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myhappyface's wonderful beta. Othello in "Becoming II," or How Xander is Iago
Alternate title: Xander sucks, and I've had too much college.
Alternate title: Xander sucks, and I've had too much college.
Joss Whedon is a big fan of Bill Shakespeare; I mean, come on, he named one of his protagonists “Cordelia,” and he has a demon named “Illyria.” Plus all the other stuff.
I’m a fan of Shakespeare, too, and I just reread Othello. Othello is mentioned specifically in Buffy (“Earshot”), though the parallel is the third season binary of Buffy and Faith: how Faith, who betrays, and who enjoys doing bad things, is “the darkside of [Buffy herself],” her Iago. And that’s very interesting. But I find myself more interested in how Xander is Buffy’s Iago.
This essay will focus on Xander’s Iagoing of Buffy throughout the series, with special attention paid to the “handkerchief” events of season two’s “Becoming II.”
The Play
Let’s assume that not everyone has studied Othello, and that, among those of us who have, some of us were so busy daydreaming about Buffy that we missed a few things. So that we’re all on the same page, let’s begin with a brief overview of the play.
Othello is one of Shakespeare’s late tragedies. The story is of a Moor (a term which is early modern English for “unspecified dark-skinned guy”), general of the Venetian army, and of how his fledgling marriage is destroyed by a jealous officer, Iago. As the play opens, the Moor, Othello, has just done two things: promoted a new lieutenant, Cassio, and married a (younger, virginal) white woman, Desdemona. Iago is incensed at being passed over for Cassio’s promotion (and at gossip that both Othello and notorious ladies’ man Cassio have been shacking up with his wife); he doesn’t really care that a black man has married Desdemona, but the mixed marriage provides the perfect vehicle to get under Othello’s skin. Over the course of the play, “Honest Iago” sews lies and innuendos that lead Othello to believe irrefutably that his new bride is sleeping with his new lieutenant. Jealousy drives him mad, and he kills Desdemona, and then himself.
Othello is not really about race. Othello is about Othering: the process of distinguishing a minority (the person who is not “Us,” but “Other”) from the majority, usually paired with ranking that “Other” in a hierarchy of race/sex/religion/whatever. In Othello, Othello is both Othered by the Venetians, and by himself.
It is important also to note that Iago is not, until the very end, recognized by any character in the play as a villain. He is constantly called “honest,” and he is a trusted friend and advisor to Othello, Cassio, and several other characters. I’d like to repeat this, because it is what makes Iago’s betrayal so cutting: Othello trusts Iago implicitly. When Iago’s lies are revealed to him, Othello does not believe it, and seeks to discover whether his friend is the devil in disguise, so betrayed is he.
Everyone on the same page? Super. Now let’s talk about the Othello in Buffy.
Othering and Iagoing
Let’s start with Othering, and position our characters. In the play, Othello is an outsider to the community; it is made clear that he is only respected because of his prowess on the battlefield. Both Angel and Buffy, in this way, are put in Othello’s position; Angel is Other because he is a vampire, and Buffy because she is a woman. They are both uniquely gifted tacticians and warriors, and this secures them unusual position within the group. Though Angel’s relationship to Buffy buys him some benefit of the doubt – helping him, as a vampire in a group of demon hunters, not get killed, for example – his key function within the group is as muscle. He’s almost a secondary Buffy (placing him as Buffy’s second-in-command, the Cassio to her Othello); when Buffy is unavailable, the Scoobies have no qualms in turning to Angel to fulfill her role (“Earshot”).
Buffy’s case is more interesting; she is human, and the peer of Xander, Willow, Cordelia, and Oz, but her position within the group is based upon her place and abilities as Slayer. If Buffy were not the Slayer, how would the other members of the group – especially Xander and Giles – treat her? Would they treat her the way they do Cordelia? As it is, Buffy is the group’s leader; were she not the Slayer, would she be straggling at the rear, the butt of the occasional, “ha ha, you dress like a whore” joke?
So Buffy and Angel are Othered, and they will, at turns, play Othello. Angel will sometimes also find himself in Cassio’s place. Buffy and Angel both will also be, from time to time, Desdemona. The reasons for this are a lot less complicated than it seems: if Angel is Othello, and Buffy is his lover, then Buffy becomes Desdemona. Similarly, if Buffy is Othello, and Angel is her lover, then Angel becomes Desdemona. Of course, since Buffy can also be the virgin, and the innocent, and can be seen simply for her sex, and Angel cannot, Buffy will be Desdemona more ably than Angel.
And then there’s Xander. Xander is not Othered; Xander is, when you think about it, kind of the poster boy for the majority. He’s white, he’s male, he’s “normal;” he has no pesky supernatural powers to differentiate him from the pack. Xander Harris is the majority; he is what Buffy and Angel are Othered from.
But being in the majority is not enough to make Xander Iago. He also needs the implicit trust of the group, despite his ulterior, self-serving motives. And he has it; Xander is rarely questioned, and he is even designated as the “Heart” of the group (“Primeval”); he is Honest Xander, pure of thought and deed. Which brings us to how he’s not so honest or pure.
Xander Iagos Buffy. He lies and manipulates in order to get things he wants, things he feels, as the majority, he deserves. What is interesting about Xander’s Iagoing of Buffy is that it is made complicated because it is defined by her Otherness; Xander would not have the same aim were Buffy not a woman. Let’s look at Xander’s motives, and what he wants, the things he will deceive for. Xander is upset that Buffy chose Angel over him; he asked her out and she said no, because “a guy has to be dead” to get with her (“Prophecy Girl”). So Xander’s aim is not only to best Angel/Cassio, who Buffy/Othello chose instead, it is to “win” Buffy; Buffy herself is the prize that Xander hopes to redeem through his deception.
Revelations and Buffy’s Sex Life
In the play, Iago’s first act against Othello is to run to Desdemona’s father, Brabantio, and inform the man that “an old black ram is stupping your white ewe.” Brabantio was previously unaware of the relationship, and he goes apeshit, running off to the Senate to complain. Othello and Desdemona are both eventually brought in to plead their cases at what has essentially become an impromptu trial.
Which brings us away from “Becoming II,” which we haven’t actually gotten to yet, my bad, to “Revelations.” Xander happens upon Angel, recently back from the dead, locking lips with Buffy. What does Xander do? He convenes Giles, Willow, and Cordelia to sit trial on Buffy, an “intervention,” as she calls it. Without consulting her, he has told everyone not only that she has been “harboring a vicious killer” and lying to all of them, but that she and Angel were kissing, which, were his concern really, “Oh my God, that guy that killed a bunch of our friends is back!” should have been toward the bottom of the list of outrages. But Xander not only informs the group of Buffy’s romantic indiscretions, he uses her sexuality against her. “What [were you waiting for]? For Angel to go psycho again the next time you give him a happy?” Poor Buffy is just a woman; she cannot be trusted with her own sexuality. Especially when she does that with it.
As in Othello, the only person who seems to be interested in Buffy/Desdemona’s voice is her partner. In the trial scene in Othello, Desdemona is brought forth before the Senate, but it is Othello who asks the girl to tell her side of the story. Similarly, the only person who seems interested in Buffy’s thoughts and feelings when the subject is love is Angel, and even he doesn’t do that great a job some of the time, making decisions about their relationship for her (“The Prom”). Anytime the topic is broached with anyone else, their reaction is to tell Buffy that “when it comes to Angel, you can’t see straight,” and “we’re here to help you [make the correct decision]” (“Revelations”). Xander is the worst one with this, again and again, from his constant demonization of Angel to his telling Buffy that she is “acting like a crazy person” by “treating Riley like the rebound guy” (“Into the Woods”).
Majority Xander does not act as though Buffy’s sexuality belongs to her. Think of his yay, Angel is leaving forever! fantasy in “Surprise”: Xander gleefully imagines Buffy – who is a “Denny’s waitress by day, Slayer by night,” as though Xander doesn’t gift her with enough intelligence or agency to have an actual career – crying gratefully when rich and powerful Xander – “fly[ing] into town in [his] private jet;” apparently, Xander gives himself all the intelligence and agency he’ll need – sweeps her off her feet, and out of Angel’s arms. Why wouldn’t Buffy be grateful to be rescued from the life she’s made for herself? I mean, a poor woman, being rescued by Majority Man? A dream come true.
Becoming and Joss’s New Ending for Iago
As season two progresses, Buffy and Angel become more and more removed from the group. And they begin, as Othello does toward the end of the play, to Other themselves. Angelus takes pains to distinguish himself from any scrap of humanity. “Your boyfriend is dead” (“Innocence”). Buffy often finds herself separate from her friends, who all have happy, normal lives with happy, normal relationships, and in the end, she chooses her duties as a Slayer over her family, her normal life. During the events of the “Becoming” episodes, the final ties are broken: Buffy is kicked out of her home and her school, thus eliminating her last ties to a “normal,” majority life; Angelus discovers that it is his blood alone that can unleash the supreme evil of Acathla and send the world to hell (“Becoming II”).
Fully Othered, there’s only Iago to contend with.
In “Becoming II,” as Xander leaves to assist Buffy in her storming of Angel’s mansion, Willow tells him to let Buffy know that she and Oz will be attempting to restore Angel’s soul. When Xander arrives, however, he instead tells Buffy that Willow says to, “kick [Angel’s] ass.”
The question of course is, had Buffy known what was going on, would she still have had to kill Angel? Certainly her attitude might have been different; she might have done more toward stalling the release of Acathla, and less toward killing Angelus. There’s no way to know. However, we can guess the answer to a more interesting question: the question of intent. What was Xander’s intent in omitting Willow’s true message, and instead submitting his own agenda? An argument can be made that he was afraid, if Buffy had hope that Angel could be saved, she would immediately become a weak and helpless girl in love instead of the warrior she really needed to be. However. To me it seems much more likely that Xander’s motives are, as usual, purely selfish: Xander does not want Angel to make it out alive. He does not want Buffy and Angel back together; even though he is, at the moment, in a relationship of his own with Cordelia, he is still not happy about the thought of Buffy with another man, especially Angel, his challenger. His Cassio. Iago’s aim in Othello, remember, is not only to rise to Cassio’s rank; in the process, he wants to punish Cassio, who has taken his place, and Othello, who passed him over. And he does both.
Since Buffy is both the goal of Xander’s deception, and the object/originator (read: Othello) of it, Xander’s desire to punish Buffy is at constant odds with his desire to own her, which accounts for Xander’s mercurial moods toward her. At one turn, he is joking and flirting with her; the next, he is puffed up full of righteous indignation, putting the blood of all Angelus’s victims on her hands (“Revelations”) or telling her that he’ll kill her (“When She Was Bad”).
So what is the outcome of Xander/Iago’s deception? As it is in the book: Xander’s lie results in Buffy/Othello killing her lover, and then, in her grief, removing herself from the city. Now in the play, Othello doesn’t hop a Greyhound as Buffy does; he kills himself, too. Perhaps it is Buffy’s survival that changes Xander/Iago’s fate. In the play, Iago is found out (too late, but much sooner than Xander is), and then dragged off to be tortured and, presumably, killed for treason. His last line is a vow to never speak again. But Xander is never punished for his deceptions. Even when his lie is revealed (five seasons later, in “Selfless”), it goes completely unnoticed. Xander is never punished for his deception, and he never gives up his speech, so he is free to continue deceiving. Which begs the question: do the writers of Buffy sympathize with Iago? Do they condone Xander’s manipulation of his friends? Why else would he continue on, uncensored and unpunished, unless Joss was trying to tell us something?
Let’s think about early modern England, Shakespeare’s time, for a minute. During Shakespeare’s time, women were very Other. They were considered to be physiologically and psychologically inferior to men; they couldn’t own property, or have a legal say, without a man. A man who murdered his wife was tried for murder; a woman who murdered her husband was tried for murder and treason, because she had acted against her king and god, and in those days the country was the same as the king was the same as God. What’s the relevance to Xander’s lack of punishment? Perhaps Xander gets away scot-free because he’s the majority. The only crime he committed was against an Other, and that’s only the natural order of things, that the majority should control the world, including the world of the Other, and if they need to get Machiavellian about it, so be it. And, to follow up on the king and god bit, Xander is a character-insertion of the show’s creator, Joss Whedon, who is white, middle-class, and a man. He represents the same majority Xander does. And in this universe, he is God. It’s only fitting that God’s will be done.
I'd love to hear your thoughts.
I’m a fan of Shakespeare, too, and I just reread Othello. Othello is mentioned specifically in Buffy (“Earshot”), though the parallel is the third season binary of Buffy and Faith: how Faith, who betrays, and who enjoys doing bad things, is “the darkside of [Buffy herself],” her Iago. And that’s very interesting. But I find myself more interested in how Xander is Buffy’s Iago.
This essay will focus on Xander’s Iagoing of Buffy throughout the series, with special attention paid to the “handkerchief” events of season two’s “Becoming II.”
The Play
Let’s assume that not everyone has studied Othello, and that, among those of us who have, some of us were so busy daydreaming about Buffy that we missed a few things. So that we’re all on the same page, let’s begin with a brief overview of the play.
Othello is one of Shakespeare’s late tragedies. The story is of a Moor (a term which is early modern English for “unspecified dark-skinned guy”), general of the Venetian army, and of how his fledgling marriage is destroyed by a jealous officer, Iago. As the play opens, the Moor, Othello, has just done two things: promoted a new lieutenant, Cassio, and married a (younger, virginal) white woman, Desdemona. Iago is incensed at being passed over for Cassio’s promotion (and at gossip that both Othello and notorious ladies’ man Cassio have been shacking up with his wife); he doesn’t really care that a black man has married Desdemona, but the mixed marriage provides the perfect vehicle to get under Othello’s skin. Over the course of the play, “Honest Iago” sews lies and innuendos that lead Othello to believe irrefutably that his new bride is sleeping with his new lieutenant. Jealousy drives him mad, and he kills Desdemona, and then himself.
Othello is not really about race. Othello is about Othering: the process of distinguishing a minority (the person who is not “Us,” but “Other”) from the majority, usually paired with ranking that “Other” in a hierarchy of race/sex/religion/whatever. In Othello, Othello is both Othered by the Venetians, and by himself.
It is important also to note that Iago is not, until the very end, recognized by any character in the play as a villain. He is constantly called “honest,” and he is a trusted friend and advisor to Othello, Cassio, and several other characters. I’d like to repeat this, because it is what makes Iago’s betrayal so cutting: Othello trusts Iago implicitly. When Iago’s lies are revealed to him, Othello does not believe it, and seeks to discover whether his friend is the devil in disguise, so betrayed is he.
Everyone on the same page? Super. Now let’s talk about the Othello in Buffy.
Othering and Iagoing
Let’s start with Othering, and position our characters. In the play, Othello is an outsider to the community; it is made clear that he is only respected because of his prowess on the battlefield. Both Angel and Buffy, in this way, are put in Othello’s position; Angel is Other because he is a vampire, and Buffy because she is a woman. They are both uniquely gifted tacticians and warriors, and this secures them unusual position within the group. Though Angel’s relationship to Buffy buys him some benefit of the doubt – helping him, as a vampire in a group of demon hunters, not get killed, for example – his key function within the group is as muscle. He’s almost a secondary Buffy (placing him as Buffy’s second-in-command, the Cassio to her Othello); when Buffy is unavailable, the Scoobies have no qualms in turning to Angel to fulfill her role (“Earshot”).
Buffy’s case is more interesting; she is human, and the peer of Xander, Willow, Cordelia, and Oz, but her position within the group is based upon her place and abilities as Slayer. If Buffy were not the Slayer, how would the other members of the group – especially Xander and Giles – treat her? Would they treat her the way they do Cordelia? As it is, Buffy is the group’s leader; were she not the Slayer, would she be straggling at the rear, the butt of the occasional, “ha ha, you dress like a whore” joke?
So Buffy and Angel are Othered, and they will, at turns, play Othello. Angel will sometimes also find himself in Cassio’s place. Buffy and Angel both will also be, from time to time, Desdemona. The reasons for this are a lot less complicated than it seems: if Angel is Othello, and Buffy is his lover, then Buffy becomes Desdemona. Similarly, if Buffy is Othello, and Angel is her lover, then Angel becomes Desdemona. Of course, since Buffy can also be the virgin, and the innocent, and can be seen simply for her sex, and Angel cannot, Buffy will be Desdemona more ably than Angel.
And then there’s Xander. Xander is not Othered; Xander is, when you think about it, kind of the poster boy for the majority. He’s white, he’s male, he’s “normal;” he has no pesky supernatural powers to differentiate him from the pack. Xander Harris is the majority; he is what Buffy and Angel are Othered from.
But being in the majority is not enough to make Xander Iago. He also needs the implicit trust of the group, despite his ulterior, self-serving motives. And he has it; Xander is rarely questioned, and he is even designated as the “Heart” of the group (“Primeval”); he is Honest Xander, pure of thought and deed. Which brings us to how he’s not so honest or pure.
Xander Iagos Buffy. He lies and manipulates in order to get things he wants, things he feels, as the majority, he deserves. What is interesting about Xander’s Iagoing of Buffy is that it is made complicated because it is defined by her Otherness; Xander would not have the same aim were Buffy not a woman. Let’s look at Xander’s motives, and what he wants, the things he will deceive for. Xander is upset that Buffy chose Angel over him; he asked her out and she said no, because “a guy has to be dead” to get with her (“Prophecy Girl”). So Xander’s aim is not only to best Angel/Cassio, who Buffy/Othello chose instead, it is to “win” Buffy; Buffy herself is the prize that Xander hopes to redeem through his deception.
Revelations and Buffy’s Sex Life
In the play, Iago’s first act against Othello is to run to Desdemona’s father, Brabantio, and inform the man that “an old black ram is stupping your white ewe.” Brabantio was previously unaware of the relationship, and he goes apeshit, running off to the Senate to complain. Othello and Desdemona are both eventually brought in to plead their cases at what has essentially become an impromptu trial.
Which brings us away from “Becoming II,” which we haven’t actually gotten to yet, my bad, to “Revelations.” Xander happens upon Angel, recently back from the dead, locking lips with Buffy. What does Xander do? He convenes Giles, Willow, and Cordelia to sit trial on Buffy, an “intervention,” as she calls it. Without consulting her, he has told everyone not only that she has been “harboring a vicious killer” and lying to all of them, but that she and Angel were kissing, which, were his concern really, “Oh my God, that guy that killed a bunch of our friends is back!” should have been toward the bottom of the list of outrages. But Xander not only informs the group of Buffy’s romantic indiscretions, he uses her sexuality against her. “What [were you waiting for]? For Angel to go psycho again the next time you give him a happy?” Poor Buffy is just a woman; she cannot be trusted with her own sexuality. Especially when she does that with it.
As in Othello, the only person who seems to be interested in Buffy/Desdemona’s voice is her partner. In the trial scene in Othello, Desdemona is brought forth before the Senate, but it is Othello who asks the girl to tell her side of the story. Similarly, the only person who seems interested in Buffy’s thoughts and feelings when the subject is love is Angel, and even he doesn’t do that great a job some of the time, making decisions about their relationship for her (“The Prom”). Anytime the topic is broached with anyone else, their reaction is to tell Buffy that “when it comes to Angel, you can’t see straight,” and “we’re here to help you [make the correct decision]” (“Revelations”). Xander is the worst one with this, again and again, from his constant demonization of Angel to his telling Buffy that she is “acting like a crazy person” by “treating Riley like the rebound guy” (“Into the Woods”).
Majority Xander does not act as though Buffy’s sexuality belongs to her. Think of his yay, Angel is leaving forever! fantasy in “Surprise”: Xander gleefully imagines Buffy – who is a “Denny’s waitress by day, Slayer by night,” as though Xander doesn’t gift her with enough intelligence or agency to have an actual career – crying gratefully when rich and powerful Xander – “fly[ing] into town in [his] private jet;” apparently, Xander gives himself all the intelligence and agency he’ll need – sweeps her off her feet, and out of Angel’s arms. Why wouldn’t Buffy be grateful to be rescued from the life she’s made for herself? I mean, a poor woman, being rescued by Majority Man? A dream come true.
Becoming and Joss’s New Ending for Iago
As season two progresses, Buffy and Angel become more and more removed from the group. And they begin, as Othello does toward the end of the play, to Other themselves. Angelus takes pains to distinguish himself from any scrap of humanity. “Your boyfriend is dead” (“Innocence”). Buffy often finds herself separate from her friends, who all have happy, normal lives with happy, normal relationships, and in the end, she chooses her duties as a Slayer over her family, her normal life. During the events of the “Becoming” episodes, the final ties are broken: Buffy is kicked out of her home and her school, thus eliminating her last ties to a “normal,” majority life; Angelus discovers that it is his blood alone that can unleash the supreme evil of Acathla and send the world to hell (“Becoming II”).
Fully Othered, there’s only Iago to contend with.
In “Becoming II,” as Xander leaves to assist Buffy in her storming of Angel’s mansion, Willow tells him to let Buffy know that she and Oz will be attempting to restore Angel’s soul. When Xander arrives, however, he instead tells Buffy that Willow says to, “kick [Angel’s] ass.”
The question of course is, had Buffy known what was going on, would she still have had to kill Angel? Certainly her attitude might have been different; she might have done more toward stalling the release of Acathla, and less toward killing Angelus. There’s no way to know. However, we can guess the answer to a more interesting question: the question of intent. What was Xander’s intent in omitting Willow’s true message, and instead submitting his own agenda? An argument can be made that he was afraid, if Buffy had hope that Angel could be saved, she would immediately become a weak and helpless girl in love instead of the warrior she really needed to be. However. To me it seems much more likely that Xander’s motives are, as usual, purely selfish: Xander does not want Angel to make it out alive. He does not want Buffy and Angel back together; even though he is, at the moment, in a relationship of his own with Cordelia, he is still not happy about the thought of Buffy with another man, especially Angel, his challenger. His Cassio. Iago’s aim in Othello, remember, is not only to rise to Cassio’s rank; in the process, he wants to punish Cassio, who has taken his place, and Othello, who passed him over. And he does both.
Since Buffy is both the goal of Xander’s deception, and the object/originator (read: Othello) of it, Xander’s desire to punish Buffy is at constant odds with his desire to own her, which accounts for Xander’s mercurial moods toward her. At one turn, he is joking and flirting with her; the next, he is puffed up full of righteous indignation, putting the blood of all Angelus’s victims on her hands (“Revelations”) or telling her that he’ll kill her (“When She Was Bad”).
So what is the outcome of Xander/Iago’s deception? As it is in the book: Xander’s lie results in Buffy/Othello killing her lover, and then, in her grief, removing herself from the city. Now in the play, Othello doesn’t hop a Greyhound as Buffy does; he kills himself, too. Perhaps it is Buffy’s survival that changes Xander/Iago’s fate. In the play, Iago is found out (too late, but much sooner than Xander is), and then dragged off to be tortured and, presumably, killed for treason. His last line is a vow to never speak again. But Xander is never punished for his deceptions. Even when his lie is revealed (five seasons later, in “Selfless”), it goes completely unnoticed. Xander is never punished for his deception, and he never gives up his speech, so he is free to continue deceiving. Which begs the question: do the writers of Buffy sympathize with Iago? Do they condone Xander’s manipulation of his friends? Why else would he continue on, uncensored and unpunished, unless Joss was trying to tell us something?
Let’s think about early modern England, Shakespeare’s time, for a minute. During Shakespeare’s time, women were very Other. They were considered to be physiologically and psychologically inferior to men; they couldn’t own property, or have a legal say, without a man. A man who murdered his wife was tried for murder; a woman who murdered her husband was tried for murder and treason, because she had acted against her king and god, and in those days the country was the same as the king was the same as God. What’s the relevance to Xander’s lack of punishment? Perhaps Xander gets away scot-free because he’s the majority. The only crime he committed was against an Other, and that’s only the natural order of things, that the majority should control the world, including the world of the Other, and if they need to get Machiavellian about it, so be it. And, to follow up on the king and god bit, Xander is a character-insertion of the show’s creator, Joss Whedon, who is white, middle-class, and a man. He represents the same majority Xander does. And in this universe, he is God. It’s only fitting that God’s will be done.
I'd love to hear your thoughts.
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Re: Here from buffyphilosophy
Date: 2008-07-23 06:21 pm (UTC)Thank you! When I write grown-up, scholarly things I get scared that I'll be found out as an idiot, so your thumbs up is extremely gratifying. I'm glad you enjoyed it, and thank you for saying so.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 06:27 pm (UTC)we never got any more development.
Which is, perhaps, the point. It was never addressed, so it's possible that Joss & Co didn't feel it needed addressing, that they condoned it. People who do bad things on Buffy get punished. Buffy indulges in forbidden love; Buffy loses her lover. Angel kills people; Angel is sent to hell. Faith kills people; Faith loses a year of her life to a coma, and then another few to prison. Wesley steals Angel's child; Wesley has his throat cut, and is abandoned by his friends. Gunn does something he knows is wrong to keep his mind implant; Gunn loses his friend, and is sent to a hell dimension. If you live in Buffyland, and you do something bad, you can expect to be punished. But Xander is never punished for his deception, which suggests that it is not considered a bad thing.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 06:31 pm (UTC)If I had to guess -- and, obviously, I do, since we weren't given any direct evidence on the matter -- I would say that Willow was at first hopeful about Buffy having left for a good reason (this is addressed, I believe, at the end of "Becoming II;" Willow wonders if maybe Buffy has gone somewhere to be alone with re-ensouled Angel) and then blamed herself; Buffy would have stayed except Willow had failed her. Which speaks back to your whole "Xander betrayed Willow, too," thing.
he's never put in a second thought about speaking for Willow. Doing that Soul Spell is something he'd have never let Willow do were he positioned to deny her.
I agree with that, too. Xander takes advantage of Willow, takes her for granted . . . and, when it comes to his thoughts on magic, he believes that he is Right, and will not be swayed from the position.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 07:12 pm (UTC)What I know about the play could fit on the head of a pin, but from what I can recall, you managed to make some great points. And you verbalized quite well my issues with the way Xander saw and sometimes treated Buffy - as somehow his, who needs to be punished for making the 'wrong' choice of the vampire. He not only uses the group to punish Buffy in Revelations, he also stokes Faith's anger and sense of betrayal before aiming her at Angel, wanting a front row seat to the staking. Then in Dead Man's Party, after the shattering events of Becoming II send Buffy into a three month tailspin, he again leads the group in punishing Buffy for making the 'wrong' choice, for not being able to handle killing Angel.
He is Cassio, using others to right his sense of being wronged, and no one sees him as anything other than a good friend. Excellent comparison.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 07:37 pm (UTC)Wow. Ten years and this tired old wank is still on people's shoulders. I'm not sure which I'm rolling my eyes at more, the implicit "Xander kept right on betraying her in every season thereafter" or the implicit temper tantrum that Joss hasn't "punished" Xander for it -- and the continued Iago correllation makes it clear that the only "acceptable" punishment is Xander being cast out and killed, even Joss has made it clear that's not going to happen.
Do people honestly believe Joss considered ending Season Two any other way than Buffy having to kill Angel?
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Date: 2008-07-23 07:48 pm (UTC)First of all, kudos to coming off as more academic than simply Internet-warbly. Most of the meta I've read in recent times is entirely too marked in personal agendas and unnecessary anecdotes to have much of a point, and this certainly does. It's still obvious that you aren't a big fan of Xander, and I differ there, but it's a well-supported theory that you've provided, nonetheless.
My main rationale for why Xander's an okay guy is, I guess, character development. If you don't move beyond his season two persona, he's arguably kind of a douche - although one of my most favorite crack-ish pairings in the entire series is s2 Xander/Cordelia, so. My appreciation for Xander has always been, in part, sympathizing with him. His friends have all the powers and the special talents, and he is, at most times, painfully normal. His acting out seems justified, in that sense; he feels inadequate, and often times the most his friends do is cluck their tongues and then tell him to go hide because he'll get in their way with the fighting and magic stuff.
Also, Xander's oafy and he sticks his foot in his mouth, but he's not really a schemer. His actions are in accordance with Iago's around the time that Angel becomes Angelus, but I still have difficulty reading so much vengeance into what he does. Arguably, Xander represents the truth that nobody else wants to point out: Angel poses a big threat in that he's basically got an on/off switch, and it would be safer for them all if he died, for instance. Some of it is borne from his own vendetta against Angel - I agree with you there - but I see a lot of redemption and general good in Xander that didn't come across so much with Iago. In essence, his being the Typical White Male isn't enough of a crime to warrant permanent exile from the group, in my opinion.
This essay actually came at a good time; I'm re-watching the series after a lengthy hiatus with my girlfriend, who is completely new to the 'verse. Her reactions to things happening on the screen in the immediate sense are not clouded by later knowledge of the characters beyond that episode, which I think is why the Xander-Iago comparison is most jarring to me. Xander may not always be the shining pinnacle of friendship and good sense, but neither are any of the other characters. They all hide stuff from one another; they all have prejudices and things that encourage bad decision-making; but as episodes like "Primeval" show us, they manage to pull it together when the chips are down.
/rambling. Anyways, thank you for the fascinating read!
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Date: 2008-07-23 08:21 pm (UTC)You're correct; I could have gone through every season step by step, and didn't. Perhaps I'm shortsighted, but I don't really view Xander as a character who changes very much, so I chose to narrow my focus.
And no, I don't believe that Angel was going to make it out of season two alive. I don't even believe that, had Buffy known about what Willow was doing, things in "Becoming II" would have ended differently. What I do believe is that it was wrong of Xander to not trust his friend with the complete truth, to not believe that she deserved to know everything that was going on.
Additionally, if my essay led you to the conclusion that I thought Xander deserved to be "cast out and killed," I apologize, as this was not my intent. But, as as I was discussing with
But perhaps I've had too much college. In any event, thank you for reading, and I appreciate you taking the time to leave me with your opinions.
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Date: 2008-07-23 08:22 pm (UTC)Thank you for bringing up the other times Xander "leads the group in punishing Buffy for making the 'wrong' choice;" those are excellent examples, and I wish I'd thought of them myself. :) Thank you for reading, and for commenting; I appreciate it.
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Date: 2008-07-23 08:30 pm (UTC)Here's my thing with Xander, because I don't want to come off as full of Xanderhate. I like Xander unless I think too much about what his motives are, and then I get cranky, because yes, he's had not the best role models for sexual dynamics, but the way he treats the women on the show, especially Buffy, is not good. And it makes me sad, because Buffy is kind of my hero, and I don't like that she takes this shit from Xander. For a show that is about power, about a woman who steps up and takes some power, Xander seems . . . antithetical. You know? But at the same time, I do really want to like him, because he's earnest and funny and, yeah, has that whole Jimmy Olsen complex to overcome.
And again, if what you read in my questioning of Xander going unpunished was that I thought he deserved "permanent exile," then I apologize, because that was not what I meant. I'm just concerned, given the sketchy sexual politics of the Buffy-Xander relationship, along with the general Buffyverse caveat that people who do bad things get punished, that letting Xander off completely scot-free for his lie in "Becoming II" condones the act. (This is also why I have big, big problems with Andrew. But that's another essay . . .) Which, you know, only leads to more sketchy sexual politics, and hey, now I'm in a Mobius strip.
Anyway, thank you for reading, and taking the time to leave your comments. And happy reviewing!
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Date: 2008-07-23 09:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 09:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 09:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 09:24 pm (UTC)Edit: Also, may I pimp?
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Date: 2008-07-23 09:33 pm (UTC)Well, hey there! It's nice to see you around. :)
And thank you, J! I'm glad you liked it.
And pimp all you like. I'd be honored.
(On an unrelated note: I have always found that icon really hilarious.)
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Date: 2008-07-23 09:48 pm (UTC)I did a set of Simpsons/Buffy crossover icons a couple of years back. I wish I could get back into icon making - I reckon I've missed all the latest fads and movements in iconning though. I left around the time when the tiny text obsession happened.
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Date: 2008-07-23 10:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 10:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-23 10:14 pm (UTC)*loves*
I've been on this huge Buffy kick of late, quoting everywhere and anywhere. It's killing Joh - in the best possible way LOL.
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Date: 2008-07-23 10:22 pm (UTC)While I do agree with you on (a) it's totally a cliffhanger, get over yourself Joss, and (b) the events of NFA being "one last big fuck you before he dies," I can understand Angel's thoughts and motivations enough that I find it in character. Let's be honest: the past two years just beat any last shred of hope he had out of him. He gained and lost and gained and lost a son; he was betrayed by a member of his family; he spent the summer at the bottom of the ocean; his best friend was abducted, then possessed by an evil god, then in a coma, then back just long enough to yell, "Psych!" and die for good; he loses another member of his family; Spike is shacking up with the love of his life, and now is shadowing him, telling him about it; the love of his life and her camp have, seemingly, completely abandoned him; Harmony is his personal assistant.
I can understand how Angel has gotten desperate enough to think that one mighty show of muscle and good intentions will be enough to mean something. Which doesn't mean that it wasn't "a giant hissy fit;" it just means that he was very desperate and disillusioned and made a desperate and disillusioned decision.
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Date: 2008-07-23 10:24 pm (UTC)Good math. Hee. :)
YOU ARE PURE EVIL. In the best possible way.
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Date: 2008-07-23 10:25 pm (UTC)Try not to die. :)
OMIGOD THOSE ARE AWESOME. *is dead laughing* And dude, screw "fads." I hate that tiny text shit, and the so red it's glowing like it's radioactive shit. Just do you.
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Date: 2008-07-23 11:53 pm (UTC)Wordy McWord to all you've said. I've never studied much Shakespeare beyond high school classes, so this was both interesting and informative.
I've always felt somewhat irritated that Xander was never called on his dishonesty. It could be argued that the ultimate outcome of Becoming II was as much Xander's influence as it was Buffy or Angelus' (although maybe not. That's one of the things I love about Seasons Two: dozens of possible outcomes besides what actually happened) and no one ever addressed it with any seriousness. It was a skeevy thing to do, regardless of intentions. I feel like if someone, anyone, had said, "Hey, Xander, what's up with lying about Willow's spell?", then there could have at least been some closure on the situation, because Xander would have had to give *some* answer.
To me, it's always seemed as though addition to being the "Majority", Xander was also the most typical of the gang. In a sense, he really was just an average teenage boy who couldn't see past his crush on a girl who only saw him as a friend. Yes, he had many, many good reason to dislike vampires, but his interactions with Angel (Pre-Season 4, anyway) always seemed to be, at some level, a version of, "He has her and I don't. That bastard, what does she see in him? At least *I'm* human. At least *I've* never killed anyone." But my thoughts on Xander as the stereotypical Nice Guy Who Isn't Always So Nice would be an entire essay...
But at the same time, that doesn't make him a bad person, neccesarily. Just a normal person who could be both good and manipulative, a white knight and a lying jerk, all at the same time. It's the fact that no one ever pointed it out that bugged me, and perhaps make it seem like his actions got more "approval" from the show's creators, even if that wasn't the case.
Whew! What a long way of saying I agree with you and am very impressed by your essay!
P.S. Did I read in your comments to someone else that you had a problem with Andrew? I'd love to see your take on that, because my dislike of that character is so intense that my teeth grind everytime he's on screen...
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Date: 2008-07-24 12:08 am (UTC)Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed my take; I just got out of a five-week college course on the later Shakespeare plays, and I fear it's affected my world view.
I agree; Xander isn't really a bad guy, but he's also not really a good guy. He's layered, like people tend to be, but I think that he gets more leeway than most of the other characters, that people tend to give him more benefit of the doubt towards being a good guy, ignoring all the "lying jerk" stuff.
Okay, here's my thing on Andrew: Andrew participates in all the Trio's crimes, including Warren's magical entrapment, attempted rape, and subsequent death of Katrina. He murders Jonathan in cold blood. And, like Xander, he is never punished (not that Xander's going around murdering people. But we're kind of on the topic of men in the Buffyverse who get away with things). He becomes fully integrated into the group, and is later made a Watcher with the power to spank Angel & friends. At worst, he's laughed about for being annoying, not, you know, for murdering someone who was a friend to the Scoobies. Why is it that some people in the Buffyverse can commit crimes and never be punished, and others spend their entire lives making amends? It makes no fucking sense to me, but it makes me furious.
Also: I like your icon. :)
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Date: 2008-07-24 12:21 am (UTC)Yep, I's got Xander issues.
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Date: 2008-07-24 12:54 am (UTC)It's possible to criticize Xander for something you dislike, or even to just dislike Xander, without demonizing him, reducing him only to the sum total of those things you dislike, or refusing to give him any credit for positive character traits or motivations. I've seen it done. Unfortunatelty, this pretty much fails at that.
As for the amount of college you had or haven't had, I find that irrelevent to the discussion.