Flames wouldn't be eternal if they actually consumed anything.

Lilah ,'Not Fade Away'


Buffy 4: Grr. Arrgh.  

This is where we talk about Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No spoilers though?if you post one by accident, an admin will delete it. This thread is NO LONGER NAFDA. Please don't discuss current Angel events here.


Cindy - Jul 10, 2003 8:58:28 am PDT #3286 of 10001
Nobody

Technically, Buffy chose to activate all the potentials. So "she won't choose you" to me meant "you won't be a slayer."

Which is kind of lame, yeah. But it's the best I can do.

I don't get it. How would not activating the potentials be choosing Dawn, since Dawn wasn't a potential slayer in the first place?

I think having Xander kidnap her, choosing not to have Dawn in the final battle, is the closest thing to Ghost!Joyce/FE!Joyce prophecy fulfillment that we've got in canon.

And it's still kind of lame, too.


Lyra Jane - Jul 10, 2003 9:32:29 am PDT #3287 of 10001
Up with the sun

How would not activating the potentials be choosing Dawn, since Dawn wasn't a potential slayer in the first place?

No -- Buffy "chose" the potentials, as future slayers.

Dawn was not chosen. I don't think the fact she wasn't a potential matters, only that she was not in the group of people Buffy "chose."

It's lame, but I think it's the best interpretation you can get from what's onscreen. YReadingoftheLineMV.

I think having Xander kidnap her, choosing not to have Dawn in the final battle, is the closest thing to Ghost!Joyce/FE!Joyce prophecy fulfillment that we've got in canon.

This is a possibility, too. Or, as the writer says, it may just have been the First messing w/Dawn's mind.


Cindy - Jul 10, 2003 9:42:20 am PDT #3288 of 10001
Nobody

YReadingoftheLineMV.

It does, because to me, Dawn would have to be a choice of some kind, up for the choosing, for that to fit.

This is a possibility, too. Or, as the writer says, it may just have been the First messing w/Dawn's mind.

As many have said though, the FE lied with the truth. What should have happen (another example of lazy writing/poor execution in season 7) is that at some point in the season after CwDP, Buffy should have had to make a choice, and in doing so, if she chose Dawn, Dawn would start to doubt whether or not Buffy was Buffy, or, in not choosing Dawn, Dawn should have been felt betrayed and been more susceptible to the FE.

Or...

Buffy and the FE!In-Buffy's-Appearance, should each have been trying to convince Dawn that she/it was the real Buffy, and Dawn would have had to decide who was Buffy and who was the FE. But, since the FE was incorporeal, this couldn't really work.

It was a shame they let such a great set-up go to waste, in favor of things like the Eye of Tapioca.


tina f. - Jul 10, 2003 9:42:58 am PDT #3289 of 10001

My instinct says it was this:

the First messing w/Dawn's mind

but I would not argue with this

No -- Buffy "chose" the potentials, as future slayers.

Dawn was not chosen. I don't think the fact she wasn't a potential matters, only that she was not in the group of people Buffy "chose."

as canon as to how FE!Joyce ended up telling the "truth". Especially given the title of the finale.

If you want to get real technical though - the FE couldn't have known Dawn wouldn't get chosen, because that means it would have known Buffy's plan to defeat the ubervamp army was to activate the potentials - and it didn't know that. Or...did it? cues scary "doom doom doom doom" music


Cindy - Jul 10, 2003 9:44:59 am PDT #3290 of 10001
Nobody

My instinct says it was this:

the First messing w/Dawn's mind

In the strictest sense, we already know the above to be "true" because the writer has confirmed she was writing FE-as-Joyce.

It's just that when you take away the meta knowledge, for me, that scene is much more likely to be Joyce, than to be the FE as Joyce, because of all that happens in that episode.


tina f. - Jul 10, 2003 9:52:40 am PDT #3291 of 10001

In the strictest sense, we already know the above to be "true" because the writer has confirmed she was writing FE-as-Joyce.

I know this doesn't need to be stated yet again, but I'm gonna: that's just lame.

I know there were situations where the FE was just messing with folks - Eve with the potentials mostly - but there so could have been a great payoff of the Joyce and Dawn thing.

OK - I'm over it now.


Typo Boy - Jul 10, 2003 10:29:24 am PDT #3292 of 10001
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.

I think the best explanation of how all this fits together is: Dawn mushroom green lantern marshmallow cocoa.

t /Allyson


DCJensen - Jul 10, 2003 11:54:27 am PDT #3293 of 10001
All is well that ends in pizza.

Don't you just want to date Shawn's BF?

No, but I do want to lock him up and do experiments on him study his reactions to the eps from an outsider perspective.


Matt the Bruins fan - Jul 10, 2003 12:02:15 pm PDT #3294 of 10001
"I remember when they eventually introduced that drug kingpin who murdered people and smuggled drugs inside snakes and I was like 'Finally. A normal person.'” —RahvinDragand

I was among those who assumed from the start that "Joyce" in CWDP was actually the First Evil. It seems to me that at first the carnage ("Mother's milk is red tonitght," etc.) was revealed as illusion until Dawn (like Willow, later) started messing with magic and opened the door for it to seize control of her spell. Also note that despite Dawn invoking everyone who loved her, her actual attitude during that spell was tinged by anger and hate ("Die, bastard!"), emotional states more in line with the First than the nebulous forces of Good.


Elena - Jul 10, 2003 1:26:47 pm PDT #3295 of 10001
Thanks for all the fish.

It would have been fitting to have the FE appear as Buffy to, say, the Scoobies, the Potentials, Andrew, Dawn, Wood, the paperboy - anyone aside from just Caleb and Spike. Because it would have completely fucked with them, which is what the FE seemed to be trying to accomplish. Honestly, get a truly truth-twisting and evil Buffy saying things to Willow or Dawn? I think we would have seen some nice torture there.