Rank the arcs from best to not-as-best

[weredog]

Now that "Predators and Prey" has wrapped up and we're going to step into the five-issue-arc "Retreat" (that will end in November time), how you rank them? Why?
Mine are:

[/b] Beautiful writing that dives right into the characters, whilst streaming the plot forward. Faith and Giles were wonderfully explored and rang true to their characters from the TV series.

[2] Wolves at the Gate: Great dialogue from Goddard, as always. It was great that all of the Scoobs had a integral role in the final fight. Xander's arc was particularly emotional. Great vampire threats too! Oh, and possibly Jeanty's best pencils as of yet.

[3] Predators and Prey: With the dreadful #24 aside, I enjoyed the arc. The main plot is a little confusing, but there were more than enough character moments. It was great to have Harmony back, since we hadn't seen her since season 5 after "dumping" Spike. Kennedy and Satsu worked wonders together, almost more than Buffy and Andrew did in #23. It was great to have a Dawn-centric issue that treated her as a woman.

[4] The Long Way Home: Warren's return crashed and burned. However, the reunion between Buffy, Willow, and Xander was amazing! And the fight at the end between Buffy and Satsu versus the military was mighty.

[5] Time of Your Life: Maybe my mind will chang once the season wraps up, but I did not have a single emotional reaction to the last two issues. Dark Willow? Is she evil in this? Why? Why not? What did Buffy learn from this time travel?
[/ul]

[Wyndam]

No Future For You > Wolves at the Gate > Time of Your Life > The Long Way Home > Predators and Prey.

[tms]

[1] Wolves at the Gate
[1] No Future for You
[1] Time of your Life
[1] The Long Way Home
[1] Predators and Prey

[hitnrun017]

I'm always finding myself going back and forth between No Future for You and Wolves at the Gate, but I think I've finally made it final.

1. Wolves at the Gate: Nice to see a good amount of the gang working together. There is a great mix of comedy, horror and heartbreak.

2. No Future for You: Probably the best character writing. Vaughn handles Faith and Giles perfectly, had some of their best moments.

3. Time of Your Life: The first and final issues are near perfect. An epic story that brought up some great questions for the rest of the season. Some nice twists and turns and great stories for Fray, Buffy, Willow and Kennedy.

4. Predators and Prey: The standalone format didn't work that well, and even though Safe is awful and #21 and #23 were mediocre, I think Swell and Living Doll are two of the strongest issues.

5. The Long Way Home: I think it's pretty good, but some of the writing is just weak. Still can't get over Warren's return and the story is just all over the place.

[dragonweaver]

1. No Future for You
2. Wolves at the Gate
3. The Long Way Home
4. Predators and Prey
5. Time of Your Life

I agree weredog. The Time of Your Life arc was definitely my least favorite, which really surprises me considering Joss wrote it. I just think he tried to cram too much into those four issues and it just left me confused and sort of disappointed. It started off okay, but by the end I was happy to move on. Willow ends up living 200 years, teams up with Harth and is seemingly evil, BUT we are given very little info on why she is like this, how she lived so long, and Buffy seems to of moved on from seeing this horrible future in which she kills her best friend as if nothing happened. That screams FAIL to me.

Predators and Prey was better and there were definitely highlights, but overall I think the arc lacked focus and there wasn't any real forward momentum.

Long Way Home was actually pretty good as a whole, the big problem with that arc is the failed Warren return. I'll admit, he's reveal was quite the cliffhanger, but it the long run it doesn't make a whole lot of sense and even worse than that is the fact that Willow came away from the encounter without so much as batting an eyelash. Where was the emotional payoff?

As for Wolves at the Gate & No Future For You, weredog pretty much summed up my feelings.

[diabeticdude202]

[1] Wolves at the Gate: An amazing story told in a way that just caught my eye. I have read this volume so many times, and yet it still amazes me. From Dracula & Xander's funny lines to the Epic finale that left me thinking "Anything can happen" ... this arc was by far the best. 10/10

[2] The Long Way Home: Coming a close second, I enjoyed this arc just as much as Wolves at the Gate. The return of Amy Madison in the very first issue made me pick up the next and was excited to see where everybody was after "Chosen". Me being one of the only few who enjoyed Warren's return, I think this arc was just full of surprises. And, with the conclusion of Chain, I knew that I couldn't say "no" to season 8. 9.5/10

[3] No Future For You: For a big fan of Faith, I really enjoyed this arc in the season 8 storyline. The revelation of Twilight turned the whole story around for me...as did the rogue slayer who was just as confused as Faith was in season 3. The only thing that let me down was the misuse of characters Buffy, Willow, Xander and Dawn, the main characters. But, seeing as it was centered around Giles & Faith, I couldn't complain. 9/10

[4] Predators and Prey: Not my all time favourite arc but it was pretty darn good. Every issue in this arc was a good read, but the story took a step back for me...I would've enjoyed a nice Twilight revelation, or turning point at the end of the arc or a tragic end for a character to offset the EPIC battle that has yet to arrive....other than that, one of the best arcs so far. 8.5/10

[5] Time of Your Life: Fray...bad. Evil Willow...sweet. Time travel...bad. Big explosion...awesome! That was what this arc was like for me. Massive disappointment followed by an awesome turning point. This arc was actually quite good. I really didn't like how Joss decided to put Fray in season 8, coz it really upsetted me. It finally struck me that Buffy will one day die just like everyone else...and that's not something I like. But, some great character development....Dawn....and the inclusion of Twilight + the Riley revelation was amazing!! 8/10

As you can see I can't separate my feelings on the arc in the best way as each had their own great qualities but "Wolves at the Gate" is by far the GREATEST story ever told XD.

Xander: Yes Master....

[jellymoff]

Don't have time to elaborate right now but:

1. NFFY
2. WATG
3. TLWH
4. TOYL
5. P&P

[Rebecca]

1) The Long Way Home Good: Sad Buffy! Scoobies! Hilarity! Pretty awesome writing! Buffy Speak! Very well rounded and well thought out arc. I enjoyed every issue.

2) Time Of Your Life Good: Time Travel Paradoxes! Mel! FDW! Fray-Speak! Buffy Speak! Vi! Hot-Kennedy and centaur Dawn! (who saw that one coming?) I love that even though it took place out of the normal background and even focused a lot on anti-traditional Buffyverse characters, it did put forth a lot of development between Willow and Buffy. The Bad: Fray-speak kinda hard to follow at times lol. This arc really didn't impact the whole Twilight storyline, so it loses some points there. Also: Forest people?

3) No Future For You Good: great writing! Faith and Giles! Bad: I've never been that into the Faith storyline as I came into the series after it was canceled. It's great and all that she's dealing with her issues but it really didn't move the story along.

4) Wolves at the Gate Good: Satsu! Mecha Dawn! Badass Buffy! The Bad: This issue hated on Xander hard core. Xander's love interest gets impaled.... again. He get's to be made the butt of all jokes with Dracula in the picture. Also Dracula. Not an awesome character (OH NO SHE DIDN'T). I like Satsu, but her relationship with Buffy was disturbing from the start; not because they had gay sex, but because it wasn't making love so much as enjoying each others' bodies despite who could get hurt. Not sure I'm the hugest Drew Goddard fan. He seems hit or miss to me.

5) Predators and Prey The Good: Satsu's conversation with Kennedy made me feel a bit better for Satsu because that should help her to move on, and surprisingly made me like Kennedy. If only a smidge. The last issue was really awesome with Buffy/Xander and Buffy/Dawn convos (I can haz bander nao?)... plus Dawn finally getting some closure to the whole transformation thing that's been going on since Issue #1. Kenny was also a plus. Perhaps he'll come back for the end? The Bad: everything else. Do I even have to say #24? Vamp Cats were cute and oh-so-frightening, but they were more than slightly confusing when fitting into the Twilight game plan.

[faithswatcher]

Mostly agree on whats been said.
Wolves at the gate and No future for you are top of the list. I'm a big faith fan, and although i'm still not loving the Buffy/Satsu idea wolves at the gate was emotional, funny, good plot points that further the overall plot. So the way i get around choosing which is my favourite, is considering that NFFY is a 'standalone episode', and WATG as a plot furthering episode. You get what i mean?
I think P+P was the weakest as TOYL will make more sense once the season has ended, re-reading it will mean more in the future. P+P as far as i can see has little meaning in the grand scheme of things.

[patxshand]

Wolves at the Gate > No Future For You > Time of Your Life = Long Way Home > ........ Predators vs. Prey

[AndrewCrossett]

Wolves at the Gate: 9/10
No Future For You: 8.5/10
The Long Way Home: 8/10
Time of Your Life: 7.5/10
Predators & Prey: 6.5/10

Bearing in mind that the average comic, even those put out by major publishers, is somewhere around 4/10 in my estimation.

[rufio]

I really love every one of the first four arcs- The Long Way Home is totally underrated. It flows really nicely, it looks great, has great action and character moments & served perfectly as the introductory arc. No Future for You is wonderful. The story between Faith and Gigi was done perfectly and yes, Faith in a ball gown gives this arc some extra points. Wolves at the gate was epic. The epic-ness continues with Time of Your Life. I love both of these arcs equally.

Predators and Prey is definitely my least favorite. I thought I would like having a new story every month, but the format is not as rewarding or fulfilling as a 4/5-issue-long arc. Swell is definitely my favorite individual issue of the arc-it seemed the most balanced. Harmonic Divergence & Safe didn't excite me. Predators and Prey was pretty good-even though I don't really like Andrew. Living Doll seemed like an awfully fast and easy wrap up for the dawn/kenny storyline I've been following for the past two years. I was expecting more from that story-something bigger or more meaningful. I mean, is that really the end of dawns transformation storyline? I certainly hope not!!

[Paul]

"No Future for You" - 9/10
"Wolves at the Gate" - 9/10
"The Long Way Home" - 8/10
"Time of Your Life" - 8/10
"Predators and Prey" - 6/10

[El Diablo Robotico]

WatG - 10/10
NFFY - 8.5/10
ToYL - 7.5/10 *
TLWH - 7/10 *
P&P - 6.5/10


* - Willing to give higher ratings to both at the end of the season if and when I better understand how they fit into the overall story...

[Just Willow]

NFFY
TLWH
WatG
ToYL
P&P

[VampSlayer]

1. Time of You Life
2. Long Way Home
3. Wolves At The Gate
4. No Future For You
5. Predators and Prey

[bitca]

1. No Future for You
2. The Long Way Home
3. Time of Your Life
4. Predators and Prey
5. Wolves at the Gate

[NileQT87]

1. No Future For You
2. The Long Way Home
3. Time Of Your Life
4. Wolves At The Gate
5. Predators And Prey

[iamthewalrus]

Wolves At The Gate
No Future For You
The Long Way Home
Time Of Your Life
Predators And Prey

[BlueJay]

Wolves at the Gate
The Good: Dialog, pacing, villains, drama, etc
The Bad: Well... I thought Mecha Dawn was hard to swallow...
No Future for You
The Good: It felt a LOT like a Faith-centric movie <3
The Bad: It kinda strayed too far from the actual story
The Long Way Home
The Good: Dialog, introduction to the season, twists, Amy, etc
The Bad: Warren's return, the "initiative-like" feel, Willow's flying was hard to swallow as well...
Predators & Prey
The Good: "Swell" and "Living Doll"
The Bad: "Harmonic Divergence" was just AWFUL. "Predators & Prey" and "Safe" just made me go "meh".
Time of Your Life
The Good: Dawnie being turned into a Centaur.
XANDER: How do you feel?
DAWN: Like I was ridden hard and put away wet.
The Bad: Fray's universe (I was like, who's gives a **** about Fray?), Dark Willow, the tree people, the artwork (at times), Buffy's annoying "peppiness", the whole time-travel thing, New York, trying to follow Fray-speak, Riley's involvement (I wanted to punch him HARD), no real closure to the arc, etc.