Spike and Buffy: Complete Friendship - Part Two

Season 6 – Pleasure Friendship

Buffy returns from the dead via magical intervention from Willow. Spike has mourned Buffy’s death intensely and is shown to have kept count of the number of days she has been gone. Feeling detached from life, Buffy seeks companionship with Spike, the only person she can stand to be around (Life Serial). Her connection to Spike is beautifully presented in the episode After Life; he is quiet and caring where her friends are loud and demanding, he is interested in her where the others are interested in what she can do for them and in hearing gratitude that they’ve managed to bring her back from the dead. Is it any wonder she’s drawn to Spike? Their relationship is a logical continuation of the connection that was forged in the second half of season five and it’s something she doesn’t have to share with her friends. Of course she’s drawn to Spike!
Buffy and Spike consummate their relationship in ‘Wrecked’. It is not a typically romantic seduction but is gritty, dirty, violent and very sexy. Spike finds that his chip doesn’t recognise Buffy, so he’s able to hurt her, if he chooses. They fight and this turns into a sexual encounter that literally brings the house down. One of the defining features of season six is the dangerous and confronting nature of Spike and Buffy’s sexual relationship. Buffy knows that Spike is a soulless vampire, but is drawn to him just the same. The sex becomes addictive, though personally destructive as she fights the conflicting emotions and feelings that they bring out in each other. Buffy is ashamed of the relationship and cannot bring herself to confide the truth to her friends. She knows Spike loves her but feels that she is using him for her own sexual gratification. Desire and need, excitement and danger control the relationship making it the very definition of a pleasure friendship. Reason and logical consideration is given away completely to desire and want. Ultimately, the relationship is shown to be very unhealthy for both of them. Spike loses his way on his road to self improvement with his attempts to draw Buffy to the darkness, while the very foundations of Buffy’s calling are challenged. It is easy to dismiss this relationship as ‘bad’ because it defied conventions of a ‘normal’ sexual relationship with the heavy implication that Buffy and Spike indulged in more than vanilla, missionary position sex. It must be stated that it is not what they did that was wrong, no, that was consensual and enjoyed by both. The fault with the relationship was that Spike was a soulless vampire, and Buffy the fated vampire slayer. It is not compatible, particularly when he is still ambiguous in his position of good vs. evil. The ‘good’ slayer cannot be sleeping with the ‘bad’ vampire and still go out and do her duty with a clear conscious. It is interesting that Buffy only breaks up with Spike when she admits to herself that she has ‘feelings’ for him (As You Were). While it was purely sexual, she could handle the relationship but as soon as it was in danger of developing into something more serious on her side, that’s when she ended it.

To Be continued.....