Notes on Buffy 3.05 Homecoming

[2maggie2]

Standard disclaimer: I'll often speak of foreshadowing, but that doesn't mean I'm at all committing to the idea that there was some fixed design from the word go -- it's a short hand for talking about the resonances that end up in the text as it unspools.

Standard spoiler warning: The notes are written for folks who have seen all of BtVS and AtS.

Comments

[vamp_mogs]

I also love your point on how different the slayers really are from others. So many people want to downplay that. I really think this is why Buffy has to do her thing with the vampires. It doesn't mean she'll land there, or that she has to. But she's not just going to be Josephine Normal and settle down with a nice human boy anytime soon.

Honestly, if Joss came to me and said "I'm going to write an episode of BtVS and I want you to tell me what it will be about" I'd suggest a whole ep dedicated solely to exploring the mental scarring slayers are left with. We get a bit of it in the series but I think fans totally underestimate just how traumatic a Slayer's life must be for a teenage girl. He could easily do it (he can get inside a character's head like nobody else) and I really wish they had. I still want to write a fic exploring it, actually.

You're totally right that people like to downplay that and pretend as if Buffy's just a normal girl by day and slayer by night. It doesn't work like that. Her two lives bleed together and it means she's never a normal girl.

I hope my 5 things I like about Angel comment was OK. And I hope we're OK!

We're fine. I'll send you a message :)

[2maggie2]

I don't see how people can miss that scarring. At the beginning of Intervention Buffy explicitly tells Giles what's happening to her. In fact, I pretty much think it's the subtext of Buffy's whole story. It's subtle, but I think most of the important things about the story are subtle. (Like you noticing the automatic hit response).