AU Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Way It Should Have Been
- Thread starter Joe Washington
- Start date
Yeah, that's my take as well.
I did say it will have a mix of the original and alternate differences which are beyond Dawn being a part of the show from the beginning and the continuation of Xander's interest in Buffy. To mame some on the top of my head: the prophecy, the Anointed One continuing to be a pain in the team's butt beyond the first episode of Season 2, Giles becoming rebellious aganist the Council earlier than before and establishing his stand aganist them more openly, and Willow's act at the end of Season 3 which will have consequences, believe me. And believe me when I say there will be more differences coming.
Yeah, I figured the big changes would come in later seasons (with good reason, imo). I was just agreeing that 99% of the show looked the same up until the end of season 3.
Here are the final two seasons of AU Buffy.
SEASON FOUR
SEASON FOUR
- The government has been doing everything in its power to make it look like what happened at the end of the season was a joke. But behind closed doors, the President has ordered that the Initiative set up shop in Sunnydale to keep a close eye on what’s going on and to examine the supernatural creatures that live there, figure how they tick, and develop means against them. The Initiative uses Sunnydale University as its front.
- Despite the government’s assurances, there are people who believe these creatures exist and are on the lookout for them for different purposes. It’s making the demons work harder to capture their prey now that people are more aware of their existence. People are going to Buffy more for help now that her status as a supernatural protector is becoming more public knowledge in Sunnydale. Even the new Mayor of Sunnydale is going to Buffy for help with certain supernatural matters.
- Buffy and Xander are a couple now trying to have some personal time for each other among battling against evil and the pressures of Buffy’s college life.
- Dawn goes to a different high school after the destruction of Sunnydale High but continues her attempts to have a part of Buffy's supernatural slaying life.
- Giles leads a personal war against the Watchers’ Council with the help of some supporters to expose the traitors within the group and bring them to justice. Giles leads the war from his home, refusing to keep his eye off Buffy especially during times like these.
- Oz gets captured by the Initiative and dissected. Willow thinks Oz may have left her and is consoled by Buffy.
- Willow meets Tara, forms a bond with her, and, through that bond, recognizes her own homosexuality. Willow forms a secret covenant with Tara and other magic practitioners on the college campus. Willow receives a vision of the future in which she encounters Fray the future Slayer.
- Willow eventually confesses that she was the one who leaked the exposure tape at the end of last season which stirs up some tension between her and Buffy.
- Xander doesn’t trust Riley and the obvious attraction between Riley and Buffy and Buffy’s growing involvement with the Initiative aren’t helping with Xander’s distrust. Though Buffy likes Riley and how they function as a team, Buffy would never to cross the line with him knowing how she feels for Xander.
- Faith wakes up from her coma with a case of amnesia and Buffy takes her under her wing, feeling sorry for her and seeing it as a second chance to make things right between them.
- Late in the season, something happens that makes Faith regain her memories including the ones of the events of Season 3 up to her being stabbed by Buffy. Faith considers exacting revenge against Buffy for the misery she put her through.
- Willow finds out that Oz was murdered by the Initiative and secretly works towards its destruction. Willow forms an alliance with Adam to bring the whole house of cards down only to betray him at the last moment without her friends knowing her deception.
- Riley dies during the fight against Adam.
- Faith comes to forgive Buffy during the fight against Adam, realizing that the things she’s done and been through aren’t Buffy’s fault.
- By the end of the season, the Initiative mess creates more problems for the government’s containment of the supernatural exposure.
- Giles suggest to Faith that she directs her rage and her desire of revenge towards the Watchers’ Council whose manipulation of Faith was the true cause of her misery in Season 3, and join the war against them. Faith decides to do just that. In the final scene of the season, we see the government setting up roadblocks all around Sunnydale to prevent anyone from coming in or coming out.
- Sunnydale is under government lockdown and martial law until the government decides what to do with the town. All means of communicating with the outside world has been severed.
- Buffy and the Scoobies try to form an underground internet movement to spread the truth of what is going on in Sunnydale to the rest of the world. They get some help from Angel and his gang in Los Angeles and from Faith in Europe.
- Willow's romantic relationship with Tara strengtens despite the reveal of Oz's death along with her powers of witchcraft.
- A goddess named Glory is bent on getting a mythical key to return to her hell dimension before the event that banishes all things supernatural from Earth occurs.
- It’s revealed that Dawn is the Key and the monks in charge of the Key planted her in Buffy’s life so Buffy would be her protector. The monks fabricated memories to conceal Dawn’s true nature.
- Faith returns to Sunnydale after learning about Dawn being the Key. Faith has grown to care about Dawn during their time together and wants to be there for her, to help protect her from Glory.
- As punishment for Buffy’s hindrance in her plans for her homecoming, Glory gives Buffy’s mother Joyce the brain tumor which leads to her tragic demise.
- Joyce's death makes Xander feel that life is short so he goes to Buffy with a ring and a marriage proposal. Buffy says no but gives him some hope by telling him to give the ring to her when the conflict with Glory is over.
- With the war aganist the Coucil concluded and Giles being appointed as its new head, Giles assign Watcher security to Buffy's house and the homes of the other Scoobies to protect them from Glory and her forces.
- Watcher security was unable to stop Glory from killing Tara Tara and making it look like it was Buffy’s fault to dig the knife into the Slayer even more and to turn Willow to her side since the power she posses is needed for her return home. Stricken with grief over Tara's death, Willow turns into Dark Willow and joins forces with Glory to help her open the gateway to her hell dimension even it destroys the world in the process. With Tara no longer in her life, Willow wants it all to be over.
- Dawn gets taken away from Buffy by Glory's forces.
- When the toll of everything that has happened this year gets too much for Buffy, she falls into a catatonic state and dreams of being in a mental asylum visited by her parents. Xander brings Buffy out of it.
- In the series finale, the final showdown between Buffy and Glory occurs. Buffy is aided by Xander, Giles, Faith, Angel and his gang, and every spell and weapon Giles was able to muster from the vaults of the Watchers' Council headquarters. Willow is bent on opening the interdimensional gateway with or without Glory.
- Before the showdown, Buffy tells Xander to give her the ring he had when he asked her to marry him. Buffy wears the ring on her finger, gives Xander a passionate kiss, and tells him, "If only we had enough time," feeling the inevitable end that's coming for her.
- Giles kills Glory when she reverts to the form of her mortal host, Ben. Buffy is forced to kill Dark Willow and gives an emotional goodbye to her old friend. But Buffy is too late to stop Willow from cutting Dawn whose blood opens up the gateway.
- Buffy throws herself into the vortex to stop the gateway from destroying the world and Dawn from sacrificing her life. When Buffy goes through the vortex, the mystical energy in her blood causes all things supernatural to get swallowed by it fulfilling the very prophecy that's been looming over her life for years. The final shot of the series are of Giles, Xander, and the others watching Buffy inside the vortex being hit by its energy and Buffy's final words to Dawn being played in the background as Buffy experience agonizing pain inside the vortex while having a smile on her face, accepting her fate with a strange sense of peace. Cut to black.
- After, we fade in to a shot of a woman sitting on the ledge of a building in a futuristic world. 200 years has passed since Buffy's showdown with Buffy and it's a whole new world. The woman (Fray) is dressed almost like a pirate and has a red scythe in her hand. In the background, we hear Giles giving the speech of once in every generation there is a girl who fights aganist the forces of darkness and that girl is the Slayer. At that moment, Fray turns to the camera and smiles to us. THE END.
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Dusty Ayres
Commodore
I wished that Joss had killed off Xander instead of Tara, because Xander is just useless. And no, I don't think that what Willow went through should be considered a 'phase'; being a lesbian is as natural as being a heterosexual, and it's about time such relationships were shown on prime-time TV.
If Tara hadn't been killed, we wouldn't have seen the Dark Willow arc which is a major part of Willow's journey. Don't get me wrong. I love the Willow-Tara relationship and how Willow grew because of it. But sometimes deaths are necessary to service the overall story.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
The first two seasons are pretty much perfect, although I would make it 100% clear that Drusilla is the gypsy that got Angel cursed with his soul. If you listen to the what that gypsy was, what abilities she had, and what Angel did to her, and listen to Drusilla's backstory, you find they're pretty much the same. I think, indeed, originally that Drusilla and the gypsy are one and the same.
S3 is where it starts to unravel, and thus this is where the biggest changes have to be. First; Xander does NOT get reduced to a donut-running boy who can't do anything. During the summer Xander was the leader of their group as the fought vampires, how the leader gets to be reduced to a donut boy is beyond me. Also, in S2 Buffy was the one doing the donut running, as she didn't have what it took to do the research, Xander and Willow on the other hand are the ones doing research and use the donuts to keep going all night.
As such, during S3, Xander should really keep performing somewhat of a leadership role; his night hawk role, although less 100% in charge.
This works perfect, as in S4 when he returns from his trip and is estranged from his college going friends, he goes about hunting vamps and demons on his own, and saves one of the Initiative teams, which gets him recruited. Riley's story in the original S4, will become Xander's story: the professor pumps him full of drugs, gets separated from his friends, and starts seeing the Initiative from both the drugs, and his sense of duty and following orders partially instilled by the solidier he dressed as his new family and friends. Riley either doesn't exist at all, or is a mere recurring character as Buffy's squeeze.
This has the advantage of keeping the cast smaller, (there's also no need for Anya), but the story itself is much more visceral; first the estranging story line, as Xander is genuinely gone, as well as Xander being part of the Initiative as opposed to Riley. Riley only just arrived in the cast, he simply wasn't around long enough to instill an emotional response into the audience. His getting out is just, meh - it doesn't help that he's boring. Thus have it happen one of the core four, Xander, would tighten the season and produce a much more interesting and emotionally charged storyline.
Oh, and Spike, the moment his information runs out and can no longer help, he gets dusted right away after that. The Scoobs keep looking like idiots not dusting the vamp.
S3 is where it starts to unravel, and thus this is where the biggest changes have to be. First; Xander does NOT get reduced to a donut-running boy who can't do anything. During the summer Xander was the leader of their group as the fought vampires, how the leader gets to be reduced to a donut boy is beyond me. Also, in S2 Buffy was the one doing the donut running, as she didn't have what it took to do the research, Xander and Willow on the other hand are the ones doing research and use the donuts to keep going all night.
As such, during S3, Xander should really keep performing somewhat of a leadership role; his night hawk role, although less 100% in charge.
This works perfect, as in S4 when he returns from his trip and is estranged from his college going friends, he goes about hunting vamps and demons on his own, and saves one of the Initiative teams, which gets him recruited. Riley's story in the original S4, will become Xander's story: the professor pumps him full of drugs, gets separated from his friends, and starts seeing the Initiative from both the drugs, and his sense of duty and following orders partially instilled by the solidier he dressed as his new family and friends. Riley either doesn't exist at all, or is a mere recurring character as Buffy's squeeze.
This has the advantage of keeping the cast smaller, (there's also no need for Anya), but the story itself is much more visceral; first the estranging story line, as Xander is genuinely gone, as well as Xander being part of the Initiative as opposed to Riley. Riley only just arrived in the cast, he simply wasn't around long enough to instill an emotional response into the audience. His getting out is just, meh - it doesn't help that he's boring. Thus have it happen one of the core four, Xander, would tighten the season and produce a much more interesting and emotionally charged storyline.
Oh, and Spike, the moment his information runs out and can no longer help, he gets dusted right away after that. The Scoobs keep looking like idiots not dusting the vamp.
Dusty Ayres
Commodore
I'm sorry, but the show is called Buffy The Vampire Slayer, NOT Xander The Vampire Slayer. If Xander wanted to be what Buffy is, he should have stepped up, get buff, improve his fighting skills, and then do what you say he should-instead, all he did was be silly, get a construction job, marry Anya, and be Renfield in the Dracula episode. Not much to be proud of-that's why I wanted him killed off. Also, the killing of Tara, while great from a dramatic standpoint, to me felt like the same old, same old 'LGBT person dies at end of play/novel/movie' plot that's the bane of most LGBT people and is mentioned in the documentary The Celluloid Closet. Killing Xander would have been better, and also have the same effect on Willow as Tara being killed, but with an even better story point: it's Tara who pulls Willow away from the dark side of the Force, not Buffy, and their love grows stronger as a result!
Um Xander never married Anya remember he left her in "Hells Bells". Regarding killing Xander instead of Tara...who would reach out then to Willow to prevent her from destroying the world? Xander plays a vital role in helping to heal her somewhat. Also Tara was killed by accident remember, she was not Warren's primary target, Buffy was. Tara just happened to get caught in the cross fire. Xander was confronting Buffy regarding her relationship with Spike remember in the backyard when Warren appears and shoots...it misses Buffy goes over her shoulder and into Willow's bedroom breaks the window and pierces Tara. He could have pointed the gun at Xander and killed him but his intention was to kill Buffy and missed. Warren was a coward with a gun who didn't know how to fire it properly and his actions resulted in an accidental death that triggers Willow's down hill spiral into darkness. I disagree that Xander would have had any more poignancy and I'm a huge Xander fan.
Dusty Ayres
Commodore
As I said, Tara would be the one who reaches out to Willow and pulls her back from the brink of darkness over Xander's death. Xander dying and causing Willow to go to the dark side has just as much potency as Tara dying and causing Willow to go to the dark side. Plus, as I said before, it isn't the 'GLBT person dies' meme we've seen in art for over a century, but an even better one; the 'happy-go-lucky puppydog character that everybody loves' which isn't done as much and frankly, should be. It would have been nice to see a positive GLBT relationship thrive and get through adversity rather than see it just be snuffed so that one character goes through darkness to see the light.
We'll agree to disagree then.
To those who have already read Season 5 of AU Buffy, I've added a scene at the end of the series featuring Fray.
On another subject, Admiral Young and Dusty Ayres: you both make interesting points.
On another subject, Admiral Young and Dusty Ayres: you both make interesting points.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
You do understand that Xander is a character that only does the way writers make him do, right? And this thing is about how writers could have improved Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and thus written things differently, and writing Xander differently - aka, allow him continuous use of his spine, instead of yanking it out - is the way to make this show better, right?
That Xander, the only male character that is Buffy's age, that's her friend, is reduced to whimpering buffoon to prop her up (because apparently Hollywood (feminist writers) think that the way to show the strength of a woman is to reduce every male around them to spineless, incompetent wimps and fail miserable) makes Buffy look pathetic and weak, and reduces the show from an ensemble cast, to a dramatically broken pile of nothing. Especially if he gets yanked from buffoon to more powerful than a god, and back down again, because he's only Xander, with every other episode, because plot, and the continuing existence of Buffy's world and thus the show depends on it.
Using Xander consistently as a strong male character wouldn't have turned BtVS in XtVS, it would have only made Buffy look stronger and more competent. Riley, after all, had the same role in the season I would give Xander, and yet the show never devolved into Riley the Vampire Slayer. In the end it did devolve into Spiky-woo and his Spikettes, but that's a whole other matter.
Buffy didn't bring Willow back from the Dark Side, Xander did.
S
Stone_Cold_Sisko
Guest
I really don't think the series needs much reworking in the early seasons. I like the bit about Drusilla and the Gypsies being made clear. Spike's first appearance and meeting with Angel would probably in hindsight, be better developed and written, since later they revealed what a long-form history the 4 of them (Darla and Dru also) had.
Season 3 is perfect.
Season 4, well I would have kept Maggie Walsh around longer that episode where she bit the dust was just a fast episode, too much happened. That was 2 or 3 episodes easily. Then we'd have less "hey we're searching for Adam!" stuff.
The only time Adam seemed like a threat btw was in the Joss-penned episode where he convinces the vampires to "come out into the light" (Faith arc part 2 I believe).
In fact, THAT would have been my climax. Instead of Adam being a lurching Frankenstein plot, he would "motivate" the vampires to carry out a string of brazen daylight attacks, an actual attempted daylight vampire invasion of Sunnydale, that would actually be kind of epic. Eventually they could fight and take out Adam the same way they did in the aired S4, and Restless would air as-is.
S5 is mostly fine, except I go with the writers' original plan to turn Willow evil when Glory takes out Tara. Five great seasons.
Season 3 is perfect.
Season 4, well I would have kept Maggie Walsh around longer that episode where she bit the dust was just a fast episode, too much happened. That was 2 or 3 episodes easily. Then we'd have less "hey we're searching for Adam!" stuff.
The only time Adam seemed like a threat btw was in the Joss-penned episode where he convinces the vampires to "come out into the light" (Faith arc part 2 I believe).
In fact, THAT would have been my climax. Instead of Adam being a lurching Frankenstein plot, he would "motivate" the vampires to carry out a string of brazen daylight attacks, an actual attempted daylight vampire invasion of Sunnydale, that would actually be kind of epic. Eventually they could fight and take out Adam the same way they did in the aired S4, and Restless would air as-is.
S5 is mostly fine, except I go with the writers' original plan to turn Willow evil when Glory takes out Tara. Five great seasons.
Dusty Ayres
Commodore
For you, and guys like you. This whole thing is all because you can't stand the way that men are treated on the show, so you write it to make Buffy weak, and Xander strong.
Again, I repeat: This show is called Buffy The Vampire Slayer, NOT Xander The Vampire Slayer. There is no way that Xander can really be Buffy's equal unless he had or has the same powers, which he doesn't. You're dealing with a die that was cast 20 years ago by the creators, who wanted the inverse of the strong male hero that protects everybody from harm. Only now, you want to reverse it.Compared to how most male writers make women usually look, what's the big deal? I call this tit for tat on Joss and Marti's part. Also considering how comic book creators kill off women characters and violate their bodies in a nasty manner, I'd say the same thing again.
The show would still have been XtVS, since Xander would have overshadowed Buffy, Willow, and Tara. This is a show about strong young heroic women & the men that support them, not about a strong women who has to have a man back her up-remember, it's the inverse of the standard damsel in distress show/movie we've all seen in our lives (Kim Possible is one of these shows also.) It's really also all about overturning white male privilege, in a way; that's why the final episode of Buffy had the Slayer power be born into every young girl on the planet, instead of just a chosen few. If you're feeling bad about this, I suggest you check out some feminist blogs/websites-you might begin to understand why the writers of these shows wrote the way they did, and why it pissed you off so.
I don't think the intent of Joe's rewrite to was replace Buffy with Xander as the strong lead character. Xander isn't meant to be Buffy's equal in this just her romantic interest something that I personally had wanted to happen during the course of the series proper and which never happened for whatever reason...I chalk it up to Joss not liking happy endings and enjoying taking his audience in different directions but that is just my take on why they never hooked up. Xander in the series proper learned to deal with the fact that Buffy didn't love him in a romantic sense. In Season Eight of the comics just two issues ago there was a very poignant scene where Buffy and Xander have a heart to heart and she blurts out that she loves him but Xander replies that she doesn't love him that way and it's just confused misplaced feelings because Xander is in a relationship with Dawn.
Xander is probably my favorite character in the entire series...I love the way Joss wrote him and how he ended up. It sets up his position in the season eight comics, he doesn't dwarf Buffy but supports her as you stated in your post just now Dusty. Killing Xander would have negated all of that IMO. I'm also not arguing that Tara isn't an important character for Willow's arc because she is. Very important. I don't really understand though how you say that Tara being the one who pulls Willow back from the Dark Side is more poignant than Xander because Tara's death is what sets Willow off on that path in the first place. I guess you are confusing me.
Xander is probably my favorite character in the entire series...I love the way Joss wrote him and how he ended up. It sets up his position in the season eight comics, he doesn't dwarf Buffy but supports her as you stated in your post just now Dusty. Killing Xander would have negated all of that IMO. I'm also not arguing that Tara isn't an important character for Willow's arc because she is. Very important. I don't really understand though how you say that Tara being the one who pulls Willow back from the Dark Side is more poignant than Xander because Tara's death is what sets Willow off on that path in the first place. I guess you are confusing me.
3D Master
Rear Admiral
For you, and guys like you. This whole thing is all because you can't stand the way that men are treated on the show, so you write it to make Buffy weak, and Xander strong.
And once again, you don't get it. Once again, I repeat, this his got nothing to do with making it into Xander the Vampire Slayer, it's got do with writing a good story, and good characters. Turning every male around Buffy into spineless, weak, wimpy non-entity that only exists to try and make Buffy look good and strong, doesn't make Buffy look strong or good at all. In fact, it exact OPPOSITE. It makes Buffy look just as weak wimpy as the guys do, only slightly less so.
If on top of that you write Buffy like a weak-willed, whimpering sap who measures her life through what boyfriend she's hooked to now; it doubly drives the point home: Buffy is weak and pathetic, and if it weren't for cosmic chance giving her super powers, she wouldn't be doing anything even if her friends lives depended on it.
You see, you fail to understand, that this isn't about making guy's look strong at all, it's about making a good show, which means a strong title character, aka Buffy Summers. And to make her shine, you need to make her supporting characters shine. (Making every male wimpy and bad also doesn't make your show feminist, it just makes it misandrist.) The bullshit of the late 90s that often lasts till today (but thankfully Veronica Mars broke at least a little) to attempt to make women look strong by making the men look weak and pathetic, fails miserably. Both Buffy and Xena, look pathetic, but at least Xena isn't written like a vapid idiot who doesn't know how to function without having a (vampire) boyfriend on her arm.
Seriously, both Buffy and Xena look like if someone even marginally competent and strong comes along, be they male or female, they'd get their asses kicked easily. Hell, at one point, Wesley, Gunn, Angel, and Cordelia stood across from 200+ vampires, and Wesley's answer to the predicament was, "Kill them all." And then they proceeded to do exactly that, that's being outnumbered 50 to 1. In the same year, Buffy got her own stake rammed in her gut, almost dying, by a flunky vampire. Put the weakest of the Angel team, Cordelia, against Buffy, then tie Cordelia's hands behind her back, and Cordy will still kick Buffy's ass without breaking a sweat.
Veronica Mars on the other hand, was written as strong, smart, capable, not hung up on any boyfriend; she's also written as someone running from fights especially with guys if she doesn't have a significant weapon on her; and yet, she shone like a mighty beacon. And the males around her? From her "mere sidekick", to her father, and boyfriends, they were all written as fantastically strong characters themselves, with their own lives and not simpering idiots hanging off her every lip. And yet, Veronica, was shown to be the true star of that show, who they, not counting her father, followed her, and as a result, she looked fantastically powerful, strong and capable, outshining Buffy by about a billion times.
Give me the choice between following merely human having to run from guys Veronica Mars, or Buffy Summers superhuman vampire slayer in an apocalyptic battle, and I'm placing my ass behind Veronica without any hesitation or doubt. Buffy, even without a better choice, I'm not inclined to follow her.
That only makes Joss and Marti look like two misandrists, two people that hate men, consider them wrong and evil. It doesn't make for good stories, and doesn't make Buffy look strong and competent, it makes her look pathetic and weak. That makes it not "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", it makes it... well... something, or maybe even nothing. "Willow the Witch", maybe.
Ah, I see. So you believe that Buffy was written as such a wining, pathetic, weak-willed, incompetent moron, that if only one man shows his mere normal human competence he'd immediately overshadow even super-powered Buffy. You see, that's not a problem with a competent Xander, that's a problem with a badly written Buffy who is supposed to look strong but is written as anything but. This problem would be solved, with writing Buffy as strong, competent, and capable, and be the one even competent, strong Xander look to as the leader of their group.
Or in other words, according to you, Buffy S1 and S2 is Angel and Xander the Vampire Slayers, S3 is Angel the Vampire Slayer, S4 / S5 is Riley the Vampire Slayer, and S5 and onward is Spike the Vampire Slayer.
Nice.
Interesting you mentioned Kim Possible. You seen its last episode? Ron goes Super Saiyan (gains control of his monkey fu powers with the help of spiritual projection of the monkey ninja clan leader) and kicks the Aliens asses, completely outshining the best Kim would be able to do by about a 1,000 times. Interesting to note, that it is said, Ron could have done this all along, he simply didn't have the proper focus, mindset, and self-confidence to do so. Indeed, an earlier episode where Ron and Kim switch bodies, shows Kim perfectly able to do all her normal things in Ron's body, showing physically Ron is able to be every bit as agile, fast, and strong as Kim is; he just always lacked the right mindset.
It made Kim Possible look not so good at all, she never really looked stronger and better than Ron, just more self-confident. Indeed, I was kind of always waiting for that final episode, for every time that Kim actually needed help or even rescuing, when Ron no longer had the luxury of self-doubt, when his adrenaline flowed to save his (girl)friend, he suddenly always comes through.
Result being; the fact Kim never noticed this, and never helped him over his self-confidence problem and gained a full equal partner, made her look rather pathetic, not so bright, and perhaps even vain.
No, it's STILL in a few chosen few. The final episode had the power only in the potential Slayers, not all the girls. Of course, you must also remember that earlier in the season the creation of a Slayer was likened to rape, most of the 1000+ potentials were not asked to be turned into Slayers, Buffy and co. by the earlier metaphor performed an act of mass rape, especially considering the Slayers are actually demons; a nasty black inky blob with phallic tentacles. At the same time Buffy acts like an idiot, and regains her confidence from lying in the arms of her attempted rapist.
(You wanna improve Buffy, scrap S7, just scrapping that is enough to improve it by about a 1,000 times.)
You see, I understand perfectly why they did it, which you seem to be unwilling to grasp. And I will tell you know why, and there are two possibilities:
1. They're misandrist, and love to put their misandrist fantasies on the screen. (Granted, it's a little extreme, but with some comments and writings of these writers, there's a case to be made for it.)
2. They're bad writers. These writers were so bad at writing a good, competent, strong female character, that they could only do so convincingly (but only to some) by making every male around them, look like idiots, buffoons, spineless, and otherwise incompetent. Of course, this doesn't actually make the female characters look strong at all, just slightly less pathetic.
However, you want to see a good writer tackle a strong female main character, look no further than the already mentioned Veronica Mars. And none of the males there were written as idiots and incompetents, and genuinely wrote a strong female character. As a result Veronica outshines Kim, Xena, and Buffy by a billion times.
S
Stone_Cold_Sisko
Guest
One second thought, going to my first paragraph, I think in retrospect, I would seed the whole Angelus/Darla/Spike/Drucila gang mythology much earlier in the season, starting from "Angel" to Spike's episodes in S2, so it's not quite so abrupt. It's kind of a shame that we never got all four of them together again in either show, we only had 3 out of the 4.
Xander's whole point was that he was support--excellent support, but still support. He could have gotten Riley's chip or become a male Slayer, and he would still be support. My only objection came when they made him less stable support, but that kind of happened to everyone.
Also, as to Xander not being the one to pull Willow back? Tara's love was deep and wide and strong, yet it was also new and in many cases untested. As Xander said in his World Of Cardboard speech, he'd seen Will every way she could ever be. Tara's love, while cosmic and heartfelt, still might not have been strong enough to join Willow on that mountaintop. In her lack of confidence, Tara might well have not been able to face what Willow became. Also, let's keep in mind that Xander's steadfastness and speech would have meant shit w/o Giles enervation spell when she absorbed his magic. Given five to ten years together, Tara would have gone to face Dark Willow no questions asked. I am not at all certain she could do that at only two years, in fact we know the addict Willow was enough to drive her off.
If I had an actual S3 suggestion, it would be drawing out the angst and pain of Buffy's return, rather than forcing it all into the ugly scenes of 'Dead Man's Party'. Joyce dodging her partial responsibility (her ultimatum to Buffy helped trigger the running away) was a low point of the entire series.
Also, as to Xander not being the one to pull Willow back? Tara's love was deep and wide and strong, yet it was also new and in many cases untested. As Xander said in his World Of Cardboard speech, he'd seen Will every way she could ever be. Tara's love, while cosmic and heartfelt, still might not have been strong enough to join Willow on that mountaintop. In her lack of confidence, Tara might well have not been able to face what Willow became. Also, let's keep in mind that Xander's steadfastness and speech would have meant shit w/o Giles enervation spell when she absorbed his magic. Given five to ten years together, Tara would have gone to face Dark Willow no questions asked. I am not at all certain she could do that at only two years, in fact we know the addict Willow was enough to drive her off.
If I had an actual S3 suggestion, it would be drawing out the angst and pain of Buffy's return, rather than forcing it all into the ugly scenes of 'Dead Man's Party'. Joyce dodging her partial responsibility (her ultimatum to Buffy helped trigger the running away) was a low point of the entire series.