He's Really Not All That Bad

[deird_lj]

You know, I think Giles has a bit of an undeserved reputation.


(By the way, I did actually mean that spoiler warning, so gabrielleabelle, if you're still reading, for goodness' sake STOP.)

Specifically, I'm thinking about the scene in Shells, when Angel rings Giles for help, and Giles refuses.

As a reminder: Fred has died, Illyria has emerged, and Angel, reasoning that "the soul is what matters", tries to contact Willow for help bringing Fred back. And Giles tells him that Willow is currently unable to be contacted, and refuses to help Angel at all, because Angel's still working at Wolfram & Hart.

I've seen a lot of discussion, both fic and meta, of this scene, and almost invariably, people tend to assume that Giles was being presumptuous, and he shouldn't have dismissed Angel out of hand.
And then they decide that, clearly, Willow (and Buffy) would be really annoyed with Giles for doing that (and for behaving just like he did in Lies My Parents Told Me) because, obviously, Fred was lovely and they would definitely have helped her, had Giles just let them know...

I think I disagree.

The thing is, Fred is dead. Very definitely dead.
And I really don't see Willow - season seven Willow - trying to reverse someone's death. Not after the whole pulling-Buffy-out-of-heaven, losing-her-girlfriend-horribly, and-oh-by-the-way-almost-destroying-the-world thing. She just wouldn't.
Sure, she'd be sad (possibly very sad) that Fred had died, but she wouldn't try to bring Fred back. She's done that before.

And Buffy?
Buffy had, not five episodes earlier, sent Andrew in with a squadron of Slayers to back him up, and made it perfectly clear that, while Angel was at Wolfram & Hart, she really didn't trust him.

Giles might have been giving his own opinion, he might have had Buffy right there beside him dictating his every word, he might have been lying about Willow being unreachable... I really don't know. It's possible that he didn't discuss the situation with anyone before turning Angel down. What I don't agree with is the idea that Giles was responding any differently to the way the others would have. Not definitely, anyway.

So, yeah. I think he's getting unfairly blamed for that one.
Just an opinion.

Comments

[mabus101.livejournal.com]

All sounds pretty reasonable to me.

That said--I think if Willow had known the rather extreme consequences (Fred doesn't just die--she's basically erased completely, at least so far as we can tell) she would have attempted to help. But a) Angel's team doesn't know when they call and b) it's probably too late already, unless Willow does something extremely clever. (Actually I do have a scenario, one that Willow could plausibly come up with--we're both pretty smart--but I came up with it at least a year after the episode aired. That's running a bit late.)

[deird1]

You're right with the extreme consequences - and I'd love to hear your scenario.

Hmm... Must remember to post my meta on Fred and Illyria...

[mabus101.livejournal.com]

Actually, I can sum it up in one word: Dopplegangland.

Given that Willow succeeds in retrieving an individual from a past that didn't even happen, from the moment before her death, and at a time when she was considerably less powerful, it seems quite plausible to me that she could retrieve Fred's soul in the same manner.

OTOH, a) she'd need some real persuading to ever use that spell again and b) interfering with Illyria's rising could have dire consequences. I'm by no means suggesting the attempt would work, beyond the bare minimum of "I have here Fred's soul."

[deird1]

Ooh, interesting. And you're right, that could work. Kinda.

I wonder what would have happened to Illyria if they'd used the Ferula Gemina (for splitting Xander into two parts) on her?

[mabus101.livejournal.com]

Now that's a good one. I have no idea.