Unpopular Opinions

[lembergwatcher]

Spike ruined Buffy the Vampire Slayer

 

[Halting Hex]

Ah, the Jamie J. Weinman classic essay!  You know that hit a nerve when you recall the author's complete name, immediately, 18 years after you last read the piece.  Rock on, Jamie.

[lembergwatcher]

Instead of singing/dancing demon (Sweet or what was his name) Xander/Dawn should've summoned the Stripper Demon. Maybe in that case OMWF wouldn't have been that... terrible. Don't know the name of the pic's creator unfortunately. Hope the admins won't ban me... 

[Halting Hex]

How could it be worse, Buffy?  Well, I see that the demon let you keep your cross.  So if any of the "students" are actually vampires (taking the option that Sheila passed on and using Angel's Handy Tunnels™ to enjoy spending eternity at Sunnydale High), and were planning on attacking because you clearly don't have a stake, they still can't bite you.

Accentuate the positive, Slayer!

(Is this why Buffy keeps spare clothes at school, as seen in Surprise?  She had the standard anxiety dream about being naked at school and worried it was one of her prophecy dreams, and took precautions?  Or she took note of Willow's [endless] recaps about Xander's Billy-induced [near-] nudity in Nightmares and was all "well, I can handle Nazis, clowns and opera.  But maybe I should keep an extra outfit on hand?  Huh.)

Edited November 16, 2022 by Halting Hex

[Halting Hex]

On 6/27/2018 at 2:58 AM, Joe Hellandback said:

But [Dawn] didn't realise [the Talisman's]' significance? Xander had that knowledge. 

I'm not sure I can buy Xander as having encyclopedic knowledge of all of the paraphernalia in the shop.  I grant you that whomever actually did the summoning must have found enough instructions to accomplish the feat, but it's still possible that they didn't understand all the details.  (The whole "be Sweet's queen" part seems to have gone right over Xander's head, for example.)

I still think Dawn did it.  Remember, it's only she and Spike who don't advance an alternative explanation during "I've Got a Theory", so if you can't lie in a song, it has to be one of them.  (Okay, technically Tara gets cut off by Anya, but she didn't seem about to confess, and she co-signed Willow's "Nightmares redux" idea by doing the jazz-hands.)

And if you can  lie while singing (even though nobody seems able to even dissemble, much less spew utter falsehood), then why couldn't it be…Anya?

Think about it.  Anya damn well knows how all the shop items work.  Anya is possibly the very first person affected by the spell, yet she shows no evidence of confusion or worry about her "I'll Be The Mrs." performance the next day, keeping quiet even when Buffy (and then Giles) bring up their own experiences from the previous night.   Anya has just as much reason to be nervous about the wedding as Xander does, just from the opposite perspective. (He doesn't know if he really wants to go through with it; she only just last episode finally managed to get him to announce the engagement and is doubtless worried he'll get cold feet. [Rightly so, as it eventuates.])

And Anya could easily have skimmed over the "Queen" clause and just figured she could talk her way out of it, if need be.  Anya's not freaked out by a demon hitting on her, after all.  She'd just whisper something to Sweet about how if he forced her to come with him, she'd cut off his…feet in his sleep, and Sweet would dance tf out of Sunnydale, toot-sweet.

And of course, even if Xander realized it was Anya who did it, not Dawn, he'd still cover for her.  Indeed, it makes more sense for X to take the bullet if he knows his fiancée is endangered.  No offense, Dawnster.

Perhaps Anya deliberately left the amulet out on the counter, already knowing about Shiny McWhiny's greedy little fingers?  Frame-up! Scheming demon!

(But I still think it's Dawn.)

Edited January 2, 2023 by Halting Hex

[lembergwatcher]

That is totally something Dawn can do...

[MapleCourt]

My unpopular opinion:

Oz sucked. I hated him from the moment I saw him. Season 1 was a show about high school misfits who were sincerely good people but struggled to fit in with a superficial society. Then in Season 2 we get the most superficial character of all: the hipster douchebag guitar player who dyes his hair and is also a mega-genius who can ace any test but is too cool to care!!!! And poor Willow gets stuck with this loser for three seasons, only to have Anya standing between her and Xander when Oz finally leaves.

[MapleCourt]

And that's why Season 1 will always be the best season: no annoying characters. No Oz, no Anya, no Spike, no Faith, no Wesley, no Mayor. Just the original core cast who were perfect together and could have made one of the best series of all time for ten seasons together if the producers didn't sell out to what braindead American audiences think is cool.

Edited November 9, 2023 by MapleCourt

[MapleCourt]

Another unpopular opinion: Season 6 is good. Here's my justification:

1. No new characters. After killing us with Faiths, Rileys, Anyas and Oz's for 4 seasons, the show finally focuses on its established characters. And we aren't tortured with another lame romantic interest for Buffy ("How can I repay..." was cathartic after enduring Riley and Ben).

2. More screentime for the Big 3. Giles is missing for most of the season, but that's honestly better than dragging him out for 30 seconds of meaningless screentime like in Seasons 3-5. Xander has the most screentime since Season 2.

3. I like the Trio. They're a humanizing relief after the cascading mega-villains of previous seasons.

4. Xander finally ditches Anya. And not just at the wedding. As early as the fourth episode, we see how Xander really feels about his fiance when he covers his face as she starts spouting some horrific thing. He finally feels the way we all feel: he can't stand this annoying person and just wants to be rid of her.

5. Willow has the main story, almost equal to Buffy, which is great for fans of Willow. I don't mind Dark Willow. Some of her lines were kind of lame but Willow is Willow.

6. Kingman's Bluff: The only couples who have a life or death confrontation on Kingman's Bluff the entire series are Buffy and Angel, and Willow and Xander. These two are soulmates and this scene confirms it.

There's some bad, mainly Spike, but at least he leaves town at the end. If they just cut the scenes with him after Seeing Red, the ending would be perfect. Some of the dialogue is disappointing, making fun of the Trio for being socially awkward when that was the whole point of the first season, and Xander making fun of Andrew for being a virgin completely contradicts the message of Season 1, but I can overlook the flaws in favor of the good parts.

The only seasons I would actually rewatch are 1, 2 and 6. I might watch an episode or two from the other seasons, but those are the only good seasons in my opinion.

[lembergwatcher]

On 11/9/2023 at 10:48 PM, MapleCourt said:

And poor Willow gets stuck with this loser for three seasons

Not to mention it was thanks to Oz that Willow started messing with the dark magic and losing many of those qualities that made her very likable at the beginning. 

[lembergwatcher]

12 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

After killing us with Faiths, Rileys, Anyas and Oz's for 4 seasons, the show finally focuses on its established characters.

It does. Only those characters turn out to be very screwed-up, stripped of most qualities that made them likable in the first place and quite frankly barely resemble characters most of us loved. Buffy/Spike "romance" is just one shiny example.

12 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

More screentime for the Big 3. Giles is missing for most of the season, but that's honestly better than dragging him out for 30 seconds of meaningless screentime like in Seasons 3-5. Xander has the most screentime since Season 2.

Yes, but watching them drifting further apart and acting like some self-centered assholes, acting out of character, doing stupid shit was no joy at least for me. Xander has the most screentime since earlier seasons, yes, but in most cases not in the way I expected him to be. I expected Xander the hero, not Anya's lapdog who nearly married (ex)vengeance demon and failed to notice his supposed best friend Willow was falling apart and showing all signs of a very disturbing behavior (not to mention that Willow's existence totally revolvs around Tara, Tara, Tara). He doesn't have the guts to stand up for Willow (eps 9 & 14 for example). Sure, he had his moment at the series finale, but that was too late IMHO. And the main reason Xander was absolutely irrelevant throughout the next season.

12 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

I like the Trio. They're a humanizing relief after the cascading mega-villains of previous seasons.

Buffy was made a Slayer to fight supernatural forces, not high school nerds. Humanizing or not, in the older (and better) days it took one episode with the "threat" like that, not an entire season (i. e. Chris and Eric from Some Assembly Required).

13 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

Xander finally ditches Anya. And not just at the wedding.

Way TOO LATE. Should have done it back in the season four. And he didn't just ditch Anya and forgot the whole nightmare. Xander doesn't know what to do about Anya and the whole wedding thing (all due to the foot in his mouth in the previous season's fainale) throughout the first half of the season and then tries to make it up to "poor Ahn" for the reminder of the aforementioned season. Xander never regrets being with Anya, never aknowledges it was a big mistake. He still interacts with Anya much more than with Willow or Buffy. And it's not like he and Anya are over for good since there's a strong element of "will-they-or-won't-they" during most of season seven (they shag in 7x16, after all). 

13 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

Willow has the main story, almost equal to Buffy, which is great for fans of Willow.

There are quite a few fans of Willow who will disagree 😉. Main story is fine, it's just what kind of story this is. 

13 hours ago, MapleCourt said:

There's some bad, mainly Spike, but at least he leaves town at the end.

Spike is the star of the show in the sixth season who has more screentime than any other character except the main protagonist. And that's the saddest part. Not the only bad thing unfortunately. So cutting anything with Spike in it wasn't the option since season 4... Spike was Joss' favorite, after all.

[MapleCourt]

On 11/12/2023 at 9:35 AM, lembergwatcher said:

Way TOO LATE. Should have done it back in the season four. And he didn't just ditch Anya and forgot the whole nightmare. Xander doesn't know what to do about Anya and the whole wedding thing (all due to the foot in his mouth in the previous season's fainale) throughout the first half of the season and then tries to make it up to "poor Ahn" for the reminder of the aforementioned season. Xander never regrets being with Anya, never aknowledges it was a big mistake. He still interacts with Anya much more than with Willow or Buffy. And it's not like he and Anya are over for good since there's a strong element of "will-they-or-won't-they" during most of season seven (they shag in 7x16, after all).

That's true, defining the characters by their relationships was pretty lame. Which is why Season 7 should have been relationship free - no Anya, no Spike, no Kennedy - and just got back to the core 4 fighting demons.

[Halting Hex]

Fun fact:  I'm the person who first called it "Season Sux". (On TWoP in June 2002, when I was posting as bwdan.  Robert A. Black from the Kitten Board has claimed credit, but I beat him to it.)  I sensed that my show was broken when After Life showed Buffy unable to stand even being the same room as the Scoobs (those fucking camera angles!) and running off (repeatedly) to seek solace from Only!Spike, and Flooded confirmed that the damage was irreparable. 

Not "merely" because we spend Act IV seeing Giles rip Willow a new one for violating the "rules" of Magic (paging The Zeppo, paging Primeval) while Buffy listens to Spike "joke" about killing her friends and family and SMILES, but also because it debuted the Trio, who are the most blatant attack on the audience I've ever seen.  "Ohh, men who watch shows like this are pathetic losers [this was before "incel" was a term] who are actually dangerous psychopaths [Warren], weak-willed followers [Jonathan] and self-closeted homosexuals [Andrew]!  You can't relate to women because you want dick in your ass, but you're too stupid to admit it!  Ha-ha, what a loser!"  Up thine, Joss.

Aside from how gross it is that the season tries to make us hate Buffy, Willow and Xander while fluffing Tara the Abandoning Hypocrite, Anya the Nostalgic Sociopath and Spike the unrepentant mass-murderer and serial rapist (including necrophiliac rape), the season was just awful as television, leaving aside the crappy plotting and character assassination.  The production values went to shit, the pacing was a complete joke, and the show wasn't even funny any more.  Pretty much every attempt at "comedy" was rooted in Nerd-bashing, unnecessary meta-references, or one-dimensional sexual innuendo…and frankly, a little of that goes a loooooong way.

We had entire episodes that had fewer scenes than did Act II of Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered.  The first half of Dead Man's Party (which is a Marti Noxon angst-fest that features a long argument and a long fight) contains more attempts at humor than any three S6 episodes (and more success than any five, IMO, but I recognize that is subjective).

The show was so dedicated to licking Spike's knob that Sparky (who was one of the best sources of humor in Seasons 2 and 4) had exactly one legitimately funny line all-season.  

(From Entropy:  "Drusilla was always straightforward. Didn't have a single buggering clue about what was going on right in front of her…but she was straight about it!"  Classic.)

Precious few that were even attempts aside from that.  (Yes, "Randy Giles??" Why not call me Horny Giles or Desperate-for-a-Shag Giles, then?", but that's amnesia yuks.  Not really an honest funny.)  Mostly we got…lovely moments like this, also from Tabula Rasa:

Quote

SCUM:  We kissed, Buffy!  With the rising music, and the rising…

Oooh, haha!  Spike's talking about how he was getting an erection!  Isn't that funny??? Hahaha!

Oh, vomit.

Easily the worst season of television I have ever suffered through.  90% of the episodes were utterly repulsive, including That Fucking Musical and Fat Loser Xander Saves Crazy Murderer Willow, and Buffy is So Useless She Can't Even Beat Dirt!  A few (Life Serial, Smashed, Gone, As You Were) were semi-functional, albeit still drowning in Spuffy shit.

Yes, the ironically-named Normal Again was actually good, but one pearl doesn't save this pile of turds.  "Like watching a friend die", I wrote in 2003.  I've changed a few opinions over the past two decades, but that isn't one of them.

I have a lot more, but I'll let you read the episode threads, for a starter.  Serious disagreement.

But for now, let me quote Cee-Lo Green on the Gnarls Barkley album:

 

And I can go on and on and on…

Edited December 3, 2023 by Halting Hex

[Halting Hex]

On 11/12/2023 at 9:35 AM, lembergwatcher said:

And it's not like he and Anya are over for good since there's a strong element of "will-they-or-won't-they" during most of season seven (they shag in 7x16, after all). 

On 11/11/2023 at 8:04 PM, MapleCourt said:

Blanked out Anya dragging his recently-maimed-and-heavily-medicated (he couldn't even walk unassisted in the previous episode, recall) ass onto the dirty kitchen floor in Groped, have we?

Good.  Nice to know the BrainBleach™ still works.

[MapleCourt]

My approach to Season 6 is based on how much I hate Season 3. Everything got off track in Season 3. That's when it went from a show about four fundamentally kind and unique misfits to happy clappy teenage party hour with cool kids like Oz and Faith. Thankfully, Seth Green quit the show, so they had to take it in a different direction. Thankfully again, the audience rejected Riley and his Initiative douchebags, so Joss got desperate and pulled out the ultimate plot card - Buffy's mom getting sick and the ultimate super invincible villain.

Putting up with three seasons of that trash - Oz, Riley, and milquetoast Season 5 - I was just glad they finally got back to the main characters in Season 6. Joss did a clever job of gradually condensing Oz, Riley and Faith into Spike so that, like a frog in boiling water, I didn't realize what was happening with Spike until the final 3 episodes when I realized how much better the show was without him in it.

I agree the writing got progressively worse each season, the jokes in Season 6 that you mentioned are pretty bad, and Anya is as always an awful character, but I just fast forward through her parts. I like Willow's plot in Season 6. I like how in Episode 3, when something goes wrong, the first thing Willow does is call Xander - that would never have happened in Seasons 3-5.

Edited December 3, 2023 by MapleCourt

[lembergwatcher]

On 12/3/2023 at 2:21 PM, MapleCourt said:

I like how in Episode 3, when something goes wrong, the first thing Willow does is call Xander - that would never have happened in Seasons 3-5.

In defense of pre-season 6 episodes...
Before After Life Willow did approach Xander at least on two occasions: 1) she asked him to help her pick up formal wear for the homecoming dance (3x05); 2) she came to Xander looking for advice when it became obvious Oz had boners because of Veruca (4x06).  

[lembergwatcher]

On 12/3/2023 at 5:19 AM, Halting Hex said:

Blanked out Anya dragging his recently-maimed-and-heavily-medicated (he couldn't even walk unassisted in the previous episode, recall) ass onto the dirty kitchen floor in Groped, have we?

My shattered psyche has for some reason blocked the aforementioned disturbing image associated with quite forgettable episode inside my mind... 🙂

[MapleCourt]

On 12/5/2023 at 9:04 AM, lembergwatcher said:

In defense of pre-season 6 episodes...
Before After Life Willow did approach Xander at least on two occasions: 1) she asked him to help her pick up formal wear for the homecoming dance (3x05); 2) she came to Xander looking for advice when it became obvious Oz had boners because of Veruca (4x06).  

I mean, that was early in Season 3 when they were trying to segue out of the established Season 2 arc that Willow and Xander are besties. That scene was just a plot device to get Xander out of Willow's life.

In the Veruca season 4 episode, that is literally Xander's only scene in the entire episode, and she didn't come for help with a monster. My point was that they never go to Xander as their first source of help with a monster in Seasons 3-5.

[Halting Hex]

I don't find it terribly odd for Willow to check in with Buffy (Slayer) and/or Giles (Watcher) as the first resort when something supernatural is up.  I'm fairly certain she does that in S1-S2 as well. (It is more their specialty than Xander's, after all.)  Her going to seek Xander behind the scenes whilst Buffy is heading to her death in Prophecy Girl is lovely, but she can't go to Buffy (for obvious reasons) and Xander lives closer to her than where the school is, it is generally implied.

I mean she does tell Xander her worries over Rodney Munson's fate in Inca Mummy Girl rather quickly, but no offense to the Xan-man, I think she went to the Library to find Giles or Buffy and Xander simply happened to be there.

And any Xillow-closeness brownie points that After Life  earns are IMO rather severely cancelled out by Gone (IMO an otherwise semi-tolerable episode) where Xander's response to "somebody in a town of 38,500 did a bad spell?" is " Must be Willow, that bad bad bad bad bad addict!  It's not as if I'm boning an amoral sociopath who co-owns a magic shop and has been casting maleficent spells for over 1000 years or anything!  Or if it could be that vampire  we somehow allow to roam free, who has done a dark ritual or six himself! Or Dawn, summoner of dancing demons or T-t-t-tara, who put a curse on us last year, or any number of other possible suspects! No, let's blame my 'best friend', immediately, and bully her when she denies it!"

(And then there's the…lovely episode where Xander sells out the sobriety that he knows Willow fights to maintain every day, just to appease his Hellbitch's invented-only-for-this episode claustrophobia!  You know, that she showed zero indication of when Xander himself locked her in a closet last year!  Oh, and that classic moment where Willow walks right past Xander while covered in [what turns out to be] her dead girlfriend's blood and X doesn't even blink.)

It takes more than one "seeing as how Buffy is completely out of it and Giles is 10.000 km away, let me ask Xander's opinion" moment to redeem S6 as some sort of Xillowrific paradise for me.  Sorry.

(Also, I recall this in 4.18:

Quote

(Cut to Willow coming down the stairs.)

WILLOW: Xander? Tara? 

(Runs through the house. Finds Xander staring at the Spin The Bottle people.)

WILLOW: Xander. Ghost boy. Drowning in a tub. I, I tried to save him, but, being a ghost already, well, I was way too late.

XANDER: A ghost? (Willow nods) What's the deal? Is every frat on this campus haunted? And if so, why do people keep coming to these parties, cause it's not the snacks.

That looks like an example of Willow seeking out Xander in a supernatural crisis [if that's the exact square we're trying to land on] a good two seasons before "I was torn out of Heeeeeeeaven.  By my 'friends'.  Hold me, my darling Cheekbones!" and other S6 joys, AFAICT.

JMO.)

Edited December 9, 2023 by Halting Hex

[Jazzy24]

I’m rewatching Buffy and here are some things that might be unpopular. 
 

1. Buffy was not a good leader until the end. She repeated the same mistakes over and over. 
 

2. Buffy’s best relationships in the series is Angel, Dawn, Giles, Willow, and Xander. In this specific order. 
 

3. Seasons 2, 3 and 5 are still the best seasons of the series. 
 

4. Dawn’s introduction and writing was questionable but she kept Buffy grounded throughout the show. 
 

5. Buffy kicked ass as the Slayer but was more interesting when she dealt with human things. Angel and Dawn were the characters that kept her human. 
 

6. Buffy and Angel as soulmates is absolutely believable. It’s annoying when people try to dismiss them as a puppy first love type of relationship only. You can absolutely have your first love as your soulmate. 
 

7.Buffy was wrong many times and it puts people off her character when people excuse her wrong actions. 
 

8. Willow and Xander were absolutely cruel to Buffy more times than she ever was to them. 
 

9. That incident in season 7 where Buffy is kicked out is crap. I try to not put any stock in it because it was a contrived badly written scene to continue to keep Buffy isolated. I hate it and season 7. 

 

[Halting Hex]

3 hours ago, Jazzy24 said:

8. Willow and Xander were absolutely cruel to Buffy more times than she ever was to them. 

Unpopular opinions are meant to be unpopular, so I won't try and argue things down, but that's definitely an eyebrow raise.  

Here are a few raw statistics to counter this argument:

Number of times Buffy appears to not give a shit about Spike possibly killing Willow:  at least 4  (School Hard, Lovers Walk, The Initiative, Flooded)

Number of  times Buffy appears to not give a shit about Spike possibly killing Xander: at least 3  (Lovers Walk, Flooded, Sleeper)

Also, the Bitch of the Year dance with Xander in When She Was Bad (also aimed at Willow, whom she leaves behind without a single word)

Also, abandoning her post to "hop a Greyhound over boy troubles" and leaving Willow and Xander (and Oz and Cordy) to do her dangerous and already-proven-fatal job

Also, "how can you possibly help?" and "I'm starting to see why there's no prophecy about a Chosen One and her friends" (The Yoko Factor)

Also, the "Everyone Sucks Bur Me" speech and mocking Willow as "a Wicca who won't-a" to a virtual stranger who has no idea what Willow's been through (Get it Done, an episode wherein Willow saves Buffy's life)

Also, standing stock still and letting Caleb punch her in the face, resulting in Xander's loss of his eye. (Dirty Girls)

(Also, breaking her promise to Willow that they would both be at Xander's side to help him recover from his injury ["There were going to be card games"] and basically forcing Xander to have to keep Willow from falling to pieces. [Empty Places])

Also, lots of other stuff ("Spike's the only one who's been watching my back" and "I love my friends, but…" grates my cheese, quite a bit).

Number of times Xander brings Buffy back from the dead: 1+ (does all the work in Prophecy Girl, plus at least helping with the planning in Bargaining)

Number of times Willow brings Buffy back from the dead: 1-2 (does all the heavy lifting in Bargaining and while I don't think Buffy was truly dead in Villains, there's at least an argument there)

Number of times Buffy brings anybody she allegedly cares about back to life: big fat honking zero.

Jesse: still dead

Jenny: still dead (Buffy forgets all about her murder so she can have her boyfriend back, as Xander predicted)

Kendra: still dead.  (Buffy, in what could have been a moment to mourn her loss: "Yeah, that was such a drag.")

Joyce: still dead 

Tara: still dead

Anya: still dead.  (Okay, Anya, fair point.  But Buffy said that she took Anya in because "I don't want to lose a friend" in Him.  Well, Buffy lost her…and let her stay lost.)

People say Spike came back, even though he's clearly (and deservedly) burning in Hell for eternity (Angel season 5?? What Angel season 5???  But Buffy had bugger-all to with that, anyhow.)

I mean, Dean Winchester took his brother's place in HELL, I'm just saying. Stop slacking, Buff.  (I think the various Halliwell sisters hit double-digits in bringing each other back…)

OTOH, there was that time when Buffy left Willow in a wheelchair and ghosted her friends for months, but it took Willow and Xander about 50 hours to be entirely welcoming when Buffy deigned to come home, so I guess we're pretty much even, right?

To quote (Mirror-) Spock, "I merely state facts."

(That said, welcome back!)

Edited October 6 by Halting Hex

[Jazzy24]

21 hours ago, Halting Hex said:

Unpopular opinions are meant to be unpopular, so I won't try and argue things down, but that's definitely an eyebrow raise.  

Here are a few raw statistics to counter this argument:

Number of times Buffy appears to not give a shit about Spike possibly killing Willow:  at least 4  (School Hard, Lovers Walk, The Initiative, Flooded)

Number of  times Buffy appears to not give a shit about Spike possibly killing Xander: at least 3  (Lovers Walk, Flooded, Sleeper)

Also, the Bitch of the Year dance with Xander in When She Was Bad (also aimed at Willow, whom she leaves behind without a single word)

Also, abandoning her post to "hop a Greyhound over boy troubles" and leaving Willow and Xander (and Oz and Cordy) to do her dangerous and already-proven-fatal job

Also, "how can you possibly help?" and "I'm starting to see why there's no prophecy about a Chosen One and her friends" (The Yoko Factor)

Also, the "Everyone Sucks Bur Me" speech and mocking Willow as "a Wicca who won't-a" to a virtual stranger who has no idea what Willow's been through (Get it Done, an episode wherein Willow saves Buffy's life)

Also, standing stock still and letting Caleb punch her in the face, resulting in Xander's loss of his eye. (Dirty Girls)

(Also, breaking her promise to Willow that they would both be at Xander's side to help him recover from his injury ["There were going to be card games"] and basically forcing Xander to have to keep Willow from falling to pieces. [Empty Places])

Also, lots of other stuff ("Spike's the only one who's been watching my back" and "I love my friends, but…" grates my cheese, quite a bit).

Number of times Xander brings Buffy back from the dead: 1+ (does all the work in Prophecy Girl, plus at least helping with the planning in Bargaining)

Number of times Willow brings Buffy back from the dead: 1-2 (does all the heavy lifting in Bargaining and while I don't think Buffy was truly dead in Villains, there's at least an argument there)

Number of times Buffy brings anybody she allegedly cares about back to life: big fat honking zero.

Jesse: still dead

Jenny: still dead (Buffy forgets all about her murder so she can have her boyfriend back, as Xander predicted)

Kendra: still dead.  (Buffy, in what could have been a moment to mourn her loss: "Yeah, that was such a drag.")

Joyce: still dead 

Tara: still dead

Anya: still dead.  (Okay, Anya, fair point.  But Buffy said that she took Anya in because "I don't want to lose a friend" in Him.  Well, Buffy lost her…and let her stay lost.)

People say Spike came back, even though he's clearly (and deservedly) burning in Hell for eternity (Angel season 5?? What Angel season 5???  But Buffy had bugger-all to with that, anyhow.)

I mean, Dean Winchester took his brother's place in HELL, I'm just saying. Stop slacking, Buff.  (I think the various Halliwell sisters hit double-digits in bringing each other back…)

OTOH, there was that time when Buffy left Willow in a wheelchair and ghosted her friends for months, but it took Willow and Xander about 50 hours to be entirely welcoming when Buffy deigned to come home, so I guess we're pretty much even, right?

To quote (Mirror-) Spock, "I merely state facts."

(That said, welcome back!)

To be fair to Buffy her relationship with death is different than the Scoobies. All of them except Giles have tried to bring someone back from life. Buffy is more wise in knowing not to mess with life or death. 
 

And I got nothing about the reckless actions Buffy or any character takes concerning Spike. Buffy and every character on this show is forced to act in a way to accommodate the Spike character. 
 

Buffy doing sexy dance Xander was her going through PTSD also her leaving Willow in a wheelchair. 
 

Buffy was suprised and not prepared for Caleb that’s why she got punched. Also Xander knew the risk after seven years fighting gods, demons, monsters, etc… 

 

Also thanks it’s nice engaging with you. 

[Spartan Girl]

22 hours ago, Halting Hex said:

Number of times Willow brings Buffy back from the dead: 1-2 

That…wasn’t a good thing. Did Willow and Xander really believe Buffy was trapped in hell after SAVING THE FUCKING WORLD, or did they just want to believe it to justify messing with nature? Either way, they pulled her out of Heaven just so that their friend/Slayer would be around for their problems and emotional support, when other friends felt it would have been kinder to, you know, let her rest in peace. And Buffy was compelled to keep that little reveal to herself just to spare their feelings, and even when it was out, it was all very, “well, you’re alive now so suck it up and get over it.” So that’s not a good example of how they were supposedly better friends to Buffy than she them.

Also, Xander taking Riley’s side in the breakup without even bothering to listen to Buffy’s side let alone bother to even empathize with how hurt she was does not a good friend make. So I’m on @Jazzy24side here.

[Halting Hex]

Willow and Xander had no reason to suppose that HEEEEEEEAAAVEN even existed.  OTOH they knew that Hell-Dimensions exist, both from Buffy's tales of Angel's suffering and because we know Buffy shared her experiences in Anne with them, since Xander references it in The Replacement.  ("Buffster, you've been to Hell…they got one-bedrooms?")

Buffy died from falling through a portal to a HELL dimension, which was opened by a HELL-god.  To let her spirit rot simply on the basis of Faith and Hope and risk fate playing a cruel Trick on Buffy, now that would be heartless.

Option 1:  Willow and company bring Buffy back, Buffy misses Heeeeeeeeaven but gets to spend a few more years with her Precious Dawnie, and eventually returns to being "finished", albeit we still have no empirical evidence she was in a "better place", given that she didn't see Joyce (or Jenny or Jesse or any other dead friends) there.

Option 2:  Willow just lets Buffy chill, "but her soul ... her essence ... I mean, that could be somewhere else. She could be trapped, in-in some sort of hell dimension like Angel was. Suffering eternal torment, just because she saved us"

Which worst-case-scenario is worse?  I know which one I'd want to be certain wasn't happening.

(And recall, Willow knows about the "a century for every day" possibility, too.)

Even if the resurrection proved unfortunate, it still doesn't rise to the level of "cruel", which was the OP's argument.  Xillow acted out of love. ("It's Buffy.")

Nor is it "cruel" for Xander to point out that Buffy's window for going after Riley is rapidly diminishing, so if she thinks the relationship is worth saving, she needs to put her issues aside and get moving. 

(It is arguably cruel for Buffy go off on a tangent to attack Xander's relationship with Anya, which is so not the issue, but since the delay caused by said tangent may well be the reason Buffy didn't catch the helicopter [and thus ended up having months of degrading sex with an unrepentant serial killer/serial rapist/necrophiliac corpse], it's arguable that Buffy ended up only hurting herself, overall.)

[adhoc]

Was just re-watching OMWF, and then a few other random episodes from seasons 5 and 6. It's been years since I watched BTVS!

Came out here and saw this thread, so here are my unpopular opinions:

• Amber Benson did not rock my world as Tara. I've even wondered "what did Joss (or whoever did casting) see in her?" Sorry, all you Tara lovers. I found her pretty "meh".
• Alyson Hannigan never convinced me that Willow was gay.  I realize 25 years ago TV was more discreet than it is today, and the show was aiming for wholesome, not lewd. The thing is, I never got that "I'm really into her!" vibe from Willow.

[One4Sorrow2TooBad]

The first time I watched BtVS, I didn't care much for Tara either, I was still a Willow/Oz fan, but through it all ,I came to like Tara and was sad when she was gone. Mainly because how sad Willow was. The many times I've watched the series over, I came to like Tara, she was sweet and  she knew not to expect everything through magic. Deep down I always wanted Willow and Xander to find that true love in each other. 😂