- Billy
by Aeryn -4.21.05
[ aaeryn@blkswan.com ]

  Billy Blim, oh how we love you, you woo us with your words of love and devotion. You are like a knight in shining armor. You are a devoted crusader of the rights of women. Wait… that wasn’t Billy! I remember now! Billy was the asshole prick that turned his rage onto men provoking them into committing violence against women. Damn good episode though. It is one of the more scary Angel episodes out there.

This episode is in my top five of Angel episodes. The writing was good, acting was extremely well, I mean who didn’t get a bit freaked out by Wesley? The underlying topics were flying everywhere. This episode was a metaphor for so much unsaid topics that we face everyday.

Billy was said to bring out a primordial misogyny rage that exists deep down in the man’s psyche. What the hell does that mean anyways? Well, primordial is defined as “existing first or in an original state”. Misogyny is defined as “hatred of women.” We have seen misogyny used before in the article about Caleb. So a primordial misogyny is pretty much a first (original) hatred of women. This hatred lies deep within a male’s psyche. Let’s look at psyche, shall we? Psyche is defined as “the soul or spirit. The mind.” So this hatred is just a part of every man according to Lilah and the folks at Wolfram and Hart. Billy’s touch just brings it out in them. That explanation makes me want to puke. It is saying that all men have it in them to hurt and brutalize women. It is just a deeper part of who they are. They are taking the blame from Billy and placing it on the man.

So let’s see, if you rape a woman, can it be traced back to a primordial misogyny? Is that saying that violence against women is inherit in ALL men? If you buy Lilah’s tale, then that is what it is saying. I don’t know about you guys, but I would have a big problem with that if I were male. It also means that there is nothing that can be done about this; it is unchangeable and matter of fact. Nothing anyone can do to change it or even cure it.

Wesley begins to doubt what kind of man he is. He struggles with whom he really is underneath because of the things that he did to Fred. He wonders about what if this is who he really is underneath it all. That he had the capacity to destroy something that he deemed precious in this world through utter violence and hatred. Wesley is seen at his apartment isolated days later when Fred comes by. She says that he is a good man. Wesley doesn’t agree. He is faced with how much did the blood influence him and how much of what happened him and how much was Billy’s attitudes towards women.

Fred’s theory is the most buyable for me. Fred does not believe that any of it was Wesley or a part of Wesley’s hidden attitudes. She states that it was not him, but it was something done to him. She knows that he did not want to kill her, nor is there any part of him now that wants to kill her.

This goes along with the evidence that we have seen through out the episode. A man with no evidence of domestic violence beats his wife to death for no reason other than she wouldn’t shut up. No other preceptors. No history of mental illness or substance abuse, or any medical conditions that were known. Billy touched him and it changed the man into a carrier of Billy’s misogyny towards women. Billy would sit back and observe. He would take pleasure in watching the men hurt the women.

This is the sicko. He gets off on seeing the men hurt the women. He is like a peeping tom. Only instead of women undressing, he wants to see the women being beaten. Look at Billy in a sexual disorder model. Billy fits the classic example of a Voyeurism, sexual sadism and Antisocial Personality Disorder. The voyeurism and sexual sadism is called a paraphilias. The features of a paraphilias are “recurrent, intense, sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors generally involving 1. nonhuman objects 2. the suffering or humilation of oneself or one’s partner or 3. children or other nonconsenting persons that occur over a period of at least six months.” What am I saying with this? What I am saying is that when you add the two paraphilias to a personality disorder, you have a dangerous combination there. People do things for pleasure. Angel was able to overcome Billy because Angel did not have this hatred. Angelus dealt in pleasure. Billy dealt with his own pleasure, but to say that the primordial misogyny was not present in Angel is misleading. I believe he felt Billy’s rage. It threatened to take over, but his psyche overpowered it. He was able to do this after years of dealing with anger and hatred.

Have I confused the hell out of anyone yet? Nope? Good.

Let’s turn to the ladies. Cordelia, Fred and Lilah, in particular. The only ladies I guess I could say. Lilah gets the shit beat out of her by GAVIN! GAVIN of all people! We know then Billy is influential, because HELLO it is GAVIN! If he hadn’t had some help, Lilah could have easily bitched slapped him out of her office.

Cordelia feels responsible for Billy being out, since Angel got him out of his fire cell to save her. Lilah is responsible for putting harm to Cordelia and Angel is responsible for getting him out. Everyone is blaming himself or herself, save Lilah cause her boss’ want him out. She just wants to kill the bastard. Go girl! Billy is responsible people, quite blaming yourselves, but it shows that you are good by you looking to take the blame.

I love Cordelia’s speech to Lilah about being a viciacous bitch. It wasn’t insulting, but it was an empowering speech. I was really impacted by that speech, especially the shoes dialogue and how the two women played off each other. Joss actually wrote that part according to the commentary, and I think it was excellent.

However, Fred, well she is being stalked by Wesley who wants to kill her and seems to think that Fred is a slut. She taunts him and uses her power over him to manipulate him. Then she runs into Gunn who begs her to hit him over the head before he turns evil. After a few cussing, she does.

Fred triumphs over evil Wes and Gunn, Lilah shoots Billy, by the end of the night, everyone turns out ok. They are still haunted by Billy and how his touch affected their lives. Fred has to go and ask Wesley to come back and we can see both of their outside bruises. Wesley’s we can see his internal ones as well. First of the episode, Wesley wanted to tell Fred how he felt and by the end, he had no shot with her for a while.

In the end, we learn Billy is bad. I hope he got his fire cell back. Funny how it was Skip guarding him again. At least I think it was.

Fogey: I did enjoy the talk between Lilah & Cordy and enjoyed seeing Billy get shot even more. - It was a good episode but the primordial misogyny rage that exists deep down in the man’s psyche." was nonsensical(insert bad word of choice here).
(26.04.2005, 23:09)

Tony the Cowardly Dog: Re: Gavin, in reply to Cordy pointing out that she got the shit beaten out of her, Lilah says: "You should see the other guy!". I tend to believe her.
(21.04.2005, 19:50)

DaddyCatALSO: Hey, anybody with a functioning imagination can *think* of anything, imagine *how* it might play out. But thinking doesn't mean doing. Drawback;the way soem people are taught, they get convinced that thinking itself makes them bad and so stop fighting it.
(21.04.2005, 18:53)