I think I have thinky thoughts on this and will come back later if they are share-worthy. Great subject for a poll, though!

You know, in some ways, I think that the events of S6 were sorta necessary to the Spuffy 'ship. I think that, for me, seeing Spike and Buffy come back from that as individuals, and as a pairing, was what really got me into reading/writing fic in the first place. I like redemption stories, and the idea that they could rebuild a relationship after everything that happened was incredibly compelling.

No. I do think the events of S6 narrowed the parameters for a Spuffy relationship, though. For example, I don't think a relationship would've been possible - or should have happened - after the AR without Spike getting a soul. And the fact that there was so much dysfunction in their S6 relationship meant that there was a lot of rebuilding that needed to happen before they could be together - and, unfortunately, the show ended before they ever really managed it - but I don't think it was insurmountable, given enough time to heal.

Wish there was an undecided option. *sigh*

In my ideal world, Spuffy pretty much goes from 'Intervention' to 'Touched' and cuts out that less pleasant stuff in the middle. For the most part, I lean toward believing that yes, those issues should be insurmountable. However, there's also the notion of there not being a real world parallel of the soul/no soul issue. It's all very muddled and makes it difficult for me to decide one way or the other.

Me like Spuffy. S7 Spuffy is good, so me glad.

It was season 7 that made me a spuffy shipper, not season 6. Yeah, really bad, destructive things happened. I think they had become toxic by late season 6 (obviously YMMV on that one) and needed to take a break and do some maturing. I think they did, and their relationship in season 7 is much healthier.

Those two have been to hell and the journey back together gives them a glimmer of hope until, well, Joss showed up. :P

I too, am on board with the S7 'shipping. A couple moments in S5 made me squee and enjoy but it was just the understanding and tenderness and the downright REFUSAL to give up on each other when everyone else turned their backs that made me go "oh, oh... love!'

Although I have written S6 and after Spuffy stories I pretty much lost my belief in the 'ship then. As I have Buffy and Spike say in my story "It's Got To Be Perfect"-

"What happened to 'my willing slave'?"

"You beat him to death in the alley behind the police station."

Damn, I'm lovin' this poll idea! I've been thinking a lot about this very subject because of recent developments in the comics and felt it needed to be addressed.

I voted a firm 'no'. I draw instant parallels between S7 Spuffy and S3 Bangel and get really annoyed when people say one is acceptable and the other is not. Obviously in real life you should never date your attempted rapist, but then again the very same could be said for someone who murdered your teacher! Real world logic really does not apply when it comes to the rules regarding soul/lack of soul and vampires in the Buffyverse. The problem is that the writers stupidly decided to use the AR as a catalyst for Spike's breakdown/epiphany and really did not think through its wider emotional implications. The way that Angel is often presented as completely distinct from Angelus also makes it easier for many to seemingly forgive or dismiss his soulless acts as the work of someone else.

I like to see Spuffy as working backwards. They jump straight from friendship to the having of crazy monkey sex. The emotional closeness does not come until much later. It makes for a very unconventional romance, but that doesn't mean I do not think it would ultimately work. I actually read the novelisation of S7 whilst I was still watching S6 so I knew that the two would ultimately come back to a place of love.

I'm not sure I could buy 7Spuffy without 6Spuffy.

The vampire metaphor is desire-as-consuming the one desired.

BUFFY/JOAN: I kill your kind.
SPIKE/RANDY: And I bite yours.

The funny-dark-terrifying of 6Spuffy gives a wholly different ground to Buffy's relation to the vampiric metaphor by the sexual-but-failed-emotional relation to Spike, who despised Angel & Buffy but detested Angelus-deranged-by-Buffy even more. 5Spuffy couldn't move to 7Spuffy without first addressing both the difference & the impossibility of actual relationship between Buffy & Spike. The relationship had to move out of the realm of vampiric metaphor into the more difficult truth that there is & can be no "we were made for each other" where desire is concerned. Spike has to choose Buffy, and Buffy has to choose Spike, and S6 has to occur to propel them into free choice, into the sort of need which doesn't use the other, that gets past making the other into a fetish that signifies that one belongs to Eternal Love/Untameable Desire.

7Spuffy is warmer & deeper as it moves out of the rocky & bruising (literally for the characters) territory of 6Spuffy. There's a degree of catharsis in 6Spuffy, tho', so long as the context of physical-psychological endurance is constantly kept in view. Otherwise it would be pure de Sade . . .

I'm going to go ahead and assume you meant...well, I based my answer on the assumption that you meant if a fic were to have taken place directly after season six, or in canon, had it continued (*ignoring the comics--la la la!*), would it be feasible to have them end up together, to which I voted "No."

I think that they both had a lot of growing up to do, and once they both finished (Spike was well on his way in s5 of Ats), I don't think they'd be compatible. However, the potential was there at the end of s5 and the beginning of s6, but...it would not be wise for them to go back. I felt like (canonly speaking) their story, like Buffy and Angel's, was done. It was an important part of their lives in regards to self discovery, but the chapter ended, the story continued, and there were new characters introduced and so forth.

Damn it, I put in the wrong answer...

And my initial comment seems to have disappeared.

I meant to put the first option--"I'm a Spuffy shipper and yes." I think it was an important time in their overall development, but once they've actually had time to grow up, no--I don't see the point in them going back (canonly speaking). Their story (in canon) felt over and done to me. And really, there's nothing wrong with growing up and moving on, and I think that for those two, that'd be the best option.

That, and once they reached maturity (and I think Spike was nearly there, being his own man in s5 of Ats), I don't think they'd be compatible anyway. The potential was there at the end of s5 and the beginning of s6, but that was irrevocably shot to shit, IMO.

I haven't seen S7 yet past Same Time, Same Place, so I don't have the benefit of seeing what happens before responding to the poll. Does that make me more or less biased? ;)

I totally admire Spike for having the brass ones to go get a soul and become a new man for Buffy. And I do see some growth in Buffy through S6 and the first few eps of S7. But even after she realizes in Beneath You that he has a soul, it doesn't seem to budge her attitude toward him, so I think she's just not in a place (canon-wise) to love Spike. That, plus Joss has this real talent for messing up relationships.

Because I am a hopeless Spuffy shipper, I'm working on a post Beneath You fic that proves me totally wrong and shows that they can get together after all. And I'm writing it without watching more of S7. Just to see where canon and I diverge and come together. I'll see if I can come up with ways to get them together post S6 that make sense to me. 'Cause right now I ain't seein' it. As much as I want to.

Not even sure that made sense. Long day. Brain tired.

No. I think the events of S7 put an end to any subsequent Buffy/Spike relationship.

I'm incapable of shipping/OTP-ing, which may impact my vote? I could absolutely see them working out at some point in the future.

*thinks*

Now that I think of it (and this makes me pretty uncomfortable, actually), I suppose given the number of ASA&B (attempted sexual assault and battery) cases committed by known parties, there are probably bunches of people who are IRL with someone that tried to rape them.

I mean, I've certainly heard stories from my group about even their best mate/boyfriend or whatever requiring an extremely firm "NO" and maybe a shove in the other direction if they were completely drunk, and it didn't ruin their relationships, kwim? Add in the whole demon-y aspects and well- all this to say that as unpleasant as it is, AR might not be the deal-breaker we like to think it is. :-\

I think Spike did everything he could (got the soul, fought with her and her friends to the death)to make amends, with no expectation that it would make any difference in Buffy's feeling toward him. (at least after the fact). He was willing to be whatever she needed him to be, without condition or expectations (that is not to say that he didn't still want her to love him, just that he was willing to accept whatever terms she wanted)and I HOPE that Buffy in return would be able to set aside both her prejudices (vampire!) forgive him because of that (and also, IMP although she was not responsible for the AR she was just as guilty as he in the mess that their relationship was in season 6 because of her abuse) and see him for who he really was, someone who loved her enough to die for her. That is pretty powerful, especially for someone whose previous lovers (and father) have left her for one (stupid)reason or another. And a reasonable basis for a relationship that could work. After all, at this point they have a lot of the hard work behind them. I don't know if this really answers the question if you only take account season 6 though, I guess this would be more my take after season 7.

I ship Spuffy and no, of course not. To steal someone else's answer, they couldn't have had what they did in s7 without going through the hell of s6. I don't believe they would have had anything deep or meaningful without the events of s6 to drive them both to their lowest points individually. Talk about going through a shitstorm. And if they can go through all that and then trust each other enough to lay together in the dark the night before an apacolypse, then there's something very deep there, something lasting.

Not to mention all the hands symbolism between them and the trust and partnership they exhibited. Those two still desired each other, it just became least important in their overall relationship.

Okay, that was word vomit, and probably a little frantic but shipping isn't something you do logically, so it's hard to put down in words all my feelings about them.

I chose the second option :) I'll admit, I'm a weird shipper and don't really care about a functional romantic relationship 'working out' between them. But I think it says something that my automatic response to "Do you feel that the events of S6 put an end to any subsequent Buffy/Spike romantic relationship?" was "Duh, no."

I don't really ship Buffy with anyone - for me ships are more of an interesting fandom "what if" experiment of what two characters would bring out in each other. (With the exception of W/T because OH MY GOD, HOW CUTE WERE THEY IN S4?!? SO CUTE.) The cookie dough speech meant more to me than any of Buffy's relationships.

That said, I don't think S6 put S/B out of the realm of possibility because I think Spike's soul - his choice to go after a soul that couldn't be lost - is such a crucial demarcation. I'm glad we didn't see it on the show because I think that would be a shitty message to send in terms of mass media. (Because IRL? No, predators really can't change by any methods we have available to us.) But within the logic of the universe, yeah, it's plausible works.

B/S is so dysfunctional that I end up normalizing violence between them. I'm not sure I want to know what would be a deal breaker. But I think S6 B/S was less dysfunctional than previous seasons B/S; it was just more miserable, more life-sized and less fantastical, and disturbing in RL terms. For instance, S6 showed B/S as a life-sized angsty melodrama, while S5 was a larger-than-life violent romantic comedy. What I mean by rom com is that S5 B/S played as a boy who tries to woo a girl with funny results and misunderstandings--but since it's B/S the results are punches, insults, shotguns, B&E, cattleprods, stalking, shrines, sexbots, torture, stolen underwear, death threats, and attempted murder.

S6 Spike's seduction turned attempted rape is an improvement over what may be his M.O. of kidnapping, chains, death threats and/or torture (S/D in BII and LW; S/B in Crush). If Buffy can overlook or forgive S5 Spike, then it's within the bounds of her previous behavior to forgive attempted rape. Acquaintance rape is just a more controversial subject than mass murder, and is a RL crime that affects 1 in 4 women in the USA. So it hits closer to home than Spike's previous crimes which were also presented fantastically.

Buffy's alley beating was done with: a)permission, and b)someone who can hit her back and is capable of stopping her. IMO, S6 Buffy's less violent with Spike since she hits him as foreplay, in response to him restraining her or his use of force, or disapproval of dangerous contraband. S5 Buffy comes across as a bully since Spike can't hit her back, she hits him for stuff like lurking outside her house, and uses more than necessary force when trying to get info out of him. Spike was having sexual fantasies about her at the same time she started bullying him, so I think he'd find the beating forgivable. But in RL terms, Buffy beating up someone she's involved with is just more disturbing than beating up her ex-mortal enemy informant. The DV and battery interpretation is totally understandable.

I can't believe I wrote an S6 B/S apologia, since the sensationalistic yo-yo relationship drama grated on my nerves. During my S6 rewatch I tried to figure out what the B/S storyline was for, hence the tl;dr of me processing it.

I'm going to go with the overwheliming majority and say no.

Mostly, because I don't think they really had a romantic relationship until Season 7, just a physical connection. S6 Buffy wasn't in a relationship girl. Not with her family or friends either, and we lose a lot of the dynamic Buffy and Spike had beforehand in that, because being able to use him means not associating him with times prior to her death. And I think I'm confusing myself...

Basically, Buffy and Spike were too me, me, me in S6 to have a functional relationship, but it made Season 7 work because of those things.

Edited at 2010-05-18 07:04 am (UTC)

Do you by any chance know if there's any meta about Amanda the potential and relationship violence? I remember thinking it was really interesting that she sort of reminded Buffy of her S6 relationship with Spike before Buffy even knew she was a potential. Do they ever really interact again afterwards? I guess I'm just wondering about how we understand Buffy's comment to Knox in CWDP, "Sex and death and pain and
love, it's all, the same damn thing to you," as also being part of the slayer psyche. Slayers (especially Buffy) clearly see distinctions between sex and death and pain and love, and the confusion is really scary, as we see in S6, but that also means that said confusion is real to some extent. Blah blah, I don't know why I'm trying to think before 9 am :).

Well I'm not a Spuffy shipper. I never saw their relationship in season six as a star crossed romance, I saw it as an ugly mess for both of them.

Buffy is depressed and feeling separated from her friends and her life. The last thing she needs is Spike trying to pull her even further into the shadows. With the chip Spike can't really function as a vampire, and without a soul he can't function as a man. He's stuck in a void.

I chose 'no' as the answer to the question. Buffy is able to accept that Spike's soul makes a truely mutual loving relationship possible.

Also please note that I'm not insulting Spuffy shippers here.
Ship away, this is just the way I feel.

I voted not a Spuffy fan and that it didn't put an end to any feasible relationship. I don't think Buffy held the events against him, and though I don't have a great grasp on Spike's character, especially after the soul, I don't think he'd object, at least not forever. I realize that season seven was ambiguous enough for me to not be sure whether she meant it when she said she loved him, but now I lean towards she did. They're not the sort of people who give up after going through terrible times, and season seven proves that to me.

Hi! I've never commented on your journal before, but I've been reading some of your meta and fic today after seeing some of your essays recommended on Memorable Buffyverse Top 5 entries, and I've really enjoyed them. Considering all the crap that happens between Buffy and Spike, I sometimes feel that I have to justify shipping them (b/c in RL you obviously shouldn't support a relationship involving physical abuse and AR), so it's always a pleasure to read essays that coherently explain why this is, indeed, a perfectly plausible and awesome ship.

Anyway, I voted no. I think S7 did a good job of establishing the possibility of a future romantic relationship between them. I don't know if the events of S6 would have been necessary for Buffy to fall in love with Spike, but I am definitely in the minority opinion that she didn't love him until S7; and I actually think that she wasn't even "in love" with him in Chosen- rather, she loved him as a best friend and once the apocalypse was over and they had time to be just "Buffy and Spike" instead of "Slayer and Champion," she would have fallen in love with him if he hadn't, you know, died. Well, that was kind of a run-on sentence and probably more opinion than you wanted, but I thought I would say hi and say that I really like your writing!