[continued from previous message]   
      
       Katrina’s entire purpose seemed to be to pass away in order to further   
   the development of a male character, which is a bad look.   
       However, when that character’s whole development is that he’s an abuser   
   of women, it’s also somewhat unavoidable.   
      
           13.  SAVED: FAITH AND ROBIN   
       Faith was never one for romantic entanglements, saying that as soon as   
   she spent one night with a guy, she found out all she needed to know about   
   him.   
       Her only fling with any of the main characters had been Xander, and it   
   had just been a one night stand and she had tried to strangle him afterward.   
       When she met Robin Wood, son of a slayer, they were two people from   
   completely different worlds but they also shared some similarities both in   
   terms of their respective losses and of growing up having to take care of   
   themselves.   
       Robin helped Faith to slow down and even if they never fully got   
   together, they were clearly on that path by the end of the series.   
      
           12.   HURT: OZ AND VERUCA   
       Oz and Willow were great together, easily one of the best couples in the   
   show’s history, even when they had their ups and downs. They balanced each   
   other incredibly well.   
       However, Oz considered caging himself once a month to be an easy fix for   
   his werewolf condition and when Veruca showed up in Sunnydale, she forced   
   him to confront some hard truths about who and what he actually was.   
       His werewolf fling with Veruca devastated Willow and led to Oz being   
   forced to end Vercua’s life to stop her from eating Willow.   
       It was rushed and horrific, but Oz’s departure did allow both he and   
   Willow to confront things about themselves and grow individually after he   
   left.   
      
            11. SAVED: GILES AND JENNY   
        One of the show’s best relationships, the only problem with this   
   pairing is that their time together was so short.   
       While Jenny Calendar was introduced in season one, she appeared more   
   regularly in season two, where the chemistry between her and Giles was made   
   abundantly clear.   
       Viewers got to see a whole new, much more boyish, side of Giles and that   
   was great. But unfortunately, Jenny met a devastating end after Angel lost   
   his soul.   
       Giles returning home to see Jenny laid out on his bed is still the most   
   unsettling, devastating image in the show’s seven year history.   
       Her loss lingered throughout the rest of the series and Giles never had   
   another relationship remotely this serious.   
      
           10.  HURT: CORDELIA AND WESLEY   
       On one level, the relationship here was just hilarious. One of these   
   people is a well-to-do intellectual, a total academic and the other is   
   Cordelia.   
       However, they were certainly similar in how clueless and superficial   
   they could both be at any given moment.   
       Of course, the major problem here is that Wesley was quite a bit older   
   than Cordelia, and not in a way like Angel where he could get a pass for   
   being immortal.   
       This is different. Wesley was a grown man trying to court a high school   
   student Even if she was of legal age, it was still very creepy.   
       Thankfully, the sparks between them completely fizzled out after their   
   first kiss and they went on to have a profound friendship on   
      
           9.  SAVED: XANDER AND CORDELIA   
       Absolutely nothing about this relationship should have worked.   
   Throughout season one and up to this point in season two, the only thing   
   Xander and Cordelia had in common was the fact that they hated each other.   
       However, they traded insults more than anyone else and eventually that   
   passionate vitriol manifested itself as actual passion.   
       While this began as a relationship built on mutual lust, it transformed   
   both characters for the better, giving Xander an actual relationship and   
   forcing Cordelia to realize that she could define her coolness on her own   
   terms rather than who she hung out with or who she dated.   
       Unfortunately, even after Cordelia turned her back on her popularity,   
   Xander blew this relationship by kissing Willow.   
      
           8.   HURT: XANDER AND WILLOW   
       While season three was undoubtedly one of the show’s best, it was bogged   
   down with some questionable relationships and this was the very worst of   
   them.   
       The smartest thing this pairing did was finally make it clear to the   
   viewers that this was not something they should actually want.   
       On that level, it does succeed. Fans had wanted to see Willow and Xander   
   get together from the very first episode. Even after they found their own   
   relationships, it didn’t seem to matter. The people wanted what they wanted.   
       So Willow and Xander shared a few kisses, which completely ended his   
   time with Cordelia and put a serious strain on Willow’s relationship with   
   Oz, which took time to mend.   
      
           7.   SAVED: WILLOW AND OZ   
       When Oz was first introduced over the course of several minor   
   appearances toward the beginning of season two, fans hated him. They didn’t   
   want to see Willow with anyone but Xander.   
       It wasn’t until “Innocence”, where Oz told Willow that he wasn’t   
   going   
   to kiss her just to make Xander jealous, that fans started to fall in love   
   with this character.   
       His relationship with Willow wasn’t always easy, but it was sweet,   
   tender and based on genuine love.   
       Unfortunately, it ended only partway into season four, when Oz’s   
   struggle against his inner beast took over and forced him to leave town.   
       When Oz came back to find Willow with Tara, they left on respectful   
   terms and had the most healthy sendoff of any couple in the show’s history.   
      
           6.  HURT: WILLOW AND KENNEDY   
       On some level, the beginning of this relationship was close to the   
   beginning of Willow’s relationship with Oz, in that people really didn’t   
   want to see Willow with anyone at the time.   
       The difference here is that people never warmed up to Kennedy as a   
   character and still complain about her to this day.   
       It was strange to see Willow in a relationship while still grieving for   
   Tara, and even if the show tried to handle that as best as it could, Kennedy   
   was such a strange person for Willow to end up with.   
       Kennedy was a spoiled brat, different from Willow, but in a way that   
   stretched the concept of opposites attract to its limits.   
       Still, the series pursued the pairing and they remained together   
   throughout all of season seven.   
      
           5.   SAVED: SPIKE AND DRUSILLA   
       Unlike most of the other characters on this list, Spike and Drusilla   
   were actually introduced as a couple.   
       They brought a new layer not just to the couples that were seen on the   
   show, but as also to the mythology as a whole.   
       They were an example to the audience that vampires actually could feel   
   and share passionate love even if they did not have a soul.   
       They were utterly devoted to each other, even as they tore up Sunnydale   
   and launched numerous plots to bring down the slayer and her friends.   
       Ultimately they didn’t work out, at first because of Spike’s alliance   
   with Buffy, though it was later made clear that Dru realized before Spike   
   did that he had fallen in love with the slayer.   
      
      
           4.   HURT: BUFFY AND PARKER   
       Buffy and Parker’s relationship played out over the first few episodes   
   of the show’s fourth season, and it was much rougher on her than fans wanted   
   to see.   
       They dated for a while, spent the first couple weeks hanging out and   
   when they finally slept together he totally abandoned her and ignored her   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)