Buffy Anne Summers, aka

Posts Tagged ‘writing’

Joss Whedon Writer/Director Joss Whedon is one of the most prolific figures in television, but it wasnt always that way. He started his career as a staff writer for the sitcom, Rosanne. From there he moved onto feature films, where he worked for several years as a script doctor, on films such as Speed and Toy Story. Tired of seeing his visions rewritten, Whedon eventually returned to television, bringing with him an adaptation of his first feature film, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In this candid interview, Joss talks openly about the early days of his career, his showbiz family, his legion of fans, and the trials and tribulations of taking a cult TV hit to the big screen.

Would have to disagree though, just a bit, about Scully in The X-Files. She grew a little. It just took a long, long time.

Duration : 0:5:30

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Joss and Eliza discuss Dollhouse. Catch Dollhouse every Friday at 9/8c, only on FOX!

Duration : 0:1:16

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Sorry to be so late on this post, folks. All sorts of troubles and projects and deadlines and technical difficulties getting in the way this past week, and you might as well know I have grave doubts that my 8th post will be ready next week. We’ll see, maybe everything going on right now will all fall into place, but it is rather likely to be the week after.

Again, spoiler alert! Continue reading at your own risk if you are not entirely familiar with the show.

Anyway, as I said last time that I would begin this time in medias res, here goes:

Out here in our real world, rankism (a la Robert Fuller) is ubiquitous, and it seems to play a large role in the world of Demonic forces as well, but it is fairly unusual for anyone in the world of Buffy Summers to pull rank, and more unusual to unequivocally respect that rank for very long — and further, when someone has an issue, a concern, or something emotional to communicate, unless there are "secrets" or personal reservations involved, much more often than not, that character will tend to say it with relatively little disregard for rank or for the potential harm, either to themselves or to the cohesion of the group.

In other words, while the characters are all capable of pulling emotional punches, they rarely do so based on any of the standard hierarchies, i.e., in addition to a relative lack of familial relationships, money, gender dominance, social/political status, education, age, intelligence, athleticism, physical stature, survival skills, etc., also play very minor roles in terms of our primary characters’ relationships with one another — and even with most other characters in the outer world. Even the attempts by some characters (Giles, Cordelia, Snyder, Quentin Travers (Harris Yulin) and other members of the Watcher’s Council, Detective Stein (James MacDonald) and the Sunnydale police, etc.) to impose some hierarchy or another (age and education, money and social/political/legal — even mythological — status, etc.) generally come up quite short.

It would be reasonable to object that some of these hierarchies exist, and they do, but they exist only tangentially and superficially.

At the risk of belaboring the point, for example, the subject of money hardly comes up before season six. Even then, it is of significant concern due only to Buffy’s and Dawn’s (Michelle Trachtenberg) circumstances after the death of their mother, Joyce (Kristine Sutherland) — and after Buffy’s own death and resurrection — and even at that, money is a concern only for a short while. In the Buffyverse, with the possible exception of an episode or two, there simply is no "tyranny of money."

And so forth, e.g., in the world of Buffy Summers, the subject of status (social, political and legal) is rather limited, mostly limited to parent/child (or, similarly, Watcher’s Council/Watcher and Watcher/Slayer) relationships — oh and let’s not forget the Principal Snyder/student dynamic — but all such hierarchies are quite malleable, unevenly enforced when enforced at all, and any boundaries implied are (almost) always easily and often crossed.

The only major characters in the world of Buffy Summers that truly can be said to respect hierarchical relationships are Rupert Giles and Riley Finn (Marc Blucas), and neither remains steadfast in that respect, i.e., Giles has already been discussed in this regard, whereas Riley struggles with the hierarchy of "the Initiative" once he becomes involved with the Buffy "family," then breaks away from it altogether, and only goes back to the familiarity of the hierarchy from whence he came as a result of finally leaving Sunnydale and Buffy behind.

Later, when Riley shows up at the Doublemeat Palace unexpectedly (As You Were), Buffy simply takes off her hat and abandons her station, and yet it is clear in subsequent episodes that she still has her job. Of course you may object that’s just because she knows about the secret "meat process" ("It’s a process, they do it to the meat.") — but as insignificant as the observation that she keeps her job may be, for me at least, it is yet another reminder that, time and time again, what many of us would consider to be the normal hierarchical rules don’t usually apply in the world of Buffy Summers, i.e., she ignores the employer/employee hierarchy (and not exactly for the first time) without significant consequence.

Though it does seem to play a significant, though never explicated, role in the world of Demonic forces, not even the subject of religion holds fast in this regard.

If one forgets the metaphorical and takes plot situations literally, one might expect that characters facing death, and far worse, on an almost daily basis would occasionally give religion and religious authority their due, and even more so considering the essential qualities and quasi-religious iconography of the world of Demonic forces. Instead, the subject of God, at least in any monotheistic sense, is rarely broached, and when it is, it is summarily dismissed — for example, in Conversations with Dead People, as when the vampire Holden Webster (Jonathan M. Woodward) asks Buffy of God, "Does he exist? Is there word on that, by the way?" and Buffy replies "Nothing solid."

Clearly, this is in the manner of most fantasy and magical realism, which generally replace religion with enchantment, but it is not so characteristic of the horror genre. It might be an indication of Whedon’s atheism, or that he and his fellow writers are simply smart enough to refrain from swimming in such dangerous waters, but it also serves my point, I think, that it is no exaggeration to contend that there is no tyranny of any hierarchy in the world of Buffy Summers, that is, no hierarchical relationships that prove particularly lasting or significant.

So now that I’ve (probably) overstated my case, what does it mean and why do I think it is important? To find that out, you’ll have to wait for my next related (and quite possibly, belated) post.

Why, hello again. I’m back. Why not let me try to entertain you? Or edify you? Or, y’know, why not just sit back and relax a moment while I chat some more about Buffy and stuff?

Last time around, I proposed that the explanation for the relative lack of significant familial (and nearly all hierarchical) character relationships in the world of Buffy Summers that I found the most compelling was that the creators of BtVS simply wished to dispense with all known hierarchies that otherwise might have gotten in the way of creating the personal and emotional relationships between the characters they required (or at least desired).

If it is not immediately obvious to some what I meant in the last post by the emotional and personal nearly always trumping the hierarchical (or if you are looking for the evidence I implied I would cite at the end of the previous post) here begins the explication:

Given that Buffy the Vampire Slayer begins as Buffy enters the tenth grade, and given the characteristics common to many teens and some young adults (and even a few of us oldsters), it is almost a given that Buffy and the other "Scoobies" will frequently ridicule officious authority (sometimes to its face), such as in the case of Principal Snyder (Armin Shimerman). And similarly, it is almost a given that Buffy will frequently ignore, or make an "end run" around, her mother, who is usually oblivious to her daughter’s experience.

But perhaps somewhat less typical is the way Buffy frequently ignores and challenges and teases Giles even though he is portrayed as — and unanimously acknowledged by Buffy and all the other Scoobies and then some — as the wiser about her calling and the ways of the world of Demonic forces. Appointed to be her Watcher by the hierarchy of the Watcher’s Council, he is in fact (or at least supposedly) "the boss of" her. But his claim to that status is never more than shaky at best, which seems odder still if various plot points are to be taken literally, as it is life and death — her own and those of her friends — and even the end of the world, that are most often at stake.

As for Giles, after making some initial efforts to give the hierarchies around him their due, it is not so long before he begins, to one degree or another, to display disdain for the supposed authority of Principal Snyder, and not so long after that, to ignore the authority of the Watcher’s Council. Further, by season three, he and everyone else (except inconsequentially, Cordelia) proceed to all but ignore Wesley’s (Alexis Denisof) official position as the new Watcher.

Even Wesley, "Mr. States-The-Obvious," ultimately abandons his claim to any special status and joins the chorus without any apparent care for the Council’s will or authority (i.e., "I’m not here for the Council. Just tell me how I can help.", Graduation Day: Part 2, Season Three).

Additionally, throughout the entirety of the series, the other Scoobies frequently ignore or challenge even Buffy, even in times when their own collective survival is at stake and their reliance on her battle stealth and savvy is at its zenith. One particularly cogent example of this occurs in The Yoko Factor, Season Four. It is hard to imagine Spike’s ruse would’ve worked so well if the gang were more inclined to respect some of the hierarchies I’ll soon make explicit, i.e., Giles at least would not feel so alienated nor be so vulnerable to manipulation, nor likely would Xander and Willow, if the relationships were less personal and emotional, or to put it another way, if the hierarchies inherent in the group dynamics were more consistently acknowledged and the characters’ interactions were more persuaded by the deferential regard their respective roles conventionally imply.

(If I still haven’t been completely clear what I’m talking about with the term "hierarchies," watch for a denotative list of some of them in the next post.)

Well . . . it seems there are going to be a few more than the six or seven posts I semi-predicted before I’m done with this (I’m now semi-predicting a total of eight posts, maybe), but that’s it for now. Yet more chat about Buffy and character relationships and stuff, and my conclusions about what it all may mean, are yet to come. I intend to pick it up in medias res next time around, so . . . go watch Buffy, and until next time, don’t "touch that dial."

While I do believe the human condition is infinitely more complex than most of the pop spirituality and psychology pablum frequently thrust upon us by corporate media and celebrity, I understand many find that believing in some claim to perfect truth (even those that prove themselves to be, upon any sober reflection, altogether incoherent) is generally more comforting than believing in nothing at all.

And it has been pointed out to me on occasion that I may cherish a few incoherencies myself. So, my regret. If you were offended by the post but otherwise enjoy this blog, I simply ask that you try to overlook it.)))

As I was about to spew the last time around (in BS & BG&E post 4), in many respects the main characters in Buffy the Vampire Slayer seem all but severed from traditional family ties. What few kin they do have seem alienated or just as often, in utter denial, and — as is often made emotionally evident in the show — these characters’ real “family” are each other.

I would agree with anyone who might wish to suggest that one of the most readily apparent explanations for this is that such relationships would likely overly complicate matters for the writers, i.e., with well developed family relationships, each of the characters would be constantly juggling their responsibilities to family while being simultaneously overwhelmed with their responsibilities battling evil, and further, they might find themselves drawn into conflict between trying to protect their family members while also trying to protect each other (which might not be such a bad dramatic circumstance from the viewers’ standpoint).

And though I haven’t yet found anything in Joss’s comments to suggest this, I would also agree that it may be that Joss simply wanted to reflect the reality of the viewing audience. After all, how many of us actually come from a stereotypical traditional family these days, and even of those of us who do, how many of us feel emotionally alienated — perhaps especially as teens and young adults — from some of the very people to whom we are supposedly the closest?

So was the relative lack of familial relationships merely efficacious, or indicative of some purpose grounded in a psychological bedrock that lies much deeper? Was it conscious on the part of Whedon to set things up this way, and if so, was it to reflect some of the experience of his viewing audience, or simply to make the task of stroytelling easier? Or can we think of a few thousand other interpretations that would be just as, or more, valid?

After all, in Joss’s words, BtVS is a show to which you can, “bring your own subtext.”

Or perhaps the only meaning we should read into this — and of all possible conclusions I consider this to be the most compelling one — is that the creators of BtVS simply dispensed with anything that could get in the way of creating the kinds of relationships between the characters they wanted?

Keep in mind that I’m speaking only of the TV series and only of the above-ground “in the sunlight” world of Buffy Summers, not the comic, nor the world of Demonic forces, both of which I hope to get to eventually.

But back on topic, I do think this is the meat of the matter, for if we ask what kind of character relationships the creators were trying to create, I believe the only possible answer is that they set out to create relationships between their primary characters that would, almost entirely, dispense with all known hierarchies.

Or another way of saying that, is that the relationships between Buffy, Giles, Joyce, Willow, Xander, Cordelia, Oz, Tara, Dawn, and even many other characters throughout the series, are all almost exclusively built on a very emotional (and very personal) scaffolding that almost always trumps the hierarchical relationships in the show.

Okay. So if that’s my working thesis — that the creators of BtVS were determined to (to reiterate my phrase above) “dispense with all known hierarchies” — can I cite adequate evidence to justify it? And if so, what might I conclude is its significance?

I’ll begin that journey — in my next post.