30 Days of Buffy: Day 1

[itsnotmymind]

Taken from various people.

Day #01: Favourite season
Day #02: Favourite episode
Day #03: Favourite song used in an episode
Day #04: Favourite female character
Day #05: Least favourite female character
Day #06: Favourite male character
Day #07: Least favourite male character
Day #08: Favourite friendship
Day #09: Favourite romance
Day #10: Least favourite season
Day #11: Least favourite romance
Day #12: Least favourite episode
Day #13: Favourite potential slayer
Day #14: Favourite female villain
Day #15: Favourite male villain
Day #16:Episode you like that everyone else hates - Favourite piece of monologue
Day #17: Character you relate to the most
Day #18: Character who didn’t get enough screen time
Day #19: Character you like that everyone else hates
Day #20: Best Spike-centric episode
Day #21: Best Willow-centric episode
Day #22: Best Xander-centric episode
Day #23: Two characters you wanted to get together that never did
Day #24: Favourite example of 90s special effects
Day #25: Favourite Buffyverse saying
Day #26: Favourite Scooby moment
Day #27: Cutest moment
Day #28: Character you love to hate
Day #29: Episode you hate that everyone else loves
Day #30: What you think made Buffy so great


Day #01: Favourite season
My favorite season is S6, the everything-goes-to-hell season. I love the depression arc. This is my favorite season for Buffy/Spike, when they are at their most twisted and dysfunctional (and convoluted). I love the geeks as villains, especially Warren, who manages to both be one of the show's most human villains, and among its most irredeemable. Willow's storyline has its weak point, but it is still a powerful storyline. Xander's choice to leave Anya at the altar rang true for me for his character. Although if he'd had any sense, he would have married her and divorced her later, sparing her the humilation of being left at the altar. But Xander is sometimes lacking in the sense department. And despite everything, the season ends on a positive note, with Xander saving the world by telling Willow that he loves her, Buffy coming out of her depression, and Spike choosing to get a soul.

S5 is a close second, being arguable the least flawed season, but I find S6 to be more interesting.

Comments

[red-satin-doll.livejournal.com]

S5 is a close second, being arguable the least flawed season, but I find S6 to be more interesting.

That's pretty much my opinion as well; S6 is the season that can be hard to watch, has all sorts of flaws but is still the one that hits me hardest emotionally and personally; the season when Buffy was thoroughly cemented in my heart as my favorite fictional character because I identified with her problems and challenges that season so much. I loved S5 for the "feminine" quality of it (the focus on the Joyce/Buffy/Dawn interrelationships. It felt like something I'd been longing for ever since S1 - more focus on Joyce - and then of COURSE Joss killed her. "Mommy?" breaks me every time.)

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I once felt the S5 was the most feminist season, because women finally again outnumbered men in the credits, because Buffy decides she can be fine without a boyfriend, and because the most important relationship is between Buffy and Dawn, not Buffy and her boyfriend. But S6 is my favorite.

[red-satin-doll.livejournal.com]

I once felt the S5 was the most feminist season,

I think my feelings for S5 have changed a little since the first time I watched it; I realized recently that I tend to watch the episodes after ITW, and avoid the episodes with Riley, as well as Crush (which I found very uncomfortable the first time - me and Buffy in chains are not mixy things), etc. I'm more interested in Spike (dare I even utter his name?) from late S5 on than early to mid S5.

S6 however - I think SR is the only episode I haven't watched at least a second time all the way through; I am endlessly fascinated by the power dynamics that season (although I don't "ship" B/S until S7) and I LOVE LOVE LOVE Tara in S6 so much you have no idea. I wish they'd done more with her relationship with Buffy but that scene between them in DT, Tara offering Buffy comfort and unconditonal love on the couch where Joyce died, and with Joyce's picture right there beside them? Dear god it breaks my heart. And then Buffy greeting Tara in OAFA is the first/only moment of pure happiness she expresses all season. (Theres here happiness for Xander in HB but there is "string" attached - she's looking to them still as proof that love is possible). I think DT is one of the masterpieces of the series; I love Normal Again, Life Serial, OMWF. I love Dawn in ATW, so heartbreaking, watching her repeat her sister's "mistake" with men, dusting the first boy/vamp she ever kissed with the most stoic expression on her face.

Bargaining/After Life (I watched them on Netflix and they seemed like a single mini-arc) compete with Anne as my favorite season opener. I have huge (feminist) issues of course with AYW, Tara's death, and Grave is my least favorite season opener. But that still doesn't prevent me from talking up that season with anyone who will listen.

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Tara in S6 so much you have no idea

Despite what my icon might have you believe, Tara generally doesn't do anything for me. That said, I did admire her strength in leaving Willow, and was heartbroken at the end of Tabula Rasa when a very upset Dawn walks turns away from her.

I think DT is one of the masterpieces of the series

I completely agree. It's one of my favorite episodes of the series, possibly my absolute favorite. I love the twistyness of Buffy/Spike, Buffy trying to turn herself in and Dawn and Spike trying to argue her out of it in their different ways, the geeks finally becoming truly evil, and their differing feelings about this, and of course Buffy's breakdown at the end.

Bargaining/After Life (I watched them on Netflix and they seemed like a single mini-arc) compete with Anne as my favorite season opener.

I usually think of After Life as a separate episode, and since Bargaining is a little slow, it goes after Anne for my favorite season episode. But After Life is brilliant.

[red-satin-doll.livejournal.com]

Tara generally doesn't do anything for me.

*pouts* Actually, Tara didn't do anything for me in and of herself, with the exception of Hush and WAY (S4) until S6. I had read that she was a "beloved" character and I kept waiting to fall in love with her in her own right. And then S6, and OMWF/TR and I fell for her HARD. Comforting Buffy in DT, protecting Buffy and Willow in OAFA; Dawn geeking out when W/T are back together.

Also, the entire end scene of Tabula Rasa is one of the best episode endings - my heart is breaking for EVERYONE. You know that has to be awful for Dawn given that Hank and Joyce divorced. She didn't understand it then, either, I'm sure.

and of course Buffy's breakdown at the end.

I just saw your Day 2 post! Truly awesome choice, and a brave one (or at least it feels like it to me? I love talking about it. Infinitewhale did a post about buffy's dream in DT not to long ago (although the conversation got - out of hand. Was fun for a while though.)

I usually think of After Life as a separate episode, and since Bargaining is a little slow, it goes after Anne for my favorite season episode. But After Life is brilliant.

I admit I tend to skip through stuff in both parts of Bargaining, so I'm almost chopping the two parts down to one ep, so that skews it a bit. And yes very much to the Anne and After Life love. Buffy's blank expression in the mirror, or the look of what I can only call "shame" on the stairway KILLS me. It reminds me of Buffy looking at herself in the mirror in the Becoming flashback. Both scenes capture the essence of shame, IMO - feeling bad not for something you've done but for something you are.

[lokifan]

S6 is probably my favourite too; it's the one I've watched the most, the one that made me fall in love with BtVS. The Buffy/Spike thing is so incredibly complex and messed up, and Willow, and just... yes.

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

It's an awesome season.

[eveolina.livejournal.com]

Hi! I found your 30 Days of Buffy posts through the su_herald. I hope you don't mind me joining the discussion. Season six is my favorite season, too. Except when it is seven or five or four. There are a lot of good seasons. But six is the one I rewatch the most.

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

Hi, and nice to meet you! Of course you are welcome to comment.