Discussion of 8.16 "Time of Your Life" - Released 02/07/08 (Dark Horse)

nerd4hire said:
Good question Superstar. If Dawn is slated for 3 transformations, and they seem mythological in nature so far what's the third one. You know what would be cool? What are those hawk things from Norse mythology? Valkyries?

And yeah, Tranquility who was Buffy meeting with? My first guess was Giles and Faith, but she wouldn't need fancy dress for that. She did say the Nazi gold wasn't her only source of income, so maybe it was a meeting with an investor. One suspects a hint at an upcoming romance of some sort.

And Leah looked hot at the castle, then Boom! Another one bites the dust.
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Seeing as there's time travel going on, Dawn could turn into Twilight for her third form and come back and exist as both Dawn and Twilight at once

And maybe i just read it wrong (and i admit i did only have a quick flick through) but it seemed to me that Buffy was going to met someone that Willow's snake woman friend knows, didn't anyone else think that?


And it's nice to know that Kennedy gets special treatment, anyone else that threatened Buffy like she did would be in big trouble, yet Buffy doesn't even get a lil pissed with Kennedy saying it =|
 
I just had a thought as I was I was reading Clem Rocks post.

We've been taking it for granted Buffy's future betrayer is a Scoob. What if it isn't?

Somebody other than Buffy had to have been the one who set up that bank heist. Buffy wouldn't have had the knowledge. On the plane Buffy says to Willow there are other investors. Then there's Buffy getting dressed up to meet somebody in New York.

Some people are suspecting Hank Summers for Twilight. They could work the points above into that theory. Or it could be an upcoming Romance which has been forming in the background. It could be something else. Nevertheless the betrayer doesn't have to be a scoob. It is still the most obvious though.
 
I liked it. Did Kennedy call Willow "red" in the television series, because I don't remember her doing that. Anyways, I'm glad Kennedy's back, I've always liked her, brattyness and all.
 
nerd4hire said:
Somebody other than Buffy had to have been the one who set up that bank heist. Buffy wouldn't have had the knowledge. On the plane Buffy says to Willow there are other investors. Then there's Buffy getting dressed up to meet somebody in New York.
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Hopefully, she plans to meet more than just one investor. Regardless of how much gold, currency, and other valuables the Slayers were able to remove from the swiss bank vault, it would not be nearly enough to set up and run the sort of global operation that the Slayer franchise has become. The Scottish castle alone would have cost millions just to renovate into a facility suitable to be a Slayer force residence and training facility. Add to that the price of the extensive electronics, plus the sizable power generation unit required to run all of that equipment, and upkeep for whatever machinery that they might have, (the helicopter, for instance...)

That doesn't take into consideration the simple necessities of food, clothing, some sort of medical facility and the people to run it, weapons procurement...

Buffy is running a very large, very expensive enterprise, and the need for funding is going to be tremendous. Something like this in the real world would no doubt cost tens of millions of dollars, far more than the content of any single bank vault, unless they hit Fort Knox, and far more than anyone short of Donald Trump or Bruce Wayne could afford to bankroll.
 
Dawn's unexpected transformation started a chain reaction in my brain. Dawn is, after all, a pure construct of magic. The end of Magic would mean her own death, don't you think? What if her transformations haven't been the result of a spell by the betrayed lover, as we've been lead to believe (after all, where is Kenny now?), but a more sinister plot by Twilight to use Dawn as the catalyst for the end of Magic. Kenny could have been an agent of Twilight, or just a convenient decoy that is now dead and rotting somewhere...
Now, about that temporal anomaly... Willow seems to know a lot more about it than we thought. The vision of NY in flames in the previous issue didn't give us much in terms of clues, but Willow's got a lot out of that. This, and her reluctance to identify her "source" of info, makes me think that it's willow that is at the origin of the Anomaly.
I have two competing theories.
The anomaly is the point, in the far future, when Magic ceases to exist. Between Chosen and the beginning of season 8, Willow traveled through time to end magic in the future, because she didn't want any of her friends to be affected in her own time (especially Dawn, if I'm right that no magic means that Dawn is dead). By the time the end of Magic comes, all her friends (and herself probably) will be long gone. This act is still some sort of betrayal to the Slayer line, and it might be what Willow was refering to, evasively, when she said that she didn't betray Buffy any more than she already did (in the Future, do you follow me? 😉). Saga Visuki is a naga woman, a half snake creature. Snakes lay eggs. Is it a coincidence that the red artefact Buffy and Willow saw was egg-shaped and broken, as if it hatched something?
The second theory is that the anomaly is contemporary to Fray, and in a typical time travel paradox (egg or chicken thing), it is caused by Buffy when she meets Fray (maybe the two Scythes were never meant to meet each other), or by Willow when she travels to the future with the naga woman's help (naga are somewhat long lived or even immortal, Saga Visuki could be present at both epochs), not to end Magic, but to restore it.

Yeah, I know, my brain almost exploded. Hence the less than coherent rambling 🙂 But there you go, some food for thoughts. Dissect and comment away 🙂

Mike
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Edit:
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Oh, and now we know for sure that Satsu will be back, probably soon. Leaving her behind in Tokyo was a trick from Joss to make sure she survives the destruction of the Castle. Xander and Dawn probably weren't the only persons out when it was destroyed, so some characters may have survided as well (I can't imagine Andrew to be dead, and some other named Slayers, like Leah, might have survived too).

Mike
 
The whole Dawn turning into a Centaur I definitely don't like that idea, because I don't know it's just making the Buffy mythology a little too Charmed liked. I mean 7 yrs in the show I thought there were no such things are fairies and leprechauns and gnomes and elves and pixies, and such, but we get into season 8 we see fairies and now centaurs, I mean what's next imps? Also Dawn turning into a Centaur just proves to me that Joss Whedon has OBVIOUSLY NO IDEA, what to do with Dawn so to keep her interesting and relevant he's just turning her into a bunch of random stuff, and I could be wrong but so far it seems that way.

I think blowing up the castle was kind of cool and unexpected, but you would think that with all the money they seem to have to get helicopters and state of the art computers and communications and stuff, slayer weapons, and obviously money to pay an electric, water, gas bills and also money for groceries, they'd have something to detect a missile coming to the castle.

Also who taught Xander how to fly a helicopter? We know from I believe Season 4 that he no longer remembers his military training.
 
i really like this issue, i dont know why lol but i do.

i guess the whole concept of crossing fray and buffy over is a nice twist, hopefully this might breath new life into the fray comics but then again i wouldn't count on it.

As for dawn, i dont mind what they are doing with her. I like at the end of season six where she was starting to fight and become her own person however since there is a ton of slayers around i guess it hard to stand out eh?

as for the castle blowing up.... i like it, nice twist and i love twists.

lastly i think the art in this was better, buffy look like buffy mor then she did in the other comics. Kennedy look like Kennedy. see my biggest probem with the season 8 comic is some of the people in it look nothing like what they did in the show, you can disagree if you want but in this issue atleast they look alot better.
 
Also Dawn turning into a Centaur just proves to me that Joss Whedon has OBVIOUSLY NO IDEA, what to do with Dawn so to keep her interesting and relevant he's just turning her into a bunch of random stuff, and I could be wrong but so far it seems that way.
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Dawn long ago outgrew her usefulness.

Seasons 6 & 7 would have played out much the same without Dawn, probably even better. Dawn lovers - sorry.
The only vague use she had was for Buffy to focus on a job in Season 6 to support her. Would Buffy still have gone through the motions? Probably. The same money problems would have existed.

Season 7? Back to High School. That could have been accomplished just as easily another way, even done at the end of Season 6 as a lead in to Season 7. Such as showing Xander and construction crew building the School, having Robin meet Buffy while she was helping some student and being offered a job in the same manner done in Season 7 - with the season fade out of Buffy looking at the school with unease. Especially so since the way Season 7 began was to establish it's main focus in bringing Buffy and Robin in a face to face.
Dawn was really superfluous.

The real reason? Buffy and gang were growing up, no longer in their teens and Dawn was deemed necessary for the teen crowd to identify with. Her only real use right now is to somehow kill her.
 
B
Blondie Bear
Without Dawn, Buffy would have been even MORE alone, possibly driving her to actually sample the darkness Spike kept offering . . . and that would have been a heck of an arc.
Okay so first, what's up with the art? It was hideous. I'm only talking about the characters. They don't like anything like the real actors (but that's not what they were looking for anyway, I know that, and it was okay when they actually succeeded in doing something good that made us think "yep, that's Buffy.") and they don't look anything like the people in the 15 first numbers. Wtf ?!

Then, I'd like to shout out loud my hatred for Kennedy. I was calming down about her, but now I mean what a bitca !!!

Of course Willow knows way more that she shows. I like your theories Mike.

I liked this issue. Good start. Lots of questions unanswered... Who was Buffy meeting with ? (Angel? Now she's in the US...) What caused the anomaly ? When will Kennedy die a horrible death when a finally-aware Willow kills her ?

I didn't think the whole castle was blown up, only a tower. A big one, sure, but still. But you guys are probably right... I hope they're not dead...

About Dawn, I'm a little skeptic... Either Joss has a great idea about her, either he just doesn't know what to do with her. Why was she still a giant in "Wolves at the Gate" ? Etc.

We'll see. =)
 
nerd4hire said:
Somebody other than Buffy had to have been the one who set up that bank heist. Buffy wouldn't have had the knowledge. On the plane Buffy says to Willow there are other investors. Then there's Buffy getting dressed up to meet somebody in New York.

.
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What about the immortal guy that she was hanging about with in season 5 of angel could he figure in any of this, perhaps be helping her? They have never really mentioned him in Buffy S8 !

(I am not going by him from the Queen of the Slayers book as I myself dont consider this canon and also didnt really like the story!)

EDIT - I just relised that they do mention it at the beginning, that there is another Buffy dating him as a cover! However he could still be helping in some way!
 
I liked the issue, the art was very cool, very sexy which was a little odd and alarming.

I don't really get the whole dawn thing but it was worth it for that awesome full page image of her.

Im thinking the anomaly has to be either the magic ending, as told by the fray comic. Or the fact that the slayer line was again jumbled about being split with Fray and her brother, there would prob be something from that.

A male half slayer is pretty much a anomaly, make him a vampire and he's basically a male slayer.
 
Think I need to read this again, but loved it. The art was good.. but not as good as his work in Fray, maybe Karl was freaked about drawing Buffy. Hmm wonder who Buffy was going to see... someone she wants to look good for (you don't dress up like that for Giles). Maybe someone Angely? 😉 Kennedy and Willow are cute, but the way she talks to Buffy still pisses me off. Excited to see more of Buffy in Fray's world.. seems like she popped into the moment that we left off with Fray in Tales? I need to find my TPB of that now... the spider monkey is there, but maybe he's just her friend now? ..she was fighting that green clawy thing I guess.
 
Yes, it would look that way. The green monster and Buffy exchanged place, temporally. That's why Fray think the monster is trying to decieve her with an illusion (a glam) and she continues the fight against Buffy.

Mike
 
A
alexa
guess it's very Get it Done
In the last panel of the next to last page, right after the fist meets face introduction of Fray and Buffy, Fray, in the slang of her day, states something to the effect that whoever Buffy is, she is trying to pull some sort of scam by looking like...well...Buffy. I guess that answers the question as to whether the Fray story, where she finds the Watcher archive/library, in "Tales of The Slayers" is canon or not.

Other than its dramatic effect, though, I seriously doubt that Fray would have recognized Buffy and associated her with who she really was. It would be like me seeing someone who looks exactly like Jim Bowie or Davy Crockett and assume that they were trying to for some reason impersonate a couple of my personal heroes from the past.
 
I just got this issue (FINALLY! What took TFAW so long?!) and all I can say is, WOW! I was laughing the whole time. It's definitely my favorite issue so far. I hope the rest of the arc is this good (or even better, since this issue was sort of just an intro.)

Things I loved:

- Buffy, Xander, and Willow's conversation in the very beginning. I loved their talking about Chinese takeout ("Anybody want some more sweet and sour haggis?" "In two days' time, we'll be in the home of the best Chinese takeout in the world. Well, after San Francisco. And, I suppose, probably China..."), and then Xander telling Buffy to tell him how she knew about Saga Visuki "slowly, with many visuals."

- Centaur Dawn. When I first heard about it, I thought it'd be completely out of nowhere, but the whole "thricewise equals three curses" thing makes sense. Sure, the slapstick humor with Giant Dawn was pretty funny, but I'd like to see what they come up with now. I liked Xander calling Dawn "Flicka" and all that. I wonder what the third part of Dawn's curse will be.

- The return of Warren, Amy, and Twilight. I'd been wondering where those three ran off to.

- Willow and Kennedy. I'm horrified to admit this, but I actually kind of...*gulps* liked her reuniting with Willow. Their little conversation was kind of cute. But her bratty attitude toward Buffy did kind of annoy me.

- Buffy in New York. Just hilarious and adorable. "I'm King Kong of the worrrrld!"

- Xander telling Dawn how he's jealous that she gets to be a centaur. I just love Xander in season 8, but Dawn needs to go back to her less-complainy, Buffy season 7 persona.

- FRAY! Must I explain?

Yeah, to put it bluntly, I loved everything in this issue. Now...is it August yet?
 
white avenger said:
In the last panel of the next to last page, right after the fist meets face introduction of Fray and Buffy, Fray, in the slang of her day, states something to the effect that whoever Buffy is, she is trying to pull some sort of scam by looking like...well...Buffy. I guess that answers the question as to whether the Fray story, where she finds the Watcher archive/library, in "Tales of The Slayers" is canon or not.

Other than its dramatic effect, though, I seriously doubt that Fray would have recognized Buffy and associated her with who she really was. It would be like me seeing someone who looks exactly like Jim Bowie or Davy Crockett and assume that they were trying to for some reason impersonate a couple of my personal heroes from the past.
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As i read someone state somewhere, it's not that Fray recognises Buffy, it's that Buffy has the M? with her, therefor she must be a Slayer, and Fray knows they're all been dead for atleast 200 years, so she assumes it's just someone using a glamour. To her it's just the image of some random girl who's a Slayer, she probably has never even heard of Buffy
 
O
Otaku Mike
Very true
That whole comment about Dawn being "whiny," to me it felt like Joss' way of saying he felt that Dawn was too whiny, however since he's the creator of Dawn he's the one making her whiny and if he wanted her not to be anymore then he should write her that way
 
CharmedSlayer85 said:
That whole comment about Dawn being "whiny," to me it felt like Joss' way of saying he felt that Dawn was too whiny, however since he's the creator of Dawn he's the one making her whiny and if he wanted her not to be anymore then he should write her that way
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Yeah I enjoy how Joss gages the opinions of the audience to push the buttons of his characters. Or it's the fact that he agrees with most of us... Dawn really was played out as a whiny teenager, much more then the scoobies were.

Noticed that Buffy must have been talking to who she was meeting with on the phone. She says a meeting with a 'thing'... but would it really be a thing? Although are Angel or Spike things? 😛 More interesting to me if it was someone she knew.

And after I looked at Tales of the Slayers again, seems like we pick up a bit after Fray's story from there. Suppose the demon monkey is her sidekick now?
 
alexa said:
Yeah I enjoy how Joss gages the opinions of the audience to push the buttons of his characters. Or it's the fact that he agrees with most of us... Dawn really was played out as a whiny teenager, much more then the scoobies were.

Noticed that Buffy must have been talking to who she was meeting with on the phone. She says a meeting with a 'thing'... but would it really be a thing? Although are Angel or Spike things? 😛 More interesting to me if it was someone she knew.

And after I looked at Tales of the Slayers again, seems like we pick up a bit after Fray's story from there. Suppose the demon monkey is her sidekick now?
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I doubt Buffy is meeting with Angel and/or Spike seeing as how they're trapped in Los Angeles. Speaking of which how can all of Los Angeles be locked up in hell and the rest of the world not know about it, wouldn't that be like on all the major news media, and wouldn't Buffy definitely be trying to help if not herself then sending a tons of slayers there
 
A
alexa
because that might have all passed in 5minutes for all we know... time issue
R
Rowan Hawthorn
The other thing is, if I understand correctly, "After The Fall" is not happening at the same time as Season 8.
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