations change.
Life isn't static. Some people in our lives drop away. We get new friends. We get into new things and stop being as enthused about what we loved as children.
We grow up. We never stop growing. All of us are continually becoming someone new. It never stops. We never become 'who we are meant to be'.
"You think you know... what's to come... what you are... you haven't even begun."
When we leave Buffy, she's finally begun. We don't leave a finished person, because there is no finished person. Finished is dead. Static is dead.
Life is change. If Buffy were still the quippy girl of season one, if she were so unaffected by killing and dying, how realistic would she be?
"The Slayer forges strength from pain."
We all do. Buffy, the Slayer, is a stand-in for all of us. She is us in a fashion far more positive than Connor, who shows the isolated, fearing, and ultimately doomed side of being human. Buffy survives her childhood, wounded but stronger for the wounding. She bends. She falls. She rises again.
The monsters that Buffy faces are the monsters that we all face. As she grows older, those monsters, those fears, become more grounded in reality and humanity. She defeats them, both by skill of weapons (which is, in the end, a metaphor for facing our fears - this is why she is a better fighter when she's emotionally prepared) and by trusting others. Without trust, we are isolated and alone. Each of us is the only Slayer, trapped in the belief that we alone can face the demons that haunt us.
That's not true. That's what Buffy shows us: that by facing our fears and trusting in other people, we can always beat those fears back.
Every day is the first day of the rest of our lives.
And there are no endings, because there is always someone to remember the story and to continue to live it.