Hi! *waves* I'm not sure if we've spoken before. I found this link on the Sunnydale Herald.

I love both scenes, but I can definitely see the unpleasant patterns of women sacrificing themselves for life. I think Darla's is worse in that regard, killing herself for her unborn child (and it becomes even worse in retrospect with all the other dead-of-mystical-pregnancy women on AtS). Buffy's at least has a possible interpretation of warrior-sacrificing-herself-to-save-her-family, with Dawn as damsel-in-distress rather than child, which is a little more gender subversive. It also helps that Buffy gets better. I suppose Darla coming back to life had become a cliche by that point, but it still would have been nice to see her again.

"Summers blood" makes no sense, but when did Buffy plots ever make sense? It works emotionally.