Giles ,'Conversations with Dead People'
Is it better the second time around? Or the third? Or tenth? This is the place to come when you have a burning desire to talk about an old episode that was just re-run.
Andi and I just bought the entire Buffy and Angel oeuvre from Best Buy.
Unfortunately the "in stock" message for all 12 seasons was incorrect for the store. Good thing I pass by 3 Best Buy stores and the corporate offices on my way to and from work...
Even then, I will end up stopping at two and season 4 of Buffy is coming by mail, for free.
I am quoting myself from a conversation at TWoP, because 1) I am lazy and 2) it kinda sums up why I think Angel's very different with a soul, and Spike isn't so much:
The last scene in "Damage" said a lot about Angel. That "I was in it for the evil" line, bad as it was, made an important point. It wasn't that he liked brawling and being strong and the other demonic perks; he enjoyed being a complete sadist, and everything else was nice because it helped him be a better sadist. And with a soul, he's still that person.
[...]He's not trying to make up for what he did; he's trying to make up for who he is. The soul makes him wish he was different, basically, and gives him a motive to act like a different person. That's why he believes he's still going to hell, that's why he hung out in the gutters, that's why he's Mr. Brooding, that's why he asked Buffy if he was a righteous man in "Amends." He's not, at least by his own lights. He's still someone who'd enjoy doing awful things, and even if he doesn't do them anymore, he still believes he's damned because he knows how much he liked it. He's not so much haunted by his crimes as haunted by the fact that he enjoyed committing them.
And then on Spike:
When he was evil, he liked fighting and drinking and running around carelessly. With a soul, he can still do those things, he just fights demons instead. He was a thrill-seaker, not a sadist, which is why he liked fighting Slayers. So I could see how it'd be easier for him to brush it off by saying, "Yeah, I didn't have a soul then, so I looked for the most exciting people to fight." His identity wasn't "I'm a guy who does evil things," it was "I'm a guy who likes to fight and hunt and kill and drink and screw around." He can still be a big selfish ball of id now (I'm not saying he's a good guy, but he's a very different flavor of bad from Angel), he just has to express it a little differently, so having a soul wouldn't cause the same kind of identity crisis.
Frankly, I think William was a stronger person than anyone, himself included, gave him credit for. Sure, he was a bit of a ponce, and a bloody awful poet, but he loved deeply and unconditionally, and that affection burned into him, even when he became a vampire. I think, free from doubts and insecurities, -- and, of course, conscience -- William's personality was remarkably strong, enough to make him largely anomalous among vampires, and strong enough that, when he gets his soul back, he doesn't suffer the drastic personality shift Angel does.
I can agree that William had pronounced character traits (feeling passionately about things), but I don't see the sort of determination and agency that strikes me as characterizing a "strong" person. He appeared to be almost entirely under his mother's thumb, and in possession of a desperate need of approval from Cecily and his peers that transferred to Drusilla once he met her. After an initial transition period his vampiric personality didn't seem to bear much resemblance to his previous human one aside from having a romantic side.
Which makes me think, the respective sires may have had more to do with the development of Spike and Angel's vampiric personas than I'd previously considered. Darla was attracted to Liam for his devil-may-care attitude and joie de vivre, and those traits played a large role in his postmortem behavior with an added heaping of evil. Drusilla seemed drawn to William by his romantic nature, which—at least as expressed toward her—continued to be part of his makeup even though it was very unusual among vampires.
Ooh, Strega. I love that. And that's why I love Angel more than Spike.
Matt also makes a good point about sires.
There's an interview with James Marsters on EW.com. (spoilery for some JM casting news) He says some interesting things about Joss and Spike. [link]
[But] I don't think the character of Spike really sparked Joss' imagination. I think that he was designed to be a throwaway character that got popular with the fans. Personally, he never really got into him. Every character on the show was a version of Joss, but Joss didn't see Spike that way. Spike was the other guy. He was the guy who might mess up the show, actually, because vampires are supposed to be ugly and hated.
Except for the Master, were any of the leading character vampires ugly? Angel, Darla, Harmony, Drucilla, Buffy's school chums
Who was ugly and hated?
Who was ugly and hated?
Warren
Not a vamp though.
Not a vamp though.
true, but your question was "Who was ugly and hated?" If you want an ugly vamp, I'll give you Dalton in Surprise.
Also, Kakistos and whoever the vamp was in Helpless (is that the episode where Giles puts Buffy through the cruci-whatever-it-is ritual? Dear lord I'm rocking a huge case of medicine head + sleep dep today) Some of the shempires were gnarly.