I agree: obviously, in disposition and such, Topher is far, far more like Andrew (his amoral status reminds me of what Buffy once said about Andrew--he's not really evil, he just takes on the flavor of whatever's around at the time. Topher might have made it through life without ever encountering a major moral quandary, and so his amoral status wouldn't have been an issue. But his talents led him to the worst possible environment. And that is so cool).

It's the action of changing people, of viewing people as toys that reminds me of Warren. The whole of the show is like what Warren did to Katrina blown up to a more epic scale. Every week I think of Katrina, especially in this latest episode, though obviously in this case, Nolen would be the Warren figure.

I'm not exactly shocked by Topher's development. It just felt to me like it's taken a loooong time to start catching a glimpse of his complexity. This is not true, however. It hasn't taken longer than it took to develop, say, Spike or Lilah or someone like that (as a matter of fact, you could argue that it's taken less time). It just feels that way to me because I've never watched a Joss show as it airs. My experiences with watching all his other shows (except for Dr. Horrible) have been very short and intense: I watched entire seasons in less time than the lapse between "Vows" and "Instinct." I'm having to relearn patience and experiencing it in a different way. It's interesting.

It really did end too soon, didn't it? I could have watched for hours. And it made me really mad at Fox, too.