Is it just me, or do all these things seem really...lame?

Your priorities change when you're faced with the possibility of a natural disaster. Suddenly, television and movies aren't as important to you. It's truly horrific. I watched Batman Begins, but my attention wasn't really on it, so I'll have to watch it again before I decide to discuss it.And I finally finished watching my BtVS DVDs last week. I had a good cry after watching "Chosen". And this was *with the commentary on*. Maybe one day soon I'll be able to watch it all the way through.Now I'm not a huge season 7 hater, so I get annoyed by all the people putting it down. There are legitimate criticisms of season 7, but I always hate hearing people complain about it because they always focus their negativity on stuff I don't care about. The Beljoxa's Eye? Pfft. That's the least of my problems.So what especially bugged me about this season?1. Too much focus on extraneous characters and storylines - This season started off with strong arcs for Buffy, Spike, Willow, Xander, and Anya. Unfortunately, they were mostly sidelined by midseason to make room for crap like Potential training, Is Dawn a Slayer?, Is Giles the First?, Willow/Kennedy, and Wood's mommy issues. Frickin' Andrew, who was intended for comic relief, had a more emotionally complete story arc than most of our main characters. Plus, there *had* to be a way to make the Potentials and the First Evil interesting. Unfortunately, they didn't find it in time. They focused so much on the gang's interpersonal drama in season 6, and got a lot of negative feedback for it. Maybe they decided they should focus on other things in this season, and ended up tip-toeing around anything that would open up old wounds.2. Too much emphasis on the Big Bad - I prefer the days when each season had multiple character arcs and standalone episodes. In S7, almost every episode dealt with the First. Having all the Potentials inexplicably crammed into Buffy's house pretty much made that a necessity, but... I really preferred it when they learned everything about a major villain in just a few episodes, peppered throughout the season, like the Mayor or Glory. Maybe it was a little too convienient, but we didn't have to hear highly speculative exposition in every episode like with the First. Of course, the First Evil was a much bigger threat, but that didn't make it more interesting.I won't be able to get online until tomorrow, so any further discussion will have to wait until then. :(I'm planning on buying the Killers CD when I leave today. I've almost bought it twice this week. Last time, I almost bought it, but got AC/DC Live instead. But I believe today is going to be the day. When you're relatively broke like I am, you have to consider every purchase very, very carefully. Or maybe I'm just nuts.