Am I The Only One Who Hated Season 6?

Season 6 is MY favorite...maybe because there was no "Big Bad" but I understand where you're coming from. Maybe that's because I like Spike and, although, it's not that I DON'T like Buffy, I like Spike more. And I think he did have to go through a heck of a lot in both season 5 and 6 that wasn't much fun.

I've always kind of a had a problem with the Spike vs Angel/Angelus thing too. It made sense when it happened. Can't blame Angel for things Angelus does. But, when looking at the whole series (and even the last season of Angel) I don't understand the flak Spike gets.
I mean, when Angel loses his soul...he's just evil. Although, somehow, Spike finds a way to NOT be evil, even without a soul. Chip or no chip, I find it hard to believe that he COULDN'T have found a way to do evil things even with a chip. How about Warren? He had a soul AND wasn't a vampire and yet could still be evil.
I think he deserved more appreciation than he got. Especially when they hold him up against Angel.

Although, I will give the "Scoobies" some leway in being mean to him or at least sarcastic and rude...because one of the reasons I like Spike is because he makes me giggle with how sarcastic and rude HE is. Which Angel, wasn't so much. Which is probably why Xander (and others) didn't say snotty things to his face.
And, I have to figure, that if they were all sweet to him, then Spike wouldn't have the opprotunity to be a sarcastic smart-butt and then a lot of my fun would be gone.

I CAN understand PART of Buffy's malfunction when it comes to Spike. I can understand the "using him" part. There have been times that I've felt that lost (maybe not yanked out of heaven lost, but lost) and I could see me turning to a guy that I knew adored me and not really being as into it. I don't tolerate her CRUELNESS well though. That part bugs me as well. It always feels like she could have gotten her point across many times without actually being cruel.

Then again, I think she gets hers for it in Season 7 when they boot her out.

All in all, it's still my favorite season. I really like the part where there ISN'T a big evil (unless you count Willow) and I love the HUGE array of character feelings. I have to appreciate it...even if I don't fully understand why Buffy felt the need to be cruel. I suppose, I will be able to critique it better when I'm yanked out of heaven and forced to care for my little sister with no mother, no money and all my plans for the future dashed, when everyone else seems to have a place but me and a sarcastic vampire. :lmao:
 
I rewatched Dead Things just to try and and force myself to understand Buffy's violent breakdown. And, I have to say, I might have actually gained some insight.
Although, I'm not sure I understand the violent pummeling that Buffy/Spike and even Buffy/Angel get into...but I just may not be a violent pummeler.

I DO believe now that Spike wanted her to beat the crap out of him. Hence why he pulled out the vampire face for apparently no reason. So, she could hate him more and beat the living crap out of him.

But, in listening to her horrible tirade that she threw onto him....some insight emerged.

She'd just killed someone (or thought she did) and she can see Spike basically saying, "This one person is no big deal". She can remember all the crap that went on with Faith and knows she'd be a hypocrite to NOT turn herself in. She knows she can't tell the police what ACTUALLY happened, (and we can assume she can't afford a lawyer from Wolfram & Hart) so she'll just be locked up for who knows how long.
I'd say it would not be a stretched to guess that she doesn't really WANT to turn herself in and go to prison for 30 years. And, there is Spike telling her not to.
I think all the insanity just culminated. The feeling that she was "distant" from her friends but CLOSE to Spike. Like she DID come back wrong. She could rationalize Angel because HE had a soul. She could rationalize other things (like Xander and the hyenas, because he was possessed by hyenas). But, Spike, she has to assume is still EVIL. Heck, he says he's "evil" all the time.
So, in my mind, it wasn't like she was fighting WITH Spike, but fighting with her feelings that she couldn't rationalize. Spike "must" still be evil and therefore, if she's in cahoots with him and he's the one she's been trusting and his "don't turn yourself in" and "this girl doesn't matter" theory makes sense even a little bit in her head, then she'd have to assume SHE'S evil too.

It made a LOT more sense when I realized that he had done the vampire face thing for no apparent reason, when staying normal would have stopped some of the beating (and when he turned back, it did stop) and when I realized how this attack was supposed to go with the breakdown with Tara later....it started to make more sense.

It kind of reminded me of a friend I have that got addicted to Hydrocodone. Technically, it wasn't even all his fault, his stupid doctor was a little free with the prescriptions and not with the watching and it got out of hand. It was as close to "evil" that I've been. But, even when he was trying to get better, and probably is still better, I find myself weighing everything he says and does. I can easily see where if I were losing touch with my sober friends and were only friends with him (mainly during the actual drug time) I would start to wonder what the heck was wrong with me too.

Thanks for making me rewatch though. The pummeling is still hard to watch, but it did help to realize she wasn't really beating SPIKE up, but herself. It just doesn't help Spike's face too much. ::evil::
 
well i just started, and Willow I'm not liking at all for atleast 100 reasons, I do like the trio and Anya/Xander so far, but this will probably change ^.^ So I hope i don't hate season 6, it's not that bad so far... except for Willow using to much magic and making tara forget things :/ : erm :
 
Um... I don't think that Season 6 was all that bad. I mean, it's definitely not my favorite, but I still think it's okay. The Trio weren't too good as villains. Very funny, but not sinister or badass enough to top Faith, the Mayor, Adam or Glory. The things that really saved the season were:
A) The musical, Once More With Feeling
B) Dark Willow
I agree that Buffy can be pretty self-centered, and I did yell at my TV during this season, but I think you disproportionately hated this season.
 
I never really liked either Adam or Glory very much. I DID love the mayor and I like The First and all the fun he brought. I think it was because I never quite understood Adam and Glory's motives or what they were trying to do.
Glory does make me laugh, but her story just never quite clicked in my head as something that made sense.
Maybe it was the addition of the Initiative for Adam and those other guys out to get Glory. They kind of muddied the waters. (And my brain likes nice clear waters.) I like good and bad. Not good, bad and other people who seem to be working both against the good and the bad and never seem to want to try to compromise or come to an understanding.
Willow I get. And the Trio, I get. Nice and simple.
 
I've recently been re-watching Season 6 since I got it just a couple of weeks ago. I decided to give it another chance because I remember hating it with a passion before. But after re-watching the first 20 episodes (with 2 more to go) its not bad at all. I figured out what annoyed me in it the first time around watching it though. Buffy and her immaturity with Spike in it. Season 6 was the most immature I've ever seen Buffy act and I didn't care for it at all. Especially since Buffy has always been my favorite character but in Season 6 she was my least liked character. Not to mention all the sex with Spike brought her down even further, especially when it got completely classless. Like the Balcony scene in Dead Things or in the beginning of As You Were when she brought her sister something to eat only she had to have sex with Spike outside their house first and then gave her sister the squished burger. Her sister should have came first, not sex with Spike. Once Riley showed up in As You Were, that was the first time I've seen Buffy act more like herself since S6 started. She looked even happy up until the point where she found out he was married. I wish he wasn't though, she could have had a healthy relationship again and I never felt things with Buffy/Riley were really resolved. But anyway, after As You Were, she finally started acting more like herself again.

What really made S6 good though was Willow. Her struggle to give up the addiction to magic, her relationship with Tara, her going all dark Willow after Tara dies. She's what kept S6 interesting. The Trio, while horrible villains, provided good comic relief (Well, Jonathan and Andrew did at least). And Xander/Anya provided adorableness up until Hells Bells. One bad thing about this Season besides Buffy would be very little Giles. I hated him leaving in S6. And of course even worse was Tara dying because she is such an awesome character.
 
W
Wiccaness
im right there with ya...willow made the season awesome!
I loved Season 6. I didn't mind the lack of the big bad. They were all facing their inner demons. That was what was important.

I've got to agree that there was a lot more to season 6 than the Spike/Buffy affair. Even if you take those two out of the picture, we've got Willow letting her magic run wild. Everyone is so involved in their own drama that no one really notices until things get all crisis-like. But there are very strong indications of Willow's increasing isolation and addiction through the whole season. That's a really interesting journey to watch. Heck, I would have loved season 6 just for dark Willow. Her journey reminds us that even the best of us can lose control and do horrible things. But just a little love and support (thank you, Xander) can bring us back to ourselves for long enough to get help (thank you, Giles).

Giles struggling with his father role was also very touching. At some point, a parent has to let go and let the kids sink or swim on their own. There are just some lessons that you can't learn -- some strength that you can't achieve -- when you are dependent on mom and dad. That's a really hard thing for a parent to face. Giles saw that he had held on for too long. He felt he was doing all of them a disservice by being a permanent safety net. His choice to leave was hard on everyone. And I think it was wrong. Given the back-from-the-deadness and stuff, I really don't think they were ready to stand on their own as adults. I think what we saw of Giles' character was really touching. He loved them enough to leave because that's what he thought was best for them, not because he relished the idea of leaving the people who had become his family.

Xander screws up big time. Which is refreshing, since he's usually the one judging everyone on how bad they screw up. He starts to make a really good life for himself. But he's got these nagging insecurities about where he comes from. He comes from the drunk hick family with the uncle in prison and the stereotypical gender roles and the working class jobs. I feel him on that one. That's where he comes from. And he's afraid that's where he's taking Anya. That makes so much sense to me that it's scary. Like Lindsay, Xander has always felt like the outsider because, at the end of the day, he's still the guy who resembles Roseanne's husband more than Ray Romano or any of the Friends. He faces that. He faces it wrong, yeah, and hurts Anya terribly in the process, but he faces it. And in Season 7, he's able to move on.

Anya tries to go back to being a demon, but finds that she's got too much human in her. She feels guilty. She hates the job. She's not meeting her quota. And when frat boys die... she wants to die to bring them back. She can't go back. She's been hurt, but regressing isn't the answer. It won't make the hurt go away. In the end, Anya chooses her human side. That's a huge step for her.

I could go on and mention the trio and Tara and Dawn and probably a few other things, but this post is getting kind of long. My point here is that in this season, the characters all face their inner demons. Every one of them. They all grow up. They put the easy, black-and-white world of childhood behind them and face the uncertainty of adulthood. Season 6 is HARD on the scoobies. They lose their innocence. But they come out of it as adults ready to take on the First evil and its manipulations because, now, they have some idea of what evil is about. Season 6 has sooo much character development that it's great. I couldn't hate it if I tried -- and that's without mention of the Buffy/Spike debacle.
 
G
GATEGOD
I didn't recognize you with your new avatar ^_^ totally agree!
Ii disagree here big time, there was nothing going on to give him a breaking point, right before he tried to rape her they were talking about why buffy couldnt let xander kill spike, his the one that starts to get closer to her and tries to get her to feel it

I think people usually misinterpret the Spike rape scene, IMO it's very clear what it was all about, basically Spike LOVES Buffy, Buffy doesn't know what she feels for him, but its important to remember that their RELATIONSHIP is completely sexual, sex is what keeps it going (also Buffy is in a way using Spike throughout the whole of Season 6, to "feel") In the rape scene Spike tries to make Buffy feel what he feels for her, but because he hasnt been able to make her "feel" in any other form but sex, he "rapes" her, stupid of him, yes, but also realistic.

Hope what i wrote is like clear cause its hard to explain!

Oh and I LOVE season 6!
 
palabravampiress
palabravampiress
That makes sense. Spike even said as much before she kicked him away.
I watched season 6 for the first time and finished it like 1 week ago.
I do not hate this season. I found very interesting, like palabravampiress said: "they were all facing their inner demons" and that was interesting.
As far as I'm concerned, I think it is way more interessant to see how a relation is going on, than to see Buffy fighting a demon. I mean, you can learn a lot, even on yourself sometimes. And that makes the season interesting. You can't watch it once and say: "I got everything". For me you have to watch it several times in order to get everything, in order to be able to take the side of such or such character.
Apart from that, let me say what I didn't like:
> Tara's death of course, I feel like her character could have brought a lot in the next season. We barely began to know her better and then...
> First I thought that I would miss Giles because he is one of my favourite characters but, in fact, I forgot he left. It's only when he came back that I realised he actually left. I don't think it's a bad thing that he went back to the UK. The characters needed to grow up by themselves.
> I also thought that the trio would be more present, like in each epi and I thought I'd be fed up with them. But no.

So, of course, I'm gonna rewatch this season, as soon as I have time!
 
W
Wiccaness
yay another s6 fan...and completely agree w/ you
I loved S6, but I wasn't a big fan of the trio. I actually loved seeing Buffy, Xander and Willow screw up, each in their own way. It was nice to be reminded that they were humans with flaws, makes them more interesting.
 
W
WickedWillow2
I hated the trio. I fast forward sometimes through their parts. I do however love Andrew in season 7.
I looooooooooved season 6. One of my favorites. There's always room for improvement but I don't think I could see much change about season 6.
 
T
TabulaRasa
Yes I don't think I could have seen much change either. Other than a slower more painful death for Warren.
Season 6 is very depressing.But there was intentionally no "big bad" due to the fact that Joss was attempting to build it up to a Anti-climactic final.wich was no where near Anti-climactic because you could see a mile away that she she was going to lose the plot eventually.And i found their relation ship to be rather dissgusting too,but its good in a way i guess.
 
Season 6 is very depressing.But there was intentionally no "big bad" due to the fact that Joss was attempting to build it up to a Anti-climactic final.wich was no where near Anti-climactic because you could see a mile away that she she was going to lose the plot eventually.And i found their relation ship to be rather dissgusting too,but its good in a way i guess.

Do you mean She as in Willow, and they as in Willow and Tara?
 
I didn't hate Season 6. I consider it to be amongst the best of the series.

It's interesting how many BUFFY fans seemed to prefer the early years, when Buffy had remained a high school student. They seemed to have a low tolerance of Buffy having to develop as a character and mature into an adult. Some claim that they simply couldn't tolerate the bad writing. I disagree. I don't think the writing was worse than it was during the early years. I suspect that many simply wanted the show to remain the same without any real development.


There were two Big Bads for Season 6. Their names were Warren Mears and Willow Rosenberg. Just because they were humans, does not mean they were not capable of being monsters . . . or being a threat to the world.
 
I JUST WANNA POINT OUT ONE THING!!!

spike had to literly talk himself in to biting the girl and who knows if he actully would have drained her dry?

i am so sick of everyone judging him cause

No soul = bad

people with souls do hurrendious things everyday

warreewn for exaple

katrina was right it would have been rape and he killed her not to meantion tara and what he said to willow
 
Nope, you're not the only one.

But, me, personally? I LOVED IT! Sorry, I loved the whole idea of the season and the standalones were stellar, as well as the arc. A few stinkers, but still great.
 
I liked most of season 6, mostly Anya, and Evil Willow was cool and evil... Non evil Willow I'm no so lovey about though. She seemed more evil when she wasn't super evil Willow in my opinion. Which is the only thing I didn't like ^_^ Her and her obsession with Magic through out the season and the pushing away of Tara etc. etc.
 
I wish we could have kept Tara. She was just so nice and good and wonderful (says the oh-so-articulate Palabra).

But, then again, I like that all of this delving into the dark side of the Scoobies came with a cost.
 
I wish we could have kept Tara. She was just so nice and good and wonderful (says the oh-so-articulate Palabra).

But, then again, I like that all of this delving into the dark side of the Scoobies came with a cost.

Those reasons are exactly why we couldn't keep her! :lmao: Joss likes to delve into things, give great characters, and kill them. ESPECIALLY because they just got back together in that episode.

Personally, I was more sad because of her growth that season and how Amber Benson really gave her more of a role than she was supposed to have, imo. It could've been very system, but she really made that character better than it was. The speech in "Entropy" and just how she became her own character and not the shy outcast in the group.
 
noo i didnt mean,willow and tara's relationship was disgusting,theres was one i miss more than the others.i meant that buffy and spikes was.
 
Back
Top Bottom