And Mr. Trick was supposed to be the Big Bad for Season Three, but instead they shifted to the Mayor, who was the better character.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- Mr. Trick was wasted. He was a great character, had a fresh outlook on evil, and they wasted him when they switched to the mayor. I loved the mayor, don't get me wrong. They should have had Trick leave town instead of getting killed. He seems like the kind of villain that would say "this isn't working, I'm out"

I think it's a great reason, maybe the best. Great character, great actor, enhances the show. Let's bend the show that way.

Yabbut.

Your whole list up there (which was mostly information I didn't know) was all about guys, pretty much. Here's a list of reasons not to kill Xander, Giles, Spike, Oz, and Riley. And then you compare that to Jenny Calendar, Tara, Joyce, Anya.

I just agree that it's a trend worth looking at, whatever the ultimate conclusion.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- Mr. Trick was wasted. He was a great character, had a fresh outlook on evil, and they wasted him when they switched to the mayor. I loved the mayor, don't get me wrong. They should have had Trick leave town instead of getting killed. He seems like the kind of villain that would say "this isn't working, I'm out"

Amen.

Mr. Trick and Sunday should have worked together to conquer Sunnydale and the World.

Xander as the First is a gloriously juicy idea. Flashbacks to the Wish!Verse all over the place.

Gender issues never ping me. I just figured more females died because it was such an estrogen-heavy show. You can't kill characters who aren't there. (Damn, why couldn't they have made Xander gay, all the cute guys he could be going through, plus something for his character to do other than be the damned Zeppo.) Cassie really did need to be female, though, for the Cassandra ping.

On the whole, I liked AtS over Buffy because there were more guys to girls. Feel free to take my input with a grain of salt, though, because over the years I've discovered an odd disinclination to be interested in the Life of Girls as a social entity/creation/thing that is. I have been accused more than once of liking the company of men over the company of women, and I think I have to plead guilty. This probably speaks more to the quality of women I've had directly around me than anything else. You see what happens when you don't find your proper tribe until you're all grown up?

sumi, I think JZ's point (forgive me, Hon, for not waiting for you to respond) was that a disproportionate number of 'good' characters who died were women.

As Sophia first pointed out, a disproportionate number of the major recurring characters that had strong connections with the core cast were women. You had Angel, Oz, and Riley on one hand and Joyce, Jenny Calendar, Faith, Anya, Tara, and Dawn on the other. Guys other than Giles or Xander tended to be (or become) villains, and the death toll among their ranks was pretty high too. Spike, and Angel (and Darla) ended up returning like bad pennies, but Drusilla was the only major villain I can think of that was subject to death and didn't get killed off.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- Mr. Trick was wasted. He was a great character, had a fresh outlook on evil, and they wasted him when they switched to the mayor. I loved the mayor, don't get me wrong. They should have had Trick leave town instead of getting killed. He seems like the kind of villain that would say "this isn't working, I'm out"

Oh, I'll agree with you. He had a lame death. And you're right that he would have just left and then been able to come back for more hijinks.

Mr. Trick and Sunday should have worked together to conquer Sunnydale and the World.

Heh.

Here's a list of reasons not to kill Xander, Giles, Spike, Oz, and Riley. And then you compare that to Jenny Calendar, Tara, Joyce, Anya.

And, oh, God, I just had a flash of an S3 in which Angelus offs Oz for Willow's discovery in exactly the same circumstances that he actually did Jenny. And I know blah-blah-too-early-for-Dark!Willow-cakes, but oh damn that would have been horrifying and twisted and just wrenching. Taking the terrible loveliness and eroticism and vulnerability of the tableau of Jenny's murdered body (and there's a whole dissertation hiding in that image about the male gaze and whose dead bodies we see and how -- such a world of difference between Jenny in a rose-petal-strewn bed and Wash impaled in his pilot's seat, dying in a moment of competence, confidence and power), and flipping the gender? Fuck. I love Oz to little bitty pieces, but now I long for this.

I'll never forgive the writers for having Mr. Trick—he of the great "It's called an Uzi, ya chump. Could have saved your ass right about now," line—try to kill the Slayer on his own with a crate and a scarf.

Taking the terrible loveliness and eroticism and vulnerability of the tableau of Jenny's murdered body (and there's a whole dissertation hiding in that image about the male gaze and whose dead bodies we see and how -- such a world of difference between Jenny in a rose-petal-strewn bed and Wash impaled in his pilot's seat, dying in a moment of competence, confidence and power)

Hey! Wanna write my Problematic Media essay for me?

Because, yeah, that image is one that's On the List.

(For simplicity's sake, the list STARTS with Laura Palmer for me. Sadly, it never quite ends.)