My new roommate has the entire show on DVD and he told me that he thought it was crap until a friend of his told him to watch some “musical” episode. He loved it and watched the entire show. Now he says that the show is one of the best ever.
I had never watched the show because it gave me a bad vibe but I decided to give it a try tonight so I borrowed one of his DVDs and watched the first two episodes. And well, seems to be it’s a bunch of superficial crap laced with tired cliches reminiscent of Smallville and the O.C.
Is there anything I’m missing? Anything I should know? Or should I just give up on it immediately and forget it ever happened?
Oh, man. I anticipate a pile-on in… three… two… one…
Seriously, if it’s not your bag, it’s not your bag. Though the bolded part above makes you look a bit ill-informed. Considering that Smallville, in particular, is pretty much “Young Clark Kent in a mediocre Buffy rip-off”.
If you’ve watched episodes and don’t like it, you don’t like it. You might like it if you watched more. You might not.
I thought the series started out strongly enough that I would never say, “Oh, just forge through until episode X where it all comes together.” I think what makes Buffy enjoyable (for those of us who enjoy it) is already present in episode 1.
Pile-on? Did somebody say pile-on? We wouldn’t do something like that. Especially to a guest (albeit a particularly clueless one). If s/he doesn’t appreciate the better things in Life, so be it.
Well, what can I say. I pride myself on having a pretty good taste (though i’m pretty sure I thought the same thing 10 years ago and I can’t believe some of the crap I liked). Here are some samples of shows I greatly enjoy/ed:
Scrubs, Family Guy, Futurama, Simpsons, Sopranos, Oz, Sex and the city, Red Dwarf, Friends, The Wire, First season of 24, Arrested Development, Boomtown…(the last 2 are on the verge of being “just” good shows)
I don’t know about being clueless. I’m not trying to start a flame war or anything (and this being the SDMB, i’m fairly sure it won’t happen). I just calls them like I sees them. I know i’m not alone, my wife doesn’t like Buffy either…
If you don’t like it, hey, you don’t have to. You should realize that Buffy was on way before the O.C. and several years before Smallville, which would mean it’s they that are reminiscent of Buffy.
I think the first two episodes are great, but the entire first season has a different feel from what the show eventually winds up with when it hits its stride.
From your OP, it sounds like you just don’t like teen dramas, in which case you’re probably not going to like Buffy. That said, it’s not superficial, and the cliches are used for a reason. And also, The O.C. is great.
Smallville rips off Buffy and does a pretty poor job of it.
I don’t know what episodes you saw so I can’t really tell you if I saw you the good eps or the less good eps. Just so you know, S1 was a mid-season replacement for the WB and as such, only had 12 episodes and most of them were stand-alone Monster of the Week types. I enjoy them because they took well-known cliches and turned them upside down, and I always appreciate that. But I know lots of people in the fandom who more or less ignore S1.
Season 2 is when the show really hit its stride. The overall arc is much, much tighter than S1, and the standalone episodes were brilliant. You could start with S2 and probably not be too confused.
It took me several episodes to get into the series. I saw Buffy vs Dracula and The Body, both from S5, and Puppet Show and The Witch from season 1 and School Hard from season 2 before I really expressed interest in watching the entire series. Of course, once I did watch the entire series, I sold my soul to Joss Whedon and dedicated myself to the obsession with all the fervency of a Born Again Christian. So you might want to be careful of that, because from my experience in the fandom, it’s not an uncommon experience.
One of the most satisfying things about the series, for me, is something you can’t get from viewing just one or two episodes. It’s the amazing interconnectedness of the episodes. Too many series will introduce characters or events that are basically forgotten once that particular episode’s credits roll. But Buffy doesn’t do that. Minor characters make frequent reappearances, implying a vibrant, ongoing world beyond the scope of the main cast. The deaths of previous villains are referenced. One betrayal in particular took several seasons to be revealed. In short, stuff gets tied together. It’s beautiful to watch such attention to detail.
I never liked it on TV. The light moments just seemed silly, and broke the mood. I’m not much of a TV person – I don’t follow any shows right now, for instance.
It took a while of seeing random episodes, until I got interested in seeing more, and now I own the DVDs and have gone through the entire run several times. I, too, now worship Joss Whedon. I also have Angel and Firefly–Firefly is probably more user-friendly for quick engagement.
The DVDs work much better than the TV version for me–something about the pacing. The light moments now seem more whistling-in-the-dark rather than silly.
The point is that there is something in this show for several types of fans. Some got it immediately, some of us backed into it. But most agree that it is the long haul, when you see the whole pattern, that makes it something extremely special, and makes you want to wallow in the details.
That being said, you are welcome not to like it, or not to want to commit the time to getting it. Just understand that you may not be able to judge its quality after a few episodes.
Some people don’t like ice cream, too. We’d never force them to eat it, we’d just talk behind their backs about how much they’re missing out.
While the show gets better and different as it goes on, most of what’s there to love is there in the first two eps (although the acting from Boreanaz and Brendon gets better). In particular (spoilers for Harvest), if you didn’t die laughing in the “sunrise – it’s in about six hours” scene, then I think the show isn’t for you.
That said, if you’re still willing to sgive it a shot, try The Puppet Show. It’s near the end of S1. It’s the S1 episode that IMO really executed everything just right. If you like it, then go back through S1; as noted above one of the best things about the show is that it builds and builds over time. But if you don’t like Puppet Show, then forget it, the show ain’t for you.
Season 1 is pretty weak on its own, but I’m a huge fan of Prophecy Girl. Gets me every time. When I got into Buffy, it was from catching a season 3 episode. I started watching more of it–it was playing on FX two eps a day–and quickly became obsessed, to the point of reading scripts online and pestering poor Mauvaise to fill in some story so I could watch S6 on TV. I enjoy the hell our of Season 1 now, but I have to say if I walked into Buffy with any expectations, some of Season 1 would probably let me down.
Don’t watch bad television if you don’t want to, but I think you’ll find the show has a lot to offer.
It kind of peaked with season 3, so there’s no clear jumping-on point. All I can tell you is that, while the plots are nothing strikingly original, the series does have some of the smartest dialogue on television and the characters grow in real-time. If you watch a couple of early episodes expecting no more than that, you’ll get drawn in. Probably.
There are other series that I’m hesitant to dive into on some friend’s recommendation (24 and Alias come to mind), so I know where you’re coming from. I avoided Buffy until it was in its last season and managed to get up to speed via reruns on cable. And as clever as “Once More with Feeling” was, I can think of at least a dozen better episodes (“Hush,” “The Zeppo,” “Inca Mummy Girl,” “Prom Queen,” “Band Candy,” etc.). Catch a few random episodes, walk in with an open mind, give it a shot.
I watched the show throughout its entire duration. I tried in vain to get my fellow teachers to watch as well, but they immediately dismissed it as a brainless teen dramady, based on the title. Subsequently, several of them have starting watching it in reruns and are now hooked, asking me plot points about episodes I haven’t seen in years. Cracks me up!
Oh, well. If everybody liked the same things, the world would be a very boring place.