It's just not making sense to me.

Same here. I need to reread the whole story arc.

Sail, I think you have the wrong person that Willow felt was in need of killing. She told Melika and her sister that to arrange events, but everything seemed designed to put Buffy in the position of having to kill her .

My reading of that is the same as Matt's.

I thought about that. It just seems kind of strange to me to arrange suicide by slayer. And why Buffy? Did Willow think Melaka couldn't do it? And how'd she end up evil, again! Aargh. Most of all, why put Buffy through that? Knowing she'd have to go back and face the still-live Willow?

There are just too many questions that I can't see any answers to from previous episodes and I don't know that they'll be answered in the future. Unless Joss plans to keep this running for a very long time.

I figure we'll get the answer at some point - seems like that was far too much trouble to go to unless it had to be Buffy for some reason .

Okay, so that was Riley in the big reveal? I couldn't figure out if it was supposed to be or not, and meant to go back and check who Buffy was supposed to meet in New York (if they said who she was supposed to meet).

Among other reasons I was confused was that his speech patterns didn't read as Riley-ish to me at all.

It sure looked like Riley to me.

I wonder if Buffy having to kill Willow had something to do with the spell Willow cast at the end of Seaon 7, and that Willow was connected to the slayer axe thingy and maybe only Buffy wielding it would be powerful enough to do Willow in.

I probably need to go back and reread the series because I'm confused.

Buffy met with Riley to get info on Twilight not realizing he's a member? The attack on the Scottish compound was Twilight and had nothing to do with the temporal rift?

Future!Evil!Willow needed Buffy to kill her with the Scythe, so she arranged the temporal rift, playing Fray, Harth and Buffy. That part makes sense.

Moreso than Riley being part of Twilight. How did he go from Happy Demon Hunter Guy to working with Twilight and Amy & Warren?

The last time we saw him, he and Covert Ops Barbie were pretty blasé about the corrupting effects of using black magic to fight demons, and quite willing to let Willow take on those risks without a word of warning until afterwards. It seems like a natural progression to me.

I can see I really need to go back and reread season 8 from the beginning. I've lost track of so many fine points in the misty reaches of time.