thedeadlyhook

Well, except that if the mental ward scenario is just Buffy's imagination working overtime, then she's merely picking an event she recalls in her real life and reinterpreting it in the context of her fantasy life. We have no *textual* reason to privilege the insane asylum scenario over the Sunnydale scenario, although obviously if we relate it to our own experiences the insane asylum is the more likely interpretation ;-) I quite often think that Buffy's story makes more sense (in my own private universe) if she's actually a really boring, plain, unpopular girl with a dull life, who copes with that by fantasising that she's pretty and important and inspires passionate devotion in really hot guys - oh wait, she is boring and unpopular and has a dull life when she's not slaying... If it weren't for Joss's fetish about hiring pretty actors (even the ugly people are pretty in the Whedonverse), I think my theory would entirely hold water :-)