I'm not saying Wood's desire and attempt to kill Spike were not understandable. But there's a huge gulf between understandable (and even sympathetic) and justified.

Yes. This. There's a speech that Jack McCoy once gave in Law & Order that applies here. Somebody was going for a sympathy defense and kept talking about all the bad things the person they murdered had done to them and don't you understand why I did it?

McCoy's response was "yes, I understand. I sympathise with everything you've been through, and I even understand your need for vengeance. What I don't understand is where you picked up a knife and stabbed them to death."

Justification does not = excuse.

Edited to add: Sorry to be snippy. I'm just bitter at the direction the show has taken.

I think a lot of us are there, or near there. And allow me to add, I didn't say this to be snippty on my part, I just wanted to add my $0.02. So I hope I didn't offend.

Spike did take the coat away from Wood - prick.

No he didn't. Wood never had the coat.

My memory is really hazy, but I seem to remember a thing about Spike taking the coat back after Wood's attempted killing.

Is it maybe that Wood took the coat just before trying to kill Spike in the cross-room, and Spike just snatched it back before exiting?

Like a freaking well.

Aw, this makes me happy. Thanks!

Sean, no offense taken :) I will say that in regard to murdering humans, absolutely no justification. With vampires? Gets a little gray in that area, I think.

"Cordelia's desire for vengence against Xander was justfied, but the wish that Buffy had never come to Sunnydale, not so much."

S3 is one of my favorites, but I grit my teeth during "Lovers Walk" and "the Wish," because Cordelia had been wronged. I love Cordelia, and it was both tragic and inevitable that a high school senior would unknowingly wish eternal damnation on the wrong target, Buffy.

What S7 didn't do, and I thought it would last summer when I was watching S6 reruns, was that Xander and Buffy would drive off into the sunset together. He is at once the most perfect and imperfect man for Buffy. I loved his line earlier this week about bringing Buffy back to life, because that is what he does...

Again, this doesn't add up in the Buffyverse.

Maybe the Buffyverse previous to season 6, but as far as I can see, anything goes now.

So should Angel have been staked back in S3? Or in the past couple of seasons on AtS, what about Holtz?

My problem with the Spike and Wood confrontation wasn't that Spike would pull an anti-Angel and not be bothered that much by Nikki's death at his unsouled hands. My problem is that that distinction is fascinating and major and a rich vein to mine, and yet the writers haven't shown (at least to me) hint one that they're actually trying to explore it, in that scene or anywhere else. I honestly felt that the writers would've been perfectly fine with giving that exact same scene, with the exact same motivations, to Chipped!Soulless!Spike.

Compare to Angel's quick recap, at the beginning of Players, I think, of his feelings about what Angelus did in the episodes prior. Yes, he said that he didn't feel responsible or guilty, but the writing and acting emphasized that Angel wasn't just dropping the subject. He came across as having weighed pain and guilt against reason and a need for clear-headedness, and went with the latter. In contrast, Spike's explanation to Wood, despite the words being there and years of establishment of Spike's personality, just screamed to me "Yeah, I killed her, so what."

It felt to me like Buffy was taking what has arguably been the Buffyverse's most interesting construct for finding philosophical insight, "vampire has a soul and feels guilt", and treated it like a joke about Giles getting knocked unconscious. I've liked this season a fair bit, but if ever there's been a "Show Don't Tell!"-screaming moment for me this year, that was it.

First off, let me say that I agree that there's a wealth of interesting material that I wish had been mined further in this whole storyline.

But this contrast with Angel doesn't bother me. Spike and Angel are both souled vampires - but they're very different people, and it doesn't surprise me that they're going to react very differently.

Angel, whether as Liam, Angelus, or Angel, has always leaned a bit towards the melodramatic. He's more than a little in love with the idea of himself, as concept rather than individual. As an evil vampire, he was as theatrical and diabolical as he could be. In his human past, he wasn't just going to lock horns with his father, he had to go out and make it as public and shameful for the family as he could manage. And as souled vamp, he plunged into the loveliest depths of despair and broodiness.

That just ain't Spike. He lives (or not) much more in the moment. His plans are less far-reaching and comprehensive, his kills are less meaningful except where they give him some bragging rights he can dine out on. The one thing that does affect him deeply is love, and that's something he directs obsessively at one particular individual, be it his mother, Dru, or Buffy. Post-soul, it's still the same for him. It's still all about Buffy, and he takes a lot of his cues from her. Buffy still wants him around - he can't be all that unforgiveable. And he's not going to obsess over individual kills because he never did in the first place. It's just not that meaningful to him.

How they came to be souled is another factor, of course. Spike's also got one up on Angel simply because he has the example of Angel to judge and contrast with his own experience. He's seen that a vamp with a soul can be redeemed, can be accepted, can be loved...especially by Buffy. And Spike's also got that sort of little brother love/hate thing going on that means he's probably consciously resisting following Angel's broody, angstful example.

Will the finale run long, ie, past the top of the hour? Hubby has a show that starts immediately after Buffy that he switches tapes for, and I need to warn him not to jump too fast.

I'm pretty sure that there are just going to be fewer commercials because of the Acuvue sponsorship.

Nikki's/Spike's coat: Wood stripped it off Spike when he was going to kill him.

They fought.

Spike retrieved it when he left.

I liked that. It was symbolic of Spike accepting, incoporating, integrating the soulles era of his life (which is what he'd really just done with the whole trigger thing) with whom he is now. I think taking that coat back was one time when the writers did "show" us (rather than "tell"), this season.

That's why nobody staked Spike after he got the chip.

I thought nobody staked Spike after he got the chip because he'd been defanged. He was no longer a threat.

What you say is right. For me, it's just incomplete within the Buffyverse moral code. Nobody staked Spike after he was defanged by the chip and was no longer a (I'd add 'immediate' here, because he still could plan/oversee murder) threat, because staking him at that point would have been an act of vengeance for past wrongs, not a defensive action.

Cindy, the distinction I would make is whether things are done for good or evil. Vampires' intent is evil. Vampire killers are on the side of good.

I don't see the Buffyverse telling us that. I think that was part of Faith's conceit that got her into trouble in Season 3. That's what's behind the whole want - take - have mentality.

I don't interpret the Buffyverse moral of Wood's story that way. I interpret the moral of Wood's story as saying he was doing this with evil intent, i.e. he was intent on seeking vengeance. Remember that Wood's suspicion that Spike killed his mom was confirmed by The First Evil. Use of the FE in that way, wasn't a throw-away plot-point. That's a cue - a cue that killing Spike (as is - ensoulled and not intentionally harming humans) was going to be an evil act.

If, in real life, a human had committed a string of murders, felt convicted of all he did wrong, and then turned himself in and the cops shot him at the station, we'd say it was evil. If a victim's family member did it, we'd understand and sympathize and perhaps know we'd act no better, but we'd still know it was wrong.

(Please don't continue the above analogy on to death penalty arguments, because it wasn't intended to cover that, and is specifically why I'll keep the Scoobies in the role of cops here, not the entire legal system. It wasn't intended to reach that far because Buffy and co. aren't here to play judge, jury and executioner, they are first line defense; they're security; they're our body guards; they're our army warding off hostile attackers.)

So Wood has been acting on the side of good by killing vampires. While I see your point on the vengeance thing, I still think he'd be justified in killing Spike merely because he's a vampire. The fact that he can get his rocks off because the guy killed his mother is just gravy. And for the record, your chocolate scenario is of the evil :)

Consider The Initiative storyline, their treatment of Oz, and R*ley's initial response to finding out that Oz was a werewolf (which was a metaphor for racism). Also involving Oz, consider Cain (or whomever - that werewolf hunter was in Phases). Consider when Uncle Enyos reminded Jenny that their clan doesn't serve justice; they serve vengeance. These are all planks in the Buffyverse moral framework.

I don't know that we've ever really been told that vampire killers are good in an absolute sense. We've traditionally seen vampire killers killing vamps out of self-defense/defense of the vulnerable. That is good, but a defense-based killing has a different motivation than a punishment-based killing. In fact, it's a different act than slaying to punish them for past wrongs.

For, me, Wood's desire for venegence is justified, but the method he wanted to take his vengence was not.

and (in response to something else...)

Yes. This. There's a speech that Jack McCoy once gave in Law & Order that applies here. Somebody was going for a sympathy defense and kept talking about all the bad things the person they murdered had done to them and don't you understand why I did it?

McCoy's response was "yes, I understand. I sympathise with everything you've been through, and I even understand your need for vengeance. What I don't understand is where you picked up a knife and stabbed them to death."

Justification does not = excuse.

I agree with all of the above, except the first clause from justkim, and the last line from Sean. I think those words (justified, justification) are problematic; the word choice makes the rest of it untrue. If the killings were justified, that would literally excuse them. To justify something means to make prove something or somebody right (righteous); to make it/them free from blame; to absolve (from) guilt.

Slayers patrol and find vampires (who by reason of their being are always hunting, and/or in the act of/planning mayhem) and kill them, because that is the only way to stop them. It's always the only way, proven by eons of history. Soulless vampires kill. When you see a soulless vampire, you see a guy with no conscience and a bomb locked to him somehow. He has swallowed the key, and he's standing in a crowded building. His bomb is running on a clock and will explode when the clock runs out, killing whomever is around. It also has a "detonate now" button.

When you see the slayer, you're seeing a cop approach the guy and the guy is not going to disarm his bomb. If the slayer/cop approaches vamp/bomb guy, he'll press that "detonate now" button and take the slayer/cop out. The only way to stop vamp/bomb guy is to kill him.

(cont'd in next post)