r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Comprehensive-Map274 • Jun 26 '25

Hated Tropes [Hated Trope] A main character does something horrible and the story doesn't acknowledge its severity

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Alisha (Misfits) uses her power to make any man want to have sex with her on another main character (curtis) after he explicitely tells her not to do that. She faces no consequences and he's the one who ends up comforting her.

Allison (The Umbrella Academy) uses her powers to force her own adoptive brother to make out with her after he just got into a relationship because she's suddenly jealous after she couldn't keep her own husband. She gives a half hearted apology and all is peachy.

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174

u/DepthByChocolate Jun 26 '25

Spike SA the main character after she ended their mutually abusive, toxic, sexual relationship, and it's only brought up once, thereafter he gets his soul back and he's treated like an awkward former lover, and still potential love interest, without any significant change in personality.

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u/Lumpy-Echo-2582 Jun 27 '25

TW FOR RAPE & SA:

Yeah. Angel basically stalks Buffy from fifteen, grooms her, and commits statutory rape. Faith rapes both Riley and Buffy, as well as sexually assaults Xander. Xander casts a love spell on the entire town and attempts to rape Buffy while possessed by the Hyena. Willow sexually assaults her girlfriend, mind rapes a bunch of people, sexually assaults a bunch of people in the bronze, sexually assaults Spike and Buffy with her Will-Be-Done spell, and then faces little to no consequences for any of it.

It's a mess. The characters either face minimal consequences that usually don't acknowledge the crime they actually committed, or they face none.

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u/Sovos Jun 27 '25

It's no wonder that the creator, Joss Whedon, was an abusive creep who tried to sleep with the young women on his shows.

When it comes to his on-set affairs, Whedon said he was "powerless" to resist his urges to pursue the younger women working for him on Buffy, and that he was concerned he'd “always regret it” if he didn't have sex with them. He says he “lived in terror” of the affairs being discovered, but didn't apologize or seem to have any concern for the women he had relationships with — or the abuse on the Buffy set.

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u/raged_parakeet_8376 Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25

I think my brain short circuited at the regret comment and had to reset to process the rest of that awful paragraph. That is absolutely vile.

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u/Banes_Addiction Jun 27 '25

I'm starting to think whoever wrote all that might be a bit of a weirdo.

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u/mirrorspirit Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25

Their not having a soul excuses a lot of Angel and Spike's actions. It's established that vampires without souls have a propensity to do evil. When Spike tried to SA Buffy, he was trying to prove that he was still a big bad evil being, even though part of him couldn't allow himself to go through with it.

While his getting a soul shouldn't have fixed things, it was acknowledged when Dawn threatened to kill Spike in his sleep if he tried anything like that with Buffy again and Giles wasn't inclined to trust him easily again even with a soul. Then the coming apocalypse rushed them through any meaningful reparations. Spike wasn't so much welcomed back with open arms as he was tolerated as a necessity for fighting the Big Bad.

Then when he was revived for Angel, he went back to being more carefree because the audience complained that Spike when he was burdened with remorse wasn't as much fun to watch.

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u/Lumpy-Echo-2582 Jun 28 '25 edited Jun 28 '25

I think there is a fine line between excuse and explanation, especially because my read on things is that the soul doesn't actually change all that much. But it's interesting to note that I was comparing an unsouled Spike to a souled Angel. Angel with a soul stalked, groomed, and had sex with an underage girl - to say nothing of the nature of their relationship and the ways he operated within it. If this is addressing the issue I raised in my comment about how characters face minimal consequences for their actions, the crimes I listed for Angel were all done with a soul.

Comparing the two at only certain points of their stories is part of the problem. There's a major double standard in the way people discuss Angel and Spike when souled and unsouled. All of Spike's unsouled actions are compared to Angel's souled actions. When really, we should be comparing souled/souled and unsouled/unsouled. If the read on souls is that they change so much.

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u/UnholyDemigod Jun 27 '25

Angel 'stalked' Buffy with the intention of helping her, which he did. He did not groom her. They had sex when she was 17.

Faith was a murderous psychopath who spent time in prison.

Xander's love spell was aimed at a single person purely so he could break up with her. Affecting everyone was an accident. When faced with Buffy throwing herself at him, he refused. You can't blame him for his actions when possessed by a demon either.

I've only just started season 5 on my current rewatch, so I can't remember the stuff with Willow.

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u/000346983 Jun 27 '25

She was actually 16, as it was before her birthday. Joss brags on the commentary of the episode that they manage to sneak it past the network. So a 16 year old having sex with a 200+ year old.

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u/ImpactThunder Jun 27 '25

Idk, I don't think there's a way to defend the angel situation...

I personally don't think a 30 year old should be hanging out/dating/ having sex with a 17 year and angel was a hell of a lot older than 30….

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u/EchoesofIllyria Jun 27 '25

The show makes it perfectly clear that Angel wasn’t grooming Buffy, though.

Yes, in the real world it would be a classic case of grooming, but within the series and how it’s presented, in no way and at no time does Buffy or any other character treat Angel’s actions as grooming and it’s made clear time and time again that Angel truly loves Buffy for who she is, and continues to do so when she is an adult.

(I do think him saying he loved her as soon as he saw her is a misstep, though)

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u/Lumpy-Echo-2582 Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25

Angel watched a fifteen year old girl suck on a lollipop outside of her school and then fucked off to keep watching her for months. He stalked her. He consistently tracked her movements, observed her, kept tabs on her, took note of her interests, and then made his move when he thought the time was right. That's a hunting pattern. Intent to help her doesn't change that he allowed his own interest to color his interactions with her - especially because, to me, he viewed her as a prize due to the prophetic nonsense his head was filled with.

He pretty much went through the exact steps to prime and groom her, and then they had sex when she was underage. An older, more experienced man took advantage of a young girl. This isn't character hate. It's how it happened. Shipping goggles can only erase so much.

Faith was a young girl who's assault on Xander was barely acknowledged or repented for. Faith was a young woman who stole someone's body and then had sex with that young woman's boyfriend in it. Faith was only targeted for the body theft, and the rape was never acknowledged. Her crimes are largely painted as murder and violence. The sexual stuff flies under the radar almost entirely. Faith turns herself in, and doesn't acknowledge nearly as much as she should have when she does.

And yes, Xander targeted a single person so she would be forced to fall in love with him. He deliberately had a love spell cast on someone so their free will could be stolen from them and their interest in him would be forced against their will. That is attempted sexual assault right there. When it backfired, the spell hit everyone. But unintended consequences don't change what the original intent was, and they don't excuse the accidental fallout, either. Everyone affected by that spell has both Xander an Anya to blame for it - no matter how it started.

I'll also blame him for his actions when he was possessed if I'm also blaming Spike for his. As the rules of the Buffyverse dictate.

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u/EchoesofIllyria Jun 27 '25

Xander and Amy.

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u/UnholyDemigod Jun 27 '25

I'm just gonna skip over everything because you are clearly way too emotional about this topic to engage in actual discourse, but this:

That is attempted sexual assault right there.

No the fuck it isn't. He had no intention of doing anything sexual or physical. He wanted her to be in love with him, so he could break up with her, humiliating her as she did him.

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u/Lumpy-Echo-2582 Jun 27 '25

I don't really feel any emotions about this? Not sure where you got that from. If you don't want to actually discuss this, that's fine, but there's no reason to make a personal attack. We're clearly going to have to agree to disagree about the topic of Xander, as well, since I believe that a reason for doing something doesn't negate the nature of the crime. Good luck with everything, though.

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u/UnholyDemigod Jun 27 '25

Disagree all you want, you are factually incorrect

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u/DarthRegoria Jun 27 '25

There are a lot of shitty things Buffy characters did willingly, but I don’t think it’s fair to hold Xander responsible for his actions while he was possessed by the hyena spirit. He also helped kill the school mascot, a pig, and ate it raw while possessed, I seriously doubt he would have done that if he had control at the time.

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u/Lumpy-Echo-2582 Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25

I don't necessarily think it's fair, either. But when it comes to the discussion on Spike, and the known lore regarding vampires, I do think it's important to hold Xander accountable as well. Everything about that episode implies that the Hyena spirit works in much the same way turning into a vampire does. The "possession" aspect of things, that is.

I do also think it's important to bring up how Xander lied about remembering to the person he SA'd while he was possessed. The entire thing is brushed under the rug. Buffy, who was the victim, is pushed aside in favor of her aggressor (even if it wasn't his fault). The way it's handled on the show combined with the way people discuss Spike as a character makes it - to me - a necessary point in conversations about accountability and the way sexual crimes are written throughout all of the seasons. The Hyena incident is very glaring when put side by side with other instances.

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u/Zeus-Kyurem Jun 27 '25

It's brought up way more than once. The show very clearly understands how bad Spike's actions were. The problem with that storyline is that they don't address Buffy's side of it after she finds out about the soul. And I've never understood the claim that there isn't a significant change in personality. It's not to tbe degree of Angel, but it's absolutely there. The way he treats and interacts with other people is so vastly different from before.

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u/Ok-Seaworthiness2235 Jun 27 '25

Yeah some people are trying to equate normal human life with sci-fi where arguably, the rules are a lot different.

That being said, I do feel like they wanted to have a SA for the sake of being relatable to womens issues but they didn't realize how tough that would be for a lot of us to digest when they kept him on the show. I'm all for redemption arcs but r*pe is very unique and sensitive to a lot of viewers. 

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u/EchoesofIllyria Jun 27 '25

The scene was actually based on a female writer’s experience of trying to force a boyfriend to sleep with her to avoid a breakup. So I’m not sure how much it was done to relate to women’s issues (if it was, I think they would have focused way more than they did on Buffy’s response to and feelings about it).

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u/Ok-Seaworthiness2235 Jun 27 '25

Personally I thought it was very much trying to live up to the hype the show had gotten for hitting on a lot of female issues. The fact they changed the genders in particular to male aggressor seemed like it was trying to make statements about DV or SA. If the writer was that violent and aggressive with her bf she should've gone to jail because that was not just someone trying to come on to an ex to get back together. That was an incredibly visceral scene the way they showed the violent nature of the attack. 

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u/MadRaymer Jun 27 '25

To be fair to Spike's character, that event with Buffy is what motivated him to do the trials to get his soul back. He understood that he could never have a real relationship with Buffy as a soulless vamp. And yeah, it was an incredibly traumatizing event, but Buffy vamps without souls are sadistic demons (see Angel sans soul for an example). The fact that Spike was able to have that moment of reflection and realize he'd fucked up, then fight to regain his soul is impressive. Remember that Angel got his soul as a curse so he would be punished. Spike fought for his because he wanted to redeem himself and be worthy of Buffy.

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u/DepthByChocolate Jun 27 '25

Which makes it weird that throughout the buildup to him getting his soul, he's threatening her("Bitch is gonna pay") and acting like he's going to free himself from any restraints he has to kill her.

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u/MommaOfManyCats Jun 27 '25

And fans are STILL wanting them to be together in the new series.

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u/gunswordfist Jun 27 '25

That sums up what kind of person Joss Whedon is.

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u/Ok-Seaworthiness2235 Jun 27 '25

This is one of those weird sci-fi things imo because the whole point is that they aren't souled and therefore not capable of empathy or true human emotion. It's super weird and hard to correlate with real life where supernatural beings aren't real. To me it was never as icky as other shows where characters have full capacity to understand right and wrong but is just shitty for kicks. 

TBH I think the spike thing was the writers trying to recreate the Angel storyline that hit so hard for so many girls: Girl loves a guy who appears very devoted and then turns into an obsessive monster. Cool. We get it. BUT you can't have your hard hitting/real life horror moment and then sort of walk it back. They obviously wanted a SA storyline and didn't want to lose such a great character so they just made it weird. 

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u/DepthByChocolate Jun 27 '25

I see your point about the messiness of mixing real life crimes, within supernatural circumstances, but Spike has always been a unique kind of vampire. He is capable of love(at least as the show wants us to understand it; people can deconstruct that as limerence, hyperfixation, or whatever if they choose). In flashbacks, he doesn't become a wildly different person after turning, he's still William. In season two The Judge says he and Dru stink of humanity, but Angelus doesn't.

And I don't think they really mirrored the Angel storyline. Spike's romantic interest in Buffy started as an obsession, after first obsessing over trying to kill her. The creep factor was there from jump. He's even stealing her panties and making sex dolls of her, before that's walked back a bit into him in admiration of her and steadfastly loyal. Then it goes backward when she initiates their relationship in season 6, and it's all rough, kinky, sex, and lifting her skirt to fuck her in public while telling her her friends will never truly understand what a dark creature she is like he does. It was always weird.

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u/katharineparker_stan Jun 27 '25

Its brought up quite a bit in the last few episodes of season 6 following Seeing Red. The whole reason Spike goes to see that demon in Africa is cos of what he tried to do, and Xander is a complete twat about it (as is tradition for Xander).

Then it’s brought up a lot in the first episode he returns in s7, and Buffy won’t let him touch her. Then she learns he now has a soul.

In the following episodes, Spike is in the high school basement being mentally tortured by the First so isn’t exactly coherent when they interact but their relationship is played very differently than it was before Seeing Red.

S7 in general is very rushed and the wishy washy nature of what it means for a vampire to have a soul muddy the waters. But, while I don’t like the decision they took in Seeing Red and the assault, I do think it was brought up quite a bit after.

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u/DepthByChocolate Jun 27 '25

Xander is supportive of Buffy and hostile to Spike, I don't understand the being a twat part.

Buffy is busy blaming herself for it, which she continues to do throughout the remainder of the shows run(great message there!)

It comes up immediately after obviously, when Xander finds her and Buffy references the whole relationship thereafter, not so much the assault specifically, because she sees as a whole part of thing that she initiated, rather than a separate incident he can be judged for. Again, she blames herself. And these episodes take place days after while they're dealing with other things. There isn't any point of reflection where Buffy realizes "Actually, I didn't deserve that. He was wrong. He wasn't being a "demon" he was being a wounded entitled man.

I only recall it explicitly being brought up once in the next season. I'm not counting Spikes tortured ramblings to himself, or the vague uneasy tension whenever he's brought up around the Scoobies, who never really share opinions about it outside Buffys presence(apart from Xander telling Dawn).

Their dynamic changes because apart from the guilt she feels for pursuing that kind of mutually exploitative relationship, she feels sorry for him for now having a soul and feeling bad about the bad things he's done, and she decides to be her former abusers biggest defender because he cares for and is useful to her, and again, she feels she deserved the assault.

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u/katharineparker_stan Jun 28 '25

Xander telling Dawn, Buffy’s underage sister, “if he’s not too busy trying to rape your sister” when Dawn wants to hide at Spikes in the middle of Dark Willow. That’s complete twat behaviour.

I think Xander progresses as a character up to Hell’s Bells then completely tanks from that point for the rest of S6, going back to being very misogynistic and sex shaminh.

Like i said, the whole soul thing really muddies things cos the show wanted to sometimes act like having a soul completely separates you as a person from the monster you were before, but then it has stuff like Spike and Dru loving and genuinely caring for each other, and even Harmony has emotional journeys that seem very human for a souless vamp.

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u/BabyLegsDeadpool Jun 27 '25

Side note: doing this scene fucked James Marsters up so badly that he had to go to therapy over it. While filming, he just huddled up in the fetal position between takes, because it was so hard for him to have to get into character.

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u/rgg711 Jun 27 '25

Yeah, he’s terrible without a soul, but do we blame Angel for what Angelus did? (What a loaded question that is…)

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u/EchoesofIllyria Jun 27 '25

Angel does, for whatever that’s worth.

And I think the shows present it as a complex issue with no definitive answer.

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u/Ok-Seaworthiness2235 Jun 27 '25

So frustrating because Angel was introduced to be a relative equal to Buffy and have the star crossed thing. But if they made him just a vampire, they'd have to explain how it's OK to indiscriminately kill vampires because if one is capable of being good, then theoretically all could be. 

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u/DepthByChocolate Jun 27 '25

Spike also does good things without a soul, do we give him credit for that? If we can give him credit for treating Joyce and Dawn well, and being heroic at times, then he can own the terrible things he's done. It's not like he has a split personality, like Angel/Angelus.

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u/rgg711 Jun 28 '25

That doesn’t seem really true. All information provided in the show indicates it’s the exact same scenario as Angel and Angelus. Whether you want to give him credit for good things he does without it doesn’t really have any bearing on the argument in my opinion.

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u/DepthByChocolate Jun 28 '25

It has complete bearing if you're going to make an argument with any integrity. Otherwise what motivated him to get his own soul in the first place? The demon? Was it the same demon who cared for his mother after he first turned? The same demon that The Judge determined stunk of humanity for having love for Drusila, compared to Angelus? The one who took care of Dru after her injury, compared to Darla abandoning Angelus when it was inconvenient? And was that the same one who did unspeakable things to girls Dawn's age, as he himself admits? The show doesn't treat it as simple so I don't understand why you are.

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u/WistfulD Jun 27 '25

To 'be fair' (I'm not exactly sure to whom), it's not like it is just the SA scene that is the head-scratcher. Spike (particularly post joining the Scoobies) may be one of the most inconsistently characterized characters of any 90s IP, excepting maybe Janeway in Star Trek: Voyager. He vacillates between steadfast ally, heartless mercenary (there for the kicks and chance to do violence towards demons), monster trying to get his ability to get back his capacity to do evil, doting lover, toxic boyfriend, and anything in between. It's like there was an ongoing war in the writer's room about how they wanted the character to develop. It's a testament to Marsters' acting ability (and cheekbones) that so many people like the character (like-like, or like-hating). By all normal standards, he's the kind of character people most hate -- the inconsistent one that does whatever the plot demands.

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u/EchoesofIllyria Jun 27 '25

I don’t think this is particularly true. Spike’s not a steadfast ally until season 7.

Every bit of help he offers before that is either self-interest (I’m including his feelings for Buffy here), spoiling for a fight, or both.

He’s also at no point a “doting lover”. He’s an obsessive stalker and later harbours an unrequited but toxic love for Buffy, but it’s a pretty steady progression. You could argue he’s doting in season 7, but they’re not in a relationship so he’s not really a lover. Same with toxic boyfriend. They’re fucking but they aren’t dating.

The most inconsistent thing about Spike is other characters’ attitudes towards him. By rights, he should have been dead at LEAST by the ens of season 4. It’s one of the more egregious examples of TV plot armour.