I finished watching Firefly on DVD a few weeks ago. I was so sad when it was over. Then I had to decide what to watch next and I decided on Angel. I've watched the first 5 episodes, and most of the background has been covered. But I'm a little fuzzy on the "rules" a vampire must follow.
Vampires can't enter a residence without an invitation (I sort of remember something like that from the Buffy movie, which I watched once in 1992). Are there other limitations like this? Are public buildings okay?
In the episode I watched last night, Angel was attacked from behind by a demon who was waiting for Doyle. Angel morphed into his vampire image and the demon was freaked out. Are vampires more powerful than other creatures?
Does anyone know of a website that lays out the background story of the Buffy/Angel 'verse?
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Personally, I'd suggest starting Buffy first, and when you reach the season 4, start watching Angel in tandem. (After the first couple seasons of Angel, this no longer really matters... as there is little crossover, except for 1 visitor in the next to the last season.)
Vampires can't come into private residences unless invited by someone who lives there or unless the occupant is dead. Public buildings are different. Vampires are free to enter.
No, vampires aren't more powerful as a rule. SOME vampires, however, have reputations as being pretty hardcore. Angel is one of them. What episode was it, though? It might be more than that.
There really isn't a background story of the Buffy/Angel verse. It explains itself as it goes along. There are plenty of websites that will spoil the episodes for you, though.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
maui, I'd watch the first three seasons of Buffy before watching Angel.
Even after that there are episodes of each which will lose something if you're not watching the other.
(It'd be coolest to alternate buffy and angel episodes starting in Buffy's forth, Angel's First season, but... massive pain...)
But yes, Public buildings are ok. Demon lairs, ok. Private residences of dead people, ok.
Fire, Sunlight, Stakes, Beheading.
Anything else? =)
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Oh, and the Buffy movie isn't really canon. Joss Whedon was disappointed with it, and the tv show only refers to the movie in small ways. (Like Buffy talking about burning down the gym at her old school in season 1. She never mentions her love interest back then, and when they show her there in flashbacks, they did have her as the popular flighty girl.
Let's see... other limitations of vampires...
Garlic does nothing to deter them, although Buffy does at one point use some during an emotional time... I think this was psychological and nothing more.
Crosses burn them. Holy Water burns them. Sunlight burns them and eventually dusts them. Stake through the heart dusts them.
That's all I can think of.. Pretty standard, really.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Ah yes. I had forgotten about beheading.
I love Buffy and Angel. I love my DVD collections of them, too. Posted by theresa51282 (Member # 8037) on :
I also would recommend you watch Buffy first. I also think it will lead you to enjoy early Buffy better as well.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
My husband prefered Angel over Buffy, especially the first few seasons, but that's pretty much because he only tolerated the soap opera stuff, as he called it (which I think is too harsh. it's not soap operaish at all.). I, personally, loved the relationships aspect--not just the love stuff, but the friendships, too, and everything in between. He really prefered the dark P.I. aspect to early Angel.
But since you probably wouldn't feel the same as he did, I'd suggest watching Buffy first. Posted by maui babe (Member # 1894) on :
The episode I watched last night was #5 in season one - "Rm w/a vu". It's the first indication that Doyle is in trouble (and I've heard and read spoilers that he dies in the first season, so it seems to be a set up for that). The demon was called Griff (he did look vaguely like a griffin, now that I think about it) and he was killed, or at least disabled later in the episode.
Posted by blacwolve (Member # 2972) on :
Fire can also kill them.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
Fire, sunlight, beheading and staking with wood through the heart are all fatal to vampires in the Buffy/Angel verse.
quote:(It'd be coolest to alternate buffy and angel episodes starting in Buffy's forth, Angel's First season, but... massive pain...)
I tried to do this. It's Not At All Healthy.
*dies*
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
And non-fatal wounds can incapacitate them. For example, gunfire (not one shot, but auto-fire) can put one down temporarily.
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: And non-fatal wounds can incapacitate them. For example, gunfire (not one shot, but auto-fire) can put one down temporarily.
Although this is done somewhat inconsistently. In the earlier seasons of both shows, relatively minor wounds can incapacitate vampires (for example, a single bullet wound in the Buffy episode "Angel"), whereas in later seasons, Angel would routinely walk around with a sword shoved all the way through him, clearly only moderately inconvenienced.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
And vampires who aren't essential to the plot go up in nanoseconds if sunlight hits them, where hero vampires (Angel, Spike) can last for seconds, long enough to get back under cover. Apparently, being in the credits confers added resilience.
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
The first season of Angel is kinda slow (at least I thought it was, I know other folks here have said they liked it and even preferred it to later seasons).
When I was watching all 7 seasons of Buffy last year, I watched some of the first season of Angel when I got to season 4 of Buffy. I'm glad I watched enough of Angel to get a sense of what was going on over on that show... but since the first season of Angel was kinda slow, and Buffy season 4 was zooming along... I ended up watching the rest of Buffy before going back and giving Angel another try. (Slogging through the rest of Angel season 1 was sometimes dull, but starting with season 2 it got MUCH better.)
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
quote:Apparently, being in the credits confers added resilience.
This is true of all television. Everyone knows that your name being in the opening credits means you can take an extra bullet.
Similarly, there is a variance in the length it takes for vampires to dust after they are staked. Sometimes, they have enough time to look surprised and gasp out a final word or two. The unimportant ones just dust immediately, just before going for the hero's neck (etc.)
Sunlight always takes longer, and seems to require full body exposure- at least hands and head, since there are clothes involved- for fire to occur quickly enough to prevent action upon the vampire's part.
Technically, I think, the point with bullets and other such measures was that vampires experience the same pain as humans, the wound just doesn't kill them. The pain enough is therefore supposed to be incapacitating. However, I think the pain came to be lessened as the seasons went on in order to allow for dramatic "I've got a hole in me so big a truck could drive through it but I'm still fighting" scenes.
Which, let's face it, are cool.
And about the vampires/demons thing, there seem to be different levels of demon. Vampires are definately at least part human (obviously) and therefore are I suppose 'lesser' than pure demons, who I am under the impression, there are very few true ones around. I think most demons who walk the earth are somehow so-called "tainted" by humanity somehow.
It's all very complicated.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
It's not so much that it's complicated. It's more that it's inconsistent and doesn't make sense.
Whedon repeatedly sacrifices continuity for convenience or the dramatic needs of an episode.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I think vampires are actually pretty high up on the power scale, except for the big bads the vampires themselves worship.
There's definitely a hierarchy within vampires as well. Spike killed two slayers in single combat. The Scoobs routinely dust lesser vampire, then get their collective tails kicked by one boss or miniboss (think Darla at the end of season 2). This seems to be fairly consistent with the dusting time, too, (the Master took like a minute to go) except for when Joss wants to get some clever dialog in.
And we forgive him for that because we like it. Posted by neo-dragon (Member # 7168) on :
Actually, I always got the impression that typical vampires are pretty low on the demon power scale. I mean, vampires are often taken out by regular humans. And it's been stated that other demons tend to look down on them (although that's primarily because they're more human than other demons).
Of course, it depends on the vampire. Those that are part of the Master's line tend to be particularly powerful: ie. The Master -> Darla -> Angel -> Drusilla -> Spike. Angel and Spike regularly kill other vampires and demons with ease.
Posted by Humean316 (Member # 8175) on :
Yeah, vampires are pretty low on the evil scale, they are hybrids, according to the show, between humans and demons. If you really think about it too, Spike and Angelus both were pretty weak compared to any other big bad that the scoobies faced. The only reason Angelus was so terrifying was how emotional and sick he truly was, and Spike was pretty much Adam's b***h.
ETA: I would echo those who say that you should watch Buffy first. Angel is the spin-off and alot of what they do on Angel is based on the events of Buffy. Plus, the cross-overs between the shows are based in Buffy, and then concluded on Angel.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
They also get burned by and turn away from crosses.
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
Gravity doesn't affect them much. It happens a few times that one of them falls a couple hundred feet onto concrete. And is every bone in their body smashed? Nope, just slows them down a bit. Posted by neo-dragon (Member # 7168) on :
Yeah, their bodies are very tough.
*very minor Angel spoiler*
There was one time when Angel was repeatedly run over by Lindsay in his truck, and then beaten with a sledge-hammer, and then Lindsay turned his back on him for about 5 seconds and Angel was already on his feet and turning the tables on him.
*end spoilers*
Anyway, here's a good summary of everything there is to know about Buffyverse vampires. Their origins, there powers, their weaknesses, etc.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire_%28Buffyverse%29
You'll have to add in "http://" and cut and paste because I can't post it as a link or even with the http:// for some reason. Posted by lem (Member # 6914) on :
I always thought the vampires in Buffyverse got more powerful as they aged. Angel and Spike are powerful because they are so old. The vamp in season one of Buffy is the big baddy because he is one of the oldest vampires.
All of the freshly turned vamps are so new and weak that even high school kids can dust them.
**BUFFY SPOILER TO A REALLY COOL SCENE THAT ANNOYED ME**
One of the few scenes in Buffy that annoyed me so much that I could not suspend disbelief was when Buffy's mom whacks Spike right on top of the head with an axe. The weight of an axe alone would cut his head in half--not to mention the strength of a protective mom.
Anyone can shove a wooden stake through a vampire's chest plate with no problem, yet a metal axe bearing down on a skull will bounce off???
It was a cool scene tho! Any scene with Spike is a cool scene.
Posted by neo-dragon (Member # 7168) on :
Didn't she use the blunt end of the axe? She didn't know about vampires then, so she thought he was a human and thus wasn't trying to kill him. So if it was a blow that wasn't intended to be lethal for a human, it's not surprising that it didn't do much harm to Spike. Also, yes it does seem that Vampires get more powerful as they grow older. Also, the power of their sire seems to be a factor as well. It's explained in the wikipedia link I referred to above.
Okay, so I have 3 questions about Buffyverse vampires that I have never been able to find answers to:
1) Do they need to go to the bathroom? Presumably not if they are only drinking blood, but they sometimes choose to consume regular food and drink even though it doesn't sustain them. So when they do eat/drink, do they have to expel waste like humans?
2) Does their hair grow?
*ANGEL SPOILER*
Angel spends 2-3 months trapped at the bottom of a lake, and when he is freed, his hair isn't any longer and he has no beard. Not to mention that fact that shaving would be troublesome when one has no reflection.
*END SPOILER*
3) Can severe neurological damage (ie. being shot in the head) permanently disable them?
*BUFFY and ANGEL SPOILERS*
When Spike gets the chip put in his brain it is said that it can't be removed by just anyone because unless it is removed properly it could cause permanent brain damage. Also, when Angel was stuck at the bottom of the lake and couldn't feed for months, Wesley said that it was possible that he may have suffered permanent brain damage from starvation. So particularly because of the issue with Spike's chip, I wonder if a bullet to the head would turn a vampire into a vegetable forever even though it wouldn't die from the injury.
*END SPOILERS* Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
No idea about (1) and (3), but the answer to (2) is probably a yes. Notice that when...
*SPOILERS FOR BUFFY SEASON 7*
...Spike returns after getting his soul, his hair has grown out. You can see the roots under the Captain Platinum hair dye. After a few episodes, he apparently goes to the barber and returns to his usual blondie-bear glory.
*END SPOILERS*
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
A different question -- are there any fun books or websites that have good Buffy/Angel trivia? I've seen a couple books in stores that've been pretty dull (mostly just episode synopses and actor profiles). Stuff that's really fun for me = when the writers talk about how their plans changed for the show (such-and-such character was originally meant to die after a couple episodes, while such-and-such character was killed off because the actor wanted to leave, etc.)
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
My reply to (1), (2), and (3) is:
Buffyverse isn't internally consistent enough for those questions to really make any sense. For all three questions, the answer is "Yes if it's convenient for the current episode, not if it's not."
Posted by littlelf (Member # 6145) on :
Does anyone else channel surf looking for new Firefly episodes in complete and utter disbelief? Or, is it just me?
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
A planned ABC sitcom produced by Elton John and his longtime lyricist, Bernie Taupin, about a gay rock star will apparently never see the light of a TV tube. According to Fox News, the show, titled Him & Us, which was to have starred Anthony Head as Max Flash and Sex and the City's Kim Cattrall as his manager Samantha, was not picked up despite initial favorable reaction to the pilot. In an interview with The Stage magazine, Cattrall remarked, "It would have been a great series. Perhaps the subject matter might have been too much for some people."
Ack, too bad, we miss out on a chance to hear more singing by Giles.
(Well, I probably never would've watched it anyway, there's enough other shows I don't get to as it is. But, fun concept...)
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
***Firefly spoilers ***
I hooked someone else on Firefly the other night. He was making a stopover to drink coffee before driving home, so we watched "The Train Job" instead of the pilot. He wasn't sure what to make of it until Simon drugged Jayne. Then he really got into it.
I also showed him the scene in the pilot where Mal takes out the federal undercover officer. He liked that.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
I love my DVD collections of them, too. ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
![[Confused]](confused.gif)