Spike, parte I

Spike (né William Pratt, aka William The Bloody), is a fictional character created by Joss Whedon for the cult television programs, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. The character is portrayed by James Marsters. He is considered a breakout character.

Character history:

William Pratt before his siring
William Pratt was born circa 1853 in London to Anne Pratt and an as yet unnamed husband. William's surname was not revealed in the series and for years was widely accepted to be "Walthrop" in the fandom, which made it fanon. However, creator Joss Whedon recently revealed it to be "Pratt". William Pratt was the birth name of legendary horror actor Boris Karloff.

Since the actor who plays him is 5'11" (1.80 meters), it's safe to say the character shares the same height.

In 1880, at approximately 25 to 30 years of age, William was a brown-haired, ineffectual gentleman who lived with his mother and wrote poetry. He was called "William the Bloody" behind his back by his peers, because his poetry was so "bloody awful." This nickname (with more deadly connotations) would follow him in the future as a vampire. While he traveled in society circles, he found little in common with his peers and felt a general disconnect from their interests and discussions. He preferred creating things of beauty rather than dwelling on the scandalous and seedy elements of existence, and he showed a strong capacity for loyalty and devoted love, which would also follow him after his siring. After his romantic overtures were rejected by the aristocratic Cecily, a despondent William accepted comfort in the arms of Drusilla only to be bitten and transformed into a vampire. He had always been very close to his mother, and after he became a vampire he also turned her into a vampire to prevent her from dying from an illness (while new vampires in the Buffy universe typically turn completely evil and delight in killing their families, Spike was a notable exception and was as single-mindedly devoted to his mother as ever.)

Unfortunately his mother as a soulless vampire proved to be a truly evil creature, taunting Spike that she had despised him all along, and insinuating that Spike had always had a sexual fascination with her. Unlike Spike, who had retained many elements of his own personality, the creature she had become seemed to have retained little of her original self (as Spike later remarked upon in "Lies My Parents Told Me"). He ended up reluctantly staking her, because he could not bear to see his mother in such a twisted, unnatural, abusive form. He wrote a poem about the experience entitled "The Wanton Folly of Me Mum", the text of which was never actually presented. The entire matricidal experience was a terrible trauma for Spike, and it would later be exploited by an evil force as a hypnotic trigger. After staking his mother, Spike began a new life with Drusilla. Euphoric with his new-found vampiric abilities, and hungry for revenge on his peers, he abandoned the genteel hypocrisy of Victorian life. He became a rebel, adopting a working class accent and becoming prone to impulsiveness and violence. He adopted the nom de guerre "Spike" because of a habit of torturing people with railroad spikes. It should be noted that one of his detractors in his human days exclaimed he'd rather "have a railroad spike driven through [his] head" than listen to William's poetry, a possible inspiration for the torture.

In the company of Drusilla, her sire Angelus and Angelus's sire Darla, Spike terrorized Europe and Asia for almost two decades. Utterly devoted to Drusilla, Spike had a strained relationship with Angelus, rather like two rival brothers. Although Angelus did enjoy the company of another male vampire in their travels, he found Spike's eagerness for battle to be an unnecessary risk and unbecoming, since Angelus regarded killing as an art, not a sport, and while Angel killed for the sheer act of evil in itself Spike did it for amusement and the rush. Tensions also arose surrounding Angelus's ongoing sexual relationship with Drusilla, which continued despite Spike's strong disapproval.

Spike kills his first Slayer
In 1900, in one of his proudest moments, Spike killed Xin Rong, a Chinese Slayer, during the Boxer Rebellion; it was her blessed sword that gave him the scar on his left eyebrow, which remains a century later. Shortly afterward, Spike and Drusilla lost touch with Darla and Angelus (who, unknown to Spike or Drusilla, had recently been cursed with a soul), and the couple wandered the world seeking amusement and mayhem, occasionally separating to pursue separate interests but always reuniting. During World War II, Spike was captured by Nazis for experimentation and transported aboard a submarine which was in turn seized by Americans; after Spike and two other vampires killed most of the crew, Angel made Spike and another vampire Angel had just sired, leave the sub, by forcing them to swim to shore before the submarine reached the United States. By the 1950's, Spike, having reunited with Drusilla, spent some time in Italy.

At some point in a century or so of being his own boss, Spike employed a pair of Fyarl Demons as muscle, which is noteworthy since in the Buffyverse vampires and demons rarely get along; Spike would continue this diversity in friendships throughout his unlife. He attended Woodstock, where he drank blood from a flower child and spent the next several hours watching his own hand move. Spike frequently challenges vampire conventions and limitations. For example, Spike often treats his vulnerability to the sun as an inconvenience, rather than a limitation; he drives in broad daylight in vehicles with blacked-out windows, and he regularly travels outside during the day, using a blanket for cover. Spike also embraced certain elements of humanity, such as love and loyalty, that would be considered too human, and therefore offensive or impure, to other vampires.

Spike's story before he appears in Sunnydale unfolds in flashbacks scattered among numerous episodes of both "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Angel". They were not presented in chronological order. A guide to finding the flashback or flashbacks to a particular event is at Angel, Darla, Spike and Dru: Before 1997.