cordelia chase

btvs + soft focus forest | requested by @buffyscmmers​

The Past and Present through Drusilla + Buffy

Drusilla being written as a potential Slayer would unequivocally make her the underside of Buffy in the nexus of Angel’s dark past. They are both framed as competing binaries of Angel’s love life: Drusilla’s ornate ceremonial-like gown attests the conspicuously old-fashioned comport that is so detached from Buffy’s ostentatious ‘90s fashion wear and flippant demeanour. In this regard Angel’s love for Buffy is viewed as much more grounded in the present, and framed within the context of the show as a redemptitive beacon the two ill-fated lovers must protect before they can completely subdue the demons of a bygone era from re-emerging. His “demons”, though unknowingly, are satiated by junctures of unadulterated bliss. Precious moments that wrestle with his soul and solemn redemption. For this his redemption is regularly contested, and can only ever be fully achieved by extricating himself from his relationship with Buffy.

Alternatively the perverse nature of his involvement with Drusilla, serves as a damning reminder of a past he cannot ever truly expunge. It is thus an aspect of himself that he must forever duly acknowledge. She is an oppressive symbol whose main purpose is to obstruct his new undertaking and belie his redemption. All the more so when you consider just how that is possible: Drusilla is the past he cannot bury. Just like how her formal attire is constantly at odds with modernity; her status as a displaced victim posits the prolonged cruelty she and her victims (indirectly Angelus’) have had to suffer. Unlike Buffy, who is continuously growing and evolving from her relationships, Drusilla remains stagnant. Her entrenched resistance to change forces her to become an obsolete symbol that dances in the minds of other characters, somewhat displaying her status as a peripatetic victim, neither dead nor living. Just there.

It is learned when we first meet Drusilla in S2 that her mental faculties have regressed as a result of a mob attack she incurred whilst in Prague. For this reason her speech is often fragmented and her demeanour, child-like. But rather than impeding her, this binds Drusilla to the past more so by clinging on to a hybridized innocence she possesses at the cost of her sanity. What little innocence she might have retained of her “past” self, she clings to. Indeed, her peripheral attachments to the characters mostly exist within flashbacks. Buffy, on the other hand, is much more malleable when it comes to accepting the passage of time – though this isn’t to say it’s always by choice, as it’s mostly situational. She is the current Slayer at the time. Buffy cannot afford to be stagnant with her duties otherwise she risks being killed. She must forever move forward even when she doesn’t really want to. In this way the show really does well to capture the metaphor of growth by painting these two distinct binaries of the past and present in Drusilla and Buffy respectively.

Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers in BTVS 6x07 “Once More, With Feeling”

appearances in first and last episode → season 1

Buffy the Vampire Slayer | 3.21 “Graduation Day, Part I”

Turns out David Boreaneaz is tricky to capture but Angel is admittedly one of my favorite broody, tall-and-dark and socially weird vampires in fiction 🦇

Finished rewatching Buffy the Vampire Slayer and want to thank James Marsters for his face 🧛🏼‍♀️

when characters are like me: cordelia chase