And incidentally, I love Anya's death. It's brutal, it's devoid of greater meaning, it's random. This is what happens in war: people die. They don't get opportunities for last-breath soliloquys, they don't go down the hero, their deaths don't have individual 'meaning'. They aren't saved by the people they love or by the lives they've led. They... just... die. Brutally and needlessly. We hate being confronted with this fact in a fictional environment, where we expect that more or less everything will work out for the best. But Joss Whedon doesn't often go for that. He didn't with Joyce, and he didn't with Anya. That's one of the many things I admire about him.
I agree with this... some very true statements.
But, at the same time, I feel I must argue the point... yes, people die in war. It's a blunt fact. But Anya's death simply did not fit the show. It was out of place, rushed...
Yeah, Joyce's death was sudden. But her death was also given an entire episode. I can't help but feel that Anya's death was just a flaw in writing and a result of the fact that so much was crammed into the last episode of a series that clearly everyone working on was tired of. Joss has said it himself, how exhausted he was at that point with the show.
Throughout the show's history, other main character died as well. Tara was shot senselessly. But her death had consequences. It's something that Joss had preached from the beginning: Everything has consequences. Willow turned evil. Jenny died, and it was a major breaking point for the characters in S2. Her death also asserted that Joss was willing to let beloved characters go.
But I can't abide by Anya's death, saying it's the brutal truth. Because, quite frankly, this was a fictional show. And, up until that point, the "brutal truth of war" was only somewhat asserted. Her death was over in two seconds, and the only period of recognition was Xander saying something along the lines of "that's my girl... always doing the stupid thing". Now, there's no way of knowing whether the other characters reflected upon her after the fact (unless maybe you read the comics....) but for those of us who don't read the comics, that was it.
For me, it was just lax writing. Either the desire to kill someone off who the audience cared about, or (as one rumour has it...) so that Anya's character would not have to return if a movie was ever made. I'm betting on the first one.
