#i guess. mostly its nonsensical dont read this ok im anxious just posting it bc its so incoherent

[dawnssummers]

i wish people were more nuanced about willow she's just as terrible as spike okay. not in the way that willow and/or spike vitriolic haters think. or a little in that there's a category of spike criticisms that extend to willow it's just that i like both characters still especially willow. they juet both have very blurred moral boundaries eg both helping dawn in forever. or honestly even willow and spike both kind of trying to fix their love lives with a spell in lovers walk bc they are struggling to cope and process. then this post about them in becoming / the gift / chosen. this other post too.

then in s6 both are comparable to the trio in how they: seek to control others to the point of violating boundaries; view buffy on a pedestal and position themsleves as villains in opposition to the hero (spike does this with all slayers); again call moral categories into question; have an attitude of self-pity however buried, etc. like it isn't just spike, willow does it tooooo she forced buffy back to life!! and i do feel like willow is "good" while doing all this and spike is "evil" and then "not good but okay" - upheld by the show and the characters views of themselves - until s6 when willow resurrects buffy "for her", and buffy sleeps with spike to feel something where i truly don't think spike realises that it's also a form of self destruction. obviously a selfishness to both / refusal to see how buffy could be hurting that is also present in willow erasing tara's memories and then everybody's memories.

i also have thoughts on seeing red as their turning points, for spike to finally finally realise that something needs to change and then follow angel's footsteps to get a soul, whereas willow at the end of the episode follows faith's spiral into evil (unconsciously but still a parallel) because she had an already fragile sense of worth broken by tara's death and so for her there's only descent until xander gets through to her. seeing red also having sexual violence and a lesbian dying right after a moment of happiness to manufacture character development is bad and it should at the very least have been filmed with sensitivity and not for a double shock but whatever. anyway. if anything that run of episodes is proof that a soul doesn't force you to be good and that you can't just decide that you are good (or evil, which dark!willow tried to insist she is bc she thought goodness was no longer available to her) but rather good is a choice enforced with each action...! willow does choose not to end the world, spike does choose to get a soul. buffy does choose to live in the world, this world she has chosen to protect, and with dawn beside her.

this is just thoughts thrown at the screen but look. willow is my special girl and she is already in the coalition of characters who have evil phases and beyond that are not always very good people tm however i am advocating for her to be in subset of people who do insane things for or because of buffy. she even has to make a physical journey back in s7 which spike faith then angel also do. okay.