the juxtaposition of Buffy's fight with a random vamp and Cordy's making out with a random guy Something you didn't mention (and something that will be brought to the fore in The Wish) is how Buffy's fight enables Cordelia's life to be possible. It's a foreshadowing of the choice she'll make later in the episode: She'll give her life so others can live.
And all your thoughts about father figures/suitors, made me think, and it all fits together very neatly: On the human side we have Xander and Giles (and Giles is, I think, very much Xander's father-figure too), both devoted, both willing to fight for Buffy in any way they can. On the vampires side we have Angel and The Master, the two of them not just related, but having a father/prodigal son dynamic. The Master (head of the family) will literally kill Buffy, and Angel - here torn between all kinds of different impulses, and thus too conflicted to act decisively - will, once Buffy accepts him, follow in his family's footsteps and try to kill her too. (The way in which Spike manages to fall into both camps, and overcome the obstacles, is rather neat IMHO.)
The slayer is not supposed to know the anointed one. But Buffy does know him, going to him and letting him lead her to her death. Well she doesn't know him back in NKABOTFD, which is when it mattered. If she'd killed him then, things would probably have been different. Knowing him now doesn't change anything.
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Date: 2010-09-30 10:44 am (UTC)Something you didn't mention (and something that will be brought to the fore in The Wish) is how Buffy's fight enables Cordelia's life to be possible. It's a foreshadowing of the choice she'll make later in the episode: She'll give her life so others can live.
And all your thoughts about father figures/suitors, made me think, and it all fits together very neatly: On the human side we have Xander and Giles (and Giles is, I think, very much Xander's father-figure too), both devoted, both willing to fight for Buffy in any way they can. On the vampires side we have Angel and The Master, the two of them not just related, but having a father/prodigal son dynamic. The Master (head of the family) will literally kill Buffy, and Angel - here torn between all kinds of different impulses, and thus too conflicted to act decisively - will, once Buffy accepts him, follow in his family's footsteps and try to kill her too. (The way in which Spike manages to fall into both camps, and overcome the obstacles, is rather neat IMHO.)
The slayer is not supposed to know the anointed one. But Buffy does know him, going to him and letting him lead her to her death.
Well she doesn't know him back in NKABOTFD, which is when it mattered. If she'd killed him then, things would probably have been different. Knowing him now doesn't change anything.