Don't judge a book by it's cover

Very often, when you find a particularly negative review of Buffy The Vampire Slayer dvd, you find someone whose glancing opinion bounces off the surface "appearance" of the show and does not delve into the actual substance therein. Frequently, they are people who haven't really seen enough episodes to form a well thought-out opinion on the series, the content, and the characters as a whole--especially, people who have only seen a few eps from season one. Season one is the most shallow end of the series. It really gives you no clue as to what the series ends up being. Believe me, it gets more intense and complicated and dark as it goes on. If you decide to give it a try, I suggest checking out a handful of episodes from season three on before passing judgment. Some good examples are S3--The Wish, Helpless, Doppelgangland, S4--Something Blue, Hush and Restless, S5--Fool for Love, Triangle, Weight of the World, The Gift (I'd also say The Body but that one gives too much away) S6--Bargaining, Tabula Rasa, Older and Far Away, S7--Beneath You, Selfless, Conversations With Dead People, The Killer In Me, Get It Done (I'd say Chosen but it's the series finale which also would give too much away).

About Buffy The Vampire Slayer dvd season itself--Buffy is the antithesis of the "pretty-blond-victim" who runs from the "psycho ax-murderer" in horror films past--the girl who always twisted her ankle and fell in her attempt to get away. How many times did we see that scene and feel just a little bit disgusted with the victim for not even trying to fight back? How many times did we see that scene and feel disgusted with the directors for typing female victims in this way over and over again? Buffy, herself, isn't the "traditional" feminist TV icon. Many of those are women who have forfeited the ultra-feminine symbols of their gender--love, compassion and vulnerability in order to maintain equal footing with men. Buffy doesn't do this. Buffy embraces those symbols in one hand and hones and wields them to fight evil in the other.

Buffy on dvd appears as a bubble-gum program, aimed at teens and while it's fan-base is largely younger viewers (teens-twenties), it's major themes profoundly confront the more mature ideas of good vs. evil, life and death, friendship, religion, the soul and the true meanings of power and love in such a way that is rarely addressed in current entertainment. It challenges the traditional ideas of religion as being an "institution" and asserts that it is something to be lived, that real love requires self-sacrifice, that true friendship requires far-reaching forgiveness, that true power is rooted in love and compassion and that good and evil, while in shades of gray can still be defined.