And there's just no way that Spike was of so little weight in Buffy's life that Joss thinks it's a matter of indifference to Buffy's character such that we don't need to know just why Spike isn't in her life now.

I wish I could agree. I still can't shake the nasty feeling that Joss wants to bury Spuffy quietly in the back garden, wonderful final moments in Chosen notwithstanding. And not because he hates Spike or the Spuffy relationship, just that he doesn't want to deal with it again for all sorts of reasons.

One of which might be the damage he feels it did to his feminist credentials. In view of quinara's post on the inherent problems of the femal empowerment message in Chosen, I suspect that Joss is more likely to have thought of those and want to address them than return to a story he feels is over and done with.

But we'll see.