I know those are your opinions, it just seems that you are arguing for the sake of it. For example, how could you not see that the point of the series was that Buffy was always alone? They stressed that in one way or another in each season.
I know season 7 was all screwy, which you can blame on Joss not being there and about 8 different EP. There wasn't one or two people that had an outline of the whole season, like the past. They got rid of Marti because of the outlash of season 6, even though it ruled. They should have sticked with her and Joss as the EPs, not 50 others too.
I lost my thought.