I decided to drop the Reasons Buffy is Shpiffing acronym. This is the second in my blog series on why the TV show 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' is so cool. The previous one is about how the opening scene turned the stereotypical horror genre scene on its head by having the cute blonde not be the victim but the killer. In 1997 that was pretty ground breaking.
This blog focuses a little on Buffy's use of metaphors. (There may be more than one blog on this topic).
The writers and creators of 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' wanted their stories to be relatable to the audience. A show about monsters and vampires with a superhero that can kill them is not a concept Joss Whedon and some others on his creative team felt people would warm to. After the flop that was 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the Movie)' (1992) Joss believed Buffy would never see the light of day again. In the Buffy movie (written by a young Joss Whedon but taken over by the Kuzui's, who removed Joss from the production) the idea was to turn the horror genre on it's head by having the blonde girl not be the victim (repeated in episode one of Buffy) but the hero and so she seems helpless but actually has all this training, strength and weaponry to fight vampires. The TV series became a lot more about metaphors of monsters reflecting real life.
The basic premise of seasons 1-3 is that Highschool is Hell. In Buffy this becomes literal. The mouth to Hell is sitting under the school's library. This 'Hellmouth' causes supernatural things to occur in the school making Highschool literally Hell.
Within this premise a lot of other metaphors can be seen within individual episodes. Two academics who studied Buffy had this to say (yes there are college courses on Buffy, you can get a degree in 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' from some colleges) "In the world of Buffy the problems that teenagers face become literal monsters." (Wilcox, Rhonda V. (April 2002). "Introduction" Fighting the Forces: What's at Stake in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Rowman & Littlefield, pg. xix)
Here are a few examples:
In the episode 'Out of Mind, Out of Sight' there is a girl called Marcie Ross has been ignored in school for her whole career. She has no friends and no one notices her. She wants to run for 'May Queen' but no one votes for her, or perhaps even allows her try. The episode sees her invisible. (pun intended)
She felt invisible in school and so she becomes, literally, invisible. Then acts out to get attention and kidnaps the May Queen winner and head cheerleader, Cordelia.
In the episode 'Witch' another girl, Amy Madison, begins acting strangely and when Buffy and co investigate they find that Amy is actually not Amy, but her mother.
Amy's mother was head cheerleader in her day and was popular and in later life has become a recluse, divorced loser. She thinks Amy is throwing her life away by not striving to be popular and so takes over her daughter's body and lives a second life. The metaphor of course being that sometimes parents try to live their lives through their kids.
Another fantastic metaphor Buffy uses is in the episodes 'Surprise' and 'Innocence'. In this episode Buffy turns 17 and for the first time Angel and she have sex. She wakes up to find him gone and next time she sees him he is horrible to her and it turns it he has literally lost his soul, turned evil and wants her dead. Not content with that Angel decides to end the world. The story being that sometimes guys promise the world to their girlfriend's but then, after they get the sex they want, they just walk off and leave. Becoming nearly a completely different person.
There are so many more I can mention but because all of the above are from seasons 1 and 2 I thought it would be good, for the last one, to jump to season 6 (the second last season of Buffy, just to show that the metaphor thing stayed all the time).
In the big story of season 6 Willow (Buffy's best friend) becomes addicted to magic. She starts off in season 3 floating pencils and other small things but as time goes on and she is dumped, loses her college place, Buffy is depressed and doesn't help her, etc. She moves deeper and deeper into magic. Eventually it leads her to become 'Dark Willow'. Her normally red hair goes black and she gets veins all along her face. She kills the guy who killed her ex. Then, feeling the pain of the world, she decides to end all the pain by ending the world. The thing that stops her is Xander (her other best friend) telling her that he loves her. He tells her again and again as she shoots him with energy blasts. He uses stories from her past and present until her hair goes red again and the veins disappear.
The magic is drugs, I guess that's obvious but maybe not. It shows the addictiveness of drugs and the movement towards getting deeper into it: breakups, rebounds and death causing a downward spiral.
Anyway, that's enough of metaphors for awhile (there are at least 144 though). If you watch Buffy post a metaphor you know or like somewhere :)
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