Thoughts on Bangel in the context of gender roles and subversion in Buffy shiping

[boot_the_grime]

This recent post by shadowkat about shipping Spuffy and gender reversals in the relationship  shadowkat67.livejournal.com/793238.html linked on Buffyforums by moscow_watcher got me to write a short reply about my views, which are a bit different from hers. I can't do that on her LJ  because she flipped out on me with absolutely no reason and attacked me on her LJ about a

Comments

[itsnotmymind]

I agree with the fact that Spike plays masculine roles as well as feminine roles in the relationship. It's not a straight-forward gender swap. One thing I always liked about Buffy/Spike was when they reversed gender roles, it wasn't just the woman doing the stereotypically masculine thing and the man doing the stereotypically feminine thing, it was the cute blonde twenty-something ex-cheerleader doing the stereotypically masculine thing and the 200+ badass vampire doing the stereotypically feminine thing.

I also agree about Buffy/Angel not fitting that particular trope quite so easily. (Fred/Gunn? I'm really not sure where she's coming from with that one.)

Angel does seem to be coded upper class while Spike is coded lower class (which is in opposition to Spike's human background). I'm never sure what to make of that, except that it lines up with the class coding of Buffy and Faith. But Angel doesn't have societal power when he's soulless. He's an outcast.

How Angel managed to make Buffy not notice how pathetic he really was in

[selenak]

To get the sidetrack out of the way first, what on earth "Cordelia/Angel, Fred/Wesely, Fred/Gunn, Echo/ What'shisname who played Helo (Ballard?)" have in common with the trope in question beats me, considering that, as has been mentioned elsewhere, Fred and Gunn are of equal social and age status (and probably of traumatic past status, if you consider "years-in-a-hell-dimension-as-slave-going-insane" versus "had-to-stake-my-sister"). Wesley doesn't become qualified for brooding Byronic hero until post "Loyalty", and there's never any "saving" on Fred's part. Echo is the one with the mysterious past (as Caroline) living in wealth, and the way Paul Ballard insists on casting himself as the saviour is if anything a take on the noir detective/femme fatale trope, not the Gothic romance. And Angel/Cordelia as written is a mess, but it does get started after two years of the relationship being written as a friendship with Cordelia firmly in the truthteller/sarcastic sidekick role, which, again, is a different trope altogether. As for Dracula

[itsnotmymind]

If I may stay Doylist: in my experience, most shippers like to believe THEIR ship (whatever it happens to be) is the subversive, original one, the unconventional anti-main stream one, while any other ship, particularly if it's popular as well, is mainstream/boring/conventional/patriarchal/sexist/etc.I think everyone finds it easier to see the best in what they like, and the worst in what they don't like, whether it's a show or a pairing or a character or anything else. Like with favorite characters on Buffy and Angel, it seems that fans notice and remember the times when their pet character was treated unfairly on the show, and not the times when their pet character benefited while other characters were treated unfairly

[selenak]

Which is probably because, despite his many flaws, Riley was (arguably) the best long-term boyfriend Buffy ever had (on account of, you know, not being a stalkerish mass-murderer).He. He does have that advantage. Mind you, I couldn't see Buffy/Riley lasting, either, and I'm all for critisizing the helicopter run of doom and the way the show via not refuting the Xander and Anya analysis of the situation seemed to blame Buffy unilateraly for their breakup. But for the most part, it struck me as a credible relationship for Buffy to have after the teenage apocalyptic drama with Angel. I dimly recall one of the writers - Doug Petrie*, I think - saying back in s4 that Riley was supposed to be Clark Kent/Superman to Angel's Bruce Wayne/Batman for Buffy, and you can see that in the way he's written in the first half of s4 especially. But of course once the Initiative storyline was played out they had the problem of what to do with Riley other than him being Buffy's boyfriend, and Marc Blucas wasn't bad, just not charismatic enough to justify

[local_max]

Petrie is SO OBVIOUSLY a Buffy/Faith shipper

[ever_neutral]

Yeah, agreed with this post. I think that Buffy/Angel conveys a lot of conventional, heteronormative ideals that the media laps up (his larger, ~strong physique and her small, feminine one), but the actual ship involves a lot of gender-bending. Sometimes the show/s would go back on a lot of that gender-bending (I'm thinking of how S3 ended, and episodes like "I Will Remember You"), but still.

[local_max]

Though S3 also ends with Angel as the damsel that Buffy has to save, and Buffy beating Angel senseless -- so I think maybe the very last shot of Angel manfully staring at her and walking away is a bit of a reestablishment of the fantasy of the mysterious dark lover, after he's been humiliated, damselized, and beaten. B/A is especially interesting when you consider how many subtle power plays there are in the ship.

[ever_neutral]

so I think maybe the very last shot of Angel manfully staring at her and walking away is a bit of a reestablishment of the fantasy of the mysterious dark lover, after he's been humiliated, damselized, and beaten.

Indeed. Good point.

[local_max]

Yeah, definitely. I think the main thing that's relevant about both Buffy/Spike and Buffy/Angel (and Buffy/Riley and Buffy/Xander as a potential ship, and all the others) is that each relationship enforces some gender stereotypes and breaks others. I do think sometimes I feel as if there is a sense in fandom in which one ship is supposed to "win" on the basis that that ship, and that ship alone, subverts/destroys gender norms, but really there are inversions all over the place. I think the big Buffy/Angel thing that is associated with traditional gender norms is Angel making decisions for Buffy, hiding information from her, while she is largely open with him; but that still plays into certain stereotypes about the male hero and the mysterious femme fatale.

[selenak]

I do think sometimes I feel as if there is a sense in fandom in which one ship is supposed to "win" on the basis that that ship, and that ship alone, subverts/destroys gender norms, but really there are inversions all over the place.

*nods* Yes, and that makes for a lot of partisan projection. A few weeks back 12_12_12 wrote some meta about m/f relationships that presented both lovers as equals versus the Gothic romance model, and in her reading, Buffy/Angel was all about the equal gender subversive partnership while Buffy/Spike was all about the narrative privileging Spike over Buffy (which made for a separate complaint post of hers). Which isn't my reading of the relationships at all, but it's telling that she got this based on the same textual material that Shadowkat used for her interpretation of Buffy/Angel as all gender-conventional unequal Gothic Romance and Buffy/Spike all subversion and equality: we all see, to a degree, what we want to see.

I think the big Buffy/Angel thing that is associated with traditional gender norms is

[local_max]

Yes to "see what we want to see." I'm trying to bias myself, if one can choose one's biases, to seeing relationships...equitably, that on some level both partners in any relationship (not nec. romantic) have a POV and a legitimate case to be the powerless one, or the powerful one. But that's not always true (or, it's not always true that both sides have equivalent cases, there are always at least two sides, just not necessarily good sides

[selenak]

Yes, from a Doylist pov, I think s3 is the first season where Buffy/Xander wasn't regarded as a future option anymore. On a Watsonian level, I think that's where Xander consciously doesn't hope for a romantic relationship anymore as well, but the much later Restless is the point where even his subconscious has accepted it. Note that Buffy, unlike Willow and Tara, is not sexualized in his dream; and she calls him "brother", a word he repeats and that hangs between them for a while.

Definitely the Angel narrative of Buffy is different than the Buffy narrative of Angel, which is a fascinating thing.

It is. Of course the moment in Guise will be Guise where the fake Swami retcons the entire Buffy/Angel relationship as Angel acting out his Darla issues is played as a joke, but as a joke with at least some truth in it as far as AtS is concerned. Which is a very different story from Buffy-as-inspiration-to-do-good on BTVS (suggesting that the truth is somewhere in the middle). And the s3 opener is an explicit textual critique of the "my

[red_satin_doll]

There are some ways in which their gender roles are flipped - and some ways in which they are not...

The closest to how I see it is what an academic essay on Spuffy said - they don't flip gender roles, they share gender roles. I don't think anyone was "in control" of the relationship, especially not in season 6 which was a constant struggle. I know the view expressed in this essay, it's the view of many female Spuffy shippers who identify with Spike and not with Buffy. But I don't share it and it misses a lot of the complexity of the relationship. Which is what makes it all the more interesting.I can't add anything of profound interest, just that you've summarized my feelings about Buffy/Spike very succinctly. And while Bangel bores me (although on first watch I rooted for them BECAUSE I felt for Buffy, not because of Angel himself so much), I can see what you say about the subversion in that relationship a bit more clearly now (gabrielleabelle's metas on "Subversive Bangel" helped in that regard as well