Buffy to be canceled!

[Edena_of_Neith]

I must agree with Ranger.
Everyone Buffy knows seems to be in a great deal of personal pain - if Willow can find companionship amidst the lonely and grim world of war she has been dragged into, more power to her.

Willow seems like a very delicate, easily injured girl.
She is caught squarely in the midst of something every bit as grim for her as being drafted and sent off to war would be for us.
Not so good for her.

I must say, Buffy has style.
I have seen my share of Dracula films.
I have seen the repeated death of Dracula, in film after film, until I started sympathizing with the poor guy.
Then along comes Buffy, who stakes him, and when he reforms, stakes him again and says:

I know you always come back. I've watched all your films.

Then, when he tries to reform yet again, Buffy says:

I'm standing right here!

And Dracula gives it up and beats it.

Not bad.
Not bad either, when she purposefully stepped on the Demon of Fear, and squashed him into jello.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

The greatest thing about the Tara/Willow relationship was the dialogue, like Willow saying "I don't want you to think I just come round here for the spells, y'know?"

Although the Spike/Buffy's mom conversation is still my favourite:

B'sMom: Have we ever met before?
Spike: Yeah. You stuck a fire axe in my head. 'Get your hands off my daughter'. Y'know.
B'sMom: Oh.

 

[Horacio]

The greatest thing about the Tara/Willow relationship was the dialogue, like Willow saying "I don't want you to think I just come round here for the spells, y'know?"

Although the Spike/Buffy's mom conversation is still my favourite:

B'sMom: Have we ever met before?
Spike: Yeah. You stuck a fire axe in my head. 'Get your hands off my daughter'. Y'know.
B'sMom: Oh.

Buffy is one of the most quotable series I've ever seen...

 

[Crothian]

Buffy is one of the most quotable series I've ever seen...

It is very quotible, so is Sports Night. But Buffy is probably a little more quotible dues to lasting 7 seasons verse two.

 

[S'mon]

Is Willow a lesbian or bisexual, then?

If she was a real person she'd be bisexual. Since she's a fictional character she used to be heterosexual but now she's homosexual.
Interesting reading about the political pressure to ensure that Willow never 'went back' - the sudden 100% switch in orientation always seemed implausible to me. People who are gay know they're gay from an early age, it doesn't hit them at age 20.

 

[Mark]

People who are gay know they're gay from an early age, it doesn't hit them at age 20.

That's what my little brother tells me...and I believe him. Of course, in the mind of some male writers of fiction (or perhaps any heterosexual writers of fiction), it can happen quite easily. It's one of the things that is an obstacle between Joss being a very good and interesting writer and Joss being a great writer.

 

[S'mon]

That's what my little brother tells me...and I believe him. Of course, in the mind of some male writers of fiction (or perhaps any heterosexual writers of fiction), it can happen quite easily. It's one of the things that is an obstacle between Joss being a very good and interesting writer and Joss being a great writer.

I get the impression that Joss would have handled Willow's orientation more plausibly if he'd been allowed to (ie wasn't scared to do so). Eg:

There's an early indication when Willow meets the Vampire-alternate Willow that perhaps Willow has some inclinations that way "And I think she's kinda gay!"

When Willow falls for Tara she falls in love with the person, gender is almost irrelevant. I always thought this was well handled.

It's after Willow 'becomes gay' that the problem starts. Joss deals with this tangentially in the 'magic jacket' episode where Willow & all the other female characters lust after the boy in the magic jacket. Reaction of everyone else to Willow:

"You can't want _him_! You're gay!"

So Willow prepares a spell to turn him into a girl! I got the impression that Willow was doing this as much from peer pressure (the Buffyverse corollary of GLAD-pressure on Whedon) as much as any genuine preference.

It would be nice to see US tv (and gay-rights groups, apparently) reach a maturity level where it can be accepted that some people's sexual orientation is ambiguous and not easily pigeonholed. Some people are hardwired one way, some the other, but many are in-between, and this seems to be an unacceptable truth. I wonder why?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Maybe it is because nobody wants to accept that he might, maybe hidden deep inside, a sexual preference that he normaly might seem "perverted" or that would make him part of the people "who cannot understand and accept people who live their lifes their own way"...


Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Umbran]

People who are gay know they're gay from an early age, it doesn't hit them at age 20.

Overgeneralization isn't a good thing, even if it isn't explicitly negative.

 

[WayneLigon]

Interesting reading about the political pressure to ensure that Willow never 'went back' - the sudden 100% switch in orientation always seemed implausible to me. People who are gay know they're gay from an early age, it doesn't hit them at age 20.

It depends, actually. Some interesting research on orientation suggests that sexual preference for some people can change over spans of time, wandering back and forth across gender lines; that it's not unlike a person's changing tastes for various foods (I used to really like green beans - now I cannot stand them) save that it's a lot more resistant to change.

I only have up to Season Three on DVD, so I have yet to form an opinion on her orientation.