Buffy was more than the first three seasons!

[eilowyn]

So I'm annoyed at much Buffy scholarship right now. I just read the Buffy chapter in Susan Douglas' "Enlightened Sexism," and all it focused on were the high school years. The barest mention of seasons past 3 is a quip about Buffy "taking up" with "the Billy Idol look-alike vampire Spike," but it's literally a parenthetical aside. I'm completely

Comments

[angearia]

I think one thing to consider is the interaction with BtVS's pop culture status and how it started waning towards the later seasons. Also, the early seasons are easier in a way. The metaphors are so obvious. It also depends on when these articles and books were published. If they came out as Season 6/7 was airing, that might be why there's less focus on the later seasons.

I haven't noticed a particular bent towards the earlier seasons on Slayage, but I haven't made a very thorough survey of it all with that in mind. There's plenty of articles there on the later seasons and that's my go-to source for Buffy Studies.

[kwritten]

the early seasons are easier in a way. The metaphors are so obvious.
Interestingly, this is one thing about academia that bothers me. They get so excited that there's a metaphor and they understand it that they completely ignore how the metaphor is able to operate through cultural narrative/signification. There's a definitie lack of depth to the academic discussion as it pertains to Whedon-studies.

[eilowyn]

Slayage is usually reliable. It's some of the early books that give me pause, but they were published while the show was still on air, so they only had the early seasons to meditate on.

[beer_good_foamy]

Also, the early seasons are easier in a way. The metaphors are so obvious.

Exactly. As neat as the "high school is hell" formula is, most of the actual storylines and metaphors are based on easily recognizable standard plots - with the Romeo & Juliet of Buffy/Angel as one of the cornerstones. It subverts details and aspects of the stories, but it doesn't actually change them. It's a lot easier to fit into and compare to any other number of stories. That's not to say that the later seasons are a complete redefinition of everything, but they're less dependent on playing with tropes we already know by heart.

[infinitewhale]

Then came Angel, who was counted as the best lover because he met Buffy on a spiritual level.

What? Angel "fell in love" with Buffy after seeing her sitting on the school steps having a lollipop. The only thing missing was a narration describing how the name rolled off his tongue.

The idea that they met on any level at all given his patronization and head-patting of her in the first 3 seasons is weird to me. It almost makes me want to defend Riley. Almost.

[eilowyn]

Yeah. That was my reaction to that essay.

[kwritten]

What I've noticed in academia is that - unfortunately - there's no correlary to the outside world. Most of Whedon-studies that I've seen focuses on the texts themselves and don't really think about the cultural context. Also - I was very close personally with a professor who heads the Whedon section at the SW/TX Scifi/Fantasy conference every year... and it became clear that most of what happens at the academic conferences is a lot of fangirling, and not as much analysis... or: analysis in order to prove that Whedon is the best thing ever. Which he's not. And acadmia's job is to interrogate the moments in which he's not and explain them. Academia doesn't do this. Not from what I have seen.

I recall one essay that pissed me off, where the author compared Buffy's romances to Plato's classes of loveI've read this and cannot tell you how much I hate it (I yelled at the comp screen when I read your paragraph on it because I hate it so much

[eilowyn]

I, um, may or may not have almost every Buffy studies book in my library because I convinced my mom I was spending my money on school books. But the books are where I see it the most. It gets to the point that they have a specific book on seasons 6&7 so that the "dark" seasons can be discussed. I'm happy to say (now that I recall) that the professor who taught the course on Buffy did write a paper on Buffy that focused a lot on Spike's redemption story, so I know it's not all bad.

So that's what happens at these conferences! I was thinking about trying to get my professor to give me independent study credit for going to the 2012 Whedon Studies conference, but that was a no go.

I've read that article, and damit, it stole one of my theses! (Mine was actually Faith and Spike as Buffy's shadow selves. Oh well. I've got massive feminism in fandom paper to start!

[kwritten]

I'm still debating going to Slayage in 2012 - I <3 Canada, so I'm thinking of going just for pure pleasure. I would hope that David Lavery and Rhonda Wilcox would keep the fangirling under control.

I wish ... gah - I wish there wasn't such a divided line between academia and fandom. A lot of great thinkers are right here, totally ignored.

[eilowyn]

Going to Middle Tennessee State University just for David Lavery as my grad advisor is a distinct possibility for me. I'd get a degree in English (instead of cinema and media studies/film and television studies), which will lead to more teaching jobs, won't it? (I tend to interrogate any new friends in grad school about their experience, just to let you know!)

[shapinglight]

I think a lot of people focus on the 'high school is hell' thing, not least Joss himself and the other writers. I suppose it's just easier.

[eilowyn]

I guess it is easier; there's not a lot of backstory that needs explaining when you start with Angel's arc. But season 5 is so good!

[fenderlove]

I had a Women's Studies professor who had written something scholarly about BtVS that got published. She gushed about the show in class, so I excitedly used it as the basis of a paper about the unintended consequences of trying to subvert female stereotypes and tropes and haphazardly falling into those same tropes without realizing it (how female intelligence is presented on the show, the reversal of gender roles, etc). Later, my prof came up to me and started asking questions about Seeing Red, and it hit me that she had not seen a single episode past Season Three. I offered her my DVDs to watch, but she said that she didn't want to revise her published work or revisit it. O_o;;;

[eilowyn]

There are those diehards who insist the show should have ended with the high school years because everything else is crap. I've encountered some of them in fandom, and it wasn't very pleasant.

[sidhlairiel]

I think that may be because many of those same fans can't accept the fact that Buffy had a love life after she broke up with Angel. They like to live in this little head canon bubble where she is eternally eighteen and besotted with him.