EffulgentBitca
Scooby
It's important to be able to critique what you love, so here we go. What are the moments, decisions, or general stuff happening throughout BtvS and AtS that you believe could have been written and/or approached in a better manner? What bothered you the most in the Buffyverse?
My list includes:
1. Not exploring the AR from Buffy's perspective. Bonus point for not having any conversation between her and Spike about it in season 7.
2. The treatment of the female leads on AtS, most notably Cordelia's arc. There's much to be said about the turn that her character's story took, but even leaving that aside for a moment the fact that I have to refer to her using the term mystical pregnancies, as in plural, is irksome in itself. There's also Fred and how the focus stopped being on her journey of adapting, growing, and learning to live with all the trauma, and shifted instead to her being the common object of affection for two guys. And, of course, they made the love triangle all about them, not her.
3. The execution of Empty Places. This is one of the most controversial episodes of the show and I think part of the reason for that is that the characters have legitimate complaints regarding Buffy's attitude, but the way in which everything plays out isn't organic (Dawn kicking Buffy out of the house is still something I find hard to believe) and it ends up feeling contrived. It should be an opportunity for Buffy to confront her wrongs and learn from them for the finale, which she does nonetheless, but everyone's terrible behaviour and their extreme, thoughtless solution distract from that. The characters saying, thinking, and acting awfully towards each other without ever truly geting a resolution on that, since the show is ending, is a sad way in which to leave them after all these years. It also doesn't help how so much of the season was focused on the Potentials instead of the core group, including the mutiny itself for which they are the catalysts.
4. The slight overlook of Angel's development and history throughout his show in episodes such as the last two in Buffy and in parts of the 5th season of AtS.
5. Reducing the richer, more nuanced conflict between Spike and Angel to girl-drama. I'm looking at you, Destiny. Somewhat related to that, I'm also not a fan of how they turn into petty, entitled children in episodes such as Chosen and The Girl in Question. I know it's mostly played for laughs, but I wish they adressed that properly since every single guy that had feelings for Buffy exhibits this toxic attitude. *Xander and Riley joined the chat*
Honorable mention:
Lying and deliberately misleading the audience, creating unecessary confusion in the process. Spike's journey at the end of the 6th season and the writer's comments accompanying it are explicit in that sense. But there are also small moments, such as Dawn's robotic weirdness in No Place Like Home when she is alone with Joyce, a scene that exists for the sole purpose of building up artificial tension. I'm also a bit conflicted regarding the withhold of information at the end of AtS and the avalanche that follows in a short stretch of time, but I also kind of like it so we'll leave it at that. Oh and I have to give a shout out to a special variation of this issue, unfortunately deserving of its own category given the frequency with which one encounters it in the Whedonverse:
The emotional manipulation of suddenly putting people together after a long anticipation (Fred's rushed, yet perfectly timed reciprocation of Wesley's feelings for her, anyone?) and showing them being happy just to maximise the impact of the death of one of them. Bonus point for adding Tara in the intro of Seeing Red.
My list includes:
1. Not exploring the AR from Buffy's perspective. Bonus point for not having any conversation between her and Spike about it in season 7.
2. The treatment of the female leads on AtS, most notably Cordelia's arc. There's much to be said about the turn that her character's story took, but even leaving that aside for a moment the fact that I have to refer to her using the term mystical pregnancies, as in plural, is irksome in itself. There's also Fred and how the focus stopped being on her journey of adapting, growing, and learning to live with all the trauma, and shifted instead to her being the common object of affection for two guys. And, of course, they made the love triangle all about them, not her.
3. The execution of Empty Places. This is one of the most controversial episodes of the show and I think part of the reason for that is that the characters have legitimate complaints regarding Buffy's attitude, but the way in which everything plays out isn't organic (Dawn kicking Buffy out of the house is still something I find hard to believe) and it ends up feeling contrived. It should be an opportunity for Buffy to confront her wrongs and learn from them for the finale, which she does nonetheless, but everyone's terrible behaviour and their extreme, thoughtless solution distract from that. The characters saying, thinking, and acting awfully towards each other without ever truly geting a resolution on that, since the show is ending, is a sad way in which to leave them after all these years. It also doesn't help how so much of the season was focused on the Potentials instead of the core group, including the mutiny itself for which they are the catalysts.
4. The slight overlook of Angel's development and history throughout his show in episodes such as the last two in Buffy and in parts of the 5th season of AtS.
5. Reducing the richer, more nuanced conflict between Spike and Angel to girl-drama. I'm looking at you, Destiny. Somewhat related to that, I'm also not a fan of how they turn into petty, entitled children in episodes such as Chosen and The Girl in Question. I know it's mostly played for laughs, but I wish they adressed that properly since every single guy that had feelings for Buffy exhibits this toxic attitude. *Xander and Riley joined the chat*
Honorable mention:
Lying and deliberately misleading the audience, creating unecessary confusion in the process. Spike's journey at the end of the 6th season and the writer's comments accompanying it are explicit in that sense. But there are also small moments, such as Dawn's robotic weirdness in No Place Like Home when she is alone with Joyce, a scene that exists for the sole purpose of building up artificial tension. I'm also a bit conflicted regarding the withhold of information at the end of AtS and the avalanche that follows in a short stretch of time, but I also kind of like it so we'll leave it at that. Oh and I have to give a shout out to a special variation of this issue, unfortunately deserving of its own category given the frequency with which one encounters it in the Whedonverse:
The emotional manipulation of suddenly putting people together after a long anticipation (Fred's rushed, yet perfectly timed reciprocation of Wesley's feelings for her, anyone?) and showing them being happy just to maximise the impact of the death of one of them. Bonus point for adding Tara in the intro of Seeing Red.