In some weird twisted fantasy way Julie does (and don’t)like Bonnie (wait before you cuss me out pls hear me out!). Istg, I know that lady got a racist boner for black people just hear me out. Bonnie’s heroism is unmatched to JP she’s the only one she constantly praises in Buffy’s image. She really wanted to recreate Buffy in general but she doesn’t have the writing capabilities to deliver. The the problem is JP doesn’t understand Buffy either, because heroism is apart of Buffy but Buffy was very much a teenaged girl too. Buffy needed her friends, Buffy wanted to do normal things, Buffy had HEAVY traumas. Buffy wanted a normal life as much as she was the slayer. Buffy dated the bad boy and it grew within her arc! Then with Bonnie, Julie’s prejudice and racist ways she just couldn’t let go and let Bonnie be the way Elena/Caroline are. But Elena and Caroline aren’t heroines to Julie, they’re perfect helpless little damsels to her. JP can see the hero, the fighter but within Bonnie she can’t see her dating the bad boy, or exploring her sexuality or personality period because that means pulling that racist hat she holds for black women (Kat specifically too) off. That just can’t be and I think that the fact that the actors really wanted those things do Bonnie was partially the boiling point to “hey we don’t need Bonnie let her suffer for helping her friends when we backed her into a corner anyway!”, like she said black women will save the day because white women are ruining it! She has a weird fixation on heroism, but the understandings that even a hero needs day to deal with pain.
I watched an interview/panel Kat did with acting coach and they both detailed how Bonnie was a victim, and to empower her Kat had to dig deep within her own trauma to give Bonnie something because she’d do these scenes and suddenly this and that was cut- and the writers wouldn’t see Bonnie as a victim just a hero essentially. When you look to the other witches, specifically white they aren’t “Buffy” enough for JP.
While Freya - protects her family, Davina protected Kol/Josh, Marcel… and Hope and twins did things for the school you never see an interview where JP referenced them in the eyes of how she saw Buffy. Freya and Davina were owed their happy endings to JP, but if you take away their powerful scenes (Hope too) what is the character?
Hope was supposed to be the second chance at Buffy, the book!Bonnie type but that failed immediately lol.
