Our sweet, geeky Willow is so believable I always forget she’s played by a literal model until this episode lmao. For real though, anyone know the workout routine? I know the 90s were brutal for women's beauty standards and what it took to achieve them, buuut I have a revenge body to create and unfortunately no evil vampires to slay 💔

I never liked her. I did not really buy her shy but nice nerd persona, it seemed she dropped that the moment she got the tiniest taste of power and confidence. What she did to Tara was not acceptable. She was a bad friend to Buffy. She did not care about Dawn. She is one of those people that are a mean girl deep inside, but since they are not really popular, they can't behave how they want.

She was totally reckless with her magic, was really mean to Anya in 5x11. The moment Giles turned his back, she started taking and using stuff from the magic box.

In 3x01 she says "she is doing serious dating" and resents that she was not able to talk about it to Buffy. Mind you, Buffy just went through serious trauma, was kicked out of home, had to kill Angel, but hey, its all about Willow.

While Cordelia is a nice girl deep down, but a bitch on the surface, Willow is the exact opposite.

I’m rewatching Season 5, and people always love to say how awful Xander is as a character… But watching Triangle (S5E11) as an adult, I can’t help but notice how Willow is actually a selfish, stubborn b*tch. She’s straight-up mean to Anya—for literally no reason. She is a bully.

Giles goes to England to find some info on Glory and leaves the shop to Anya (reluctantly, because nobody trusts her), even though she’s by far the most qualified to run the place. Willow just strolls in, takes ingredients without paying, gaslights Anya, and paints her as a pain in the ass. And of course, things go horribly wrong—like they always do whenever Willow decides she knows best and puts everyone in danger with her magic.

Honestly, Willow gets away with way too much just because she’s part of the Scooby core. If Xander had pulled half the stuff she did, the fandom would crucify him.

What do you guys think?

I like Tara, but I felt like Willow's character started becoming really unlikeable when she began to date Tara. Maybe that's why I prefer Willow with Oz back when she was nicer.

Me, my wife and some friends recently went to a drag show/buffy pub quiz.

We came second based on an answer I’m absolutely sure is incorrect (not bitter at all /s).

The question was, what was willows first spell in the series? We answered with a guess that it was the de-inviting of angel to her house. We almost chose the spinning of the pencil.

The quiz masters said it was her giving angel his soul back. Which seems like a HUGE spell for her first spell?! Are they correct?

Vamp Willow is pretty clearly attracted to both men and women. She's with Xander in the Wishverse, flirts with women (Sandy), is attracted to her alternate-universe self, regular Willow had real feelings for Xander, had a serious relationship with Oz, then fell in love with Tara, but once the show committed to Willow being gay it feels like all of her attraction to men beforehand was basically erased from the conversation.

Also, was anybody else a dumbass like me that didn't get all the spells as sex metaphors and only figured out that they're dating when Willow actually said it in the episode where Oz comes back? Lol

Me after watching Full Moon Rising.

Mind blown 🤯 . Did you know?

I honestly believe that Willow’s fashion sense rivals that of Buffy’s, maybe even surpassing it (at the risk of blaspheming). Her fashion evolution is the best in the show. How it starts off innocent and unassuming and morphs into a more mature and darker version of itself mirroring that of her character’s transformation. I love that she stays true to her colour palette throughout. She is the autumn to Buffy’s summer.

I know Willow was a fan favourite back in the day but it seems to me that while Xander is a divisive character (the vitriol against him is evident, but I often come across commenters defending him), the general consensus nowadays (at least here on Reddit) is that Willow basically... sucks.

So, are there any other fans out there who can still say they genuinely like Willow, or even that Willow is their favourite character?

As a sidenote, allow me to vent: sometimes I get baffled at how ruthless many people here are when judging the characters' morals. I mean, even if I can't stand Xander (and I can't), I'd never suggest he was a worthless piece of junk or that he's a terrible friend. Same with Willow, she has terrible, terrible moments, but neither Willow nor Xander are ultimately horrible people. But the moment opinions like "the Scoobies are terrible friends" and "Cordelia was a better friend to Buffy than Xander or Willow", I'm genuinely worried. Not because the characters didn't do awful things, not because they were perfect friends all the time or because the writing wasn't ham fisted on occasion, but I surely hope folks are cutting real people some slack instead of labelling everyone a sociopath, narcissistic and toxic. Again, it's great that we can now recognise problematic behaviour when we see it, but we don't have to forget nuance and how people are often contradictory (and how good people might, given the circumstances, act horrendously).

Why is Willow seen as gay rather than bisexual? I always am confused as although she really thrives once she finds Tara, her feelings and love towards Oz and early pining for Xander do feel very genuine. Was the show, in making it very clear on every possible occasion after she starts dating Tara that she’s a lesbian now (lol pretty funny but also kinda awkward and dated), trying to sort of retcon the feelings she had for male characters or is it more a situation of the writers being of the time and not fully understanding queer and most importantly bisexual people?

Don’t get me wrong, the representation, especially for the time was beautiful and groundbreaking and most importantly as a diehard wlw makes me very happy inside :3 However I have noticed a lot of tropes from early television representations of queer women regarding the sort of idea that a woman can “turn into a lesbian” and a lot of comments like “she’s gay now” or the Buffybot’s iconic “you’re recently gay”.

I understand that this kind of thing can happen and people only realise later on that they’re gay and never look back, but the show’s fierce firmness with the whole black and white straight or gay idea is throwing me off. Hoping the queer little scoobies on reddit could provide some insight or theories. 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈💕

hands down one of my favourite episodes to ever exist and hellllooo vamp Willow is everything.

(Almost done watching Angel season 5 so please no spoilers)

I've always been confused by how often this gets brought up on this sub.

I know that on the surface Willow can look like a squatter. She's living in Buffy's house, she's recovering after her magic addiction and after putting Dawn in a car accident while high on magic, so I understand why some fans get that impression.

But do we actually know she wasn't financially contributing?

The show never says Willow wasn't paying rent, helping with groceries, or covering part of the utilities. We know Buffy is overwhelmed by the financial burden after Joyce dies, but we never get a breakdown of everyone's contributions. Just because we don't see Willow handing Buffy money on screen doesn't mean it wasn't happening off screen.

If it really was becoming an issue, it also doesn't seem like Buffy herself viewed it as one. if Willow truly wasn't pulling her weight financially, I think the show would have had Buffy say something eventually. Instead, that's mostly been filled in by the fandom.

Now, I will say Willow was incredibly tacky for bringing up Buffy's financial problems literally minutes after Buffy had been resurrected. Buffy had barely processed being ripped out of heaven before Willow was talking about bills and responsibilities. That was awful timing, and I completely understand why people criticize Willow for that.

The same applies to Tara. People rarely question whether Tara was contributing financially, but the show doesn't spell that out either.

To me, this feels like one of those things that has become accepted as fact within the fandom even though the show never explicitly says Willow was freeloading. Unless I'm forgetting a scene, I've never understood why it's treated as canon that she wasn't helping financially.

I saw a recent post about this moment in the last image and it just made me think about how special their bond was. In Prophecy Girl, it was the conversation between Buffy and Willow, that lead Buffy to face the master. My guess is that she probably would have faced him regardless but it would have taken her more time but seeing Willow like this pushed her to do it. In Becoming, Willow's official entry to darkness was to save Angel for Buffy. Idk why but I found this so special and moving. In The Gift, Buffy acknowledge that Willow is her strongest weapon... how far did we go ? Now, I've made a pretty heavy rant before about how I thought that Willow always deep down envied Buffy and I still by that, as one line in the season 6 finale proved that to me. But I could never deny the love they had for each other. And at the end, it was Buffy and Willow who changed the game. Beautiful, complex, messy but always loving!

And as soon Willow lost her one and only source of comfort and support system, it took the other characters no more than twenty minutes to say 'oh Willow, you've gone dark, it seems like we will have to kill you soon'. I'm exaggerating, of course, but I really don't like how the Dark Willow arc never fully addressed the emotional ignorance and neglect of Willow's closest friends - or how she was driven to that extreme because she had to spend an entire season acting as their caretaker basically, and Tara being the one person she could rely on.