SoS: The Pack: Xander's Dark Moment?

garfan said:
people criticize Xander for lying about not remembering but I don't think any good would come from not doing it. People think Buffy deserves to be able to confront the person who attacked her.

But that means Xander either accepts blame for something he had no control over or Buffy has to actively forgive him for something she endured rather than just letting it go
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I don't think that letting Buffy and Xander acknowledge what happened has to end in Xander getting blamed or in Buffy forgiving him for something that he didn't even really do. Those aren't the only two possible outcomes. I also don't like the implication that Buffy should be "just letting it go" when she was assaulted. The show doesn't let her be upset about it. Is it useful for her to be upset about it? Probably not, especially since she was fully capable of getting herself out of that situation. But she's not invulnerable. This would still have been really scary. It was scary for Xander, too. And considering how upset he is at the end of the episode, I think it probably would have helped him a lot to actually talk about it with Buffy, who knows it wasn't really him and clearly doesn't blame him. I understand why Xander lied, but I don't think it was a good choice and would have liked to see him get called out on it later when the writers make the choice to bring up this episode again. The writers themselves don't just let it go, why should Buffy?
 
CardboardGhost said:
The show expected us to be sympathetic to him because it always expects us to be sympathetic to him, but the episode doesn't actually write him sympathetically.
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I don't know if the show expected us to feel sympathy for him overall. I think that Xander was clearly depicted as doing something wrong and petty when he blackmailed Amy into getting revenge on Cordy with a brainwashing spell. And what follows, including Giles being deeply disappointed by him, is the show showing us that his decision was reckless and stupid. I think we are supposed to feel similarly to how Giles felt there. Disappointed.

The only part where we can really empathize with Xander is in how awful it would feel to have your loved one dump you because they want to please their friends. Although, to be honest, when I first watched this episode, I didn't really feel much for either Xander or Cordy because both of their characters could be awful and I thought they kind of deserved each other. It was like witnessing two toxic individuals getting back at each other. Didn't really move the needle much for me, one way or the other. But that was before I saw more of both of these characters.
 
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