The problem is people don't just turn gay.
Beg to differ. I have a good friend who dated men until she was 37, then suddenly met the right woman. It was like a switch was thrown.
If she did indeed turn gay, and didn't just fall in love with a woman, I bet she wasn't drooling over men while she was with her girlfriend, hell, with her girlfriend right next to her, hell, saying how hot the guy is with her girlfriend right next to her.
How I would have written Buffy:
There would have been no "The Zeppo". During S2 Xander was research guy as well as able to fight, then there's him having leadership qualities as "Night Hawk". Buffy in contrast, did donut runs - which makes sense, especially nightly runs, vampires around and all. Therefor I would not break continuity by him suddenly being unable to do anything at all except serving as a meat shield and delivering donuts.
S4: Riley would have a severely diminished role, if he is even present at all. His story, would go to Xander, where it belongs. He kills a demon saving some Initiative soldiers, he's brought in, and Xander accepts. The Initiative becomes his new family, and will eventually have to choose between them and the Scooby gang. This equals: no cast bloat, and the theme of growing apart after highschool of the season, working so much better, being as it is now much more prevalant throughout the season, as well as tying into Big Bad storyline at the same time. Also; the whole choosing between two family things, and not knowing which is the better one, becomes much more visceral if it is with a character we actually know and love, as opposed to this dude that is Buffy's new hanger one that we know nothing about, and the dude not knowing much about Buffy and vice versa.
Spike would either remain a reluctant helper because he likes killing things; or he would get dusted when he crosses the line one too many times.
S6: Remember how Xander not once in the five years before that displayed any hint he was a Scifi geek? In fact, he was characterized as something quite different, like pretty much the opposite? Well, they just turned Xander into a geek to diminish the fact that Troika pretty much trampled all over the viewers of Buffy. Yep, geeks, who not only turn evil, but are completely pathetically incompetent evil to boot. That's ffing your audience up the ass on a level few have equaled. In my S6, the Troika would use their powers smartly - they would be extremely competent and intelligent. You know, the way they should have done, given their accomplishments. Also, they would essentially be Doctor Doom. When they finally are taken down, you gotta be wondering - if they had succeeded, would the world have been a better place?
S7: None of the giant ass plotholes you can drive a semi through - the First's plan for one thing, will stat the First's plan from beginning to end. It doesn't just seem to switch sides over and over. And oh, yeah, IF I were going to use the "share the power thing", I wouldn't equate turning a girl into a Slayer with raping her only a few episodes before, making the "sharing the power" an act of mass-rape.
Oh, yeah: one more bit of character-continuity preserved; check out Hank's loving concern over Buffy in the S2 opener vs. the guy that wouldn't even show up for his ex-wife's, mother to his children funeral - including leaving an underage Dawn in who knows who's care. Hank would show up from time to time, S2 opener's Hank, that is. But this is one more bad, idiotic Joss writing: MUST WRITE DARK FEMINISM! A father that cares especially if the mother already does? NOOOO!
She's always been one of my favorite characters on the show. On the other hand, I really liked her episodes on Angel, so maybe it's better that it turned out the way it did.
It's funny that someone should call the whole Dark Willow thing an X-Men Dark Phoenix rip-off. When I was watching "X-Men: The Last Stand" with a friend of mine at the movies, he said to me at the end, "This is just a rip-off of the end of Buffy season 6". 
