Confusion

[Anonymous416]

On the episode, "Potential", Buffy told the potential slayers that her death could make one of them the next slayer. When Dawn thought she was a potential slayer, she said that Buffy would have to die if she ever got activated. But when Buffy died in seson 6, how come another slayer wasn't activated?

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

There is a very long answer to this but the short is
Season 5 Buffy wasn't the active Slayer, Faith was.
Willow's spell to revive her thrust her back in the Slayer line and we don't count the Computer going beep at the end of season 6 in the hospital after Buffy has been shot as a death.

 

[SARArb]

i was confused about it too. thanks. 🙂

 

[Optional]

that's not how I see it, but that's a possibility. I saw it because it was a mystical death as was very clearly stated in the show. Since she wasn't physically dead, her soul and essence were still out there somewhere, it didn't count as dying. I'm sure the end of season 6 is she wasn't dead long enough? She was dead a lot longer in season 1. Or.. Willow being all powerful could have interrupted the connection with the slayer line mojo and prevented it from knowing Buffy had died. That's how I saw it.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

that's not how I see it, but that's a possibility. I saw it because it was a mystical death as was very clearly stated in the show. Since she wasn't physically dead, her soul and essence were still out there somewhere, it didn't count as dying. I'm sure the end of season 6 is she wasn't dead long enough? She was dead a lot longer in season 1. Or.. Willow being all powerful could have interrupted the connection with the slayer line mojo and prevented it from knowing Buffy had died. That's how I saw it.

Actually if you rewatch the episode, its very likely that the reason she 'flatlined' wasn't actualy death but Willow causing interference with the machine, bit like a 'cell phone'.

However, the end of season 5 when Buffy died, even though it was a mystical death, her body still died and her soul went to the next stage.
This is confirmed in Angel because Skip suggests its unlikely that Cordelia would come back from this next level as no one ever has, except a slayer once.

Mystical or not, Buffy's death at the end of season 6 was very real and Willow's ressurrection spell didn't just bring her back, brought the Slayer back and put her where she belonged. Season 7 deals alot with this.

Buffy 'died' in season one, relinquishing her position as active Slayer, died again in season 5 as a regular girl with super powers then brought back as The Slayer(causing a paradox one wonders being two active Slayers within the line) and then survives the gunshot wound to stand as the Slayer.

 

[nerd4hire]

Concerning the Season 6 flat-line death (if that's what it was), I often wonder why people are so quick to sluff off Xander's quote from his Dirty Girl's in praise of Buffy speech.

She's laid down her life—literally—to protect the people around her. This girl has died two times, and she's still standing.

So that exists. It's canon. You now have to approach it one of 3 ways.

Fanwank it with some variation of "Xander made a mistake".

Say the writers don't know as much about how many times Buffy died as you too.

or...

accept the fact, that somehow for whatever reasons, in the Buffyverse Buffy has only died twice.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

Concerning the Season 6 flat-line death (if that's what it was), I often wonder why people are so quick to sluff off Xander's quote from his Dirty Girl's in praise of Buffy speech.



So that exists. It's canon. You now have to approach it one of 3 ways.

Fanwank it with some variation of "Xander made a mistake".

Say the writers don't know as much about how many times Buffy died as you too.

or...

accept the fact, that somehow for whatever reasons, in the Buffyverse Buffy has only died twice.

Willow had so much power and energy going through her, its very likely that we are supposed to infer that she caused a power disruption in the machines.

I'd bet any money that was the intended point of that.

 

[Black Eye Guy]

Also when a machine flatlines, it doesn't actually mean the persons dead, it means the heart is beating to slowly for the machone to pick up. But the person can still be alive.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

Also when a machine flatlines, it doesn't actually mean the persons dead, it means the heart is beating to slowly for the machone to pick up. But the person can still be alive.

We don't want to go down that route. Technically Buffy's heart couldn't have stopped properly in season 1 yet it classed her as dead.

The only explanation that fits with the facts as they stand(which we know can change) is that the machine was effected by the electromagnetic disruption caused by Willows power overload.

 

[meg]

buffy has died in season 1 then in season 5 then in season 6 they did class it as another death because if u remember in season 1 she only died for a minute excatly the same as season 6 she flatlined there for her heart and lungs were not working = death the reason another slayer wasnt called is because faith is still the active slayer and even if buffy died completly faith would still be an active slayer so another one wouldnt be called its just a scriptwriting flaw when they state that buffy would have to die for another to be called

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

buffy has died in season 1 then in season 5 then in season 6 they did class it as another death because if u remember in season 1 she only died for a minute excatly the same as season 6 she flatlined there for her heart and lungs were not working = death the reason another slayer wasnt called is because faith is still the active slayer and even if buffy died completly faith would still be an active slayer so another one wouldnt be called its just a scriptwriting flaw when they state that buffy would have to die for another to be called

Show me anywhere that they say Buffy died in season 6?
It's not even suggested.
The more likely explanantion, that fits with everything we know, is that Willow, magically charged as she was, affected the electrical machinery.

 

[meg]

she flatlined it was nothing to do with willow all willow did was remove the bullet and heal her. she affects the lights i've just read the transcript but it says nothing about the machinary just the lights

quote from xander - XANDER: You've got to stop doing this. This dying thing's funny once, maybe twice.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

she flatlined it was nothing to do with willow all willow did was remove the bullet and heal her. she affects the lights i've just read the transcript but it says nothing about the machinary just the lights

quote from xander - XANDER: You've got to stop doing this. This dying thing's funny once, maybe twice.

Ask yourself this.
What is the difference between tha electrical current going through the lights and going through the machinery?
Nothing.
You've read a transcript not THE script.
With all the mojo going through Willow, the fact is more likely that Willow affected it then Buffy dying.

As for the Xander comment - late in teh series he doesn't count that as a death - which means 1 of two things.
1) everyone on the show 'forgot' that the lead character died again
2) he realised that Buffy didn't actually die, it was faulty machinery caused by the Willow power surge.

 

[meg]

i've always counted it as a death and will continue to do so...

 

[nerd4hire]

I've never understood why people insist on believing the parts of the script that don't make sense, but write off the parts that do as script flaws.

You mention this.

"quote from xander - XANDER: You've got to stop doing this. This dying thing's funny once, maybe twice."

But Xander later says Buffy only died twice.

So why was the mistake in the later quote, but not in the earlier one. If we say the earlier one we can simply say the first one was hyperbole, or conjecture, where the second one is based on a later on more studied examination by the scoobs of the facts.

You say the three flat out declarations the line passed through Buffy were errors, but if we choose to believe them we can make sense of the questions of Season 7. If we don't we can't.

 

[Spirit_Of_Fred]

she affects the lights i've just read the transcript but it says nothing about the machinary just the light.

well, according to this script, it was all the machines:

(Suddenly, the lights in the room start to flicker)
NURSE #2: BP - it's... I don't know what it's doing...
(We can hear the heart monitor start to go crazy - slowing and speeding up... Now we see that all the electrical monitors in the room are malfunctioning)

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