With Angel, I think I much more likely to kneejerk away with "that's not Wes or Connor or Angel or Cordelia or Gunn" or whatever and then, not be able to continue.

Oh, yeah, definitely. I think, the more attached to the canon you are, the harder it is to accept fic versions of characters/'verse. And Angel is the holy grail of that, whereas Buffy, especially later seasons, there is stuff that I balked at a lot, so fic that changes that is good.