This post discusses some relatively old developments in the Buffy “Season 8″ comic which I haven’t kept up with in recent months so forgive me for being outdated and for spoiling you at the same time.

Is a recent interview with Joss Whedon, Joss claimed that he had heard no complaints about Buffy’s foray into homosexuality, or perhaps simply bisexuality, or perhaps even simplest sexual experimentation.

Really Joss?

I’ve got a few complaints. First of all, it didn’t flow naturally. I’m working off of old memories now, but I don’t remember that cut to Buffy sprawled out covered in sheets next to a fellow slayer making a heck of a lot of sense. It works in that we all know that Buffy gets horny when she slays. But if that were the case, then why did her experimentation not happen when slaying with Faith years ago?

Another argument I’ve had with myself is that Buffy, in that universe, was still basically the age of a college student and that’s a time ripe with experimentation. But it’s not that age that induces experimentation, but the maturity and independence of that time. And Buffy has had to be incredibly mature for years. Her times for experimentation are over. One of my biggest complaints with Season 7 of Buffy was that Buffy still acted like a petulant child a lot of the time. She should have been more mature, because she was more mature. The same applies here.

Overall, I just don’t think the situation was handled very well. I’m sure they could have done a lesbian storyline with Buffy smartly, but to me there were simply too many things that didn’t add up or make sense in the greater scheme. I’m not alone either. There were quite a few people who didn’t like the direction the story took on forums, some of them being quite hyperbolic about the whole thing, but most citing their issues with the story in reasonable terms. It didn’t ruin Buffy for me, it didn’t ruin the comic for me, it didn’t even ruin the storyline for me, but to say there were no complaints is a little presumptuous.

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a synopsis/review of two new shows from MRC (Media Rights Capital) that were airing on the outsourced CW Sunday night lineup. After discussing the merits and faults of the shows I pondered their likelihood of survival. Here’s what I had to say:

It doesn’t look great, but I’m cautiously optimistic about the prospects for both of these shows, primarily because of this: their ratings aren’t stellar, but MRC is an independent producer and its requirements when it comes to ratings might not be as grand as networks. And it seems to me that MRC is working towards establishing itself as a producer of quality television programming. They might not succeed, but the very fact that they have that goal means to me that they’ll give their material more of a chance than an established network.

Oops. My bad. Apparently, unbeknownst to me — but knownst to others — MRC was having cash flow and managerial issues which likely led to the cancellations. And sure, the atrocious ratings probably didn’t help, but in the end, it comes down to a lack of faith in your product. And me, I’ve got too much faith. Everyone I know considers me a pessimist of the highest order, but I’m in fact an incredibly optimistic, almost naïvely so, guy.

Which is why, when MRC shut down production to “work on scripts” I didn’t really see it as the company saving some cash while they decide the faith of the show. I saw it as a company willing to work to improve a product. For the most part, I genuinely believe that television networks want to do more than just sell advertising.

Yes, sometimes networks are too quick with their trigger finger, cancelling shows before they’ve had a chance to build a base, but overall they try to let shows develop if there is promise. Unfortunately, a brilliant show with ever-decreasing ratings doesn’t show promise to most network executives, much to the detriment of good taste. So there is a level of practised cynicism I should have by now, but I generally don’t. No matter how many times I get burned, I keep going back to the networks to see what new brilliance they have that no one seems to be watching. Not that Valentine or Easy Money were brilliant, far from it, but their deaths are a symptom of a greater problem that television is enduring right now. A problem I on occasion rail against, but most of the time am ignorant of simply because I have too much faith.

Oh well, two fewer shows to watch every week.