Spike didn’t have a whole town collapse on his head. Nor did he have an entire town implode around him.
Watch your videotapes, kiddies. When we last saw Spike, he was disintegrating. Sunnydale could not have collapsed on or imploded around Spike because there was no more Spike to collapse on or implode around.
Sunnydale collapsed into the void Spike left in the Buffyverse when he died. The episode having been shot before WB announced that AtS is being renewed and James Marsters is joining the cast as a regular, the town was completely grief-stricken at his apparent demise and tried to follow him into the Great Beyond.
Watch, Spike will turn up in the White Room at the W&H building, then have to make a mad dash for the door in order to avoid being crushed to a third death by the rubble of what was once a smallish Southern California town.
Not enough people died in the finale. They should have killed Andrew and Principal Wood and maybe even Xander. And more of the Former Potentials. For a titanic battle, it sure didn’t translate into a commensurate level of dead good guys.
Looked to me like most of the Potentials bought it. We only “knew” a few – Kennedy, Vi, Rona and Amanda. Kennedy lamentably survived, so did Vi. Amanda, sadly, died. Rona was not looking too hot at the end.
As for Wood, he’s hanging in there as possible spin off material, no doubt. You couldn’t kill both Anya and Xander with the set up they had – though if they’d been together and died trying to save each other, that would have worked. But I think you needed the Core Four to make it through.
Spike was offed before Angel was renewed, but I think they were planning to bring him into Angel from the get-go. There were some very strong hints at shanshu-ing in this episode.
If Spike is human when he shows up on Angel, it casts a whole new light on not only “Amends” from season 3, but all of the hell the First put Spike through this year on Buffy.
Since the First can’t die, it might be cute to see it have a one shot appearance on Angel at some point. Would be a decent chance to wrap up a loose end or two. Plus, I like the First. When it’s cool, it’s damn cool. When it’s lame, though, it’s… well, about as lame as lame can be. And that alone makes it Evil.
Season Six displayed the same pattern, IMHO. Started out strong up through the episode after the musical, then sort of stalled until the final 3-4 eps. Not really a coincidence that during that time, Giles left and the whole Buffy/Spike thing came out. I wasn’t as bugged by the magic addiction thing as a lot of people, but the absence of Giles and the twisted Buffy/Spike thing weighed the series down.
spectrum, actually, JM coming on board as a regular was what clinched Angel being renewed. Having a “new” character with a large ready-made fan base was a potential ratings boost that WB just couldn’t resist.
On the fan boards that I post too, there’s been speculation since Lurky said “we shall return your soul” that Spike would shanshu, much to Angel’s annoyance.
Swapping out the uber-unpopular Connor for the uber-popular Spike was about the smartest move WB could have made with regards to saving AtS and giving the ratings a much-needed shot in the arm. I just hope that the writers keep doing what they’re doing next season, only with Spike and less clothing.
(On Spike, that is. The writers can wear burqas, for all I care.)
Nope, DB Woodside has already signed a contract for a different series, while all the spin-off talk was up in the air. At first I assumed he would be on the Faith spinoff, but David Fury confirmed that Spike would be the male lead, not Wood, if the spinoff happened. I guess they kept him around because they really like him…
First, let me say that if any series deserved a 2-hour series finale, it was Buffy. To whoever is responsible for giving such an iconic show such short shrift, I say, “Grrrrrr!”
I did think that having so many people survive such a huge battle did seem a little contrived. It seems like we lost more kids to the Mayor and his vampire stooges at the high school graduation then we did having 15-20 newly inaugerated Slayers (who had some training, but little experience) fight an ocean of the same critters that once bounced Buffy’s ass all over the place. It was a bit, well, anti-climactic, as climaxes go.
I thought Wood should have died. If not in the school, (which would have been somehow fitting), then on the bus with Faith. Having one of the principles die would have added some weight and finality to the finale of a series that has never shied away from killing off regulars. I wouldn’t have minded losing ALL the SITs, too. Killing Anya was almost a throw-away, as she was probably the one character who had the least unfinished business. And I felt that having Xander show so little grief at her loss cheapened her exit even more … for all her short-comings, she deserved a better send-off.
I also agree that Spike’s heroic exit would have had much greater impact had it not been made known that he would be back next season, albeit on a different show. sigh
That said, there were some great Buffy moments in this episode. The oil wrestling comment, the appropriately brief and dryly comic appearance of Angel, Spike’s drawing of Angel, the D&D scene, Willow’s “sweet girl, not very bright” comment about Buffy, the four principles standing together for a moment before going off to take care of yet another Apocalypse … As another poster already said, it was like having just one more bang-up episode of Buffy, rather than something that knotted up all the loose ends … and that makes me even more sorry the show is gone. It made me realize how much I’m really going to miss it.
I agree. S7 was a disjointed mess. Worse yet, all the characters became loathsome: Spike lost his charisma, Xander turned sarcastic and bitter (he should have married Anya, IMO), Buffy became grouchy, and Willow lost her sweet innocence…And to top it off, they introduced the annoying SITs, who added NOTHING to the show.
Truly, BtVS would have been a much stronger series had it ended after S5. IMO, “The Gift” would have been a perfect ending to an exceptional show. I don’t plan to buy S6 or 7 on DVD.
All I’m going to say is that Joss must be the best script doctor ever. He took all the fantastically disparate elements of the past season and wrapped them up into an entertaining finale. Sure, there were some bits of stuffing sticking out the sides (The First’s sucky planning and all the things everyone’s already pointed out), but think about what a monumental task it was to take this show that had strayed so far from its core and bring it back into recognizable shape. Whedon is god, people!
I just thought of Xander going after a still alive Anya, fighting through the bringers and ubervamps to reach her, only for the two of them to get cornered and overwhelmed in slow motion Boromir style. I think that would have worked VERY well.
Joss had already stated that the main four will not die in the seris. They remain, always.
It may have been the First Evil, but that didn’t make it the most evil, or the best at being evil, or the smartest evil, or even the most dangerous evil. Heck, Jasmine was worlds more powerful. And it was never even explained why it could only take on the forms of the dead people.
Uh-huh. Or maybe like many prophecies it can be interpreted after the fact to fit many situations. I actually have heard of a willing suspension of disbelief, thanks for asking, but to me it’s revisionist to say the prophecy in question refers to anyone other than Angel. I’d be interested in seeing any comments you can find from the writers saying they knew a few years ago that Spike would get his soul back and sacrifice himself to save the world, and they wrote that prophecy as an intentional red herring. Until then, I’ll go with the simpler explanation that a prophecy on AtS three years ago concerning the vampire with a soul refers to Angel, not Spike.
Sorry, but this whole “san-shu” thing was mentioned on 1 episode of A:ts, some three years ago. Sure it would be interesting if this prophecy applies not to Angel, but to Spike. But you’re stretching this bit of speculation, and acting as if it was an obvious fact. I’ll admit that it’s a possibility…but I could bring up a lot of other bits of “foreshadowing” that point Spike in a whole other direction. (by the way…your points about the quality of ME’s writing sound exactly like what I wrote last month…funny!)
Anyways…since we’re all nitpicking…I’ll add my own: I think the writers should have taken better advantage of The First’s talents. It would have been cool if it appeared as characters from the past that we didn’t even know were dead. Like as Riley or Oz. Then both the viewers and the Scoobies would be surprised as we find out that this character had been killed since the last time we saw them. The First really could have done some damage that way…
