Did the darker approach since s5 ruin the show?

[exogenesis1203]

Many people seems to dislike how the show begin to take a dive into the pit of darkness since s5.
Although I must say that the whole pulled from heaven arc in s6 feels annoying and forced, I really like that dark approach in s7.
The emotions in s7 just feel right, one of my favorite episode is Help,right from the beginning I already got this sense of dread that it's not gonna end well for Cassie but it still brought tears to my eyes in the end...it feels a lot more realistic than the "dark" approach in s6, s6 to me now just feel like all those other similar stupid angst the kids love so much these days.

[tkts]

I like the second half of the series better than the first, but I don't think it's because of the darkness. Rather, it's because as the characters became more mature and seasoned, I started to enjoy watching them more.

I just jumped from Season 5 to Season 2. (You know those times when you watch "I Was Made to Love You" both with and without the commentary track just to spread it out longer because you don't want to deal with "The Body" just yet? Yeah.) It had been a while since I'd watched any Season 2 episodes, since my rewatches often just cover Seasons 5-7. And in addition to the little things that I had to readjust to, like Buffy's high school hair and Willow being all shy and stammering again, I found that I really don't have a lot of patience for the angst-filled Bangel saga that Dawn later described as the "eeeeeee, my boyfriend's a vampire, crazy crazy" days.

[astranger]

I would say no. Remember Season 2 had some very 'dark' moments too.

There are several problems with the later seasons, not just one that we can finger. The first one is that from the last three seasons Glory is the only decent villain. Warren is pathetic, Willows magic Apocalypse is sans build up and the First spends most of his time in monologue.

But that's not the only problem. Dawns introduction was very jarring. So much so that I though I'd missed an episode. And there are also some seriously questionable choices the writers made such as magic addiction, killing Tara, Hells Bells and some of the Spuffy stuff could have been better handled. The eventual character saturation didn't help.

However it's worth noting that even the later series has many good episodes, Once More With Feeling, Tabula Rasa, Selfless and Conversations with Dead People all rank as some of the best Buffy episodes. So no, it wasn't just the sense of darkness. Quality matters to tone and that's whats important here.

[Tea - Total]

I love the darkness. Season 5 was my best season, it had it all to offer really. Darkness is one of them and i thought it was great to show that kind of concept, we all know Buffy can get really dark sometimes, but i love it. In season 6, i felt that it was trying to connect with the themes of life. Which is true because life is dark.

[midwesternwatcher]

Nov 30, 2010 19:52:52 GMT -5 exogenesis1203 said:

I must say that the whole pulled from heaven arc in s6 feels annoying and forced....

Ouch! I can't let that pass without protest.

The Buffyverse doesn't really have a take on the afterlife (too controversial), but if you think there's any correlation at all between how a person behaved in life and her fate afterward, then after season 5 Buffy must end up in heaven or something like it. I don't anyone, in the verse or out, thought that Buffy in hell was a serious possibility, except Willow, who had a vested interest.

Trying to bring Buffy back is just what Willow would do. Or so I think. Does anyone disagree? And if Buffy comes back, she has to come back from something like heaven. Doesn't that follow? What's forced about it?

Remember the "dual soliloquy" of Buffy and Spike, when she tells him she was in heaven, and no one else must know? If I had to pick a favorite moment in the whole show, I think that would be it. And Buffy's turn to the dark side, her affair with Spike, seems natural when you consider that she lives by virtue of black magic.

There are philosophies, including that of Plato, in which return to life is as natural as death. But the consensus in the Western world, which makes the background of everything in Buffy, is that death is natural and resurrection is violently unnatural and destructive of all order (the resurrection for which Christians hope seems to involve a rewriting of natural order and is a different thing). The vampire myth can be seen as a thought-experiment to illustrate this.

Of course the resurrection of Buffy throws everything out of whack. That's how we get S7, and S8. It's all predictable, once Buffy comes back.

Please explain to me what is forced or annoying about that. I'm flabbergasted, I haven't the foggiest notion what you're talking about.

[rufio]

good points midwesternwatcher. The resurrection story line seemed totally on point. The timing was appropriate for character & story development.
The later seasons naturally got darker. They couldn't forever stay in the high school setting - they had to enter real life, and real life can be super dark. I think the direction the story has gone (even in season 8) is very realistic- for a fantasy show based in reality.

I think the resurrection story line was extremely interesting and well executed. It was clearly only Willow who was hell bent on bringing Buffy back. Evey one else was just roped in in the end. This speaks volumes about Willows character and her relationship with Buffy.

Although I love and appreciate the lighter side of Buffy, I respect and am more interested and the darker elements. It is more true to life thanks to the writers stepping away from what made the original film flop- it was too light, cheesy etc.. This is why I think the idea of the animated Buffy series would be so amazing. Being aimed more for children- it would capitalize on the lighter side of Buffy. Plus, we would get more stories to enhance the earlier seasons of Buffy and would have stories that wouldn't work on the live action t.v. show.

[midwesternwatcher]

Absolutely I agree! I can see why some people think they overdid it, though. We need a little comic relief from time to time. I just finished watching "Him," perhaps the weakest episode in S7, but a nice break from the bleak.

[henzINNIT]

Being too serious does make the show dip into cheese, but it mostly walked the line well. The end of Season 5 was brilliant. Season 6 and 7 just weren't as well written, starting with some big flaws during conception which followed through all the way on to the screen.

[Inappropriate Starches]

I find that people favourite season tend to be split. They either like 1-3, or 5-7 best and season 4 is up in the air.

For me I like 4-7 best. It's not to say at all that I didn't like the beginning of the show, but I think, especially as I got older that the latter half of the show had more I could relate to. It always baffled me in the earlier seasons how 'good' they all were. They never drank, smoked, did drugs, and they rarely even talked about it. Not even the good kids I knew in high school never even talked about it, lol.

Again it's not that it wasn't good, but as they got older it got messier, and to me that's more real. People make mistakes, people date the wrong person, hurt their friends, get hurt by their friends. It's just messy, and as long as it doesn't seem like a soap opera, messy television just always seems better to me. So to answer the question, no, I don't think going darker ruined the show at all, I think it allowed the show to evolve, which in my opinion is a good thing.

[midwesternwatcher]

Each season had to top the last, right? The villain had to be bigger, the crisis more painful, so that the triumph could be more exhilarating. It had to get darker. As long as it remained believable and meaningful, darker was better. I feel it remained believable and meaningful to the end. I guess there are some of us who felt that, at some point, it became too dark to be taken seriously.

[BennyTheKey]

Darkness doesn't equal bad, it actually makes for some interesting plots. Season 5 was done just right I think, Season 6 however was just too real? I like it overall but something was missing (the main problem I have with this season was SpikexBuffy, no offence). Season 7 reminded me of a Season 5..just not as good. I don't think any of the dark moments ruined the show, it just made it more mature for a more mature audience.

[Miss. Rogueh]

Dec 3, 2010 13:29:14 GMT -5 midwesternwatcher said:

The Buffyverse doesn't really have a take on the afterlife (too controversial), but if you think there's any correlation at all between how a person behaved in life and her fate afterward, then after season 5 Buffy must end up in heaven or something like it. I don't anyone, in the verse or out, thought that Buffy in hell was a serious possibility, except Willow, who had a vested interest.

I believe the theory was that Buffy's soul/spirit (whatever it is) was sucked into the hell dimensions. Kind of like Angel was, now granted when it happened to Angel his physical body went with him. But being that the gates of the hell dimensions were crashing and they had never experienced this before it is reasonable that they would think that there was a possibility of saving her from whatever "horrible hell dimension", rather then believe that Buffy (a girl who seemed invincible.) was dead and gone forever.

[midwesternwatcher]

Let me see. I think what Buffy dived into was a "rift in reality" where all the dimensions mixed. I suppose she could've vanished and wound up in any dimension, but her body, of course, remained in this one, and it was dead.

I always assumed it was just an ordinary death where the "soul" if there is one is separated from the body and goes, well, wherever souls go. Ordinary death by mystical forces, that means. All kinds of forces can cause death.

[Inappropriate Starches]

^I think both are valid. Willow seemed to assume that where Buffy's soul was had something to do with the portal, but since it was in fact a portal I figured if that was what happened her body would go with her but it didn't.

Either way of looking at it however explains where she went just fine. She would go to 'heaven' if her death was 'natural' enough because she was a good person and fought against evil etc. etc. She also had the option of going to any dimention with the portal so it makes sense either by her altruism or luck that she would end up in a heavenly dimention.