LIES MY PARENTS TOLD ME
Created | Updated Apr 29, 2005
As most of the points I wanted to make about Lies My Parents Told Me have already been extensively been delat with by others on this board, (in particular on the following threads: Whose parents?; The mission is what matters; Redemption: a work in progress; Buffy, Spike, Giles and Wood; You wanna bring your mum wiv us?), this week I'll be brief for a change .(She said innocently, as outbursts of Homeric laughter rumbled through the internet.)
I know this has also been amply discussed, but I simply can't let both the 'lies' and the 'parents' go unmentioned, as they're just too important. The only 'parent' we can be absolutely sure of telling a blatant lie is Giles, luring Buffy to the graveyard under false pretenses. All other cases are at least ambiguous.
Nikki never lies to Robin. I thought she said something like "Everything's gonna be allright, baby boy", which would be a typical thing for a parent to say.. Not a terrible lie, more a false reassurance. But as it turns out, she doesn't even do that, she only praises him for being a good boy and staying put, tells him he'll have to stay at Crowley's, because it's no longer safe to go home while she's "got a job to do". And she loves him, but the mission is what matters. I believe both statements are true , and not mutually exclusive; you might argue she doesn't love him enough if the mission comes first, or that the mission-statement is just as much trying to convince herself of it, and she eventually got killed because she lost focus worrying about her child. But none of these make her words untrue.
Anne's case will remain debatable forever: are the things she says to her son after being sired just the vicious words of an evil being, or is it a surpressed part of her intrinsic personality surfacing? Surely she didn't want her William to become like this when he grew up. She must have had bigger aspirations for her only child than being a bloody awful poet without (girl)friends or status. As a vamp she was able to say the things she would barely allow herself to think as a victorian woman. But if it was the demon, not the mother saying those things, what does this tell us about everything vamp Spike said so far? Also, there's been ample discussion about the character of the vampire being rooted in the person it once was. If this is what sweet, caring Anne becomes, then why does William stay almost unchanged, showing his victorian inhibitions when his mother starts her sexual incitements? Aren't all vampires supposed to be of shady morals, especially in the eros-thanatos department? Why does William need his mother's rejection to become Spike instead of turning evil right after being sired? He's deeply wounded when she ridicules him expressing his most intimate feelings. Shy William would never talk to others about his emotions, poetry is clearly his only outlet, being teased and scoffed at by his peers. Probably no friends and just his mother to have long talks with ("A captive audience for your witless prattle") Finally, ironically, Spike DOES take after her despite or because of what she said: "I used to hate to be cruel in life. Now I find it rather freeing." Either he still couldn't help but listen, or it triggered him to rebel against everything she (and he himself) once stood for.
Last, but by no means least, there's the question of guilt. William killed his mother twice, what crime could be worse or have a greater psychological effect than that? You wonder what created the creature he eventually became: the fact that if this was how his mother, the only person of whose love he had been sure, truly felt about him, nothing m,attered anymore, or that nothing could be worse than killing her. With the kill, he severed all ties with the past, but if he only now comes to realise it wasn't his mother that hurt him so deeply with her derisive comments, but the demon talking, then why did he stake her at the time? Revenge? Questions, questions. Feel free to submit your opinion.
Now let's move to Giles and Buffy, whose graveyard-lesson seemed to parody those therapists preferring to go for a walk or play sports during sessions to make their clients loosen up. And a lesson it was, not a training, like Giles feigned, or the test of her priorities he tried to turn it into. It became a lesson in trust, and, inadvertedly, probably the last thing the watcher got to 'teach' the slayer. "I think you taught me everything I need to know", she says, closing her door in his face. We've seen her shutting a door like this before: in Older And Far Away it signified a new beginning of her relationship with DAwn, closing off a phase where her little sister got lost because of her negligence. Now the student-teacher phase seems to have come to an end. LAst year Giles wwent back to England to make Buffy stand on her own legs (or;"You don't need me anymore, so I guess I better go"?), but this is where ties are really severed, albeit inadvertedly. Never willing to submit to authority anyway, will she now turn away from all values he tried to instil into her?
Their disturbing conversation about sacrifice (discussed in the In defence- and The mission is what matters-threads) can be explained in several ways, none of them completely satisfying. Does she mean that if she had to choose between herself and Dawn, she'll be willing to sacrifice her sister and live, or is it that knowing what the world would be like without a slayer (as we saw early season 6), she realises she has no alternative but stay because they need her? The whole thing becomes even more puzzling when we take into consideration her experiences with the afterlife: having been in 'heaven', she shouldn't fear death and be glad to return to the state of fulfilledness she so cruelly got ripped out of.
A few things noone seems to have mentiioned so far.
There appears to be a definite recurring team about fathers in the whole series. If they're not completely absent, as in both Spike and Wood's case (Isn't that amazingly ironic; "She was all I had, she was my world" says Wood. If anyone knows what that feels like, it should be Spike.) or semi-absent, as in Buffy's, they're no good: Tara got abused, maybe not physically but definately psychologically, same goes for Xander. And now the surrogate father of the title-character betrays her.
Finally we learn the meaning of the trigger-song, heard here in three different versions (anyone able to read a deeper meaning?). Listen to those words: "Just as the sun was shining", not for Spike then, being a creature of the night. "Never leave me, don't decieve me" Who do you think that refers to, bearing in mind Spike's words "It's allright mother [] we'll be together forever". And with this, the question as to who the "maiden" would refer to is also solved. Not Buffy, not his mother, but fair William, the lonely, uncorrupted poet himself.
Giles, like a father struggling with the fact his grown-up duaghter makes her own choices that may conflict withhis ideas about life and his aspirations for his child, is not the only one who's jealous and concerned about Buffy. Both men see their position in her life threatened by someone they feel doesn't belong on their side and definately not by her side. Their way of thinking about the greater goood is very similar -not surprising, if you remember Wood was raised by a watcher. It might not even be that far-fetched to say Wood is the New World version of Giles: NYC vs English countryside, sharp-dressed vs stuffy, fast-talking vs thoughtfully looking for the right words, and, most striking her, defending the knowledge "from crafted bindings and pages vs hitting a key on his fancy i-Mac. (Trying to surpress Buffy' out-of line "boring, old and English, just like you".)
More observations, questions, and comments? sure:
Mark Spike's words at the end of his speech to Wood: "Thanks, doc. You cured me after all. I got my free will now. I'm not under the First or *anyone else's* influences now.
Other quotes to remember:
Giles: "The stone is just a catalyst for the process. The rest is up to Spike"
Wood: "What does it mean?"
Spike: "Mean? Nothing. It's just, uh, my mum used to sing it to me ...when I was a *baby*
I know this has also been amply discussed, but I simply can't let both the 'lies' and the 'parents' go unmentioned, as they're just too important. The only 'parent' we can be absolutely sure of telling a blatant lie is Giles, luring Buffy to the graveyard under false pretenses. All other cases are at least ambiguous.
Nikki never lies to Robin. I thought she said something like "Everything's gonna be allright, baby boy", which would be a typical thing for a parent to say.. Not a terrible lie, more a false reassurance. But as it turns out, she doesn't even do that, she only praises him for being a good boy and staying put, tells him he'll have to stay at Crowley's, because it's no longer safe to go home while she's "got a job to do". And she loves him, but the mission is what matters. I believe both statements are true , and not mutually exclusive; you might argue she doesn't love him enough if the mission comes first, or that the mission-statement is just as much trying to convince herself of it, and she eventually got killed because she lost focus worrying about her child. But none of these make her words untrue.
Anne's case will remain debatable forever: are the things she says to her son after being sired just the vicious words of an evil being, or is it a surpressed part of her intrinsic personality surfacing? Surely she didn't want her William to become like this when he grew up. She must have had bigger aspirations for her only child than being a bloody awful poet without (girl)friends or status. As a vamp she was able to say the things she would barely allow herself to think as a victorian woman. But if it was the demon, not the mother saying those things, what does this tell us about everything vamp Spike said so far? Also, there's been ample discussion about the character of the vampire being rooted in the person it once was. If this is what sweet, caring Anne becomes, then why does William stay almost unchanged, showing his victorian inhibitions when his mother starts her sexual incitements? Aren't all vampires supposed to be of shady morals, especially in the eros-thanatos department? Why does William need his mother's rejection to become Spike instead of turning evil right after being sired? He's deeply wounded when she ridicules him expressing his most intimate feelings. Shy William would never talk to others about his emotions, poetry is clearly his only outlet, being teased and scoffed at by his peers. Probably no friends and just his mother to have long talks with ("A captive audience for your witless prattle") Finally, ironically, Spike DOES take after her despite or because of what she said: "I used to hate to be cruel in life. Now I find it rather freeing." Either he still couldn't help but listen, or it triggered him to rebel against everything she (and he himself) once stood for.
Last, but by no means least, there's the question of guilt. William killed his mother twice, what crime could be worse or have a greater psychological effect than that? You wonder what created the creature he eventually became: the fact that if this was how his mother, the only person of whose love he had been sure, truly felt about him, nothing m,attered anymore, or that nothing could be worse than killing her. With the kill, he severed all ties with the past, but if he only now comes to realise it wasn't his mother that hurt him so deeply with her derisive comments, but the demon talking, then why did he stake her at the time? Revenge? Questions, questions. Feel free to submit your opinion.
Now let's move to Giles and Buffy, whose graveyard-lesson seemed to parody those therapists preferring to go for a walk or play sports during sessions to make their clients loosen up. And a lesson it was, not a training, like Giles feigned, or the test of her priorities he tried to turn it into. It became a lesson in trust, and, inadvertedly, probably the last thing the watcher got to 'teach' the slayer. "I think you taught me everything I need to know", she says, closing her door in his face. We've seen her shutting a door like this before: in Older And Far Away it signified a new beginning of her relationship with DAwn, closing off a phase where her little sister got lost because of her negligence. Now the student-teacher phase seems to have come to an end. LAst year Giles wwent back to England to make Buffy stand on her own legs (or;"You don't need me anymore, so I guess I better go"?), but this is where ties are really severed, albeit inadvertedly. Never willing to submit to authority anyway, will she now turn away from all values he tried to instil into her?
Their disturbing conversation about sacrifice (discussed in the In defence- and The mission is what matters-threads) can be explained in several ways, none of them completely satisfying. Does she mean that if she had to choose between herself and Dawn, she'll be willing to sacrifice her sister and live, or is it that knowing what the world would be like without a slayer (as we saw early season 6), she realises she has no alternative but stay because they need her? The whole thing becomes even more puzzling when we take into consideration her experiences with the afterlife: having been in 'heaven', she shouldn't fear death and be glad to return to the state of fulfilledness she so cruelly got ripped out of.
A few things noone seems to have mentiioned so far.
There appears to be a definite recurring team about fathers in the whole series. If they're not completely absent, as in both Spike and Wood's case (Isn't that amazingly ironic; "She was all I had, she was my world" says Wood. If anyone knows what that feels like, it should be Spike.) or semi-absent, as in Buffy's, they're no good: Tara got abused, maybe not physically but definately psychologically, same goes for Xander. And now the surrogate father of the title-character betrays her.
Finally we learn the meaning of the trigger-song, heard here in three different versions (anyone able to read a deeper meaning?). Listen to those words: "Just as the sun was shining", not for Spike then, being a creature of the night. "Never leave me, don't decieve me" Who do you think that refers to, bearing in mind Spike's words "It's allright mother [] we'll be together forever". And with this, the question as to who the "maiden" would refer to is also solved. Not Buffy, not his mother, but fair William, the lonely, uncorrupted poet himself.
Giles, like a father struggling with the fact his grown-up duaghter makes her own choices that may conflict withhis ideas about life and his aspirations for his child, is not the only one who's jealous and concerned about Buffy. Both men see their position in her life threatened by someone they feel doesn't belong on their side and definately not by her side. Their way of thinking about the greater goood is very similar -not surprising, if you remember Wood was raised by a watcher. It might not even be that far-fetched to say Wood is the New World version of Giles: NYC vs English countryside, sharp-dressed vs stuffy, fast-talking vs thoughtfully looking for the right words, and, most striking her, defending the knowledge "from crafted bindings and pages vs hitting a key on his fancy i-Mac. (Trying to surpress Buffy' out-of line "boring, old and English, just like you".)
More observations, questions, and comments? sure:
Mark Spike's words at the end of his speech to Wood: "Thanks, doc. You cured me after all. I got my free will now. I'm not under the First or *anyone else's* influences now.
Other quotes to remember:
Giles: "The stone is just a catalyst for the process. The rest is up to Spike"
Wood: "What does it mean?"
Spike: "Mean? Nothing. It's just, uh, my mum used to sing it to me ...when I was a *baby*
