Slayer Review by Michael Lee

Five out of Five Beakers

I've wanted more TV coverage on the MISFITS site for a while, and the impending US release of Keith Topping's Buffy the Vampire Slayer program guide Slayer is a good time to cover the best science fiction and fantasy television program currently on the air and give it a broader context than just reviewing any particular week's episode.

Why is Buffy fantastic? Because it combines drama, comedy, fantasy, and reality better than any other show I've ever seen. I can only compare it to Doctor Who, which is the only other show that I know that can simultaneously take itself so seriously and mock itself on a regular basis. (Darrin Morgan's episodes of the X-Files do this as well, but not the series as a whole.)

Slayer is a particularly good program guide because it is more than just a listing of all of the episodes of the first three years of Buffy, but also analyzies individual episodes and the series as a whole. It points out how Buffy both covers the univernsal themes of growing up, but also how Buffy is very much the product of its time; with modern music and modern concerns. After all, this is the series which had two episodes (Earshot and Graduation Day Part 2) delayed for months because they were too real, even with the vampires and demons.

What makes Slayer particularly readable isn't just that it lists a short description of each episode and their titles, but also includes the best quotes in the series, points out where Buffy's mom denies the obvious evidence of Buffy's nature, references to other works, or soundtrack items of note. It puts the series into context.

It is interesting to have an Englishman's view of Buffy as well. It means that there are some elements where things that are obvious for Americans are pointed out. However, that's very much in the intention of the book. It means that this most British of American series can have the British elements pointed out.

A good program guide needs to do be both something that you can both read and browse successfully. When I got my copy, I read it nearly from cover to cover, and if I watch episodes in the future, I'm sure I'll review the entry of the episode as well. I've done similar things with the Doctor Who and Avengers guides that Keith has done with Paul Cornell and Martin Day in the past, which are of a similar style as Slayer. With so many of Virgin's program guides done in this style, it means that you can compare the different series through their guides, and it's a style that is entertaing and informative. (It isn't the best format if you're looking for production information though, but this means that they aren't at all dry books, and they can actually be very funny.)

Slayer is an unofficial guide to Buffy -- and this means that the episodes of the series are given honest reviews. An official guide won't point out the more disappointing episodes of the series; at the same time, this is still an enthusiast's guide -- not so nitpicky and critical that it is no longer enjoyable to read.

One of the few questions is whether or not this book is premature; the book runs through the end of the third season, and ends with Buffy's graduation from High School. Of course, what this means is that we need to have a Slayer 2 in a couple of years. However, by only covering her high school years, this makes it a good point to evaluate the series. If you've read both volumes of Andy Lane's Babylon File, the books are notable because of the disappointing end to Babylon 5, where the first volume was written when the show was at its creative peak half way through, and the second at the conclusion of the series, after the disappointing fifth season. While both Buffy and now Angel continue their generally strong records, they are both different series than Buffy was during her high school years, and future volumes may point out the two series evolution.

My five out of five beakers is both for Slayer and Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a series.

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Theorizing that one could time travel within his own lifetime, Michael Lee stepped into the MISFITS Website and vanished .... He woke to find himself trapped on the Internet, facing pages that were not his own and driven by an unknown force to change the MISFITS Website for the better. His only guide on this journey is Professor Maxwell Misfittle, an observer from his own time, who appears in the form of a hologram that only Mike can see and hear. And so Mr. Lee finds himself leaping from site to site, striving to put right what once went wrong and hoping each time that his next leap will be the leap home.