Let's talk about poor Xander.
First my apologies for length and my compliments to the Board Mama for allowing long posts. I have
not seen any posts analyzing just Xander outside of a ship. (Sorry if I missed them, the board
appears to be obsessed with Spike at the moment and ships.) Xander is an incredibly fascinating
character whose story is about to take off. Of the characters in BvTS - he is the only one without
special abilities or supernatural tendencies. And he has always been one of my favorites.
Xander is the guy next door, the class clown, and the boy I had a crush on in high school.
Unfortunately he only wanted the popular girl or the one he couldn't have. One of my favorite
episodes - The Witch, shows Xander telling Willow that what he likes about her is she's just one of
the guys. This is echoed by Buffy who tells Xander that what she likes about him is he's just one of
the girls. (Great Karmic moment! And says quite a bit about the old Xander - he always wanted
what he couldn't have when the best thing was right beneath his nose.) Xander also had the lowest
self-esteem of just about any character on the show - he covered it with bravado, and quick retorts.
Often making fun of himself before anyone else can. His banter with Cordelia in Season 1-3 was
classic.
Xander is first introduced as the geeky guy on the skateboard. He is comic relief. He tries to help the
hero, often falling flat on his face in the process. But he always comes through in the crunch. In
Welcome to The Hellmouth, Xander, against everyone's advice, shows up in the tunnels to help
Buffy rescue his friend Jesse. When Buffy asks if he at least brought a stake. He says - "well no, the
part of my brain that remembers that was too busy reminding me of why I shouldn't be doing this. I
did bring a flashlight." Buffy: Turn that off!" Xander somewhat sheepishly does. He does, however,
help her out. If it weren't for him, she probably would have died. Buffy has never been able to see
when she's in over her head. This act of heroism is repeated in countless episodes: Becoming Part II,
The Freshman, Beer Bad, Primeval, What's My Line, etc…In The Freshman - Xander is the one
who grabs the others to help her. He goes with her to the vamps lair. And Buffy does eventually
acknowledge this in Checkpoint: "That boy has clocked more field time than any of you has." (- in
her speech to the Watcher Council.)
Xander's fears. We know he is afraid of being invisible: this is shown in Fear Itself and also
mentioned in The Zeppo. His friends often take his presence for granted, treat him as a hanger-on or
someone who needs to be protected. In NA - Willow tells Buffy that Xander has gone to look for
the demon, Buffy's first reaction is concern: she doesn't believe he can handle a demon alone. (She's
right of course, but that's beside the point.)
Xander often accompanies Buffy when she tells him to stay behind. (Interesting ironic twist here -
instead of the dumb blond accompanying the hero into danger and getting hurt, we have the dopey
guy following the heroine into danger. Not that Xander always gets hurt, sometimes he actually saves
the day. And he really isn't that dopey; he just thinks he is.)
In the Replacement and The Zeppo we get to explore Xander's fear of inadequacy, that he is just a
loser that everyone has to help. He can't possibly be the confident self-assured man that finds a cool
apartment, gets a promotion at work, and deserves Anya's love. (See The Replacement). In the
Zeppo - he feels ignored, pushed aside by the SG. Both episodes end well. Xander learns in the
Zeppo that he can be a hero in his own right and does not need the SG. He can stand up for himself
and defeat the bad guy. (Before he only fantasized about this - Halloween.) In The Replacement -
he learns that he is a capable man and an insecure goofball. He is both and that is okay, because
both are lovable in their own right.
What about the fears explored in Restless? Xander's biggest fear has not been invisibility or
inadequacy, but becoming his father. How many people fear this? Isn't part of growing up - learning
to separate oneself from one's family? To be your own man or woman? All along - Xander's family
has been described as losers. Periodically characters refer to Xander's parents as embarrassing or
something Xander wishes to avoid. In Amends - Cordelia states that Xander sleeps outside to get
away from his loser parents' drunken battles. (Is Xander an only child? We don't appear to know. I
assume so. It appears that this is something Xander, Willow and Buffy have in common up to
Season 5 - all three are only children. (Please let me know if I missed a reference somewhere to
siblings.) end of digression.) Later in Forever - Xander tells Willow he'll go see her mom to get
reassurance, he really doesn't care if his parents live or die. Then Restless - Xander is stuck in the
basement. Every door or path he tries leads him back into it. The only one he refuses to try is the
one that leads upstairs to his parents. Have we ever seen him use this path? In Restless he even
states: "That's not the way out." Maybe it is? At the end of Restless - it appears to be the only way
out. And what he's afraid of is not the vampires that he first mentions when he hears someone at the
door: " Hey I didn't order any vampires." It's his father - who eventually bursts through accusing
Xander of making his mother cry. "Why won't you come upstairs - you mother won't stop crying,
you have no heart, the line ends here!" His father smashes his fist into Xander's chest, becomes the
first slayer and rips out Xander's heart.
But doesn't Xander eventually go upstairs? He gets the job, the apartment. He proposes to Anya.
Even sets up the wedding. That is until the demon appears and shows him the nightmare. It's
interesting that the nightmare is Xander's life with his parents. The drunken useless father, the nagging
mother, and the violence. I felt like I was watching a scene from Bad Marriage 101. What does
Xander say to Anya when he tells her he can't go through with it? "It wasn't you that I was
hating…?" What does Xander say to the demon after the nightmare has concluded: "Is Anya ok?
What happened to Anya?" He is terrified of hurting her. He tells Anya the wedding is off while he is
watching his father abuse his mother. For the first time, we actually get to meet Xander's parents and
family. And they are worse than we ever expected. They are worse than the demons attending the
wedding. Is it any wonder that Xander is terrified of becoming them? Heck - he even looks a bit like
his father in this episode, the beefy physique.
Now let's talk about Xander and Buffy. Interesting relationship. What is Buffy to Xander? Or
perhaps the better question is what has Buffy's presence done for Xander?
Before Buffy, Xander was a geeky guy who rode a skateboard, cracked jokes, and flirted with
popular girls he couldn't have. After Buffy, Xander went on missions, fought demons, saved the
world, and found a purpose outside of his family home and cracking jokes. Buffy has given Xander a
purpose, a way of addressing his inadequacy, a way of avoiding his parents' loser life. That is up
until now. Now they are out of high school and Xander has responsibilities. He can no longer just
fight the demon of the week. He has to work. Even without Buffy present, he discovered this - see
Bargaining Part I & II - Xander got pummeled. So when he and the SG bring back Buffy - they are
in effect leaving the demon hunting business. They do not go out on patrol with her anymore. Spike
does. They aren't present when she's fighting the vamps in All The Way. Or in Wrecked. Or Dead
Things. Or AYW. We rarely see X/A outside of the Magic Shop. Has Xander grown up then? Has
he fought the hard real life battles without shortcuts? (We'll return to this later.)
Does Xander love Buffy? Yes, I think so. I think he wants to save her. He wants to be the hero but
has learned that he can't. He found this out in The Gift and to some degree in Becoming Part II. He
can help her. But he can't save her. He can't make her choices for her or give her a job. The battle
with the demons is essentially hers. He is a glorified brick-layer who can chip in from time to time.
And he is no longer ashamed of that. (See the Gift - "And the glorified brick layer - gets one!") This
must have been a tough realization for him. If it weren't for Anya - it may have destroyed him at
some point, but by Afterlife and Life Serial - I got the feeling he'd accepted his new role in SG.
Then we come to HB - this scene surprised me, it's the one that Anya says -" your back wouldn't
have gone out if you hadn't exerted yourself trying to help Buffy. I told you not to. And it didn't help.
You weren't able to save her." (Not exact but close.)
His reaction? To pick up a frying pan and hit her. So clearly Xander has not completely come to
terms with his inability to save Buffy. Or maybe he's just afraid that he hasn't - it was just a
nightmare after all. Not real.
So where does this lead us? There has been very little spoilage on Xander's future. (Or I've
managed to successfully avoid it, yeah me! Wish I could say the same for the other spoilers. Dang
me!) I think Xander's journey is different from Buffy's and Willow's.
Xander has to realize that he does not have to become his father. He has to realize that
Buffy, the SG, his father, even Anya do not define him. That he is a good man in his own right and
can survive and live a good life on his own. In a way, Xander has to get back to who he was at the
end of The Replacement and The Zeppo. He has to overcome his fears and not let his father or
Buffy remove his heart. Otherwise he will be stuck in his father's basement, heartless, and alone.
Do I think he will make it? You betcha. In many ways he's come further than the others. He has a
good job, he has friends outside the gang, before HB he had the most stable relationship, and he did
it all the hard way without magic, without stunts. Now all he has to do is find a way of forgiving Anya
and himself, and accepting that even though he's not the superhero - he can be a hero in his own
right.
Thanks for reading. Be interested to seeing your thoughts.
;-) Shadowkat
-----------
Some feedback:
My dear, dear 'Kat...
Right after your first paragraph, I flashed back to Season 1 of BtVS, and I could remember yelling at
the screen: "Xander, get away from the blonde, she's nothing but trouble! Go for the redhead, I tell
ya, the redhead!" I threw up my hands in frustration. "Dingus."
It never occurred to me until this season why Xander went for all the tough, smart-mouthed women:
he wanted someone who was the OPPOSITE of his mom. Back in high school, Willow was the
sweet, goofy, gentle Willow we all fell in love with; but somewhere inside, Xander was afraid his
dark side would eventually emerge and chew her into tiny, adorable bits.
But his dark side is emerging anyway, and he's going to have to go upstairs and face it. Amazing how
the events of the last two years have changed my view of "Restless": after worrying about Xander's
imminent death, I'm thinking that his dream in "Restless" isn't about dying--it's about ending the cycle
of abuse in his family. When Dad/1st Slayer says he's the end of the line, I take it as a sign of hope.
The emotional and physical abuse in the Harris family ends here, now.
Wonderful post, 'kat. I'll crib from it for months....
-----------
First off that was a brilliant review of Xander, but one thing I noticed you didn't mention from
Restless was Buffy's big brother comment, and I think this really defines his role now. While many
people saw the comment about how Buffy considered Xander her big brother, I think it says more
that Xander considers Buffy his little sister, he has to protect her and help. He isn't the biggest part of
her life, but he's always there when she needs him for anything, like in NA he says "hands up those
for research", it's been shown time after time that he hates reseach but he's willing to do it to help her
out. Not only that but if he can he's there for physical and emotional support, as many siblings are for
each other, especially those of close ages. Think about when Buffy said to Dawn "The most
important job I have is looking out for you", and I think I'm not the only one who can just as easily
see Xander saying the same thing to Buffy.
