Buffy The Vampire Slayer, "Fool For Love" Review (5x07)

Brief Synopsis: “When a vampire Buffy encounters on a routine patrol almost kills her with her own stake, Buffy begins to obsess over the deaths of the previous Vampire Slayers. Desperate for answers, she turns to the only person she knows with firsthand knowledge on how two former Slayers were murdered, having killed them himself...Spike.”


"Family" (5x06) quick link here                                                                                                                                                     "Shadow" (5x08) quick link here

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With that being said, let’s get started, shall we?



“Fool For Love” is a simple plot that gives us backstory on Spike, while keeping the flashbacks relevant to present day stories and themes. This isn’t new for the Buffyverse, having done similar things in Angel’s “The Prodigal” and Buffy’s “Becoming”. However, the way in which this episode is written, acted, and directed makes it one of the most intelligent pieces of television that I’ve seen in some time. Doug Petrie is a very competent writer. He’s penned such “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” episodes as “Bad Girls”, “Enemies”, and “This Year’s Girl”, amongst others. However, this is easily his finest 42-minute contribution to the show. This is a Joss Whedon-level quality of episode here, people. As I’m sure you’ve all realised by now, I adore flashback episodes and I absolutely adore the ‘Fanged Four’ (Angel, Spike, Darla, and Drusilla). Due to their age and interconnecting relationships, they allow such depth to be brought to the show through flashbacks and interactions in the present day. They literally bring hundreds of years of stories to the show. “Fool For Love” focuses on Spike’s origin story. How was he turned into a vampire by Drusilla? Why? What was William like before being sired? How did Spike kill his two Slayers? How did he get that scar on his eyebrow? Where did he get his leather coat? Why does he act the way he does around strong females? Why is he so loving compared to other vampires? What has shaped Spike’s identity and motivations? Why is he attracted to female who treat him like dirt? These questions are all answered over the 42 minutes that “Fool For Love” explores. It’s taken four seasons, FOUR SEASONS, to get our first Spike-centric episode. I’m okay with it taking this long because this is Spike’s first real season as a main cast member and part of the Scoobies. Yes, he was in the opening credits for season four, but he didn’t do a great deal outside of messing with the Scoobies a little and being miserable at Giles’ house. “Fool For Love” is the strongest episode of the season thus far and will remain so until “The Body” nine episodes later.

“Fool For Love” is a clever title because that’s exactly what Spike is and what William was before him. Look at William with Cecily, look at Spike with Drusilla and Buffy...Spike’s a romantic who always seems to end up falling for a strong-willed woman who looks at Spike as beneath her. Before he was sired, he was mocked, ridiculed, and rejected for being a hopeless, emotional, loving fool that followed his heart. This, I feel, paved the way for shaping Spike’s identity. He developed an inferiority complex after Cecily rejected him and told him that he was beneath her. If Angelus was the bi-product of Liam trying to be everything his father said he’d never be...successful, motivated, hard working, passionate, ruthless, famous...then Spike is the culmination of a lifetime of rejection and ridicule as William. Spike acting the way he does is a realistic response to how William was treated after Spike gains some strength and power for the first time as a vampire. However, even without a soul, Spike has large aspects of William’s personality just beneath the tough exterior of Spike. Remember, The Judge remarks in “Surprise” that Spike and Drusilla are in love, which is a rarity amongst soulless vampires that we’ve seen thus far. They’re capable of loving feelings, but usually only if there’s something in it for them other than love. Spike and Drusilla were genuinely in love for over a hundred years.

The flashbacks in this episode raise a very interesting question regarding Spike’s feelings for Buffy...since the moment he laid eyes on her in The Bronze in “School Hard”, Spike has been captivated by Buffy. Drusilla saw Spike’s feelings for Buffy way before Spike did, but they were there from the very beginning. Later in the review I’ll talk about whether Spike was attracted to Buffy just because she was a Vampire Slayer (something he admits to being obsessed with), but for now I’m going to look at other reasons. Buffy treats Spike just like Cecily treated William...like he’s beneath her. Like he’s inferior. This changes over the next couple of seasons, but up until this point Spike’s been nothing more to Buffy than an annoyance who’s sometimes useful. Every time Buffy treats him like crap, he’s more drawn to her because of his fundamental desire to prove himself as worthy. He can’t prove it to Cecily as she’s long dead (or is she?...*cough* Halfrek! *cough*), so he’s trying to prove to Buffy that he can be a good man. Outside of his mother, William was looked down upon by the people that surrounded him during his mortal life, which means that Spike is subconsciously drawn to people who will continue to treat him this way. It’s psychology 101. He’s drawn to people who look down on him and treat him as inferior and he’s always chasing after a person that he knows deep down it can’t work with in the long run. He’s always trying to win affections through violence or a grand gesture. Buffy ends up being the exception after she’s resurrected because she is also drawn to darkness. Plus, Spike has all those ‘mummy issues’, but that’s a story for “Lies My Parents Told Me”.

The episode opens with a classic “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” scene. Buffy is patrolling, battling a heinous vampire fiend, and is her usual pun-believable self...then she gets staked. WITH HER OWN STAKE. Talk about adding insult to injury. Buffy has never almost been killed by a regular vampire one-on-one before. When she was powerless in “Helpless”, sure. When she’s been outnumbered, absolutely. This was just a regular one-on-one battle in a routine patrol. We’ve never seen Buffy so vulnerable as she is here under these circumstances. Due to this tiny, insignificant almost death, Buffy gets scared.

Dawn: “Did I just pull a Slayer related cover-up thing? C’mon, who’s the man?”
Buffy: “You are. A very short, annoying man.”

(you just know Dawn is thinking "who's short now, bitch?")

Throughout the course of this season, we’ve witnessed Buffy becoming more and more interested in her Slayer lineage and history. We’ve seen her channelling her Slayer powers with more focus, we’ve seen her practising with a Watcher again, and we’ve seen her putting her Slayer training before anything in her life voluntarily (instead of Giles having to nag her into it like in high school). Now, because of her near death experience, she’s interested in why the other Slayers died. Why did they lose? What did they do wrong? How can Buffy avoid an early death herself? Luckily, someone already in Sunnydale has not only been around for a hundred and twenty eight years, but has also killed two former Slayers. How convenient. I’ve also got to mention that the scene where Giles and Buffy are talking about the deaths of previous Slayers is heartbreaking when you think about the season finale. Buffy is desperate to avoid an early death (she dies in 15 episodes) and Giles explains to Buffy that the previous Watchers didn’t keep more detailed journals of their Slayer’s deaths because it would have been too painful for them to do so. After Buffy’s death, Giles leaves Sunnydale a broken, hollow man. UGH, kill me now?

Giles: “I suppose if they’re anything like me, they just find the whole subject too...”
Buffy: “Unseemly? Damn. Love you, but you Watchers are such prigs sometimes.”
Giles: “Painful, I was going to say...”

Buffy just told Giles she loves him! Can I pretend that “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” ends with “Shadow”? Joyce is alive, Riley hasn’t left, Tara is alive and happy with Willow, Buffy is alive, Anya is alive...

Xander: “Hey, Riley! What’s the *does hand signal* all about?!”
Riley: “It means yell real loud so that the vampires who don’t know we’re coming will have a sporting chance.”

It’s just sooo typical that Riley gets all sarcastic and interesting as he’s about to leave. After being told by Dawn in the previous episode that Buffy doesn’t like him patrolling because she’s afraid he’ll get hurt and she likes him all weak and ‘kitteny’, Riley is thirsty to prove himself. He sees himself as an alpha male and he wants to know he’s capable of patrolling and wants Buffy to know he’s capable of contributing something to her life...especially as she’s been so distant with him lately and he feels like she doesn’t love him and that he’s losing her. Buffy is drawn to darkness and danger (possibly because of the demon essence of her Slayer abilities). Riley’s last gasp effort to get Buffy’s romantic attention again is to become more like the men she’s drawn towards. He acts badass here and blows up a vampire nest by himself, he lets vampires bite him, he throws Spike out into the sunlight, and he stakes Spike with a fake-wooden stake.

Yet again, Buffy turns to Spike for help because Spike has something she needs. Notice at this point she never goes to Spike for anything other than furthering her own agenda. By the end of this season, Buffy turns to Spike because she’s started to trust and appreciate him. At this point, however, she hates Spike. She gets what she wants, beats him up, and goes on her merry way. Of course, to Spike, beating him up is practically blowing him, so he’s drawn to Buffy more and more because Buffy treats him like shit. The ever observant Spike notices that Buffy has been injured in the line of duty and that she’s after answers to avoid her own death. This smoothly leads us into the first flashback...

Buffy: “Were you born this big a pain in the ass?”
Spike: “What can I tell you, baby. I’ve always been bad...”
*cue to 1880, where William is pondering what another word for ‘gleaming’ is. How bad.*

(erm, suuuure...)

We discover that William is an emotional, friendly chap that wears his heart on his sleeve. It actually helps clear up a lot of Spike’s personality traits in the present day. It’s already been established that when someone is sired, they keep a certain semblance of their former selves. Little fragments of personality shine through. For example, after Jesse was sired in “The Harvest”, he was still obsessed with Cordelia. Also, after Liam was turned into Angelus, the first thing he did was go after the mortal father he hated. Spike has been an anomaly amongst vampires since he was introduced to the show. He’s loving, easily hurt (emotionally), and falls in love very quickly and deeply. These flashbacks explain why Spike is that way. Hearing Spike talk in an upper-class English accent is something I never thought I’d encounter, but it makes an odd sort of sense that William comes from some sort of wealth. The word ‘effulgent’ should also be used more in general. In the flashback, William is besotted with a young lady called ‘Cecily’ (the future Vengeance Demon Halfrek). We also discover that Spike gained the nickname ‘William The Bloody’ because of his bloody awful poetry. Later on, Spike obviously tries to play up that the name stems from his violent nature, but in reality he gained it because of his sensitive one. One of the men at the party quips that he’d rather have a railroad spike through his head than listen to another one of William’s poems. William, who is in earshot, remembers this insult, as a railroad spike becomes his weapon of choice after he’s sired by Drusilla. It’s how he earned the name ‘Spike’. YOU SEE HOW WELL EVERYTHING IS SEWN TOGETHER IN THIS EPISODE? WE’RE JUST GETTING STARTED!

William finally plucks up the courage to tell Cecily how he feels about her and Cecily’s response is less than inspiring for William...

Cecily: “You’re nothing to me, William. You’re beneath me.”

Ouch. Such ouch. This one little sentence stays with Spike for the rest of his life and sets up the rest of his journey. You’d have thought that after 128 years Spike would have forgotten this one sentence, right? Wrong! It’s why Buffy saying the same thing to him later in the episode has such a profound effect on him. It reignites his inferiority complex. William tries to bargain with Cecily, to explain to her that he’s a good man and worthy of being her partner. There are many parallels between this episode and “The Gift”. I’ve mentioned the conversation between Giles and Buffy, I will talk about more later in the review, and this scene also contains one. Buffy and Cecily are very similar in their views of Spike, but what changes over the years is that Spike evolves as a person. In this scene, William tells Cecily that he’s a bad poet, but he’s a good man. In “The Gift”, Spike tells Buffy that he’s a monster, but Buffy treats him like a man. It’s the exact opposite to what he says to Cecily in this flashback.

To those of you that don’t watch “Angel”, I highly suggest you watch Angel’s “Darla”. It contains many of the same flashbacks as this episode, only they take place from Angel’s perspective instead of Spike’s perspective. You discover why Angelus isn’t happy about Spike killing a Slayer, you discover why Angelus steers the rest of the ‘Fanged Four’ away from the alley that Drusilla is drawn towards, you discover that the people that William bumps in to and yells “watch where you’re going!” at are actually Angelus, Darla, and Drusilla...you need to watch “Darla” to fully appreciate the flashbacks of this episode.

From the moment Drusilla laid eyes on William, she had a certain fascination with him. She chose him because he was a loving romantic with a poet’s heart. She sees in him someone that she can sire and be with happily for eternity. When you think about how loving they were together until Angelus rejoined them and ruined their happy home, you can see why Drusilla sired William. She could read his thoughts with her mystical powers and sensed that William was looking for something ‘effulgent’. The similarities between Liam (Angel) and William are apparent as well in these flashbacks. Both were turned into vampires in an alleyway, both readily accepted their siring and weren’t forcibly turned...EVEN THEIR NAMES ARE SIMILAR! LIAM IS THE IRISH VERSION OF WILLIAM! Both become vampires with a soul, both are in love with Buffy...why can’t they just whip them out, grab a tape measure, and be done with it already? All that sexual tension.

After Angelus tells Spike about the existence of Slayers, Spike becomes obsessed (does this mean that Spike killing two Slayers is Angelus’ fault? Hmm...). Totally obsessed. This aspect of his personality never changes, as years later we witness Spike’s obsession with Buffy. It’s interesting that long before he met Buffy, he was stalking Vampire Slayers. Buffy was just the first one that he developed romantic feelings for instead of just lust and a desire to ‘dance’ with. Also, the differences in styles between Angelus and Spike are apparent and really interesting in “Fool For Love”. I can’t recall another episode of “Buffy The Vampire Slayer” where Angel and Spike’s backstories are tied together so much in flashbacks, which means that this episode is the time where we get to see their old lives together the most. Angelus is an artistic serial killer. He’s cunning, methodical, takes great pride in his work, and enjoys breaking his victim’s spirit before killing them. Spike is exactly the opposite. Spike’s a brawler. He’s about spontaneity, fighting for the fun of fighting, and he loves being in tight situations. He enjoys bleeding, he enjoys getting hit. Angelus loves the chase and the setup, Spike loves the actual fight. If those guys could have put their differences aside and truly teamed up, they’d have been unbeatable!

Finally getting to see Spike fight (and kill) both of the Slayers he’s been bragging about for 71 episodes is another highlight. Spike bragging about it doesn’t help you picture it in your head and realise just what an achievement it is. Watching it firsthand does. During the fight with the Chinese Slayer, Spike receives his eyebrow scar, thus creating the first part of the Spike that we know in present day Sunnydale. After the well choreographed fight scene comes to a close, Spike delivers the burn of all burns to the Slayer that’s dying in his arms...“sorry, love. I don’t speak Chinese”. Notice that the second she dies, Spike and Drusilla start shagging right next to her dead corpse. This helps further the point that fighting and violence make Spike hungry and horny...sound familiar? Vampires and Vampire Slayers do have a few things in common...they both stem from demon, they’re both drawn to darkness and violence, and being surrounded by that violence is a turn-on for them. Spike, Angelus, Buffy, Faith...fighting and sex go hand-in-hand to all of these characters. It explains why Spike is so attracted to Buffy, it explains why he became very obsessed, very quick, and it helps to explain their volatile, dysfunctional relationship in the next season while Buffy is battling P.T.S.D.

Angelus is not happy that Spike has killed a Slayer. If you haven’t seen “Darla”, you’ll think his reaction is jealousy. However, while jealousy may play a small part, most of Angelus’ reaction is confusion and sadness. He’s already been re-ensoulled by this point and he’s desperate to prove to Darla that he’s still capable of being Angelus...he’s failing miserably. He directs Drusilla away from an alley because he knows that a family is hiding down it. Angelus is confused. Desperately trying to be what he once was, while also battling all the grief and hatred he’s feeling towards himself over everything Angelus did. It’s almost like he wishes he could be Angelus again just to make the pain and self-hatred stop. The slow-motion shot of the Fanged Four walking towards the camera is iconic. Four of the most important characters in the ‘Verse, at the height of their power, walking towards the camera with chaos exploding behind them...in bad wigs. It doesn’t get much better than that as far as visuals go on television.

Next up is Spike vs. Slayer #2, Nikki Wood. My love for this fight scene knows no bounds. Firstly, it’s on a moving train! Secondly, oh sweet mother of good choreography. Everything looks realistic and captivating. Spike’s attire looks badass. He’s started wearing his hair in the slicked-back, bleached blonde style that we’re used to (part two of making Spike the character he is when he arrives in “School Hard”). His tanktop is fitting for the 70s...covered in zips and chains. That shouldn’t work, but it does. I don’t know why it does. I don’t know why Spike is wearing that when fighting a Slayer – what if during the midst of battle they have to call a time-out because Nikki’s hair is caught in his zips?! DID HE EVEN THINK ABOUT THAT?! 

Honestly, though. The best part about the Spike-Nikki fight is how the ending of it is excellently used alongside Spike’s incredible monologue to Buffy. As far as monologues go...hell, as far as scenes go for all 144 episodes, this has got to be right up there with the very best the show ever produces. Is this the greatest monologue the show ever produces? Is it your favourite monologue? It’s a tough call because this is a show filled with amazing monologues and speeches. “Passion”, “The Gift”, “Chosen”...there are many. The monologue flipping between present day Spike and the punk rock version of Spike in New York was masterfully directed and written. The visual alone is memorable, but when you throw in Spike’s monologue and the power behind the words and just how much meaning those words will carry for the season finale, I don’t think it would be hyperbole to call this a perfect scene. Spike snaps Nikki’s neck (Jenny, anyone?!) and plucks her leather jacket from her corpse to keep for himself. This completes Spike’s new persona. William has now completed his transformation into Spike and achieved everything he wanted to be, all the things he never was as a mortal man. I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention that while Spike and Buffy are fighting and exchanging witticisms, their chemistry is off-the-charts. Now, onto the dialogue itself...

Spike’s words to Buffy play into the overall theme of the season, which is Buffy exploring what it means to be a Slayer and what the essence of her power is. Spike tells Buffy that every single Slayer has an innate desire to be killed. To discover what death is like, to stop the fighting and exhaustion and just give in. A Slayer’s life is all about death. Buffy says as much to the potentials in season seven. Death isn’t just her job and her calling, it’s her art, her passion, and her purpose. Death creates a Slayer and death removes a Slayer. Buffy dreams about beheading tactics, patrols on a daily basis, and sacrifices her own well-being and sanity to battle the forces of darkness. Not just because it’s expected of her due to her Slayer status - those days are behind us. She also does it because she wants to. She craves the hunt, craves the battle, craves the kill. Spike is just pre-warning Buffy about what the First Slayer will tell her later in the season: death is her gift. God, this season is so well written. It ties together perfectly. While seasons two and three are my very favourites (this one is third), season five might be the best one from a storytelling standpoint. Buffy’s journey in this season is probably the most complex and well thought out. Every episode adds something to Buffy’s sacrifice in “The Gift”. A little moment here, a little prod there. It’s funny that so few people saw it coming, actually! I certainly never did! All the signs are there!

James Marsters has never been a better actor that he is during this scene (and episode in general). The sexual tension and bloodlust between Spike and Buffy reaches boiling point and Spike tries to kiss Buffy. Buffy is disgusted and tells Spike that perhaps he’s right. Perhaps she is drawn to death and darkness like he suggests...but not with him, never with him (oh, the irony). He’s beneath her (he certainly is beneath her in the next season). Buffy telling Spike that he’s beneath her is an obvious extension of what Cecily said to William all those years ago. Spike is stuck reliving the same cycle over and over again. He’s a fool for love because he doesn’t learn from his mistakes. He’s love’s bitch time and time again. He falls fast and he falls hard. As I’ve mentioned, I feel that Spike is partially attracted to Buffy because she treats him like he’s beneath her and he’s trying to validate himself after being told that by Cecily. He’s trying to prove his worth to Buffy because he never got the opportunity as a human to prove it to Cecily. It’s a fascinating topic whether it’s true or not.

In Spike’s twisted mind, it’s almost as though he thinks he’s doing the Slayers a favour by killing them and giving them some peace. He’s fulfilling their death wish. Let’s not forget, Buffy tried to run from being the Slayer for five years. She’s been desperate for a normal life and to live peacefully for a very long time. Yet again, this ties perfectly into “The Gift”, where Buffy has finally accepted her Slayer responsibilities and makes the ultimate sacrifice to save the world she was chosen to protect. Buffy doesn’t sacrifice herself because she wants some peace and has a death wish, but because death is her gift to save the world from eternal torment. Spike’s words here are true, it’s his reasoning that’s wrong in the end. At the time of this speech, are Spike’s words true? I don’t think so. I think most of the catalysts for Buffy accepting her responsibilities stems from her journey this season...Riley’s departure, her mother’s death, being thrust into an adult world, and her need to save her sister. However, everything Spike says here is justified. He’s basically telling the audience what’s going to happen over the rest of this season for Buffy, only we’re not aware of it at the time! I could fanboy about this scene forever, but it’s time to close out the episode in equally great fashion.

After Spike’s rejection...again...we finally get a flashback explaining what happened between Spike and Drusilla after they left Sunnydale. I’ve been waiting for this scene since “Lovers Walk”! Long before Spike was aware of it, Drusilla realised that Spike was subconsciously in love with the Slayer. So she sought comfort elsewhere...in the arms of an antlered, slimy version of Clem with tighter skin, a Chaos Demon. He’s so friendly! I can’t believe they actually showed the  Chaos Demon that Spike was complaining about in “Lovers Walk”. I will be eternally grateful.

Spike’s a sensitive person with a combustible personality. He gets severely depressed when love doesn’t go his way, which is often as he’s love’s bitch (he says as much in “Lovers Walk”), and he gets highly aggressive when he’s rejected (jump forward to “Crush” for further proof). Spike returns to his crypt with bad intentions on his mind, grabs a shotgun, and goes after Buffy. He finds Buffy sitting on the steps of her back porch, crying because she’s terrified about her mother going to hospital for a CAT scan. It’s very uncommon to see Buffy worried about something so normal and real. So uncommon in fact that it stops Spike from killing her. Instead of shooting, he asks her what’s wrong. I wish Spike and Buffy’s relationship in season six was as great as it was in seasons five and seven! Even before the romance, Spike and Buffy work great as friends in this season once they start to accept each other. They don’t like each other here, but there’s a mutual respect between them. The same can be said for Spike and Angel’s relationship too. Spike, always the fool for love, instead of killing Buffy, places a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. Even without a soul, this act alone proves that he’s not beneath Buffy or Cecily. Him being a fool for love is not just one of his greatest weaknesses, but one of his greatest strengths as well. The episode fades to black as Buffy and Spike ponder what’s to come.


Quote Of The Episode

Spike: “Every day you wake up to the same bloody question that haunts you...‘is today the day I die?’ Death is on your heels, baby, and sooner or later it’s going to catch you. Part of you wants it. Not only to stop the fear and the uncertainty, but because you’re just a little bit in love with it. Death is your art. You make it with your hands day after day. That final gasp, that look of peace. Part of you is desperate to know, what’s it like? Where does it lead you? Now you see, that’s the secret. Not the punch you didn’t throw or the kicks you didn’t land...she merely wanted it. Every Slayer has a death wish...even you. The only reason you’ve lasted as long as you have is you’ve got ties to the world. Your mom, brat kid Sister, Scoobies...they all tie you here, but you’re just putting off the inevitable. Sooner or later, you’re gonna want it. And the second...the second that happens, you know I’ll be there. I’ll slip in. Have myself a real good day. Here endeth the lesson.”

FINAL SCORE: 9/10

What are your thoughts on "Fool For Love"? Did you enjoy this episode? Dislike it? Let me know all your thoughts in the comments section below!

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