To give you guys a break from glowy Bangel-fucking, let's play with Spike! I mean...numbers...concerning Spike...it's fun!

Old-school members of my flist might remember Spike Speak wherein I was a huge nerd tallied up the nicknames Spike used for people in S4. Basically, I had/have a thought that Spike uses people's real names more than fans seem to think he does in fanfics, so I wanted to check it out myself. After doing S4, I went back and did Spike Speak for S2 (w/ Bonus S3!). And I've now finally done S5! Look at the progress!

This is useful for Spike nerds and writers. Also, if you're bored. Or you just want something Buffy-related that has nothing to do with the comics.



And a few notes, but it can be difficult to tell what "counts" in these things. Basically, if I could substitute the character's name in, I tallied it up. So Spike calling Angelus a "poofter" in the FFL flashback doesn't count (as Spike yelling "Angelus" at him wouldn't make any sense). Also, sometimes he used variations on the same name (Most noticeably variation between "the Slayer" and just "Slayer"). When this occurred, I counted them as one and the same. Savvy?

Buffy:

Buffy - 34
     Directed to someone else: 20
     Directed to Buffy: 14
Slayer - 23
     Directed to someone else: 12
     Directed to Buffy: 11
Bitch - 4
Love - 4
The girl - 4
Baby - 2
Summers - 2
Honey
The poor twig
Big sister
Sunshine
Blondie
Pet
Big sis
Lady

Yes, Spike refers to Buffy most often by her name, comprising 42% of his references to her. Slayer comes in second at 24%. I also noted down who he was talking to when using the terms, and he was still most likely to call her by her name while talking to her as opposed to calling her "Slayer" (36% vs 28%). I included the raw numbers so you guys can play with them.

Riley:

Boy - 2
Cubscout
Enormous hall monitor
Captain Cardboard
Charlie
You sod
Friend
Riley
What's-his-face

He has a variety of names for Riley. And he obviously doesn't like the guy as he only refers to him by name 10% of the time (and that was while talking to someone else)

Harmony:

Harm - 8
Harmony - 3
You silly bint
Baby
Sweetbreads

He calls Harmony by her full name 21% of the time, but if we include "Harm", her shortened name, that jumps up to 79%.

Drusilla:

Dru - 6
Drusilla - 3
Pet - 2
Love
My ex

And, again, we have him often resorting to a shortened version of her real name. However, he uses some variation of her name 69% of the time.

Dawn:

Dawn - 4
Kid - 2
Little bit - 2
Nibblet - 2
Brat kid sister
Bite-sized one
Kid sis
Bitty Buffy
Platelet
Sweet bit
The girl

While he does refer to Dawn by name 24% of the time, he has a very wide variety of nicknames for her. It'll be interesting to see how this develops in S6.

Joyce:

Mum - 4
Joyce - 3
The lady

I feel I should clarify that he refers to her as either Buffy or Dawn's "mum" a lot when talking to other people. He's not referring to her as his mum.

Giles:

Giles
Captain Slowpoke
Gramps

Xander:

Monkey boy
Harris
Special ed
Lackbrain

Willow:

Will - 2

Anya:

Lady

Buffybot:

Slayer - 3
Buffy - 2

I had to make a call in distinguishing between the Buffybot and Buffy. I decided to go ahead and consider them as separate entities, despite the fact that Spike talks to her as if she were Buffy for most of the episode.

Scoobies:

Scoobies
Kids

Ben:

Ben - 8
Doc

I'll admit, the "Ben is Glory" gag at the beginning of Weight of the World inflates the numbers quite a bit...

Glory:

Glory - 15
This skank
Glory chippie
Bitch
The great one
The lady

And ditto what I said for Ben.

Doc:

Bloke - 2
Doc - 2
Mate
A fella

Darla:

Darla

Gregor:

Scarface
General Armor-all

Willow and Tara:

Lover-Wiccas

Dracula:

Dracula
Drac
Poncy bugger

Mort:

Mort

Pacey:

Pacey - 1

Doctor (From OOMM):

Doc - 6
The good doctor
Mate

Cecily:

Cecily - 3

Angel/us:

Mate - 2
Angel

The Chinese Slayer:

Love

Random vamp:

Mate

Olaf:

Mate

Lydia:

Pet

Joyce and Dawn:

Ladies

April:

Darlin'

Warren:

Warren

Summers Women:

Summers women

Whew! In total, he makes reference to people 221 times throughout the season. He uses a person's name (shortened or otherwise) 104 times. That means that 47% of the time Spike will use a person's proper name.

Questions? Comments?