Diary of a Buffy the Vampire Slayer Virgin – Welcome to Sunnydale

(Season 1, Episodes 1-4)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and subsequently Angel, are two of those television shows that I never really got the chance to get into. In the college town I lived in when it premiered, the only unaffiliated local station had chosen to align with UPN rather than The WB when the opportunity came.  That left me able to watch Star Trek: Voyager from the beginning, but no Buffy.

I’d remembered the original Buffy film with Kristy Swanson in the title role, and had been hearing good things about this new iteration, but by the time I was able to catch it several seasons had past and I couldn’t bring myself to jump on board the show after having missed so much of what had gone before. I have a shamefully long list of series like this. And all of this was before the days of online streaming of episodes and readily available DVD sets.

When the opportunity came up to review an episode of Buffy for another site, I threw open the doors and left it up to the readers to pick which episode I’d cover. The ultimate winner was the fourth season episode “Hush,” but even more people were insisting the only right thing to do was start at the beginning and watch the entire series. Well, it wasn’t feasible for me to do so in that scenario, but now it is.

1 – “Welcome to the Hellmouth (Part 1 of 2)”
(Original Air Date: March 10, 1997) You know a show’s old when James Spader (Boston Legal) is cited as a “call me” guy. And you could definitely tell the show was in California. How else can you explain the first four kids you meet being named Buffy, Willow, Xander and Cordelia? At the same time, it’s fun to see how young everyone looks. While Sarah Michelle Gellar (19) and Eric Balfour (19) were at least the right age for high school, not so for Alyson Hannigan (23), Nicholas Brendan (25) or Charisma Carpenter (26). It’s amazing to think this is 12 years ago now.

The makeup on the vampires is pretty solid right from the beginning, even if the same can’t be said for the writing and acting. Oh most if it is spot-on, but there were some awkward moments or tilted deliveries. Particularly from Brendan, who was maybe trying a little too hard as Xander in the beginning.

Right off the bat, though, Hannigan was an absolute delight as Willow. She has such a natural presentation that you absolutely believe that character. She brings the same strength to Lily on How I Met Your Mother, though the two are nothing alike. And we won’t even talk about her American Pie persona!

Whedon established this crazy world of seemingly normal high school dramatics pretty well and then BAM! vampires out the wazoo! It’s an impressive feat to balance the two. Usually on a television show the supernatural element completely overwhelms the normal (a la Supernatural) or the opposite occurs and you have only a trace of the “different.” But here the two are seamlessly equals. You are invested as much in Buffy’s attempts to just be normal in high school as you are with her attempts to keep innocents alive and kick vampire ass.

Only 0n The WB in its infancy could a show like this have survived. I can’t imagine Fox or NBC sticking with it for seven seasons. And like any good two-hour premiere that would later be broken up into two separate episodes, they had to leave things on a killer cliffhanger. Good thing viewers only had to wait through a commercial break to see how our girl got out of her tomb.

2 – “The Harvest (Part 2 of 2)”
(Original Air Date: March 10, 1997) So what did we learn in the conclusion of this two-parter? Jessie was doomed because his name was just too ordinary. Luke was a Chatty Cathy as the vessel and Xander is an idiot who loves to get into things over his head. Do you think Buffy had a “Scooby Gang” with her at her old high school? Yes, I already know they were called that; I didn’t live under a rock the last decade. I hope we get some more backstory on Buffy since she’s pretty much an established Slayer by this point. Or I guess the movie is considered canon.

I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of the Master beneath the city streets, as he seems the most likely source of weekly slaying needs. So his once-in-a-century has passed, as Giles said that doesn’t mean he’s going to be willing to wait a century to come forth. Plus we’ve got six-and-a-half more years of this to cover.

I do like how Angel was introduced. He’s definitely got brooding and mysterious down, but so far he’s been cryptic and cowardly. Not a particularly admirable pairing of qualities. And he’s already smitten with the slayer. But I guess we all are.

3 – “The Witch”
(Original Air Date: March 17, 1997)

“I laugh in the face of danger. Then I hide until it goes away.” –Xander

The slayer and slayettes are a lot of fun together. And Giles, but then he’s not so much fun as a fuddy duddy. Now there’re witches to contend with in Sunnydale as well? Shouldn’t that take a whole different skill set? Are there witch slayers out there?

I did see the body switch angle coming with the mother being the witch and having stolen her daughter’s life to relive her high school glory days. What I couldn’t understand is why she would want to go back to high school anyway. Good lord, nobody wants to go back and relive high school, even if it went well the first time.

It was pretty sloppy work on the part of the gang to not bother tying up Amy’s mother when they were doing their reversal spell. Or gagging her or something. What did they think was going to happen? She’d just slide back into her body and give up? Also, who is Amy living with now? There was no sign of a father, and I don’t think a trophy in a display case is a fitting parent for DFS.

4 – “Teacher’s Pet”
(Original Air Date: March 25, 1997)

Poor Buffy. Finally finds a teacher who believes in her potential and he goes and loses his head. But at least Angel shows up to give more cryptic warnings. He’d better develop a bit more personality if he wants to win his own show. At least he gave her his jacket so she could see his scratches and be concerned. That’s smooth, Angel.

The substitute Miss French was bad news right from the beginning. She certainly had the boys distracted, but only the pure ones. I guess this means in the Buffy-verse, any type of monster we can conceive is possible. Now we have giant praying mantis substitute teachers, though the real Miss French was adorable.

Willow continued to pine after Xander while Xander pined after Buffy … the classic love triangle. For now. I’ll give the show credit for one thing, it’s a lot of fun. Fun’s in short supply on television right now, but I find myself enjoying every sample I can find (Chuck, Reaper).

And now I have years worth of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to enjoy as well. See you next week for the next four installments.

Clacked by Jason Hughes
on May 25, 2009 @ 16:00 EST5EDT