BUFFY Fans: What happened to Andrew in Season 7?

[ReadyAndWilling]

hey all, so i went out for my daily run this morning and i started to think about the character of Andrew; specifically his role in S7.

he seemed to just 'be there' and not really do much at all, other than be an annoyance to the scooby gang. i remember watching the show during its run on television and kept thinking they were saving his character up to play a huge role in the finale. of course, it never came. i had the idea that Andrew would show up and somehow, make use of his demonic summoner abilities. i imagined he'd come into the finale and tip the scales of battle in their favor by summoning a group of super strong demons that were bound to obey his will. maybe not be a group of warrior demons, but maybe a group of 'medic demons' that would help the group in their fight against the First.

it seemed like he as a character was just wasted and was there for no real reason. i don't know what joss and the crew were thinking here.

 

[Admiral_Young]

^ You hit it on the head in the first sentence of your paragraph

"he seemed to just 'be there' and not really do much at all, other than be an annoyance to the scooby gang"

Andrew was nothing more than comedic fodder and a plot device. He has an increased role in Buffy Season Eight as well as two episodes of Angel in season five.

 

[Mr Light]

A lot of people in Season Seven were just standing around with nothing to do but made comedic quips

 

[DS9Continuing]

A lot of people in Season Seven were just standing around with nothing to do but made comedic quips

From "Get It Done" :

Buffy: What do you actually do? Seriously.

Anya: I... provide much needed sarcasm.

Xander: Actually, that's my job.

Which is kind of the dialogue itself admitting that you're right. Except that... it's totally not right.

What's actually going on in that exchange - to my mind at least - is Buffy browbeating them all until they submit. They actually contribute a great deal - Xander and Andrew keep the house running in various ways while the girls worry about fighting (a reversal of the stereotypical gender roles), and Anya provides much needed contacts in the demon underworld of Sunnydale.

Unfortunately Buffy had spent so much time convincing everyone that she was the only one who was any good at anything and could actually contribute anything, that they all couldn't see the good they did themselves.

Anyway as to Andrew - he was there as comic relief, yes, which was necessary in a season when everyone was so depressed by the coming conflict that they were all miserable mofo's. But he was also there to be redeemed after his actions of season 6 and "CWDP."

He served as an example of Buffy's most powerful weapon against evil - the ability to take evil people and turn them into allies in the fight against evil. Angel, Spike, Anya, Andrew... even Faith to an extent, all became better people though contact with Buffy.

As to his function in "Chosen," I think that there he served as an example that sometimes the good ones die and the merely adequate ones live through it. He was as suprised by that as any of us.

 

[C_Miller]

A lot of people in Season Seven were just standing around with nothing to do but made comedic quips

Like most of our leads. Man, the whole season could have been epic. I mean, they were dealing with the literal incarnation of evil that throughout history has been known as a deceiver and a manipulator and spent the season tearing our heroes down and apart. That easily could have been a season fit for the rest of the series as a summation of the work as a whole. But unfortunately, we were left with Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Slayage.

Edit: But to answer your question, you pretty much hit the nail on the head. He was comic relief in the same way that Xander, Anya, Spike, Dawn and the potentials were, except he had no moments of drama. In my opinion, he was relatively useless and took away from the other characters I had grown to enjoy over the course of the series. I probably would have been much happier if he were Jonathan. At least we knew him.

 

[saturn5]

I liked him in season 7, he was the outsider, the comic foil and a gift for subtexters. With the scoobs all so able nowadays we needed the new guy much in the same way that Dawn takes over Willow's bashful virgin schtick. Also it's nice to have a character to be redeemed when everyone else already has