Tigerlily

I loved Buffy in each and every season, no matter what she said or did. From the beginning when most people were satisfied with her perky socialness to the end when people were putting down her supposed coldness. I rarely thought her cold or entitled. Or, among those other things, stupid or antilearning for herself without some designated smart person to explain anything to her.

One of the things that're usually overlooked is her interest in learning. True, early on she doesn't seem to care for studying. Then there are the little moments. In Teacher's Pet she does her homework after being encouraged by one teacher who didn't think she was bad or stupid. Late in season two she has that frustrated moment with Willow and is comforted at her encouragement. In season three Buffy has a favorite teacher and is saddened when she doesn't remember her. By season four she has openly developed an interest in her classes and is comfortable enough by season five to actually study Slayer lore- it was a blow to have to drop out and later to not be able to return, and it's too bad that by the end of the series she seems to have given up on college entirely.

It's likely that Buffy herself is overlooking this part of her. After a high school career of first subverting her smarts for popularity, then Slaying and the stress of that, and having to give up after a short time of true contentment in college, maybe she's just resigned to the idea that it's not for her to learn or be anything but a Slayer scraping a living in human society.






An interesting quirk of Relena's is her early pretending to have conversations when people weren't there. She acts out an introduction to Heero after he runs off, for example. I can relate to that a bit, because I do something similar. Her loneliness and interest in adventure is evident early on from this and the fact that she keeps chasing Heero instead of being scared and avoiding him.

Which is part of the reasons people give for bashing her- that she's a stalker. Admittedly she does follow Heero around, but that's no worse than the ways the other characters are a bit off. Part of what I like is this character progression- the determinedly adventurous girl gets involved in a global political power struggle and she handles it admirably. Instead of breaking down or staying all bitter and angry she quickly rises to the situations around her and starts shaping them herself, even when up against the people that were responsible for the whole mess and want to keep using her to make it worse. So composed and determined and intelligent.

I wonder if she's been readying herself for this with all that acting scenarios out loud by herself. Which reminds me that as the daughter of an important politician, she must have been very aware of the politics around her. On top of her strong will her entire life prepared her for the role she takes in the series- this is no special hero just because, or some naive person messing about with matters bigger than her. No matter how silly some of her earlier scenes from her more protected world are.