SPX and VIX are both traded by people/bots so VIX is no means a better tool to predict the future. But people that trade VIX might have a better understanding of the market than people who just trade SPX alone.
The market recovered but how confident it is? Generally, when the market rises VIX falls sharply, I mean un-proportionally sharp. But when it doesn't, I can only suspect something is going out there.