I do think that Joss is doing this leap forward, slowly reveal how they got there thing. One of the early covers was a picture of Buffy as a jigsaw with a good number of the pieces missing. So, for example, the revelation that Buffy was robbing banks served to bring into focus a bunch of things that didn't make sense. But we still need to know how she got there in order to understand that. Anywho, I'm thinking the reveal about where she's at with Spike will be part of that.

I think it's interesting story telling. It's very much like what they did in BSG, which I understand Joss likes a lot. But you are right that the big downside to it (assuming that's what's going on) is that he's made his audience a very long time to figure out what's up.

We'll see. I remain hopeful. But that could just be naivete on my part.