Unfortunate Relationship Tropes: Anything for Love

I haven’t done Unfortunate Relationship Tropes since I introduced the feature, back when I discussed Amy (later Clara’s) unfortunate habit of preferring death to carrying on without their beaus on Doctor Who.  Today, the trope in question has copious offenders, but in exploring it, I’m primarily looking at Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.  (Spoilers for both shows.)

The premise is simple.  One character is in danger, possibly on the point of death.  While everyone panics on their behalf, their love interest goes for the full, “This is X we’re talking about, and you can’t begin to know how I feel!!!  Why are we just standing around when we should be bending the heavens to rescue them, consequences be damned!!!!”  And since both series frequently deal with apocalypse-level events, those potential consequences can be pretty far-reaching.  It’s tricky, because it’s not cool to have the heroes all-but-literally say, “The world can go to hell as long as I can save him/her.”  Surely, our heroes should be able to recognize that, no matter how painful it may be, the world has to come first (not to mention, the imperiled love interest is part of the world that risks destruction if the heroes don’t intervene.)  Yet, even though we want the heroes do the noble thing and prioritize the good of the world, we’re personally invested in the imperiled character.  So, for the hero to say, “Good luck, babe – I gotta focus on the big picture.  Hope you don’t die in the meantime!” doesn’t really engender support, either.

This trope plays out numerous times in the Buffyverse.  On Buffy, when Willow is kidnapped by the Mayor, Oz is so bent on protecting Willow above all else that he forces the gang’s hand into giving the Mayor what he wants in exchange for Willow, severely weakening their arsenal against him.  This seems minor compared to other examples, but it’s significant for me because Oz takes everyone’s choice away; while the others are understandably freaked but trying to discuss what they need to do, he unilaterally makes the decision for them.  When Faith poisons Angel, Buffy’s ready to straight-up sacrifice Faith to save him.  This is huge – not only would it obviously result in Faith’s death, but it’s a potentially-damning act that Buffy may not be able to come back from.  On Angel, when Cordelia is taken over by an ancient malevolence, Angel is adamantly against fighting it in any way that would harm Cordy.  In holding back, he exposes the world to incredible evil, and the rest of the season is spent trying to stop the force that’s born that day.  It’s noteworthy, though, that Buffy’s most extreme example involves sisters, not lovers.  When Glory plans to use Dawn’s blood to open a gate to a hell dimension – one that will only close when she dies – Buffy is prepared to kill her own friends to keep them from bringing things to a swift end if Glory succeeds.  Even though unimaginable horrors will be unleashed on the world and Dawn will likely die regardless, Buffy insists that, “The last thing she’ll see is me protecting her.”  In the end, when hell opens, Buffy stops it by sacrificing, not Dawn, but herself.

That said, the shows get points for subverting the trope on rare, important occasions.  There’s Angel and Spike, who, on Angel, let Fred succumb to Illyria rather than allow half the world be infected.  Both of them, though, are Fred’s friends rather than lovers.  If Wesley had been there, what would he have done?  But the greatest example is probably my favorite moment in either series – Buffy stabbing Angel to keep the world from being sucked into hell.  It’s a devastating scene, with Angel just regaining his soul and unsure of what’s going on, and Buffy, wrecked, realizing what she has to do.  But that’s the thing:  she has to do it, and she does, for the greater good, despite how the cost destroys her.  That right there is Buffy’s Biggest Damn Hero moment.

Unfortunate Relationship Tropes: I Die Without You

New feature today – I’m pretty sure the title speaks for itself.  Now, before you say, “What about the Sunday Who Review?”, fear not.  While any unfortunate relationship trope has many fictional examples (or they wouldn’t be tropes,) it’s my plan to focus on a single work for each entry, and in the past few years, new Who has been rife with this particular device.  (Spoilers for series 5-8.)

The basics are simple:  a character, bereft of their beloved, would rather die than live without them.  It’s as old as the hills, with a certain pair of star-crossed lovers as its codependent poster children.  I pretty much always dislike this trope when I see it.  I mean, okay – I don’t experience romantic attraction, so I’ve never felt that type of heartbreak, but any relationship that trumps a person’s entire life is icky to me.  You can’t just live for one person.  It’s too small, too sad.

This is distinct from someone dying (or seriously risking their life) to save their lover.  I’m not wholly on board with that device either, but at least it has a positive aim, rescuing someone.  It’s why I don’t count Clara stepping into the Doctor’s time stream at the end of series 7 as an example of this trope.  First, it’s not exactly clear what’s being Clara and Eleven, but more importantly, she’s driven by a desire to help and protect the Doctor.  Plus, Clara’s serving the greater good; when the Doctor isn’t around the save the day, things fall apart, universe-wise.  (Not that I don’t hate the “I was born to save the Doctor” line – ugh.)  Generally speaking, RTD-era character sacrifices align with this as well, even with Rose and Nine/Ten and all their drama.

By and large, though, the Moffat era prefers more pointless, allegedly-romantic “I die without you” moments.  Yes, it’s a time-travel show with paradoxes and alternate timelines, so not many stay dead for long, and Amy has an awful lot of Rory deaths to deal with.  But it happens again and again.  There’s “Amy’s Choice,” where Rory is killed in one reality, and Amy decides it must be the dream and kills herself, the Doctor, and her unborn child to wake in the other reality.  She admits she doesn’t know she’s right but doesn’t care, saying, “If this is real life, I don’t want it.”  Later, when Rory gets filled in, it’s treated as romantic, the ultimate proof that she “chooses” him and is in it for the long haul.  And that’s just the start.  She gives herself up to the siren in “The Curse of the Black Spot” and she twice dies for Rory in “The Angels Take Manhattan,” once jumping off a building with him (he’s trying to thwart the Angels, while she doesn’t want to risk him not coming back from it) and later turning her back on an Angel to be displaced to the same time as Rory.  “The Girl Who Waited” is borderline – older Amy gives up her chance to live so that young Amy can be with Rory – but it’s all wrapped up in her realization that they can’t both be with Rory and her heartache at seeing the loving way he looks at young Amy.

As for Clara, she gets a pass in “The Name of the Doctor,” but she hasn’t fared so well since.  To say she unravels when Danny dies puts it mildly.  Over the course of three consecutive episodes, she 1) tries to force the Doctor to change the past by destroying TARDIS keys in a volcano, presumably dooming them both to dying there, 2) vows that she’ll find her way to Danny in the Nethersphere, ignoring his protests that she can only get there by dying, 3) doesn’t seem to care when the Doctor warns that Cyber-Danny will kill her if she turns on his emotional inhibitor, and 4) doesn’t want to leave a dream world in which Danny is still alive, despite knowing it means the alien creature eating her brain will finish the job.  I mean, seriously?  I know she’s hurting, and I feel for her, but come on!  Can we say enough is enough on this trope?  Please, Who?