Buffy the Vampire Slayer: 20 Years

Twenty years.

Twenty years ago, I was 10 years old. In fact, I was 10 years and five days old.

I didn’t see the movie Buffy the Vampire Slayer until after it came out on cable. I know, it’s a shocker. I’m so up to date on movies, how can this possibly be?

The first time I watched it, I was immediately in love. I loved Buffy. I really loved Pike. I loved Merrick (the first time I loved Donald Sutherland, certainly not the last). I loved Pee Wee the Vampire. There was no bad for me.

And it was the one and only time in her entire career I liked Hilary Swank.

One girl in all the world. Sure, she had to put up with unsightly birth marks, and extremely painful crampy radar, but she was a badass. My love for acrobatics in movies started early, so all of her tumbling and cartwheeling was some of my favorite bits.

And she was funny! I quoted that movie so much, my friends threatened physical violence.

“I have no sense of history?! He wears a brown tie!”

“Does Elvis talk to you? Does he tell you to do things? Do you see spots?”

“We’re immortal, Buffy. We can do anything!” “Oh, yeah? Clap.”

Yeah, I was a very, very big fan of the show.

Which is why, five years later, when the WB announced a television show was going to premiere, based on this movie, my answer was a big, fat, resounding oh hay-ell, no.

It took about two years for me to give it a shot, and realize I was a moron. And in the twelve or so years I’ve been a fan of the television show, I’ve come to realize that the opinion regarding the movie is extreme. Most people hate it. With a firey passion.

I still love it. Unironically, in fact. I acknowledge that Joss hated it, and in comparison with the TV show, it is pretty awful. But it doesn’t stop me from loving the ever holy hell out of it.

I’ve been a fan of Buffy, in one form or the other, for 20 years now.

Yes. I feel awfully old. But it’s a proud old.

Side note: I told my niece we were watching something very important tonight, for the sole reason that as of today, it’s been out 20 years.

As I was putting it in, I said, “This is the movie that started it all.”

“…is that the name of it?”

 

And lastly, here’s a picture of Seth Green from a deleted scene. Dorky vamp FTW.