If you’ve been active in the Buffy fandom at any point in the last twenty years, you’ll know that there are a few big questions that come up in fan spaces at least once every month to be endlessly debated. Topics that are litigated and re-litigated and re-re-re-re-ligitated until everyone who has participated in them is sick to their back teeth, but will inevitably bring themselves to comment on it when it comes round again. Was Buffy right in Selfless? Is Willow really gay or bisexual? Was That Scene in Seeing Red acceptable? What about that other one? Was Xander right to say “kick his ass”? Is Xander ever right? What is the soul anyway? Season Six*. And perhaps the greatest discourse generator of all – Buffy’s love life.
It is an irrefutable Law of Fandom that where there are characters, there will be shipping. Actually, scratch that – if the Onceler fandom is anything to go by, there will be shipping even where there aren’t characters[1]. This inevitability comes closer when you have a show that is, at least in part, a teen drama = a genre where romantic hijinks are a staple – full of attractive, young, shippable people. And then you add in vampires, who have in some ways been sex symbols since Bram Stoker’s time. The most famous ship war (one that actually gained mainstream media attention) comes from Twilight, another vampire-themed teen drama. The Vampire Diaries and Buffy are echoes of this phenomenon on either side of history.
Buffy, of course, always had greater artistic ambitions than these other series, to the point that you really can’t compare them. This isn’t to knock the appeal of these other series (if you root around on the internet you can probably still find my Elena/Elijah fan fiction), but Buffy was a show that always strove to be about something meaningful in every episode. It’s a show that lives in metaphor, symbolism, parallels, foreshadowing, meaning greater than itself. It didn’t always succeed (that’s when you get Beer Bad or Beauty and the Beasts), but most of the time it did. And the very fact that it had these ambitions I think puts this show in a different artistic category, closer to the “prestige TV” that arrived at the end of the 90s than to the YA trend of stock heroines and their Hot Monster Boyfriends. But still, inevitably, one of the defining debates of the Buffy fandom is the burning question of which sultry serial killer you want Buffy to hook up with.
To some extent, Buffy does invite this. Romantic subplots are a constant presence across most episodes. Romance has tidal-wave impacts on whole season arcs – almost destroying the world in S2, and arguably saving it in S7. Every main character apart from Giles after S2 always has a dedicated love interest as a secondary character. Angel and Spike are interesting characters outside of this, but they are also Hot Monster Boyfriends in their own way.
I think a totally myopic view of shipping as a sports competition is a detriment to good critical analysis. I have seen in fandom how ships can override other debates, and a debate about “is Season Six a good season?” ends up as a proxy debate for “are you a Spuffy shipper?”. If your absolute number one priority when you watch Buffy is the question of who Buffy ends up with then, well, good for you, I hope you enjoy doing that, but you’re not getting the full experience of Buffy as a show.
At the same time though, there is a trend of backlash against shipping, where having an opinion on a character’s love life is seen as a bit gauche, a bit low-brow. The correct opinion is to say “shipping isn’t that important, you should be talking about Buffy’s character arc”. And while I get that in part, I think that it’s myopic in its own way, to suppose that romance is less important than any other part of a character’s life. Romance is important to an awful lot of people. In art, viewing the show through the lens of a particular relationship (through “shipping goggles” if you will) can sometimes be very revealing, and lead to really interesting insights. Shipping done well is a benefit to a fandom, and some of the backlash against it I think can be tinged with the assumption that things that primarily women are interested in are inherently more frivolous. And finally, I think that the “romance isn’t that important” viewpoint would have one very important objector – Buffy herself.
The main concern of Never Kill A Boy On the First Date is love, romance, and how it relates to Buffy. The focus isn’t on Buffy/Owen in the way that for example I Will Remember You is about Buffy/Angel, because Owen doesn’t really matter as a person in his own right. It’s about the concept of dating and how it can relate to Buffy’s life, and Owen is a stand-in for every potential love interest of Buffy’s. There are two questions that this episode is asking: Should Buffy Be Dating People and If So, Who Should She Date?
Buffy is split into two people – the Girl who wants to go on dates, and the Slayer who has to save the world. Giles, as he so often does in this season, represents Buffy’s commitment to The Mission. He sarcastically dismisses her normal-girl wishes in the face of the the utmost importance of ancient prophecies (“Alright, I’ll just jump in my time machine, go back to the twelfth century and ask the vampires to postpone their ancient prophecy for a few days while you take in dinner and a show.”). Just as in Witch, he objects to the supposed frivolity of the normal human life Buffy wants to lead. Subtextually it’s also the supposed frivolity of the typically female interests (cheerleading, dating boys) that is being objected to, in comparison to the (typically male in most stories) Heroic destiny.
Buffy is resolute in her own mission – to have her own life. She chooses to make romance a part of that life. The trouble comes in the attempts to balance that life with her life as a Slayer. So her instinct is to split herself into two people. Just as in Witch, where she insisted that she could save the world from vampires but also do “something normal”, she again explains that she wants to live in both these worlds, but keep them both separate. She invokes the classic Superhero trope of the secret identity as an example.
“This is the 90’s. The 1990’s, in point of fact, and I can do both. Clark Kent has a job. I just wanna go on a date.”
Buffy Summers, 1×05 Never Kill A Boy On The First Date
Buffy has always made the most sense to me as a Superhero story first, and other genres second. (If nothing else, it explains the prevalence of robots alongside fantasy monsters). Buffy slots right in alongside any other famous Superhero, secret identity and all. Her Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne/Peter Parker is The Girl, and her Superman/Batman/Spider-man is The Slayer. A major conflict of the show is Buffy’s evolving attempt to find a synthesis between these two sides of herself. Her arc in season one isn’t about coming to accept the Slayer side of herself and committing to her destiny, it is about bringing both sides together and accepting that they both need to exist.
Giles is on a journey to learning this lesson. At the episode’s end, he sits down with Buffy and compliments her achievements so far. He states explicitly that his tomes of Ancient Prophecies – the dry representation of the Slayer Mission – do not provide all the answers. They can only be felt out by living a life. While he is still a figure of responsibility and her Magical Destiny, he comes to respect and acknowledge Buffy’s existence as a person.
“I have volumes of lore, of prophecies, of predictions. But I don’t have an instruction manual. We feel our way as we go along.”
Rupert Giles, 1×05 Never Kill A Boy On The First Date
We see who Buffy could become if she committed wholly and solely to Ancient Prophecies and Magical Destinies and dismissed the human part of herself – she’d be the Anointed One. He enters in this episode as a pure distillation of Prophecy and Destiny, having little personality or autonomy outside of what is written for him. He “rises from the ashes of the dead”, just as Slayers rise out of the death of another slayer. He is effectively called the Chosen One. He is described as “the Master’s Warrior”, in the same way that the Slayer is intended as a warrior against the forces of darkness.
Through that lens, we could see The Master as a twisted mirror of Giles. He is the Anointed’s Watcher in a way, guiding him to his preordained destiny, just as Giles is trying to do with Buffy. ‘Master’ and ‘Watcher’ are words with a similar implication of paternal oversight and control. The Master and Giles are both shown giving lessons in this episode (“Here endeth the lesson”) Following Giles’ guidance leads Buffy to the Master, and the Master is the very image of Ancient Vampiric Prophecies. It’s becoming obvious to me now why in Buffy’s dream in When She Was Bad, she pulls the mask off Giles to reveal The Master.
We never learn anything about the Anointed, other than that he seemed to be traveling with his mother. We don’t know his interests, or his favourites, or his desires as a human being. He is Buffy if she shed the part of herself that wants to cheerlead and go on dates. Importantly, he is forever trapped in the body of a child. His childhood is eternal. If season one is a journey into adulthood for Buffy, then the Anointed, a character who will never grow up, must represent the path that Buffy should not take. That path is one of Magical Destiny and Ancient Prophecy, a cold life with no room for love or companionship.
I think this episode is pretty firm in the fact that Buffy should be allowed to date. So the question is then, what kind of person should she date. Our case study in that question is the first of Buffy’s canonical love interests – Owen.
The first thing we notice about Owen is that he is a prototype version of Angel. He is described as “solitary, mysterious”, “the type of person to lock themselves in a dark room with a book”,”manly yet sensitive”, as having the ability to “brood for 40 minutes straight”. These are literally just descriptions of Angel. He even kind of comes back from the dead at the end of the episode, just as Buffy’s love interests are wont to do. Buffy does indeed have a type it seems.
We saw Buffy becoming closer to Angel in Teacher’s Pet, so it makes sense that in this episode she is drawn to an off-brand version of him. As Buffy’s shadow, Cordelia also makes a play for Owen, and later in the episode she rapidly switches her attention to Angel himself. This takes on another level of humour when you consider how Cordy and Angel’s relationship develops in the later seasons of Angel.
Angel himself is starting to edge into a more recognisable version of the character. In the first few episodes we’ve seen David Boreanaz play a confident, wisecracking, sarcastic Trickster Mentor who pokes at Buffy’s competence (“I knew you’d find this place sooner or later. Actually, I thought it’d be sooner.”). He’s a fine enough character, but he’s not Angel, or at least not an Angel that makes sense at this point in his arc. The slightly awkward figure we see here, lying badly about knowing Buffy “from work”, is closer to the dorky Angel we will come to enjoy.
As mentioned earlier, Buffy is trying to distillate the two parts of herself, and this does not go unnoticed by Owen.
“One minute you’re right there, I’ve got you figured. The next, it’s like you’re two people.”
Owen and Buffy Summers,1×05 Never Kill A Boy On The First Date
“Really? Which one do you like better?”
“I’ll let you know.“
Despite Owen’s informed allure, this immediately displays an issue with him as a potential love interest for Buffy, namely that he doesn’t seem to actually like her. Just before this, he straight-up Not Like Other Girls her (“It’s my fault. I just find most girls pretty frivolous. I mean, there’s a lot more important things in life than dating, y’know?”). This is a problem, because part of the point of Buffy as a character is that she is, in fact, Like Other Girls. She likes shopping and cheerleading and boys and all the things that are so readily dismissed as “frivolous”. She is “just a girl”. The Girl and The Slayer. Comparing this scene to Buffy’s stated insecurities in The Replacement is one of the best cases you can make for the appeal of Riley as Buffy’s love interest.
“I have Buffy Buffy. Being the slayer’s part of who you are. You keep thinking I don’t get that… if you led a perfectly normal life, you wouldn’t be half as crazy as you are. I gotta have that. I gotta have it all. I’m talking toes, elbows, the whole bad-ice-skating-movie obsession, everything. There’s no part of you I’m not in love with.”
Riley Finn, 5×03 The Replacement
Owen is only interested in The Slayer. This is not surprising – we are introduced to him with his love for Emily Dickinson, and he specifically cites the morbidity of her writing as the main appeal for him. The Slayer is a symbol and instrument of pure morbid death. He is not a person who will respect Buffy as a person – only as The Slayer.
When Buffy sees Owen on the morning after the adventure in the funeral home, she fears that he may have seen too much of The Slayer, and so will be put off The Girl. It is in fact the opposite problem – he likes The Slayer too much. He turns out to be a thrill-seeker who gets a rush from being so close to death. He shows little to no interest in Buffy the Girl. Both Buffy and the audience are led to believe that this is a story about Buffy’s Slayer life getting in the way of her love life, and her having to abandon one of them. But it’s a touch more complex than that. Both this season and this episode are about how Buffy will bring together and balance both parts of herself.
Xander is right when he says that Buffy needs somebody who knows her secrets, and still likes her anyway. The Heart is correct in this matter of the heart. Not someone who is only interested in her secrets, in The Slayer, nor someone who doesn’t know all her secrets, and only knows The Girl. Neither of those people are the complete Buffy Summers. A romantic relationship that does not acknowledge someone’s entire personhood is as unhealthy as a life that is lived while repressing a part of oneself. It would be a partial love. Who should Buffy be with? She should be with someone who appreciates the multitudes contained within her. Who loves The Girl and The Slayer, as Buffy is slowly learning to love both parts of herself. They should love Buffy like we love Buffy, warts and all. So with that resolved, the fandom will have no more need to argue about this.
…Right?
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References:
[1] Sarah Z, Tumblr’s Strangest Obsession: A History of the Onceler Fandom, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us5Y_Kba7To
*No, Both, No, Yes, No, Yes, Choice and Hoo Boy.
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