The haters were in the minority, but definitely there. (A lot of them echoed what was said above - they thought Spike just got a ripoff of a Riley moment.)

In some ways it almost doesn't matter whether Buffy really loves Spike or not at the end - even if she does, she's never able to express it in a way that gets through to him. Or that's how it reads to me, anyhow. I have no confidence that I understand what Joss actually wanted me to think about Buffy, so I can't say if I agree with him or not.