Buffy season 11 no 2
Dec. 21st, 2016 08:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shapinglightRead this and...
Spoilers behind cut
...I thought it was pretty good, but a cursory skim-read of opinions on another site makes it clear it's not going to go down so well in some quarters.
In short, the reaction to the wholesale destruction of San Francisco sets in, with the US government appointing a new secretary of supernatural affairs, undertaking a mandatory census of 'supernatural individuals' so as to 'normalize' their status, recruiting a bunch of Slayers (not Buffy) to police the situation, then reacting to the rise in hate crimes against supernatural-type beings by sending them off to internment camps 'for their own safety.'
Buffy and her friends react in different ways. Spike doomsays a lot, Mini!Giles ums and ahs, Andrew leaves the country altogether (after yet another group hug, which even Spike joins in).
It all sounds very black and white (government bad/supernatural-types good), but is actually more nuanced than that. For one thing, one of the questions that various posters were getting somewhat exercised about on the other site - that, if vampires and demons aren't all 100% evil (apart from Angel and Spike because they have souls), doesn't that make Buffy a mass-murderer for killing them all the time etc, etc? -gets raised by the characters. In fact, it's Spike who raises it when he says to Willow that he doesn't want the likes of Vicki the vampire to have equal protection under the law, and that if she does, it raises thorny ethical questions about Buffy's job.
No conclusions are reached, but as the issue continues, it's pretty clear that Buffy and Willow come down on the side of not pandering to mob hysteria (Buffy and Spike save a demon who is being beaten up by a crowd, then Buffy refuses to join the government-sponsored Slayers, who want to get back to basics and fight 'the vampires, the demons and the forces of darkness,' then Willow saves some Wiccans who are in danger of being burned alive by a mob with a show of force that goes viral on the 'net because someone filmed it on their smartphone, then refuses the secretary of supernatural affairs' offer to join her team because it would mean becoming a sworn federal agent).
However, IMO anyway, none of the government characters are depicted as 'evil,' and not all the members of the mobs actually want to kill anyone. One of them even thinks they're the ones who're going to end up in camps.
So anyway, yes, I liked it. I'm intrigued to see where the story's going to go. In fact, the only not so good thing about it, IMO, is that the inking is rubbish on some of the pages. Maybe Rebekah Isaacs was pressed for time and had to finish them in a rush?
Spoilers behind cut
...I thought it was pretty good, but a cursory skim-read of opinions on another site makes it clear it's not going to go down so well in some quarters.
In short, the reaction to the wholesale destruction of San Francisco sets in, with the US government appointing a new secretary of supernatural affairs, undertaking a mandatory census of 'supernatural individuals' so as to 'normalize' their status, recruiting a bunch of Slayers (not Buffy) to police the situation, then reacting to the rise in hate crimes against supernatural-type beings by sending them off to internment camps 'for their own safety.'
Buffy and her friends react in different ways. Spike doomsays a lot, Mini!Giles ums and ahs, Andrew leaves the country altogether (after yet another group hug, which even Spike joins in).
It all sounds very black and white (government bad/supernatural-types good), but is actually more nuanced than that. For one thing, one of the questions that various posters were getting somewhat exercised about on the other site - that, if vampires and demons aren't all 100% evil (apart from Angel and Spike because they have souls), doesn't that make Buffy a mass-murderer for killing them all the time etc, etc? -gets raised by the characters. In fact, it's Spike who raises it when he says to Willow that he doesn't want the likes of Vicki the vampire to have equal protection under the law, and that if she does, it raises thorny ethical questions about Buffy's job.
No conclusions are reached, but as the issue continues, it's pretty clear that Buffy and Willow come down on the side of not pandering to mob hysteria (Buffy and Spike save a demon who is being beaten up by a crowd, then Buffy refuses to join the government-sponsored Slayers, who want to get back to basics and fight 'the vampires, the demons and the forces of darkness,' then Willow saves some Wiccans who are in danger of being burned alive by a mob with a show of force that goes viral on the 'net because someone filmed it on their smartphone, then refuses the secretary of supernatural affairs' offer to join her team because it would mean becoming a sworn federal agent).
However, IMO anyway, none of the government characters are depicted as 'evil,' and not all the members of the mobs actually want to kill anyone. One of them even thinks they're the ones who're going to end up in camps.
So anyway, yes, I liked it. I'm intrigued to see where the story's going to go. In fact, the only not so good thing about it, IMO, is that the inking is rubbish on some of the pages. Maybe Rebekah Isaacs was pressed for time and had to finish them in a rush?
no subject
Date: 2016-12-21 04:13 pm (UTC)