I love Darla. Seriously. I think she's awesome. But I also think that he went to such great lengths to save her because he saw himself in her. They did share a lot. I don't think it was anything special and particular about Darla herself that made him want to go out of his way to help her, I think it was just history, and what could have been, if things had gone a little differently for Angel. I still say that the most important person to Angel is Buffy.

Oh, please. The most important person to Angel was obviously Cordy. TheirLoveWasSoPure!

(ducks)

You'd best be ducking, mister.

Buffy and Darla were, in my view, equally important to Angel, though I think Buffy has the edge if you weigh in him seeing the other as a person instead of a symbol of something. Darla had incredible symbolic importance to him, but her personal connection was to Angelus, not to Angel. (You can reverse that with Buffy: Angelus was as obsessed with destroying her in S2 BtVS as Angel was with saving Darla in S2 AtS.)

It's interesting, to me at least, though I've no doubt that I'm stating the obvious, that the further Angel was removed from himself and his mission (S5), the more Buffy reverted in his mind to the symbol she started as, instead of the person he knew and loved.

Randomly, I think that in S3 Buffy, Angel came as close to getting Buffy and her mindset and what goes on in that little blonde head as anyone ever did, which is why the S3 BtVS Angst Extended Mix doesn't bother me at all. Faith, for the record, comes second closest, but there's a Buffy/Faith mutual blind spot WRT motivations.

Without the distance of observer, Spike (who is the master of the Personal Blind Spot) didn't really get what made her tick at all, though he got her physical (beyond sexual) rhythms down pat.

Buffy.

Angel killed Darla for her.

At the point he did so, I think Buffy was definitely more important. Given everything that happened after that, with Darla's rebirth, the attempts to save her, Angel's dark period and ephiphny, and Connor's birth, I think that might not hold.

My 2 cents: Angel would say Buffy was more important to him, but he wouldn't be a reliable narrator when he did so. I think Darla was a more important force in his life.

(By the way, I think this has been fun, and I have more "who is more important" questions I would like to see discussed, so I'm going to ask a few more of them from time to time, unless someone asks me not to.)

(nicely)

(and then gives me a cookie.)

(withholds cookie)

Ask away. If the question is a good one, then you get the cookie.

I think Perkins' take on it is mine. Angel's love for Buffy may have burned a little brighter in that first year, while they were a couple, but I don't think it was sustainable. And by the time he really got into the mission instead of skulking around and helping occasionally, they weren't really a couple anymore. I see his heroic actions from that point on as more guilt/making amends-motivated than inspired by Buffy.

Buffy.

Angel killed Darla for her.

Remember how very near a thing that was at the time, despite Angel being nominally committed to fighting evil at that point.

Darla. Her turning him set the course for his entire (un)life. Without Darla, he's Liam, an obscure 18th century Irish squire. Maybe he grows up/into his role in society, maybe not.

Without Darla, B/A never happens.

Who do you think was more important to Angel, Darla or Buffy?

I'm having a preposition issue. TO Angel or FOR Angel? Because I think that the answer is different.