I need to start this article off by saying I used to have a life sized cardboard cut out of Spike and a life size poster, as well as calendars, statues, and toys. I’ve met James Marsters. Spike was the love of my life for five years of my childhood and well into my teenage years.
And then he wasn’t.
I’m not coming at this as someone who was a certified hater from birth. I was a stan. Writing this article has always been at the forefront of my mind but I never had the guts to write it. Spike is a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan favourite. Spuffy is endgame (even if it makes me want to rip my hair out). I don’t hate James Marsters, I think he’s pretty talented and a nice enough guy to talk to (counting that time I met him once). I don’t even think Spike is the worst character on this show (Xander exists.) But as I get older and try to make my mark on the horror world, I think it’s important to discuss why this character sucks. I will try to break this essay into parts to explain why the character doesn’t work, and where I think things went wrong.
Did Spike Always Suck?
No. I can still watch Season 2 of Buffy and get some genuine joy from his character. He is at his best when he is working with Drusilla (Juliet Landau), his sire and longtime girlfriend. As a character, Spike is basically a bullied kid who has become the bully, with Drusilla being the only person who can access his softer side. I’m a sucker for that “mean to thee, but not to me” relationship dynamic in fiction, and it works well because both of them are vampires aka monsters. Spike being this brutal killer and the only vampire ever to kill two slayers on one side, and then the other side is him buying his girlfriend pet birds or babying her, is such a great writing move. Spike is threatening but he also has weaknesses, and I think he is at his best in this season because it illustrates that perfectly.
It also sets into motion that Spike is a romantic, but is also exceedingly selfish; in Season 2 he eventually teams up with Buffy to help fight Angelus not to prevent the end of the world, but so he can take Drusilla somewhere else and they can mend their relationship. He doesn’t care about other people, he cares about his partner and his relationship but only on his terms. He is controlling, he is needy, he is gross — but he is a villain dating another villain, so these traits are not glorified. They are darkly comedic at best. Because the viewers were never supposed to see these characters again, they can interpret this in a way they see fit and never think about these characters. They could have been fan favourites–and they were. Spike was so beloved that the creator, Joss Whedon, brought him back for a guest episode.
Fine.
Then he brought him back permanently — not because he liked the character, but because fans demanded it–and this is where things get screwy.
When Did Spike Start To Suck?
While Season 4 started to plant the seeds of doubt, I would argue Season 5 is when he really started to just blow as a character. After having a chip implanted in his brain that stopped him from killing people in Season 4, Spike started to reluctantly help Buffy and company kill demons and other vampires because he can still do that. It works — it works with his character arc of being selfish and doing what works for him, but it also is the beginnings of his hero arc which he ONLY goes on because — he becomes obsessed with Buffy.
This is where the show starts to have it’s cake and eat it too. Spike had an unhealthy relationship with Drusilla but the writing was aware it was not healthy or ideal. He was obsessive, controlling, and needy, traits that used to show how evil he was. Now the writers were repackaging these same traits but trying to say it was real love. Wrong-o. Spike even builds a robot lookalike of Buffy TO HAVE SEX WITH IT. He steals her sweaters and makes his girlfriend wear them and pretend to be Buffy.
Spike having a hero arc because he wants to get laid is not the redemption arc the writers think it is — and they try to sell it as something even more special than Angel, a vampire who is cursed with a soul and can never experience a moment of true joy or he will lose his soul. So Angel spends his days repenting and trying to do good while denying himself any true happiness because he can’t bear the idea of hurting people — a hero.
Spike decides to be good so Buffy will get in his pants. Spike is a nice guy incel. Period.
While Buffy rebuffed (pun not intended) his advances at first, eventually the two of them had this trauma induced physical relationship after Buffy came back from the dead a second time. Again, the dynamic was unhealthy. They were using each other — Buffy to feel something, and Spike was just satiating his obsession. Eventually, Buffy breaks it off — and Spike responds by trying to assault her. This is disgusting, but honestly how an incel would respond, so who is shocked? Apparently no one, as no one ever addresses this ever.
Spike feels bad and then goes to get his soul, and we have to deal with that for a whole half a season before he finally dies as a sacrifice for the whole town. Buffy says she loves him (this dude tried to rape her, but okay I guess) and he dies, and you think you’re finally free of this menace but no, this peroxide piece of shit shows up on Angel. Then my boy Angel has to fucking engage with this piece of shit and get schooled constantly on hOw AcTuAlLy Spike is the better man. Except that he isn’t. While one could argue he got his soul on his own while Angel was cursed with his, Spike only even wanted to be a better person so Buffy will love him. Which again, it’s an in character choice, but still grossly selfish. WHY IS HE A HERO?!
Could Spike Be Redeemed?
No.
If all the stuff I mentioned wasn’t enough, they also pair him with Harmony when he returns as a permanent but unwanted fixture in Season 4. Harmony is a ditzy vampire who used to bully Buffy and friends in high school. While her character is shallow, vapid and annoying, she is also permanently eighteen. Audiences are supposed to laugh at Harmony, which is all well and good, until part of the joke becomes Spike (a man at least in his late twenties when he was turned, and having been a vampire for one hundred and twenty years) verbally and physically abuses this girl. At one point, he tests out a magic ring on her, with the ring giving them the power to not be staked, and he tests it by staking her — meaning that if the test failed, she would die. He is also constantly calling her annoying, stupid, and worthless. She is reduced to tears at one point, and we see her walking around alone just crying because she doesn’t understand why he is so mean to her. AND THEY STAY TOGETHER FOR TWO YEARS. What’s the joke, Joss? Because Harmony is annoying she deserves to be abused? It’s gross. Spike is gross.
I wish Buffy had staked his ass at the end of Season 2. I hate this character and growing up is realizing he’s a huge piece of shit and there are so many better men in the Buffy-verse to care about.