In regards to this post.
xoxox
Tag: BTVS
“Surely even the most heinous criminal deserves a seventh chance.”
— Spike, Beneath You (via incorrectbuffyquotes)
@theroyalpalmtreeofoz said: I’d debate the black humour around drusilla at all actually? black humour acknowledges the awfulness of the situation i think most of the humour around drusilla happens because the writers forgot how awful her situation was. Most of its people laughing at her as well which black humour or not is still awful
In regards to this post.
Excellent point.
I recall reading somewhere (I can’t quite remember the source) that if a man awaiting execution walks up to the gallows and tells a joke at his own expense, that’s gallows humour. However, If the executioner or the crowd there to watch him hang make a joke at his expense, that’s not gallows humour, that’s just sadism.
The former is self-deprecating humour from someone trying to glean some comfort from their situation through levity. The latter is people deriving pleasure from someone else’s misfortune.
I remember thinking that analogy summed up perfectly why dark humour doesn’t usually hit the right notes for me. The former can work for me, the latter simply can’t.
In the case of Drusilla’s arc, it was rarely Dru finding some respite in joking about her misfortune. It was almost always other characters making fun of her misfortune (for example, Angel’s ‘fickle’ jab in Lover’s Walk or pretty much any time Spike mentions his sire after the events of Crush).
As for the writers more or less forgetting Drusilla’s backstory…Honestly that wouldn’t surprise me. I’ve long since accepted that the writers didn’t particularly care for Drusilla, and in their defence, as a minor character maybe that’s to be expected in the grand scheme of things. It makes me sad because personally I adore Drusilla’s character and think she had a lot of unfulfilled potential, but at least there’s always fanfiction.
I was borrowed. Someone has to speak for her.
What she says: I’m fine.
What she means: Drusilla wanted to be good. She fought her whole human life to be a good, kind person even after being told her powers made her a spawn of Satan. Even as a demon, Drusilla plants daisies and attempts to nurture pet birds and mothers her dolls because deep down, she still wants to care for things, to be that kind, loving person she once was. But Drusilla can’t be good. Drusilla has no soul and no sanity. Her daisies wilt. Her birds starve. She manages to look after her dolls only by virtue of them obviously (though perhaps not obviously to her) not being alive and therefore having no needs. And she is so far gone now that she cannot even understand why all these things she tries to care for die. If the Drusilla who existed before Angelus twisted her mind could see who she was now, she would be horrified. And at this point, perhaps the greatest mercy anyone could do for her now would be to stake her.
Dusting Drusilla: Why Dru Should Be Killed Off
“I destroyed everything she had. Everything that gave her world meaning. When there was nothing else left, I destroyed her mind. Then I sired her. Made her immortal. Condemned her to an eternity of insanity…So my greatest achievement would endure forever.”
– Angel, Angel and Faith: Daddy Issues.
While I haven’t read all the Buffy comics, I have been keeping up with them where I can, and I have followed Drusilla’s storyline. In short, I found it to be very poignant and compelling, constantly teasing the idea of providing a redemption arc for the character and then snatching it away in an abrupt and cruel manner.
In one appearance, Drusilla makes some progress towards regaining her sanity after being sent to a mental institution. However, she eventually snaps and murders the doctors who were trying to help her after overhearing a nurse describe her as a ‘waste of time’.
Similarly, Spike attempts to offer Dru a chance at redemption when he gives her his soul. Unfortunately, the guilt of the soul drives her to deeper depths of insanity and Spike is forced to take it back.
On another occasion- possibly the cruellest of all – Angel finds out that Drusilla has become sane after meeting a demon that feeds off of trauma. Dru hopes to help people by getting the demon to feed off the trauma of troubled individuals, though this has the side effect of driving them mad. Arguing that ‘our trauma is what makes us who we are’, Angel slaughters the demon and Drusilla’s trauma is returned to her, driving her insane a second time.
The message from the writers seems crystal clear; Drusilla is not capable of being saved. The character- subjected to centuries of torment by her tragic circumstances – cannot be redeemed, or if she can, it’s not an avenue the writers are willing to seriously pursue (take your pick). They’ve demonstrated this on three separate occasions.
As Faith puts it;
Hold up…What I said about us not giving up [on people]…I didn’t mean Drusilla. Soulless, okay. Crazy, I can work with. But soulless AND crazy … that’s a bridge too far. The chick’s a mess.
– Faith Lehane, Angel and Faith: Daddy Issues.
I do not know if the comics will be getting another season. If they will, I don’t know if there are any plans to include Drusilla.
But if there are, there’s just one thing I hope for this character.
I want Drusilla to be killed off.
I don’t particularly mind how it happens. Perhaps Angel- in an act of mercy – decides to finally put his ‘masterpiece’ out of her misery. Perhaps Spike finishes what he started in Crush as a parallel to how Angel staked his own sire. Perhaps Buffy or even a random slayer kills her. Regardless, I think it needs to happen for there to be a respectful ending for this character.
She is too unstable to be ensouled. She is too traumatised to be sane. While at one point she could have found some semblance of solace through her love affair with Spike, he has developed too much as a character for this pairing (however much my shipping heart aches) to ever make sense again without his development regressing by years. In fact, I’d argue that the final nail in the coffin for the Spike/Dru relationship was hammered in as early as Out of My Mind (2000).
So, whatever to do with the character now? Have her turn up periodically as a minion to whatever Big Bad is causing trouble, make some cryptic comments, fight the heroes, and then scamper into the shadows again as soon as it becomes clear that she’s losing? Simply not have her appear again at all, leaving the character forever suffering alone through eternal torment in the imagination of the fandom? No. I think Drusilla deserves better than both these options.
Drusilla’s storyline deserves some closure, some resolution, some end to the torment Angelus inflicted on her.
Drusilla may not have appeared in the series often, but she had a huge impact for a character so rarely seen. She influenced Angel and Spike’s characters in countless ways. She served as the most potent reminder of Angelus’ evil. She became a fan favourite and couples still cosplay as Spike and Dru to this day.
And if – when the franchise ends – Drusilla’s last appearance is her scurrying away into the darkness again, forever lurking somewhere in the distance? I’ll be pretty disappointed.
I just realized why Drusilla flips out when she sees the roses in “Surprise.”
ANGEL SENDS RED ROSES TO BUFFY IN “BEWITCHED, BOTHERED, AND BEWILDERED” AND SCATTERS RED ROSE PETALS IN JENNY’S HOUSE IN “PASSIONS.” Red roses are part of his stalking pattern. And whose stalking and siring constituted, by his own account, the worst thing he’d ever done before he got his soul back?
DRUSILLA.
No wonder she has a panic attack.
““Well God, I guess you got me again, didn’t you? Yeah, that was a good one, God. Hope it made you laugh, you sick bastard.”
— Drusilla, Becoming Part 1 (via incorrectbuffyquotes)
I wish Angel would have acted as sorry as he said he was.
I am not a huge fan of Angel, but I’m also not running a group determined to murder him with rusty spoons. HOWEVER. If there’s any one reason why I will not join his fanclub it’s because of how he treats Drusilla. He told Buffy that he regretted everything he did to her, but he never actually acted like it. He was almost nicer to her when he was ANGELUS than he was when he was souled.
Angel always treated Drusilla like he found her to be annoying. He was irritated by her and the way she acted. Like he wasn’t the one who stalked her, murdered everyone she was close to, raped her, drove her to insanity, and then turned her into a vampire to make sure that her suffering would be eternal. If he was so regretful of his actions, why would he treat her as though she was just an aggravation to him? If he really felt bad everything he’d done, shouldn’t he act like it? Everyone thinks of him as a hero, but I’m not so sure.
Drusilla deserved so much more than what she was given from life. She wanted to be pure. And Angelus took that away from her. He took everything away from her. He condemned her to a life that was so hellish that she may never even realize that she’s in hell if someone kills her off.
I think what Angel did to Drusilla is unforgivable. There’s no making excuses for it.
I was rewatching “Becoming” and now I want to read a million pages of meta about Cordy vs Dru wrt their visions and how a) Spike and Angelus regard Dru’s visions b) Angel regards Cordys vs Angelus regards Dru’s c) Angelus’ past with Dru impacts Angel’s future with Cordy (and Doyle when he’s the one w/visions). But also I want to know what Dru would be like if she somehow got her soul back. I was told you’re the person to talk to about these things. Hope your holiday was good!
What an awesome question, I can’t say I’ve ever thought about the parallels between Cordy and Dru before. :3 You’ve clearly thought long and hard about this yourself, and I’d love to hear your interpretation, seeing as yours is as good as mine. And it was wonderful, thank you for asking! ❤
First and foremost, I think it’s important that we establish their visions as a power that takes away their power. Sounds contradictory, right? But really, while clairvoyance in the Buffyverse is a rare and useful talent, it also has a nasty habit of taking away the seer in question’s strength. Doyle’s visions led to him discovering his demonic heritage, which led to his marriage falling apart, which led to his drinking and gambling addiction, for example. Drusilla’s made her a target of the sadistic Angelus. Cassie’s premonition of her death resulted in her feeling helpless and hopeless for the rest of her life. Cordy hadn’t inherited her powers for even a day before she was kidnapped and almost auctioned off as a fortune-telling slave, and that’s tame in comparison to the various miseries her visions caused for her later on.
So, we’ve made it clear that visions are a power that renders its wielder powerless. This is why when Cordelia gets a vision she experiences crippling migraines, whereas when Drusilla gets a vision she suffers stomach cramps instead. Cordelia gets headaches during her visions because her strength lies in her head. Her mind. Her sharp wit, her willpower, her determined mentality that has always allowed her to survive. Therefore, the visions inflict pain upon her head because that is the strength the visions are attacking. On the other hand, Dru doesn’t get headaches but describes her stomach as getting “all tied up” (Becoming Part 1) and clutches at her belly in obvious agony when she has a premonition in Passion. This is a reflection of how a vampire’s strength lies in their hunger for the hunt, their relentless thirst for human flesh that makes them so dangerous. It doesn’t explain why Dru had stomach pains before being sired, but that’s the best explanation I can think of. This is the most important difference between the two characters in regards to their powers.
As for the difference between how Angel regards Cordy’s abilities and how he regards Dru’s, I think the difference is that he saw Drusilla as a physic, and Cordelia as a person who just so happened to be physic. In other words, Drusilla was sired as a trophy. As an object. Used to entertain Angelus with her insanity and to provide him with useful insights of the future. On the other hand, Cordelia Chase was seen by him as a person in her own right. Not just a crystal ball on legs. This is probably because he met Cordelia with a soul, and as such with a degree of empathy.
And how does Angel’s past with Dru effect his future with Cordy? Well, I’m not sure if it does. Perhaps by helping Cordelia through her struggles with her visions, he sees this as a way of repenting for how he in turn exploited Drusilla for her visions?
In regards to how Drusilla would deal with a soul, my guess is very, very badly. The rest of the Fanged Four went insane with the guilt of it, and they were more or less psychologically stable beforehand. Imagine how that burden would effect someone who was already insane. I’m not sure if you think of the comics as canon or not, but in the Spike miniseries Dru does get a soul, and it drives her completely over the edge.
Summary: Cordelia and Drusilla’s powers are very different, and the way Angel perceives them is very different. While Cordelia gets migraines with her visions to reflect how her strength lies in her mind, Drusilla gets pains in her stomach because her strength lies in her hunger as a vampire.
Thanks so much for the question! ❤
xox
Cheloneuniverse 