You really don't think Angel counted?

In hindsight, Angel seems slightly idealized or even removed from the mainstream. He evolved from a Mysterious Presence to Buffy's Older Boyfriend. (I'm separating Angel from Angelus for this purpose.)

Even after he returned in S3, he's metaphorically the boyfriend who's gone off to college. They may have a relationship, but there's a barrier between them. Instead of distance, there's the gypsy curse.

It's possible to identify with him then, but not easy.

It's possible to identify with him then, but not easy.

I never identified with any of them, so I have a perspective gap. I mean, if push came to shove, there's some weird Spikification going on there, but that's because he's wearing my clothes, most likely.

I liked them all, varying amounts, and intellectually understood where you might plug into Buffy or Xander, but that was about it.

The part where she was fleeing gives it a different vibe for me, though.

On the bright side, at least Angelus didn't stick her in the fridge.

Has it been mentioned onscreen, ever, that he wasn't dead? I mean, in rebuttal to the claim he was?

Nope, I don't believe so. Unless you count Willow's "And that all worked out okay..." in Selfless.

I am very down with the idea that you can play a part in the big battle against evil without being able to do a single physical thing. Hence my irritation with the superification of Cordelia.

Sure, there are Justines and Gunns, but Wesleys and Freds need bigger weapons.

Jenny couldn't have done a damned thing to save her life, but she was fighting the good fight, in a very valuable way, and as such, she was a combatant in the larger sense, in the way I parse things.

Being physically vulnerable is not being powerless.

Gandalfe, I sent you the spreadsheet. There's also a zipped copy (it's an Excel file) on my site here if anyone cares. (It's just zipped out of habit; it's not like it's a big file.)

Their list of recurring characters seems goofier every time I look at it, so have many grains of salt handy, but Good/Bad/Other breakdown...

Buffy
22 villains: 6 women, 16 men. This doesn't include Allan Finch (RIP), Willy, or Parker, because I couldn't decide which side to put them on. 3 of the 6 women were killed. 14 of the 16 men were killed. (6 by Buffy.)

31 heroes: 15 women, 16 men. 7 of the 15 women were killed. 4 of the 16 men were killed.

Angel
17 villains: 6 women, 11 men. Left in the ambiguous category: Illyria, Justine, Holtz (RIP), and Merl (RIP). 3 of the 6 women were killed. 11 of the 11 men were killed. (But only 3 by Angel. Loser!)

15 heroes: 6 women, 9 men. 2 of the 6 women were killed. 2 of the 9 men were killed.

I wonder if I can add a column for # of episodes... hm.

So one thing is clear -- if you're a male, it's much healthier to be a hero.

Yes. And it's extremely unhealthy to date Angel. I just realized this morning that if you fall in love with Angel, you'll kill yourself. Or at the very least, deliberately do something that causes your own death.

So Lindsey was doomed no matter what...

With the exception of Xander and (after S3) Giles, all the characters you identified with were always women

I think it's possible to identify with Oz or Riley (pre-vamp ho visits) at least as much as it's possible to identify with Tara or Anya -- all four are on the show as romantic partners. But like ita, I don't really identify with anyone, so I'm not sure I'm right about this. Why do you think the women are easier to identify with?

Yes. And it's extremely unhealthy to date Angel. I just realized this morning that if you fall in love with Angel, you'll kill yourself. Or at the very least, deliberately do something that causes your own death.

Hmm. If we count self preservation instinct-free curiousity, this even applies to Fred. She and Angel did go out to the movies together and then again for ice cream.

So Lindsey was doomed no matter what...

I think Lindsey was aiming for suicide via dating Angel.

And, since the discussion originally began with "sure seems like the creators might be sexist," do we have to skew the fact that it's KNOWN that they wanted to kill Oz eventually and also that it's KNOWN that, barring that, Joss sure wanted to bring Tara back and Amber said "no"? (A fact of which I'm glad, personally.) Assuming, of course, we're only counting "permanently dead" as "dead."

And what makes a character someone we personally invest in, anyway? Why was Darla loved more than Holtz, so that we count her death as important but his as not? He, too, was often portrayed sympathetically, probably more often than Darla was. But the writing and acting didn't get under our skin as much, or else his death might have had more significance. I, personally, had no emotion when they killed Cordy, for that matter, as she had already been dead by bad writing in my head for ages (any emotion I had was entirely for Angel, not for personal investment in Cordy by that point).

And Fred, rather than Wesley or Gunn or Knox, had to be Illyria's victim so that Illyria could be the hot exotic goddess that she is. Girl gods are prettier. This makes perfect sense in my mind.