Shamelessly Unoriginal Buffy Post

I was checking out the MySpace page of a MySpace "friend" the other day, and I noticed that he had a big picture of Buffy on his site and the comment that, in times of crisis, he asks himself, "what would Buffy do?" (Reminder to self: Get that bumper sticker!) That reminded me of this piece, which I wrote in June of 2003. (It helps - a lot - if you are a Buffy fan.) And since it's very very late, and I'm very very tired, and I probably won't be posting again tomorrow - here it is.

Just picked up Buffy Season 4, hot off the...whatever it is that DVDs roll off of. It was on sale, and it came with the added "incentive" of a free copy of the Buffy movie, causing me to raise my eyebrows and ask the clerk if she'd ever actually SEEN the movie, prompting a discussion that produced gems like these (you can decide who's the bigger geek):

clerk: I saw the movie and hated it. It wasn't what Joss wanted.

me: (thinking: oh, we're on a first name basis with "Joss"...this can't be good...) Well, I did like Kristy Swanson better as Buffy than Sarah Michelle
Gellar, who is such a little waif next to Kristy Swanson.

clerk: (dubiously) oh? I love Sarah Michelle Gellar's Buffy, though as a person she's a diva.

me: (quietly) I don't actually know her...

clerk: she never came to any of the fan conventions I went to.

me: and yet she and James Marsters [Spike] seem to really like each other, and he seems by all accounts to be a very nice guy. Anyway, Season 4 isn't my favorite, but it's got "Hush" on it...

clerk: Seasons 3 and 4 are my favorites. I love Spike like he used to be, not this crappy version we got in seasons 5, 6, and 7. I just hope they don't [some term I don't know because I don't watch Angel that means turn him human -- Shan Shoe?] him.

me: Oh, I love the new Spike! I really wanted him and Buffy to be together! I wanted him to become human so he could be with Buffy, but since she's gone now there's no point...

clerk: I'm not a Sbuffy fan [yes, I swear she said "Sbuffy." It must be an actual fan word!]. I think Buffy and Angel belong together.

me: urg. No, I don't like Angel.

clerk: they don't need to duplicate what they already have. [point of order: I don't think any vampires are human, but again, I haven't been watching Angel.]
They don't need any vampires with souls. [begins naming characters from Angel and I have no idea what she's talking about so I just look at her blankly. She clearly has very specific ideas for what should happen next, and she is telling me about them.]

me: well, have a little faith. Joss is still working on Angel, isn't he? He'll work it out. [yup, I actually said this! but had she not established the first name basis, I would have said "Joss Whedon."]

It was kind of fun to have a discussion with someone else who likes the show, but there was some of that disdain and oneupmanship (on her part -- I was too busy being quietly amused) that is illustrated so well by Jack Black in Hi Fidelity. Had I not been busy being quietly amused, I would have been annoyed.

So - who's the bigger nerd?