Pretty much all the formerly dead characters who made ghostly reappearances during the course of season seven were quite obviously evil. Or rather, the First Evil. All of them, that is,except one: Joyce. When in episode seven (Conversations With Dead People) she managed to scare the living daylights out of Dawn (not to mention everyone in the audience) by not only having her beautiful spirit attacked by the First but then ominously (and all too plausibly) warning Dawn that her sister was going to abandon her at some point in the future, it was very unclear if she really was Higher Being Joyce or a cruel trick by the First to dupe Dawn.

Dressed in a flowing white gown (a la Cordelia) and glowing with inner wisdom, she seemed to have overcome the First in order to warn Dawn - surely something a supernatural mother would want to do. Surely something Joyce would want to do. But, perhaps, she was really the First, attempting to split the Scoobies asunder by planting seeds of division - much like Spike in The Yoko Factor three seasons before.

Her second appearance was slightly darker, more First-like. She turned up in Buffy's dreams in Bring on the Night, possibly trying to shake her daughter's confidence - or was that showing motherly concern for her exhausted scion? And it was definitely a dream sequence, so was it anything more than Buffy's overactive imagination? It was even possible that there were two Joyces - a good spirit and a manifestation of the First.

Both appearances were well written and nicely portrayed by Kristine Sutherland so that Joyce's intentions were never quite obvious, and we here had hoped that it was leading to more use of Joytce in later episodes - whether evil or not - but for whatever reason it was not to be. But that still lef the question: was she evil or not? It looked like we'd never know, as despite ample opportunity the First never became Joyce to taunt Buffy in later episodes (the finale would have been perfect for that, damn you Joss), and Night was the last we ever were to see of the Bouffanted One.

But now we have an answer! Here at JOYFFA island we used our network of contacts to get in touch with none other than Jane Espenson (no, really), esteemed writer, producer and all-round comedy guru of Buffy - and by no small coincidence the writer of the Joyce scenes in Conversations - to give us the truth. And it is...

She was the First all along! Apparently Jane was surprised that anyone might think different; perhaps she underestimated the world's desire to see Higher Being Joyce. Though, given what happened to Cordelia, she'd have been evil even if she was a Higher Being.

So there you have it. A definitive answer to the great riddle of season seven. Or one of them anyway - how did they have the money to feed all those Potentials?