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Buffy the Vampire Slayer

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Television

                 Buffy the Vampire Slayer
         Genre       Action/drama/ comedy/ fantasy
     Running time    42 minutes
      Creator(s)     Joss Whedon
       Starring      Sarah Michelle Gellar
                     Nicholas Brendon
                     Alyson Hannigan
                     Charisma Carpenter
                     Anthony Stewart Head
                     David Boreanaz
                     Seth Green
                     James Marsters
                     Marc Blucas
                     Emma Caulfield
                     Michelle Trachtenberg
                     Amber Benson
   Country of origin Flag of United States  United States
   Original channel  The WB ( 1997– 2001)
                     UPN ( 2001– 2003)
     Original run    March 10, 1997– May 20, 2003
    No. of episodes  144
                     Official website
                       IMDb profile
                      TV.com summary

   Buffy the Vampire Slayer is an American cult television series that
   aired from March 10, 1997, until May 20, 2003. Writer-director Joss
   Whedon created the series under his production tag, Mutant Enemy. The
   series follows Buffy Anne Summers (played by Sarah Michelle Gellar),
   the latest in a line of young women chosen by fate to battle against
   vampires, demons, and the forces of darkness. Like previous slayers,
   Buffy is aided by a Watcher, who guides and trains her. Unlike her
   predecessors, Buffy surrounds herself with a circle of loyal friends
   who become known as the " Scooby Gang".

   The series usually reached between two and four million viewers on
   original airings. Although such ratings are lower than successful shows
   on the "big four" networks ( ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox), they were a
   success for the relatively new and smaller Warner Brothers Network.
   Reviews for the show were overwhelmingly positive, and it was ranked
   #41 on the list of TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. The WB
   network closed on September 17, 2006, after airing an "homage" to their
   "most memorable series", including the pilot episodes of Buffy and its
   spin-off, Angel.

   Buffy's success has led to hundreds of tie-in products, including
   novels, comics and video games. The series has received attention in
   fandom, parody and academia, and has influenced the direction of other
   television series.

Production

Origins

   Writer Joss Whedon developed Buffy to invert the Hollywood formula of
   "the little blonde girl who goes into a dark alley and gets killed in
   every horror movie." Whedon wanted "to subvert that idea and create
   someone who was a hero." He explained:


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

     The very first mission statement of the show, was the joy of female
                   power: having it, using it, sharing it.


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

   The concept was first visited through Whedon's script for the 1992
   movie, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which featured Kristy Swanson in the
   title role. The director saw it as a "pop culture comedy about what
   people think about vampires." Whedon disagreed: "I had written this
   scary film about an empowered woman, and they turned it into a broad
   comedy. It was crushing." The script was praised within the industry,
   but the movie was not.

   Several years later, Gail Berman, a Sandollar Productions executive,
   approached Joss Whedon to develop his Buffy concept into a television
   series. Whedon explained that "They said, ‘Do you want to do a show?’
   And I thought, ‘High school as a horror movie.’ And so the metaphor
   became the central concept behind Buffy, and that’s how I sold it." The
   supernatural elements in the series stood as metaphors for personal
   anxieties associated with adolescence and young adulthood. Whedon went
   on to write and partly fund a 25-minute unaired Buffy pilot that was
   shown to networks and eventually sold to the WB Network. The latter
   promoted the premiere with a series of History of the Slayer clips, and
   the first episode aired on March 10, 1997.

Executive producers

   Joss Whedon was credited as executive producer throughout the run of
   the series, and for the first five seasons (1997-2001) he was also the
   show runner (a role that involves serving as head writer and being
   responsible for every aspect of production). Marti Noxon took on the
   role for seasons six and seven (2001-2003), but Whedon continued to be
   involved with writing and directing Buffy alongside projects such as
   Angel, Fray and Firefly. Fran Rubel Kuzui and her husband, Kaz Kuzui
   were credited as executive producers but were not heavily involved in
   the show. Their credit, rights and royalties over the franchise relate
   to their funding, producing and directing of the original movie version
   of Buffy.

Writing

   Script-writing was done by Mutant Enemy, a production company created
   by Whedon in 1997. The writers with the most writing credits include:
   Steven S. DeKnight, Jane Espenson, David Fury, Drew Goddard, Drew
   Greenberg, Rebecca Rand Kirshner, Marti Noxon and Doug Petrie.

   Jane Espenson has explained how scripts came together. First, the
   writers talked about the emotional issues facing Buffy Summers and how
   she would confront them through her battle against evil supernatural
   forces. Then the episode's story was "broken" into acts and scenes. Act
   breaks were designed as key moments to intrigue viewers so that they
   would stay with the episode through advertisements. The writers
   collectively filled in scenes surrounding these act breaks for a more
   fleshed-out story. A whiteboard marked their progress by mapping brief
   descriptions of each scene. Once "breaking" was done, the credited
   author wrote an outline for the episode, which was checked by Whedon or
   Noxon. The writer then wrote a full script, which went through a series
   of drafts, and finally a quick rewrite from the show runner. The final
   article was used as the shooting script.

Casting

   Four roles were cast before the series aired. The title role went to
   Sarah Michelle Gellar, who had appeared as Sydney Rutledge in Swan's
   Crossing and Kendall Hart in All My Children. At age eighteen in 1995,
   Gellar had already won a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger
   Leading Actress in a Drama Series. In 1996 she was initially cast as
   Cordelia Chase during a week of auditioning.

   Anthony Stewart Head had already led a prolific acting and singing
   career but remained best known for a series of twelve coffee
   commercials with Sharon Maughan for Nescafé Gold Blend. He accepted the
   role of Rupert Giles.

   Unlike other Buffy regulars, Nicholas Brendon had little acting
   experience, instead working various jobs — including production
   assistant, plumber's assistant, veterinary janitor, food delivery,
   script delivery, day care counselor and waiter — before deciding to
   break into acting to help him overcome a stutter. He landed his Xander
   Harris role following only four days of auditioning.

   Alyson Hannigan was the last of the original four to be cast. Following
   her role in My Stepmother Is an Alien, she appeared in commercials and
   supporting roles on television shows throughout the early 1990s. In
   1996 the role of Willow Rosenberg was initially given to Riff Regan for
   the unaired Buffy pilot but Hannigan auditioned when the role was
   recast for the series proper. She described her approach to auditions
   in an interview through her treatment of a particular moment: Willow
   tells Buffy that her Barbie doll was taken from her as a child, and
   Buffy asks if she ever got the Barbie back. "Willow's line was 'Most of
   it.' And so I thought I'm gonna make that a really happy thing. I was
   so proud that she got most of it back. That clued in on how I was going
   to play the rest of the scene. It defines the character." Her approach
   subsequently helped her win the role.

Broadcast history

   Buffy the Vampire Slayer first aired on March 10, 1997 on the WB
   network and played a key role in the growth of the Warner Bros.
   television network in its early years. After five seasons, it
   transferred to the United Paramount Network ( UPN) for its final two
   seasons. The show went into syndication in the United States on FX. In
   the United Kingdom, the entire series aired on BBC2. The BBC gave the
   show two time slots, an early-evening slot for a family-friendly
   version with violence and bad language cut out and a late-night uncut
   version. From the fourth season onwards, the BBC aired the show in
   anamorphic 16:9 widescreen format, but Whedon later said that Buffy was
   never intended to be viewed this way.

   The sixth and seventh seasons were originally broadcast on UPN during
   2001-2003. Sarah Michelle Gellar explained to Entertainment Weekly why
   she decided not to sign on for an eighth season, "[When] we started to
   have such a strong year this year, I thought: 'This is how I want to go
   out, on top, at our best." Whedon and UPN gave some considerations to
   production of a spin-off series that would not require Gellar,
   including a possible Faith series, but nothing became of those plans.

Opening sequence

   The Buffy opening sequence provides credits early in each show. The
   music was performed by punk rock band Nerf Herder. The song sounds
   similar to a German pop song from the Eighties called " Codo" by "
   Döf", but Nerf Herder have said that they had "never heard of Döf", and
   the similarity was coincidental. In the DVD commentary for the first
   Buffy episode, Whedon said his decision to go with Nerf Herder's theme
   was influenced by cast member Alyson Hannigan who had made him listen
   to the band's music. Janet Halfyard, in her essay "Music, Gender, and
   Identity in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel", describes the opening:


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

    It begins with the sound of an organ, accompanied by a wolf’s howl,
         with a visual image of a flickering night sky overlaid with
    unintelligible archaic script, the associations with both the silent
   era and films such as Nosferatu and with the conventions of the Hammer
           House of Horror and horror in general are unmistakable.


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

   But the theme changes: "[The opening sequence] removes itself from the
   sphere of 1960s and 70s horror by replaying the same motif, the organ
   now supplanted by an aggressively strummed electric guitar, relocating
   itself in modern youth culture." This music is heard over images of a
   young cast involved in the action and turbulence of adolescence. The
   sequence provides a post-modern twist on the horror genre.

Music

   Buffy features a mix of original, indie, rock and pop music. The
   composers spent around seven days scoring between fourteen to thirty
   minutes of music for each episode. Christophe Beck revealed that the
   Buffy composers used computers and synthesizers and were limited to
   recording one or two "real" samples. Despite this, their goal was to
   produce "dramatic" orchestration that would stand up to film scores.

   Alongside the score, most episodes featured indie rock music, usually
   at the characters' venue of choice, The Bronze. Buffy Music Supervisor
   John King explained that "we like to use unsigned bands" that "you
   would believe would play in this place". For example, the group Four
   Star Mary were portrayed on screen by the fictional front Dingoes Ate
   My Baby. Pop songs by famous artists were rarely featured prominently,
   but several episodes spotlighted the sounds of more famous artists such
   as Sarah McLachlan (" Full of Grace" and " Prayer of St. Francis") and
   Michelle Branch (" Goodbye to You"). The popularity of music used in
   Buffy has led to three soundtrack albums: Buffy: The Album, Radio
   Sunnydale and "Once More, with Feeling" Soundtrack.

Setting and storylines

Setting and filming locations

   Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

   Most of Buffy was shot on location in Los Angeles, California. The show
   is set in the fictional Californian town of Sunnydale (roughly
   analogous to Santa Barbara), whose suburban Sunnydale High School sits
   on top of a " Hellmouth", a gateway to demon realms. The Hellmouth
   serves as a nexus for a wide variety of evil creatures and supernatural
   phenomena, and lies beneath the school library. In addition to being an
   open-ended plot device, Joss Whedon has cited the Hellmouth and "High
   school as Hell" as one of the primary metaphors in creating the series.

   The high school used in the first three seasons is actually Torrance
   High School, in Torrance, California. The school exterior is used in
   other television shows and movies, most notably Beverly Hills 90210,
   Bring It On, She's All That (explaining Sarah Michelle Gellar's
   appearance in the cafeteria scene of that movie), and the spoof, Not
   Another Teen Movie. In addition to the high school and its library,
   scenes take place in the town's cemeteries, a local nightclub ( The
   Bronze), and Buffy's home, where many of the characters live at various
   points in the series.

Format

   Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

   Buffy is told in a serialized format, with each episode involving a
   self-contained story while contributing to a larger storyline, which is
   broken down into season-long narratives marked by the rise and defeat
   of a powerful antagonist, commonly referred to as the " Big Bad". The
   show blends different genres, including horror, martial arts, romance,
   melodrama, farce, comedy, and even, in one episode, musical comedy.

   The series' narrative revolves around Buffy and her friends,
   collectively dubbed the " Scooby Gang", who struggle to balance the
   fight against supernatural evils with their complex social lives. A
   typical episode contains one or more villains, or supernatural
   phenomena that is thwarted or defeated. Though elements and
   relationships are explored and ongoing subplots are included, the show
   focuses primarily on Buffy and her role as an archetypal hero.

   The most prominent monsters in the Buffy bestiary are vampires, which
   are based on traditional myths, lore, and literary conventions. Buffy
   and her companions fight a wide variety of demons, as well as ghosts,
   werewolves, zombies, and ethically unsound humans. They frequently save
   the world from annihilation by a combination of physical combat, magic,
   and detective-style investigation, and are guided by an extensive
   collection of ancient and mystical reference books. Hand-to-hand combat
   is chiefly undertaken by Buffy, Angel, later Spike, and to a far lesser
   degree Giles and Xander. Willow eventually becomes an adept witch,
   while Giles contributes his extensive knowledge of demonology and
   supernatural lore.

Inspirations and metaphors

   During the first year of the series, Whedon described the show as " My
   So-Called Life meets The X-Files."

   My So-Called Life gave a sympathetic portrayal of teen anxieties, in
   contrast, The X-Files delivered a supernatural "monster of the week"
   storyline. Alongside these series, Whedon has cited cult film Night of
   the Comet as a "big influence", and credited the X-Men character Kitty
   Pryde as a significant influence on the character of Buffy. The authors
   of unofficial guidebook Dusted point out that the series was often a
   pastiche, borrowing elements from previous horror novels, movies and
   short stories and from such common literary stock as folklore and
   mythology. Nevitt & Smith describe Buffy's use of pastiche as "post
   modern Gothic". For example, the Adam character parallels the
   Frankenstein monster, the episode " Bad Eggs" parallels Invasion of the
   Body Snatchers, and so on.

   Buffy episodes include a deeper meaning or metaphor as well. Whedon
   explained, "We think very carefully about what we're trying to say
   emotionally, politically, and even philosophically while we're writing
   it… it really is, apart from being a pop-culture phenomenon, something
   that is deeply layered textually episode by episode." Academics Wilcox
   and Lavery provide examples of how a few episodes deal with real life
   issues turned into supernatural metaphors:


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

    In the world of Buffy the problems that teenagers face become literal
     monsters. A mother can take over her daughter's life (" Witch"); a
   strict stepfather-to-be really is a heartless machine (" Ted"); a young
       lesbian fears that her nature is demonic (" Goodbye Iowa" and "
      Family"); a girl who has sex with even the nicest-seeming guy may
        discover that he afterwards becomes a monster (" Innocence").


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

   The love affair between the vampire Angel and Buffy was fraught with
   metaphors. For example, their night of passion cost the vampire his
   soul. Sarah Michelle Gellar said: "That's the ultimate metaphor. You
   sleep with a guy and he turns bad on you."

Plot

   Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details about the entire series of
   Buffy the Vampire Slayer follow.

   The first season exemplifies the "high school as hell" concept. Buffy
   Summers has just moved to Sunnydale and hopes to escape her slayer
   duties. Her plans are complicated by Rupert Giles, her new Watcher, who
   reminds her of the inescapable presence of evil. Sunnydale High is
   built atop a Hellmouth, a portal to demon dimensions that attracts
   supernatural phenomena to the area. Buffy meets two schoolmates who
   will help fight evil through the series, but they must first prevent an
   ancient and especially threatening vampire from opening the Hellmouth
   and unleashing Hell on Earth.

   The emotional stakes are raised in the second season. Buffy consummates
   her relationship with her vampire lover Angel, unknowingly removing his
   cursed soul as a result. He once more becomes a sadistic killer seeking
   to destroy the world. Buffy is forced to kill him, and leaves Sunnydale
   shattered.

   After attempting a new life in Los Angeles, Buffy returns to town in
   the third season. She is soon confronted with an unstable slayer, Angel
   (again), and an often affable but definitely evil mayor's plans for
   Graduation Day.

   The fourth season sees Buffy and Willow enroll at UC Sunnydale while
   Xander joins the workforce. Willow explores her sexuality with another
   witch, while Buffy begins dating a student who is a member of The
   Initiative, a top-secret military installation based beneath the UC
   Sunnydale campus. They appear to be a well-meaning anti-demon
   operation, but a secret project goes horribly wrong. The season also
   marked the first year in which Joss Whedon oversaw other TV series.

   During the fifth season, an exiled Hell-God searches for a "key" that
   will allow her to return to her home dimension. The "key" has been
   turned into human form as Buffy's younger sister. The Hell-God
   eventually discovers the truth and kidnaps Dawn. Buffy sacrifices
   herself to save Dawn and the world.

   Buffy's friends resurrect her through a powerful spell in the sixth
   season. Buffy returns from Heaven and finds a job at a fast food
   restaurant. Her friends are unaware of her inner turmoils as they face
   their own troubles: Xander leaves his fiancée at the altar and Willow
   becomes addicted to magic. When Willow's girlfriend is killed by a
   deranged murderer, Willow descends into darkness and begins a rampage.

   The instability caused by Buffy's revival enables the First Evil to
   amass an army of powerful vampires against humankind during the final
   season. Willow invokes a magical spell that activates all potential
   slayers in the world as the Scooby Gang defeats evil once more.

Characters

Main characters

   Buffy Anne Summers (played by Sarah Michelle Gellar) is " the Slayer,"
   one in a long line of young women chosen by fate to battle evil forces.
   This mystic calling endows her with a limited degree of clairvoyance,
   usually in the form of prophetic dreams, as well as dramatically
   increased physical strength, endurance, agility, intuition and ease of
   healing.

   Buffy receives guidance from her Watcher, Rupert Giles (played by
   Anthony Stewart Head). Giles, rarely referred to by his first name, is
   a member of the Watchers' Council, whose job is to train the Slayers.
   Giles researches the supernatural creatures that Buffy must face,
   offering insights into their origins and advice on how to kill them.

   Buffy is also helped by friends she meets at Sunnydale High: Willow
   Rosenberg ( Alyson Hannigan) and Xander Harris ( Nicholas Brendon).
   Willow is originally a bookish wallflower; she provides a contrast to
   Buffy's outgoing personality, but shares the social isolation Buffy
   suffers after becoming a Slayer. As the series progresses, Willow
   becomes a more assertive character, a powerful witch, and a lesbian. In
   contrast Xander, with no supernatural skills, provides comic relief and
   a grounded perspective. Buffy and Willow are the only characters who
   appear in all 144 episodes; Xander is missing in only one.

Supporting, recurring and minor characters

   The cast of characters grew over the course of the series. Buffy first
   arrives in Sunnydale with her mother, Joyce Summers (portrayed by
   Kristine Sutherland) who functions as an anchor of normality in the
   Scoobies' lives, even after she learns of Buffy's role in the
   supernatural world (" Becoming II"). Buffy's teenage sister Dawn
   Summers ( Michelle Trachtenberg) does not appear until the fifth
   season.

   The vampire Angel (portrayed by David Boreanaz) is Buffy's love
   interest throughout the first three seasons. He leaves Buffy to make
   amends for his sins and search for redemption in his own spin-off,
   Angel.

   At Sunnydale High, Buffy meets several other students willing to join
   her fight for good (alongside her friends Willow and Xander). Cordelia
   Chase ( Charisma Carpenter), the archetypal shallow cheerleader,
   reluctantly becomes involved, and Daniel "Oz" Osbourne ( Seth Green), a
   fellow student, rock guitarist and werewolf, joins the Scooby Gang
   through his relationship with Willow. Anya ( Emma Caulfield), a former
   vengeance demon (Anyanka) who specialized in avenging scorned women,
   becomes Xander's lover after losing her powers, and joins the Scooby
   Gang in the fourth season.

   In Buffy's senior year at school, she meets Faith ( Eliza Dushku), the
   second current-slayer who was brought forth when a previous slayer was
   killed by a vampire. Although she initially fights on the side of good
   with Buffy and the rest of the Scooby gang, she comes to stand against
   them after accidentally killing a human.

   Buffy gathers other allies: Spike ( James Marsters), a vampire, is an
   old companion of Angelus and one of Buffy's major enemies in early
   seasons, although they later become allies and lovers. Spike is known
   for his Billy Idol-style platinum blond hair and his black leather
   duster, stolen from a previous Slayer. Tara Maclay ( Amber Benson) is a
   fellow member of Willow's Wicca group during the fourth season, and
   their friendship eventually turns into an ongoing love affair. Buffy
   also becomes involved personally and professionally with Riley Finn (
   Marc Blucas), a military operative in " the Initiative", which hunts
   demons using science and technology.

   Buffy featured dozens of recurring characters, both major and minor.
   For example the Big Bad characters were featured for at least one
   season (e.g., Glorificus was a character that appeared in 13 episodes,
   spanning much of Season 5). Similarly, characters that allied
   themselves to the Scooby Gang and characters which attended the same
   institutions were sometimes featured in multiple episodes.

Spinoffs

   Buffy has inspired a range of official and unofficial works, including
   television shows, books, comics and games. This expansion of the series
   encouraged use of the term " Buffyverse" to describe the fictional
   universe in which Buffy and related stories take place. A timeline
   listing when these stories take place in relation to each other can be
   traced in a Buffyverse chronology.

   The franchise has inspired Buffy action figures and merchandise such as
   official Buffy/Angel magazines and Buffy companion books. Eden Studios
   has published a Buffy role-playing game, while Score Entertainment has
   released a Buffy Collectible Card Game.

Angel

   Buffy's perpetual love for the vampire-with-a-soul, Angel, played by
   David Boreanaz, is a recurrent theme in the first three seasons of the
   show. The spin-off Angel was introduced in October, 1999, at the start
   of Buffy's fourth season. The series was created by Buffy's creator
   Whedon in collaboration with David Greenwalt. Like Buffy, it was
   produced by the production company, Mutant Enemy. At times, it
   performed better in the Nielsen Ratings than its parent series.

   The series was given a darker tone focusing on the ongoing trials of
   Angel in Los Angeles. His character is tormented by guilt following the
   return of his soul, punishment for more than a century of murder and
   torture. During the first four seasons of the show, he works as a
   private detective in a fictionalized version of Los Angeles,
   California, where he and his associates work to "help the helpless" and
   to restore the faith and "save the souls" of those who have lost their
   way. Typically, this mission involves doing battle with evil demons or
   demonically-allied humans (primarily the law firm Wolfram and Hart),
   while Angel must also contend with his own violent nature. In the fifth
   season, the Senior Partners of Wolfram and Hart take a bold gamble in
   their campaign to corrupt Angel, giving him control of their Los
   Angeles office. Angel accepts the deal as an opportunity to fight evil
   from the inside.

   In addition to Boreanaz, Angel inherited Buffy regulars Charisma
   Carpenter ( Cordelia Chase) and Alexis Denisof ( Wesley Wyndam-Pryce),
   followed later by Mercedes McNab ( Harmony Kendall) and James Marsters
   ( Spike). Several actors who played Buffy characters made guest
   appearances on Angel, including Seth Green ( Oz), Sarah Michelle Geller
   ( Buffy Summers), Eliza Dushku ( Faith Lehane), Tom Lenk ( Andrew
   Wells), and Alyson Hannigan ( Willow Rosenberg). Angel continued to
   appear occasionally on Buffy.

Expanded universe

   Outside of the TV series, the Buffyverse has been officially expanded
   and elaborated on by authors and artists in the so-called "Buffyverse
   Expanded Universe". The creators of these works may or may not keep to
   established continuity. Similarly, writers for the TV series were under
   no obligation to use information which had been established by the
   Expanded Universe, and sometimes contradicted such continuity.

   The Buffy comics are published by Dark Horse, which has retained the
   right to produce from 1998 onwards. In 2003, Whedon wrote an
   eight-issue miniseries for Dark Horse Comics entitled Fray, about a
   Slayer in the future. Following the publication of Tales of the
   Vampires in 2004, Dark Horse Comics halted publication on
   Buffyverse-related comics and graphic novels. The company has recently
   announced that Whedon will be producing another comic series with
   twenty issues beginning in March 2007, to pick up where the television
   show left off — taking the place of an eighth canonical season.

   Pocket Books hold the license to produce Buffy novels. Since 1998, they
   have published more than sixty Buffy novels. These sometimes flesh out
   background information on characters; for example, Go Ask Malice
   provides lots of information about Faith Lehane. The most recent novels
   include Carnival of Souls, Blackout and Portal Through Time. They
   continue to be released, with upcoming books scheduled for December and
   April 2006.

   Five official Buffy video games have been released on portable and home
   consoles. The most recent, Chaos Bleeds, was released in 2003 for
   GameCube, Xbox and PlayStation 2. This was the first game that allowed
   players to take control of characters other than Buffy Summers.

Undeveloped spinoffs

   The popularity of Buffy and Angel has led to attempts to develop more
   on-screen ventures in the fictional 'Buffyverse'. These projects remain
   undeveloped and may never be greenlighted. In 2002, two potential
   spinoffs were in discussion: Buffy the Animated Series and Ripper.
   Buffy the Animated Series was a proposed animated TV show based on
   Buffy. Whedon and Jeph Loeb were to be Executive Producers for the show
   and most of the cast from Buffy were to return to voice their
   characters. 20th Century Fox showed an interest in developing and
   selling the show to another network. A three minute pilot was completed
   in 2004 but never picked up. Whedon revealed to The Hollywood Reporter:
   "We just couldn't find a home for [it]. We had six or seven hilarious
   scripts from our own staff — and nobody wanted it." Neither the pilot
   nor the scripts have been seen outside of the entertainment industry,
   though writer Jane Espenson has teasingly revealed small extracts from
   some of her scripts for the show.

   Ripper was originally a proposed television show based upon the
   character of Rupert Giles. More recent information has suggested that
   if Ripper were ever made it would be a TV-movie or a DVD-movie. As of
   2006, there are still no concrete plans.

   In 2003, a year after the first public discussions on Buffy the
   Animated Series and Ripper, Buffy was nearing its end. Espenson has
   said that during this time spin-offs were discussed, "I think Marti
   talked with Joss about Slayer School and Tim Minear talked with him
   about Faith on a motorcycle. I assume there was some back-and-forth
   pitching." Espenson has revealed that Slayer School might have used new
   slayers and potentially included Willow Rosenberg, but Whedon did not
   think that such a spinoff felt right.

   Dushku declined the pitch for a Buffyverse TV series based on Faith and
   instead agreed to a deal to produce Tru Calling. Dushku explained to
   IGN: "It would have been a really hard thing to do, and not that I
   wouldn't have been up for a challenge, but with it coming on
   immediately following [Buffy], I think that those would have been
   really big boots to fill." Tim Minear explained some of the ideas
   behind the aborted series: "The show was basically going to be Faith
   meets Kung Fu. It would have been Faith, probably on a motorcycle,
   crossing the earth, trying to find her place in the world."

   Finally, during the summer of 2004 after the end of Angel, a movie
   about Spike was proposed. The movie would have been directed by Tim
   Minear and starred Marsters and Amy Acker and featured Alyson Hannigan.
   Outside the 2006 Saturn Awards, Whedon announced that he had pitched
   the concept to various bodies but had yet to receive any feedback.

Cultural impact

   Buffy has had a cultural impact on a number of media. It has impacted
   television studies, fan-made films, it has been parodied and
   referenced, and has even influenced other television series.

Academia

   Buffy is notable for attracting the interest of scholars of popular
   culture as a subset of popular culture studies. Academic settings
   increasingly include the show as a topic of literary study and
   analysis. National Public Radio describes Buffy as having a "special
   following among academics, some of whom have staked a claim in what
   they call "Buffy Studies." Though not widely recognized as a distinct
   discipline, the term "Buffy studies" is commonly used amongst the
   peer-reviewed academic Buffy-related writings. The response to this
   attention has had its critics. For example Jes Battis, who authored
   Blood Relations in Buffy and Angel, admits that study of the Buffyverse
   "invokes an uneasy combination of enthusiasm and ire", and meets "a
   certain amount of disdain from within the halls of the academy".
   Nonetheless Buffy (1997-2003) eventually led to the publication of
   around twenty books and hundreds of articles examining the themes of
   the show from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives including
   sociology, psychology, philosophy, and women's studies.

Fandom and fan films

   The popularity of Buffy has led to websites, online discussion forums,
   works of Buffy fan fiction and several unofficial fan-made productions.
   Buffy fan films have been created for distribution on the internet. In
   2001 " Fluffy the English Vampire Slayer" was released and became "one
   of the first widely watched Whedonverse fan films". The
   computer-animated series Consanguinity, following the non-canonical
   vampires Damien and James, was released from 2004 onwards. Most
   recently Cherub, a parody of Angel, has completed its second and final
   season. The upcoming Forgotten Memories will provide a direct
   continuation of Buffy, with all roles recast, set two to three months
   after " Chosen".

Parodies

   The show has been spoofed by several comedy sketch shows. For example
   MADtv featured a "Buffy the Umpire Slayer" sketch, in which Buffy slew
   umpires in high school baseball games. Buffy cast members have been
   involved in spoofs as well. Another episode of MADtv featured guest
   star Michelle Trachtenberg as Dawn in a sketch called "Bunny the
   Vampire Slayer" with MADtv character Bunny Swan ( Alex Borstein). Even
   Sarah Michelle Gellar has participated in several parody sketches,
   including a Saturday Night Live sketch in which the Slayer is relocated
   to the Seinfeld universe, and adding her voice to an episode of Robot
   Chicken that parodied a would-be eighth season of Buffy ( Seth Green,
   who played Oz on Buffy, co-created this series).

   The Simpsons 2005 episode, " Treehouse of Horror XVI" contained four
   segments, the last of which, "I've Grown a Costume on Your Face",
   parodied the Buffy episode " Halloween", which had aired eight years
   earlier.

   There are several Buffy adult parodies, web comic parodies include
   Muffin the Vampire Baker on the Sluggy Freelance webcomic, and several
   musical spoofs including: Once More With Hobbits, which rewrites the
   lyrics of Buffy's musical episode Once More, with Feeling and the filk
   song "Angel's Lament".

Impact on television

   Commentators of the entertainment industry including All Movie Guide,
   Hollywood Reporter and the Washington Post have cited Buffy as
   "influential". Autumn 2003 saw several new shows going into production
   in the U.S. that featured strong females forced to come to terms with
   supernatural power or destiny while trying to maintain a normal life.
   These post-Buffy shows include Dead Like Me and Joan of Arcadia. Bryan
   Fuller, the creator of Dead Like Me said that "[Buffy] showed that
   young women could be in situations that were both fantastic and
   relatable, and instead of shunting women off to the side, it put them
   at the centre." Buffy, while itself taking certain elements from the
   classic series of Doctor Who (1963-1989) (even referencing it in one
   episode), became a blueprint for the revived series (2005-), and
   executive producer Russell T. Davies has said


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

       Buffy the Vampire Slayer showed the whole world, and an entire
     sprawling industry, that writing monsters and demons and end-of-the
   world isn’t hack-work, it can challenge the best. Joss Whedon raised
  the bar for every writer—not just genre/niche writers, but every single
                                 one of us.


   Buffy the Vampire Slayer

   In addition, Buffy alumni have gone on to write for or create other
   shows, some of which bear a notable resemblance to the style and
   concepts of Buffy. Such endeavors include Tru Calling ( Douglas Petrie,
   Jane Espenson and even lead actress Eliza Dushku), Wonderfalls ( Tim
   Minear), Point Pleasant (Marti Noxon), Jake 2.0 ( David Greenwalt), The
   Inside (Tim Minear) and Smallville ( Steven S. DeKnight).

Series information

   The first season was introduced as a mid-season replacement, and
   therefore was made up of only 12 episodes. Each subsequent season was
   built up of 22 episodes. Discounting the Unaired Buffy pilot, the seven
   seasons make up a total of 144 Buffy episodes aired between 1997 and
   2003.

Awards and nominations

   Buffy has gathered a number of awards and nominations which include an
   Emmy Award nomination for the 2000 episode " Hush", which featured an
   extended sequence with no character dialogue. The 2001 episode " The
   Body" revolved around the death of Buffy's mother. It was filmed with
   no musical score, only diegetic music; it was nominated for a Nebula
   Award in 2002. The fall 2001 musical episode " Once More, with
   Feeling", received plaudits, but was omitted from Emmy nomination
   ballots by accident. It has since been featured on Channel 4's "100
   Greatest Musicals".

DVD releases

   DVD Release Date
   U.S. UK Australia
   The Complete First Season 15 January 2002 27 November 2000 20 Nov 2000
   The Complete Second Season 11 June 2002 21 May 2001 15 Jun 2001
   The Complete Third Season 7 January 2003 29 October 2001 22 Nov 2001
   The Complete Fourth Season 10 June 2003 13 May 2002 20 May 2002
   The Complete Fifth Season 9 December 2003 28 October 2002 29 Nov 2002
   The Complete Sixth Season 25 May 2004 12 May 2003 20 Apr 2003
   The Complete Seventh Season 16 November 2004 5 April 2004 15 May 2004
   The Chosen Collection (Seasons 1–7) 15 November 2005 — —
   The Complete DVD Collection (Seasons 1–7) — 31 October 2005 23 November
   2005
   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffy_the_Vampire_Slayer"
   This reference article is mainly selected from the English Wikipedia
   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
   Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.
