I'm kind of surprised by the love for Ms. Swithin and the Xander-hating going on here.
First off, I think we're still, through Ms. Swithin's eyes, seriously over-estimating Xander. Sneaky, ruthless, etc? Sure. "OMG! Teh Ethiopian W0lf!!!"? Eh... No. But how well do you think some Council-born-and-bred researcher - who has demonstrated a distinct, Andrew-esque separation from reality from the very beginning - is going to take being shown up and outmaneuvered by a goofy (but sneaky) blue collar kid from America? It's far easier for her to believe that Xander is this brilliant, unstoppable leader than it is for her to admit that she's been spectacularly stupid.
Second, Cruciamentum? Again, no. She wasn't stripped of her power. She was armed, deliberately, with holy water and stakes. She was even offered a training session - that she deliberately wasted - in order to help prepare her. She was given a buddy to bail her out if she genuinely couldn't handle it. The only thing she wasn't told ahead of time was that she was actually being tested.
Let's run through that again: We had one untrained, armed, knowledgeable Slayer, with additional Slayers (plus the normal crew) waiting in the wings as backup. We had one unarmed, disoriented, panicky vampire. While there's obviously always a chance things can go pear shaped, this was hardly locking a (functionally) normal human in with a vamp and saying "Hi, no help for you, hope you don't die!"
Stop looking through Ms. Swithin's "Oh, woe is me!" eyes for a minute. This was half giving a Slayer her first vamp kill under very controlled circumstances and half acting to stop Ms. Swithin from making her (seriously deranged) "Xander is trying to take over the world!" report to Wyndham-Pryce.
Liz? Congrats, I think you might have had people feeling almost too sympathetic for your character. :) As for me, well, the earlier Andrew comparison was deliberate - Ms. Swithin strikes me as a pompous twit with a near crippling disconnect from the world around her. Like Andrew, I don't particularly care for her, but she certainly is amusing at times. Also like Andrew, half the fun is figuring out which portions of this skewed perspective are actually relatively accurate and which are manufactured entirely in Ms. Swithin's head.
no subject
First off, I think we're still, through Ms. Swithin's eyes, seriously over-estimating Xander. Sneaky, ruthless, etc? Sure. "OMG! Teh Ethiopian W0lf!!!"? Eh... No. But how well do you think some Council-born-and-bred researcher - who has demonstrated a distinct, Andrew-esque separation from reality from the very beginning - is going to take being shown up and outmaneuvered by a goofy (but sneaky) blue collar kid from America? It's far easier for her to believe that Xander is this brilliant, unstoppable leader than it is for her to admit that she's been spectacularly stupid.
Second, Cruciamentum? Again, no. She wasn't stripped of her power. She was armed, deliberately, with holy water and stakes. She was even offered a training session - that she deliberately wasted - in order to help prepare her. She was given a buddy to bail her out if she genuinely couldn't handle it. The only thing she wasn't told ahead of time was that she was actually being tested.
Let's run through that again: We had one untrained, armed, knowledgeable Slayer, with additional Slayers (plus the normal crew) waiting in the wings as backup. We had one unarmed, disoriented, panicky vampire. While there's obviously always a chance things can go pear shaped, this was hardly locking a (functionally) normal human in with a vamp and saying "Hi, no help for you, hope you don't die!"
Stop looking through Ms. Swithin's "Oh, woe is me!" eyes for a minute. This was half giving a Slayer her first vamp kill under very controlled circumstances and half acting to stop Ms. Swithin from making her (seriously deranged) "Xander is trying to take over the world!" report to Wyndham-Pryce.
Liz? Congrats, I think you might have had people feeling almost too sympathetic for your character. :) As for me, well, the earlier Andrew comparison was deliberate - Ms. Swithin strikes me as a pompous twit with a near crippling disconnect from the world around her. Like Andrew, I don't particularly care for her, but she certainly is amusing at times. Also like Andrew, half the fun is figuring out which portions of this skewed perspective are actually relatively accurate and which are manufactured entirely in Ms. Swithin's head.
Bravo!