Re: ::BuffyWantsWillow::Cas and optimism

[danspector@xxxxxxxxx]

don't 

think

I 

need 

DISCUSSION

space

here,

but, 

hey,

what the hell, might as well:


Cas wrote (re Season 7):

>We may just be surprised.

Cas, is there anything at all this year that gives you reason for
optimism, besides just wishful thinking? Were you pleasantly surprised
by ANYTHING in Season 6? Did ME ever surpass your expectations and not
play to the lowest common denominator?

Yeah, we were glad when Spuffy broke up, but they're getting back
together, so that's off the list. (If she trusts and misses a soulless
rapist, I'm reasonably sure she can forgive him now that he's souled.)

The last real good, "hey, this is an intelligent show" moment I had was
in "Tough Love", when they acknowledged that the Perfect Lesbian Couple
can have issues, too, and let the issues come out in a realistic manner.

This year, all I can come up with is the moment when they ended Act 3 of
"As You Were" by revealing Spike as "The Doctor" and I got excited to
think that they were going to tell us Spike (and the writers) had been
playing us all along. Really surprise us. That delusion barely
outlasted the commercial break.

The only other thing that semi-qualifies is Xander not going through
with the wedding. But they didn't use that to springboard any further
character development, just give Anya back her "kewl" powers without
changing her personality at all (a soul? what's a soul?) and have
Xander go through "The Zeppo, Take 3". You know, where he feels useless
for the first half of the ep and then turns out to be the hero and ME
goes "See! He's not useless after all! That's character growth!".
Which fools anyone stupid enough to not ALREADY KNOW that Xander isn't
useless, that he's saved the world several times over, that the gang
considers him vitally important, superpowers or no. It's called "forced
regression for false progress". It was crap in "The Zeppo" (but
redeemed by the ep being a parody of the standard BtVS ep), it was crap
in "The Replacement" (but redeemed by the "Two Xanders" premise, some
really funny lines, and the fantastic Riley scenes--I always thought
the title was a sorrowful homage to Marc Blucas, myself), and it's crap
here. And redeemed by not a thing, other than the W/X sites now having
"broken yellow crayon" to put on their fact pages, along with "6th grade
field trip" and "8th grade cotillion". 

"Grave" sucked a fifth of ass, straight from the bottle. Would have
made a decent action movie (if you didn't mind the villain's constantly
shifting motives, plans, and powers), but lacked a basic requirement for
"Buffy", namely Buffy. And Willow. And Xander. Giles was relatively
in character, and Anya was good (though she's a cartoon on her best day,
anyway), but our lead characters were never convincing. Silly us,
thinking that a season of emotional distance had to end with
reconnection and emotional resonance.

Dan

captain of the good ship "Bitter" and not resigning my commission any
time soon.