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Why the Hos Want Vaughn to Be Undercover
The Vartan Ho Webmistresses have talked over pretty much every scenario out there for what the hell is going on with Vaughn. And we think that the best -- perhaps ONLY -- possible way to salvage his character is for him to have married the COW as an undercover operation, to be a "raven" in spy parlance. Anything else makes him weak, impotent, gullible, passive, pitiable, a victim -- or all of the above. That's how he's basically been portrayed this season, but we desperately desire for him to be strong and smart and proactive, like he used to be.
Bradley Cooper had a quote about Will after he was no longer a regular on the show: "It was tough playing that character. He was a victim. He was a passive character, except for the finale, when he takes charge of his life and becomes proactive."
And that is exactly what has been done to Vaughn this season. He has been made passive, insubstantial, a shell of his former self. He's become mostly flotsam, beaten about by the waves of the plot, crushed under a Trianvil. That is not what fans want from Vaughn.
We want Vaughn to be proactive, not reactive, and the undercover-Vaughn explanation is the only one of the list that would accomplish that. We want the power over his choices to be in his own hands, not in someone else's.
How strong, how noble, how devoted to his love for Sydney he would look if he were the ONLY one who knew what he was doing, if he had compromised his morals and whored himself out and gone into the teeth of the Covenant by himself to discover the truth of Sydney's death. THAT is romantic. THAT is strength. THAT is the Vaughn that fans want. And it's perfectly in character, given his secret investigation of Irina last season. He is not a man who just gives up -- or at least, he didn't used to be.
Oh, and the dramatic character possibilities that would lie down this path! It would give Vaughn so much more depth, good, strong layers that he has long needed. Would his father have approved of what he did? What would Jack think of Vaughn doing what Irina did to him? Would he respect him for doing it to find justice for Sydney's death, or would the wounds it reopened for him be too strong? What would Vaughn think of having something like this in common with the woman who murdered his father? There's just SO much character depth to be mined from this scenario, something which has been sorely lacking this season. This way would provide dramatic television with the human element that this show seems to have tossed out the window this year -- all while preserving Vaughn's character.
The only possible issue that we can see from this scenario is a question of why he hasn't told Sydney about it yet, but we think that is easily explained. He couldn't tell her immediately because, given the "cloned" characters in the past, he couldn't immediately be sure it was Sydney. Then, he couldn't be sure that she wasn't still being manipulated or controlled because of what was done to her during the two years. How could he be sure she wasn't now being used against her will or knowledge? They could have done anything to her in those two years -- and he had to find out what before he could tell her the truth. And, of course, there is the ultimate reason: his love for her and fear for her.
Imagine his emotional agony of not being able to tell her that he didn't just move on to Lauren, that he still loves her with all his heart, knowing that to tell her would have jeopardized her life if his deception was discovered. And having lost her once, how could he EVER do anything to put her at risk like that? He went through the knife-edge she walked when she was a double at SD-6, worrying over her constantly, knowing the least little thing could blow her cover and cost her her life. How could he put her further in the aim of the villains of the Covenant? It's simple: He couldn't. He couldn't run the risk that if he was found out, if his cover was blown, it could mean her death, too. Her life is far more valuable to him than anything, even his own happiness. He would rather hurt her now for a time than lose her again forever. That he could never survive again.
Sydney might be angry at first, of course, but would realize that it came from his love for her -- and that it was no different from her not letting him know she was alive for a year after she escaped the Covenant's torture. Compared to her letting him continue to believe she was dead, it seems a lesser "crime" against a loved one. If she could do that to "protect" him, so he could continue the marriage charade to protect her.
We've also talked over the other possibilities we see.
He was so grief-stricken by Sydney's death that he was an easy target for LuEvil to take advantage of? We hate that one. It makes him look foolish and gullible, especially given his knowledge of what happened to Jack, Will and Neil Caplan. Not realizing it was being done to him, given how often he knows it has happened to others, makes him seem really stupid. Not even grief can excuse that level of gullibility and willingness to move on from Sydney. Plus, what would really be the point of LuEvil going after him? He wasn't even in the CIA any longer, and if he was in such bad shape, he wasn't a threat. Also, now that he seems to realize he still has such strong feelings for Sydney, he seems like a total wuss for remaining with the COW, and doing so betrays his love for Sydney.
He's been brainwashed? Horrible! Just furthers the presentation of him as weak and passive and a boy not good enough for Sydney, as Jack asserted earlier this season. It's also pretty lame. Again, it seems pointless since he was out of the CIA and LuEvil already had an "in" by being in the NSC. It makes the marriage nothing more than a willful manipulation by the writers to keep Sydney and Vaughn apart. If Vaughn were somehow a threat, there was no need for marrying Lauren to be part of the brainwashing -- they could have simply neutralized whatever was making him a threat without throwing a wife into the mix. We find this one the most manipulative.
Both of the above scenarios also harm other characters besides Vaughn. They make Dixon and Kendall look horrible for them to have known that Sydney was alive and yet just let Vaughn marry LuEvil. Dixon comes off especially bad, given his grief over losing Diane. Kendall we could buy not telling Vaughn, but NOT Dixon. It's even worse for him to have allowed Vaughn to marry LuEvil without telling him the truth about Sydney being alive than it would have been for Vaughn not to have been able to tell Syd he was undercover, because that literally changed the course of Vaughn's life.
He's really in love with Lauren? Doesn't even bear thinking about if his character and the Syd/Vaughn love story is to be preserved.
It's not really him, he's a clone? So ridiculous we didn't even include it in the poll.
Given all the alternatives that have been identified in the fan base recently, the only one that we feel could go toward redeeming Vaughn's character and restoring him to a position of strength and intelligence is for him to have been undercover. His character has been severely damaged and undermined this season, and any other explanation for his behavior will only continue this shameful character assassination.
--The Safe House Webmistresses
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