I've been where your at as far as not being able to accept the tragedy with the comedy. I think Joss' curse, if he has one, is that he does both comedy and tragedy so incredibly well that he has a very real ability to make a viewer go from one complete end of that spectrum to the other and cause a huge emotional hang over that even real life can't often match.

Rather than walk away I have become willing to take the good with the bad and learn to appreciate why the tradgedy part of the story is needed. I'll watch the tradgedy the first time, and if I can stomach it well then I'll rewatch it, if I can not, I wont watch it. (example, I fast forward the sad part of Serenity and skip to the next scene).

When I first clicked on this link I expected another "I can't believe Joss would kill off (insert character name here)! I'm never watching this again" rants that usually occur after a character death. I wasn't going to comment, but was going to giggle a little at the 'I'm going to hold my breath until I get what I want' tone that usually saturates said rant.

However, what I found was an articulate and well thought out decision. Our tastes evolve over time and yours appear to be doing so. The fandom will be less for the loss of someone willing to rationally explain their viewpoint and not just flying off the handle. I hope you find what your looking for in other fandoms, and perhaps you will someday find yourself looking for a little tragedy. We'll be here to welcome you back if you do.

Thanks for the kind words, y'all… and you're right. I should definately take a break. But I can't seem to, damnit. Ah don't know how ta quit Joss.

Well, in a purely, ya know, fan sort of way.

Really.

earthwulf said:

I’m not sure why, but everyting he does, while smart, sharp and funny, is tinged with tragedy. I can’t help but wonder if he’d slated Buzz Lightyear to actaully be blown up in an early draft of "Toy Story". I’m fine with the occasional tragedic happening, as life isn’t always rosy. But to have everything have some sort of major blow out sorrowful episode – well, I don’t want to always be thinking "Who is going to die? Which character has he made me care about will kick the bucket?"

I empathise — some times I'm not strong enough. You know those days where the zeitqeist of the planet is a little too dark all on it's own without any help from Mr. Whedon (although the funny is what delights me over and over…and over).

I'm still stalled in S6 of Buffy because of the Tara's truncated arc…well you know. And I love the show!

I can always pick it up at some future point. Give me something to look forward to: unwatched Whedon.

SanJuran said:

But most people I know really don't care for Joss' type of manipulation – let's make people care about this character so it'll hurt more when I kill them! – any more than I do.  So no, I'm not gonna pimp that stuff.

I really hate to break this to you, then: That's pretty standard writing practice. Most writers work that way. It just happens that Joss is really really really good at it.

To a certain extent, storytelling is the art of manipulating the audience. If the audience isn't emotionally invested in the characters, the story means much less, and is pretty forgettable. And when a writer decides to kill off a character, they want that death to matter. In some cases, that's because they're killing off an unsympathetic character and want the audience to feel vindicated, or in most cases because they want the audience to mourn the character. A death should have an impact. 

This wasn't a random or meaningless death. It a) furthered the plot, b) pushed ahead the emotional journey of the main character and c) was really, really sad. A) and B) are arguably more important than C).

That said, you have a perfect right to avoid what you want to avoid. Personally I will not go see very sad/intense movies in the theatre, where I can't get away from them (I will watch them on DVD because I can control the viewing experience). I have a whole list of books/movies in my head that I read/watched once and will never again because I found them too painfully sad. So although Joss' work actually hasn't reached my personal 'never watch again' list (although Serenity came close), it's fine if it's on yours. I'm not judging. If you don't want to recommend it to people because you don't think the people you know will appreciate it, that's fine too. (Personally I will recommend stuff that ends sadly with a warning. Particularly to my mum, who always wants to be warned about character deaths — although she loves Joss' work, too.)   I'm just saying what he does isn't particularly unusual or underhanded — it's how well he does it.

There are three options: kill of characters the audience cares about, kill of characters the audience doesn't care about, and not to kill off anyone. You could do the latter, and not kill of anyone, but this quickly becomes a universe with no risks, and that's just plain dull. Killing off characters the audience doesn't care about, is a very common option, but it has little impact. The "nameless redshirt" who dies to show that a situation is dangerous goes unmourned – his or her death means nothing. If you are not going to have a world where no one is ever going to die, and not going to have a world where only disposable people die, the only thing left is to have a world where characters that the audience cares about just might die.