The Real Buffy?

Recently, I had a chance to read the most intriguing article posted in a forum. But let me start from the beginning to explain how I came upon this piece of work. For a while I’d been thinking about purchasing “Buffy The Vampire Slayer (movie 1992).” It was on my mind seeing as how I already had the “Buffy: Series 1-5” and “Angel: The Series 1” on DVD. Why not get the original work? I’d seen the movie way back when it came out. And I slightly remember it being “not that good.” But still, I wanted it for the overall collection. The beginning of Joss Whedon’s masterpiece. So I was out researching on the net, since it been a while since I’d seen the movie. My first stop is always The Internet Movie Database. That’s when I came upon the article in the forum section.

It read “Better than the series.” I was appalled at the thought of the movie being better than the series. So I scrolled back to the top of the page to check I was in the right place. Sure enough, I was. I was further intrigued when I clicked on the link itself. The first post was:

Better than the series
by - MurderedKurt (Sun Jun 1 01:40:15)

This movie was sooooo much better than the series. I hate how people say the series was better, the original is always better. Luke, Kristy, David, Paul and Donald were all great in it. Oh and I can’t forget about Hillary Swank and Ben Affleck.

Like any other avid “Buffy” fan I had to read down the page to see the responses. There was a surprising amount of love and hate for both the movie and the series alike. This forum brought me back to why I was actually researching. After reading it I decided that I definitely needed to get the movie to reassure myself that I was going to defend the right “Buffy.”

Of course, as soon as the movie came in the mail (I purchased it at Wal-Mart.com) I popped it into the DVD player. The first thing that hit me was the horrid cheerleading scene at the beginning of the movie. I was thinking, I’m going to want to kill myself after watching this. Though the movie does get a little better.

I finished up the movie feeling unsatisfied. I journeyed back to the forum to read everyone’s defenses for the movie itself, and I found some to have backed up their arguments quite well. But the worst part is that some people actually think Kristy Swanson is a better actor than Sarah Michelle Gellar. Maybe she was, for the “Buffy” movie. I hope Sarah Michelle would never lower herself to do a cheeseball movie as corny as the one Kristy done. So the question arises, Was it possible for Kristy to have actually finished up the series as “Buffy?” No… In no way could she had gotten the job done, and kept the series alive for seven seasons. Sarah Michelle can handle all the parts of a character growing over seven years. She is one of the most emotionally fit actors I’ve ever seen.

Kristy, though, still gets the benefit of the doubt. She wasn’t surrounded by the incredible cast that Sarah Michelle had been. Sarah was supported by Anthony Stewart Head, Nicholas Brendon, Emma Caulfield, Michelle Trachtenberg, James Marsters, David Boreanaz, Seth Green, Amber Benson, Charisma Carpenter and Alyson Hannigan. Why’d I leave Alyson last? Because she played the character (Willow) that help keep this series alive the most. She grew as an actress over the years to be my favorite among them all. I see big things ahead for her. But back to the point. Kristy was surrounded by…Well….Donald Sutherland…Oh yeah, and Luke Perry. A lot of people praised Donald for his work in the film. I thought his character (Merrick) was fairly well portrayed. And a lot of people would only say, Luke Perry was only good because he was the mainstream hottie at that time. I disagree. Luke was the only actor I really thought done a decent job in the movie. Albeit, the acting wasn’t very convincing in any other part. So he stood out a bit.

So what does make these two separate entities so different? The story. The characters. In the movie the runtime was 86 minutes. The series had like 5760 minutes (96 hours) for characters to grow. That’s what makes the series better. We see them as real people with real problems aside from saving the world on a daily basis. We see them grow as people just as we do. That makes us attached. That’s why we feel we can’t ever let go of these people who are growing with us. It’s like we just killed them. Or they just died, and not ever coming back. It’s a hard pill to swallow.

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