Giles isn’t just a librarian, but her Watcher - an expert designated by an organisation known as the Council, to guide every Slayer in her work.īuffy initially wants no part of it. You see, she’s moved to Sunnydale to escape her secret identity as a Slayer: a young woman chosen to fight the forces of evil, imbued with supernatural strength and agility. When Buffy heads to the library to pick up her schoolbooks, the librarian Rupert Giles hands her an ancient tome titled “Vampyres” instead. They’re clearly not the “cool kids” of Sunnydale High, but Buffy seems to prefer their company to that of Cordelia - the school’s Queen Bee, who tries to take the new girl under her wing. Buffy also meets Xander's best friend Willow. A boy zooms by on his skateboard and takes a tumble near her.

It was the debut episode of a TV show, just a few minutes past its opening: A teenager walks into high school it’s her first day there. It was 1997, I was 12, and surfing television when I fell into my grand, unrequited passion. It is simply an ode to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a look at what made it special when it released in 1997, and why it remains relevant, nearly two-and-a-half decades later.įew experiences feel as lonely as nursing a desperate, one-sided love, and not having even the catharsis of talking to someone about it. This essay is neither academic nor analytical. It inspired reams of academic dissertation, changing the way we think of, discuss, write about, and approach popular culture. Buffy put a female superhero - flawed and fallible, strong and inspiring - front and centre. It changed creators’ ideas about what was possible in television. So when the chance to review a classic came up, I knew I had a second, precious opportunity.īeyond my fangirl motivations, Buffy deserves to be written about for its indelible impact on the pop culture we consume today.

This March was the 23rd anniversary of the show’s premiere and I’d missed the deadline to write about it. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that a huge part of why Buffy the Vampire Slayer is my pick for the #RewindToUnwind series is down to how much I loved it growing up.

Half life vampire slayer