I planned to write a post tonight about a fantastic article in the New York Times today on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's last issue (absolutely heartbreaking, by the way), and I probably will by the end of the week.
But after abandoning about fifty halfhearted attempts at a staggeringly brilliant and insightful piece on the state of print journalism, I turned to my latest means of procrastination: watching old episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Hulu.
I confess: Buffy is kind of my favorite thing ever. The first six episodes of the first season are pretty standard fare: mildly silly serial episodes featuring an incredibly young Sarah Michelle Gellar fighting off laughably ugly vampires, witches and their ilk. The music, clothing and hair are wonderfully 90s-tastic, the one-liners are appropriately witty, and the characters are surprisingly endearing.
Otherwise, though, Buffy was kind of a guilty pleasure of mine. Until tonight.
I just finished watching episode 7 -- where Buffy, the Chosen One, uber-vampire slayer and all that, realizes that she's in love with mysterious bad boy Angel, who just happens to be a vampire. But! Angel has a soul! And a conscience! And he doesn't eat people! (And he is really, really hot.) The whole episode adds a huge new level of depth and danger and conflict to the show, while staying true to its quirky, likeable roots. There's a reason why Buffy is a cult classic, after all, and that really comes through in this episode.
Joss Whedon, the show's creator, said that the first season of Buffy is "high school as a horror film." In the Buffy world, a controlling mother isn't just an annoying helicopter parent; she's a witch who possesses her daughter in order to relieve her glory days. The quiet girl everyone ignores literally becomes invisible. The meanest kids in school might actually be demons. It's campy and ridiculous a lot of the time, but at its core, Buffy is really about issues that everyone who's ever been a teenager has faced: figuring out who you are, taking on frightening responsibilities and trying to stay sane through it all.
And have I mentioned how attractive Angel is? Because, seriously. Dayum, grrl.
