Season 2? Not the worst. Like a lot of you, I think it had strong foundations in character and theme. It also made great strides toward the season-length narrative arc structure that would define seasons 3 - 5.
Watching BtVS evolve was a lot like watching the evolution of the novel. Buffy season 1 is like like something out of Defoe or Fielding. The characters get up to all sorts of crazy adventures. They're stories, yeah. And they're bound together by character and chronology, yeah. But does that a novel make? Not quite. Our favorite castaway and our favorite scamp have entertaining and sometimes even enlightening adventures that occur in rapid succession, but those adventures lack depth. Chance, more than development, determines the obstacle that will be faced and overcome in the next installment. Buffy season 1 is the same way. It lays the groundwork for meaning, depth, and continuity. It approaches it at a crawl.
Season 2, well, we're getting closer. Season 2 of Buffy is like picking up a novel by Richardson. The disparate elements to which we were introduced in season 1 finally coalesce into an undeniable whole. There's some fat that could be trimmed, yeah, but there's also a recognizable attempt at a coherent beginning, middle, and end. Obstacles begin to be generated from within, not just by chance. Characters mature and develop within their stock roles and a very puritan, Richardsonian worldview. Buffy is the innocent, virtuous and besmirched "Clarissa," whose innate goodness trumps her enemy's evil. Likewise, Angel is the charming trickster, "Lovelace," whose true monstrosity is revealed and must be defeated in a duel. Fortunately, Buffy doesn't die. Just as in Richardson, theme begins to bind things together, albeit in a hit-you-over-the-head sort of way. It's heavy and a little preachy. Good and bad, right and wrong, are clearly delineated. Still, the seeds of something deeper -- something grayer and more complex and true to the human experience -- are there.
Just as the 18th century provided the often-shaky foundation for the form and structure of the novel, seasons 1 and 2 of Buffy helped the show to find its footing and to mature. Beginning with Jane Austen, the 19th century is generally regarded as the "classic" period for the novel. Similarly, the first two seasons propel Buffy into its classic period and then into its gothic period and then into season 7, which, umm, I don't get at all. 🙂