March 21, 2002

The Bloody Awful Poet Society celebrated its first anniversary in February!

To commemorate the occasion, we thought it would be nice to put together a special web page. We asked all members and any other interested redemptionists to join in the celebration by writing a short essay, of 100 words or less, of how they became a Redemptionista, and why they think Spike should be redeemed.

Following are the essays. If you would like to contribute your Redemption thoughts, instructions follow at the end.

Moms
I started watching buffy with my children, and thought wow that Angel is a hottie. My kids say, "mom!" ( id-life crisis maybe?)  But getting deeper involved with the characters, Spike  just opened my heart to an emotional little boy. He needs love and a strong love, a real love. If the " buf" can go for Angel, i'm sure Spike who tries so hard and seemingly wears his heart on his sleeve can be redeemed in the Buf's eyes. I always am in favor of the under dog. I want him to win. Spike's character pulled him into me heart and soul. Buffy,( the writers) better do the right thing. I wll be very dissappointed and so will many many fans.

Ps. Husband actually got jealous of picture of Spike in my den.

LovesBtch
In "School Hard" it is obvious that Spike is different, and in "Becoming" the extent of this difference manifested.  In "Fool for Love" we are teased with the concept of redemption, but for me, "Crush" solidified the possibility for him to be redeemed.  He paused before drinking that girl, and it was not because of his chip-the girl was already dead.  In season 6, the Troika, who possess the ever-elusive soul kill without remorse.  Spike has a heart, which he not only follows, but that literally owns him.  He is love's bitch.  A soul is worthless currency, and now Spike just must stay on the road that he has begun to tread to receive redemption.
 

Serena
Spike has and always will be my favourite character...certainly he is the most colourful and by far, the most complex. Buffy could learn so much for him if she would only stop and really look at him. She needs to let go of her preconceived notions or she will never truly see Spike for who he really is. It is a testament to Spike's character that he has remained so loyal and faithful but more than anything, patient with her. He could have so easily given up by now and yet he waits patiently and faithfully for her to finally recognize what nobility actually lays beneath the "monstor" that she has convinced herself is Spike. She needs to trust herself and her own feelings and truly open her heart to the possibility that Spike is not who she wants to think he is. Her acknowledgement of Spike the man, not the monster would truly move her into the land of the mature. She does not need to accept him as a romantic love, but the time has come for her to recognize that he truly is a noble person...vampire or not.
 

SidneyM
Even when Spike was evil he would do anything for someone he loved. The romantic in me loved that, but I never really felt the writers would give him any chance at redemption until he was "chipped" in S4. I was sooo thrilled. Finally someone had realized the potential of that character. Since I never frequented the boards at that time and didn't know anyone who watched BTVS, I thought I was the only one who saw this potential for him. Don't I feel silly now.
 

holy_shnikes
I became a Redemptionist to some extent way back in season 2 in the epeisode "I Only Have Eyes for You." Angelus is basically saying that Drusilla is sleeping with him and Spike is on the verge of tears. I didn't have a word for it but I was struck that this vampire was different and had feelings. I have been hooked on my favorite blondie bear ever since.
 

moms622
With this story plot, I think the show can be the longest drama series in tv history. :et me know if anyone agrees. Hey writers are you listening. Let's go for it, everyone. Fans adore Spike and crave his redemption. We all want the Spike bashing to stop. I see the Buff and Spike coming together and having baby spikes and baby Buffets. The children are a mixure of slayer dna and vampire dna. As a family they guide thier lives and their children's lives to combat everyday darkness. In a sense parents do this with their own children in real lives. The mix the children posess can also identify with the personalities of the children. remember on Bewitched. Little Tabitha did the magic nose thing like her mom, but her brother Adam was more mortal like Darren. I'd continue do watch their lives unfold.
 

whitecat17
" Angel, there has to be some part of you in there that still remembers who you are." I doubt this question will ever come up, from Buffy to Spike, referring to the soulful person he used to be.... mostly because the person he used to be is already there. It seems to be that Spike has surpassed normal vampire behaviors, and even without a soul Spike is capable of loving a girl with whom he knows he has no chance with. He is even capable of expressing concern. "Is there anything I can do?" In this moment he up front defied what vampires are supposed to be...selfish, he defied his demon, and his natural instinct... all for love. The personification of Spike, the man he made himself be, was in this moment in FFL melted away to the core of what he really is...a good guy, and no demon, it seems, can just make that go away. If this can happen, it's possible this same feeling may taint him further and thus... he will be redeemed. In the episode FFL, it was this moment in which we ALL saw that Spike was no longer a one-dimensional character... he remembers who he is; he just doesn't want to admit it and that doesn't make him evil...just insecure.
 

Moonmissy
The first time episode of BtVS I watched is "Crush." I didn't know anything about BtVS, or how the characters are like. But Spike caught me as the most endearing human character of the story. I fell in love with him when I saw his face before he fed off the dead girl in the Bronze. I saw hesitation in his eyes. In the last moment of the episode, I saw the most humanly face filled with the totality of emotions in less than 5 seconds before the door was closed. Spike became a source of intrigue for me since then.
 

Claudia
I think that the redemption is posible since "Something Blue" because in this episode Spike is willing to help Giles (who is blind) and the gang just because he is in love, and in this time he was just under a spell, and now that he is truly in love with Buffy, obviuosly is on the way of the redemption, and he is doing everything to change and be worthy of her. (Sorry my English, isn't my language, but I guess that the idea is clear)

Karen
I became a redemptionista because overcoming the worst in ourselves is what living is about. If courage is defined as doing the brave thing when you are frightened perhaps redemption is knowingly doing the right thing even when you are not a good person. Both are acts of will. Both are often initially motivated by love, however both are best when they come from conviction. Spike needs a sense of self worth. Virtue may be its own punishment, but the reward of virtue is the conviction that you are stronger that the sum of your measurable components. Spike as the Big Bad indulged his demon, but it never ruled him. William is also the past. A good man, but one who could turn his back on life's unpleasantness. I think Spike can and, ME & Co. willing, will become more than the man & the demon combined, a self-motivated force for good. (With or without Buffy.)
 

Alice
With "Lover's Walk," I think ME set out to make us identify with Spike. And since then, he has become a vampire whose humanity we do see and cannot ignore. We see that there is a terribly human man inside the terrible monster. And what does that say when ME makes his humanity more compelling than any other character's on the show? It speaks to all of us who've ever doubted our place in the world and our worthiness to be loved. And the need to transcend our base mortal selves through love. Who could resist such a siren call?
 

Patti
I've only been watching BtVS for about 2 months--just since FX started the latest repeat cycle, but I have become totally obsessed with it and have been inhaling it voraciously! This is such great stuff--who'd've thunk it?! I too am a confirmed Redemptionist. Anyone that can love as selflessly as Spike does Buffy, despite all his big-bad talk, is already on the road. Just the fact that he let her beat him to a bloody pulp without lifting a finger to stop her...hello!!! Hate can turn to love, and evil can be redeemed by good (remember Darth Vader?) :) Buffy needs to see the real man Spike has become, not the evil one from the past she insists on keeping foremost in her mind. Spike isn't perfect-- it must be difficult to be good after centuries of being bad--but he usually does the right thing in the end.
 

Khristine
I remember the very first time I saw Spike: it was in the middle of ridiculing a cousin who had become besotted with a show I perceived as a ring in pop-culture hell... Even then I was drawn to the character and kept hoping against hope that he would kill the protagonist. (and her friends too) I have come a long way since then, when Karma came to bite me in the posterior and I became obsessed with the show because of a certain morally ambiguous but oh-so-intriguing and complex bottle blonde. Spike epitomizes the power of free will and the redeeming nature of being able to give love freely. What can I say? I am hooked.
 

Jenn
Though I have been a Spike fan from "School Hard," it took a repeat of "Out of my Mind" last winter to make me a redemptionist. I loved the whole episode, especially the final scene. Spike's realization that his obsessive hatred of Buffy was actually love made him an even more complex character. Then I discovered S/B fanfiction and I realized that for them to get together, Spike would have to be redeemed. However, as I watched more, I began to want redemption only for Spike's sake. Every time he tries to do good, I want somebody to acknowledge him.
 

Geri
I just started watching BtVS last summer, during reruns of season 5. "Crush" was about the 4th episode I saw, and it made me a fan of the show, and a redemptionist. Spike was such a fascinating character, and screwed things up so spectacularly, I couldn't help but root for him to learn to understand what giving up the whole evil thing really meant, and to eventually get it right.
 

Laura
Spike was always my favorite character, but I didn't become emotionally invested in him until "Crush." He loved Buffy so much and tried so hard that I couldn't help but sympathize. I still wasn't sure if he could be redeemed though, until "Intervention." After having his every hope rejected and destroyed, he still endured horrible torture and would have died for Buffy, even if she never even knew what he'd done. For me, that was proof that his love was selfless, and that he was capable of becoming so much more than the "evil thing" Buffy thought he was.
 

Fear of Redemption
Xander is who we refer to when speaking of BtVS' "Every day guy". I am of the opinion, that Spike is the true master of that title. So many people identify with and are drawn to him. His need for love, his inclination for doing bad, his desire for and fear of redemption, and his ability to make us forget about his past all because of his striving to be something more. All of these things that make William/Spike irresistible, also make him redeemable. He is William and we will only ever be content with him.
 

Rogiari
I became a redemptionista much sooner than Spike's Fool for Love appeared in Italy, my country. And that's, due to the fact that in the meanwhile I had discovered this amazing site. Then, I met William, and I fell for him so hard, that now every time Spike smiles, every time he cries, every time he looks at us with those astonishing blue eyes of him...I see William again. The man he was, the man he can be again, if he chooses what to be instead of letting the demon choose for him...and Buffy saw the light in his eyes, sometimes around Becoming part II, and she keeps on seeing it, and she can deny this to everybody, but not to herself...or to Spike himself. And she would keep on following that line in deep darkness
 

Pamela
Spike, once "merely" a complex villain, became over the course of a few episodes a believable impossibility - a creature with a heart that more than makes up for his lack of a soul. How can this be? Can it be that we all, no matter how serious our disadvantages, can rise above what we are told is our nature, despite others' insistence that we can't change? Can it be that the human spirit can rise from the muck that we make of our lives, that sticky swamp of crimes both large and small? Some of us hope so.
 

Christy
I became a redemptionista when Spike paired up with Buffy to defeat Angel, he didn't eat the cop, and he was honest with Joyce about who he was. At that point I thought he could be a good guy, given half a chance.:: ::I think Spike should be redeemed because it is a story of hope. If an evil, soul-less vampire can change, there is hope for all of us. By redeeming Spike, judging him on who he is now, and not who he used to be, the message is sent that you can become a better person. ::
 

Orna.
Oh what a day it was. I remember the first time I saw Spike in season 2, from the first scene, it struck me that he was different. At first I just noticed that his character was great, and that he was evil, yet in a much more human way than all previous villains. ::Although he steadily became more "amiable" for redemption, I didn't think he was going to turn down that path.::But as I watched his metamorphosis in s5, I became a redemptionist.:: Originally his motive was to get close to Buffy, but I think that now he genuinely wants to be a "good guy".
 

Martine
The shift::::Many a time, I passed by the TV and caught a glimpse of dark leather clothes, and eye-catching, threatening, enticing bleached hair. But I never stopped.::::Then one evening, I saw a bleached-blond man move like a cat around a pool table, telling his story in a rumbling voice.::::For the first time, I sat down. I watched the evil man's anger rise; a riffle; the menacing stance; the lethal hatred.::::And then, his face shifted.::::Concern. Shared pain. Sitting down, patting Buffy's shoulder awkwardly.::::And I was hooked. Simple as that...::
 

Mel
I became a redemptionista because I have a "thing" if you will, for bad boys. Spike definitely has the image down, but something tells me that there's good in there. That's even better! I like it when a guy has the leaning towards evil but chooses to be good instead. It's also kind of romantic to know that a guy is changing for and because of you. Love hurts, but heals as well.::Spike should be redeemed so that people can see that what once was is not always. A person can change, no matter what deeds have been done.
 

Drujan
I hoped for redemption since Initiative, when an evil vampire, instead of acting enraged, made a surprising choice to comfort and allay insecurities of his victim who he couldn't bite. I became convinced that Spike will be redeemed in FFL. Spike doesn't have a soul, but he has an amazing heart, and that's much more important. He doesn't need a soul to be redeemed. He loves selflessly and completely, he can empathize and feel compassion... This soulless demon still has enough humanity left in him to learn to view humans not as his food but as "people who are us".
 

Colleen
I came late into Spike fascination, after years of my son and friend begging me to watch the show. I started watching shortly after the chipping, and must say the first real sign I had that Spike was changing (though I had trouble convincing my son and friend) was when he helped the girl in Triangle. There was no one to give him brownie points, Buffy wasn't watching, yet he continued to help the injured young woman. It was obvious to me - this was not your average evil vampire. A small step? Perhaps. But every baby step for Spike is like a giant step for those with a "soul" (how I've come to dislike the word). I must say I fell in love with Spike in Something Blue, but I saw how far he could go in Triangle.
 

AngelusR
Who is Spike?::::Spike is a vampire obviously but he is also so much more then that, he is the personification of an elusive second chance. He has the motivation and the ability to not only save himself but to fall in love in the process. Love is something no creature without a soul can feel but Spike is slowly beginning to realise that his feelings towards Buffy are not powered by his lust for pain but for genuine compassion. His redemption is no longer a personal crusade for the girl he wants but the only thing that can save him from the empty loveless world of before that Spike has fought so hard to erase. His attempt to seek redemption and solace from his past is the reason why i am so enthralled in Spike, if a blood sucking demon can take the opportunity to make the most of a second chance then it really gives hope to the countless humans that are also willing to make a new, better start then the one they left behind.
 

Mary Anne
I began thinking in terms of Spike's redemption after the September 11th disaster. Before that I was simply enjoying the softening of the character, as he turned away from being a one-dimensional cartoon villain into something real. Then I realized, if a fictional soulless vampire could be redeemed by love, then maybe one day real-life souled men could be redeemed enough not to commit mass murder in the name of God. You see, I think Spike's story is really ours. A world without redemption is a world without hope. And a world without hope is another name for hell.
 

Scarlett
My name is Scarlett and I'm a Redemptionista. I believe that when someone says something better than I ever could, I should just bow down and give praise where it is due. On BAPS, post #72788 is a philosophical essay on the meaning of a true Existentialist Hero (our boy Spike) and we only need to read that to understand the fact that Spike has a free will and all the choices he makes are his own. The chip makes him passively evil, not actively good. I believe that earns him the right to be redeemed. In my fantasies it also earns him the right (WHEN THE SERIES ENDS) to hold a dying Buffy in his arms and when she breathes her last breath, to fall on a stake and join her in the afterlife.
 

Tourmaline
I began watching Buffy during season 4 so I had never seen the non-chipped Spike. I liked the character from the beginning although I never gave much thought about redemption. Then came Fool For Love. The moment he sat down next to her on the porch I believed he should be redeemed. Since then I have caught all the early episodes. Nothing I have seen in the earlier shows or since has changed my redemptionist opinion. P.S. The scene where Spike tells Buffy how long she has been gone and the scene at the Crypt door during Dead Things have forever cemented my feelings.
 

Verinthalia
I never was a die hard fan of BtVS in the first 3 seasons. The character of Spike was to me, a comic relief. He never was deeply evil, just a bad boy anarchist. Even in season 4 before the Initiative caught him, the Spike character reminded me of an angry child with his 'I'll pay you back' attitude. But in "Fool for Love" and the Angel cross over, I discovered that William was a sad and lonely man. Before he was turned he was the romantic geek who desperately needed some one to validate him as a man and to love him in return. As a survivor myself of emotional and physical abuse, we tend to do one of two things, we fade away, disappear to avoid drawing any more pain. Or we take all feelings and lock them safely away, we only show Bravado or rage. If you do not feel, you can't get hurt. Spike is William's defense. He is so unsure of how to release his feelings, that he only opens himself to more pain. I am so angry now at Buffy herself, He needs for her to see him and acknowledge that he does have feelings, He has fallen back in to hit me, hurt me, prove you love me, way of thinking. The Buffy in "Dead Things" is pulling him back into the mind games and painful sexuality that Dru warped and wrapped him into for sooooo long. Her beating him to a bloody pulp followed my his line of 'you only hurt the ones you love' shows he accepting the pain she inflicts as proof of her love.
 

Zola
Spike has always been my favorite character, but I began to believe in his redemption in "Intervention". After Buffy rejected him, there were plenty of rotten things he could have done. Instead, he ordered the BuffyBot. He wanted her to be a secret so that he could deal with his love for Buffy without hurting anyone. This was a huge step forward because it meant that he had accepted Buffy's wishes and wasn't seeking revenge. His later refusal to reveal the Key's whereabouts to Glory even under torture clinched it. Spike was changing for the better and I was hooked!
 

Rachel
I became a Redemptionista with "Fool for Love"--what can I say about that episode that isn't already up there on the screen? I need to believe in the possibility of redemption because of the hope implied by that possibility. Spike is a modern Tannhauser: he has done evil things in the past, and by any human yardstick, he is a danger, but if redemption is possible for him, then it's possible for anyone.
 

Sylvia
I believe in Spike's redemption because of his portrayer. I wouldn't be this obsessed if someone less talented than James were playing the part. Shallow? Perhaps, but I care about Spike desperately. I see every emotion cross his face, hatred, longing, fear, vulnerability, desire, love and it's all due to one of the most gifted actors I've ever seen. I care about Spike because James has *made* me care, through his brilliant portrayal. Not very redemptionista-oriented, sorry, just my thought. I have to add that the writing helps :), but it still wouldn't fly for me if not for James.
 

Sirona7
When Spike revealed William, everything about the character changed for me. I remembered what Darla said to Angelus in The Prodigal (Angel s1) "What we once were informs all that we have become. The same love will infect our hearts - even if they no longer beat. Simple death won't change that." And so it was that William's humanity threads through Spike-he was a "good man". We have seen many glimpses of this complex humanity: gentleness, courtesy, friendliness, dare I say, compassion, commingled with obstinacy, fear of inferiority, and childlike impulsivity. But proof of his redeemableness is in Fool for Love, when Spike lowers the shotgun, and asks Buffy, "What's wrong? Is there something I can do?" at that moment he reclaimed something intangible from his humanity. Since then, Spike has come much further along the journey but we find him now at a crossroads. He can continue to insist on his darkness or he can accept the good and that he wants good for himself not just for Buffy's sake. After Dead Things, Buffy can see Spike as someone not just something. I hope that she gives Spike that which will truly allow him to choose the better path- respect- and begins to esteem him as a former enemy and a valued friend. That's what I hope for them both.

Melissa
"It isn't right!"

 The speech on Angel concerning the Angelmobile and nancyboy hair gel  had to be immediately found and downloaded as soon as I could find  it.  I think it all started there.

 "No, no, no..that isn't right!" I stomped off to bed after watching  the tape. "She's supposed to be with Angel!" 'Something Blue' had  made me mad.

I tossed and turned for the five hours I was allowed to sleep before  work. Dreams filled my head concerning the the show. Angel had  left...Riley was...boring.  Spike was kind of cute, and funny. But he was evil, not that I minded, but there has to be at least one hint of  redemption.  His redemption was only the chip.

Monster in her man speech to Riley.  Crumpled chocolates.  Compassion on the porch.  And he stayed no matter how hard she pushed him away. He kept his promise. As much as he wanted her back, he did not want her back like this.

 Yeah, he's won me over, he's better for her than Angel. So I guess 'Something Blue' was right all along.
 

Sanguine
 I have always identified with the underdog -- their alienation, their Otherness.  After I found out about William, the lovesick  poet Spike had once been, I saw a tantalizing narrative possibility.  Spike's love for Buffy might inspire him to reject his violent vampiric nature; love might be more important to him than bloodshed.  I saw this possibility because I believe that  love can transform us.  I believe in free will.  We are not pawns of fate; we possess the ability to shape our own destinies.  I do not believe in the fundamentalist notion that only the Chosen Few can be redeemed.

Shakespeare wrote that actors are the abstract and brief chroniclers of our times.  In these dark times, I must believe that love can overcome violence.  I must believe art matters. And that's why I want to see Spike struggle towards the light.
 
 

Michelle
He was the cool kid everyone wanted to be:
leather-clad with a dangerous aura. Then we saw underneath the facade to an everybody: a poet, a gentle soul. We saw it was an accident of location that made him a vampire, it could happen to any one of us, ambushed in a dark alley. We felt a resonance, empathy, for his path. We saw that his journey is our journey too. We believe him capable of redemption because to believe otherwise is to remove hope for ourselves in the daily struggle with our own inner darkness, our inner 'vampiric' nature.

Magnus
From his humble beginnings as a villain, to be killed  off soon, he began to be one of the most complex characters on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Somewhere between then and now, I began to care about him, not because he was a cool guy with a leather coat and an attitude, but because he touched something inside of me. Spikes struggle against overwhelming odds and his fight against his innate urges to do evil speak to me on a basic level.

 Spike will one day know redemption, I'm sure of it. I'm a firm believer in free will, I'm certain that one day, through the love of his friends, he will decide of his own to leave the ways of evil behind him.

Spicywings
It was probably School Hard--
he loved without condition,

Or . . . Lover's Walk?
He hurt so deeply cause
"She didn't even care enough to
cut off my head . . . "
He would have done it.

Maybe Intervention?
Beaten, tortured, yet ever loyal,
unwilling to cause her more pain.

Or atop the tower, when he
realized he couldn't save his Niblet?

Or After Life when he shared her wounds?

Evil doesn't love that compassionately,
hurt that intensely,
or remain ever loyal.
Spike does, and thereby travels the Road.

Jody
I first started watching BtVS as the tail end of Season three. When Spike appeared in season 4, I had no idea of his previous history with Buffy and the next thing I knew he was chipped, so I never appreciated him as a Big Bad until much later. The episode that hooked me on the show was The Initiative, and the scene between Spike and Willow. After that I just adored his character. I want his redemption because it will keep him on the show...villains have a very short shelf life. And I want him to have Buffy because HE wants it so badly, though lately it does seem that he could do better. He has evolved so much since his early days, it seems impossible that some people cannot see this. True it is still all about Buffy, and Dawn, and to a lesser extent, her friends, but with a little encouragement and help, he could go much further. I really think it is a black mark against the SG that they have missed this opportunity to "convert" a vampire to the good side, when it was within their power. It is only their prejudice and selfishness which prevented this. I really hope that this situation, along with the Buffy situation changes over the course of the next season or 2. Spike would be a valuable member of the SG, if they would..all of them..ever give him a chance.

Siobhan
I became a Redemptionista when Spike turned his back on Drusilla in Crush.  The earlier interactions between Spike and Dawn showed the possibilities; Spike cared about someone other than Buffy or himself and was willing to endure Buffy's wrath to give Dawn what she needed.  He glimpsed a life different from anything Drusilla could offer and was left with the choice to go back to his own bad self or reach for something new.   When Spike shocked Drusilla he made the braver choice - he went with the unknown.  That was, for me, when redemption for Spike became a reality.
 

Alane
When Spike put down the gun in "Fool for Love," he also set aside his own selfish needs. In that moment, I became a Redemptionist -- even though I had no word for it at the time. Spike changes in that scene. If he could change from a murderous rage to to compassion, I knew that any change for him was possible. His fate is in his own hands. It always has been.
 

If you'd like to add your thoughts to this page, send them to  SpikeRedemption@aol.com . Or, just type in your essay on this Web page!
 

If you have any questions, contact alanesue@aol.com

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