[continued from previous message]   
      
   From there, season five saw Buffy battle Glory, part ways with Riley, lose her   
   mom, and defend her sister. It was natural for Buffy to drop out of college.   
   In fact, it was arguably unrealistic for Buffy to have lasted as long as she   
   did in a rigorous    
   academic program alongside her slaying duties. The weight of responsibility   
   was just too much to keep up her studies by the home stretch of season five.   
      
      
   3   
   Least Realistic: Cordelia And Xander’s Relationship   
      
   Season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer sees Cordelia let down her guard as she   
   makes the full shift from antagonist to the Scoobies to part of the gang. Then   
   she starts dating Xander.   
      
   It's a trope for TV shows to have enemies wind up romantic partners, but this   
   was one of the least sensical pairings on Buffy. Cordelia was portrayed as   
   both popular and shallow. Her feeling of a magnetic attraction to Xander, who   
   was largely ignored by    
   everyone in the school, didn't make sense. The contrivance felt like a   
   Hollywood cliché, with the dork landing the girl who was out of his league,   
   despite offering little of value to her.   
      
      
   2   
   Most Realistic: The Class Protector   
       
   There’s a certain sad sweetness to Buffy protecting the people of Sunnydale   
   in largely anonymous fashion. The show does not portray it as common knowledge   
   that even vampires exist, let alone that there’s a Slayer.   
       
   Late season three episode, “The Prom,” rendered one of the best big school   
   dances in the history of movies or TV, and was highlighted by Buffy’s   
   classmates rallying to publicly present her with The Class Protector Award.   
   The superlative    
   realistically demonstrated that an individual can’t help so many people, so   
   many times, without them noticing and wanting to give thanks.   
      
      
   1   
   Least Realistic: The 18th Birthday Test   
       
   Buffy's eighteenth birthday nearly killed her. She unknowingly fell victim to   
   a slayer ritual in which she was drugged to subdue her superhuman powers and   
   pitted against an especially dangerous vampire to test her wits.   
      
   The premise of this test, portrayed in season three episode “Helpless,”   
   felt absurd. After all, there’s only supposed to be one slayer at a time,   
   who has substantial responsibility for protecting the world, and who   
   presumably grows more formidable    
   with experience. Subjecting her to physical and psychological torment, not to   
   mention putting her life at risk feels both cruel and wildly impractical for   
   all of the Watchers to be complicit in.   
      
   	[one last thing - season 5.  I don't see how Glory's minions could walk   
   through a hospital, and just about everywhere else and never be seen.]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)