Riley was the group's innocence during season 4 - he might have been the big soldier boy, but he was fundementally innocent about the way that the world the Scoobies live in works.
Mmmmm. Not sure I can quite see that. I agree that he's the outsider being brought into their world, but he's not as innocent as Dawn was. There's some other nebulous quality that's almost innocence, I'm sure ...
I think Angel, Spike and Oz all fill the same function, just in different ways. I'm not sure what you'd call it, if you tried to classify it, but it's the way that none of them are fully human anymore.
I agree that they all represent a point about the non-human members of the Buffyverse (and how you shouldn't stake them on sight) but I'm not sure if that defines their role in the group. I'll have to think about it.
He's the outsider and he analyses their behaviour. He picks it apart and draws conclusions from what he sees.
Re: About Buffy. :)
Mmmmm. Not sure I can quite see that. I agree that he's the outsider being brought into their world, but he's not as innocent as Dawn was. There's some other nebulous quality that's almost innocence, I'm sure ...
I think Angel, Spike and Oz all fill the same function, just in different ways. I'm not sure what you'd call it, if you tried to classify it, but it's the way that none of them are fully human anymore.
I agree that they all represent a point about the non-human members of the Buffyverse (and how you shouldn't stake them on sight) but I'm not sure if that defines their role in the group. I'll have to think about it.
He's the outsider and he analyses their behaviour. He picks it apart and draws conclusions from what he sees.
Indeed.