You know what I mean.
I don’t care if it turned out to be all Jasmine’s plot and Cordy was possessed. the visual of Conner and his mother-figure going at it turned me off the whole season. Well, that and the fact that they were “vamping” the season because Charisma got herself knocked up.
Might wanna ask a mod to spoiler the name, lissener.
Someone up above said that people hated him for not being Angel, and I think that’s what it ultimately boils down to, along with the Iowa farmboy thing. Personally, I liked him, and thought he brought an interesting dynamic to the group. Plus, I liked that Xander got another male friend and though I’m not at all a shipper, I totally believe Xander had a crush on him. Watch their scene in Family, where they’re rough-housing. The subtext there was pretty blatant, to me at least.
I threw some spoiler tags around his first paragraph, just to be on the safe side.
I tend to agree with you here. I still hold that the best man for Buffy was Parker. Yes, Parker. Every other guy wanted to change Buffy, or control her, or make her something other than what she was. Parker just wanted to bone her.
The meet-cute makes the FACT of the relationshipinevitable, and I was careful not to spoil any specifics, but whatever.
This is Buffy we’re talking about: it’s equal odds that a meet-cute is a sign of an inevitable relationship, or an incipient incursion by a cosmic horror. Or both.
At any rate, probably not a huge spoiler one way or the other, but better safe than sorry.
It was supposed to creepy and off-putting - and it succeeded magnificantly. The whole first part of the season was a masterpiece of slithering unease.
Also, I don’t mind that half the plotline was improvised. In many cases, like here, improvisation and outside constraints bring out the best in writers.
Just wanted to mention that I’m in 100% agreement with lissener on all points, though I’m at only around 70% of the intensity he is. (I consider Buffy a great a show, but nowhere near the caliber of, say, Deadwood or Breaking Bad.)
I loves me some season 6 Buffy, and I consider Normal Again one of the show’s crowning achievements.
On a side note, I foget who is arguing which position, but for my money Angel season 4 was a masterpiece.
Justin: (major spoilers)[spoiler]I’m not sure you’re remembering season 6 Xander correctly. He was clearly depicted as having cold feet in every single episode that season up until the wedding. (The Logo repeats that I’m watching are about halfway through season 6 right now.) It wasn’t out of the blue; it was heavily, obviously, and IMO somewhat clumsily telegraphed all season long.
I tend to agree that the addictiveness of magic wasn’t well fleshed out, but they did foreshadow it way back in season 5. Tara had already started with offhand comments before she got brain-sucked by Glory.[/spoiler]
All right, I just watched The Zeppo (Season 3 Episode 13) and I thought it was hysterically funny. It took me a while to catch on to what they were doing.
At first I was pissed off. I was thinking…
WTF? This is supposed to be ‘‘The Greatest Evil Ever’’ and the hellmouth is opening up and there has been no season buildup and now we have this totally random cheesy scene with Angel and Buffy and…
Oh. I get it. Buffy’s arc is just the B Story. :smack:
God, it was brilliant irreverence. I have the utmost respect for any show willing to poke fun at itself. Once I ‘‘got it,’’ I laughed until the end.
(Watched Bad Girls too, but I’m gonna wait and see how that develops before I comment…)
cough Deep Space Nine cough “Far Beyond the Stars” cough cough 
Ah, yes. I loved The Zeppo. Xander got to prove he was competent, and nobody but Faith notices.
The Zeppo is my second favorite episode of Buffy’s entire run.
I’m curious, which episode are you referring to that did that?
Or do you mean the whole,
Holy shit, Cardassians are occupying our space station for an entire season thing? 'Cuz I admit that was pretty trippy.
Yeah, never really did the ST thing. Don’t see starting it; that’s just too big a mountain for me to move from the unwatched column into the watched column. I’m not sure I’d live long enough.
The over-the-top schmaltz of the Buffy/Angel scene in “The Zeppo” is hysterical. I love that this is how Xander sees their relationship.
YOU GUYS. Someone stole all of my Buffy and Angel DVDs* a few months ago and I really can’t afford to replace them all right now. What kind of devilment is this? GRR ARGH.
*and 95% of my other DVDs as well.
Do you have Netflix? All of the seasons are available on the Instant Queue. Which is pretty convenient, but also makes me lose huge amounts of time.
No. I suppose I could get them from the library, but I’m still grouchy that someone stole my entire DVD collection. As is right and normal, I think.
LOVE “The Zeppo.” It’s amazing to me how hilarious it is while simultaneously being a very important “character development” episode. Just brilliant writing, bolstered by fantastic acting.
“Bad Girls” kicks off what is my single favorite story arc in all of “Buffy,” if that helps. 
It also introduces my single favorite Buffyverse character of all time, Wesley Wyndham-Pryce. And I know you’re just going, *“Say whaaaaa?!!” *as you read that. Let me just say this: You’ll see why.
He’s my favorite, too. I love Wesley more than a person should love a fictional character, I’m sure.
A word on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, if I may (I can hijack my own thread, right?)
DS9 is a work of art. I think you can enjoy it as a stand-alone series, but it helps to watch some episodes of NextGen first so you can see how utterly superior the writing and character development is in DS9. The thing about Roddenberry, bless his heart, is that he didn’t want his characters to be antagonistic toward one another, preferred that they be a ‘‘happy family.’’ So, when he died, the first thing Trek writers did is create a series in which everyone in the crew pretty much hated everyone else. DS9 is the dark underbelly of the Trek Universe, a place where all these intergalactic wars and phaser skirmishes have real consequences. The series’ first episode is a drop-kick in the face to anything Trek has been before–it starts with (extremely small spoiler) an exchange between Commander Sisko and the beloved Captain Picard, a ceremonial ‘‘passing of the baton’’ between series. But… what’s this? Sisko fucking HATES Picard, and can barely conceal his contempt? And you can’t blame him? Yes. Welcome to DS9.
Imagine if… former leaders of a Jewish resistance movement were forced to work, under the military occupation of the United States, in a diplomatic capacity alongside former Nazis. Imagine that the lines between the military, the church, and the state suddenly became incredibly blurred, so blurred that individuals themselves often weren’t sure what role they were playing. That’s a gross oversimplification of the show’s premise, but it should give you a basic feel for the dynamic at work. This isn’t your daddy’s Star Trek. This is about history that can’t be buried, genocide, corruption, spiritual fulfillment and religious skepticism, the hypocrisy of the Federation, the role of culture in politics, war as a necessary evil, and real human relationships. This is a seven season story arc with enormous complexity, deeply flawed characters and the close examination of issues screamingly relevant in today’s society. They took so many creative risks with that show it is a miracle they pulled it off. But goddammit, they did.
If you only ever watch one Trek Series, watch DS9. (link to a relatively spoiler-free trailer.)