Well yeah, on an opinions board you tend to get people giving their opinions, unless they have facts to back them up. Pretty reduntant to say this.
Without Angel and Spike, the show would not last so long, I'm sure.
Pure speculation really. Many people enjoyed Season 4 and 5 of Buffy just fine and there's really no Bangel or Spuffy to speak of. For many the show was more about isolation, the meaning of family, growing up and adulthood, rather than who Buffy looks best with whilst kissing.
It's true that Angel was popular enough to get is own show and move out of Buffy's shadow and now he has his own comic to read and comment on. That might explain some of the longevity. Spike is popular but also devisive in his own right, hard to say if he helped the franchise say alive. He wasn't in most of Season 8 and that sold quite well for a while (better than the S9/10 sales).
The proof is exactly in the comics - almost 20 years of Buffyverse, and here we are discussing Buffy and Spike! While I notice that, about A&F S10, few people bother to discuss the monthly issues.
On this board people comment of Buffy more but not on the comicBuffy boards- then its about even. Lots of people love the return of Fred/Illyria for example.
And also people read Buffy to follow the characters of Willow, Xander, Dawn and Giles and their stories, not just Buffy and Spike as you so assert. Your Spuffy bias is clearly blinding you to the fact that there are other characters in the Buffyverse that people might find interesting.
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NOT having an arc? Are you kidding? She is having the biggest arc of her life
Its truly sad that you think this. The fact of Buffy having a boyfriend is not new nor is it particularly interesting (imo!
😛) and, as i have stated, it is not
her arc, it is the Spuffy arc. The attempts to inject drama and/or angst into this has failed because the writers can't think of anything new to say about them, they have to make crap up about Buffy's love life to create fake tension that never goes anywhere.
Buffy has always been much more than whoever she is currently dating- even when she was a teenager, on the show or even in the comics- she always had her own thing going on as well as the romance stuff. Every character in S10 so far (apart from Willow) has more going on than Buffy. Tragic that she's been reduced to this.