Not that long ago, I had a shameful geek secret: I had never watched a single episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  Seven months and 144 episodes later, I am now an official convert, a worshiper at the house of Buffy.   As sad as I am to be finished with the show, I have to admit that the series finished on an incredibly strong note.

When I last left you, I was convinced that Giles was dead, and that the Giles who was walking around Sunnydale was actually The First.  It didn’t take long for that theory to be debunked, and I was extremely grateful to discover that the ever resourceful Rupert had managed to get the better of the axe-wielding Bringer.  Killing Giles off camera would have been blasphemy, and it would have been a cheap move.  Just like having Dawn be another potential would have been hackneyed, the show once again allows you to believe that they are going in one direction before totally turning things around.

Another example of that was the set up that Principal Wood was up to no good, only then to reveal that he is the son of the Slayer that Spike killed in New York.  Wood made for a great ally in the fight, and even though I didn’t really think that he and Buffy had a chance, it was nice to see her have some romantic chemistry with a human for a change.

After Buffy killed the first Turok-Han, she seemed to be doing a great job as a leader of the Potentials, but from that moment on the show did an excellent job with casting doubt on her role as General.  The events at the winery in “Dirty Girls” were downright upsetting, and even though we didn’t get a ton of background information on Caleb, he very quickly established himself as one hell of a badass.  Even though it was a given that some of the Potentials wouldn’t make it, seeing him brutally murder a couple was sort of hard to watch.

And then, if that wasn’t enough, he goes and gouges out of Xander’s eyes!  Holy crap!  That was seriously just a smidge too much.  What the hell did Xander do to deserve that?  I get that it was another way to show that Buffy and company were in for the fight of their lives, but damn, I kept waiting for Willow to do some sort of eye-puncturing reversal spell or something, but nope.  The dude’s a cyclops, and that’s that.  Although I have to wonder why Caleb didn’t go for both eyes instead of settling for just one; it’s not like the young Mr. Harris could have stopped him.

It was nice to see Faith come back, although it was a little frustrating knowing that I clearly missed some stuff with her that happened on sister-show Angel.  But they did a good job at giving me the Reader’s Digest version, and I was grateful for that.  It’s hard to imagine her rejoining the side of good, but I’ll get there in good time.  Faith was still the same old gal deep down though, using Wood for sex and taking the Potentials out for a good time, and hey, why not add another reformed murderer to the team?  And speaking of reformed murderers, Andrew was given a great chance to redeem himself in “Storyteller.”  Though he did bad in the past, he ended up showing off a human side and ended up actually coming in handy.

As for Spike, I have to admit that I was kind of behind the whole Giles and Wood plan to take him out.  The First specifically said that he was going to play a part in his plan, and so keeping him around just seemed foolish and wrong.  They never said specifically that by deactivating the trigger he wasn’t able to be used anymore, but I guess that must have been the case because once Spike was able to sing the song his mother sang without any ill effects, The First mostly left him alone.  And while I can appreciate that Buffy didn’t want Spike dead because he is strong, she should have more actively tried to find a way to turn off his trigger.  In the end it was turned off by more of a happy accident than anything else, which I guess is just as good, but I wonder what exactly The First was going to have him do, and when his “time” would have been.

The final battle made for an exciting finish to the season, but it left me with a few more annoyingly nit-picky questions.  First off, why were these Turok-Han vampires so much easier to kill than the first one Buffy squared off with?  Secondly, was the seal always the entrance to the Hellmouth?  In Season Four, a couple of demons tried to open it up by sacrificing themselves, and then it was just sort of a hole in the ground.  Did I miss something there?  And weren’t all of the Potential Slayers either dead or fighting in Sunnydale?  How come all those other girls, like the abused woman and the little leaguer were also potential chosen ones?  I also don’t fully understand all of the logistics of The First’s plan.  So the Turok-Han are ancient vampires, but The First said that his army was growing by the day.  How do they make more ancient vampires?  And he had to wait until there were more of them than people?  It didn’t look like there was anywhere near a billion of them down in that pit, so how long was it going to take for that to happen?  And why didn’t he take Buffy out long ago – he kept saying that she would die later, but why did he need her around until some never fully explained end game?  I assume that ties into his plan with Spike in some way, but I would love to know what that plan was.

In spite of those questions, the climactic battle was still really cool, and I loved the way that Buffy and Willow changed the rules of the Slayer game to even the odds.  (Although it might have made more sense for Buffy, Faith, and the Potentials to not open the seal until Willow’s spell had been cast, but that wouldn’t have been as dramatic…)  Spike got to die an honorable death, and despite my issues with his character lately, seeing him sacrifice himself for the good of the world was a nice way to let the guy go with dignity.  I wish they had explained the amulet a little bit more, although it occurs to me that perhaps they did on Angel.

I was sad to see Anya get taken down without much fanfare, and I was surprised that she ended up falling in battle instead of Andrew.  But I loved the way that the four original Scoobies  got to share a special moment before it all went down, joking about going to the mall afterward.  And hell, name another show where an entire town could be wasted and it would still be a happy ending.  Am I right?

So it all ended nicely, but I am jonesing for more.  There have been a few videogames – are any of them worth checking out?  And what about this Season 8 comic that I’ve heard about?  Joss Whedon has his hand in them, right?   So that’s got to count for something.  And of course I can still go back and watch the DVDs again, listening to all of the commentaries and such, but before I get to that, I feel like I still have some unfinished business in the Buffyverse…

Hey Raf, can I borrow your Angel DVDs?