Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Leave it to me to get interested in a television show after it goes off the air. I did this years ago with Twin Peaks. My friends had told me about it, quoting lines from it, but it wasn't until years later, when it came out on video, that I rented every volume from the video store. And then, of course, I had to see the movie, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me.

And so it is with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. My friends have raved about it for years, and yet I never became a regular watcher myself. Even though I sometimes saw part of an episode at a friend's house, I'd never watched any all the way through.

This might seem strange if you know me, because I'm something of a self-made expert in the vampire mythos. It all started when a college English professor had us read Anne Rice's The Vampire Lestat. Rice's use of the vampire mythos fascinated me, and I thought it would make a good radio program, to look at the vampire mythos and how it had changed over the years.

So the summer after my senior year in college, I immersed myself in books and movies, putting together a four-hour radio special called "In Search of the Vampire," tracing the vampire mythos through legend and pop culture. It aired on WPSU on Halloween 1993, my last program ever for the station.

For some time after that, my interest in the vampire mythos continued. I collected videos and books and other vampire related doodads. But the Buffy series, I believe, was just bad timing. Not only did I not have a television, but by then, in 1997, I had sort of O.D.'d on vampires. If it had started a couple years earlier, I know I would have been hooked.

At a New Year's Eve party this year, I won two box sets of Buffy as a door prize. The Gryphon and I watched the first six episode, but unfortunately, we kept watching while I was too tired to stay awake.

Lately, we've gotten back to them, starting with the second box, which comes from later in the series. I'm hooked. Unfortunately, we've only got two episodes left, after which I'll need to either seek out DVDs or see if any kindhearted friends will lend me more episodes.

One of the first things I noticed about Buffy was the writing, which is excellent. Of course, in the first few episodes, the dialogue sounds suspiciously like a 30-something male's humor coming out of teenagers' mouths, i.e. creator Joss Whedon. However, as the series progresses the actors grow into their parts, becoming more comfortable with their lines and making their characters more believable.

Not content to rest on thousands of years of prior vampire lore, Whedon puts his own spin on the mythos. Sunnydale High School is located on a "hell mouth," which reminds me of the line from Shakespeare, "hell itself breathes out contagion to this world." Because of this "hell mouth," which makes the school a center of paranormal activity, each episode deals with a new challenge, not always vampires.

I believe Whedon did this in part to keep the interest of viewers. But I also believe he had to create new challenges for Buffy, who becomes a very skilled slayer and can dispatch an ordinary vampire with little trouble.

To help Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) figure out who she's fighting and how to conquer them, she has the assistance of the school librarian, Giles (Anthony Stewart Head). He is a "watcher." In the Buffy mythos, each generation produces a vampire slayer. To assist her, she has the help of a "watcher," who stays in the background and provides her with assistance, training and research.

As the series progresses, more and more of her friends and classmates find out about her vocation. Soon, she has a small group of compatriots to help with either footwork or research. Of course, none of them are skilled slayers and therefore can't take on the bad guys themselves.

Now, Joss Whedon's vampires are fascinating because they blend ideas from both ancient mythology and modern myth. Most of the vampires fit the ancient type of the vampire as a human who has been infected with a demon and no longer has a soul. They are completely bestial and repulsive, without a saving grace.

And yet, one vampire fits the modern concept of the vampire as reluctant vampire, as a vampire with a heart, so to speak. This idea can be traced back to Varney, The Vampire, Or, The Feast of Blood, written by James Malcolm Rymer in 1845. This romance, distributed as a series of "penny dreadfuls," which were very popular in the streets of London, featured a reluctant vampire who eventually did the honorable thing and threw himself into a volcano to end his damned existence.

These romantic, conflicted vampires are a modern invention, a product of mass publishing, written in a post-Enlightenment time when few people feared the ancient myths.

Likewise Angel (David Boreanaz), the reluctant vampire, has had his soul returned to him by a gypsy curse. He must live the vampire existence while knowing, and regretting, the consequences of his actions. Naturally, he and Buffy fall for each other, and complications ensue.

Now, I've aware there's a spin-off series, Angel. I'm sure it would be just as interesting, but I think I'd like to watch more of the original series first to get the back story.

Buffy is one of two popular current manifestations of the vampire mythos, the other being, of course, the Anne Rice vampire chronicles. Both take their own slant on the legend and introduce new elements.

Anne Rice's chronicles, it seems, appeal to a range of readers but have more appeal to the Goth types. Buffy, on the other hand, appeals to an equally large range of viewers but seems to appeal strongly to Science Fiction fans. This might be because Goths appreciate the broodiness and lavish attention to detail in Anne Rice's books, whereas SF fans find it easier to identify with Buffy's characters.

Buffy's circle of friends includes Buffy, of course, who begins the series as a vampire-slaying cheerleader and later commits fully to vampire slaying. Then there's wisecracking friend Xander (Nicholas Brendon), who has an ill-disguised crush on Buffy and is an average, every day high school student. Bookish Willow (Alyson Hannigan) begins the series dressing in very old-fashioned flowered dresses but eventually comes out of her shell, with Buffy's help. Then, of course, there's the school librarian, Giles, British, earnest and kindhearted.

Even the popular girl, Cordelia (Charisma Carpenter), eventually comes around to their side, providing comic relief with her unapologetic self-interest.

In addition to this cast of identifiable characters, Buffy's shows take a typical SF format, where every week the cast faces a new unknown entity. Each week, at least part of the answer comes through learning: books, computers and clever schemes.

Joss Whedon said he liked the idea of doing first a movie and then a series which featured a blonde teenager as the vampire slayer. This, he said, was because in so many horror stories, she's the hapless victim. So no doubt, the popularity of the show among females comes from the empowerment of watching a female hero.

It also doesn't hurt that the cast is easy on the eyes: there's someone for everyone, I'd imagine.

Whatever the cause of the series' popularity, I'm finally a Buffy fan. And so my long dormant interest in vampires resurrects itself, like Christopher Lee, from a drop of fresh blood. Before you know it, I'll be back to my own ways, combing book stores and video stores for fresh visions of the vampire mythos that has haunted and fascinated us all for eons.

Copyright 2004 by Alyce Wilson

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