I have now seen Five By Five and Sanctuary, and, lo, I am quite pleased with the concept of Faith growing up and taking responsibility for her choices. It was also very satisfying to hear Angel warn Faith that her repentance will be difficult and painful and that, no matter her effort, she may never "balance the cosmic scale." Joss, you've won me over again.
Also: I think dork-muffin Wesley may be my designated woobie.
Ah yes, that was the two-parter that made a lot of spin-off sceptics go from "hm, nice" to "wow, awesome" about AtS.
Wesley: you and the entire rest of the fandom. I'm feeling somewhat smug, because I thought he was a woobie before he got tortured by Faith (I felt intensely sorry for him at the end of season 3 BTVS, due to Giles and Buffy venting their issues with the Council on him which weren't really his fault), and delighted when he showed up at AtS, so eager to find friends. Anyway, Wesley gets a fantastic arc of his own during the course of the show, and Alexis Denisof shows he excells at both tragedy and comedy like no-one's business.
There is also the possibility to love Wesley's storyline in season 3 and hate most of the rest.*g* Okay, I have season 3 issues due to what was done to Cordelia's characterisation. Otoh, season 4 is yummy, imo the best written of all the AtS seasons (2 loses out because of the Pylea eps), and since a lot of it was set up in 3, I can't recommend the skipping.
pleased
Wesley: you and the entire rest of the fandom. I'm feeling somewhat smug, because I thought he was a woobie before he got tortured by Faith (I felt intensely sorry for him at the end of season 3 BTVS, due to Giles and Buffy venting their issues with the Council on him which weren't really his fault), and delighted when he showed up at AtS, so eager to find friends. Anyway, Wesley gets a fantastic arc of his own during the course of the show, and Alexis Denisof shows he excells at both tragedy and comedy like no-one's business.
And as for Wesley... you're either going to LOVE season three or HATE it.