"I thought you were a myth." "Well, you were Myth-taken!"

[rogueslayer452]

++ Tumblr just forced a new dashboard beta layout on everyone just now, and aside from being absolutely ugly it's barely functional. Endless scrolling should never be a thing, I can't find anything anymore and it slows everything down. :( I'm hoping that they sort things out and actually allow people to opt out because otherwise it's totally unusable. Ugh.

ETA: I just found out that Tumblr is doing a survey about the beta dashboard, where you can give your answers on how you feel about it. Which is actually the first time I've seen them do this, so that's something. So if you're on Tumblr please do fill this out, or if you know someone who uses Tumblr send this to them so they can do the same. It was linked in the staff post, but most don't read those anyway so it's good to at least get this out there for those who missed it. I don't know if anything will come out of it, but I'm hoping this will at least give us the option to opt out.

ETA 2: Apparently you need Xkit installed to get the option to revert to the old dashboard settings. Also, the survey has added an section at the end where you can actually write additional comments which wasn't there previously.

++ Anyway, here is a BTVS meme taken from itsnotmymind:


What is your favourite season for Buffy's character?
It's between season two and season five. I definitely think the second season was such a game-changer for the show overall, but certainly for Buffy's character. She started off the season with bringing in her PTSD from her encounter with The Master and after having been dead and brought back to life, and the season ended with her traumatic experience with Angel turning into Angelus and having to deal with that aftermath in the end. It was just a rough season for Buffy, but it added a lot of growth for her, especially in comparison to her in the first season. And the fifth season really added to that with the life-changes, with the revelation about Dawn (and feeling protective of her) to the death of her mother, to understanding her purpose and what she needed to do to save the world. Buffy's arc in the fifth season was struggling a lot with the transition into adulthood.

What is your favourite season for Willow's character?
Eh, it's hard to really say. Definitely earlier seasons than later seasons, for sure, because I ended up severely disliking her towards the end of the show.

What is your favourite season for Xander's character?
None, to be brutally honest.

What is your favourite season for Giles' character?
Season three, most definitely. And I say that specifically for the episode of "Helpless" because it showed his humanity and how protective he is with Buffy. He might've been fired from being her Watcher, but he remained there to watch over her nonetheless. We'd seen Giles acting this kind of paternal role before, this season truly demonstrated it full force with that episode and we see it continuing throughout the series.

What is your favourite episode from each season of the show?

Season One: "Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind"
Season Two: "Surprise"/"Innocence"
Season Three: "Bad Girls"
Season Four: "Hush"
Season Five: "Family"
Season Six: "Once More, With Feeling"
Season Seven: "Chosen"

What is your favourite Scooby season?
Season three, because I liked that it included everyone, not just Buffy, Willow, Xander and Giles, but also Oz and Cordelia and Angel, and even Wesley towards the end. Because although they weren't a central part of the Scooby Gang, they still were a part of it even if briefly. And they all contributed to the final fight, and I liked that. It made me wish that the Scooby Gang did extend more members aside from just the main four.

What is your favourite Bangel season?
Oh, definitely the second season. It's possibly the best season for Buffy/Angel, the sweet moments and the heartbreaking ones, the angst that occurs when Angel turns into Angelus and then in the finale where Buffy sends him to Hell the moment where he gets his soul back? All of the emotions, I tell you. The second season was one hell of a ride for Buffy/Angel and nothing else could ever compare.

What is your favourite Ruffy season?
That's a horrible ship name. And none, because I disliked Riley and Riley/Buffy.

What is your favourite Spuffy season?
None.

What is your favourite Faith episode?
ALL OF THEM.

Who is your favourite Big Bad?
Oh, this is honestly tough. I really loved The Mayor and Glory, because they were just fun villains and were unassuming but still quite threatening when they needed to be, and I did love how Glory was a game-changer in terms of a Big Bad essentially being a god, adding the obstacle of how do you even defeat a god from another dimension. But I actually have to go with Angelus, because this was such a personal battle for Buffy to defeat, very emotional, and Angelus was incredibly threatening and dangerous and it added so many layers to the already complicated situation.

What character do you feel is most underrated?
Dawn Summers. Mostly because she gets such an unfair amount of hate for absolutely no reason. She doesn't have to be your favorite and you don't have to like her, but the bashing of her character that has happened throughout the years still baffle me.

What is your favourite "comedy" episode?
The season three episode "Band Candy", because seeing Giles reverted to his younger punk self was such a delight, and seeing the adults acting ridiculous was a riot.

What is your favourite version of the opening credits?
Season three, though I'm biased because it's my favorite season.

What is your favourite flashback?
The flashbacks in "Becoming, Part 1", it was a nice way of us seeing the creation of Angelus, the curse that brought him to having a soul and being Angel, and his quest for redemption. Also, the flashbacks in "Fool For Love", I especially liked seeing Spike as his human self before he was turned.

What character do you wish we saw more of?
I wished that we could've gotten more of Kendra. If she had to suffer the fate she did, I wished we'd gotten at least more episodes with her in between so we would be able to get to know her a bit more and see her teaming up with Buffy and the gang, and possibly even develop more of a friendship with Buffy as they bond with their Slayer connection. I think it would've made an even more emotional impact when she was killed.

What is your favourite episode out of Hush, Restless, The Body or OMWF?
Probably "Hush", it was a very creative episode and I really enjoyed the creepy nursery rhyme that came with it. And for the sake of emotional episodes, "The Body" is one episode that I don't rewatch that often but whenever I do it still gets to me every single time. No other hour of television hits those raw, real moments like that one does. It's not a favorite in terms of "I enjoyed it", but more of "this made me feel things" and therefore that's what makes it special.

What is your favourite set?
I really liked the Sunnydale High School library. It was such an important set piece for the first three seasons. Plus, the design of the library itself was quite interesting, since it's unlike any school library I've ever seen.

What is your favourite fight scene?
The fight between Buffy and Faith in "Graduation Day, Part 1" and the epic battle sequence in "Graduation Day, Part 2" and in the series finale, "Chosen".

Willow/Oz or Willow/Tara?
I don't really know how to answer this question because I have liked both of them for different reasons, until I didn't. I always thought that Willow/Oz was rather sweet, although she cheated on him and I felt like he shouldn't have taken her back so quickly. And I liked Willow/Tara in the beginning, before Willow ended up mistreating Tara in the sixth season.

Xander/Cordy or Xander/Anya?
Neither because both Cordelia and Anya deserved better.

Comments

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who likes "Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind".

More Kendra would have been nice. I have to admit the minute I realized she was a black girl with Buffy's powers I knew she was dead. I didn't even expect her to make it out of the first two parter. Not one of Mutant Enemy's most shining moments.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

It was such an interesting concept of an episode. I know S1 is considered a basic filler season especially in comparison to the rest of the show, but it had some genuinely interesting episodes.

The show didn't really do well with black or minority characters in general, which is something of a huge disappointment when you look back on it and how they treated some of them. :/

[noybusiness.livejournal.com]

I know S1 is considered a basic filler season especially in comparison to the rest of the show

Not an opinion you'll ever hear me express.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Me neither. I have a soft spot for season one, and I definitely recommend that newcomers watch it despite others claiming that it's not essential.

[wretched.livejournal.com]

Yeah my Tumblr was basically unusable with that new look. If you wanna turn it off, you can go into your dashboard settings and there's an option.

Just switch the "use the old dashboard" option on :)

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I don't have that option. :(

And it seems like only some people have that option to go back to the old dashboard, while some don't. And some people said that it appears and reappears, I saw someone mention that they went back to the old dash but then it returned to the beta mode again with no option available. So it's a frustrating situation. I'm hoping that it gets resolved soon, and that this survey they have (should they listen to it) will get them to realize that we all need need that toggle to opt out.

[wretched.livejournal.com]

Oh that sucks :( I hope they keep the opt out for people permanently because honestly most of the changes they make the site are terrible.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Yeah, throughout Tumblr's history there's been only a few changes that have actually benefited the site as a whole, the rest are just unnecessary and make everything worse. At least it appears that they're working with the Xkit people on this, hence the survey, so hopefully things will get fixed soon. But I hate that they just forced this change on people like this.

[malicat.livejournal.com]

I think you only have this option when you have xkit installed?

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that seems to be the case. I just installed Xkit (since I didn't have it before) and now I have the toggle to revert to the old dashboard settings.

[malicat.livejournal.com]

I had it for ages (and it was very useful) but it slowed down my computer too much so I had to deactivate a while ago but the good thing is,you can install xkit turn the beta version off and then deinstall xkit again if you want :)

[silverusagi]

Endless scrolling should never be a thing

I KNOW.

I like going through page by page. Because I can get five pages in, stop and do something else, and then continue going back on my dashboard. Endless scrolling slows down the browser, and once you start, you can't (I can't, at least) pause and leave it open because by then my laptop fan is in overdrive.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Same! Endless scrolling is quite pointless because it tends to make everything go much slower, browser to freeze and then crash. And my laptop will sometimes crash too, if there's so much happening that it can't take it. Even if you have the most flawless interface that goes smoothly, not everyone will be able to handle it. And for a site like Tumblr, where there are so many gifs? Yeah, that's a recipe for disaster. Also, I have so many likes, thousands of them, and having endless scrolling for that makes it impossible to find anything. It makes enjoying the site, which is much needed now with the current state of things more than ever, difficult imho.

I'm hoping the survey at least convinces them to give all of us the option to opt out and switch back to the old interface. Like, I feel like sites should do that anyway if they're gonna make a change, y'know?

[silverusagi]

Oh man, likes is endless scrolling too?! Of course it is.

I don't have thousands, as I tend to use likes as a 'to do' list of things to read or reblog later, it's still super annoying.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Yeah, sadly. :/ It's why I'm hoping this gets corrected soon.

I use likes as both a "reblog later" and as kind of a memory thing, since Tumblr doesn't have something where you can save a post in a memories section like LJ, for example. I also kind of have a system with my reblogging, it's a thing, so this has really kind of screwed me up royally, which is why I haven't reblogged anything today since they sprung this on us.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

An update: apparently, you have to have Xkit installed to have the option to revert to the old dashboard settings. I didn't have Xkit previously so that's why there wasn't anything to opt out, and now that I have it and switched it back everything is back to normal.

It still sucks that they unexpectedly sprung this on everyone, and those without Xkit might not know unless they go searching.

[silverusagi]

I guess I'll have to install Xkit, then. I never bothered with it before.

[sherrilina.livejournal.com]

Man I haven't been on Tumblr in like 3 years...*sigh*

I am the odd one out who actually really disliked season 3...some of the most unwatchable episodes IMO (like The Zeppo JFC), and I just didn't like the Faith/Mayor storyline as much. My faves are seasons 2 and 5 in a tie.

Glad you also hate Xander and think Dawn is underrated though! ;)

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Well, if you missed the entire Tumblr banning "porn", aka banning "female-presenting nipples" and massive censorship fisaco and then Yahoo/Verizon selling Tumblr for less than what they bought it for, then it's certainly been a hot minute. I'm still on Tumblr, mostly for the fandom since that's where it all is these days, but it's been quite a ride.

I adore season three, it's basically my favorite season of the entire show tbh. I am biased though because it's where I started watching the show, and it's where it was the introduction of my favorite character, Faith, and it's the season where I enjoy and love the majority of the episodes ("The Zeppo" though isn't a favorite, it's pretty much meh imho, it was a Xander-centric episode and I'm not fond of him so it's low on my list anyway because of that). But yeah, I loved everything about the third season.

[icecoldrain.livejournal.com]

My wi-fi is on the fritz majority of the time so endless scrolling is the actual worst. That, and the changes they made to the chat function will be hard for a lot of people who are far sighted to read well even with their glasses. I'm near sighted and was like, why tf is this scrunched together now?! lol.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Everything about the interface is just so ugly, I don't know who thought this was a good idea but they were wrong. It's not only not functional (i.e. the endless scroll which is a nightmare even on a good day), but it's also such an eyesore. UGH.

[icecoldrain.livejournal.com]

Right?! There's so many glitches with it too. One of my friends was getting so mad when we were talking on tumblr last night because it was so delayed. We also discovered that we can't send each other posts without copy pasting the link into the chat since it says we both don't exist in the send a post option and that the gif search doesn't work. It's honestly a mess and very true to tumblr just launching things no one asked for and without testing it properly to make sure it works.

The thing I do like is that there's a night mode. That helps a lot when I have a migraine!

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if you caught it, but if you install Xkit you have the option to go back to the old dashboard settings, which is a blessing.

But yeah, I don't know what they were thinking with this update, it feels like they want it all to be aligned with mobile settings and be more like social media feeds like Twitter, but none of what they did is usable in any way. The only good thing is night mode, as you said. Otherwise though, everything else is just garbage. I know that websites do this a lot, forcing changes without consulting their users first, which should actually be part of basic professionalism, but y'know. At least this time they had the courtesy of giving users a survey about this update, something they never did before.

[kikimay]

Oh God, S2 is such a defining, iconic season for Buffy but it hurts me a lot. It hurts me to see her so vulnerable, so young, facing her lover's betrayal, and that's why I could never list it as my favorite because I feel too bad when I watch her cry. Awwww, babyyyy.

Now that you made me think about it, I wish we have more Kendra but also more ancient slayer lore. I could have been awesome!

The new Tumblr settings, or whatever that's called, SUCKS!!!

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

The second season was probably the most emotional season for Buffy, without a doubt. She's suffered and endured a lot throughout the show, but the second season really changed the game with the direction of the show overall and with Buffy's character, especially when you compare her character in the first season, with the exception of the last two episodes. It hurts, but that's kind of why I love it so much because it was the defining season for not just the show, but for Buffy's character as a whole.

And yes to more Slayer lore. It sucks that we never truly got more flashbacks or even Slayer-connected dreams with previous generations of Slayers. I felt like that would've been so cool, just to see the different kinds of Slayers throughout history, know their stories, the things that Buffy would end up learning from this lineage. It's such a missed opportunity, tbh.

The new Tumblr settings, or whatever that's called, SUCKS!!!

It really does. Though if you have Xkit you have the ability to revert to the old dashboard settings. I just installed it and it works. But still, this shouldn't have been sprung on everyone like they did without warning, or without giving everyone the option to opt out.

[kikimay]

It hurts, but that's kind of why I love it so much because it was the defining season for not just the show, but for Buffy's character as a whole.

It truly was a defining season and a defining character arc for Buffy. She endured all the pain and still was able to make the bravest choice (Which is what will happen in S5 too)

It sucks that we never truly got more flashbacks or even Slayer-connected dreams with previous generations of Slayers.

It's in the comics though! I don't know if you could be interested, but at the time I read both "Tales of Vampires" (With different episodes focusing on the turning stories) and "Tales of Slayers, which I loved the most because each episode was about a Slayer in a different time setting. And it was made when the comics were somehow related to the show, at least written by the show authors.

I installed Xkit ASAP! I couldn't handle the annoying changes.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I only know vague things about the comics, just details that have emerged about them over the years, and have only read the one-offs like Fray (which I really liked), but that's nice to hear that there's more exploration of the lore that they didn't fully expand on properly within the show.

[malicat.livejournal.com]

I hate the new tumblr too. Especially the endless scrolling because my laptop can't handle it :/
I was able to turn off the beta thing for now (when you have xkit installed/activated) but I'm sure they will force it on us eventually...

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I hate that they want to turn the site into basically the next Twitter or something. Sure, some people use Tumblr on their mobile devices, but many of us use it on desktop and that can easily crash and cause other problems with so much traffic, especially with so many gifs. Hell, even going on individual Tumblr blogs on my Kindle every gif is slowed down because it cannot handle all of that activity.

I know that Xkit is working with this new update, hence the survey, but at the same time I don't want this to become the new look for the site. If nothing else, allow everyone to have the option to opt out of it if they don't like it.

[noybusiness.livejournal.com]

I wished that we could've gotten more of Kendra. If she had to suffer the fate she did, I wished we'd gotten at least more episodes with her in between so we would be able to get to know her a bit more and see her teaming up with Buffy and the gang, and possibly even develop more of a friendship with Buffy as they bond with their Slayer connection. I think it would've made an even more emotional impact when she was killed.

That's why it's so great that she has such a big role in the new universe (and so far shows no signs of incipient being killed off).

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I haven't gotten into the new universe (or any of the comics for that matter), however that's nice to hear. :)

[noybusiness.livejournal.com]

I really recommend it when you have the opportunity! It's easier to get into than the previous comics would be since there's less out to collect so far and it's more recent, and it really has both freshness and that je-ne-c'est-quais that made the TV series stick with people. I'm not in the squad that disliked the Seasons 8-12 comics, but even people who are have said they prefer the new ones.