The Buffyverse Project

The Buffyverse Project

Look, I despise the disgusting man that is Joss Whedon as much as the next person, he is a nasty piece of work. However, I grew up with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It replaced Sabrina the Teenage Witch as my obsession. I’d tape episodes off the TV in all sorts of whacky orders – season 3 aired on BBC2 while season 4 aired on Sky One (I think that’s who held the satellite license?) and I watched both. Eventually, we got the video box sets and I watched them all in order, I was part of a Buffy chat community on the MSN chatrooms, I ran my own Buffy fansite (it was called Something Blue, Hush and Welcome to the Hellmouth were taken), and I collected the novelisations and the Watcher’s Guides they put out. I loved Buffy.

Angel, Buffy, and Faith - Buffyverse Project

What’s my point? You see… I got a bit of a hankering to revisit the books I read when I was growing up. I was putting together a post draft for a different project and started wondering if the Buffy books I used to read hold up to time. So I started going through a list and adding them all to a not-public Amazon wishlist and thinking about a potential project. I will get to that in a moment, I promise! Then I thought you know, maybe my dad still has those old books. I distinctly remember him selling a bunch of my old books and stuff (RIP witchcraft books and Sims 2), but I wasn’t sure about my Buffy collection so I texted him and not long after, he replied saying he’d found a few and was willing to send them over to me, probably over time because there’s a few.

The Buffyverse Project

So here’s my thinking. I haven’t watched Buffy in years, I still have the DVD collection of all 7 seasons and a DVD player in my PC. Heck knows where Buffy is streaming these days, bless physical media! I also have never seen Angel all the way through, and I know that is up on Disney+. So what if I watched Buffy and Angel in chronological order, and read the books alongside the seasons, so I get a refresher of what’s going on in the show and while the novelisations are standalone and basically non-canonical, I thought it could be fun to read them dependent on the seasons they are set in.

Giles and Buffy - Buffyverse Project

The whole point is to revisit a world that brought me so much joy when I was a teenager growing up, absorb a little nostalgia, and see how well it all holds up. My tastes have certainly changed over the years, but the Buffyverse was pretty seminal for me, and I’m interested to peek back in. Pick-up whatever I’m missing second hand, maybe check out some fan-fiction as well. It could be a lot of fun!

My only caveat is the Joss Whedon issue. I would do a post looking over everything he’s been accused of over the years though honestly, this Variety article covers things pretty well. But I’m not going to be putting money into his pockets, and I want to give some love to everybody else who made this franchise what it was, especially those who suffered from his cruelty. If all goes well, I’d like to wrap this project up with Kiersten White’s Slayer novels! I’ve been intrigued about those since I first heard about them and while they’re not reviewed amazingly well, I like to make my own mind up! As for the comics, I do want to read them someday and I suppose this would be a great time for it but I’m not sure just yet if I’ll jump into those on the Buffyverse project or maybe I will. This will be a long challenge as I’m a slow reader and I won’t be exclusively reading Buffy tie-in novels, so we shall see down the line!

Buffy menacingly holding a weapon - Buffyverse Project

The Buffyverse Project Posts

  • The Buffy Movie Post – My thoughts on the Buffy movie following a rewatch looking at the lore differences between it and the series.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the Buffyverse project! Were/are you a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan? Did you ever read the novelisations? Do you want to join me?! Or perhaps do a similar challenge with a different franchise!

0 thoughts on “The Buffyverse Project

  1. I never got into Buffy as it always aired at inconvenient times, but I watched the movie long ago, and just started watching Buffy on whatever streaming service. Never read the books though. So I might join you in watching the series 🙂

  2. I loved buffy almost as much as I loved Xena, and I grew up watching both. I was never super invested in the universe outside of the show (no books, no social media, forums, etc) but it was still one of those shows that I still remember and I know influenced certain aspects of my life even to this day. I think this project idea is great, and I can’t wait to read more about it! I believe Buffy also streams on Disney+ so it might be time for me to give that a re-watch while I knit! I’ve also never made it through the Angel series, you’re not alone in that. ^^

  3. We watched the first two or three seasons of Buffy when it was first broadcast and loved it but then we discovered EverQuest and literally never watched any TV shows again for more than a decade. A couple of years ago I got Amazon Prime and saw the whole run was streaming there. I watched it from start to finish and it was absolutely magnificent. It gets very bleak in the middle seasons and then it gets darker from there. I was very surprised having framed my ideas of what it would be like from the first couple of much lighter seasons.

    When I finished the last season I bought all the Watchers guides and I have been thinking about watching the whole run again… only I see it’s now on Disney+, as is Angel, which I never got round to watching. I was thinking about subbing to Disney+ so that’s another incentive.

    I had largely missed most of the controversy over Joss Whedon. He sounds like a nightmare to work with from the Variety article although I suspect he would be no worse than many others in the industry based on the nature of the unpleasantness. I did know that some of the cast were uncomfortable with some of the narrative choices in later seasons and as I said it does get very dark at times but in large part that darkness is what makes it stand out from other fantasy shows of its era. What makes it so much worse regarding Whedon in particular, though, is the disconnect between his behavior and the strongly feminist/feminist ally position he claimed at the time. Even so, I wouldn’t let his behavior taint the quality of the work to which his name is attached, and I do think Buffy is a magnifecent TV show.

    Speaking of Sabrina, which you were, briefly, have you seen the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina? That has some issues too but I loved it.

    1. I have to agree. ^^

      I have seen Chilling Adventures! It definitely lagged in areas but overall I loved it. I’m easily swayed by anything featuring witches and/or magic. 😄 I did feel the ending was a tad… rushed? And there was a choice at the very end that I don’t want to spoil for others but the implications of it made me very uncomfortable.

  4. This sounds like so so so so so much fun! It’s always a blast to revisit child/teenage books that provided joy. I understand how you feel about not wanting to put more money in his hands though…maybe see if there are second hand copies on ebay?

  5. I just happen to be on Season 2 of Buffy right now (both Buffy and Angel are on Hulu, FYI) and loving every minute! I have a lot of opinions about cancel culture which I won’t go into here, but I will always be a fan of the show😁

  6. I watched Buffy and Angel through as they released, but I still think this is more of a watch from the sidelines project for me. Although you did just get me to watch clips from the musical episode again. Haha.

    It might be bunnies..!

  7. I have Kiersten White’s Slayer on my TBR. I love Buffy so much, I was the perfect age for it when it was first on so I grew up with the Scooby gang. Which makes me even more angry at Whedon for being an asshole. But I do see the point often given that a TV show is made by a lot of people, and the victims deserve their work to be seen, as long as we don’t give more work to the abusers (though obviously he still gets more work, but I won’t support that).

    1. Yeah, same! Think series 3 was airing when I was around 11 or 12? Which was when I came into it.

      And same, it’s honestly why I’m a little dubious about checking out the comics? I’ll see.

  8. As a HUGE Buffy/Angel fan, I love the idea, but I understand how difficult it can be to separate the work from the creator. In this case, I look at the universe as an ensemble piece where Whedon may have guided it, but it was the actors, the producers, and the directors who made each episode work. I feel his ‘voice’ is less dominant than it would be with an author/book.

    With all that said, you NEED to see Angel through to the end! What a fantastic series that just kept getting better and better, and which ended on one of the best TV cliffhangers of all time.

    1. Yeah, that’s basically where I’ve come to with it. And heck it’s been such a delight revisiting the Scooby Gang again! And I will, I’ll watch it when I reach season 4. 😀

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