Buffy the Vampire Slayer : Vampire versions of people accurate or not?

Back when Vampire Willow visits Sunnydale somehow and they're all in high school Willow says that she thinks her vampire self is kind of gay and Buffy tells her it wasn't her and then Angel says: "Well actually" but then says never mind because he doesn't want to influence her personal life or whatever

so there we see that vampire versions may be the true version of someone since real Willow becomes a lesbian later on

Then with Spike and his mother
he says that she really loved him and that the cruel vampire version wasn't really her

so which is it then?
both seem to contradict whether or not the vampire versions of people are close to the true nature of someone

Are different writers to blame for the inconsistency or am i missing something?

In-world, the reason why Angel says "well actually" is that the demon inside the vampire, the thing that makes the descisions, has no memory of its own. That means the personality of the vampire is based on the memory of the soul that previously inhabited this body.

Thus the vampire is not the person that existed before this point, but it is based on that person. Just that the demon has no conscience and has a drive for evil.

I would like to point out however that Willow at that point wasnt gay yet. I think Joss was still in the process to descide if he would make Xander or Willow gay. Because it wasnt descided yet, both Xander as well as Willow are making gay references - in fact Xander made them more often than Willow.

So really the whole deal was to keep all options open.

Especially at this point they kept the option open that there would be different explanations for what happends to human beings when they got converted to vampires than that a demon takes over. For example maybe the soul actually gets converted, tained, to demonic nature ? Then Angelus wouldnt be really a different thing from Angel, just the part of Angel that converted to sort-of a "demon soul". Kind of a split personality. Just like some people have lost the connection between their left and their right brain and are two different people in one.


A gentleman will not insult me, and no man not a gentleman can insult me.

Thanks a lot! Your explanation allows for what happened with Willow and Spike's mother to make sense and shows that there are no inconsistencies.

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Thus the vampire is not the person that existed before this point, but it is based on that person.

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Actually the vampire is the person that existed before.

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In-world, the reason why Angel says "well actually" is that the demon inside the vampire, the thing that makes the descisions, has no memory of its own. That means the personality of the vampire is based on the memory of the soul that previously inhabited this body.

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In the Buffyverse soul is mere conscience. It doesn't have a memory or personality. This is proved on Angel. Ryan didn't have a soul.

Ryan is clearly a very rare exception to the usual rules.


A gentleman will not insult me, and no man not a gentleman can insult me.

But that proves the rule. A soul is not necessarily the memories or personality. Something Illyria also displays as she's able to impersonate Fred seamlessly enough to fool her parents.

And even Spike shows it. His personality is not altered when receiving a soul. Harmony still acts like Harmony when she's a soulless vampire.

Seize the moment, 'cause tomorrow you might be dead.

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Ryan is clearly a very rare exception to the usual rules.

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No, he isn't. There are also other cases which prove that soul is mere conscience. Kathy stole Buffy's soul, but she didn't have Buffy's personality. Buffy didn't lose her identity, she just acted weird. When Darla was pregnant with Connor, his soul was inside of her. Darla didn't lose her personality. She didn't have Connor's personality. She was herself, but she had conscience. When Angel talks about Angelus' evil deeds, he always talks about how he did them. It wasn't some separate demon. It was he who did those deeds. Spike is clearly the same person with or without soul. Harmony is the same person with or without soul etc.

I agree with Poem. Also want to point out, Vampire Willow isn't gay, as seen in "The Wish" she's sexually attracted to vampire Xander and even makes out with him while they suck Cordelia's blood.. If anything she's bi.

I think Vamp Willow was making advances on Willow just to toy with her/freak her out.. Either that or she's an extreme narcissist.

There were arguably some sexual undertones to the girl she drank at the Bronze, and when she went after Cordelia in "Dopplegangland".
But as Angel began saying "Well, actually," because vampires are predominantly defined by who they were as humans; even if not consciously expressed when they were alive. He only trails off and backtracks after Buffy shoots him a look, conveying a desire end Willow's train of thought; at least for the time being.


"What's the matter, sir? It still tastes like cream of corn."
"Except it's deviled ham!"

Yes, I think vampire Willow is bi.. which is interesting as many posters have considered Willow to be bi, despite herself always identifying as gay. I just think..if the writers were trying to foreshadow Willow's sexuality, they could have done it in a better way than making her come on to herself. Pretty poor show there.

The vampire version isn't really them. It is a demon with their bodies/memories.

Yes, this makes more sense. Thanks!

Yeah. I have to agree with this one. I don't know if you saw the final episode of Season 2 of 'Angel' when they were stuck in Pylea but when Angel tried to turn into a vampire he become a green demon and that demon was said to be what the demon inside him really looked like and it was a separate entity.

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No. Not really. I know a lot of Buffy fans including my Wifey but none of us have celebrations over the anniversies of TV shows but we might watch the first season again in between watching repeats of 'Alias' on DVD.

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what the demon inside him really looked like and it was a separate entity

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But it wasn't really a separate entity; no more than Oz running rampant in his wolf form. Angel lost himself to a more primal mentality; and in large part because he wasn't expecting to be so feral. It overwhelmed him, but he was able to protect Fred - as opposed to a completely separate entity, who should just see her as a happy meal with legs - and he managed to calm down and reassert conscious control over his form; which again is exactly what Oz needed, after learning to better control his inner wolf, even as it came at the expense of the wolf being able to come out when the full moon wasn't out. In both cases it was an emotional control element, and in Pylea Angel lost his normal level of control, but that doesn't mean it was fundamentally someone else, rather than just another, deeper part of him.
Doyle looked radically different when he demoned out, but it was still him; and he and Angel even discussed Doyle's reluctance to tap into that, in spite of him being stronger in his demon form, because Doyle was afraid of that side of him, and how it might alter who he was.


"You can lead a hearse to water, but you can't make it sink." The Cat

I do think it's accurate, and for the reasons you said, and what's depicted in the show, I disagree with the premise that humans-turned-vampires aren't really the human, but a demon that's replaced them wholesale, and taken over their memories.
We see others in the Buffyverse who are both human and a demon; Doyle was born part demon, Cordelia was made part demon, but she remain Cordelia until after her so called ascension, when Jasmine usurped her physical form.

By all account, it's a contiguous existence from humanity to become a demon, and in a couple of cases back again. Yes, Angel becomes disoriented when his soul is restored, but it's fleeting; and once the effect of his soul being reintegrated, the reality that he settles back into isn't a perception that he was anywhere else, or that some other being was responsible for his body's behavior in his absence - it's him, entirely and always, he has no distinction.
The best I've reconcile what a soul is - at least in terms of what is lost when someone becomes a vampires - isn't their state of consciousness; because that clearly remains. Instead it seems to be more an aspect of their psyche, something along the lines of the person's Super Ego; which is what otherwise balances the impulses of the EGO and ID, which tend to be more primal and work on the pain/pleasure principal.

Vamp Willow reflects an iteration of Willow stripped of inhibition; and is often brought up as not only an early indicator for her future relationship with women, but also in the general discussion of whether not her later identifying strictly as gay was an oversimplification; given that in "The Wish," she seen being involved with Xander, and takes a similarly perverse delighting in "playing" with Angel. This has been observed by some as an indication that her sexuality is more fluid.
Season 7 also lends credence to the idea of the contiguous existence of a human into a vampire state; where as Willow takes on more power to fuel her rampage, she begins to reflect a comparable demeanor to Vamp Willow, culminating in her saying, "Bored now." This lends a strong indication that the progression of behavior of Vamp Willow is predominantly defined by the Willow component of that combination, and how she would act when freed of social conventions or morality.
William & Spike are virtually indistinguishable, save for a sudden desire to cut a bloody swath across Europe; which might be best explained as a burgeoning hunger after your appetite has been radically altered. His first concern remain his mother, he still expected to maintain the same relationship as before; and more than a century later, he's still plagued on a psychological level by how that played out. More than that, he maintains the emotional ties to the song his mother sang to him as a human child; such that the First is able to use it to brainwash him.
As for how his mother responded upon being turned - a term that should stand out in its description of the process; as opposed to being "replaced" - he inhibitions are released, and she's free to express the resentment she's held towards William, that she never dared speak allowed before. That doesn't make her someone else, even as it's a side of her William never knew existed. But it sort personifies the need for detachment among the likes of Slayers and Watchers; who can afford to humanize vampires, or want to believe there's something in any of them that could be reached and convinced to be anything but a danger to the rest of humanity. Buffy had that trouble first hand with Angel, after he lost his soul. She wanted desperately to be able to bring out in him the kinder behavior she had experienced before, but he had been stripped of his capacity to do that; and as a result she hesitates to do what needed to be done. It's a convenient and arguably necessary belief to have, that the human is gone, but that does mean it's true. That didn't mean he wasn't literally another entity, but arguably more a radically altered psyche. How else do you define a person? When it's the same body, albeit mutated, and the same memories, the same personality, the same base psychology, only rendered impaired through the loss of some ineffable quality defined as a "soul," at what point do you say that, yes, this is the same person, body and mind, but perverted by a mystical transformation that makes them more of a monster than they would have been otherwise; rather than try to claim it's someone else using their body and mind?


We're Starfleet officers; weird is part of the job."

I think Willow is Bi. When Oz returns to Sunnydale Willow is very torn about being with Oz or Tara. She states that she has feelings for both of them. She never actually chooses between them, Oz leaves because he discovers that he can't control the werewolf within when he's upset.

Well that's because Willow was still exploring her sedxuality in season 4. It was new to her, so maybe she identified as bi. But i think Oz's departure was the departure of sexual feelings towards men.

She gay.

Vamp Willow would suggest otherwise.


"What's the matter, sir? It still tastes like cream of corn."
"Except it's deviled ham!"

I feel like Willow was really probably a lesbian identified bisexual. I think labeling her as a lesbian was just an over simplication by the writers. In those days being bi I think was probably a bit more taboo than being straight up gay. Even now it seems people just want people to pick a team and stick with it so they don't have to think too hard. I can understand them wanting to please people and not making it seem like Tara dying was going to make Willow straight again but it really retcons Willows love life pre-Tara. I feel like she had genuine infatuation and love with many guys. Willows feelings for Xander were long standing and sexual in nature they were so intense at one point that she couldn't stay faithful to Oz and had to try and perform a spell just so she could keep her hands off of him. I feel like Willow should have had a crush on Buffy first or something to usher in her questioning her sexuality. I mean Willow had a crush on Giles why not Buffy? I bet a lot of straight people even crush on Buffy so why not Willow?

The way you put thag explanation was so spot on what I was thinking myself only I really couldn't put it into words like that definitely agree with your theory. The vampires in this show are just unhinged versions of their human selves with no moral compass to hold them back.

No, I think there are a lot of factors that influence a person's vamp self, some keep their human characteristics, others it becomes twisted in them.

With Willow as a vampire, I don't think it was just the lesbian part of her that points to a vampire being basically the person that they were before. Willow was an overachiever at everything. She was the top student in the school, and she excelled at the magicks so hard that Amy turned her into Warren to take her down a notch. So why wouldn't perfect, overachieving Willow be the baddest Vampire out there? She'd be a pretty quick learner at how to be really nasty, as we see with how she tortured Angel. She was the Master's favorite, which means she must be a mean killing machine. She was probably a pretty perfect and overachieving vampire.

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Formerly known as "Greenmandms"