Spoilerific
by James Schellenberg
I'm the person who hates spoilers, mainly because they wreck a book or movie for me. I'm a stickler for experiencing something in the way that the creator intended (whether this is a smart or helpful habit is quite another question). In the case of, say, a TV show like
Buffy or
Angel that's been off the air for years, keeping free of spoilers is nearly impossible nowadays. What's fair game for spoilers? Everything, apparently.
Now, it's pretty easy to spoof this dilemma (as
Lore Sjoberg does very ably), but I definitely fall into the camp of people who like to experience a book or a movie or a show for myself first. As a completely contradictory tendency, I do read around to find out what show has buzz, or what movie was unexpectedly good, or so on. This is a dangerous activity if you're trying to keep spoiler-free!
The various shows put together by Joss Whedon and friends were always high on the buzz-worthy list by people whose opinion I trusted (like
here for example). But watching seven seasons of
Buffy and five seasons of
Angel seemed like a pretty tall order! Part of what prompted me to take the plunge was
Firefly (see comments below). Another part was direct recommendations by friends who watched all the episodes in order and reported back favourably on the time well-spent.
So I set aside my dislike of vampire stories, and fired up episode 1 of season 1 of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The first batch is shorter than a regular season, only 13 episodes, and it had a distinctly cheesy feel to it. The episodes reminded me a bit of early Stephen King, repurposing common horror myths, but this time with a snappy one-liner and a pop culture reference instead of a bleak small-town angle.
With that in mind, Season 2 of
Buffy hit me pretty hard, in a I-can't-believe-they-just-did-that impressed way. I had no idea about the Angel-related storyline that happens about halfway through the season (is that vague enough, you other anti-spoiler people?), and I was glad of that. In Season 1, the story twists were fairly basic - for example, if the evil ventriloquist's dummy actually turned out to be a skilled demon slayer (
The Puppet Show), it's a small revelation. But by Season 2, the developments in the show started to have real emotional weight, and I savoured the moment much more when I could discover the future, so to speak, just as the characters were themselves.
As I watched more episodes of
Buffy, I fell into line with nerdy conventional wisdom about the awesomeness of the show. One or two other big developments were shocks to me, the fate of one particular female character was spoiled by the "Previously on
Buffy" clip from a future episode that I watched by accident, and for some reason, I knew all the details about the series finale.
I'm not sure how I found out about it, but oddly enough (and contradictorily enough), I'm glad that I did. My main reaction to the show, more so than enjoyment of the quips or appreciation of the intricacies of the Buffyverse lore and continuity, was always about how hard life as a slayer was, all day, every day, for Buffy. Moments of emotional peace were few and far between, and the show accumulated quite a body count as fighting evil took a toll on those around Buffy. What could possibly happen to Buffy to make up for all those years of battle? The closing moments of the show, while a small tally compared to years and years of unhappiness, were about as sweet a vindication as could be imagined.
In an unusual parallel, the only episode of
Angel that I had seen before I started with Season 1 of that show was the series finale! When I happened to catch it on original broadcast, I really had no idea what was happening, but the closing moment stuck with me. Not as clever as the
Buffy finale, but it fit quite well with the theme of the show. Generally speaking, spoilers for
Angel didn't bother me as much as for
Buffy - I think it had to do with the way that the longer storylines in
Angel struggled to find the same emotional impact as similar season-long arcs in
Buffy, so knowing about the big reveal wasn't as destructive.
So I've wrapped up both shows now, and with some amount of sadness I've joined all the other fans of the work of Whedon and co. in waiting to see what will happen next.
Buffy Season 8, the new comic book series that officially continues Buffy's story, has some interesting tidbits, but I find that it falls prey a little too easily to the comic-book habit of using the most arcane bits of backstory as key plot moments, much more so than even in the regular
Buffy episodes on TV (see comments by Douglas Wolk, in his book
Reading Comics, about how vasty universes of continuity in comics have become an out-of-control way of marking the line between a fan and a newbie). I haven't had a chance to look at the similar
Angel comic book project.
As I've mentioned, I was a Buffy
and Angel
newbie not that long ago. In fact, my first experience with a Joss Whedon show was Firefly - on DVD. I was lukewarm on the movie version, Serenity
, but Firefly
itself is still one of those standout experiences.
Tags: horror , Joss Whedon , spoilers , vampires
I didn't much like Season 1 when it originally played. The very serious cult of evil around The Master got on my nerves. But I watched the show occasionally because my room-mates were enjoying it.
However, I really loved how they transformed the show with Spike and Drusilla in Season 2. That first episode where they change over (I'm avoiding spoilers, but they finally get rid of that really anoying damien child) is one of my favorite moments. I think the whole tone of the series changes at that point.
And unlike Angel (which had at least one terrible, virtually unwatchable season) I found all the season's of Buffy remained quite enjoyable.
—Mr.Dave
I was ok with Angel, but some friends who I managed to twist their arms into watching Buffy, and later became enthusiastic themselves, never got into Angel at all. The show had one or two nice moments, but a couple of times they tried to pull the same trick as the series finale of Buffy - really alter things - and it backfired pretty badly. I wonder if we're talking about the same season of Angel, Mr. Dave? (And the vagueness of this conversation is a good reason why people tend to use spoilers online ;)
—James Schellenberg
the angel comic doesn't really seem to be about the characters from the show. not that there's a whole new string of characters, just that the feel of the show is not there. the first issue is pretty run of the mill apocalyptic.
how's that for avoiding spoilers? i realize that one of the many ways i'm a bad geek is that spoilers don't ruin my fun.
—Carol Borden
Season four! Season four of Angel is un-fucking-watchable! I don't care who knows it.
And I say that out of love. I watched Buffy and Angel in broadcast, but I still like to curl up with DVDs now and then. In fact, it's become part of my prescription when I'm home sick with the flu or a sprained ankle or what-not. There's something very satisfying about the revisiting, like someone is reading me a favorite story while I lie on the couch and drink tea. Knowing what happens is just part of the experience, melancholy as that may be in some cases. Strangely, I find it difficult to rewatch single episodes cold, but I can work my way through a season like it's my job. Any season of either show, that is, except Angel, season four.
Thanks for the Buffy ruminations, James.
—weed
I agree with Weed. Season 4 is pretty bad. It's so goddamn serious. When there's apocalyptic stuff in Buffy there was almost always some kind of humor as well. Buffy or Xander or even Spike would say something amusing - even if it was only gallows humor. But as I recall, Angel and all of his crew were no fun at all. Everyone on the show was having the most misrable time, and it was no fun to watch.
Also, I understand that the actress who played Cordelia was having some personal problems which may have impacted her performance (or ability to perform) at the time. That may be an excuse for suckiness, but it doesn't make it any less sucky.
—Mr.Dave
I dunno, I must have this weird switch in my head: sometimes I get fed up with a series and stop watching it if I find it annoys me too much (Battlestar Galactica, that's you!), and other times I soldier through a lot of what is clearly crap and not think about it too much. Case in point is Angel Season 4, which not only is pretty bad, but it screwed up a lot of stuff about earlier seasons by trying to retcon it all into some big plot twist.
Weed, that sounds like an awesome I'm-home-sick-and- need-to-cheer-up plan! I'll keep that in mind, now that I've watched both series.
—James Schellenberg
They've been brought together before in James Kolchalka's 
Let's see: there's a kingdom of evil invading from the north, there's a type of thieves' guild in a gritty capital city, plus a mysterious sword, tons of magic, and much more, all stuffed into that stereotypical fantasy container, the trilogy. How the heck could anyone do something interesting with this material? Over to you, newcomer Brent Weeks. 