Buffy Saves the Day - Again!

This is an excerpt from a long sidetrek I took while rewriting Breaking Dawn. It became my go-to page every time *I* needed a diversion from Twilight. I toned it down so that it wasn't quite so 'snotty' after the 'cheating' scandal came down so that it could become a diversion for people who need one. (It used to get quite a few hits when I had it at the top - so I'm putting it back up there.)

While former Buffy fans may get the most out of this post - Twilight Fans can relate to MANY things about Buffy and her various vampire sweethearts. This is the kind of obsession that is semi-GOOD for you because Buffy never hurt anyone's head.

Here is a reminder for you Buffy/Angel fans AND an introduction for everyone else to the ORIGINAL Vampire-Human-High-School-Girl story, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Sorry, a few of these videos are down and I can't keep up with replacing/deleting them. These Buffy YouTube videos I've been putting up have been sporadically vanishing and it's really starting to irritate me. Buffy just celebrated its 20TH ANNIVERSARY - Surely HOLLYWOOD - an industry that SO AGGRESSIVELY EXPLOITS their STARS can let some of this stuff GO after awhile!

This is Spike - a Vampire - telling Buffy WHY he loves her. HOWEVER, he could just as well be telling her WHY ALL of us fans love her, so I'm putting this up here at the top! :) THANKS for being SUCH a lovable Buffy for ALL those years (and beyond), Sarah Michelle Gellar!

You know, now that I just rewatched this first video to remind myself "what you would be seeing" first about Buffy... DESPITE all my issues with the way Stephenie wrote the character of Bella in the books, THAT's why this subject is so maddening for me. Because *my* view of Bella was probably more from YOUR point of view - which was a MIX of the books and the movies.

There is NOTHING wrong with not being able to separate the two (Bella & Kristen) very easily, because the REASON you're all mad at Kristen IS pretty much her fault, too. She MADE you all fall in love with Bella AND her (and unfortunately, her LIFE - that's not her fault)... And while Bella may be a perfect Vampire now, Kristen isn't - and we WOULDN'T (or at least, we SHOULDN'T) want her to be!

You CAN'T TELL ME that you CAN'T SEE ANY similarities in "our Bella" as compared to Buffy in that above video. And those of you Buffy fans who followed this character RELIGIOUSLY know just HOW LOW Buffy WAS during this scene. She had been COMPLETELY REJECTED by ABSOLUTELY EVERYONE - including every single person still alive that she LOVED except for SPIKE! (She had even been TOLD to LEAVE by her beloved SISTER!)

WHO is going to save OUR GIRL, now? :)

REAL LOVE is UNCONDITIONAL - YOU of ALL people KNOW THIS, Twihards, THIS is what Stephenie's pretty story was ABOUT! You've been embracing it, loving it and SOME of you have even been LIVING it for YEARS (Oh yeah, I'm familiar with ALL the different levels of obsessions). You die-hard Twilight Fans KNOW how to love like this!
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Gotta LOVE fan-made stuff, sometimes... Someone took the time to put together a fairly-well-made tribute to BOTH Buffy & Angel. It starts with the opening of one of my favorite Buffy episodes, "The Gentlemen"; then becomes fast-paced, and FUN!

An introduction to Buffy the Vampire Slayer called, "She's a Hero, You See..." It starts with season one and goes through all seven seasons in four minutes. Here's another great intro more from an ending perspective.

There's only ONE thing on this earth more powerful than evil, and that's US.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer (a line she says in the previous video that may be a little fuzzy to hear clearly)

THE VAMPIRES

THIS is a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan video surrounding VAMPIRE ROMANCE within Buffy/Angel - Just Vampires, NO Humans! It kind of introduces Buffy/Angel's MAIN Vampire family of four. This is a real-make-believe "Vampire Family" with very twisted relationships! PLUS, this video demonstrates that BUFFY is a TIMELESS story. This video is done by a fan to Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance", which came out LONG after Buffy ended, ha! (GOD, I MISS you Buffy/Faith!)

THIS is an ADORABLE and really pretty fan-made YouTube video about Drusilla called "The Stars" done to the music of "Dream a Little Dream" (Drusilla has a very special relationship with the stars for you who don't know)... She is the coolest, creepiest vamp among the fanged-four AND she is probably the one who would be closest to our beloved Bella's character.

As a Human, Drusilla was originally tormented by Angel (before he regained his soul) because he was fascinated by her eerie psychic abilities as a Human (of course, back in Drusilla's Human days (the 1800's) being psychic was considered to be EVIL).

But SHE was a GOOD GIRL who didn't want to be evil... Angel killed everyone in her family and then followed her to a convent where she was trying to find sanctuary. He gutted the convent, kidnapped her and turned her into a TRULY EVIL Vampire on the DAY she made her Holy Vows to God... Yeah, Drusilla turned out to be a pretty fascinating Vamp alright! Doing this becomes one of the biggest regrets Angel has to deal with AFTER his soul is restored by Gypsies and he is able to FEEL remorse for his previously evil actions.

Actually, ALL of our beloved fanged-four Buffy/Angel vamps are equally cool/creepy in their own ways... Darla is the oldest, and a beautiful blond bombshell who was dying of Syphilis as a prostitute when she was turned by "The Master" (in the 1600s, I think) - a Vampire who WAS (thanks, Buffy!) so old that his face no longer changed back into Human form. Darla comes with an attitude and a deep OLD evil streak.

One of my favorite lines of her is in response to Angel while she is confronting him about still having a soul after saving a Christian refugee family from her during the Boxer Rebellion in China. She's got this incredibly hurt look on her face as she says something like, "You saved them from *me*" (includes pained expression with heartbroken hand-over-heart motion).

Angel as a soulless Vampire (he's actually kind of a boring - but sexy - brood with his soul) LOVES DRAMA... Note his twisted approach to turning Drusilla above. You can be sure both he and Darla had fun playing with (traumatizing) her like cats with a helpless mouse before she was turned. NUNS are "his thing, everybody knows that"... You'll hear this line about Angel later if you watch through all these Videos, ha!

And Spike... He's the rebel... "His blood is his own"... Doesn't play by ANYBODY's rules, Vampire OR Human! When he was Human, he had ALREADY earned the nickname "William the Bloody" because of his "bloody-awful" poetry, NOT because of any SCARY reason, ha! That came later with the NEW nickname that he earned after Drusilla turned him. He took out revenge on all those high-society critics by driving railroad SPIKES through their heads! AND Billy Idol supposedly STOLE his look from Spike! Yeah, Spike's pretty damn cool... You'll see more videos about ALL of them, below. :)

Here's a video on the history of the infamous fanged four Vampires in Buffy/Angel starting with DARLA, the oldest one among them being changed; and then Darla changing Angel; and then Angel changing Drusilla (who would be the closest thing to Bella in this scenario), and then Drusilla changing William the Bloody (AKA Spike!).

YEAH, Angel and Spike started out as Vampire Mentor and Fledgling Vamp Newborn; but they grew apart for ALOT of reasons through the years as this hysterical scene of Spike making fun of Angel demonstrates, LoL! And here's an EVEN MORE hysterical scene from the last season of Angel and Spike arguing over the MOST ridiculous thing. And THIS is a HYSTERICAL video of our bad Vamp boys in a collection of some of their funniest moments together.

Here's a multiple romantic twister for ya. Forget your basic "love triangle", THIS is more like a couple of triangles imposed on top of each other, ha! In the PRESENT day, Angel & Spike are flying to Italy together on some mission - but REALLY, they are BOTH hoping to run into Buffy (whom they are BOTH madly in love with; AND they know she is currently dating their arch-nemesis, "The Immortal" (who is an ingeniously enigmatic character, neither good nor evil, ha!). Here's how that episode played out with the two of them chasing after Buffy around Rome. And here's a short mini-scene within that episode of the two of them arguing about "who has saved the world the most", LoL!

You'll meet Andrew in the above videos. This video will make the ending above make more sense. Andrew started out in Buffy and became a member of the MOST FUN, absurd, hysterical and HATED arch-nemesis' trio of Buffy's - MORESO than ANY evil demon or Vampire they created for this series EVER was! (Yeah, Buffy/Angel had LOTS of great villains - that's saying alot. The three actors who played these goofball characters EACH DESERVED every acting AWARD that was possible at the time, ha! (I don't know if any of them received any, though.)

AND ALL three are HUMAN kids whom our scooby-gang went to school with! Andrew started out as a screw-up; but in these above episodes, he is the only surviving member of this dungeons-and-dragons-science-fiction geek trio. His CONTINUING storyline is that he is being trained to be a Watcher in the Buffyverse.

I'm just realizing the video I keep referring to is down, unfortunately - it's hard to tell which character is Andrew without it. Here is Warren talking with Andrew, trying to convince him to kill Jonathan (their 3rd). It includes a sidetrek inside Andrew's wonky brain regarding HIS fantasy about this group, ha!

In this video, Darla (the BLOND VAMPIRE in all the above videos, AND Angel's Sire and Lifemate for a LONG time) is getting ready to give birth to his Human-Vampire hybrid baby! Connor was born because (long story) essentially "the fates" owed them a life. And since Angel has a soul (that can admittedly get lost on occasion); Connor has a soul and is Human, but he has many Vampire capabilities.

THIS video tells Angel and Darla's love story... Here's a little background to clarify for those of you who don't know the story: Darla changed Angel way back when, and they hung out together for a couple of centuries. THEN, Darla brings Angel a little virgin gypsy girl for Angel's birthday (which he has been craving). He drains this girl and kills her, and her magic-laden gypsy clan is MAD. They impose a curse on Angel to restore his soul so that he can feel remorse for his many Vampire sins as vengeance.

DARLA, previous to this video, was KILLED by ANGEL in the first season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer during a fight between Buffy and Darla (she had GUNS) - Angel killed his OWN SIRE to save the Human-Vampire-Slayer teenage VIRGIN high-school girl that he had fallen HOPELESSLY in love with.

However, in Angel, Darla is brought back to life as a HUMAN at first - in order to tempt Angel into turning her - long story! And EVEN though Darla is DYING as a Human from Syphilis because that's what she was dying of when she was turned ages ago; Angel REFUSES (for pretty much the same reasons Edward does, but for Buffy Vampires things are MUCH worse. They don't just lose/damage their soul, they are REPLACED by a demon!).

BUT Darla eventually gets changed back into a Vampire by Drusilla (one of Angel's "children" - the DARK-haired Vampire in the videos above - who calls Darla "grandmummy" or something like that, ha!). It is AFTER Darla is changed into a Vampire this SECOND time that she and Angel get freaky and conceive Connor - another LONG (yet believable explanation) story.

This is a montage of Angel with his infant Human-Vampire hybrid son, Connor - a child who was born because his Vampire mother staked herself to die so he could be born! Talk about a mother sacrificing herself! Curious about what a Vampire would be like with a baby? Check these out! Here is another good YouTube video done to the lullaby, "Demonslayer" - PERFECT song - of Angel and Connor that starts with the scene of Darla staking herself; and flops back and forth between Connor as a baby and as a teenager fighting demons. If you're a fan of "Mad Men", you'll see a young Vincent in here - he was a wonderful Connor. :)

Angel and Wesley "spaz dancing" to YMCA - OMG!

Here's kind of a tribute to Wesley with a little more clear video of him and Angel spaz dancing - because I can't find many good videos of him from Buffy. Both he and Angel are attending a party that Cordelia is throwing AND they are TRYING to blend in, LoL! If you didn't watch Wesley's character develop before it crossed over from Buffy to Angel - you really missed out! Alexis Denisof was HYSTERICAL and he is YET ANOTHER great Buffy/Angel actor who deserved awards!

Wesley started out as a pansy, over-privileged Englishman who had been raised to become a Watcher in the footsteps of this infamous (and now very disappointed) Father. His character became darker and darker throughout Angel, but he started out as SUCH a GOOFY GEEK in Buffy - this hysterical video is about him just arriving in Los Angeles to join Angel's team, but he had difficulties dealing with his "stakes" at first. Every once in awhile (as the above videos demonstrate), that comes out loud and clear, LoL! (Incidentally, THIS is ALSO the guy Allison Hannigan (Buffy's "Willow" character and from How I Met Your Mother) is married to - and I think they are just now onto having baby number two.

Oh yeah, we fans keep (somewhat) track of you all. SEE, an enriching, LIFETIME relationship CAN WORK - even in HOLLYWOOD! :)

Cordelia & Wesley explaining to Fred WHY Angel & Buffy can't be together - hysterical!!

And THIS video is a tribute to Angel's Demon, Loren (a music-obsessed "Frank Sinatra" type who is somewhat psychic). He escaped the "hell dimension" he was from through a portal and then discovered music after he came to our dimension. In this video, he is returning home with Angel - long story. But we get to meet his family and WHY he left. Cute, short video. We love Angel's Green Demon! (Incidentally, Angel is in another dimension in this scene, so he gets to see his reflection in a mirror for the first time in ages - funny!)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, her Scooby-Gang and her Vampire Love Stories
 (YES, Buffy has MORE than ONE!)

I often like to start at the end, ha! THIS video is from the last season of Buffy, and she is teaching her new involuntary slayer recruits EXACTLY what a Vampire Slayer is. Buffy has already fought this Uber-Vamp once before and it KICKED her *ass. EVERYONE (including her) is terrified of it and they don't know hardly anything about it aside that it appears to be pretty DARN indestructible... But, BUFFY knows better, ha! THIS is Buffy in one of her FINEST hours! This scene actually started with Buffy giving one of her infamous lectures, and then turns into a pretty good posturing scene. The last line of it is cut off at the beginning of this video, but I just HAPPEN to remember it. She says something like, "I ALWAYS find a way... *I* am THE THING Evil things have nightmares about... And right now, you and me are going to show 'em why..."

Her ending statement to the girls is also cut off at the end... She tells them something like, "I don't know what's coming up next, but I do know it will be hard and painful... Always BELIEVE you're going to WIN" and a few other things...

Here's Buffy and her ARMY of Slayers in the FINAL Battle of the series finale against an ARMY of Ubervamps (see above, but in the thousands) at the mouth of Hell. (AND incidentally, Spike is sacrificing himself to SAVE the WORLD!) This video can get a little choppy once in awhile, but it isn't constant and its watchable.

The Scooby's catching Buffy's watcher, Giles, indulging in a little "grown-up time"... Singing "Behind Blue Eyes" in front of a small audience in a quaint, little coffeeshop. This scene really is ADORABLE, ha! From Season 4 - after Angel has gone off to LA and has his own show, I think. :)

This video is SO FUN - done to the music of "Hey Mickey", this is a bunch of hysterical Buffy moments set together in a fast pace, ha!

Buffy & Angel *sigh*

This is the main reason WHY Angel had to leave Buffy - because ONE moment of PERFECT happiness (having sex with Buffy, for one thing); makes the gypsy curse that has his soul restored/imposed upon his Vampire body will come undone. When that happens, Angel turns back into Angelus the EVIL Vampire!

The BEST of Xander!

Buffy and Spike fighting in the SUN in Season 4. Spike is a Vampire who NEVER plays by the rules, ha! Buffy and Willow are in college, and Buffy has just had her first brush-off with a college guy after a one-night-stand (that SHE thought was going to be longer than one night). Spike has just overheard a conversation between Buffy and "Parker", and he has some fun poking at Buffy about it.

Buffy and Faith: Slayer vs. Slayer, Friend or Foe? Faith the Vampire Slayer was called when Kendra the Vampire Slayer was killed by Drusilla in season 2. KENDRA was originally called as a slayer when Buffy died at the end of season 1. BUT, Xander (a mere Human boy) saved her life by giving her CPR, and she came BOUNDING back to life with a VENGEANCE against "The Master"!

Alyson Hannigan Fans (from "How I Met Your Mother") - This is WILLOW over the years... They came up with some really fun stuff for her character!

One of the MOST hysterical scenes in Buffy! This is Willow and Spike, but he's having some problems performing, ha! This video puts a spotlight on the whole "killing IS sex for Vampires" thing...

Xander & Willow are Vampires in another Universe, but Vamp-Willow is somehow pulled through into Buffy's Universe. When she meets her sweet, fuzzy-pink-sweatered Human counterpart, insanity ensues, ha!

And DANG, didn't we all seriously MISS OZ until Tara came along!

Willow and Tara in Buffy the Musical, "Under Your Spell".

DARK Willow - This is what magic can do to you. Willow is a very very good girl, but when she's BAD, she's very VERY EVIL! Incidentally, the guy shooting the gun at the beginning of this is "Warren" from our beloved arch-nemesis geek-trio you met above - THUS the hatred for this group! He is accidentally shooting our uber-sweet AND MUCH beloved TARA - Ugh! THIS was hard to watch, but WHAT a STORYLINE! KUDOS, KUDOS and MORE KUDOS to Joss Whedon and his creative writing teams for ALL the wonderfully winding, juicy and intense storylines woven throughout BOTH Buffy & Angel! And THANKS SO MUCH Amber Benson for breaking our HEARTS like this!

Cordelia in a play with Angel and Wesley sitting in the audience for moral support. This is season 1 of Angel, 1 think, maybe 2... Cordelia moved to LA to pursue her dream to become an actress after she graduated from Sunnydale. But, things aren't working out so well...

Cordelia in her final appearance on Angel as her character is wrapping up on the last season. This is the first part, kind of a preview of the episode. Cordelia has been in a coma for a few months and she has just come out of it. Angel has been feeling insecure, "off" and really unsure about his place in the world. In this episode, Cordelia comes back to remind him... But, she can't stay long.

It would be nearly impossible for me to have to nail down which character within Buffy is my favorite... But if I was forced to make a list, Cordelia would be in my top three somewhere and she MIGHT EVEN have the top spot! She was the character who GREW the MOST and became a backbone of support for Angel. She had the kind of HUMAN confidence the majority of us can only dream of from the day she was born. If you're smart, you DO NOT mess with the mere Human Cordelia, ha! It was both her strength AND her flaw. QUADRUPLE KUDOS to Charisma Carpenter for bringing this incredibly complicated yet FUN character to life for us! Despite how beautiful this last episode was, I was SO SORRY to see her go! :)

FRED is another character that would be RIGHT UP THERE on my favorites list AND it was REALLY HARD to watch her die in the final season of Angel. Willow, Tara and Fred are probably among the SWEETEST characters ever written for television... BUT Willow and Fred were turned EVIL - in Willow's case, temporarily. Fred turned into "Illyria" and this YouTube video tells her story. She is basically an Ancient God-Demon who no longer fits into this world and has to come to terms with that... Will she fight on the side of Evil when the big fight comes down or will she fight with Angel's soldiers for Good? Incidentally, we ALSO lost Wesley - you'll see that in here, too. :(

It was kind of too bad that the series ended so soon after she was changed into this creature (and I think many of us saw her and Spike becoming a thing eventually if that was possibly, LoL!). It seemed like this new character had so many stories to encounter. I don't know if the actress who played this character, Amy Acker, ever won any awards for this transformation - but it was an AMAZING one, she certainly deserved them! We were all as much in love with Illyria as we ever were with Fred, and that's saying ALOT!

And of course, we ALSO lost Anya in the final battle on Buffy... I really could also go on and on about her character and the talented actress who portrayed her, Emma Caulfield. Anya WAS a VENGEANCE Demon who granted wishes to scorned women, causing the men who had betrayed them LOTS of twisted pain on their behalf - an EVIL talent in which she was both INFAMOUS for among her Demon peers AND took a great deal of pride in, ha!

But THEN she lost her "demonness", turned back into a Human THOUSANDS of years into the future from when she originally had been - THEN became Xander's hysterically funny, self-involved, poignant, bunny-fearing girlfriend! This is Anya & Xander singing their duet in the Buffy Musical. And THIS is our beloved Scooby-gang in the Buffy Musical with Anya going off on a solo about BUNNIES.

I've showed you a few different clips from "Buffy the Musical" - and if you aren't familiar with the series and/or you haven't seen it; it is one of the MOST BELOVED episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer EVEN THOUGH it is probably ALSO the goofiest one! It was one of those episodes that you JUST HAD to look up HOW the heck they came up with the storyline, ha! Apparently, Joss Whedon was having a gathering of some sort at his house, and the cast members who were there - for some strange reason - broke out into song and INSPIRED the concept of "Once More With Feeling".

THANK YOU Buffy cast for "putting yourselves out here" like this - it was SO MUCH WONKY FUN! Here's Dawn (Buffy's Sister, played by Michelle Trachenberg) and the dancing-demon they ACCIDENTALLY summoned - singing a duet essentially about "what's going on". This is Buffy singing HER song - she's REALLY DOWN. You'll see why... And here is this demon's "Once More with Feeling Reprise" of the same song as he is saying goodbye to the Scooby Gang. SO FUN!

This is Spike and HARMONY... Harmony was HYSTERICAL... She was originally one of Cordelia's best snobby friends in High School (and generally a Willow/Xander bully). But she was turned into a Vampire at the end of Season 3 at the big showdown. She eventually ran across Spike, and from Season 4 on - she was a MUCH LOVED comic relief! Thank you, Mercedes McNab - brilliant! Both Harmony and Spike ended up in the last Season of Angel, so this video kind of crosses both turfs (as so much of this stuff does!)

The REASON Buffy falls for Spike is because she DIED for a few months at the end of season 5. And while HE was already in love with her before that (even though he didn't have his soul back, yet); she finds him to be a soothing and understanding presence after Willow and her friends resurrect her from DEATH. They do this because they believe Buffy is suffering in a Hell dimension, but she has REALLY been in HEAVEN!

As you can imagine... Buffy has a hard time coping for awhile, and Spike is the PERFECT diversion, ha! Here's a good video on Buffy's perspective during ALOT of her hardest moments, "The Hardest Thing in this World is to Live in it". And here is a REALLY good video from Buffy's perspective during this time while she is FIGHTING her OBSESSION over SPIKE the most irresistible-est Vampire of them all! (Thanks James Marsters - you're STILL the HOTTEST!)

AND from Buffy the Vampire Slayer MUSICAL, here's Spike singing a Vampire love song to Buffy, "Let Me Rest in Peace". Spike is the ORIGINAL ROMANTIC and Vampire REBEL!

You Buffy fans will get a HUGE kick out of this. Here's a fan tribute to Spike interlaced with alot of his BEST scenes that we all LOVE! And here's part 2 of that video - even BETTER - Hysterically SPIKE!