Hmmm. I can see where you're coming from with that - Certainly Willow is the one who says at the end of Chosen "Slayers are awakening, all over", and she seems thrilled by it, by becoming part of something greater than herself. It's what I suppose she has wanted, in a sense, has envied in Buffy and tried to match with magic, and it makes sense that Willow is all about power while Buffy's goal was simply to "get the job done". (The rousing speech in Chosen aside, I doubt it's a course of action Buffy would have taken if it wasn't necessary in her mind. It's certainly not something she sought to do prior to this. And part of it was very personal: "You'll die alone".) True, but it’s Buffy’s plan, and Buffy does smile at the episode’s end as a result of what’s happened and the way she is *no longer alone*. I don’t think it’s actually entirely true either that Willow is “all about the power,” and certainly Willow was not excited about the plan and wasn’t exactly itching to go to the place of profound, overwhelming power again given that she didn’t know what it would do to her. I do think though that Willow recognizes on some level that she is not whole because she is so powerless. The three most central arcs in the series are Buffy’s, Willow’s and Xander’s, and Buffy’s is to accept her power, Willow’s is to become powerful, and Xander’s is to accept that he of limited power and to figure out what to do with that. The reason Willow needs to take power is that the universe simply doled her out an unfairly low amount—in the sense that if Willow didn’t take power, she would literally die. She can’t just wait around for Buffy to save her (as is her primary role in season one), because one day Buffy *won’t* save her (no fault of Buffy’s, it’s the reality): she has to figure out how to manage herself. In Doppelgangland, in particular, we learn that Willow has a whole chunk of her identity hidden away from her, including her sexual orientation, because she doesn’t have the power to express herself, she’s so constrained by social expectations and people demanding things from her with her having no power to talk back to them or refuse unreasonable requests, including from her friends. The reason that magic is so deeply intertwined with her relationship with Tara is not just because the metaphors get all mixy, but because magic always represents both power and the ability to discover one’s true self (or, perhaps more worryingly, to create false selves), all the way through the show. I don’t think Willow needs to be an uberwitch in order to be authentically herself, but she does need to be something other than the girl whose mother picks out clothes for her but whose mother also barely notices she’s alive. Power *is* personal, power is what allows her to be unafraid of being herself. The difficulty is how to be herself without encroaching on others, but even in season six, many of her worst violations are because she was still unable to fully realize that she could be and love who she actually was.
well, that paragraph was probably unnecessary, I just want to emphasize that Willow's desire for power (and knowledge) is not a wholly bad thing nor is it purely about power for its own sake; she actually does need it, at least initially, though of course she doesn't know how to deal with it when she gets it initially.
Not sure I understand, could you elaborate a bit? and btw what is "w.r.t."?
w.r.t. = with respect to. Um, it's used in math proofs a lot so I assume everyone uses it, but it is probably a specialized expression.
What I meant was: Harmony is mostly (in Willow's mind) a total follower, superficial, concerned about boys and clothes and being pretty. Riley is a cowboy. Both are -- really outdated in today's world. Regressive gender identities, which date back well before the 20th century (though Harmony's particular valley girl stuff incarnation is more recent). (Also, Harmony is more complicated than that, just as Riley is.) If Buffy is a flapper, she's much more progressive -- much closer to the modern human. That was sort of my point, if badly stated.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2012-11-30 08:41 pm (UTC)True, but it’s Buffy’s plan, and Buffy does smile at the episode’s end as a result of what’s happened and the way she is *no longer alone*. I don’t think it’s actually entirely true either that Willow is “all about the power,” and certainly Willow was not excited about the plan and wasn’t exactly itching to go to the place of profound, overwhelming power again given that she didn’t know what it would do to her. I do think though that Willow recognizes on some level that she is not whole because she is so powerless. The three most central arcs in the series are Buffy’s, Willow’s and Xander’s, and Buffy’s is to accept her power, Willow’s is to become powerful, and Xander’s is to accept that he of limited power and to figure out what to do with that. The reason Willow needs to take power is that the universe simply doled her out an unfairly low amount—in the sense that if Willow didn’t take power, she would literally die. She can’t just wait around for Buffy to save her (as is her primary role in season one), because one day Buffy *won’t* save her (no fault of Buffy’s, it’s the reality): she has to figure out how to manage herself. In Doppelgangland, in particular, we learn that Willow has a whole chunk of her identity hidden away from her, including her sexual orientation, because she doesn’t have the power to express herself, she’s so constrained by social expectations and people demanding things from her with her having no power to talk back to them or refuse unreasonable requests, including from her friends. The reason that magic is so deeply intertwined with her relationship with Tara is not just because the metaphors get all mixy, but because magic always represents both power and the ability to discover one’s true self (or, perhaps more worryingly, to create false selves), all the way through the show. I don’t think Willow needs to be an uberwitch in order to be authentically herself, but she does need to be something other than the girl whose mother picks out clothes for her but whose mother also barely notices she’s alive. Power *is* personal, power is what allows her to be unafraid of being herself. The difficulty is how to be herself without encroaching on others, but even in season six, many of her worst violations are because she was still unable to fully realize that she could be and love who she actually was.
well, that paragraph was probably unnecessary, I just want to emphasize that Willow's desire for power (and knowledge) is not a wholly bad thing nor is it purely about power for its own sake; she actually does need it, at least initially, though of course she doesn't know how to deal with it when she gets it initially.
Not sure I understand, could you elaborate a bit? and btw what is "w.r.t."?
w.r.t. = with respect to. Um, it's used in math proofs a lot so I assume everyone uses it, but it is probably a specialized expression.
What I meant was: Harmony is mostly (in Willow's mind) a total follower, superficial, concerned about boys and clothes and being pretty. Riley is a cowboy. Both are -- really outdated in today's world. Regressive gender identities, which date back well before the 20th century (though Harmony's particular valley girl stuff incarnation is more recent). (Also, Harmony is more complicated than that, just as Riley is.) If Buffy is a flapper, she's much more progressive -- much closer to the modern human. That was sort of my point, if badly stated.