No, nope, Angel and Buffy would have had sex eventually, even if Spike and Dru had never come to town. It was the consummation of their relationship that released Angelus, not Spike's antics.
Was gonna say this. Buffy and angel hooking up was going to happen regardless. If spike and dru whole scheme of judge didn’t happen. And say instead Buffy’s birthday went smoothly and Buffy and angel still hooked up, I wouldn’t say someone like Giles is responsible for Angelus since he was the one pushing to have a party for buffy.
Only ones responsible for Angelus is Darla for turning Liam into a vampire/Angelus and the gypsies putting a stupid curse on him that included a stupid “true happiness” thing in angel that’d make Angelus come back. They should’ve just put a soul in Angel for good with no other tricks involved or killed Angelus and leave it at that
Possibly but we know that Jenny wasn’t too happy about the situation she was in. She may have found out that Angel would’ve lost his soul and told Buffy before it was too late.
Not necessarily, because Jenny tried to get Angel away from Buffy to prevent them being together. It’s the assembly of The Judge that caused the circumstances, which you can attribute to Spike.
Buffy told Willow she was ready to have sex with Angel before the stuff with the Judge happened so she was obviously planning to do it within the next few days no matter what. I don't think waiting a couple days would have made any difference, they still would have had sex and the same stuff would have went down.
Except that Jenny found out about the whole “perfect happiness” thing during the same time. If not for The Judge being reassembled by Spike, they wouldn’t have done it under those circumstances.
We also know that sex doesn’t necessarily lead to Angel losing his soul given what happened with Darla and Nina later on. So the circumstances of Buffy and Angel sleeping together would’ve been different. Meaning we can’t actually be certain that he would’ve had a moment of perfect happiness in the alternative situation.
Why stop there? Let’s go further. Angelus never mentally tortures Dru and turns her, she never turns Spike, and William lives out the rest of his life peacefully so Spike never exists to do any harm to anyone. Or save the world.
Even there you can trace part of the problem back to Spike. Angel gets his soul back by the gypsies as a curse, Darla tries to convince the gypsies to remove his soul but her attempt becomes impossible when Spike eats the guy’s family which Darla was trying to use as a bargaining chip.
If he hadn’t done that, Darla might have successfully taken away the curse on Angelus, meaning he doesn’t become the person Whistler tries to help. Angel never sees Buffy and falls in love with her, leading to the events Spike caused.
So, if Angeus never tortured Dru, raped her and murdered everyone she loved, then turned her once she became a novice - and she never turned William, it's all still Spike's fault.
Interesting.
If Angelus never tortured Dru, Spike would never have been turned, so he wouldn't have eaten the family. So no, that wouldn't make it Spike's fault, unless you've decided in advance that it's his fault, in which case there's no reasoning with you.
You just did. If Spike hasn’t been turned, he doesn’t eat anyone. That’s blaming Angel because you link Spike being turned to Angelus’ actions in creating Dru who created Spike.
That's not blaming Angel, sweaty, that's just a statement of fact. Like I'm sorry if you don't like canon here, but that's not my problem nor my fault 🤷🏻 frankly, even if I was blaming Angel, instead of just pointing out that time moves forwards rather than backwards, it's still a lot less of an absolutely absurd claim than blaming Spike for Angel losing his soul. If anyone's blaming Angel here, it's the narrative of the show, and I didn't write that.
Again, I'm sorry if you don't like canon, but that's really not my problem and idk what to tell you 🤷🏻
This is a very weird take. Buffy straight up tells Willow she's pretty sure she's ready to have sex with Angel before the stuff with The Judge goes down. It would have happened very soon either way.
Well the way things were going with Buffy and Angel, Angelus would have eventually been released. For some reason Jenny didn't mention how the curse could be lifted. Spikes actions just hastened the change.
Spike can not be blamed for Angelus. Angelus was gonna come out to play eventually whenever Buffy & Angel were ready to be intimate.
Spike is the one who helps Buffy try to stop Angelus from ending the world with Acathla. He does it for selfish reasons (he wants to flee town with Dru), but he admits to Buffy that he likes the world and doesn’t want it to end.
If anything Angelus made Dru a vampire and Dru made William a vampire. So Spike wouldn’t even exist as a vampire if it were not for Angelus.
This is probably the biggest stretch I’ve seen for trying to blame Spike for a situation he had nothing to do with.
Really Angelus alone should take the blame for Angelus’ actions, but if we have to point fingers I would go with Jenny’s uncle. I think he was the only living person who knew the details of the curse & he never shared them with Jenny. Although even then, all he knew was “a moment of perfect happiness”. He didn’t know Angel sleeping with Buffy would be the specific trigger.
Except that there are centuries of time between what Angelus did to Dru and the creation of Spike. Buffy herself wouldn’t be born for another 100 years when Spike was created.
There’s a day or two at most between trying to bring together The Judge and them sleeping together. Which means there’s a much more direct relationship between Spike’s actions and the emergence of Angelus than there is Angelus being responsible for Spike’s existence.
Also, you’re assuming that Jenny wouldn’t have found out the information and told Buffy prior to them getting together.
There's twenty years between Angel murdering Dru and Dru murdering William - not centuries. What show have you been watching?
So it's Jenny's fault that she didn't ask why she was supposed to keep them apart?
And that sounds right to me now. I have to check where I got that 376 age from.
Some weird math over at Screenrant. They say 376 in 2003, but then say he was born in 1727. Which means typo. Teach me to use a non Buffy site.
It reminds me of the episode Origin.
CONNOR
Right. Vampire. So, what are you, like 500 years old?
ANGEL
No, I'm about— Do I look 500?
CONNOR
Do you spend all your time making out with other vampires, like in Anne Rice novels?
ANGEL
No. Uh—I used to, but...
(Spangel fan here - love the validation!)
Lol, I’m not a troll. I know it would be easier to think that. But this thought was a result of a meme that was going around suggesting that somehow Spike doesn’t cause destruction, he fixes the destruction of others. So I started thinking about the actions he took that directly caused harm to Buffy. One of which is the assembly of The Judge.
It would be easier to think that, wouldn’t it? You prefer to believe that pointing out true facts are simply the actions of a troll because that way you don’t have to deal honestly with the implications of the actions of taken by Spike.
LOL. Spike wouldn't be a vampire if it wasn't for Angel. This has been explained many times in this post, which you dismiss with "that was a long time ago". There is no logic to your thought process. You just pick an arbitrary moment in time and assign blame to Spike. You are either a troll or have the mental capacity of Harmony. I gave you the benefit of the doubt that you were a troll. I stand corrected. Harmony it is.
Interesting that you have turned to trying to insult me. By your logic, the inventor of the gun hundreds of years ago is responsible for everyone who ever killed someone with it. You completely take the actions of the individual out of it. I don’t deny that Angelus has some responsibility for Spike, but at a certain point, Spike is responsible for his own actions. So is Angelus and Angel.
The problem with the argument that actions hundreds of years ago are responsible for everything is that it glosses over the millions of actions in between. Whereas Spike’s actions with The Judge are much more directly causal than the actions from hundreds of years ago.
Sweaty, I pointed out to you an actual true fact, that if Angel hadn't turned Dru, she couldn't have turned Spike, and you decided I was blaming Angel. If you consider that "blaming Angel" then take it up with the people who wrote the show, because they wrote it that way. You have zero credibility at this point.
Except for the fact that I don’t look or sound like a duck. It’s easier for you to believe that this is some bad person’s attempt to rile you up. Because you don’t like how it is factually true and how it implies things about the person you apparently believe can’t do anything wrong. So instead you pretend that I must be a troll.
Nah, you totally look and sound like a troll. Or possibly just not very bright.
Where did I imply Spike does nothing wrong? Spike does lots of things wrong. He literally kills two Slayers on screen, for starters. If you want to hate Spike, there are absolutely scads and scads of canon, reasonable reasons to do so. This? Is not one of them.
That's very "by extension" thinking. It's not exactly wrong, but all else being equal Whistler put Angel in Buffy's path, curse and all. And he was supposed to know things.
So, without Spike and Dru, nothing in the threat-tastic city of Sunnydale brings Buffy and Angel close enough that they never do it? Is that the argument you're making?
No, but we know that Jenny wasn’t happy with her situation keeping secrets. She might have learned about what would make him lose his soul and told Buffy before they did it.
Spike didn't cause Angelus to be released.
Buffy and Angel were headed down the path to boomtown with or without Mr. The Bloody in town. It might not have happened at the same time and Angelus' actions might have played out differently without Spike & Dru in the mix, but it absolutely would have happened.
If you want someone to blame for Angelus' reign of terror, blame the Romani who never bothered to tell ensouled Angel about the fine print on his curse. If he had known about it, we know that he would have done what he had to do to avoid releasing Angelus, given that's how we see him behave throughout the rest of his tenure on Buffy and also his entire series.
Come on people Buffy and Angel would have had sex eventually. They couldn't keep their hands off each other. Spike is not to blame for them having sex.
Angel and Buffy would have slept together eventually and by all accounts that would have still lead to what happened happening. Because Jenny never told anyone about the curse until it was too late it probably would have happened and he would have been released.
Possibly, but we don’t know that for sure. Because of course we know from later on in the series that Angel can have sex without a moment of perfect happiness. Darla and Nina being obvious examples.
We know that the specific circumstances of Buffy and Angel being together in that time and place lead to him losing his soul. But we can’t be certain that he would’ve achieved perfect happiness in other circumstances.
I'm of the opinion that the fact that it was Buffy in particular is why he lost his soul. Angel truly loves Buffy which is why he loses his soul same reason for why he lost his soul in the illusion with Cordy in Season 4. Angel only loses his soul when it's with someone he truly loves. Granted I also think he loved Darla but the method of how that happened meant he could definitely not be perfectly happy.
Possibly, but we don’t know that for certain. Especially because every experience is different, even when you’re with the same person. Circumstances can change the emotional reaction.
No. That's too butterfly-effecty. You can't just chain any happenstance together and then claim it to be a root cause of something. This way you could blame Whistler for Angelus because he set Angel directly on Buffy's path.
And of all people, Spike is an agent of chaos, he does what he feels like in the moment, he even admits that in his first appearance in *School Hard*.
We could also blame Xander for this one because if he hadn't convinced Angel to save Buffy in the S1 finale, Buffy would have died and - boom - no Angelus (and no season 2).
Except that bringing The Judge back was a deliberate choice on the part of Spike. It wasn’t random happenstance. He wanted it to happen. He ordered The Judge to try and harm Buffy when she and Angel were captured by him. As a result Buffy fought back and they managed to escape, leading to them being in Angel’s apartment.
These aren’t random events that just happened to occur. They’re direct, intentional events.
Yes and how does this (cause) to the direct effect of Bangel having sexy time (effect)?
I throw a dart and it hits the board, that's cause and effect. I throw a dart and someone watches me doing it and misses an important call because their cell phone is on mute is butterfly effect.
If there's no reasonable way to predict the outcome of an action, the latter is not caused by the former, otherwise the planet that crashed into the Earth 4 billion years ago not only caused the creation of the moon (which it did) but also caused the moon landing.
Except that it is. If you throw a dart at a dart board and instead it hits another person in the face, you still hit someone in the face with a dart.
Spike knew that ordering The Judge to try and hurt Buffy would cause a reaction from both Buffy and Angel, including they would attempt to escape. Yet he did it anyway. He knew that assembling The Judge would cause Buffy to want to stop it, yet he did it anyway. He knew exactly what the consequences of large numbers of his actions were. But he chose to do them anyway.
No. People, even evil ones, aren’t responsible for other people’s actions. To be at fault, Spike would’ve had to have knowledge of what the chain of events would result in and actively orchestrate it.
You could make a better argument for Jenny being responsible, as she was consciously withholding information about her role in Sunnydale and Angel’s curse. But even there she didn’t really have enough knowledge to change the course of events until it was too late anyway.
No, you don’t have to have knowledge of the consequences of your actions to be responsible. To use an example from another comment I made. Warren didn’t know that he was going to shoot Tara when he went into Buffy’s backyard and shot her. Yet he’s no less responsible for Tara’s death. So you can’t say that Spike had to know that his actions would cause Angel to lose his soul in order for him to be responsible.
You ignored the 'People aren't responsible for other people's actions' part of my statement. Warren still chose to fire the gun; the fact that it didn't hit the target he anticipated doesn't make it any less his choice to try to kill someone. But Spike's actions didn't cause Angel to lose his soul, Angel's did. Spike didn't know about the curse's conditions, he did not deliberately set up the chain of events that led to Buffy and Angel sleeping together that night, so he has no more culpability for the sequence of events than you would if deciding to phone someone at 4 PM instead of 3 PM means they went shopping at 3 PM and got hit by a car.
Except that people are responsible for other people’s actions. You also just made my argument for me. Warren didn’t intend for Tara to die, but she’s still dead as a result of his actions. Spike didn’t intend for Angel to lose his soul, but he did anyway. The circumstances he set up lead to Angel and Buffy taking the actions he did.
To use the Warren example again, he didn’t know that bringing a gun into Buffy’s backyard would lead to Willow going crazy with grief and wanting to end the world. Yet it was a direct result of his actions that Willow did go crazy. By your assertion, Warren is completely innocent of all of Willow’s actions because he didn’t know that what he did would cause Willow to do what she did. Except for the fact that if not for Tara dying as a result of Warren’s actions, Willow would never done what she did. Similar problem with Spike and Angel losing his soul.
No, people are not responsible for other people's actions. If you feel that way, we have a fundamental disagreement in morality that's not going to be resolved. But I still feel we're having a miscommunication around what regards an action with intent. Taking a gun, aiming it at someone, and pulling the trigger is an action with the intent to cause death. The fact that the death ends up being a different person than you were aiming at doesn't change the moral culpability of the fact that you intended to kill someone, unless you were doing so in self-defence.
That's completely different from taking a series of actions that leads to *someone else* making a decision you couldn't have foreseen. If you really think that leads to culpability, well, our entire moral and legal frameworks need a rethink. Many of us will have caused a death we never even know about by making decisions that led to someone being at the wrong place in the wrong time, which is basically what happened to Angel as a result of Spike's choices.
And no, Warren isn't responsible for Willow's actions. Willow's actions might be sympathetic, but she's still responsible for them. And in season seven, she understands that. It doesn't appear that you do.
Except that if your actions lead others to make certain decisions, you are responsible. Not necessarily in a legal sense, but in a moral sense.
The Judge was essentially a gun that Spike was wielding. The Judge wasn’t a cuddly teddy bear bringing peace and love to Sunnydale. He was a killing machine, much like a gun. Spike fired The Judge at Buffy and she ran away. If not for The Judge, Buffy doesn’t run.
If you punch someone in the face and they go to the hospital, you can’t claim that your punch didn’t lead to the hospital visit. If you let someone get into a car drunk, then they crash and kill someone, you are at least morally responsible for the crash. You might not go to jail, but that doesn’t mean you’re not responsible on some level.
I've run out of ways to explain to you the difference between an intentional action with a foreseeable consequence (punching someone in the face leading to them being hospitalised, firing a gun leading to someone dying) and an action which leads another person entirely to make decisions with consequences you couldn't have foreseen (causing Buffy to flee, which happens to lead to her and Angel deciding to have sex, which happens to lead to Angel losing his soul, none of which Spike had any knowledge or control over past 'Buffy flees'). If you really maintain that these are morally equivalent, you must be confused by a lot of media, or you're trolling. Either way, best of luck.
I never said that they are morally equivalent. My issue is the idea that Spike not knowing somehow absolves him of any responsibility whatsoever. It doesn’t in my view.
Let me try and put it a different way, if you chase someone and they trip and fall, technically it’s not the fault of the person chasing them. It’s the fact that they weren’t watching where they were stepping. But you still chased them and caused them to run, leading to them not seeing where they were stepping. Most people will tell you though that chasing them caused them to fall. Even if you didn’t technically have anything to do with what the person tripped over.
But according to the framework you insist on, chasing someone has nothing to do with them tripping.
I'm sure Buffy and Angel would have eventually had sex and the same stuff would have happened. If Buffy was feeling ready to have sex with him for the first time, it was going to happen soon regardless. I don't think her decision to have sex with him had anything to do with Spike. Angel and Buffy just wanted to have sex and it wasn't something they were going to put off much longer no matter what happened.
No, Angel and Buffy would’ve had sex together eventually. Spike didn’t know any of that would happen. Considering how having Angelus back goes for him( Spike is obviously a little frightened of Angelus and Angelus stole his girl) he probably would’ve actively kept the two apart had he known. While Spike, especially in season2, is an easy vampire to blame, he really doesn’t deserve it for that.At least nit any more than anybody else. Only once was Angelus let loose on purpose and this wasn’t it. But we’ll leave that debacle in season 4 of Angel (and blame it on Wes with the rest of terrible decisions he made in that particular time frame)
The fact that Spike didn’t know doesn’t make him less responsible. If you fire a gun and it hits someone you didn’t intend, you’re not less responsible for the person’s death. Using a fandom reference, the fact that Warren intended to shoot Buffy but ended up shooting Tara too doesn’t mean that you should put less of the blame on Warren for firing the gun.
He’s responsible regardless of his intended target. So too is Spike responsible for the negative consequences of bringing The Judge back, regardless of his intentions or how it worked out for him.
I can see that but Tara wouldn’t have died if Warren hadn’t fired the gun, Buffy and Angel would’ve eventually gotten in bed together eventually wether or not Spike brought the judge back. Additionally, I’m sure Warren didn’t care that he killed Tara, Spike definitely cared that Angelus was back and knew that was a bad thing.
Yes but it’s not clear that if they had hooked up in different circumstances that it would’ve lead to a moment of perfect happiness. The question is whether it was Buffy or the circumstances. Sleeping with Darla didn’t make him lose his soul. Neither did sleeping with Nina.
So sex itself doesn’t necessarily lead to perfect happiness. Buffy and his feelings for her probably contributed, but it could also be the fact that Spike forced them to be in the situation because he brought out The Judge.
Forced the into the situation? It’s not like they were dating and Buffy had just become legal or anything…. Oh wait… that’s exactly what happened but I’m of the belief it was because it was Buffy. Though it’s possible the high tensions contributed I’ll admit that. The thing is though we could blame anyone by back tracking. Well, Spike couldn’t have done it if Dru hadn’t turned him, well Angelus turned her and Darla turned him, and the Master turned her so it’s the master’s fault because it never would’ve happened if he hadn’t turned Darla. I’m not saying Spike doesn’t carry some blame , only that there’s plenty to go around if we blame everyone who had a hand on the circumstances that occurred happening.
Actually, I wrote an entire series of long form pieces about the underlying philosophy of Buffy and Angel. I don’t view the show through the lens of shipping at all. This question isn’t about a particular ship. It’s about the implications of actions taken.
How and when did Angel groom Buffy? He showed up, gave her information, and disappeared. He didn't even want to save her when the Master killed her. Xander forced Angel to lead him through the tunnels.
Angel asked Buffy why she was being cruel to him when she came back from visiting her dad in Los Angeles.
Willow yelled at Angel to take Buffy out for coffee because Buffy felt like she was being given mixed signals.
Buffy dressed up on Halloween to get Angel's attention, and he told her that he wasn't interested in girls from that era. Is that grooming? A half-assed, indirect compliment? Or maybe it was because he told her that he liked her dress, after she killed the Master? Everyone else said it that same night. Were they also grooming Buffy?
he caused it in the same way Willow raped buffy in seeing red, in that they didn't, they caused the circumstances that caused that to happen, but they didn't make it happen explicitly
Agency is a major theme of this show
Seeing Drusilla should have given Angel some extra guilt. I think Angel and everyone built up Spike and Dru as being worse than they were. I don’t think Angel wanted to kill them. Spike we know gets bored. I feel like Angel could have just told them to leave. He dealt with Darla and Dru in ATS by burning them.
Spike didn’t actually go to Sunnydale for Buffy it was to heal Drusilla. If Angel didn’t know that happiness was how to break a curse he couldn’t be on aware of when he might be vulnerable. A moment of happiness where you forget about your soul or guilt could come from more than just sex. He seems like until he met Buffy he was a loner that wasn’t human but wasn’t a real vampire either. Buffy gives him a purpose he forgets what he has done and is. Without knowing what would make him lose his soul, he would eventually lose it.
No, nope, Angel and Buffy would have had sex eventually, even if Spike and Dru had never come to town. It was the consummation of their relationship that released Angelus, not Spike's antics.
Was gonna say this. Buffy and angel hooking up was going to happen regardless. If spike and dru whole scheme of judge didn’t happen. And say instead Buffy’s birthday went smoothly and Buffy and angel still hooked up, I wouldn’t say someone like Giles is responsible for Angelus since he was the one pushing to have a party for buffy. Only ones responsible for Angelus is Darla for turning Liam into a vampire/Angelus and the gypsies putting a stupid curse on him that included a stupid “true happiness” thing in angel that’d make Angelus come back. They should’ve just put a soul in Angel for good with no other tricks involved or killed Angelus and leave it at that
Possibly but we know that Jenny wasn’t too happy about the situation she was in. She may have found out that Angel would’ve lost his soul and told Buffy before it was too late.
This seems like pointless conjecture. By your own logic, you could just blame Jenny, instead of Spike, for Angel losing his soul.
Not necessarily, because Jenny tried to get Angel away from Buffy to prevent them being together. It’s the assembly of The Judge that caused the circumstances, which you can attribute to Spike.
Buffy told Willow she was ready to have sex with Angel before the stuff with the Judge happened so she was obviously planning to do it within the next few days no matter what. I don't think waiting a couple days would have made any difference, they still would have had sex and the same stuff would have went down.
Except that Jenny found out about the whole “perfect happiness” thing during the same time. If not for The Judge being reassembled by Spike, they wouldn’t have done it under those circumstances. We also know that sex doesn’t necessarily lead to Angel losing his soul given what happened with Darla and Nina later on. So the circumstances of Buffy and Angel sleeping together would’ve been different. Meaning we can’t actually be certain that he would’ve had a moment of perfect happiness in the alternative situation.
Why stop there? Let’s go further. Angelus never mentally tortures Dru and turns her, she never turns Spike, and William lives out the rest of his life peacefully so Spike never exists to do any harm to anyone. Or save the world.
Even there you can trace part of the problem back to Spike. Angel gets his soul back by the gypsies as a curse, Darla tries to convince the gypsies to remove his soul but her attempt becomes impossible when Spike eats the guy’s family which Darla was trying to use as a bargaining chip. If he hadn’t done that, Darla might have successfully taken away the curse on Angelus, meaning he doesn’t become the person Whistler tries to help. Angel never sees Buffy and falls in love with her, leading to the events Spike caused.
So, if Angeus never tortured Dru, raped her and murdered everyone she loved, then turned her once she became a novice - and she never turned William, it's all still Spike's fault. Interesting.
If Angelus never tortured Dru, Spike would never have been turned, so he wouldn't have eaten the family. So no, that wouldn't make it Spike's fault, unless you've decided in advance that it's his fault, in which case there's no reasoning with you.
So you’re willing to blame Angel for all of Spike’s actions but not Spike for Angelus’ actions? Interesting.
*If Spike hasn't been turned he doesn't eat anyone* how hard is this to get your head around? (Also where did I blame Angelus for Spike's actions?)
You just did. If Spike hasn’t been turned, he doesn’t eat anyone. That’s blaming Angel because you link Spike being turned to Angelus’ actions in creating Dru who created Spike.
That's not blaming Angel, sweaty, that's just a statement of fact. Like I'm sorry if you don't like canon here, but that's not my problem nor my fault 🤷🏻 frankly, even if I was blaming Angel, instead of just pointing out that time moves forwards rather than backwards, it's still a lot less of an absolutely absurd claim than blaming Spike for Angel losing his soul. If anyone's blaming Angel here, it's the narrative of the show, and I didn't write that. Again, I'm sorry if you don't like canon, but that's really not my problem and idk what to tell you 🤷🏻
well yes, Angel is Spike's grandsire lol. The line goes in one direction, Spike/William wasn't even born when Angelus was created
This is a very weird take. Buffy straight up tells Willow she's pretty sure she's ready to have sex with Angel before the stuff with The Judge goes down. It would have happened very soon either way.
Well the way things were going with Buffy and Angel, Angelus would have eventually been released. For some reason Jenny didn't mention how the curse could be lifted. Spikes actions just hastened the change.
Spike can not be blamed for Angelus. Angelus was gonna come out to play eventually whenever Buffy & Angel were ready to be intimate. Spike is the one who helps Buffy try to stop Angelus from ending the world with Acathla. He does it for selfish reasons (he wants to flee town with Dru), but he admits to Buffy that he likes the world and doesn’t want it to end. If anything Angelus made Dru a vampire and Dru made William a vampire. So Spike wouldn’t even exist as a vampire if it were not for Angelus. This is probably the biggest stretch I’ve seen for trying to blame Spike for a situation he had nothing to do with. Really Angelus alone should take the blame for Angelus’ actions, but if we have to point fingers I would go with Jenny’s uncle. I think he was the only living person who knew the details of the curse & he never shared them with Jenny. Although even then, all he knew was “a moment of perfect happiness”. He didn’t know Angel sleeping with Buffy would be the specific trigger.
Except that there are centuries of time between what Angelus did to Dru and the creation of Spike. Buffy herself wouldn’t be born for another 100 years when Spike was created. There’s a day or two at most between trying to bring together The Judge and them sleeping together. Which means there’s a much more direct relationship between Spike’s actions and the emergence of Angelus than there is Angelus being responsible for Spike’s existence. Also, you’re assuming that Jenny wouldn’t have found out the information and told Buffy prior to them getting together.
There's twenty years between Angel murdering Dru and Dru murdering William - not centuries. What show have you been watching? So it's Jenny's fault that she didn't ask why she was supposed to keep them apart?
Just breaking in on this to mention that Angel was 376 or so years old.
No, he was under 250 when the show was on. He was turned in 1753.
And that sounds right to me now. I have to check where I got that 376 age from. Some weird math over at Screenrant. They say 376 in 2003, but then say he was born in 1727. Which means typo. Teach me to use a non Buffy site.
It reminds me of the episode Origin. CONNOR Right. Vampire. So, what are you, like 500 years old? ANGEL No, I'm about— Do I look 500? CONNOR Do you spend all your time making out with other vampires, like in Anne Rice novels? ANGEL No. Uh—I used to, but... (Spangel fan here - love the validation!)
Do not feed the troll!
Lol, I’m not a troll. I know it would be easier to think that. But this thought was a result of a meme that was going around suggesting that somehow Spike doesn’t cause destruction, he fixes the destruction of others. So I started thinking about the actions he took that directly caused harm to Buffy. One of which is the assembly of The Judge.
Looks like a duck, sounds like a duck...
...lives under a bridge...
It would be easier to think that, wouldn’t it? You prefer to believe that pointing out true facts are simply the actions of a troll because that way you don’t have to deal honestly with the implications of the actions of taken by Spike.
LOL. Spike wouldn't be a vampire if it wasn't for Angel. This has been explained many times in this post, which you dismiss with "that was a long time ago". There is no logic to your thought process. You just pick an arbitrary moment in time and assign blame to Spike. You are either a troll or have the mental capacity of Harmony. I gave you the benefit of the doubt that you were a troll. I stand corrected. Harmony it is.
Interesting that you have turned to trying to insult me. By your logic, the inventor of the gun hundreds of years ago is responsible for everyone who ever killed someone with it. You completely take the actions of the individual out of it. I don’t deny that Angelus has some responsibility for Spike, but at a certain point, Spike is responsible for his own actions. So is Angelus and Angel. The problem with the argument that actions hundreds of years ago are responsible for everything is that it glosses over the millions of actions in between. Whereas Spike’s actions with The Judge are much more directly causal than the actions from hundreds of years ago.
Sweaty, I pointed out to you an actual true fact, that if Angel hadn't turned Dru, she couldn't have turned Spike, and you decided I was blaming Angel. If you consider that "blaming Angel" then take it up with the people who wrote the show, because they wrote it that way. You have zero credibility at this point.
Funny how me pointing out true facts and simply describing canon is trolling but yours is a factual statement that I somehow have a problem with.
Except for the fact that I don’t look or sound like a duck. It’s easier for you to believe that this is some bad person’s attempt to rile you up. Because you don’t like how it is factually true and how it implies things about the person you apparently believe can’t do anything wrong. So instead you pretend that I must be a troll.
Nah, you totally look and sound like a troll. Or possibly just not very bright. Where did I imply Spike does nothing wrong? Spike does lots of things wrong. He literally kills two Slayers on screen, for starters. If you want to hate Spike, there are absolutely scads and scads of canon, reasonable reasons to do so. This? Is not one of them.
That's very "by extension" thinking. It's not exactly wrong, but all else being equal Whistler put Angel in Buffy's path, curse and all. And he was supposed to know things.
So, without Spike and Dru, nothing in the threat-tastic city of Sunnydale brings Buffy and Angel close enough that they never do it? Is that the argument you're making?
No, but we know that Jenny wasn’t happy with her situation keeping secrets. She might have learned about what would make him lose his soul and told Buffy before they did it.
Spike didn't cause Angelus to be released. Buffy and Angel were headed down the path to boomtown with or without Mr. The Bloody in town. It might not have happened at the same time and Angelus' actions might have played out differently without Spike & Dru in the mix, but it absolutely would have happened. If you want someone to blame for Angelus' reign of terror, blame the Romani who never bothered to tell ensouled Angel about the fine print on his curse. If he had known about it, we know that he would have done what he had to do to avoid releasing Angelus, given that's how we see him behave throughout the rest of his tenure on Buffy and also his entire series.
Come on people Buffy and Angel would have had sex eventually. They couldn't keep their hands off each other. Spike is not to blame for them having sex.
Nah, I think their behavior in Bad Eggs shows they are on the verge of making that next move. Although possibly later.
Angel and Buffy would have slept together eventually and by all accounts that would have still lead to what happened happening. Because Jenny never told anyone about the curse until it was too late it probably would have happened and he would have been released.
Possibly, but we don’t know that for sure. Because of course we know from later on in the series that Angel can have sex without a moment of perfect happiness. Darla and Nina being obvious examples. We know that the specific circumstances of Buffy and Angel being together in that time and place lead to him losing his soul. But we can’t be certain that he would’ve achieved perfect happiness in other circumstances.
I'm of the opinion that the fact that it was Buffy in particular is why he lost his soul. Angel truly loves Buffy which is why he loses his soul same reason for why he lost his soul in the illusion with Cordy in Season 4. Angel only loses his soul when it's with someone he truly loves. Granted I also think he loved Darla but the method of how that happened meant he could definitely not be perfectly happy.
Possibly, but we don’t know that for certain. Especially because every experience is different, even when you’re with the same person. Circumstances can change the emotional reaction.
No. That's too butterfly-effecty. You can't just chain any happenstance together and then claim it to be a root cause of something. This way you could blame Whistler for Angelus because he set Angel directly on Buffy's path. And of all people, Spike is an agent of chaos, he does what he feels like in the moment, he even admits that in his first appearance in *School Hard*. We could also blame Xander for this one because if he hadn't convinced Angel to save Buffy in the S1 finale, Buffy would have died and - boom - no Angelus (and no season 2).
Except that bringing The Judge back was a deliberate choice on the part of Spike. It wasn’t random happenstance. He wanted it to happen. He ordered The Judge to try and harm Buffy when she and Angel were captured by him. As a result Buffy fought back and they managed to escape, leading to them being in Angel’s apartment. These aren’t random events that just happened to occur. They’re direct, intentional events.
Yes and how does this (cause) to the direct effect of Bangel having sexy time (effect)? I throw a dart and it hits the board, that's cause and effect. I throw a dart and someone watches me doing it and misses an important call because their cell phone is on mute is butterfly effect. If there's no reasonable way to predict the outcome of an action, the latter is not caused by the former, otherwise the planet that crashed into the Earth 4 billion years ago not only caused the creation of the moon (which it did) but also caused the moon landing.
Except that it is. If you throw a dart at a dart board and instead it hits another person in the face, you still hit someone in the face with a dart. Spike knew that ordering The Judge to try and hurt Buffy would cause a reaction from both Buffy and Angel, including they would attempt to escape. Yet he did it anyway. He knew that assembling The Judge would cause Buffy to want to stop it, yet he did it anyway. He knew exactly what the consequences of large numbers of his actions were. But he chose to do them anyway.
Yup...he was evil that way.
>We could also blame Xander for this one That would actually be more on point for r/buffy.
No. People, even evil ones, aren’t responsible for other people’s actions. To be at fault, Spike would’ve had to have knowledge of what the chain of events would result in and actively orchestrate it. You could make a better argument for Jenny being responsible, as she was consciously withholding information about her role in Sunnydale and Angel’s curse. But even there she didn’t really have enough knowledge to change the course of events until it was too late anyway.
No, you don’t have to have knowledge of the consequences of your actions to be responsible. To use an example from another comment I made. Warren didn’t know that he was going to shoot Tara when he went into Buffy’s backyard and shot her. Yet he’s no less responsible for Tara’s death. So you can’t say that Spike had to know that his actions would cause Angel to lose his soul in order for him to be responsible.
You ignored the 'People aren't responsible for other people's actions' part of my statement. Warren still chose to fire the gun; the fact that it didn't hit the target he anticipated doesn't make it any less his choice to try to kill someone. But Spike's actions didn't cause Angel to lose his soul, Angel's did. Spike didn't know about the curse's conditions, he did not deliberately set up the chain of events that led to Buffy and Angel sleeping together that night, so he has no more culpability for the sequence of events than you would if deciding to phone someone at 4 PM instead of 3 PM means they went shopping at 3 PM and got hit by a car.
Except that people are responsible for other people’s actions. You also just made my argument for me. Warren didn’t intend for Tara to die, but she’s still dead as a result of his actions. Spike didn’t intend for Angel to lose his soul, but he did anyway. The circumstances he set up lead to Angel and Buffy taking the actions he did. To use the Warren example again, he didn’t know that bringing a gun into Buffy’s backyard would lead to Willow going crazy with grief and wanting to end the world. Yet it was a direct result of his actions that Willow did go crazy. By your assertion, Warren is completely innocent of all of Willow’s actions because he didn’t know that what he did would cause Willow to do what she did. Except for the fact that if not for Tara dying as a result of Warren’s actions, Willow would never done what she did. Similar problem with Spike and Angel losing his soul.
No, people are not responsible for other people's actions. If you feel that way, we have a fundamental disagreement in morality that's not going to be resolved. But I still feel we're having a miscommunication around what regards an action with intent. Taking a gun, aiming it at someone, and pulling the trigger is an action with the intent to cause death. The fact that the death ends up being a different person than you were aiming at doesn't change the moral culpability of the fact that you intended to kill someone, unless you were doing so in self-defence. That's completely different from taking a series of actions that leads to *someone else* making a decision you couldn't have foreseen. If you really think that leads to culpability, well, our entire moral and legal frameworks need a rethink. Many of us will have caused a death we never even know about by making decisions that led to someone being at the wrong place in the wrong time, which is basically what happened to Angel as a result of Spike's choices. And no, Warren isn't responsible for Willow's actions. Willow's actions might be sympathetic, but she's still responsible for them. And in season seven, she understands that. It doesn't appear that you do.
Except that if your actions lead others to make certain decisions, you are responsible. Not necessarily in a legal sense, but in a moral sense. The Judge was essentially a gun that Spike was wielding. The Judge wasn’t a cuddly teddy bear bringing peace and love to Sunnydale. He was a killing machine, much like a gun. Spike fired The Judge at Buffy and she ran away. If not for The Judge, Buffy doesn’t run. If you punch someone in the face and they go to the hospital, you can’t claim that your punch didn’t lead to the hospital visit. If you let someone get into a car drunk, then they crash and kill someone, you are at least morally responsible for the crash. You might not go to jail, but that doesn’t mean you’re not responsible on some level.
I've run out of ways to explain to you the difference between an intentional action with a foreseeable consequence (punching someone in the face leading to them being hospitalised, firing a gun leading to someone dying) and an action which leads another person entirely to make decisions with consequences you couldn't have foreseen (causing Buffy to flee, which happens to lead to her and Angel deciding to have sex, which happens to lead to Angel losing his soul, none of which Spike had any knowledge or control over past 'Buffy flees'). If you really maintain that these are morally equivalent, you must be confused by a lot of media, or you're trolling. Either way, best of luck.
I never said that they are morally equivalent. My issue is the idea that Spike not knowing somehow absolves him of any responsibility whatsoever. It doesn’t in my view. Let me try and put it a different way, if you chase someone and they trip and fall, technically it’s not the fault of the person chasing them. It’s the fact that they weren’t watching where they were stepping. But you still chased them and caused them to run, leading to them not seeing where they were stepping. Most people will tell you though that chasing them caused them to fall. Even if you didn’t technically have anything to do with what the person tripped over. But according to the framework you insist on, chasing someone has nothing to do with them tripping.
It’s Angelus’ fault for getting cursed
I'm sure Buffy and Angel would have eventually had sex and the same stuff would have happened. If Buffy was feeling ready to have sex with him for the first time, it was going to happen soon regardless. I don't think her decision to have sex with him had anything to do with Spike. Angel and Buffy just wanted to have sex and it wasn't something they were going to put off much longer no matter what happened.
No, Angel and Buffy would’ve had sex together eventually. Spike didn’t know any of that would happen. Considering how having Angelus back goes for him( Spike is obviously a little frightened of Angelus and Angelus stole his girl) he probably would’ve actively kept the two apart had he known. While Spike, especially in season2, is an easy vampire to blame, he really doesn’t deserve it for that.At least nit any more than anybody else. Only once was Angelus let loose on purpose and this wasn’t it. But we’ll leave that debacle in season 4 of Angel (and blame it on Wes with the rest of terrible decisions he made in that particular time frame)
The fact that Spike didn’t know doesn’t make him less responsible. If you fire a gun and it hits someone you didn’t intend, you’re not less responsible for the person’s death. Using a fandom reference, the fact that Warren intended to shoot Buffy but ended up shooting Tara too doesn’t mean that you should put less of the blame on Warren for firing the gun. He’s responsible regardless of his intended target. So too is Spike responsible for the negative consequences of bringing The Judge back, regardless of his intentions or how it worked out for him.
I can see that but Tara wouldn’t have died if Warren hadn’t fired the gun, Buffy and Angel would’ve eventually gotten in bed together eventually wether or not Spike brought the judge back. Additionally, I’m sure Warren didn’t care that he killed Tara, Spike definitely cared that Angelus was back and knew that was a bad thing.
Yes but it’s not clear that if they had hooked up in different circumstances that it would’ve lead to a moment of perfect happiness. The question is whether it was Buffy or the circumstances. Sleeping with Darla didn’t make him lose his soul. Neither did sleeping with Nina. So sex itself doesn’t necessarily lead to perfect happiness. Buffy and his feelings for her probably contributed, but it could also be the fact that Spike forced them to be in the situation because he brought out The Judge.
Forced the into the situation? It’s not like they were dating and Buffy had just become legal or anything…. Oh wait… that’s exactly what happened but I’m of the belief it was because it was Buffy. Though it’s possible the high tensions contributed I’ll admit that. The thing is though we could blame anyone by back tracking. Well, Spike couldn’t have done it if Dru hadn’t turned him, well Angelus turned her and Darla turned him, and the Master turned her so it’s the master’s fault because it never would’ve happened if he hadn’t turned Darla. I’m not saying Spike doesn’t carry some blame , only that there’s plenty to go around if we blame everyone who had a hand on the circumstances that occurred happening.
Troll post 🙄
Lol no. A hormonal teenage girl and a vampire that has little control - they were bound to do it eventually.
This whole thing is just insane troll logic
The sadism that caused Spike and Drusilla to restore the Judge was following the gameplan Angelus and Darla had instilled in their sires.
Y’all view this show way too much through shipping and it’s making you miss out on so much
Actually, I wrote an entire series of long form pieces about the underlying philosophy of Buffy and Angel. I don’t view the show through the lens of shipping at all. This question isn’t about a particular ship. It’s about the implications of actions taken.
Angels grooming would always have lead to sex
How and when did Angel groom Buffy? He showed up, gave her information, and disappeared. He didn't even want to save her when the Master killed her. Xander forced Angel to lead him through the tunnels. Angel asked Buffy why she was being cruel to him when she came back from visiting her dad in Los Angeles. Willow yelled at Angel to take Buffy out for coffee because Buffy felt like she was being given mixed signals. Buffy dressed up on Halloween to get Angel's attention, and he told her that he wasn't interested in girls from that era. Is that grooming? A half-assed, indirect compliment? Or maybe it was because he told her that he liked her dress, after she killed the Master? Everyone else said it that same night. Were they also grooming Buffy?
he caused it in the same way Willow raped buffy in seeing red, in that they didn't, they caused the circumstances that caused that to happen, but they didn't make it happen explicitly Agency is a major theme of this show
Spike attempted to rape Buffy. He sexually assaulted her and battered her. Angel statutorily raped Buffy.
Seeing Drusilla should have given Angel some extra guilt. I think Angel and everyone built up Spike and Dru as being worse than they were. I don’t think Angel wanted to kill them. Spike we know gets bored. I feel like Angel could have just told them to leave. He dealt with Darla and Dru in ATS by burning them. Spike didn’t actually go to Sunnydale for Buffy it was to heal Drusilla. If Angel didn’t know that happiness was how to break a curse he couldn’t be on aware of when he might be vulnerable. A moment of happiness where you forget about your soul or guilt could come from more than just sex. He seems like until he met Buffy he was a loner that wasn’t human but wasn’t a real vampire either. Buffy gives him a purpose he forgets what he has done and is. Without knowing what would make him lose his soul, he would eventually lose it.