How fitting that I’m talking about vampire slayers on Friday the 13th. Couldn’t have planned that better myself. So after spending my entire spring break watching the entirety of How I Met Your Mother (that’s six and a half seasons in less than a week, for those of you counting), I needed a new show. I finished the third season of Battlestar Galactica afterwards, but I wanted something I hadn’t seen before. And after all I knew about Joss Whedon and my own nerdiness, it made sense to get into Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Overall, I love this show. I’m a couple episodes into season 2, and it’s just about all I can think about anymore. It’s a little slow at times, but I’ll definitely be seeing it through to the end. What follows is my initial review of the series, based on what I’ve seen so far.
Characters:
Buffy- I like that Buffy is young and rash and stupid- it gives her room to grow and be dynamic. She’s far from the perfect strong female protagonist, and that works really well. She feels much more real. However, does anyone else think it’s weird that her super slayer strength kind of comes and goes? Like, one minute she’s punching her fist through a solid wood door, and the next she loses a fight to some regular human. It’s weird.
Giles- I love everything about Giles’ character. He’s the perfect mix of awkward and intelligence, but there’s enough we don’t know about him to keep him from falling flat. I can’t wait to see where he goes.
Xander- Who names their kid Xander? I have mixed feelings about him. He’s kind of cute, but mostly he’s kind of annoying. And I feel so bad for Willow. 🙁
Willow- speaking of, I completely love Willow as well. She has a lot of room to grow as a character, and Alyson Hannigan is just adorable.
Angel- I read something somewhere about how sometimes Angel isn’t very nice and wears leather pants. That’ll be interesting. I want to see far more of him. He makes my heart all fluttery, and the sexual tension/relationship he has with Buffy is amazing. I hold Twilight very dearly in my heart, the books, not the movies, but Whedon has already surpassed that romance, and easily.
Premise/ basic concerns
I love the premise of this show- it’s right up my alley. Badass teenage girl that fights mythical monsters while also trying to maintain a normal life? My kind of show. There do seem to be some fairly significant plot holes, though.
First of all, the vampires in this show don’t look like vampires, but everyone always knows what they are. When some random human is being chased by them or whatever, they’re always like “oh, hey! A vampire! Save me!” How do they know they’re vampires?? They just look like humanoid monsters.
Also, how are the schools in that town not completely shut down? Kids die at alarming rates, and yet there always seem to be more, completely at peace with their crazy town. You could argue that they’ve lived on the hell mouth for a long time and they just take the constant deaths in stride, but what about Buffy’s mom? They’re new in town. And during one episode, two kids are found dead in the auditorium over the course of a couple of days, and all Buffy’s mom can talk about is how excited she is about Buffy’s talent show. The talent show that takes place in the auditorium, where TWO KIDS WERE JUST FOUND DEAD IN HORRIBLE WAYS. How does that not come up in conversation??
And what about class? Every once in a while someone will mention something about Buffy skipping classes, but she seems to average two classes attended per week and her grades aren’t suffering more than usual. No one is concerned about the fact that half the time she’s not even on campus. She’s clearly not flunking, and her mom never really brings it up. Maybe the 90s were just better times to go to high school. Geez.
In all, though, I am quickly becoming obsessed with the show, and I can’t wait to see where it goes next.
