If Buffy had stayed dead another 5 to 10 episodes

[JCoatsworth]

I think, if Buffy had stayed dead longer, the impact of her reincarnation would have been way greater. The show could have focused on the other Scoobies for a while, for example Dawn dealing with losing her whole family, or a grief-stricken Giles working in England, and Willow, Tara and the others struggling to fight the demons that are slowly but surely getting more and more.
Of course, all of this would have been even darker than Season 6 already is.

Just a random thought I had. What do you guys think?

 

[Wesley Pryce]

I would love this idea,but not happening, they wouldn't allow it,they need their title character alive. 🙂

 

[white avenger]

It would be hard, though, to run a series titled "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" for several episodes without the title character present in some form (and I don't think that the Buffybot should count as the real Buffy, before someone suggests it) Even if they had come up with some plausible reason to bring Faith back to fill in for the time, it still wouldn't work. If the series had been titled "The Vampire Slayer Chronicles," or maybe "Guardians Of The Hellmouth," yeah, they could have done without Buffy. Otherwise, it's her show. She doesn't have to be the central focus of every episode, nut she has to be there.

Now, what they might have done to get around that would have been to have a fairly lengthy flashback in each episode, or have Buffy appear as a disembodied spirit, the way that Spike did in Season 5 of "Angel." That would still, in my opinion, be cheating, but it's the closest that they could come to not actually having Buffy there.

 

[JCoatsworth]

Thanks for the answers, guys.
Sure, it's unrealistic, and pretty much no network would agree to do it, because they just need the title character in the show.
But if we disregard this issue, and they would do it, what would you think about it?

 

[AnthonyCordova]

Eh, maybe some fanboys and critics might have objected but I wouldn't have cared. If they had a really good idea to follow through with it, they could have taken the chance. You can't live in fear of fanboys and fangirls and critics. Some of them have poor taste anyway and would ruin the show if they always had it their way. Same thing with network execs. Of course, you have to compromise with network people but still, if the follow-through ideas were good enough...And as long as the show was getting good ratings...I personally would not have been upset if Buffy had been dead awhile longer. I think the idea has potential maybe.

Maybe if Buffy had been in hell instead of heaven (as has been offered as a possibility in other threads) maybe we could have seen Buffy in that dimension trying to survive and get out(?), as well as the gang trying to hold their own in Sunnydale. I don't know, there seem to be possibilities there for a creative writing team.

 

[Fuffy Baith]

It's an interesting idea and I agree that having her gone longer would make her resurrection have more of an impact. It would be nice to see how the scoobies were getting along without her. I guess then the question becomes what would have the season opener cliffhanger been? They clearly wanted to end the first episode with Buffy getting resurrected in her coffin.

My idea would be maybe make a big deal about how the scoobies think she's in hell and the last scene was of Buffy in heaven. I don't think that's any better though.

 

[Wesley Pryce]

Well i like the idea,i love the first ep with Spike,Willow,Tara, Xander,and Giles all fighting to kill the vampires,it was a fun,new style ,a great team effort,would've loved more of that. So i'm all for it 🙂

 

[TotallySpiked]

I think it would have been interesting if Buffy was in a hell dimension and the Scoobies thought she was in heaven and the only person who knew her whereabouts was Faith, who had some prophetic dreams about it.
It could have brought Faith back into the loop a bit earlier and earned her trust back with the gang; finally putting her differences from Buffy aside and devising a plan to get her out of that dimension. Maybe for a short time we see Faith struggling with the decision to come back given everything that's happened.
You could still deal with the fall-out of the Scoobies feeling bad about not researching where Buffy would end up if she'd die. Buffy could struggle with the idea that perhaps when she does eventually die again, where she would end up. The uncertainty and the 'hell on earth' outlook would still be there.
Just a few ideas...