impalementation:#i dunno why this image got to me so much#the idea that this season is about power a
impalementation:#i dunno why this image got to me so much#the idea that this season is about power and responsibility and redemption#the feeling of wanting to give up#the feeling that the only hope for sanctifying yourself is destruction#the idea of self-destruction as giving up#the ‘beneath you’/‘you’re beneath me’ parallel#the idea of the thing ‘beneath’ not being lurking evil (although that) but that which you’ve declared beyond redeeming#the fact that this is foreshadowing of course#the fact that this is a starting point#the transformation of the martyred despair of self-destruction to the sunlit nobility of true self-sacrifice#there’s a parallel here between original sin and the fact that the villain this season is ‘the first evil’#women as the originators of sin and this season being all about women coping with how to use power#the souled vampire being another image of original sin#the person rejected by artifacts of religious purity and wracked with guilt but who is ambiguously responsible for the sins that haunt them#the idea that you try to be responsible *not* because you think you’re sinful but simply because you must#(the fact that buffy has always felt free to treat spike cruelly to make herself feel better because his inherent evil#ie sin#absolved her.#but once you think it’s okay to punish evil in that way you start to punish yourself similarly for your own evils.#so it is absolutely crucial that buffy gets a chance too see spike–and herself#and everyone else–as capable of change. leaving even redemption out of it. just capable of good. despite their sins.)#tv#buffy ( @the-lookbook ) -- source link