Hmmm, Buffy talk.

Let's play a Buffy game.

Option 1: Starting in Season One, list potential storylines which seemed implicit but which were never fully explored. For example, at what point would a Buffy/Xander romance have actually made sense. Because I think Joss considered it back then and I still think Zoe/Wash is his vision of that.

Option 2: We can play Overrated / Underrated. The key in this game is kind of all in how you set up the terms to get the most interesting conjunction. Overrated - DB's sexiness ; Underrated - ASH's sexiness. Overrated recurring character - Jonathan ; Underrated - Big Gay Larry. etc.

It was so much fun! I miss it.

Me too! Jeremy Piven at his funniest! And Paula Marshall - hubba hubba!

I still think Zoe/Wash is his vision of that

Crack, dude.

Which is to say, less facetiously, I don't think in a core cast of 4, two of them get to be that solidly happy. No way, no how, no Joss.

Ok, Hec. I think I would've bought B?X uptil season 3. Overrated SMG's sexiness. Underrated; AH's.

I don't think in a core cast of 4, two of them get to be that solidly happy. No way, no how, no Joss.

Zoe/Wash are sort of...down the line. As if Buffy and Xander type characters had a happy ending. Or...continuation.

Overrated SMG's sexiness. Underrated; AH.

Heh - well, you know I'm down with that.

As if Buffy and Xander type characters had a happy ending. Or...continuation.

What's your supporting documentation? Besides that she fights and he's a goof?

I don't think S1 B/X could ever have lasted long enough to be down the line, and post S3, it was never going to happen.

What happened in S2 again?

Cause I dug Sipowicz, but he's not pretty enough to torture.

Eternal wisdom, right there.

I am no Buffy/Xander shipper, but I think Buffy Xander could actually happen in a few years. Once Buffy is cookies.

What's your supporting documentation? Besides that she fights and he's a goof?

Well, it's all speculation so I'm short on documentation. I think Xander maps to Wash pretty easily. Wash is post-competence Xander, except he flies spaceships instead of fixing window frames. Buffy maps less clearly to Zoe - they're very different kind of warriors. But they're both Big Damn Heroes and both couplings would engender a kind of "What's she doing with him?" kind of first impression.

I don't think S1 B/X could ever have lasted long enough to be down the line, and post S3, it was never going to happen.

I think that Joss had a habit of throwing things out there that he might or might not pickup later. It's been commented that if Xander had been developed into a gay character his encounter with Larry would've been seen as prescient, instead of Vamp!Willow's gay-Now-ness. I think they had moments of intimacy between Buffy and Xander where they hinted she might have more feelings for him. The two moments that come to mind were when she sort of leaned lovingly into him while he was wearing the puffy attacker suit in training, and the way she looked at him in Hell's Bells when he was getting dressed in his tuxedo.

What happened in S2 again?

Stuff. Neck snapping.