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red_satin_doll) wrote2013-02-06 01:21 pm
red_satin_doll) wrote2013-02-06 01:21 pm
Entry tags:
Potential Rupert Giles Prompt Puppy (don't say "bunny" or Anya will freak, 'kay?)
ETA 10/08/13: Dead Things screencap
Has anyone ever written a Buffyverse fic in which Giles, not Willow, becomes the Big Bad? The idea occurred to me not long after reading the episode notes for WTTH by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
2maggie2
In the Bronze, Buffy sees Giles up on the balcony, and he calls her attention to the others out there dancing -- she’s separate from them, with a duty to protect them. (The scene gets called back in season six in Dead Things when Spike adds another layer to Buffy’s fundamental separation from others – but it starts here in the very first episode).
Maggie is talking specifically within the context of how Buffy is separated from her friends/family as the Slayer from the very first episode, but her comments brought back the memory of one of my first visceral reactions to the series. There was something astonishingly creepy about the way Giles is suddenly "there", beside her, an older man next to a 16-year-old girl (foreshadowing Bangel), and I didn't have a "bead" on his character yet. The idea that he would turn out to be a villain who betrays Buffy and isn't what he seems, was as likely a notion as anything else. All of which turns out to be true and false at the same time: he doesn't turn out to be a villain but he does have a dark past as the Ripper (as does Angel), he does betray Buffy at times (Helpless, LMPTM), he kills a man behind Buffy's back knowing she wouldn't approve (The Gift).
And when I watched the balcony scene in Dead Things ("Alone in dark with me") my mind was racing back to the parallel scene in WTTH, giving both scenes greater emotional power - foreshadowing squared to th nth egree. The writers surely could not have imagined any of these events when this was written and shot, bu bless* them for knowingly or unknowingly providing the bones right from the start for everything that was to come.
So if I'd had to guess which of the Core Four was most likely to become a Big Bad down the road at the time I was watching S1, I probably would have said Giles. So it got me wondering if "Giles as the Big Bad" has been done as a fanfiction. I can't imagine someone in the last 15 years hasn't played with the concept. If Willow as the Big Bad was fraught with emotional turmoil, the drama and angst of Giles in that role could make LMPTM look like a Sunday cake-walk.
So, gentle flisters - point me the way to one that's already been written, or let that little puppy play around in your head for a while until you come up with something grand. FYI : I've decided to adopt the term plot puppy because: it's still a small, cute animal that you can stroke and love and huggle, and it won't upset Anya needlessly. In this case, a puppy with very sharp teeth that isn't nearly as harmless as it looks.
ETA:beer_good_foamy and I both ended up rec'ing the same story in the convo thread below, "All Set Down" desoto_hia873 , an AU take on The Gift (and as you know I seem to have a kink for those.) Giles is forced to perform a terrible but necessary act. It doesn't quite fit the "Giles as Big Bad" criteria but it really is quite good.
** (Yes, I know Joss is an atheist. So am I. Or maybe agnostic. Let's go with "undecided".)
Posted on Dreamwidth http://red-satin-doll.dreamwidth.org/11747.html
Has anyone ever written a Buffyverse fic in which Giles, not Willow, becomes the Big Bad? The idea occurred to me not long after reading the episode notes for WTTH by
2maggie2In the Bronze, Buffy sees Giles up on the balcony, and he calls her attention to the others out there dancing -- she’s separate from them, with a duty to protect them. (The scene gets called back in season six in Dead Things when Spike adds another layer to Buffy’s fundamental separation from others – but it starts here in the very first episode).
(Dead Things screencap courtesy of www.bloodqueen.com)
Maggie is talking specifically within the context of how Buffy is separated from her friends/family as the Slayer from the very first episode, but her comments brought back the memory of one of my first visceral reactions to the series. There was something astonishingly creepy about the way Giles is suddenly "there", beside her, an older man next to a 16-year-old girl (foreshadowing Bangel), and I didn't have a "bead" on his character yet. The idea that he would turn out to be a villain who betrays Buffy and isn't what he seems, was as likely a notion as anything else. All of which turns out to be true and false at the same time: he doesn't turn out to be a villain but he does have a dark past as the Ripper (as does Angel), he does betray Buffy at times (Helpless, LMPTM), he kills a man behind Buffy's back knowing she wouldn't approve (The Gift).
And when I watched the balcony scene in Dead Things ("Alone in dark with me") my mind was racing back to the parallel scene in WTTH, giving both scenes greater emotional power - foreshadowing squared to th nth egree. The writers surely could not have imagined any of these events when this was written and shot, bu bless* them for knowingly or unknowingly providing the bones right from the start for everything that was to come.
So if I'd had to guess which of the Core Four was most likely to become a Big Bad down the road at the time I was watching S1, I probably would have said Giles. So it got me wondering if "Giles as the Big Bad" has been done as a fanfiction. I can't imagine someone in the last 15 years hasn't played with the concept. If Willow as the Big Bad was fraught with emotional turmoil, the drama and angst of Giles in that role could make LMPTM look like a Sunday cake-walk.
So, gentle flisters - point me the way to one that's already been written, or let that little puppy play around in your head for a while until you come up with something grand. FYI : I've decided to adopt the term plot puppy because: it's still a small, cute animal that you can stroke and love and huggle, and it won't upset Anya needlessly. In this case, a puppy with very sharp teeth that isn't nearly as harmless as it looks.
ETA:
beer_good_foamy and I both ended up rec'ing the same story in the convo thread below, "All Set Down" desoto_hia873 , an AU take on The Gift (and as you know I seem to have a kink for those.) Giles is forced to perform a terrible but necessary act. It doesn't quite fit the "Giles as Big Bad" criteria but it really is quite good.** (Yes, I know Joss is an atheist. So am I. Or maybe agnostic. Let's go with "undecided".)
Posted on Dreamwidth http://red-satin-doll.dreamwidth.org/11747.html
no subject
It's not a rules-verse fic as far as I remember; let me look and see what I can find. Lilah was a major character IIRC.
no subject
I just adored Jenny because characters like her - smart, mature, sexy, confident women - are hard to find on American TV. (And even films - it's part of what caused my partner and I to start seeking out foreign films. The first time I saw Carmen Maura it was LUV...) I really loved the relationship she and Giles had, the reversed gender dynamics (foreshadowing Buffy and Spike IMO); and it was a disappointment not only that she was killed off, but that no one ever took her place in that role of "mature woman". Joyce is really only on the sidelines of the story, which also annoyed me; I wanted her to have a more active role in it because the whole single mother-daughter dynamic is a familiar one to me. And I just like to see mature women characters in my stories, period.
So perhaps on some level I was shipping Giles with ANY halfway feasible potential partner. I thought a Giles/Joyce hookup would have been interesting - he's already Buffy's father figure, right? (I was also hoping to see more of Olivia - again, disappointment.)
Giles with one of the scoobies tends to seriously creep me out. I can usually see where shippers are coming from even if I don't agree but not in that case!
Oh god YES to this. Not long ago I came across Antennapedia's Giles/Buffy stories, my favorite being the hours after-Chosen "A Soft Place to Land" - some nice insights into Giles. So I gave it a try - broadening my horizons - but after a while I just had to back out. No matter how well-written I can't ship Giles with any of the Scoobies but especially with Buffy, it's just SO incestuous. Willow at least admits she used to find him sexy on the show so there is canonical basis for that (which I still find squicky anyway) but Buffy and Giles? No, nuh-uh that's a bridge too far for me.
no subject
I do like to ship Giles with Spike - there some pretty deep stories dealing with them together, almost always at the end of season five where the story could have ended. I can also see Giles with Ethan and/or Wesley. (Xander - scooby squick)
no subject
I have seen some good Giles/Spike - since I'm not into porn or NC-17 and really not into m/m, I skip those bits but the potential of the dynamics there really goes under-explored on the show - mainly because of ASH wanting to be with his family more, I suppose. That's why I love the resonance from Something Blue to Restless (Giles and Spike on the swingset, training Spike to be a "Watcher" - which is what he becomes on the show informally, "someone to watch over" Buffy), to First Date and Giles as the disapproving father-figure. I can see why people ship them, I just prefer the gen variant.
no subject
You still may like Career Change - it has virtually no porn.
no subject
And I thought I was the only one who used that phrase :)
no subject
In a society saturated with porn, obsessed with looks, and devoid of real values (loving, accepting, helping, etc) you do get cynical.