I'm not a huge Dawn lover. But it's kind of hilarious how she's dismissed as a brat who's always complaining despite not having any real problems. Her mom is dead, she doesn't have a relationship with her father, she's fully aware that she only exists because of the whole key thing, she watched her sister die and then come back to life, and she watched one of her best friends die - who happened to be the girlfriend of her sister's best friend, because she doesn't seem to have any truly close relationships other than through her sister. The person she feels the safest around besides Buffy is Spike. On top of all of that, her sister has all the same problems, but also has supernatural powers that Dawn doesn't have, despite technically being a supernatural entity herself. And she's still in school! She doesn't have being the slayer to fall back on, and if she doesn't do well in school there's the constant threat of being taken away from the only family she has left. The girl has a lot on her plate and it's only ever "about her" when she acts out, so of course she's a brat. I'd be a lot worse!
A lot of us Buffy fans are very harsh on Dawn sometimes, and I decided to humour this in the video. I don’t hate Dawn per say, I have no problem with her character in S5 or S7 (minus Empty Places), or for the first half of S6. It’s just that last half of S6 where the show was going for a much darker tone, where her problems and drama (more akin to the earlier seasons of the show) really don’t fit in with said tone. The show had moved past teen drama, but her character seemed to act as a way of implementing it into a show about young adults finding their way in the world, and I just think they shit the bed with her writing-wise. They fix it in S7, and she eventually becomes a full-time Scoobie so there’s a happy ending to it all, I suppose.
death happens. billions of people's somebody is dead. welcome to life. its this. its living. you born you die and if you're lucky you get to do some good shopping in between........the writers failed dawn cause they gave her nothing to do but whine and be a nuance to the viewers and characters. could have had her powers be weakened and can teleport short distances by side stepping into an alt dimension. could have her become willow's apprentice ("willow's been teaching me some spells and stuff" real me, season 5), could have had buffy train her in martial arts. they could have done SOMETHING with her and chose to do nothing. even the attempt to give her a supporting cast of her own were one offs with characters we never see again. she lives a charmed life for someone living in sunnydale. sister is the slayer, got supernaturals to protect her, has a HUGE family in the scoobies. healthy, young, beautiful, skinny, a roof over her head, food in her mouth and clothes on her back. you things take life for granted. learn to count your blessings instead of your failures.
The thing I always found interesting about Tabula Rasa, was the fact that Randy Giles (Spike) wasn't a soulless monster. He didn't know his chip existed and he had no soul, so there should have been nothing at all stopping him from being as bad as they come. Yet he wasn't.
I don't think Tara leaving and Willow's magic "addiction" was out of order. I agree that Rack could've been introduced earlier, but if the temptation and addictive nature of the magic from the show was ACTUALLY equivalent to drugs (and I say this as a former heroin addict), it makes perfect sense that Willow would go off the deep end AFTER Tara leaves. The magic/drug analog could definitely be seen as problematic, but if we just go with it and assume that the darker the magic, the harder the equivalent drug, it really does make sense. Willow was clearly going down a path of "self-destruction" with her magic use, and I think that most people on that path (myself included), would ABSOLUTELY go on a "binge" after something traumatic happened, especially if they thought it was or actually was their fault. I actually don't think it's out of character at all. I've always identified with Willow, both before and after the magic "addiction" 🤷
Rewatching this video, and just wanted to say that (while the drug/magic analogy is super on the nose and not very elegant), Willow's descent into darkness really isn't that sudden. Like I said, if we take the magic/drug analogy at face value, there were pretty clear signs that things could go in this direction for Multiple seasons. Taking on Glory in season 5 was probably the turning point (didn't the book say "Darkest Magicks" or something?) And while that was in the name of love, it was actually for revenge. Willow has always been an incredibly unstable person (in my opinion... Like I said, I relate to her). There were subtle signs of her recklessness and magic abuse all throughout season 3, 4, and 5 (even in S2 when she insisted on re-ensouling Angel in the hospital, following the failure of their first attempt), it just wasn't necessarily framed negatively or as a "problem." She's smart, capable, RESILIENT, and just happens to be good at things, and believe me, that can easily give someone a false sense of security.... If we're going with the drug/magic analogy still..... It's like a "casual" drug user who might do a little bit of coke or molly when they go out and party, or take an oxy or benzo at the end of the night sometimes ... But then they eventually start doing something everytime they go out (uppers or downers), and then they need something to balance it when they're not going out, or to level themselves out throughout the night..... It sounds extreme, but it's really not, and I guarantee there are a TON of people who seem to "suddenly" be addicts, especially for super addictive drugs like some opioids (or apparently the "Darkest Magicks" in the Buffyverse lol). I mean, I myself went from being a "casual" or "party" drug user for years to a full blown opioid addict within the course of a month or less (though I had "casually" done lots of drugs, including opioids, for several years prior to my dependency and addiction). Willow started using more and more magic (and in turn, gradually more "dark magic") throughout the years, so if "dark magic" is like an opioid, and the magic Rack has is equivalent to fentanyl or something, then it actually makes perfect sense 🤷
I don’t know why Tara is so disliked? I love the character, and I’m not Gay so it’s not that kind of love. I loved the character of Tara, She starts out very meek and stuttering insecure by as her character progresses through the story wep get to see her Compassion for all of the gang. She is always willing to help others without Judgement her kindness to others that don’t deserve it from her The way she helps Buffy when Buffy thinks she came back wrong holding onto her while she crys in a comforting way, almost motherly but not Judging Buffy even when she finds out Buffy has been sleeping with Spike. Even Zander and Willow were appalled by the information. privately where Buffy can’t see the looks we get to see the reactions they have. All Tara says when it sinks in is cOh! Then goes on like it never came out her capacity for empathy is lovely as well. Yeah I loved the character of Tara I think she was true to herself even when the fact she has been the gang mfor awhile. I was not happy she gang for awhile. She was very kind. I was sorry she was killed off. I think she could have continued on adding her name personality to Angel or another show . The gang could have learned allot from her about how to treat each other.
Who dislikes Tara? I was a 90s kid. I have been alive for every era of fandom of this show. I do not remember anyone disliking Tara. Literally. Not ONE person. I can't think of anyone I have ever met or heard of who disliked her. I think you are just wrong about this.
I've heard of some people disliking her on message boards and stuff, but only because there is no character that pleases everyone. She is otherwise very beloved.
Me too mate, I'm just a heterosexual fella, but I really liked Tara throughout her time with the show. She was honest, endearing and helped out the other Scoobies. Why hate on her? I wish the show had kept her around and give her and Willow a happy ending. They made a great relationship and great chemistry with each other on screen.
I believe that she should have at least gotten a good scolding She rather than let her slide because of her age. which teaches her not to be responsible for her behavior. There are many more examples in the series that either the adults or Dawn are not allowed to be a responsible for their behaviors. She can’t be expected to see these things and not learn by example. Children learn what they live Dawn is very selfish. She amore hugs and time than she is getting. Along with the weight of the lies, and secrets she must carry. I confess I love the character Clem without the kitten eating.
People hate Xander? Why??? And, maybe unpopular opinion here, but i absolutely loved the way Normal Again ended. You of course know from the rest of the episodes that it was still part of the hallucination, but HELL YES did that mess with my head on the first watch! It was a "cuss you" to the viewer and i thought it was FANTASTIC. Like, "Oh you want a nice happy ending all wrapped up and she's back with her friends well CUSS YOU HAHHAHHAHAHHAHA!!!!!" The zoom out. Her parents absolutely devastated. Geez oh man! Even though i knew it was just mind games, i kept thinking about it for days, just WHAT IF??? WHAT IF?!?!??!
Actually at 20:35, Buffy isn't being optimistic here. She's going through the motions of "being optimistic" because she knows that's what usually happens during this point in a battle/investigation, but it's pretty clear throughout the episode that she does not actually share this optimism.
I understand saying that writing something is "out of character." As a writer myself, I become protective of my idea of what my characters would do. However, as an observer of human behavior, I can understand all of the trauma that makes for stupid choices.
Willows descent into addiction is 100% how fast it happens. We've had so much build up with her going too far, and being too eager, even when she first started. So with all of the emotional stress she was under, all a person needs is the release and the permission to let go and a full out of character slide into degeneracy is going to happen. Especially with an addictive personality, as a reformed alcoholic and drug user, I did things I never thought I would and the build up was slow, but once that spark was lit it was a fast an very noticeable change. So for me I can relate to her struggle and it was exactly how I experienced the world of addiction.
You said there was no way Spike made it to Africa so fast. I think he was in Haiti. Haiti is an island off the coast of Florida and it's basically the capitol city of Vudu, so it make sense that there'd be some special magic there.
@@rhythmchyc3089 I don't think so. He is on a beach, surrounded by black people, and he finds at least one person who knows some sort of Vudu-esque black magic. That could easily be Haiti. Haiti's population are descended from African slaves, so they are black, so it might appear to be Africa, but Haiti is off the coast of the United States, it's not hard to get there from California. There are several islands like that off the coast of the United states inhabitted by the descendants of African slaves, Jamaica for example. I think the audience is meant to assume Spike is somewhere in that area.
@@William-the-Guy I see your reasoning but I’m still surprised this wasn’t clarified in the show or even on a wiki page? The set design is not Caribbean, though. No country in this part of the world has this set up. Also, the language is not Creole. I don’t know what the language it is, unfortunately. It could’ve even been made up.
For me season 6 was one of the best seasons of the show. The big bad of this show is neither the trio nor Dark Willow, but depression and addiction. Therefore I I never had problems with the analogy of magic = drugs or Buffys "relation" with Spike. And I also think the rape scene with Spike was neccassary to remind the audiens that Spike was still a monster. I nver had a problem - storywise - with killing off Tara to push Willow over the edge. Yes, some developments are rushed and I allways think it was ridiculous, that the Watchers Council didn't provide an allowance to the slayer after Buffy found back to the Council in season 5... Therefore I allways hated the storyline around her fastfood job. Yes Dawn is a pain, but I never saw it as bad writing, but as problems of a teenager learning, that she was created by monchs with fabricated memories, loosing her mother and her sister. She has big emotional problems which are not really adreassed by the people arround her. It was bad writing, that the scenes with Spike after the raping attempt indicated, that he want's his chip removed to get a payback. There was no indication what so ever that he wanted his soul back. Missleading is bad wirting...
I had the same feeling about Spike's journey, for all we know, to get his chip taken out, not to get his soul back. I read somewhere that this was deliberate, to mislead the viewers, but that Whedon had always intended that Spike really did go to get his soul back.
@@marinaeulalia Yeah, I get what they were going for with the misdirect, but it was pretty clunky, and I think even more than the writing itself that probably comes from the poor directing decision to not tell James the direction it was going so he could play it differently. Thinking about it logically, there's no reason Spike would have gone through all of that just to get the chip out: For starters, it already didn't work on Buffy anyway. And even if it was more of a general "the chip is starting to give me a kind of hint of a conscience that I don't want", which would explain why he could still want it out, the chip was a science thing, so why would he need to go all the way to Africa and endure the trials when he could easily have continued trying to find ways to force a doctor to remove it like he had already previously? There's just no way his first thought would have been to go through all of that just to have a simple chip magically removed. And I don't know all the rules of the lore around the trials, but just going based off of this with Spike and Angel in Angel season 2 with the trials for Darla, would someone even be *given* the chance at trials for something like removing the chip? In both cases we've seen, it seems like they tend to be centered around noble goals, not "I want to be able to go full evil again". So yeah, there are a ton of reasons it logically makes way more sense that it was always his intention to fight for his soul. But they play it so heavy on the sinister misdirect that when the reveal happens, it doesn't FEEL like those previous scenes could have been him wanting his soul back. And James is an incredible actor, so he easily could have tread that line of saying ambiguous things in a way where it's confusing for a bit but once the reveal happens you go "oooh, okay, that makes so much sense!", but the fact that they didn't tell him explains why it feels off; because he was probably directed to play it full sinister.
I'm currently watching season 6 of Buffy the vampire Slayer I really enjoyed this season it's about real choices in life rather it's addiction or marriage even habits we struggle on a normal daily basis best season I have to say😊
Another factor that makes Xander leaving Anya at the alter more understandable is that he's about 20 or 21 years old, which is easy to forget because Nicholas Brendon was about 30. It is very likely a 20-year-old could get swept up in emotion during an apocalypse and ask his girlfriend to marry him before he is actually ready, and then not know what to do when he realizes he is not actually ready until confronted with the actual wedding day. But it's jarring to watch a 30-year-old do that because we consider that to be a more mature and stable age for marriage. Of course in reality, trauma can negatively impact your relationships at any age, but to an audience I think that being not even college-graduate age does make Xander even more sympathetic here--not only does he have unaddressed trauma that a demon is exploiting to heighten his fears, but his brain is not even fully developed. It's just that it's easy to forget that Xander is still so young without the benefit of lockers or a dorm room in the background.
Exactly. It's hard for us to see these characters as " kids" because they were put in adult situations for the longest time that it's hard to remember that they are barely out of their teens by S6&S7.
Tara was awesome! Although, I do not agree with the analysis of Spike in the Normal Again episode. He did not just come in her room to threaten her to come back to him. What happened was he came to check on her as Willow asked and then when he proceeded to ask her if she was alright..she responded to say you are not apart of my life...basically f*** off. Whether he should have been understanding that she was going nuts as she didn't know what was reality or not...to be fair to him...that is kind of the message she was sending to him always, and yeah he was hurt by it. So in retaliation Spike proceeded to give his own analysis of what Buffy was going through. That she was not attracted to the dark as he once thought...she was addicted to the misery. Meaning you won't go tell your friends about a relationship you hate to be in, you should tell them cause that would tech free up your anxiety since you desperately wanted to hide it...either they would help her get through it or they would abandon her which then he says...then come with me in the darkness I will be there for you....either way you need to snap the hell out of it cause you are not all godlike like you think...it is okay to make choices that might not be accepted by others blah blah blah. Something to that affect, but no he did not just show up in her room to demand she tell them about their relationship.
1:16:13 Willow could have wished, to Anya, (who I will remind you all from the episode “The Wish” can LITERALLY CREATE A WHOLE NEW DIFFERENT WORLD) that Warren died of a heart attack or something before firing the gun, or, hell, was never born, which would have gotten revenge on him and brought Tara back to life in one fell swoop. There’s a throwaway line she could have wished for vengeance, no she wanted to do it herself. But think outside the Magic Box, Willow!
I like this season, but there are definitely problems. I always hated Reilly, sorry. And I've always liked Xander and totally get how connecting worries about the upcoming marriage with his own abusive childhood could lead him to freak out and leave Anya, as fucked up as it was. And i feel like i should stand up for dawn a little. She's a teenager who's lost her mom and her sister,, and then got the sister back who wouldn't spend any time with her. Basically, she has lots of reasons to be whiny and annoying, just let her be with that. The shoplifting, however, is a little more of a thing. And i completely agree that both dark willow and Giles legendary entrance are fucking amazing.
I really don't understand why some people try to go as far as possible to make excuses for what grown-ups do , but automatically get annoyed whenever a teenage girl "who was created some year ago by monks" opens her mouth. That is the part annoying me most.
You raise a good point there. My main focus in doing Episodic Analysis is what it says on the tin, and that's "Analyse". I try my best to justify every character's controversial decision, and because I tend to talk for so long about things, it's very easy to contradict yourself unintentionally. I found it very hard to justify Dawn's actions in comparison to the shit everyone else was going through during S6. I have almost no problem with her character during S5 and S7, only this one. I know that teenagers make things about themselves, and that that is the essence of Dawn's character, but it doesn't mean that I can't dislike her or things she says and does. The reason for her character existing does not justify her actions.
i've been reading the vampire slayer recently, which is one of the latest comic series. in it, willow and giles perform a spell to remove buffy's trauma, as it has been greatly impacting her and her work as the slayer. it backfires, and willow ends up gaining all of buffy's trauma and slayer powers, whilst buffy loses memory of ever being the slayer. it introduces the theory that the slayer is able to be the slayer because of deep magicks which protect them from the impact of their suffering. these magicks corrupt willow, pushing her to become dark willow. after facing off with hungurus, the slayer eater, willow is pushed over the edge, and makes the same decision that she does in series 6. she wants to completely end reality to stop the suffering of her friends, and sees it as the only way that she can help them. i think it's interesting how it seems like no matter the context, willow is susceptible to turning to dark magick and will make the same decision over and over again. it's also interesting to contrast her decision with cordelia's decision in angel. when cordelia experiences everyone's pain, it just makes her want to help people
Not sure if this has been mentioned, but originally Dawn's character was written to be much younger. When they hired the actor, they did not change the scripts and so Dawn's behavior seems not as mature as it should be. I think it works given her "creation" and it gets slowly adjusted. Also, I can still remember being an asshole teen not realizing what a jerk I had been 🙄
DeKnight was already moving to Angel when Seeing Red was wrote (though it was not public knowledge). He received a double promotion to Co-Producer for the move and was regarded as good enough to replace Tim Minear at Angel. When spoilers of Tara's death leaked the writers tried to quash them, DeKnight went as far as to say that he'd quit if Tara died (knowing he was already leaving). Obviously Tara's death was not DeKnight's idea, it was part of the overall Dark Willow plot; and possibly was intended originally for Season 5 (substituted for Glory only brain-wiping Tara). Marti Noxon has gone on record as saying the Spike AR of Buffy was her idea. The writers were well aware that the fanbase felt they knew the writers and had a tendency to credit or blame the credited writer for episode content, and as DeKnight was leaving he was essentially picked to write the less savory plot points. The problem with the attempted rape is that its an attempted rape. The funny serial killing vampire is acceptable because serial killing vampires don't exist and we can enjoy the snark and ultimately they don't actually kill anyone we know or care about. There is no such thing as a funny rapist, even one based in fantasy. The issue is though is that the fanbase did like Spike, and the show built up to the attempted rape and made it 'understandable', Buffy is far stronger that Spike its not quite the same thing as real life male violence (anymore than Angel punching Buffy after she hit him first), and that I felt led to fans justifying what happened. I find it difficult to accept that it was a great message to air. I get that they needed some big event to cause Spike to seek out his soul, I get that Spike without a soul was supposed to be Evil. But I think in retrospect they could have easily have had the big event being Spike and Anya in Entropy or even just Buffy ending it.
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And Xander having the audacity to tell Dawn about what happened with Spike and Buffy should have been mentioned. That was never his place to tell. I have never liked Xander.
Xander always seemed to get a pass. In S7 when Buffy confronted him about saying that Willow told her To kick Angels ass when it was clearly a lie nobody ever took him to task over it, same with him casting the spell in once more with feeling. Nobody took him to task over it he got a pass.
Wonderful analysis! Yeah, I really didn't have a problem with Dawn in season 5 and liked her quite a lot in early s6, but by the later episodes her constantly making things about her definitely started to get grating. I don't HATE her the way a lot of people seem to, and I'm actually really liking her growth in the first few episodes of s7 so far (still watching the rest!), but she was getting on my nerves there for a while - which, to be fair, is perfectly normal teenage behavior haha. Re the infamous Seeing Red bathroom scene: Agreed that from a Spike character perspective, it was *very* powerful and a necessary tipping point for his character. I never saw it as a "reminder that he's still pure evil" kind of deal though; almost to the contrary, to me it was a stark reminder of just what it meant that he was still flying soulless, even if he HAD reached a really impressive degree of humanity. That's what makes it so horrifying to me; Spike, especially by this point, was no Angelus. He did not do what he did because he took joy in hurting Buffy; on the contrary, his feelings of love for her had not changed at all. What he didn't have without a soul was the ability to truly understand how what he was doing was such a massive, traumatic breach of her trust. Their relationship had become so toxic and complicated, and he fundamentally didn't have the ability to grasp how their mix of violence and sex before, which he had confused for passionate love, was not the same as him forcing himself on her and her begging him to stop. And the fact that he didn't have that ability, importantly, MATTERED to him. Once she snapped him out of it and he took in how traumatized she was, the fact that he couldn't understand why this time was different was what made him realize the compensation he was doing for not having a soul would never be enough. So yes, it was a reminder to the audience AND to Spike why having a soul matters so much, but I don't think that distinction would have ever mattered to him if he was still pure evil. The very fact that he realized where the deficiency was, and cared enough to seek out the solution, was a unique amount of humanity for someone soulless, not pure evil at all. It was just a horrible, painful thing to have to have happen for him to get there. And I do wish they had come up with an equally logical thing for him to do to have him reach that point for his character progression that wouldn't come at the expense of a whole new load of trauma for Buffy after everything she'd already been through. Re Xander: Oh, Xander... my feelings about him are so complicated haha. It kind of surprises me though that people seem SO especially hard on him about the Hells Bells situation, because that was honestly probably the moment where I felt like I understood him best, and really sympathized with him. Should he have done that kind of introspection sooner and called off the wedding before it was literally happening? Of course. But it does make sense why the specific circumstances that went down would be a huge catalyst for him realizing the degree to which he wasn't ready to be married, and the groundwork laid over the seasons about his home life make it very easy to understand why he would have such a hard time trusting that marriage could be a good thing; maybe more importantly, that HE could be a good husband. My sympathy for him started wearing thin thought in Entropy, when he was so entirely out of line shaming Anya and straight up trying to kill Spike, when neither of them had done anything tf wrong!! Understandable reasons or not, HE was the one who walked away on their wedding day, and Anya wasn't even remotely obligated to agree to continue dating after that, nor did she ever do so. So her choosing to take solace in Spike was none of Xander's business. His lifelong best friendship with Willow has always been my favorite thing about him though, and the yellow crayon speech gets me every time
Killing Spike - which would’ve been bad even if he wasn’t defenseless - was straight up abuser behavior, which indicated that Xander thought Anya was his property. Xander had lots of toxic issues with women, as evidenced in his jealousy toward Angel/Spike.
Really mean about Dawn honestly. I mean tbf she's a fictional character, but most real life teenagers are a lot more like Dawn than like Buffy (when buffy was still a teen i mean) and most of them can't decide if they want to be treated like kids or grown ups, and nearly all have their moments of being bratty or taking things out on their loved ones. Okay you don't have to like it, but to me it's very realistic in that regard 😂
Poor Dawn. She was ok. I don't get *all* the hate. Just some of it. Poor Reilly! Great breakdown of the season. I agree with you regarding the underrated, all-too-brief Buffy & Tara friendship.
Easily for me the worst season of Buffy. Like you I actually liked all the set up of the first half of the season and was looking forward to how they were going to pay it off. Suffice as to say I was underwhelmed. I thought the Spike/Buffy sexcapades went on for too long. The Xander/Anya story really didn't go anywhere and actually would have made more sense to me if they had married and Dawn was just annoying. But for me the biggest flaw is Willow's storyline. I agree that the magic as drugs analogy is handled exceptionally poorly. I can only think that they wanted Willow to go "bad" but not "too bad" as to alienate her. I say if you are going to go with the magic as drugs analogy, which I thought was problematic, then go for it. Have Willow completely loose her moral grip. They could have had a back season with Willow, Amy and Rack becoming their very own Trio of sorts. You could have the notion of Amy representing the devil on Willow's shoulder and Tara the angel, fighting for her soul so to speak. But I disagree with you slightly on Tara's death. I do agree it was a terrible decision but one of the reasons I despise it is that there was more to say with that character. We barely got a chance to really get to know her beyond being Willow's girlfriend. Moreover, I also found Joss' decision to add AMber to the credits was less about thanking her and more about duping the audience into thinking things were going to be better. Joss can't help being an emotional sadist.
The issue with the bathroom scene in Seeing Red is that Spike isn't pure evil. He's done selfless things despite having no soul, Tara says herself that Spike has done good. The writers didn't seem to know what they were doing with him tbh. They can't suddenly be like "hey, remember Spike is pure evil!" when theyfe given us evidence to the contrary.
@@whenthepawn99 It’s a valid point you’ve made. The only issue is that a lot of Spike’s good actions are a result of his obsession with Buffy, and his want to impress her rather than doing them simply because they’re good. The writers had to give Spike motivation to change himself and make it so his good actions are done because he knows they’re right, and not just to make it seem like he’s a good person.
@@episodicanalysis I understand that but I'm thinking specifically of the scene where he let's himself get tortured by Glory and, when speaking to who he thinks is the Buffybot, says something along the lines of he protected Dawn because he didn't want Buffy to suffer that loss. And then after Buffy died he still cared for Dawn. He didn't know Buffy would ever come back. He did that with no soul.
@@whenthepawn99 Ah right, I understand where you’re coming from there. My interpretation of that is although there is some good within Spike, like you say, at the end of the day he’s still soulless. For every good thing he does, there’s a bad thing. But the point is that you’re supposed to like him as a character, and that’s why the shower scene is so shocking for viewers. It was a very big risk for them to do, and controversial for sure. I personally think the scene was a bold idea, although executed excellently by SMG and Marsters. If the writers’ aim was to convince me Spike was a soulless character, they succeeded, and it makes his redemption by the end of S7 all the more great.
@@episodicanalysis OK so that's where we diverge I suppose. For one, it doesn't make sense that there's any good in Spike, following the shows logic. This is why I say that the writers messed up his characterisation. In my opinion anyway. Angel had no good in him whatsoever when he was soulless. And secondly, the scene in Seeing Red was a step too far for me personally. The Buffybot pushed it but that scene was the end of Spuffy for me. For the writers to walk it back and have her forgive him made me upset. I think, in the larger scheme, that's a bad message to send to young girls. That a man can assault you and still be a good guy who you just need to believe in. He did good things when soulless and he also tried to rape her while soulless. That's the reality of the shown, as written. Personally, I don't think they should have written that scene but they did and (again, personally) they didn't handle well at all. Xander and Dawn treated it with the gravity necessary but the show undercut it by having Buffy fotgive him. Watching it, it definitely feels like the writers are trying to say "look he's EVIL! DID YOU FORGET??" And its like, well yeah a lot of us did forget because you wrote him to be good kind of a lot 😂 I understand whatever side people fall on because the writers messed him up! If someone thinks he's irredeemable, I get it. If someone thinks he truly loved Buffy, I agree. Etc. Because the writers could never seem to decide themselves.
@@whenthepawn99 I think you’re right when you say that’s where we diverge. We can discuss what the writer’s intentions were for eternity without really knowing. At what point do we stop viewing every scene or line of dialogue intended as a message to a specific demographic, or what point we view it as what it simply is, and that’s art. At the end of the day, art is subjective, vampires and demons don’t really exist and whatever stories are told using made-up entities have to be taken with a pinch of salt anyway. But that’s part of the reason why I made these videos; and why I enjoy having discussions like this one about the show. There are so many different ways to interpret each character and storyline, and each person’s experience is different as a result, and that fascinates me.
My favorite season with season 3. All the characters are well developed and reach their climax in the show. The villains were great and the season is audacious, creative and surprising.
it so didnt start the musical episode trope. 227 (an 80s black show) did it loooooooooong before buffy. xena did it before buffy. moonlighting. i love lucy............
As for Dawn, she is exactly how a teenager acts. They never like to be called a kid, but as soon as something bad happens or they are out of their depth the first thing that comes out of their mouths is "Hey, I'm just a kid." So she is not the most annoying character of the show for doing this by any means.
This is the problem with a character that gets some what popular that any plans that were in place for the character's arc is deemed as wrong just because of the popularity of their coupling with another character. If Seth Green had stay on the show, this was apparently going to be his character's exit from the show so it would seem that Tara was given his arc as this was the plan for Willow's arc in the show. As for seeing red, THAT scene made perfect sense for that 'relationship'.
what are you referring to when you say that "once more with feeling" is the last of "the big 3"? what are the "big 3"? just asking for clarification please.
The big three are the three most critically acclaimed episodes of the show. The first is “Hush” from S4, the second is “The Body” from S5, and the last is “Once More, with Feeling” in S6. I talked about it in my previous videos, sorry for the confusion.
I still don’t like Xander lol. While I don’t believe he deserves the amount of hate he gets he always annoyed me. He pushed everyone around him to take responsibility for their wrong doings and never fully took responsibility for his shortcomings himself. At least that’s been my perception of him. I think that part of his character could have been resolved if they acknowledged the lie he told in the episode when Buffy killed Angel.
I LOVE Xander! His character development is aptly stated in the final season when he's talking to Dawn after she finds out she isn't a potential. Yes, neither of them have "powers" but his superpower is his heart, empathy and uncanny ability to see past people's bs and see the bigger picture (why Caleb poked out one of his eyes). Of the main three, I have to say he's my favorite. I'm not a big fan of Dawn's either. She comes off SO bratty I just want to smack her. Especially when she screams, "get out, get out, get out!" Although I do have to say, when she picked up the sword to fight with Buffy, Michelle does an excellent job with her expression. You can see the surprise and acceptance that Buffy sees her as capable.. until she ruins it with her whine about Buffy not wanting to be with her. And people don't like Tara? Wut? Her character is awesome1 I was so upset when she died!!
Disagree on the out of character for willow portion. Everytime I rewatch the show it makes more sence. It's a show they have to speed up process of addiction And on dawn it's both she isn't a kid and is. When you're that age you want to be whatever makes you feel better. I actually grow to like dawn more with every rewatch. You blame the people who you shouldn't because you can't always understand things at that age. I also COMPLETELY disagree ab seeing red. It's too far I'm sorry but if they ever wanted him to be redeemed it was too far. Don't get me wrong I love spike but I have to forget seeing red. There is bad things that aren't rpe there are ways to show he is evil w out that. And it feels like someone trying to justify it. I think peoples hatred of dawn gets so ridiculous. She's a teen she's gonna be annoying. PEOPLE DONT LIKE ANDREW?!?!??!?!?! it's so fun watching a show years after it was released because ny opinion is my own it's not formed by the fan base. It's formed by me. I love love the audience insert.
You kinda downpayed the fact that Buffy was abusive to Spike. I mean she literally had sex with him, then beat him up and shouted "You're a thing!" That happened. Everyone ignores the abuse she heaped on him for the entire year, because he finally snapped under the weight of all that abuse and does something unforgivable. But the abuse did still happen.
@@rhythmchyc3089 Absolutely. It always bugged me that I point that out to fans and they like never even thought of it. YES what Spike eventually did was worse, there is no question of that, but that does not somehow erase all the bad things Buffy did. I worry about people who can't see that. Makes me wonder what kind of judgements they make on people in real life.
@@William-the-Guy fandoms skew things all the time to fit their agendas. I ignore them. Also, I watched Buffy when it aired and wasn’t involved in any of the community bullshit in any of the forums. So my mind is set about what Buffy and Spike were during this period without any of the noise.
@@William-the-Guy She literally rapes *him* in Gone! But since that had cutesy music and he eventually gets into it, that gets a pass - even though he clearly has no idea who's touching him at first and when he knows, declines the sex and wants to talk about their relationship first, and she *ignores his boundaries*. Reverse the genders and now you have people up in arms. Very frustrating.
Buffy didn’t abuse Spike, he used and manipulated her the entire season, taking advantage of her vulnerable state. The “abuse” that she engaged in was reactive.
angel shouldn't charge either hes trying to make up because of what hes done and charging people undoes that. leave it to cordelia to think about money
Why shouldn't Angel and Buffy for that matter charge for helping people? Cops, soldiers, and firefighters get paid to help and keep the community safe. Hell even Watchers get paid for their work.
@@jamie7398 Wait a minute... Buffy got Giles back payed from when he was fired. Why the heck didn't buffy demand the council pay her a watchers salary as well? They would have agreed and then she would have been fine.
@@kyleellis1825 It annoys me every time I watch that episode when Buffy get Giles back pay from being fired, and she doesn't have the council give her any money. She was a slayer for 3 years when she quit at the end of season 3 and 15 when she started. Buffy deserved a pay check from the Watchers Council.
@@jamie7398 Exactly. Buffy was only poor this season because the writers wanted her to work dead end jobs and ruin her psyche. Buffy should have had this taken care of with one call to the council. "Hey... did a new slayer get called when I was dead? No? Cool, so I'm a bonus slayer, pay me or you're back down to one."
The writing for Giles in S6 and S7 was incredibly out of character. He’s been established as the most loyal to Buffy of any of the Scoobies, and “has a father’s love for the child.” I understand they had to write an excuse for him to be out, but feel like there could’ve been a bit more of an “urgent reason” he had to leave. Him also not being present at the (intended) wedding of Anya and Xander didn’t make sense or align with his character. And the way he acts in a couple episodes during the end of S7 is even more out of character.
"They were unable to continue funding the show due to how popular it had become". WTF?! "Sorry boss, this show is real good and everyone loves it. We have to drop it, right now!" "What about just using the popularity to increase advertising rates, getting us more money. Which is kinda why we're here. No?" "Yeah, no. Gotta cancel it. RIGHT NOW!" Capitalism has outlived its usefulness, and functionality.
I love Xander for all the reasons you listed. I've spent years trying to convince people that Xander is one of the best written characters of this show, but very few people agreed with me. lol
agreed. The level of hate Xander and Riley got was i sure coming from a place. Many in the fandom has misdirection towards men. For reasons i can't answer. how can i say this? the horrible things the women have done and said and all is forgiven. Willow murdering, Faith
I think most of the hate Xander/Riley get is because they are normal humans, the sins they commit are ones that a lot of female viewers have experienced. - Oz cheating on Willow can be excused as werewolf stuff. - It's really hard to put yourself in Buffy's shoes, because how many of us have an abusive partner kill a bunch of our friends and then try to end the world? - Willow magically date R*ping Tara for weeks is almost all offscreen/done to happy music. We see Hyena Xander hold down Buffy and the super strength is negated, so it seems like a normal assault.
@@TheTytoGaurdian From the threads I've been apart of, people more blame him for saying he doesn't remember what happened. But anyone blaming him for his actions while possessed are 100% in the wrong.
@kyle ellis I think it is kind of understandable that he pretends not to remember. The hyenas made him do some really bad/embarrassing stuff. I think I'd want to pretend not to remember, too, if only to prevent the topic coming up later among the group. I'm sure he never wanted to be reminded of that experience ever again. Leaving Anya at the alter.... ugh, that was so bad! Xander, whether he felt like it was the right thing to do or not, handled that situation very badly. He does deserve hate for that, but the character knows and acknowledges this, and I was willing to let him move on from it, eventually. I do think the hate towards Riley is warranted, though. I am sympathetic to his plight about not believing Buffy loved him as much as he loved her, but he never tried to talk to her about it. He just let it build until he spiraled, then told her he was leaving, and then left in a matter of hours. Ugh, I know it looks like I'm giving Xander a pass for being flawed and not Riley, but at least Xander tried to make things right. He tried to apologize. Did Riley? No, he just came back a short time later, happily married, asking Buffy for help. The nerve of him coming back and asking for help like that after how he left things? That's why I give Xander the pass and not Riley.
@@TheTytoGaurdian It's understandable. But it would have been far better for everyone if they just dealt with what happened. Honestly, Anya deserved FAR worse than just Xander leaving her at the altar. Anyanka tortured and killed for a thousand years (with a soul). But Anya never feels bad or even tries to make amends for anything. The only time she feels bad is when the dog gets eaten. Xander shouldn't be getting blamed for having a traumatic vision. IT was specifically a revenge plan against Anya because she ruined someone's life. Yeah Xander could have handled it better. But we saw during the musical epissode that both of them had things they were hiding. The relationship was doomed to failure and I really wish they would have realized that in S4 when Anya said he only cared about lots of orgasims.
I'm really sorry about that! A lot of people tell me that, and add on my accent, sometimes it's difficult for even 1st language English speakers to understand what I'm saying xD
Hey! TH-cam videos have playback speed options in the settings menu; maybe you can change the video to 0.75x or 0.50x speed to help you understand easier. Hope that helps 🙏
You speak so fast i can only understand every other sentence. The subtitles on thing also keeps tilting out cause it doesnt keep up with the narration.
You defending Xander vs Dawn and neglecting to mention her strong points as a character is bizarre. I don’t know why you could empathize with Xander’s stupidity as an adult but you have no respect for Dawn’s struggles as a teenager.
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I'm not a huge Dawn lover. But it's kind of hilarious how she's dismissed as a brat who's always complaining despite not having any real problems. Her mom is dead, she doesn't have a relationship with her father, she's fully aware that she only exists because of the whole key thing, she watched her sister die and then come back to life, and she watched one of her best friends die - who happened to be the girlfriend of her sister's best friend, because she doesn't seem to have any truly close relationships other than through her sister. The person she feels the safest around besides Buffy is Spike. On top of all of that, her sister has all the same problems, but also has supernatural powers that Dawn doesn't have, despite technically being a supernatural entity herself. And she's still in school! She doesn't have being the slayer to fall back on, and if she doesn't do well in school there's the constant threat of being taken away from the only family she has left. The girl has a lot on her plate and it's only ever "about her" when she acts out, so of course she's a brat. I'd be a lot worse!
A lot of us Buffy fans are very harsh on Dawn sometimes, and I decided to humour this in the video. I don’t hate Dawn per say, I have no problem with her character in S5 or S7 (minus Empty Places), or for the first half of S6.
It’s just that last half of S6 where the show was going for a much darker tone, where her problems and drama (more akin to the earlier seasons of the show) really don’t fit in with said tone. The show had moved past teen drama, but her character seemed to act as a way of implementing it into a show about young adults finding their way in the world, and I just think they shit the bed with her writing-wise. They fix it in S7, and she eventually becomes a full-time Scoobie so there’s a happy ending to it all, I suppose.
death happens. billions of people's somebody is dead. welcome to life. its this. its living. you born you die and if you're lucky you get to do some good shopping in between........the writers failed dawn cause they gave her nothing to do but whine and be a nuance to the viewers and characters. could have had her powers be weakened and can teleport short distances by side stepping into an alt dimension. could have her become willow's apprentice ("willow's been teaching me some spells and stuff" real me, season 5), could have had buffy train her in martial arts. they could have done SOMETHING with her and chose to do nothing. even the attempt to give her a supporting cast of her own were one offs with characters we never see again. she lives a charmed life for someone living in sunnydale. sister is the slayer, got supernaturals to protect her, has a HUGE family in the scoobies. healthy, young, beautiful, skinny, a roof over her head, food in her mouth and clothes on her back. you things take life for granted. learn to count your blessings instead of your failures.
@@serenityq26girl no, just no. Lol
@@serenityq26ain't nobody close to you has left this dimension yet has it?
@@serenityq26 that doesn't mean death doesn't affect people though???
The thing I always found interesting about Tabula Rasa, was the fact that Randy Giles (Spike) wasn't a soulless monster. He didn't know his chip existed and he had no soul, so there should have been nothing at all stopping him from being as bad as they come. Yet he wasn't.
I don't think Tara leaving and Willow's magic "addiction" was out of order. I agree that Rack could've been introduced earlier, but if the temptation and addictive nature of the magic from the show was ACTUALLY equivalent to drugs (and I say this as a former heroin addict), it makes perfect sense that Willow would go off the deep end AFTER Tara leaves. The magic/drug analog could definitely be seen as problematic, but if we just go with it and assume that the darker the magic, the harder the equivalent drug, it really does make sense. Willow was clearly going down a path of "self-destruction" with her magic use, and I think that most people on that path (myself included), would ABSOLUTELY go on a "binge" after something traumatic happened, especially if they thought it was or actually was their fault. I actually don't think it's out of character at all. I've always identified with Willow, both before and after the magic "addiction" 🤷
Rewatching this video, and just wanted to say that (while the drug/magic analogy is super on the nose and not very elegant), Willow's descent into darkness really isn't that sudden. Like I said, if we take the magic/drug analogy at face value, there were pretty clear signs that things could go in this direction for Multiple seasons. Taking on Glory in season 5 was probably the turning point (didn't the book say "Darkest Magicks" or something?) And while that was in the name of love, it was actually for revenge. Willow has always been an incredibly unstable person (in my opinion... Like I said, I relate to her). There were subtle signs of her recklessness and magic abuse all throughout season 3, 4, and 5 (even in S2 when she insisted on re-ensouling Angel in the hospital, following the failure of their first attempt), it just wasn't necessarily framed negatively or as a "problem." She's smart, capable, RESILIENT, and just happens to be good at things, and believe me, that can easily give someone a false sense of security.... If we're going with the drug/magic analogy still..... It's like a "casual" drug user who might do a little bit of coke or molly when they go out and party, or take an oxy or benzo at the end of the night sometimes ... But then they eventually start doing something everytime they go out (uppers or downers), and then they need something to balance it when they're not going out, or to level themselves out throughout the night..... It sounds extreme, but it's really not, and I guarantee there are a TON of people who seem to "suddenly" be addicts, especially for super addictive drugs like some opioids (or apparently the "Darkest Magicks" in the Buffyverse lol). I mean, I myself went from being a "casual" or "party" drug user for years to a full blown opioid addict within the course of a month or less (though I had "casually" done lots of drugs, including opioids, for several years prior to my dependency and addiction). Willow started using more and more magic (and in turn, gradually more "dark magic") throughout the years, so if "dark magic" is like an opioid, and the magic Rack has is equivalent to fentanyl or something, then it actually makes perfect sense 🤷
When dark willow kills Warren, she says "Bored now." Which was dark VAMPIRE Willow's catchphrase.
Dark Willow proves that any human can be pushed far as a result of anger and grief if they aren’t careful.
Exactly
I don’t know why Tara is so disliked? I love the character, and I’m not Gay so it’s not that kind of love. I loved the character of Tara, She starts out very meek and stuttering insecure by as her character progresses through the story wep get to see her Compassion for all of the gang. She is always willing to help others without Judgement her kindness to others that don’t deserve it from her The way she helps Buffy when Buffy thinks she came back wrong holding onto her while she crys in a comforting way, almost motherly but not Judging Buffy even when she finds out Buffy has been sleeping with Spike. Even Zander and
Willow were appalled by the information. privately where Buffy can’t see the looks we get to see the reactions they have. All Tara says when it sinks in is cOh! Then goes on like it never came out her capacity for empathy is lovely as well. Yeah I loved the character of Tara I think she was true to herself even when the fact she has been the gang mfor awhile. I was not happy she gang for awhile. She was very kind. I was sorry she was killed off. I think she could have continued on adding her name personality to Angel or another show . The gang could have learned allot from her about how to treat each other.
As far as I remember, Tara was a very beloved character back then.
She isn't disliked.. She's actually one of the fan favourites.
Who dislikes Tara? I was a 90s kid. I have been alive for every era of fandom of this show. I do not remember anyone disliking Tara. Literally. Not ONE person. I can't think of anyone I have ever met or heard of who disliked her. I think you are just wrong about this.
I've heard of some people disliking her on message boards and stuff, but only because there is no character that pleases everyone. She is otherwise very beloved.
Me too mate, I'm just a heterosexual fella, but I really liked Tara throughout her time with the show. She was honest, endearing and helped out the other Scoobies. Why hate on her? I wish the show had kept her around and give her and Willow a happy ending. They made a great relationship and great chemistry with each other on screen.
You seem to forget, Dawn is still a young teen, of course she gon take things personally
I believe that she should have at least gotten a good scolding She rather than let her slide because of her age. which teaches her not to be responsible for her behavior. There are many more examples in the series that either the adults or Dawn are not allowed to be a responsible for their behaviors. She can’t be expected to see these things and not learn by example. Children learn what they live Dawn is very selfish. She amore hugs and time than she is getting. Along with the weight of the lies, and secrets she must carry. I confess I love the character Clem without the kitten eating.
I liked Sam.
everyone does the difference is shes annoying
People hate Xander? Why???
And, maybe unpopular opinion here, but i absolutely loved the way Normal Again ended. You of course know from the rest of the episodes that it was still part of the hallucination, but HELL YES did that mess with my head on the first watch! It was a "cuss you" to the viewer and i thought it was FANTASTIC. Like, "Oh you want a nice happy ending all wrapped up and she's back with her friends well CUSS YOU HAHHAHHAHAHHAHA!!!!!" The zoom out. Her parents absolutely devastated. Geez oh man! Even though i knew it was just mind games, i kept thinking about it for days, just WHAT IF??? WHAT IF?!?!??!
he makes some misogynistic comments and the show validates him for it which tbf is quite annoying. thats not xanders fault though, its the writers.
Did you know Anthony Stewart Head made an album and Amber Benson is featured on one of the tracks
Actually at 20:35, Buffy isn't being optimistic here. She's going through the motions of "being optimistic" because she knows that's what usually happens during this point in a battle/investigation, but it's pretty clear throughout the episode that she does not actually share this optimism.
I understand saying that writing something is "out of character." As a writer myself, I become protective of my idea of what my characters would do. However, as an observer of human behavior, I can understand all of the trauma that makes for stupid choices.
Willows descent into addiction is 100% how fast it happens. We've had so much build up with her going too far, and being too eager, even when she first started. So with all of the emotional stress she was under, all a person needs is the release and the permission to let go and a full out of character slide into degeneracy is going to happen. Especially with an addictive personality, as a reformed alcoholic and drug user, I did things I never thought I would and the build up was slow, but once that spark was lit it was a fast an very noticeable change. So for me I can relate to her struggle and it was exactly how I experienced the world of addiction.
You said there was no way Spike made it to Africa so fast. I think he was in Haiti. Haiti is an island off the coast of Florida and it's basically the capitol city of Vudu, so it make sense that there'd be some special magic there.
Did no one ever confirm where Spike was at the end of the episode?
@@rhythmchyc3089 I don't think so. He is on a beach, surrounded by black people, and he finds at least one person who knows some sort of Vudu-esque black magic. That could easily be Haiti. Haiti's population are descended from African slaves, so they are black, so it might appear to be Africa, but Haiti is off the coast of the United States, it's not hard to get there from California.
There are several islands like that off the coast of the United states inhabitted by the descendants of African slaves, Jamaica for example. I think the audience is meant to assume Spike is somewhere in that area.
@@William-the-Guy I see your reasoning but I’m still surprised this wasn’t clarified in the show or even on a wiki page?
The set design is not Caribbean, though. No country in this part of the world has this set up. Also, the language is not Creole. I don’t know what the language it is, unfortunately. It could’ve even been made up.
For me season 6 was one of the best seasons of the show. The big bad of this show is neither the trio nor Dark Willow, but depression and addiction. Therefore I I never had problems with the analogy of magic = drugs or Buffys "relation" with Spike. And I also think the rape scene with Spike was neccassary to remind the audiens that Spike was still a monster. I nver had a problem - storywise - with killing off Tara to push Willow over the edge. Yes, some developments are rushed and I allways think it was ridiculous, that the Watchers Council didn't provide an allowance to the slayer after Buffy found back to the Council in season 5... Therefore I allways hated the storyline around her fastfood job.
Yes Dawn is a pain, but I never saw it as bad writing, but as problems of a teenager learning, that she was created by monchs with fabricated memories, loosing her mother and her sister. She has big emotional problems which are not really adreassed by the people arround her.
It was bad writing, that the scenes with Spike after the raping attempt indicated, that he want's his chip removed to get a payback. There was no indication what so ever that he wanted his soul back. Missleading is bad wirting...
I had the same feeling about Spike's journey, for all we know, to get his chip taken out, not to get his soul back. I read somewhere that this was deliberate, to mislead the viewers, but that Whedon had always intended that Spike really did go to get his soul back.
@@marinaeulalia Yeah, I get what they were going for with the misdirect, but it was pretty clunky, and I think even more than the writing itself that probably comes from the poor directing decision to not tell James the direction it was going so he could play it differently.
Thinking about it logically, there's no reason Spike would have gone through all of that just to get the chip out: For starters, it already didn't work on Buffy anyway. And even if it was more of a general "the chip is starting to give me a kind of hint of a conscience that I don't want", which would explain why he could still want it out, the chip was a science thing, so why would he need to go all the way to Africa and endure the trials when he could easily have continued trying to find ways to force a doctor to remove it like he had already previously? There's just no way his first thought would have been to go through all of that just to have a simple chip magically removed. And I don't know all the rules of the lore around the trials, but just going based off of this with Spike and Angel in Angel season 2 with the trials for Darla, would someone even be *given* the chance at trials for something like removing the chip? In both cases we've seen, it seems like they tend to be centered around noble goals, not "I want to be able to go full evil again".
So yeah, there are a ton of reasons it logically makes way more sense that it was always his intention to fight for his soul. But they play it so heavy on the sinister misdirect that when the reveal happens, it doesn't FEEL like those previous scenes could have been him wanting his soul back. And James is an incredible actor, so he easily could have tread that line of saying ambiguous things in a way where it's confusing for a bit but once the reveal happens you go "oooh, okay, that makes so much sense!", but the fact that they didn't tell him explains why it feels off; because he was probably directed to play it full sinister.
I'm currently watching season 6 of Buffy the vampire Slayer I really enjoyed this season it's about real choices in life rather it's addiction or marriage even habits we struggle on a normal daily basis best season I have to say😊
Michelle Branch's goodbye to you tho.... Hurts so good
I have a trauma response whenever I hear that song because all I can think of is Willow crying as Tara leaves. So....yep.
@@JhadeSagrav 🥺 my heart goes out to you 🫶🏾
Another factor that makes Xander leaving Anya at the alter more understandable is that he's about 20 or 21 years old, which is easy to forget because Nicholas Brendon was about 30. It is very likely a 20-year-old could get swept up in emotion during an apocalypse and ask his girlfriend to marry him before he is actually ready, and then not know what to do when he realizes he is not actually ready until confronted with the actual wedding day. But it's jarring to watch a 30-year-old do that because we consider that to be a more mature and stable age for marriage. Of course in reality, trauma can negatively impact your relationships at any age, but to an audience I think that being not even college-graduate age does make Xander even more sympathetic here--not only does he have unaddressed trauma that a demon is exploiting to heighten his fears, but his brain is not even fully developed. It's just that it's easy to forget that Xander is still so young without the benefit of lockers or a dorm room in the background.
Exactly. It's hard for us to see these characters as " kids" because they were put in adult situations for the longest time that it's hard to remember that they are barely out of their teens by S6&S7.
“What is this, St. Elsewhere?” 😂😂😂
Tara was awesome! Although, I do not agree with the analysis of Spike in the Normal Again episode. He did not just come in her room to threaten her to come back to him. What happened was he came to check on her as Willow asked and then when he proceeded to ask her if she was alright..she responded to say you are not apart of my life...basically f*** off. Whether he should have been understanding that she was going nuts as she didn't know what was reality or not...to be fair to him...that is kind of the message she was sending to him always, and yeah he was hurt by it. So in retaliation Spike proceeded to give his own analysis of what Buffy was going through. That she was not attracted to the dark as he once thought...she was addicted to the misery. Meaning you won't go tell your friends about a relationship you hate to be in, you should tell them cause that would tech free up your anxiety since you desperately wanted to hide it...either they would help her get through it or they would abandon her which then he says...then come with me in the darkness I will be there for you....either way you need to snap the hell out of it cause you are not all godlike like you think...it is okay to make choices that might not be accepted by others blah blah blah. Something to that affect, but no he did not just show up in her room to demand she tell them about their relationship.
1:16:13 Willow could have wished, to Anya, (who I will remind you all from the episode “The Wish” can LITERALLY CREATE A WHOLE NEW DIFFERENT WORLD) that Warren died of a heart attack or something before firing the gun, or, hell, was never born, which would have gotten revenge on him and brought Tara back to life in one fell swoop. There’s a throwaway line she could have wished for vengeance, no she wanted to do it herself. But think outside the Magic Box, Willow!
I like this season, but there are definitely problems. I always hated Reilly, sorry. And I've always liked Xander and totally get how connecting worries about the upcoming marriage with his own abusive childhood could lead him to freak out and leave Anya, as fucked up as it was. And i feel like i should stand up for dawn a little. She's a teenager who's lost her mom and her sister,, and then got the sister back who wouldn't spend any time with her. Basically, she has lots of reasons to be whiny and annoying, just let her be with that. The shoplifting, however, is a little more of a thing. And i completely agree that both dark willow and Giles legendary entrance are fucking amazing.
I really don't understand why some people try to go as far as possible to make excuses for what grown-ups do , but automatically get annoyed whenever a teenage girl "who was created some year ago by monks" opens her mouth. That is the part annoying me most.
You raise a good point there. My main focus in doing Episodic Analysis is what it says on the tin, and that's "Analyse". I try my best to justify every character's controversial decision, and because I tend to talk for so long about things, it's very easy to contradict yourself unintentionally. I found it very hard to justify Dawn's actions in comparison to the shit everyone else was going through during S6. I have almost no problem with her character during S5 and S7, only this one. I know that teenagers make things about themselves, and that that is the essence of Dawn's character, but it doesn't mean that I can't dislike her or things she says and does. The reason for her character existing does not justify her actions.
i've been reading the vampire slayer recently, which is one of the latest comic series. in it, willow and giles perform a spell to remove buffy's trauma, as it has been greatly impacting her and her work as the slayer. it backfires, and willow ends up gaining all of buffy's trauma and slayer powers, whilst buffy loses memory of ever being the slayer. it introduces the theory that the slayer is able to be the slayer because of deep magicks which protect them from the impact of their suffering. these magicks corrupt willow, pushing her to become dark willow. after facing off with hungurus, the slayer eater, willow is pushed over the edge, and makes the same decision that she does in series 6. she wants to completely end reality to stop the suffering of her friends, and sees it as the only way that she can help them. i think it's interesting how it seems like no matter the context, willow is susceptible to turning to dark magick and will make the same decision over and over again. it's also interesting to contrast her decision with cordelia's decision in angel. when cordelia experiences everyone's pain, it just makes her want to help people
we (the gays) could have had amber benson saying the f slur on Buffy????? we were so robbed 😭😭😭
Not sure if this has been mentioned, but originally Dawn's character was written to be much younger. When they hired the actor, they did not change the scripts and so Dawn's behavior seems not as mature as it should be. I think it works given her "creation" and it gets slowly adjusted. Also, I can still remember being an asshole teen not realizing what a jerk I had been 🙄
Thank you for making this. I was looking for content to help refresh my mind on where I was.
DeKnight was already moving to Angel when Seeing Red was wrote (though it was not public knowledge). He received a double promotion to Co-Producer for the move and was regarded as good enough to replace Tim Minear at Angel. When spoilers of Tara's death leaked the writers tried to quash them, DeKnight went as far as to say that he'd quit if Tara died (knowing he was already leaving). Obviously Tara's death was not DeKnight's idea, it was part of the overall Dark Willow plot; and possibly was intended originally for Season 5 (substituted for Glory only brain-wiping Tara). Marti Noxon has gone on record as saying the Spike AR of Buffy was her idea. The writers were well aware that the fanbase felt they knew the writers and had a tendency to credit or blame the credited writer for episode content, and as DeKnight was leaving he was essentially picked to write the less savory plot points.
The problem with the attempted rape is that its an attempted rape. The funny serial killing vampire is acceptable because serial killing vampires don't exist and we can enjoy the snark and ultimately they don't actually kill anyone we know or care about. There is no such thing as a funny rapist, even one based in fantasy. The issue is though is that the fanbase did like Spike, and the show built up to the attempted rape and made it 'understandable', Buffy is far stronger that Spike its not quite the same thing as real life male violence (anymore than Angel punching Buffy after she hit him first), and that I felt led to fans justifying what happened. I find it difficult to accept that it was a great message to air. I get that they needed some big event to cause Spike to seek out his soul, I get that Spike without a soul was supposed to be Evil. But I think in retrospect they could have easily have had the big event being Spike and Anya in Entropy or even just Buffy ending it.
I just want to write that my name is Josh and i want to write that on October 1, 2022 the FUSE channel began airing reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer all seven days a week. the FUSE channel won the syndication rights to all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. People who are lucky enough to have the FUSE channel can watch and DVR reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer seven days a week anytime they want to.
And Xander having the audacity to tell Dawn about what happened with Spike and Buffy should have been mentioned. That was never his place to tell. I have never liked Xander.
Xander always seemed to get a pass. In S7 when Buffy confronted him about saying that Willow told her To kick Angels ass when it was clearly a lie nobody ever took him to task over it, same with him casting the spell in once more with feeling. Nobody took him to task over it he got a pass.
Love your dedication to the work
Wonderful analysis!
Yeah, I really didn't have a problem with Dawn in season 5 and liked her quite a lot in early s6, but by the later episodes her constantly making things about her definitely started to get grating. I don't HATE her the way a lot of people seem to, and I'm actually really liking her growth in the first few episodes of s7 so far (still watching the rest!), but she was getting on my nerves there for a while - which, to be fair, is perfectly normal teenage behavior haha.
Re the infamous Seeing Red bathroom scene:
Agreed that from a Spike character perspective, it was *very* powerful and a necessary tipping point for his character. I never saw it as a "reminder that he's still pure evil" kind of deal though; almost to the contrary, to me it was a stark reminder of just what it meant that he was still flying soulless, even if he HAD reached a really impressive degree of humanity. That's what makes it so horrifying to me; Spike, especially by this point, was no Angelus. He did not do what he did because he took joy in hurting Buffy; on the contrary, his feelings of love for her had not changed at all. What he didn't have without a soul was the ability to truly understand how what he was doing was such a massive, traumatic breach of her trust.
Their relationship had become so toxic and complicated, and he fundamentally didn't have the ability to grasp how their mix of violence and sex before, which he had confused for passionate love, was not the same as him forcing himself on her and her begging him to stop. And the fact that he didn't have that ability, importantly, MATTERED to him. Once she snapped him out of it and he took in how traumatized she was, the fact that he couldn't understand why this time was different was what made him realize the compensation he was doing for not having a soul would never be enough. So yes, it was a reminder to the audience AND to Spike why having a soul matters so much, but I don't think that distinction would have ever mattered to him if he was still pure evil. The very fact that he realized where the deficiency was, and cared enough to seek out the solution, was a unique amount of humanity for someone soulless, not pure evil at all. It was just a horrible, painful thing to have to have happen for him to get there. And I do wish they had come up with an equally logical thing for him to do to have him reach that point for his character progression that wouldn't come at the expense of a whole new load of trauma for Buffy after everything she'd already been through.
Re Xander:
Oh, Xander... my feelings about him are so complicated haha. It kind of surprises me though that people seem SO especially hard on him about the Hells Bells situation, because that was honestly probably the moment where I felt like I understood him best, and really sympathized with him. Should he have done that kind of introspection sooner and called off the wedding before it was literally happening? Of course. But it does make sense why the specific circumstances that went down would be a huge catalyst for him realizing the degree to which he wasn't ready to be married, and the groundwork laid over the seasons about his home life make it very easy to understand why he would have such a hard time trusting that marriage could be a good thing; maybe more importantly, that HE could be a good husband.
My sympathy for him started wearing thin thought in Entropy, when he was so entirely out of line shaming Anya and straight up trying to kill Spike, when neither of them had done anything tf wrong!! Understandable reasons or not, HE was the one who walked away on their wedding day, and Anya wasn't even remotely obligated to agree to continue dating after that, nor did she ever do so. So her choosing to take solace in Spike was none of Xander's business.
His lifelong best friendship with Willow has always been my favorite thing about him though, and the yellow crayon speech gets me every time
Agree with everything you said!^^
Killing Spike - which would’ve been bad even if he wasn’t defenseless - was straight up abuser behavior, which indicated that Xander thought Anya was his property. Xander had lots of toxic issues with women, as evidenced in his jealousy toward Angel/Spike.
1:30:53 I have made the same points about Xander many times! They hate Xander, but don’t hate Willow, who TRIED TO DESTROY THE WHOLE WORLD???
While hopped up on grief and dark magic. Xanders excuse is…?
Really mean about Dawn honestly. I mean tbf she's a fictional character, but most real life teenagers are a lot more like Dawn than like Buffy (when buffy was still a teen i mean) and most of them can't decide if they want to be treated like kids or grown ups, and nearly all have their moments of being bratty or taking things out on their loved ones. Okay you don't have to like it, but to me it's very realistic in that regard 😂
Poor Dawn. She was ok. I don't get *all* the hate. Just some of it.
Poor Reilly!
Great breakdown of the season. I agree with you regarding the underrated, all-too-brief Buffy & Tara friendship.
"Stop touching my magic bone!"
The Xander Episode joke has made me laugh every single time.
At 26:57, you can see Spike's stunt double, and I find that funny
1:31:36 - DONT EVER DO THAT AGAIN GOT IT?
Easily for me the worst season of Buffy. Like you I actually liked all the set up of the first half of the season and was looking forward to how they were going to pay it off. Suffice as to say I was underwhelmed. I thought the Spike/Buffy sexcapades went on for too long. The Xander/Anya story really didn't go anywhere and actually would have made more sense to me if they had married and Dawn was just annoying.
But for me the biggest flaw is Willow's storyline. I agree that the magic as drugs analogy is handled exceptionally poorly. I can only think that they wanted Willow to go "bad" but not "too bad" as to alienate her. I say if you are going to go with the magic as drugs analogy, which I thought was problematic, then go for it. Have Willow completely loose her moral grip. They could have had a back season with Willow, Amy and Rack becoming their very own Trio of sorts. You could have the notion of Amy representing the devil on Willow's shoulder and Tara the angel, fighting for her soul so to speak.
But I disagree with you slightly on Tara's death. I do agree it was a terrible decision but one of the reasons I despise it is that there was more to say with that character. We barely got a chance to really get to know her beyond being Willow's girlfriend. Moreover, I also found Joss' decision to add AMber to the credits was less about thanking her and more about duping the audience into thinking things were going to be better. Joss can't help being an emotional sadist.
The issue with the bathroom scene in Seeing Red is that Spike isn't pure evil. He's done selfless things despite having no soul, Tara says herself that Spike has done good. The writers didn't seem to know what they were doing with him tbh. They can't suddenly be like "hey, remember Spike is pure evil!" when theyfe given us evidence to the contrary.
@@whenthepawn99 It’s a valid point you’ve made. The only issue is that a lot of Spike’s good actions are a result of his obsession with Buffy, and his want to impress her rather than doing them simply because they’re good. The writers had to give Spike motivation to change himself and make it so his good actions are done because he knows they’re right, and not just to make it seem like he’s a good person.
@@episodicanalysis I understand that but I'm thinking specifically of the scene where he let's himself get tortured by Glory and, when speaking to who he thinks is the Buffybot, says something along the lines of he protected Dawn because he didn't want Buffy to suffer that loss. And then after Buffy died he still cared for Dawn. He didn't know Buffy would ever come back. He did that with no soul.
@@whenthepawn99 Ah right, I understand where you’re coming from there. My interpretation of that is although there is some good within Spike, like you say, at the end of the day he’s still soulless. For every good thing he does, there’s a bad thing. But the point is that you’re supposed to like him as a character, and that’s why the shower scene is so shocking for viewers. It was a very big risk for them to do, and controversial for sure. I personally think the scene was a bold idea, although executed excellently by SMG and Marsters. If the writers’ aim was to convince me Spike was a soulless character, they succeeded, and it makes his redemption by the end of S7 all the more great.
@@episodicanalysis OK so that's where we diverge I suppose. For one, it doesn't make sense that there's any good in Spike, following the shows logic. This is why I say that the writers messed up his characterisation. In my opinion anyway. Angel had no good in him whatsoever when he was soulless. And secondly, the scene in Seeing Red was a step too far for me personally. The Buffybot pushed it but that scene was the end of Spuffy for me. For the writers to walk it back and have her forgive him made me upset. I think, in the larger scheme, that's a bad message to send to young girls. That a man can assault you and still be a good guy who you just need to believe in. He did good things when soulless and he also tried to rape her while soulless. That's the reality of the shown, as written. Personally, I don't think they should have written that scene but they did and (again, personally) they didn't handle well at all. Xander and Dawn treated it with the gravity necessary but the show undercut it by having Buffy fotgive him. Watching it, it definitely feels like the writers are trying to say "look he's EVIL! DID YOU FORGET??" And its like, well yeah a lot of us did forget because you wrote him to be good kind of a lot 😂 I understand whatever side people fall on because the writers messed him up! If someone thinks he's irredeemable, I get it. If someone thinks he truly loved Buffy, I agree. Etc. Because the writers could never seem to decide themselves.
@@whenthepawn99 I think you’re right when you say that’s where we diverge. We can discuss what the writer’s intentions were for eternity without really knowing. At what point do we stop viewing every scene or line of dialogue intended as a message to a specific demographic, or what point we view it as what it simply is, and that’s art. At the end of the day, art is subjective, vampires and demons don’t really exist and whatever stories are told using made-up entities have to be taken with a pinch of salt anyway. But that’s part of the reason why I made these videos; and why I enjoy having discussions like this one about the show. There are so many different ways to interpret each character and storyline, and each person’s experience is different as a result, and that fascinates me.
My favorite season with season 3. All the characters are well developed and reach their climax in the show. The villains were great and the season is audacious, creative and surprising.
it so didnt start the musical episode trope. 227 (an 80s black show) did it loooooooooong before buffy. xena did it before buffy. moonlighting. i love lucy............
As for Dawn, she is exactly how a teenager acts. They never like to be called a kid, but as soon as something bad happens or they are out of their depth the first thing that comes out of their mouths is "Hey, I'm just a kid." So she is not the most annoying character of the show for doing this by any means.
This is the problem with a character that gets some what popular that any plans that were in place for the character's arc is deemed as wrong just because of the popularity of their coupling with another character.
If Seth Green had stay on the show, this was apparently going to be his character's exit from the show so it would seem that Tara was given his arc as this was the plan for Willow's arc in the show.
As for seeing red, THAT scene made perfect sense for that 'relationship'.
46:37 Weird editing here. I think Willow’s name is cut? Is that right?
It sounds weird, yes. But Willow’s name was never mentioned, it was just a long breath that was cut.
Excited for the final installment!
Glad you enjoyed the video, thanks!
@@episodicanalysis I've enjoyed the 6. (:
half of the fun of this season is watching the trio b*tch at each other 😂
what are you referring to when you say that "once more with feeling" is the last of "the big 3"? what are the "big 3"? just asking for clarification please.
The big three are the three most critically acclaimed episodes of the show. The first is “Hush” from S4, the second is “The Body” from S5, and the last is “Once More, with Feeling” in S6. I talked about it in my previous videos, sorry for the confusion.
The bs tara n willow just lived in the summer house rent free telling buffy she had money problems was the biggest bs
I still don’t like Xander lol. While I don’t believe he deserves the amount of hate he gets he always annoyed me. He pushed everyone around him to take responsibility for their wrong doings and never fully took responsibility for his shortcomings himself. At least that’s been my perception of him. I think that part of his character could have been resolved if they acknowledged the lie he told in the episode when Buffy killed Angel.
I LOVE Xander! His character development is aptly stated in the final season when he's talking to Dawn after she finds out she isn't a potential. Yes, neither of them have "powers" but his superpower is his heart, empathy and uncanny ability to see past people's bs and see the bigger picture (why Caleb poked out one of his eyes). Of the main three, I have to say he's my favorite. I'm not a big fan of Dawn's either. She comes off SO bratty I just want to smack her. Especially when she screams, "get out, get out, get out!" Although I do have to say, when she picked up the sword to fight with Buffy, Michelle does an excellent job with her expression. You can see the surprise and acceptance that Buffy sees her as capable.. until she ruins it with her whine about Buffy not wanting to be with her. And people don't like Tara? Wut? Her character is awesome1 I was so upset when she died!!
Disagree on the out of character for willow portion. Everytime I rewatch the show it makes more sence. It's a show they have to speed up process of addiction
And on dawn it's both she isn't a kid and is. When you're that age you want to be whatever makes you feel better. I actually grow to like dawn more with every rewatch. You blame the people who you shouldn't because you can't always understand things at that age.
I also COMPLETELY disagree ab seeing red. It's too far I'm sorry but if they ever wanted him to be redeemed it was too far. Don't get me wrong I love spike but I have to forget seeing red. There is bad things that aren't rpe there are ways to show he is evil w out that. And it feels like someone trying to justify it.
I think peoples hatred of dawn gets so ridiculous. She's a teen she's gonna be annoying.
PEOPLE DONT LIKE ANDREW?!?!??!?!?! it's so fun watching a show years after it was released because ny opinion is my own it's not formed by the fan base. It's formed by me. I love love the audience insert.
48:06 What? What?! WHAAAAAT?!?!?! Holy Christ on a cracker! I never knew that before! Holy shit WTAF???
You kinda downpayed the fact that Buffy was abusive to Spike. I mean she literally had sex with him, then beat him up and shouted "You're a thing!" That happened. Everyone ignores the abuse she heaped on him for the entire year, because he finally snapped under the weight of all that abuse and does something unforgivable. But the abuse did still happen.
She abused him in season 5, too. Their relationship is so fucked up.
@@rhythmchyc3089 Absolutely. It always bugged me that I point that out to fans and they like never even thought of it. YES what Spike eventually did was worse, there is no question of that, but that does not somehow erase all the bad things Buffy did. I worry about people who can't see that. Makes me wonder what kind of judgements they make on people in real life.
@@William-the-Guy fandoms skew things all the time to fit their agendas. I ignore them. Also, I watched Buffy when it aired and wasn’t involved in any of the community bullshit in any of the forums. So my mind is set about what Buffy and Spike were during this period without any of the noise.
@@William-the-Guy She literally rapes *him* in Gone! But since that had cutesy music and he eventually gets into it, that gets a pass - even though he clearly has no idea who's touching him at first and when he knows, declines the sex and wants to talk about their relationship first, and she *ignores his boundaries*. Reverse the genders and now you have people up in arms. Very frustrating.
Buffy didn’t abuse Spike, he used and manipulated her the entire season, taking advantage of her vulnerable state. The “abuse” that she engaged in was reactive.
I don't think the end of Normal Again is a misstep, it's meant to be disconcerting.
1:30:58 - I'll be the judge of that, big boi
angel shouldn't charge either hes trying to make up because of what hes done and charging people undoes that. leave it to cordelia to think about money
Doyle was his guide from the Powers. Doyle said to charge and had a plausible reason, so of course Angel was going to charge people.
Why shouldn't Angel and Buffy for that matter charge for helping people? Cops, soldiers, and firefighters get paid to help and keep the community safe. Hell even Watchers get paid for their work.
@@jamie7398 Wait a minute... Buffy got Giles back payed from when he was fired. Why the heck didn't buffy demand the council pay her a watchers salary as well?
They would have agreed and then she would have been fine.
@@kyleellis1825 It annoys me every time I watch that episode when Buffy get Giles back pay from being fired, and she doesn't have the council give her any money. She was a slayer for 3 years when she quit at the end of season 3 and 15 when she started. Buffy deserved a pay check from the Watchers Council.
@@jamie7398 Exactly. Buffy was only poor this season because the writers wanted her to work dead end jobs and ruin her psyche. Buffy should have had this taken care of with one call to the council.
"Hey... did a new slayer get called when I was dead? No? Cool, so I'm a bonus slayer, pay me or you're back down to one."
I urge musicals but love this episode
Does this mean Rack is stronger than books absorbed Willow?
The writing for Giles in S6 and S7 was incredibly out of character. He’s been established as the most loyal to Buffy of any of the Scoobies, and “has a father’s love for the child.” I understand they had to write an excuse for him to be out, but feel like there could’ve been a bit more of an “urgent reason” he had to leave. Him also not being present at the (intended) wedding of Anya and Xander didn’t make sense or align with his character.
And the way he acts in a couple episodes during the end of S7 is even more out of character.
"They were unable to continue funding the show due to how popular it had become". WTF?! "Sorry boss, this show is real good and everyone loves it. We have to drop it, right now!" "What about just using the popularity to increase advertising rates, getting us more money. Which is kinda why we're here. No?" "Yeah, no. Gotta cancel it. RIGHT NOW!" Capitalism has outlived its usefulness, and functionality.
I love Xander for all the reasons you listed. I've spent years trying to convince people that Xander is one of the best written characters of this show, but very few people agreed with me. lol
The trio have aged surprisingly well as a big bad. Way too prescient
I agree. They’re much scarier now as I’ve grown up and witnessed what those types have the ability to do. 😬
I hate how the show is called into question in Normal Again - you don't do that at least not to me. It's a residual effect - eff that writer.
agreed. The level of hate Xander and Riley got was i sure coming from a place. Many in the fandom has misdirection towards men. For reasons i can't answer. how can i say this? the horrible things the women have done and said and all is forgiven. Willow murdering, Faith
I think most of the hate Xander/Riley get is because they are normal humans, the sins they commit are ones that a lot of female viewers have experienced.
- Oz cheating on Willow can be excused as werewolf stuff.
- It's really hard to put yourself in Buffy's shoes, because how many of us have an abusive partner kill a bunch of our friends and then try to end the world?
- Willow magically date R*ping Tara for weeks is almost all offscreen/done to happy music. We see Hyena Xander hold down Buffy and the super strength is negated, so it seems like a normal assault.
@kyle ellis Understandable, but I still think it's undeserved when it comes to the hyena episode. He wasn't even himself. He was possessed.
@@TheTytoGaurdian From the threads I've been apart of, people more blame him for saying he doesn't remember what happened.
But anyone blaming him for his actions while possessed are 100% in the wrong.
@kyle ellis I think it is kind of understandable that he pretends not to remember. The hyenas made him do some really bad/embarrassing stuff. I think I'd want to pretend not to remember, too, if only to prevent the topic coming up later among the group. I'm sure he never wanted to be reminded of that experience ever again.
Leaving Anya at the alter.... ugh, that was so bad! Xander, whether he felt like it was the right thing to do or not, handled that situation very badly. He does deserve hate for that, but the character knows and acknowledges this, and I was willing to let him move on from it, eventually.
I do think the hate towards Riley is warranted, though. I am sympathetic to his plight about not believing Buffy loved him as much as he loved her, but he never tried to talk to her about it. He just let it build until he spiraled, then told her he was leaving, and then left in a matter of hours. Ugh, I know it looks like I'm giving Xander a pass for being flawed and not Riley, but at least Xander tried to make things right. He tried to apologize. Did Riley? No, he just came back a short time later, happily married, asking Buffy for help. The nerve of him coming back and asking for help like that after how he left things? That's why I give Xander the pass and not Riley.
@@TheTytoGaurdian It's understandable. But it would have been far better for everyone if they just dealt with what happened.
Honestly, Anya deserved FAR worse than just Xander leaving her at the altar. Anyanka tortured and killed for a thousand years (with a soul). But Anya never feels bad or even tries to make amends for anything. The only time she feels bad is when the dog gets eaten.
Xander shouldn't be getting blamed for having a traumatic vision. IT was specifically a revenge plan against Anya because she ruined someone's life.
Yeah Xander could have handled it better. But we saw during the musical epissode that both of them had things they were hiding. The relationship was doomed to failure and I really wish they would have realized that in S4 when Anya said he only cared about lots of orgasims.
I do wish you would speak slower and allow us more time to absorb what you have to say.
This is still my fav BTVS season.
Hello my English 2nd language you speak very fast!
I'm really sorry about that! A lot of people tell me that, and add on my accent, sometimes it's difficult for even 1st language English speakers to understand what I'm saying xD
Hey! TH-cam videos have playback speed options in the settings menu; maybe you can change the video to 0.75x or 0.50x speed to help you understand easier. Hope that helps 🙏
You speak so fast i can only understand every other sentence. The subtitles on thing also keeps tilting out cause it doesnt keep up with the narration.
Dawn 😂 “fuck off”
Nah F Xander.
This is definitely when the show got stupid.. angel was definitely the better show..
You defending Xander vs Dawn and neglecting to mention her strong points as a character is bizarre. I don’t know why you could empathize with Xander’s stupidity as an adult but you have no respect for Dawn’s struggles as a teenager.
I would like a spinoff prequel of the adventures of Rack and Zachary.