Julie, I also felt the notes, especially on Anya's death, were just right. I think I saw them as having just dealt with something so huge, everything was a part of that huge-wholeness, rather than an individual event.

I took it that way myself, and surprised myself; watching it during the actual finale, I was nodding and frowning and reacting, but at no point did I clutch up. I certainly didn't at Anya's death.

But watching it with Nic when he got home? I found myself with tears sliding down my cheeks, at Xander calling for her. If her eyes hadn't been open...

But still.

I heart Susan so much.

t hugs Deena and continues to be all sniffly

I tried to explain to DH this morning about always coming out of things like the finale or the Battle of Helm's Deep wishing I had a sword and a Buffy or an Aragorn to point me at the evil instead of having to be all metaphorical about it.

He knows that next time I can afford a new hobby, I intend to take up either fencing or kendo. Somehow he now finds this worrisome.

Of course, in real life I strongly doubt I'd show any physical courage whatsoever, at least not of the grandiose run back into burning buildings or leap in front of an assasin's bullet type. Big old death-fearing coward here. But still.

t turning into a pumpkin. Will look forward to reading Julie on baseball tomorrow.

On rewatch, I think there was a lot more going on in the scene with Xander and Andrew talking about Anya than just the surface discussion.

Xander's "That's my girl. Always doing the stupid thing." line might have sounded callous or flippant, but think about Anya's history as a vengeance demon and as an ex-demon who was more than a little selfish and whose attitude towards death was a mixture of callousness and horror. In the past, Anya wouldn't have considered laying her life down for anyone, (with the possible exception of Xander, depending on what kind of mood she was in that day).

Through the past two seasons, however, she's learned and changed enough so that in the end (according to Andrew's version of things) she was able to die fighting to protect a stupid human.

Xander will grieve for her, but at least he can do so knowing that Anya completed a very important personal journey before dying.

Contrast Anya in the Season 7 finale with her in Season 3. Then she ran, and she viewed Xander as being stupid for staying and fighting for his friends. ("Are you really gonna be that much help to them? You'll probably just get in the way.") In the Series finale she did the same "stupid" thing that he did. He knew he made the right choice then (and all the times before and since then) and he was acknowledging that she did too.

Re spoilers and Joss: I've thought about this a lot, understandably, being his arch nemesisises in the whole spoiler issue. I think he's kind of missing the point in his ideas about spoilerphiles, and Scrappy's point is closer. It's not so much that people find out what happens; and it's not even fully that people rush to judgment. It's that the Internet creates a culture where people become invested in ideas about characters and stories, and they are reluctant to change their minds. When you're around a group of people who reinforce your ideas about the story on a daily basis, and you create a community based on those ideas, then it's going to be difficult to move on from those ideas.

And that, I think, is what really bothers Joss. Because he is all about storytelling and conflict and change. His willingness to change the show's premises and characters is something I admire (and if I have to read about how revolutionary the Alias finale was one more time, I might take a baseball bat to my computer screen--it's not nearly as inventive as what Joss has done over 7 years). But the Internet promotes ideological inertia, not change or growth.

Just to reiterate, my order of seasons is 3,4,2,7,6,1,5. However, those last 4 are pretty close, although 5 is definitely the nadir IMHO.

As for spoilers, I've always pretty much been a medium hardcore 'ho. I don't attempt to seek out the scripts or the wildfeeds, but plot points don't bother me. On the whole issue, I agree with scrappy in that I think what ME objects to is casting aspersions on something on the basis of spoilers rather than the thing itself.

That said, I also understand using spoilers as a way to steel oneself against something you aren't going to enjoy.

All in all, my unspoiled experience was more fun, and seriously folks, a lot less effort.

Really? The whole reason I got spoiled in the first pace was because it seemed very unnatural to me not to read articles and reviews and whatever else I could get my hands on about the show as soon as they came out.

I dunno, I'm strange -- I won't read wildfeeds or in-depth discussions of what's gonna happen (I checked out of the Spoilers thread for a few weeks before Home, and almost a week before Chosen). But knowing Eliza Dushku will be in five episodes, or Anthony Stewart Head is leaving the show, or whatever TV Guide tells me? Not so important to my viewing experience. And I like knowing who dies so I don't freak out -- I made a friend spoil me for Angel's death at the intermission in Rent. I can't imagine how I would have taken Spike's death if I hadn't known about it.

Of course, one of my first Buffista posts was asking if Joyce was really dead, or just mostly dead, and if the actress was leaving the show, and when I asked that someone sent me to spoilers. So it's really your fault I'm all dirty.

Oh, and I can't rank the seasons, because tend to think in terms of episodes, not arcs. At a guess, maybe 2, 3, 6, 5, 4, 7, 1.

My ranking of seasons is probably 5, 2, 1, 4, 6, 3, 7. Though damn, the first third of 6 is probably in the top 2. In fact, start with Blood Ties and go through Tabula Rasa, and that's probably the finest set of episodes in the series.

The moment where Anya steeled herself was much like where Merry and Pippin leapt out to distract the Uruk Hai from Frodo -- it made me tear up because they're not supposed to fight, dammit! But they do get it, now, something bigger than self-preservation -- world preservation, and even though they're the least well equipped, pitifully so, they do it.

Because you can be a hero without the power.

The "stupid" thing Anya did? Was go against her every self-description, and fight for people she didn't even love. For people she didn't even know. Yeah, by her books, it was stupid. A marvellous stupid thing.

Damn it, ita, you're making me tear up.